Volume
Vol. 14, The Smiling Forehead
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Sufi Teachings
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5. Nirvana
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Vol. 14, The Smiling Forehead
Sufi Teachings
5. Nirvana
Perhaps you have read in books of Eastern philosophy the words nirvana and mukti, and you have become frightened! Nirvana means to become nothing. You may say, "I do not want to become nothing." Everyone wants to become something, no one wants to become nothing. Those who want to be something -- although that can be taken for nothing! -- are so frightened of that idea. I have seen hundreds and thousands who were interested in Eastern philosophy, but when it came to being nothing they found it a difficult idea to grasp and they found it frightening to think, "One day this 'I' shall be nothing."
But they do not know that it is the solving of this question which allows one to be; for what man identifies himself with is a mortal thing that will one day expire, and he will no more find himself to be as he had thought himself to be.
Nirvana therefore is the fifth and highest consciousness which I am explaining now. The experience of this consciousness is of a similar kind to that of a person in deep sleep. But in the deep sleep one is asleep outwardly, which means in the physical and in the mental body, while in the condition of nirvana, or highest consciousness, a person is conscious all through: he is conscious of the body as much as of the soul. Then the consciousness is so evenly divided while yet he keeps to the highest stage, that at that time the person lives fully.
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