The Guru and the Disciple
145
What self-interest do you have?’ I do have self-interest in this.
My self-interest is that you attain the bliss that I have attained.
People are suffering; they are roasting like potatoes in a fire pit.
They are struggling hopelessly like fish out of water. That is why I
have to go around wandering from one place to another. Many
have attained this path of bliss.
Questioner: So that is not a self-serving need, but rather a
bhavna (inner intent) that all living beings attain salvation.
Dadashri: It is a bhavna that people attain salvation. No
one except the Tirthankaras and the Gnanis have such bhavnas.
How can one think about others when he is not content himself?
What do people seek? They seek to attain a higher status. A
sadhu (monk) keeps thinking, ‘When will they make me an
acharya (religious principal)?’ while the acharya thinks, ‘when
will he make me…?’ These are all the bhavna they have. Then
there are people who have the bhavna to deal in the black market.
A collector has a bhavna for becoming a commissioner. No one
cares about Jagat kalyan (world’s salvation). Therefore, in the
relative, the whole world is preoccupied with guruta (superiority).
They cannot attain gurutam, the highest inner state, the Gnani.
Questioner: What is meant by guruta (superiority) in the
relative?
Dadashri: Guruta means a need to advance higher. They
all believe they will become superior as they go higher. They want
superiority only in the relative. But when are they likely to become
superior in the relative world? The relative world is temporary. A
person tries to go higher with whatever superiority he has attained,
but there is no telling when he will fall. In the relative world one
needs laghuta (to want to become lower). Those who try to be
superior in the relative world will not attain anything.
Superiority makes one crash in the end
He who has not become laghutam (lower than the lowest)