印度的圣哲
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中文
印度的圣哲们
谈及印度的圣哲们，我的心灵回溯到历史无从记录、传说也徒然试图从遥远的黑暗中揭开秘密的那些时代。印度的圣哲们几乎是数不胜数的，因为印度民族数千年来究竟在做什么，除了孕育圣哲之外，还有别的吗？因此，我将选取其中几位最杰出的、划时代的人物，将我对他们的研究呈现于诸位面前。
首先，我们需要对我们的经典略加了解。我们的经典中存在两种真理的理想：一种是我们所称的永恒真理，另一种则在权威性上略逊一筹，然而在特定的情形、时代与地点之下，仍具有约束力。涉及灵魂本性、神的本性以及灵魂与神之关系的永恒关系，被体现于我们所称的天启书（Shrutis），即吠陀之中。第二类真理是我们所称的史论书（Smritis），体现于摩奴（Manu）、亚伽瓦尔基亚（Yâjnavalkya）等著述者的文字中，以及往世书（Purânas），直至坦特罗（Tantras）。第二类书籍与教义从属于天启书，因为凡其中任何一处与天启书相抵触，天启书必须占上风。这是律法。其理念是，人之命运与目标的框架，已在吠陀中全部勾勒；细节则留待史论书与往世书逐一加以阐发。至于一般性的指引，天启书已然足够；对于灵性生活而言，再无可增益之处，再无可知之事。引领灵魂走向完美所必需的一切，已在天启书中完备无缺；细节则由史论书随时代而补充。
另一个特点是，这些天启书中有许多圣哲作为其中真理的记录者，大多是男性，甚至也有一些女性。关于他们的个人生平、出生日期等，我们所知甚少；然而他们最好的思想、我称之为最重大的发现，都保存于此，体现于我们国家的神圣文献——吠陀之中。另一方面，在史论书中，人物形象则更为突出。令人震撼的、巨人般的、震动世界的人物，仿佛第一次站在我们面前，有时其气魄甚至超过其教义。
这是我们必须理解的一个特点——我们的宗教宣扬一位非人格的人格神。它宣扬任意数量的非人格律法，加上任意数量的人格性；然而，我们宗教的源头，在于天启书、在于吠陀，是完全非人格的；人物形象全部出现在史论书与往世书中——那些伟大的化身（Avatâras），即神的降世，先知们，以及其他。还应当注意的是，除我们的宗教之外，世界上其他每一种宗教，都依赖于某一个或某些人格创始人的生平。基督教建立于耶稣基督的生平之上，伊斯兰教建立于穆罕默德的生平之上，佛教建立于佛陀的生平之上，耆那教建立于耆那（Jinas）的生平之上，如此等等。由此自然而然地推导出，在这所有的宗教中，必然有大量关于他们所称的这些伟大人物历史证据的争论。若在任何时候，关于这些人物在古代存在的历史证据变得薄弱，整座宗教大厦便会轰然倒塌，支离破碎。我们得以逃过这一命运，是因为我们的宗教不是建立在人物之上，而是建立在原则之上。你信奉宗教，不是因为它来自某位圣哲的权威，不，甚至不是来自某位化身的权威。克里希纳（Krishna）不是吠陀的权威；吠陀才是克里希纳本身的权威。他的荣耀在于，他是曾经存在的最伟大的吠陀宣讲者。其他化身亦然；我们所有的圣哲亦然。我们的第一原则是，人之完美与走向自由所必需的一切，都在吠陀之中。你不能发现任何新东西。你不能超越完美的统一体，那是所有知识的目标；这在那里早已达到，超越统一体是不可能的。当"汝即梵"（Tat Twam Asi）被发现之时，宗教知识便已圆满，而这就在吠陀之中。其余留下的，便是根据不同的时代与地点、不同的情形与环境，随时随地引导人们沿着那古老、古老的道路前行；人们必须被引导沿这古老的道路行走，因此这些伟大的导师（Guru）们来了，这些伟大的圣哲们来了。没有任何东西比克里希纳（Shri Krishna）在《薄伽梵歌》（Gitâ）中那句著名的话更清楚地支持这一立场："每当美德衰微、不义盛行之时，我便创造自我，以保护善者；为消灭一切不义，我将一次又一次地降世。"这便是印度的理念。
由此推导出什么？一方面，有这些永恒的原则，它们立足于自身的根基，甚至不依赖于任何推理，更不依赖于圣哲们的权威——无论他们多么伟大，也不依赖于化身的权威——无论他们多么光辉灿烂。我们可以注意到，由于这是印度独特的立场，我们的主张是，唯有吠檀多（Vedanta）能成为普世宗教，而且它已经是世界上现存的普世宗教——因为它传授的是原则，而非人物。建立在某一个人之上的宗教，不能被人类所有种族以同一类型接受。在我们国家内，我们发现，有许多伟大的人物；即便在一座小城中，也有许多人物被那座城市中不同的心灵奉为典范。如何可能让一个人——如穆罕默德或佛陀或基督——成为整个世界所有人的唯一典范，乃至道德、伦理、灵性与宗教的全部真实，只能来自那一个人、唯独那一个人的认可？如今，吠檀多的宗教不需要任何这样的人格权威。它的依据是人类永恒的本性，它的伦理建立于人类永恒的灵性同一体之上——这同一体早已存在，早已成就，无需再行成就。另一方面，从极为久远的时代起，我们的圣哲们便已意识到这一事实：绝大多数人类需要一种人格。他们必须以某种形式拥有一位人格神。佛陀那宣告反对人格神存在的人，不到其逝世五十年，他的弟子们便从他身上制造出了一位人格神。人格神是必要的，与此同时，我们也知道，与其是对一位人格神的徒劳想象——这在百分之九十九的情况下是不值得人类崇拜的——倒不如说，在这个世界上，活着的、行走于我们中间的活神，时而会出现。这些活神比任何凭空想象的神更值得崇拜，比任何我们凭空虚构的神——也就是说，比任何我们头脑中能够形成的关于神的概念——都更值得崇拜。克里希纳（Shri Krishna）远比你我所能拥有的任何关于神的概念更为伟大。佛陀（Buddha）是一个更崇高的、更为鲜活和令人崇敬的理念，比你我在心中所能构想的理想更为崇高；正因如此，他们始终驾驭着人类的崇拜，甚至取代了所有凭空想象的神灵。
我们的圣哲们知道这一点，因此将礼拜这些伟大人物、这些化身的自由开放给所有印度人民。是的，其中最伟大的一位化身更进一步："凡外在的人身上显现出非凡灵性力量之处，当知我在其中，那显现正是来自我。"这便为印度教徒崇拜世界各地所有国家的化身，留下了开放的门户。印度教徒可以崇拜来自任何国家、任何圣人与任何贤者；事实上，我们知道，我们有时会走入基督教的教堂礼拜，有时多次走入穆斯林的清真寺礼拜——这是好事。为何不呢？正如我所说，我们的宗教是普世宗教。它足够包容，足够宽广，能涵纳所有的理想。世界上已经存在的所有宗教理想，都能立即被纳入其中，而我们也能耐心地等待未来将要出现的所有理想，以同样的方式被接纳，被吠檀多宗教那无限的双臂所拥抱。
这或多或少便是我们对于伟大圣哲、神之化身们所持的立场。此外还有次要的人物。我们在吠陀中一再看到"仙人"（Rishi）这个词，它在当今已成为一个常见词汇。仙人是伟大的权威。我们必须理解这一理念。其定义是，仙人是"咒语的观见者"（Mantra-drashtâ），即思想的观见者。宗教的证明是什么？——这在极其古远的时代便已被提问。"感官之中无有证明"，这是宣告。
यतो वाचो निवर्तन्ते अप्राप्य मनसा सह
——"语言与心灵未能到达目标便反转而回的地方。"
न तत्र चक्षुर्गच्छति न वाग्गच्छति नो मनः ।
——"在那里，眼睛不能到达，言语不能到达，心灵也不能到达"——这已是千百年来的宣告。外在的自然，无法为我们提供关于灵魂存在、神的存在、永恒的生命、人的目标等任何答案。这个心灵在不断变化，始终处于流变的状态；它是有限的，它是支离破碎的。有限的自然如何能够讲述无限、不变、完整、不可分割、永恒的东西呢？它永远不能。凡人类试图从死沉的物质中获得答案，历史都表明结果是何等灾难性的。那么，吠陀所宣告的知识从何而来？它是通过成为一位仙人而来的。这知识不在感官之中；但感官就是人类存在的全部吗？谁敢说感官是人之一切？即便在我们的生活之中，在我们每一个人的生命中，也有平静的时刻——或许是当我们目睹所爱之人的死亡，或许是当某种打击降临，或许是当极度的幸福来临。还有许多其他场合，心灵仿佛变得平静，片刻间感受到它的真实本性；超越于彼处的那无限的一瞥——言语无法抵达、心灵无法去往之处——向我们显现。这在日常生活中时有发生，但它必须被提升、被修习、被完善。人们在很久以前便已发现，灵魂不被感官所束缚或限制，不，甚至不被意识所束缚。我们必须理解，意识不过是那无限链条中的一个环节的名称。存在与意识并不等同，意识不过是存在的一部分。超越意识之处，才是大胆探索之所在。意识受感官的束缚。超越那里，超越感官，人必须前行，才能达到灵性世界的真理；而即便在今日，也有一些人能够成功地超越感官的界限。这些人便被称为仙人，因为他们与灵性的真理面对面。
因此，吠陀的证明，与我面前这张桌子的证明完全相同——"现量"（Pratyaksha），即直接的感知。这我以感官看见，而灵性的真理我们同样在人类灵魂的超意识状态中看见。这种仙人的状态不受时间或地点、性别或种族的限制。婆磋衍那（Vâtsyâyana）大胆宣称，这种仙人的境界是圣哲的后裔、雅利安人（Aryan）、非雅利安人，乃至梅车哈人（Mlechchha）的共同财产。这便是吠陀所说的圣哲之道，我们应当时时记住这印度宗教的理想——我也希望世界上其他民族同样能够记住并学习这一理想，以便减少争斗，减少纷争。宗教不在书本中，不在理论中，不在教条中，不在清谈中，甚至不在推理中。它是存在，是成为。是的，我的朋友们，在你们每一个人成为仙人、与灵性的事实面对面之前，宗教生活尚未为你们开始。在超意识的门为你们开启之前，宗教不过是空谈，不过是准备。你们不过是在复述二手、三手的东西；这里适用佛陀与某些婆罗门讨论时说的那句美丽的话。他们来讨论梵（Brahman）的本性，这位伟大的圣哲问道："你见过梵吗？""没有，"婆罗门说；"你的父亲见过吗？""没有，他也没有见过"；"你的祖父见过吗？""我想连他也没有见过。""我的朋友，你们怎么能就一位你的父亲和祖父都从未见过的人展开讨论，还试图驳倒对方呢？"这便是整个世界在做的事情。让我们以吠檀多的语言说："这真我（Atman）不能凭借过多的言谈达到，不，即便是最高的智慧也不能达到，不，即便是研读吠陀本身也不能达到。"
