No World For Jnanis

Sri Annamalai Swami

Bhagavan used to say that there can never be a perfect world because the world is always a creation of the imperfect mind. A perfect object cannot be made by such an imperfect tool. He also used to say, 'While the mind exists, good and bad exist; but for jnanis, who have no mind at all, there is no good or bad and no world.'

One other anecdote about creation is worth recounting. Jnanasambandhar, the 6th century Saivite saint, was touring South India when he arrived at a temple he had not previously visited. Before he entered it, he had a dream in which Lord Shiva appeared and told him, 'You will be given a palanquin of pearls.' 

On the same day Shiva appeared in the dream of one of the temple trustees and said, 'There is a palanquin of pearls in your storeroom. Give it to Jnanasambandhar to use.' The trustee went to the storeroom, found the palanquin and gave it to the saint. The palanquin was not part of the temple's property. It had mysteriously manifested there on the day that Shiva appeared in the trustee's dream.

B told us this story while we were sitting in the hall. At the conclusion of the narrative I asked, 'How did the palanquin appear out of nowhere in the storeroom?'

B replied, 'The God who has the power to create the whole universe in a single instant, for such a being, would it be a difficult thing to create one small palanquin?'