Complete Works of Swami Vivekananda - Vol-4
THOUGHTS ON THE GITA
During his sojourn in Calcutta in 1897, Swami Vivekananda used
to stay for the most part at the Math, the headquarters of the
Ramakrisnna Mission, located then at Alambazar. During this time
several young men, who had been preparing themselves for some
time previously, gathered round him and took the vows of
Brahmacharya and Sannyâsa, and Swamiji began to train them for
future work, by holding classes on the Gitâ and Vedanta, and
initiating them into the practices of meditation. In one of
these classes he talked eloquently in Bengali on the Gita. The
following is the translation of the summary of the discourse as
it was entered in the Math diary:
The book known as the Gita forms a part of the Mahâbhârata. To
understand the Gita properly, several things are very important
to know. First, whether it formed a part of the Mahabharata,
i.e. whether the authorship attributed to Veda-Vyâsa was true,
or if it was merely interpolated within the great epic;
secondly, whether there was any historical personality of the
name of Krishna; thirdly, whether the great war of Kurukshetra
as mentioned in the Gita actually took place; and fourthly,
whether Arjuna and others were real historical persons.
Now in the first place, let us see what grounds there are for
such inquiry. We know that there were many who went by the name
of Veda-Vyasa; and among them who was the real author of the
Gita - the Bâdarâyana Vyasa or Dvaipâyana Vyasa? "Vyasa" was
only a title. Anyone who composed a new Purâna was known by the
name of Vyasa, like the word Vikramâditya, which was also a
general name. Another point is, the book, Gita, had not been
much known to the generality of people before Shankarâchârya
made it famous by writing his great commentary on it. Long
before that, there was current, according to many, the
commentary on it by Bodhâyana. If this could be proved, it would
go a long way, no doubt, to establish the antiquity of the Gita
and the authorship of Vyasa. But the Bodhayana Bhâshya on the
Vedânta Sutras - from which Râmânuja compiled his Shri-Bhâshya,
which Shankaracharya mentions and even quotes in part here and
there in his own commentary, and which was so greatly discussed
by the Swami Dayânanda - not a copy even of that Bodhayana
Bhashya could I find while travelling throughout India. It is
said that even Ramanuja compiled his Bhashya from a worm-eaten
manuscript which he happened to find. When even this great
Bodhayana Bhashya on the Vedanta-Sutras is so much enshrouded in
the darkness of uncertainty, it is simply useless to try to
establish the existence of the Bodhayana Bhashya on the Gita.
Some infer that Shankaracharya was the author of the Gita, and
that it was he who foisted it into the body of the Mahabharata.
Then as to the second point in question, much doubt exists about
the personality of Krishna. In one place in the Chhândogya
Upanishad we find mention of Krishna, the son of Devaki, who
received spiritual instructions from one Ghora, a Yogi. In the
Mahabharata, Krishna is the king of Dwârakâ; and in the Vishnu
Purâna we find a description of Krishna playing with the Gopis.
Again, in the Bhâgavata, the account of his Râsalilâ is detailed
at length. In very ancient times in our country there was in
vogue an Utsava called Madanotsava (celebration in honour of
Cupid). That very thing was transformed into Dola and thrust
upon the shoulders of Krishna. Who can be so bold as to assert
that the Rasalila and other things connected with him were not
similarly fastened upon him? In ancient times there was very
little tendency in our country to find out truths by historical
research. So any one could say what he thought best without
substantiating it with proper facts and evidence. Another thing:
in those ancient times there was very little hankering after
name and fame in men. So it often happened that one man composed
a book and made it pass current in the name of his Guru or of
someone else. In such cases it is very hazardous for the
investigator of historical facts to get at the truth. In ancient
times they had no knowledge whatever of geography; imagination
ran riot. And so we meet with such fantastic creations of the
brain as sweet-ocean, milk-ocean, clarified-butter-ocean,
curd-ocean, etc! In the Puranas, we find one living ten thousand
years, another a hundred thousand years! But the Vedas say,
शतायुर्वै पुरुषः - "Man lives a hundred years." Whom shall we
follow here? So, to reach a correct conclusion in the case of
Krishna is well-nigh impossible.
It is human nature to build round the real character of a great
man all sorts of imaginary superhuman attributes. As regards
Krishna the same must have happened, but it seems quite probable
that he was a king. Quite probable I say, because in ancient
times in our country it was chiefly the kings who exerted
themselves most in the preaching of Brahma-Jnâna. Another point
to be especially noted here is that whoever might have been the
author of the Gita, we find its teachings the same as those in
the whole of the Mahabharata. From this we can safely infer that
in the age of the Mahabharata some great man arose and preached
the Brahma-Jnâna in this new garb to the then existing society.
Another fact comes to the fore that in the olden days, as one
sect after another arose, there also came into existence and use
among them one new scripture or another. It happened, too, that
in the lapse of time both the sect and its scripture died out,
or the sect ceased to exist but its scripture remained.
Similarly, it was quite probable that the Gita was the scripture
of such a sect which had embodied its high and noble ideas in
this sacred book.
Now to the third point, bearing on the subject of the
Kurukshetra War, no special evidence in support of it can be
adduced. But there is no doubt that there was a war fought
between the Kurus and the Panchâlas. Another thing: how could
there be so much discussion about Jnâna, Bhakti, and Yoga on the
battle-field, where the huge army stood in battle array ready to
fight, just waiting for the last signal? And was any shorthand
writer present there to note down every word spoken between
Krishna and Arjuna, in the din and turmoil of the battle-field?
According to some, this Kurukshetra War is only an allegory.
When we sum up its esoteric significance, it means the war which
is constantly going on within man between the tendencies of good
and evil. This meaning, too, may not be irrational.
About the fourth point, there is enough ground of doubt as
regards the historicity of Arjuna and others, and it is this:
Shatapatha Brâhmana is a very ancient book. In it are mentioned
somewhere all the names of those who were the performers of the
Ashvamedha Yajna: but in those places there is not only no
mention, but no hint even of the names of Arjuna and others,
though it speaks of Janamejaya, the son of Parikshit who was a
grandson of Arjuna. Yet in the Mahabharata and other books it is
stated that Yudhishthira, Arjuna, and others celebrated the
Ashvamedha sacrifice.
One thing should be especially remembered here, that there is no
connection between these historical researches and our real aim,
which is the knowledge that leads to the acquirement of Dharma.
Even if the historicity of the whole thing is proved to be
absolutely false today, it will not in the least be any loss to
us. Then what is the use of so much historical research, you may
ask. It has its use, because we have to get at the truth; it
will not do for us to remain bound by wrong ideas born of
ignorance. In this country people think very little of the
importance of such inquiries. Many of the sects believe that in
order to preach a good thing which may be beneficial to many,
there is no harm in telling an untruth, if that helps such
preaching, or in other words, the end justifies the means. Hence
we find many of our Tantras beginning with, "Mahâdeva said to
Pârvati". But our duty should be to convince ourselves of the
truth, to believe in truth only. Such is the power of
superstition, or faith in old traditions without inquiry into
its truth, that it keeps men bound hand and foot, so much so,
that even Jesus the Christ, Mohammed, and other great men
believed in many such superstitions and could not shake them
off. You have to keep your eye always fixed on truth only and
shun all superstitions completely.
Now it is for us to see what there is in the Gita. If we study
the Upanishads we notice, in wandering through the mazes of many
irrelevant subjects, the sudden introduction of the discussion
of a great truth, just as in the midst of a huge wilderness a
traveller unexpectedly comes across here and there an
exquisitely beautiful rose, with its leaves, thorns, roots, all
entangled. Compared with that, the Gita is like these truths
beautifully arranged together in their proper places - like a
fine garland or a bouquet of the choicest flowers. The
Upanishads deal elaborately with Shraddhâ in many places, but
hardly mention Bhakti. In the Gita, on the other hand, the
subject of Bhakti is not only again and again dealt with, but in
it, the innate spirit of Bhakti has attained its culmination.
Now let us see some of the main points discussed in the Gita.
Wherein lies the originality of the Gita which distinguishes it
from all preceding scriptures? It is this: Though before its
advent, Yoga, Jnana, Bhakti, etc. had each its strong adherents,
they all quarrelled among themselves, each claiming superiority
for his own chosen path; no one ever tried to seek for
reconciliation among these different paths. It was the author of
the Gita who for the first time tried to harmonise these. He
took the best from what all the sects then existing had to offer
and threaded them in the Gita. But even where Krishna failed to
show a complete reconciliation (Samanvaya) among these warring
sects, it was fully accomplished by Ramakrishna Paramahamsa in
this nineteenth century.
The next is, Nishkâma Karma, or work without desire or
attachment. People nowadays understand what is meant by this in
various ways. Some say what is implied by being unattached is to
become purposeless. If that were its real meaning, then
heartless brutes and the walls would be the best exponents of
the performance of Nishkama Karma. Many others, again, give the
example of Janaka, and wish themselves to be equally recognised
as past masters in the practice of Nishkama Karma! Janaka (lit.
father) did not acquire that distinction by bringing forth
children, but these people all want to be Janakas, with the sole
qualification of being the fathers of a brood of children! No!
The true Nishkama Karmi (performer of work without desire) is
neither to be like a brute, nor to be inert, nor heartless. He
is not Tâmasika but of pure Sattva. His heart is so full of love
and sympathy that he can embrace the whole world with his love.
The world at large cannot generally comprehend his all-embracing
love and sympathy.
The reconciliation of the different paths of Dharma, and work
without desire or attachment - these are the two special
characteristics of the Gita.
Let us now read a little from the second chapter.