让我们以吠陀的语言向世界所有民族言说：你们的争斗和纷争是徒劳的；你们所要宣讲的神，你们见过吗？若你们未曾见过，你们的宣讲是徒劳的；你们不知道自己在说什么；若你们已见过神，你们便不会争吵，你们的面容本身将会放光。奥义书中一位古代圣哲派遣儿子出去学习梵（Brahman），孩子回来了，父亲问："你学到了什么？"孩子回答说，他学了许多科学。但父亲说："那什么都不是，回去吧。"儿子回去了，当他再次归来时，父亲问了同样的问题，孩子给出了同样的回答。他又一次必须回去。等到第三次他回来时，他整个面容都在闪耀光辉；他的父亲站起来宣告："是的，今天，我的孩子，你的面容放光，如一位梵的知者。"当你认识了神，你整个面容将会改变，你的声音将会改变，你整个形象将会改变。你将是人类的祝福；无人能够抗拒仙人。这便是仙人之道，这是我们宗教中的理想。其余一切——这些清谈与推理，这些哲学、二元论与不二论，甚至吠陀本身——不过是准备，是次要的事物。另一种才是首要的。吠陀、语法、天文学等，这些都是次要的；那使我们能够实现不变之一体的知识，才是至高的知识。那些已经实现的人，便是我们在吠陀中所见的圣哲；我们也明白，这"仙人"是一种类型的名称，是一类人的名称——每一个真正的印度教徒，都被期待在其生命的某个时期成为这一类人；而成为这一类人，对于印度教徒而言，意味着解脱（Moksha）。不是信奉教条，不是去千座寺庙礼拜，也不是在世界上所有的河流中沐浴，而是成为仙人，成为"咒语的观见者"——那才是自由，那才是解脱。
时至较近的时代，出现了伟大的震撼世界的圣哲，以及众多的化身；依据《薄伽梵往世书》（Bhâgavata），化身的数目也是无限的。在印度最受崇拜的，是罗摩（Râma）与克里希纳（Krishna）。罗摩，那英雄时代古老的偶像，真理与道德的化身，理想的儿子、理想的丈夫、理想的父亲，尤其是理想的君王——这位罗摩，是被伟大的圣哲蚁垤（Vâlmiki）所描绘的。没有任何语言比这位伟大诗人描绘罗摩生平所用的语言更为纯洁、更为高雅、更为美丽，同时又更为简朴。更遑论悉多（Sitâ）了！你可以穷尽已往世界所有的文献，我也可以向你保证，你还必须穷尽未来世界所有的文献，然后才能找到另一个悉多。悉多是独一无二的；这一形象一经描绘，便已成为永恒。也许历史上出现过数位罗摩，却绝不会有第二个悉多！她是真正印度女性的典范，因为印度关于一位完美女性的所有理想，都从悉多的这一段生命中生长而来；数千年来，她就这样矗立在那里，赢得了整个雅利安大地（Âryâvarta）每一位男人、女人与孩子的崇拜。她将永远在那里，这光荣的悉多，比纯洁本身更为纯洁，充满忍耐，充满苦难。她无怨无悔地承受着那苦难的生活，她那永贞永洁的妻子，她那人民的理想，她那众神的理想，那伟大的悉多——她必将永远是我们的民族之神。我们每一个人对她都太熟悉，无需过多的描绘。即便我们所有的神话都消失，即便我们的吠陀消逝，即便我们的梵语永久地湮没，只要这里还有五个印度教徒活着，哪怕他们只说着最粗俗的方言，悉多的故事也将在场。请记住我的话：悉多已深入我们民族的血脉。她存在于每一位印度教男女的血液之中；我们都是悉多的孩子。任何试图使我们的女性现代化的尝试，若企图将我们的女性从悉多的理想中引离，都将立即遭到失败，正如我们每天所见。印度的女性必须在悉多的足迹中成长和发展，这是唯一的道路。
其次是那以各种形态受到崇拜的人物——既是男人也是女人、既是儿童也是成人所喜爱的理想，我指的是《薄伽梵往世书》的作者不满足于称之为化身之人——他说："其他化身不过是主的部分显现，而克里希纳（Krishna）就是主本身。"当我们惊叹于他性格的多元性时，这些形容词被用于他身上也就不足为奇了。他是最奇妙的游方僧（Sannyasin），同时也是最奇妙的家主，合二为一；他具有最为奇妙的激情（Rajas）与力量，同时又生活于最为奇妙的弃绝之中。克里希纳若不研读《薄伽梵歌》（Gita）是永远无法被理解的，因为他就是自己教义的化身。这些化身中的每一位，都作为其所宣讲之道的活的示范而来。克里希纳，《薄伽梵歌》的宣讲者，其一生都是那部《天神之歌》的化身；他是无执（non-attachment）的伟大示范。他放弃了自己的王位，对其漠然置之。他，印度的领袖，一言可令君王从王座上退下，却从不想成为君王。他只是那简单的克里希纳，永远是那个曾与牧女们（Gopis）嬉戏的克里希纳。啊，那段最为奇妙的生命历程，最难以理解，无人应当试图理解——除非他已变得完全纯洁，那段在温达班（Vrindâban）最为奇妙地展开的爱的扩张，以那美丽的嬉戏加以象征和表达——非彻底沉醉于爱中者，非饮尽爱之杯者，无人能够理解！谁能理解牧女们那爱的悸动——那爱的纯粹理想，那无所求的爱，那甚至不为天堂而存在的爱，那不在乎今生或来世任何东西的爱？在这里，我的朋友们，通过牧女们的这种爱，找到了人格神与非人格神之间冲突的唯一解决方案。我们知道，人格神是人类生命的至高点；我们知道，相信一位弥漫于宇宙之中的非人格神——万物不过是其显现——在哲学上是合理的。然而与此同时，我们的灵魂渴求某种具体的东西，某种我们想要把握的东西，某种我们能够将灵魂倾注于其脚下的东西，如此等等。因此，人格神是人类本性的最高构想。然而理性面对这样的理念不禁愕然。这与你在《梵经》（Brahma-Sutras）中讨论的那个古老、古老的问题是同一个——你在林中所见德罗帕蒂（Draupadi）与坚战（Yudhishthira）讨论的问题：若有一位人格神，全仁全慈、全能全知，为何世间竟有如此的地狱，为何祂要创造这一切？——祂必然是一位偏私的神。没有解答，而唯一能够找到的解答，就是你在关于牧女之爱的故事中所读到的。她们憎恨任何被用于克里希纳的形容词；她们不在乎他是宇宙的主宰，她们不在乎他是全能的，她们不在乎他是遍知的，如此等等。她们所理解的唯一一件事，是他是无限的爱，仅此而已。牧女们对克里希纳的理解，只是那温达班的克里希纳。他，万军的统帅，万王之王，在她们眼中不过是牧羊人，永远是牧羊人。"我不要财富，不要众多的人民，也不要学识；不，我甚至不要升入天堂。让我一次又一次地投生，主啊，只将这一件事赐予我——让我对你拥有爱，且那爱是为爱而爱。"宗教史上的一个伟大里程碑在此出现——为爱而爱的理想，为工作而工作的理想，为责任而尽责的理想；这些话语第一次从那最伟大化身克里希纳的唇间落下，并在人类历史上，第一次落在印度这片土地上。恐惧的宗教与诱惑的宗教就此永远消逝，尽管有地狱的恐惧与天堂享乐的诱惑，最崇高的理想依然降临了——为爱而爱，为责任而尽责，为工作而工作。
那是怎样的一种爱！我刚才已告诉你们，牧女们的爱很难理解。在我们中间，不乏那些不能理解那段最为奇妙的插曲之奇妙意义的愚昧之人。让我重复说，在我们中间，甚至有些不洁的愚人，虽出自我们的血脉，却试图回避这一段，仿佛它是某种不洁之物。对于他们，我只有一句话要说：先使自己变得纯洁；你们必须记住，讲述牧女之爱历史的人，不是别人，正是舒卡提婆（Shuka Deva）。记录这段奇妙的牧女之爱的历史学家，是一位出生便纯洁的人，是那永远纯洁的舒卡，毗耶娑（Vyâsa）之子。只要心中存有自私，对神的爱便是不可能的；它不过是做生意："我给你些什么；哦，主啊，你也回报我些什么"；而主说："若你不这样做，我将在你死后好好照料你。我也许会在来世将你烘烤一生，"如此等等。只要这类念头还在头脑中，人怎能理解牧女们那疯狂悸动的爱？"哦，若能得到那双嘴唇的一吻，哪怕一吻！曾被你亲吻过的人，对你的渴望将永远增长，所有的苦恼都消散了，他忘记了对万物的爱，除了你和你，只有你。"是的，先忘记对黄金的爱，对名声与名誉的爱，对我们这细小可怜的世界的爱。然后，也只有到那时，你才能理解牧女们的爱——那圣洁得非舍弃一切才能触碰的爱，那圣洁得非灵魂变得完全纯洁才能理解的爱。那些心中每时每刻涌动着肉欲、金钱与名声念头的人，竟敢于批判和理解牧女们的爱！那便是克里希纳化身的精髓所在。甚至《薄伽梵歌》那宏大的哲学，也无法与那疯狂相提并论；因为在《薄伽梵歌》中，弟子被一步一步缓慢地教导如何向目标迈进，而这里是享受的疯狂，是爱的醉意，在这里，弟子与导师、教义与书籍，这一切都已融为一体；甚至对于恐惧、神与天堂的理念——一切都被抛掷在外。剩下的是爱的疯狂。那是对一切的遗忘，那爱者在世间除了克里希纳，除了克里希纳，再看不见其他，每个众生的面容都变成了克里希纳，他自己的面容也看似克里希纳，他自己的灵魂已被染上克里希纳的色彩。那便是伟大的克里希纳！
不要将时间浪费在细枝末节上。把握其生命的框架与精髓。克里希纳生平中或许有许多历史上的不一致，或许有许多添加插入之处。所有这些或许都是真的；然而与此同时，必然存在一个基础，一个根基，使得这一新的、巨大的开创成为可能。考察任何其他圣哲或先知的生平，我们都会发现，那位先知不过是他之前已有之物的演进，我们会发现，那位先知不过是在宣讲那些即便在他自己的时代也已在其国中流传的理念。关于那位先知是否真实存在，甚至可以存在巨大的疑问。然而在这里，我向任何人挑战：请证明这些事物——这些理想——为工作而工作，为爱而爱，为责任而尽责——并非克里希纳独有的原创思想；若是，那必然有某个人，这些理念首先从其而起。这些理念不可能是从任何人那里借来的。它们在克里希纳诞生之时，还未漂浮在大气之中。然而，主克里希纳是这些理念的第一位宣讲者，他的弟子毗耶娑（Vyasa）继承并向人类宣讲了这些理念。这是最高的理想图景。从他身上我们所能获得的最高的东西，是"牧女群中的爱人"（Gopijanavallabha），是温达班（Vrindaban）牧女们的至爱。当这种疯狂降临于你的头脑，当你理解了那受祝福的牧女们，你便会理解什么是爱。当整个世界消失，当所有其他的考量都已消亡，当你变得纯心，不再有其他目标，甚至不再追求真理，那时，也只有那时，那种爱的疯狂才会来临——那牧女们所拥有的那种爱的力量与威力，那无限之爱的力量，那为爱而爱的爱。那是目标。当你得到了那个，你便得到了一切。
