11
SEE GOD IN THE AVATARA, WHAT USE RUNNING HERE AND THERE?
Morton School, Calcutta. It is 11.30 a.m. M. is lying in his bed in his chamber on the fourth level. He is not keeping fit. The Kathamrita is under print with two printing presses. Though Antevasi has the entire responsibility, M. still instructs him on all matters. He says to Antevasi, ‘Please go to the Balakrishna Press and ask them to send the gailey proofs without delay. Unless you press them to hurry up, they will get delayed. So one should always keep pressurizing them.’ M. has been in bed throughout the day. Bhaktas who come to see him return soon. There has not been much spiritual talk.
It is Wednesday, the 30th of July 1924, the fourteenth day of the lunar month, 46th dandas / 29 palas. 5 p.m. M. has been coming to the staircase room quite frequently. A number of bhaktas have arrived. M. talks to them for a while, and then returns to his room. He has sent Antevasi to the Vani Press, late in the afternoon. This press is also printing the Kathamrita.
It is twilight. M. meditates for a while. The bhaktas join him. He now asks them to read the Kathamrita. Whenever he is not well, he mostly asks some holy book to be read.
At the behest of M., Antevasi reads the Kathamrita, Part I Chapter 14 - Sri Ramakrishna has visited the Balaram Mandir and the Girish Bhavan. Girish has invited the whole group of devotees to his house. Rama and Mahima Chakravarty have also come. It’s Friday, the 24th of April 1885. Thakur has contracted a sore-throat.
A joyous festival is being celebrated in Girish’s house today. Bhagavan Sri Ramakrishna has come accompanied by the bhaktas. He is keen to see how ‘English men’ (the anglicised Indians) carry out a discussion. So Mahima and Girish undertake a discussion. While Mahima believes in jnana, Girish has faith in bhakti.
Mahima - Everybody can become Sri Krishna by taking to spiritual practice.
Girish - Impossible. Only Sri Krishna can be Sri Krishna. If all the qualities of Sri Krishna manifest themselves in a person he is none else than Sri Krishna. An ordinary human-being can’t become Sri Krishna.
M. — Mahimacharan doesn’t accept incarnation of God, Narendra also doesn’t. That’s why Thakur has broached this subject. He is going to talk of the principle behind it. Thakur says that a human-being can attain samadhi at the most by spiritual practice but he can’t come down to the earth again. However, he who is able to do so has done it by God’s will. God wills that the former should teach mankind. On the other hand, an avatara can always lose himself in samadhi and yet come down to teach. It is like a minister who can go only upto the state secretariat with the king but the son of a king can go anywhere - in and out of the palace. The same is the difference between an ordinary human being and avatara.
M. (smiling) — Mahimacharan believes that one cannot do any worldly work after attaining samadhi. About Thakur, he says, ‘He was in a higher state earlier. He has now climbed down.’ (All laugh loudly). Seeing Thakur making merry with the devotees, Mahima said so. So Thakur gave examples of Narada, Sukadeva, Shankar, Ramanuja, Prahlad and Hanuman - all of them attended to work after attaining samadhi. The rishis also did so after samadhi, for example, Vyasa, Vashishtha, Yajnavalkya and Janak.
"The avatara is God Himself. He can certainly work in a lower state. If the other human-beings work after samadhi, they do so by God’s will for teaching mankind. The avatara, on the other hand, works at His own will.
(Laughing) "Mahimacharan says, ‘I had the state twelve years ago which Narendra has today. Why does Thakur dance and make merry with him so much?’ (All laugh) Mahima Chakravarty has quite softened now - because of his discussions with Girish Babu. That’s why he agrees to all this.
"What a beautiful illustration! The shadow of man disappears at midday. Similarly the conceit of man does not survive after samadhi. A divine illustration indeed!
"Mahimacharan is proud because he can talk on the Vedas. Thakur makes little of it. The knowledge derived from books and the knowledge attained after samadhi are two things, very different from each other. Without experiencing samadhi one cannot rid one oneself of one’s egotism. That’s why Thakur asked the ordinary human being to live in the world like a maid servant. Hanuman was in the mood of a servitor after attaining samadhi. Some of Thakur’s bhaktas also had the disposition of a servitor or a son. One belongs to the state of aspirant the other to that of the perfected one.
