111 God for the disbeliever’s soul
In order to disprove God, you must have enormous knowledge. And when you
have enormous knowledge, you cannot disprove God!
God for the disbeliever's soul
You have always thought of God as a father, up in the heavens somewhere.
But can you see God as a child? When you see God as a father, you will
want to demand and take from Him. But when you see God as a child, you
have no demands.
God is the very core of your existence. You are pregnant with God. You
have to take care of your pregnancy and deliver this Child into the
world. God is your child who clings onto you like a baby till you grow
old and die. This child clings on to you crying for nourishment.
Sadhana, Satsang and Seva are the nourishment.
It is difficult to see God as formless and it is difficult to see God as
form. The formless is so abstract and God in a form appears to be too
limited. So some people prefer to be atheists.
But atheism is not a reality, it is just a matter of convenience. When
you have a spirit of inquiry, or are in search of truth, atheism falls
apart. With a spirit of inquiry, you cannot deny something which you
have not disproved. An atheist denies God without first disproving it.
In order to disprove God, you must have enormous knowledge. And when you
have enormous knowledge, you cannot disprove God! For one to say that
something does not exist, one should know about the whole universe. So
you can never be 100 percent atheist. An atheist is only a believer who
is sleeping! In fact an atheist is someone who has a concept of God!
For a person to say, ``I don't believe in anything'',
means he must believe in himself — so he believes in himself about
whom he does not even know! An atheist can never be sincere because
sincerity needs depth — and an atheist refuses to go to the depths.
Because the deeper he goes, he finds a void, a field of all
possibilities — he has to accept that there are many secrets he does
not know. He would then need to acknowledge his ignorance, which he
refuses to do, because the moment he is sincere, he seriously starts
doubting his atheism. A doubt-free atheist is next to impossible! So you
can never be a sincere and doubt-free atheist.
* When the atheist realises his ignorance, what does he do?
* Where does he go?
* Does he go to a Guru?
* What does a guru do to him?
Atheism is when one does not believe either in values or in the
abstract. When an atheist comes to the guru, what happens? You start
experiencing your own form and discover that you are indeed formless,
hollow and empty. And this abstract non-form in you becomes more and
more concrete!
The guru makes the abstract more real and what you thought as solid
appears to be more unreal. Sensitivity and subtlety dawns. Perception of
love, not as an emotion, but as the substratum of existence becomes
evident. The formless spirit shines through every form in creation and
the mystery of life deepens, shattering the atheism. Then the journey
begins and it has four stages.
1. The first stage is Saarupya (to see the formless in the form) ie,
seeing God in all the forms. Often, one feels more comfortable seeing
God as formless rather than with a form, because with a form, one feels
a distance, a duality, a fear of rejection and other limitations. In
life all our interactions are with the form, other than in deep sleep
and in Samadhi. And, if you do not see God in the form, then the waking
part of life remains devoid of the Divine. All those who accept God to
be formless use symbols, and perhaps love the symbols more than God
himself! If God comes and tells a Christian to leave the cross or a
Muslim to drop the crescent, perhaps he may not do it! To begin with,
loving the formless is possible only through forms.
2. The second stage is Saamipya (closeness) ie, feeling absolutely
close to the form you have chosen and reaching out to the formless. This
leads to a sense of intimacy with the whole of creation. In this stage,
one overcomes the fear of rejection and other fears. But this is time
and space bound.
3. The third stage is Saanidhya — feeling the presence of the
Divine by which you transcend the limitations of time and space.
4. Then the final stage is Saayujya, ie, when you are firmly
entrenched with the Divine. It is then that you realise you are one with
the Divine. There is a total merging with the Beloved and all duality
disappears.
Take care of your God! Atheists lurk around the corner! Doubts,
disbelief and ignorance are the atheists in your mind — so you
better take care!
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