来看一个较低的层面——克里希纳，《薄伽梵歌》的宣讲者。是的，印度现在有一种尝试，就像将马车置于马前。我们许多人认为，克里希纳作为牧女们的爱人，是某种有些怪异的东西，欧洲人也不太喜欢。某某博士不喜欢它。那自然，牧女们就得去！若没有欧洲人的认可，克里希纳怎能存在？他不能！在《摩诃婆罗多》（Mahabharata）中，除一两处之外，几乎没有提到牧女们，而那几处也并非特别引人注目的地方。在德罗帕蒂（Draupadi）的祷告中，有关于温达班生活的提及，在屋留卡（Shishupâla）的讲辞中，也再次提到这温达班。这些都是添加插入的！凡欧洲人不喜欢的：都必须被抛弃。那些都是添加，是对牧女们与克里希纳的提及！好吧，这些沉溺于商业主义之中的人，甚至连宗教的理想也变得商业化了，他们都在试图通过在此间做些什么来升入天堂；那班尼亚商人想要复利，想在此间积累些东西，在那里享受。牧女们在这样的思想体系中自然没有地位。从那位理想的爱人，我们来到了克里希纳的较低层面——《薄伽梵歌》的宣讲者。比《薄伽梵歌》更好的对吠陀的注疏，从未被写就，也不可能被写就。天启书或奥义书的精义，由于注疏家众多，各以其方式加以诠释，本难以被理解。然后，主本身来临了，祂就是天启书的启示者，作为《薄伽梵歌》的宣讲者，向我们展示其含义；而今日的印度别无所求，世界别无所求，胜过那种诠释的方法。令人惊奇的是，后来的经典注疏家，甚至在注释《薄伽梵歌》时，许多时候也不能领会其含义，许多时候也不能把握其旨趣。在《薄伽梵歌》中，你发现了什么，而在现代的注疏家中你又发现了什么？一位不二论的注疏家拿起一部奥义书；其中有许多二元论的段落，他扭曲折磨它们，试图赋予某种含义，要将它们全部纳入他自己的含义之中。若来了一位二元论的注疏家，有许多非二元论的文本，他开始对其施以折磨，要将它们全部纳入二元论的含义。然而你在《薄伽梵歌》中发现，没有任何试图折磨它们中任何一段的尝试。它们都是对的，主说；因为人类的灵魂缓缓地、逐步地向上攀升，一步一步，从粗糙到精细，从精细到更精细，直至达到绝对，达到目标。这便是《薄伽梵歌》中的内容。甚至业分（Karma Kanda）也被纳入，并表明，尽管它不能直接给予解脱，只能间接地给予，然而那也是有效的；图像是间接有效的；仪式、形式，一切都是有效的，只有一个条件——心灵的纯洁。因为只要心灵纯洁、心灵诚挚，礼拜便是有效的，并能引向目标；而所有这些不同的礼拜方式都是必要的，否则它们为何在那里？宗教与宗派不是虚伪和邪恶之人的杰作，如我们某些现代人所想的那样，说这些人发明了这一切以获取些许钱财。然而无论这种解释看起来多么合理，它并不是真实的，它们根本不是以那种方式被发明的。它们是人类灵魂需要的产物。它们都在这里，以满足不同类型的人类心灵的渴望与需求；你无需对它们加以宣扬抵制。当那种需求不再存在之日，它们将随着那种需求的消失而消失；只要那种需求存在，它们就必然存在，无论你如何宣扬，无论你如何批判。你可以动用刀剑或枪炮，你可以以人类的鲜血淹没这世界，然而只要有对偶像的需求，它们就必然存在。这些形式，以及宗教中所有不同的步骤，将会持续存在，而我们从主克里希纳（Shri Krishna）那里理解了为什么应当如此。
现在进入印度历史上一段较为黯淡的篇章。在《薄伽梵歌》中，我们已隐约听到各宗派冲突的遥远回响，主（Shri Krishna）介入其间，将它们全部加以调和；他是伟大的和谐宣扬者，最伟大的和谐导师，主克里希纳。他说："他们都如珍珠串于一线般，穿于我身上。"我们已经隐约听到这遥远的声音，冲突的低鸣；此后或许有过一段和谐宁静的时期，然后冲突以新的形式爆发，不仅在宗教的基础上，而且极可能在种姓的基础上——我们社群中两股强大力量，即王权与祭司权之间的争斗。从那场淹没印度近千年的浪潮的最高浪峰，我们看见另一位光辉的人物，那便是我们的乔达摩·释迦牟尼（Gautama Shâkyamuni）。诸位都了解他的教义与宣道。我们礼拜他为神的化身，世界上曾见过的最伟大、最大胆的道德宣讲者，最伟大的业力瑜伽师（Karma-Yogi）；仿佛作为他自己的弟子，同一个克里希纳再度降临，以示如何将他的理论付诸实践。曾经在《薄伽梵歌》中宣讲"即便是这种宗教中极细微之事，也能从大恐惧中拯救人"的同一个声音，再度响起。"女人，或吠舍（Vaishyas），或即便是首陀罗（Shudras），皆能抵达最高目标。"打破所有人的束缚，斩断所有人的枷锁，向所有人宣告达到最高目标的自由，《薄伽梵歌》的话语降临了，克里希纳那威严的声音如雷霆滚动："即便在今生，那心灵坚定地安住于同一性之中的人，已经克服了相对性，因为神是纯洁的，对一切同一，因此这样的人被称为活在神之中的人。""这样，在各处同样见到主的圣哲，不以自我伤害真我，因此达到最高目标。"仿佛是为了给予这一宣讲一个活生生的示范，仿佛是为了使其至少一部分付诸实践，那位宣讲者本身以另一种形态降临，那便是释迦牟尼——向穷人与苦难者宣讲的宣讲者，他甚至放弃了神明的语言，以人民的语言言说，以便能够触动人民的心灵；他放弃王位，与乞丐、穷人和贱民生活在一起，如第二位罗摩（Rama）般将首陀罗揽入胸怀。
诸位都了解他伟大的工作，他崇高的品格。然而这工作有一个重大的缺陷，为此我们至今仍在承受苦果。此过错不在于主本身。他是纯洁而光辉的，然而不幸的是，这样崇高的理想，无法被涌入雅利安怀抱的各个尚未开化、尚未教化的人类种族所充分消化。这些种族，带着各种各样的迷信和可怖的崇拜，涌入雅利安的怀抱，一度看似已趋于文明，然而不到一个世纪，他们便重新取出了他们的蛇、他们的鬼魂，以及他们的祖先曾经崇拜的一切，于是整个印度变成了一片堕落的迷信之地。早期的佛教徒在其对杀生的愤慨中，谴责了吠陀中的祭祀；而这些祭祀曾在每个家庭中举行。曾有一团火焰燃烧着，那便是礼拜仪式的全部器具。这些祭祀被消弭了，取而代之的，是华丽的寺庙、华丽的仪式、华丽的祭司，以及你在现代印度所见到的一切。当我读到某些现代人——那些本应有更深见识的人——所写的书籍，说佛陀是婆罗门偶像崇拜的摧毁者，我不禁莞尔。他们几乎不知道，正是佛教在印度创造了婆罗门教与偶像崇拜。
一两年前有一本书，是一位俄国绅士写的，他声称发现了一段关于耶稣基督极为奇特的生平，书中他说，基督曾前往贾格纳特（Jagannath）寺庙向婆罗门求学，但对其排外性与偶像感到厌倦，于是转而前往西藏的喇嘛处，修成圆满，然后回到了故乡。对于任何了解印度历史的人来说，这一陈述本身便证明了整件事是一个骗局，因为贾格纳特寺庙是一座古老的佛教寺庙。我们将它及其他一些寺庙接手并重新印度教化了。我们还将要做许多类似的事情。那就是贾格纳特，当时那里一个婆罗门都没有，而我们却被告知耶稣基督曾去那里向婆罗门学习。我们伟大的俄国考古学家是这样说的。
这样，尽管有对众生慈悲的宣讲，尽管有崇高的伦理宗教，尽管有关于一个永久灵魂的存在与否的细枝末节的争论，整个佛教的大厦还是分崩离析；而这崩溃实在是触目惊心的。我既没有时间，也没有倾向，来向诸位描述佛教遗留下来的那种丑陋。最为可怖的仪式，最骇人听闻的、最猥亵的书籍——人手所曾写就或人脑所曾构想的，最兽性的宗教形态，所有这些，都是堕落的佛教的产物。
然而印度必须继续存活，诸主的灵从天降临。那位宣告"每当美德衰微，我便降临"的主再度降临，这一次，显现在南方，那年轻的婆罗门崛起——据说他在十六岁时便已完成了他所有的著述；那奇妙的少年商羯罗阿阇黎（Shankaracharya）出现了。这位十六岁少年的著述，是现代世界的奇迹，那少年本身亦是如此。他希望将印度世界带回其原初的纯粹，然而想想他面前任务的浩大。我已向诸位讲述了当时形势的若干要点。所有这些你们试图改革的丑陋，都是那段堕落统治的产物。鞑靼人（Tartars）、俾路支人（Baluchis）以及所有人类中最野蛮的种族来到印度，成为佛教徒，与我们同化，带来了他们的民族习俗，使我们整个民族生活成了一页最为可怖、最为兽性习俗的巨大篇章。那便是那少年从佛教徒那里继承的遗产；而从那时起直到今日，印度的全部工作，便是吠檀多对这种佛教堕落的重新征服。这一工作至今仍在进行，尚未完成。商羯罗（Shankara）来了，作为一位伟大的哲学家，他表明，佛教与吠檀多的真实精髓并无根本的不同，然而弟子们并未理解导师，已经自我堕落，否认了灵魂和神的存在，沦为无神论者。这便是商羯罗所表明的，所有的佛教徒开始回归旧有的宗教。然而他们已经习惯于所有这些形式，又该如何处置呢？
于是来了那光辉的罗摩奴阇（Râmânuja）。商羯罗拥有伟大的智慧，我担心，他的心灵不如他的智慧那般伟大。罗摩奴阇的心灵更为宽大。他对被践踏的人怀有感情，对他们充满同情。他接受了那些积累起来的仪式，尽可能地加以净化，并为那些绝对需要这些仪式的人设立了新的仪式、新的礼拜方式。与此同时，他向所有人敞开了最高灵性礼拜的门——从婆罗门直至首陀罗。那便是罗摩奴阇的工作。那工作滚滚向前，侵入北方，被那里的一些伟大领袖所接受；然而那是很久以后的事，是在穆斯林统治时期；而在北方那些比较近代的先知们中，最为光辉的，是柴坦尼亚（Chaitanya）。
你们可以注意到自罗摩奴阇时代以来的一个特点——向所有人敞开灵性之门。这是所有在商羯罗之后继起的先知们的旗帜，正如它也是所有在商羯罗之前的先知们的旗帜。我不明白为何商羯罗被呈现为相当排外；我在他的著述中找不到任何排外的东西。正如佛陀（Lord Buddha）的宣告，被归咎于商羯罗教义的那种排外性，极可能不是来自他的教义，而是来自他弟子们的无能。这位北方的伟大圣哲柴坦尼亚，体现了牧女们那疯狂的爱。他本人是婆罗门，出身于当时最为理性主义的家族之一，本人是一位逻辑学教授，以争斗和赢得言辞胜利为业——因为这是他从幼年起所学到的生命的最高理想——然而通过某位圣哲的慈悲，那个人的整个生命发生了改变；他放弃了争斗、纷争，放弃了逻辑学教职，成为世界上所曾有过的最伟大的虔信（Bhakti）导师之一——疯狂的柴坦尼亚。他的虔信席卷孟加拉全境，给每一个人带来了安慰。他的爱无边无际。圣人或罪人，印度教徒或穆斯林，纯洁或不洁，妓女，街头流浪者——所有人都分享了他的爱，所有人都分享了他的慈悲；即便到今日，尽管随着时间的推移一切都大为衰退，他的宗派依然是穷人、被践踏者、被逐出者、软弱者、被所有社会所拒绝者的庇护所。然而我必须为了真相而说，我们发现这样一点：在哲学宗派中，我们发现了奇妙的自由主义。遵循商羯罗的人，没有一个会说印度的各个宗派真的是不同的。与此同时，他在种姓问题上是极度排外的坚定支持者。然而在每一个毗湿奴派（Vaishnavite）宣道者那里，我们发现，在种姓问题的教义上有着奇妙的自由主义，然而在宗教问题上却是排外的。
