Every prophet and every saint has a way, but it leads to God: all the ways are really one.
Mevlana Jalaluddin Rumi
Mathnawi, I, 30861
There is a timeless teaching lying at the spiritual core of all religions and wisdom traditions, expressed in the testimony of the mystics and the teaching of the masters. From time immemorial and around the globe, prophets and seers sing of this wisdom within, and masters, saints and sages teach how to realize this truth that lies hidden within the heart.
Ultimate Reality
The masters of wisdom teach that the source, course and goal of the spiritual path are but different aspects of one indivisible ultimate reality.
I am That,
Thou art That,
All this is That,
There is nothing else but That,
That is all there is.
The task of the seeker is to turn That
into This
by consciously realizing one's true nature. According to Meher Baba, the sole purpose of creation is the eventual enlightenment of all beings:
Knowing that Creation is not an accident and that it has a deeper meaning than is apparent to the eye, the seers of all ages have time and again drawn the attention of the world to the fact that, although for a certain period of his life on this planet man may identify himself exclusively with the life of the senses, his transcendental destiny is God-realization.
Maulana Rumi, in his Masnavi, has a parable that illustrates this: The cub of a tiger happened to be re a red amongst a flock of sheep. As the cub grew up, it developed all the traits of the sheep and grazed and bleated like them, so that it never thought of itself as anything different from the sheep. One day, however, a tiger from the jungle approached the one from the flock and said to him, "Do you know that you are a tiger like me, and not one of the sheep?" Thereafter he coaxed the strayed tiger to look at its image in a rivulet nearby, and succeeded in enlightening it as to its true nature.
The moral of this fable is that man also allows himself to be identified with the world of the senses and seems to have no way of escape. But there is a way of escape, for eventually a Master appears who enlightens him. He is then redeemed, and fin d s himself in the course of time face to face with his ultimate goal — God-realization.
— Meher Baba
God Speaks: The Them of Creation and Its Purpose
Walnut Creek, CA: Sufism Reoriented, 2nd rev. ed., 1973, (1997 reprint), p. 38
Conceptualizing Ultimate Reality
Ultimate reality can be considered in many ways, for example, as transcendent, immanent, and both transcendent and immanent. It can also be conceived as formless and with form, as well as personal and impersonal. Diffferent traditions have different words for these various conceptions of ultimate reality. Here are some examples from East and West in matrix form, showing the relation of form and formless to personal and impersonal.
(Note: The correspondence of these terms is not meant to be exactly the same in the significance from tradition to tradition. Different traditions use somewhat different concepts for these categories. There are often more than one or two terms for each category, so this list is offered as suggestive rather than exhaustive.)
Buddhist Tradition
| Form | Formless | |
|---|---|---|
| Personal | Nirmanakaya | Sambhogakaya |
| Impersonal | Pratitya-Samutpada | Dharmakaya, Tatatha |
Jesus Tradition
| Form | Formless | |
|---|---|---|
| Personal | Jesus, Holy Trinity | God |
| Impersonal | Love, Power | Godhead |
Platonic Tradition
| Form | Formless | |
|---|---|---|
| Personal | Zeus | Theos |
| Impersonal | Demiourgos | To On, To Hen, Ton Kalon |
Qabalistic Tradition
| Form | Formless | |
|---|---|---|
| Personal | Adam Kadmon | YHVH, Eiyeh Asher Eiyeh |
| Impersonal | Sefiroth | Ayin, Ayn Sof |
Sufi Tradition
| Form | Formless | |
|---|---|---|
| Personal | Al-Insãn al-Kãmil | Allah |
| Impersonal | Sifat | Ghayb ul-Ghaib, Dhat/Zat |
Taoist Tradition
| Form | Formless | |
|---|---|---|
| Personal | Shang Ti, Tao-te t'ien-tsun | T'ien |
| Impersonal | Te | Tao, Wu Ji, Yu |
Vedic Tradition
| Form | Formless | |
|---|---|---|
| Personal | Avatara, Ishta Devata | Paramatma |
| Impersonal | Saguna Brahman | Nirguna Brahman |
Western Tradition
| Form | Formless | |
|---|---|---|
| Personal | Chosen Form of God | God |
| Impersonal | Higher Power | Being, Absolute |
Strictly speaking, ultimate reality is ineffable, since it lies beyond the limits of thought and language. All these terms attempt to convey something of this reality that exceeds the bounds of ideas, imagination, and emotion. The wise remind us that no mental conception, logical construct, poetic symbol, or artistic representation is capable of expressing ultimate reality as it really is. Such concepts and constructs are only instruments the mind employs in its feeble attempt to go beyond its inherent limitations. But the mesh of the net of thought and language is not fine enough to capture that which is subtle, let alone hold the unmanifest.
Yet, human beings need not be guided by blind faith alone. For the heart has wings capable of flying where the thinking mind cannot. These are the wings of love and awe. Love impels the soul to soar toward that which is ultimately attractive, and awe humbles one's limited individuality before the mysterium tremendum. While we rush with open arms toward the beautiful, we feel compelled to bow down before the sublime.
