Master's prayer

MASTER (smiling): “I see. You think as the intellectuals do: one reaps the results of one’s actions. Give up these ideas. The effect of karma wears away if one takes refuge in God. I prayed to the Divine Mother with flowers in my hand: ‘Here, Mother, take Thy sin;

here, take Thy virtue. I don’t want either of these; give me only real bhakti. Here, Mother, take Thy good; here, take Thy bad. I don’t want any of Thy good or bad; give me only real bhakti. Here, Mother, take Thy dharma; here, take Thy adharma. I don’t want any of Thy dharma or adharma; give me only real bhakti. Here, Mother, take Thy knowledge;

here, take Thy ignorance. I don’t want any of Thy knowledge or ignorance; give me only real bhakti. Here, Mother, take Thy purity; here, take Thy impurity. Give me only real bhakti.’ "

NANDA “Can God violate law?”

MASTER: “What do you mean? He is the Lord of all. He can do everything. He who has made the law can also change it.

Nature of worldly enjoyment

“But you may very well talk that way. Perhaps you want to enjoy the world, and that is why you talk that way. There is a view that a man’s inner spirit is not awakened unless he is through with enjoyment. But what is there to enjoy? The pleasures of ‘woman and gold’?

This moment they exist and the next moment they disappear. It is all momentary.

What is there in ‘woman and gold’?

It is like the hog plum-all stone and skin. If one eats it, one suffers from colic. Or like a sweetmeat. Once you swallow it, it is gone.”

Is God partial?

Nanda remained silent a few minutes. Then he said: “Oh, yes. People no doubt talk that way. But is God partial? If things happen through God’s grace, then I must say God is partial.”

MASTER: “But God Himself has become everything-the universe and its living beings.

You will realize it when you have Perfect Knowledge. God Himself has become the 24 cosmic principles: the mind, intellect, body, and so forth. Is there anyone but Himself to whom He can show partiality?”

NANDA: “Why has He assumed all these different forms? Why are some wise and some ignorant?”

MASTER: “It is His sweet will.”

ATUL: “Kedār Bābu puts it nicely. Once a man asked him, ‘Why has God created the world?’ He replied, ‘I was not present at the conference where God made the plans of His creation.’”

MASTER: “Oh! It is His sweet will”

So saying, the Master sang:

O Mother, all is done after Thine own sweet will: Thou art in truth self-willed, Redeemer of mankind! Thou workest Thine own work; men only call it theirs. Thou it is that holdest the elephant in the mire; Thou, that helpest the lame man scale the loftiest hill. On some Thou dost bestow the bliss of Brahmanhood; Yet others Thou dost hurl into this world below. Thou art the Moving Force, and I the mere machine; The house am I, and Thou the Spirit dwelling there; I am the chariot, and Thou the Charioteer: I move alone as Thou, O Mother, movest me.

Liberation for all

The Divine Mother is full of bliss. Creation, preservation, and destruction are the waves of Her sportive pleasure. Innumerable are the living beings. Only one or two among them obtain liberation. And that makes Her happy. Out of a hundred thousand kites, at best but one or two break free;

Thou dost laugh and clap Thy hands, O Mother, watching them! Some are being entangled in the world and some are being liberated from it. How many are the boats, O mind, That float on the ocean of this world! How many are those that sink!”

NANDA: “It may be Her sweet will; but it is death to us.”

MASTER: “But who are you? It is the Divine Mother who has become all this. It is only as long as you do not know Her that you say, ‘I’, ‘I’.

“All will surely realize God. All will be liberated. It may be that some get their meal in the morning, some at noon, and some in the evening: but none will go without food. All, without any exception, will certainly know their real Self.”

PASUPATI: “True, sir. It seems that it is God alone who has become everything.”

Nature of “I”

MASTER: “Try to find out what this ‘I’ is. Is this ‘I’ the bones or flesh or blood or intestines? Seeking the ‘I’, you discover ‘Thou’.

