KESHAB, THE BEARER OF THAKUR’S
IDEAS
1.
Morton School, M.’s bedroom on the fourth level. It is evening. M. is seated on his bed. To his left the devotees are seated on benches Vinay, Doctor Bakshi, Jagabandhu, Rajni and others. They are followed by Shuka Lal, Balai and others. A devotee from Kharagpur has also arrived. And also, Bhuvan Maiti. He is studying in a college and has his lodging in the Prachar Ashrama in Nava Vidhan Brahmo Samaj. But he is a devotee of Sri Ramakrishna Paramahansa Deva. M. had visited the Prachara Ashrama yesterday. There, the bhaktas were celebrating in connection with Keshab Sen’s birth anniversary. A ‘lantern lecture’ was given there yesterday, topic: The History of Brahmo Samaj, Speaker: Sri Jnananjana Viyogi.
The teachers of the Nava Vidhan Brahmo Samaj, Pramatha Sen and others reside in the Prachara Ashrama. It is situated in the Ramanath Majumdar Street close to the Mirzapur street. A number of bhaktas had accompanied M., the bhaktas who regularly visit him. The subject of the first slide was Raja Ram Mohan Roy’s visits to holy places.
It is 27th November, 1924 today, 12th Agrahayana, 1331 (B.Y.), Thursday, the first day of the bright fortnight, 37 Dandas/46 Palas.
M. is not quite well today. He has got cold. Last evening, while returning from Prachara Ashrama, he had caught cold.
On the 24th and 25th November, there were lantern lectures in the Morton School too. Jnananjana Viyogi was the speaker. The subject of the first day was cholera and tuberculosis. M. also saw it seated in the veranda on the second level with the bhaktas for sometime. Thereafter, he went to the Nava Vidhan Brahmo Samaj. There, the subject of discussion was the life of Keshab Babu. Like a honeybee, M. always draws Sri Ramakrishna’s nectar like words from the life of Keshab. He frequently goes there for this purpose. He says that the nectar of the words of Sri Ramakrishna is flowing within Keshab.
The subject of the lecture of the 25th November was smallpox. M. saw all the illustrations with the bhaktas sitting in the veranda of the second level. Another lantern slide lecture will be held on malaria in the Morton School on the coming 29th of November.
Being unwell, M. is seated on his bed in his room on the fourth level. He is happily talking to the bhaktas.
M. (to Bhuvan) Why do I go so frequently to the Nava Vidhan Samaj? Thakur’s power has percolated into Keshab Babu. How long he had the privilege of Thakur’s company! Thakur also used to visit him. How he loved him! He enjoyed his whole love before we, his intimate devotees, arrived.
"Aha! Thakur used to say, ‘He is a divine personality. When I see him, I feel there is the sound of water boiling in a kettle in my head.’"
Doctor Bakshi What does it mean?
M. It means that he felt highly inspired so much that his nervous system could not tolerate it. What else could it mean? Thakur used to name such a state as mahavayu.
A Certain Bhakta The Brahmo Devotees do not want to accept that Keshab Sen was indebted to Thakur for perfecting his religious life.
M. Truth manifests itself by its own light, like the sun. So, it does not depend on the acceptance of others. Besides, there is no harm if they do not accept it.
"If a person becomes rich because of the wealth of his father, does he have to proclaim it? I don’t listen to what others say. I have seen both these persons with my own eyes, and also their divine contact. He received Thakur’s love for ten years. It is not possible to estimate the value of a moment of the avatara’s grace and here it was love lasting ten years.
"After the passing away of Keshab Babu, his mother went to Cossipore with one of Keshab’s son to see Thakur. Thakur was ailing. Yet, embracing the boy, he began to cry. On Keshab’s passing away, Thakur did not rise from his bed for three days. He said while crying, ‘Mother, why have You bound me with such affection?’ Just read what Keshab Babu has written himself He has himself written, ‘There is none like him in this world. He should be preserved within a glass case or He should be kept like they keep grapes in cotton wool.’ One can well understand from this what was Thakur in Keshab Babu’s estimation."
Bhuvan There is a Brahmo Devotee who loses his equilibrium with just so little He is very sentimental.
M. How can he be other than sentimental? The loving souls have an independent nature.
Saying this M. sings the whole of the following song:
A loving person is independent by nature,
Brother, none is his own or a stranger.
He is a unique jewel;
He who is a loving soul cares little even for Indra’s status,
His face is always smiling as if his mind is a lake of nectar.
