|
Age After Age, when
the wick of righoutsness burns low, the Avatar (Christ, Rasool, Buddha,
Imam Medhi) comes yet once again to rekindle the torch of Love and Truth
Age after age, amidst the clamor of disruptions, wars, fear
and chaos, rings the Avatar's call:
"COME ALL UNTO ME"
"Although,
because of the veil of illusion, this Call of the Ancient One may appear
as a voice in the wilderness, its echo and re-echo nevertheless pervades
through time and space to rouse at first a few, and eventually millions from their deep slumber of ignorance. And in the midst of
illusion, as the
Voice behind all voices, it awakens humanity to bear
witness to the Manifestation of God amidst mankind.
"The time is come. I repeat the Call, and bid all come unto me.
"This
time-honored Call of mine thrills the hearts of those who have
patiently endured all in their love for God, loving God only for love
of God. There are those who fear and shudder at its reverberations and
would flee or resist. And there are yet others who, baffled, fail to
understand why the Highest of the High, who is all-sufficient, need
necessarily give this Call to humanity.
"Irrespective
of doubts and convictions, and for the Infinite Love I bear for one and
all, I continue to come as the Avatar, to be judged time and again by
humanity in its ignorance, in order to help man distinguish the Real
from the false.
"Invariably
muffled in the cloak of the infinitely true humility of the Ancient
One, the Divine Call is at first little heeded, until, in its infinite
strength, it spreads in volume to reverberate and keep on reverberating
in countless hearts as the Voice of Reality.
"Strength begets humility, whereas modesty bespeaks weakness. Only he who is truly great can be really humble.
"When,
in the firm knowledge of it, a man admits his true greatness, it is in
itself an expression of humility. He accepts his greatness as most
natural and is expressing merely what he is, just as a man would not
hesitate to admit to himself and others the fact of his being man.
"For
a truly great man, who knows himself to be truly great, to deny his greatness would be to belittle what he indubitably is. For whereas
modesty is the basis of guise, true greatness is free from camouflage.
"On the other hand, when a man expresses a greatness he know or feels
he does not possess, he is the greatest hypocrite.
"Honest is the man who is not great and, knowing and feeling this, firmly and frankly states that he is not great.
"There
are more than a few who are not great, yet assume a humility in the
genuine belief of their own worth. Through words and actions they
express repeatedly their humbleness, professing to be servants of
humanity. True humility is not acquired by merely donning a garb of
humility. True humility spontaneously and continually emanates from the
strength of the truly great. Voicing one's humbleness does not make one
humble. For all that a parrot may utter, "I am a man," it does not make
it so.
"Better
the absence of greatness than the establishing of a false greatness by
assumed humility. Not only do these efforts at humility on man's part not express strength, they are, on the contrary, expressions of
modesty born of weakness, which springs from a lack of knowledge of the
truth of Reality.
"Beware
of modesty. Modesty, under the cloak of humility, invariably leads one
into the clutches of self-deception. Modesty breeds egoism, and man
eventually succumbs to pride through assumed humility.
"The greatest greatness and the greatest humility go hand in hand naturally and without effort.
"When
the Greatest of all says, "I am the Greatest," it is but a spontaneous
expression of an infallible Truth. The strength of his greatness lies
not in raising the dead, but in his great humiliation when he allows himself to be ridiculed, persecuted, and crucified at the hands of those
who are weak in flesh and spirit. Throughout the ages, humanity has
failed to fathom the true depth of the Humility underlying the greatness
of the Avatar, gauging his Divinity by its acquired, limited religious
standards. Even real saints and sages, who have some knowledge of the
Truth, have failed to understand the Avatar's greatness when faced with
his real humility.
"Age
after age, history repeats itself when men and women, in their
ignorance, limitations and pride, sit in judgment over the
God-incarnated man who declares his Godhood, and condemn him for
uttering the Truths they cannot understand. He is indifferent to abuse
and persecution for, in his true compassion he understands, in his
continual experience of Reality he knows, and in his infinite mercy he
forgives.
"God
is all. God knows all, and God does all. When the Avatar proclaims he
is the Ancient One, it is God who proclaims His manifestation on earth.
When man utters for or against the Avatarhood, it is God who speaks
through him. It is God alone who declares Himself through the Avatar
and mankind.
"I
tell you all, with my Divine Authority, that you and I are not "WE,"
but "ONE". You unconsciously feel my Avatarhood within you; I
consciously feel in you what each of you feel. Thus every one of us is
Avatar, in the sense that everyone and everything is everyone and
everything, at the same time, and for all time.
"There
is nothing but God. He is the only Reality, and we all are one inthe
indivisible Oneness of this absolute Reality. When the One who has
realized God says, "I am God. You are God, and we are all one," and
also awakens this feeling of Oneness in his illusion-bound selves, then
the question of the lowly and the great, the poor and the rich, the
humble and the modest, the good and the bad, simply vanishes. It is his
false awareness of duality that misleads man into making illusory
distinctions and filing them into separate categories.
"I
repeat and emphasize that, in my continual and eternal experience of
Reality, no difference exists between the worldly rich and the poor.
But if ever such a question of difference between opulence and poverty
were to exist for me, I would deem him really poor who, possessing
worldly riches, possesses not the wealth of love for God. And I would
know him truly rich who, owning nothing, possesses the priceless
treasure of his love for God. His is the poverty that kings could envy
and that makes even the King of kings his slave.
"Know,
therefore, that in the eyes of God the only difference between the rich
and the poor is not of wealth and poverty, but in the degrees of
intensity and sincerity in the longing for God.
"Love
for God alone can annihilate the falsity of the limited ego, the basis
of life ephemeral. It alone can make one realize the Reality of one's
Unlimited Ego, the basis of Eternal Existence. The divine Ego, as the
basis of Eternal Existence, continually expresses itself; but shrouded
in the veil of ignorance, man misconstrues his Indivisible Ego and
experiences and expresses it as the limited, separate ego.
"Pay
heed when I say with my Divine Authority that the Oneness of Reality is
so uncompromisingly unlimited and all-pervading that not only "We are One," but even this collective term of "We" has no place in the
Infinite Indivisible Oneness.
"Awaken
from your ignorance and try at least to understand that, in the
uncompromisingly Indivisible Oneness, not only is the Avatar God, but
also the ant and the sparrow, just as one and all of you are nothing
but God. The only apparent difference is in the states of
consciousness. The Avatar knows that which is a sparrow is not a
sparrow, whereas the sparrow does not realize this and, being ignorant
of its ignorance, identifies itself as a sparrow.
"Live
not in ignorance. Do not waste your precious life-span in
differentiating and judging your fellowmen, but learn to long for the
love of God. Even in the midst of your worldly activities, live only to
find and realize your true identity with your Beloved God.
"Be pure and simple, and love all because all are one. Live a sincere life; be natural, and be honest with yourself.
"Honesty
will guard you against false modesty and will give you the strength of
true humility. Spare no pains to help others. Seek no other reward than
the gift of Divine Love. Yearn for this gift sincerely and intensely,
and I promise in the name of my Divine Honesty that I will give you
much more than you yearn for.
"I give you all my blessing that the spark of my Divine Love may
implant in your hearts the deep longing for love of God."
|