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Deep Nārāyaṇa Bhagavān Kī Jai! Deveśvara Mahādeva Kī Jai! Samādha Kṛṣṇa Bhagavān Kī Jai! Satya Sanātana Dharma Kī Jai! Your Excellency, Ambassador of India to Hungary, Gauri Shankar Gupta Ji, and dear brothers and sisters from different parts of the world, welcome all of you here. The subject of this conference, as you know, is spirituality and religion. We are here to develop spirituality during this seminar. We will hear more about that. The Vedas, Upanishads, and ancient literatures speak about spirituality and one universal God. As Swami Chidānand told, we just came back from our spiritual journey, a spiritual kayak alap. We spent two and a half months at the bank of the holy river Gaṅgā. The place where we had our camp was known as Gaurī Śaṅkar. In that Gaurī Śaṅkar, there was a special place reserved for the Mahāmaṇḍaleśvara. As a Mahābandhīśvara of Mahānirvāṇī Akhāḍā, we had the Mahānirvāṇī Akhāḍā’s land, which the Melā authority gives for the period of the Kumbh Melā—about 25 hectares of land. The Gaṅgā, which is flowing originally, is called Nīldhārā. Nīldhārā means the blue stream, which comes from Lord Śiva’s head, from his hair, because Gaṅgā first landed on Śiva’s head. You know the story. The place where we stayed is the place where Lord Brahmā performed tapasyā. That is called Brahma Kuṇḍ. The kuṇḍ is a pool or a deep place where the water is. All who come to the Mahā Kumbh Melā should bathe there. So we were in just the right place. After that, Haridwar began to civilize, and some rich people directed the Gaṅgā more towards the valleys and made a place called Harkipadi. But it doesn’t matter. Gaṅgā is Gaṅgā. All kinds of water which are there—groundwater or surface water—all are the water of the Gaṅgā. Minden víz, amely ennek a Gaṅgā közelében van, az mind Gaṅgā víz, akár egy kis medence, akár maga a folyó. The water which we got in our water pipes, the water taps, was filtered and cleaned, and we could drink that, we could cook with that, our food and everything. So all was Gaṅgā’s water. No doubt, Gaṅgā is holy. Gaṅgā descended on this planet to free humans from their sins. Gaṅgā came here to free us from our sins. In Christianity, Jesus also came to free us from sins. Gaṅgā was, you can say, the daughter of Brahmā, and Jesus was known as the son of the Father. Brahmā is known as the Father, the Holy Father, the Creator. Anyhow, it’s interesting how the religions are uniting together, but spirituality is beyond that. We will talk about this during our seminar: spirituality and religion. First, I would like to welcome once more His Excellency Gaurī Śaṅkarjī Gupta. And you know what "Gaurī Śaṅkar" means? Who knows? Hands up, please. Who knows what is Gaurī Śaṅkar? Hands up, not like this, like that. Okay, thank you very much. Good. Gaurī is Pārvatī. Gaurī as Pārvatī or Śakti, and Śaṅkara is Śiva. We have in our Kuṇḍalinī Yoga book a picture: half body Śiva, male, and half body is Gaurī or Pārvatī as a female. So both principles are in one. Now you know, you saw the picture. Then how could you forget? So tonight, you have to meditate half an hour more. I welcome him here in this conference dedicated to spirituality and religion. He joined his office here just two or three months ago. That was a very significant day, the 12th of February. And, you know, we had a bath on the 12th of February. Another thing is, well, a swami is for the whole world, you know. Śaṅkarācārya said, "My birthplace is this planet Earth. My roof is the sky, my bed is the earth. A swami belongs to the entire world, and so does a politician, too, especially an ambassador. I have to work for a country, for the whole world." But if we look back to our past, we come from the same place, Rajasthan. So also, we are a little bit more attached to each other. So, Your Excellency, welcome, Gaurī Śaṅkarjī, and the floor is yours, please. Dear brothers and sisters from various countries of Europe and other parts of the world, first of all, I would like to seek Swāmījī’s blessings, not only for myself, but for all of us, for turning millions of people to the path of spirituality. It’s only because of his teachings that we are all together here, trying to tread on the path of spirituality through various religions. So I would like to seek his blessings first of all, before I say anything more. Now, I am very happy to hear that the theme of this conference is religion