What do you think about the effect of religious integrism which is now becoming the fashion?
You don’t have to go very far; your namaz itself is yoga. You just see how many asana are there. Izakat is one exercise of yoga, a mudra. You have in it shashankasana which is very necessary for stimulating the adrenal gland. Then you have padahastasana which is very good for the stomach and digestive system. I need not go into detail.
Every religion has the scientific base behind it and Islam is no exception to this because the wise people who developed the religions were not ordinary minds and they wanted to integrate the practicals of life into the body of religion, so that prayer, that is higher life, and yogasana, the physical well being could go hand-in-hand in coordination. In the last 200 years or so, a lot of changes have taken place in the world which never took place in the last 5,000 years. Man has suddenly come in confrontation with fast developing ideas, cultures and situations, and he is not able to handle them properly.
In the last fifty years, our developing countries are facing terrible stress, and we have to attend to the requirements of life exactly and accurately. We are not travelling on horseback. Even if we go a little bit like this or a little bit like that, it does not matter. If we travel by plane and something goes wrong, it is finished.
In this age of stress, where many new problems are coming in, it is necessary that every religion must look into what should be brought in for the welfare of its people. Hindus who only wear dhotis have brought pant and coat. Muslims who wore a big long gown have changed to a new dress, because that is our requirement now. In those days there was no high blood pressure and no heart attacks. I don’t know if our ancestors ever knew what was cancer and what was a tumour. Such great maladies we have, the mental hospitals are full and drug addiction is so high. As a result of this, practices such as yoga and Zen have to be integrated in our lives.
Whether you are a Brahmin, a Shmiterr, Madian, Hoshiy or Suni, a Muslim, Protestant or Catholic, even if you do not believe in anything and be a sceptic and agnostic, your problems are not different. The Hindu does not have a Hindu heart attack, and a Muslim does not have a Muslim heart attack. If I get a heart attack, you are not going to give me one medicine and a different medicine to him. It is the same treatment, because everywhere we are facing the same culture, situation, political, economic distress, congestion, the same passions and desires. Naturally, the diseases will also be the same.
Zen also has got a very important role to play because it brings out the deep-rooted complexes. You see we have a lot of problems. We do not know them. Nobody knows them. At certain moments they come out. When they come out you start crying, talking, seeing things, or having some sort of psychic experiences. It is very necessary for you to get them out, because they create the diseases, like cancer.
In the same way, yoga is also very important because in our day-to-day life we go to the office at 7 o’clock and by the time we are back it is evening 7. Is life mechanical? Day in and day out, seven to seven, you are out. If you are addicted to night clubs, you are out even more and never in the house. After some time, you have a problem, the problem of a human mind.
What am I doing? What is the purpose? What is the value of all this? What is this substance? You start questioning yourself. Then there comes inner guilt. The guilt of a philosophical man. Everybody has got it I know, but if you practise yoga a little bit every morning, this guilt will not come. You will have the consolation that you are doing something for yourself. It is important that these sciences or cults must be given to our people in a very compatible state, because every practice has a cultural background.
For instance, Islam is an oriental system. If you bring a culture or a cult from the occident like psychology, it will not work with them, because Islam is basically oriental in structure. We may believe in the philosophy of the modern psychology, but it will not be benefiting and beneficial to our culture.
Hinduism, Buddhism, Zen are oriental systems, and the cultural clarity is there. There may be philosophical differences. Islam is monotheistic, Hinduism is polytheistic. There may be philosophical imbalances, but there is no moral and cultural imbalance and disharmony. So we can take the elements of Islam into our cultural life and Islam can take the elements of that system into their cultural life. For instance, getting up in the morning 4 o’clock and singing Ajam. It has nothing to do with the culture of Scandinavians, where it is so cold at 4 o’clock, but in India we can do it, because 4 o’clock is a very convenient hour for us. So, this element from Islam we can take, and Islam can take yoga. This is called a very happy cultural blending. I wish that those who have been doing yoga and Zen, should be allowed to practise in peace.
Every religion especially the Muslim religion insists that the real presence of God is found in the heart of the believer. So it seems that techniques like Zen and yoga deal with the deeper areas of the mind where God is manifested. Can these Zen and yoga techniques help people find God?
When you clean the mirror, you can definitely see your face. When the mind is composed, you can definitely feel God in your heart. When the mind is clouded by anxieties, you cannot even see yourself and the vision of God is too far. Just as the sun is covered by clouds, or the embryo is covered by membrane, in the same way, this maya, the illusion of the mind, stands between myself and reality. The practices of yoga go very far. They take an aspirant right up to samadhi where the ego does not exist, where the trace and the link with karma do not exist anymore, where there is total silence, and during these silent hours you can commune, you can feel God.
This is also said in the books of Islam. It is written in almost every religious book. The nearer you get to that land of silence, the clearer you can have the vision of the divine. So you can use any method which is practical, tangible and effective.
April 1982, Casablanca, Morocco