Duties of life

(To Bankim, smiling) “Well, what do you say about man’s duties?”

BANKIM (smiling): “If you ask me about them, I should say they are eating, sleeping, and sex-life.”

Master scolds Bankim

MASTER (sharply): “Eh? You are very saucy! What you do day and night comes out through your mouth. A man belches what he eats. If he eats radish, he belches radish; if he eats green coconut, he belches green coconut. Day and night you live in the midst of ‘woman and gold’; so your mouth utters words about that alone. By constantly thinking of worldly things a man becomes calculating and deceitful. On the other hand, he becomes guileless by thinking of God. A man who has seen God will never say what you have just said. What will a pundit’s scholarship profit him if he does not think of God and has no discrimination and renunciation? Of what use is erudition if the mind dwells on ‘woman and gold’?

“Kites and vultures soar very high indeed, but their gaze is fixed only on the charnel-pit. The pundit has no doubt studied many books and scriptures; he may rattle off their texts, or he may have written books. But if he is attached to women, if he thinks of money and honour as the essential things, will you call him a pundit? How can a man be a pundit if his mind does not dwell on God?

Devotees and the worldly-minded

“Some may say about the devotees: ‘Day and night these people speak about God. They are crazy; they have lost their heads. But how clever we are! How we enjoy pleasure- money, honour, the senses!’ The crow, too thinks he is a clever bird; but the first thing he does when he wakes up in the early morning is to fill his stomach with nothing but others’ filth. Haven’t you noticed how he struts about? Very clever indeed!”

There was dead silence.

Sri Ramakrishna continued: “But like the swan are those who think of God, who pray day and night to get rid of their attachment to worldly things and their love for ‘woman and gold’, who do not enjoy anything except the nectar of the Lotus Feet of the Lord, and to whom worldly pleasures taste bitter. If you put a mixture of milk and water before the swan, it will leave the water and drink only the milk. And haven’t you noticed the gait of a swan? It goes straight ahead in one direction. So it is with genuine devotees: they go toward God alone. They seek nothing else; they enjoy nothing else.

(Tenderly, to Bankim) “Please don’t take offence at my words.”

BANKIM: “Sir, I haven’t come here to hear sweet things.”

MASTER (to Bankim): “‘Woman and gold’ alone is the world; that alone is māyā. Because of it you cannot see or think of God. After the birth of one or two children, husband and wife should live as brother and sister and talk only of God. Then both their minds will be drawn to God, and the wife will be a help to the husband on the path of spirituality. None can taste divine bliss without giving up his animal feeling. A devotee should pray to God to help him get rid of this feeling. It. must be a sincere prayer. God is our Inner Controller; He will certainly listen to our prayer if it is sincere. “And ‘gold’. Sitting on the bank of the Ganges below the Panchavati, I used to say, ‘Rupee is clay and clay is rupee;’ Then I threw both into the Ganges.” BANKIM: “Indeed! Money is clay! Sir, if you have a few pennies you can help the poor. If money is clay, then a man cannot give in charity or do good to others.”

Charity -The sannyāsi’s duty

MASTER (to Bankim): “Charity! Doing good! How dare you say you can do good to others? Man struts about so much; but if one pours foul water into his mouth when he is asleep, he doesn’t even know it; his mouth overflows with it. Where are his boasting, his vanity, his pride, then?

“A sannyāsi must give up ‘woman and gold’; he cannot accept it any more. One must not swallow one’s own spittle. When a sannyāsi gives something to another, he knows that it is not himself who gives. Kindness belongs to God alone. How can a man lay claim to it? Charity depends on the will of Rāma. A true sannyāsi renounces ‘woman and gold’ both mentally and outwardly. He who eats no molasses must not even keep molasses about.

If he does, and yet tells others not to eat it, they won’t listen to him. “A householder, of course, needs money, for he has a wife and children. He should save up to feed them. They say that the bird and the sannyāsi should not provide for the future. But the mother bird brings food in her mouth for her chicks; so she too provides. A householder needs money. He has to support his family.

The householder’s duty

If a householder is a genuine devotee he performs his duties without attachment; he surrenders the fruit of his work to God-his gain or loss, his pleasure or pain-and day and night he prays for devotion and for nothing else. This is called motiveless work, the performance of duty without attachment. A sannyāsi, too, must do all his work in that spirit of detachment; but he has no worldly duties to attend to, like a householder.

If a householder gives in charity in a spirit of detachment, he is really doing good to himself and not to others. It is God alone that he serves- God, who dwells in all beings; and when he serves God, he is really doing good to himself and not to others. If a man thus serves God through all beings, not through men alone but through animals and other living beings as well; if he doesn’t seek name and fame, or heaven after death; if he doesn’t seek any return from those he serves; if he can carry on his work of service in this spirit-then he performs truly selfless work, work without attachment. Through such selfless work he does good to himself. This is called karma yoga. This too is a way to realize God. But it is very difficult, and not suited to the Kaliyuga.

“Therefore I say, he who works in such a detached spirit-who is kind and charitable-benefits only himself. Helping others, doing good to others-this is the work of God alone, who for men has created the sun and moon, father and mother, fruits, flowers, and corn.

The love that you see in parents is God’s love: He has given it to them to preserve His creation. The compassion that you see in the kind-hearted is God’s compassion: He has given it to them to protect the helpless. Whether you are charitable or not, He will have His work done somehow or other. Nothing can stop His work.

“What then is man’s duty? What else can it be? It is just to take refuge in God and to pray to Him with a yearning heart for His vision.

Difficulty of karma-yoga

“Sambhu said to me: ‘It is my desire to build a large number of hospitals and dispensaries. Thus I can do much good to the poor.’ I said to him: ‘Yes, that is not bad if you can do it in a detached spirit. But to be detached is very difficult unless you sincerely love God. And further, if you entangle yourself in many activities, you will be attached to them in a way unknown to yourself. You may think you have no motive behind your work, but perhaps there has already grown a desire for fame and the advertising of your name. Then again, if you are entangled in too many activities, the pressure of them will make you forget God.’ I also said to him: ‘Sambhu, let me ask you one thing. If God appears before you, will you want Him or a number of hospitals and dispensaries?’ If one realizes God, one doesn’t enjoy anything else. One who has tasted syrup of sugar candy cannot enjoy a drink made from common treacle.

“Those who build hospitals and dispensaries, and get pleasure from that, are no doubt good people; but they are of a different type. He who is a real devotee of God seeks nothing but God. If he finds himself entangled in too much work, he earnestly prays, ‘Lord, be gracious and reduce my work; my mind, which should think of Thee day and night, has been wasting its power; it thinks of worldly things alone.’ Pure-souled devotees are in a class by themselves. You cannot have real love of God unless you know that God alone is real and all else illusory. You cannot have real love of God unless you know that the world is impermanent, only of two days’ existence, while its Creator alone is real and eternal. “Janaka and sages like him worked in the world at the command of God.