The Desireless Path

The third question:

Neither a theist nor an atheist, they cannot be disciples. They have already taken the attitude, they have already decided, so what is the point of being a disciple? If you already know, how can you be a disciple? Discipleship means the realization that, "I don't know." Atheists, theists - no, they cannot be disciples.

And if you believe in something you will miss the beauty of discipleship. If you know something already, that knowing will give you ego. It will not make you humble. That's why pundits and scholars miss. Sometimes sinners have reached, but scholars never. They know too much; they are so clever. Their cleverness is their disease; that becomes the suicide. They will not listen because they will not be ready to learn.

Discipleship simply means an attitude to learn - moment to moment remaining aware that "I don't know." This knowing that "I don't know," this awareness that "I am ignorant," gives you opening; then you are not closed.

The moment you say, "I know," you are a closed circle; the door is no more open. But when you say, "I don't know," it means you are ready to learn. It means the door is open.

If you have already reached, concluded, you cannot be a disciple. One has to be in a receptive mood. One has to be continuously aware that the real is unknown and "Whatsoever I know is trivial, is just rubbish." What do you know? You may have gathered much information, but that is not knowledge. You may have accumulated much dust through universities; that is not knowledge. You may know about Buddha, you may know about Jesus, but that is not knowledge. Unless you become a Buddha, there is no knowledge. Unless you are the Jesus, there is no knowledge

Knowledge comes through being, not through memory. You can have a trained memory; memory is just a mechanism. It will not give you a richer being. It may give you nightmarish dreams, but it will not give you a richer being. You will remain the same covered with much dust. Knowledge, and particularly the ego that comes through knowledge - the feeling that "I know" closes you. Now you cannot be a disciple. And if you cannot be a disciple, you cannot enter the discipline of yoga. So come to the door of yoga ignorant - alert of your ignorance, alert that you don't know. And I will tell you: this is the only knowledge which will help, the knowledge that "I don't know."

This will make you humble. A subtle humility will come to you. The ego, by and by, will subside. Knowing that you don't know, how can you be egoistic? Knowledge is the most subtle food for ego: you feel you are something. You know; you become somebody.

Just two days before, I initiated a girl from the West into sannyas and I gave her a name, "Yoga Sambodhi" and I asked, "Will it be easy for you to pronounce?" She said, "Yes. It looks just like the English word 'somebody'." But sambodhi is quite the opposite. When you become nobody, then sambodhi happens. Sambodhi means enlightenment. If you are somebody, sambodhi will never happen. That "somebodiness" is the barrier.

When you feel you are nobody, when you feel you are nothing, suddenly you are available to many mysteries to happen to you. Your doors are open. The sun can rise; the sunrays can penetrate you. Your gloom, your darkness, will disappear. But you are closed. The sun may be knocking on the door, but there is no opening; not even a window is open.

Atheists or theists, Hindus or Mohammedans, Christians or Buddhists, they cannot enter on the path. They believe. They have already reached without reaching anywhere. They have concluded without any realization. They have words in the minds - concepts, theories, scriptures. And the more the burden, the more they are dead.

The fourth question:

No, I never said that yoga doesn't ask for faith. I said yoga doesn't ask for any belief. Faith is totally different, trust is totally different. [In this context faith = trust.] Belief is an intellectual thing, but faith is a very deep intimacy. It is not intellectual. You love a Master, then you trust and there is faith. But this faith is not in any concept, it is in the very person. And this is not a condition; it is not required - remember this distinction. It is not required that you must have faith in the Master; it is not a precondition. All that is said is this: if trust happens between you and the Master, then satsang will be possible. It is just a situation, not a condition. Nothing is required.

Just as love... If love happens then marriage can follow, but you cannot make love a condition, that first you must love and then marriage will follow. But then you will ask, "How one can love? If it happens, it happens; if it is not happening, it is not happening." You cannot do anything. So you cannot force trust.

In the old days seekers will roam all over the world. They will roam from one Master to another, just waiting for the phenomenon to happen. You cannot force it. You may pass through many Masters, just in search if somewhere something clicks. Then the thing has happened; it is not a condition. You cannot go to a Master and try to trust him. How can you try to trust? The very try, the very effort, shows you don't trust. How can you try to love someone? Or can you? If you try, the whole thing has become false. It is a happening.

But unless this happens, satsang will not be possible. Then the Master cannot give his grace to you. Not that he will prevent himself from giving, you are not available. He cannot do anything. You are not open.

The sun may be waiting near the window but it is closed, what the sun can do? The rays will reflect back. They will come, knock on the door and go back. Remember, it is not a condition that you open the door and sun will rise; it is not a condition! The sun may not be there, it may be night. Just by opening your door you cannot create the sun. Your opening of the door is just your being available. If the sun is there, he can enter.

So seekers will move, will have to move from one Master to another. The only thing to remember is, they must remain open and they should not judge. If you come near a Master, you don't feel any turning with him, move - but don't judge. Because your judgment will be wrong. You have never been in contact. Unless you love, you don't know, so don't judge. Simply say, "This Master is not for me; I am not for this Master. The thing has not happened." You simply move on.

If you start judging, then you are closing yourself for other Masters also. You may have to pass through many, many situations, but remember this: don't judge. Whenever you feel that something is wrong with the Master, move. That means you cannot trust. Something has gone wrong, you cannot trust. But don't say the Master is wrong; you don't know. You simply move; that's enough. You seek somewhere else.

If you start judging, condemning, concluding, then you will be closed. And these eyes which judge will never be able to trust. Once you have become a victim of judgment you will never be able to trust because you will find something or other which will help you not to trust, which will give you a closing.

