"Celibacy & sex"

 

    The first step to free the world from sexuality is to allow children to remain nude, as much as possible, in the home. As far as it is feasible, it is advisable to allow children, both boys and girls, to play in the nude, so that they become totally acquainted with each other’s bodies. Then, tomorrow, there will be no necessity for them to snuggle up to each other in the streets. Then there will be no need to print nude pictures in books. Then they will be so familiar with each other’s bodies that no kind of perverted attraction will be possible in the future.

    But the way of the world is just the opposite. The people who have covered and concealed the body have unwittingly created so great an attraction for it that, although it has overtaken our minds, we still haven’t felt the full impact.

    Children should remain nude and should play in the nude for a long time, so no seed of madness remains to plague them the rest of their lives.

    But the disease is already there, and it is on the increase. The existence of the disease can be observed in the bulk of obscene literature now being published. People read it, hiding it between the covers of the GITA and the BIBLE. We shout that obscene books should be banned, but we never pause to think where the men who read them are coming from; we protest the displaying of nude pictures but never stop to ask why they are exhibited in the first place.

    Sex is natural, but sexuality is the product of anti-sex teachings. If these teachings are followed, if the advice given in these unscientific sermons is taken, the soul of man will be totally filled with sexuality. It has almost happened. But, thank God, such teachers are not very successful. And because of their failure, man has been able to salvage some of his conscience, some of his discrimination. If man understands sex properly, he can rise above it. He should rise above it; it is necessary that he rise above it.

    All our efforts to date have borne wrong results because we have not befriended sex but have declared war on it; we have used suppression and lack of understanding as ways of dealing with sex problems. The deeper a man’s understanding, the higher he can rise above sex; the less his understanding, the greater his attempts to suppress sex will be. And the results of repression are never fruitful, never pleasing, never healthy.

    Sex is man’s most vibrant energy, but it should not be an end unto itself: sex should lead man to his soul. The goal is from lust to light.

    To reach celibacy sex must be understood. To know sex is to be free of it, to transcend it; but even after a lifetime of sexual experience, a man is not able to detect that intercourse gives him a fleeting experience of samadhi, a peek into superconsciousness. That is the great pull of sex; that is the great allure of sex: it is the magnetic attraction of the Supreme. You have to know and to meditate upon this momentary glimpse; you have to focus on it with awareness. On everyone its pull is so tremendously strong.

    There are other, easier ways to attain to the very same experience – meditation, yoga and prayer are other alternatives – but only the channel of sex has such a powerful influence on man. It is very important to consider the various ways there are to reach the same goal.

    If a mother is sensible, she will relate her experiences of sex to her daughter in time, before she slips into a netherland of sex, before she loses herself in unknown, immature ways. If a father is sensitive in discharging his parental responsibility, he must freely discuss the subject with his son and daughter – to warn them against the common pitfalls and to save their lives from possible perversion in the future.

    But the irony of the situation is that neither the father nor the mother has any deep, conscious experience in the matter. They themselves haven’t risen above the level of physical sex, and so they fear their children may become entangled at the same level as well. But did anybody guide you? You have entangled yourself. And your children will also entangle themselves. And it will be repeated in the second and third generations and so forth. But isn’t it possible if your children are spoken to, if they are taught, if they are allowed to think freely for themselves, that they may save themselves from dissipating their energy? They may conserve their energy. And they may transform it.

    We have all seen coal many times. Scientists say that in a period of a few thousand years coal is transformed into diamonds, and that there is no chemical or structural difference between coal and diamonds. A diamond is the transformed manifestation of a piece of coal. A diamond is only coal. Sex is coal, whereas brahmacharya, celibacy, is diamond. Celibacy is a form of sex; celibacy is the transformation of sex. Celibacy is coal, but after it has undergone a certain process. And there is no enmity between the two extremes. No enemy of sex can ever become brahmacharya.

    What do we mean by brahmacharya, by celibacy? It is the charya of Brahma; it is communion with God. It is the realization of the divine experience, of the experience of God. And, by the use of conscious understanding, it is possible to direct one’s sexual energy on this path, on the path to God.