Same-sightedness of the jnani : Sri Ramana Maharshi’s Example

Sri Ramana Maharshi – A modern manifestation of the highest truth of Advaita Vedanta

Today, as we witness so many instances of religious intolerance and the politicizing of petty religious issues, it is salutary to consider how one of the greatest spiritual giants of modern India, Sri Ramana Maharshi (1879-1950) viewed such differences.

Described as “the crown jewel of Vedanta” by John Allen Grimes in one his books, Ramana Maharshi is indeed a modern manifestation of the highest truth of Advaita Vedanta in its strictest form.

While many seekers from India and abroad came to see the Maharshi and many of them left accounts of their visits, the British journalist Paul Brunton’s 1934 book A Search In Secret India was particularly instrumental in announcing the glory of Sri Ramana to the western world.

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Even before the publication of Brunton’s book, Self Realisation: The Life and Teachings of Ramana Maharshi was published by B V Narasimha Swami in 1931 and this biography also was instrumental in attracting a large number of seekers to the Maharshi. However, Brunton’s book made the Maharshi known to the western world in a big way, and streams of seekers from across the oceans started coming to him.

Even now his Ashram is a place of pilgrimage for people of different religions from all nations of the world. Everyone is treated equally, has equal access to the facilities of the Ashram, and no distinctions are made in terms of race, caste, creed, religion, etc. These distinctions were absolutely nothing to the Maharshi, and the Ashram has not swerved from the master’s teachings.

Dr Hafiz Syed, a staunch Muslim and a professor of Islamic Studies at Allahabad University, came to visit Ramana Maharshi on reading Paul Brunton’s A Search In Secret India and being encouraged by Maurice Frydman, a Polish Jew and a brilliant engineer who would later become a Hindu sannyasi.

In his very first visits to Ramana Maharshi, Dr Sayed noted how the Maharshi treated all visitors equally, irrespective of his or her position in society or religion or any other marker of socio-cultural identity. Fruits, sweets or other offerings that visitors sometimes brought were shared equally with all present. During meal times in the ashram, the Maharshi and the visitors ate in the dining hall together.

Some orthodox Brahmins did not feel comfortable about eating together with “lower caste” people and with people of other religions, so they could sit separately in the same hall, if they wished, for the Maharshi never forced rules on anyone.

Dr Syed was extremely surprised when he a Muslim, was invited to sit with the inmates of the ashram, other visitors and the Maharshi, to have his meals, and he said that social agitations and movements were not so successful in defeating the absurd rules of caste and untouchability as Ramana Maharshi’s quiet methods were.

Dr Syed and his wife, both very particular about following a strictly Islamic way of life, were so moved by Ramana Maharshi’s solicitude for them, that they later built a house near the ashram and stayed there till the Maharshi attained mahanirvana in 1950.

Saab Jaan, a Muslim schoolmate of the Maharshi, recalled how even as a school boy, Ramana’s actions showed his conviction of the oneness of all religions. He said that Venkataraman (Ramana Maharshi’s name before he came to be called Bhagavan Sri Ramana Maharshi) would take him along while going round the temple of Lord Subramania at Tirupparankunram, saying that God was the same, and only human beings created differences.

Saab Jaan and other friends and relatives of young Venkataraman suddenly lost contact with him when, in 1896, after a life-changing spiritual experience, he left home for ever. Many years later, when Saab Jaan came to know that his old schoolmate Venkataraman had become a revered sage at Tiruvannamalai, he went to pay him a visit, and the Maharshi would make him sit beside him when taking meals. Eventually, of course, Saab Jaan became an ardent devotee of the Maharshi.

Mastan Swami, a simple Muslim weaver from the village of Desur near Tiruvannamalai, was one of the most extraordinary of Ramana Maharshi’s devotees. He experienced samadhi the very first time he visited the Maharshi. He would later be constantly with the Maharshi, as one of his attendants. There are many photographs which show the Maharshi on the sacred Arunachala Hill at Tiruvannamalai, accompanied by Mastan Swami.

Maharshi once said that of all the people who visited him, Mastan’s was the most perfect, mature soul.

Although the Maharshi did not give religious discourses in the ordinary sense, he clarified the doubts of serious seekers and answered their questions. Besides, his entire life was a demonstration of the truth of Advaita Vedanta. He also composed some exquisitely beautiful poetry expressing the highest sentiments of bhakti and Vedanta in Tamil, Sanskrit and Telegu.

He did not make it a point to discuss other religions, but he respected all religions. Occasionally he would point out how certain statements in the Bible could be considered entirely Vedantic. Sometimes he would ask Mastan Swami to sing the songs of the Tamil Sufi saint Kunagudi Mastan Sahib.

