A learned man once said, “In India there is a certain tree: Whosoever takes and eats of its fruit, he grows not old nor ever dies.” A king heard this tale from a learned person: he became a lover of the tree and its fruit. He sent an intelligent minister to India in search of it and gave him ample funds to support his travels.
For many years his minister wandered about India in quest of the tree. The minister travelled from town to town and village to village, asking every person he came across about this wonderful tree. Many people though he was mad while others just ignored him. Some people took pity on him and told the minister that his search was futile and there was no such tree. People said he was wasting his precious life.
The devoted minister, however, did not give up his search. His king kept on sending him money for this search. Years passed and the minister turned old and finally he gave up his search. He admitted that his search was a failure and tearfully he begun his journey back home.
While on his way back, he decided to pay a visit to a learned Sufi, whom he wanted to share his misery with. Once he reached the Sufi’s house, the minister knelt down and tearfully said, “O Learned saint, I have failed in my mission. I have let my king down. I beg you to have mercy and show me the right path.”
“What are you searching for”, the saint kindly asked. The minister explained that he had been in search of a tree that produces a fruit which gives eternal life.
The sufi explained, “the tree that you seek is the Tree of Knowledge, which grows within the human heart. You have gone after the form, you have gone astray: you cannot find IT because you have abandoned the reality. Sometimes IT is named ‘tree,’ sometimes ‘sun’; sometimes it is named ‘sea,’ sometimes ‘cloud.’ IT is that one thing from which a hundred thousand effects arise: innumerable names may be properly applied to that one thing.
Whoever seeks the (mere) name, if he is entrusted (with a confidential mission) he is hopeless and in distraction, even as you are. Why do you stick to the name ‘tree,’ so that you are left bitterly disappointed and ill-fortuned? Pass on from the name and look at the attributes, in order that the attributes may show you the way to the essence.”
The saint further added. “Let me explain to you using an example. One person may be father in relation to you; in regard to another individual, he may be son. In regard to another he may be wrath and a foe; in regard to another he may be graciousness and a friend. He has hundreds of thousands of names, but he is one man: the owner of every quality is incapable of giving any true description of him. So what you are looking for has many names, and one existence. Don’t search for one of the names.
Move beyond any attachment to names. Every war and every conflict between human beings has happened because of some disagreement about names. It’s such unnecessary foolishness, because just beyond the arguing there’s a long table of companionship, set and waiting for us to sit down.”
The END
The Learnings
1: Every human being, who has taken birth on Earth has atleast once thought about having an eternal life. What if I never die, is a common question. Here, the more important question is, why do we seek eternal life? We need to first understand what is constituted as “life”. For most of us, life is Waking up every morning, going to work, coming back home, watching TV or having some ‘party’ and going to sleep and getting up next day to repeat this process. (For more on this, Do watch Tamasha, an Imtiaz Ali Masterpeice) Is that what we call living a life? Thinking on this question will help us to understand what we are “really” looking for...
2: Most of our quests are looking for things outside of us. We are looking for objects which will give us happiness, we are looking for the medicine which will remove all our diseases, we are looking for clothes and cosmetics which will make us look very attractive and protect us from all kind of heat, dust & rain and so on and so forth. Thus, we are always looking for something which is outside. Similarly, the Minister was looking for this tree, the key to eternal life, outside his country and in the world around.
3: Why do we want an eternal life? If we look closely, this thought of eternal life comes only in the moment of happiness and excitement. We wish that “this happiness never ceases” and then “the ephemerality of life “comes to our mind, and then we think “I hope I could enjoy this all the time...” One does not think of having an eternal life when he is in pain or any kind of sorrow. He only wishes that “Somehow this period of sorrow gets over as soon as possible...” So this hope and prayer for eternal life is nothing but the desire to experience the happiness “always” without any time limit. Since, it is our mind which knows that nothing lasts forever, we are afraid of this time limit and for that reason we look for something eternal. Stop for a moment and ponder on this! What is real happiness ?
4: When you have done “atmachintan” on the above question, a stage will come when you will find that happiness is an internal state of mind rather than something which is present outside of us. It is our mind which is an a state of constant agitation that devoids us of all happiness! And, when we further probe the vagaries of the mind, an understanding will come that that time is also just a concept of the mind. This has been thoroughly realized by our great saints and hence they can say that they have achieved the eternal life.
5: We have seen, read and heard in many stories is that one should look inside to find “real” happiness. What is meant by looking inside? The answer lies in trying to focus on our own Awareness, just like our mind focuses on “outside” things. It is about looking at our own consciousness which is the witness of everything that is happening in the world. This Awareness is the just a witness to what is happening outside and is never touched by pleasure or plain. It resides in pure form as our reality and discovering this reality will lead us to eternal happiness and life.
6: The process to get towards this real happiness of life starts from being in the state of understanding and enquiry. When we start at looking things deeply, when we start finding the real essence of the things, when we question “why is it happening in this way?, What is it that is creating this phenomenon? , then we find out that there is a underlying reality and we can sense this reality within ourselves. This process of churning within ourselves, this “AtmaChintan”, can take us through the journey which has to be inside rather than outside. The Minister, who is trying to get to the real source of happiness and life, is advised by the saint to look in the “right place”
7: It is very essential that we start looking inside but before going there we have to get tired of looking outside. This is a process that everybody has to go through, he has to first get convinced that the happiness which he has been looking for is not being available outside, but it is inside. This conviction only comes, not by reading or being told, but by personal experience over a long time and in some cases many lifetimes. The journey is long but has to be started someday.
8: In this story, we can see that finally, real happiness came to minister and not to the king because the king was not ready to go through the arduous journey which is very important to reach that stage of understanding. He was trying to “buy-out” his eternal fruit. That's how life is; whether you are a king or a beggar - to reach to the eternal happiness, everybody must undertake his/her own journey. A Guru or a teacher can only show us the way and can tell us where we are faltering but we cannot buy the fruit. We must earn it!!
Epilogue: Let us tell you another story. Once after creating the human beings, the God thought about where he should hide happiness which should be not so easily available to the human beings. An angel appeared before the God and he said, “Lord, let me go and hide this happiness in the far corners of the space so that it is not attainable to any man/women.” Lord says,” the human is very intelligent and he will create the spaceship to go and find it easily. ”Then the Angel says, “Then, let me go and hide this thing deep inside the ocean”, again the lord interjected, “That human is smart and can make himself physically strong so that he can dive into the ocean to find it.” Then, the Angel says that let me go and put it inside the sand particles of the desert, the lord replied, “That human is very perseverant, he will easily sieve whole of the desert and find this happiness.” With all ideas failing, angel hung is face in dejection. Suddenly, Lord’s face shone brightly. He says, “Hide it inside the man. Because of his mind, he will always be keeping looking outside and will never turn inside to find it….” This Story is from speech given by Dr Chandra Prakash Diwedi, the director of TV series like Chanakya and Upanishad Ganga.
STORY CREDIT: Jalāl al-Dīn, Rūmī and Coleman Barks. The Soul of Rumi : A New Collection of Ecstatic Poems. 1st ed. San Francisco: Harper San Francisco, 2001, 46-7 & Rumi's Masnavi Book 2: 62, The search for the Tree of Life.
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