Realizing Ultimate Reality
Core spirituality is the universal and integral Way to realize this one, unchanging, indivisible ultimate reality, which is the source and ground of phenomena. This universal wisdom of life, set forth in the testimony of the mystics and the teaching of the masters, lies at the heart of all spiritual traditions. Being central to every religious tradition, the perennial wisdom of core spirituality may be viewed as being the ancient religion of humankind.
Normative religions consider doctrine, ritual and observance to be central and take mysticism to be peripheral. Conversely, perennial wisdom considers mystical spirituality to be central and all the rest, peripheral.
Mystical spirituality has been called knowledge of the heart.
For this wisdom of life is written in the human heart by the finger of
God
as on a tablet of stone. Ineffable, it cannot be captured in words. Universal, it is present in everyone as a hidden treasure waiting to be discovered by exploring the cave of the heart.
The wise say that one must experience it for oneself through personal revelation. Core spirituality is the inner quest for this revelation, necessarily undertaken alone. Yet, it is usually pursued in companionship with others of like mind and heart. The spiritual path is a route of pilgrimage along which travel a multitude of caravans.
On this quest, everyone's journey is unique. Even though the ladder of ascent is the same for all, everyone mounts it differently, depending on their constitution and circumstances. According to Eastern traditions and esoteric Western teachings, this journey spans many lifetimes.
The Spiritual Quest
On this path of development, one accumulates many experiences, the residue of which is stored in the unconscious as heaps of latent impressions. These are different from the memories of one's present lifetime that are stored in the subconscious and which can potentially be recalled. For the deep impressions accumulated in previous lives are ordinarily beyond the grasp of conscious recall. As a result, most people are not only unaware that such impressions exist but also do not realize that they strongly influence desire, thought, and action. Even those who accept reincarnation and the law of actions' consequences are not directly aware of their own impressions or those of others unless they are advanced spiritually.
In the Sanskrit of the Vedic tradition and Buddhism, these impressions are called sanskaras and vasanas of karma (action). In the Arabic of Sufism they are called nuqoosh-i-amal or impressions of action
also. In the Hebrew of Qabalah they are called qliphoth or shells.
In the Jesus tradition, they are called sins,
meaning that which separates the individualized soul from God. These accumulated impressions constitute sheaths
or veils
concealing the true nature of the self, soul or spirit from itself. The spiritual path involves thinning out and finally resolving the accumulated impressions, thereby removing these seven veils
, each of which conceals one of the inner planes from grosser vision.
Every human being goes through the same process of conception, gestation, birth, maturation, aging, and death, and every individual does so uniquely. So too, every drop-soul which establishes its identity as separate from the ocean of Reality goes through the same process of apparent separation from the unitary source, evolution through the seven kingdoms to the human form, involution on the spiritual path through the inner planes, and realization of one's true nature. Yet, everyone's journey of awakening to one's eternal essence is unique to that individual.
The Goal
Core spirituality is the quest to realize the presence of the one Reality, as well as to manifest this presence in everyday life. Summarizing the universal teaching, Meher Baba reveals how is this accomplished by removing the veil of impressions giving rise to limited mind and constituting the lower self or individual ego. According to Meher Baba, the goal of life is to realize God:
The real Goal of life is not the death of the ego but the death of the mind. When Mohammed or Jesus or Zoroaster talked of being born once and of dying once, it was of the mind [and not of the body]. When mind dies totally, the false ego becomes Real I [i. e., false ego is completely effaced and Real I manifests]. In reality ego is not born and as such it does not die. Ego [as witness consciousness] is always Real. It is only due to mind that ego acts and feels limited and false.
Mind takes the body according to its good and bad impressions [sanskaras]. Taking up and giving up of bodies is not the mind or the ego taking birth or dying. Every time when body is discarded, mind survives, impressions remain. These impressions press on mind to spend them by taking another body. So mind takes another body according to the impressions; ego witnesses. And another body and another.
When you are in sound sleep, ego, mind and sanskaras are there. Sanskaras wake up mind. They say,
— Meher BabaGo on, spend us.Waking up from the sound sleep is, in a way, an everyday birth for the body. When one body is left, another body comes up though there is a time lag between the giving up of one body and taking up another. Mind exists even when a new body is not given to the ego; it is the mind-state of heaven or hell. But mind has to die while it is in a human body, retaining full consciousness. This is the Goal.
in Bal Natu, Glimpses Of The God-Man, 1979, Vol. II, p. 343
Longer version in Bhau Kalchuri, Lord Meher, vol. 10, p. 3712-3718
Ways and Means
Meher Baba observes that the means to realizing God are many. But the way of surrendering to a God-realized master (guru kripa yoga) is superior to all other ways because a God-realized Master is all-knowing, all-powerful, and all-compassionate, hence, is able to deal with one's accumulated impressions most expeditiously:
God manifests his presence when and where lust, greed, anger, jealousy, hatred, back-biting and selfish desires are totally absent. But, as they are the outcome of impressions (sanskaras) of past lives, and must necessarily be expressed, getting rid of them is ordinarily impossible. It would be like a rock trying to lift itself. Nevertheless, past impressions must be expressed to be got rid of. But at the same time that these past impressions are being expressed and spent, new ones are forged, because of the presence and assertion of the lower self.