"How beautifully Thakur defines his close disciples today! Says, he, ‘The close disciples are like pillars in the Nat-mandir - They live always close to the Master and share his pleasure and pain. The distant disciples are like exterior pillars - they visit some times to enquire after him.’ This illustration of Thakur serves as a measure to sift the intimate disciples from the distant disciples."
At times M. listens silently to the reading. Sometimes he elucidates. The reading is over. M. sits closing his eyes for a while. He again comments.
M. (to the bhaktas) — The bhaktas run after the Lord, and sometimes the Lord also runs after the bhaktas. Just see how Thakur used to go running to Calcutta from Dakshineswar.
"The bhaktas have so much to do. They can’t go to him. And even if they haven’t much work, there are other handicaps. Maybe some of them are mere boys, they have no money and the they are afraid of their people, they may give them a beating.
"Even those who are not plagued by them may not like to visit him for they have their minds in other matters. Thakur knows their innermost thoughts - he knew all this. So he himself went running to them to help them.
"And why not? Wasn’t it his duty? If father or mother doesn’t do so, who will?
"We are ignorant people. How far can we see? He can see all, he is the controller of the mind. He gauges both the attraction and the repulsion of our minds and comes to raise us. This is the reason for his visit of today.
"Girish Ghosh has recently started visiting him. He had fallen so low, so Thakur comes to lift him into his arms. The main purpose of his visit today is to grant him his grace.
"Didn’t he say just after a visit or two: ‘You are the Lord Brahman Absolute, the avatara? You have come to redeem me.’ It is to fortify this feeling firmly in his mind that he has come today.
"Girish welcomes him by lying prostrate before him. Such a proud man and see what he does today! What a wonder and why not? How much he has sinned and yet he attained infinite peace, infinite joy and infinite spiritual wealth without paying anything. He has seen the Lord - such an invaluable attainment. And this too he has attained not by closing his eyes in samadhi but with his bodily eyes - he has seen the God in the avatara, in the human body of Thakur. He has today brought to his house Him who is the indivisible Existence-Knowledge-Bliss, beyond mind and speech, who creates, preserves and dissolves the world in the blinking of an eye; Him he is feeding with his own hands and making merry with Him. That’s why overwhelmed with bhakti, drowned in love and forgetting himself in gratitude, he rolls at his feet. What a rare sight, what a living manifestation of faith, it is the descent of Vaikuntha (the abode of Vishnu) in the mortal world."
M. (to the young man) — Not only this, he breaks the clod with a clod. Narendra does not believe in the avatara - he belongs to the realm of the Indivisible. Thakur teaches Narendra through Girish. Narendra, you know, is to proclaim Thakur to the world later on. So he makes Girish broach the principle of avatara-hood. How he introduces himself! Says he, ‘The avatara is like a cow’s udder. It yields milk, so it is of special use. The udder yields milk, that is to say the grandeur of God shows itself through the avatara - and it result in jnana and bhakti, discrimination and dispassion, peace and joy, prema and samadhi.
"Among men in human body, the avatara is the highest. From him gushes forth a flood of jnana, bhakti and intense love for the devotees of this world.
"So it is said that its one and the same thing, whether one merges oneself in the infinite Lord, Indivisible Existence-Knowledge-Bliss or one sees Him in all creatures. Therefore it is said that seeing God and seeing the avatara are one and the same. By seeing the avatara one sees God. Christ also said, ‘I and my Father are one’. (John 10:30) Sri krishna also said the same in the Bhagavata: Aham atma gudakesha sarva bhutashya sthita - I am the Self, Gudakesha, seated in the hearts of all beings. This has also been said in the Gita (10:20). Jnana, bhakti and prema manifest themselves in the world only through the avatara. Thakur himself said, ‘I am that avatara.’
"If the desired thing is available at a particular place why should one go about elsewhere in search of it? Just see, What an incontrovertible saying this is! Touch the Ganga or the sea at any place, you have touched it all - nobody has to touch the whole of the Ganga - from the Gomukhi to the Ganga Sagar. Or the whole of the sea? Touching the sea at Puri you touch the infinite sea.
"God exists in the form of the universe. And He is also avanga manas agocharam - beyond mind and speech. If we can see Him in the avatara, what is the use of roaming about in the universe?"
Enter the Doctor, Vinay and others.
M. — Well, Vinay Babu, have you brought the list of items used in the celebration the other day?
Vinay — Yes Sir!
M. — Let us hear it. It is good if a list has been complied. It helps to make lists of the coming years.
Vinay reads and M. comments in between. He says to the bhaktas, ‘Please listen. The list is being read. If you have any comments please make them.’
