Question: About the
Temple -- where will
it be, how will it be built and how does it relate to The
Greatest Sign?
Maitreya: You can call the Temple the
outer expression of the inner teaching of the Mission. As you
know, the Temple is going to be built in the shape of The
Greatest Sign. The Greatest Sign is the crystallized
teaching around which the rest of our teaching evolves.
Even the Reminder says, "We surrender
ourselves to you, the words revealed to us through your Prophets and
The Greatest Sign, which clarifies the confusion between all."
The Greatest Sign is really a symbol of
unification, the unifying force on earth. It shows how all religions
have so far come as a segment of the greater truth, that is
represented by The Greatest Sign.
The building of the Temple itself, as a
building, is not the goal. The realization of The Greatest Sign
and the teaching behind the
Temple
is important. They bring the unity as every person who comes to this
Temple
realizes that each door, each entrance to the Temple,
represents one or more religions of the world, which have come to
humanity for the last six or twelve thousand years.
This also brings the realization that if you are a
Hindu, a Cabalist, a mystic of the Christian religion, a Sufi, or on
any path that tries to realize the universe through personal
experience and oneness with the Spirit, you are a part of
The Greatest Sign. If you are a Jew, a Christian, a Moslem or
from any other religion of the world, you'll find that you are
included. The Greatest Sign represents you.
Separation from God really doesn't exist. That's why
we don't say any one is separated from God. We say, "There's an
illusion of separation." Illusion means something which isn't true.
It means something that we imagine exists. Separation is an
illusion. So really there is no separation from God.
It's the same thing for the Mission.
The
Greatest Sign and the Temple represent the unity of the
universe, the oneness of One God. Any belief or religion which
separates itself from the Temple or the Mission, has
an illusion of separation. They are not really separated from us. We
don't consider anyone separate from the Mission. They might
have an illusion that they are separate. They might have an illusion
of, "No, My way is different than yours." They might have an
illusion that, "My own religion is different. I'm a Moslem, or a
Jew, or a Christian, or a Baha'i, or a Mystic, or a Buddhist, or a
Hindu or whatever." That is an illusion.
Of course, Maya, or illusion, is very powerful.
Probably 99% of humanity has an illusion of separation from God. And
that is where the problems come from. Yet, with meditation and more
people in higher consciousness, the more people will realize that
they have no escape, they are a part of God. That is the only place
to go -- or not to go, they're already there. Just to realize it,
that God is everything. We are one in the Spirit. If we're one in
the Spirit of God then there is no religion.
God-realization is not a religion. God-realization
is to know God, to be one with God. If you are not one with God,
then it becomes a religion. Religion really means dogma. In most of
the references to religion it's, "My religion is this." What he or
she really means is, "This is the dogma I believe in." Dogma might
not be the truth. Dogma means a series of beliefs.
Dogma can be truth if you really are one with God
and you have a series of beliefs in oneness with God. Yet dogma can
also be untruth -- like any belief which separates. There's a very
easy way to realize untrue dogma. Like I said, there is no
separation in God. There is no separation in Spirit. Everything is
one in the Spirit of God. So if someone believes that another is
separated from him or her, an illusion exists.
Untrue dogma also is the same thing. It's a belief,
or a set of beliefs, or religion that believes that some other
people are not as good as they, or they are separated from them.
That is untrue dogma, that is religion. That is belief. That brings
suffering. That brings all the confusion on the earth.
Yet if you bring this truth, that there is no such
thing as separation, then all of us are the Children of God and One
in His Spirit. That is the True Religion. This is also what The
Greatest Sign, THOTH, the Temple and we are
supposed to do. The Temple manifests a crystallized teaching,
a Oneness of all religions and God to humanity, and THOTH
also represents the same thing. The
Mission represents the same thing. The Greatest Sign
represents the same thing.
That is why the Temple is built with six
entrances. Each entrance represents one or more of the religions of
the world. Each person can enter the
Temple
from any door. But when you are inside the Temple, you are
one with all the religions. There is no separation. They are One.
There are also twelve sections around the center of
the
Temple
which house all kinds of literature, pro and con our teaching. We
should at least give the people a chance to read an idea saying
something against Oneness. Put it on the bookshelf where the people
can pick it up, read it and see that point of view also, to see how
they feel about it.
God loves people to search, ask and knock. He will
answer them and guide them. Of course, a few people might become
confused, not realizing how to search and really go to the heart of
the matter. There's always the possibility that some people will
fall into illusion. On the way to reach the Essence of God there are
a lot of pitfalls. Some people might become attached to a person.
Some might become attached to their own lives, a negative idea, etc.
So if anyone, any system, any belief becomes concerned about those
who do not believe their set of beliefs, then they become rigid.
They become a burden on humanity.
