by Chaitanya Keerti published in dna
A real guru is the one who liberates us and with whom we are in deep love, faith and reverence.
This July has been blessed with two full moon nights. The first was in early July and the second is on 31st July, which is being celebrated as Guru Purnima, the full moon night dedicated to the guru, the master.
In India, sometimes we start calling all kinds of people in the teaching profession as our gurus. This is wrong. Being a guru is not a profession, just as being a teacher is a profession. A real guru may not be an educated person or a scholar who can impart knowledge to students. The guru is a realised soul, who has attained to his ultimate potential and has become enlightened. And his light pulls the unenlightened seekers towards him.
Osho explains this phenomenon: In Hindi, gravitation is called gurutwa karshan. Just as the earth gravitates, the guru gravitates people towards himself — without doing anything. The earth is not doing anything while gravitating you; it is just the nature of the earth that anything that is within its area of two hundred miles will start being pulled towards it. Guru means one who is weight-full, centered, rooted, and has the quality of gravitation.
But that original meaning has been lost as all kinds of gurus have been mushrooming and bringing a bad name to this very meaningful word. The word guru has become almost condemnatory. The root meaning of the word is beautiful. The word originally means one who is more consolidated, crystallised, one who has more weight. And his very presence is magnetic and we get naturally pulled towards him.
A real guru is the one who liberates us and with whom we are in deep love, faith and reverence. A guru is a presence. Through him one gets the first glimpse of divinity. A guru creates, transforms and gives a new birth to a seeker so that with complete trust one can follow his guru while travelling through many unknown paths and doors. The guru’s blessing is a vital phenomenon. Through a guru one can look into his own future and can be aware of his own destiny. Through him one starts coming up like a seed trying to sprout towards the sky.
When we are pulled towards mystic Kabir, Guru Nanak and Gautama the Buddha, we do have a strange feeling. The feeling is that we are being pulled towards them and at the same time we are being pulled inwards. It is a very strange paradoxical phenomenon. The closer we come to our guru, the closer we come to ourself. The more we become attracted towards the guru, the more we become independent. The more we become surrendered to the guru, the more we feel that we have freedom we never had before.
Osho expresses this phenomenon in a poetic metaphor: “Guru is like full moon and disciple is like ashadh (the month of clouds and rains). The moon of Sharad Purnima is beautiful because it is in the empty sky. There is no disciple then, the guru is alone. If the same beauty happens in ashadh, then it is something, where the guru is surrounded by clouds like disciples. The disciples have come with their darkness of many lives. They are like dark clouds, they are the weather of ashadh. If the guru can shine like the full moon in that atmosphere of darkness, if he can produce light in that atmosphere of darkness, only then he is the guru. That’s why Ashadh Purnima is Guru Purnima. It has an indication towards the guru and an indication towards the disciple. And naturally, where these two meet, there is meaningfulness.”
Chaitanya Keerti travels around the world to facilitate Osho meditation retreats.
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