Pheena

An important thing to keep in mind, as Nanak stresses time and again, is that God has not stood apart or removed Himself from His creation after creating it, nor is He in any way opposed to it, nor has He forgotten it. God's work of creation goes on every minute, eternally. Actually, creation is God's way of being. He creates and creates and creates, and He is always interested in whatever He creates. This is very significant. We tell the seeker not to be attached to anything in order to attain God, but God Himself is not unattached or uninvolved. If He were so, the process of creation would stop; everything would come to a halt. Now what is this? As soon as you become one with God a new kind of involvement arises, a new interest, where there is no difference between attachment and nonattachment, where there is neither desire nor desirelessness, where there is neither enchantment nor otherwise. All differences fall away. God creates with full interest and desire, yet He is desireless, uninvolved. How will you be able to understand this paradox? Nanak says it is as difficult as 'chewing on iron'. God creates, so His interest is natural, His involvement is natural; but it is not a blind involvement as we have with our desires. In His involvement there is no possessiveness, no ownership. He creates you and frees you, and lets you loose. This is why you can wander, commit sin, do evil. He does not bind you in chains to keep you away from evil. He has His relationship with you, all right, but He does not stand in the way of your freedom. It is not that He is against you, yet you are completely independent. This is rather complex. When a mother is attached to her son, this attachment kills his freedom, for she is always saying: Don't go here, don't go there. Don't do this, don't do that, and a thousand other don'ts. She smothers him with her love, but kills him nevertheless. She doesn't give him enough independence to allow him to stand on his own two feet or gain some experience of life; in this manner she cripples the child. He will never become mature as long as he is under his mother's protection; even when she dies, her hold over her son will continue as before and he will find it difficult, if not impossible, to love another woman. He knows only one love, his mother. Anyone else would be sinful. The mother was interested in the child, but it was blind infatuation. A relationship with open eyes protects you, and at the same time does not destroy your freedom. It sometimes obstructs with a view to making you worthy of going ahead. It makes you strong. It supports you today and withdraws the support little by little so that you may be able to stand on your own tomorrow. It does not lend the support in order to make a cripple of you. Then there is another kind of mother: if she is told that her attachment to her child is harmful, she draws back completely and removes all restraint from the child. Now total nonrestraint is not the same as giving freedom to your child. If it is a boy he may go to prostitutes, take drugs, gamble, steal, murder. The mother has given him full freedom to do as he pleases; she has become indifferent to her child. First she cared so much, but her caring was blind; now there is negligence and indifference, which is equally blind. The balance lies between the two. This balance is the characteristic of God. It is His very nature. His attitude towards His creation is: He protects you so that you may be independent, and gives you independence so that one day you may be able to surrender. These are two apparent contradictions. He gives you the opportunity to go far away, for if you do not go far how will you come close? He gives you license to wander, for if you do not wander how will you gain experience? He gives you a chance to fall, for if you do not fall how will you learn to protect yourself? And yet He protects you and follows you. His eye watches everywhere; His shadow is everywhere; He envelops you from all sides. No matter how far from Him you go, still He is beside you, so close that whenever you need Him you have only to turn and there He is -- available to you that very moment. There is the well known couplet: "In the mirror of my heart is the picture of my beloved. I have only to bend a little to get a glimpse of Him." No matter how far you go, He is always behind you, following you. He causes you no interference, no matter what path you tread. He does not even stop you from going wrong, if that's where you are heading. He allows you to be wrong if you so wish, and in His tender love He does not remove His energy from you, but waits. He awaits your pleasure. He hopes that one day you will return and when you do -- ah, what joy, what ecstasy he feels! SEEING ALL THIS AND THINKING OF IT, HE FLOWERS IN HAPPINESS, NANAK SAYS, TO DESCRIBE HIM IS LIKE CHEWING ON IRON. This is certainly so, for there all contradictions are laid to rest, and become one. I have studied the lives of many people and find that we can move towards any extreme and do all kinds of things, but all extremes can be very dangerous. I know a very possessive husband who follows his wife not just as a shadow, but like a ghost. When he is in the office he is always worried; perhaps his wife is laughing with someone and having a good time. He would leave his work and pay surprise visits home just to check on her. He cannot bear her talking and laughing with others without him. He firmly believes in the descriptions of the wife given by Kalidas, the famous Indian poet. In one of his best known poems he describes a wife so pining away from a fifteen-day absence from her beloved, that she 'wilts away and becomes like a skeleton' and then she describes it all in messages sent to him with the clouds. This constant siege from all sides has filled the wife with boredom and subtle hatred. Theirs had been a marriage of love. They had been very much in love. I could see that, and I knew them for a long time. But when the husbands love became so excessive, his hands no longer formed a garland around her neck, but became a noose. It is not diamonds and gold alone that bind; such love could also be fatal. The wife's love began to diminish and she began dreaming of being freed from her husband. The more independent she tried to become, the more restrictions he created for her. I explained to the husband that this was madness, that he was killing his wife's love for him with his own hands. Love also wants freedom and a chance to breath. Love needs a little distance, a little aloneness, some time to oneself. I advised him, "Don't be after her so much or you will kill her love for you. Then you will have only yourself to blame." After a great deal of discussion the husband began to see some sense in it, but then he began to disregard her completely. Now even if he saw her in bed with another man, it would make no difference to him. He says he has given up his possessiveness. He says, "Now I have nothing to do with her. She can do what she pleases. I am in no way connected with her now." The only type of connection he knows is a noose. This is a natural human trait. If full freedom is given as in the West, it tends to become total indifference, or we set up such a complete subjugation that it can strangle. This is what is happening in the East. To say anything about God is as good as 'chewing on iron', so difficult is it. He is both: He gives you full freedom, but His love is not an iota less on account of this. He leaves you free, which is the only genuine love.. There is no conflict between His love and the freedom He gives you; He does not stop you even if your feet go astray, but waits patiently for you to return. When you retrace your steps and the prodigal comes home -- oh the joy, the celebration! Nanak says: He worries about you and thinks of you. He rejoices in you. He does not stand apart, unaffected; His nonattachment is filled with a deep essential affection. He is far and yet He is near. He has left you to do as you please, and yet His eye is always on you. He has never, never left you. He always stands besides you. Your sorrow and anguish touch Him; your joy and happiness fill Him with cheer. You are not a stranger in this universe; it is your house. You are not alone in this world. God is always with you. This assurance and comfort has deep meaning for the devotee; otherwise there is nothing. If you put aside the thought of God, the world stands untouched, unconcerned beside you; it does not bother what you do or what you do not do, whether you live or whether you die. Let the storm take you; there is no one to care. But for the devotee there is great assurance and solace in the feeling that 'someone is waiting for me'. When you return home you will not find it empty; when you return inwards to your own nature you will find God awaiting you. Not only will you find Him waiting, but you will be enchanted by all the arrangements for the celebration He has made in your house. A story that Jesus told time and again is well worth understanding. A rich man had two sons. One boy turned into a vagabond. When he came of age he demanded his half share, which he took and left for the city, for the village offered no means of spending his money: there were no gambling houses, no taverns, no prostitutes. He lost every penny he had in these pursuits and become a roadside beggar. The father was keeping track of him. When he heard of his son's destitution, he was very unhappy. He knew that it was useless to try to bring him back by force, for that might take him farther away. He could only wait, hoping that when his son began to see things in their right perspective he would return on his own. The elder son remained at home. He worked hard and had doubled the remaining inheritance. He plowed the fields and tended the vineyards, working from morning to night. Then one day it occurred to the beggar son: "I shall die this way. I still have a home. My father is alive and I can count on his love. He gave me an opportunity to learn for myself what is right and what is wrong, so I am sure his compassion will not fail me now and he will take me back to his heart. I have full confidence in him." One day he sent word to his father that he was coming home. The father arranged a grand reception. He had lambs butchered and the best of everything prepared, for his son was coming home. He decorated the whole village with flowers and invited everybody in the village. The elder brother was in the fields. Someone went to him and said, "It is so injust! You have served your father faithfully your whole life and have doubled and trebled his assets. You have never gone against his wishes, yet he never arranged such a grand reception in your honor. Now your brother who squandered his inheritance on wine, women and song is returning, and look at what your father is doing for him. It is rank injustice." The elder brother also felt it was unfair. He returned home saddened and downhearted. He saw the lamps and the flowers set out in his brother's honor and could bear it no longer. He went to his father and said, "I have served you and obeyed you my whole life, but you have never prepared a feast in my honor. Today this prodigal son of yours returns home and look how much you have done to receive him. I can't believe my eyes." The father replied, "Son, you have always been near me. You never went astray, so there was no need to welcome you. You are always with me and welcome every moment. You are so close to my heart, but this boy who went astray, who wandered and ruined himself, and for whom I spent so many anxious, sleepless nights, he is returning and needs to be welcomed. You gave me no cause for worry; instead I have always been happy and pleased with you, so there is no need to express excessive happiness in your case." When the prodigal returns a magnificent reception is called for. Jesus would say: Good people, holy men and saints, are like the elder brother; those who have gone stray, sinned, committed crimes, are like the younger brother. Jesus made this a wonderful beginning for his spiritual teachings and because of this, the Jews turned against him. For the Jews believe that he who sins is punished by God; whereas Jesus has said He will welcome him when he returns for He loves him. Do as much wrong as you please, you cannot remove yourself from His heart. You may show your back to Him but He will wait. He is the Father of all. We have a very deep connection with existence, and existence feels pleased -- so the Hindus have known from time immemorial. That is why it is said that when a person attains buddhahood flowers bloom out of season. Flowers open when Buddha passes by, whatever the season, for existence is filled with bliss at that moment. This is what Nanak is saying, that He is so filled with joy and dances in ecstasy whenever the prodigal returns. This is the union of freedom and love. Do what you will, you cannot displease Him. His love for you is much deeper than anything you might do. But His attachment is not like yours. He doesn't chain you by the neck. God is not a prison; God is love and freedom. It is difficult to explain, for they appear so contrary, for when you love a person you take away his freedom, and when you give freedom you say goodbye to love. Where affection and nonaffection both are, where desire and desirelessness both are, where all contradictions unite, there is the great confluence. NANAK SAYS, TO DESCRIBE HIM IS LIKE CHEWING ON IRON.

