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Pythagoras

VOL. 1, PHILOSOPHIA PERENNIS

Chapter-10

Bliss Beyond All Duality

Third Question

 

 

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The third question

Question 3

IT IS WRITTEN THAT THE TREE OF KNOWLEDGE WAS PART OF CREATION, AND ADAM AND EVE WERE FORBIDDEN TO EAT ITS FRUITS.

WHAT HAPPENS WHEN ONE MAN BECOMES ENLIGHTENED?

HOW DOES HE USE THIS TREE AND ITS FRUITS?

Madhumati,

IN THE GARDEN OF EDEN there were two trees -- special trees. One was known as the tree of knowledge, and God had forbidden Adam and Eve this tree -- the tree of knowledge. The fruit of it was not to be eaten.

There was another special tree; it was the tree of life. That too God had told Adam and Eve not to eat from. But they never bothered about the tree of life; they became interested in the tree of knowledge.

This parable is beautiful -- remember, this is only a parable, of great significance. It has nothing to do with God, Adam and Eve. It has something to do with YOU.

We ARE in the Garden of Eden and there are two trees: the tree of life and the tree of knowledge. And everybody is interested in the tree of knowledge; it is very rarely that a person becomes interested in the tree of life. Whenever a person becomes interested in the tree of life he becomes a Buddha, a Jesus a Mahavira, a Mohammed. But very few people ever become interested in the tree of life.

For example, the first question -- Larry Obenfeld asked, "I have fallen in love with you. Why? " This is moving towards the tree of knowledge. 'Why' is the way. He cannot stop with love; the 'why' has to be asked. If you stop with love you will eat from the tree of life -- because love is life. If you ask why, you have moved away from the tree of life towards the tree of knowledge.

And even if you come to know why, it is all futile -- it is not going to nourish you. You can know as much as there is; a single human brain can contain all the libraries of the world -- that is the capacity of a single human brain -- but still you will not have known anything really. You will not have lived.

The parable is a symbolic expression: it is our story. When you see a roseflower, rather than going close to it and touching it and smelling it and dancing around it and being with it in deep prayer, love, meditation -- you ask questions: "From where does it come? What kind of rose is this?" You start comparing it with other roses that you have seen in the past -- bigger, smaller, more beautiful, less beautiful. Immediately, the moment you see the rose, you start moving towards the tree of knowledge. You don't live the experience. You don't dance the rose, you don't feel the rose.

In Zen they say that if you want to paint bamboos, then go and first become a bamboo.

Once a Zen Master sent his disciple -- he was a great painter, the disciple was also a great painter -- and he told him to go to the forest and be with the bamboos and become a bamboo. "And when you have become a bamboo then come and paint, because before becoming a bamboo, whatsoever you paint is going to be basically wrong -- because you don't know the bamboo from the inside."

That is the difference between a painting and a photograph. The photograph shows only the circumference, the bamboo from the outside. And if the painter also shows the bamboo from the outside, then what is the need of the painter? The camera can do far better, more efficiently, faster and more quickly.

But the camera will never be able to replace the painter, because one thing the camera can never do: it cannot become the bamboo. The painter can become the bamboo.

The disciple went to the forest. For three years nothing was heard about him. Then the Master became worried: "It is too long." And the Master was getting old, so he sent a few people to search for him: "Where is he?" And he told the people, "Look wherever you find bamboos -- look. He will be found somewhere as a bamboo."

And he was found as a bamboo -- he was standing amongst many bamboos. It was a beautiful morning, it was windy and the bamboos were swaying and he was swaying with the bamboos. The people who had gone to look for him were mystified. They could see that he was no more a man; he had completely forgotten himself. He was a bamboo -- he was drinking the sun as a bamboo drinks. He was standing in the mud, his feet were almost like roots, and he was swaying.

They had to pull him up, they had to take him out, they had to force him to come to the Master. The Master had a look at him and he said, "Absolutely right. Now you paint -- now you will be painting real bamboos. You have not only seen bamboos from the outside, now you have known them from the inside too. And that is real knowing: that is live knowing."

Adam and Eve became interested in the tree of knowledge, just as we all become interested in the tree of knowledge. Look at small children -- they immediately ask questions: "Why? Why is it so?" Adam and Eve again, moving towards the tree of knowledge.

You can go on eating from the tree of knowledge, but it is not going to nourish you and it is not going to fulfill you. You will be full of rubbish -- because knowledge is information, it is not experience. And only experience liberates. In fact only experience makes you a knower.

To be knowledgeable is one thing, to be a knower totally another. The modern philosopher is knowledgeable; he eats from the tree of knowledge. The Pythagorean philosopher, Pythagoras' concept of the philosopher, is that of a seer, a knower. He meditates, and slowly slowly drowns himself into existence. He becomes part of the whole, he becomes one with the whole, and then there is a knowing of a totally different kind, qualitatively different.

You ask me, Madhumati: IT IS WRITTEN THAT THE TREE OF KNOWLEDGE WAS PART OF CREATION, AND ADAM AND EVE WERE FORBIDDEN TO EAT ITS FRUITS.

WHAT HAPPENS WHEN ONE MAN BECOMES ENLIGHTENED?