一位有伟大的头脑，另一位有宽广的心灵，而那诞生一位将这头脑与心灵合而为一之人的时机已经成熟——那时机已经成熟，一位能在同一个身体中兼具商羯罗那光辉灿烂的智慧、与柴坦尼亚那奇妙宽广无限的心灵之人将要诞生；那个人，他能在每一个宗派中看见同一灵性的运作，同一个神；那个人，他能在每一个众生中见到神，他的心灵将为穷人、为软弱者、为被逐出者、为被践踏者、为这世界中无论是印度还是印度之外的每一个人而哭泣；而同时，他那宏大光辉的智慧，将构想出如此崇高的思想，能使不仅是印度内部，而且印度之外一切相互冲突的宗派得到和谐，带来那奇妙的和谐，那头脑与心灵合而为一的普世宗教降临于世。这样的一个人诞生了，我有幸在其脚下坐了多年。那时机已经成熟，这样的一个人诞生实属必要，而他来了；其中最为奇妙的部分，是他的生命工作就在一座充满西方思想的城市旁边——那城市曾疯狂地追随那些西方的理念，那城市比印度任何其他城市都更加西化。就在那里，他生活着，毫无书本知识；这位伟大的智慧，甚至从未学会用自己的名字写作，然而我们大学中最高学历的毕业生，都在他身上发现了一位智识上的巨人。他是一个奇特的人，这位斯里·罗摩克里希纳·帕拉马汉萨（Shri Ramakrishna Paramahamsa）。这是一个漫长的、漫长的故事，今晚我没有时间讲述关于他的任何事情。让我现在只提及伟大的斯里·罗摩克里希纳（Shri Ramakrishna），印度圣哲们的圆满，时代的圣哲，其教义在今日、在当今时代最为有益的人。请注意那在这个人身后运作的神圣力量。一位穷婆罗门的儿子，生于一座偏僻无名的村庄，默默无闻，如今在欧洲和美洲字面意义上被成千上万的人所礼拜，明日将被更多的人所礼拜。谁能知道主的计划！
现在，我的兄弟们，若你们看不到那只手，看不到天意的手指，那是因为你们是盲人，确实是生来就盲。若时机来临，若有另一个机会，我将向你们更充分地讲述他。现在只让我说，若我向你们说了一句真话，那是他的，唯独是他的；若我向你们说了许多不是真实的、不正确的、对人类没有益处的话，那些都是我自己的，责任在我。
注记
English
THE SAGES OF INDIA
In speaking of the sages of India, my mind goes back to those periods of which history has no record, and tradition tries in vain to bring the secrets out of the gloom of the past. The sages of India have been almost innumerable, for what has the Hindu nation been doing for thousands of years except producing sages? I will take, therefore, the lives of a few of the most brilliant ones, the epoch-makers, and present them before you, that is to say, my study of them.
In the first place, we have to understand a little about our scriptures. Two ideals of truth are in our scriptures; the one is, what we call the eternal, and the other is not so authoritative, yet binding under particular circumstances, times, and places. The eternal relations which deal with the nature of the soul, and of God, and the relations between souls and God are embodied in what we call the Shrutis, the Vedas. The next set of truths is what we call the Smritis, as embodied in the words of Manu. Yâjnavalkya, and other writers and also in the Purânas, down to the Tantras. The second class of books and teachings is subordinate to the Shrutis, inasmuch as whenever any one of these contradicts anything in the Shrutis, the Shrutis must prevail. This is the law. The idea is that the framework of the destiny and goal of man has been all delineated in the Vedas, the details have been left to be worked out in the Smritis and Puranas. As for general directions, the Shrutis are enough; for spiritual life, nothing more can be said, nothing more can be known. All that is necessary has been known, all the advice that is necessary to lead the soul to perfection has been completed in the Shrutis; the details alone were left out, and these the Smritis have supplied from time to time.
Another peculiarity is that these Shrutis have many sages as the recorders of the truths in them, mostly men, even some women. Very little is known of their personalities, the dates of their birth, and so forth, but their best thoughts, their best discoveries, I should say, are preserved there, embodied in the sacred literature of our country, the Vedas. In the Smritis, on the other hand, personalities are more in evidence. Startling, gigantic, impressive, world-moving persons stand before us, as it were, for the first time, sometimes of more magnitude even than their teachings.
This is a peculiarity which we have to understand — that our religion preaches an Impersonal Personal God. It preaches any amount of impersonal laws plus any amount of personality, but the very fountain-head of our religion is in the Shrutis, the Vedas, which are perfectly impersonal; the persons all come in the Smritis and Puranas — the great Avatâras, Incarnations of God, Prophets, and so forth. And this ought also to be observed that except our religion every other religion in the world depends upon the life or lives of some personal founder or founders. Christianity is built upon the life of Jesus Christ, Mohammedanism upon Mohammed, Buddhism upon Buddha, Jainism upon the Jinas, and so on. It naturally follows that there must be in all these religions a good deal of fight about what they call the historical evidences of these great personalities. If at any time the historical evidences about the existence of these personages in ancient times become weak, the whole building of the religion tumbles down and is broken to pieces. We escaped this fate because our religion is not based upon persons but on principles. That you obey your religion is not because it came through the authority of a sage, no, not even of an Incarnation. Krishna is not the authority of the Vedas, but the Vedas are the authority of Krishna himself. His glory is that he is the greatest preacher of the Vedas that ever existed. So with the other Incarnations; so with all