Thanks lalleshvari ji.

i've heard of many Niramlai Sants, but never understood what does it mean to be Nirmalai Sant....is it a lineage of Sants from certain area/Family? can someone please give me soem info.

I head the same thing from Sant Maskeen Singh ji.

Here is an Excellent Article to help u understand....It is written by a Christian, but the Idea is Universal. I had to read it few times to comprehend the point he was trying to portray, but I Hope it helps you answer your question. http://www.mit.edu/~mcguyton/ABSK/MereChri...ty/merech25.htm TIME AND BEYOND TIME It is a very silly idea that in reading a book you must never 'skip'. All sensible people skip freely when they come to a chapter which they find is going to be no use to them. In this chapter I am going to talk about something which may be helpful to some readers, but which may seem to others merely an unnecessary complication. If you are one of the second sort of readers, then I advise you not to bother about this chapter at all but to turn on to the next. In the last chapter I had to touch on the subject of prayer, and while that is still fresh in your mind and my own, I should like to deal with a difficulty that some people find about the whole idea of prayer. A man put it to me by saying 'I can believe in God all right, but what I cannot swallow is the idea of Him attending to several hundred million human beings who are all addressing Him at the same moment.' And I have found that quite a lot of people feel this. Now, the first thing to notice is that the whole sting of it comes in the words at the same moment. Most of us can imagine God attending to any number of applicants if only they came one by one and He had an endless time to do it in. So what is really at the back of this difficulty is the idea of God having to fit too many things into one moment of time. Well that is of course what happens to us. Our life comes to us moment by moment. One moment disappears before the next comes along: and there is room for very little in each. That is what Time is like. And of course you and I tend to take it for granted that this Time series - this arrangement of past, present and future - is not simply the way life comes to us but the way all things really exist. We tend to assume that the whole universe and God Himself are always moving on from past to future just as we do. But many learned men do not agree with that. It was the Theologians who first started the idea that some things are not in Time at all: later the Philosophers took it over: and now some of the scientists are doing the same. Almost certainly God is not in Time. His life does not consist of moments following one another. If a million people are praying to Him at ten-thirty tonight, He need not listen to them all in that one little snippet which we call ten-thirty. Ten-thirty-and every other moment from the beginning of the world-is always the Present for Him. If you like to put it that way, He has all eternity in which to listen to the split second of prayer put up by a pilot as his plane crashes in flames. That is difficult, I know. Let me try to give something, not the same, but a bit like it. Suppose I am writing a novel. I write 'Mary laid down her work; next moment came a knock at the door!' For Mary who has to live in the imaginary time of my story there is no interval between putting down the work and hearing the knock. But I, who am Mary's maker, do not live in that imaginary time at all. Between writing the first half of that sentence and the second, I might sit down for three hours and think steadily about Mary. I could think about Mary as if she were the only character in the book and for as. long as I pleased, and the hours I spent in doing so would not appear in Mary's time (the time inside the story) at all. This is not a perfect illustration, of course. But it may give just a glimpse of what I believe to be the truth. God is not hurried along in the Time-stream of this universe any more than an author is hurried along in the imaginary time of his own novel. He has infinite attention to spare for each one of us. He does not have to deal with us in the mass. You are as much alone with Him as if you were the only being He had ever created. When Christ died, He died for you individually just as much as if you had been the only man in the world. The way in which my illustration breaks down is this. In it the author gets out of one Time-series (the real one). But God, I believe, does not live in a Time-series at all. His life is not dribbled out moment by moment like ours with Him it is, so to speak, still 1920 and already 1960 For His life is Himself. If you picture Time as a straight line along which we have to travel, then you must picture God as the whole page on which the line is drawn. We come to the parts of the line one by one: we have to leave A behind before we get to B, and cannot reach C until we leave B behind. God, from above or outside or all round, contains the whole line, and sees it all. The idea is worth trying to grasp because it removes some apparent difficulties in Christianity. Before I became a Christian one of my objections was as follows. The Christians said that the eternal God who is everywhere and keeps the whole universe going, once became a human being. Well, then, said I, how did the whole universe keep going while He was a baby, or while He was asleep? How could He at the same time be God who knows everything and also a man asking his disciples 'Who touched me?' You will notice that the sting lay in the time words: 'While He was a baby'-'How could He at the same time?' In other words I was assuming that Christ's life as God was in time, and that His life as the man Jesus in Palestine was a shorter period taken out of that time - just as my service in the army was a shorter period taken out of my total life. And that is how most of us perhaps tend to think about it. We picture God living through a period when His human life was still in the future: then coming to a period when it was present: then going on to a period when He could look back on it as something in the past. But probably these ideas correspond to nothing in the actual facts. You cannot fit Christ's earthly life in Palestine into any time-relations with His life as God beyond all space and time. It is really, I suggest, a timeless truth about God that human nature, and the human experience of weakness and sleep and ignorance, are somehow included in His whole divine life. This human life in God is from our point of view a particular period in the history of our world (from the year A.D. one till the Crucifixion). We therefore imagine it is also a period in the history of God's own existence. But God has no history. He is too completely and utterly real to have one. For, of course, to have a history means losing part of your reality (because it has already slipped away into the past) and not yet having another part (because it is still in the future): in fact having nothing but the tiny little present, which has gone before you can speak about it. God forbid we should think God was like that. Even we may hope not to be