He does not care for caste, nor for name,
He merely fills his heart with emotion, never to bother about being called names,
When he has the key to happiness in his hand, what fear has he?
His conduct is different from and independent of the rituals of the Vedas,
Even when the moon falls in the midst of darkness, there is no mark of it on his face,
And even when the fourteen worlds are destroyed, he builds his home in the sky.
M. These are all Brahmo Songs, written by Trailokya Sanyal. Thakur used to sing all of them. Seeing the various states of Thakur, Trailokya Babu used to compose songs and sing them to him.
Song
My friend, to whom shall I speak out my heart. Since there is a ban on it.
Unless there is someone to share the grief, I cannot survive.
He who has the heart of a man can be recognised by his eyes.
But there are only one or two such,
Who laugh in emotion and dance in love. They can walk up and down the ujana path... and so on.
Song
My mind has gone deep down into the sea of Gaurang’s beauty, having lifted the veil,
And it has not returned.
2.
It is a very cold winter. M. is sitting on his bed facing west with a woollen shirt and a wrapper over it. His feet are covered with a quilt. Later, Shuka Lal enters and takes his seat on a stool to the west of the bed. He faces east. They talk at random. The maid comes and says, ‘The mother has sent me to ask you what would you like to eat, milk and roasted rice or milk and bread?’ M. said, ‘Milk and bread.’
M. (to the devotees) The ‘ujana path’ that is to say the path of God, not the path of the world. For him, the world has been proved to be an illusion to a great extent. So, he has established himself on the God, the Eternal. This is the state of samadhi. This comes about after samadhi. Even while he lives in the household, he sees God in all. So, his mind does not go elsewhere, it remains absorbed in God.
"By living exactly like a maid in your own house, you attain this state. Thakur has described his own state in all these songs. In this state, one needs the company of a close and pure minded devotee. At one place, Thakur went into samadhi. His neck got twisted. There was nobody in the room. Then he sang this very song. Baburam (Swami Premananda) could touch him in every state. He said about him, ‘He is pure to his bones.’ In such a state, one needs a person who can share one’s pain. Worldly people cannot understand this state.
" ‘My mind has gone deep down,’ that is to say I went into samadhi the state of the Gopis. In the beginning, saguna samadhi (samadhi with qualities), sakar samadhi (samadhi with form) manifests itself. Later on in mahabhava all becomes one. Thakur had this state. He would sing about his own state. The devotees were wonder-struck as they gazed at him trying to understand what was happening within him. So coming down from a higher state, he used to narrate it in a song.
"So long as one is fond of a beautiful form and good taste, one does not attain this state. One does not attain this state when there is even a trace of sensory enjoyments. When the mindness of the mind disappears, when the mind is stripped of its sensuous nature, one attains this state. Also, this comes about by His grace."
A devotee (to himself) For many days, M. has a different mood because of the birth anniversary of Keshab Sen. Repeatedly thinking of the loving contact of Thakur and Keshab, the mind perhaps wants to return home, a salt doll wishes to sink itself into the sea. But, the key is with Thakur. Though, by the grace of Thakur, his close devotees have tasted the joys of the beyond, yet without His will, they cannot return home at all. Thakur said to M. pointing with his thumb and the little finger, ‘You will have to do this much of Mother’s work.’ Till ‘this much’ has been done he cannot be free.
"Also the body is so indisposed, that is another reason for inspiration to go back. Thakur had said to M., ‘You have gained the guru. This body is His (Thakur’s) own.’ In spite of bodily trouble in this old age, the apostles do not have the option of leaving the body."
Shuka Lal The close disciples of Thakur are already free by His grace. They can give up their bodily existence at their will. Thereby, they can end the pain of their disease and old age.
M. The close disciples cannot. They are ever-free. Their advent is always for the good of the world, always for teaching. When He discharges them, only then they get liberated freeing themselves from their body. Their advent is for teaching of the world. Till this work is over, they cannot depart. Swamiji had said, ‘He has made me dance like a monkey with a rope in its nostrils for the last ten years. What can I do about it?’
"The avatara lila is quiet another thing. The bhaktas, the close disciples, are not like other ordinary people. Only, when He discharges them, they are freed."
The next day. M.’s bed room in Morton School. He is not well, so he is sitting on his bed. To the south of the bed, Vinay and the Younger Jiten are seated on a bench. Antevasi was cooking in his kitchen at half past seven in the morning. At half past eight, he comes to M.’s room. What M. had said to the devotees before the end of his conversation with them, he repeats it to Antevasi.
