The Preceptor as God
Baba says that the role of a guru is vital. He is the one who opens the inner eye and shows the way to joy and happiness. Therefore, Guru Poornima is celebrated each year on July 13.
This day, Guru Poornima, is celebrated by people as a day to be thankful for their spiritual preceptors, those who initiated them into spiritual disciplines, and for mantra recitals, meditation, recitation of God’s name, and study of sacred texts. We have a popular saying, “Without a preceptor, all learning is blind.” But this saying refers to authentic gurus, those who have the double qualification of gu and ru: gu meaning devoid of gunas [attributes] and ru meaning devoid of rupa [form]—that is to say, those who have transcended form and flavor, those who have merged in God, in the Over-soul Itself. Only these gurus can help you to attain [self-realization].
The Vedas declare that the mother, father, and preceptor have to be treated as God. The mother brings forth and trains the emotions and intelligence, and fosters and feeds the body during the critical first few years of life. The father protects, guides, and supports the child till it is able to fend for itself. The preceptor opens the inner eye; he shows the way to joy and happiness here and hereafter. So the responsibility of the guru is overwhelming.
Today, we have gurus who scheme for earning riches and status; their minds are poisoned by the fumes of egotism and greed. They cause even the faithful to desert the path of discipline that they have entered. Others have vast learning, and consequently, they suffer from a swelled head and the infection of competition. God will not accept such men as His favorites. You may put in an envelope a letter written in exceptionally beautiful style, containing precious sentiments and decorated with charming drawings, but unless you affix a stamp, it cannot reach the person to whom it is addressed. On the other hand, the paper may be crumpled and cheap, the sentiments may be commonplace, and the style may be poor, but fix the stamp, and the letter reaches its destination. What is essential is the yearning, the anguish. If that is evident, the prayer will reach God.
Eternal Vigilance is the Price of Peace
Every object in nature, every incident in time, is really speaking and teaching you a lesson, as the postal stamp does. One morning, Dakshinamurthi [the deity presiding over human effort to attain wisdom] was walking slowly along the seashore. He looked at the waves and drew a lesson from them. He saw the waves, slowly but systematically, carrying a bit of straw toward the shore, passing it from one crest to another until it was deposited on land.
The sea is a broad expanse; it is deep and mighty. But, yet, it is constantly engaged in clearing itself of all extraneous things. It knows that you must not neglect a desire. Like the straw, you must force it back onto the shore where it can do no harm. Eternal vigilance is the price of peace and happiness. Dakshinamurthi exclaimed, “Wonderful! The sea has taught me a great lesson”—the lesson being that danger lurks when desire raises its head.
Take the example of Sita. She was the daughter of the greatest knower of Truth and philosopher of the age, Janaka. She was the consort of the Lord; her father-in-law was the mighty emperor Dasaratha. Nevertheless, when her Lord was exiled and sent into the forest for 14 years, she gave up all the luxuries to which she had become accustomed and insisted on being taken by Him into the same forest as His companion. What tremendous detachment! What admirable adherence to the dictates of morality! But when she saw a golden deer in the woods, a desire entered her heart; as a result, she had to suffer the agony of separation from the Lord. That is the tragedy of desire arising from the senses and the mind. He who instructs you to give up desire is the real guru.
Keep the Heart Cool, Pure, and Soft
Each religion emphasizes one name and one form of God and recommends it for acceptance. Some even insist that God has no other name or form. But the Reality is beyond name and form, it has akshara (the indestructible, eternal) as its characteristic and Om as its form. You reach the akshara stage—the stage of attributeless unity—in three steps of spiritual practice: (1) I am Yours, (2) You are mine, and (3) You are myself. Through spiritual practice, each person must transcend this duality of “I” and “You.” “I” is only the reflection of “You” in this body. The consummation is reached when duality is superseded. That is why it has been declared, “It is good to be born in a church, but it is not good to die in it.” That is to say, before life ends, all must go beyond the limits set by institutionalized religion and reach the vast limitless expanse of the oversoul, which pervades all.
As the Judge from Calcutta [the previous speaker] said just now in his speech, the head is of no help in this spiritual practice; the heart must win the goal. Ramadas of Bhadrachalam used to write on palm leaves hundreds of songs on his favorite deity, Rama. After a while, the leaves accumulated into a gigantic pile. One day, Ramadas stood by its side and wondered, “Am I the fellow who wrote all these? Did I write them for my satisfaction or for pleasing Rama?” He carried the whole pile and threw it into the Godavari River. Only 108 songs floated on the water; the rest sank and were lost forever. Those 108 came forth from the heart; the rest were products of intelligence, of cleverness. They rose from the head. God does not reside in the head; He is the dweller in the heart. Keep the heart cool, pure, and soft—as the moonlight is on this day, Guru Poornima.
To do this, your mind has to be cleansed, and it can only cleanse itself. Just as you shape an iron sickle or axe with an iron hammer, the mind is both the shaper and the shaped. The power behind the mind that helps it to shape itself well is faith in God. That is why it is declared that you must have faith in God, holy places, scriptures, and soothsayers, as well as in the mantra [with which the preceptor initiates you], the drug [that cures you of illness], and the teacher [who leads you to self-realization]. Cultivate that faith, and everything else will be added unto you.
Source: Sathya Sai Speaks, Vol. IX
