The higher Values of Life

V

A Muslim Saint says:

How long will you go on playing with the clay like a child and besmearing yourself with  it?

When the soul leaves the body, what remains? Clay.

Dust thou art, and unto dust returneth.

How long will you continue like that?

We are wonderfully developed in two ways, but about our soul we know nothing or next to nothing. We know only so much as is given in the scriptures. We know only that much which we can grasp by our finite intellect. If we want to understand the true import of the scriptures, we must sit at the feet of Someone Who has practical knowledge of the Self and the Overself, because all scriptures speak of the same thing.

Even if we come across a Master Who is a practical adept and He explains to us all the things concerning our own Self and the Overself, still, until we have that experience on our own and for ourselves, we cannot be satisfied.

If at all we read the scriptures, the pursuit in the domain of self-knowledge is restricted mainly to reading one scripture or the other, attending some holy place of worship, and that is all.

These, however, are but elementary steps and by themselves lead to no worthwhile results. Moreover, we will find that many of us go to churches or to holy places of worship, but how many are there who really do so for the sake of having knowledge of God? Very few indeed. Most of us are there to pray for our livelihood or our children or for some other material benefit. We are reading the scriptures for the reason that other circumstances may be adjusted satisfactorily. The majority of us are religious only in that way.

But will such people, by going to the holy places of worship, find God?

Ask and it will be given unto you. Knock and it shall be opened.

But if we are just asking for worldly things, how will we have God instead?

Lord God is kind and what ye ask of Him, that shall He give unto you.

The story is told of a Persian prince Majnu, who fell in love with the princess Laila. So fervent was his adoration that he kissed the earth she trod. Once people told him: Look here, God wants to see you. He replied: All right; if He wants to see me, let Him come in the shape of my Laila. Do you think that such a man will ever find God? He will find Laila, no doubt; but not God.

Similarly, like so many Majnus, we go to the temple seeking not God but the idols of our hearts. How then can we have God? Only they can have God who seek God. For them the way is open; for them there is some Godman to put them on the Path.

So our pursuit of the Spiritual Way is restricted to that one thing. Those who have a real desire in them to search and find God, He makes arrangements for them to be put on the Way.

The elementary step in order to know oneself is to read the Holy Scriptures we have with us. But they tell us:

Whosoever shall lose his life shall save it, and whosoever shall save his life shall lose it.

What does that mean? Whosoever is merely living the physical life through the organs of senses, knowing little or nothing about his own Inner Self, naturally he will be losing his Everlasting Life all along. Those who transcend this physical life, know themselves and know God, will have Everlasting Life.

The scriptures say that very clearly in very simple words. But the intellectual people who have had no practical knowledge of self-analysis, experience with their own Selves and with God, have made it hard to understand. That is all. Otherwise, the truths are very simple.

Again, Christ says:

Unless you be born anew, you cannot see the Kingdom of God.

Be born anew? How? Nicodemus, a very learned man, met Jesus and inquired:

Well, Master, how is it You say we must be born again? How can we be born again? How can we re-enter the womb again and be born again?

What did Christ say?

Look here, you are a learned man, a very wise man. People sit at your feet, worship you like anything. Don’t you see, flesh is flesh, and you are to be born of the spirit?

This has been a personal problem for all of us. The Masters Who came and were capable of giving us the practical solution, gave us the first-hand experience of how to rise above body consciousness and know ourselves.

The whole thing is just topsy-turvy, I would say. We are the indwellers of the house. We have to know and lay up something for where we have to go. But we have identified ourselves with the body so much so that we cannot differentiate ourselves from it. 

Now we are working from the level of the body, knowing nothing but our physical self. We are only considering this outer world and its possessions, as if these were the only be-all and end-all of life. The whole thing is topsy-turvy.

That is why Masters have been laying stress:

What is a man profited if he shall gain the whole world and lose his own soul?

Then, They ask:

What shall a man give in exchange for his soul?

You see how important it is.

It is we who have to leave the body, and we know little or nothing about our own Self.

We know only so much as is given in the scriptures. But even if we read them for years and years, all through our life, do we have any experience at all? 

Of course, we fill our brains with so many facts and theories and the records of the experiences of others. But do they help? It is just like a man going to be married. Afterwards the couple drive away all joyous. But besides them there are many others who join in the festivities; they get nothing thereby.

As an Indian proverb goes:

There are two to have a marriage and the rest stand by.

It does not in any way mean that we should not read scriptures. We should. That is an elementary step. They are valuable records, worth tons of gold and rubies and emeralds, for those who would like to just peep inside, to know themselves and to know God.

We are now merely identified with the body. We are working in the body, behaving from the level of the body, and we are attached to the body and all its environments. The more we are attached, the more we are away from the Life Everlasting. 

That is why it is said:

Strive to withdraw from the love of all visible things and direct your attention to the things invisible.

The more we are attached to the outside, to the physical things, the more we are away from our Inner Self, our Higher Self. Until we withdraw for a while from that place and rise above body consciousness, know ourselves, we cannot know God or come near God or come in contact with God.

When we know for certain that we have to leave the body, why get attached to it?

As I just told you, I have to leave for India in a few days, leave the United States and go back to India. I know I will have to go back. I will be leaving you all, of course. I will not be too much attached to the possessions, this and that thing; I have to leave. I have to simply pass my days and go back, that is all.

For this reason, man’s life consists not in possessions, not in the abundance of things he possesses:

The life is more than the meat, and the body is more than the raiment.

You see how we behave in worldly ways; suppose you are wearing a costly costume or apparel. You meet some accident and that apparel is just spoiled and torn. You say: ‘Never mind, I am saved.’ Again, when you are sick and the doctors declare there is little hope of your life. What do you say? ‘All right, I will spend all the money I have, even all the possessions I have, so that I may be saved.’ Our bodies are more valuable than all other material possessions. When another accident comes, in which you break your arm or leg, what do you say? ‘Well, never mind: I am saved.’ And that which is saved is your own Self, more valuable even than the body.

The Masters have been bringing home to us the fact that the Inner Self is the True Jewel in the body, the most priceless treasure. We have never known this Inner Self. Until we know it, the life being more than the meat, we will not be doing anything for that life.