M. (to Antevasi) What a nice thing the Lord has said about the company of sadhus in the Bhagavata. He said, ‘One can reach the state of God realisation by the company of sadhus alone.’ Says Sri Krishna, ‘The Gopis of Braja and the ladies at the yajna achieved the joy of Brahman just by My company and by losing themselves in love for Me.’ In other words, they attained this state just by their love for Krishna.
"He instructs Uddhava on dispassion. He says, ‘Giving up all worldly duties and leaving your home, come out and take to tapasya.’ And then he says in another way, ‘Love Me. Then, you will be able to attain the eternal life easily.’
"He mentioned Gopis as an example. They were rustic women, unintelligent, sans sanskaras, sans renunciation and dispassion. Even then, they reached the state, so difficult to attain even by the yogis, just by giving Me their love with one mind.
"He tells the state of the mind of the Gopis to Uddhava, ‘When I came to Mathura, they contemplated upon Me so much that they lost all sense of their body. The homes and the people of the neighbourhood etc. simply did not exist in their estimation.’
"Uddhava was a pundit learned in all the shastras, a jnani bhakta. ‘What the jnani gets by deep thought, what the yogi gets by concentration, the Gopis attained that rare state just by loving Me. Just by thinking of Me, they forgot the body and the world like the yogis. So, I tell Uddhava only to think upon Me.’
"And He gave another illustration to Uddhava. He had read shastras etc. Krishna said to him, ‘Just as a river becomes the sea by falling into it, similarly the Gopis became full of Krishna by contemplating on Me,’ i.e. they became one with Brahman.
"Faith does not come easily. So, to establish it in the intellect, he gives so many illustrations and tells different ways again and again, ‘Contemplate on Me like Gopis.’ "
M. (to all present) Thakur also said to the bhaktas, ‘You will not have to do much, only know who I am and who you are, and you will attain.’ And then he also said clearly, ‘You will succeed just by thinking upon me. Verily, verily, I say, who thinks upon me will gain my wealth, like the son inheriting his father’s wealth. My wealth comprises jnana, bhakti, discrimination, dispassion, peace, happiness, love and samadhi.’
A Particular Bhakta The Gopis loved Sri Krishna secretly like one does one’s lover. How then did they attain the joy of Brahman?
M. Thakur said, ‘If you take chilli even without knowing it, you will, yet, feel its pungency.’ Krishna knew that he was God, never mind, if the Gopis did not. They however gave their love to Sri Krishna forgetting the whole world, their body, home, near and dear ones, all.
"Thakur said to Keshab Sen, ‘Don’t accept Gopis. But, only accept their attraction for the Lord.’ So much attraction that they even forgot the world!
M. (to Antevasi) Some devotees of Thakur also become completely filled with Ramakrishna by thinking upon him.
"Mary Magdalene also became Christ by continuous contemplation on him.
"This is the easy way. The avatara comes to show the easy way to the devotees. They come and make teachers of so many of them. They in turn make teachers of others.
"This is a very easy and natural way for the devotees. By giving their love to the avatara, they give their love to God. When this happens, it is done."
3.
M. is pensive for a while. He talks again.
M. (to Antevasi) They call this body a boat and the guru oars-man. Guru, that is to say avatara, God. You have a boat and you have a boatman. He who does not reach even when he has a boat commits suicide that is to say, destroys himself.
"Effort is needed. Labour is needed. The guru is sitting holding the oar. In other words, he is in the heart as its controller. Besides, Thakur the avatara is anyway there. One must make some effort. At least, take a step or two, He will come and lead you holding your hand. This is his promise, a great chance indeed."
M. is again silent. Then he resumes.
M. (to the bhaktas) Once the Holy Mother was living in a rented house near the cremation ghat in Belur. I had to go to her by crossing the Ganga. The boatman who usually would take me across was not there. His name was Dora. Another boatman said, ‘Come into the boat, I shall take you across. What does it matter if Dora is not there?’ I got into the boat and he also took me to the other bank. I did not return that night.
"What an attraction, as if some one was pulling me!"
A Particular Bhakta (to himself) The body, a boat and the guru, a boatman. If you are in earnest, the guru takes you across. In other words, he takes you out of the sea of the world and gives refuge at His holy feet. Has he made an illustration of it by narrating this incident of his life?
M. (to the bhaktas) It would be nice if some one could commit it to memory (the twelfth adhyaya of the eleventh skandha of the Bhagavata) the importance of the company of sadhus. (To Vinay) You can do it in ten minutes. Or, take an hour. Had Gadadhar been here, he would have memorised.