always rationed in that way. Another difficulty we get if we believe God to be in time is this. Everyone who believes in God at all believes that He knows what you and I are going to do to-morrow. But if He knows I am going to do so-and-so, how can I be free to do otherwise? Well, here once again, the difficulty comes from thinking that God is progressing along the Timeline like us: the only difference being that He can see ahead and we cannot. Well, if that were true, if God foresaw our acts, it would be very hard to understand how we could be free not to do them. But suppose God is outside and above the Time-line. In that case, what we call 'to-morrow' is visible to Him in just the same way as what we call 'to-day'. All the days are 'Now' for Him. He does not remember you doing things yesterday; He simply sees you doing them, because, though you have lost yesterday, He has not. He does not 'foresee' you doing things to-morrow; He simply sees you doing them because, though to-morrow is not yet there for you, it is for Him. You never supposed that your actions at this moment were any less free because God knows what you are doing. Well. He knows your tomorrow's actions in just the same way -because He is already in to-morrow and can simply watch you. In a sense, He does not know your action till you have done it: but then the moment at which you have done it is already `Now' for Him. This idea has helped me a good deal. If it does not help you, leave it alone. It is a `Christian idea' in the sense that great and wise Christians have held it and there is nothing in it contrary to Christianity. But it is not in the Bible or any of the creeds. You can be a perfectly good Christian without accepting it, or indeed without thinking of the matter at all

MOGA *echos*

First sis ji, I am not getting upset., and yes it held some Value to my Mother, but not to the point that she is obsessed over Gold or she'll cry if she found it missing. If our Guru ji can give us Kakars to wear out of love and My mother gives me a Necklace to wear out of Love, Now you tell me what is the Difference?? Your Mother is your First Guru for without her your body could not exist. It was her that fed you when you were hungry. So I cannot deny her gift out of love. Perhaps you can, but I CANNOT. Secondly, who says i am dressing up, i have already pointed out that i don't wear Gold except that necklace which i wear underneath my shirt. Dressing up is like showing off to other, you can assume that i do that, but it will only be an Assumption. I am not obsessed with GOLD, NOR DO I CARE ABOUT GOLD. If i wear a Necklace and if in your eyes it makes me a bad person? then it does. If you follow the Rehat I am not even considered a Sikh because I am a Mona and I haven't yet taken Amrit. So I don't even know what religion i belong to. So the Rehat tells me I am not a Sikh; but yet i should follow the rehat which is only for Sikhs?? The only thing that is left is for someone to tell me that I am going to Hell for wearing a Necklace. Please dont' assume that everyoen who wears Gold is Obsessed with it or is trying to look good infront of others. I am not making up an excuse for anything. The necklace around my neck was a gift from my mother, simply that, If you want to keep digging into it trying to find something that isn't there, then please do so. Again i must Stress this point, that the OBSESSION with GOLD is the Killer not Gold itself. If you Find Pleasure in Gold then it is a Problem. A Person Can wear Gold without being obsessed with it. I am not getting upset...just stating my views. Waheguru

Why did Bhai Nabi and Ghani Khan lie when they acclaimed that the Person they were Carrying on their Shoulder was Uch tha Peer when he was Guru Gobind Singh?? Their Lying was justified, because they had to lie to Protect the Truth. Next time a Girl runs into your home with half torn clothes, and a while later a Man comes to your doorstep asking you if you had seen a girl run by, please feel free to tell him the Truth that she is hiding in your house. Picking up a sword should be your last choice, not the First. Look if you don't understand what i am trying to say then simply ignore me...i can't explain it any better than i have in the other thread.

Firstly You don't know a thing about me, the answer i gave was personal. I accept that which is given by Love ie: Necklace, a slap, a yelling. Well obviously you didn't understand what i was trying to present to you thru simplicity, yet you are taking it as a life and death situation. Im sorry my answer doesn't meet your expectations. What Rehatnama are you talking about?? Rather Which ONE? Is it from the same Rehat which the writer of that rehat wanted to add Jathka Meat is allowed to it? Did Our 10th Guru wear Gold?? if so well then Image of God himself is not following your Rehat? Did he have greed so he wore it?? No because he was a KING. KING of the SIKHS and if a Measly Sikh of the GURU were to wear a Necklace give by his mother out of Love, he becomes a Sinner?? Wearing a Necklace out of Greed or Desire for Gold is a SIN, for it adds to the attachment to maya. Me Personally could care less for gold, if perhaps you did not read what i wrote. You are correct then it becomes Unneccesary to wear it, but u did not understand that the love it was given with. If me wearing the Necklace makes my mother feel as if i have accepted her Gift. If i had simply thrown it back in her face by saying, " No The Rehat Says no Sikh is allowed to wear Jewlery" YOU probably can, but im sorry i cannot for the love was worth much greater than the Gold Necklace and the Necklace became a Symbol. I don't have attachment to the Necklace, i have attachment to the Love by which the Necklace was given with. If it was a Mala which she gave, i would've wore it. For the Intention it was given with was greater than the object itself. Jewlery is not only made of Gold. The Nihungs wear tons of Metal around them, in forms of weapons, why isn't that Jewlery, because it serves a purpose of protection right. Well my Necklace serves a purpose to my mother, don't confuse this as she will be sadned if she saw me without the Necklace. You should Also question the Brides Wearing Jewlery on their Wedding day and the days following it. The Body is a Temple and the Temple of Sikhism (Harmandir Sahib) is covered with Gold, Why? Shouldn't they set an Example to the Sikhs?? If you can feel the presence of God inside of Harmandir Sahib Regardless of the Covering/Decorating the outter Shell with Gold, then if i wear a Necklace will he Punish me. I will only hurt myself if i Attach myself to that Gold. I don't have the Desire for Gold. Then it makes no difference if i wear it or not. The purpose of Rehat to not allow someone to wear Jewelry/Makeup is so that the desire/Attachment to Maya does not occur, well i am telling you that i have no desire for Gold, so what difference does it make if i wear it or not. When i know and Within me no Desire arises for the Gold arises by the blessing of Waheguru. So keep your Rehat about me wearing a Necklace to yourself...i will take it up with Waheguru when i see him :!:

