Need a Master?

Question: When Papaji was asked if a person needs a teacher, he said: ‘Yes,’ and also that there is no teacher. My question is, because you did have a true teacher, do you think it’s really necessary? Does one come to a point where you can’t experience more truth because you don’t have a teacher?

Hanuman: Well, sometimes he was speaking from an absolute view. So, when he was saying there is no teacher and no student, he was really saying that That which the teacher is and That which the student is are the same. They are not two.

Speaking from a more relative point of view, he would be saying that a teacher is necessary. There are those who have awoken, seemingly, without a teacher. Those who are from some other lineages perhaps speak about the necessity of a teacher. Those who awoke without will say no teacher is necessary.

So, what do you make of all of that? Grace is available to everybody.

We all know the possibility of Grace for everyone on this Earth at any moment. There is a kind of engagement with a teacher that can be extraordinarily useful. For example, with some, the Master would be cutting through arrogance. To be engaged by a teacher in that way could be quite useful.

But I am sensitive to this question, because I know many people would love to have met and been in the presence of the Master, and I do not want anyone to feel they missed out, or that was some kind of a chance of a lifetime, because really, it is all a chance of a lifetime, this amazing opportunity we have, all of us.

I’ve seen many people who have benefited amazingly by being in the presence of the Master, and a year later you would never know that they had learned anything at all. And there are those who are professional guru hoppers, who find the guru du jour and partake of that meal and then the next, as if that is what it is about.

So, the best I could say about it is to be connected to That which is within you that is absolutely true. And so, there is no longer a seeming necessity to look to anyone else as the authority.