Life & Teachings of Ramana Maharshi
by Sw.Madhavtirth
Swami Madhavtirtha (1895-1960) was a prolific writer on a wide variety of spiritual topics. He had studied Vedanta and found himself increasingly attracted to the teachings of Sri Aurobindo, which failed to satisfy him. His first and only visit to the Ashram for two weeks took place in 1944. In his book 'The Life and Teachings of Ramana Maharshi' (original in Gujarati), he wrote that the visit substantially changed the course of his life.
I should like to refer to a somewhat mystical experience I had during my visit. It is rather difficult to describe such an experience but I shall try to convey some idea about it by borrowing an analogy from the Bhagavatam. Sometime before the birth of Lord Krishna, it is said, the Lord entered the heart of Vasudeva, who then shined like the sun. Later, that light passed into Devaki through a mere look of Vasudeva, after which she shined like the moon.
On the very first day of my darshan of the Maharshi in the dining hall, I found in the look of the sage the dazzling brilliance of the sun. On a subsequent day, while in the presence of the Maharshi in the hall, I recognised the same brilliance in the look of the sage. It seemed to pierce me to the core of my being, even as the light of the Lord passed into Devaki through the look of Vasudeva. My breath seemed to stop for a while and my mind was elevated into some spiritual realm of unutterable peace and happiness.
I had authored a small book entitled 'Maya' in which I had attempted to relate certain ideas on the reality of the world to those propounded by Einstein in his theory of relativity. I had sent the Maharshi a copy of my book prior to my visit. It was a revelation to me that the Maharshi could judge offhand, as it were, such modern theories as that of relativity, proceeding entirely on the basis of his own experience of the Absolute.
While sitting in the hall, I observed the Maharshi resting on his couch wholly unconcerned with what was taking place in his presence. From the constant flow of visitors who prostrated before him and moved one after the other, I could easily discern in him the attitude of oneness with all. I can confidently say that it was through his abhinnabhava (feeling of parity for all) that he touched the inner being of visitors, who were then able to feel within themselves the presence of the universal spirit, transcending thought.
Having realised that the Maharshi was radiating the power of the Self in this way, I decided to ask how I could best prepare myself to receive the transmission of grace while sitting in his presence. He said, “You will get spiritual help sitting in this hall if you keep yourself still. The aim is to give up all practices. When the mind becomes still, the power of Self will be experienced. The waves of Self will be experienced. The waves of the Self are pervading everywhere. If the mind is at peace, one begins to experience them.“
The reciprocal relationship between the Maharshi and his abhinnabhava and the aspirant sitting in his presence is analogous to that of a radio transmitter and a receiver. If the visitor is anxious to receive the fullest benefit of the benign influence radiating from the silent presence of the sage, he must attune his mind, which according to the analogy will be the receiving set tuned to proper wavelength.
The silence of the sage is constant and exercises uninterruptedly its benign influence, whether the sage appears to be outwardly aware of the world or not. Reverting to the analogy of the transmitter, I may say that so far as the sage is concerned, his spiritual influence is transmitting unceasingly. But from the point of view of the seeker, who is still subject to the veiling power of maya, the continued beneficent influence exercised by the sage will have no apparent effect unless the seeker is ready to receive it.
When I enquired whether I should gaze at his eyes or his face, or should close my eyes and concentrate on a particular object, he replied, “Gaze at your own real nature. Everywhere there is one, so it is all the same whether you keep your eyes open or closed. If you wish to meditate, do so on the ‘I’ that is within you. It is atman.”
When asked about the required sitting posture, the sage’s view was that stability in Self was the real posture. The compulsion of having a particular kind of posture could make the mind agitated.
Regarding the swaadhyaya (personal study) he said, “Self is the real book. You can glance anywhere in that book; nobody can take it away from you.Whenever you are free turn towards Self.Thereafter you may read whatever you like.”