ummm u did not understand exactly what was being portrayed by him and me. you should read it more thorougly.

It makes heck of a difference. The Sacred Place for Sikhs do not carry the whole of our Guru????!!!????!!!!?? Assuming that the Raagmala is not in the SGGS that are at Harmandir Sahib. The one place where you can go and see no discrepencies in our Guru. The one place where our Guru is complete without errors. I think it makes heck of a Difference.

you are question the minor things in life...I wear a Gold Necklace around my Neck, I have never liked wearing anything on my fingers or around my neck. It was a Gift from my mother on my 18th birthday. I wear it because she bought it especially for me....mind you we are not very rich, she had to save money for the necklace. I wear it, it does not effect my devotion to God. It does not make me greedy. It is not the Gold that is bad, it is Greed that is bad. Money is not bad, it is the obsession with that money that is the sin. The answer to your question will vary from person to person. Everyone has their reason. If the reason is Obsession or greed, then it is obvious that he/she is misguided and lost in her/his desires. I can wear a necklace and still love God. I don't ahve any desire for gold. I could care less for it. Wearing a necklace is the choice i make for it makes no difference if i had it on or not.

No sooner does a person attain to shame than grace begins to rain on him, and the wretched pauper becomes a king. Saints have said, "Through His grace the lame cross mountains, the blind begin to see, and the deaf begin to hear." The saints are not talking of the ordinary lame and blind; they are talking about you. As long as you are filled with arrogance your ears remain deaf, your eyes remain blind and your heart will be stone; it will be insensitive and register nothing. Till you are almost as good as dead, the flame of your light will be flickering unsteadily, as if the oil is running out. Your flame will lack the luster. There will be no urgency or intensity or depth of sensitivity in your life to awaken your heart, so that it does not beat with a dull thud as if half dead. Your life should be like a river in spate; not only are you full yourself but you wish to give to others since you have so much. Within you should be a magnificence, a fragrance. The more of it you spread, the more it grows, and you possess life's infinite source. This happens with grace. It is paradoxical, which is why the words of the saints appear mysterious. They are simple, artless, but nonetheless mystifying, for they seem to be saying the reverse of things: Die so that you can live; lose yourself in order to be worthy of attaining; or, be no more and the elixir of existence is yours. You keep saving yourself, therefore you are nothing. The more you hold onto yourself, the more miserable and wretched and meaningless you will be. The more you save yourself, the more shall you wonder. These are paradoxical statements that are not immediately understood, for they are contrary to our logic. It says, "If you want to be, save yourself." The saints say, "If you want to be, lose yourself. Did the saviour save even Himself?" Our logic says, "What if we die?" So we cling all the harder to life. But the saint says, "He who clutches harder to life, his death stands at the door long before his time!" Those who accepted death, welcomed it and went to encounter it found the nectar. They found that death was only a mask behind which the nectar was hidden. You run because of fear and deny yourself the nectar. When you embrace death you find the nectar. The characteristic of that aspect of life which is compassion and grace is power. The fourth book of Carlos Castaneda is called Tales of Power. It deals precisely with Nanak's fourth realm. As soon as the rays of His compassion descend on you, you attain infinite power. You become capable of untold power; you touch mud and it becomes gold. Before, it was different: you touched gold and it turned into mud, because then you were. Now wherever you look you see heaven. Before this wherever you turned was hell; wherever your feet fell, the place became inauspicious; whatever you did turned poisonous, even your love turned to hate, your friends turned foes. All this happened because you yourself were wrong. You were going against God so the results were contrary. Because of your own self, the results were unfavorable. Now you are no more and everything is possible. Now your very shadow holds magic. Wherever your eyes look the gates of heaven will open. Wherever you go, whatever you do, the very air in that place will change. The people who gather around you will be affected by your glory; it will permeate them. Therefore, Nanak insists on the company of the saints. He says to seek out saints and holy men, for they are the same ones who have attained the source of power. Their company is elevating, glorious. Sitting next to them.... Energy or power is active and infectious. Remember, well-being and health are equally infectious. Not only does evil enter you through others, but also goodness enters you and flows to others. You feel a freshness in the company of a fresh person. Sit a little with stale, sad, half-dead people, and their drawn faces will so affect you that you depart a different person -- sad, ready to cry like them. Sit with laughing, gay people and even if you have been sad, their joy will begin to infect you. Man is not different from or separated from man. From within we are all connected and flow into each other. Nanak stresses a great deal the company of holy men and saints. He says, "How will your efforts help? Instead, stay next to those who have attained His support, and through them His hands will touch you too! Through them the fragrant air will reach your heart. "When a person passes through a garden the fragrance of flowers catches onto his clothes. When a person passes a Buddha, knowingly or unwittingly, the fragrance of his buddhahood permeates his clothes. He no longer can remain where he was; somehow he is a changed person. The company of saints is invaluable. To establish contact with God is difficult for the simple reason that you have no idea whatsoever of Him. The saint is His symbol; you can discover his name and address and find him easily, but where will you seek God? Saint means someone in whom God has crystallized -- where his rays are so intense, and the heat so terrible! A saint intensifies God within him in much the same way as we concentrate the rays of the sun through a lens. God is in you too but he is more sparse, less concentrated; His rays do not set fire to you. There is only a lukewarmness that somehow gives you life. The saint is full of fire. He is fire! You are bound to feel the heat when you sit next to him. Something within you will also begin to burn and be destroyed. The day you attain His grace you begin to gain strength. But remember, that strength is not yours. If you become arrogant with it you will lose it, and in all likelihood tumble right to the bottom. For the subtle ego follows you till the end. It is the last thing to fall. It follows you like a shadow; you hear neither its footsteps nor its voice, and because it walks behind you, you cannot see it. Just as the body has its shadow, the mind's shadow is the ego. That is why there are stories that the person who attains God loses his shadow. By this don't assume that the physical shadow is lost, for this shadow is bound to last as long as the body endures. It is the internal shadow of the mind, the ego, that is lost. Then, he performs all actions required of him in life, but no shadow forms within; his mind has become transparent. It no longer exists. Remember, don't be under the impression that you will become strong and powerful. His grace and compassion will rain on you -- when you are not. That is all the power you will be capable of. You will become a medium, which is an important word. The flute produces notes which do not belong to it, but to the player. The flute is merely a medium. What is special about the flute, its excellence, lies in the fact that it is hollow. The hollowness allows for the notes to flow. The day that God's grace begins to pour on you, you become like the flute. Kabir said: I am only a bamboo tube. The songs are all His. It is He who sings. I am only the medium, an instrument. And the instrument is such that I am absolutely hollow, like a bamboo. There is nothing within me.

