|
|||||||
|
|
|
|||||
|
|
|||||||
TRUTH ALONE CONQUERS; RADHA BURNIER; (Lecture delivered at the Annual Convention at Adyar, 1987)
WE are living in a world of intense strife and turmoil. Perhaps the world has never been really peaceful. The story of man- kind has been one of war, conquest, con- flict, seizing other people’s possessions, enslaving populations, oppressing the weak and so on. There is of course the other side, the culture, philosophy, and the arts: none the less one cannot ignore the continual strife and unending misery in human society.
The root cause of this situation is not really political, economic or structural; it lies in the corrupt mind of man. We do not always realize what corruption implies. It is not merely a question of being dishonest, or of acquiring what rightfully belongs to another. Corrup- tion has several different forms. Destructiveness, which has affected the human mind in all ages and peoples, is an aspect of corruption. Man wantonly destroys his fellow-men, being uniquely aggressive in respect of his own species. He is also rapidly destroying plants, animals, the purity of the sky, thus putting an end to Nature’s beauty, and the wonder and variety of the earth.
Every form of self-interest is a symptom of the decay of the mind. Why does man do this? Why does he create conflict rather than bring about co-operation? Why is he so prone to destroy, and so reluctant to be constructive? Perhaps because he has so little knowledge of the nature of the universe of which he is an intrinsic part. This amounts to saying that he has no faith in the power of truth, because truth is the nature of things as they are, the universe as it is, each thing in its essential nature, and ourselves as we really are.
This is truth, but we do not know what the essential nature of ourselves or of any- thing else is. Therefore we are divorced from truth, we do not believe in it, or trust truth somehow to bring about the good. We are afraid of being true to ourselves, for we think we cannot attain material success that way. We doubt if we can better ourselves through benevolence, and because of this lack of faith, we have to suffer.
Human society cannot exist without a certain amount of order in it. If there is total anarchy and indiscipline, it would be impossible to live together as a community or a nation. Therefore, every- where people have tried to regulate relationships and bring about some kind of order through such well-known means as legislation, the police, the army, methods of rewards and punishment, and deterrents of various kinds. That kind of order is the lowest kind that one can establish in a society, because it is chronically at the breaking point. Every civilization collapses sooner or later because order is sought to be established from outside. There is a tension between the authority of the establishment and the self-interest of individual citizens. There may also be a conspiracy of self-interest between a certain section of the popu- lation and the authorities.
We must note on the other hand that most of the religions have made affirm- ations about the supreme power of truth. Truth is said to be above all things, above the will of man, his desires, his ideas and plans. The Christian scripture declares, ‘Great is truth and mighty above all things.’ Very similar is the sentence from the Upanishad, satyam eva jayate, ‘Truth alone conquers’, which India has adopted for its motto. But although the motto may be honoured in principle and although the Upanlshads, the Bible, and other revered scriptures declare that truth is above all things, most people prefer the advice of the humourist Mark Twain who said, ‘Truth Is the most valuable thing we have, so let us economize it’!
This is the principle on which most people base their lives, not realizing that living in falsehood is an extremely corn- plic~ated affair, whether it Is at the collective level or at the individual level. It has often been pointed out that If you tell a lie you have to go on covering It up with more lies. Deceit is a slippery path, and it is difficult to recover from it once a person starts that way. Falsity generates mental stress, which is why lie-detectors are commonly used these days for testing. Apparently, when someone indulges in lies, agitation and stress make themselves evident. Conflict also creates stress. Knowing this, it would seem sensible to adopt a saner course!
Think of a world in which everyone can be trusted; life would be so much simpler for everybody. But in a world where almost nobody can be trusted, there is need for complicated procedures, checks and regulations. In many countries, there are innumerable rules and laws because corruption is pervasive. The more false- hood there is, the more complicated life must be. Life is much simpler when people are straightforward, co-operative and affectionate. This simple fact which even a child should be able to understand is what the large majority of people do not want to grasp.
If you quarrel at home or anywhere else, think of all the tension it creates, the thoughts and reactions it generates, the indigestion it causes and so forth; while when there is harmonious relationship, when you feel affectionate, there is no problem. We can all live serenely, without whirlpools within our heads. A violation of truth is a violation of one’s self-nature, which is why there is agitation and stress; and whe~i there is contradiction inside the psyche it breeds chaos outside. A person who Is at odds with himself creates problems for others. He misinterprets, he is very demanding; the frustrated individual Is always a source of disharmony. Therefore, unless there is harmony and integrity within, there cannot be social order outside or happiness and well-being for mankind as a whole. Shakespeare wrote:
To thine own self be true, And it must follow, as the night the day, Thou canst not then be false to any man.
