| | | One
sadhak said, "I hear it said that the body is transient, unclean, derived
from uncleanliness. I hear this not once, but a number of times. I came here for
spiritual training. I was told to observe my body. Time and again, the exhortation
ran, 'Perceive your body!' I felt confused. Whatever is impure, transient, mortal,
heterogenous, unclean, a mere skeleton of flesh and bone, deserves no attention.
One comes here for meditation, to witness something great, to perceive the soul
or to meet God face to face. What is the utility of perceiving one's body? None,
whatever. Besides, this physical organism is meant for experiencing pleasure,
to be seated in comfort, to feel the cool breeze, drink cold water and eat hot
food. That is after all the main use of the body. The body is a means of experiencing
pleasure; it is meant for enjoyment. Why deprive it for nothing? During, meditation
one has to sit in one posture. The whole body begins to ache; the feet ache. The
whole body gets wet with perspiration. This amounts to oppressing the body, troubling
it unnecessarily."
A great many questions are possible. But if we
get entangled with questioning and counter-questioning, we shall never come to
the end of it. We would never arrive at a satisfactory resolution. So we must
not, complicate the issue. Let us concede that the body is unclean, impure, mortal
and transient. And also let us concede that man does torment it. Let us take things
the way the questioner wants us to take them, so as not to cause undue provocation.
I
accepted the questioner's arguments. I said, "Yes, the body is unclean. You
heard it said and someone told you. Both are right; neither the teller nor the
listener is wrong. We cannot but acknowledge that every man is born and dies;
that every man is transient. We know that the body casts forth many impurities.
If it is not regularly cleaned, no one would care to come near it because, of
the terrible stench exuding there from. The sweat gives out an offensive smell.
So does the urine and the excrement. The body is unclean. Thanks to nature, our
sense of sight, of hearing and touch is limited. These senses function only at
certain frequencies. If their functioning were not limited, man would not be able
to withstand his own body. The pressure of the senses would then be so great as
to drive him mad. Nature has so ordained that while man's capacity for knowledge
is boundless, his senses partake only a little of that knowledge. If ears could
hear all the words, man would go crazy in a day. If eyes could see all the things,
man will not be able to sleep, and would certainly lose his sanity. If the nose
were to smell everything all at once, man would not be able to keep his equilibrium
even for a moment. He would feel like vomiting all the time, because of the smell.
It is therefore good that each sense functions at a certain frequency, otherwise
living would be a great burden. Man would then not be able to hear anything, nor
see anything, nor smell anything. He would have been so pestered by sense-objects
as to lose his senses altogether.
The scientists once constructed a sound-proof
house, where sounds from outside could not enter, nor sounds from within go out.
And some of these scientists sat in the house for observation. Soon they heard
noises which seemed to come from a machine. They wondered wherefrom these noises
came. How could any noise enter a sound-proof house from without? Investigations
revealed that nothing was coming from outside, and that all the noises which they
heard proceeded from the great factory within the human body itself The flow of
blood in the arteries, and the working of the great nervous system - all the sounds
originated from these.
Because of the outside noises, we cannot hear the
noises within. When the outer noises stop, we become sensible of the inner workings.
Only when an individual enters the depths of meditation concentrating on perception
of his body, he becomes aware of the innumerable vibrations 'm various parts of
his body, not before. That is how our bodies are organised, making life possible.
I
do not deny that the body is impure and unclean. And I also acknowledge the fact
that in the practice of various techniques, the body suffers some initial discomfort.
Those used to getting up at seven, have to leave their bed at four. The discomfort
caused is undeniable. Though one of the sadhaks says, "This is no discomfort,
whatsoever. Waking up is no trouble; on the contrary, it is a joy. I used to get
up at seven. Now I get up at four. I have three more hours of waking time, which
is a distinct advantage. However, in the shiver, we are made to practise one-hour
meditation four times a day. This is too much. The body is not accustomed to it.
The duration of meditation should be less."
I said, "it will
be more comfortable, if there is no meditation. Why meditate at all? Better no
meditation than less. We have prescribed the bare minimum. Otherwise no adequate
results would follow. If you are not prepared to do that, why attend a shiver?"
The
sadhak persisted, "We are made to do asanas. The body aches all over. There
is pain in the back. The feet ache too. The muscles get strained. Doing asanas
is a torment.