and spirituality, a subject which is very dear to my heart as well. I consider religions like various rivers trying to reach the ocean, and spirituality is the ocean where we all try to reach. All the rivers try to reach that big ocean of spirituality. All the religions, whether it’s Christianity, Judaism, Islam, Hinduism, Sikhism, or Jainism, they all teach us how to attain the root, the path of spirituality in our life. So, what is spirituality? Let’s think about it. In my view, spirituality is to discover one’s own self and one’s relation with the Creator. In the Upanishads, they say that everything in this universe, whether it is animate or inanimate—jad or chetan, the two words, jad and chetan, inanimate and animate—they all come from one single element, which is called Brahman. Like from clay, you can make thousands of pots in various shapes and sizes. With cotton, you can make millions of garments in different shapes and sizes, but ultimately they all come from clay and cotton. In the same way, all the creation in this universe—it’s not only the humans, but all other creation—they all are part of one single element, Brahma, who creates the entire universe from his will. And through looking into our own self, I can actually prove to you that it is true. Now, look at us, at our own body. When I say, "This is my hand, this is my body," who am I? "My body" means it’s a possessive pronoun. There has to be something called "I" to have that body. What is that "I" in the body, which possesses the body? What goes out when we die from our body? Now I’ll come back to this question a little later, but let me give you the analysis of the human body to begin with. When you see my body, you see this body is like a vegetable without my senses. If I don’t have the five senses of perception and the five senses of action, you know, senses, this body is what? It’s like a vegetable. If I can’t see, if I can’t speak, if I can’t listen, if I can’t eat, this body has no meaning. If I don’t see, if I don’t hear, if I can’t eat, then my body is just a lifeless piece, nothing. So the body is actually controlled by the senses. But the senses are controlled by the mind, that is the mana. The mind, which you cannot see, you can’t touch; it’s invisible, untouchable. You can’t even feel it unless you think deeply about it. It is a thing which is not visible, which is very powerful, which controls your senses. You will not listen to me right now unless your mind is with your ears. You cannot see anything unless your mind is with your eyes. Every action which your sense performs, the mind must be with that sense to perform that act. Beyond mind, it’s intellect. Your mind is very volatile; it can travel in a second to New York, and another second to Delhi, and even in a millisecond to the moon. It’s very volatile, and intellect keeps trying to control the mind, telling that... this is not good. Do this. Don’t do this. But the next thing is the intellect. The mind is something extremely flexible; it is as if it were moving. At one moment we are here, at the other moment we are in New York, we can be in our thoughts in the third, even on the moon. Now, even beyond intellect is the human soul, ātmā, which controls everything else in the human body. Now, if you believe that the body is weak, the senses control it, which we can feel, we can also feel that the mind controls the senses, we can also feel that the intellect controls the mind, then you have to believe that there is a soul inside us, which controls everything else. And we feel that the mind directs the feelings, the intellect controls the mind, then we have to accept that as well, that the ātmā is the supreme director of all the other things. Now you must realize, when you analyze this, that the subtler the thing becomes, the more powerful it is. It’s like, if you reach the atomic, from the gross to the atom, the atom is more powerful than the gross. The body is gross, it is not powerful. The senses are small, they are more powerful. The mind is invisible, it’s much more powerful. The intellect is invisible, you can’t touch it, can’t see it, it is more powerful. So the more subtle it is, it becomes more profound, more powerful. Actually, you see the open space, this is space where nothing can be visible. It is very powerful; it’s the most powerful element in this universe. Nothing is visible here, but it has everything which you can think of, conceive of, in the