We can now look at the -ether side. There is a spark of truth in everyone and everything, perhaps hidden under layers of self-Interested thoughts and emotions. That spark is alive, ready to burst into flame. To use a different metaphor, it is an Impetus, pushing like a tiny seed which grows Into a mighty banyan tree. This concealed force has sometimes been called the Christ nature. Some say that the Buddha nature is in all things; the flower, the plant, and every atom contains it
. It is so strong, so mighty that one cannot wish it away, or run away from it, however hard one might strive, because It is the very depth of ourselves. From where to where can one run away? This is the theme of the beautiful poem of Francis Thompson, ‘The Hound of Heaven:
I fled Him, down the nights and down the days; I fled Him, down the arches of the years; I fled Him, down the labyrinthine ways Of my own mind.
Unfortunately for ourselves, we seek to run away, to lose ourselves in pleasure, in petty satisfactions, attaching ourselves to families, relationships, becoming maniacs for work, occupied all the time, so that we need not face what is within. Yet it cannot be escaped: Nigh and nigh draws the chase With unperturbed pace Deliberate speed, majestic instancy. There can be no peace, no happiness, rio realization of the significance of life when we are trying to escape what is within, the heart of ourselves. Because we do not realize this, we do what we consider to be realistic or pragmatic. This is the bane of the human mind that it wants to be pragmatic, for pragmatism so- called is most unpractical. Obviously all the ‘practical’ policies and actions so far have not brought about human happiness or a good society. Each one is seeking to get the best out of life through wealth and pleasure, in duties performed, and all kinds of other things. Indian tradition has classified the human aims as art ha (possessions, property), kãma (pleasure, sensation, excitement), dharma (religious duties) and moksha (inward freedom). The last is rarely sought. People prefer immediate gain, which the first three aims promise. This seems more practical, yet it is nothing but short-sightedness—a fragmented, opportunistic attitude.
In recent years, expediency has dictated the cutting down of vast forests at an alarming rate. Thereby man is destroying his own beautiful habitat, the earth. By possibly altering its climate irreversibly, he is committing suicide. This is a speciality of mankind: trying to put an end to itself through pollu- tion, through the armament race, and destructiveness In general. It may be immediately profitable to cut trees, but it is disastrous in the long run. From the short-term point of view it is also advantageous for people to arm them- selves more and more, but it makes for a cruel, violent world of terrorism, child- battering, etc.
It is essential to know what the true goal of man is in order to act wisely. This also involves knowing oneself,~ as explained earlier. What are we? Are we the body, with its aches and pains, its sensations and desires, the body which decays so quickly, and which can become a source of misery? Are we our inconstant emotions—disappointment one day, hope another day, liking somebody and then disliking him? Being tossed around in the current of opposites, are we our disjointed, restless thoughts? There are all these contradictions within, and we pursue ends which cater to those contradictions—an impossible task. We produce turmoil inside and outside, because we do not know ourselves and do not want to know ourselves. Self- deception has become second nature.
Madame Blavatsky said, ‘It is not the fear of God which is the beginning of wisdom but the knowledge of Self which is wisdom itself’ One of the greatest of human gifts is the power to comprehend values. A mind which is incapable of realizing values Is not human. Even when It is unevolved, the human mind senses that there is some such thing as truth; it knows the difference between harmony and disharmony. It can consciously rise out of its finite interests to universal perceptions. The loftier and the more universal the outlook of the mind, the more clearly does it see that many of the facts which at one time seemed to be important and which it mistook for truth are not truth at all. Facts are not truth. There is an infinity of facts about the universe, and science is gathering such information. There is no limit to this search or to information connected with subtler fields relating to fairies, devas, astral bodies, auras and other things normally invisible to others. But life is not merely a collection of facts, of things, or of functions. It is far more significant and profound.
Why are people ready to think that what they know now and the facts which may become available in the future are truth? They do so only because this kind of knowledge has produced comforts, novelties, excitement and ego satis- faction. Journeying to the moon or pos- sessing electronic houses which bake the food while the owner is in his office or open the door of the garage before he arrives offer great satisfaction to the ego. Therefore material achievements have taken precedence over everything else. They have overshadowed concern for values.
When success is disconnected from relationship, which is what is happen- ing now, there is tragedy. Relationship does not thrive in the mad race for achievement. Kindness, tenderness and affection which are intrinsic to relationship and therefore to life have become irrelevant to a lot of people. Alienation, imbalances of the mind, and violence abound in the present day because we do not care for relationship. Life is relationship, as Krishnamurti pointed out. There is a loving intelligence, an ordered purpose behind all the processes of life, the phenomena which we see outside. To have a glimpse of that purposeful order, that intelligence and love at work, the creative energy of this universe, may be to know truth. A fragmentary, distorted perception cannot see this. The mind must shed its finite interests to reach a wholeness of understanding and sympathy, the dimension of universality. Virtue is in that. Hence, truth is not so much knowledge; it has to do with relationship, with the wider vision, wholeness of perception, and therefore with love.
