Pilgrim's India

by ARUNDHATHI SUBRAMANIAM

  ‘There is nothing one has to achieve,’ I told him. ‘When that is known everything becomes light.’

  Satisfied, Uday bowed to the ground, offered me a bundle of incense sticks and left.

  ‘Sadhus do not die in three days!’ I retorted to the obsessive voice of reason and caution.

  I was adopted by a group of about fifteen sadhus who were camping out with their old, huge and lenient guru on the hardened silt left by annual floods at Asi ghat.

  The younger ones built a dhooni while others swept with straw. They found two large branches and lit a fire with dried cow dung, laid out plastic covers around the hearth and then their blankets, forming a broad circle. The fire was high and vigorous. They considered its intensity as a blessing. Om Namah Shivayah! The Naga babas stripped off. We smoked chillums. We sang hymns. They honoured their guru, lifting him up in the air several times. Guruji ki jai! It was a feast for these divine vagrants.

  ‘It is a feast every day!’ Ramanand Das Mahatyagi told me. He had a broad smile and responsibility for the supply of ganja. He asked me, ‘What did you come here for?’

  ‘Wisdom,’ I answered in joy.

  This twenty-two-year-old Naga baba straightened up and, raising an arm and his chin, he professed:

  ‘The final wisdom is: all is One. And now, what do you do? Become a sadhu?’

  I quivered with longing and fear.

  I spent the night between two babas. My first night under the sky.

  In the morning, I bowed before Ramanand Das and put down a dakshina at his feet. My young guru accepted it with pleasure, honoured and proud to have been useful. I gave an offering to his guru as well, and he at once announced its amount with satisfaction. And then I watched these free, simple and generous men disappear, frolicking about villages and cities as I somehow imagined the disciples of Saint Francis of Assisi.

  Final wisdom is: all is One. And now? I already missed them.

  I considered the civilization that raises renunciants to the rank of saints, respects them during their lifetime and supports them, as being admirably wise. What a miracle that a country exists where this way of life is possible! I would not die in three days! I refused to listen to the shivers and the fears and I promised myself to return one day.

  I understood that whatever my professional achievements, no matter what I would manage to acquire or elucidate, I would still be missing the essential: Peace. And this is how I discovered how not to be a materialist …

  There is nothing one has to do—this point of view, this Weltanschauung, this darshan, this awareness generated peace but did not maintain it. I wanted to spend my life in its aura.

  And the prophecy of Balamani Baba came true.

  Five years later, I left my apartment, job, income tax, world news and other compulsory concerns; I left my friends, gave up wine, cheese, Pastis, saucisson and many other sweet pleasures like monthly wages and annual bonuses, spring mattresses and private cars, central heating and my books, and I followed the advice of Ram Tilak Baba: I returned to Varanasi. And I met Ananda Baba, my guru.

  _______________________________________

  These extracts are from Sadhus: Going Beyond the Dreadlocks.

  23.

  The Hill of the Holy Beacon

  Paul Brunton

  This is an excerpt from a British journalist and seeker’s discovery of sacred India—particularly convincing for its journey from cautious scepticism to an experience both profound and life-changing. It is easy to see why Brunton’s account inspired Somerset Maugham to visit Tiruvannamalai—which in turn produced the best-selling novel, The Razor’s Edge. It is also easy to see why Brunton’s travelogue commands the attention of seekers decades after its publication. The silent sage of Arunachala comes alive.—Ed.

  At the Madras terminus of the South Indian Railway, Subramanya and I board a carriage on the Ceylon boat train. For several hours we roll onwards through the most variegated scenes. Green stretches of growing rice alternate with gaunt red hills, shady plantations of stately coconut trees are followed by scattered peasants toiling in the paddy fields.

