5th May, 1943
Mr B— is a keen devotee of Sri Bhagavan. A few days ago he lost his only son, which shook his faith in the Maharshi and in God’s grace. For some days he went on strike by staying away from the Ashram, but today he came in “to have it out” with Sri Bhagavan with a long list of questions which he had prepared. After receiving some answers he was satisfied.
Mr B: What is Faith?
Bh: Faith, Love, Grace, are all your nature, the Self.
B: If so, Faith and Grace are obtainable only on the Realisation of the Self. All that we call Faith etc., before then is variable and untrue.
Bh: Quite so.
B: Is sorrow a thought?
Bh: All thoughts are sorrowful.
B: Even pleasurable thoughts must be also sorrowful.
Bh: Yes, because thoughts take one’s attention away from the Self, which is undiluted Happiness.
B: What made Bhagavan come to Arunachala?
Bh: What made you all come?
B: By that I want to know whether there has been any difference in Bhagavan’s spiritual outlook between the day he left Madura and now.
Bh: None at all — the same experience has prevailed throughout without change.
B: Then where was the need for Bhagavan to write hymns in praise of Arunachala? Was that for him or for us?
Bh: I do not know why I wrote them. It might have been for others.
B: What is Life?
Bh: Materially speaking, Life is the body; spiritually speaking, it is the Ultimate Consciousness. It depends on how you look at it.
B: What is Death?
Bh: It is oblivion of one’s real nature.
At this stage a visitor interrupted by asking whether suicide was a wrong act.
Bh: Killing the innocent body is certainly wrong. Suicide must be committed on the mind, where the suffering is deposited, and not on the body, which is insentient and feels nothing. The mind is the real culprit, being the creator of the anguish which tempts to suicide, but by an error of judgement, the innocent, insentient body is punished for it.
3rd September, 1948
Three Anglo-Indian lady-doctors came from Bangalore. One of them had recently lost her husband in an air crash. She asked Sri Bhagavan
Lady: Is there rebirth?
Bh: Do you know what birth is?
L: O yes, I know that I exist now, but I want to know if I’ll exist in the future.
Bh: Past!.... Present!.... Future!....
L: Yes, today is the result of yesterday, the Past, and tomorrow, the Future, will be the result of today, the Present. Am I right?
Bh: There is neither Past nor Future. There is only the Present. Yesterday was the present to you when you experienced it, and tomorrow will be also the present when you will experience it. Therefore experience takes place only in the present, and beyond experience nothing exists.
L: Are then Past and Future mere imagination?
Bh: Yes, even the Present is mere imagination, for the sense of time is purely mental. Space is similarly mental; therefore birth and rebirth, which take place in time and space cannot be other than imagination.
The article is taken from the book Life Beyond Death by Anil Sharma