January 15, 1969
(After the visit of an "Acharya," or Jain master, who came
surrounded with his disciples.)
He tried every way to make me talk! I refused. I had never seen them, with their mouths covered [[Jain sadhus or monks cover their mouths with a patch of cloth so as not to swallow microbes. ]] – it doesn’t stop them from talking!
It seems he said yesterday (he came yesterday) that he hadn’t yet begun his sadhana, that he was going round India and would begin his sadhana afterwards …. He asked me for a message; I didn’t tell him anything, but inwardly I said to him, "Be sincere, be sincere …." But I didn’t speak. He even tried flattery, but it didn’t work! He said, "Oh …" (looking closely to see whether it had any effect), "Oh, I’ve heard about you a lot, but to see you is something else altogether …." I only had a slight difficulty not to laugh!
There were men and women, they call the women "nuns," and they too have their mouths covered ….
***
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(Then Mother refers to an American disciple who has set up the
whole Greek pantheon in his home and is very unbalanced.)
It’s odd, he is receptive enough: every time I do something, there is a result … but the result he attributes to his gods! So it makes a muddle in his consciousness.
(silence)
It has remained, this [superman] consciousness. It has remained, it’s very strong, oh! … Today again, with these [Jain] sadhus, I had the experience: it came, mon petit, it was tremendous! It came massively, it enveloped me completely, so I sat very still, like that, behind it: nothing could get through. Interesting … Oh, it really is a power. Down to the vital. Physically, the body cannot respond; there is indeed an action, but … it’s not that. It’s not that. But it has put a vital in the body (you know that the vital had gone away), an awesome vital! That’s quite amusing. You feel as if you were saying to people, "Keep still!"
I am going to try it on A. [the American disciple], I’ll see if it makes him steady on his feet again …. He’ll believe it’s his statue of Athena! It doesn’t matter. Even those who think well still think nonsense, so …
This sadhu, "it" tried to pull him within, but when the pressure became very strong, he started talking! He couldn’t … [bear or contain it]. The disciple who was near him became very excited, but he controlled him.
He began with some banality about "the work I am doing for humanity" (some stupid remark of the sort), and when he saw it didn’t work, he kept as quiet as he could, then started talking again and said what I told you that he had "heard about me a lot, but …" As for me, I kept putting all this consciousness between the body and him.
After all, I enjoyed myself! (Mother laughs)
He had a stick, which he had even wrapped in white! He was all white, and the stick too was white; he carried it like this, as a bishop carries his crosier.
They have completely shut themselves in.
Ah, they’ve deliberately cut themselves off from the world, and they want to assert that: separation is part of their conception.
They have shut themselves in their saintliness.
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Many of them, I am sure, have suppressed desires and all kinds of such things in a state of ferment …. But the body kept very still with that [superman consciousness] around it, and the Consciousness kept saying to him, "The individual is nothing, abdicate, abdicate the individual – be sincere, abdicate the individual. The supreme Consciousness alone is …." It didn’t touch him. I don’t know if something in him received it, but he didn’t notice it …. We’ll see.
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