सञ्जय उवाच॥
तं तथा कृपयाविष्टमश्रुपूर्णाकुलेक्षणम् ।
विषीदन्तमिदं वाक्यमुवाच मधुसूदनः ॥१॥
श्रीभगवानुवाच ॥
कुतस्त्वा कश्मलमिदं विषमे समुपस्थितम् ।
अनार्यजुष्टमस्वर्ग्यमकीर्तिकरमर्जुन ॥२॥
क्लैब्यं मा स्म गमः पार्थ नैतत्त्वय्युपपद्यते ।
क्षुद्रं हृदयदौर्बल्यं त्यक्त्वोत्तिष्ठ परंतप ॥३॥
"Sanjaya said:
To him who was thus overwhelmed with pity and sorrowing, and
whose eyes were dimmed with tears, Madhusudana spoke these
words.
The Blessed Lord said:
In such a strait, whence comes upon thee, O Arjuna, this
dejection, un-Aryan-like, disgraceful, and contrary to the
attainment of heaven?
Yield not to unmanliness, O son of Prithâ! Ill doth it become
thee. Cast off this mean faint-heartedness and arise, O scorcher
of thine enemies!"
In the Shlokas beginning with तं तथा कृपयाविष्टं, how
poetically, how beautifully, has Arjuna's real position been
painted! Then Shri Krishna advises Arjuna; and in the words
क्लैब्यं मा स्म गमः पार्थ etc., why is he goading Arjuna to
fight? Because it was not that the disinclination of Arjuna to
fight arose out of the overwhelming predominance of pure Sattva
Guna; it was all Tamas that brought on this unwillingness. The
nature of a man of Sattva Guna is, that he is equally calm in
all situations in life - whether it be prosperity or adversity.
But Arjuna was afraid, he was overwhelmed with pity. That he had
the instinct and the inclination to fight is proved by the
simple fact that he came to the battle-field with no other
purpose than that. Frequently in our lives also such things are
seen to happen. Many people think they are Sâttvika by nature,
but they are really nothing but Tâmasika. Many living in an
uncleanly way regard themselves as Paramahamsas! Why? Because
the Shâstras say that Paramahamsas live like one inert, or mad,
or like an unclean spirit. Paramahamsas are compared to
children, but here it should be understood that the comparison
is one-sided. The Paramahamsa and the child are not one and
non-different. They only appear similar, being the two extreme
poles, as it were. One has reached to a state beyond Jnana, and
the other has not got even an inkling of Jnana. The quickest and
the gentlest vibrations of light are both beyond the reach of
our ordinary vision; but in the one it is intense heat, and in
the other it may be said to be almost without any heat. So it is
with the opposite qualities of Sattva and Tamas. They seem in
some respects to be the same, no doubt, but there is a world of
difference between them. The Tamoguna loves very much to array
itself in the garb of the Sattva. Here, in Arjuna, the mighty
warrior, it has come under the guise of Dayâ (pity).
In order to remove this delusion which had overtaken Arjuna,
what did the Bhagavân say? As I always preach that you should
not decry a man by calling him a sinner, but that you should
draw his attention to the omnipotent power that is in him, in
the same way does the Bhagavan speak to Arjuna.
नैतत्त्वय्युपपद्यते - "It doth not befit thee!" "Thou art Atman
imperishable, beyond all evil. Having forgotten thy real nature,
thou hast, by thinking thyself a sinner, as one afflicted with
bodily evils and mental grief, thou hast made thyself so - this
doth not befit thee!" - so says the Bhagavan: क्लैब्यं मा स्म
गमः पार्थ - Yield not to unmanliness, O son of Pritha. There is
in the world neither sin nor misery, neither disease nor grief;
if there is anything in the world which can be called sin, it is
this - 'fear'; know that any work which brings out the latent
power in thee is Punya (virtue); and that which makes thy body
and mind weak is, verily, sin. Shake off this weakness, this
faintheartedness! क्लैब्यं मा स्म गमः पार्थ। - Thou art a hero,
a Vira; this is unbecoming of thee."
If you, my sons, can proclaim this message to the world क्लैब्यं
मा स्म गमः पार्थ नैतत्त्वय्युपपद्यते - then all this disease,
grief, sin, and sorrow will vanish from off the face of the
earth in three days. All these ideas of weakness will be
nowhere. Now it is everywhere - this current of the vibration of
fear. Reverse the current: bring in the opposite vibration, and
behold the magic transformation! Thou art omnipotent - go, go to
the mouth of the cannon, fear not.
Hate not the most abject sinner, fool; not to his exterior. Turn
thy gaze inward, where resides the Paramâtman. Proclaim to the
whole world with trumpet voice, "There is no sin in thee, there
is no misery in thee; thou art the reservoir of omnipotent
power. Arise, awake, and manifest the Divinity within!"
If one reads this one Shloka - क्लैब्यं मा स्म गमः पार्थ
नैतत्त्वय्युपपद्यते । क्षुद्रं हृदयदौर्बल्यं त्यक्त्वोत्तिष्ठ
परंतप॥ - one gets all the merits of reading the entire Gita; for
in this one Shloka lies imbedded the whole Message of the Gita.
THE STORY OF JADA BHARATA
(Delivered in California)
There was a great monarch named Bharata. The land which is
called India by foreigners is known to her children as Bhârata
Varsha. Now, it is enjoined on every Hindu when he becomes old,
to give up all worldly pursuits - to leave the cares of the
world, its wealth, happiness, and enjoyments to his son - and
retire into the forest, there to meditate upon the Self which is
the only reality in him, and thus break the bonds which bind him
to life. King or priest, peasant or servant, man or woman, none
is exempt from this duty: for all the duties of the householder
- of the son, the brother, the husband, the father, the wife,
the daughter, the mother, the sister - are but preparations
towards that one stage, when all the bonds which bind the soul
to matter are severed asunder forever.
The great king Bharata in his old age gave over his throne to
his son, and retired into the forest. He who had been ruler over
millions and millions of subjects, who had lived in marble
palaces, inlaid with gold and silver, who had drunk out of
jewelled cups - this king built a little cottage with his own
hands, made of reeds and grass, on the banks of a river in the
Himalayan forests. There he lived on roots and wild herbs,
collected by his own hands, and constantly meditated upon Him
who is always present in the soul of man. Days, months, and
years passed. One day, a deer came to drink water nearby where
the royal sage was meditating. At the same moment, a lion roared
at a little distance off. The deer was so terrified that she,
without satisfying her thirst, made a big jump to cross the
river. The deer was with young, and this extreme exertion and
sudden fright made her give birth to a little fawn, and
immediately after she fell dead. The fawn fell into the water
and was being carried rapidly away by the foaming stream, when
it caught the eyes of the king. The king rose from his position
of meditation and rescuing the fawn from the water, took it to
his cottage, made a fire, and with care and attention fondled
the little thing back to life. Then the kindly sage took the
fawn under his protection, bringing it up on soft grass and
fruits. The fawn thrived under the paternal care of the retired
monarch, and grew into a beautiful deer. Then, he whose mind had
been strong enough to break away from lifelong attachment to
power, position, and family, became attached to the deer which
he had saved from the stream. And as he became fonder and fonder
of the deer, the less and less he could concentrate his mind
upon the Lord. When the deer went out to graze in the forest, if
it were late in returning, the mind of the royal sage would
become anxious and worried. He would think, "Perhaps my little
one has been attacked by some tiger - or perhaps some other
danger has befallen it; otherwise, why is it late?"
Some years passed in this way, but one day death came, and the
royal sage laid himself down to die. But his mind, instead of
being intent upon the Self, was thinking about the deer; and
with his eyes fixed upon the sad looks of his beloved deer, his
soul left the body. As the result of this, in the next birth he
was born as a deer. But no Karma is lost, and all the great and
good deeds done by him as a king and sage bore their fruit. This
deer was a born Jâtismara, and remembered his past birth, though
he was bereft of speech and was living in an animal body. He
always left his companions and was instinctively drawn to graze
near hermitages where oblations were offered and the Upanishads
were preached.
After the usual years of a deer's life had been spent, it died
and was next born as the youngest son of a rich Brahmin. And in
that life also, he remembered all his past, and even in his
childhood was determined no more to get entangled in the good
and evil of life. The child, as it grew up, was strong and
healthy, but would not speak a word, and lived as one inert and
insane, for fear of getting mixed up with worldly affairs. His
thoughts were always on the Infinite, and he lived only to wear
out his past Prârabdha Karma. In course of time the father died,
and the sons divided the property among themselves; and thinking
that the youngest was a dumb, good-for-nothing man, they seized
his share. Their charity, however, extended only so far as to
give him enough food to live upon. The wives of the brothers
were often very harsh to him, putting him to do all the hard
work; and if he was unable to do everything they wanted, they
would treat him very unkindly. But he showed neither vexation
nor fear, and neither did he speak a word. When they persecuted
him very much, he would stroll out of the house and sit under a
tree, by the hour, until their wrath was appeased, and then he
would quietly go home again.