our sages. Our first principle is that all that is necessary for the perfection of man and for attaining unto freedom is there in the Vedas. You cannot find anything new. You cannot go beyond a perfect unity, which is the goal of all knowledge; this has been already reached there, and it is impossible to go beyond the unity. Religious knowledge became complete when Tat Twam Asi (Thou art That) was discovered, and that was in the Vedas. What remained was the guidance of people from time to time according to different times and places, according to different circumstances and environments; people had to be guided along the old, old path, and for this these great teachers came, these great sages. Nothing can bear out more clearly this position than the celebrated saying of Shri Krishna in the Gitâ: "Whenever virtue subsides and irreligion prevails, I create Myself for the protection of the good; for the destruction of all immorality I am coming from time to time." This is the idea in India.
What follows? That on the one hand, there are these eternal principles which stand upon their own foundations without depending on any reasoning even, much less on the authority of sages however great, of Incarnations however brilliant they may have been. We may remark that as this is the unique position in India, our claim is that the Vedanta only can be the universal religion, that it is already the existing universal religion in the world, because it teaches principles and not persons. No religion built upon a person can be taken up as a type by all the races of mankind. In our own country we find that there have been so many grand characters; in even a small city many persons are taken up as types by the different minds in that one city. How is it possible that one person as Mohammed or Buddha or Christ, can be taken up as the one type for the whole world, nay, that the whole of morality, ethics, spirituality, and religion can be true only from the sanction of that one person, and one person alone? Now, the Vedantic religion does not require any such personal authority. Its sanction is the eternal nature of man, its ethics are based upon the eternal spiritual solidarity of man, already existing, already attained and not to be attained. On the other hand, from the very earliest times, our sages have been feeling conscious of this fact that the vast majority of mankind require a personality. They must have a Personal God in some form or other. The very Buddha who declared against the existence of a Personal God had not died fifty years before his disciples manufactured a Personal God out of him. The Personal God is necessary, and at the same time we know that instead of and better than vain imaginations of a Personal God, which in ninety-nine cases out of a hundred are unworthy of human worship we have in this world, living and walking in our midst, living Gods, now and then. These are more worthy of worship than any imaginary God, any creation of our imagination, that is to say, any idea of God which we can form. Shri Krishna is much greater than any idea of God you or I can have. Buddha is a much higher idea, a more living and idolised idea, than the ideal you or I can conceive of in our minds; and therefore it is that they always command the worship of mankind even to the exclusion of all imaginary deities.
This our sages knew, and, therefore, left it open to all Indian people to worship such great Personages, such Incarnations. Nay, the greatest of these Incarnations goes further: "Wherever an extraordinary spiritual power is manifested by external man, know that I am there, it is from Me that that manifestation comes." That leaves the door open for the Hindu to worship the Incarnations of all the countries in the world. The Hindu can worship any sage and any saint from any country whatsoever, and as a fact we know that we go and worship many times in the churches of the Christians, and many, many times in the Mohammedan mosques, and that is good. Why not? Ours, as I have said, is the universal religion. It is inclusive enough, it is broad enough to include all the ideals. All the ideals of religion that already exist in the world can be immediately included, and we can patiently wait for all the ideals that are to come in the future to be taken in the same fashion, embraced in the infinite arms of the religion of the Vedanta.
