A devotees experience -duality to nonduality

[Guest guest]

Namaste all

Going back to an old discussion on Personal god and Brahman... this

wonderful posting i found in another group seems to present a very

very compelling insight.

Many thousand Pranams to all

Sridhar

RamanaMaharshi, revathi ravisankar

<revathiravisankar> wrote:

Dear All

 

Read this on papaji and ramana

 

 

The story of Sri H.L.Poonja (Papaji) as told to David Godman

 

I APPROACHED THE MAHARSHI in a belligerent way.Are you the man who

came to see me at my house in the Punjab? I demanded. The Maharshi

remained silent.

 

 

 

I tried again. grave;Did you come to my house and tell me to come

here? Are you the man who sent me here? Again the Maharshi made no

comment.

 

 

 

Since he was unwilling to answer either of these questions I moved on

to the main purpose of my visit. Have you see God? I asked And if you

have, can you enable me to see Him? I am willing to pay any price,

even my life, but your part of the bargain is that you must show me

God.

 

 

 

No, he answered. I cannot show you God or enable you to see God,

because God is not an object that can be seen. God is the subject. He

is the seer. Don t concern yourself with objects that can be seen.

Find out who the seer is. He also added, You alone are God as if to

rebuke me for looking for a God who was outside and apart from me .

 

 

 

His words did not impress me. They seemed to me to be yet one more

excuse to add to the long list of those I had heard from swamis all

over the country. He had promised to show me God, yet now he was

trying to tell me that not only could he not show me God, no one else

could either. I would have dismissed him and his words without a

second thought had it not been for an experience I had immediatly

after he had told me to find out who this I was who wanted to see

God.

 

 

 

At the conclusion of his words he looked at me, and as he gazed into

my eyes my whole body began to tremble and shake. A thrill of nervous

energy shot through my body. My nerve endings felt as if they were

dancing and my hair stood on end. Within me I became aware of the

spiritual Heart. This is not the physical heart. It is, rather, the

source and support of all that exists. Within the Heart I saw or felt

something like a closed bud. It was very shiny and bluish. With the

Maharshi looking at me, and with myself in a state of inner silence,

I felt this bud open and bloom. I use the word bud , but this is not

an exact description. It would be more correct to say that something

that felt bud-like opened and bloomed within me in the Heart. And

when I say Heart , I dont t mean that the flowering was located in a

particular place in the body. This Heart, this Heart of my Heart, was

neither inside the body nor out of it. I cant give a more exact

description of what happened. All I can say

is that in the Maharshi s presence and under his gaze, the Heart

opened and bloomed. It was an extraordinary experience, one that I

never had before. I had not come looking for any kind of experience,

so it totally surprised me when it happened.

 

 

 

Though I had had an immensely powerful experience in the presence of

the Maharshi, his statement You alone are God and his advice to find

out who the seer is did not have a strong appeal to me. My

inclination to seek a God outside me was not dispelled either by his

words or by the experience I had had with him. I thought to myself,

It is not good to be chocolate. I want to taste chocolate I wanted to

remain separate from God so that I could enjoy the bliss of union

with Him.

 

 

 

When the devotees came in that afternoon I viewed them all with the

rather prejudiced eye of a fanatical Krishna bhakta. So far as I

could see they were just sitting quietly, doing nothing. I thought to

myself, No one here seems to be chanting the name of God. Not a

single person has a mala (rosary) to do japa with. How can they

consider themselves to be good devotees? My views on religious

practice were rather limited. All these people may have been

meditating, but so far as I was concerned, they were wasting their

time.

 

 

 

I transferred my critical gaze to the Maharshi and similar thoughts

arose: This man should be setting a good example to his followers. He

is sitting silently, not giving any talks about God. He doesn t

appear to be chanting the name of God himself, or focussing his

attention on Him in any way. These disciples are sitting around being

lazy because the Master himself is sitting there doing nothing. How

can this man show me God when he himself shows no interest in Him?

