Kathamrita , 100th Visit of M. 7-Sept-1884 Vol 4, Section 18, Chap 1
* V e n u *
Life of Thakur in his own words – beliefs of the Ghoshpara and Kartabhaja sects
Sri Ramakrishna is seated on the smaller cot in his room at the Dakshineswar temple with devotees. It is about eleven o’clock. He has not yet been served the noon meal.
Yesterday, on Saturday, Thakur paid a visit to Adhar Sen’s house with the devotees. He made everyone happy by celebrating the Lord Hari’s name through devotional singing. Today Shyamdas will perform kirtan. Many devotees are assembling to witness Thakur’s joy in devotional singing.
The first to arrive are Baburam, M., the brahmin from Srirampur, Manomohan, Bhavanath, and Kishori. Then Chunilal, Haripada, and others come, followed by the Mukherji brothers, Ram, Surendra, Tarak, Adhar, and Niranjan. Latu, Harish, and Hazra are now staying at Dakshineswar. Ramlal is the priest in Mother Kali’s temple, and he looks after Thakur. Ram Chakravarty is the priest in the Vishnu temple. Today is Sunday, 7 September 1884 ; 23rd Bhadra, 1291 B.Y., the second day of the dark fortnight of Bhadra.
After M. has saluted Thakur, Sri Ramakrishna says to him, “Hasn’t Narendra come?”
Narendra could not come that day. The brahmin from Srirampur has brought a book of songs by Ramprasad. Now and then he reads some of the songs to Thakur.
Sri Ramakrishna (to the brahmin): “My dear, do continue reading.”
Brahmin: “Put on clothes, Mother – ”
Sri Ramakrishna: “Stop! Songs like this are absolutely useless. Read only those songs that inspire love and devotion for God.”
Brahmin: “Who can know what Kali is? Even the six philosophies cannot reveal Her.”
Thakur’s sympathetic friend – the paramahamsa, the baul, and the sai
Yesterday at Adhar’s house I felt a pain in one of my legs when I was in ecstasy. That’s why I take Baburam with me. He is a sympathetic soul.
Saying this, Thakur sings:
How can I tell you, O friend, what is in my heart?
I am forbidden to speak.
I cannot live without a kindred soul.
Such a one can be recognized from the look of his eyes.
Rare indeed is such a soul who swims in bliss on a tide of intense love.
The man of the heart trades in love.
Where can one find a man of the heart,
Who carries under his arm only a tattered rag?
He says not a word, but travels on the high road.
A man of the heart only walks along the higher path.
“The bauls sing songs like this. And they also sing songs like this one:
Wait, O wandering monk, with your water-pot!
Stand and let me behold your beauty.
“According to Shaktas, a perfected soul is called a kaul. In the Vedanta, he is called a paramahamsa. The Vaishnava bauls call him a sai. ‘There is none greater than a sai.’
“When a baul attains perfection, he is known as a sai. For him there is no distinction – half of his necklace is made of cow-bones and the other half of the sacred tulsi plant.
“Hindus call him Nir and Muslims call him Pir.”
Alekh (the incomprehensible) – about the spiritual current – spiritual centre – the function of syrup – taking the pot off
“A sai calls the Ultimate Reality ‘Alekh.’ In the Vedas it is called Brahman; the sais call Him Alekh, the incomprehensible. They say of the individual soul that Alekh comes and Alekh departs. That is to say, the individual soul comes from the unmanifest and then merges back into it.
“The Bauls ask, ‘Do you know about the wind?’
That is, about the rising of the spiritual current within the ida, pingala, and sushumna, when the kundalini is awakened.
“They ask, ‘In which center are you?’ The sixth centre is the sixth centre of consciousness.
“If he says that he is in the fifth, it means that his mind has risen to the vishuddha spiritual centre.
(To M.) “There is the vision of the formless God then. As the song says.”
Saying this, Thakur chants: “Within the petals of this lotus lies hidden a secret, subtle space. Passing beyond it, one beholds the world dissolve.”
His earlier story – arrival of the Bauls and followers of the Kartabhaja and Ghoshpara
“A baul once came here. I asked him, ‘Has your syrup been refined? Is the pot down from the fire?’ The more you boil syrup, the more refined it becomes. First you have sugarcane juice. Then it turns into molasses, then into jaggery, and then sugar, then sugar candy; last of all are sugar balls. It becomes refined more and more only gradually.
“When should the pot be taken down? In other words, when will spiritual practices end? They will end when the senses are conquered. Senses are loosened the same way a leech drops off when lime is applied to it. Though one might live with a woman, one does not engage in intercourse with her.
“Many of these people conduct themselves according to the Radha Tantra. They practise spiritual disciplines with the five basic elements – earth, water, fire, air, and ether – through the use of excrement, urine, menstrual flow, and semen. It is a very dirty practice, like entering a home through the toilet.
“One day when I was eating in the courtyard, a man of the Ghoshpara sect came. He asked, ‘Are you eating, or are you feeding someone else?’ The meaning was that the person who attains spiritual perfection sees that God dwells within.
“Those who perfect themselves in this sect call people of other sects ‘bound souls.' They don’t talk in the presence of people of different views, saying, ‘There are strangers here.’”
His earlier story – visit to his birthplace. In Shari Pathar's house with Hriday
“I saw a woman of this belief in my native village – Shari (Saraswati) Pathar. People of this sect eat in each other’s houses, but they won’t take a meal in the homes of people of other sects. The Mallicks ate at Shari Pathar’s house, but they didn’t eat at Hriday’s. They say that these people are ‘bound souls.’ (Laughter.)
“One day when I was taking a stroll, I went to her house with Hriday. She had a beautiful tulsi garden. She offered parched rice with urad lentils. I ate some. Hriday ate a lot – then he felt sick.
“They call the state of perfection natural (sahaja). There is a class of people who go around saying, ‘sahaja, sahaja.’ They mention two characteristics of this state of sahaja: one, the body no longer has the ‘smell of Krishna’; two, a bee will sit on a lotus but will not sip its honey. That there is no ‘smell of Krishna’ means that all divine feelings are within and there are no outward signs, not even the name of Hari on his lips. And the meaning of the second is that there is no attachment to women – one has acquired mastery over the senses.
“They don’t like worship of the deity in an image or the like. They want a living person. That is why they are known as Kartabhaja, that is, those who adore and worship [bhaja] the spiritual preceptor [karta] – the guru – as God Himself.”
=============================================================