universe. It is the air which we breathe. It has the energy which we get into the system, into our body. It has the moisture, the water, the humidity. It has the earth when there is dust because of this. Millions of sounds travel through this. You have all cellular phones; all the sounds will come, each one individually. I can explain more in detail, but the fact is that this thing, which is not visible, which you cannot touch, which you cannot feel, is much more powerful than what we can see and what we can feel and touch. If you see what we eat, for example, food, we can live without food for a few days. Water is more subtle; we can live without water for a few days, a few hours maybe. Without air, which is even more subtle, we can’t live at all. So we all have to look into ourselves, to look for that invisible power of ātmā, which is located in each one of us. It is the ātmā, which is part of Paramātmā, which is part of Brahma, part of the Father or the Creator, whatever name you give, it’s immaterial. As the Vedas say, from one you make many. There is ultimately one single force in this universe, which manifests itself into millions of forces. So, if we can—because senses are supposed to look out, not in—we have to divert our senses to look inward, discover our soul, link this soul with the Creator, and then you will try to feel, you will realize what spirituality is. What Swāmījī has been teaching all his life, yoga, the spiritual thoughts, it will unite you. It will unite you with the universe. Then you will only find that everybody is made of the same, so on, and why should we hate each other? Otherwise, we should love each other, and we should live together with each other. Yoga means unity, and that is the unity of your soul with the greater soul in the universe. I can speak on this subject more, but I will not like to speak because I know Swāmījī has much more profound thoughts to share, and we would like to listen to him rather than I speaking to you on this issue, so I would like to conclude with one śloka from the Upaniṣad. This śloka reads like this: Oṃ Pūrṇamadaḥ Pūrṇamidaṃ Pūrṇāt Pūrṇamudacyate, Pūrṇasya Pūrṇamādāya Pūrṇamevāvaśiṣyate. Oṃ Śāntiḥ Śāntiḥ Śāntiḥ. It means that from the whole, the whole is created. From the infinite, the infinite is created, and still the infinite remains as it is. This is what the creation is. Brahma is infinite. He has created a lot of things, yet he remains infinite. We are part of Him. So I’m grateful to all of you for listening to me, and I’m really delighted that all of us, with the guidance of Swāmījī and with His blessings, are moving towards the path of spirituality, which will bring peace to this world, which will end all these conflicts which are there in our life and between many countries, thank you so much. Thank you, Your Excellency. You should know that he is also a poet, writing poetry in English and in Hindi, and he is also a great writer. Many books have been written. Once my disciple from Vienna, Austria, Dr. Rada, said, "I think all Indians are born as philosophers." So it is true; in their blood is the blood of great ṛṣis. Rishis are hermetists. Therefore, it’s called ṛṣi santān, the children of the ṛṣis. They were in Gṛhasthāśrama, they were married, but they, our entire family, they had a spiritual life. De az egész család egy volt a spiritualitásban. They did great tapasyā. És tapasyā-t, askétikus életet folytatta. Without tapasyā, you can’t find anything. Tapasya nélkül semmit nem lehet megtalálni. Now, in this modern world, tapasyā you can translate as a research work. And there is also hard work hidden in it. Research is there, but you have to research again to find out. It is very nicely explained by His Excellency in very clear words, the first two sentences which he said. You will never forget. It’s very clear, very simple, and with great meaning. Religions are like rivers, and Dharma is the ocean. In India, we say, "Feel the whole ocean in one part." In this one sentence, Mahāprabhujī said, "On this sentence, nice in bhajan, ’Śānti, śānti, nadī sari cal rahī, nyārī nyārī, sir sindhu māyā jaise jay ke samāve re.’" Satguru Śyām, moyā lagatā pyārā, mera Satguru Śyām garbhārī kar rahā. Mā, choṭī choṭī nadiyāṁ sārī cal rahī nyārī nyārī. Choti choti nadiyan, all small streams of the creeks and the rivers, they are all flowing individually. But finally, kṣīra, sindhu, māī, jāke, samāvere, finally they will enter into that ocean