Osho on Adi Shankaracharya Possessing King's Dead Body

 

 

Question 5

Once the subtle body is out, it can't enter back into the physical body completely. The adjustment and harmony between the two is disrupted forever. This is the reason why the yogis have always been ill and have been dying at an early age. How can we prepare ourselves so that the disharmony may be avoided? Can the possibilities of illness be minimized? How is this possible?

 

 

In this respect too, the first thing is: the moment the subtle body goes out of the physical body, nature's order is bound to be disrupted. The phenomenon is not natural; one should say, it is beyond nature. When a phenomenon occurs which is contrary to nature, or which is beyond nature, the entire harmony and adjustment of nature becomes disorderly.

 

A great deal of preparation is needed if one wants to save oneself from such a disorderly state. Various yogasanas and mudras, yoga postures, are very helpful in this respect. In fact all the techniques of Hatha Yoga are useful in this direction. So you need an extraordinary body -- an ordinary body won't work. You need your body to be made of steel so that it can withstand an unnatural phenomenon of such great magnitude.

 

For example, there was no fundamental difference between the body of Ramamurti and any other human body, but he had mastered a few tricks. We see that trick working every day, but it never strikes us. You see a tire; when inflated it carries the heavy weight of a car. Take out some air and the car will not move. The air has to be in a particular proportion for the tire to carry that much weight.

 

Through a special technique of pranayama one can fill the lungs with so much air that the body can hold the weight of an elephant. The chest functions exactly like a tire, like a tube. In order to withstand the weight of an elephant, if one knows the proportion, the volume of air required in the chest, then there is no problem. Ramamurti had the same kind of lungs as we do.

 

The tube inside the tire is not made of any hard steel, it doesn't have any strength. The tube's only use is that it takes in its volume a specific amount of air -- that's all. If that much air is present, the thing works.

 

Recently, a new type of car has been conceived which can run four feet above the ground. It will not require any tire tube. In fact the same trick applies in this mechanism. The car will move so fast that the air underneath will have volume enough to bear its weight. The speed will cut through the air, separating its upper and lower parts, and due to the speed a layer of four feet will be created which will sustain the moving car.

 

This works on the same principle as a moving boat. As the boat moves with speed, a void is created behind it. It is this void that helps the boat to move ahead. Water from all sides rushes to fill the void; this pushes the boat forward. This is the trick that works all along. Should the water behave differently, the boat will not move.

 

So if a car is made to run at a particular speed, a four-foot thick layer of air can be made underneath for it to function as a road. In fact, there is no need to make it really -- it will be formed automatically as the car moves at high speed. Then there won't be any need for wheels; the car will simply slide along. Then nothing else will matter -- only air will be needed, that's all.

 

Hatha Yoga has discovered many techniques which give the body a special discipline. Giving such a discipline makes the difference. That's why a hatha yogi never dies young. A normal raja yogi dies at a young age like Vivekananda or Shankaracharya, but not a hatha yogi. And the reason is that the hatha yogi gives a total discipline to his body before such a happening can take place. In order to prepare his body to withstand any unnatural situation, he performs many unnatural practices.

 

For example, when it is hot outside he will cover himself with a blanket. Sufi mystics wrap a blanket around themselves. The word suf means wool. One who always covers himself with a woolen wraparound is known as a Sufi. There is no other meaning of the word 'sufi'.

 

All Sufi fakirs in the Arab world, where the sun is burning hot, move around in blankets. In that scorching heat they wrap themselves in a woolen blanket. They create a very unnatural situation. As it is, the sun is sizzling hot, there is no greenery anywhere around, and a man is sitting there wrapped up in a blanket. He is making his body able to withstand unnatural conditions.

 

In Tibet a lama sits naked on the snow, and you will be shocked to see perspiration running down his body. This lama is working on his body to perspire even under the falling snow. His effort is very unnatural.

 

There are many such ways of preparing the body. If the body has been made to pass through these preparations, it becomes fit to withstand any unnatural happening. Then no harm is caused to the body. But ordinarily these preparations take years.

 

Consequently, the discipline of Raja Yoga finds it useless to spend so many years in preparation just to live a little longer. Hatha Yoga requires years of preparation. Twenty or thirty years are minimum -- thirty years are needed at least. If a man begins at the age of fifteen, he would be fifty by the time he is fully prepared.