 

 

 

With thoughts like these floating around in my mind, it was not long

before I generated a feeling of disgust for both the Maharshi and the

people who surrounded him. I still had some time before I had to

report for duty in Madras, but I didnt want to spend it with all

these spiritually lazy people in the ashram. I took off to the other

side of Arunachala, a few kilometres away, found a nice quiet spot in

the forest on the northern side of the hill, and settled down there

to do my Krishna japa alone and undisturbed.

 

 

 

I stayed there for about a week, immersed in my devotional practices.

Krishna would often appear before me, and we spent a lot of time

playing together. At the end of that period I felt that it was time

to go back to Madras to make preparations for my new job. On my way

out of town I paid another visit to the ashram, partly to say goodbye

and partly to tell the Maharshi that I didn t need his assistance for

seeing God because I had been seeing Him every day through my own

efforts.

 

 

 

When I appeared before him, the Maharshi asked, Where have you been?

Where are you living?On the other side of the mountain, I replied.

And what were you doing there? he enquired.

 

 

 

He had given me my cue. I was playing with my Krishna, I said in a

very smug tone of voice. I was very proud of my achievement and felt

superior to the Maharshi because I was absolutely convinced that

Krishna had not appeared to him during that period.

 

 

 

Oh, is that so? he commented looking surprised and interested. Very

good, very nice. Do you see Him now? No sir, I do not, I replied. I

only see Him when I have visions.

 

 

 

I was still feeling very pleased with myself, feeling that I had been

granted these visions, whereas the Maharshi had not. So Krishna comes

and plays with you and then He disappears, said the Maharshi. What is

the use of a God who appears and disappears? If He is a real God, He

must be with you all the time .

 

 

 

The Maharshi s lack of interest in my visionary experiences deflated

me a little, but not to the extent that I was willing to listen to

his advice. He was telling me to give up my search for an external

God and instead find the origin and identity of the one who wanted to

see Him. This was too much for me to swallow. A lifetime of devotion

to Krishna had left me incapable of conceiving the spiritual quest in

any other terms than that of a quest for a personal God. ... ...

Having therefore got, in my own jaundiced opinion, nothing from the

Maharshi except a good experience and some bad advice, I returned to

Madras to take up my new job.

 

 

 

I found a nice house to live in, big enough to accomodate my family,

and began my work. The job itself did not interest me much but I did

it dutifully and to the best of my ability because I had a wife and

children to support. All my spare time and energy was devoted to

communing with Krishna. I made a puja room in my house, informing my

wife that when I was in it, I was never to be disturbed... ...

 

 

>From my childhood on, from about the age of eight, I had been in love

with Krishna. I knew about Krishna bhaktas and how they behaved, but

I had never heard of saints who just sat quietly. In the Punjab

people showed their devotion by singing bhajans. With this background

I didn't appreciate what I saw when I first encountered the Maharshi.

One day though, all this changed. The Maharshi himself appeared

before me in Madras and said, 'Krishna bhakti alone is true. Krishna

bhakti alone is true.' By this time I knew that he never left

Tiruvannamalai for any reason, so I had to assume that it was some

kind of vision. I went back to Tiruvannamalai to get confirmation of

this manifestation. I wanted to ask him if he really had appeared to

me and said these things about Krishna bhakti.

 

 

 

I had had some disagreement with him on my first visit and this

disagreement had somehow stuck in my mind. If someone always agrees

with you, you don't think much about him. But if you have had a

quarrel with someone, that person and the quarrel you have had are

always surfacing in your mind. That was what was happening to me in

Madras. Thoughts of the Maharshi would often come to me because I

didn't agree with his views on God. I went back to Ramanasramam and

asked the Maharshi, 'Are you the person who appeared to me in Madras

and told me, 'Krishna bhakti alone is true?' ' He heard my question

but he didn't give me a reply. While I was waiting for an answer, a

group of devotees came from Vrindavan. They were on a tour of

pilgrimage places in the South. On their visit to Tirupati they had

heard that there was a swami in Tiruvannamalai who was worth

visiting. So, they all came along to have darshan. The leader of the

group presented the Maharshi with a picture of Krishna playing the

flute for Radha. It was a beautiful picture.

