The human, the Divine and the Supreme¹⁵

Dear sisters and brothers, dear seekers of the highest Truth, I am in Canada on a lecture tour, and I hope to serve the soul of Canada with my devoted heart. I shall be giving sixteen talks during my trip. Each time I give a talk, I offer my soulful gratitude to the presiding deity of Canada, to the soul of Canada, and to her I shall offer my soulful gratitude this evening.

I am a seeker. That means I am a spiritual farmer. As a farmer cultivates the land and, in the course of time, collects a bumper crop, even so, the seeker in me is cultivating the spiritual soil of Canada. Geographically, Canada is a very vast country. And spiritually, she can become extremely fertile.

Fear is human. Courage is divine. Love is supreme. A thing human is short-lived. A thing divine is long-lived. A thing supreme lives forever.

Doubt is human. Faith is divine. Surrender is supreme. A life of doubt cannot start. A life of faith walks along the path. A life of surrender reaches the Goal.

The human in us says the Goal is far, very far. The divine in us says the Goal is here, right here, and nowhere else. The Supreme in us says we ourselves are the Goal.

The human in us is stark complexity within and without. The divine in us is pure simplicity. This simplicity houses the Infinite and the Eternal. The supreme in us is sheer luminosity. In this luminosity the seeker becomes the divine Lover, and the lover becomes one with the supreme Beloved.

The human in us thinks that it has conquered everything. The divine in us feels that it can conquer everything if such is the Will of God. The supreme in us has become what it eternally is: oneness, inseparable oneness.

I am one individual and God is another individual: this is my human discovery. God and I are sempiternally one: this is my divine discovery. God is my most illumined part and I am God’s most unillumined existence: this is my supreme discovery.

The human in me feels that it is all sacrifice, that it has sacrificed everything for the world at large. The divine in me feels that it makes all possible sacrifices because the Absolute has given it the capacity to sacrifice. The supreme in me knows that there is no such thing as sacrifice. When we are all one, the question of sacrifice does not arise at all.

My body has a mind, a heart, two legs. My legs take me to school, where my mind and heart receive knowledge and wisdom. Now, my legs do not feel that they are making a tremendous sacrifice in carrying my heart and head to school, for my legs have established their inseparable oneness with my heart and my head. Similarly, when my legs and feet want to run, my head and heart co-operate. They do not feel it is any sacrifice on their part to come along.

In the inner world, there is no such thing as sacrifice; there is only the song of oneness. The physical in us ponders and thinks, and it feels that it has made tremendous progress when it starts to reason. The human in us feels that the reasoning mind is the pinnacle of perfection. But when the divine in us comes to the fore, it makes us feel that the soulful heart is what is of paramount importance, for the inmost recesses of our heart house the Infinite and the Eternal.

The human in us desires constantly and demands constantly. The divine in us aspires devotedly and inspires unreservedly. The supreme in us only loves, consciously, constantly and unconditionally.

The human in us prays, Asato ma sad gamaya… — “Lead me from the unreal to the Real. Lead me from darkness to Light. Lead me from death to Immortality.”

The divine in us prays, Hiranmayena patrena… — “The Face of Truth is covered with a brilliant golden orb. Remove it, O Sun, so that I who am devoted to the Truth may behold the Truth.”

The supreme in us knows what its Source is and where its journey will lead. It says, Anandadd hy eva khalv imani bhutani jayante… — “From Delight we came into existence. In Delight we grow. At the end of our journey’s close, into Delight we retire.”

The human in us has to be transcended on the strength of our inner cry. The divine in us has to be manifested, and for that we need God’s infinite Bounty along with our own aspiration-cry. The supreme in us is perfect Perfection, and this perfect Perfection must be established here on earth, through our conscious prayer to reach the Transcendental Consciousness. Only when we meditate do we bring down the Transcendental Consciousness, the supreme Perfection, into our lives of self-dedication, our lives of self-transcendence.

Each seeker once lived in the world of pleasure. Now he lives in the world of aspiration. Tomorrow the same seeker will live in the world of illumination. Yesterday we were human. Today we are divine. Tomorrow we will be supreme. It is our intense inner cry that will make us again what we were once upon a time. Our Source was God the Delight, and now we are trying to establish here on earth the Peace, Light and Delight of the Source through our conscious prayer, our soulful meditation and our devoted surrender to the Will of God.

As seekers we know that the human in us has to be transcended so that the divine in us can play its role most effectively. We also know that the divine in us must have an immortal existence here on earth. For that the divine in us needs the life supreme, and this life supreme we get only when our human existence is all love, all devotion and all surrender to the Inner Pilot.