Symbols of Unity

https://kirpal-sagar.org/en/symbols-of-unity/

If you come to Kirpal Sagar, you can see the symbols of unity from afar. At first sight, they are models of the four most common types of churches: the model of a Sikh temple, a Hindu temple, a mosque, and a church. These typical forms are known from all religious traditions. Less known is that they refer to the human body.

Gurdawaras, the temples of the Sikhs, are dome-shaped, similar to the form of the head. The shape of the mosque reminds one of the forehead. The nose-shaped towers of the churches often stand on a ground plan resembling a cross that corresponds to a person with outstretched arms.

Their message is: God is in us – the true temple is man himself.

The history of mystics and saints of different epochs and cultures shows that they all went the way of contemplation and meditation and thus came to their statements about God. The Holy Scriptures contain hints and reports about their inner experiences. When comparing the scriptures, one encounters conforming statements about experiences of light and inner sounds, with perfect spiritual teachers or Masters able to convey them to other people in practice.

While the Absolute God is indescribable and incomprehensible, light and sound are the two aspects through which He expresses Himself.

Everything originated through this God-power, is the life principle or the life impulse, without nothing can exist. Man as the ‘crown of creation’ has the ability to perceive It by turning inwardly and coming into contact with It. Becoming one with this power is the original goal of meditation, and this is also the spiritual core of religion, which is completely independent of the external forms and rituals of the various religions.

In the scriptures, the working God-power is described by various names, among others as Sruti in the Vedas, Naad or Udgit in the Upanishads, as Sarosha in Zend-Avesta, as the word in the Bible, as Kalima with the Prophet Mohammed, as Saut with the Sufis, Shabd or Naam in the Sikh scriptures, as music of the spheres and all harmonies with Plato and Pythagoras and as the voice of silence with the Theosophists.

Light, life, and love are regarded as the essential attributes of the divine and are innate in every sentient being. If man forgets his true nature and experiences himself as separated from that Power, it will result in strangeness, which may lead to hatred and suffering.

The relationship between man and God is based on the unity of man – the brotherhood of man under the fatherhood of God.

Satsang, one of the three pillars of spirituality (part 1)

 

 

 

(Full text can be read here):
https://www.kirpalsingh-teachings.org/index.php/en/talks/third-world-tour/480-satsang-one-of-the-three-pillars-of-spirituality28.html

By Sant Kirpal Singh, in Oakton, Virginia, USA, 29 September, 1972

 
There are so many yogas – different kinds of yoga. Each has its own scope. Hatha Yoga is there to keep your body fit. Prana Yoga is there to prolong your life. In Bhakti Yoga you have to make a hypothesis before you reach the ultimate goal. And in Gyan Yoga you have to draw an inference – not direct contact. That’s the work of very intellectual giants – not for everybody.

But the yoga that you have been put on is the most natural, quickest way of reaching the ultimate goal – God. So, in this yoga there are three pillars. First: the God-Himself-into-expression-Power, which is to be reached. The natural yoga, called Surat Shabd Yoga, which you are following is the direct way back to God. If you just catch the ray of the sun, that will take you – where? To the sun from which it emanates. So in the Surat Shabd Yoga you have to catch the God-into-expression-Power, which has two phases: light and sound. When you have a contact with that, that is called Satsang. As I told you, there are three pillars: Sat Naam, Satsang, and Satguru.

So, we will talk all about the Satsang today. What is called “Satsang”? “Sat” means “eternal” – which never falls away in dissolution or grand dissolution. That is God Himself. God does not die. And “Sang” means “to come in contact with It”. So, who has to come in contact with that God-into-expression-Power? That is our own soul. That cannot be contacted by outgoing faculties or mind or intellect. So it is we who have to contact God – not the Absolute, but the God-into-expression-Power. That is the Creator of all the world over – all universes. That Power is controlling all this creation – and also controls us in the body.

So to contact Him, first we will have to know our selves. Do you know who we are? We have got the man-body, we have got the intellect; but we are conscious entities. God is All-Consciousness, and our soul is a drop of the Ocean of All-Consciousness. This – our consciousness – is identified with mind, outgoing faculties, and all the world outside. We are identified with them so much so that we have forgotten our self. So, the first thing to have a contact with the God-into-expression-Power is to know our self. Knowing our self is at two levels: at the level of feelings, or drawing inferences. Feelings and drawing inferences are both subject to error. Seeing is above all. Seeing will arise – to whom? Your self. And you will first find your self or know your self. So it is a matter of pure self-analysis.

We say, “It is my body”, “It is my handkerchief”, “they are my spectacles”. Now, it is a quite different thing to say, “It is my handkerchief”, or “spectacles”, or “coat” and “my body”. Those three things we can take off. But can you “take off” your body? It is our body … my body … my outgoing faculties. So it is a matter of self-analysis. All Masters who came in the past – that first thing that they gave out was to know one’s self. Philosophers of the West or the East all say (the same) in their own languages. So a demonstration (is necessary) of how to analyse our selves from the outgoing faculties, mind, or intellect. That’s a matter of demonstration, which can be given by one who rises above body-consciousness daily, who has realized God, who has become the mouthpiece of God, who speaks as inspired by God. So, the first thing is that attainment, when you know your self – when you know (by first-hand experience within).

As I told you just now, our soul is under the control of the mind; mind is under the control of the outgoing faculties. And the outgoing faculties are absorbed in outer things. The first thing will be: “How to rise above body-consciousness”.

