Story 108 - What is God?

Once upon a time, the son of an Indian king came to Rama in the mountains, and put this question, "Swami Swami, what is God?" This is a deep question, a very difficult problem. This is the one subject which all the theologies and all the religions propose to investigate, and you want to know all about it in a short time. He said, "Yes, sir yes, Swami. Where shall I go to have it explained? Explain it to me." The boy was asked, "Dear prince, you want to know what God is, you want to make acquaintance with God, but do you not know that the rule is when a man wants to see a great personage, he will have to send his own card first, he will have to send to the chief his own address and name? Now you want to see God. You had better send to God your card; you had better let God know what you are. Give Him your card. I will place it in the hands of God directly, and God will come to you3 and you will see what God is." Well, the boy said, "It is all right, it is reasonable. I will directly let you know what I am. I am the son of king so and so, living on the Himalayas in Northern India. This is my name." He wrote it out on a piece of paper. It was taken up by Rama and read. It was not put into the hands of God directly, but was given back to that prince who was told, "O prince, you do not know what you are. You are like the illiterate ignorant person who wants to see your father, the king, and cannot write his own name. Will your father, the king receive him? Prince, you cannot write your name. How will God receive you? First tell us correctly what you are and then will God come to you and receive you with open arms."

The boy reflected. He began to think and think over the subject. He said. 'Swami, Swami, now I see. I made a mistake in writing my own name I have given you the address of the body only, and I have not put upon the paper what I am."

There was another attendant of that prince standing by. The attendant could not understand it. Now the prince was asked to make his meaning clear to this attendant, and the prince asked this attendant this question; "Mr. so and so, to whom does this card belong?" The man said, “To me," and then taking up a stick from the hand of the attendant, the prince asked him, "O Mr. so and so, to whom does this stick belong?" The man said, "To me." "Well to whom does this turban of yours belong?" The man said, "To me." The prince said, "All right. If the turban belongs to you, there is a relation between the turban and you; the turban is your property, and you are the owner. Then you are not the turban, the turban is yours." He said "Indeed, that is so plain." "Well, the pencil belongs to you, the pencil is yours, and you are not the pencil". He said, I am not the pencil because the pencil is mine; that is my property, I am the owner." All right! Then the prince asked that attendant, taking hold of the ears of that attendant, "Whom do these ears belong to?"

And the attendant said, "To me." The prince said, "All right, the ears belong to you, the ears are yours, consequently you are not the ears. All right, the nose belongs to you. As the nose is yours, you are not the nose. Similarly, whose body is that?" (just beckoning to the body of the attendant). The attendant said, "The body is mine; this body is mine." "If the body is yours, Mr. Attendant, then you are not the body; you cannot be the body because you say that the body is yours; you cannot be the body. The very statement my body, my ears, my head, my hands, proves that you are something else and the body together with the ears and hands and eyes, etc., is something else. This is your property, you are the owner, the master; the body is like your, garment and you are the owner. The body is like your horse and you are the rider. Now, what are you?" The attendant understood it so far, and also concurred with the prince in saying that when the prince had put down on the paper the address of the body and had meant that this, address stood for himself, the prince had made a mistake. "You are not the body, not the ears, not the nose, not the eyes, nothing of the kind. What are you then?" "Now the prince began to reflect, and said; "Well, well, I am the mind, I am the mind; I must be the mind." "Is that so indeed?” The question was put to that prince now.

Now, can you tell me how many bones have you got in your body? Can you say where the food lies in your body that you took this morning? The prince could make no answer, and these words escaped his lips, “Well, my intellect does not reach that. I have not read that. I have not yet read anything of physiology or anatomy. My brain does not catch it, my mind cannot comprehend it."