 

 

 

As the Maharshi was looking at the picture, tears started trickling

down his cheeks. When you have intense devotion for Krishna, you can

easily pick out other devotees who have that same passion. I could

see that these were real tears of devotion and that they came from

the heart and not from the mind. As I watched the tears trickling

down his cheeks, I felt them trickling into my own Heart. It was a

divine shower that filled my own Heart with love. He was so happy

looking at that picture, and I felt so happy looking at him

appreciate it. I thought to myself, 'This man has been hiding his

devotion from me. He doesn't like to show it publicly, but now I have

found out his secret. He is just as much a bhakta as I am.'

 

 

 

A bird cannot fly without two wings. After this revelation I saw that

the Maharshi was soaring on the twin wings of bhakti and jnana

(devotion and transcendental knowledge). From that moment on, my

doubts evaporated and I had immense faith in him.... When I tried to

resume my chanting, I found that I could not repeat the name of

Krishna any more. Somehow my mind refused to cooperate. I couldn't

read any of my spiritual books either. My mind, thought-free and

quiet, refused to concentrate on or pay attention to any of the

spiritual objects I tried to put in front of it. It was all very

mystifying.

 

 

 

For a quarter of a century the divine name had been flowing

effortlessly through my mind; now I couldn't even utter it once. My

thoughts turned once more to the Maharshi in Tiruvannamalai. ... ...

I sat in front of him and began to tell him my story. For twenty five

years I have been repeating the name of Krishna. Up till fairly

recently I was managing 50,000 repetitions a day. I also used to read

a lot of spiritual literature. Then Ram, Sita, Lakshman and Hanuman

appeared before me. After they left, I couldn't carry on with my

practice. I can't repeat the name any more. I can't read my books. I

can't meditate. I feel very quiet inside but there is no longer any

desire in me to put my attention on God. In fact I can't do it even

if I try. My mind refuses to engage itself in thoughts of God. What

has happened to me and what should I do?' The Maharshi looked at me

and asked, 'How did you come here from Madras?' I didn't see the

point of his question, but I politely told him the answer

: 'By train.' And what happened when you got to the station at

Tiruvannamalai?' he enquired. 'Well, I got off the train, handed in

my ticket and engaged a bullock cart to take me to the ashram.' And

when you reached the ashram and paid off the driver of the cart, what

happened to the cart?' It went away, presumably back to town,' I

said, still not clear as to where this line of questioning was

leading. The Maharshi then explained what he was driving at. The

train brought you to your destination. You got off it because you

didn't need it anymore. It had brought you to the place you wanted to

reach. Likewise with the bullock cart. You got off it when it had

brought you to Ramanasramam. You don't need either the train or the

cart any more. They were the means for bringing you here. Now you are

here, they are of no use to you. That is what has happened with your

chanting. Your japa, your reading and your meditation have brought

you to your spiritual destination. You don't need them any

more. You yourself did not give up your practices; they left you of

their own accord because they had served their purpose. You have

arrived.'

 

 

 

Then he looked at me intently. I could feel that my whole body and

mind were being washed with waves of purity. They were being purified

by his silent gaze. I could feel him looking intently into my Heart.

Under that spellbinding gaze I felt every atom of my body being

purified. It was as if a new body was being created for me. A process

of transformation was going on Ñ the old body was dying, atom by

atom, and a new body was being created in its place. Then, suddenly,

I understood. I knew that this man who had spoken to me was, in

reality, what I already was, what I had always been. There was a

sudden impact of recognition as I became aware of the Self. I use the

word 'recognition' deliberately, because as soon as the experience

was revealed to me, I knew, unerringly, that this was the same state

of peace and happiness that I had been immersed in as an eight-year-

old boy in Lahore, on the occasion when I had refused to accept the

mango drink.

