1
WHY IS one person called a seer when we all have eyes
and the power of sight? What else is needed to be a seer
than a doctor's certificate that our sight is keen?
There are some people who take in everything the contrary
way. While everybody stands upon his feet with his head
up, in India you may see faqirs and Yogis who stand upon
their head with their feet in the air; they wish to know
what experience they may have by seeing in this way. Everybody
is born with an inclination to certain things, an inclination
to sleep, to eat and to drink, an inclination to comfort;
in this too these faqirs take the contrary way. They sit
or stand in one position for hours and hours; they fast,
they do not drink for days and weeks; they torture themselves
in these ways. It is not that there is any virtue in this,
it is not that God is pleased with their torturing themselves,
nor that their self, their ego is pleased with it. It is
only that they wish to see what experience they get by this.
We all have the tendency to see faults in another; they
try to see faults in themselves. They see virtue in sin,
and sin in virtue. The world says, 'That man is bad, he
has done this, he has done that'. They do not call anyone
bad, they see what good there is even in the one who is
called bad. Therefore Christ, because he was a dervish,
did not condemn the sinner. He said to those who thought
themselves righteous, 'Your father is the devil', that is:
the nafs, the ego. In every virtue, in everything appearing
in the garb of virtue, there is sin, or at least conceit:
'I am virtuous, I am moral, I am religious'. This is the
worst of virtue. Therefore Hafiz says, 'Show me the way
of the freethinkers. Suitable it appears to me, for the
way of virtue and piety seems very far off and long'.
We all like to be honored, to be esteemed, to have attention
paid to us; these faqirs and Yogis wish to know what experience
there is in disgrace. They call the living dead and the
dead living. Praise, consideration from people is nothing
to them; they think it is praise from the dead, creatures
of four days. The plant, the fire, the wall, things that
to us are dead, speak to them, reveal everything to them.
In the jungle every tree, every stone speaks to them.
If there is a chair, a table, a piano in the room, we
say there is something; if not, we say there is nothing.
To them this space which we call nothing is full of everything;
in it is everything. They call everything nothing, and in
what to us is nothing they see everything.
What is learning without seeing? Christ did not have
a degree from a university – he saw. Learned people are
always disputing. One says, 'There are five elements'; after
ten years another comes and says, 'No, there are twenty
elements'; after twenty-five years another comes and says,
'I have discovered the true thing: there are seventy-five'.
Seers from the first day till now have never differed in
the truth which they all hold.
2
The seer sees more than the astrologer can see; he sees
much more; there is no comparison. But the difference is
that the seer does not speak about it. If he did so, he
would become just like the astrologer. For the seer every
person's soul is just like an open letter, but if he would
begin to say this his sight would become dimmer every day,
because it is a trust given to him by God. If he were to
divulge it, it would become dim. With spiritual trust they
are entrusted who can keep the trust, who can keep a secret.
checked 04-Nov-2006
