The Parable of the Calf

After the music the Master sat with the devotees. Just then Niranjan arrived and prostrated himself before him. At the very sight of this beloved disciple the Master stood up; with beaming eyes and smiling face, and said: “You have come too! (To M.) You see, this boy is absolutely guileless. One cannot be guileless without a great deal of spiritual discipline in previous births. A hypocritical and calculating mind can never attain God.

“Don’t you see that God incarnates Himself only in a family where innocence exists? How guileless Dasaratha was! So was Nanda, Krishna’s father. There is a saying: ‘Ah, how innocent a man he is!

He is just like Nanda.’

(To Niranjan) “I feel as if a dark veil has covered your face. It is because you have accepted a job in an office. One must keep accounts there. Besides, one must attend to many other things, and that always keeps the mind in a state of worry. You are serving in an office like other worldly people; but there is a slight difference, in that you are earning money for the sake of your mother. One must show the highest respect to one’s mother, for she is the very embodiment of the Blissful Mother of the Universe. If you had accepted the job for the sake of wife and children, I should have said: ‘Fie upon you! Shame! A thousand shames!’

(To Mani Mallick, pointing to Niranjan) “Look at this boy. He is absolutely guileless. But he has one fault: he is slightly untruthful nowadays. The other day he said that he would visit me again very soon, but he didn’t come. (To Niranjan) That is why Rākhāl asked you why you didn’t come to see me while you were at Ariadaha, so near Dakshineswar.”

NIRANJAN: “I was there only a couple of days.”

MASTER (to Niranjan, pointing to M.) “He is the headmaster of a school. At my bidding he went to see you. (To M.) Did you send Baburam to me the other day?”

The Master went to an adjoining room and began to talk with some devotees there.

MASTER (to M.): “Ah! How wonderful was the yearning of the gopis for Krishna! They were seized with divine madness at the very sight of the black tamala tree. Separation from Krishna created such a fire of anguish in Radha’s heart that it dried up even the tears in her eyes! Her tears would disappear in steam. There were other times when nobody could notice the depth of her feeling. People do not notice the plunge of an elephant in a big lake.”

M: “Yes, sir, that is true. Chaitanya, too, experienced a similar feeling. He mistook a forest for the sacred grove of Vrindāvan, and the dark water of the ocean for the blue Jamuna”

MASTER: “Ah! If anyone has but a particle of such prema! What yearning! What love! Radha possessed not only one hundred per cent of divine love, but 125%.

This is what it means to be intoxicated with ecstatic love of God. The sum and substance of the whole matter is that a man must love God, must be restless for Him.

It doesn’t matter whether you believe in God with form or in God without form. You may or may not believe that God incarnates Himself as man. But you will realize Him if you have that yearning. Then He Himself will let you know what He is like. If you must be mad, why should you be mad for the things of the world? If you must be mad, be mad for God alone.”

Presently Sri Ramakrishna returned to the main hall of the house. A big pillow was placed near him for his use. Before touching it he said, “Om Tat Sat” Perhaps the pillow had been used by many worldly people, and that was why he purified it in this way.

Bhavanath, M., and other devotees sat near him. It was getting late, but there was no indication that the meal was going to be served. The Master became impatient, like a child, and said: “I don’t see any sign of food.

What’s the matter? Where is Narendra?”

A DEVOTEE (with a smile): “Sir, Ram Babu is the manager of the feast. He is superintending everything.”

MASTER (laughing): “Oh, Ram is the manager! Then we know what to expect.”

A DEVOTEE: “Things like this always happen when he is the supervisor.” (All laugh.)

MASTER (to the devotees): “Where is Surendra? What a nice disposition he has now! He is very outspoken; he isn’t afraid to speak the truth. He is unstinting in his liberality. No one that goes to him for help comes away empty-handed. (To M.) You went to Bhagavan Das. What sort of man is he?”

M: “He is very old now. I saw him at Kalna. It was night. He lay on a carpet and a devotee fed him with food that had been offered to God. He can hear only if one speaks loudly into his ear.

Hearing me mention your name he said, ‘You have nothing to worry about.’”

BHAVANATH (to M.): “You haven’t been to Dakshineswar for a long time. The Master asked me about you and said one day, ‘Has M. lost all taste for this place?’

Bhavanath laughed as he said these words. The Master heard their conversation and said to M. in a loving voice: “Yes, that is true. Why haven’t you been to Dakshineswar for such a long time?”

M. could only stammer some lame excuses.

Just then Mahimacharan arrived. He lived at Cossipore near Calcutta. Mahimacharan held the Master in great respect and was a frequent visitor at the temple garden. He was a man of independent means, having inherited some ancestral property. He devoted his time to religious thought and to the study of the scriptures. He was a man of some scholarship, having studied many books, both Sanskrit and English.

