# The Nectar of God (Part: 14) আমরা যদি আধ্যাত্মিক জীবনের সত্যিকারের অভিজ্ঞতা অর্জন করতে চাই, তবে প্রথমেই আমাদের বুঝতে হবে যে ঈশ্বর কোনো বহির্ভূত বস্তু নন। তিনি আমাদের অন্তর্গত সত্তায়, আমাদের চেতনার গভীরতায় বিদ্যমান। এই সত্য উপলব্ধি না হলে আমাদের সকল সাধনা বৃথা হয়ে যায়। আমরা যেন বাইরে খুঁজে পাওয়ার চেষ্টা করি এবং ভিতরের সম্পদ হাতছাড়া করি। If we truly wish to attain genuine spiritual experience, we must first understand this: God is no external object. He resides in the depths of our inner being, in the profound recesses of our consciousness. Without this realization, all our spiritual practices become mere futility. We find ourselves searching without, while the treasure within slips through our fingers. ঈশ্বরের খোঁজ করা মানে নিজেকে খোঁজা। নিজের সত্যিকারের রূপ, আত্মার প্রকৃত স্বভাব উন্মোচন করা। এই যাত্রা অত্যন্ত ব্যক্তিগত, অত্যন্ত অন্তরঙ্গ। কোনো শাস্ত্র, কোনো গুরু এই পথ তৈরি করে দিতে পারেন না। তারা শুধু নির্দেশনা দিতে পারেন, পথপ্রদর্শক হতে পারেন। কিন্তু পথ চলা, পদক্ষেপ রাখা—এটি সম্পূর্ণভাবে আমাদের নিজস্ব দায়িত্ব। To seek God is to seek oneself. To unveil one's true form, to uncover the authentic nature of the soul. This journey is profoundly personal, achingly intimate. No scripture, no master can fashion this path for you. They can only offer guidance, serve as wayfarers. But the walking itself, each step forward—this remains entirely, inescapably yours. মানুষ বিভিন্ন পথে, বিভিন্ন পদ্ধতিতে এই সত্যের সন্ধান করেছে। কেউ ভক্তির মাধ্যমে, কেউ জ্ঞানের পথে, কেউ কর্মের যোগে। এই বৈচিত্র্য নিজেই একটি প্রমাণ যে একটি মাত্র পথ নেই, একটি মাত্র উপায় নেই। প্রতিটি হৃদয়, প্রতিটি সত্তা তার নিজস্ব পথ খোদাই করে নেয়। এবং সেটাই সঠিক পথ, যদি তা সৎ এবং আন্তরিক হয়। Across ages, humanity has pursued this truth through manifold paths and methods. Some through devotion, some through the way of knowledge, others through the discipline of righteous action. This very diversity is proof that no single road exists, no one true way. Each heart, each consciousness carves its own passage. And that path is the right one, if it be pursued with sincerity and genuine longing. কিন্তু এই স্বাধীনতা একটি দায়িত্বও বহন করে। আত্মপ্রতারণার সুযোগও অনেক বেশি। আমরা নিজেদের ভুলের পথকেই সঠিক বলে গ্রহণ করতে পারি, যদি আমাদের সতর্কতা না থাকে। তাই প্রজ্ঞা প্রয়োজন, বিবেক প্রয়োজন। এবং একটি গভীর অন্তর্দৃষ্টি, যা আমাদের বলতে পারে কখন আমরা সত্যের দিকে যাচ্ছি, কখন ভ্রম থেকে বেরিয়ে আসছি। Yet this freedom carries its burden. The temptation toward self-deception runs deep. We may embrace our own erring paths as truth, should vigilance abandon us. Thus wisdom becomes necessary, conscience indispensable. And a keen inner vision too—one that tells us when we move toward truth, when we stumble away from delusion. ঈশ্বর সুধা, আধ্যাত্মিকতার এই অমৃত, আসলে আমাদের নিজস্ব সত্যের আবিষ্কার। যখন আমরা আমাদের প্রকৃত স্বরূপ জানি, তখনই সেই অমৃত আমাদের হৃদয়ে স্বাদিত হয়। এবং সেই অনুভূতির চেয়ে বড় কোনো আনন্দ, কোনো শান্তি এই জগতে নেই। This nectar of God, this ambrosia of the spiritual life, is ultimately the discovery of our own truth. When we know our authentic nature, then alone does that sacred draught become tangible upon our tongue. And there exists no greater joy, no profounder peace in all this world than that realization.

In a particular person's life, a certain truth may sometimes take deep hold for specific reasons. The history of religious thought offers many such instances. Because of one's birth into a community, a person may come to believe that he is perhaps more or less beloved of God than another, and this very notion brings about a shift in his prayer-truth. Those who insist that the truth of their own religion is supreme fail to grasp that many other truths exist in this world, by following which one may equally draw near to God. Thus to claim the superiority of one's own community is nothing but a form of religious foolishness. The curious thing is that such obstinacy owes much to the favorable environment that surrounds us. Without the support of circumstances, people fall silent, for they lack the leverage needed to proclaim their religious truth as supreme through sheer force. When belief lacks the edge of intellect and discernment, it is called mental blindness. To live safely and comfortably while blind, one must dwell in the kingdom of the blind. In this regard, religion itself does not initiate one into blindness; rather, those already initiated impart blindness to religion.