About the problem of weariness, fear and anxiety, he said, “Find out to whom the problem occurs. By conducting this inquiry these things will disappear. If you direct your mind towards Self, fear and anxiety will go away.“
The Maharshi told me that ‘I’ (ahamkara) feeling is the root of all thoughts. If you destroy the root, the leaves and branches will wither away. Having put the question ‘Who am I’? before the mind, one should search for the root of the ‘I’ and make very sincere and persistent efforts to stop other thoughts. In all sadhanas the mind has to be kept quiet. Further, to get the experience one should not rely on buddhi alone, but should combine it with a firm conviction (bhavana) about one’s success through continued effort against all odds.
The Maharshi said that when camphor bums nothing remains afterwards. In the same way, while searching the Self all efforts must be made to ensure that the mind is burnt out. So long as the world is not realised to be false, thoughts of the world will keep on coming. Without the mind there is no world. In sleep, since there is no mind, there is no world. The world exists in relation to the mind. It is not a thing independent and existing by itself.
Once a visitor asked, why does God allow so much injustice to go on and why there is so much insufficiency among us?The Maharshi replied, “Go to God and ask Him about it. If you cannot go to Him as you are admitting, how to ask the question? Weak people do not get liberation.” In answer to another question, the Maharshi said, “So long as the body is there, some activity is bound to happen. Only the attitude ‘I am the doer’ has to be given up. The activities do not obstruct. It is the attitude ‘I did’ that is the obstruction. Further, so long as an external object is required [for happiness], incompleteness is felt. When it is felt that atman alone is there, permanent happiness stays.“
The Maharshi disagreed with Sri Aurobindo’s view that getting established in the Self in a perfect manner is not possible through a normal human body. For this, according to Sri Aurobindo, it was necessary to have a vignanamaya sarira, that is, a body which will not be attacked by disease and not die without one’s desire.
The Maharshi’s replies were always very cogent. Every word seemed to have a force that made disputation entirely out of place.
Although the Maharshi gave forthright answers to questions, at no point of time did he insist that he alone was right.
During one conversation that I noted down, he pointed out that the evangelical fervour that can be found in many religious zealots is merely a manifestation of their egos.
The Maharshi never wanted to impose Hindu ideas on those who would not appreciate them. If Christians, Muslims and others came to him for advice, he would propound the essential mystical teachings of their own religion and ask them to strive for union with their own particular chosen God.
The Maharshi never encouraged worship of his form. He refused to let himself be garlanded and would not permit any one to do puja to him.
Whether the Maharshi spoke in order to clear the doubts of an earnest aspirant, or whether he sat in perfect silence, one received a fresh illumination, a new angle of vision and sometimes a very inspiring reorientation of one’s spiritual outlook.
Embodying the Advaitic truth, the one universal spirit transcending the bounds of time and space, the Maharshi truly represents in himself the University of Spiritual Education.
Q: Is the world real or false?
M: So long as there is mind, the world is there. During sleep there is no mind, so the world is not there.
Q: While I am sleeping, other people who are awake continue to see the world.
M: The people who are awake at that time are part of the world [whose existence you are trying to prove], so what they say cannot be taken as a piece of admissible evidence. At that time [when you are asleep] it [first] has to be proved whether or not other people exist. That which has to be proved cannot be taken for granted as existent. Their existence has to be proved independently, but such a proof cannot be found. Those who are awake have minds that are moving; that is why they see the world. So, the world exists in relation to the mind. It is not a thing independent and existing by itself.
Q: What is the relationship between maya, the power that makes us take the world to be real, and Atman, the reality itself?
M: A man gets married in a dream and there the groom is real but the wife is false. And when he wakes up he is the same man as before. Similarly, the real Atman always remains as it is. It does not get affected or contaminated by maya. It does not marry either maya or anatma [the not-Self] because it is complete, whereas the substance of the world is unreal.
The individual ‘I’ is like the dream state of the man. When it begins to arise, the mind and the sense organs begin to operate. When it goes, they also go away. The root of all perceived material things is this ‘I’. Aham, ‘I’, is real, but ahankara, the ego ‘I’, is false.
Q: Just as in a rope the knowledge of the serpent is false, so in Brahman the knowledge of the world is false.
