#255 The one who looked for God (story)

Shri Swami Rama Tirtha also known as Ram Swami was an Indian teacher of Vedanta. He lived from 1873 to 1906. One of the earlier teachers to lecture in the United States travelling there in 1902 and was preceded by Swami Vivekananda earlier. Here is a lovely story that he would narrate.

Once upon a time, the son of an Indian King came to Rama in the mountains and put this question, ‘Swami what is God?’

And the Swami said, ‘Well, this is one subject that all religions propose to investigate. And you want to know all about this in a short time?’

So the boy said, ‘Yes Swami. What shall I do to have this explained to me?’

The Swami said, ‘Dear prince, you want to know what God is? You want to be acquainted with God? But don’t you know what the rule is? That when a person goes to see a great king or a great person, he has to send his own card first. He has to indicate to this king what his own address and name is.’

Now since you want to see God you better send your visiting card to God and you better let God know what you are. So how about you give me your card and I will place it in the hands of God directly. And then God can come to you and you will be able to see what God is. ‘

‘Okay, this seems quite alright and reasonable. I will directly let you know what I am. I am the son of King so and so and I am living in the Himalayas in Northern India. This is my name.’

He writes it out on a piece of paper and gives it to Rama.

Rama says, ‘I cannot put it in the hands of God because you don’t know who you are. You are like this illiterate ignorant person who wants to see another great person and you cannot even write your own name.’

‘How will God receive you? Tell me correctly who you are and then God can come to receive you with open arms.’ 

So, the boy reflected, thought over the subject. And then he said

‘Swami, now I see the mistake in writing my own name.

I just give you the address of the body only. And I ‘ve not really written on the paper who I am.’

So the prince who wanted to know God asked his attendant was standing nearby. ‘Mr so and so to whom does this card belong?’

And the attendant said to him, ‘To me’

Okay, to whom does this stick belong?  and picking up a stick from the hand of the attendant, the man said, ‘To me’. 

Well, the prince said ‘Okay, if the stick belongs to you, there is a relation between the stick and you.  You are the owner and the stick is your property and you’re not the stick. Correct?’

The attendant said, ‘Yes, Master.’

Then the prince takes hold of the ears of the attendant. ‘Whom do these ears belong to?’

And the attendant said, ‘To me’. 

The prince said, ‘Okay. The ears belong to you. The ears are yours. Likewise, your nose belongs to you.’

And touching the body of the attendant, he asks, ‘Whose body is this?’

So, the attendant says ‘It’s my body master.’

‘Oh, then you are not the body you cannot be the body because you said that the body is yours. So the words that you have used, My body, my ears proves that you are something else. This is your property. You are the owner, the master’.

Now, what are you? The prince asks the attendant. The attendant doesn’t say anything.

Then the  prince says,  ‘Well actually the address of the body that I had put down, I agree I made a mistake. And that I cannot be the body because it happens to belong to me.’

I cannot be the mind or am I the mind? Well, maybe I am the mind. I must be the mind.

He is thinking aloud.

‘Then try to figure out the answer to the question. Who am I?’

The Prince asks the attendant, ‘Now you tell me how many bones do you have in the body? Can you say where the food lies in your body that you took this morning?

The attendant doesn’t say much. The prince goes on speaking and is trying to make sense of all of this.

He says, ‘But the same thing applies. The mind also is yours. The intellect is yours. And if anything has this kind of a connection, then I cannot be that.

The Swami goes on saying, ‘Well think a little bit more. Because it all depends on what you see you are. Only then God can be brought before you  and you will be able to see God.

So the prince says, Well I’m trying to think but my mind cannot reach further.

Then the Swami says ‘Okay, let me help you. So, think about what you have done today. Can you share about what kind of actions you have performed since morning?’

So, the prince began to relate, ‘Well, I woke up early in the morning had a bath. Did this thing and that thing, took my breakfast, read a great deal, wrote some letters, visited some friends, received some friends and came here to meet the swami.’

So he was asked, ‘Is that all?  Have you not done a great deal more?’

He thought and he mentioned a few more things.

And then the Swami said, ‘Well you have done hundreds and thousands of other actions and you just refuse to mention them. This is not right.  Please tell me everything that you have done.’

The prince heard all these strange words and was startled and he says ‘Well, I have not done anything more than what I have told you.’

So, the Swami says, ‘Well you have! What is looking at me, the Swami? Well, you see the river and you see the face of this Swami but who is making the six muscles in the eyes move.  You know right, that the muscles in the eyes move. Who makes that happen? It cannot be anyone else. It must be your own self. That makes the muscles in the eye move in the act of seeing.’

So the prince said, ‘Well, it must be I, it cannot be anything else. Well, who is seeing right now and listening to my words?’