 

Hence, the discipline of Raja Yoga decided not to be so much concerned about the body. If such a state does occur and the body dies, then so be it. What is the need for saving it? So these preparations were abandoned.

 

That's why Shankaracharya died at the age of thirty-three; the reason is that his body was not prepared to handle an event of such magnitude. But there was no need for such a preparation. If it appears necessary then it is all right; otherwise, no need to bother. If one has to work for years in order that the body may last for only thirty-three years, and if the body is saved to last for thirty-three years more, then the arrangement doesn't prove to be of much benefit. If I have to work from the time I am fifteen until I am fifty, I will already have lost thirty-five years in preparation. Should I remain alive for another thirty-five years -- till the age of eighty-five -- the sum total of years that I will have 'lived' will still be thirty-five. So it has no meaning.

 

If someone were to have said to Shankaracharya, "You could have lived for seventy years if you had practiced Hatha Yoga," Shankaracharya would have replied, "But I would have had to work forty years for it. I find making such an effort unnecessary. I like to die at the age of thirty-three. There is nothing wrong in it."

 

Hence, gradually Hatha Yoga lagged behind. The reason was that no one was ready to follow its long practices. But my feeling is, Hatha Yoga can come back in the future if its practices are followed with the help of science.

 

As I see it, what took thirty-five years can now be completed in five years with the help of science. Time can be saved with the maximum use of science. However, it will be a while before the scientific Hatha Yoga can come into being. I believe scientific Hatha Yoga will be born in the West, not in India, because India doesn't have any scientific environment at all.

 

So time can be saved, but it doesn't serve any particular purpose. It might be useful to save time under very special circumstances, but that too will happen only on the gross level, the level of the physical body.

 

For Shankaracharya it may not be useful to continue living but for others it can be. That's why even if remotely, even if barely, Hatha Yoga is still meaningful. One could have said to Shankaracharya, "Granted that extending life is of no use to you. However, if you could live for thirty-five years more, it would benefit many people." This is the only excuse which can bring back Hatha Yoga.

 

When the subtle body separates from the gross body, the adjustment between the two is interrupted. It is almost like once you take apart the engine of a car, you can reassemble it, but it does shorten the life of the engine. That's why the buyer first makes sure the engine of the car was not dismantled before. Even if the engine has been put together exactly the way it should be, it does lose its longevity. The reason is that it cannot be the same -- even a little change in its original adjustment affects the life of the engine.

 

Furthermore, in our body there are some elements that die very quickly; there are other elements that take a little longer to die. And there are some elements that refuse to die even after the man is dead. Even in the grave the dead man's nails and hair keep growing for some time. They keep doing their job and take a longer time to die.

 

Death occurs on many levels. In fact there are several arrangements in your body which are automatic -- even the presence of your soul is not needed for them to function. For example, I am sitting here talking to you. If I leave this room the talking would stop, but the fan will go on moving because the fan has its own arrangement -- it has nothing to do with my presence.

 

There are two kinds of systems in our body. One system is such that it will come to an end as soon as the consciousness leaves the body. Another system keeps working for a short while even after the consciousness has left the body. It is automatic, it has a built-in arrangement to continue to function for an extended period of time. The consciousness will move out and the hair won't know the man is dead. The hair will take quite a while to know the man is gone, that it need not grow anymore.

 

So there are certain elements within us which die very soon; there are some which die in six seconds -- for example in case of a heart attack. A man can survive a heart attack if aid reaches him in six seconds. Basically, a heart attack is not a death; it is just a structural fault which can be set right. In the first world war about fifty people were saved like this in Russia. If the aid reached in six seconds to soldiers who died of a heart attack, they survived. But after six seconds certain elements die, and then it becomes very difficult to revive them. The delicate parts of our brain die very soon -- immediately.

 

So if the subtle body stays out for too long, then it becomes very necessary to protect the physical body; otherwise, some of its elements will begin to die. However, you won't be able to gauge how long the subtle body remained outside, because the gross and the subtle body exist on a different time scale. For instance, if my subtle body goes out, it may seem like I stayed for years in that state. But after returning to the physical body I may find not even a second has elapsed. The time scales for both are different.

 

It is as though a man dozes off and dreams he is being married, the marriage procession is moving on, then he had children, and they grow up and now they are being married. He wakes up and narrates his long dream. One may tell him, "But you dozed off for only a minute, how can such a long dream take place in such a short time?" It can; the time scale is different. Such a long dream can take place in one minute, for the simple reason that its time measurement is very different from that of the waking state -- it is very fast, speedy.