M: That is correct. It is not necessary to keep knowledge of a thing that is not real.
Q: It could be said the window has come out of the wood, but still it is not separate from the wood. If one can give up the knowledge of the work done on the wood, then it is wood only.
M: That is true.
Q: In a rope a snake is seen. It is possible to argue that, for the illusion to be effective, one must have seen a real snake at some other place and time in order to know what a snake looks like. Only then can the illusion occur. In the same way, if at some place the real world is seen, then only can an illusion of it appear in Brahman.
M: That [analogy] is known as anyatha khyati [an argument put forward by the Nyaya school of philosophy], but it has no validity.
Q: In the alatha-shanti of Gaudapada’s Karika [v. 97], it is said that if the slightest vaidharmata bhava [the attitude that there is something that exists other than the Self] remains, then oneness will not be established and the breaking of the veil that covers the Self will not take place. In that context, what is the meaning of vaidharmata?
M: In that verse the term vaidharmata should be understood to be parichinna bhava [an attitude of restriction]. If you want God, he is there all the time. So long as the world is not realised to be false, thoughts of the world will keep on coming. So long as the snake is seen, the rope does not appear. The mind that creates the world will not be able to take the world as false. As it happens in the dream state, so it also happens in the waking state. Without the mind there is no world. In sleep, since there is no mind, there is no world. Therefore it is not necessary to think of the world that is imagined by the mind.
That which is nitya nivritta [always removed, that is, never existing] need not be given any thought to. A barber, after having thrown out someone’s hair does not count how many are black and how many are white as all of them have to be thrown away. Similarly, it is not necessary to count imaginary things. It is only necessary to cease to imagine that they are true. To remove the snake from the rope, it is not necessary to kill the snake. In the same way it is not necessary to kill the mind. By understanding the complete non-existence of the mind, the mind will go away.
The experience that is without the seer and the seen, that is without time and space, is the real experience. When we have a dream, we see many varieties of forms. Out of them we believe one form to be ‘my’ form and we also believe that ‘I am that’. If we are the manufacturer of the dream, then we are the actor in all the forms in the dream as well as the actor in our own form. The one who has the dream believes that all the forms [in the dream] are real, and that they are separate from each other. And he also believes that in the dream he himself has a form. He is not aware that he is both the actor of the dream and all the other forms [that he sees]. He realises on waking that everything in the dream was he and he alone. In the same way, a jnani knows that the world [being only a dream] is never created. Whatever is there is all his own Self, one and undivided.
Q: In golden ornaments both the gold and the ornaments seem to be real. The only difference is that the piece of gold does not have the same beauty as the ornament. Likewise, both Brahman and the world appear to be real.
M: Whether you keep the gold or the gold ornaments, in both, the basic material is the same. The name given to a form is for everyday activities. If there were a lot of gold ornaments lying around, and if we were to say, ‘Please get the gold’, the job could not be done. Similarly, there is only one ‘I’ and it is the same in all people, but for worldly activities we cannot say, ‘Please call that “I”’. That is why some ‘I’s are called ‘Ramachandran’ and some ‘Krishna Lal’. Even so, there is only one ‘I’.
Q: If the ‘I’ at one place calls the ‘I’ at some other place ‘you’, many mistakes will happen.
M: During worldly activity, if your attention is fixed on the fundamental reality, there is no difficulty. But ordinary people forget the reality and take the name alone to be real. The different ‘I’s are not real. There is only one ‘I’. The separate ‘I’ is like a watchman in a fort. He is like the protector of the body. The real owner in everybody is only the one real ‘I’. So, when the separate ‘I’ surrenders to the real ‘I’, then, [because the idea of a separate self who ‘owns’ the body disappears], ‘I’ and mine are eliminated. The true state comes into existence when, after sorting out what belongs to whom, the ego ‘I’ surrenders itself to the real owner.
Q: If such teachings are spread in the world there will be no wars.
M: [No reply.]
Q: In order to make an effective effort for Self-knowledge, does one have to reduce other activities or not?