It is we who give strength to all these outgoing faculties and body. When the indweller, soul, just leaves the body (at the time of death), the body lies intact as it is but it cannot work. So all Masters have said, “Please man, know thy self.” When you know your self – you also reside in this very man-body. You cannot run away out of it, although there are eyes, ears, nose, mouth, and other things. Some Power controls us in the body. That Power is called “God-into-expression-Power”. That very Power controls all the universe over. We reside in this man-body, and that Power whom we have to contact also resides in this very body. Those who go out to find Him, they are never successful. Those who come to a Master, He tells them, “All right, please, tap inside! (The One) whom you are after, He is within you already. Why are you going on wandering outside?”

So when you sit at the feet of the Master, He gives you some first-hand experience how to rise above body-consciousness: withdraw from outside, withdraw from the body below, and come to the tenth door of the body which is at the back of the eyes – which is the seat of the soul in the body – from where it (the soul) plunges, it is ushered into the beyond. Then you know you are soul. When you know it, then you find that that Power is controlling you. The first, the highest class of Satsang is to know your self and come into contact with the God-into-expression-Power.

Now, so long as we do not come in contact, by rising above body-consciousness, with that Power which is controlling us in the body, (we need) the company of those who are in contact with that Power, conscious contact; they may be learned or unlearned. In their company they can teach us how to rise above body-consciousness and come in contact with that Power which is already within us. The company of the Saints, those who are the mouthpiece of God, who are conscious of that Power within them all the time, is also called Satsang. They are competent to give us first to know our selves by withdrawing us from outside and from the body below; they drag us up, and open the inner eye. We see the light of God, we see God, come in contact with God.

So, it is said, there are two such Satsangs: first class, when you have a contact with It; or (second class) sit in the company of somebody who has got that contact and can give you a contact. Do you follow? This (Satsang) is one of the pillars of the Surat Shabd Yoga. Each (pillar) has its own work: Sat Naam, Satguru, and Satsang.

So Masters tell us, they pray, they tell us how to pray, that’s the point. They have that contact, but still they tell us something so that we may know how to pray and what to pray. Guru Ram Das, the fourth Guru of the Sikhs, prayed, “O God, bring me in contact with the Guru who works like a philosopher’s stone.” The quality of a philosopher’s stone is given that whenever it comes in contact with any metal, that is turned into gold – any kind of metal. So He prayed, “O God, let me meet such a Guru who, like a philosopher’s stone, would turn me to gold.” He said, “I did pray, and my prayers were heard.”

 
 

To be continued…

 
 

One and One is One

Life and death is one
Beginning and end is one
Time and space is one
Finiteness and infinity is one
Destruction and construction is one
Fear and courage is one
Positive and negative is one

One and one is one
One is not one
It is being and not being
Meditation of Wordless Words

Morning beyond matter and mind…

DidisArist, 27.02.2022

Right understanding, part 53 – by Sant Kirpal Singh

Led astray

 

 

We believe the more of here and there
In all directions of “spirituality”
The greater the “weight”
The better the “taste”, the “spices”
The deeper the realization
The more developed we are
On the “path of spirituality”

We mix everything in one pot
And wonder
Why we still suffer blindly
Without proper background knowledge
Proper understanding

It blinds our power of discrimination
Makes us walk thoughtlessly on thin ice
Because not everything is tolerable for us
Not every “spiritual ingredient”

We can even drown in this process
Without even knowing it
While stepping on dangerous ice

Eating wrong mushrooms
May cause dangerous consequences
Taking the wrong medicine
For body and spirit
Will have dramatic effects

Before we prepare a “spiritual diet”
We should know its “ingredients” very well.

Do we not blindly follow what is in fashion?
Such as countless types of yoga and meditation?
But in truth do not know where they lead us
To the purpose of our existence?

Who only knows the night,
Knows nothing of the light of the day
Everything is then limited within the range of the night

Are we not blind in a moonless night?

Didi’Artist, 03.05.2021

 
 

The competence of Sant Kirpal Singh Ji – a true story

 

A true event – reported by Dr. Harbhajan Singh

 

At the foot of the hills, close to Kiratpur in Punjab, there is a lonely, small village where only a few people live. Among them was a poor, old couple who lived all alone. They were both initiated by the Master. The woman became very receptive to Master. When she went inside, she realized that she should do something for the Master. Although she was very old, almost too old to walk, she said: “I have to do something”. So she always walked very slowly picking up little branches from the trees. She sold them and kept the money for the Master. She said to her husband: “No, we will not touch this money. It is for Master.

They had a cow. The woman was quite sure that one day Master would come to her house, even if people said, “How will He come here? He cannot come to such a village. Not even a car can drive here! But she didn’t listen to their objections. She was sure that Master would come. He had promised her.

So every day she collected a little butter for the Master and kept it safe. She wrapped the butter in rags to protect it from mice and rats; for they were very poor and had no vessel to hold the butter in.

One day Master came to this area and asked His driver to take the road (to this village). The driver replied: “Master, you can’t go there with the car the road is much too bad, all bumpy and full of potholes. People always go there on foot. Master replied: “You don’t have to drive, the car is driving. Don’t worry!”

 

When Master arrived, He immediately pulled a knife out of His pocket and said, “Mother, where is the butter? She wrapped it out of the dirty rags and Master ate some of it full of joy. Then she gave Him the money: “Master, this is Your money! It was twenty rupees, a very small amount, but it took her a month or more to get it together. Every day she had saved a few coins. Master gave her a lot of love. He said to her: “Now you don’t have to work anymore”. He gave her some money. “This sum will be sent to you every month from now on. That will be enough for you. Now all you have to do is meditate. You are accepted, what more do you want? When Master says that you are accepted – what more do you need? These are wonderful things from His life.