I replied, "Pain is not really caused by the asanas.
Doing yogic asanas is like initiating a movement against perversion. But the nerves
are not accustomed to yogic practices. To practise means to molest, to provoke,
to tease. This is bound to produce a reaction in the body. If there is no reaction
whatsoever in the face of provocation the body becomes freed front passions and
affections. As it is, the body is bound to react. There is sickness. You don't
take any medicine. No reaction; sickness continues. The moment you do anything
to tease out the disease, it is bound to call forth physical reaction. Sometimes,
the reaction is terrific. You may interpret it as a needless torment to the body.
Apparently it seems to be that. Man apprehends only the apparent; the subtle remains
ungrasped.
A master said to his servant in great annoyance, "You are
a great fool!" The servant answered with folded hands, "Master! It is
you who are great, I am very small."
The servant did not really grasp
what the master said. To the undiscerning only the very obvious is intelligible;
the deeper significance is beyond him.
So I said to the questioner, Friend!
Go deep into the matter. You say the body is being tormented. If you really understand,
your very language would change. The body is not being tormented; it is being
trained. To torment the body is one thing, to train it quite another. It is no
torment at all; in fact it is purification. Without the purification of the body,
without removing the accumulated impurities, there will never be light. For illumination,
you have to wash away all dirt. For enlightenment all confusion must dissolve.
A blurred glass cannot reflect dearly. No image appears in a faded mirror; no
light comes out of a hazy lamp. The glass of the lantern must be cleaned. One
may find it troublesome to be obliged to clean the chimney, but the purpose of
cleaning the chimney is not to cause distress. To bear hardship and to cause hardship
are two different things.
The training of the body might involve some initial
hardship, but the purpose is not to cause hardship to the body. Far from it! The
sole objective of spiritual training and religion is freedom from suffering, freedom
from all troubles. What rids you of suffering cannot be its cause. One pain leads
to another; it cannot give pleasure. One who invites suffering and is bent upon
making himself unhappy, will continue to be unhappy for ever. Lord Mahavira said,
"The unhappy attain to unhappiness; the happy know it not." Let us go
deeper into this truth. During the course of training, the body might suffer some
mortification. Gold is extracted from the mine, but the gold bricks are not so
easily got. The ore has to pass through unimaginable heat before it yields gold.
Only after the metal has passed through extreme heat, do we get the glittering
yellow substance. If the ingot of metal were to say, "Don't torment me. Don't
heat me up," will it ever become gold? Without undergoing the heating process,
it will remain a clod of earth. If gold is to become gold, the bright shining
metal which the world cherishes, it will have to pass through scorching fire.
To pass the gold through fire is not to torment it; the whole process is meant
to lend it greater lustre. It all depends upon the objective. To purify is one
motive, to torment another. When the guru reprimands his pupil it is not to torment
of destroy him, but to perfect him. Where the objective is destruction, there
is torment; where, on the other hand, the objective is purification, it is fulfilment
itself.
Asanas are performed so that the body is freed of its impurities,
so that it is purified, so that it is properly disciplined to meet the challenge
of life.
Some people say that breath does not reach the lungs at all. How
could it reach there? We have created numberless obstacles. We have accumulated
such refuse that would not let the breath free movement. If some physician were
to give us treatment, he will have to administer purgatives for many days to cleanse
the stomach of its collected filth. Even the cleansing of the lungs, the stomach
and the arteries so as to remove all impediments, is not adequate from the point
of view of the sadhak. He has to achieve still greater purification. From the
medical point of view, the body may have been cleansed of all excrement, it may
have been declared to be fully recovered, yet a sadhak looks far ahead - he is
concerned with the removal not only of the rubbish that clogs the body, but also
that which clogs his mind, his consciousness. To remove those mental faeces, a
catharsis on a large scale is necessary. There is a difference between the purgation
of the body and the catharsis of consciousness. Both of them are, however, achieved
through asanas, pranayam, and yogic exercises.
There are five methods of
body-purification-kayotsarga, asanas, bandhs, physical exercises and pranayama.
All these five are employed to clean away the impurities which naturally accumulate
in the physical organism. But the body also accumulates much mental refuse through
emotions and attachment. Much filth also accumulates in the form of mental impressions.