M. (to Antevasi) Just read this adhyaya the greatness of the company of sadhus.
Antevasi reads and M. gives the meaning in between.
M. Please read it again.
Antevasi
na bodhayati mam yogo na sankhyam dharmam eva ca,
na svadhyayastapastyago neshtapurtam na dakshina,
vratani yajnashchhandansi tirthani niyama yamah,
yathavarundhe satsangah sarvasangapaho hi mam.
[Practice of Yoga, sankhya (philosophical reflection), dharma (virtuous conduct), Vedic study, austerities, renunciation, Vedic rites, charity, gifts, observance of vows and fasts, yajnas, visit to holy places, chanting of mantras and control of mind (yama) and of the body do not help one to realise Me so much as the company of the holy, which eradicates all worldly attachments from the mind of man (Srimadbhagvata XI:12:1-2)]
M. The Lord says, ‘The way the company of sadhus binds Me, nothing else does.’ Besides, when the inner longing for the company of sadhus awakens, all other attachments perish. Who wants the company of sadhus earnestly? He who is not at peace with himself. The source of peace is God. Peace comes by contemplation of God. Where there is peace, there is real happiness.
"Thakur said, one should keep the company of the person by sitting with whom, by being friendly with whom, only the feeling of God rises in the mind and one begins to perceive that only God is eternal and company of sadhu transitory, only He is real. One should keep his company.
"No other remedy, no other thing can bring long lasting peace. So, if one asks for the company of the holy, just this one remedy kills all one’s worldly desires.
"Thakur said, ‘He who calls upon God with a sincere heart will have to come here.’ And he also said, ‘Mother, fulfil the desires of those who come here with an earnest mind.’
"Observance of vows and rules also brings peace, but it is temporary. But the peace of the company of the holy is permanent. Why? The company of the holy brings God, the embodiment of Reality near to you.
"Uddhava was a man of spiritual wisdom, a devotee and learned in shastras. To him, the Lord talked of the Gopis. Even earlier, He had sent him to the Gopis saying, ‘The Gopis have forgotten the world in their love for Me. These rustic, uncivilised, unlettered women have attained the state, which the yogis reach only by practising yoga for long and by observing vows, rules and so on, just by keeping My company and by loving Me with their whole heart."
Antevasi reads:
Ta narvidan mayyanushangabaddhadhiyah svamatmanamadastathedam,
Yatha samadhau munayodhvitoye nadyah pravishta iv namarupe.
[Just as name and form are lost in samadhi by sages, like the river merging in the ocean, the intensely loving selves of the Gopis lost in Me their separate existence lost the awareness of their kith and kin, whom one looks upon as one’s own, lost even consciousness of their body with which one identifies oneself. (Bhagavata XI:12:12)]
M. Thakur said, ‘The salt doll went to fathom the sea and itself became the sea.’ Similarly, by thinking constantly upon Krishna, the Gopis got filled with Krishna. They forgot the world. They forgot even the body which is so dear to man and they forgot their near and dear ones, their present, their future all, like the river losing itself in the sea. In other words, the company of Sri Krishna brought that state to the Gopis which the Munis get at the time of samadhi by being one with Parabrahman. Thakur said, ‘The (undeveloped) cockroach thinking upon a cockroach becomes a cockroach.’
The reading of the twelfth adhyaya ends.
4.
M. He said to Arjuna, ‘Giving up all duties, take refuge in Me alone mamekam sharanam vraja (Gita 18:56). Follow My advice.’ To Uddhava also He said, ‘mamekameva sharanamanam sarvadehinam yahi…’
"How amazing is His play! Uddhava stayed with Sri Krishna for so long. He still calls him Yogeshwareshwar The Lord of the Lord of yogis but along with it he says to him, ‘My doubts are not dispelled even by Your fear-dispelling words.’ It is because of the sense of the body. Thakur used to say, ‘The feeling of doership.’ This is all a play of Maya. So Thakur would always pray as a human being, ‘Do not delude me by Your world-enchanting Maya.’
"He said to Arjuna, ‘Place your whole burden on Me and live and work in the world. The renunciation of the work is not for you now.’ And to Uddhava, He said, ‘Giving up all work, embrace sannyasa and think upon Me.’ Thus, let one take that which one can digest. Both the yoga of the work and the renunciation of work are correct because of the difference is states, in one’s eligibility.
"This self-sense is also given by Him. This generates doubts. He wants to get some work done by him. He made Arjuna wage a war and he made Uddhava practice austerity.