Mostly, however, the Maharshi’s message of unity was conveyed through simple behaviour—in the equal treatment that people of different races, religions, castes and classes received from him. Also, he never showed any special regard for the social standing or the wealth of a visitor.

If a maharaja or some other high dignitary came to visit the Maharshi, the Ashram management might get busy with the reception, but the Maharshi showed no signs of excitement at all. Dr S Radhakrishnan, before he became the President of India, would sometimes sit before the Maharshi and then leave, without a word passing between the Maharshi and him.

If the Maharshi showed any special consideration, it was for the poor villagers who came to him in very large numbers on festive occasions. Once when the Ashram management had put a small wooden barricade before the Maharshi so that the dirty, sweating people could not touch him, Maharshi simply walked out of the barricade and sat a place where he was easily accessible to the multitudes.

During the years when he was living on the hill, sometimes poor women who came to gather fodder or fuel on the hill, came to him in the sweltering heat of the South Indian summer, and requested him to pour water on their bodies. He poured water on their bodies, and also gave them water to drink. These women belonged to the so-called low castes, but of course that meant nothing to the Maharshi.

Once when they arrived at noon, they asked for food. The Maharshi told his attendant, Kunju Swami (who, incidentally was also from a so-called low caste of Kerala) to tell his (the Maharshi’s) mother to give food to the women. Maharshi’s mother had just finished cooking, and as she was still not free of her Brahminical ideas of caste hierarchy, she hesitated to offer the food.

According to caste rules, giving that food to the women would mean that she would have to take her bath again and cook again for herself. Observing his mother’s hesitation, the Maharshi told her, gesturing towards the women, “Do you know who they are? They are all forms of Arunachala Shiva Himself!” (Arunachala Shiva is the presiding deity of the Aurnachala Hill and the Arunachaleswara temple, and is considered Parameswara or Brahman or the Ultimate Reality.)

Such was the power of the Maharshi’s utterance that his mother did not merely serve the food to the women immediately, but she also gave up all her ideas about caste distinctions from that moment.

Food is free in the Ashram for all inmates, and there is also a custom to feed the poor before the inmates of the Ashram have their lunch. Once, for some reason, the Ashram management said that the poor would be fed after the Ashram people had had their lunch. That day everyone was surprised when they did not see the Maharshi in his usual place in the dining hall.

It was the custom for the inmates to have their food after the Maharshi gestured for them to eat, but that day the Maharshi was not there. Soon, someone reported that the Maharshi was seated outside with the poor people who had gathered for the free lunch.

When he was requested to come and have his lunch, he said, “You have made a rule that you will have your lunch before the poor. You can do so, but I will wait with these people here because I am one of them.” From that day onwards, the Ashram has always fed the poor before the inmates.

While Ramana Maharshi was ever established in the Self in the strictest Avdaitic sense, he never urged anyone to relinquish his or her religion or particular method of spiritual inquiry. Frank Humphreys, a British police officer with a keen interest in the occult, was drawn to Ramana Maharshi, and his impressions of the Maharshi were published in the International Psychic Gazette.

He was also a deeply devout Catholic Christian, and his contact with the Maharshi resulted in his being gradually weaned away from his interest in the occult and the deepening of his faith in his own religion. Eventually, Humphreys returned to England and became a Christian monk. Numerous other westerners visited the Maharshi, and they all felt that following the Maharshi’s teachings did not require any change of religion.

After coming into contact with Ramana Maharshi, Parsis, Muslims, Buddhists, Christians and Hindus following different ways of worship or sadhana usually became so much better followers of their own faiths. Of course, many Indians and some westerners like Arthur Osborne and his family, A W Chadwick, a British Army officer, and S S Cohen, an Iraqi Jew, stayed on near Ramana Maharshi whom they had accepted as their guru.

Sometimes learned scholars would vie with one another, attempting to catch the Maharshi’s attention and draw him into their discussion, while the Maharshi remained seemingly aloof, majestically established in the Self, radiating the profound peace of atma jnana. Occasionally, he might respond to their request to answer a question, but he may also ignore them entirely. However, he never ignored the poor, humble villagers who also visited him.

On seeing such a person, the Maharshi, unresponsive to the scholars’ debates, would suddenly come alive with a beautiful smile and maybe, some enquiry about the welfare of the visitor. A shepherd who had visited the Maharshi while he was living on the Arunachala Hill once came down to the Ashram, and the Maharshi instantly recognized him and talked to him.