of the nectar. Ātmā or Paramātmā. As we spoke, sometimes you heard it was very nice, but his excellence is it as fine is more powerful. That’s it. As it grows, it’s less powerful. So, invisible thoughts—you think no one sees. You can think what you want to think, but they are more powerful: the thoughts of jealousy, anger, greed, or love, happiness, kindness, merciful thoughts, blessings. And that is also the power of the mantra. Mantra, Holī Gurujī used to say, mantra, man means the mind. And trā means satisfied, like when you are hungry and you eat a good lunch or dinner, you are satisfied. Or you are very thirsty and you drink nice water, cool water, which quenches your thirst. Similarly, the mind is hungry. Thirsty from many, many lives, it is still very hungry. Though this mind is now with a human body, it is more hungry: hunger of money, hunger of position, hunger of name, hunger of beauty, hunger of partner. And so on and so on and so on. This mind, this jīvā, is hungry, but this hunger will never be content. Whatever you will do, try to make your hunger less. That will create more, like fuel in the fire. Till today, no one could satisfy their hunger of any kind. Vāsanā. Vāsanā is the hunger, means the desires. Day by day, desires are growing. What a kind of illness? A terrible illness, and no one is happy. To fulfill this vastness. You are looking for someone to find a husband or a wife. You try very hard to meet that person. Maybe yes, you will get it, but at the end, you will not be happy. Either the person will go away according to the modern way of life, or sooner or later one will die. It’s never, never, and never can be fulfilled. And the same thing in the next life. In the evening, we all go to sleep with a full stomach, and in the morning, we get up with a full stomach or an empty stomach. Similarly, this jīva, this jīvātmā, would like to fulfill the desire in the next life. But still, you can’t. So, Jīvā is an individual, the powerful soul traveling as an individual on the waves of time, fluttering on the waves of time through the endless universe, experiencing happiness and unhappiness, through darkness and light. And if stopped somewhere, that means again rebirth. Again, it creates the complication. And you don’t ask anyone before you create a complication. You don’t ask a doctor, "Can I become ill?" But when you are ill, then you go to the doctor. So, don’t tell your master, "Should I make some complication?" But when you have complication, then you come. In yoga, it is said, Svādhyāya. Sva means the self, adhyāya is a chapter. Before going to sleep tonight, look in your this past time of this life: how many chapters? How many chapters you began? How many have you finished, and how many are still unfinished? Means all kinds of bad or good experiences, relations. Happiness, fear, anxiety. Only this hunger can be finished forever. One Mahātma, Ācārya Rāmjī Mahārāj from Jodhpur said, Amar ho jisko khāne se mithāī ho to aisī ho, faṭāde man viṣayon se kaṭhāī ho to aisī ho. Eat that kind of sweet which makes you immortal. Eat that kind of sweet which makes you immortal. And it spoils your taste toward the desires. That is the right sourness of the lemon. Kuber bhi hajar jiske, that time that yogī achieves or realizes that kind of, or the state of the mind or consciousness. Kuber. Kuber is the treasurer of God. God must have really a lot. Entire universe, all the sources, what is it? Resources are there. Minden a rendelkezésére áll. Kuber bihajar jiske. Now the késier, or the treasurer of God, is in seva of that yogī. És az Istenekint, ekkor az Istenekint stárnoka is ezt a yogīt szolgálja ettől fogva. Ready to give as much as you want. És szolgálatára áll, és bármit a rendelkezésére bocsát. But what does that yogī do? He doesn’t notice anyone. He denies. And he survives day by day through bhikṣā. Bhikṣā means alms. What you call bhikṣukmaṅg. That’s called tṛpti. Tṛpti means contentment. That comes through mantra. Mantra. And "tra" means also liberation. Traima. Liberation. Liberate me. Tantra. Tant means expand. Expand your consciousness and liberate thyself from those vastnesses. So mantra, you cannot touch. You cannot see. But it is the power in that, that resonance. Now, the Rūpa Parabrahma, the form of the Supreme, is that resonance. If all the rivers are directed towards that ocean... So rivers are our vṛttis. Rivers are our senses. As His Excellency said, five senses of