The boy said I. 

The Swami said ‘Well, if you were seeing and hearing my words, who was the one who ate this morning?

The boy said I.

‘Well if you took the meals in this morning and it is you who will go to the toilet,  who is it that assimilate and digest the food? Who is it? It must be you.

The problem is that science does not admit the solution to this problem of who am I. Somehow science directs your attention outward and tries to seek the cause of a phenomenon outside of the person involved.’

The Swami continues, ‘Dear prince, just think the process of digestion implies hundreds of movements. In the process of digestion in mastication saliva is emitted from the glands in the mouth. Then is the next process of oxidation. Blood is formed. The blood courses through the veins, the same food is being converted into muscles, bones and hair – great amount of processes. So many processes go on in the body just connected to assimilation and digestion. You make the blood course through the veins. You yourself make the hair grow. You make the body develop. There’s just so many millions of actions that you do every day and you say that you have done a few actions.’

So, the prince said ‘Well, you are right. There are so many processes that are done but I don’t know about it. But I can see what you’re saying that in this body there are two kinds of work being done involuntary and voluntary. And a lot of what you’re referring to are these involuntary actions that I’m not aware of.’

So then he was asked, ‘When you go to bed, do you die or live?’

Prince says No! I don’t die? I just perhaps go on dreaming or I just fall into deep sleep.’

Then when you wake up after enjoying the deep sleep, do you not make statements like I enjoyed a profound sleep tonight or I had no dream tonight?’

‘Yes.’

‘Are you sure that you don’t die when you go to sleep? ‘

‘No, no! I am very much there. Maybe the mind is not there. But I know that I have not died. It seems like I’m an eyewitness. Yes, in my deep sleep, I see no dreams, no rivers, no mountains in that state. I don’t have a father or a mother. I have no house, no family. Everything seems dead and gone. I slept and there was nothing there. Nobody was present. ’

So then the prince is asked, ‘Are you sure about this?

Yes.

Are you an eyewitness that nothing was there?

‘Yes. ’

‘Then what are you? Are you a human being? ’

‘Yes, I am a human being!’

‘You were present there and according to you, there was nothing else there. ’

The prince says, ‘Yes.’

Just to make sure I understood what you said that only you were present? There was no father no mother, no husband, no wife, no house, no river, no family present. This was the evidence that you have given and you’re the only eyewitness to this and it proves that you did not sleep.

Because if you had been asleep, you would have said well, even I was not there. Correct? ’

‘Yes.’

And while nothing else was there, ‘if you had died then who would have made the blood run through the blood vessels would have continued the process of digestion in the stomach?’

So what you’re saying is that the mind sleeps but you are something beyond the mind and the body, you are very much there. ’

The prince says, ‘Yes, I am beginning to understand that I am the infinite power which never sleeps, which never changes. In my youth, the body was different, in my childhood, the mind was not the same as I have now. They were entirely different. Doctors tell us that after seven years, the whole system undergoes a thorough change. Every moment the body’s changing. Every second the mind is changing. I see that.’

The Swami says, ‘Think a little bit more about it. And only then I can take your visiting card to God. You know the promise right? You put down your right address on paper and God will be introduced to you immediately.’

Now the prince had come to know about himself that he was someone unchanging, something that was never asleep. And he wanted to know what God is.

The Swami further asked, ‘You know here are these trees growing. Is the power that makes these trees grow different from the power that makes the trees on the other side grow? ’

The prince said, ‘No, no, it must be the same power certainly. Then is the power which makes all these trees grow different from the powers that make the bodies of the animals grow?’

‘No, no, it cannot be different. It must be the same.’

Then is the power which makes the stars move different from the power which makes the rivers flow?’.

He said it cannot be different and must be the same.

‘So, the same universal power of nature or the unknowable which makes the stars shine, which makes your eyes twinkle, the same power which is the cause of the growth of that body’s hair which you call ‘mine’, the same power which makes the blood course through the veins through the body and the same power that makes the trees grow and other beings grow are all indeed one. Then that power, that Shakti – are you not that Shakti, which makes your hair grow and your blood flow through the veins?’

‘Are you not that shakti, the Shakti which is beyond the body and mind?

If so, you are the same power and shakti that is governing the force of the universe.

You are the same divinity – you are the God that you seek.’

‘That which is present everywhere, which is unchanging, which is still present in many forms. You are that being. Isn’t it? ‘

The prince is amazed, ‘That’s true. I wanted to know God and I came to you asking what God is and because of your insistence on putting my right introduction onto the visiting card, I now find my own self. I am the Atma! What was I asking?’

What a silly question I put forward that in trying to know God, you have helped me find me.

Thus, God was known as ‘I am’.