Now the prince was asked, "Dear prince, O good boy, you say your mind cannot comprehend it, your intellect cannot reach up to that, your brain cannot understand this» By making these remarks, you confess or admit that the brain is yours, the mind is yours, the intellect is yours. Well, if the intellect is yours, you are not the intellect. If the mind is yours, you are not the mind. If the brain is your, you are not the brain. These very words of your show that you are the master of the intellect, the owner of the brain, and ruler of the mind. You are not the mind, the intellect, or the brain. What are you? Think, think, please. Be more careful and let us know correctly what you are. Then will God be just brought to you, and you will see God, you will be introduced directly into the presence of God. Please tell us what you are."

The body began to think, and thought and thought but could not go further. He said, "My intellect, my mind cannot reach further."

Oh, how true are these words! Indeed the mind or intellect cannot reach the true Divinity or God within. The real Atma, the true God is beyond the reach of words and minds.

The boy was asked to sit down for a while and meditate upon what his intellect had reached so far. "I am not the body; I am not the mind." If so, feel it, put it into practice, repeat it in the language of feeling, in the language of action; realise that you are not the body. , If you live this thought only, if you work into practice even so much of the truth, if you are above the body and the mind, you become free from all fear. Fear leaves you when you raise yourself above the level of the body or the mind. All anxiety ceases, all sorrow is gone, when you realize even so much of the truth that you are something beyond the body, beyond the mind."

After that, the boy was helped on a little to realize what he himself was, and he was asked, "Brother, prince, what have you done to-day? Will you please let us know work or deeds that you have performed this morning?"

He began to relate; "1 woke up early in the morning took bath, and did this thing and that thing, took my breakfast, read a great deal, wrote some letters, visited some friends, received some friends, and came here to pay my respects to the Swami."

Now the prince was asked, "Is that all? Have you not done a great deal more? Is that all? Just see." He thought and thought, and then mentioned a few other things of the same sort. "That is not all," said Rama. "You have done thousands of things more; you have done hundreds thousands, nay, millions of things more. Innumerable actions you have done, and you refuse to make mention of them. This is not becoming. Please let us know what you have done. Tell us everything that you have done this morning."

The prince, hearing such strange words that he had done thousands of things besides the few that he named, was startled. "I have not done anything more than what I have told you sir; I have not done anything more." "No, you have done millions, trillions, quadrillions of things more." How is that? The boy was asked, "What is looking at the Swami?" He said, "1" "Are you seeing this face, this river Ganges that flows beside us?" He said, "Yes, indeed." "Well, you see the river and you see the face of the Swami, but who makes the six muscles in the eyes move? You know the six muscles in the eyes move, but who makes the muscles move. It cannot be anybody else; It cannot be anything extra. It must be your own self that makes the muscles in the eye move in the act of seeing."

The boy said, Oh! Indeed, it must be I; it cannot be anything else."

"Well, who is seeing just now, who is attending to this discourse?" The boy said, "I, it is I." "Well, if you are seeing, if you are attending to this discourse, who is making the oratory nerves vibrate? It must be you, it must be you. Nobody else. Who took the meals this morning?" The boy said, "I, I." "Well" if you took the meals this morning and it is you that twill go to the toilet and vacate, who is it that assimilates and digests the food? Who is it, please? Tell us if you ate and you threw it out. Then it must be you who digests, it must be yourself that assimilates, it cannot be anybody else. Those days are gone when outside causes were sought after to explain the phenomena in Nature, If a man fell down, the cause of his. fall was said to be some outside ghost. Science does not admit such solution of the problem. Science and philosophy require you to seek the cause of a phenomenon in the phenomenon itself.

Here you take the food, go into the toilet and throw it off. When it is digested, it must be digested by yourself, no outside power comes and digests it; it must be your own self- The cause of digestion also must be sought within you and not without you."

