IT HAD RAINED all night and most of the morning, and now the sun was going down behind dark, heavy clouds. There was no colour in the sky, but the perfume of the rain-soaked earth filled the air. The frogs had croaked all night long with persistency and rhythm, but with the dawn they became silent. The tree trunks were dark with the long rain, and the leaves washed clean of the summer’s dust, would be rich and green again in a few more days. The lawns too would be greener, the bushes would soon be flowering, and there would be rejoicing. How welcome was the rain after the hot, dusty days! The mountains beyond the hills seemed not too far away and the breeze blowing from them was cool and pure. There would be more work, more food, and starvation would be a thing of the past.
下了整夜的雨，早上的大部分时间也在下， 现在，太阳在厚重的乌云后面下落。 天空中没有色彩，但是，雨水浸透的泥土的芬芳充满了空气。 青蛙整夜都坚持不懈地、有节奏地呱呱叫， 但随着黎明的到来，它们变得安宁了。 树干因长期的雨水而黑暗， 树叶被洗去了夏天的灰尘，再过几天，就会再次变得富饶和绿色。 草坪也会更绿，灌木丛很快就会开花，这里会充满欢欣鼓舞。 在经历了炎热的、扬尘四起的天气，雨水是多么地受欢迎！ 山丘之外的山脉似乎不算太遥远。 从那里吹来的微风清凉而纯净。 将有更多的劳作、更多的食物，饥饿将成为过去。
One of those large brown eagles was making wide circles in the sky, floating on the breeze without a beat of its wings. Hundreds of people on bicycles were going home after a long day in the office. A few talked as they rode, but most of them were silent and evidently tired out. A large group had stopped, with their bicycles resting against their bodies, and were animatedly discussing some issue, while nearby a policeman wearily watched them, On the corner a big new building was going up. The road was full of brown puddles, and the passing cars splashed one with dirty water which left dark marks on one’s clothing. A cyclist stopped, bought from a vendor one cigarette, and was on his way again.
其中的一只棕色的大鹰在天空中划出宽阔的圆圈， 漂浮在微风中，翅膀没有拍打。 数百名骑自行车的人在办公室里度过了漫长的一天后回家。 有些人在骑车时聊天，但大多数人都沉默不语，显然很累。 一大群人停了下来，自行车靠在他们的身上， 正在激烈地讨论一些问题，而附近的一名警察疲惫地看着他们， 在拐角处，一座巨大的新建筑正在升起。 路上到处都是棕色的水坑， 过往的汽车飞溅起脏水，在衣服上留下了深色的痕迹。 一个骑自行车的人停了下来，从小贩那里买了一支烟，然后又上路了。
A boy came along carrying on his head an old kerosene tin, half-filled with some liquid. He must have been working around that new building which was under construction. He had bright eyes and an extraordinarily cheerful face; he was thin but strongly built, and his skin was very dark, burnt by the sun. He wore a shirt and a loincloth, both the colour of the earth brown with long usage. His head was well-shaped, and there was a certain arrogance in his walk – a boy doing a man’s work. As he left the crowd behind he began to sing, and suddenly the whole atmosphere changed. His voice was ordinary, a boyish voice, lusty and raucous; but the song had rhythm, and he would probably have kept time with his hands, had not one hand been holding the kerosene tin on top of his head. He was aware that someone was walking behind him, but was too cheerful to be shy, and he was obviously not in any way concerned with the peculiar change that had come about in the atmosphere. There was a blessing in the air, a love that covered everything, a gentleness that was simple, without calculation, a goodness that was ever flowering.
一个男孩头上顶着一个旧煤油罐，走了过来， 罐子里装满了一些液体。他一定在那座正在修建的新建筑周围工作。 他有一双明亮的眼睛和一张异常开朗的脸。 他瘦小，但身体强壮，他的皮肤黝黑，被太阳晒的。 他穿着衬衫和腰布，都呈棕褐色，已经穿得很旧了。 他的头型很好，走路时有一种骄傲 —— 一个男孩在做男人的工作。 当他离开人群后，他开始唱歌，突然间整个气氛发生了变化。 他的嗓音很普通，充满了孩子气，活泼而沙哑。 但是这首歌有节奏，如果不是一只手扶着头顶上的煤油罐， 他可能会用双手打节拍。 他意识到有人跟在他身后，但是他太开朗了，以至于没有害羞， 他显然没有注意到 气氛中发生的特殊变化。 空气中弥漫着一种祝福，一种包裹一切的爱， 一种简单的、没有算计的温柔，一种永远绽放的善良。
Abruptly the boy stopped singing and turned towards a dilapidated hut that stood some distance back from the road. It would soon be raining again.
