“God is all. God knows all, and God does all.”
Meher Baba’s Call (1954)
Context: God is all. God knows all, and God does all. When the Avatar proclaims he is the Ancient One, it is God who proclaims His manifestation on earth. When man utters for or against the Avatarhood, it is God who speaks through him. It is God alone who declares Himself through the Avatar and mankind.
44 : God Alone Is, p. 72.
The Everything and the Nothing (1963)
Context: Before he can know Who he is, man has to unlearn the mass of illusory knowledge hehas burdened himself with on the interminable journey from unconsciousness to consciousness. It is only through love that you can begin to unlearn, and, eventually, put an end to all that you do not know. God-love penetrates all illusion, while no amount of illusion can dim God-love. Start by learning to love God by beginning to love those whom you cannot. You will find that in serving others you are serving yourself. The more you remember others with kindness and generosity, the less you remember yourself; and when you completely forget yourself, you find me as the Source of all Love.
Source: Discourses (1967), Vol. III, Ch. 1 : The Avatar, p. 11.
Context: CONSCIOUSLY or unconsciously, every living creature seeks one thing. In the lower forms of life and in less advanced human beings, the quest is unconscious; in advanced human beings, it is conscious. The object of the quest is called by many names — happiness, peace, freedom, truth, love, perfection, Self-realisation, God-realisation, union with God. Essentially, it is a search for all of these, but in a special way. Everyone has moments of happiness, glimpses of truth, fleeting experiences of union with God; what they want is to make them permanent. They want to establish an abiding reality in the midst of constant change.
It is a natural desire, based fundamentally on a memory, dim or clear as the individual’s evolution may be low or high, of his essential unity with God; for, every living thing is a partial manifestation of God, conditioned only by its lack of knowledge of its own true nature. The whole of evolution, in fact, is an evolution from unconscious divinity to conscious divinity, in which God Himself, essentially eternal and unchangeable, assumes an infinite variety of forms, enjoys an infinite variety of experiences and transcends an infinite variety of self-imposed limitations. Evolution from the standpoint of the Creator is a divine sport, in which the Unconditioned tests the infinitude of His absolute knowledge, power and bliss in the midst of all conditions. But evolution from the standpoint of the creature, with his limited knowledge, limited power, limited capacity for enjoying bliss, is an epic of alternating rest and struggle, joy and sorrow, love and hate, until, in the perfected man, God balances the pairs of opposites and transcends duality. Then creature and Creator recognise themselves as one; changelessness is established in the midst of change, eternity is experienced in the midst of time. God knows Himself as God, unchangeable in essence, infinite in manifestation, ever experiencing the supreme bliss of Self-realisation in continually fresh awareness of Himself by Himself.
This realisation must and does take place only in the midst of life, for it is only in the midst of life that limitation can be experienced and transcended, and that subsequent freedom from limitation can be enjoyed.
To Robert Dreyfuss in 1964, p. 6403.
Lord Meher (1986)
“There is no greater romance in life than this adventure in realization.”
Message at Pickfair, Beverly Hills, California (1 June 1932), as quoted in Life Is A Jest (1974) edited by A. K. Hajra <!-- or 6 January? 1932 Me p100-101 -->
General sources
Context: Life becomes meaningful and all activities are purposeful only on the basis of faith in the enduring reality. … The greatest romance possible in life is to discover this Eternal Reality in the midst of infinite change. Once, one has experienced this, one sees oneself in everything that lives, one recognises all of life as his life, everybody's interests as his own. One is no longer bound by habits of the past, no longer swayed by the hopes of the future — One lives in and enjoys each present moment to the full. There is no greater romance in life than this adventure in realization.
The Final Declaration (1954)
Context: For man to have a glimpse of lasting happiness, he has first to realize that God, being in all, knows all; that God alone acts and reacts through all; that God, in the guise of countless animate and inanimate entities, experiences the innumerably varied phenomena of suffering and happiness. Thus, it is God who has brought suffering in human experience to its height, and God alone who will efface this illusory suffering and bring the illusory happiness to its height.
“You have asked for and been given enough words — it is now time to live them.”
