Ramakrishna Paramahamsa

Ramakrishna Paramahamsa lived as a very intense devotee for most of his life. He was a devotee of Kali. For him, Kali was not a deity, Kali was a living reality. She danced in front of him, she ate from his own hands, she came when he called, and she left him dripping with ecstasy. This was real, it was actually happening. This was not a hallucination, he was actually feeding her. 

Ramakrishna’s consciousness was so crystallized that whatever form he wished became a reality for him. It is such a beautiful state for a human being to be in. But though Ramakrishna’s body, mind and emotion were dripping with ecstasy, his being was longing to go beyond this ecstasy. Somewhere there was awareness that the ecstasy itself was bondage.

One day, Ramakrishna was sitting on the banks of the Hoogli River when Totapuri – a very great and rare yogi, very few like that have ever happened – came that way. Totapuri saw that Ramakrishna was a man of such intensity with the possibility to go all the way and attain enlightenment. But the problem was, he was just stuck to his devotion.

Totapuri came to Ramakrishna and tried to convince him, “Why are you still so attached to your devotion? You have the potential to take the ultimate step.” But Ramakrishna said, “I want only Kali, that’s all.” He was like a child who wanted his mother. It is not possible to reason with that. It is a different state altogether. Ramakrishna was devoted to Kali and Kali was his only interest. When he was high on her, he would be bursting with ecstasy and dancing and singing. When he got a little low, when he lost contact, he would cry like a baby. This was the way he was. So whatever enlightenment Totapuri talked about, he was not interested in all that. In many ways Totapuri tried to instruct him, but Ramakrishna was unwilling. At the same time, he was willing to sit before Totapuri because Totapuri’s presence was such.

Totapuri saw that Ramakrishna was just going on like this. Then he said, “This is very simple. Right now you are empowering your emotion, you are empowering your body, and you are empowering the chemistry within you. You are not empowering your awareness. You have the necessary energy but you just have to empower your awareness.”

Ramakrishna agreed and said, “Okay, I will empower my awareness and sit.” But the moment he has a vision of Kali, he would again go into uncontrollable states of love and ecstasy. No matter how many times he sat down, the moment he saw Kali, he would just fly off.

So Totapuri said, “The next time Kali appears, you have to take a sword and cut her into pieces.”

Ramakrishna asked, “Where do I get the sword from?” Totapuri replied, “From the same place you get Kali from. If you are able to create a whole Kali, why can’t you create a sword? You can do it. If you are able to create a goddess, why can’t you create a sword to cut her? Get ready.”

Ramakrishna sat. But the moment Kali came, he burst into ecstasy and forgot all about the sword and the awareness.

Then Totapuri told him, “You sit this time. The moment Kali comes…” and he picked up a piece of glass and said, “With this piece of glass, I am going to cut you where you are stuck. When I cut that place, you create the sword and cut Kali down.”

Again Ramakrishna sat and just when Ramakrishna was on the edge of ecstasy, when Kali appeared in his vision, Totapuri took the piece of glass and cut Ramakrishna really deep across his forehead.

At that moment, Ramakrishna created the sword and cut Kali down, becoming free from the Mother and the ecstasies of feeding off her. That is when he truly became a Paramahamsa, he became fully enlightened. He then lost himself into Samadhi.

Totapuri sat for a long time, silently watching his disciple. Finding him perfectly motionless, he locked the door and went out of the room. Three days passed, and still there was no call. In utter surprise Totapuri opened the door and found Sri Ramakrishna sitting in the very same position in which he had left him. With breathless wonder Totapuri stood before this august spectacle. “Is it really true?” he said to himself, “Is it possible that this man has attained in the course of a single day that which took me forty years of strenuous practice to achieve?” Impelled by doubt, he made a searching examination. In joyous bewilderment he cried out, “Great God, it is nothing short of a miracle!” It was undoubtedly a case of “Nirvikalpa Samadhi” the culmination of the Advaita practice!

