And as Kabir lay on the street bleeding, it bent down and whispered in his ears, “Enough with your sick little stories, your fabricated reality, with your school, your affluent friends with their sneakers and scooters and nice houses. It’s time to go Kabir. Let’s go where we started, shall we? Let’s go where you belong..”

Court orders release of four artistes alleged to be Maoists

Last week, the Bombay High Court granted bail to four street theatre artistes for allegedly having Maoist connections, observing that “speaking about corruption, social inequality, exploitation of the poor etc and desiring a better society should come into existence and is not banned in our country.”

Granting bail to Dhawala Dhengle, Siddarth Bhosale, Mayuri Bhagat and Anuradha Sonule, against a surety of Rs 30,000 each, Justice Abhay Thipsay said: “Highlighting and creating social awareness on corruption, the widening gap between the rich and the poor and exploitation of the poor is commendable and cannot be considered an evidence of being members of a terrorist organisation.”

The artistes, belonging to a street theatre group named “Kabir Kala Manch,” were picked up the Maharashtra Anti-Terrorist Squad (ATS) in 2011 on grounds that they were inciting the people to violence and members of the Communist Party of India (Maoist). Though police had detained seven people initially, four of them were still in jail since the ATS claimed to have found “incriminating documents and books” in their possession.

Going through the evidence submitted by the state, Justice Thipsay said: “Many of the books found are available in the market and there is no denial of that by the state. In any case, the said literature is not banned and reading thereof is not prohibited.”

On charges that the theatre group was advocating violence through street plays, Justice Thipsay told the public prosecutor: “There is nothing wrong in raising social issues and emphasising that a change in social order is required. The same views are expressed by several national and eminent leaders and a person cannot be branded a member of the Communist Party of India (Maoist) for expressing such views.

“On the contrary, such a reasoning would indicate that these issues, which are real and important, are not addressed by anyone else, except the Communist Party of India (Maoist), which in turn would mean that other parties or social organisations are indifferent to these problems.”

Expressing surprise at the evidence based on which the artistes were imprisoned, Justice Thipsay said: “It is surprising that highlighting the wrongs prevalent in the society and insisting that there is a need to change the situation was considered as evidence and used to convince the court of them being members of the Communist Party of India (Maoist).”

The judge further observed that even the expression of views “to the effect that a change in social order can be brought about only by a revolution” would not amount to any offence. Those who advocate the teachings of Karl Marx are certainly not committing any crime.

DOWNLOAD FULL JUDGEMENT HERE

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“A beautiful journey with Kabir begins. The quote by Rabindranath Tagore echoes, “Jodi tor daak shune kyo na aashe tobe akela cholo“, if no one hears your call walk alone. All journeyers, walk the path alone. This one for me is the last lap of life, and hopefully one which helps me find, me.”

Journeys begin, you can’t keep a track of it. A good journeyer may keep a log but the beauty of all that she experienced is captured somewhere in deep corners and confines of her heart and something which no log can ever explain. 

Love the Kabir Doha which says, “Oh Traveler !! What do you seek, your destination is at your feet.” So while we keep wandering for strange truths, we will always find home near us, and when we find home, we will find all that we truly need. Carry home in your heart and you will always be at blissful peace. 

My journey with Kabir began, as much as I started seeking for myself. The more I sought, the more I found. And Kabir’s Dohas have taught me intense love, and that love reflects and reverberates in all that I do. I should be happy, but the poet in me finds that pain is what drives me, I am addicted to saddness, and intoxication and that heady feeling is something which I crave for. 

Another little gem of thought from the Folk songs by Shabnam Virmani, “I live on the tip of the thorn  that is where I am most comfortable.” True for me, I’ve always lived in grave challenges, when most would truly give up. I’ve stood and lived that moment with dignity and grace. Hence I am proud and very proud of all that I’ve done and all that I do. 

My relations and most relations distance, but fortunately strongly bounce back like the mercury drops coming together, waiting to be one, waiting to live a rich moment. So I find that my hands and heart is never empty, I always have something which I know is a blessing and pure as a prayer. 

…So a rich evening, Kabir will be dipped in my works for sometime. While I truly relish my moment. I can only hope that everyone out there, gets to Live their Dreams, everyone Learns to dream. 

Sat Nam sweet souls!

