The Miracle of Sant Mat
When we say, “It’s a miracle,” we’re referring to an event or experience that cannot be explained by the laws of physics or the known systems and forces of nature. Because we cannot explain it, we attribute it to a divine force.
In that sense, all of Sant Mat is based on core concepts that are miraculous.
The Shabd is a divine sound current, the creative life force, the manifest form of God and is often called the “unstruck melody.” On Earth for there to be a sound, there must be a force of some kind that causes something to vibrate. The vibration sends out a wave in the form of sound which travels through the medium of air. There is no point in playing a guitar or drums on the moon because sound cannot be heard in a vacuum. Space is a vast, infinite vacuum. Somewhere in this unending universe floats our tiny blue planet, orbiting in the absolute silence of space. Somehow, the Shabd can reach us and create sound within the human mind. It can reach us in spite of the vacuum of space and without any force. It is simply miraculous. Not only is it attributable to a divine agency, but Sant Mat teaches us that it is the divine agency itself.
Humans have created amazingly sensitive instruments like electron microscopes, radio telescopes, and even gravitational field detectors. In spite of this, no instrument is subtle enough to detect the sound of the Shabd. A different instrument is needed. To address this need, the Lord has performed a second miracle – he has created a receiver subtle enough to hear the Shabd. As Maharaj Sawan Singh (Great Master) has said, noted in With the Three Masters, Vol. III:
God has made the human body with the utmost skill. It has two parts: one above the eye centre and the other below it. The lower part is designed to interact with the world and help us perform our duties; the upper is for God-realization through meditation.
So, when we are using our faculties to listen to the Shabd – to any subtle sound we can hear within – we are combining two miraculous elements: using the upper part of a human body to listen to an unstruck melody. This is amazing, and yet we complain that our lives are boring! If we have the human body with its miraculous upper part, then we should use that upper part to listen to the voice of God. Anything less is a waste of a priceless opportunity. It would be like getting a smart phone but only using it to make telephone calls –something the elderly may do. Of course, young people use their phones for everything except making a phone call.
One disciple may be hearing the inner sound loud and clear while a person sitting next to him cannot hear a thing. It is a miracle that God can reveal himself to one while remaining hidden from others, no matter how close they may be.
Once we have discussed this miracle of the audible sound current, it hardly seems worth discussing anything else because that miracle is so profound and crucial. But there is more.
The teachings place key importance on the existence of the law of karma, God’s law for this region. The affairs of the world and the details of our individual lives are all explained by this law. Everyone is reaping the karmic consequences of their past. The saints say that even if the wind blows a seed from your neighbour’s land onto your land, that has to be accounted for. For such a law to operate, there must be a record of everything that is happening on Earth 24 hours a day, seven days a week, down the ages. Such a record must cover not only the events but also what each person was thinking when the event occurred. What we think determines our moral blameworthiness. The same act can be noble or malicious, intentional or accidental, depending on what we were thinking. The first miracle of the karmic law is that all this recording is done invisibly and secretly without any sign that it is happening.
The second miracle of karma is that for everyone to reap what they have sown, everything that appears to be random must in fact be predetermined. That is exactly what the saints tell us – our destiny is written in the most minute detail before we are born. Great Master wrote in Spiritual Gems: “In peace and in cataclysms or catastrophes, only they suffer who are destined to suffer.” Consider a volcanic eruption which spews molten lava, rocks, and ash into the sky. This comes raining down on the surrounding lands and people. Nothing could seem to be more random. Yet if someone is not destined to suffer, then the lava and rocks will not land on him. How miraculous that the random appearance of everything that is going on is, in fact, entirely controlled in some hidden way. What a great magician the Lord is to stage a play and create an illusion so complete that no one can ever see the hidden strings being pulled.
The saints encourage us to vacate the body and enter the astral region. Great Master, however, warned in Dawn of Light: “As the whole astral plane is the manifestation of the negative power and it is intended by that power to hold back the up-going spirit, so great caution is needed in crossing this plane.”
