King Janaka’s Awakening

Evening was coming down over the Sarayu when Rama asked, “Gurudev, does knowledge come only through years of austerity?”

Vasishtha said, “Rama, knowledge arrives in a single moment; it is only that, before that moment, a great deal has already been made ready within. There was once such a king, Janaka of Mithila, into whose life there came one night, one song, and everything changed.”

Mithila

Janaka was the king of Mithila, and all day he was given over to the work of the realm: justice, borders, the people, all of it rested in his hands. When evening fell he would sit alone for a little while on that verandah of his palace, the one from which the garden could be seen and in which jasmine stayed in bloom.

From the outside he seemed calm, yet within him a deep thirst kept him restless.

He had put this question to the brahmins, put it to the rishis, put it to the wise, and each of them had told him something or other, and still that thirst inside him had not been quenched.

One night he was sitting on that same verandah, and in the garden the scent of jasmine had grown heavy and drifted through the air.

Just then, from far off, a song reached his ears.

The song was neither very sweet nor pitched very high, yet its words were of a kind Janaka had never heard before.

Beyond the garden, near a temple, a few siddhas were singing together.

Janaka sank into that song and began to listen with all his attention.

“That which stands behind every form, from it come all forms. That which stands behind every word, from it come all words. That which stands behind every breath, from it come all breaths. That is what you are. That is what I am. That is everything.”

Those words brought Janaka to a stillness that reached all the way inside him.

He gathered this up and kept it within himself, that there is one who stands behind every form.

My body is a form, my mind is a form, my kingdom is a form, my wife is a form, and my daughter too is a form.

So behind all these forms, who stands in the end?

Carrying this very question, Janaka closed his eyes.

Then he rested upon the one who stands behind every word.

When I speak, words come; but those words, where do they come from in the end? What I am thinking now, this thought too, where is it coming from?

Before every word there is a silence, and before every thought there is a hush, and in that silence, who in the end is seated?

The answer came from within, that I am.

But then, who is that I?

Now he rested upon the one who stands behind every breath.

Janaka listened to his breath and watched it all the way inside, the breath going in and then coming out.

Between the two of them a single moment held still, and in that very moment Janaka too grew still.

And then, in that moment, something happened that will not be bound into words.

Within Janaka all forms became one, the word too became one, and the breath too became one. The weight of identity he had been carrying was lifted, and the witness who had been seated behind him now came and stood before him.

That is what you are.

In that very moment Janaka recognized himself.

When he opened his eyes, he was no longer the same old Janaka.

Outside, everything was just as it had been, yet within him everything had changed.

In the garden the jasmine was still in bloom, the temple’s song still echoed, and the wind still moved.

But now Janaka was within all of them and also beyond all of them, because in truth he was the witness standing behind them all.

The next morning he carried out the work of the realm just as he did every day. The ministers came and began to lay out their matters, Janaka went on listening to them, and when one of the people came asking for justice, he heard the whole of it and rendered justice too.

Seen from above, everything was just the same.

But within, Janaka had by now arrived somewhere else entirely.

One minister said softly, “The king is at great peace today.”

Janaka said, “Minister, we were always at peace; only today we have come to know that peace of ours.”

Many years later, when the sage Shuka came to him, he already knew that Janaka was a strange sort of king. He runs a kingdom while inwardly he is no king; he speaks with his people while in truth belonging to no one; and he is known by the name of Janaka while being no longer that Janaka at all.

That night Janaka had been sitting on a verandah in Mithila, the jasmine in bloom and a song coming from far off, and only that much had been enough.

Rama asked, “Gurudev, will such a moment come for me as well?”

Vasishtha said, “Rama, that moment comes for every single person; it is only that one does not know in what form it will come. Perhaps it will be a song, perhaps a shloka, perhaps some word you overhear on some road, perhaps a passing wind; or perhaps there will be nothing at all, and you will simply be sitting as you are and all at once you will know.”

Rama stayed sunk in that thought for a while.

On the banks of the Sarayu there was no jasmine, yet the scent of some flower drifted softly, softly through the air.