Totapuri immediately took steps to bring the mind of Sri Ramakrishna down to the world of phenomena. Normally Totapuri would not stay for long at any given location but given the extraordinary nature of his disciple, he stayed behind for 11 more months, making sure that Sri Ramakrishna was firmly established in his meditation practice.

Yogananda Paramahamsa

One morning Mukunda (Yogananda Paramahamsa) made his way to is his Master’s empty sitting room. He planned to meditate, but his laudable purpose was unshared by disobedient thoughts. They scattered like birds before the hunter.

“Mukunda!” Sri Yukteswar’s voice sounded from a distant balcony.

I felt rebellious as my thoughts. “Master always urges me to meditated,” I muttered to myself. “He should not disturb me when he knows why I came to his room.”

He summoned me again; I remained obstinately silent. The third time his tone held rebuke.

“Sir, I am meditating,” I shouted protestingly.

“I know how you are meditating,” my guru called out, “with your mind distributed like leaves in a storm! Come here to me.”

Thwarted and exposed, I made my way sadly to his side.

“Poor boy, mountains cannot give you what you want.”               

Master spoke caressingly, comfortingly. His calm gaze was unfathomable. “Your heart’s desire shall be fulfilled.” Sri Yukteswar seldom indulged in riddles; I was bewildered. 

He struck gently on my chest above the heart. 

My body became immovably rooted; breath was drawn out of my lungs as if by some huge magnet. Soul and mind instantly lost their physical bondage and streamed out like a fluid piercing light from my every pore. The flesh was as though dead, yet in my intense awareness I knew that never before had I been fully alive. My sense of identity was no longer narrowly confined to a body but embraced the circumambient atoms. People on distant streets seemed to be moving gently over my own remote periphery. The roots of plants and trees appeared through a dim transparency of the soil; I discerned the inward flow of their sap.

The whole vicinity lay bare before me. My ordinary frontal vision was now changed to a vast spherical sight, simultaneously all-perceptive. Through the back of my head I saw men strolling far down Rai Ghat Lane, and noticed also a white cow that was leisurely approaching. When she reached the open ashram gate, I observed her as though with my two physical eyes. After she had passed behind the brick wall of the courtyard, I saw her clearly still.

All objects within my panoramic gaze trembled and vibrated like quick motion pictures. My body, Master’s, the pillared courtyard, the furniture and floor, the trees and sunshine, occasionally became violently agitated, until all melted into a luminescent sea; even as sugar crystals, thrown into a glass of water, dissolve after being shaken. The unifying light alternated with materializations of form, the metamorphoses revealing the law of cause and effect in creation.

An oceanic joy broke upon calm endless shores of my soul. The Spirit of God, I realized, is exhaustless Bliss; His body is countless tissues of light. A swelling glory within me began to envelop towns, continents, the earth, solar and stellar systems, tenuous nebulae, and floating universes. The entire cosmos, gently luminous, like a city seen afar at night, glimmered within the infinitude of my being. The dazzling light beyond the sharply etched global outlines faded slightly at the farthest edges; there I saw a mellow radiance, ever undiminished. It was indescribably subtle; the planetary pictures were formed of a grosser light.

Again and again I saw the beams condense into constellations, then resolve into sheets of transparent flame. By rhythmic reversion, sextillion worlds passed into diaphanous luster, then fire became firmament.

Soon he found his breath returned to his lungs and his communion with the Divine ended. When he opened his eyes he found Sri Yukteswar standing next to him. He immediately bowed before his guru to thank him for having given him this experience. Sri Yukteswar stood him up and told him, “You must not get over drunk with ecstasy. Much work needs to be done. Come, let us sweep the balcony floor and then we will walk by the Ganges.”

Again the master was teaching a subtle lesson. The soul may easily leap over the cosmos and dance in the glory of a divine communion but the body has to yet to perform its duties, however menial they may be.

Swami Vivekananda

On his second visit to Dakshineshwar Sri Ramakrishna went into his usual trances. During this he happened to touch Naren (Swami Vivekananda) and accidentally sent him into a trance of his own. Naren described the incident afterwards.