突然，男孩停止了歌声，转向一个破旧的小屋， 离路有一段距离。可能很快就要下雨了。
The visitor said he had held a government position that was good as far as it went, and as he had had a first-class education both at home and abroad, he could have climbed quite high. He was married, he said, and had a couple of children. Life was fairly enjoyable, for success was assured; he owned the house they were living in, and he had put aside money for the education of his children. He knew Sanskrit, and was familiar with the religious tradition. Things were going along pleasantly enough, he said; but one morning he awoke very early, had his bath, and sat down for meditation before his family or the neighbours were up. Though he had had a restful sleep, he couldn’t meditate; and suddenly he felt an overwhelming urge to spend the rest of his life in meditation. There was no hesitancy or doubt about it; he would devote his remaining years to finding whatever there was to be found through meditation, and he told his wife, and his two boys, who were at college, that he was going to become a sannyasi. His colleagues were surprised by his decision, but accepted his resignation; and in a few days he had left his home, never to return.
这位来访者说，他担任的一个政府职务，一切都还好， 而且由于他在国内外都受过一流的教育，他本来可以爬得相当高。 他说，他已婚，并有几个孩子。 生活是相当愉快的，因为成功有保证； 他拥有他们居住的房子，他留出钱给他的孩子们上学。 他懂梵文，熟悉宗教传统。 事情进展得足够愉快，他说。 但有一天早上，他一早就醒来，洗了个澡， 在家人或邻居起床之前坐下来冥想。 虽然他睡得很安逸，但他无法安宁。 突然间，他感到一种压倒性的冲动，想在冥想中度过余生。 对此，没有犹豫或怀疑； 他将把他余下的岁月花费在冥想上，去寻找， 他告诉他的妻子和他的两个在大学里的孩子，他要做一名桑雅生。 他的同事们对他的决定感到惊讶，但接受了他的辞职。 几天后，他离开了家，再也没有回来。
That was twenty-five years ago, he went on. He disciplined himself rigorously, but he found it difficult after a life of ease, and it took him a long time to master completely his thoughts and the passions that were in him. Finally, however, he began to have visions of the Buddha, of Christ and Krishna visions whose beauty was enthralling, and for days he would live as if in a trance, ever widening the boundaries of his mind and heart, utterly absorbed in that love which is devotion to the Supreme. Everything about him – the villagers, the animals, the trees, the grass – was intensely alive, brilliant in its vitality and loveliness. It had taken him all these years to touch the hem of the Infinite, he said, and it was amazing that he had survived it all.
那是二十五年前的事了，他继续说道。 他严谨地约束自己， 但在安逸的生活之后，他发现这很困难， 他花了很长时间才完全掌握自己的思想和他内心的激情。 然而，最后，他开始有佛陀、基督和克里须那的异象， 这些异象的美丽令人著迷，几天来，他像恍惚一样生活， 越来越拓宽他的头脑和心灵的界限， 完全沉浸在那种爱中，那是对至高无上的奉献。 关于他的一切 —— 村民、动物、树木、草地 —— 都非常活跃、生动和可爱。 他说，他花了这么多年的时间才摸到无限的裙摆， 令人惊讶的是，他熬过了这一切。
“I have a number of disciples and followers, as is inevitable in this country,” he went on “and one of them suggested to me that I attend a talk which was to be given by you in this town, where I happened to be for a few days. More to please him than to listen to the speaker, I went to the talk, and I was greatly impressed by what was said in reply to a question on meditation. It was stated that without self-knowledge, which in itself is meditation all meditation is a process of self-hypnosis, a projection of one’s own thought and desire. I have been thinking about all this, and have now come to talk things over with you.
