Just look at the worldly wealth he has. his palatial Ashram, the expensive vehicles he uses, the designer outfit he wears, the jewelry he adorns his body with. That should give you some idea about his genuineness.
In the past, we have had Gurus who had dozens of expensive cars – almost a different car each day of the year. Even in recent times there are Gurus who fancy owning not only cars and bikes but also aircrafts as well! They even shamelessly advocate that processing wealth is not a crime, and frugality is an old-fashioned virtue!
Well, they are on spiritual business and are justified in saying that 😉
But why did all genuine Gurus advise against over procession? In the Bible there is an interesting story. Once a rich person approached Jesus and expressed his desire to be his disciple. Jesus put a condition that the rich man should first donate whatever he had to the poor. Then and only then he could become a disciple. Obviously, the rich man did not agree!
Buddha was a prince who inherited lots of wealth. He was an heir to the throne. But he rejected all that and went away with just a begging bowl and two pieces of clothing as his sole procession.
Like Jesus, even Buddha had no place to rest his head, He slept under trees, lived on whatever people dropped into his begging bowl. He ate only once a day and never bothered to save anything for the next day. He would start the next day with a clean bowl!
Even Quran advocates frugality. It does not like going after worldly procession.
The Vedic Indians considered non amassing wealth as a great virtue. The ancient lawmaker Manu says that one who earns just enough for the day is the superior most among men.
Why all this emphasis against accumulating wealth?
Wealth has many problems.
- Firstly, no matter how much you earn, you will never be fully content. You go on looking for ways of earning more wealth. It is an endless trap.
- When you have more wealth than you need, you probably will have more enemies who may want to snatch it from you. You have to worry not only about guarding your wealth but also your life!
- You will be indirectly snatching someone else’s fair share of wealth.
- You will be encouraging uneven distribution of resources that ends up dividing the society into affluent and under privileged. That will in turn stimulate social unrest.
It all sounds nice and logical. It is music to many of us who want to do Yoga, but who don’t want to lead a disciplined life 😉
Firstly, few of these Gurus ever share their wealth with anyone except to put up a show of social service, feeding poor people, planting trees and so on. But every one knows that such things are often done with an eye on tax evasion 😉
No, you can’t ride a lion just to tame it. Once you are on its back, there is no way of getting down. The lion would devour you. So, you have to keep sitting on the lion forever. How many Ashrams we keep seeing now-a-days where the rival gangs fight among themselves on the issue of succession to the Guru. Their eyes are often on the empire that the Guru has built all through!
So, the best way is to be prudent in amassing wealth. Keep it to the minimum possible without putting yourselves and your family in distress. And if you happen to earn more than your requirement, be generous and share it with others who may be in greater need.
That way, you will be freed from the ill effects of amassing wealth and at the same time contributing your might to lessening inequality in the society. That leads to less tension, less suffering.
Patanjali calls this as Aparigraha – not acquiring more than your basic needs. This is the fourth ‘do’ in Patanjali’s first step namely Yama.
We will discuss more dos in the next episode.
A series revolving around Mind – Science of Mind, Philosophy of Mind, Notions of reality, Mind modulation, Domains beyond Mind, and so on. © Dr. King 2019
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