Life away from God is bound to be meaningless -- if not full of misery. It becomes like a nightmare, and you want to awaken but you cannot. You feel somebody sitting on your chest, and your arms are powerless to push him away; or someone is trying to shove you down a mountain and you have no way to save yourself. You try to move your hands but you cannot. You want to open your eyes, but you cannot. You want to shout, but you cannot. This is a nightmare. Everyone removed from God is in a dream state. Those who are opposed to the flow of existence are in a nightmare. Examine your own life and you will find that such is the condition. The eyes do not open, the hands do not move, the load on the chest does not lessen -- and yet you live! Then your life can be nothing but one long tale of woe. Kierkegaard, Sartre, Marcel, Heidegger, and other great thinkers of the West describe life as anguish and anxiety with no way to be freed from it. They are right to a very great extent. Life as it is generally led is a torment. But we also know of another kind of life -- that of Nanak, Kabir, Buddha, Krishna, Christ. Their lives are just the opposite of ours: where we are weighed down with harassment, their lives are a veritable dance. Where nothing echoes within us except strains of pain and sorrow, their inner self reverberates with music. Whereas we walk as if we have heavy chains around our feet, their step is light; they walk with a spring. While a look at us conveys the fruits of great sin, their appearance glows with the blessings of the divine. There is another way of living, and the key is to live not away from, but near to God, to live not against His order but in conformity with it. He whose life flows with the law undergoes a change. You may not necessarily struggle against God, but your ego pushes you -- it says the more you fight and struggle, the greater you become. But the joke of the whole thing is, just the opposite happens: the more you win, the less you become. You may find a big heart in a poor man, but not in a rich man; his heart gets smaller with every gain. A poor man may give in charity, the rich man loses his courage to give. A poor man is capable of love, but there is no music of love and cheer within a rich man; and of course, prayer and God are unheard of where he is concerned. He is barely capable of ordinary animal love. The more wealth you amass the narrower your heart gets. It is a contradiction. The internal space gets more and more constricted and you find yourself always anxious and worried about your possessions. Nanak says, in the realm of grace power is the expression, yet His compassion is attained only when you genuinely feel absolutely helpless. Not a hint of cunning can remain; the helplessness must be total. By merely saying, "I am helpless," nothing happens. The feeling must enter deep inside, penetrating the core of your heart, pervading every atom of your being. Not mere lip service but a feeling from your heart, it should be evident in your tears. It must permeate your every word, and echo even when there are no words. In your every action should ring the message to Him: I am helpless, O Lord! I am helpless! What can you do? You can neither do anything nor undo anything. Your actions have brought to pass only what should not have happened; you cannot accomplish anything. There is a saying in English that is similar in many other languages: Man proposes, God disposes! Nothing can be more erroneous. It is just the other way around -- God proposes and man disposes! God gives opportunities and proposals, and man refuses them, denies them. God wants to give everything to man. Existence is waiting to be looted at your hands, but your doors are shut. This existence wants to shower its bounty on you, but alas, your pots are turned upside down. This existence wants to enter you, but out of sheer fright you have not allowed so much as a crack to open to receive it. And you have so filled yourself with junk that even if it enters there is no space for it. You have left no place befitting Him within you. His grace is attained only when you are utterly helpless, rudderless. The total experience of this helplessness is shame. Then you are ashamed even to say I. Then you wonder on what grounds you can claim I am? On what basis can I say that I am capable of doing something? But our lives tell the opposite story. You have failed in all your ventures. All your efforts ended in vain, turned to nothing. All the fortresses you built fell into ruins and yet still you have not come to your senses, but hold on to doing. As long as this persists shame cannot enter into you, and Nanak says, "Shame is prayer." As long as you say, "I know," you will not bow down. Does a scholar ever bow down? His head never bends. He may bend his body but his head stands stiff in arrogance. There is a well known event that the Sufis use for teaching. Two friends studied together throughout their school career. When they finished school and went their separate ways, one became a powerful king and the other a fakir. So it was destined! The king lived in the royal palace; the fakir roamed naked from town to town. The king was famous, the fakir no less so. Once it happened that the fakir came to the king's capital. Since he was a childhood friend the king made suitable arrangements for his welcome; he had the whole town lit with lamps and the streets strewn with flowers. As the fakir was proceeding towards the town he met some travelers who said, "What an egoist the king is! He has made all these arrangements just to show you his magnificence. He has lamps lit not only in every house but all along the streets. The whole town looks like the Festival of Lights. He has covered the steps you are to climb with sheets of gold inlaid with precious stones. He wants to show you that you are but a naked fakir while he revels in his glory." The fakir said, "We shall see his arrogance." The day arrived for the fakir to visit his old friend. All the people went to receive him at the gates to the town. The king was also there. He looked at his friend and was dumbstruck. It was not the rainy season but the fakir's legs were smeared with muck right up to his knees! But it would have been embarrassing to ask him about it in front of so many people. When he crossed the glittering steps and entered the palace, the fakir sat on the priceless carpet spread especially in his honor -- and dirtied it! Then the king finally asked him. "Friend, there was no rain anywhere, and it is not the rainy season, then how come your legs are covered with mire?" The fakir replied, "If you wanted to show off your wealth, I wanted to show off my poverty to you." The king laughed and said, "Then come, brother, let us embrace, for neither of us has gotten anywhere. We are just where we were when we left school." Wealth can fill you with arrogance, and so can renunciation. So arrogance is the only obstruction. Once arrogance is obliterated, shame is what remains. Nanak says the He who is filled with shame gets showered with God's grace. Shame and modesty is worthiness. As long as you are arrogant you do not need Him, and how can you achieve what you do not need? You have never really called Him, wanted Him, needed Him. If ever you called Him it was for other things: when the child was ill, or you had a case in court -- but never just for Himself! Until you call Him just for Himself, all your prayers are false for your prayer has nothing to do with divinity. You want something of the world -- perhaps you might get it from God. A wealthy man was dying. He called his priest and asked him, "If I were to donate one hundred million rupees to your temple, would I get a place in heaven?" This was a natural question from a man who always thought in terms of wealth. The priest answered, "There is no harm in trying, though I cannot promise anything. I have never heard of anyone booking his seat in heaven this way. Since your wealth is going to be left anyway, why not try?" If you have acquired anything through wealth, the feeling always remains in your mind somewhere that worship or meditation can also be attained this way. Wealth is gained by ego, by ambition; whereas worship, prayer, meditation are attained through shame. God is attained only when all ambitions fall, when you find yourself utterly useless, when nothing you do turns out correct. At the moment that you are absolutely helpless and incapable of doing anything, His grace showers. Not only the ego of doing, but the ego of knowing, must also fall. That you know the four Vedas by heart, or the Koran, or that no one is more adept at the Bible -- all this knowledge will keep you from His grace. 'I know', which is the statement of your knowledge, is a subtle form of doing. Your doing and your knowing are two sides of your ego. Both must fall. Have you ever asked yourself in full awareness what you know? You do not even know the stone that lies outside your house and yet you claim to know God? You haven't been able to know a flower fully yet. The English poet, Tennyson, said: If I were to know the smallest flower fully, I would know what God and man is. You will have known everything if you have known the mystery of a flower opening, since it contains all existence. If you have understood and recognized the beauty of one single flower, you have discovered and understood the beauty of all existence. If you penetrate the truth within the flower, what is left? He who has known the drop knows the ocean, for qualitatively they are one. Whatever is in the ocean is contained in the drop. It is a small edition of the ocean. He who knows a single atom knows all. But what do we know? Whatever information we have is stale, borrowed, belonging to others. It is alien, handed down to you from thousands of hands. If thousands of people have worn the same pair of shoes, you will not be ready to step into them. But this is how your knowledge is. You have not put your feet but your head into such shoes. All your knowledge is borrowed and alien. You read the books, but cannot even be sure if the person is talking from his personal experience or hearsay. I am told: A certain film actress was very clever. When she removed her jewels each night she left a note next to them, saying: "These are fake jewels. The real ones are in the bank vault." One morning she got up and found them gone. On the table was a note, "I took the fake jewels, for I am a sham thief. The real one is in jail." Are you sure that the one whose words you are taking in, whose knowledge you are imbibing, is authentic? You have no way to find out. You have no criterion to judge the true from the false. The only real test is when you have your own experience, but then you have no further need to listen to anyone else. This is the trouble. When gold is at hand we do not have the touchstone; when we have the touchstone there is no need to test the gold. But as long as you are able to test, you need the touchstone very badly. You cover your knowledge with borrowed knowledge, and this strengthens the spine of your ego. 'I know' creates the arrogance and pride that is the hindrance. When there is neither knowledge nor action, you are no more; both your props have fallen, and the castle is razed to the ground. This state where the castle has fallen into ruins is what Nanak calls shame. When shame becomes intense, crystallized, His grace begins to pour. Your shame, His grace: these two are correlated. Shame is like a hollow in the ground and His grace is like the lifegiving rains. It also rains on the mountains, but the water slips off into the valleys below that are low, hollow and empty. His grace pours on all and you can either be a valley and receive it or a mountain and allow it to flow off. Nanak says, for Him no one is high, no one is low; no one is worthy, no one is unworthy. He showers His grace on all. There are some like valleys who are filled and blessed, whereas others are like towering mountains, so filled with themselves that there is no place to hold His grace. Be like the valley, the hollows in the ground, and you shall attain Nanak's shame. Once shame forms and the hollow takes shape, since His grace is always pouring, you will become a lake of knowledge and awareness. Your very way of being will change. You shall no more be as you are now. The hollow contains only God. Then you are no longer helpless; in fact no one is stronger than you.