We do not know the meaning of the word ‘love’, but love may be a deep knowledge of relationship. Dr Annie Besant said: That which can never come by argument, by controversy, by intellectual reasoning, will come when the heart of love within us has awakened the spiritual nature. For love is deeper than intellect, love is greater than intelligence, and the love nature and the divine nature are so closely blended that it will not be long ere the man who loves his brother loves God.
What love can discover mind and thought cannot because love penetrates to the very heart of things. It discovers the song, the fragrance within, not merely the details on the surface. Discovering the truth of relationship, and coming to that profound understanding when love becomes part of our nature may be essential for the future of humanity.
The word ‘love’ like the word ‘God’ is more known through misuse than anything else. It is confused with attachment. When a person clings to another and never allows that person out of sight, it is lauded as great love. So is a sense of possession in relation to a child, husband or wife. But love is not any of these things. It cannot co-exist with jealousy, anger or suspicion. It does not breed dependence, break up integrity or impose fear. As all great teachers have pointed out, love is the absence of self.
As mentioned earlier, love is a form of knowing. In one of the great mystic works of the West, it is said: ‘Of God himself no man can think; He may well be loved, but not thought.’ This echoes the famous declaration of the Upanishad that thought and word retreat from Reality (Brahman) without reaching it. Thinking a great deal about somebody, missing him, feeling unhappy because he is not there, and so forth are thought to be a form of love. Many are the false notions about love. The Buddha pointed out that one is tainted by love thought, but made free by love. Thinking in terms of ‘love’ is merely the desire of the self to have and to hold.
How is one to know love in the real sense, love which may be another word for truth? The Lord Buddha’s instructions were simple and clear. He indicated that daily life itself provides the training. It is there that we have to test ourselves, not by resorting to philosophers, magicians, gurus of various kinds. We cannot know whether what they speak is true or not. One can be easily deceived, as long as there is self-interest. Everyone finds the teacher he wants. People flock to gurus who tell them to indulge in drugs, sex, and what not, and to pursue the gratification of their own appetites. So each one finds the ‘teacher’ he merits and wants. The teacher may be self-deceived, a fraud, or an ignorant man. One cannot find a teacher unless there is some light within, the light of discrimination.
Therefore it is necessary to begin by testing oneself. Following the Buddha we can reject as untruth that which conduces to passion and not to dispassion, to attachment and not to detachment, to increase of gain and not to decrease, to greed and not to austerity, to discontent and not to serenity, to gregariousness and not to solitude, to indolence and not to energy, to delight in evil and not in good.
The religious fanatic, the dogmatist, or the believer thinks that he knows the truth. He quotes the Bible, the Koran or the Veda and goes to battle, slaughters heretics, and does cruel things. He hates those who do not agree with him. In pursuit of political ideology, millions have been liquidated. So, that which stirs up hatred, envy or other selfish passion is not mindful love whether he stands, walks, sits .Buddha tells us how daily life can change. This state of heart is truth. The secret is in There is no truth without love and the word ‘mindful’. By the daily testing of one’s mindful life there can be no discovery thoughts, actions and reactions when the of the truth of love is applied which a state of serenity and important thing for humanity. It is not the goodness, there grows within the heart a accumulation of facts which will save the new flower. It is the absence of self. Truth world, but love, which must increase until is grounded in silence; not the silence of the wide universe is suffused with its the tongue, nor the silence of radiance: suppression, but the deep silence of a self Tender, compassionate will we abide, void which is abolishing itself. There is no of malice, loving, and with rays of love striving then to sustain this puny, shall we suffuse all that is, even with love fragmentary, transitory and Illusory entity grown great and measureless. we call the self.
Again the Lord Buddha said: When there is increase of love in the heart of man it will solve all problems. The great cosmic mother, even at the risk of her own king Asoka said that the conquest of life, protects her son, her only son, so let dharma is greater than any other con- the disciple cultivate love without measure quest. Dharma here means true teaching. towards all beings. Let him cultivate Nothing can shatter or destroy what is towards the whole world above, below, true. It must conquer. The Latin saying around, a heart of love, unstinted, Omnia uincit amor, ‘Love conquers all’, is unmixed with differing or opposing the same as the Sanskrit saying satyam interests. And let a man maintain this eua jayate, ‘Truth alone conquers’. The understanding of Truth will kill out self, for self cannot exist where Truth abides. Seek, therefore, the world of Truth, and you will dispel the darkness where self abides ... Leave no stone, however small, unturned, for Truth may lurk beneath it. Rise to the inner level of the mind, from which you can behold the Truth In all Its nakedness and not be blinded. To do this you must have courage and Intelligence.