The Universal Message (1958)
Context: I have come not to teach but to awaken. Understand therefore that I lay down no precepts.
Throughout eternity I have laid down principles and precepts, but mankind has ignored them. Man’s inability to live God’s words makes the Avatar’s teaching a mockery. Instead of practicing the compassion He taught, man has waged crusades in His name. Instead of living the humility, purity and truth of his words, man has given way to hatred, greed and violence.
Because man has been deaf to the principles and precepts laid down by God in the past, in this present Avataric form I observe Silence. You have asked for and been given enough words — it is now time to live them.
Message (23 March 1953) <!-- Dehra Dun
General sources
Context: Who says God has created this world? We have created it by our own imagination.
God is supreme, independent. When we say he has created this illusion, we lower him and his infinity. He is beyond all this.
Only when we find him in ourselves, and even in our day to day life, do all doubts vanish.
Statement of 1938, as quoted in Meher Baba On War : And Other Relevant Messages (1972); also Discourses (1987), p. 268<!-- 1938, India, MJ 1:1 p 4-7 -->
General sources
Context: The Avatar appears in different forms, under different names, at different times, in different parts of the world. As his appearance always coincides with the spiritual birth of man, so the period immediately preceding his manifestation is always one in which humanity suffers from the pangs of the approaching birth.
“I am never silent. I speak eternally.”
"I Speak Eternally" http://www.avatarmeherbaba.org/erics/ispeak.html in Love Alone Prevails (1981) by Kitty Davy, p. 166, 179.
General sources
Context: External silence helps to achieve inner Silence, and only in internal Silence is Baba found — in profound inner Silence. I am never silent. I speak eternally. The voice that is heard deep within the soul is My voice — the voice of inspiration, of intuition, of guidance. Through those who are receptive to this voice, I speak.
“God is Infinite and His Shadow is also infinite.”
18 : The Four Journeys, p. 22.
The Everything and the Nothing (1963)
Context: God is Infinite and His Shadow is also infinite. The Shadow of God is the Infinite Space that accommodates the infinite Gross Sphere which, with its occurrences of millions of universes, within and without the ranges of men's knowledge, is the Creation that issued from the Point of Finiteness in the infinite Existence that is God.
“Through those who are receptive to this voice, I speak.”
"I Speak Eternally" http://www.avatarmeherbaba.org/erics/ispeak.html in Love Alone Prevails (1981) by Kitty Davy, p. 166, 179.
General sources
Context: External silence helps to achieve inner Silence, and only in internal Silence is Baba found — in profound inner Silence. I am never silent. I speak eternally. The voice that is heard deep within the soul is My voice — the voice of inspiration, of intuition, of guidance. Through those who are receptive to this voice, I speak.
“If, instead of seeing faults in others we look within ourselves we are loving God.”
"How to Love God" (12 September 1954) http://www.avatarmeherbaba.org/erics/lovegod.html <!-- Also in The Path of Love (1986) -->
General sources
Context: When a person tells others “Be good”, he conveys to his hearers the feeling that he is good and they are not. When he says “Be brave, honest and pure”, he conveys to his hearers the feeling that the speaker himself is all that, while they are cowards, dishonest and unclean.
To love God in the most practical way is to love our fellow beings. If we feel for others in the same way as we feel for our own dear ones, we love God.
If, instead of seeing faults in others we look within ourselves we are loving God.
Source: Discourses (1967), Vol. III, Ch. 1 : The Avatar, p. 11.
Context: CONSCIOUSLY or unconsciously, every living creature seeks one thing. In the lower forms of life and in less advanced human beings, the quest is unconscious; in advanced human beings, it is conscious. The object of the quest is called by many names — happiness, peace, freedom, truth, love, perfection, Self-realisation, God-realisation, union with God. Essentially, it is a search for all of these, but in a special way. Everyone has moments of happiness, glimpses of truth, fleeting experiences of union with God; what they want is to make them permanent. They want to establish an abiding reality in the midst of constant change.
