Truth is one, paths are many

[Guest guest]

Various extracts from some issues of The Mountain Path and elsewhere:

 

So long as you have the egosense you have to struggle. At the end of the

struggle you come to know that you have not achieved anything. You feel

that you are helpless. Then God comes to your help. But as long as you

think you can help yourself you must struggle. Struggle ceases in

surrender. Thereafter you say, 'Oh God, You do everything.' Now you find

everything is done by His will and power. Surrender gives you this

knowledge. The egosense is wiped out not only in the inner silence but

also in all your active life.

 

- Swami Ramdas

 

==================

 

You Must Cling Too

By A. Devaraja Mudaliar

 

In India we compare the aspirant who strives to the child of the monkey

that clings to its mother as she jumps from tree to tree and the devotee

who relies completely on the grace of the Guru to that of the cat that

is quite helpless and is therefore picked up by its mother and carried

in her mouth. Alluding to this, I said once that I was like the kitten

and had cast the whole responsibility on Bhagavan. He laughed but would

not agree. He said "Both are necessary; I will hold you but you must

cling too."

 

 

=================

 

So Nirvana can be attained through close association with the teacher

who is perfect. Just close association with the teacher. There are only

two methods. You can pick up according to your desire. If you have a

devotion, faith, in the teacher, you can try to find a teacher who is

perfect, who can give you freedom in this lifetime, then you have to

depend on your faith, just like sitting into a plane or a boat, you have

got nothing to do, so teacher is that carrier that will take you away.

You have not to do anything. For those people who are still ego they

have to make effort. Even meditation is an effort, you see, sitting in

meditation, concentrating on several centers, so they will also wear out

their efforts soon, one day. So in the end the result has to be the

same, it will take some lives.

 

- Papaji

 

================

 

That method by which a man makes spiritual progress is the best for him.

He should not change it for another which may not seem right to him or

please him or be useful to him.

 

- Yoga Vasishta

 

=================

 

He to whom the Eternal Word speaketh is set free from a multitude of

opinions.

 

- The Imitation of Christ

 

=================

 

All the various doctrines and paths originating at different times and

in different countries lead ultimately to the same Supreme Truth, like

the many different paths leading travelers from different places to the

same city. It is ignorance of the Absolute Truth and misunderstanding of

the different doctrines that causes their followers to quarrel in bitter

animosity with one another. They consider their own particular dogmas

and paths to be the best, as every traveler may think though wrongly,

his own to be the only or the best path.

 

- Yoga Vasishta.

 

==================

[Guest guest]

Thank you, Ashish for the quote from Yoga Vasishta.

 

Here is a story to go with it....

 

 

*******************

Long ago a farmer in desperate need of water for his

crops started digging a well. When he had dug deep enough to cover his

head without finding water, the farmer would

climb out of the hole and trudge his way back home. Day after day the

farmer kept digging new holes until, tired and exasperated, he would

toss his shovel aside and walk home.

Each night he would fall into bed and dream the promise of clear, cool

water before waking to dig a new well the following morning.

 

One day a neighbor made a rare visit to the farmer's land, his brow

raised at the sight of so many wells.

"What on earth are you doing?" the neighbor called down to the farmer

who was nearing the end of his latest well.

"I am digging a well", the farmer replied.

"But you will never find water that way!"-neighbor.

"What do you mean?" asked the farmer. "To find water, I have to dig a

well!"

"That may be so", answered the neighbor. "But the water table here

starts ten feet below the surface.

Unless you stick to one well and dig deeper,

you will never find what you are looking for".

 

 

This story is often told to signify the importance of sticking to

one teaching or one guru on the spiritual path and staying with this

chosen path rather than sampling many different paths.

*************************

 

RamanaMaharshi, "Ashish Mahajan"

<ash.mahajan@w...> wrote:

 

> ================

>

> That method by which a man makes spiritual progress is the best for

him.He should not change it for another which may not seem right to

him orplease him or be useful to him.

>

> - Yoga Vasishta

>

>