OM NAMO BHAGAVATE SRI RAMANAYA

Is This Alone False?

Sri Niranjananda Swami, the Sarvadhikari of Sri Ramanasramam, desired that the first major biography of Sri Bhagavan should be written in Tamil. But at the time, B. V. Narasimha Swami was gathering information and facts in order to write a good biography of Sri Bhagavan in English. However, even before this English book was published, a Malayalam scholar came one day to have darshan of Sri Bhagavan. As soon as he saw Sri Bhagavan he was inspired to write his biography, since he had the habit of writing the life story in Malayalam of any great soul he happen to meet. So immediately after arriving he began to gather information from some local people, asking them, 'Who is this Ramana Maharshi?' 'Where was he born?' and so on.

Not being familiar with Bhagavan or the understanding that the Self-realization of a Jnani is itself his real greatness, some people naturally imagined that Bhagavan should possess all sorts of supernatural powers (siddhis) and they therefore spread rumors which attributed such powers to him, thinking that they were thereby glorifying him. Though Bhagavan Ramana taught that all siddhis are as trivial as straw and are to be regarded as treacherous friends by the spiritual aspirant, even he was not spared from the rumors created by such people. Unfortunately, it was only from this type of people that the Malayalam scholar quickly gathered biographical information on Bhagavan. Then, within a day, he edited all his notes and completed writing the biography.

Now, according to his biography Bhagavan was a householder, a lawyer from Madurai who had three children. It was also reported that Sri Ramana exhibited a number of siddhis in various places. In this way, many fantastic but untrue incidents were contained in that biography. When he had finished writing it, the Malayalam scholar brought the biography to Sri Bhagavan.

Among those living with Sri Bhagavan at that time, no one knew Malayalam except Kunju Swami, and he happened to be absent on that day. Therefore, Bhagavan, who was himself well versed in Malayalam poetry and literature, read the whole biography from beginning to end, stopping only here and there to correct some spelling mistakes, and then returned it to the author without altering even a single statement or idea. Thinking that the biography he had written was correct in every respect, having been seen and corrected by Sri Bhagavan himself, the author was very happy.

Soon the news spread among the devotees in the Asramam that the life of Sri Bhagavan had been written in Malayalam. However, since no one knew that language, they did not know what was written in it. The next day Kunju Swami returned to the Asramam and the devotees all eagerly told him, "This new devotee has written Bhagavan's biography in Malayalam. Bhagavan has also gone through it and approved it after making all the necessary corrections."

With great surprise and joy, Kunju Swami received the biography from the Malayalam scholar and began to read through it. But when he saw the many untrue reports written in it, he was unable to bear it. He went to the author and tactfully said to him, "Many statements in this biography are totally incorrect! I am afraid that you have not gathered your information from the proper sources."

But with great confidence the author replied, "There is not even a single mistake in it. See, Bhagavan himself has corrected it with his own pen wherever it was necessary. So I am confident that this alone is his correct life history."

Without saying anything further, Kunju Swami brought the biography to Sri Bhagavan and complained, "O Bhagavan! Your own handwriting is found here in many places, so you must have seen this. But how can this all be true?"

"Are all these other things true (pointing to the world), and is this alone false?" replied Sri Bhagavan with a peaceful smile.

Though this sounds humorous, we should notice the profound teaching that lies hidden in it. From his reply it is clear that the ever-attained experience of Sri Bhagavan, who teaches that the world is a mere false appearance, is that even the ego, the individual who sees the world, is itself false. Those who do not know the Self cannot but feel slighted and angry if some historical facts in their life, which would have otherwise given them fame and glory, were omitted or written about in a distorted manner.

In this world, which is full of so-called great ones who strenuously seek praise and publicity for self glorification, how exalted is the greatness of Bhagavan Ramana who was completely indifferent to any amount of disparaging words written about him! In Bhagavan's view, even the biography we now have, which records his life as we saw it with our own eyes, is as true as this Malayalam biography. That is to say, in Bhagavan's view, even his birth, his attainment of Self-realization, his renunciation and his life as Jagat-Guru are just as real or unreal as this Malayalam biography!


This is from THE MAHARSHI News Letter