It is a natural desire, based fundamentally on a memory, dim or clear as the individual’s evolution may be low or high, of his essential unity with God; for, every living thing is a partial manifestation of God, conditioned only by its lack of knowledge of its own true nature. The whole of evolution, in fact, is an evolution from unconscious divinity to conscious divinity, in which God Himself, essentially eternal and unchangeable, assumes an infinite variety of forms, enjoys an infinite variety of experiences and transcends an infinite variety of self-imposed limitations. Evolution from the standpoint of the Creator is a divine sport, in which the Unconditioned tests the infinitude of His absolute knowledge, power and bliss in the midst of all conditions. But evolution from the standpoint of the creature, with his limited knowledge, limited power, limited capacity for enjoying bliss, is an epic of alternating rest and struggle, joy and sorrow, love and hate, until, in the perfected man, God balances the pairs of opposites and transcends duality. Then creature and Creator recognise themselves as one; changelessness is established in the midst of change, eternity is experienced in the midst of time. God knows Himself as God, unchangeable in essence, infinite in manifestation, ever experiencing the supreme bliss of Self-realisation in continually fresh awareness of Himself by Himself.
This realisation must and does take place only in the midst of life, for it is only in the midst of life that limitation can be experienced and transcended, and that subsequent freedom from limitation can be enjoyed.
The Final Declaration (1954)
Context: When my universal religion of love is on the verge of fading into insignificance, I come to breathe life into it, and to do away with the farce of dogmas that defile it in the name of religions, and stifle it with ceremonies and rituals.
The present universal confusion and unrest has filled the heart of man with greater lust for power and a greed for wealth and fame, bringing in its wake untold misery, hatred, jealousy, frustration and fear. Suffering in the world is at its height, in spite of all the striving to spread peace and prosperity to bring about lasting happiness.
“When the bubble of ignorance bursts the self realizes its oneness with the indivisible Self.”
65 : Ignorance Personified, p. 111.
The Everything and the Nothing (1963)
Context: When the bubble of ignorance bursts the self realizes its oneness with the indivisible Self.
Words that proceed from the Source of Truth have real meaning. But when men speakthese words as their own, the words become meaningless.
To Robert Dreyfuss in 1964, p. 6403.
Lord Meher (1986)
Context: Tell those who indulge in these drugs (LSD, marijuana, and other types) that it is harmful physically, mentally and spiritually, and that they should stop the taking of these drugs. Your duty is to tell them, regardless of whether they accept what you say, or if they ridicule or humiliate you, to boldly and bravely face these things.
“Better the absence of greatness than the establishing of a false greatness by assumed humility.”
Meher Baba’s Call (1954)
Context: Better the absence of greatness than the establishing of a false greatness by assumed humility. Not only do these efforts at humility on man's part not express strength, they are, on the contrary, expressions of modesty born of weakness, which springs from a lack of knowledge of the truth of Reality.
Beware of modesty. Modesty, under the cloak of humility, invariably leads one into the clutches of self-deception. Modesty breeds egoism, and man eventually succumbs to pride through assumed humility.
The greatest greatness and the greatest humility go hand in hand naturally and without effort.
“The experiences which drugs induce are as far removed from Reality as is a mirage, from water.”
As quoted in "An analysis of the problems presented in the use of LSD" (1967) UNODC http://www.unodc.org/unodc/en/data-and-analysis/bulletin/bulletin_1967-01-01_1_page003.html
General sources
Context: The experiences which drugs induce are as far removed from Reality as is a mirage, from water. No matter how much you pursue the mirage, you will never quench your thirst, and the search for Truth through drugs must end in disillusionment.
“It matters very little to dispute whether there have been ten or twenty-six or a million Avatars.”
Statement before 1955, as quoted in God Speaks : The Theme of Creation and Its Purpose (1973), p. 266.
General sources
Context: Whether there have been 26 Avatars since Adam, or 124,000 Prophets, as is sometimes claimed, or whether Jesus Christ was the last and only Messiah, or Muhammad the last Prophet, is all immaterial and insignificant when eternity and reality are under consideration.
It matters very little to dispute whether there have been ten or twenty-six or a million Avatars. The truth is that the Avatar is always one and the same, and that the five Sadgurus bring about the advent of the Avatar on earth. This has been going on cycle after cycle, and millions of such cycles must have passed by, and will continue to pass by, without affecting eternity in the least.