On Humility

Part 1

Dear Ones

On this auspicious day of the Birth Anniversary of Hazur Maharaj Baba Sawan Singh Ji, I send you one and all, my heartiest wishes for your progress on the Spiritual Way back to the Home of our Father – through the natural yoga of Light and Life and Love, the Surat Shabd Yoga.

In my previous years’ messages, I have been mostly dwelling on rising above body consciousness, to be reborn and to learn to die while alive, etc., so as to enable one to enter the Kingdom of God, which is within us – as prescribed by all the past Masters now come to us through His Benign Grace. There are many aspects of His Divine Life, but I will now dwell on the two most important ones, viz., humility and simplicity – the most needed at this hour, which if followed will set our lives in the right direction and enable us to achieve perfection.

All Masters, such as Jesus, Mahavira, Buddha, Kabir and Nanak, etc., of the past, and Ramakrishna, Hazur Baba Sawan Singh, Sadhu Vaswani, etc., of recent days, radiated this Divine Lustre from Their personalities.

Man knows so many things, but he does not know himself. A man has so many sheaths in himself, covering the depths of his heart. Man learns and unlearns all through life. It is wiser to remain a student than to be a teacher; a student of the mystery of life.

A parable goes to say that a seeker of God, in the quest of Heaven, wandering here and there, found himself perchance at the Gate of Heaven. The gatekeeper asked him, Who are you? The seeker answered, A teacher. The gatekeeper asked him to wait, and went in to report. After a while he returned and said that he could not let him in, as there was no place for teachers in the heaven-world. He was told to go back and wash the dust of dead words clinging to him in the waters of silence.

So many teachers are vain; they parade their learning. How can there be a place in there for him who lives in a world of vanity?

Every day he sat in the silence and listened to the words of Saints, and his self-consciousness began to develop, and he became humble, and prayed to be the servant of all men, lonely and lowly ones, and animals – a servant of God’s creation. Then the portals of Heaven were opened and he entered in and beheld the Master’s face: pure and fair beyond compare.

All the Masters of the past and the present say that,

The Kingdom of God is for the humble of heart.

So many of us, alas, are proud, vain in ego lost; and blind to the wisdom, we do but wander from darkness to darkness.

The god that rules millions is the ego; enthrone on your heart the God of Love, and cease to wander – and what should be done to do so? Become humble as ashes and dust.

The world is full of the proud of purse or power or learning. Whereas, we should be humble and simple and empty ourselves of all ‘self’ that the Lord might do with us what He would.

The life worth living is life in the Spirit. Its basis is humility. We should be reduced to a cipher and God becomes axe.

Let us be perfect as our Father is in Heaven.

The truly humble are the truly happy. For want of humility, men and women are leading an unbearable, miserable life. All this misery is from within it is not a change in our circumstances, but deliverance from the thraldom of the self, the petty ego that sits d tyrant, robbing us of the bliss that is our heritage as children of God. We are, as it were, in a cage of self-centredness, and until this prison is opened by the key of humility, the swan bird of the Soul is not free and cannot swim to the regions of radiance and joy.

The way to true blessedness is the way of humility and Love. He who is humble has no problems. He has God as his Guide. Significant are the words of the shepherd boy singing in John Bunyan’s Pilgrim’s Progress:

He that is down need fear no fall, he that is low, no pride; he that is humble ever shall have God to be his guide. I am content with what I have, little be it, or much; and Lord, contentment still I crave, because Thou sayest such.

Rightly has it been said that if there were no humility in this world, everyone would long ago have committed suicide.

When the light of humility dawns on the soul, the darkness of selfishness disappears and the soul no longer lives for itself, but for God. The soul loses itself in God, lives in God, and is transformed into Him. This is the alchemy of humility. It transforms the lowest into the Highest. The great Chinese sage, Lao Tse, expressed the thought in beautiful words:

How does the sea become the king of all rivers and streams? Because it lies lower than them.

St Augustine said the Way to God is,

First humility, second humility and third humility.

He who is proud of possessions or of learning or of authority will not go to any Saint unless he is humble. Even if he goes to the Saint, but considers himself superior to Him, he will not listen to Him. A glass which is kept above a tumbler of water will remain empty – until it is put below the tumbler. You know what you know; just listen to what the other says. Perhaps we can learn something from him.

Yes, the branches of a fruit-laden tree bend of their own accord. Even so, the man who, losing himself, finds God – finds Him everywhere and in everyone – bends before all, offers homage of his heart to all. This is True Humility. It is not a forced sense of lowliness. Such a one lives in unity with all. He is in others and others are in him.

It is the fake ego-self that gives rise to the sense of discord and separation. When the illusion of ego is broken, one feels, I am not apart from others, but others are parts of the One – God – the Master – and all of us are engaged in the same service of God.

Each one of us is unique in his own way. There is a Divine Purpose behind the life of everyone who comes into the world; no one has been created for nothing. We have something to learn from everyone. This is the mystery of humility.

The truly humble person does not compare himself with others. He knows that none of us, however evolved, is perfect; none of us is complete in himself. The humble person does not regard one as better than the other; he believes in the Divinity of each. If one says and asserts that he is better than others, then he is not perfect as yet.