One day; when the wives of the brothers had treated him with
more than usual unkindness, Bharata went out of the house,
seated himself under the shadow of a tree and rested. Now it
happened that the king of the country was passing by, carried in
a palanquin on the shoulders of bearers. One of the bearers had
unexpectedly fallen ill, and so his attendants were looking
about for a man to replace him. They came upon Bharata seated
under a tree; and seeing he was a strong young man, they asked
him if he would take the place of the sick man in bearing the
king's palanquin. But Bharata did not reply. Seeing that he was
so able-bodied, the king's servants caught hold of him and
placed the pole on his shoulders. Without speaking a word,
Bharata went on. Very soon after this, the king remarked that
the palanquin was not being evenly carried, and looking out of
the palanquin addressed the new bearer, saying "Fool, rest a
while; if thy shoulders pain thee, rest a while." Then Bharata
laying the pole of the palanquin down, opened his lips for the
first time in his life, and spoke, "Whom dost thou, O King, call
a fool? Whom dost thou ask to lay down the palanquin? Who dost
thou say is weary? Whom dost thou address as 'thou'? If thou
meanest, O King, by the word 'thee' this mass of flesh, it is
composed of the same matter as thine; it is unconscious, and it
knoweth no weariness, it knoweth no pain. If it is the mind, the
mind is the same as thine; it is universal. But if the word
'thee' is applied to something beyond that, then it is the Self,
the Reality in me, which is the same as in thee, and it is the
One in the universe. Dost thou mean, O King, that the Self can
ever be weary, that It can ever be tired, that It can ever be
hurt? I did not want, O King - this body did not want - to
trample upon the poor worms crawling on the road, and therefore,
in trying to avoid them, the palanquin moved unevenly. But the
Self was never tired; It was never weak; It never bore the pole
of the palanquin: for It is omnipotent and omnipresent." And so
he dwelt eloquently on the nature of the soul, and on the
highest knowledge, etc. The king, who was proud of his learning,
knowledge, and philosophy, alighted from the palanquin, and fell
at the feet of Bharata, saying, "I ask thy pardon, O mighty one,
I did not know that thou wast a sage, when I asked thee to carry
me." Bharata blessed him and departed. He then resumed the even
tenor of his previous life. When Bharata left the body, he was
freed forever from the bondage of birth.
THE STORY OF PRAHLADA
(Delivered in California)
Hiranyakashipu was the king of the Daityas. The Daityas, though
born of the same parentage as the Devas or gods, were always, at
war with the latter. The Daityas had no part in the oblations
and offerings of mankind, or in the government of the world and
its guidance. But sometimes they waxed strong and drove all the
Devas from the heaven, and seized the throne of the gods and
ruled for a time. Then the Devas prayed to Vishnu, the
Omnipresent Lord of the universe, and He helped them out of
their difficulty. The Daityas were driven out, and once more the
gods reigned. Hiranyakashipu, king of the Daityas, in his turn,
succeeded in conquering his cousins, the Devas, and seated
himself on the throne of the heavens and ruled the three worlds
- the middle world, inhabited by men and animals; the heavens,
inhabited by gods and godlike beings; and the nether world,
inhabited by the Daityas. Now, Hiranyakashipu declared himself
to be the God of the whole universe and proclaimed that there
was no other God but himself, and strictly enjoined that the
Omnipotent Vishnu should have no worship offered to Him
anywhere; and that all the worship should henceforth be given to
himself only.
Hiranyakashipu had a son called Prahlâda. Now, it so happened,
that this Prahlada from his infancy was devoted to God. He
showed indications of this as a child; and the king of the
Daityas, fearing that the evil he wanted to drive away from the
world would crop up in his own family, made over his son to two
teachers called Shanda and Amarka, who were very stern
disciplinarians, with strict injunctions that Prahlada was never
to hear even the name of Vishnu mentioned. The teachers took the
prince to their home, and there he was put to study with the
other children of his age. But the little Prahlada, instead of
learning from his books, devoted all the time in teaching the
other boys how to worship Vishnu. When the teachers found it
out, they were frightened, for the fear of the mighty king
Hiranyakashipu was upon them, and they tried their best to
dissuade the child from such teachings. But Prahlada could no
more stop his teaching and worshipping Vishnu than he could stop
breathing. To clear themselves, the teachers told the terrible
fact to the king, that his son was not only worshipping Vishnu
himself, but also spoiling all the other children by teaching
them to worship Vishnu.
The monarch became very much enraged when he heard this and
called the boy to his presence. He tried by gentle persuasions
to dissuade Prahlada from the worship of Vishnu and taught him
that he, the king, was the only God to worship. But it was to no
purpose. The child declared, again and again, that the
Omnipresent Vishnu, Lord of the universe, was the only Being to
be worshipped - for even he, the king, held his throne only so
long as it pleased Vishnu. The rage of the king knew no bounds,
and he ordered the boy to be immediately killed. So the Daityas
struck him with pointed weapons; but Prahlad's mind was so
intent upon Vishnu that he felt no pain from them.
When his father, the king, saw that it was so, he became
frightened but, roused to the worst passions of a Daitya,
contrived various diabolical means to kill the boy. He ordered
him to be trampled under foot by an elephant. The enraged
elephant could not crush the body any more than he could have
crushed a block of iron. So this measure also was to no purpose.
Then the king ordered the boy to be thrown over a precipice, and
this order too was duly carried out; but, as Vishnu resided in
the heart of Prahlada, he came down upon the earth as gently as
a flower drops upon the grass. Poison, fire, starvation,
throwing into a well, enchantments, and other measures were then
tried on the child one after another, but to no purpose. Nothing
could hurt him in whose heart dwelt Vishnu.
At last, the king ordered the boy to be tied with mighty
serpents called up from the nether worlds, and then cast to the
bottom of the ocean, where huge mountains were to be piled high
upon him, so that in course of time, if not immediately, he
might die; and he ordered him to be left in this plight. Even
though treated in this manner, the boy continued to pray to his
beloved Vishnu: "Salutation to Thee, Lord of the universe. Thou
beautiful Vishnu!" Thus thinking and meditating on Vishnu, he
began to feel that Vishnu was near him, nay, that He was in his
own soul, until he began to feel that he was Vishnu, and that he
was everything and everywhere.
As soon as he realised this, all the snake bonds snapped
asunder; the mountains were pulverised, the ocean upheaved, and
he was gently lifted up above the waves, and safely carried to
the shore. As Prahlada stood there, he forgot that he was a
Daitya and had a mortal body: he felt he was the universe and
all the powers of the universe emanated from him; there was
nothing in nature that could injure him; he himself was the
ruler of nature. Time passed thus, in one unbroken ecstasy of
bliss, until gradually Prahlada began to remember that he had a
body and that he was Prahlada. As soon as he became once more
conscious of the body, he saw that God was within and without;
and everything appeared to him as Vishnu.
When the king Hiranyakashipu found to his horror that all mortal
means of getting rid of the boy who was perfectly devoted to his
enemy, the God Vishnu, were powerless, he was at a loss to know
what to do. The king had the boy again brought before him, and
tried to persuade him once more to listen to his advice, through
gentle means. But Prahlada made the same reply. Thinking,
however, that these childish whims of the boy would be rectified
with age and further training, he put him again under the charge
of the teachers, Shanda and Amarka, asking them to teach him the
duties of the king. But those teachings did not appeal to
Prahlada, and he spent his time in instructing his schoolmates
in the path of devotion to the Lord Vishnu.
When his father came to hear about it, he again became furious
with rage, and calling the boy to him, threatened to kill him,
and abused Vishnu in the worst language. But Prahlada still
insisted that Vishnu was the Lord of the universe, the
Beginningless, the Endless, the Omnipotent and the Omnipresent,
and as such, he alone was to be worshipped. The king roared with
anger and said: "Thou evil one, if thy Vishnu is God
omnipresent, why doth he not reside in that pillar yonder?"
Prahlada humbly submitted that He did do so. "If so," cried the
king, "let him defend thee; I will kill thee with this sword."
Thus saying the king rushed at him with sword in hand, and dealt
a terrible blow at the pillar. Instantly thundering voice was
heard, and lo and behold, there issued forth from the pillar
Vishnu in His awful Nrisimha form - half-lion, half-man!
Panic-stricken, the Daityas ran away in all directions; but
Hiranyakashipu fought with him long and desperately, till he was
finally overpowered and killed.
Then the gods descended from heaven and offered hymns to Vishnu,
and Prahlada also fell at His feet and broke forth into
exquisite hymns of praise and devotion. And he heard the Voice
of God saying, "Ask, Prahlada ask for anything thou desires";
thou art My favourite child; therefore ask for anything thou
mayest wish." And Prahlada choked with feelings replied, "Lord,
I have seen Thee. What else can I want? Do thou not tempt me
with earthly or heavenly boons." Again the Voice said: "Yet ask
something, my son." And then Prahlada replied, "That intense
love, O Lord, which the ignorant bear to worldly things, may I
have the same love for Thee; may I have the same intensity of
love for Thee, but only for love's sake!"
Then the Lord said, "Prahlada, though My intense devotees never
desire for anything, here or hereafter, yet by My command, do
thou enjoy the blessings of this world to the end of the present
cycle, and perform works of religious merit, with thy heart
fixed on Me. And thus in time, after the dissolution of thy
body, thou shalt attain Me." Thus blessing Prahlada, the Lord
Vishnu disappeared. Then the gods headed by Brahma installed
Prahlada on the throne of the Daityas and returned to their
respective spheres.
THE GREAT TEACHERS OF THE WORLD
(Delivered at the Shakespeare Club, Pasadena, California,
February 3, 1900)
The universe, according to the theory of the Hindus, is moving
in cycles of wave forms. It rises, reaches its zenith, then
falls and remains in the hollow, as it were, for some time, once
more to rise, and so on, in wave after wave and fall after fall.
What is true of the universe is true of every part of it. The
march of human affairs is like that. The history of nations is
like that: they rise and they fall; after the rise comes a fall,
again out of the fall comes a rise, with greater power. This
motion is always going on. In the religious world the same
movement exists. In every nation's spiritual life, there is a
fall as well as a rise. The nation goes down, and everything
seems to go to pieces. Then, again, it gains strength, rises; a
huge wave comes, sometimes a tidal wave - and always on the
topmost crest of the wave is a shining soul, the Messenger.
Creator and created by turns, he is the impetus that makes the
wave rise, the nation rise: at the same time, he is created by
the same forces which make the wave, acting and interacting by
turns. He puts forth his tremendous power upon society; and
society makes him what he is. These are the great
world-thinkers. These are the Prophets of the world, the
Messengers of life, the Incarnations of God.