The touch at once gave rise to a unique experience within me. With my eyes open I saw the walls and everything in the room whirl rapidly and vanish into naught, and the whole universe together with my individuality was about to merge in an all-encompassing void! I was terribly frightened and thought I was facing death! Unable to control myself I cried out for help and Sri Ramakrishna laughed and touched me again and restored me back to my senses.

This incident wounded Naren’s pride and marked a turning point. At this point he was not sure if the experience was a result as some sort of mesmerism or hypnotism and not sure if he could trust his own experience as something authentic. But the seed was sown. Naren had tasted briefly a new level of conscious experience for the first time.

In spite of their differences Naren felt a pull towards Sri Ramakrishna and he kept coming back. He was not yet willing to give up logic and reasoning and he did not give any credence to this talk of his future greatness. Once he told Sri Ramakrishna, “Since you love me and wish to see me great, these fancies naturally come to your mind.”

Nevertheless Naren slowly began to realize that Sri Ramakrishna was indeed experiencing something extraordinary and authentic. What had initially appeared to him as eccentric behavior now seemed as a child-like behavior of a God-intoxicated man. But Naren was yet in no mood to accept Sri Ramakrishna as his guru or accept his teachings. One day he told Sri Ramakrishna, “Even though I love you it does not mean that I shall accept your words without exercising my critical judgment.” Sri Ramakrishna rejoiced at the intellectual sincerity of Naren. Of all his disciples Naren was the only one who dared challenge him.

One night as Naren meditated, he felt as if somebody had placed a bright lamp behind his head. The intensity of light slowly increased and suddenly burst open and he merged into the Absolute. When he came back to his senses he could only feel his head and had no sensation in the rest of his body. He cried for help and a brother disciple, Gopal, responded. Gopal tried to bring back sensation in Naren’s legs by massaging them to no avail. Thinking that Naren was dying he ran in panic to Sri Ramakrishna who merely smiled and said, “Let him stay in that state for a while; he has teased me long enough for it.”

Naren had already gone back into Samadhi and he stayed there for a few more hours. When he regained normal consciousness he realized that he had experienced Nirvikalpa Samadhi, the highest form of conscious experience. He immediately went to meet Sri Ramakrishna, who told him: "Now the Mother has shown you everything. But this realization, like the jewel locked in a box, will be hidden away from you and kept in my custody. I will keep the key with me. Only after you have fulfilled your mission on this earth will the box be unlocked, and you will know everything as you have known now".

Naren was destined never to experience the highest state of consciousness again till the very end of his life. Sri Ramakrishna warned him that there was very little separating him from the deepest experience and there was always danger that he would topple into it at any time.

He warned Naren to stay away from it and instead devote his time to the deeper mission of his life. From now on Naren would feel twin pulls. One pulled him in the direction of his work and the other towards deeper meditation. In line of the wishes of his Guru, Naren would henceforth focus only on his work. His ideal was that of Avalokitesvara, the Buddha who postponed his own enlightenment for the good of humanity. 

Ramana Mahirshi

One day in 1986 when he was not quite seventeen, and was sitting alone on the second floor of his uncle’s house, when a sudden and overwhelming fear of death came over him. He was sure he was going to die. The feeling of his imminent demise however did not unnerve him. He calmly lay on the ground and stretched out his limbs, holding them stiff, as if rigor-mortis had set in. A wave of realization soon hit him and he came to a deep realization that he was not his mind-body. The fear of death vanished forever from his life. 

Venkataraman (his former name) found that from now on he was on a higher spiritual plane than normal and his life was forever changed. Somehow Venkataraman had stumbled into a kind of “self-awakening”, a process that normally is difficult for most of us even under the guidance of an expert Guru. From now on nothing that he had valued earlier mattered. School, friends, relatives, nothing of this mattered to him anymore. All he was concerned about was all things spiritual. He would go to the temple everyday and be so moved by the images of Saints and Gods that tears would flow freely. He now avoided company and instead preferred to sit alone and meditate.

Swami Muktananda

One evening I went for the darshan of Bhagawan Nityananda. After the darshan, he always asked me, "Are you leaving now?" But that day he did not put his usual question, so I stayed on. I spent the night immersed in the sublime joy of meditation on the Guru.