This, more or less, is our position with regard to the great sages, the Incarnations of God. There are also secondary characters. We find the word Rishi again and again mentioned in the Vedas, and it has become a common word at the present time. The Rishi is the great authority. We have to understand that idea. The definition is that the Rishi is the Mantra-drashtâ, the seer of thought. What is the proof of religion? — this was asked in very ancient times. There is no proof in the senses was the declaration.यतो वाचो निवर्तन्ते अप्राप्य मनसा सह — "From whence words reflect back with thought without reaching the goal." न तत्र चक्षुर्गच्छति न वाग्गच्छति नो मनः । — "There the eyes cannot reach, neither can speech, nor the mind" — that has been the declaration for ages and ages. Nature outside cannot give us any answer as to the existence of the soul, the existence of God, the eternal life, the goal of man, and all that. This mind is continually changing, always in a state of flux; it is finite, it is broken into pieces. How can nature tell of the Infinite, the Unchangeable, the Unbroken, the Indivisible, the Eternal? It never can. And whenever mankind has striven to get an answer from dull dead matter, history shows how disastrous the results have been. How comes, then, the knowledge which the Vedas declare? It comes through being a Rishi. This knowledge is not in the senses; but are the senses the be-all and the end-all of the human being? Who dare say that the senses are the all-in-all of man? Even in our lives, in the life of every one of us here, there come moments of calmness, perhaps, when we see before us the death of one we loved, when some shock comes to us, or when extreme blessedness comes to us. Many other occasions there are when the mind, as it were, becomes calm, feels for the moment its real nature; and a glimpse of the Infinite beyond, where words cannot reach nor the mind go, is revealed to us. This happens in ordinary life, but it has to be heightened, practiced, perfected. Men found out ages ago that the soul is not bound or limited by the senses, no, not even by consciousness. We have to understand that this consciousness is only the name of one link in the infinite chain. Being is not identical with consciousness, but consciousness is only one part of Being. Beyond consciousness is where the bold search lies. Consciousness is bound by the senses. Beyond that, beyond the senses, men must go in order to arrive at truths of the spiritual world, and there are even now persons who succeed in going beyond the bounds of the senses. These are called Rishis, because they come face to face with spiritual truths.
The proof, therefore, of the Vedas is just the same as the proof of this table before me, Pratyaksha, direct perception. This I see with the senses, and the truths of spirituality we also see in a superconscious state of the human soul. This Rishi-state is not limited by time or place, by sex or race. Vâtsyâyana boldly declares that this Rishihood is the common property of the descendants of the sage, of the Aryan, of the non-Aryan, of even the Mlechchha. This is the sageship of the Vedas, and constantly we ought to remember this ideal of religion in India, which I wish other nations of the world would also remember and learn, so that there may be less fight and less quarrel. Religion is not in books, nor in theories, nor in dogmas, nor in talking, not even in reasoning. It is being and becoming. Ay, my friends, until each one of you has become a Rishi and come face to face with spiritual facts, religious life has not begun for you. Until the superconscious opens for you, religion is mere talk, it is nothing but preparation. You are talking second-hand, third-hand, and here applies that beautiful saying of Buddha when he had a discussion with some Brahmins. They came discussing about the nature of Brahman, and the great sage asked, "Have you seen Brahman?" "No, said the Brahmin; "Or your father?" "No, neither has he"; "Or your grandfather?" "I don't think even he saw Him." "My friend, how can you discuss about a person whom your father and grandfather never saw, and try to put each other down?" That is what the whole world is doing. Let us say in the language of the Vedanta, "This Atman is not to be reached by too much talk, no, not even by the highest intellect, no, not even by the study of the Vedas themselves."
Let us speak to all the nations of the world in the language of the Vedas: Vain are your fights and your quarrels; have you seen God whom you want to preach? If you have not seen, vain is your preaching; you do not know what you say; and if you have seen God, you will not quarrel, your very face will shine. An ancient sage of the Upanishads sent his son out to learn about Brahman, and the child came back, and the father asked, "what have you learnt?" The child replied he had learnt so many sciences. But the father said, "That is nothing, go back." And the son went back, and when he returned again the father asked the same question, and the same answer came from the child. Once more he had to go back. And the next time he came, his whole face was shining; and his father stood up and declared, "Ay, today, my child, your face shines like a knower of Brahman." When you have known God, your very face will be changed, your voice will be changed, your whole appearance will he changed. You will be a blessing to mankind; none will be able to resist the Rishi. This is the Rishihood, the ideal in our religion. The rest, all these talks and reasonings and philosophies and dualisms and monisms, and even the Vedas themselves are but preparations, secondary things. The other is primary. The Vedas, grammar, astronomy, etc., all these are secondary; that is supreme knowledge which makes us realise the Unchangeable One. Those who realised are the sages whom we find in the Vedas; and we understand how this Rishi is the name of a type, of a class, which every one of us, as true Hindus, is expected to become at some period of our life, and becoming which, to the Hindu, means salvation. Not belief in doctrines, not going to thousands of temples, nor bathing in all the rivers in the world, but becoming the Rishi, the Mantra-drashta — that is freedom, that is salvation.
Coming down to later times, there have been great world-moving sages, great Incarnations of whom there have been many; and according to the Bhâgavata, they also are infinite in number, and those that are worshipped most in India are Râma and Krishna. Rama, the ancient idol of the heroic ages, the embodiment of truth, of morality, the ideal son, the ideal husband, the ideal father, and above all, the ideal king, this Rama has been presented before us by the great sage Vâlmiki. No language can be purer, none chaster, none more beautiful and at the same time simpler than the language in which the great poet has depicted the life of Rama. And what to speak of Sitâ? You may exhaust the literature of the world that is past, and I may assure you that you will have to exhaust the literature of the world of the future, before finding another Sita. Sita is unique; that character was depicted once and for all. There may have been several Ramas, perhaps, but never more than one Sita! She is the very type of the true Indian woman, for all the Indian ideals of a perfected woman have grown out of that one life of Sita; and here she stands these thousands of years, commanding the worship of every man, woman, and child throughout the length and breadth of the land of Âryâvarta. There she will always be, this glorious Sita, purer than purity itself, all patience, and all suffering. She who suffered that life of suffering without a murmur, she the ever-chaste and ever-pure wife, she the ideal of the people, the ideal of the gods, the great Sita, our national God she must always remain. And every one of us knows her too well to require much delineation. All our mythology may vanish, even our Vedas may depart, and our Sanskrit language may vanish for ever, but so long as there will be five Hindus living here, even if only speaking the most vulgar patois, there will be the story of Sita present. Mark my words: Sita has gone into the very vitals of our race. She is there in the blood of every Hindu man and woman; we are all children of Sita. Any attempt to modernise our women, if it tries to take our women away from that ideal of Sita, is immediately a failure, as we see every day. The women of India must grow and develop in the footprints of Sita, and that is the only way.
The next is He who is worshipped in various forms, the favourite ideal of men as well as of women, the ideal of children, as well as of grown-up men. I mean He whom the writer of the Bhagavata was not content to call an Incarnation but says, "The other Incarnations were but parts of the Lord. He, Krishna, was the Lord Himself." And it is not strange that such adjectives are applied to him when we marvel at the many-sidedness of his character. He was the most wonderful Sannyasin, and the most wonderful householder in one; he had the most wonderful amount of Rajas, power, and was at the same time living in the midst of the most wonderful renunciation. Krishna can never he understood until you have studied the Gita, for he was the embodiment of his own teaching. Every one of these Incarnations came as a living illustration of what they came to preach. Krishna, the preacher of the Gita, was all his life the embodiment of that Song Celestial; he was the great illustration of non-attachment. He gives up his throne and never cares for it. He, the leader of India, at whose word kings come down from their thrones, never wants to be a king. He is the simple Krishna, ever the same Krishna who played with the Gopis. Ah, that most marvellous passage of his life, the most difficult to understand, and which none ought to attempt to understand until he has become perfectly chaste and pure, that most marvellous expansion of love, allegorised and expressed in that beautiful play at Vrindâban, which none can understand but he who has become mad with love, drunk deep of the cup of love! Who can understand the throes of the lore of the Gopis — the very ideal of love, love that wants nothing, love that even does not care for heaven, love that does not care for anything in this world or the world to come? And here, my friends, through this love of the Gopis has been found the only solution of the conflict between the Personal and the Impersonal God. We know how the Personal God is the highest point of human life; we know that it is philosophical to believe in an Impersonal God immanent in the universe, of whom everything is but a manifestation. At the same time our souls hanker after something concrete, something which we want to grasp, at whose feet we can pour out our soul, and so on. The Personal God is therefore the highest conception of human nature. Yet reason stands aghast at such an idea. It is the same old, old question which you find discussed in the Brahma-Sutras, which you find Draupadi discussing with Yudhishthira in the forest: If there is a Personal God, all-merciful, all-powerful, why is the hell of an earth here, why did He create this? — He must be a partial God. There was no solution, and the only solution that can be found is what you read about the love of the Gopis. They hated every adjective that was applied to Krishna; they did not care to know that he was the Lord of creation, they did not care to know that he was almighty, they did not care to know that he was omnipotent, and so forth. The only thing they understood was that he was infinite Love, that was all. The Gopis understood Krishna only as the Krishna of Vrindaban. He, the leader of the hosts, the King of kings, to them was the shepherd, and the shepherd for ever. "I do not want wealth, nor many people, nor do I want learning; no, not even do I want to go to heaven. Let one be born again and again, but Lord, grant me this, that I may have love for Thee, and that for love's sake." A great landmark in the history of religion is here, the ideal of love for love's sake, work for work's sake, duty for duty's sake, and it for the first time fell from the lips of the greatest of Incarnations, Krishna, and for the first time in the history of humanity, upon the soil of India. The religions of fear and of temptations were gone for ever, and in spite of the fear of hell and temptation of enjoyment in heaven, came the grandest of ideals, love for love's sake, duty for duty's sake, work for work's sake.