A week ago I wrote about getting up in the morning and maintaining the morning sadhana routine while on a more rigorous daily schedule (even though holidays can be exhausting as well!). As you might know, I have been reading the English translation of Sri Guru Grant Sahib since the end of last August, spending anything from 15 minutes to three hours a day reading (except at Solstice I chose to use my time differently). I completed my first read- through this Tuesday, exactly one month after taking amrit at Winter Solstice. On most days I got applicable information about life in general but there were times when the message was truly distinct. This mostly happened with questions that were sincerely important for my soul on that time or day.

The next morning after my post for you I sat own and started reading….I had had a few days of not reading that much so I was looking forward to spending some more time with the Guru. What I read was amazingly connected to my blog- post, very cool! Because I am excited about having a guide like this in my life,  I want to share a few quotes from that morning with you all. They are both on Ang 1371 (ang means “limb” which is used instead of “page” when talking about sections Sri Guru Grant Sahib. This is done out of respect, because SGGS truly is our living Guru and not “just a book”.)

Here was the first section related to my early morning challenge:

Kabeer: O conch shell, remain in the ocean. If you are separated from it, you shall scream at sunrise from temple to temple. || 126 || Kabeer, what are you doing sleeping? Wake up and cry in fear and pain. Those who live in the grave – how can they sleep in peace? || 127 || Kabeer, what are you doing sleeping? Why not rise up and meditate on the Lord? One day you shall sleep with your legs outstretched. || 128 || Kabeer, what are you doing sleeping? Wake up, and sit up. Attach yourself to the One, from whom you have been separated. || 129 || Kabeer, do not leave the Society of the Saints; walk upon this Path. See them, and be sanctified; meet them, and chant the Name. || 130 ||

Of course, this doesn´t talk just about waking up in the morning but waking up from the lifelong sleep with Maya and really using our time in this lifetime well by staying connected with our Divine Creator. That way we can live a life that fulfills our innermost desires. But I also see this text as literal message that the best way to do that is to get up early in the morning and meditate (chant the Name – Naam), because one day you will be gone and don´t have that chance anymore.

The other section was about organizing my time and procrastinating my actions:

Kabeer, that which you have to do tomorrow – do it today instead; and that which you have to do now – do it immediately! Later on, you will not be able to do anything, when death hangs over your head. || 138 ||

I feel that these sections also address one important issue I personally have not taken so seriously yet. The subject that we all will die and we should remember that every moment…Only then when we realize how easily this can all be taken away, out of our reach, can our eyes be opened to what is truly important. Are you doing those really important things now? If tonight should you take your last breath, what have you left behind, how did you spend your days? Did you make a difference, did you have an experience?

With these thoughts I want to wish you a weekend full of life,

Waheguru!

Namleen Kaur

Waiting for Amrit. Photo by Sahej Anand Singh

Please forgive me for any mistakes and misunderstandings I have, I am just in the beginning of learning…

Kankar patthar chunke, masjid le banaye, ta chad mullah bang de, ka behra hue khudaye”, he sings in a pensive and mournful tone. “The song says, ‘they pick and gather stones to build mosques and climb minarets to shout out prayers; is God hard of hearing’,” translates Kaluram Bamaniya, a folk singer from Malwa in Madhya Pradesh.

While the voice stirs up the mind and the lyrics linger on, what makes Bamaniya’s songs really special is the fact that the lyrics are 600 years old, written in the 15th century by celebrated poet-philosopher Kabir. “His poems were full of wisdom and applied to everybody. This verse talks about Muslims, but there were others about Hindus also. His verses talk about religion, life, morality and many other subjects,” says Bamaniya, who will perform during Kabir Sadhana at the Kalachaya Cultural Centre on Monday, 7 pm onwards.

Now we are being quiet!  Now we are learning to be with ourselves, bathed in peace and love.  Now we are remembering who we really are, before we took on all those definitions from being in the world.  This is the practice of the heart.  This is where we find quiet, serenity, and peace.

On the tree of silence grows the fruit of peace.

Written by the Indian poet, Kabir, in the 1400s, the simplicity of the statement resonates today.

See what happens when you set aside some time for silence.  See who you become over time.  You might come to see that those quiet moments of your day are the ones you value the most.  You might see into the magnificense that dwells within you.  With in YOU, right now.  Perhaps lying dormant because you have never been quiet enough to know it.  Shhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!  Listen to the silence!

A few more ideas:

• Just before going to bed or falling asleep, take some time to rest your mind. Let go of the replay of the day or dwelling on a problem to be solved.  Put it all to “bed.”  Let your mind flow to something small you enjoyed during your day then rest in that moment of happiness.
• Just before rising, take a moment to open with gratitude and kindness into the new day.  Think of something that will bring pleasure as the day begins, even if it is simply a cup of tea or coffee, the face of someone you love, the warmth of a shower.  Then rest in the stillness of that momentary thought.
• Before going into the stillness, remind yourself — I love myself completely NOW.  You cannot say it often enough.