Experiments have established that the poison of thought accumulates in our nails
and various limbs and this poison cannot be expelled by any purgative, or by kayotsargic
methods. No doctor or physician can wash these away. Their eradication is possible
only through non-attachment and love. This is the sixth method of body-purification.
The
body is chock-full of accumulated dirt. Unless it is cleaned and purified, unless
it is properly moulded, it would be next to impossible for us to achieve our aim.
We shall not be able to make any progress towards the perfection of consciousness.
An
important means of maintaining good health is through ensuring the elasticity
of the backbone. The man, whose spine is not flexible, cannot be said to be healthy,
physically or psychologically. The backbone of today's men is not resilient, and,
how can it be otherwise? The spine lacks its nourishment. If the belly gets its
fill it is because of its militancy. The quiet man in today's world, the silent
one, is ever ignored. That perhaps accounts for the large-scale dissemination
of the cult of violence; you get nothing without a fight. Therefore keep fighting.
Some people say that is the way of the world - conflict. That is why perhaps the
social workers proclaim 'struggle' to be the law of life. Many social scientists,
evolutionists and communication specialists support this view. And they are not
far from the truth either. Such is our world that you cannot get along without
fighting. Hence the proverb, "Even the mother neglects the child until it
cries." Only when the baby cries, does it attract its mother's attention.
If it sleeps peacefully, the mother pays no attention to it.
So conflict
has become inevitable. The stomach is bellicose. The digestive organs shout for
nourishment. Just a days fasting makes them restless. A lot of problems crop up.
However, the heart, the kidneys, the brain and the spine - they are not aggressive
or militant. So they stand neglected. That is how filth accumulates there. The
backbone has a great importance of its own. All the nerves, up or down, pass through
it. Here is the means that regulates them all. A man, whose spine is not resilient,
cannot be very successful in meditation. A man without a flexible backbone cannot
enjoy physical or psychological health. Rigidity and aches proceed from inflexibility.
That is why an efficient doctor pays attention to the condition of the backbone
first.
Nowadays we have a new system of treatment called osteopathy, where
the condition of the spine forms the basis on which the whole body is treated.
It is precisely determined if and where there is a defect in the spine. However,
what effort does modern man make to keep his spine flexible? Is any nourishment
provided to the backbone? Never! Modern man has no time to think of it even.
Asanas
serve to make the backbone resilient. By doing asanas, the blood flows more freely
through the bone and it gets massaged. Thus, its resilience is maintained and
it gets strengthened thereby. If the spine is resilient, the body and the mind
too become pliable. However, modern man seldom takes recourse to these methods.
He has much faith 'm medicine, no faith at all in asanas. That is why perhaps
he is always sick, always suffering from one disease or another.
Ours is
a meditation centre for developing an integrated personality. In other words,
here is a centre where man's various distortions are brought to light. An individual
is a veritable storehouse of ills. He comes here and practises dhyana. His hidden
flaws come to the fore, and are uprooted. The inner disorder manifests itself
in the form of aches in various parts of the body.
Once upon a time there
was a monk. A disciple came to him. He served the monk with devotion. The monk
was pleased. He gave the disciple some oil and said, "This oil has miraculous
properties. Smear your body with it. It will grow to be perfect." The monk
went away. The disciple anointed his body with the oil.
Devotees came,
but as soon as they glanced at him, they departed. It happened on the first day,
then on the second, and again on the third. The pupil said to himself, "What
has happened? Hundreds of devotees used to come to me; they used to sit at my
feet and listen to my discourses. Now they fly from me! Why?" He went to
his guru and said, "O Master! A strange change has taken place in my devotees.
Nobody comes near me now." The master said, "Did you make some experiment
recently?" The disciple said, "I did no such thing. Only a monk came.
He gave me some oil I anointed my body with that. That is all." The master
smelled the body and said, "Oh Lord; that was sudarshan oil. If the body
is smeared with this oil, it becomes transparent, and the whole image of the mind
is visible through it. Your mind is not yet perfect. It has many defects. It is
dirty and crooked. All these days it lay covered. Nobody could know its real nature.
But, by the virtue of this oil, your mind is now reflected in your body. The devotees
come. They look at the image reflected in the body and stand aghast, exclaiming
to themselves, 'How is it that those before whom we bow down, whom we look upon
as God, as utterly detached, have such unclean hearts and perverted minds? How
can we respect such people? How can we give our devotion to them?' And so these
devotees look from far and depart. Disciple! Wipe off this oil from your body.