Man has an idea that there can be only one religion, that there
can be only one Prophet, and that there can be only one
Incarnation; but that idea is not true. By studying the lives of
all these great Messengers, we find that each, as it were, was
destined to play a part, and a part only; that the harmony
consists in the sum total and not in one note. As in the life of
races - no race is born to alone enjoy the world. None dare say
no. Each race has a part to play in this divine harmony of
nations. Each race has its mission to perform, its duty to
fulfil. The sum total is the great harmony.
So, not any one of these Prophets is born to rule the world
forever. None has yet succeeded and none is going to be the
ruler forever. Each only contributes a part; and, as to that
part, it is true that in the long run every Prophet will govern
the world and its destinies.
Most of us are born believers in a personal religion. We talk of
principles, we think of theories, and that is all right; but
every thought and every movement, every one of our actions,
shows that we can only understand the principle when it comes to
us through a person. We can grasp an idea only when it comes to
us through a materialised ideal person. We can understand the
precept only through the example. Would to God that all of us
were so developed that we would not require any example, would
not require any person. But that we are not; and, naturally, the
vast majority of mankind have put their souls at the feet of
these extraordinary personalities, the Prophets, the
Incarnations of God - Incarnations worshipped by the Christians,
by the Buddhists, and by the Hindus. The Mohammedans from the
beginning stood against any such worship. They would have
nothing to do with worshipping the Prophets or the Messengers,
or paying any homage to them; but, practically, instead of one
Prophet, thousands upon thousands of saints are being
worshipped. We cannot go against facts! We are bound to worship
personalities, and it is good. Remember that word from your
great Prophet to the query: "Lord, show us the Father", "He that
hath seen me hath seen the Father." Which of us can imagine
anything except that He is a man? We can only see Him in and
through humanity. The vibration of light is everywhere in this
room: why cannot lie see it everywhere? You have to see it only
in that lamp. God is an Omnipresent Principle - everywhere: but
we are so constituted at present that we can see Him, feel Him,
only in and through a human God. And when these great Lights
come, then man realises God. And they come in a different way
from what we come. We come as beggars; they come as Emperors. We
come here like orphans, as people who have lost their way and do
not know it. What are we to do? We do not know what is the
meaning of our lives. We cannot realise it. Today we are doing
one thing, tomorrow another. We are like little bits of straw
rocking to and fro in water, like feathers blown about in a
hurricane.
But, in the history of mankind, you will find that there come
these Messengers, and that from their very birth their mission
is found and formed. The whole plan is there, laid down; and you
see them swerving not one inch from that. Because they come with
a mission, they come with a message, they do not want to reason.
Did you ever hear or read of these great Teachers, or Prophets,
reasoning out what they taught? No, not one of them did so. They
speak direct. Why should they reason? They see the Truth. And
not only do they see it but they show it! If you ask me, "Is
there any God?" and I say "Yes", you immediately ask my grounds
for saying so, and poor me has to exercise all his powers to
provide you with some reason. If you had come to Christ and
said, "Is there any God?" he would have said, "Yes"; and if you
had asked, "Is there any proof?" he would have replied, "Behold
the Lord!" And thus, you see, it is a direct perception, and not
at all the ratiocination of reason. There is no groping in the
dark, but there is the strength of direct vision. I see this
table; no amount of reason can take that faith from me. It is a
direct perception. Such is their faith - faith in their ideals,
faith in their mission, faith in themselves, above all else. The
great shining Ones believe in themselves as nobody else ever
does. The people say, "Do you believe in God? Do you believe in
a future life? Do you believe in this doctrine or that dogma?"
But here the base is wanting: this belief in oneself. Ay, the
man who cannot believe in himself, how can they expect him to
believe in anything else? I am not sure of my own existence. One
moment I think that I am existing and nothing can destroy me;
the next moment I am quaking in fear of death. One minute I
think I am immortal; the next minute, a spook appears, and then
I don't know what I am, nor where I am. I don't know whether I
am living or dead. One moment I think that I am spiritual, that
I am moral; and the next moment, a blow comes, and I am thrown
flat on my back. And why? - I have lost faith in myself, my
moral backbone is broken.
But in these great Teachers you will always find this sign: that
they have intense faith in themselves. Such intense faith is
unique, and we cannot understand it. That is why we try to
explain away in various ways what these Teachers speak of
themselves; and people invent twenty thousand theories to
explain what they say about their realisation. We do not think
of ourselves in the same way, and, naturally, we cannot
understand them.
Then again, when they speak, the world is bound to listen. When
they speak, each word is direct; it bursts like a bomb-shell.
What is in the word, unless it has the Power behind? What
matters it what language you speak, and how you arrange your
language? What matters it whether you speak correct grammar or
with fine rhetoric? What matters it whether your language is
ornamental or not? The question is whether or not you have
anything to give. It is a question of giving and taking, and not
listening. Have you anything to give? - that is the first
question. If you have, then give. Words but convey the gift: it
is but one of the many modes. Sometimes we do not speak at all.
There is an old Sanskrit verse which says, "I saw the Teacher
sitting under a tree. He was a young man of sixteen, and the
disciple was an old man of eighty. The preaching of the Teacher
was silence, and the doubts of the disciple departed."
Sometimes they do not speak at all, but vet they convey the
Truth from mind to mind. They come to give. They command, they
are the Messengers; you have to receive the Command. Do you not
remember in your own scriptures the authority with which Jesus
speaks? "Go ye, therefore, and teach all nations . . . teaching
them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you." It
runs through all his utterances, that tremendous faith in his
own message. That you find in the life of all these great giants
whom the world worships as its Prophets.
These great Teachers are the living Gods on this earth. Whom
else should we worship? I try to get an idea of God in my mind,
and I find what a false little thing I conceive; it would be a
sin to worship that God. I open my eyes and look at the actual
life of these great ones of the earth. They are higher than any
conception of God that I could ever form. For, what conception
of mercy could a man like me form who would go after a man if he
steals anything from me and send him to jail? And what can be my
highest idea of forgiveness? Nothing beyond myself. Which of you
can jump out of your own bodies? Which of you can jump out of
your own minds? Not one of you. What idea of divine love can you
form except what you actually live? What we have never
experienced we can form no idea of. So, all my best attempts at
forming an idea of God would fail in every case. And here are
plain facts, and not idealism - actual facts of love, of mercy,
of purity, of which I can have no conception even. What wonder
that I should fall at the feet of these men and worship them as
God? And what else can anyone do? I should like to see the man
who can do anything else, however much he may talk. Talking is
not actuality. Talking about God and the Impersonal, and this
and that is all very good; but these man-Gods are the real Gods
of all nations and all races. These divine men have been
worshipped and will be worshipped so long as man is man. Therein
is our faith, therein is our hope, of a reality. Of what avail
is a mere mystical principle!
The purpose and intent of what I have to say to you is this,
that I have found it possible in my life to worship all of them,
and to be ready for all that are yet to come. A mother
recognises her son in any dress in which he may appear before
her; and if one does not do so, I am sure she is not the mother
of that man. Now, as regards those of you that think that you
understand Truth and Divinity and God in only one Prophet in the
world, and not in any other, naturally, the conclusion which I
draw is that you do not understand Divinity in anybody; you have
simply swallowed words and identified yourself with one sect,
just as you would in party politics, as a matter of opinion; but
that is no religion at all. There are some fools in this world
who use brackish water although there is excellent sweet water
nearby, because, they say, the brackish-water well was dug by
their father. Now, in my little experience I have collected this
knowledge - that for all the devilry that religion is, blamed
with, religion is not at all in fault: no religion ever
persecuted men, no religion ever burnt witches, no religion ever
did any of these things. What then incited people to do these
things? Politics, but never religion; and if such politics takes
the name of religion whose fault is that?
So, when each man stands and says "My Prophet is the only true
Prophet," he is not correct - he knows not the alpha of
religion. Religion is neither talk, nor theory, nor intellectual
consent. It is realisation in the heart of our hearts; it is
touching God; it is feeling, realising that I am a spirit in
relation with the Universal Spirit and all Its great
manifestations. If you have really entered the house of the
Father, how can you have seen His children and not known them?
And if you do not recognise them, you have not entered the house
of the Father. The mother recognises her child in any dress and
knows him however disguised. Recognise all the great, spiritual
men and women in every age and country, and see that they are
not really at variance with one another. Wherever there has been
actual religion - this touch of the Divine, the soul coming in
direct sense-contact with the Divine - there has always been a
broadening of the mind which enables it to see the light
everywhere. Now, some Mohammedans are the crudest in this
respect, and the most sectarian. Their watchword is: "There is
one God, and Mohammed is His Prophet." Everything beyond that
not only is bad, but must be destroyed forthwith; at a moment's
notice, every man or woman who does not exactly believe in that
must be killed; everything that does not belong to this worship
must be immediately broken; every book that teaches anything
else must be burnt. From the Pacific to the Atlantic, for five
hundred years blood ran all over the world. That is
Mohammedanism! Nevertheless, among these Mohammedans, wherever
there has a philosophic man, he was sure to protest against
these cruelties. In that he showed the touch of the Divine and
realised a fragment of the truth; he was not playing with his
religion; for it was not his father's religion he was talking,
but spoke the truth direct like a man.
Side by side with tie modern theory of evolution, there is
another thing: atavism. There is a tendency in us to revert to
old ideas in religion. Let us think something new, even if it be
wrong. It is better to do that. Why should you not try to hit
the mark? We become wiser through failures. Time is infinite.