And what a love! I have told you just now that it is very difficult to understand the love of the Gopis. There are not wanting fools, even in the midst of us, who cannot understand the marvellous significance of that most marvellous of all episodes. There are, let me repeat, impure fools, even born of our blood, who try to shrink from that as if from something impure. To them I have only to say, first make yourselves pure; and you must remember that he who tells the history of the love of the Gopis is none else but Shuka Deva. The historian who records this marvellous love of the Gopis is one who was born pure, the eternally pure Shuka, the son of Vyâsa. So long as there its selfishness in the heart, so long is love of God impossible; it is nothing but shopkeeping: "I give you something; O Lord, you give me something in return"; and says the Lord, "If you do not do this, I will take good care of you when you die. I will roast you all the rest of your lives. perhaps", and so on. So long as such ideas are in the brain, how can one understand the mad throes of the Gopis' love? "O for one, one kiss of those lips! One who has been kissed by Thee, his thirst for Thee increases for ever, all sorrows vanish, and he forgets love for everything else but for Thee and Thee alone." Ay, forget first the love for gold, and name and fame, and for this little trumpery world of ours. Then, only then, you will understand the love of the Gopis, too holy to be attempted without giving up everything, too sacred co be understood until the soul has become perfectly pure. People with ideas of sex, and of money, and of fame, bubbling up every minute in the heart, daring to criticise and understand the love of the Gopis! That is the very essence of the Krishna Incarnation. Even the Gita, the great philosophy itself, does not compare with that madness, for in the Gita the disciple is taught slowly how to walk towards the goal, but here is the madness of enjoyment, the drunkenness of love, where disciples and teachers and teachings and books and all these things have become one; even the ideas of fear, and God, and heaven — everything has been thrown away. What remains is the madness of love. It is forgetfulness of everything, and the lover sees nothing in the world except that Krishna and Krishna alone, when the face of every being becomes a Krishna, when his own face looks like Krishna, when his own soul has become tinged with the Krishna colour. That was the great Krishna!
Do not waste your time upon little details. Take up the framework, the essence of the life. There may be many historical discrepancies, there may be interpolations in the life of Krishna. All these things may be true; but, at the same time, there must have been a basis, a foundation for this new and tremendous departure. Taking the life of any other sage or prophet, we find that that prophet is only the evolution of what had gone before him, we find that that prophet is only preaching the ideas that had been scattered about his own country even in his own times. Great doubts may exist even as to whether that prophet existed or not. But here, I challenge any one to show whether these things, these ideals — work for work's sake, love for love's sake, duty for duty's sake, were not original ideas with Krishna, and as such, there must have been someone with whom these ideas originated. They could not have been borrowed from anybody else. They were not floating about in the atmosphere when Krishna was born. But the Lord Krishna was the first preacher of this; his disciple Vyasa took it up and preached it unto mankind. This is the highest idea to picture. The highest thing we can get out of him is Gopijanavallabha, the Beloved of the Gopis of Vrindaban. When that madness comes in your brain, when you understand the blessed Gopis, then you will understand what love is. When the whole world will vanish, when all other considerations will have died out, when you will become pure-hearted with no other aim, not even the search after truth, then and then alone will come to you the madness of that love, the strength and the power of that infinite love which the Gopis had, that love for love's sake. That is the goal. When you have got that, you have got everything.
To come down to the lower stratum — Krishna, the preacher of the Gita. Ay, there is an attempt in India now which is like putting the cart before the horse. Many of our people think that Krishna as the lover of the Gopis is something rather uncanny, and the Europeans do not like it much. Dr. So-and-so does not like it. Certainly then, the Gopis have to go! Without the sanction of Europeans how can Krishna live? He cannot! In the Mahabharata there is no mention of the Gopis except in one or two places, and those not very remarkable places. In the prayer of Draupadi there is mention of a Vrindaban life, and in the speech of Shishupâla there is again mention of this Vrindaban. All these are interpolations! What the Europeans do not want: must be thrown off. They are interpolations, the mention of the Gopis and of Krishna too! Well, with these men, steeped in commercialism, where even the ideal of religion has become commercial, they are all trying to go to heaven by doing something here; the bania wants compound interest, wants to lay by something here and enjoy it there. Certainly the Gopis have no place in such a system of thought. From that ideal lover we come down to the lower stratum of Krishna, the preacher of the Gita. Than the Gita no better commentary on the Vedas has been written or can be written. The essence of the Shrutis, or of the Upanishads, is hard to be understood, seeing that there are so many commentators, each one trying to interpret in his own way. Then the Lord Himself comes, He who is the inspirer of the Shrutis, to show us the meaning of them, as the preacher of the Gita, and today India wants nothing better, the world wants nothing better than that method of interpretation. It is a wonder that subsequent interpreters of the scriptures, even commenting upon the Gita, many times could not catch the meaning, many times could not catch the drift. For what do you find in the Gita, and what in modern commentators? One non-dualistic commentator takes up an Upanishad; there are so many dualistic passages, and he twists and tortures them into some meaning, and wants to bring them all into a meaning of his own. If a dualistic commentator comes, there are so many nondualistic texts which he begins to torture, to bring them all round to dualistic meaning. But you find in the Gita there is no attempt at torturing any one of them. They are all right, says the Lord; for slowly and gradually the human soul rises up and up, step after step, from the gross to the fine, from the fine to the finer, until it reaches the Absolute, the goal. That is what is in the Gita. Even the Karma Kanda is taken up, and it is shown that although it cannot give salvation direct; but only indirectly, yet that is also valid; images are valid indirectly; ceremonies, forms, everything is valid only with one condition, purity of the heart. For worship is valid and leads to the goal if the heart is pure and the heart is sincere; and all these various modes of worship are necessary, else why should they be there? Religions and sects are not the work of hypocrites and wicked people who invented all these to get a little money, as some of our modern men want to think. However reasonable that explanation may seem, it is not true, and they were not invented that way at all. They are the outcome of the necessity of the human soul. They are all here to satisfy the hankering and thirst of different classes of human minds, and you need not preach against them. The day when that necessity will cease, they will vanish along with the cessation of that necessity; and so long as that necessity remains, they must be there in spite of your preaching, in spite of your criticism. You may bring the sword or the gun into play, you may deluge the world with human blood, but so long as there is a necessity for idols, they must remain. These forms, and all the various steps in religion will remain, and we understand from the Lord Shri Krishna why they should.
