Let It Be So

The first question:

THE HUMAN MIND  tends to convert every experience into a question. That is a very destructive step. Please avoid it. Here near me the whole purpose is to know that which is not knowable, to know that which is not expressible, to know that which cannot be put into words. When it starts happening, don't make a problem out of it, don't create a question out of it - because your very questioning will become a stopping. Then your mind will have started something else and you are distracted.

When it starts happening, enjoy it, love it, be nourished by it, savour it, dance it, sing it, but don't make a question about it. Just be it. And allow it total space. It will grow. It needs space in you to grow.

Don't be in a hurry to make a theory out of it. Theories are very dangerous. They can kill the child in the womb. The moment you start thinking in terms of analysing, knowing what it is and what it is not, comparing, labelling, you are moving towards an abortion. You will miss something that was going to grow - you killed it. Don't be suicidal, don't be analytical, just allow it. Feel its presence - but not with the mind. Feel its presence with your totaility. Let your heart be open to it and it will grow.

And in that very growth, by and by understanding will come. Understanding is not going to come through analysis, through thinking, through brooding, through logic. Understanding is going to come by deeper and deeper experience.

You say something has happened to you through me but it is something which is inexpressible. Let it be so. Be happy. You are blessed. When something inexpressible starts happening then you are on the right track, you are moving towards God, the ultimate mystery. Whenever you have something within you which you cannot understand, that simply shows something bigger than you has entered in you - otherwise you could have understood it, you could have figured it out. Something bigger than the mind has penetrated you, a ray of light in the dark soul, a ray of light in the dark night of the mind. The mind cannot comprehend it; it is beyond its understanding. But not beyond understanding, remember. Beyond the understanding that is possible for the mind but not beyond understanding - because there is understanding which is not of the mind: the understanding of the total organ, of your total being, of your totality.

But that comes not by analysis, not by dissection; it comes by absorbing the experience. Eat it! That which is inexpressible has to be eaten by you. Jesus says to his disciples, 'Eat me.' That's what he means: eat the inexpressible, eat the unknown. Digest it, let it circulate into your blood. Let it become part of you. And then you will know. And the knowing will arise as suddenly as the experience has arisen.

Now a ray has entered in you. Allow it to become part of you - only then will you understand it.

This understanding is not the understanding you have been acquainted with up to now. You have known only the mind and its ways. It labels things very immediately. Whenever you ask what this is, what are you asking really? You see a bush and a flower and you say, 'What is this?' Somebody says 'a rosebush' and you think you have understood. Somebody has just uttered a word 'rose' and you think you have understood.

But if you don't know the name you feel a little disturbed. That unknown flower confronts you, challenges you. You feel your prestige is at stake. Because that unknown flower continuously says, 'You don't know me, so what kind of knowledge is yours? You don't know even me?' The flower goes on hitting hard at you and you start feeling disturbed. You want to know so that you can finish with this challenge. You go to the library, you look at the books, at the Encyclopedia Britannica; you find out what the name of this rose is. It is 'rose' - okay, you have labelled it. Now you can be at ease.

But what have you done? Just by putting a word to the rosebush do you think you have understood it? You have lost an opportunity of understanding. You have lost a great challenge. Because remember well - the name 'rose' is given by man to the rosebush, the rosebush does not know the name at all. If you talk about the rosebush to the rosebush, the rosebush will not understand it. What are you talking about? What nonsense are you talking about? The rosebush has no name as far as the bush itself is concerned - the name is given by others, given by people like you who cannot tolerate the unknowable anywhere.

The unknowable is such an uneasy thing, it creates so much discomfort. You see somebody; you say, 'Who is this man?' And then somebody says he is a Chinese, or an African, or a Japanese, and you feel at ease. What have you known? Just by saying that he is a Chinese.... There are millions of Chinese - eight hundred million - and no other Chinese is like him. In fact, nothing exists like THE Chinese. There are millions and millions of Chinese - each individual is unique, different; each has his own signature, his own being. What have you understood by labelling a man as a Chinese? But you feel at ease.

What religion does he belong to? He is a Buddhist. Another label has come into your hand. You know a little more now. To what party does he belong? He is a communist. Still a few more labels you gather - and then you think you have known the man.

Is knowledge as cheap as the mind thinks? Labelling is not knowledge. Labelling is a way to avoid the opportunity that was open. You could have known the man if you had got involved with him. You could have known the rosebush if you had meditated alone with it, if you had allowed its fragrance to enter into your nostrils and into your heart; if you had touched it with love. If you had had a communion with this rosebush you might have known something.

I don't say you can know the rosebush totally. If you can know a single rosebush totally then you have known the whole universe - because in the single rosebush the whole universe is involved: the sun and the moon and the stars and the past and the present and the future. All time and all space is converging on that small roseflower. If you can know it in its totality you will have known the whole universe. Then nothing is left behind. Each small thing is so great.

And when something like an unknown flower starts blooming within you, don't be in a hurry to dissect it; don't put it on the table and cut it and start looking for the ingredients. Enjoy it. Love it. Help it to grow. A grace has descended upon you. You have become a Hasid.

That is the meaning of Hasid - grace.