God is not a burden. God is freedom. God is complete
openness of mind and heart...not a complete openness of mind and
heart that if anything untrue came, still you believe in it and
accept it. He has already given His Words in the Scriptures and
THOTH
that we can measure against.
God's Words have come in Scriptures. We have offered
humanity many Scriptures to which they can refer. They can go to the
Bhagavad-Gita. They can go to the Upanishads. They can go
to the Old Testament or the New Testament. They can
read the Koran, the books of Baha'i or any other Scriptures
that relate to
The Greatest Sign. If you look at them and remove the
confusion between them by understanding our teaching and The
Greatest Sign, then they are a very good measure to see -- is
this word really true? Is it really true that I have to set my
subconscious mind in such a way that I become a millionaire? Or is
it the goal of life to buy and have all these things that we watch
on television that tell us, that is the goal of the life?
The measurement is, The Goal of The Life is To
Be(come) Divine. That is the measurement. That is what I can
measure my life against. These people on television are bombarding
me all the time, "Buy this, eat that, go on this vacation, get this
job, buy this car." Is that the goal of the life?
That's OK. I'm not saying it's bad to have a nice
car. Yet, is it the goal of my life? Should I live all my life for
it? So see, there are measurements. Although we are open-hearted and
open-minded, we are not fools. We are not people who can be dragged
to any new fad, or into any new idea or to any new approach.
If you don't have any measure, then you don't have
anything against which to measure this information. So you're pulled
in every direction. There are so many things out there telling you,
"Here, we have the truth." The other person says, "No, we have the
truth." Another person says, "We have the truth." Suddenly you
realize that you're compromising a lot of your principles if you
want to be pulled toward each of them, because you have no choice.
You have to fit your set of values in such a way that they fit all
these beliefs.
That is where some people are confused, because they
want to believe in so many beliefs out there which are not from God.
You can't please everyone. Somewhere you have to draw the line and
say, "No, I won't believe it. Though this sounds good, I will
examine it. I might put it in my spirit for some time, play with it
and let it soak in me and my spirit to see what the Spirit says. Is
it really the Word of God? Is it really what God wants to be done
and is it the way He really wants?"
So each person can search, ask, knock and at the
same time, measure everything he receives with these values that
have been cherished all through history. Any nation, any family, any
organization, any people who followed these principles prospered
because the Spirit was behind them. And those values are strongly
manifested in the communities, in family love, in the house that is
based on the Spirit, on God.
The house, the family, the community which is based
on the Spirit is strong. It's a very strong unity. If you have a
nice strong house, it doesn't matter how large a storm is out there.
You sit inside, warm and comfortable. Outside, yes, there is a
storm. You don't care because your house is strong, it's built on a
good foundation. If someone comes and says, "Hey, let's put this
door in this place," and another says, "Let's stretch that wall that
way," after awhile your house doesn't look like a house anymore,
it's just going in all different directions. And because you haven't
planned it very well from the foundation, it becomes a very weak,
ugly house. If there's a strong wind, that's it. It just falls like
a house of cards -- just falls all the way down to the ground.
So the Temple is the unifying manifestation
of our teaching and because it is a building, it will attract a lot
of people. Even those who come to visit will have experiences in the
rooms and corridors in the center. They will see another
manifestation of a unified humanity. They will come and look, feel,
and experience, and they will be affected.
Also there will be many books in the libraries that
they can read, search and understand. Eventually, after they read,
search and intellectually try to understand, they go one step
closer. They go to the center of the Temple which is a quiet
place. There are no lectures. There is nothing there to disturb you.
It is a place of meditation, a place of Soul-to-Soul and
Spirit-to-Spirit communication, to be with God.
The intellect is good. We're not saying that
intellect is bad. You should read the books in those libraries. But
go beyond intellect. Go to the Spirit beyond intellect.
You enter the Temple in one religion, in one
door. You become unified inside that Temple. You have access
to all kinds of literature that you can read and use to satisfy your
intellectual curiosities. Still, that is not enough. You go to the
Spirit in the center of the Temple. The center of the Temple is where the real realization is.
The top of the libraries are built in the shape of
pyramids. Pyramids are very intellectual things. They're very
sharp-sided, like intellect.
A dome is very spiritual. It's very hard to find any
sharp sides. It's very mellow. It's very smooth. That's why in the
very top of the center of the
Temple, there will be a dome.
So when you sit in the libraries and read, the
effect of the pyramids will please the intellectual understanding.
When you go inside, in the center of the
Temple
and you meditate, there will be greater spiritual realization
because of the dome that's at the top of the center of the Temple.
Around this Temple there will be universities
in which to study scientific facts, scientific endeavors,
intellectual understanding, and research and development to try to
find out about the universe in the libraries, etc. So nothing is
left out. A well rounded, prepared humanity will be created.
Humanity is not only the physical, but also is the mental and the
spiritual.