Look at the wall. Did the wall ever tell a lie? It is always the
wall. Man tells a lie - and becomes a god too. It is better to
do something; never mind even if it proves to be wrong it is
better than doing nothing. The cow never tells a lie, but she
remains a cow, all the time. Do something! Think some thought;
it doesn't matter whether you are right or wrong. But think
something! Because my forefathers did not think this way, shall
I sit down quietly and gradually lose my sense of feeling and my
own thinking faculties? I may as well be dead! And what is life
worth if we have no living ideas, no convictions of our own
about religion? There is some hope for the atheists, because
though they differ from others, they think for themselves. The
people who never think anything for themselves are not yet born
into the world of religion; they have a mere jelly-fish
existence. They will not think; they do not care for religion.
But the disbeliever, the atheist, cares, and he is struggling.
So think something! Struggle Godward! Never mind if you fail,
never mind if you get hold of a queer theory. If you are afraid
to be called queer, keep it in your own mind - you need not go
and preach it to others. But do something! Struggle Godward!
Light must come. If a man feeds me every day of my life, in the
long run I shall lose the use of my hands. Spiritual death is
the result of following each other like a flock of sheep. Death
is the result of inaction. Be active; and wherever there is
activity, there must be difference. Difference is the sauce of
life; it is the beauty, it is the art of everything. Difference
makes all beautiful here. It is variety that is the source of
life, the sign of life. Why should we be afraid of it?
Now, we are coming into a position to understand about the
Prophets. Now, we see that the historical evidence is - apart
from the jelly-fish existence in religion - that where there has
been any real thinking, any real love for God, the soul has
grown Godwards and has got as it were, a glimpse now and then,
has come into direct perception, even for a second, even once in
its life. Immediately, "All doubts vanish forever, and all the
crookedness of the heart is made straight, and all bondages
vanish, and the results of action and Karma fly when He is seen
who is the nearest of the near and the farthest of the far."
That is religion, that is all of religion; the rest is mere
theory, dogma, so many ways of going to that state of direct
perception. Now we are fighting over the basket and the fruits
have fallen into the ditch.
If two men quarrel about religion, just ask them the question:
"Have you seen God? Have you seen these things?" One man says
that Christ is the only Prophet: well, has he seen Christ? "Has
your father seen Him?" "No, Sir." "Has your grandfather seen
Him?" "No, Sir." "Have you seen Him?" "No, Sir." "Then what are
you quarrelling for? The fruits have fallen into the ditch, and
you are quarrelling over the basket!" Sensible men and women
should be ashamed to go on quarrelling in that way!
These great Messengers and Prophets are great and true. Why?
Because, each one has come to preach a great idea. Take the
Prophets of India, for instance. They are the oldest of the
founders of religion. We takes first, Krishna. You who have read
the Gitâ see all through the book that the one idea is
non-attachment. Remain unattached. The heart's love is due to
only One. To whom? To Him who never changeth. Who is that One?
It is God. Do not make the mistake of giving the heart to
anything that is changing, because that is misery. You may give
it to a man; but if he dies, misery is the result. You may give
it to a friend, but he may tomorrow become your enemy. If you
give it to your husband, he may one day quarrel with you. You
may give it to your wife, and she may die the day after
tomorrow. Now, this is the way the world is going on. So says
Krishna in the Gita: The Lord is the only One who never changes.
His love never fails. Wherever we are and whatever we do, He is
ever and ever the same merciful, the same loving heart. He never
changes, He is never angry, whatever we do. How can God be angry
with us? Your babe does many mischievous things: are you angry
with that babe? Does not God know what we are going to be? He
knows we are all going to be perfect, sooner or later. He has
patience, infinite patience. We must love Him, and everyone that
lives - only in and through Him. This is the keynote. You must
love the wife, but not for the wife's sake. "Never, O Beloved,
is the husband loved on account of the husband, but because the
Lord is in the husband." The Vedanta philosophy says that even
in the love of the husband and wife, although the wife is
thinking that she is loving the husband, the real attraction is
the Lord, who is present there. He is the only attraction, there
is no other; but the wife in most cases does not know that it is
so, but ignorantly she is doing the right thing, which is,
loving the Lord. Only, when one does it ignorantly, it may bring
pain. If one does it knowingly, that is salvation. This is what
our scriptures say. Wherever there is love, wherever there is a
spark of joy, know that to be a spark of His presence because He
is joy, blessedness, and love itself. Without that there cannot
be any love.
This is the trend of Krishna's instruction all the time. He has
implanted that upon his race, so that when a Hindu does
anything, even if he drinks water, he says "If there is virtue
in it, let it go to the Lord." The Buddhist says, if he does any
good deed, "Let the merit of the good deed belong to the world;
if there is any virtue in what I do, let it go to the world, and
let the evils of the world come to me." The Hindu says he is a
great believer in God; the Hindu says that God is omnipotent and
that He is the Soul of every soul everywhere; the Hindu says, If
I give all my virtues unto Him, that is the greatest sacrifice,
and they will go to the whole universe."
Now, this is one phase; and what is the other message of
Krishna? "Whosoever lives in the midst of the world, and works,
and gives up all the fruit of his action unto the Lord, he is
never touched with the evils of the world. Just as the lotus,
born under the water, rises up and blossoms above the water,
even so is the man who is engaged in the activities of the
world, giving up all the fruit of his activities unto the Lord"
(Gita, V. 10).
Krishna strikes another note as a teacher of intense activity.
Work, work, work day and night, says the Gita. You may ask,
"Then, where is peace? If all through life I am to work like a
cart-horse and die in harness, what am I here for?" Krishna
says, "Yes, you will find peace. Flying from work is never the
way to find peace." Throw off your duties if you can, and go to
the top of a mountain; even there the mind is going - whirling,
whirling, whirling. Someone asked a Sannyasin, "Sir, have you
found a nice place? How many years have you been travelling in
the Himalayas?" "For forty years," replied the Sannyasin. "There
are many beautiful spots to select from, and to settle down in:
why did you not do so?" "Because for these forty years my mind
would not allow me to do so." We all say, "Let us find peace";
but the mind will not allow us to do so.
You know the story of the man who caught a Tartar. A soldier was
outside the town, and he cried out when he came near the
barracks, "I have caught a Tartar." A voice called out, "Bring
him in." "He won't come in, sir." "Then you come in." "He won't
let me come in, sir." So, in this mind of ours, we have "caught
a Tartar": neither can we tone it down, nor will it let us be
toned down. We have all "caught Tartars". We all say, be quiet,
and peaceful, and so forth. But every baby can say that and
thinks he can do it. However, that is very difficult. I have
tried. I threw overboard all my duties and fled to the tops of
mountains; I lived in caves and deep forests - but all the same,
I "caught a Tartar" because I had my world with me all the time.
The "Tartar" is what I have in my own mind, so we must not blame
poor people outside. "These circumstances are good, and these
are bad," so we say, while the "Tartar" is here, within; if we
can quiet him down, we shall be all right.
Therefore Krishna teaches us not to shirk our duties, but to
take them up manfully, and not think of the result. The servant
has no right to question. The soldier has no right to reason. Go
forward, and do not pay too much attention to the nature of the
work you have to do. Ask your mind if you are unselfish. If you
are, never mind anything, nothing can resist you! Plunge in! Do
the duty at hand. And when you have done this, by degrees you
will realise the Truth: "Whosoever in the midst of intense
activity finds intense peace, whosoever in the midst of the
greatest peace finds the greatest activity, he is a Yogi, he is
a great soul, he has arrived at perfection."
Now, you see that the result of this teaching is that all the
duties of the world are sanctified. There is no duty in this
world which we have any right to call menial: and each man's
work is quite as good as that of the emperor on his throne.
Listen to Buddha's message - a tremendous message. It has a
place in our heart. Says Buddha, "Root out selfishness, and
everything that makes you selfish. Have neither wife, child, nor
family. Be not of the world; become perfectly unselfish." A
worldly man thinks he will be unselfish, but when he looks at
the face of his wife it makes him selfish. The mother thinks she
will be perfectly unselfish, but she looks at her baby, and
immediately selfishness comes. So with everything in this world.
As soon as selfish desires arise, as soon as some selfish
pursuit is followed, immediately the whole man, the real man, is
gone: he is like a brute, he is a slave' he forgets his fellow
men. No more does he say, "You first and I afterwards," but it
is "I first and let everyone else look out for himself."
We find that Krishna's message has also a place for us. Without
that message, we cannot move at all. We cannot conscientiously
and with peace, joy, and happiness, take up any duty of our
lives without listening to the message of Krishna: "Be not
afraid even if there is evil in your work, for there is no work
which has no evil." "Leave it unto the Lord, and do not look for
the results."
On the other hand, there is a corner in the heart for the other
message: Time flies; this world is finite and all misery. With
your good food, nice clothes, and your comfortable home, O
sleeping man and woman, do you ever think of the millions that
are starving and dying? Think of the great fact that it is all
misery, misery, misery! Note the first utterance of the child:
when it enters into the world, it weeps. That is the fact - the
child-weeps. This is a place for weeping! If we listen to the
Messenger, we should not be selfish.
Behold another Messenger, He of Nazareth. He teaches, "Be ready,
for the Kingdom of Heaven is at hand." I have pondered over the
message of Krishna, and am trying to work without attachment,
but sometimes I forget. Then, suddenly, comes to me the message
of Buddha: "Take care, for everything in the world as
evanescent, and there is always misery in this life." I listen
to that, and I am uncertain which to accept. Then again comes,
like a thunderbolt, the message: "Be ready, for the Kingdom of
Heaven is at hand." Do not delay a moment. Leave nothing for
tomorrow. Get ready for the final event, which may overtake you
immediately, even now. That message, also, has a place, and we
acknowledge it. We salute the Messenger, we salute the Lord.