If one is to be free of the endless chain of impressions, past and present, this assertive lower self must be abolished. Only when one's assertive (lower) self is removed can the impressions be automatically spent without incurring the binding of fresh sanskaras. One who has achieved this can never be bound by, or held responsible any more, for his actions, good or bad, which are the expression of his past impressions of virtue, patience, lust, anger, etc. Thus, with the cessation of new sanskaras, all past impressions naturally unwind to the finish, and one is free of all impressions.
To follow the path of the true yogas — karma yoga, dnyan yoga, raj yoga, bhakti yoga — is the remedy for the uprooting of this heritage of evils derived from past impressions, expressed by constant actions, and sustained by the continual formation of new ones. In karma yoga, one tries to lose one's self in selfless service for others. In dnyan yoga one tries to lose one's self in contemplation and meditation. In raj yoga one tries to lose one's identity with the individual self, and establish identity with the universal self by aiming, through constant mental poise and non-attachment, to be in the world and yet not of it. In bhakti yoga one tries to lose one's self in devotion to God. Even in these yogas, only when the zenith is reached can the individuality of the lower self be lost, yet consciousness remain.
But the easiest and safest way to lose one's self is by completely surrendering to the Perfect Master. Then the past, present and future of the one who has surrendered are drowned in the Master, and he is no longer either bound by, or responsible for, any of his actions, whether good or bad, expressed during his implicit obedience to the Master. Thus complete surrenderance to the Perfect Master is, in itself, freedom.
— Meher Baba
Messages Delivered During Andhra Tour, 1954 (booklet), p. 9-10
Also cited in The Glow, Feb. 1978, p. 24, and Bhau Kalchuri, Lord Meher, vol. 12, p. 4303
In the Vedic tradition the way of the Master's grace is called guru kripa yoga. Meher Baba explains why the Perfect Master is in this unique position to exercise spiritual power, a position which also includes the Avatar as the Highest of the High and the Master of Masters:
The Sadguru or Perfect Master has a position and power which is unique. There are many souls in the world who are more or less advanced on the spiritual Path, but there are few who have crossed all six stages of the internal spheres of consciousness and become one with the infinite source of existence, knowledge and bliss. The Sadguru has not only experienced the different planes of consciousness, but he actually permeates the very being of all souls because of his having become one with the Infinite. He is the pivot of universal activity.
In a sense, to him are due all your thoughts and actions, your joys and sorrows, your frets and fumes, your strength and weaknesses, your possessions and surrenderance and your love and longing. He not only pervades all existence, but is consciously conversant with the cosmic law of cause and effect and the complex working of the sanskaras of the individual souls. The causes of individual happiness or misery, vices or virtues are as much known to him as the causes of cosmic changes and upheavals. Every being is an open book for the infinite searchlight of his omnipresent consciousness. Because of his union with the Infinite, he is endowed with unlimited power and in the twinkling of an eye can annihilate all the sanskaras of the soul and liberate it from all entanglements and bondage.
— Meher Baba
Discourses
Myrtle Beach, SC: Sheriar Press, 2nd rev. ed., 1987, p. 58-59
All of these ways are found in the world's spiritual teachings and traditions. Some teachings and traditions emphasize certain means over others. For example, Advaita Vedanta and Zen Buddhism emphasize the way of knowledge, while Sufism and the Way of Jesus emphasize the the way of love. The way brought by Abraham and reiterated by Muhammad emphasizes submission to God through perfect obedience to His commands. Zoroaster brought the message, good thoughts, good words, and good deeds
, and the life story of Rama told in the Ramayana emphasizes doing what is right just because it is right (dharma). The way emphasized by Krishna in the Bhagavad Gita (18:64-69) and also Meher Baba is complete surrenderance to the Avatar. Similarly, initiation into Buddhism begins with taking refuge in the compassionate Buddha. Jesus also said, "I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me." (John 14:6 KJV)
The various ways or yogas are not mutually exclusive but complementary, like rivers flowing toward the same sea. As these rivers flow toward the sea, they begin to converge. Near the ocean, the banks that separate them begin to recede and finally disappear altogether, their waters becoming indistinguishable from each other and that of the ocean.
Mature spiritual living is the confluence of love, knowledge, right action, internal renunciation and service, with the grace and under the guidance of the one Master, of whom all realized masters are the conscious embodiment. Hazrat Inayat Khan's Sufi invocation encapsulates this:
Toward the One,
The Perfection of Love, Harmony, and Beauty,
The Only Being,
United with All the Illuminated Souls,
Who form the Embodiment of the Master,
The Spirit of Guidance.
1. Jalaluddin Rumi, The Mathnawi of Jalaluddin Rumi, edited from the oldest manuscripts available, with critical notes, translation and commentary by Reynold A. Nicholson, in 8 volumes, London: Messrs Luzac & Co., 1925-1940.