XV / (i)
Satsang
The term is comprised of two words: Sat, meaning God – the Unchangeable Permanence, and Sang, denoting union. It stands for contact with God. It can be had by the soul only when it shakes off all the trappings, physical, astral and causal. It also means an association with a living Master-Soul who is an embodiment of the awakened life principle in Him.
Sat, or life, in its fullness, is manifest in Him. He teaches nothing but spirituality, which is the source of all life and without which people lead merely a deluded and unsound existence on the plane of the senses. He tells us that besides the senses, mind and intellect, there is yet another power, greater than all these, for it quickens them with life, namely, the spirit or soul. It is, in fact, the only motor power in the body, and the pity of it is that we are altogether ignorant of it and have never even given a thought to it. It is the problem of problems, the most important and vital, and yet the most ignored. An association with a Saint, a Sage or a Master-Soul will directly dye an aspirant in the colours of spirituality, in just the same way as proximity to fire gives warmth and nearness to ice, cold.
The fact is that,
God does not live on the highest heaven nor in the depths of the earth, for no space is sufficient to contain Him. But He truly resides in the bosom of a Godman.
Maulana Rumi
My mind like a bird flew heavenwards, the paradise was all deserted as the Lord resides with His Saints.
Kabir
It may be said that such a person is as much a Polarised God as an electric switch is a polarised powerhouse, or a safe sea-beach is a suitable place where one can have a comfortable dip in waters of the sea. The true criterion of such a Satsang is that talks delivered there are always confined to spirit, its nature, its place and value in human life, its perennial Source and how to gain the same. The Godman thus shows how to escape from sufferings, decay and death, which are rampant in the world and to which all living creatures are subject.