What is the Fellowship ?
STUDENT: What is this Fellowship?
BABA MUHAIYADDEEN: The word fellowship sounds like the Tamil words pelai, which means fault, and supi which means to suck. The baby mind sucks at the faults and desires in the heart of man as if they were milk. It likes all things which are evil.
The Fellowship is here to tell that baby mind:
• Correct yourself.
• Correct your faults.
• Bring peace to your heart.
• Destroy your arrogance and show love and compassion.
• Destroy the karma to which you are connected.
• Destroy your own hunger and erase the hunger of others.
• Cut away your selfishness and help all lives.
• Do not earn wages for your own good; dedicate your life to the good of others.
• Do not live by taking the property of others; show them the way to live in contentment and equality.
• Come to a state of peace.
God has given His kingdom to all His creations so that each one can live in contentment. All the animals in the jungle and the creatures in the ocean are connected; the birds of the air are connected; and even the sun, the moon, and the stars live connectedly in the sky. Man alone has lost his contentment because of his selfishness, his desires, his greed, his arrogance and pride, his trickery and treachery, and the differences he sees between the I and the you.
To man, who is never satisfied, the Fellowship says, "All other lives live happily, O man. Why can't you? God has given you a kingdom of freedom. Realize that in His kingdom everyone lives contentedly. O man, why do you destroy the contentment of others? Learn to live in contentment. Give up your jealousy, ignorance, and selfishness. Act with the qualities of God. Imbibe wisdom and live like a man. Show the compassion of God to all lives, so that they can exist as one life, in contentment and unity. Live in the state of God's peacefulness, the state of love, compassion, freedom, and equality. Resolve to live in this state. Then the place where you live can be changed into heaven, into the kingdom of God.
The Fellowship says, "O mankind, understand this. We are human beings, are we not? Man is the noblest of God's creations. But you have abandoned your human face, preferring to show instead the face of a dog, a donkey, or a snake. Sometimes you even turn your face into that of a demon or a ghost. You put on the masks of tigers, lions, elephants, bears, vultures, monkeys, and eagles. You put on the masks of four hundred trillion, ten thousand animals. Don't you know that each one of these is out to kill the other? Why are you fond of these masks? You wear them in your heart as well as on your face.
"O man, you were born beautiful. God gave you such a beautiful face. And of all hearts, God gave you the most beautiful. He endowed you with seven kinds of wisdom. Animals were given only three levels of wisdom—feeling, awareness, and intellect. But God gave you four more levels—judgment, subtle wisdom, divine analytic wisdom, and divine luminous wisdom. And God gave you a connection to Him. He placed His kingdom within you and placed you within His kingdom. Your life is within Him, and He lives within you as your life. Your secret is within God and God's secret is within you.
"O man, you should be representative, a king, and a friend to all lives. God gave you special abilities so that you could protect others, but having received such power, what have you done? You have abandoned your true state and your beauty and have taken on the faces of animals and demons, preferring these to your human face. You have forgotten the beauty of God and the beauty of man and have lost the qualities of God and the qualities of man. You have uprooted the truth of God and the truth of man. You have lost the abilities God gave you.
"O man, try to understand this. Try to change into a true human being and try to live in that way, serving all lives. Let your actions fit your words. Let your speech be put into action in the form of duty. Let your outer behavior match your inner qualities. With those qualities you can rule the kingdom of God and show others how to live in that kingdom in equality, peace, and tranquility. This is a life of freedom. Realize this, O man."
The Fellowship teaches so many things. It explains what a life of human freedom is. It shows the way to realize the faults of man and to avoid them It teaches and illustrates the qualities of God. That is the function of the Fellowship.
Muhaiyaddeen, Bawa. Questions of Life - Answers of Wisdom. Philadelphia: Fellowship Press, 1991. 33-35.
BABA MUHAIYADDEEN: The word fellowship sounds like the Tamil words pelai, which means fault, and supi which means to suck. The baby mind sucks at the faults and desires in the heart of man as if they were milk. It likes all things which are evil.
The Fellowship is here to tell that baby mind:
• Correct yourself.
• Correct your faults.
• Bring peace to your heart.
• Destroy your arrogance and show love and compassion.
• Destroy the karma to which you are connected.
• Destroy your own hunger and erase the hunger of others.
• Cut away your selfishness and help all lives.
• Do not earn wages for your own good; dedicate your life to the good of others.
• Do not live by taking the property of others; show them the way to live in contentment and equality.
• Come to a state of peace.
God has given His kingdom to all His creations so that each one can live in contentment. All the animals in the jungle and the creatures in the ocean are connected; the birds of the air are connected; and even the sun, the moon, and the stars live connectedly in the sky. Man alone has lost his contentment because of his selfishness, his desires, his greed, his arrogance and pride, his trickery and treachery, and the differences he sees between the I and the you.
To man, who is never satisfied, the Fellowship says, "All other lives live happily, O man. Why can't you? God has given you a kingdom of freedom. Realize that in His kingdom everyone lives contentedly. O man, why do you destroy the contentment of others? Learn to live in contentment. Give up your jealousy, ignorance, and selfishness. Act with the qualities of God. Imbibe wisdom and live like a man. Show the compassion of God to all lives, so that they can exist as one life, in contentment and unity. Live in the state of God's peacefulness, the state of love, compassion, freedom, and equality. Resolve to live in this state. Then the place where you live can be changed into heaven, into the kingdom of God.
The Fellowship says, "O mankind, understand this. We are human beings, are we not? Man is the noblest of God's creations. But you have abandoned your human face, preferring to show instead the face of a dog, a donkey, or a snake. Sometimes you even turn your face into that of a demon or a ghost. You put on the masks of tigers, lions, elephants, bears, vultures, monkeys, and eagles. You put on the masks of four hundred trillion, ten thousand animals. Don't you know that each one of these is out to kill the other? Why are you fond of these masks? You wear them in your heart as well as on your face.
"O man, you were born beautiful. God gave you such a beautiful face. And of all hearts, God gave you the most beautiful. He endowed you with seven kinds of wisdom. Animals were given only three levels of wisdom—feeling, awareness, and intellect. But God gave you four more levels—judgment, subtle wisdom, divine analytic wisdom, and divine luminous wisdom. And God gave you a connection to Him. He placed His kingdom within you and placed you within His kingdom. Your life is within Him, and He lives within you as your life. Your secret is within God and God's secret is within you.
"O man, you should be representative, a king, and a friend to all lives. God gave you special abilities so that you could protect others, but having received such power, what have you done? You have abandoned your true state and your beauty and have taken on the faces of animals and demons, preferring these to your human face. You have forgotten the beauty of God and the beauty of man and have lost the qualities of God and the qualities of man. You have uprooted the truth of God and the truth of man. You have lost the abilities God gave you.
"O man, try to understand this. Try to change into a true human being and try to live in that way, serving all lives. Let your actions fit your words. Let your speech be put into action in the form of duty. Let your outer behavior match your inner qualities. With those qualities you can rule the kingdom of God and show others how to live in that kingdom in equality, peace, and tranquility. This is a life of freedom. Realize this, O man."
The Fellowship teaches so many things. It explains what a life of human freedom is. It shows the way to realize the faults of man and to avoid them It teaches and illustrates the qualities of God. That is the function of the Fellowship.
Muhaiyaddeen, Bawa. Questions of Life - Answers of Wisdom. Philadelphia: Fellowship Press, 1991. 33-35.
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