CHAPTER FIVE

BRAHMACHARYA, SOLITUDE AND
SOCIAL LIFE

1.   "Brahmacharya is `being in Brahman' (or `living in
Brahman'). It has no connection with celibacy, as it is commonly understood. A real Brahmachari, that is, one who lives in Brahman, finds bliss in Brahman, which is the Self. Why should he then look for other sources of happiness? In fact emergence from the Self is the cause of all misery."
Talk 17

Note: To be oneself is the most blissful state. That is Brahmacharya, or `living in Brahman'. How then can he who has been so fortunate as to enjoy that bliss seek the much lesser pleasures of the world, which, apart from their being doubtful, depend upon others to confer or withhold? The inference therefore is that celibacy is granted in a Jnani ^[?], who is ever in the brimful bliss of the Self. Yet this inference will be wrong if it is taken as a general rule that Jnanis are always celibates; for some of the most famous Jnanis are known to have married one, or more than one wife and have had children, some with possessions and some without. A Jnani is a liberated person: liberated also from all rules and regulations; from all codes of ethical, religious and social conduct — he is a law unto himself, and there is no knowing what he does and does not do. Yet he is known to lead a sattvic life, having divested himself of all the rajasic and tamasic tendencies even before the attainment of jnana.

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Celibacy as a help to sadhana is in this Advaitic line doubtful. A married life is, from this point of view alone, certainly no bar to the highest: it may even be of more help in certain cases, in what the Tantras call the `vira' or `heroic' sadhaka. In cases where celibacy does not create definite mental and emotional disturbances which mar the peaceful sadhana, then certainly it is of great help, inasmuch as it rids one of the preoccupations, duties, and anxieties which a family life drags in its wake. And to make this point clear Bhagavan continues the explanation:

2.   "Celibacy is certainly an aid to realisation among so many other aids."
Talk 17

Note: "Among so many other aids" must not escape us: It is the main point in this text. It gives celibacy a negligible value on a par with so many other helpful factors. This is confirmed by the next answer.

3.   "Is not then celibacy indispensable? Can a married man realise the Self?"
Bhagavan: "Certainly, it (Realisation) is a matter of fitness of mind. Married or unmarried one can realise the Self, because the Self is here and now."
Talk 17

Note: The Self is All: the married as well as the unmarried.
Being one's own self, who can be debarred from experiencing it in its utter purity, if the mind has been prepared for it? If celibacy is the only cause of eligibility, then all celibates should be muktas and all grihastas in abysmal bondage, which experience and tradition refute.

4.   "How does a grihasta fare in the scheme of Moksha?"
Bhagavan: "Why do you think yourself to be a grihasta?
If you go out as a sannyasi, the thought that you are a
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sannyasi will haunt you. You will be only substituting one thought by another. The mental obstacles are always there.
They even increase in new surroundings. There is no help in the change of environment. The mind is the obstacle.
Therefore why change the environment?"
Talk 54

Note: The real enemy, therefore, of the sadhana is not so much a domestic life as the habits, the restlessness, the pet notions, the desires, the stubbornness, the dullness — the immaturity, in brief — of the mind which keeps us company wherever we go. Why blame it on the family, or sometimes even on
God Himself?

Bhagavan rubs it in:

5.   "The environment never abandons you, according to your desire. Look at me. I left home. Look at yourselves. You have come here leaving the home environment. What do you find here? Is this different from what you left?"
Talk 54

Note: "Look at me: I left home", Bhagavan says, forgetting for a moment that what he found in the pitch-like dinginess of Pathalalinga (underground cave) in the Big Temple at
Tiruvannamalai, to which he had escaped from home in 1896, was entirely different from his home "environment" in Madurai. To strike a personal note of my own, I would add that seeing Bhagavan all day long, and seeing a grasping landlord as an incubus of a neighbour elsewhere, an incubus which certainly was not "according to my conscious desire", makes a Himalayan difference. But we understand what the
Master means. One carries one's environment with him, which is not other than one's own mind, as we discussed in the last note. No one can leave his mind behind and go out in search of God. The mind is thus the most troublesome as well as the most helpful instrument, depending on the use
we make of it, an instrument which keeps us constant company. It makes the environments.