The morning of the fifteenth of August, 1947, dawned. What an auspicious day! How nectarean! What merit and exceptional fortune it held in its womb! It was the most remarkable day of my life—the most significant day, not only of this lifetime, but of many lifetimes! The holiest of the holy, O yes, the most auspicious of all auspicious days, broke.

The sun rose slightly above the horizon. The atmosphere was tranquil. I was standing in the eastern corner of the hall absorbed in contemplation of the Guru. In the opposite corner stood Monappa, Gurudev's cook. Inside the meditation room, Gurudev made his characteristic 'hunh' sound to indicate that he was about to come out from his meditation. Soon he appeared, revealing a form which I had never seen before. He was wearing beautiful wooden sandals. He moved forward and backward, smiling to himself, and walked around chanting certain mysterious mantras. Then he would stand in front of me, smiling and humming. He was wearing a white shawl, a loin-cloth and the sandals on his feet. He faced me again and again, uttering a loud 'hunh.' One hour passed in that way.

Then Gurudev came close to me and his body touched mine. This surprise completely benumbed me. I was standing facing west, while Gurudev faced east, his body adjacent to mine. I opened my eyes to look at him. Lo! His eyes wide open in shamhhavi mudra, were gazing straight into mine. I was dazed. I could not close my eyes; I had lost all power of volition. The divine rays emanating from Gurudev's eyes virtually paralysed mine. We remained in this stance for a short while. Then I heard the heavenly strain of his 'hunh.' When I had somewhat regained consciousness, I found he had stepped back about two feet.

He was saying, 'Take these sandals, wear them. Would you like to wear these sandals of mine?". Though amazed, I replied reverently and firmly, "Gurudev, these sandals are not meant for me to wear, but to worship. Sire, if you kindly agree, I shall spread my cloth. Please be so gracious as to place your feet on it and leave your sandals."

My revered Gurudev accepted my request. Making his sound of 'hunh,' he lifted his left foot along with the sandal and placed it on my cloth. Then, bringing the left foot down and lifting the right one, he put in the other sandal as well. He stood facing me directly. He looked into my eyes again. Watching carefully, I saw a ray of light entering me from his pupils. It felt hot, like burning fever. Its light was dazzling, like that of a highpowered bulb. As that ray emanating from Bhagawan Nityananda's pupils penetrated mine, I was thrilled with amazement, joy and fear. I was beholding its colour, and chanting Guru Om. It was a full unbroken beam of divine radiance. Its colour kept changing from molten gold to saffron to a shade deeper than the blue of a shining star. I stood utterly transfixed. Then as Gurudev moved slightly, chanting his 'hunh,' I stirred, partially recovering my wits. I bowed to the sandals in my cloth. I prostrated myself at his feet. I rose with my heart pulsating with bliss.

I said in a soft, tender tone, ''Gurudev! What divine luck! I have obtained the highest boon today. Kindly dwell in your fullness in these sandals and allow me to worship them, though I do not know the proper manner." As I uttered these words, he went towards the western wing of the hall. He returned with some flowers, two bananas, a few incense sticks and a pinch of kum-kum. He placed them all on the sandals.

Making his 'hunh' sound, he went inside. This sound sometimes indicated different instructions. If he turned his head while uttering this sound, it was a hint for me to leave. But he had not yet made that gesture, so I remained standing. Bhagawan came out, holding a blue shawl which he put around me. What marvelous fortune! Since early morning I had been receiving precious gifts, one after another. Then he rushed towards the kitchen where Monappa was cooking bhajiyas of unripe bananas and putting them in a plate. Taking two handfuls of them, he came over and put them in the same cloth which held the sandals and other gifts. Finally uttering his blissful 'hunh,' he made the sign for me to depart.

What a significant day! How sacred and auspicious! As I came out I began to congratulate myself: "Aha! What an hour! How fruitful! What meritorious deeds I must have done to deserve all this!"