(To a young bhakta who is a bit sceptical) "Well if a list of the puja of the time of Chaitanya Deva was available, would you not want to see it shouting yes, yes; just tell me this. They why are you surprised now?
The first public celebration of M.’s birthday was held at the house of Dr. Kartik Bakshi in Cossipore on Monday, the 21st July, the Nagpanchmi day. Swamis Saradananda and Subodhananda attended the celebrations along with M. Besides the inner circle of Thakur’s children, many old sadhus also joined those celebrations. Swamis Dhirananda, Shantananda, Dharmananda, Jnana Maharaj, Omkarananda and many other sadhus participated and took prasad there. The sadhus of the math themselves performed shodshopachara puja (a perfect puja with sixteen articles) and hoam (oblations performed by offering clarified butter into consecrated fire). All the bhaktas of the Morton School were also present. It is the list of that celebration that is being read.
M. (to the Doctor) — They should not have procured so many mangoes when they are not good - serving a slice to each should have been enough. Rabri (sweetened cream) and such others things are not served in plenty. Buying a rupee worth of it, offering it to Thakur as bhoga, it should be served in small quantity to all. Just offering eight mangoes by count to Thakur would have been all right.
"And no vegetable curries were prepared. They should have made some plum chutney. Let there be small quantities of rasagullas and sandesh but there should be a lot of curd. Curd wards off disease. In other words, the meal should be such that it is not harmful to health.
"And the one should hold a council together. All plans should be got approved from experienced hands. Otherwise it leads to waste. So Thakur said: ‘A miser is better than a spendthrift.’
Mohan (to himself) — How wonderful is the conduct of the disciples of the avatara! This is indeed the right conduct. They have learnt in the very presence of the Lord in human form. Thakur used to say: ‘Why must a bhakta be a fool?’ So they concern themselves with all matters. The worker must be competent and his work must be faultless. Thakur used to say, ‘He who can keep an account of salt can also keep the account of sugar candy.’ He who is competent in worldly matter can also be competent in spiritual matters. The bhaktas have come to hear about religion, but he is talking to them on worldly conduct. Reason? If the mind is competent and concentrated on external matters it can also be so about God. ‘One has just to turn round the corner,’ Thakur used to say.
M. (to the bhaktas) — Thakur asks someone (M. himself) how much would a stool cost? Bhakta said perhaps one rupee and a half. Thakur rejoined, ‘If a bathing seat costs just six annas, why should a stool cost so much. Just see, he was an avatara. What a sense of proportion he had! Can others have it?
"We are fools. We do not possess such a sharp intellect. So Thakur made us see with his finger. Those who have such conscious intellect are the persons to whom Lord reveals Himself.
"Thakur sent somebody to bring a leaf of beetle from the Alam Bazar. He brought seven leaves. Then some employee said, ‘I brought ten for a pice.’ Thakur immediately scolded him saying, ‘Go to him, fool, return these. If you do not want so many leaves you can give them away to others but why should you allow yourself to be cheated.’ One who gets cheated by these things, also gets cheated by mahamaya’s magic. We have only one mind. With such a mind as this, one can not realize God. Even if he is given something worthwhile, he will not be able to keep it - he will not be able to keep anything divine if and when it is given to him."
What is M. thinking ? His mind is tied to the past. He resumes his talk.
M. (to the Elder Jiten) — As a boy I went for dinner with my mother to a local doctor’s house. I was twelve then. We got excellent curd and first class sandesh. The sugar-murki was giving out a very sweet aroma. That aroma I am still tasting, Oh! (laughs).
"You don’t have a chopper and yet take a raw coconut. First have a chopper before taking the coconut."
There has been some wastage of eatables on M.’s anniversary celebration. First one must have a sharp intellect and then experience, besides mutual consultation - only then an undertaking ends well. This was not done in the last festival. Is this the reason that he says that one needs a chopper, that is to say the experience of a jnani, thereafter he should buy a coconut, that is to say celebrate?
For M. there is no difference between dharma and Karma (work) - they are one. If the work is well thought of, well conceived, it purifies the mind and leads to jnana. This becomes the means to attain moksha (liberation). Otherwise all work is bondage.
Evening of the next day, in the staircase room of the Morton School. M. is seated on a chair facing north, he has a woolen cloth on him. It is bad weather - it is raining in torrents and he is unwell. His neuralgic back-ache has increased but he is still there with the bhaktas.