If you eat from the tree of knowledge you will never become enlightened. You will collect much information, maybe even about enlightenment and about enlightened people of the past, but this will not be your own understanding; it will not arise out of you. It will not be your own awakening.

But if you eat from the tree of life, if you experience life and love and joy and sadness -- the bitterness and the sweetness, all -- if you experience life in its totality, in its heights and its depths, the valleys and the peaks, the dark nights and the sunlit days, agonies and ecstasies... if you experience life in its totality, you will become enlightened. It is only life lived totally that brings enlightenment.

And when you become enlightened, you become a tree of knowledge yourself. But nobody becomes the tree of knowledge by eating the fruit of the tree. One becomes the tree of knowledge by eating the fruit of the tree of life.

Buddha spoke for forty-two years. The day he became enlightened, he became himself the tree of knowledge. Now if you come to a Buddha, don't go on eating the fruits that are available. Each enlightened person is a tree of knowledge -- rather than eating the fruits, which are sweet and delicious, try to live Buddhahood. Rather than collecting information from the Buddha, imbibe his spirit.

Many times people come here, and whatsoever I say, they start taking notes -- particularly Indians. One doctor used to come, and he would be continuously scribbling and scribbling. I called him, I asked him, "What are you doing? " He said, "Whatsoever you say is so beautiful that I have to write it just in case I forget."

Now this man is eating fruits, collecting information. He is completely missing me! He is not even attentive to what I am saying -- he is more interested in writing it, memorizing it. He will not even understand what is being said, because to understand it you have to be totally attentive, you have to be in tune with me.

This is not a question of verbal communication: it is a question of non-verbal communion. And then you imbibe the spirit. That's why I say again and again that a real disciple is a cannibal -- he eats the Master, drinks the Master, he becomes drunk. He goes on receiving the energy.

The transfer has not to be of knowledge but of energy. The transfer has to be of light. It is beyond scriptures. What I say, if you remain only with that, you have collected many beautiful fruits -- but you are doing what Adam and Eve did.

And who is this serpent? It represents your mind. Your mind is curious, your mind is continuously hankering for more information. Your mind is the snake. Your mind persuades you, seduces you and tells you, "Eat as much as you can of the tree of knowledge -- because the more you know, the more godlike you will become."

But to become godlike is one thing, to become God is totally another. When you can become gods, why become godlike? That is a very poor substitute. When you can become a seer, a knower, why become knowledgeable? When you can become a Buddha in your own right, why be settled with anything lower than that? Why be satisfied with anything lower than that? Taste it yourself! And then the same tree that is the tree of knowledge can become the tree of life.

Buddha has said: "Buddhas only point the way -- you have to walk."

Zen people say: "Fingers pointing to the moon." Don't become too much interested in the fingers; forget the fingers and look at the moon. The man of understanding will look at the moon and will forget the finger. And the man who is not alert, aware, conscious, will start chewing the finger and will forget all about the moon.

That's how a pundit is born -- a knowledgeable person, a scholar. Scholars are the most stupid people on the earth. Of course their stupidity is very scholarly; it is decorated with great knowledge. They can quote the Koran and the Bible and the Gita -- they know all that has been known, and they know nothing at the same time. Deep down they are just empty, hollow.

If you become too much interested in knowledge you will remain empty and hollow and poor. Become interested in life! -- living is the real thing. Don't go on collecting information about what meditation is: meditate! Don't go on collecting information about what dancing is -- there are encyclopaedias on dance, but the whole encyclopaedia is utterly meaningless if you don't dance yourself. And if you carry those encyclopaedias they are a great burden. Even if it is the encyclopaedia on dance, if you carry it the very weight of it will not allow you to dance, will be a hindrance.

Throw all those encyclopaedias! And people have become walking encyclopaedias. Unburden yourself from knowledge and start living. And when you start living, then ordinary things are transformed into extraordinary beauty. Just small things -- life consists of small things -- but when you bring the quality of intense, passionate love they are transformed, they become luminous.

The man who becomes enlightened becomes himself the tree of knowledge. Beware of the Buddhas. That's why Buddha says: "If you meet me on the way, kill me!" Beware of the Buddhas. The last thing that Zarathustra said to his disciples was: "Beware of me!" He was leaving for the mountains, to disappear and die in the mountains; in the silence, in the eternal virginity of the mountains he was going to die. He had lived beautifully, a long life. Now he wanted to have a beautiful death in the valleys surrounded by the mountains, with the sound of running water and birds and flowers and the fragrance.

The disciples asked, "Your last message, Master?"

And he said, "Beware of me."

That has been always the last message of all great Masters. When Buddha was leaving his body, Ananda, his chief disciple, asked, "Bhagwan, what is your last message?"

He opened his eyes and said, "Be a light unto yourself. Forget all about me: be a light unto yourself."

Live, dance, love, be. And if you have to learn anything from a Buddha, from anyone who has become awakened, learn this: forget the fingers and look at the moon. The moon is life, the fingers are just knowledge.

 

Next: Chapter 10, Bliss Beyond All Duality, Fourth Question

 

Energy Enhancement          Enlightened Texts         Pythagoras           Philosofia Perennis

 

 

Chapter 10

 

 

 

 
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