  As I sit at the window, the swift Indian dusk begins to blot out the landscape and I turn my head to muse of other things. I begin to wonder at the strange things which have happened since I have worn the golden ring which Brama has given me. For my plans have changed their face; a concatenation of unexpected circumstances has arisen to drive me farther south, instead of going farther east as I have intended. Is it possible, I ask myself, that these golden claws hold a stone which really possesses the mysterious power which the Yogi has claimed for it? Although I endeavour to keep an open mind, it is difficult for any westerner of scientifically trained mind to credit the idea. I dismiss the speculation from my mind, but do not succeed in driving away the uncertainty which lurks at the back of my thoughts. Why is it that my footsteps have been so strangely guided to the mountain hermitage whither I am travelling? Why is it that two men, who both wear the yellow robe, have been coupled as destiny’s agents to the extent of directing my reluctant eyes towards the Maharishee? I use this word destiny, not in its common sense, but because I am at a loss for a better one. Past experience has taught me full well that seemingly unimportant happenings sometimes play an unexpected part in composing the picture of one’s life.

  We leave the train, and with it the main line, forty miles from Pondicherry, that pathetic little remnant of France’s territorial possessions in India. We go over to a quiet, little-used branch railroad which runs into the interior, and wait for nearly two hours in the semi-gloom of a bleak waiting-room. The holy man paces along the bleaker platform outside, his tall figure looking half-ghost, half-real in the starlight. At last the ill-timed train, which puffs infrequently up and down the line, carries us away. There are but few other passengers.

  I fall into a fitful, dream-broken sleep which continues for some hours until my companion awakens me. We descend at a little wayside station and the train screeches and grinds away into the silent darkness. Night’s life has not quite run out and so we sit in a bare and comfortless little waiting-room, whose small kerosene lamp we light ourselves.

  We wait patiently while day fights with darkness for supremacy. When a pale dawn emerges at last, creeping bit by bit through a small barred window in the back of our room, I peer out at such portion of our surroundings as becomes visible. Out of the morning haze there rises the faint outline of a solitary hill, apparently some few miles distant. The base is of impressive extent and the body of ample girth, but the head is not to be seen, being yet thickshrouded in the dawn mists.

  My guide ventures outside, where he discovers a man loudly snoring in his tiny bullock cart. A shout or two brings the driver back to this mundane existence, thus making him aware of business waiting in the offing. When informed of our destination, he seems but too eager to transport us. I gaze somewhat dubiously at his narrow conveyance—a bamboo canopy balanced on two wheels. Anyway, we clamber aboard and the man manages the luggage after us. The holy man manages to compress himself into the minimum space which a human being can possibly occupy; I crouch under the low canopy with legs dangling out in space; the driver squats upon the shaft between his bulls with his chin almost touching his knees, and the problem of accommodation being thus solved more or less satisfactorily, we bid him be off …

  I judge that we have now travelled about five or six miles, when we reach the lower slopes of the hill whose vague outline I had seen from the station. It rises like a reddish-brown giant in the clear morning sunlight. The mists have now rolled away, revealing a broad skyline at the top. It is an isolated upland of red soil and brown rock, barren for the most part, with large tracts almost treeless, and with masses of stone split into great boulders tossed about in chaotic disorder.

  ‘Arunachala! The sacred red mountain!’ exclaims my companion, noticing the direction of my gaze. A fervent expression of adoration passes across his face. He is momentarily rapt in ecstasy, like some medie
val saint.

  I ask him, ‘Does, the name mean anything?’

  ‘I have just given you the meaning,’ he replies with a smile. ‘The name is composed of two words, “aruna” and “achala”, which mean red mountain, and since it is also the name of the presiding deity of the temple, its full translation should be “sacred red mountain”.’

  ‘Then where does the holy beacon come in?’

  ‘Ah! Once a year the temple priests celebrate their central festival. Immediately that occurs within the temple, a huge fire blazes out on top of the mountain, its flame being fed with vast quantities of butter and camphor. It burns for many days and can be seen for many miles around. Whoever sees it, at once prostrates himself before it. It symbolizes the fact that this mountain is sacred ground, overshadowed by a great deity.’