Well, the boy admitted so far. Now he was asked, "Dear Prince, just reflect, just think for a while. The process of digestion implies of hundreds of movements. In the process of digestion, in mastication, saliva is emitted from the glands in the mouth. Here is again the next process of oxidation going on. Here is blood being formed. There is the blood coursing through the veins, there is the same food being converted into carnal muscles, bones, and hair; here is the process of growth going on the body. Here are a great many processes going on, and all these processes in the body are connected with the process of assimilation and digestion.

If you take the food, it is you yourself who are the cause of digestion; you yourself make the blood course through your veins. You yourself make the hair grow; you yourself make the body develop, and here mark how many processes there are; how many works, how many deeds there are that you are performing every moment."

The boy began to think and said, "Indeed, indeed, sir, in my body, in this body, there are thousands of processes that the intellect does not know, about which the mind is unconscious, and still they are being performed, and it must be I that am performing all that, and indeed it was a mistake I made when I said that I had done a few things; a few things only, and nothing more; a few things that were done through the agency of intellect or mind." It must be made further clear. In this body of yours two kinds of functions are being discharged; there are two kinds of works being done, involuntary and voluntary. Voluntary acts are those that are performed through the agency of the intellect or mind. For instance, reading, writing, walking, and drinking. These are acts done through the agencies of the intellect or mind. Besides these, there are thousands of acts or processes being performed directly, so to say, without the agency, or without the medium of mind or intellect. For instance, respiration, the coursing of blood through the veins, the growth of hair etc.

"Well," he said, "indeed I have understood it so far that I am something beyond the intellect." At this time, the attendant of the prince asked: "Sir, make it more clear to me, I have not quite comprehended it yet." Well, that attendant was asked, "Mr. so and so, when you go to bed, do you die or live? The attendant said, "I do not die." And what about the intellect? He said, "I go on dreaming, the intellect is still there." "And when you are in the deep sleep state, (you know there is a state called the deep sleep state; in that state no dreams even are seen), where is the intellect, where is the mind?"

He began to think. "Well, it passes into nothingness; it is no longer there, the intellect is not there, the mind is not there, but are you there or not? He said, "Oh, indeed I must be there; I remain there." Well, mark here, even in the deep sleep state, where the intellect ceases, where the intellect is as it were, like a garment hoisted on a peg, hoisted on a post like an overcoat, the intellect is taken off and placed upon the post, you are still there, you do not die out. The attendant said, "The intellect is not there, and I do not die out. This I do not quite comprehend."

Well, the attendant was asked, "When you wake up after enjoying this deep sleep, when you wake up, do you not make such statements, *I enjoyed a profound sleep to-night; I had no dream to-night.'

Do you not make remarks of that kind?" He said, "Yes." Well, this point is very subtle. The readers should attend it closely. When after waking up from the deep sleep state, this remark is made, "I slept so sound that I saw no dreams, I saw no rivers, mountains, in that state there was no father, no mother, no house, no family, nothing of the kind; all was dead and gone; there was nothing, nothing, nothing there, I slept and there was nothing there." This statement is like the statement made by the man who bore witness to the desolation of a place, and said: "At the dead of night, at such and such a place, there was not a single human being present." That man was asked to write out this statement. He put it on paper. The magistrate asked him, "Well, is this statement true?" He said, "Yes, sir." Well, is this statement made on hearsay, or founded upon your evidence, are you an eye witness?"

He said, "Yes, I am an eye-witness. This is not based on hearsay." "You are an eye-witness that at the time mentioned on the paper and at the place mentioned on the paper, there was not a single human being present?" He said, "Yes" "What are you? Are you a human being or not?" He said, "Yes, I am. a human being." "Well, then, if this statement is to be true according to you, it must be wrong according to us, because, as you were present and you are a human being, the statement that there was not a single human being present is not literally true. You were present there. In order that this statement may be true according to you, it must be false according to us, because in order that there might be nobody, there must be something, must be at least yourself present at the time."