And then comes Mohammed, the Messenger of equality. You ask,
"What good can there be in his religion?" If there were no good,
how could it live? The good alone lives, that alone survives;
because the good alone is strong, therefore it survives. How
long is the life of an impure man, even in this life? Is not the
life of the pure man much longer? Without doubt, for purity is
strength, goodness is strength. How could Mohammedanism have
lived, had there been nothing good in its teaching? There is
much good. Mohammed was the Prophet of equality, of the
brotherhood of man, the brotherhood of all Mussulmans
So we see that each Prophet, each Messenger, has a particular
message. When you first listen to that message, and then look at
his life, you see his whole life stands explained, radiant.
Now, ignorant fools start twenty thousand theories, and put
forward, according to their own mental development, explanations
to suit their own ideas, and ascribe them to these great
Teachers. They take their teachings and put their
misconstruction upon them. With every great Prophet his life is
the only commentary. Look at his life: what he did will bear out
the texts. Read the Gita, and you will find that it is exactly
borne out by the life of the Teacher.
Mohammed by his life showed that amongst Mohammedans there
should be perfect equality and brotherhood. There was no
question of race, caste, creed, colour, or sex. The Sultan of
Turkey may buy a Negro from the mart of Africa, and bring him in
chains to Turkey; but should he become a Mohammedan and have
sufficient merit and abilities, he might even marry the daughter
of the Sultan. Compare this with the way in which the Negroes
and the American Indians are treated in this country! And what
do Hindus do? If one of your missionaries chance to touch the
food of an orthodox person, he would throw it away.
Notwithstanding our grand philosophy, you note our weakness in
practice; but there You see the greatness of the Mohammedan
beyond other races, showing itself in equality, perfect equality
regardless of race or colour.
Will other and greater Prophets come? Certainly they will come
in this world. But do not look forward to that. I should better
like that each one of you became a Prophet of this real New
Testament, which is made up of all the Old Testaments. Take all
the old messages, supplement them with your own realisations and
become a Prophet unto others. Each one of these Teachers has
been great; each has left something for us; they have been our
Gods. We salute them, we are their servants; and, all the same,
we salute ourselves; for if they have been Prophets and children
of God, we also are the same. They reached their perfection, and
we are going to attain ours now. Remember the words of Jesus:
"The Kingdom of Heaven is at hand!" This very moment let
everyone of us make a staunch resolution: "I will become a
Prophet, I will become a messenger of Light, I will become a
child of God, nay, I will become a God!"
ON LORD BUDDHA
(Delivered in Detroit)
In every religion we find one type of self-devotion particularly
developed. The type of working without a motive is most highly
developed in Buddhism. Do not mistake Buddhism and Brâhminism.
In this country you are very apt to do so. Buddhism is one of
our sects. It was founded by a great man called Gautama, who
became disgusted at the eternal metaphysical discussions of his
day, and the cumbrous rituals, and more especially with the
caste system. Some people say that we are born to a certain
state, and therefore we are superior to others who are not thus
born. He was also against the tremendous priestcraft. He
preached a religion in which there was no motive power, and was
perfectly agnostic about metaphysics or theories about God. He
was often asked if there was a God, and he answered, he did not
know. When asked about right conduct, he would reply, "Do good
and be good." There came five Brâhmins, who asked him to settle
their discussion. One said, "Sir, my book says that God is such
and such, and that this is the way to come to God." Another
said, "That is wrong, for my book says such and such, and this
is the way to come to God"; and so the others. He listened
calmly to all of them, and then asked them one by one, "Does any
one of your books say that God becomes angry, that He ever
injures anyone, that He is impure?" "No, Sir, they all teach
that God is pure and good." "Then, my friends, why do you not
become pure and good first, that you may know what God is?"
Of course I do not endorse all his philosophy. I want a good
deal of metaphysics, for myself. I entirely differ in many
respects, but, because I differ, is that any reason why I should
not see the beauty of the man? He was the only man who was
bereft of all motive power. There were other great men who all
said they were the Incarnations of God Himself, and that those
who would believe in them would go to heaven. But what did
Buddha say with his dying breath? "None can help you; help
yourself; work out your own salvation." He said about himself,
"Buddha is the name of infinite knowledge, infinite as the sky;
I, Gautama, have reached that state; you will all reach that too
if you struggle for it." Bereft of all motive power, he did not
want to go to heaven, did not want money; he gave up his throne
and everything else and went about begging his bread through the
streets of India, preaching for the good of men and animals with
a heart as wide as the ocean.
He was the only man who was ever ready to give up his life for
animals to stop a sacrifice. He once said to a king, "If the
sacrifice of a lamb helps you to go to heaven, sacrificing a man
will help you better; so sacrifice me." The king was astonished.
And yet this man was without any motive power. He stands as the
perfection of the active type, and the very height to which he
attained shows that through the power of work we can also attain
to the highest spirituality.
To many the path becomes easier if they believe in God. But the
life of Buddha shows that even a man who does not believe in
God, has no metaphysics, belongs to no sect, and does not go to
any church, or temple, and is a confessed materialist, even he
can attain to the highest. We have no right to judge him. I wish
I had one infinitesimal part of Buddha's heart. Buddha may or
may not have believed in God; that does not matter to me. He
reached the same state of perfection to which others come by
Bhakti - love of God - Yoga, or Jnâna. Perfection does not come
from belief or faith. Talk does not count for anything. Parrots
can do that. Perfection comes through the disinterested
performance of action.
CHRIST, THE MESSENGER
(Delivered at Los Angeles, California, 1900)
The wave rises on the ocean, and there is a hollow. Again
another wave rises, perhaps bigger than the former, to fall down
again, similarly, again to rise - driving onward. In the march
of events, we notice the rise and fall, and we generally look
towards the rise, forgetting the fall. But both are necessary,
and both are great. This is the nature of the universe. Whether
in the world of our thoughts, the world of our relations in
society, or in our spiritual affairs, the same movement of
succession, of rises and falls, is going on. Hence great
predominances in the march of events, the liberal ideals, are
marshalled ahead, to sink down, to digest, as it were, to
ruminate over the past - to adjust, to conserve, to gather
strength once more for a rise and a bigger rise.
The history of nations also has ever been like that. The great
soul, the Messenger we are to study this afternoon, came at a
period of the history of his race which we may well designate as
a great fall. We catch only little glimpses here and there of
the stray records that have been kept of his sayings and doings;
for verily it has been well said, that the doings and sayings of
that great soul would fill the world if they had all been
written down. And the three years of his ministry were like one
compressed, concentrated age, which it has taken nineteen
hundred years to unfold, and who knows how much longer it will
yet take! Little men like you and me are simply the recipients
of just a little energy. A few minutes, a few hours, a few years
at best, are enough to spend it all, to stretch it out, as it
were, to its fullest strength, and then we are gone forever. But
mark this giant that came; centuries and ages pass, yet the
energy that he left upon the world is not yet stretched, nor yet
expended to its full. It goes on adding new vigour as the ages
roll on.
Now what you see in the life of Christ is the life of all the
past. The life of every man is, in a manner, the life of the
past. It comes to him through heredity, through surroundings,
through education, through his own reincarnation - the past of
the race. In a manner, the past of the earth, the past of the
whole world is there, upon every soul. What are we, in the
present, but a result, an effect, in the hands of that infinite
past? What are we but floating waveless in the eternal current
of events, irresistibly moved forward and onward and incapable
of rest? But you and I are only little things, bubbles. There
are always some giant waves in the ocean of affairs, and in you
and me the life of the past race has been embodied only a
little; but there are giants who embody, as it were, almost the
whole of the past and who stretch out their hands for the
future. These are the sign-posts here and there which point to
the march of humanity; these are verily gigantic, their shadows
covering the earth - they stand undying, eternal! As it has been
said by the same Messenger, "No man hath seen God at any time,
but through the Son." And that is true. And where shall we see
God but in the Son? It is true that you and I, and the poorest
of us, the meanest even, embody that God, even reflect that God.
The vibration of light is everywhere, omnipresent; but we have
to strike the light of the lamp before we can see the light. The
Omnipresent God of the universe cannot be seen until He is
reflected by these giant lamps of the earth - The Prophets, the
man-Gods, the Incarnations, the embodiments of God.
We all know that God exists, and yet we do not see Him, we do
not understand Him. Take one of these great Messengers of light,
compare his character with the highest ideal of God that you
ever formed, and you will find that your God falls short of the
ideal, and that the character of the Prophet exceeds your
conceptions. You cannot even form a higher ideal of God than
what the actually embodied have practically realised and set
before us as an example. Is it wrong, therefore, to worship
these as God? Is it a sin to fall at the feet of these man-Gods
and worship them as the only divine beings in the world? If they
are really, actually, higher than all our conceptions of God,
what harm is there in worshipping them? Not only is there no
harm, but it is the only possible and positive way of worship.
However much you may try by struggle, by abstraction, by
whatsoever method you like, still so long as you are a man in
the world of men, your world is human, your religion is human,
and your God is human. And that must be so. Who is not practical
enough to take up an actually existing thing and give up an idea
which is only an abstraction, which he cannot grasp, and is
difficult of approach except through a concrete medium?
Therefore, these Incarnations of God have been worshipped in all
ages and in all countries.
We are now going to study a little of the life of Christ, the
Incarnation of the Jews. When Christ was born, the Jews were in
that state which I call a state of fall between two waves; a
state of conservatism; a state where the human mind is, as it
were, tired for the time being of moving forward and is taking
care only of what it has already; a state when the attention is
more bent upon particulars, upon details, than upon the great,
general, and bigger problems of life; a state of stagnation,
rather than a towing ahead; a state of suffering more than of
doing. Mark you, I do not blame this state of things. We have no
right to criticise it - because had it not been for this fall,
the next rise, which was embodied in Jesus of Nazareth would
have been impossible. The Pharisees and Sadducees might have
been insincere, they might have been doing things which they
ought not to have done; they might have been even hypocrites;
but whatever they were, these factors were the very cause, of
which the Messenger was the effect. The Pharisees and Sadducees
at one end were the very impetus which came out at the other end
as the gigantic brain of Jesus of Nazareth.