Snippets of silence help us to be calm in a different way than long periods of, say, meditation.  Both have great benefit.  See how it feels to you.

With love and namaste, Deanne

For more words, go to www.deannemincer.com

We knew we needed to get to the old city where we had booked a few nights at the dirt-cheap Mishra Guesthouse. Carrying our packs, we headed towards the train station, figuring on picking up a rickshaw from there. Fewer than 20 steps from the now-deserted bus we were hailed by a jolly middle-aged man who beamed at us from across the street. “Come!” he called, “please have a cup of tea!” Although it is generally not recommended to accept such offers while traveling, there was something about him that drew us to the seats he was beckoning us towards. And after the five-hour bus trip some chai sounded very welcoming!

After we set down our packs and were seated outside of a little shop on the side of the busy street the man ducked across to a nearby chai shop and returned with three chais. “It is so rare to see foreigners in this part of Varanasi,” he exclaimed, “are you here to see Kabir’s mosque?” We tried to explain that our bus had just dropped us of on the side of the road and that we were on our way to the old city, but he just looked puzzled and said, “but this is not the bus station, and buses do not normally come down this road. It must be that you were dropped here for a reason! I am not usually here either, but here I am, and here are you. This is indeed a very lucky day!”

Now, I have to admit that I know almost nothing about Kabir‘s life (1440–1518) or his works. For example, I had no idea that he was born and lived in Varanasi, or that his followers, known as Kabir panthis, are estimated to be around 9,600,000 worldwide. Abandoned by his birth parents and brought up by a family of Muslim weavers, the young Kabir tricked the Hindu Vaishnavite Swami Ramananda into taking him as his disciple. Kabir never became a sadhu or renunciate, choosing rather to live a simple householder life as a weaver and a poet. His basic spiritual/religious philosophy included finding and expressing the union between the divine principles of the relative – personal soul (jivatma) and the absolute – God (paramatma), as well as insisting that such spiritual practice be made accessible to all, regardless of caste or religion. My main prior exposure to Kabir occurred during the Zen sesshin held in Tiruvanammalai back in October and led by Senior Dharma Teacher Ryushin Paul Haller from the San Francisco Zen Center. During that sesshin Paul related Zen teachings to Kabir’s poetry. See the earlier post to find his third Dharma Talk from that sesshin.

In any case, PP (our new friend) asked us if we had the time and would like to see the Kabir Mosque/Temple just down the road from where we sat. “Of course,” we said, as it would have indeed been a shame to pass up this unique opportunity. As it turned out, we spent the rest of the afternoon and early evening in the company of a variety of wonderful people, all Kabir followers, starting with Sunny and extending to the Mosque’s muezzin, other Kabir Panthis, and the head guru at the Kabir Chaura Math (ashram) further down the street. As the day unfolded more and more doors were opened for us (literally) and we were given access to parts of the Mosque that were not open to the public, including the inside of the main dome and the rooftop of the temple complex. PP kept exclaiming that this was indeed a very lucky day for all of us, and that Graham and I must both have very good karma to be given such gifts. We could not argue with him. Upon entering the temple space even though we could not understand any of the muezzin’s recitation of Kabir’s poems (broadcast via loudspeaker to the neighborhood), the sound of his lilting voice was remarkably beautiful. He offered us prasad when we went in to see the main altar, before being taken up to the roof of the building, where the main dome of the mosque was located. This dome had the most exquisite acoustics and was gorgeous in its white and unadorned simplicity:

After practicing some “Aums” we were taken back outside to the rooftop, where we could see the lowering sun over the hazy city. On that rooftop we noticed a number of kites that had fallen, and after helping our friends collect them, we paused long enough to have a go ourselves at getting the simple paper and bamboo fliers up in the air:

We exited the building and relaxed for a while on the lawn where other groups of Indians were gathered to enjoy the end of the day. Everyone was very friendly and welcoming, and then someone offered to take us to meet the Guru of the Kabir Chaura complex and ashram, which was just across and down the street from us. PP was very happy with this offer, and again declared how fortunate we were. He too had never met the Guru in person and was delighted to be given the opportunity. Once there we were again offered tea and snacks and an audience with the head teacher, who unfortunately did not speak English. Nevertheless, we found him to be very open and welcoming to us, and some of his attendants translated between us as we asked him some basic questions about their practice at the ashram. They offered us a room at the ashram as well as dinner, but as the sun was well below the horizon we felt the need to journey on towards our booked room at the Mishra guesthouse. Thanking all of the kind people who had so embraced us we took our leave. We walked back to the location of our original meeting with PP, and there he and his friends flagged down a rickshaw to take us on our way. This was an incredible introduction to the city of Varanasi, and as we rode through the noisy and cluttered streets of one of the oldest continuously occupied cities in the world, we did indeed reflect upon how lucky we were that day.