hmmm interushting thread ya'll got here....so anyone here had their mind changed either way for or against raag mala?? Say does anyone know whether the raag mala exists in the hand written SGGS at Harmandir Sahib? They one that is kept on the second floor??

so basically your approach is that if majority are in agreement, so it must be true? Majority of the Sikhs Lack the dicipline, that does not mean they are on the right path. Majority of the Population of the world is in pain, that does not mean its the only way to live. But i kinda see what you are saying tho, since it has to do with historical refrences and if u find more than one scholars saying the same thing, it has a greater chance to be true.

Identity binds you to you faith, but when time comes it too must fade into nothingness. Identity is necessary if there is Ego. If no ego exist What do have to identify yourself with? You say "I Am A Sikh with 5ks" But you are no one without ego. Identity is a set of rules to have when you are lost. But don't get tied down to those rules as once you have realized who you truely are...what need is there for the rules.

Rehat has to change overtime, as do rules and regulations of the world and the laws. If it was in the Rehat 200 years ago to not to trust muslims, there must have been a reason, for in those times Muslims were against Sikhs. so it was told, But if you still follow that part of the Rehat, it seems obsurd as the Muslim Emperors that were bent on killing sikhs do not exist today. So the Rehat must change to accomedate the Present Time. Then the question becomes Who has the right to change the Rehat. Who has the ability to gather up the right words that do not contain loop holes and no contradictions. That right there is the issue taht is causing the problems. If someone does not like the change in the rehat, they take the rehat and create a different group that follows their rehat. Its a never ending cycle of division.

Propaganda.

you make it seem like its mandatory to tell others my name.....why does it even matter, if someone asks me i'll tell them , but i don't see the big deal in this. I think u r making a big deal out of nothing. This is after all the internet, Identity can be mistaken, lied about. How do you know what i say is who i am. I could be a riskha driver acting like i have a porche in my driveway...or whatever.

you people are trippin over because a sis wears earing?? Please...don't become fanatics. It is simply an earing.....Yogis wear earing. Are they wrong?? Maybe she likes wearing them...isn't that good enough...forcing someone and telling them they are wrong for wearing them is judging them. It is natural for anyone going thru ( im assuming that she is in her 16-20 years age) such experience. I pierced my ear...because i wanted it and i liked the way it looked, but after few months i realized it wasn't me. Experiences weigh alot more than simply words given to someoen that it is bad to wear earings. Next time your sister or cousin gets married tell her that she can't wear earrings or put on make up because it is bad. Who are you to come inbetween her beloved husband and her. Does anyone come between you and god and tells you, that you can't wear the make up of meditation?? If she wears outside makeup it is still out of the desire for her husband. It isn't a SIN to wear makeup. It all matters onwhat the intentions are. If she is doing it for her husband, who are you to stop her??

A sikh is that who sees god in all....just because one wears a Pug and has a beard blows up a plane, does not mean he is a sikh. He cannot be a sikh for he is an impostor hiding under the clothes of a Doctor. a murderer lies in mind of an individual not in his clothes or his appearence. We acknowledge the outside appearence and we lable them, but we forget that in which truth lies. A Sikh is full of Compassion and love for humanity. A doctor is that who can heal other without wearing his white coat because the power, the knowledge does not lie in his clothes or his Stethoscope but within him.