"So long as there is body, there is mind. Because, there is mind, there is doubt. The doubt goes only in samadhi, when one has the darshan of the Lord. But, when the mind comes down to the earth, it enters the region of Maya. Doubt will then come. The doubt of a spiritually-perfected man is diluted even though the mind may be in the world. He, who has not realised the Self, finds it very difficult. One should then have faith in the guru’s words.
"What a riddle! Sri Krishna stands in front, and He says, ‘I am Parabrahman.’ Even then, he cannot put his firm faith in it. So, He said, ‘Go to Badrinarayana. Think upon Me. This will help control your doubt. With work, it is bound to increase.’
"The same is the state of Thakur’s devotees. He had shown his Real Self, that is Parama-Brahman, to the inner circle of his devotees. Even then, the doubt persists, though it cannot harm them. And, even if it does a little, it does so till the ‘I’ persists in them. When they give up the body, they are totally freed."
The Younger Jiten (humbly) I have not been able to stabilise my mind for a number of days. It runs about in all directions.
M. (with sympathy) No fear. Thakur is the guru. Such human life and this boat of life with the guru as the boatman! You have got the human life and also the boatman. What to fear? The boatman is an expert. He shows the right course.
"Thakur said to Girish Ghosh, ‘The cloud will rise in the mind at times, just as it does in the sky. It rises and then disappears this is its nature.’ Because, there is the body. The body, well, its nature is the same. There is no reason to have fear.’
"As soon as the cloud rises, the boatmen become conscious in the river. And when, it is clear they sit down and smoke. Sometime, the boat may sink, then they take to the life-belt. Thakur is the life-belt, He is also the river. He is the boat of life and He is the boatman. He is the cloud and He is also the storm, also the boat of life.
"If you were to say that there is the threat of the crocodile in water, he also gave the prescription for it rub the body with turmeric of discrimination. The crocodile will not touch you because of its smell."
It is seven in the evening. M. has kept to his room throughout the day because of his ill-health. The devotees come and sit on benches in the partitioned room close to M.’s the Doctor, the Younger Jiten, Vinay, Balai, a son of Doctor’s sister, Jagabandhu and so on. The Elder Jiten takes his seat on a chair near the staircase room on arriving.
M. is ill. But, he will go to the latrine on the second level without listening to anybody. The Mahapurusha Maharaj once sent a word through Antevasi from the Math, that M. should carry out all such necessities on the upper floor. But, he did not agree to this suggestion. He said humbly, ‘They all are sadhus so anxious for my welfare. But it is nothing climbing down from the fourth level to the second level.’
M. goes down to the second level. Lest the devotees begin to talk at random, he asks Antevasi to read the Bhagavata to them. Antevasi reads the hymn to the Devi sung by Brahma visit to the Swargapuri. He reads for an hour.
An hour ago, M. went to the second level to have his meal. The bhaktas are impatient thinking why he has not returned.
M. was coming up after the call of nature when Swami Madhavananda and Swami Nikhilananda arrived. He sat with them on the veranda of second level on a bench to talk with them. Recently, Nikhilananda had toured the western India. There, the life of Thakur and his words are discussed with great reverence in many big ashramas. The men of Gujarat are devotees of Thakur. The Kathamrita has been published in Gujarati. Mahatma Gandhi has written the introduction to the English version of Thakur’s Life. He had said therein, ‘Sri Ramakrishna was a God-realised soul. We can see God in front of us with our own eyes in the mirror of his life. Sri Ramakrishna is physical manifestation of divinity.’
The sadhus talk of it with a lot of gusto while M. listens with great curiosity like a child. Finally, he says full of joy, "It will all become red at the end." That is to say, that Sri Ramakrishna’s current of thought will spread everywhere in India. He says, "Why only India? It will spread in other countries too. Pointing at his own photo, Thakur had said, ‘This picture will be worshiped in all homes later on.’ What a wonder that it is becoming so every day! But for God who could have asserted it."
9 p.m. The devotees have cooked khichri and offered it as bhog in the western hall on the second level. Having done so, they all sit down and take prasad the Younger Nalini, Rajni, Balai, Vinay, Jagabandhu, the Younger Jiten, Lakshman and so on. At the suggestion of M., the bhaktas enjoy themselves with such small but loving celebrations in this way from time to time. M. says, "Thakur himself established such happy celebrations. He used to make the devotees celebrate in this way at times. Why he did so, who can tell? Only, he knows it."
Morton School, Calcutta,
Friday 21st November, 1924,
13th Agrahayana 1331 (B.Y.),
The 2nd day of the bright fortnight,
31 Dandas/48 Palas.