So when you wake up after enjoying the deep sleep, you make this remark, "I did not see anything in the dream." Well, we may say that you must have been present; there was no father, no mother, no husband, no wife, no house, no river, no family present in that state, but you must have been present; the very evidence that you give, the very witness that you bear, proves that you did not sleep, that you did not go to sleep; for had you been asleep, who would have told us about the nothingness of that place? You are something beyond the intellect; the intellect was asleep, the brain was at rest in a way, but you were not asleep. If you had been asleep who would have made the blood run- through the blood vessels, who would have continued the process of digestion in the stomach, who would have continued the process of the growth of your body;, if you had really fallen into the deep sleep state? So you are something which is never asleep. The intellect sleeps, but not you. You are something beyond the intellect mind, and body.

Now the attendant said, "Sir, sir, I have understood it so far, and have come to know that I am a power divine, that I am the infinite power which never sleeps, never changes. In my youth, the body was different; in my childhood, the mind was not the same as I have now, the body was not the same as I have now. In my childhood, my intellect, brain, body, and mind were entirely different from what they are now." "Doctors tell us that after seven years, the whole system undergoes a thorough change; every moment the body is changing, and every second the mind is changing, and the mental thoughts, the mental ideas which you entertained in our childhood, where are they now? In the days of childhood you looked upon the Sun as a beautiful cake which was eaten by the angels, the moon was a beautiful piece of silver; the stars were as big as diamonds. Where are these ideas gone? Your mind, your intellect has undergone a thorough, a wholesale change. But you still say, "When I was a child, when I was a boy, when I shall grow up to the age of seventy." You still make such remarks which show that you are something which was the same in childhood, which was the same in boyhood, which will be the same at the age of seventy. When you say, "I went to sleep, I went into the deep sleep state, etc.," when you make remarks of that kind, it shows that there is the true “I" in you, the real Self in you, which remains the same in the dreamland, which remains the same in the deep sleep state, which remains the same in the wakeful state. There is something within you which remains the same when you are in a swoon, which remains the same when you are bathing, when you are writing. Just think, reflect, just mark please. Are you not something which remains the same under all circumstances, unchanging in its being, the same yesterday, to-day and forever? If so, just reflect a little more, think a little more, and you will be immediately brought face to face with God. You know the promise was, know yourself, put down your right address on paper, and God will be introduced to you immediately.

Now, the boy, the prince, expected that as he knew about himself, he had come to know that he was something unchanging, something constant, something which was never asleep. Now he wanted to know what God is. The prince was asked: "Brother, mark, here are these trees growing. Is the power that makes this tree grow different from the power that makes that tree grow?" He said, "No, no, it must be the same power certainly." "Now, is the power which makes all these trees grow different from the power that makes the bodies of animals grow?" He said, "No, no, it can on t be different, it must be the same." "Now, is the power, the force which makes the stars move, different from the power which makes these rivers flow?" He said, "It cannot be different, it must be the same." "Well, now the power that makes these trees grow cannot be different from the power which makes your body or your hair grow.

The same universal power of nature, the same universal Divinity, or the Unknowable, which makes the stars shine, makes your eyes twinkle, the same power which is the cause of the growth of that body's hair which you call mine, the same power makes the blood course through the veins of each and all, indeed, and then what are you? Are you not that power, which makes your hair grow, which makes your blood flow through your veins, which makes your food get digested? Are you not that power? That power which is beyond the intellect, the mind, that indeed you are. If so, you are the same power which is governing the force of the whole Universe, you are the same Divinity, you are the same God, the same Unknowable, the same Energy, Force, Substance, anything you may call it, the same Divinity, the All which is present everywhere. The same, the same you are."

The boy was astonished and he said, "Really, really, I wanted to know God. I put the question what God is, and I find my own Self, my true Atma is God. What was I asking, what did I ask, what a silly question did I put! I had to know myself. I had to know what I am, and God was known." Thus was God known.

MORAL: God is your own Self, beyond body, mind and intellect.

Vol. 1 (63-73)