MASTER (to Mahima): “What is this? I see a steamship here. (All laugh.) We expect here a small boat at the most, but a real steamship has arrived. But then I know. It’s the rainy season!” (Laughter.)

The Master was conversing with Mahimacharan. He asked him: “Isn’t feeding people a kind of service to God? God exists in all beings as fire. To feed people is to offer oblations to that Indwelling Spirit.

But then one shouldn’t feed the wicked, I mean people who are entangled in gross worldliness or who have committed heinous crimes like adultery. Even the ground where such people sit becomes impure to a depth of seven cubits. Once Hriday fed a number of people at his native place.

A good many of them were wicked. I said to Hriday: ‘Look here. If you feed such people I shall leave your house at once.’ (To Mahima) I hear that you used to feed people; but now you don’t give any such feasts. Is it because your expenses have gone up?” (Laughter.)

The meal was to be served on the south verandah of the house. Leaf-plates were being placed on the floor. The Master said to Mahimacharan: “Please go there and see what they are doing. You may help them a little in serving the food. But I shouldn’t ask you.”

Mahimacharan said: “Let them bring in the food. I shall see.” Hemming and hawing, he went toward the kitchen, but presently he came back.

Sri Ramakrishna and the devotees enjoyed the meal greatly. Afterwards he rested awhile. About two o’clock in the afternoon Pratap Chandra Mazumdar of the Brahmo Samaj arrived. He was a co-worker of Keshab Chandra Sen and had been to Europe and America in connection with the Brahmo missionary work. He greeted Sri Ramakrishna, and the Master, too, bowed before him with his usual modesty.

They were soon engaged in conversation.

PRATAP: “I have been to Darjeeling recently for a change of air.”

MASTER: “But your health hasn’t much improved. What are you suffering from?”

PRATAP: “The same-illness that Keshab died of.”

They began to talk about Keshab. Pratap said: “Even in boyhood he showed non-attachment to worldly things, seldom making merry with other boys. He was a student in the Hindu College. At that time he became friendly with Satyendra and through him made the acquaintance of his father, Devendranath Tagore. Keshab cultivated bhakti and at the same time practised meditation. At times he would be so much overcome with divine love that he would become unconscious. The main purpose of his life was to introduce religion among householders.

The conversation next turned to a certain Marhatta lady.

PRATAP: “Some women of our country have been to England. This Marhatta lady, who is very scholarly, also visited England. Later she embraced Christianity. Have you heard her name, sir?”

MASTER: “No. But from what you say it seems to me that she has a desire for name and fame. That kind of egotism is not good. The feeling ‘I am the doer’ is the outcome of ignorance. But the feeling that God does everything is due to knowledge. God alone is the Doer; all others are mere instruments in His hands.

Parable of the calf

An egotistic man’s misfortune is like the condition of the calf.

The calf says, ‘Hamma! Hamma!’ that is, ‘I! I!’. Just look at its misfortune! At times it is yoked to the plough and made to work in the field from sunup to sundown, rain or shine. Again, it may be slaughtered by the butcher.

In that case the flesh is eaten and the skin tanned into hide. From the hide shoes are made. People put on these shoes and walk on the rough ground. Still that is not the end of its misfortunes. Drums are made from its skin and mercilessly beaten with sticks.

At last its entrails are made into strings for the bow used in carding cotton. When used by the carder the string gives the sound ‘Tuhu! Tuhu!’,‘Thou! Thou!’-that is, ‘It is Thou, O Lord! It is Thou!’ It no longer says, ‘Hamma! Hamma!’, ‘I! I!’ Only then does the calf’s trouble come to an end, and it is liberated. It doesn’t return to the world of action.

“Likewise, when the embodied soul says: ‘O God, I am not the doer; Thou art the Doer. I am the machine and Thou art its Operator’, only then does its suffering of worldly life come to an end; only then does it obtain liberation. It no longer has to be reborn in this world of action.”

A DEVOTEE: “How can a man get rid of his ego?”

MASTER: “You cannot get rid of it until you have realized God. If you find a person free from ego, then know for certain that he has seen God.”

DEVOTEE: “What, sir, are the signs of God-vision?”

MASTER: “Yes, there are such signs. It is said in the Bhagavata that a man who has seen God behaves sometimes like a child, sometimes like a ghoul, sometimes like an inert thing, and sometimes like a madman.