The attention to forms, to formulas, to the everyday details of
religion, and to rituals, may sometimes be laughed at; but
nevertheless, within them is strength. Many times in the rushing
forward we lose much strength. As a fact, the fanatic is
stronger than the liberal man. Even the fanatic, therefore, has
one great virtue, he conserves energy, a tremendous amount of
it. As with the individual so with the race, energy is gathered
to be conserved. Hemmed in all around by external enemies,
driven to focus in a centre by the Romans, by the Hellenic
tendencies in the world of intellect, by waves from Persia,
India, and Alexandria - hemmed in physically, mentally, and
morally - there stood the race with an inherent, conservative,
tremendous strength, which their descendants have not lost even
today. And the race was forced to concentrate and focus all its
energies upon Jerusalem and Judaism. But all power when once
gathered cannot remain collected; it must expend and expand
itself. There is no power on earth which can be kept long
confined within a narrow limit. It cannot be kept compressed too
long to allow of expansion at a subsequent period.
This concentrated energy amongst the Jewish race found its
expression at the next period in the rise of Christianity. The
gathered streams collected into a body. Gradually, all the
little streams joined together, and became a surging wave on the
top of which we find standing out the character of Jesus of
Nazareth. Thus, every Prophet is a creation of his own times,
the creation of the past of his race; he himself is the creator
of the future. The cause of today is the effect of the past and
the cause for the future. In this position stands the Messenger.
In him is embodied all that is the best and greatest in his own
race, the meaning, the life, for which that race has struggled
for ages; and he himself is the impetus for the future, not only
to his own race but to unnumbered other races of the world.
We must bear another fact in mind: that my view of the great
Prophet of Nazareth would be from the standpoint of the Orient.
Many times you forget, also, that the Nazarene himself was an
Oriental of Orientals. With all your attempts to paint him with
blue eyes and yellow hair, the Nazarene was still an Oriental.
All the similes, the imageries, in which the Bible is written -
the scenes, the locations, the attitudes, the groups, the
poetry, and symbol, - speak to you of the Orient: of the bright
sky, of the heat, of the sun, of the desert, of the thirsty men
and animals; of men and women coming with pitchers on their
heads to fill them at the wells; of the flocks, of the
ploughmen, of the cultivation that is going on around; of the
water-mill and wheel, of the mill-pond, of the millstones. All
these are to be seen today in Asia.
The voice of Asia has been the voice of religion. The voice of
Europe is the voice of politics. Each is great in its own
sphere. The voice of Europe is the voice of ancient Greece. To
the Greek mind, his immediate society was all in all: beyond
that, it is Barbarian. None but the Greek has the right to live.
Whatever the Greeks do is right and correct; whatever else there
exists in the world is neither right nor correct, nor should be
allowed to live. It is intensely human in its sympathies,
intensely natural, intensely artistic, therefore. The Greek
lives entirely in this world. He does not care to dream. Even
his poetry is practical. His gods and goddesses are not only
human beings, but intensely human, with all human passions and
feelings almost the same as with any of us. He loves what is
beautiful, but, mind you, it is always external nature: the
beauty of the hills, of the snows, of the flowers, the beauty of
forms and of figures, the beauty in the human face, and, more
often, in the human form - that is what the Greeks liked. And
the Greeks being the teachers of all subsequent Europeanism, the
voice of Europe is Greek.
There is another type in Asia. Think of that vast, huge
continent, whose mountain-tops go beyond the clouds, almost
touching the canopy of heaven's blue; a rolling desert of miles
upon miles where a drop of water cannot be found, neither will a
blade of grass grow; interminable forests and gigantic rivers
rushing down into the sea. In the midst of all these
surroundings, the oriental love of the beautiful and of the
sublime developed itself in another direction. It looked inside,
and not outside. There is also the thirst for nature, and there
is also the same thirst for power; there is also the same thirst
for excellence, the same idea of the Greek and Barbarian, but it
has extended over a larger circle. In Asia, even today, birth or
colour or language never makes a race. That which makes a race
is its religion. We are all Christians; we are all Mohammedans;
we are all Hindus, or all Buddhists. No matter if a Buddhist is
a Chinaman, or is a man from Persia, they think that they are
brothers, because of their professing the same religion.
Religion is the tie, unity of humanity. And then again, the
Oriental, for the same reason, is a visionary, is a born
dreamer. The ripples of the waterfalls, the songs of the birds,
the beauties of the sun and moon and the stars and the whole
earth are pleasant enough; but they are not sufficient for the
oriental mind; He wants to dream a dream beyond. He wants to go
beyond the present. The present, as it were, is nothing to him.
The Orient has been the cradle of the human race for ages, and
all the vicissitudes of fortune are there - kingdoms succeeding
kingdoms, empires succeeding empires, human power, glory, and
wealth, all rolling down there: a Golgotha of power and
learning. That is the Orient: a Golgotha of power, of kingdoms,
of learning. No wonder, the oriental mind looks with contempt
upon the things of this world and naturally wants to see
something that changeth not, something which dieth not,
something which in the midst of this world of misery and death
is eternal, blissful, undying. An oriental Prophet never tires
of insisting upon these ideals; and, as for Prophets, you may
also remember that without one exception, all the Messengers
were Orientals.
We see, therefore, in the life of this area: Messenger of life,
the first watchword: "Not this life, but something higher"; and,
like the true son of the Orient, he is practical in that. You
people of the West are practical in your own department, in
military affairs, and in managing political circles and other
things. Perhaps the Oriental is not practical in those ways, but
he is practical in his own field; he is practical in religion.
If one preaches a philosophy, tomorrow there are hundreds who
will struggle their best to make it practical in their lives. If
a man preaches that standing on one foot would lead one to
salvation, he will immediately get five hundred to stand on one
foot. You may call it ludicrous; but, mark you, beneath that is
their philosophy - that intense practicality. In the West, plans
of salvation mean intellectual gymnastics - plans which are
never worked out, never brought into practical life. In the
West, the preacher who talks the best is the greatest preacher.
So, we find Jesus of Nazareth, in the first place, the true son
of the Orient, intensely practical. He has no faith in this
evanescent world and all its belongings. No need of
text-torturing, as is the fashion in the West in modern times,
no need of stretching out texts until the, will not stretch any
more. Texts are not India rubber, and even that has its limits.
Now, no making of religion to pander to the sense vanity of the
present day! Mark you, let us all be honest. If we cannot follow
the ideal, let us confess our weakness, but not degrade it; let
not any try to pull it down. One gets sick at heart at the
different accounts of the life of the Christ that Western people
give. I do not know what he was or what he was not! One would
make him a great politician; another, perhaps, would make of him
a great military general; another, a great patriotic Jew; and so
on. Is there any warrant in the books for all such assumptions?
The best commentary on the life of a great teacher is his own
life. "The foxes have holes, the birds of the air have nests,
but the Son of man hath not where to lay his head." That is what
Christ says as they only way to salvation; he lays down no other
way. Let us confess in sackcloth and ashes that we cannot do
that. We still have fondness for "me and mine". We want
property, money, wealth. Woe unto us! Let us confess and not put
to shame that great Teacher of Humanity! He had no family ties.
But do you think that, that Man had any physical ideas in him?
Do you think that, this mass of light, this God and not-man,
came down to earth, to be the brother of animals? And yet,
people make him preach all sorts of things. He had no sex ideas!
He was a soul! Nothing but a soul - just working a body for the
good of humanity; and that was all his relation to the body. In
the soul there is no sex. The disembodied soul has no
relationship to the animal, no relationship to the body. The
ideal may be far away beyond us. But never mind, keep to the
ideal. Let us confess that it is our ideal, but we cannot
approach it yet.
He had no other occupation in life, no other thought except that
one, that he was a spirit. He was a disembodied, unfettered,
unbound spirit. And not only so, but he, with his marvellous
vision, had found that every man and woman, whether Jew or
Gentile, whether rich or poor, whether saint or sinner, was the
embodiment of the same undying spirit as himself. Therefore, the
one work his whole life showed was to call upon them to realise
their own spiritual nature. Give up, he says, these
superstitious dreams that you are low and that you are poor.
Think not that you are trampled upon and tyrannised over as if
you were slaves, for within you is something that can never be
tyrannised over, never be trampled upon, never be troubled,
never be killed. You are all Sons of God, immortal spirit.
"Know", he declared, "the Kingdom of Heaven is within you." "I
and my Father are one." Dare you stand up and say, not only that
"I am the Son of God", but I shall also find in my heart of
hearts that "I and my Father are one"? That was what Jesus of
Nazareth said. He never talks of this world and of this life. He
has nothing to do with it, except that he wants to get hold of
the world as it is, give it a push and drive it forward and
onward until the whole world has reached to the effulgent Light
of God, until everyone has realised his spiritual nature, until
death is vanished and misery banished.
We have read the different stories that have been written about
him; we know the scholars and their writings, and the higher
criticism; and we know all that has been done by study. We are
not here to discuss how much of the New Testament is true, we
are not here to discuss how much of that life is historical. It
does not matter at all whether the New Testament was written
within five hundred years of his birth, nor does it matter even,
how much of that life is true. But there is something behind it,
something we want to imitate. To tell a lie, you have to imitate
a truth, and that truth is a fact. You cannot imitate that which
never existed. You cannot imitate that which you never
perceived. But there must have been a nucleus, a tremendous
power that came down, a marvellous manifestation of spiritual
power - and of that we are speaking. It stands there. Therefore,
we are not afraid of all the criticisms of the scholars. If I,
as an Oriental, have to worship Jesus of Nazareth, there is only
one way left to me, that is, to worship him as God and nothing
else. Have we no right to worship him in that way, do you mean
to say? If we bring him down to our own level and simply pay him
a little respect as a great man, why should we worship at all?