So don't trust, don't judge, move. Someday, if you go on moving, the thing is bound to happen: someday, somewhere, in some moment, because there are moments - you cannot do anything about them when you are vulnerable, and when the Master is flowing. You are vulnerable, you meet. In a certain point of time and space, the meeting happens. Then satsang becomes possible.

Satsang means close proximity with a Master, with a man who has known. Because then, he can flow. He is already flowing. Sufis say that that's enough. Just to be in close proximity of a Master, that is enough. Just to sit near him, just to walk by the side of him, just to sit outside his room, just to watch in the night just sitting outside his wall, just to go on remembering, that's enough.

But it takes years, these years of waiting. And he will not treat you well, remember he will create every type of hindrance. He will give you many chances to judge. He will spread rumors about himself so you can think that he is wrong, you can escape. He will help you in every way to escape. Unless you pass all these hurdles... And they are necessary, because a cheap trust is of no use. A trust, a seasoned trust, which has waited long, has become a strong rock... Only then the deepest layers can be penetrated.

Patanjali doesn't say that you will have to believe. Belief is intellectual. You believe in Hinduism, it is not your trust. It is just that accidentally you were born in a Hindu family, and so you have heard; from the very childhood you have been impregnated. You have been impressed about theories, concepts, philosophies, systems. They have become part of your blood. They have just fallen into your unconscious; you believe in them. But that belief is of no use because it has not transformed you. It is a dead thing, borrowed.

A trust is never a dead thing. You cannot borrow a trust from your family. It is a personal phenomenon. you will have to come to it. Hinduism is traditional, Mohammedanism is traditional.

The first group around Mohammed - they were the real Moslems - because it was a trust for them; they had come personally to the Master. They had lived with the Master in close proximity; they had satsang. They had a faith in Mohammed, and Mohammed is not a man easily to be trusted. Difficult.

If you had been to Mohammed you will escape. He had nine wives. Impossible to believe in such a man. He had a sword in his hand, and on his sword was written, "Peace is the motto"; the word 'Islam' means peace. How can you believe this man?

You can believe in a Mahavira when he says "Nonviolence"; he is non-violent. Obviously, you can believe in Mahavira. How can you believe in Mohammed with a sword? And he says, "Love is the message and peace is the motto." You cannot believe. This man is creating hurdles. He was a Sufi; he was a Master. He will create every difficulty. So if your mind still functions, you doubt, you are skeptical, you escape. But if you remain, wait, if you have patience - and infinite patience will be needed - someday you will come to know Mohammed, you will become a Muslim. Just by knowing him, you will become a Muslim.

The first group of disciples was a totally different thing. The first group of disciples of Buddha was a totally different thing. Now Buddhists are dead. Mohammedans are dead. They are traditionally Mohammedans.

Truth cannot be transferred like property. Your parents cannot give you truth. They can give you property because the property belongs to the world. Truth doesn't belong to the world; they cannot give it to you, they cannot have it treasured. They cannot have it in the bank so that it can be transferred to you. You will have to seek on your own. You will have to suffer, and you will have to become a disciple and you will have to pass through rigorous discipline. It will be a personal happening. Truth is always personal. It happens to a person. Trust is different, belief is different. Belief is given by others, trust is earned by yourself.

Patanjali doesn't require any belief, but without trust nothing can be done, without trust nothing is possible. But you cannot force it - understand. You cannot force your trust; it is not in your hands to force it. If you force, it will be false. And no-trust is better than a false trust, because you are wasting yourself. It is better to move somewhere else where the real can happen.

Don't judge, go on moving. Someday, somewhere, your Master is waiting. And the Master cannot be shown to you - "Go here and this will be your Master." You will have to seek, you will have to suffer, because through suffering and seeking you will be able to see him. Your eyes will become clear; the tears will disappear. Your eyes will be unclouded and you will realize that this is the Master.

It is reported:

One of the Sufis, Junaid, came to an old fakir, and he asked him, "I have heard that you know. Show me the path." The old man said, "You have heard that I know. You don't know. Look at me and feel."

The man said, "I cannot feel anything. Just do one thing: show me the path where I can find my Master." So the old man said, "You go first to Mecca. Have the pilgrimage and search such and such a man. He will be sitting under a tree. His eyes will be such: they will be throwing light, and you will feel a certain perfume like musk around him. Go and seek."

And Junaid traveled and traveled for twenty years. Wherever he heard a Master is, he will go. But neither the tree was there, nor the perfume, the musk, nor those eyes the old man has described. The personality was not there. And he had a ready-made formula, so he will judge immediately, "This is not my Master," and he will move ahead.

After twenty years he reached under a tree. The Master was there. The musk was floating in the air, just like a haze around the man. The eyes were fiery, a red light was falling. This is the man. He fell into his feet and said, "Master, I have been searching for you for twenty years."

The Master said, "I am also waiting for you twenty years. Look again." He looked. This was the same man twenty years before who has shown him the way to find the Master. Junaid started weeping. He said, "What? You played a joke upon me? Twenty years wasted Why couldn't you say that you are my Master?"

The old man said, "That would not have helped; that was of not much use - because unless you have eyes to see... These twenty years helped you to see me; I am the same man. But twenty years before you had told me that 'I don't feel anything.' I am the same, but now you have become capable to feel. You have changed. These twenty years rubbed you hard. All the dust has fallen; your mind is clear. This fragrance of musk was there that time also, but you were not capable to smelling it. Your nose was closed; your eyes were not functioning; your heart was not really beating. So, contact was not possible."

You don't know nobody can say where the trust will happen. I don't say trust the Master, I simply say find a person where trust happens - that person is your Master. And you cannot do anything about it. You will have to wander. The thing is certain to happen, but the seeking is necessary because seeking prepares you. Not that the seeking leads you to the Master, seeking prepares you so that you can see. He may be just near you.

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