August 27, 2025
Wisdom and intellect are completely interrelated. If your intellect is dull, the wisdom that is derived through that intellect is also dull. The dull intellect thinks that one point of view is the absolute truth which means that you think that your point of view is the only truth in the whole world.
It may refer to your concept of God, your religious doctrine, your community, caste or religion. He who imagines that one fragment of existence is the totality of existence, has a dull intellect. When you hear this, perhaps in your heart you feel that this is the basis for the yogis' tolerance. Tolerance is an inadequate and insufficient quality.
We saw in the life of Swami Sivananda that he never exhibited tolerance. There was, of course, not the slightest trace of intolerance in Him, but He was not tolerant. He had His own faith, He had His own deity (if you wish to call it so), His own method of adoring God, His own philosophy, His own teaching, His own ashram, His own disciples; but He loved, appreciated, admired, revered and honored all other doctrines, all other points of view, all other philosophies and all other saints of all the religions of the world - not in a spirit of condescension or tolerance, but (that is the most beautiful thing) in the fullest realization that 'that is this'. It is not even a feeling, - 'This is my point of view and that is your point of view. You can have it.', but the fullest realization that your point of view is the same as 'my' point of view. We are both looking at the same truth. There is no difference.
In Swami Sivananda's vision there is or there was or there will always be only one truth. That will be seen by diverse people from infinitely diverse points of view, and each one is exactly the same as the other.
I am proceeding towards enlightenment with dedication. That movement itself seems to cut a path; and that becomes to a method, a technique.