  The hill now towers over our heads. It is not without its rugged grandeur, this lonely peak patterned with red, brown and grey boulders, thrusting its flat head thousands of feet into the pearly sky. Whether the holy man’s words have affected me or whether for some unaccountable cause, I find a queer feeling of awe arising in me as I meditate upon the picture of the sacred mountain, as I gaze up wonderingly at the steep incline of Arunachala.

  ‘Do you know,’ whispers my companion, ‘that this mountain is not only esteemed holy ground, but the local traditions dare to assert that the gods placed it there to mark the spiritual centre of the world!’

  This little bit of legend forces me to smile. How naïve it is!

  At length I learn that we are approaching the Maharishee’s hermitage. We turn aside from the road and move down a rough path which brings us to a thick grove of coconut and mango trees. We cross this until the path suddenly comes to an abrupt termination before an unlocked gate. The driver descends, pushes the gate open, and then drives us into a large unpaved courtyard. I stretch out my cramped limbs, descend to the ground, and look around.

  The cloistered domain of the Maharishee is hemmed in at the front by closely growing trees and a thickly clustered garden; it is screened at the back and side by hedgerows of shrub and cactus, while away to the west stretches the scrub jungle and what appears to be dense forest. It is most picturesquely placed on a lower spur of the hill. Secluded and apart, it seems a fitting spot for those who wish to pursue profound themes of meditation.

  Two small buildings with thatched roofs occupy the left side of the courtyard. Adjoining them stands a long, modern structure, whose red-tiled roof comes sharply down into overhanging eaves. A small veranda stretches across a part of the front.

  The centre of the courtyard is marked by a large well. I watch a boy, who is naked to the waist and dark-skinned to the point of blackness, slowly draw a bucket of water to the surface with the aid of a creaking hand windlass.

  The sound of our entry brings a few men out of the buildings into the courtyard. Their dresses are extremely varied. One is garbed in nothing but a ragged loin-cloth, but another is prosperously attired in a white silk robe. They stare questioningly at us. My guide grins hugely, evidently enjoying their astonishment. He crosses to them and says something in Tamil. The expression on their faces changes immediately, for they smile in unison and beam at me with pleasure. I like their faces and their bearing.

  ‘We shall now go into the hall of the Maharishee,’ announces the holy man of the yellow robe, bidding me to follow him. I pause outside the uncovered stone veranda and remove my shoes. I gather up the little pile of fruits which I have brought as an offering, and pass into an open doorway.

  Twenty brown-and-black faces flash their eyes upon us. Their owners are squatting in half-circles on a red-tiled floor. They are grouped at a respectful distance from the corner which lies farthest to the right hand of the door. Apparently everyone has been facing this corner just prior to our entry. I glance there for a moment and perceive a seated figure upon a long white divan, but it suffices to tell me that here indeed is the Maharishee.

  My guide approaches the divan, prostrates himself prone on the floor, and buries his eyes under folded hands.

  The divan is but a few paces away from a broad, high window in the end wall. The light falls clearly upon the Maharishee and I can take in every detail of his profile, for he is seated gazing rigidly through the window in the precise direction whence we have come this morning. His head does not move, so, thinking to catch his eye and greet him as I offer the fruits, I move quietly over to the window, place the gift before him, and retreat a pace or two.

  A small brass brazier stands before his couch. It is filled with burning charcoal, and a pleasant odour tells me that some aromatic powder has been thrown in the glowing embers. Close by is an incense burner filled with joss sticks. Threads of bluish grey smoke arise and float in the air, but the pungent perfume is quite different.

  I fold a thin cotton blanket upon the floor and sit down, gazing expectantly at the silent figure in such a rigid attitude upon the couch. The Maharishee’s body is almost nude, except for a thin, narrow loin-cloth, but that is common enough in these parts. His skin is slightly copper-coloured, yet quite fair in comparison with that of the average south Indian. I judge him to be a tall man; his age somewhere in the early fifties. His head, which is covered with closely cropped grey hair, is well formed. The high and broad expanse of forehead gives intellectual distinction to his personality. His features are more European than Indian. Such is my first impression.

