190. gurus
Maharajji continued,
“If we long for permanent peace and happiness and freedom from the laws of
karma, we must seek the Lord within. Our soul is of the essence of the Lord. ‘Just
as oil is in sesame seeds,’ says Kabir, ‘and fire is in flint, so does he reside in your body,
the Lord whom you seek day and night.’ Jesus Christ also pronounces in the Bible,
‘The kingdom of God is within you.’ As Christ says, our body is the ‘temple of the
living God,’ for it is within our body alone that he can be realized and experienced.
“One can see for oneself how ignorant we are when we look for the Lord in man-
made shrines instead of the temple made by God himself to reside in. The saints ad-
vise us, therefore, that if we want to realize God, we must look for him within our-
selves and nowhere else. Naturally the question now arises that if God is within our
own body, which is the true temple of God, why do we not see him? What is the ob-
stacle, and how can it be removed? The obvious reply is that it is our desires and
wishes, our love and attachment for the world and its objects, that generate the love
and attachment in us. Naturally, it is our own mind. Whatever karma the mind im-
pels us to do, the consequences have to be suffered by the soul also, for the mind and
soul are knotted together. We know that water in the clouds is pure, but when it falls
on the ground as rain, it gathers all kinds of impurities. The condition of our soul
is no way different from that of rainwater. It is of the same essence as God himself,
but having become subservient to the mind, it has gathered dirt and dross and lost
its purity. As long as the soul does not free itself from the clutches of the mind, it
cannot know its source.
“All genuine seekers realize the importance of controlling and subduing the
mind. To that end they try diverse methods and techniques. Some resort to auster-
ities and repetition of holy names, some indulge in charitable acts, others leave their
hearths and homes and seek the seclusion of mountains and forests. There are still
others who make endless rounds of temples, mosques, churches, gurdwaras, and de-
vote themselves to the study of scriptures and sacred books and listen to learned dis-
courses. All these functions are solely directed to one end, namely, to control the
mind. The truth, however, is that the cravings and desires of the mind have only
been suppressed for a while; they have not disappeared, nor have they been con-
quered. The more we suppress a thing, the more it rebounds and reacts.”
Maharajji then went on to say that the only way of detaching the mind was to attach
it to something higher—to the God within. This could be done by seeking the com-