One forgets one’s pain when talking or hearing spiritual matters. Just as it is joyful to keep the mind on God at the time of meditation, similarly the mind of those, who are drenched in the showers of divine Kathamrita and their goal, gets merged in God. Their body consciousness decreases. Thus comes joy and the intoxication of divine talk. Just as a man forgets the trials and tribulations of the world by taking wine, similarly the talk of God has also its intoxication. The narration of His life is the life-breath of those in trouble - tapta jivanam.
Whenever M. is not well he always showers the nectar of divine words on others. Even when lying ill he makes sadhus and bhaktas sit on his bed and talks to them of God. Once he had fever. The doctors prohibited all talk, but the fever did not leave him for the whole month. Doctor Satyacharan Chakravarty was then called in. He was a devotee. As soon he saw him he said, ‘Let him talk. Let him do what he likes.’ M. began showering the nectar of Thakur’s words. Along with it he rid himself of his fever.
This too is a way, the yoga of sankirtan (community singing), and the yoga of showering the nectar of the Word.
M. is a little more unwell today. So he asked for the Kathamrita to be read after the evening meditation. Volume One, 8th section: Sri Ramakrishna in the annual festival of the Brahmo Samaj in Sinduria Patti.
Even in an inclement weather the devotees have arrived - the Doctor, Vinay, the Younger Nalini, the Younger Amulya, Balai, the Younger Jiten, Manoranjan, Bhaumik, Sukhendu, Jagabandhu and others are seated close to M. The Kathamrita is being read by the Younger Amulya.
The Reader: Sri Ramakrishna says, ‘If the butter of jnana and bhakti is taken out from the milk of the mind, it will never get dissolved in the water of the world.’
M. (to the bhaktas) — There are quite some good people among the Brahmos - bhaktas as they were. That’s why Thakur used to go running to them. But none of their leaders would leave his house to undertake tapasya. So, Thakur went to them to say: ‘Take out butter and then live in the world.’
"He wanted to do good to all, how they can benefit most, that’s why this was very much needed. The ‘material’ is good but for the want of sadhan it is losing quality. So whenever he saw them he would ask them to take to sadhana. And he would sing this song: ‘O my mind drown yourself in the sea of the beauty of the Lord.’
"Vijay Goswami has returned from Gaya after practising tapasya. A new person he has become. How happy Thakur feels on seeing him! Vijay Babu had recognized Thakur. He said, ‘I have been going round, I have seen that some have it two annas in a rupee, while others have four annas of it. But here it is full sixteen annas in rupee.’
"Without carrying out tapasya in a solitary place one can not see the difference - one cannot see where one is and where one has to go.
"And unless you take refugee in truth you cannot practice sadhana-bhajan, this he said and this he said too, ‘It is Kaliyuga. By holding on to truth you can attain God.’
"People cannot know him externally. But by holding on to truth you can see Him - it was to say this that he went to Brahmo Samaj.
"While living a worldly life man forgets truth. So Thakur said, ‘I have given up all to the Mother but I could not give truth to her.’ Unless one can distinguish the truth and untruth the body does not last. That is why he had taken refuge in satya (truth) while living within mithya (illusory world). Within him always dwelt the Mother, the picture of truth.
"He has shown the people of this world another way out. If one can not practice so many rules of the religion but holds on to the truth, even then he can realise God. Said he, ‘Truth is like a chain. If one holds the chain, one can find the log.’ The log wood is drowned in water, tied to a chain. Log wood meaning God.
"They say: mere talk can not soak the roasted rice. Similarly how can mere talking help you? The Vedas say: someone has said so and so. That particular saying has to be stored within, those emotions are to be collected and fixed in one’s heart and mind. Amidst the sufferings and sorrows of this world, the light of that collection of good emotions is needed. To talk so highly from the mouth, and to work like the same as before! The parrot repeats Radhakrishna, but as soon as the cat catches it, the same ‘tain-tain’ (its natural voice). How will it go about then? The musical notes have to be practised hands on.
"But people of the Brahmo Samaj loved Thakur. In whatever bhava one may love him, it will certainly do good. He himself has said, ‘The chilli will have its pungent effect even if eaten unawares.’ Those people didn’t recognise him as an avatara. That may have been so. But he knew that they loved him. So their good was inevitable."
Calcutta,
Thursday, 31st July 1924.
The night of the new moon, 49 dandas/4 palas.