M: The Self has no relationship with either activity or non-activity. The Self remains as it is by its own sakti. Think of that.
Q: How to get Self-knowledge?
M: To whom does this question occur? You should think of him.
Q: Is mula prakritti [the seed or root out of which all material things evolve] the form of consciousness?
M: Yes.
Q: Is lower prakritti [matter] inert?
M: It appears to be inert. In reality there is only one essence and that is why everything is consciousness only.
Q: As a tree grows out of a seed, likewise does multiplicity come from the one?
M: When you realise the one, the many will not be seen.
Q: Then how did multiplicity come into being?
M: It is because of delusion that it is seen like that.
Q: How did delusion occur?
M: To whom does this question arise? Think of that.
Q: How to do that?
M: The delusion that has come by wrong thinking will go by correct thinking.
Q: What is the thing called jivatma [individual self]?
M: To whom does this question occur? Think of that, meaning, think of who you are. And by thinking of what you really are, all the difficulties will be removed.
Q: In one of your books it is written that the mind should be annihilated. How to do this work?
M: It will be easy to destroy the mind if one knows the real nature of the mind.
Q: Is the remembrance of past samskaras [the ingrained habits of the mind that cause it to behave in a particular way] called ‘mind’?
M: The samskaras and the results of those samskaras are not real. During sleep they go away.
Q: How to control such a mind?
M: Except for enquiry into the self, there is no way that the mind can be destroyed.
Q: How to meditate?
M: Being aware of the Self is the real meditation. When the mind gives up its habit of choosing and deciding, it turns towards its own real nature. At that time it gets into the established state. When the ego gets more powerful, entry into this state does not take place.
Q: Should we be patriotic and should we not serve our country?
M: First be what you are. Therein lies all truth and happiness. While trying to become someone else, the ahankara gets in. You think that the world will be conquered by your power, but when you turn inwards towards the Self, you will know that a higher power is working everywhere.
Q: Does God bestow grace on jivas or not?
M: However much you remember God, God remembers you much more.
Q: Why does God allow so much injustice to go on and why is there so much insufficiency among us?
M: Go to God and ask him about it.
Q: I cannot go there to him.
M: If you cannot go to him, how to ask the question? Weak people do not get liberation.
Q: What I cannot see with my eyes I do not believe in. God is not seen by me, so I do not believe in him.
M: I cannot see your brains. So what is wrong if I believe that you have no brains?
Q: Will we have to undergo the fruits of our present karma in the next birth or not?
M: Are you born now? Why do you think of other births? The fact is, birth and death are not real. The thoughts of rebirth are the thoughts of ignorance. Through the thoughts of Self-knowledge the thoughts of birth and death get snapped and one gets established in the Self. Truly, actions do not trouble us. It is only the sense of performing actions that does. The idea of doing the actions or leaving them is false. Think of the one who does the karma.
Q: We should make all men the same.
M: Put everyone to sleep and everyone will be the same.
Q: Who is sleeping?
M: The knower, pramata, is sleeping. Adhistana does not wake up or sleep. During sleep, the knower, the means of knowing and the known get dissolved, leaving the activityless state of Atman.
Q: If the Atman is without activity at that time, how then does it know itself?
M: For the Atman there is nothing to know or be known. It is the one who has no knowledge who has to make an effort to gain knowledge. This is what takes place in the waking state. Anatman, which is the not-Self, which can also be called chidabhasa, the reflected consciousness, has the ignorance, so this reflected consciousness has to make an effort for jnana, or knowledge. Knowing and not knowing happen in the not-self.
The Self does not have to obtain knowledge, for it is knowledge itself. When the knower, the reflected consciousness, is felt, at that time ajnana or ignorance is present. The one who feels this ignorance then makes an effort to attain jnana, which is knowledge. When the reflected consciousness gets the knowledge, it no longer remains. This is because the reflected consciousness always remains with ignorance or mityajnana [false knowledge].
During sleep there is no reflected consciousness. So, [at that time], the false knowledge is not to be obtained. To know the Self means to know the form of the Self. This [explanation] is all from the point of view of the current conversation. In reality, there is only the Atman. Because this is so, there is nothing to know and nothing to be known.