Nanak has divided existence and its quest into four realms. The division is very scientific and worth understanding. He names the realms: Religion, Knowledge, Shame and Grace. The section of religion deals with the expression of dharma, the law, the rule, that governs the whole of existence. The Vedas refer to it as rut, which means unchangeable law -- what Lao Tzu calls Tao. From rut is derived rutu, the seasons. At the time of the Vedas, the seasons were so regular and clear-cut that there was not a moment's difference from one year to the next. Spring would come on the exact day, the rains would start the very day they were supposed to. Man has disturbed nature completely so that the seasons are no longer seasons. The word rutu was given specifically to the seasons for they worked exactly according to their timetable, following an unchangeable law. There was a system at work. Because of man's so-called knowledge, everything has gone haywire; even the seasons have gone off the rails, so to speak. The West is now much more concerned about this state of affairs, giving rise to a movement around a new branch of science: ecology. Ecologists insist that nature be not tampered with. They believe that man should leave nature to God if he wishes to survive. Changes in nature bring about changes in the surroundings, which are being destroyed, and we are approaching a point that is dangerous for mankind. The art of knowing the most intrinsic discipline of the supreme law of life is called dharma, religion. Buddha used the Pali word, dhamma, to mean the rule. When a Buddhist monk says, "Now I surrender myself to the law," he lets go of his self to seek shelter in the supreme law "through which I was born and in which I shall dissolve." To know truth is to know this rule. To express this fundamental law of life, Nanak says, is the basis for the realm of religion. We live, but we live by our thoughts. We think a thousand times before we take a single step. And the more we think the more our steps fall in the wrong place. Whatever steps we take without the intrusion of thoughts invariably lead us right. You eat your food but you do not think about digesting it. The rule digests the food. Try this experiment: after meals concentrate on the stomach and the process of digestion -- you will end with an upset stomach. As soon as you interfere with the unconscious law you create chaos within. Every night you sleep. One night ponder at length on how you fall asleep, how sleep comes, and what happens -- you will pass a sleepless night. It isn't strange that people who think a great deal suffer from insomnia. Life goes on! The trees never think about when they should let the flowers bloom. The tree knows from its very roots. It does not think, for all its mechanisms are built in. The rivers flow towards the sea. Do they have any sense of direction? Do they have any maps? An unconscious rule guides their waters towards the ocean. This gigantic universe works without thoughts; and nowhere do we find a single mistake or mishappening. Everything works according to the rule -- except man. Man has gone wrong for he does not obey the rule; instead he is guided by his thoughts. He thinks: Should I do this or not? Is this right or wrong? What would be the outcome if I...? Will I gain something? What will people say? In the haze of smoke created by a thousand-and-one such thoughts, the straight line of life gets hidden and lost. He who works in a state of no-thought is an enlightened being. So religion is not wisdom, nor a decision of your intellect. Religion is a quest by a man who is tired of his intelligence, who is harassed by it, who has tried every direction and finds himself a helpless failure in the end. Such a man lets go of his intelligence and then says, "Your will, not mine, O Lord! Take me where You will." This Nanak refers to as the divine order. Don't imagine this to mean that there is a huge person sitting somewhere issuing orders, that there is a supreme father, the Supreme God! The rule works without the orderer, the rule is God Himself. We have to use words that people can understand; so also we have to make use of symbols, signs. Foolish people often cling to symbols; so they think God has hands, mouth, limbs, that he sits on a throne and dispenses justice and gives orders. If we do not obey his orders, we are irreligious; if we do, we are relifious. If we don't obey, He will be displeased and angry and then punish us. If we obey He will reward us. This is all useless nonsense! You are attaching too much importance to mere symbols. Only the law exists. There is no one sitting there on high who works the rule. When you move in harmony with the rule all wrong actions stop on their own, for the rule knows no wrong. Then when the right actions accumulate through you, the melody of joy begins to play. When your actions are right they will spread a fragrance of happiness and joy all around. This fragrance signals that your actions are correct. When something wrong happens through you the shadow of sorrow will surround you. The greater the wrong, the greater the anxiety and worry and suffering. Don't look upon suffering as a punishment, but rather as the outcome of wrong action. If a man leaves the straight road and wanders into a jungle and then thorns prick him, he understands that he has gone off the track. Not being on the road, there are bound to be thorns. The man looks for the right track and gets back to the road; now no thorns prick him because there are none. When you hit against a wall and hurt your head, the wall is not punishing you. What has the wall to do with you? When you find the door you can go out easily without hurting your head. It is just like this. The day you begin to recognize the law, you will have found the door. As long as you are oblivious of the rule you will keep knocking your head against the wall. How many times have you hurt yourself, how many wounds do you bear on your head? These are wounds you have gathered over millions of births that are oozing, festering, and causing endless pain. And you think someone is punishing you. No one is punishing you; you are reaping your own harvest. Always bear in mind whenever you are unhappy you have gone against nature; whenever you are ill you are out of harmony with nature. Illness is a warning, a hint to you; as such it is helpful and for your own good. If there were no illness you would never know when you have left nature's path, or when you have gone against the eternal arrangement of life. Then you will keep wandering with no way for you to come back. Suffering and sorrow turns you back to God. This is why you remember Him when you are in pain and sorrow. In joy you never think of Him. The saint prays: "Oh Lord, let there always be a little suffering as a reminder, so that we remain constantly in prayer, always calling out to you. If there is no pain or sorrow, we shall have no excuse to call You. In happiness we forget you; we shall be lost!" Suffering means just one thing: you have wavered in religion somewhere, somehow. Do not blame others, nor your fortune, nor be angry with God. Take it as a hint, a warning, and try to find out where you have slipped. Where have you gone against nature? Then try to fall in line with nature -- for that is religion.

The fourth division is the realm of grace. He says, when you are filled with shame His grace pours on you. When you become zero, emptiness, then perfection descends on you -- not before that. Your stiff-backed arrogance is the obstruction between you and His grace. You rely on your own self, you need no help even when you pray. When you ask Him for something, it is just one of your many attempts. You are also tapping this source -- perhaps something will come of it. And if something does emerge you claim it was your own effort that brought about the achievement. Mulla Nasruddin climbed up into a cherry tree. The cherries were ripe, but high in the tree so he had to climb way up. He became frightened and prayed, "Oh, God, if I reach the cherries and get them, I shall offer one naya paisa in the mosque." Now Mulla began to climb with full faith that God would see to him. As he neared the top branch, the thought struck him, "One naya paisa is too much to have committed, and there aren't that many cherries; besides I'm climbing on my own. It wasn't necessary to bring God into this at all." When his hands reached the cherries he said, "I could buy more than this for one naya paisa in the market and You haven't moved a finger. I'll offer a few cherries in place of the naya paisa." As he was busy thinking this his foot slipped and he came crashing to the ground. As he lay there he called out to God, "Couldn't You even take a joke? If You had been a little more patient I would have offered the one naya paisa at the mosque as I promised." When you worship or pray it is all a display of your egotism and arrogance. It is a decoration for your ego. Real prayer is when you are not, when the worshipper is no more, worship starts. Nanak says, in shame you melt, you are obliterated. On the one hand you are no more, and on the other His grace pours showers of joy on you. Bliss is always pouring down, but you were so filled with your arrogance that there was no place for it inside. So grace only pours constantly when shame empties you inside.