Both the community that considers itself close to God and the community that deems itself distant from God contain within them certain individuals who are believers not in their community's limited truth, but in the universal truth of the world. They are worshippers of truth's universal form. They are always prepared to accept truth simply as truth. Knowing full well that a collision between their community's truth and their own conscience's truth is inevitable, they remain steadfast in the truth of their conscience, and when crisis demands a choice, they are seen standing not with their community, but with truth itself. Through this, truth becomes established in the world. Whether the community to which they belong is strong or weak, the community's truth is destroyed and God's truth becomes firmly established.

Just as humans have fashioned deities by endowing them with various characteristics from their imagination, and have thereby created conflicts among these fashioned deities, so too has natural doubt arisen among ordinary people at different times. When multiple deities assume opposing positions on ideological grounds, division inevitably appears among their respective worshippers. God's word could never teach such a doctrine. The conflict that arises among people is not the responsibility of God or religion, but rather of the delusion and error of certain foolish persons. Through creating such divisions in the name of religion, humanity has experienced throughout ages extreme hatred and warfare among nations. Surely such bloodshed and slaughter were never God's command. The religious leaders bear primary responsibility for this. They mislead people by offering false interpretations of religion to suit their own purposes. Religion does not create distance between human beings; rather, those who trade in religion or foment conflict are accountable for such distance.

If all humanity were united in the love of one God, conflict and strife would never arise in this world. Because men have failed to achieve such unity, they have instead bred jealousy and distance among themselves. Had each person been able to understand his own faith without dependence on another's word, life would hold far less suffering. In seeking God, had men run to their own hearts instead of to temples or spiritual teachers, they would find Him with ease. This would save time and spare them needless confusion. If all people on earth are truly children of the same God, then what is the notion that one's God is good while another's is evil but pure foolishness?

In the true music of religion, life ascends and the mind expands. Through it, one's conscience develops, and liberation from the bonds of sin and death becomes possible. When one learns to embrace all the world's people as one's own, the intellect and understanding are freed from the tyranny of harmful thoughts, malicious impulses, and unnecessary preoccupations. Then it becomes easy for our inner self to draw near to the Supreme Self.

We call a people great in proportion to the truth they have sought and found. When an organization is formed from the representatives of various nations, one might think it necessary to determine which nation's opinion should be heard first, or which has the greatest number of representatives. Yet for such an organization to maintain its strength and momentum, one must examine not merely the number of representatives but also the wisdom, conscience, and capacity for truth-seeking of those offering counsel. One must consider the quality of thought among their thinkers—what truths have they grasped, whether these are provincial truths or universal truths. These are matters of grave importance. For work of genuine quality, quantity is not what matters; quality alone is essential.

An advanced civilization's people may be slaughtered; barbarians may reduce a magnificent city to rubble; a brutal fool of a ruler may destroy institutions built by great minds; self-seeking men, terrified by the ideals of a noble soul, may murder him—yet in all these cases, the truth that shines forth and takes root can never be destroyed. Rather, it unfolds and grows through the ages. Thus does truth remain forever immortal in this world. Even today, people venerate the sacred and truthful remnants of ancient peoples as blessed ground.

God never shows greater grace to one nation than to another, nor lesser grace to any. He offers the pursuit of truth equally to the civilized and the uncivilized, to the learned and the unlearned, to all nations alike. Yet not all receive it in the same measure, and therein lies the qualitative difference between nations. It is not God, but we ourselves who judge the superiority of nations by this truth or this treasure of knowledge. And it is by this truth that certain men from among various nations achieve immortality. The world comes to know a nation through the deeds of its greatest sons.

Truth is so grand that it does not hesitate to take even the petty self-interests of mankind as its vehicle. As truth travels upon the camel's back in the desert, so too does it journey within the ship's hull upon the sea. Some place greater weight upon the vehicle of truth than upon truth itself, and embrace even the most material manifestation of truth without reserve. Thus it is that the great truths of social order and governance are propagated and received through their practical utility, before they are acknowledged as inseparable parts of all religious devotion and universal love. Take, for instance, all the great truths of politics—they have entered human knowledge not through their inherent merit, but because of the calculations of fear or other worldly consequences. Mankind sometimes embraces these creations of its own mind with tenderness, sheltering them at home precisely because of their outward utility. And God, in this matter, sends truth to each nation in the very form that nation can receive it. Some are poisoned outright and killed; others are killed by poison mixed into their food. Some learn of their death before it comes; others never know that in a few moments they will perish. Yet in both cases, the destination remains the same.

It is not true that we honor truth only for the sake of self-interest. The simple truth that man has an inborn right to direct his bodily and mental faculties according to his own will—this some cannot grasp. That it is a grave wrong to bind innocent men in the chains of servitude, and that to create laws and rules in order to legitimize injustice for the sake of personal or communal interest is an even greater wrong—to understand this simple truth requires only intelligence and conscience; it needs no external law. When conflict arises between truth and self-interest, man is compelled to strengthen the power of his mind through the devotion of his heart to the highest measure, and inspired by this universal truth, he begins to struggle. Through this struggle, the grave disorders and sins of society are gradually dispelled. Herein lies the victory of truth.