  The couch is covered with white cushions and the Maharishee’s feet rest upon a magnificently marked tiger skin.

  Pin-drop silence prevails throughout the long hall. The sage remains perfectly still, motionless, quite undisturbed at our arrival. A swarthy disciple sits on the floor at the other side of the divan. He breaks into the quietude by beginning to pull at a rope which works a punkah-fan made of bamboo matting. The fan is fixed to a wooden beam and suspended immediately above the sage’s head. I listen to its rhythmic purring, the while I look full into the eyes of the seated figure in the hope of catching his notice. They are dark brown, medium-sized and wide open.

  If he is aware of my presence, he betrays no hint, gives no sign. His body is supernaturally quiet, as steady as a statue. Not once does he catch my gaze, for his eyes continue to look into remote space, and infinitely remote it seems. I find this scene strangely reminiscent. Where have I seen its like? I rummage through the portrait gallery of memory and find the picture of the Sage Who Never Speaks, that recluse whom I visited in his isolated cottage near Madras, that man whose body seemed cut from stone, so motionless it was. There is a curious similarity in this unfamiliar stillness of body which I now behold in the Maharishee.

  It is an ancient theory of mine that one can take the inventory of a man’s soul from his eyes. But before those of the Maharishee I hesitate, puzzled and baffled.

  The minutes creep by with unutterable slowness. First they mount up to a half-hour by the hermitage clock which hangs on a wall; this too passes by and becomes a whole hour. Yet no one in the hall seems to stir; certainly no one dares to speak. I reach a point of visual concentration where I have forgotten the existence of all save this silent figure on the couch. My offering of fruits remains unregarded on the small carved table which stands before him.

  My guide has given me no warning that his master will receive me as I had been received by the Sage Who Never Speaks. It has come upon me abruptly, this strange reception characterized by complete indifference. The first thought which would come into the mind of any European, ‘Is this man merely posing for the benefit of his devotees?’ crosses my mind once or twice but I soon rule it out. He is certainly in a trance condition, though my guide has not informed me that his master indulges in trances. The next thought which occupies my mind, ‘Is this state of mystical contemplation nothing more than meaningless vacancy?’ has a longer sway but I let it go for the simple reason that I cannot answer it.

  There is something in this man which holds my attention as steel filings are held by a magnet. I cannot turn my
gaze away from him. My initial bewilderment, my perplexity at being totally ignored, slowly fade away as this strange fascination begins to grip me more firmly. But it is not till the second hour of the uncommon scene that I became aware of a silent, resistless change which is taking place within my mind. One by one, the questions which I have prepared in the train with such meticulous accuracy drop away. For, it does not now seem to matter whether they are asked or not, and it does not seem to matter whether I solve the problems which have hitherto troubled me. I know only that a steady river of quietness seems to be flowing near me, that a great peace is penetrating the inner reaches of my being, and that my thought-tortured brain is beginning to arrive at some rest.

  How small seem those questions which I have asked myself with such frequency! How petty grows the panorama of the lost years! I perceive with sudden clarity that the intellect creates its own problems and then makes itself miserable trying to solve them. This is indeed a novel concept to enter the mind of one who has hitherto placed such high value upon intellect.

  I surrender myself to the steadily deepening sense of restfulness until two hours have passed. The passage of time now provokes no irritation, because I feel that the chains of mind-made problems are being broken and thrown away. And then, little by little, a new question takes the field of consciousness.

  ‘Does this man, the Maharishee, emanate the perfume of spiritual peace as the flower emanates fragrance from its petals?’

  I do not consider myself a competent person to apprehend spirituality, but I have personal reactions to other people. This dawning suspicion that the mysterious peace which has arisen within me must be attributed to the geographical situation in which I am now placed, is my reaction to the personality of the Maharishee. I begin to wonder whether, by some radioactivity of the soul, some unknown telepathic process, the stillness which invades the troubled waters of my own soul really comes from him. Yet he remains completely impassive, completely unaware of my very existence, it seems.