Our scriptures say, "These great children of Light, who manifest
the Light themselves, who are Light themselves, they, being
worshipped, become, as it were, one with us and we become one
with them."
For, you see, in three ways man perceives God. At first the
undeveloped intellect of the uneducated man sees God as far
away, up in the heavens somewhere, sitting on a throne as a
great Judge. He looks upon Him as a fire, as a terror. Now, that
is good, for there is nothing bad in it. You must remember that
humanity travels not from error to truth, but from truth to
truth; it may be, if you like it better, from lower truth to
higher truth, but never from error to truth. Suppose you start
from here and travel towards the sun in a straight line. From
here the sun looks only small in size. Suppose you go forward a
million miles, the sun will be much bigger. At every stage the
sun will become bigger and bigger. Suppose twenty thousand
photographs had been taken of the same sun, from different
standpoints; these twenty thousand photographs will all
certainly differ from one another. But can you deny that each is
a photograph of the same sun? So all forms of religion, high or
low, are just different stages toward that eternal state of
Light, which is God Himself. Some embody a lower view, some a
higher, and that is all the difference. Therefore, the religions
of the unthinking masses all over the world must be, and have
always been, of a God who is outside of the universe, who lives
in heaven, who governs from that place, who is a punisher of the
bad and a rewarder of the good, and so on. As man advanced
spiritually, he began to feel that God was omnipresent, that He
must be in him, that He must be everywhere, that He was not a
distant God, but dearly the Soul of all souls. As my soul moves
my body, even so is God the mover of my soul. Soul within soul.
And a few individuals who had developed enough and were pure
enough, went still further, and at last found God. As the New
Testament says, "Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall
see God." And they found at last that they and the Father were
one.
You find that all these three stages are taught by the Great
Teacher in the New Testament. Note the Common Prayer he taught:
"Our Father which art in Heaven, hallowed be Thy name," and so
on - a simple prayer, a child's prayer. Mark you, it is the
"Common Prayer" because it is intended for the uneducated
masses. To a higher circle, to those who had advanced a little
more, he gave a more elevated teaching: "I am in my Father, and
ye in me, and I in you." Do you remember that? And then, when
the Jews asked him who he was, he declared that he and his
Father were one, and the Jews thought that that was blasphemy.
What did he mean by that? This has been also told by your old
Prophets, "Ye are gods and all of you are children of the Most
High." Mark the same three stages. You will find that it is
easier for you to begin with the first and end with the last.
The Messenger came to show the path: that the spirit is not in
forms, that it is not through all sorts of vexations and knotty
problems of philosophy that you know the spirit. Better that you
had no learning, better that you never read a book in your life.
These are not at all necessary for salvation - neither wealth,
nor position nor power, not even learning; but what is necessary
is that one thing, purity. "Blessed are the pure in heart," for
the spirit in its own nature is pure. How can it be otherwise?
It is of God, it has come from God. In the language of the
Bible, "It is the breath of God." In the language of the Koran,
"It is the soul of God." Do you mean to say that the Spirit of
God can ever be impure? But, alas, it has been, as it were,
covered over with the dust and dirt of ages, through our own
actions, good and evil. Various works which were not correct,
which were not true, have covered the same spirit with the dust
and dirt of the ignorance of ages. It is only necessary to clear
away the dust and dirt, and then the spirit shines immediately.
"Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God." "The
Kingdom of Heaven is within you." Where goest thou to seek for
the Kingdom of God, asks Jesus of Nazareth, when it is there,
within you? Cleanse the spirit, and it is there. It is already
yours. How can you get what is not yours? It is yours by right.
You are the heirs of immortality, sons of the Eternal Father.
This is the great lesson of the Messenger, and another which is
the basis of all religions, is renunciation. How can you make
the spirit pure? By renunciation. A rich young man asked Jesus,
"Good Master, what shall I do that I may inherit eternal life?"
And Jesus said unto him, "One thing thou lackest; go thy way,
sell whatsoever thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt
have treasures in heaven: and come, take up thy cross, and
follow Me." And he was sad at that saying and went away grieved;
for he had great possessions. We are all more or less like that.
The voice is ringing in our ears day and night. In the midst of
our pleasures and joys, in the midst of worldly things, we think
that we have forgotten everything else. Then comes a moment's
pause and the voice rings in our ears "Give up all that thou
hast and follow Me." "Whosoever will save his life shall lose
it; and whosoever shall lose his life for My sake shall find
it." For whoever gives up this life for His sake, finds the life
immortal. In the midst of all our weakness there is a moment of
pause and the voice rings: "Give up all that thou hast; give it
to the poor and follow me." This is the one ideal he preaches,
and this has been the ideal preached by all the great Prophets
of the world: renunciation. What is meant by renunciation? That
there is only one ideal in morality: unselfishness. Be selfless.
The ideal is perfect unselfishness. When a man is struck on the
right cheek, he turns the left also. When a man's coat is
carried off, he gives away his cloak also.
We should work in the best way we can, without dragging the
ideal down. Here is the ideal. When a man has no more self in
him, no possession, nothing to call "me" or "mine", has given
himself up entirely, destroyed himself as it were - in that man
is God Himself; for in him self-will is gone, crushed out,
annihilated. That is the ideal man. We cannot reach that state
yet; yet, let us worship the ideal, and slowly struggle to reach
the ideal, though, maybe, with faltering steps. It may be
tomorrow, or it may be a thousand years hence; but that ideal
has to be reached. For it is not only the end, but also the
means. To be unselfish, perfectly selfless, is salvation itself;
for the man within dies, and God alone remains.
One more point. All the teachers of humanity are unselfish.
Suppose Jesus of Nazareth was teaching; and a man came and told
him, "What you teach is beautiful. I believe that it is the way
to perfection, and I am ready to follow it; but I do not care to
worship you as the only begotten Son of God." What would be the
answer of Jesus of Nazareth? "Very well, brother, follow the
ideal and advance in your own way. I do not care whether you
give me the credit for the teaching or not. I am not a
shopkeeper. I do not trade in religion. I only teach truth, and
truth is nobody's property. Nobody can patent truth. Truth is
God Himself. Go forward." But what the disciples say nowadays
is: "No matter whether you practice the teachings or not, do you
give credit to the Man? If you credit the Master, you will be
saved; if not, there is no salvation for you." And thus the
whole teaching of the Master is degenerated, and all the
struggle and fight is for the personality of the Man. They do
not know that in imposing that difference, they are, in a
manner, bringing shame to the very Man they want to honour - the
very Man that would have shrunk with shame from such an idea.
What did he care if there was one man in the world that
remembered him or not? He had to deliver his message, and he
gave it. And if he had twenty thousand lives, he would give them
all up for the poorest man in the world. If he had to be
tortured millions of times for a million despised Samaritans,
and if for each one of them the sacrifice of his own life would
be the only condition of salvation, he would have given his
life. And all this without wishing to have his name known even
to a single person. Quiet, unknown, silent, would he world, just
as the Lord works. Now, what would the disciple say? He will
tell you that you may be a perfect man, perfectly unselfish; but
unless you give the credit to our teacher, to our saint, it is
of no avail. Why? What is the origin of this superstition, this
ignorance? The disciple thinks that the Lord can manifest
Himself only once. There lies the whole mistake. God manifests
Himself to you in man. But throughout nature, what happens once
must have happened before, and must happen in future. There is
nothing in nature which is not bound by law; and that means that
whatever happens once must go on and must have been going on.
In India they have the same idea of the Incarnations of God. One
of their great Incarnations, Krishna, whose grand sermon, the
Bhagavad-Gitâ, some of you might have read, says, "Though I am
unborn, of changeless nature, and Lord of beings, yet
subjugating My Prakriti, I come into being by My own Mâyâ.
Whenever virtue subsides and immorality prevails, then I body
Myself forth. For the protection of the good, for the
destruction of the wicked, and for the establishment of Dharma,
I come into being, in every age." Whenever the world goes down,
the Lord comes to help it forward; and so He does from time to
time and place to place. In another passage He speaks to this
effect: Wherever thou findest a great soul of immense power and
purity struggling to raise humanity, know that he is born of My
splendour, that I am there working through him.
Let us, therefore, find God not only in Jesus of Nazareth, but
in all the great Ones that have preceded him, in all that came
after him, and all that are yet to come. Our worship is
unbounded and free. They are all manifestations of the same
Infinite God. They are all pure and unselfish; they struggled
and gave up their lives for us, poor human beings. They each and
all suffer vicarious atonement for every one of us, and also for
all that are to come hereafter.
In a sense you are all Prophets; every one of you is a Prophet,
bearing the burden of the world on your own shoulders. Have you
ever seen a man, have you ever seen a woman, who is not quietly,
patiently, bearing his or her little burden of life? The great
Prophets were giants - they bore a gigantic world on their
shoulders. Compared with them we are pigmies, no doubt, yet we
are doing the same task; in our little circles, in our little
homes, we are bearing our little crosses. There is no one so
evil, no one so worthless, but he has to bear his own cross. But
with all our mistakes, with all our evil thoughts and evil
deeds, there is a bright spot somewhere; there is still
somewhere the golden thread through which we are always in touch
with the divine. For, know for certain, that the moment the
touch of the divine is lost there would be annihilation. And
because none can be annihilated, there is always somewhere in
our heart of hearts, however low and degraded we may be, a
little circle of light which is in constant touch with the
divine.
Our salutations go to all the past Prophets whose teachings and
lives we have inherited, whatever might have been their race,
clime, or creed! Our salutations go to all those Godlike men and
women who are working to help humanity, whatever be their birth,
colour, or race! Our salutations to those who are coming in the
future - living Gods - to work unselfishly for our descendants.