 

If the subtle body stayed out even for a minute, it may seem to you as if you have been out for years. It doesn't give you any idea how long you remained outside really. In that condition it is absolutely necessary that the body is preserved -- which is very difficult. However, if complete arrangements are made, one's subtle body can stay outside for a long time.

 

There is an incident in the life of Shankaracharya which is worth relating. It is meaningless to talk of how long he stayed outside in terms of his subtle body's time scale, but according to our time scale he remained outside his physical body for six months. A woman got him into trouble.

 

He had a debate with Mandan Mishra which Mandan lost. But Mandan's wife made a very womanly argument, which only women can make. She said, "Only one half of Mandan Mishra has lost. I, the other half of him, am still alive. Until you have defeated me, you can't claim to have defeated Mandan Mishra totally."

 

Shankara was put into difficulty. Although what the woman said was right, it didn't really carry any weight. Mandan Mishra was fully defeated. One doesn't have to defeat Gama, the wrestler and his wife too in order to become the winner. But the wife of Mandan Mishra, Bharati, was worth having a debate with. The world has seen very few learned women of her caliber. So the idea of debating with her appealed to Shankara. He thought it would be fun. He figured if Mandan couldn't win, how long would Bharati last before him? But he was mistaken.

 

It is very easy to defeat a man, but it is not so easy to defeat a woman, because the arguments of man and woman, winning or losing, are never the same. They follow a different logic. That's why so often husbands and wives don't understand each other. Their ways of reasoning are different, they are never harmonious. They often go parallel, never meeting anywhere.

 

So Shankara thought Bharati would discuss matters like Brahman, etcetera. But she didn't raise any issue regarding Brahman, because she had witnessed how Mandan Mishra had got himself in trouble on that ground. She knew very well any discussion of Brahman and maya will be of no use. So she said to Shankara, "Please say something about sex."

 

Shankara was at a loss. He said, "I am an accomplished celibate. Please don't ask me anything about sex."

 

Bharati said, "If you know nothing about sex, then what else do you know? When you don't know even this much, I wonder what you may be knowing about the Brahman, maya and so on. You will have to say something about sex because, after all, it is the very source of this world you call maya. I will debate only on that topic."

 

Shankara said, "Please allow me six months' time to learn about this subject. I have no knowledge of it, no one ever taught me. I don't know the secret of sex."

 

In order to learn the secret of sex, Shankara had to leave his body and enter into another body. Here one may ask, "Why could he not have learned through his own body?" He could have, but his entire life energy had become so introverted, the entire flow of energy had moved so deep inside, that it was difficult to draw it out.

 

He could have, of course, related with a woman using his own body. If he had set out to know what sex was all about, he could have related with any woman by means of his own body, but the problem was that his whole bioenergy had turned inward. Drawing it out would have required more than six months. It was not a simple thing. It is easy to draw the energy within from without, but to draw it out again is very difficult. It is easy to drop pebbles and pick diamonds, but very difficult to give up diamonds for pebbles.

 

So Shankaracharya was in a predicament. He knew his body was no good for the challenge at hand. He asked his friends to go and find out if anyone has just died so that he may enter his body. Then he told them to guard his own body zealously till he returned. He entered into the dead body of a king, lived through it for six months, and then came back.

 

Shankara's body was maintained for six months. This kind of guarding and maintenance of the body is an extremely difficult task. Only individuals of incredible devotion must have been entrusted with this responsibility.

 

As I mentioned earlier, a Tibetan seeker sits out in the open in the biting cold and makes his body perspire. This is all a matter of will. Through his determination he denies the reality of the bitter cold and creates another reality that the sun is shining and it is hot. Merely by his resolve, he subordinates his circumstances to his state of mind.

 

The actual situation around him is that of the falling snow, but closing his eyes he denies that situation. He suggests to himself that it is not snowing, that the sun is burning hot. He causes this suggestion to go so deep within that a moment comes when his every breath, every cell of his body, every part of his being begins to feel the heat. Then how can he not perspire? His very perspiration shows that he made his state of mind prevail over the circumstances.

 

In a sense, all yoga is nothing but allowing the state of mind to overcome the circumstances. And all worldliness in a sense is nothing but subjecting the state of mind to the circumstances.

