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How about reading the Gita? || AP Neem Candies
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4 years ago
True Master
Image vs. Reality
Usefulness
Scriptures
Meditativeness
Shri Krishna
Upanishads
Ego
Description

Acharya Prashant addresses the question of how to identify a true master with limited knowledge by using the analogy of a patient and a doctor. He asks whether one would thank the most reputed doctor in town or the one who actually provides a cure. Similarly, a mother would be grateful to the specific doctor who helped her deliver her baby, not necessarily the most famous or expensive hospital. The speaker emphasizes that a master's reputation or grandeur is irrelevant if they are of no use to the seeker. He extends this by asking, "How can somebody be great if he has not been able to help you?" The speaker acknowledges that his approach might seem disruptive rather than supportive, but he affirms this by stating that a doctor's task is to disrupt the pattern of the disease. He clarifies that his critique is not aimed at the masters themselves but at the false images of them that people carry. He argues that people claim to know the great figures of the past, like Shri Krishna, but what they truly know is merely a secondhand, distorted image. This image, he explains, is a product of one's own mind and is ultimately false. His intention, therefore, is to disrupt this false image, not the person. He elaborates that these images are useless because they are an extension of one's own ego. For example, many people claim to love and respect Shri Krishna but have never read the Gita; they carry a "moth-eaten" and juvenile image of him. The speaker asserts that there are two ways to gain true knowledge: the best way is through one's own meditativeness, where truth arises from within, and the next best way is through the diligent and honest study of original scriptures like the Upanishads. He criticizes the hypocrisy of being neither meditative nor diligent while forming opinions based on random stories and hearsay, without understanding the scriptures' true essence.