“我有许多门徒和追随者，这在这个国家是不可避免的，” 他接着说，“其中一个人建议我 去参加一个由你在这个镇上举行的讲话， 我碰巧在那里呆了几天。与其说我是去听讲，不如说是为了取悦于他， 我去听了，在回答一个关于冥想的问题时，你说的话给我留下了深刻的印象。 那句话是，没有自我认识 —— 而自我认识本身即是冥想， 所有的冥想都是自我催眠的过程，是一个人自己思想和欲望的投影。 我一直在思考这一切，现在过来和你谈谈这件事情。
“I see that what you say is perfectly true, and it’s a great shock to me to perceive that I have been caught in the images or projections of my own mind. I now realize very profoundly what my meditation has been. For twenty-five years I have been held in a beautiful garden of my own making; the personages, the visions were the outcome of my particular culture and of the things I have desired, studied and absorbed. I now understand the significance of what I have been doing, and I am more than appalled at having wasted so many precious years.”
“我看到你说的是完全正确的， 对我来说，意识到自己被自己头脑的图像或投影所吸引，这让我感到非常震惊。 我现在非常深刻地意识到我的冥想是什么。 二十五年来，我被关押在一个我自己创造的美丽花园里。 里面的人物、异象是我特定文化的结果， 也是我所渴望的、研究的和吸收的东西的产物。 我现在理解我现在所做的事情的重要性， 我对浪费这么多宝贵的岁月感到非常震惊。”
We remained silent for some time. “What am I to do now?” he presently continued. “Is there any way out of the prison I have built for myself? I can see that what I have come to in my meditation is a dead-end, though only a few days ago it seemed so full of glorious significance. However much I would like to, I can’t go back to all that self-delusion and self-stimulation. I want to tear through these veils of illusion and come upon that which is not put together by the mind. You have no idea what I have been through during the last two days! The structure which I had so carefully and painfully built up over a period of twenty-five years has no meaning any more, and it seems to me that I shall have to start all over again. From where am I to start?”
我们沉默了一段时间。 “我现在该怎么办？” 他现在继续说道。 “有什么办法可以走出我为自己建造的监狱吗？ 我可以看到，我在冥想中得出的结果是一条死胡同， 尽管就在几天前，它似乎充满了光荣的意义。 无论我多么想，我都无法回到所有的自我欺骗和自我刺激。 我想撕开这些幻觉的面纱， 去发现那些不是由头脑拼凑起来的东西。 你不知道我在过去两天里经历了什么！ 我在二十五年的时间里，如此小心和痛苦地建立起来的结构已经没有意义了， 在我看来，我将不得不重新开始。我从哪里开始？”
May it not be that there is no restarting at all, but only the perception of the false as the false which is the beginning of understanding? If one were to start again, one might be caught in another illusion, perhaps in a different manner. What blinds us is the desire to achieve an end, a result; but if we perceived that the result we desire is still within the self-centred field, then there would be no thought of achievement. Seeing the false as the false, and the true as the true, is wisdom.
也许，根本没有所谓的重新开始， 而只有感知假即是假，也就是理解的开端。 如果一个人重新开始，他可能会陷入另一种幻觉，也许是以不同的方式。 使我们双眼蒙蔽的，是达成目的、结果的欲望； 但是，如果我们意识到：我们渴望的结果依然在以自我为中心的领域内， 那么就不会有达成的想法。 看见假即是假，真即是真，即是智慧。
“But do I really see that what I have been doing for the last twenty-five years is false? Am I aware of all the implications of what I have regarded as meditation?”
“但我真的看到我过去二十五年来一直在做的事情是假的吗？ 我是否意识到我所认为的冥想的所有含义？”
The craving for experience is the beginning of illusion. As you now realize, your visions were but the projections of your background, of your conditioning, and it is these projections that you have experienced. Surely this is not meditation. The beginning of meditation is the understanding of the background, of the self, and without this understanding, what is called meditation, however pleasurable or painful, is merely a form of self-hypnosis. You have practised self-control, mastered thought, and concentrated on the furthering of experience. This is a self-centred occupation, it is not meditation; and to perceive that it is not meditation is the beginning of meditation. To see the truth in the false sets the mind free from the false. Freedom from the false does not come about through the desire to achieve it; it comes when the mind is no longer concerned with success with the attainment of an end. There must be the cessation of all search, and only then is there a possibility of the coming into being of that which is nameless.
