In this illusory experience called this lifetime, take nothing
seriously – including yourself!
I caught up
with my cousin after a long, long time. We talked about Life, philosophy and
spirituality for a couple of hours. In the course of the conversation, my
cousin remarked that Adi Shankara (788 ~ 820 CE) was the greatest philosophers
of all time – greater perhaps than Socrates, Plato and Aristotle. My cousin extolled
the virtues of the Vivekachudamani,
the epic poem that Adi Shankara wrote in 580 verses, to expound his Advaita Vedanta philosophy. I found the
conversation with my cousin empowering and enriching. Even so, I came away with
a sense of disagreement over anyone wanting to merely pride Indian intellect as
being ahead of and above the rest of the world.
Why can’t we
enjoy anything – philosophy, experiences, whatever – in Life without comparing,
I thought to myself. In fact, a story that Osho often narrated from Adi
Shankara’s Life, highlights the same perspective.
Adi Shankara was in Benares.
One day, early in the morning – it was still dark because traditionally the
Hindu monks take a bath before sunrise – he took a bath. And as he was coming
up the steps, a man touched him on purpose, not accidentally, but on purpose, and
told him, “Please forgive me. I am a sudra,
I am untouchable. I am sorry, but you will have to take another bath to clean
yourself.”
Shankara was very angry.
He said, “It was not accidental, the way you did that; you did it on purpose.
You should be punished in hell.”
The man said, “When all is illusory, it seems only hell remains real.”
Shankara was taken aback.
The man said, “Before you
go for your bath again, you have to answer my few questions. If you don’t
answer me, each time you come up after your bath, I will touch you.”
It was lonely and nobody else was there, so Shankara said, “You seem to be a
very strange person. What are your questions?”
He said, “My first
question is: Is my body illusory? Is your body illusory? And if two illusions
touch each other, what is the problem? Why are you going to take another bath?
You are not practicing what you are preaching. How, in an illusory world, can
there be a distinction between the untouchable and the brahmin? – the impure
and the pure? – when both are illusory, when both are made of the same stuff as
dreams are made of? What is the fuss?”
Shankara, who had been
conquering great philosophers up until then with his intellect, could not
answer this simple man because any answer was going to be against his own philosophy.
If he says they are illusory, then there is no point in being angry about it.
If he says they are real, then at least he accepts the reality of bodies…but
then there is a problem. If human bodies are real, then animal bodies, the
bodies of the trees, the bodies of the planets, the stars…then everything is
real.
And the man said, “I know
you cannot answer this – it will finish your whole philosophy. I’ll ask you
another question: I am a sudra,
untouchable, impure, but where is my impurity – in my body or in my soul? I
have heard you declaring that the soul is absolutely and forever pure, and
there is no way to make it impure; so how can there be a distinction between
souls? Both are pure, absolutely pure, and there are no degrees of impurity –
that somebody is more pure and somebody is less pure. So perhaps it is my soul
that has made you impure and you have to take another bath?”
Now, the second question was
even more difficult. Shankara had never been in such trouble – actual,
practical, in a way, scientific trouble! Rather than arguing about words, the sudra had created a situation in which
the great Adi Shankara was check-mated. He gracefully accepted his defeat. And
the sudra said, “Then don’t go take
another bath. Anyway there is no river, no me, no you; all is a dream. Just go
into the temple – that too is a dream – and pray to God. He too is a dream,
because he is a projection of a mind which is illusory, and an illusory mind
cannot project anything real!”
I find this story beautiful. Unputdownable
in fact. I believe the big learning here is this – enjoy everything that you
see or experience for it’s own sake. Don’t try to dramatize and intellectualize
anything. Least of all Life. My cousin has phenomenal insights into Advaita Vedanta no doubt, but he lost me
while making the avoidable comparison.
I don’t think it ever is about who is
bigger or who is better or who is richer or who is more beautiful. Everything
is what it is. Everyone is who they are. And nothing is permanent. Everything
and everyone is transient. So, don’t get caught up in a competition that is
meaningless, in running a race which is a non-starter or in ritualizing and
intellectualizing Life. Just live – as long
as your Life lasts!
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