Acharya Prashant responds to a questioner who is unable to understand the writings of Khalil Gibran. He begins by asserting that it is sufficient if the questioner can understand him, the living teacher who is present. He explains that Gibran was speaking to his own audience, and the speaker is talking to the current one. Therefore, it is not necessary to be able to understand Gibran; if one does, it is a bonus. The important thing is to understand the teacher who is in front of you. Gibran's audience was meant to understand Gibran. The speaker elaborates that this is precisely why scriptures and saints have always emphasized the importance of a living teacher. The role of a living teacher is to make the timeless truths digestible for the contemporary audience. He assures the questioner that a time will come when they will be able to read Gibran as lucidly as they hear the speaker now. The difficulty in understanding past masters like Gibran stems from their different style, context, and the passage of time, as it has been a century since he wrote. To illustrate this, Acharya Prashant gives examples from the poet Khusro. He explains that a Westerner might struggle to comprehend the spiritual depth of a line like, "You've taken away my identity with just one glance," because the cultural context of Khusro's India, where women did not typically look into a man's eyes, is lost on the modern mind. He also mentions that the millennial generation finds it difficult to relate to the works of saints like Kabir because the values and concepts, such as devotion, piety, and shame ('lajja'), are alien to them. The problem with understanding Gibran is similar; his world is different from ours.