对体验的渴望，是幻觉的开端。 正如你现在意识到的，你的异象只不过是你的背景、你的条件反射的投影， 而你所体验到的，正是这些投影。当然，它不是冥想。 冥想的开始是对背景的理解，对自我的理解， 如果没有这种理解，所谓的冥想， 无论多么愉快或痛苦，都只是一种自我催眠的形式。 你已经练习了自我控制， 掌握了思想，并专注于体验的进一步发展。 这是一种以自我为中心的占有，它不是冥想； 感知它不是冥想，即是冥想的开始。 看见虚假的本质，使头脑从虚假中解脱。 从虚假中解放，不是通过想要达成的欲望而到来的。 当头脑不再关心成功和抵达目的时，它就会到来。 必须停止一切的搜寻， 只有这样，才可能有无名的呈现。
“I do not want to deceive myself again.”
“我不想再欺骗自己了。”
Self-deception exists when there is any form of craving or attachment: attachment to a prejudice, to an experience, to a system of thought. Consciously or unconsciously, the experiencer is always seeking greater, deeper, wider experience; and as long as the experiencer exists, there must be delusion in one form or another. “All this involves time and patience, doesn’t it?”
自我欺骗之所以存在，是由于有任何形式的渴望或依恋 —— 对偏见、体验、思想体系的依恋。 有意或无意地，体验者总是在寻求更伟大、更深刻、更广阔的体验； 只要体验者存在，就一定有这样或那样的妄想。 “这一切都涉及时间和耐心，不是吗？”
Time and patience may be necessary for the achievement of a goal. An ambitious man, worldly or otherwise, needs time to gain his end. Mind is the product of time, as all thought is its result; and thought working to free itself from time only strengthens its enslavement to time. Time exists only when there is a psychological gap between what is and what should be, which is called the ideal, the end. To be aware of the falseness of this whole manner of thinking is to be free from it – which does not demand any effort, any practice. Understanding is immediate, it is not of time.
时间和耐心对于实现目标可能是必要的。 一个雄心勃勃的人，无论世俗与否，都需要时间来达到他的目的。 头脑是时间的产物，如同所有的思想都是它的结果； 而思想在努力工作，想从时间中解脱，却只会强化时间对它的奴役。 当现状与被称之为理想、目标的‘应该是’之间存在心理上的差距时， 时间才会存在。 意识到这整种思考方式的虚假性，即是从中解脱 —— 这不需要任何努力、任何修行。 理解是即刻的，与时间无关。
“The meditation I have indulged in can have meaning only when it is seen to be false, and I think I see it to be false. But...”
“我所沉迷的冥想只有在它被认为是虚假的时候才有意义， 我想，我看到了它的虚假。但是……”
Please don’t ask the inevitable question as to what there will be in its place, and so on. When the false has dropped away, there is freedom for that which is not false to come into being. You cannot seek the true through the false; the false is not a steppingstone to the true. The false must cease wholly, not in comparison to the true. There is no comparison between the false and the true; violence and love cannot be compared. Violence must cease for love to be. The cessation of violence is not a matter of time. The perception of the false as the false is the ending of the false. Let the mind be empty, and not filled with the things of the mind. Then there is only meditation, and not a meditator who is meditating.
请不要问这种不可避免的问题：它的地位是什么，等等。 当虚假消失时， 就有了自由，非虚假的事物就会存在。 你不能通过虚假来寻求真理；虚假不是通往真实的垫脚石。 假必须完全消逝，而不是与真比较。 假与真之间没有可比性； 暴力与爱是无法比较的。暴力必须消逝，爱才能存在。 暴力的消逝不是时间问题。 感知到假即是假，即是假的终结。 让头脑空虚，别被头脑的东西所填满。 然后只有冥想，而没有冥想的冥想者。
“I have been occupied with the meditator, the seeker, the enjoyer, the experiencer, which is myself. I have lived in a pleasant garden of my own creation, and have been a prisoner therein. I now see the falseness of all that – dimly, but I see it.”
“我一直受制于冥想者、寻求者、享受者、体验者，也就是自我。 我住在一个我自己创造的宜人花园里，并在那里被囚禁。 我现在看到了这一切的虚假性 —— 模模糊糊地，但我看见它了。”