Q: In Mysore State somebody has written a book called Mulavidyanirasa [The Removal of Basic Ignorance]. Have you seen it?
M: In the Self there is no ignorance, so there is no need to remove it.
Q: I do not know how to give up karma.
M: Why do you believe that you are the one who does the karma? Let me give you an example: think of how you came here. You got into a bullock cart at your house, reached the station and boarded the train. Then the train started and eventually reached the station where you got down. Then you got into a bullock cart again and now you are sitting here. When I ask you [about your trip] you say, ‘I came here from my village’. Is this true? The cart and the train moved, not you. Just as, through a mistake, you believe the movement of the cart and the train to be your own, so also all other actions, through a similar mistake, you believe to be yours. These actions are not yours, they are Bhagavan’s.
Q: If one were to keep such a state of non-action, the mind would become void and no worldly activities could be done.
M: First obtain this state where no differences arise and then tell me whether actions can be done or not. Truly speaking, so long as the body is there, some activity is bound to happen. Only the attitude ‘I am the doer’ has to be given up. The activities do not obstruct. It is the attitude ‘I did’ that is the obstruction.
Q: If such a sight of unity is given to everyone, they are likely to remain in this mode and fall into immorality.
M: Misconduct, hatred and attachment are the result of the differences caused by the discriminative intellect. When the proper sense of oneness comes, thoughts of misconduct will not arise.
Q: In the nirvikalpa state [the state in which no differences arise], if there is nothing there except the Atman, how does one get ananda [bliss]?
M: You think that you can only get happiness when there is contact with something separate from you. But that is not the truth. Ananda is the very nature of the Self. The happiness that you get from other things is part of the happiness of the Atman, but it is not the complete happiness. So long as an external object is required [for happiness], incompleteness is felt. When it is felt that the Atman alone is there, permanent happiness stays. If it were not so and if happiness were to be obtained from external things, then, to give an example, as the number of people in a family increases, and the amount of one’s wealth increases, happiness should increase to the same extent. And as the quantity of these things decreases, happiness should decrease by the same amount. Furthermore, during sleep, when external objects have all gone away, at that time unhappiness should be felt. In sleep, though, you feel that there is nothing. Yet, when a man wakes up from sleep, he says, ‘I slept very happily’. So, when nothing exists except the Atman, then there is happiness.
Whenever the things we like appear before the Atman, at that time the mind feels the Atman. Truly speaking, ananda exists only within the Atman, and apart from it there is no other ananda. And that ananda is not separate or far away. If you are in a state that is giving you the experience of ananda, at that time you are actually diving into the Atman. It is because of this diving into the Atman that you get the bliss of the Atman. However, because of your association with incorrect thoughts, you project [the cause of] the ananda on to external things. When you experience ananda, you are unknowingly diving into the Atman. The truth of one’s own real nature, which is the Atman, is that it is an undivided oneness. One’s own reality is ananda. That is what you are. If you were to dive knowingly into the Atman, with the conviction born of this experience, then the state of Self would be experienced.
Q: Worries of worldly life trouble me much and I do not find happiness anywhere.
M: Do these worries trouble you in sleep?
Q: No.
M: Are you the same person now as you were in sleep, or are you not?
Q: Yes.
M: So, it proves that the worries do not belong to you. Those who believe the mind to be real will not be able to subdue it. In the state in which the mind appears to be real, the thief [the mind] cheats by putting on the dress of the policeman [in order to pretend to catch himself]. Hence, we must know how to destroy the mind by knowing its real nature.
People ask me how to control the mind. The answer is, ‘Show me the mind’. It is but a bundle of thoughts. How will the mind, which is a collection of thoughts, come under control by a thought of controlling it? Reach its source, therefore. Seek the Atman. All misery will come to an end if you turn your mind inwards. If you feel that the world is created by the imagination of the individual soul, then that imagination must be given up. If you think that God has created the world, then surrender to Him all your responsibilities and leave the burden of the whole world to Him.