In other words, nothing exists inside you but the power of God. There is no ‘I’, but only ‘He’. (To Pasupati) You have so much wealth, but you have no egotism. It is not possible to rid oneself altogether of the ego; so, as long as it is there, let the rascal remain as the servant of God. (All laugh.)

The ego that makes a man feel he is a devotee of God or a son of God or a servant of God is good. But the ego that makes a man attached to ‘woman and gold’ is the ‘unripe ego’.

That ego is to be renounced.”

The head of the household and the others were very much pleased to hear this interpretation of the ego.

MASTER (to Pasupati): “There are two signs of knowledge: first, absence of pride, and second, a peaceful nature. You have both. Therefore you must have received the grace of God.

“Too much wealth makes one forget God. That is the very nature of wealth. Jadu Mallick has become very rich. Nowadays he doesn’t talk of God. Formerly he used to enjoy spiritual talk a great deal.

‘Woman and gold’ is a kind of wine. If a man drinks too much wine, he does not show his father and uncle the respect that is due to them. Very often he abuses them. A drunkard cannot distinguish between his superior and his inferior.”

NANDA: “That is true, sir.”

PASUPATI: “Sir, what do you think of Theosophy and Spiritualism? Are these true? What do you think of the solar plane, the lunar plane, the stellar plane?”

MASTER: “My dear sir, I don’t know about these things. Why bother about them so much? You have come to the orchard to eat mangoes. Enjoy them. What is the use of your calculating how many mango-trees there are, how many millions of branches, how many billions of leaves? I have come to the orchard to eat mangoes. Let me enjoy them.

“Once a man’s inner spirit is awakened, once he succeeds in knowing God, he doesn’t feel the desire even to know about all this rubbish. How incoherently a delirious patient talks: ‘I shall eat five seers of rice! I shall drink a whole tank of water!’ ‘Will you?’ says the physician. ‘All right! You will have them.’ Saying this, the physician goes on with his smoke. But he pays attention to what the patient says when the patient is no longer delirious.”

PASUPATI: “Will our delirium last for ever?”

MASTER: “Why should you think so? Fix your mind on God, and spiritual consciousness will be awakened in you.”

PASUPATI (smiling): “Our union with God is only momentary. It doesn’t last any longer than a pipeful of tobacco.” (All Laugh.) MASTER: “What if that is so? Union with God even for one moment surely gives a man liberation.

Ahalyā said to Rāma, ‘O Rāma, it doesn’t matter if I am born as a pig or any other being; only bless me that my mind may dwell on Thy Lotus Feet and be filled with real devotion to Thee.’

Nārada said to Rāma: ‘O Rāma, I want from Thee no other favour. Please give me real love for Thee; and please bless me, that I may not come under the spell of Thy world- bewitching māyā.’

When a man sincerely prays to God, he is able to fix his mind on God and develop real love for His Lotus Feet.

Give up all such notions as: ‘Shall we be cured of our delirium?’, ‘What will happen to us?’, ‘We are sinners!’ (To Nanda) One must have this kind of faith: ‘What? Once I have uttered the name of Rāma, can I be a sinner any more?’”

NANDA: “Is there no after-life? What about punishment for our sins?”

MASTER: “Why not enjoy your mangoes? What need have you to calculate about the after-life and what happens then, and things like that? Eat your mangoes. You need mangoes. You need devotion to God. " God, the Wish-fulfilling Tree

NANDA: “But where is the mango-tree? Where do I get mangoes?”

MASTER: “Tree? God is the eternal and infinite Brahman. He does exist; there is no doubt about it. He is eternal. But you must remember this, that He is the Kalpataru. Come, let us go for a walk, O mind, to Kāli, the Wish-fulfilling Tree, And there beneath It gather the four fruits of life. “You must go to the Kalpataru and pray. Only then will you obtain the fruits. Only then will the fruits fall from the tree. Only then will you be able to gather them. There are four fruits: dharma, artha, kama, and moksha. The jnanis seek the fruit of liberation; and the bhaktas, love of God, love without any motive behind it. They seek neither dharma nor artha nor kama.