THE SPEAKING TREE
Total Surrender to The Guru Principle

The Guru Gita says: ‘‘IfShiva is angry with you, the guru will take care of you, but if the guru iscross with you, even Shiva will not be able to protect you against the wrath ofyour guru.’’ How strange, I thought. Shiva is thecreator, sustainer and destroyer of the universe; he is the vital principle fromwhich all objects emerge. How can a living guru be more powerful than the lordof the universe?As I began to read about the guru principle, Irealised that a spiritual guru is not merely a guide or teacher; he is also theone who transforms a disciple’s life in her pursuit of Self-realisation. Aguru is able to do this because he has identified his own consciousness with thepure consciousness of God. He therefore dwells at the deepest source point ofrea-lity; there is no ego, no pretension, no limitation to his expression of thehighest truth.Implicit within the notion of the guru is the idea of ajourney of mystical ascent, a movement from the ordinary state of wakingconsciousness towards the expansive recognition of the divine self. He is onewho has completed this most extraordinary journey and has thus relinquishedforever the illusions and limitations of the ordinary and narrowego-sense.Such a spiritual teacher is a paradoxical being; heembodies the conjunction of the absolute and the relative; he is the master ofspace and time, free and possessionless, yet emperor of the universe. To becompletely surrounded by the light of consciousness is the intrinsic nature ofthe state of the siddha. It is for this reason the master who dwells in such acondition no longer apprehends the world as different from himself. The statehas often been called sahajasamadhi or ‘spontaneous’ samadhi. Bathedin the radiance of the Supreme, all forms of life reveal their intrinsic purity,perfection and formlessness.The spiritual teacher transmits thesacred tradition that leads to God. This truth is not fashioned by the humanmind; rather it is revealed to the mind. Further, this truth is not bound byconstraints of time, space and causality but exists in its own autonomous andindependent sphere. A being who can awaken this god-consciousness in adisciple’s life is worthy of veneration. It is for this reason that Indiansaints — whether Tukaram, Kabir, Jnanesvar or Eknath — havesurrendered themselves completely before their guru. Swami Muktanand ofGa-neshpuri in his autobiography The Play of Consciousness writes that when hesurrendered before Swami Nityananda, he did not think he was surrenderinghimself to a fellow human being but to the great Self. Swami Chidvilasananda,Muktananda’s spiritual heir, has said: ‘‘Of all therelationships in the world, the relationship between the guru and disciple isconsi-dered to be the most sublime.’’The guru is asdevoted to his disciples as his disciples are devoted to him. There areinnumerable stories of how Swami Nitya-nanda would intervene on behalf of hisdisciples. One day, a student found that Swami Nityananda’s feet wereswollen and asked him what the matter was. ‘‘People come to me forseva but they also deposit their desires and difficulties at my feet and whilethe ocean of divine mercy washes away much of the effect, a little has to beaccepted by the body,’’ he informed the devotee.Such aguru can be approached only with love and devotion. And just as we bow beforehim and pray for his blessings, the forces of the universe also bow before suchan individual. Such a person cannot be slighted. He is at the centre of theuniverse and any slight to him will invoke the fury of those very elements towhom we pray.