Mustard oil is good enough for you."
The awakening of wisdom is not
unlike sudarshan oil; the flaws of those who come here for dhyana, all stand displayed.
Whatever is accumulated within, comes out. When a man's shortcomings are exposed,
he feels confounded, and cannot help complaining, "I came here to meditate,
but the feet and the back ache badly. The neck is strained. The stomach is upset."
I think this exposure is all for the better. The inner defects must come to the
fore. This in itself constitutes a step towards fulfilment, one of the means of
bodily purification.
Whatever is done during the period of spiritual training,
is done not to torment the body, but to make it perfect. In this process of fulfilment,
the body might suffer some discomfort, but the objective of the training is not
to cause any suffering. A man falls sick. He takes medicine. Is not taking medicine
a trouble? It is indeed a trouble. It takes half a minute to inject some fluid
into the body, but the pain caused by the injection does not subside for days
together. The giving of an injection is followed by pain; sometimes there is fever,
too; at times, the prick even grows septic. Thus, the patient undergoes terrible
suffering. The administration of an injection causes pain, but the objective thereof
is not to cause pain. On the contrary, it is aimed at curing the disease. Are
operations performed on the body merely to add to its suffering? No. The body
might undergo some suffering, but to cause such suffering can never be the physician's
aim. The curing of the disease and any suffering that the treatment might occasion,
inevitably go together.
For the body's perfection, asanas, pranayama, bandhs
etc. are all useful. However, the most important of these is the practice of non-attachment.
The
body is a wonder-casket, containing an amazing variety of things. Even a whole
life-time's study would not bring out all the secrets thereof. It is a very complex
organism. Look at the skin - its colour and shape. But that is not all. Look at
its texture: one square centimetre of it contains two lakh cells. Also there are
two lakh sweat-glands. A thorough analysis reveals how immense and complex is
this workshop of the skin. It is a vast subject. Enough for the moment.
Non-attachment
is essential for bodily perfection. For attachment gives rise to a number of disorders.
In an unconscious state, attachment takes hold of the mind and every inch of the
body stands defiled. It is a pitiable condition. The individual is lost in confusion.
This defilement can be got rid of only through non-attachment.
Body-perception,
kayotsarga, and non-attachment are all means of awakening intelligence. Meditation
is not a study of vacancy, a meaningless void. Meditation means self-awareness
and direct self-realisation. Meditation has two parts-awakening and realisation.
Awakening comes first, and as this awakening gradually matures, one moves towards
realisation - direct experiencing of breath, of body, of various limbs, and finally
of consciousness itself.
My questioner's argument that the body is vile,
is not incorrect. Defilements enter the physical organism from the outer world
of matter, as well as through inner attachment. And means are available for excreting
this filth. We cannot say that the body is wholly vile, or that it is not vile
at all. It is vile and not vile, impure and pure at one and the same time. If
it were wholly vile, all talk of body-perception in preksha dhyana would be pointless.
If it were not vile at all, there could be no talk of body-purification. Both
statements are relative.
A spiritual master was accompanied by a number
of disciples. The master felt thirsty. One of the disciples went running to fetch
water. The master looked into the vessel and said, "Oh, how dirty is this
water!" The pupil said, "Stay, master; I'll fetch another jugful."
After ten minutes, the disciple reappeared with a jug of water. The master again
looked into the jug and exclaimed, "Ali, how clean this water is! The first
jugful was so dirty!" The pupil replied, "Sir! Earlier a long train
of vehicles had crossed the stream; so the water was all muddied. Now it has gradually
cleared up, all dirt has settled down." The master said, "That is our
condition, too. When the train of attachment rumbles through the mind, our consciousness
is all sullied. With the removal of attachment, our consciousness becomes pure.
Not only does consciousness become pure, but the body, too."
Two points
of view. Is the body being tormented or is it being perfected? Is the body vile
and impure, or is it pure and unsullied? The approach is all-important. If we
look at the body rightly, then we leave all foulness behind and move in the direction
of pure consciousness. We leave all talk of mortification, and instead talk of
transformation. That is the way and the whole purpose of bodily perfection. |