I was beside myself with amazement. I had never expected such an event to occur. It was unlikely for one such as I to receive the Guru's sandals, because at that time Bhagawan Nityananda had many ardent devotees who had been devoted to him for years. Some were quite old; some were business magnates. Each claimed to be an advanced and experienced seeker, being closest to Bhagawan, while I was an ordinary and unfamiliar visitor, rather new to the place. I had not performed any special kind of sadhana nor had I achieved any worthwhile stage. I owned neither a mansion nor a business concern. I was in every way a poor man. Therefore all that had happened showed that I was exceptionally fortunate.

That day he had gazed into my eyes with his eyes wide open in Parashiva's shamhhavi mudra, as if he had never seen me before. He had entered me with his divine ray of Chiti that grants all powers. Beholding that ray, I had experienced different states—tremors in the body, tears flowing from the eyes, stupefaction, detachment and supreme joy. Thus he had blessed me with sublime initiation.

Sri Annamalai Swami

Sri Annamalai Swami recollects the circumstances that led him to Bhagavan in the year 1928, when he was 22 years old. One can’t help but wonder at the supreme power of the divine hand at play.

Sometime in 1928, when I was twenty-one years old, a wandering sādhu passed through the village. He gave me a copy of Upadėsa Undiyār which contained a photo of Sri Ramana Maharshi. As soon as I saw that photo I had the feeling that this was my Guru. Simultaneously, an intense desire arose within me to go and see him.

That night I had a dream in which I saw Ramana Maharshi walking from the lower slopes of Arunachala to the old hall. At the threshold of the old hall he washed his feet with the water that was in his water pot. I came near him, prostrated at his feet, and then went into a kind of swoon because the shock of having darshan was too much for me. As I was lying on the ground with my mouth open, Bhagavan poured water from his pot into my mouth. I remember repeating the words ‘Mahadeva, Mahadeva’ (one of the names of Siva) as the water was being poured in. Bhagavan gazed at me for a few seconds before turning to go into the hall. When I woke the next morning I decided that I should go immediately to Bhagavan and have his darshan.

I arrived at Tiruvannamalai there at about 1 p.m. As I approached the hall, part of the dream I had had in my village repeated itself in real life. I saw Bhagavan walk down the hill, cross the ashram and pause outside the hall while he washed his feet with water from his kamandalu (water pot). Then he went inside. I sprinkled some of this water on my head, drank a little, and then went inside to meet him.

Bhagavan was sitting on his couch while an attendant called Madhava Swami dried his feet with a cloth. Madhava Swami went out a few minutes later, leaving Bhagavan and me alone in the hall. I had bought a small packet of dried grapes and some sugar candy to give him. I placed them on a small table that was next to Bhagavan’s sofa and prostrated to him.’

When I stood up I saw that Bhagavan was eating a little of my offering. As I watched him swallow, the thought came to me that my offering was going directly into Siva’s stomach. I sat down and Bhagavan gazed at me in silence for about 10–15 minutes. There was a great feeling of physical relief and relaxation while Bhagavan was looking at me. I felt a wonderful coolness pervade my body. It was like immersing myself in a cool pool after being outside in the hot sun.

I asked for permission to stay and this was readily granted. A small hut was given to me and for the first week I stayed there as a guest of the ashram. During those first few days I either gathered flowers for the ashram’s puja or just sat with Bhagavan in his hall. As the days passed I became more and more convinced that Bhagavan was my Guru. Feeling a strong urge to settle down in the ashram, I asked Chinnaswami, Bhagavan’s younger brother, if I could work in the ashram. Chinnaswami granted my request and said that I could serve as Bhagavan’s attendant. At that time Madhava Swami was doing the job by himself.

Chinnaswami told me, ‘Madhava Swami is the only attendant at the moment. Whenever he goes out of the hall or goes for a rest you should stay with Bhagavan and attend to all his needs.’

Later after few days Chinnaswami entrusted me with the construction work of ashram. While I didn’t realise it at that time, my days as an ashram worker were coming to a close. In retrospect I can remember this incident which indicated that Bhagavan knew that my time in the ashram was coming to an end. I was doing some digging with a crowbar when Bhagavan came and asked me, ‘Did you decide to do this work yourself or did Chinnaswami ask you to do it?’

