Meditation for the Day

23. Prayer (the Transformation Tarot)

Love and the law of Moses

Let your gestures be alive, spontaneous. Let your own awareness decide your lifestyle, life pattern. Don't allow anybody else to decide it. That is a sin, to allow anybody else to decide it.

Why is it a sin?--because you will never be in it. It will remain superficial, it will be hypocrisy. Don't ask anybody how to pray. Let the moment decide, let the moment be decisive, and the truth of the moment should be your prayer. And once you allow the truth of the moment to possess you, you will start growing and you will know tremendous beauties of prayer. You have entered on the path.

A famous story about Moses: He was passing through a forest and he saw a man praying. The man was saying such absurd things that Moses had to stop. What the man was saying was profane, sacrilegious. He was saying, "God, you must be feeling sometimes very alone--I can come and be always with you like a shadow. Why suffer loneliness when I am here? And I am not a useless person either--I will give you a good bath, and I will take all the lice from your hair and your body..."

Lice?! Moses could not believe his ears: what is this man talking about? "And I will cook food for you--everybody likes what I cook. And I will prepare your bed and I will wash your clothes. When you are ill I will take care of you. I will be a mother to you, a wife to you, a servant, a slave--I can be all kinds of things. Just give me a hint so I can come..."

Moses stopped him and said, "What are you doing? To whom are you talking? Lice in God's hair? He needs a bath? Stop this nonsense! This is not prayer. God will be offended by you." Looking at Moses, the man fell at his feet. He said, "I am sorry. I am an illiterate, ignorant man. I don't know how to pray. Please, you teach me!"

So Moses taught him the right way to pray, and he was very happy because he had put a man on the right track. Happy, puffed up in his ego, Moses went away. And when he was alone in the forest, a thundering voice came from the sky and said, "Moses, I have sent you into the world to bring people to me, to bridge people with me, but not to take my lovers away from me. And that's exactly what you have done. That man is one of the most intimate to me. Go back and apologize. Take your prayer back! You have destroyed the whole beauty of his dialogue. He is sincere, he is loving. His love is true. Whatsoever he was saying, he was saying from his heart, it was not a ritual. Now what you have given to him is just a ritual. He will repeat it but it will be only on the lips; it will not be coming from his being."

on having faith

in the wee hours
amid the thick night airs
come the changes

changes of heart and
shadows taking form grow full
but I stay the course

telling not a one
of my deep concerns, unfounded
for I still believe

I believe in love
grace visits those who hold true
as sunlight at dawn

dark nights and bad dreams
have no power here, for peace
moved in for good

the memory of all that

no, no they can't take that away from me

and my mind takes a wander
down a memory lane
remembering all the same
things said and done
for love

i sang to the trees
i kissed the wind
i wrote the words
my heart declared
my soul confirmed

and day did come
as night did pass

the memory of all that
no, they can't take that away

KEEPING QUIET ~ Pablo Neruda

Now we will count to twelve and we will all keep still.

For once on the face of the earth,

let's not speak in any language;

let's stop for a second,

and not move our arms so much.

It would be an exotic moment

without rush, without engines;

we would all be together in a sudden strangeness.

Fisherman in the cold sea would not harm whales

and the man gathering salt would not look at his hurt hands.

Those who prepare green wars,

wars with gas, wars with fire,

victories with no survivors,

would put on clean clothes and walk about with their brothers

in the shade, doing nothing.

What I want should not be confused with total inactivity.

Life is what it is about.....

If we were not so single minded about keeping our lives moving,

and for once could do nothing,

perhaps a huge silence might interrupt this sadness

of never understanding ourselvesand of threatening ourselves with death.

Perhaps the earth can teach us,

as when everything seems dead in winter and later proves to be alive.

Now I'll count up to twelve

and you keep quiet and I will go