Our brief excursion into the birth and death place of the Saint Kabir was enough to propel me to want to learn more. A brief online exploration led me to the following poem, which reminded me of some words found in one of the chants used by the San Francisco Zen Center, The Self-Receiving and Employing Samadhi, which is an excerpt from Eihei Dogen Zenji‘s work Bendowa:

“In the authentic tradition of our teaching, it is said that this directly transmitted, straightforward buddha-dharma is the unsurpassable of the unsurpassable. From the first time you meet a master, without engaging in incense offering, bowing, chanting Buddha’s name, repentance, or reading scriptures, you should just wholeheartedly sit, and thus drop away body and mind.”

Kabir puts in this way:

Are you looking for me? I am in the next seat.
My shoulder is against yours.
You will not find me in stupas, not in Indian shrine rooms,
nor in synagogues, nor in cathedrals:
not in masses, nor in kirtans, not in legs winding around your
own neck, nor in eating nothing but vegetables.
When you really look for me, you will see me instantly—
you will find me in the tiniest house of time.
Kabir says: Student, tell me what is God?
He is the breath inside the breath.

(translation by Robert Bly)

Another gem I found also bears mentioning. This piece was uttered by a young Kabir:

“O, my friend, my beloved, I had gone to search, to seek myself, but something strange has happened. Rather than finding myself, I have disappeared just like a dewdrop disappearing in the ocean. The dewdrop has disappeared in the ocean. Now how can you find the dewdrop again?”

Legend has it that on his deathbed Kabir called for his son and asked him to reverse the last line of his poem to read, “the ocean has disappeared in the dewdrop.”

In Dogen Zenji‘s Genjo Koan (Actualizing the Fundamental Point) he says, “Enlightenment is like the moon reflected in the water. The moon does not get wet, nor is the water broken. Although its light is wide and great, the moon is reflected even in a puddle an inch wide. The whole moon and the entire sky are reflected in dewdrops on the grass, or even in one drop of water. Enlightenment does not divide you, just as the moon does not break the water. You cannot hinder enlightenment just as a drop of water does not hinder the moon in the sky. The depth of the drop is the height of the moon. Each reflection, however long or short its duration, manifests the vastness of the dewdrop and realizes the limitlessness of the moonlight in the sky.”

And Shunryu Suzuki‘s Zen Mind Beginner’s Mind‘s lecture on the waterfall also expresses a similar teaching. In these works we find a kindred spirit of play between relative and absolute, between the many and the one: touching the non-dual nature of Reality or God, and accessible through daily life, devotion, and meditation. Indeed an auspicious entry into the ancient city.

When we become one with the earth
When the dust shall protect my soul
Or I glide in the whispering air
Or my ashes float and kiss each shore
When the potter is sculpted
Recrafted and designed
Will you be able to recognize me?
Will you accept me then?
Should I wait for you?
I can accept no less than the whole
Sharing will burn me
Imprison me
I am a free fighter
Enjoy my company
And if you want me still
Avail yourself in your entirety
Till then …..

(Mehak’s Poetry)

Returns to the ocean, even the highest wave.
Never separated, such is the divine play.

There can be no end, to that which hadn’t begun.
The Light of Love, the eternally vast ocean.

I came with nothing, I return with none.
This journey on Earth, with the Moon and Sun.

Khayyam and Kabir haven’t come and gone.
Awakened and alive, are forever One.

Read how Kabir put it:

I won’t come

I won’t go

I won’t live

I won’t die

I’ll keep uttering

The name

And lose myself

In it

I’m bowl

And I’m platter

I’m man

And I’m woman

I’m grapefruit

And I’m sweet lime

I’m Hindu

And I’m Muslim

I’m fish

And I’m net

I’m fisherman

And I’m time

I’m nothing

Says Kabir

I’m not among the living

Or the dead

— Translated by Arvind Krishna Mehrotra