I told him that Chinnaswami had asked me to do it. Bhagavan was not very pleased. So, he has given you work. Why is he giving you work like this?’

A little later Yogi Ramaiah remarked to Bhagavan, ‘Annamalai Swami is working very hard. His body has become very weak. You should give him some rest.’ Bhagavan agreed with him. ‘Yes, we have to give him some rest. We have to give freedom to him.’

A few days later I went to Bhagavan’s bathroom to help him with his morning bath. Madhava Swami asked a question: ‘Bhagavan, the people who take ganjā (an ayurvedic preparation whose principal ingredient is cannabis) experience some kind of ānanda (bliss). What is the nature of this ānandā? Is it the same ānandā that the scriptures speak of?’

‘Eating this ganjā is a very bad habit,’ replied Bhagavan. Then, laughing loudly, he came over to me, hugged me and called out, Ānandā!, Ānandā! This is how these ganjā-taking people behave!’

It was not a brief hug. Madhava Swami told me later that he held me tightly for about two minutes. After the first few seconds I completely lost awareness of my body and the world. Initially, there was a feeling of happiness and bliss, but this soon gave way to a state in which there were no feelings and no experiences. I did not lose consciousness. I just ceased to be aware of anything that was going on around me. I remained in this state for about fifteen minutes. When I recovered my usual consciousness I was standing alone in the bathroom. Madhava Swami and Bhagavan had long since departed for breakfast. I had not seen them open the door and leave, nor had I heard the breakfast bell.

Baba Lokenath

'If you know who you are, you will come to know everything. There is nothing in this external, manifested world which is not within you. Believe my words, there is no truth without, because your Atman is ‘Sarvabhutatman’ the Atman seated in the hearts of all creatures.  In you is the dormant seed form of all the knowledge, power and wealth of this entire creation'. These were the instructions from my Guru Shri Bhagavan Ganguly after which I practiced Yoga and attained Samadhi.

Recalling his time in the Himalayas, Baba Lokenath said, “While in Samadhi, heaps of snow would cover my body and would melt away. In that sublime state I had no feeling of the existence of my body. I was in that state of Samadhi for a long time. Then finally the effortless state of the Ultimate Truth was revealed. In that state, there was no difference between me, the rest of the cosmos and all its manifestations. The inner and the outer all merged into each other as an expression of ultimate bliss, absolute joy. There is no state beyond this to be achieved in human life with total effort and divine grace.”

Swami Ramdas

One day, the sadhuram who was accompanying him, decided to take Ramdas to receive “darshan” (spiritual grace) from Ramana Maharshi. The visitors prostrated themselves at the feet of the saint. The place exuded peace. The Maharshi was still young; he possessed such a calm expression and such a look of tenderness and serenity that all those who came to him were subject to the charm of his peace and his joy. 

Ramdas said to the Maharshi: “Maharaj, here stands before Thee a humble slave. Have pity on him. His only prayer to Thee is to give him thy blessing.” The Maharshi, turning his beautiful eyes towards Ramdas, and looking intently for a few minutes into his eyes as though he was pouring into Ramdas his blessing through those orbs, shook his head to say that he had blessed. A thrill of inexpressible joy coursed through the frame of Ramdas, his whole body quivering like a leaf in the breeze. He forgot everything around him and fell into an inexpressible ecstasy. This was a crucial experience for him. Referring to this single visit, he considered that, after his father, the Maharshi was his second guru.

After this experience Ramana Mahirshi inspired in Ramdas the desire to spend some time in solitude on Arunachala Hill. Ramdas found a small cave, which he entered and settled in. He stayed there for twenty days and twenty nights, ceaselessly repeating the mantra given to him by his guru. He felt most blissful sensations since he could here hold undisturbed communion with Ram. He was actually rolling in a sea of indescribable happiness.

