It happened that just in the last part of the last century, Rani Rasmani built a temple in Calcutta, in Dakshineshwar on the bank of the Ganges. But Rani Rasmani was not a high-caste Hindu, she was a sudra, she was untouchable. So no brahmin was ready to worship in her temple, although she was immensely rich and she was ready to give as much money as you wanted. And she explained to the brahmins, “I have not even entered the temple; I simply go up to the steps and bow down from there. I have not entered the inner shrine; I have not even seen the statue of Krishna that is inside the temple. It is made with my money, but money cannot be sudra because money is continuously changing hands from sudra to brahmin, from brahmin to chhatriya. So you cannot call the temple a sudra temple.” But no brahmin was ready to be a priest in her temple – all over Bengal she searched.
Ramakrishna agreed. He was uneducated. There are only two classes of Bengali, and he was very poor. The whole village tried to prevent him but they all knew he was a little eccentric: if he decides, then he decides.
They talked much about it, that it was built by a sudra. He said, “All the temples are made by sudras because the labor, the craftsmen – they all belong to the sudra. Every temple is made by sudras. Can you show me a temple which is made by brahmins?” Not only are they made by sudras, but the most beautiful parts are made by Mohammedans because they have a traditional craftsmanship in marble. What they can do nobody else can do.
So Ramakrishna said, “All temples are made by sudras, there is no question about it. And money does not matter – money goes on moving. And I cannot refuse her because it is a question of Krishna being there, unworshipped. You have made Krishna also a sudra, an untouchable. The rani herself cannot enter. I am going.”
He went. The rani was happy but alerted because the man looked a little eccentric. But someone was better than no one, so she accepted Ramakrishna. And then complaints started coming about Ramakrishna.
The complaints were that sometimes he fights with Krishna. Rather than worshipping him, he shouts at him, fights with him. He uses vulgar language before him – he came from a village. Sometimes just to punish him he does not give Krishna food. And sometimes he dances the whole day from morning to evening, praying to Krishna.
The rani asked Ramakrishna, “What is going on?”
He said, “Everything is going well. When he is good to me I am good to him, and when he is nasty to me I am nasty to him. Sometimes I am praying for hours and he does not appear; then I punish him the next day: I don’t give him food. That brings him to his senses. Certainly I also don’t eat that day. I cry the whole day because I have not given food to him, I have not even opened the door – I have let it remain locked.”
One experience of Ramakrishna will show you how illusions can be created. In the beginning – it was the birthday of Krishna – he told him, “You have to appear today. It is no ordinary day, it is your birthday. I will dance and sing the whole day and the whole night. And if you don’t appear” – a sword used to hang there in the temple – he said, “I will take the sword and cut off my head.”
He danced the whole day; the evening came, the night came. It was in the middle of the night – everything was silent. The temple is in a lonely place on the Ganges. Hungry the whole day, dancing the whole day, tired, utterly tired, he was continuously singing and praying, “Appear to me!” Then he pulled out the sword and was going to cut off his head when, at that moment, Krishna appeared. The sword fell from Ramakrishna’s hand when he saw Krishna.
Now, it is so simple – a psychological matter. If you do such things you lose the balance of your mind. And Ramakrishna was childish in his behavior, in his living. He was praised as a saint because he was childlike, but because he was childlike he was experiencing Krishna face to face.
One of the great masters was passing through India…. There is a tradition of many masters: they go around the Ganges, all the way to the source, and then back along the other bank to where it falls into the ocean. One master was simply passing by and he came to know about Ramakrishna – that he sees Krishna. He laughed. He said, “The man must be innocent but gullible. He must be innocent but childlike.”
He remained in the temple; he talked to Ramakrishna. He explained to him what was happening: “What you are doing is all your creation. It is your imagination. Rama does not appear to you, Vishnu does not appear to you, Shiva does not appear to you. There is no question of Christ and Moses and others. Why does only Krishna appear to you? It is your imagination. And if you put so much pressure on your mind that you are going to cut off your head, naturally the mind is going to do anything to save your life.”
Ramakrishna said, “Then you help me to get rid of this illusion.”
The master said, “I can help, but the real thing has to be done by you. You sit silently, close your eyes, and when Krishna appears before your eyes, just cut him into two pieces and he will fall apart. There is nothing in it.”
Ramakrishna asked, “From where do I bring a sword to cut him?”
And the master said, “From wherever you have brought this Krishna! If you can bring Krishna, from the same imagination you can bring a sword and cut him in two.”
Ramakrishna tried three or four times, but the moment he saw Krishna he would start swaying and he would forget the sword and the cutting and the master and all his teaching.
The master said, “You are impossible! I am wasting my time. When you see Krishna appear in your mind you don’t cut him; rather you start swaying. And I can see on your face that you are enjoying the experience.”
Ramakrishna said, “I know that I am wasting your time, but what am I to do, because when he appears I simply forget myself.”
So the master said, “I will bring a piece of glass, and when I see that you have started swaying and your face is looking ecstatic, I will cut exactly in the middle of your forehead with the glass to remind you that this is the time. You do the same: take the sword and cut Krishna in two.”
He actually cut the forehead of Ramakrishna, and Ramakrishna gathered courage and cut Krishna inside. He remained for six hours in absolute silence, and when he opened his eyes, his first words were, “The last barrier has fallen… the last barrier has fallen.”
Our own imagination is our last barrier. Once we are without imagination then reality is there face to face. It is not Christian, it is not Hindu, it is not Mohammedan.
Gnosticism simply says this much: Each individual should follow his own inner being, dropping thoughts, imagination, emotions, sentiments – anything that comes in the way. It is not you.
