Aptavani-2
297
Errors in penance and renunciation
Questioner : Can a person attain liberation through
penance and kriya (rituals)?
Dadashri : Penance and kriya will beget fruits for you but
not liberation. If you plant a neem seed, you will get bitter fruits
and if you plant a mango stone, you will get sweet fruits.
Whatever fruit you want, plant accordingly. The penance for
liberation is different altogether; it is antartapa (internal penance).
Liberation has four pillars: knowledge, vision, conduct and
penance. Penance is one of the four pillars of liberation, but
people have become fixed on doing just penance without
understanding this. It’s like clinging on to just one leg of this bed.
The body is not meant to be subjected to penance, the mind is,
and that too without anyone’s knowledge. But today people just
take on external penance i.e. visible penance; they grab on to
whatever comes along. What benefits will an ascetic attain if he
does external penance? His body will grow stronger; the
penance his body is subjected to will fortify it. But is the body
going to come with him to his next life? It is going to be
cremated. As long as this body exists, you have to accomplish
only the work for liberation. Tyagis i.e. those who renounce are
merely exercising with penance. These are nothing but exercise
centers; they do nothing for the Soul. Men exercise in trying to
live without their wives and so they leave their wives and
runaway. The wife sometimes goes to live with her parents for
a long time, does she not? So they can live at home also, why
should men runaway from home? When a husband and wife
quarrel everyday, their son makes a mental note, “I am not going
to have a wife.” He ties such a strong inner karmic knot of not
wanting a wife, that when the karma unfolds to give effect, he
runs away from his wife. Instead he should suffer his prapta tapa
(the penance that has presented itself) and some day he will
attain liberation if he continues to suffer the penance. Suffering