So humans can develop themselves in all levels. They
will not be developed in only one level. See, anything that develops
in only one level is going to be a very unbalanced development. Even
if you develop only spiritually, it's unbalanced. You go too far.
You sit there in an ecstatic level. If God wanted you to go into an
ecstatic level, He would have created this universe in that state.
He wants you to see the play. He wants you to search Him, to find
Him and to realize Him on all levels, the physical, mental and the
spiritual levels.
Around this Temple and the universities,
there are the
Communities of Light where people who meditate are living.
They have their own communities, their own system. They have their
own chosen people as leaders or representatives. Each community has
their own set-up of how they run their community. At the same time,
they have access to all this knowledge.
So you can just imagine, if you can, the New
Jerusalem --
Communities of Light, the Temple, the meditation rooms
in every community or the community centers. In the community
centers there are also going to be lectures, study and all those
things for the people who want to go to a deeper level, to have the
ability to give Satsang.
There are no lectures in the Temple. In the
Communities of Light there are all kinds of lectures and
endeavors to make the people realize higher consciousness.
All of these are interrelated, and the
Temple
is a very great part of the whole thing. It is the external
manifestation of our teaching.
Question: What would you say to someone who
said, "The
Communities of Light sound wonderful but at my age, I'm never
going to see them. So what is the value to me?"
Maitreya: Well there's a story. A king was
riding on his horse with his company. He suddenly came across this
95 year old man planting a tree. The king became very startled. He
said, "This man is not going to be here more than, at the most, five
or ten years. This tree is going to take fifty years to grow and
become strong and useful." So he, just out of curiosity, went to
that man and said, "Old man, why are you putting so much effort into
this tree, that's not going to give you any fruit or anything that
will be useful to you?"
The old man said, "Others grew and I ate. Now I grow
that others might enjoy." In essence he said, "I will plant this
tree. I might not see it. I might not receive any fruit from it but
others after me will enjoy this tree. Others will receive the good
fruit of it and may even remember me for what I did. Yet, even if
they don't remember me, it doesn't matter. The most important thing
is, I can do this for the future."
What he was saying was, I'll put forth this effort
now because I'm not attached to the results of my action. He was
completely submissive to the Spirit. He was saying, I'm not doing
this because there is something in it for me, I'm doing it because
that is God's Will. That is how the universe works. If I plant a
tree, in the future, others will enjoy it.
If I put some endeavor in this Mission, the
future people will see the results. I might even come back and live
in those communities. When you believe in reincarnation, you don't
live just for this life. You live for many lives to come.
So, if you say, I'm not going to put in any effort
because I'm old, then you're already dead. You have to put in effort
to the end, to the last breath that is in your chest. And not that
you're going to gain something, but because God put that breath in
your chest and you're going to use that breath for Him.
If you believe the Communities of Light are
the answer, then it's your obligation to help, join and do what you
can. Maybe you have been studying about this and it has been
revealed to you that this is the answer and now what you are looking
for has been told and fulfilled. It doesn't matter if it's going to
benefit you or not.
I might not even see the Temple myself, yet
is it going to prevent me from putting my effort toward it? It might
take l,000 years before people start realizing what I am saying.
Should that prevent me from going ahead and doing my work, from
doing the thing that Spirit told me to do? No, it doesn't, because
we're not attached to the results of our actions. We do the task in
the moment.
You see, you do it because you want to do it,
because you follow God. God's timetable is different from mine and
yours. See, it took more than 5,000 years for what God had promised
to Abraham to be fulfilled for his children. If Abraham had said,
"Oh, it's not going to be for me. I'm not going to see this promise.
So I'm not going to do Your bidding. I'm just going to stay in a
small little place somewhere in the big city and do my little
thing."
He had to do it because he knew God. He said, "Even
if it takes thousands of years, that's what I have to do now. If it
takes two thousand years, fine, I'll do my thing now."
It sometimes seems slow but that's how God works. If
you want to do things fast, you make a lot of mistakes. You fall
into the trips that push you to the edge, of pushing yourself for
something that is not God's Will.
You may come into recruiting people, trying to
really get members to the Mission, members to the
organization, because the members are not coming. "I am on the Board
of Directors, I'm not going to be selected as the President for the
next term. So I have to push my people to get members." After awhile
the Spirit leaves you. There's no Spirit in that organization.
Spirit takes Its time and It doesn't do for the
results of Its action. Of course, if you receive results, beautiful,
wonderful. It opens your heart. It makes you joyful. When you see
people doing something beautiful around the Mission, it makes
your heart sing. You say, "That's beautiful! That's such a Unity!"
If every person brings a little of his beauty to the
group, then we're going to be a beautiful group. But if I lock up my
beauty because I'm not going to see the results, that is not a good
approach. That means that you are not yet submissive to the Will of
God. Therefore, do the Will day-by-day, the result will eventually
manifest itself.