On the one hand our travel agent, the Master, wants us to go to the astral land but, on the other hand, it is very dangerous. Now we would be entitled to ask the travel agent before we head to some foreign and unknown country whether we will be safe. Should we hire a guard or carry weapons? The Master says: “Don’t worry, I will give you a mantra.” We say: “A mantra? For a dangerous country? Wouldn’t we be better off with a gun?” The Master assures us that the mantra is no ordinary thing. It has magic powers. According to Great Master: “No evil spirit can stand before the repetition of the five Holy Names. All spirits that come in this way must be tested by repetition of the five Names.”
In Spiritual Gems he tells us:
When you see any form inside, then repeat the five names. … Evil spirits do not stay when those five names are repeated, and thus they would not be able to deceive you. Only good spirits stay, and the spirit that stays when these names are used is worthy of your trust. Converse freely with it.
It is miraculous that the simran given by the satguru is charged with his power. That power is recognized by all spirits in the astral region. If we ourselves give the mantra to anyone, it will be worthless to them. But when it is given by the Master, it has power throughout the higher regions. Our novels and movies of magical stories always have the wizards or witches using some magic incantation, some magic words, like abracadabra. Consider that we as disciples now also have an actual magic mantra that is so powerful that evil entities cannot resist its force.
Another magical aspect of simran is this: Our simran is a kind of passport to every stage within, and it is an “open sesame,” a key that opens every gate and door. Maharaj Charan Singh explains in Quest for Light:
The idea of repeating the names of these governors or rulers of the territories we have to pass through is that we should familiarize ourself with them and they should know us when we come across them during our spiritual journey within. When we repeat their names they help us in passing through their territory with great comfort and ease.
How incredible that although we are so tiny and insignificant, still, our faint repetition is heard in the highest regions, and those powers respond.
Simran isn’t only magic in the inner regions – it also has vital magical properties right here on Earth. First, simran gathers the attention. All other thoughts spread the attention into the world. Simran gathers the attention towards the eye centre. Second, simran finds the eye centre by itself. It resists going downward and has the magic tendency to go inwards and upwards. Third, simran is the only thought that we can think in our entire lives that will change us, the thinker. All other thoughts leave us in the same state of consciousness as we were, but simran elevates our consciousness. Fourth, simran is the only thing that we carry with us beyond death. Anything else we get hold of during our lives, we leave behind when we die. But simran is a gift from the Master that goes with us even after death so that we can use it in the inner regions.
The Master’s simran is given at the time of initiation. We do not appreciate the nature of this gift, nor can we understand the wonder of being initiated by a true master. A seeker might think that he can give this path a try, get initiated, and see how it goes. “I can always give it up and go back to my old ways,” he says to himself. But that is not how this path works. Once the Master initiates us, we can never become “uninitiated.” The best thing about initiation is that the Master will never leave you alone again. The worst thing about initiation is that the Master will never leave you alone again.
As Hazur Maharaj Ji said in Spiritual Perspectives, Vol. II:
Well, brother, this relationship is such that it can never be destroyed. Once the seed has been sown, it has to sprout and bear fruit. Once we come on the path, we have to follow it and find the destination. No matter how much we go right or left, ultimately we will again find ourselves on the path. … Once the seed has been sown, it cannot be destroyed.
So, in a sense, initiation by a true master is like a slow-acting poison for the wayward mind, an injection of an antiparasitic potion for which there is no cure. Slowly it will take effect and weaken the grip that the parasite mind has held over the soul for ages. It is irreversible, and there is no antidote.
When we take stock of our situation, we see that we have a human body with miraculous faculties. We have access to the miraculous inner sound of divine origin. We have a magic mantra to protect us from evil and open all inner gates and doors. We are initiated. Our good days have begun. We are homeward bound. The chorus of a song made popular by Rod Stewart captures our happy condition:
We are sailing, we are sailing
Home again ’cross the sea
We are sailing stormy waters
To be near you, to be free
Oh, Lord, to be near you, to be free