Third is the realm of shame. When a person knows what is to be known, then only does he realize his own ignorance, hence the shame. The ignorant man swaggers about in arrogance. Without modesty the ignorant are totally unaware of the ignorance that fills them. An ignorant person struts about as a wise man. Only the wise knows how vast is his ignorance. He feels: What do I know? Hardly anything! Socrates said, "When I became enlightened the one thing I knew for certain was that I knew nothing." When knowledge becomes complete this is what you know -- that you know nothing, that you are nothing. You become a zero. This zero Nanak calls the realm of shame. Then you are filled with shame: What am I? Nothing worthy of the name, and how I prided myself on my knowledge -- swollen like a bubble! How I exaggerated the little I knew. Mulla Nasruddin had just returned from a journey. He was telling his father, "There was such a storm on the river as was never experienced before. The waves rose fifty feet high." His father said, "You are exaggerating a bit too much. I have spent fifty years going up and down this river and I have never seen waves like you describe. The river never rises that high." Mulla said, "Be sensible, father. Everything is increasing. Just look at how the price of grain has gone up." Man finds ways and means to support his exaggeration. And on this stands his greatest exaggeration -- that I am. It is the biggest lie in this world. If the existence of God is the greatest truth, the existence of the I is the greatest lie, for two I's cannot exist at the same time. Existence is one. If all existence is one, it can have only one center. But each man, each individual person constantly proclaims 'I am'. The enlightened person is filled with shame at the excesses and exaggerations he formerly engaged in. What proclamations he made over mere nothings! There was only a large bubble that burst at the slightest touch; there were paper boats that disintegrated as soon as they touched the water; there was a house of cards that fell in the slightest breeze. But how many exaggerations he indulged himself in for them! Mulla Nasruddin was arrested and brought before the court for using foul language about a well-known politician. When the magistrate asked him why he called him a big ass, Mulla said, "Your Honor, it was not my fault. I know the high position this gentleman holds. He is our minister. But what could I do when he himself asked me, 'Do you know who I am?' I had to tell him." Your eyes ask the same question of others: Do you know who I am? If someone's feet trips you, or you are pushed by someone, you turn back as if to say, "Don't you see who I am?" The fact is that you do not know who you are. Who knows himself? Those who really know, their egos are annihilated. As long as you do not know, the I exists. Next time a person asks you, "Do you know who I am?" please ask him in return, "Do you?" It is all arrogant talk when a man asks, "Do you know how rich I am? Don't you know my status, my position?" He implies that he can get you in trouble, that he is a dangerous man. It is a proclamation of violence. You say that, only when you want to convey your power to destroy the other person. All your arrogance is violence. Ego is the thread of violence. The one who knows is not even aware of his being; he does not know who he is, he is lost. The ignorant remains arrogant and proclaims, "I am." He who is enlightened stops this language. So Nanak calls this third part the realm of shame. He says, when the enlightened one is asked to speak he does not know what to say, and to whom. He has nothing to say, he makes no claims. Even before God he is filled with shame, for in his heart he is aware of the endless false claims he has made before. God in His compassion graced him with enlightenment! If, as he stood before Him and conveyed: Here I am! Accept me! it would be total arrogance. If he prayed it was only that he might be accepted by Him. If he did a good act, if he built a temple or mosque or gurudwara, it was only to show Him that he was something. The wise man becomes overcome with shame; with what face will he stand before Him? All your appearances are false, made up to show the world. Just think, if today you were to stand before God which of your faces would you show Him? The one you show to your wife, your boss, or your servant? Will you show Him the face that you take to your sweetheart or the one you assume before the lowly and poor? Which of these masks will you put on? Before those who are powerful your tail keeps wagging and you try to please in every little way. Your appearance bears the expression of flattery and wily charm. And how stiff is your posture before a lowly person! From him you expect the same flattery and attention as you give to those who are higher than you. You expect him to wag his tail and appreciate every word that comes out of you. Remember, he who demands flattery has had to flatter someone somewhere, and is actually taking revenge. But the person who has seen himself correctly, never praises anyone nor expects praise from others. There is one God. If He is praised that is enough. From whom is he to ask praise? For everywhere it is He. Nanak says, one dies of dreadful shame when one stands before truth; for one finds that not a single appearance is worth the name. All are dirty, all are false. Zen masters tell their disciples: "When you have discovered your original face your search is over." They exhort them to find the face they had before they were born, to look for the face that will be with them after death. All intervening faces are false. Psychologists say that if a person tries to go back into his past by reawakening his memory he can only go up to the age of five or four, or at the most to three. He cannot go beyond that. The first three years of life cast no imprint on the mind. Why? Because till then you are so artless and simple that you have no mask. To have a memory one has to claim something. The ego creates memory. All remembrances are the ego, which remembers everything and keeps account of every moment of your life. For the first three years you are so innocent, so guileless, you do not know who you are. You have no claim to anything. A three-year-old comes jumping and prancing and laughing aloud as he tells his mother, "I was last in the class today." He has no idea what it is to be first or to be last. The ego is not yet formed. He has no idea of caste or creed, of his house and home, high caste or low caste. He is blissfully unaware whether he is a brahmin or untouchable. He knows nothing yet. His face is without blemish. Only such a face can you present before God. But the parents begin their vicious training very early in life. They begin to impose the false masks from the very first day. The mother, at the very outset, expects the child to smile when she looks at him. If he does not she feels hurt. The child may not feel like smiling, but soon he learns that he must smile at his mother's glance, whether he likes it or not. The lying has started. The child gets his first mask. Then many, many more masks are added as the child grows up. It becomes most embarrassing to stand before Him with these false faces, says Nanak. Whenever anybody becomes aware of this fact he is filled with shame. Then he looks and looks and cannot discover which one is authentic. The more he seeks, the more he is faced with other appearances, just as when you remove one layer of an onion another one appears; for the false is deposited on the mind in layer upon layer from infinite births. That is all that you have done in your infinite births, but when you remove them layer by layer, you find nothing remains -- except emptiness! Nanak says that when the emptiness emerges one is drowned in shame. One feels: What was I? I was nothing and yet I claimed to be this, and that. This is the shame that Nanak refers to as the third realm.