jñāna and five senses of karma: jñānendriya, karmendriya. And without these senses, this life is senseless. Just like a stone, so senses are very important. Holy Gurujī said in one bhajan, Sadām vai ajab rāt hamārā. O my brothers, O saints, my coach is a very wondrous coach. Wonderful. Betha baram bara. Many times I sat in this coach. Ten horses are pulling this coach. Das ghoda chalesh ratme, ajab chal apara, the running, the way of the walking is very different, wondrous and endless, apara, these horses. How they are pulling, how they are going. And it has its own desires. Everyone is pulling this and that side, endless. But it is the intellect which controls these horses. And mind is the rider, the viveka that is in this coach, sitting inside. Anubhavakāra vichāra, the experiences of all past and this life. God Krishna said, "Before doing any karma, know the form of the karma." When you will know exactly what you are doing, then your Viveka will tell you what kind of fruits you will get. Now, you do or not is your choice. Intellect, so your intellect can be spoiled. The intellect can be negative, selfish, but not the vivekā. Vivekā is a cream, cream of the intellect. Vivekā is a cream, cream of the intellect. One can be without vivekā. But if you have Viveka, then Viveka is like a knife moving between the cheese, half here and half there. Vivek Mantri, rehe saatme anubhav karad, vichāra rājā, ātmā betharat mahī, nirākāra. And the king, his ātmā, is sitting in this coach. Nirākāra is the self, chetan, awakened, full of consciousness, and nirākāra has no form. You can’t see, but it is there, as His Excellency said in the Upaniṣad. But it is there, the Ātmā. Chauda Lok, Ikisho Brahman, Ratme Sakalpasara: the 14 worlds, 7 below and 7 above, Ikisho Brahman, 2100 sun systems or universes. They all exist in this coach of the human body. Vedas say, what is in the universe, that is in this body. So the awareness of the yogī, what we call the astral traveling, can travel with the awareness up to 2,100 different universes in this Ananta. And in this coach, beautiful music, many, many instruments are playing. I travel through this body, this world, and... Industrial world, without suffering at all. But we are suffering. I want this, I don’t like this, I want to have this, I want to go there, I don’t like him or her. And so, you know, liking and disliking. Guruji said, "This jīva is born while crying in a human body. Animal babies don’t cry." Humans cry. All creatures which are giving babies, babies don’t cry when they are born. But you girls, how much you cried, or boys, even the fourth never knew there is some baby born. They were born while crying, living while criticizing or backbiting, and will die while thinking of pity or sorrows. Therefore, all vṛttis, all the senses, through that mantra, guru mantra, if you can direct to that oneness, you are there. No doubts. But you must have that confidence, the faith. Just to take a mantra is not a difficult thing. You can read the mantra on this piece of paper. But the functions of the help are your faith and the Master’s blessings. How much faith do you have? You know all. So, different religions developed according to the climate situations and the countries where the culture is developed. Where there are humans, there is culture. And where humans go, the culture goes with them. And after certain kilometers, the culture is a little bit changing. So religion is very close to the culture, but it is good, but the aim of all religion is only one, that is God, the Formless God. Therefore, you will see in the Upaniṣads, in the Vedas, there is no name of any incarnation or any God. Only Īśvara, the Nirguṇa, only one God. But time to time, divine incarnation came on this planet, and therefore we respect all, that’s it. But God is one. The beautiful example we heard from the clay: you make different pots. Many, many. But the reality is not the pot. The reality is that clay. Many ornaments are made out of gold. And when you buy those ornaments, you don’t buy only the ornaments, but the gold. So inside is a gold ornament made out of gold. Similarly, every one of us, what is living in us is the light of God, the same God. Doesn’t matter if you are coming from Europe, Asia, or Africa. There is one nation, so spirituality unites. And ignorance divides through the conflicts in religions. So we will continue tomorrow again. Thank you for listening. And now we will have...