At the end of the twentieth day, as he came out of his cave, his eyes were filled with a strange light and he saw the Divine everywhere. He saw It in the stones, he saw It in the trees, he saw It in the plants and the rocks, and he cried out that he saw Ram everywhere. Like a madman, he raced in every direction and he kissed everything he found, stones, plants, a man who was passing …

For two years from the time of the significant change which had come over him, Ramdas had been prepared to enter into the very depths of his being for the realisation of the immutable, calm and eternal spirit of God. Here he had to transcend name, form, thought and will—every feeling of the heart and faculty of the mind. The world had then appeared to him as a dim shadow—a dreamy nothing. The vision then was mainly internal. It was only for the glory of the Atman in His pristine purity, peace and joy as an all-pervading, immanent, static, immortal and glowing spirit.

In the earlier stages this vision was occasionally lost, pulling him down to the old life of diversity with its turmoil of like and dislike, joy and grief. But he would be drawn in again into the silence and calmness of the Spirit. A stage was soon reached when this dwelling in the spirit became a permanent and unvarying experience with no more falling off from it, and then a still exalted state came on; his hitherto inner vision projected outwards. First a glimpse of this new vision dazzled him off and on. This was the working of divine love. He would feel as though his very soul had expanded like the blossoming of a flower and, by a flash as it were, enveloped the whole universe embracing all in a subtle halo of love and light. This experience granted him bliss infinitely greater than he had in the previous state. Now it was that Ramdas began to cry out “Ram is all, it is He as everybody and everything.” This condition was for some months coming on and vanishing. When it wore away, he would instinctively run to solitude. When it was present, he freely mixed in the world preaching the glory of Divine Love and Bliss. With this externalised vision started Ramdas’ mission. Its fullness and magnificence was revealed to him during his stay in the Kadri cave, and here the experience became more sustained and continuous. The vision of God shone in his eyes and he would see none but Him in all objects. Now wave after wave of joy rose in him. He realised that he had attained to a consciousness, full of splendour, power and bliss.

Guru Nanak

Around the year 1485, a 16-year-old boy named Nanak moved to Sultanpur Lodhi in Punjab, where he lived for the next 14 years. Each day before sunrise, he would go for ablutions by the Kali Bein, a seasonal rivulet, accompanied by Mardana, the minstrel boy and his to-be lifelong companion.

One day, to Mardana’s surprise, Nanak plunged into the river but didn’t surface. Mardana waited and waited and then rushed to the town to seek assistance. Everyone thought that either Nanak had drowned or had been washed away in the river, which was in spate.

Nanak was then working as a storekeeper for Nawab Daulat Khan, governor of Jalandhar Doab. When the Nawab learnt about the incident he rushed to the spot and asked the fishermen to throw their nets in the rivulet and find Nanak. All efforts failed.

Then, suddenly on the fourth day, Nanak appeared in town. Khan heaved a sigh of relief and there was great rejoicing among his friends and relatives. But by now Nanak was a completely changed man. His face was radiant and there was divine light in his eyes. He was perpetually in deep reflective thought.

As word about Nanak’s return spread, people started thronging the place. They asked him where he had been, but Nanak remained silent. People said he was in the water for many days so he was out of his mind. But Nanak did not respond. 

After a day passed, he said: ‘Na koi Hindu, na koi Mussalman (There is no Hindu, there is no Muslim’. Each time he spoke, he repeated these words.

The Janamsakhi (literally, life story or biography) describes the incident as a communion with God, who gave him a cup of nectar to drink and charged him with the mission in the following words:

'Nanak I am with thee. Through thee will my name be magnified. Whosoever follows thee, him will I save. Go into the world to pray and teach mankind how to pray. Be not sullied by the ways of the world. Let your life be one of praise of the Word (naam), charity (daan), ablution (isnaan), service (seva) and prayer (simran). Nanak I give thee my pledge. Let this be thy life’s mission.’

The ‘mysterious’ voice spoke again: ‘Nanak he whom you bless will be blessed by Me; he to whom you are benevolent shall receive My benevolence. I am the Great God, the Supreme Creator. Thou art the Guru, The Supreme Guru of God.’ Nanak is said to have received the robe of honour from the hands of God Himself who revealed to him the ‘Divine Reality.