 

 

 

The silent gaze of the Maharshi re-established me in that primal

state. The desire to search for an external god perished in the

direct knowledge and experience of the Self which the Maharshi

revealed to me. I cannot describe exactly what the experience was or

is, because the books are right when they say that words cannot

convey it. I can only talk about peripheral things. I can say that

every cell, every atom in my body, leapt to attention as they all

recognised and experienced the Self that animated and supported them,

but the experience itself I cannot describe. I knew that my spiritual

quest had definitely ended, but the source of that knowledge will

always remain indescribable.

Ravi Sankar

Lusaka,Zambia

[Guest guest]

--- asridhar19 <asridhar19 wrote:

> Namaste all

> Going back to an old discussion on Personal god and

> Brahman... this

> wonderful posting i found in another group seems to

> present a very

> very compelling insight.

> Many thousand Pranams to all

> Sridhar

 

Namste Sridhar,

Many thanks for this posting which is very relevant to

my research into the nature of ineffability, language

and direct experience.

May I mention to the new members of this group that I

set up a website for this research a year ago:

www.nonameorform.co.uk

and I would welcome any contributions via that

website.

The site needs to be updated but I have not the time

at the moment,

 

Many thanks

 

Ken Knight

 

 

 

New Photos - easier uploading and sharing.

 

[Guest guest]

Dear Sridharji,

Could you please help me with details of the website where you found this lovely

account ?

Pranams

Mohan

 

asridhar19 <asridhar19 wrote:

Namaste all

Going back to an old discussion on Personal god and Brahman... this

wonderful posting i found in another group seems to present a very

very compelling insight.

Many thousand Pranams to all

Sridhar

RamanaMaharshi, revathi ravisankar

<revathiravisankar> wrote:

Dear All

 

Read this on papaji and ramana

 

 

The story of Sri H.L.Poonja (Papaji) as told to David Godman

 

I APPROACHED THE MAHARSHI in a belligerent way.Are you the man who

came to see me at my house in the Punjab? I demanded. The Maharshi

remained silent.

 

 

 

 

India Education Special: Study in the UK now.

 

 

[Guest guest]

Namaste Mohanji

This was a posting in Ramanamaharshi .

You could to the group by sending e-mail to the address

below and read archives. There are many wonderful accounts.

 

RamanaMaharshi-

 

You could also go through some of the web-sites below

:

http://www.ramana-maharshi.org

http://www.davidgodman.org/index.shtml

The latter has downloadable books on teachings of Bhagwan Ramana.

If you are interested I'll reply off list on a set of books I found

wonderful too.

Many Pranams to all

 

Sridhar

advaitin, S Mohan <mohanirmala> wrote:

> Dear Sridharji,

> Could you please help me with details of the website where you

found this lovely account ?

> Pranams

> Mohan

>

[Guest guest]

Dear Sridharji,

Thanks for the information. I would indeed be grateful for your list of books.

Incidentally, in case you are interested you may like to see the Newsletter of

the Arunachala Ashrama at Flushing, NY ...website www.arunachala.org where

Dennis who runs the Ashram was kind enough to post our little contribution on my

father-in-law, Sri V N Srinivasa Rao's experience with Bhagavan in their

July/Aug 2003 newsletter.

Everything is His Grace !

Warm regards and pranams

Mohan

 

asridhar19 <asridhar19 wrote:

Namaste Mohanji

This was a posting in Ramanamaharshi .

You could to the group by sending e-mail to the address

below and read archives. There are many wonderful accounts.

 

RamanaMaharshi-

 

You could also go through some of the web-sites below

:

http://www.ramana-maharshi.org

http://www.davidgodman.org/index.shtml

The latter has downloadable books on teachings of Bhagwan Ramana.

If you are interested I'll reply off list on a set of books I found

wonderful too.

Many Pranams to all

 

Sridhar

advaitin, S Mohan <mohanirmala> wrote:

> Dear Sridharji,

> Could you please help me with details of the website where you

found this lovely account ?

> Pranams

> Mohan

>

 

 

 

 

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India Education Special: Study in the UK now.