VBT – Meditation 69.1

VBT – Meditation 69.1

A Relative Phenomenon

This sutra is very deep, it says “SINCE IN TRUTH, BONDAGE AND FREEDOM ARE RELATED…”

They are not opposite, they are relative. What is freedom? You say, “Not bondage.” And what is bondage? You say, “Not freedom.” You can define them by each other. They are just like hot and cold, not opposite. What is hot and what is cold? They are just degrees of the same phenomenon – degrees of temperature – but the phenomenon is the same, and they are relative. If there is in one bucket cold water and in another there is hot water and you put in both your hands – one hand in the hot and one in the cold – what will you feel? A difference of degrees.

And if at first you cool down both your hands on ice and then you put both your hands into the hot and the cold water, what will happen? Now again you will feel a difference. Your cold hand will now feel more hot in the hot water than it felt before. And if your other hand has become cold, much colder than the cold water, then that water will now look hot; you will not feel it as cool. It is relative.

There are only degrees of difference, but the phenomenon is the same.

Tantra says that bondage and liberation, SAMSARA and MOKSHA, are not two things, but a relative phenomenon – of the same thing. So tantra is unique. Tantra says that you have to be liberated not only from bondage; you have to be liberated from MOKSHA also. Unless you are liberated from both, you are not Liberated.

So the first thing: don’t try to go against anything because you will move to something which belongs to it. It looks the opposite, but it is not. Don’t move from sex to BRAHMACHARYA. If you are trying to move from sex to BRAHMACHARYA, your BRAHMACHARYA will be nothing but sexuality. Don’t move from greed to no-greed because that no-greed will again be a subtle greed. That is why if a tradition teaches to be non-greedy, it gives you some profit motive in it.

I was staying with a saint, and he told his followers, “If you leave greed you will get much in the other world. If you leave greed, you will gain much in the other world!” Those who are greedy, greedy for the other world, will be influenced by this. They may be motivated, and they will be ready to leave many things to gain. But the motive to gain remains; otherwise how can a greedy man move toward non-greed? Some motive must be there which fulfills his greed deeply.

So don’t create opposite poles. All opposites are related; they are degrees of the same phenomenon. If you become aware of this, you will say that both poles are the same. If you can feel this, that both poles are the same, and if this feeling deepens, you will be liberated from both.