The Master Remains

There is one final episode I must tell before I complete the story of my association with my Master.

Many years later, sitting on the banks of the Ganga, I had an extraordinary vision of myself, the self that had been H.W.L. Poonja, in all its various incarnations through time. I watched the self move from body to body, from form to form. It went through plants, through animals, through birds, through human bodies, each in a different place in a different time. The sequence was extraordinarily long. Thousands and thousands of incarnations, spanning millions of years, appeared before me. My own body finally appeared as the last one of the sequence, followed shortly afterwards by the radiant form of Sri Ramana Maharshi. The vision then ended. The appearance of the Maharshi had ended that seemingly endless sequence of births and rebirths. After his intervention in my life, the self that finally took the form of Poonja could incarnate no more. The Maharshi destroyed it by a single look.

As I watched the endless incarnations roll by, I also experienced time progressing at its normal speed. That is to say, it really felt as if millions of years were elapsing. Yet when my normal consciousness returned, I realised that the whole vision had occupied but an instant of time. One may dream a whole lifetime but when one wakes up one knows that the time which elapsed in the dream was not real, that the person in the dream was not real, and that the world which that person inhabited was not real. All this is recognised instantly at the moment of waking. Similarly, when one wakes up to the Self, one knows instantly that time, the world, and the life one appeared to live in it are all unreal.

That vision by the Ganga brought home this truth to me very vividly. I knew that all my lifetimes in samsara were unreal, that the Maharshi had woken me up from this wholly imaginary nightmare by showing me the Self that I really am. Now, freed from that ridiculous samsara, and speaking from the standpoint of the Self, the only reality, I can say, ‘Nothing has ever come into existence; nothing has ever happened; the unchanging, formless Self alone exists’. That is my experience, and that is the experience of everyone who has realised the Self.

A few months ago, at one of the satsangs I conduct in Lucknow, someone gave me a note which concluded:

‘My humble respects and gratitude to you, especially to one who was a disciple of Ramana Maharshi.’ I couldn’t let this pass. ‘Why do you say “was”?’ I exclaimed. ‘Please correct your grammar! Please correct your grammar! I am his disciple! He is my Master. How can I throw him away into the past? There is no past and no future for the Master. There isn’t even a present because he has transcended time.’

When I left him physically in 1947 he told me, ‘I am with you wherever you are’. That was his promise and that is my experience. There is no one called Poonja left anymore. There is only an emptiness where he used to be. And in that emptiness there shines the ‘I’, the ‘I’ that is my reality, the ‘I’ that is my Master, the ‘I’ that he promised would be with me wherever I am. Whenever I speak, it is not someone called Poonja who is speaking, it is the ‘I’ that is the Maharshi who speaks, the ‘I’ which is the Self in the Heart of all beings.

I tried to explain this to the person who sent me the note. Who am I? What am I?

I never think it is I, Poonja, who am speaking. It is he, the Maharshi, the Master who is speaking. If I ever thought that this person called Poonja was speaking to you, I would have no right to sit here because whatever would come out of my mouth would be false. It is my own Master who speaks; it is your own Master who speaks.

It is your own Heart speaking; it is your own Self which is speaking to you. There is no one here claiming to be an intermediary. There is no one here claiming that he once had a Master called “Sri Ramana Maharshi”. There is only emptiness, and in that emptiness the “I” which is, not was, my Master speaks.

‘I am sitting here introducing you to my teacher and his teachings. He is the teacher, not I. He is your own Self. He is the teacher of the world. He was the teacher before you even knew him. He was there, waiting for you, smiling within your Heart. Now you are attracted by him, not me. I, Poonja, am not in the picture at all.’

Poonja has gone for good, but the Master remains and will always remain. He is seated in my Heart as my own imperishable Self. Shining as the ‘I’, he alone is.

Mahasmadhi

On 6th September, 1997 Papaji passed away in the intensive-care ward of a Lucknow hospital, having succumbed to what the doctors there called ‘acute respiratory failure'. Papaji was cremated the following day and his ashes were immersed in the Ganga a few days later by Surendra, his son, and by the devotees who accompanied him. —

Though his health had been poor for some time, Papaji continued to give regular public satsangs till 25 th August (Krishna Janmashtami), and the never-ending stream of devotees was made welcome at his home until a severe attack of viral fever, bronchitis and asthma forced his admission to hospital on 2 nd September.

http://www.satsangbhavan.net/biography.htm

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