A rather sadder chapter of India's history comes now. In the Gita we already hear the distant sound of the conflicts of sects, and the Lord comes in the middle to harmonise them all; He, the great preacher of harmony, the greatest teacher of harmony, Lord Shri Krishna. He says, "In Me they are all strung like pearls upon a thread." We already hear the distant sounds, the murmurs of the conflict, and possibly there was a period of harmony and calmness, when it broke out anew, not only on religious grounds, but roost possibly on caste grounds — the fight between the two powerful factors in our community, the kings and the priests. And from the topmost crest of the wave that deluged India for nearly a thousand years, we see another glorious figure, and that was our Gautama Shâkyamuni. You all know about his teachings and preachings. We worship him as God incarnate, the greatest, the boldest preacher of morality that the world ever saw, the greatest Karma-Yogi; as disciple of himself, as it were, the same Krishna came to show how to make his theories practical. There came once again the same voice that in the Gita preached, "Even the least bit done of this religion saves from great fear". "Women, or Vaishyas, or even Shudras, all reach the highest goal." Breaking the bondages of all, the chains of all, declaring liberty to all to reach the highest goal, come the words of the Gita, rolls like thunder the mighty voice of Krishna: "Even in this life they have conquered relativity, whose minds are firmly fixed upon the sameness, for God is pure and the same to all, therefore such are said to be living in God." "Thus seeing the same Lord equally present everywhere, the sage does not injure the Self by the self, and thus reaches the highest goal." As it were to give a living example of this preaching, as it were to make at least one part of it practical, the preacher himself came in another form, and this was Shakyamuni, the preacher to the poor and the miserable, he who rejected even the language of the gods to speak in the language of the people, so that he might reach the hearts of the people, he who gave up a throne to live with beggars, and the poor, and the downcast, he who pressed the Pariah to his breast like a second Rama.
You all know about his great work, his grand character. But the work had one great defect, and for that we are suffering even today. No blame attaches to the Lord. He is pure and glorious, but unfortunately such high ideals could not be well assimilated by the different uncivilised and uncultured races of mankind who flocked within the fold of the Aryans. These races, with varieties of superstition and hideous worship, rushed within the fold of the Aryans and for a time appeared as if they had become civilised, but before a century had passed they brought out their snakes, their ghosts, and all the other things their ancestors used to worship, and thus the whole of India became one degraded mass of superstition. The earlier Buddhists in their rage against the killing of animals had denounced the sacrifices of the Vedas; and these sacrifices used to be held in every house. There was a fire burning, and that was all the paraphernalia of worship. These sacrifices were obliterated, and in their place came gorgeous temples, gorgeous ceremonies, and gorgeous priests, and all that you see in India in modern times. I smile when I read books written by some modern people who ought to have known better, that the Buddha was the destroyer of Brahminical idolatry. Little do they know that Buddhism created Brahminism and idolatry in India.
There was a book written a year or two ago by a Russian gentleman, who claimed to have found out a very curious life of Jesus Christ, and in one part of the book he says that Christ went to the temple of Jagannath to study with the Brahmins, but became disgusted with their exclusiveness and their idols, and so he went to the Lamas of Tibet instead, became perfect, and went home. To any man who knows anything about Indian history, that very statement proves that the whole thing was a fraud, because the temple of Jagannath is an old Buddhistic temple. We took this and others over and re-Hinduised them. We shall have to do many things like that yet. That is Jagannath, and there was not one Brahmin there then, and yet we are told that Jesus Christ came to study with the Brahmins there. So says our great Russian archaeologist.
Thus, in spite of the preaching of mercy to animals, in spite of the sublime ethical religion, in spite of the hairsplitting discussions about the existence or non-existence of a permanent soul, the whole building of Buddhism tumbled down piecemeal; and the ruin was simply hideous. I have neither the time nor the inclination to describe to you the hideousness that came in the wake of Buddhism. The most hideous ceremonies, the most horrible, the most obscene books that human hands ever wrote or the human brain ever conceived, the most bestial forms that ever passed under the name of religion, have all been the creation of degraded Buddhism.
But India has to live, and the spirit of the Lords descended again. He who declared, "I will come whenever virtue subsides", came again, and this time the manifestation was in the South, and up rose that young Brahmin of whom it has been declared that at the age of sixteen he had completed all his writings; the marvellous boy Shankaracharya arose. The writings of this boy of sixteen are the wonders of the modern world, and so was the boy. He wanted to bring back the Indian world to its pristine purity, but think of the amount of the task before him. I have told you a few points about the state of things that existed in India. All these horrors that you are trying to reform are the outcome of that reign of degradation. The Tartars and the Baluchis and all the hideous races of mankind came to India and became Buddhists, and assimilated with us, and brought their national customs, and the whole of our national life became a huge page of the most horrible and the most bestial customs. That was the inheritance which that boy got from the Buddhists, and from that time to this, the whole work in India is a reconquest of this Buddhistic degradation by the Vedanta. It is still going on, it is not yet finished. Shankara came, a great philosopher, and showed that the real essence of Buddhism and that of the Vedanta are not very different, but that the disciples did not understand the Master and have degraded themselves, denied the existence of the soul and of God, and have become atheists. That was what Shankara showed, and all the Buddhists began to come back to the old religion. But then they had become accustomed to all these forms; what could be done?
Then came the brilliant Râmânuja. Shankara, with his great intellect, I am afraid, had not as great a heart. Ramanuja's heart was greater. He felt for the downtrodden, he sympathised with them. He took up the ceremonies, the accretions that had gathered, made them pure so far as they could be, and instituted new ceremonies, new methods of worship, for the people who absolutely required them. At the same time he opened the door to the highest; spiritual worship from the Brahmin to the Pariah. That was Ramanuja's work. That work rolled on, invaded the North, was taken up by some great leaders there; but that was much later, during the Mohammedan rule; and the brightest of these prophets of comparatively modern times in the North was Chaitanya.
You may mark one characteristic since the time of Ramanuja — the opening of the door of spirituality to every one. That has been the watchword of all prophets succeeding Ramanuja, as it had been the watchword of all the prophets before Shankara. I do not know why Shankara should be represented as rather exclusive; I do not find anything in his writings which is exclusive. As in the case of the declarations of the Lord Buddha, this exclusiveness that has been attributed to Shankara's teachings is most possibly not due to his teachings, but to the incapacity of his disciples. This one great Northern sage, Chaitanya, represented the mad love of the Gopis. Himself a Brahmin, born of one of the most rationalistic families of the day, himself a professor of logic fighting and gaining a word-victory — for, this he had learnt from his childhood as the highest ideal of life and yet through the mercy of some sage the whole life of that man became changed; he gave up his fight, his quarrels, his professorship of logic and became one of the greatest teachers of Bhakti the world has ever known — mad Chaitanya. His Bhakti rolled over the whole land of Bengal, bringing solace to every one. His love knew no bounds. The saint or the sinner, the Hindu or the Mohammedan, the pure or the impure, the prostitute, the streetwalker — all had a share in his love, all had a share in his mercy: and even to the present day, although greatly degenerated, as everything does become in time, his sect is the refuge of the poor, of the downtrodden, of the outcast, of the weak, of those who have been rejected by all society. But at the same time I must remark for truth's sake that we find this: In the philosophic sects we find wonderful liberalisms. There is not a man who follows Shankara who will say that all the different sects of India are really different. At the same time he was a tremendous upholder of exclusiveness as regards caste. But with every Vaishnavite preacher we find a wonderful liberalism as to the teaching of caste questions, but exclusiveness as regards religious questions.
The one had a great head, the other a large heart, and the time was ripe for one to be born, the embodiment of both this head and heart; the time was ripe for one to be born who in one body would have the brilliant intellect of Shankara and the wonderfully expansive, infinite heart of Chaitanya; one who would see in every sect the same spirit working, the same God; one who would see God in every being, one whose heart would weep for the poor, for the weak, for the outcast, for the downtrodden, for every one in this world, inside India or outside India; and at the same time whose grand brilliant intellect would conceive of such noble thoughts as would harmonise all conflicting sects, not only in India but outside of India, and bring a marvellous harmony, the universal religion of head and heart into existence. Such a man was born, and I had the good fortune to sit at his feet for years. The time was ripe, it was necessary that such a man should be born, and he came; and the most wonderful part of it was that his life's work was just near a city which was full of Western thought, a city which had run mad after these occidental ideas, a city which had become more Europeanised than any other city in India. There he lived, without any book-learning whatsoever; this great intellect never learnt even to write his own name, but the most graduates of our university found in him an intellectual giant. He was a strange man, this Shri Ramakrishna Paramahamsa. It is a long, long story, and I have no time to tell anything about him tonight. Let me now only mention the great Shri Ramakrishna, the fulfilment of the Indian sages, the sage for the time, one whose teaching is just now, in the present time, most beneficial. And mark the divine power working behind the man. The son of a poor priest, born in an out-of-the-way village, unknown and unthought of, today is worshipped literally by thousands in Europe and America, and tomorrow will be worshipped by thousands more. Who knows the plans of the Lord!
Now, my brothers, if you do not see the hand, the finger of Providence, it is because you are blind, born blind indeed. If time comes, and another opportunity, I will speak to you more fully about him. Only let me say now that if I have told you one word of truth, it was his and his alone, and if I have told you many things which were not true, which were not correct, which were not beneficial to the human race, they were all mine, and on me is the responsibility.
Notes
文本来自Wikisource公共领域。原版由阿德瓦伊塔修道院出版。