“The man who has seen God becomes like a child. He is beyond the three gunas; he is unattached to any of them. He behaves like a ghoul, for he maintains the same attitude toward things holy and unholy. Again, like a madman, he sometimes laughs and sometimes weeps. Now he dresses himself like a dandy and the next moment he goes entirely naked and roams about with his cloth under his arm. Therefore he seems to be a lunatic. Again, at times he sits motionless like an inert thing.”

DEVOTEE: “Does the ego disappear altogether after the realization of God?”

MASTER: “Yes, sometimes God totally effaces the ego of His devotee, as in the state of samādhi.

But in many cases He keeps a trace of ego. But that doesn’t injure anybody. It is like the ego of a child. A five-year-old child no doubt says ‘I’, but that ego doesn’t harm anybody. At the touch of the philosopher’s stone, steel is turned into gold; the steel sword becomes a sword of gold.

The gold sword has the form of a sword, no doubt, but it cannot injure anybody. One cannot cut anything with a gold sword. (To Pratap) “You have been to England. Tell us what you saw there.”

PRATAP: “The English people worship what you call ‘gold’. Of course, there are also some good people in England, those who live an unattached life. But generally one finds there a great display of rajas in everything. I saw the same thing in America.”

MASTER (to Pratap): “It is not in England alone that one sees attachment to worldly things. You see it everywhere. But remember that work is only the first step in spiritual life.

God cannot be realized without sattva-love, discrimination, kindness, and so on. It is the very nature of rajas to involve a man in many worldly activities. That is why rajas degenerates into tamas. If a man is entangled in too many activities he surely forgets God.

He becomes more and more attached to ‘woman and gold’.

“But it is not possible for you to give up work altogether. Your very nature will lead you to it whether you like it or not. Therefore the scriptures ask you to work in a detached spirit, that is to say, not to crave the work’s results. For example, you may perform devotions and worship, and practise austerities, but your aim is not to earn people’s recognition or to increase your merit.

“To work in such a spirit of detachment is known as karmayoga. But it is very difficult.

We are living in the Kaliyuga, when one easily becomes attached to one’s actions. You may think you are working in a detached spirit, but attachment creeps into the mind from nobody knows where. You may worship in the temple or arrange a grand religious festival or feed many poor and starving people.

You may think you have done all this without hankering after the results. But unknown to yourself the desire for name and fame has somehow crept into your mind. Complete detachment from the results of action is possible only for one who has seen God.”

A DEVOTEE: “Then what is the way for those who have not seen God? Must they give up all the duties of the world?”

MASTER: “The best path for this age is bhaktiyoga, the path of bhakti prescribed by Nārada: to sing the name and glories of God and pray to Him with a longing heart, ‘O God, give me knowledge, give me devotion, and reveal Thyself to me!’ The path of karma is extremely difficult.

Therefore one should pray: ‘O God, make my duties fewer and fewer; and may I, through Thy grace, do the few duties that Thou givest me without any attachment to their results! May I have no desire to be involved in many activities!’

“It is not possible to give up work altogether. Even to think or to meditate is a kind of work.

As you develop love for God, your worldly activities become fewer and fewer of themselves. And you lose all interest in them. Can one who has tasted a drink made of sugar candy enjoy a drink made of ordinary molasses?”

A DEVOTEE: “The English people always exhort us to be active. Isn’t action the aim of life then?”

MASTER: “The aim of life is the attainment of God. Work is only a preliminary step; it can never be the end. Even unselfish work is only a means; it is not the end.

“Sambhu Mallick once said to me, ‘Please bless me, sir, that I may spend all my money for good purposes, such as building hospitals and dispensaries; making roads, and digging wells.’ I said to him: ‘It will be good if you can do these things in a spirit of detachment.

But that is very difficult. Whatever you may do, you must always remember that the aim of this life of yours is the attainment of God and not the building of hospitals and dispensaries. Suppose God appeared before you and said to you, “Accept a boon from Me.”

Would you then ask Him, “O God, build me some hospitals and dispensaries”? Or would you not rather pray to Him: “O God, may I have pure love at Your Lotus Feet! May I have Your uninterrupted vision!”? Hospitals, dispensaries, and all such things are unreal.

God alone is real and all else unreal. Furthermore, after realizing God one feels that He alone is the Doer and we are but His instruments. Then why should we forget Him and destroy ourselves by being involved in too many activities?

After realizing Him, one may, through His grace, become His instrument in building many hospitals and dispensaries.’

“Therefore work is only the first step. It can never be the goal of life. Devote yourself to spiritual practice and go forward. Through practice you will advance more and more in the path of God. At last you will come to know that God alone is real and all else is illusory, and that the goal of life is the attainment of God.