The poor shepherd said that one of his ewes had been lost for some two days, and he was looking for her, although he thought, that by now, the leopards or thieves may have finished her. The Maharshi didn’t say anything to this, but asked the shepherd to help him in a little a task he was doing at that moment.

The shepherd then worked with the Maharshi for a few moments, and then the Maharshi pointed to a certain direction and told the shepherd to go that way, and that he would find his lost ewe there. The shepherd went and found his ewe and two little lambs she had given birth to.

No work, however “small” in the eyes of the world, was mean or demeaning to the Maharshi. Once when he was in one of the caves on the hill, a visitor who had never before seen the Maharshi, came, and saw a bare-bodied man in a loin-cloth arranging firewood. The visitor didn’t think that the Maharshi would be engaged in such “low-level” tasks, and waited for the arrival of the Maharshi.

When one of the Maharshi’s attendants, wearing bhasma on his forehead and exhibiting other such paraphernalia of the pious came there, the visitor fell flat on the ground, prostrating to him. Of course, the attendant then told the visitor that not he, but the young man who had been arranging firewood, and was now sitting silently, was the Maharshi.

Unlike many people who claim to be gurus, the Maharshi never wore grand dresses to signify his greatness. His usual clothing was a single, white loin cloth around the waist, and may be, an extra cloth on the body in winters. Ochre-clothed sannyasis with rudraksha or tulsi beads on their necks and bhasma or tilak on their foreheads would often visit the Maharshi who would be clothed in a loin cloth – the usual dress of many poor Tamil villager of the times.

Sometimes such visitors would ask the Maharshi about sannayas ashrama and the significance of wearing the ochre clothes of the sannyasi. The Maharshi’s view on this subject was that merely wearing ochre clothes and going through the initiation of sannayas did not make one a sannyasi, but true sannyas happens from within; and when that happens, it is immaterial whether one wears ochre or white, or whether one goes through the prescribed ceremonies or not.

Despite the simplicity of his physical appearance, however, the Maharshi was constantly established in the Self and could look magnificently withdrawn into himself. Sometimes this would happen in a trice : one moment he would be smilingly answering a seeker’s question, and the next moment he could become silent and look imposing like the Arunachala Hill he adored.

Actually, at all times, he was in sahaja samadhi, which is considered to be the highest state of consciousness possible, higher even than nirvikalpa samadhi. Of course, there were times, especially when he was living on the hill, when he would enter nirvikalpa samadhi  for long periods. This would often happen when the Vedas were recited before him, a practice continued in his shrine today.

And during the days of his first arrival at Tiruvannamalai he would remain in nirvikalpa samadhi for inordinately long periods. It is due to the watchful care of some devotees that his body survived that period of spontaneous nirvikalpa samadhi.

Despite being in such an exalted state, however, the Maharshi never differentiated between himself and others. To him, there were no ajnanis; all were jnanis like him. This attitude of utter equality cannot even be understood by us who comprehend the world only in terms of the differences between the self and the other. It requires at least a taste of nirvikalpa, if not sahaja, to be able to comprehend the Maharshi’s attitude in full.

Almost every day, the Maharshi would visit the Ashram kitchen very early in the morning, and help the workers there in their work of preparing food. He would cut vegetables, grind chutney, cook, and chat with the widows and other people working in the kitchen. The kitchen workers knew that this was the Maharshi’s way of extending his grace to them. They did not have the time or opportunity to sit with the Maharshi in the hall, so the Maharshi himself came to them, worked with them, and often gave them spiritual instructions.

One of the Maharshi’s intimate disciples, a pure-souled devotee and a great Sanskrit scholar, Jagadeesha Shastri was suffering from terminal cancer, and the doctors had lost hope on him. Then, as a last resort, Shastri wrote a beautiful prayer called prapatti ashtakam to the Maharshi. In this prayer, Shastri repeatedly asserts his sense of total surrender to his master.

It is not known how the Maharshi reacted to the prayer, although it can be supposed that he must have simply remained silent, as was his wont. He was not in the habit of openly declaring his protection or his grace, although many devotees claim that once their prayers reached the Maharshi’s ears, their problems would somehow be solved.

The Maharshi’s devotees also believe that the master actually saved Jagadeesha Shastri from imminent death, because after composing prapatti ashtakam,  he lived for 39 more years, actively writing and giving scholarly discourses. Prapatti ashtakam lists the sterling qualities of the Maharshi, among which, of course, Shastri mentions his master’s same-sightedness or sense of equality.

He calls the Maharshi abrahmakeetantasamam, the one to whom, all from the creator Brahma to the worm, are equal.

[Sanjeev Kumar Nath is an Associate Professor in Department of English, Gauhati University]

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