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By "the environment never abandons you, according to your desire", Bhagavan wishes to impress upon us again the relentlessness of the mental sankalpas — our own whims and fancies, — which shape our circumstances. We thus prepare our bed and we sleep on it.

6.   "Even if one is immersed in nirvikalpa samadhi for years together, when he emerges from it, he will find himself in the environment which he is bound to have. That is the reason why Sankaracharya emphasised sahaja samadhi in preference to nirvikalpa samadhi in his excellent work Vivekachudamani. One should be in spontaneous samadhi, that is, in his pristine state, in any environment."
Talk 54

Note: Bhagavan continues the topic, but includes in the mind the physical environment, which, for the Jnani ^[?] affects only the physical body. Even the Jnani ^[?], Bhagavan elsewhere asserts, has to be subject to the karma of the body — his mind being no longer tarnishable. The Jnani ^[?] is ever in samadhi. When he switches off the world, he is in nirvikalpa (better call it kevala nirvikalpa, because sahaja is also called nirvikalpa. Vide chapter on samadhi); when he switches it on, he is in sahaja, that is, perceiving the physical world at the same time as being in the reality, The physical environment of the Jnani ^[?] is chalked out for his body by prarabdha, and this sticks to him as long as he is in the body. But of whatever sort it may be, it cannot affect his mind which is ever centred in the "pristine state", irrespective of what the physical environments are.

7.   "Solitude is in the mind. One may be in the thick of the world and maintain serenity of mind: such a one is in solitude. Another may be in a forest, but still unable to control his mind. He cannot be said to be in solitude. A
man attached to desire cannot get solitude wherever he may be. A detached man is always in solitude."
Talk 20

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Note: We have already observed that the state of the mind is the true environment. But the remark of the Master about the relation of desires to solitude can be summed up as: "Desire is the crowd, and desirelessness solitude." Or, "Desire creates the city and desirelessness the forest." Bhagavan develops this point:

8.   "Work performed with attachment is a shackle, whereas performed with detachment does not affect the doer.
The latter is in solitude even while working. As for service, Realisation of the Self is the greatest service that can be rendered to humanity. Therefore the saints are helpful although they dwell in forests. But it should not be forgotten that solitude is not obtained in forests only, but even in towns, in the thick of worldly occupations.
The help is imperceptible, but it is still there. A saint helps the whole humanity unknown to it."
Talk 20

Note: This should give the quietus to the criticism that yogis, or seekers of the path of Liberation, are selfish. The critics will now see their short-sightedness in attaching great importance to physical service, which on no account can give permanent and all-round satisfaction. Laws of Economics and Social Reform may work well on the physical plane, may increase the earning capacity of the labourer, give him a better shelter, educate his children, and raise him to a higher social status. But it can never give him happiness. We see it before our eyes that the more you raise wages, the greater will be the struggle of the labourer to gain more — he never knows where to stop his demands. But even if you make him a millionaire, his mind will remain an indigent proletariat, like the fuzzy and ever-agitated minds of all the
millionaires under the sun. Therefore all this talk of working for, and uplifting the poor is intrinsically based on false values.
Poor is he who is unhappy, even if his wealth were that of
Croesus. The greatest wealth is the peace which flows from true knowledge, which can be imparted only by these "selfish" yogis and Rishis. This does not mean that philanthropists and social workers should close shop and cease helping. It is their dharma to help, which they cannot shirk, for in the performance of this dharma lies their own salvation. But they must stop sneering at the one who alone can give the most valuable help of all, namely, redemption from ignorance and misery — and for ever.

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The questioner remarked: "In Europe it is not understood by the people that in solitude one can be helpful, imagining that working in the world alone can be useful."
Bhagavan: "Never mind Europe and America. Where are they but in your mind? Realise yourself and all will be realised.
If you dream and wake up and recall the men of your dream, will you try to ascertain if these men are also awake?"