Spiritual Courage – The Boldness which Believes in the Truth and Dares to Practice It-1

Spiritual Courage – The Boldness which Believes in the Truth and Dares to Practice It-1

If you wish to change the world, cultivate the boldness that does not quake, that does not budge one inch from the path of truth!

“Be a blazing fire of truth, be a beauteous blossom of love and be a soothing balm of peace.” -- Khwaja Moinuddin Chishti (13th century Muslim Sufi saint)

There are two sorts of courage. One is the physical kind – the courage to jump into the mouth of danger. Tigers and wolves in that case have been better than men. But there is another sort of boldness, one that is far rarer to find – spiritual courage.

An invading emperor, Alexander the Great, went to India. His teacher told him to go and see some of those sages of India. After a long search he found a very old man sitting on a block of stone. The Emperor talked with him a little and became very much pleased with the conversation of the man. He asked the sage to go with him to his country.

“No, I am quite satisfied with my forest here.”

Said the Emperor, “I will give you money, position and wealth, for I am the Emperor of the world.”

“He indeed is the steady man who does not move one inch from the way of truth.”
- King Bharthari (1 BC)

“No,” replied the man, “I don’t care for those things.”

The Emperor replied, “If you do not go I will kill you.”

The man burst into a laugh. “That is the silliest thing you ever said, Emperor. You cannot kill me. Me the sun cannot dry, neither fire can burn, neither instrument kill, for I am the birthless, the deathless, the omnipotent, omnipresent soul, ever living.” The Emperor returned greatly humbled.

There is another such story – In the Great Indian Mutiny of 1857 there was a Swami (holy man), a very great soul. A Mahommedan mutineer stabbed him and nearly killed him. The Hindu mutineers brought the Mahommedan to the Swami and offered to kill him. But the Swami turned and said; “Yet brother, thou art He (God), thou art He (God)!” and expired.

“The abiding cause of all misery is not in the lack of life’s furniture, but in the obscurity of life’s significance. An undue emphasis upon “me” and “mine”, which falsifies the perspective of truth.”
- Rabindranath Tagore

Today, the world once again requires such bold men and women! We need people like the sage who did not quake, not even in the face of death, for he believed in the truth that the soul is eternal; we need men and women like the Swami who had the courage to not only recognize the truth, that God resides in every soul, but who dared to put it into practice by forgiving even the one who caused the greatest harm.

Om Namah Shivay