This Bank and that Bank
This is an excerpt of a beautiful discourse delivered by Bhagavan Baba on the occasion of the inauguration of a branch office of State Bank of India in Prasanthi Nilayam more than 40 years ago.
I am glad that the State Bank of India is opening a branch here in the Prashanthi Nilayam area. Artha (wealth) is one of the Purushaarthas – legitimate objects of human endeavour. The four purushaarthas are dharma, artha, kaama and moksha (righteousness, wealth, desire and liberation). They have been listed so, in that order, on purpose.
Dharma (righteousness) has to direct and control the process of earning wealth (artha) and moksha (liberation) is to be the regulating factor of desire (kaama). All wealth accruing from sources minted by adharma (unrighteous means) is to be treated with contempt as unworthy of man.
All desires that do not subserve the one supreme need for liberation are to be given up as beneath the dignity of man. So, the Adhyaathmic (spiritual) basis of dharma and moksha, has to be the root of both artha and kaama. Without it, earning degenerates into plundering; desire degenerates into death.
This Bank helps you to keep your money safe when you deposit it with them. They are happy to receive it from you; they will allow you to make use of it when you are in difficulty. But your money helps you only in worldly distress. You accumulate it with great care, by thousands of acts of denial, denying yourselves this comfort or that convenience, saving in this item and that, spending less and earning more; but a day comes when you have to leave the pile and go, empty-handed.
This passbook will not be looked into there. Why, even while here, when the pile grows into an attractive quantity, sons start fighting for it, causing you anxiety and fear; taxes take away a large share; thieves and crooks have an eye on it.
There is another Bank which receives deposits and maintains accounts strictly and confidentially. Every little sum is entered and accounted for deeds, thoughts, words, good, bad and indifferent. If this Bank takes good care of your aasthi (properties, wealth), that Bank watches whether you are an aasthika, a person who acts on the assumption that there is asthi – a sovereign guiding principle that is divine, that whispers warnings from the heart when dharma and sathya are infringed, when artha and kaama enslave man unchecked. No son can sue for that aasthi (wealth); no tax-gatherer can lay his hands on it.
No crook can transfer it to his purse. Open a deposit account there, in that Bank, for your prosperity here and hereafter. That deposit, growing by your spiritual efforts, will give you joy and peace.
While you should develop this saving habit here, for the sake of old age and a rainy day, it is necessary that you should develop that “saving habit” for the hereafter, so that you may be saved. Dharmam chara, sathyam vada is the method. Dharma, sathya and prema (Righteousness, Truth and Love) are the currency accepted by that other Bank. All acts, words and feelings ringing with the purity of these metals will be accepted as deposits. So, along with an account in this bank, you must take care to have an account in that other Bank also…
