The Bawa Muhaiyaddeen Fellowship
Online Library
Where Does the Path to God Begin
A short talk given by M. R. Bawa Muhaiyaddeen from Questions of Life, Answers of Wisdom Volume 2.
Crisi
Beutler: For one who wishes to know God, where does the path
to God begin? And what is that path like?
M. R. Bawa Muhaiyaddeen: The path to God is very
easy. Think of a little baby-he has no world in him, no differences, no anger,
no selfishness, no envy. He has nothing of that state. He shows equality toward
all; he will go to everyone. He will smile at everyone. Anyone can kiss a
baby. Isn't a baby like that?
A baby begins as a cell. After it takes a form and comes out, the baby acts
out everything. By the time the child is three years old, he will imitate
whatever both of you did earlier in your sexual play. If you were on all fours,
he will imitate that. If you were on two legs, he will imitate that. Whatever
state you were in-if you behaved like a cow, he will act like a cow. If you
acted like a donkey, he will show you what a donkey does.
If you look with wisdom, you will be able to see the baby imitating every
act you performed. Even though he did not actually see you doing these things,
he has an awareness of them all. He will show the way you kissed. He will
bite the nose in the same way you nibbled at the nose. He will scratch the
way you scratched. The way you tickled, the way you walked, the way you lay
face down or face up or on your back-he will disclose every act of yours as
if in a photograph. The baby is saying, "Look at this foolishness, O
world! Look at this ignorance!"
Then he will look up at the sky and smile, saying, "I used to be up
there. Now I have come here." The baby will smile and talk to God and
His angels and the heavenly beings. But here (in the world), he will be acting
out your antics, telling God, "They did this; this is how they did it,
etc." Like that, he will tell in detail the entire history of the parents,
while speaking to God in his own language, "Ooom, aang, oong."
The baby will speak the language of those who come to visit you-the monkey-man,
the dog-man, the cat-man-all your friends, your relatives, your neighbors,
and your loved ones. He will speak all languages-the language of the birds,
snakes, reptiles, jinns, fairies, and angels-trying to explain all these things
to you in his own language. But all the while the baby will also be conversing
with God. He speaks God's language.
That same state must exist within us again, toward the end of our life. That
baby's state, God's state, must come at the end. The original baby is God's
baby, the baby that reveals and explains wisdom. Those baby qualities and
actions must be there in the end. But the time in between babyhood and the
end-that is hell. It is the story of the world that is in you now, and that
is what the baby is trying to show you.
So if, at the end, you can regain that same state of babyhood that was in you at birth, if you can regain those same qualities, then you will commune once again with God. You will embrace everyone, as a baby does, showing the same love for all without any differences. Only that infant state will earn you the right to speak with God. That is the quality we start off with, and we must end up with the same quality.