 

It has not been recorded or even mentioned anywhere exactly what Shankara's friends did in order to preserve his physical body. For six months, a group of his devotees sat around his body without breaking the circle. The idea was to maintain a fixed number of people present all the time. They would take turns with others, but basically everyone present was required to remain awake and alert all twenty-four hours. A special environment had to be maintained in the cave where the body was being guarded. It was necessary that certain thought waves prevail in that cave.

 

About seven individuals were needed to sit around the body feeling intensely that they are not breathing, Shankara is; they are not alive but Shankara is. And their bioelectricity had to flow continuously into Shankara's body.

 

The hands of these seven people were to be placed upon Shankara's seven chakras. It was essential that the bioelectricity of these seven people be poured uninterruptedly into the seven chakras of Shankara; only then was it possible to preserve Shankara's body for six months. Even a moment's lapse was enough to break the circuit, causing the body to lose its temperature.

 

It was imperative that the same degree of temperature which is present in the normal living human being should be maintained in Shankara's body. Not even the slightest variation was allowed in his body temperature. And this body heat could not be created by any other external means except that these seven individuals continue to pass their whole life energy, all their magnetic forces through the seven chakras of Shankara's body.

 

Throughout this experiment, the body never comes to know that the man is not present, because the seven individuals supply the same energy that the body received from the man under normal conditions. Do you follow what I am saying?

 

The body never comes to know its seven chakras are no longer receiving energy from the man's consciousness, precisely because the chakras go on receiving a non-stop flow of energy from the seven individuals sitting around. These individuals function like transmission centers. Consequently, the body remains alive. But if any error occurs in the procedure, the body gets ready to die. Until then it remains totally unaware.

 

So a body can be kept alive if other people supply energy to it. This was the incredible technique used in order to keep Shankara alive for six months. For six months a group of individuals was diligently engaged in it. Taking turns, it was required that seven people always remain actively involved in the process. Finally, Shankara returned after six months and answered Bharati's questions. This is how he came to learn about something he had no knowledge of.

 

There was yet another way of learning about sex, but Shankara was not aware of it. Had such an event occurred in Mahavira's life, he would not have entered into another body. Instead, he would have entered into the memory of his past lives; that was yet another source available. This technique of remembering past lives, however, remained limited only to the Jainas and the Buddhists -- it never reached the Hindus.

 

Had such a question been raised to Mahavira, he would not have bothered to enter another body -- there was no need. Rather he would have revived the memories of his relations with women in his previous lives, and known through this method. He would not have needed six months. But Shankara didn't have the scientific knowledge of this technique. He knew the science of entering into the other body, which was developed by a different group of seekers.

 

There are many spiritual sciences, and so far no religion possesses all the details of all these sciences. A certain religion developed a particular technique and then remained satisfied with it. But up to now, no single religion has been founded which contains the treasures of all the religions. And this will not come about until we have stopped seeing other religions with enmity. If these religions could come close to each other as friends and share each other's treasures, become partners, a new science may evolve that makes use of an infinite number of sources.

 

What was developed in Egypt is unknown in India. Those who built the pyramids knew something which no one in India knows. Those who worked in the monasteries of Tibet possessed something which is not found in India. What India has known is unknown in Tibet. What is known by one is not known by the other, and the problem is that each looks upon its respective fragment as complete.

 

Now going back into past lives is a very simple experiment; entering another body is very difficult and very dangerous. The experiment in regression is very easy and it involves no danger. But Shankara had no knowledge of this technique. Since he spent all his life challenging and debating the Jainas and the Buddhists, all the doors of Jainism and Buddhism were closed to him.

 

He could not gain anything from them because he could not establish any contact with them. It was a process of continuous confrontation. Naturally, some doors were closed to Shankara. Shankara was not ready to receive sunrays coming from any other direction except through his own door.

 

Although we don't realize it, the fact is no matter through which door the rays may enter, they come from the same sun. But here we are, sitting by our respective doors, putting our claim on it. We fail to recognize that what an Arab does wrapped up in a woolen blanket under the sun is the same thing a Tibetan does naked in the falling snow. Their work is identical -- there is no difference at all. Although they are engaged in contrary experiments, essentially both are involved in the same kind of work: the principles are the same.

 

-Osho, “And Now and Here, #13, Q5”