MEDITATION & SPIRITUAL LIFE CHAPTER 8
THE GURU AND
SPIRITUAL GUIDANCE
Table of Contents
Need for training in spiritual life .............................................................1
Function of the Guru ...........................................................................2
Need for a Guru .................................................................................3
The power of spiritual initiation .............................................................4
The power of the Mantra ......................................................................5
The pure mind as Guru ........................................................................6
Avatāra — the greatest Teacher ..............................................................7
The eternal Teacher ............................................................................9
Need for training in spiritual life
A disciple of the great Chinese mystic philosopher Lao Tsu narrates the following story.
A young man joined the gang of a robber chief named Chi. One day the young apprentice
asked his leader, ‘Can the Tao (the right Way) be found in thieving?’ And Chi replied:
‘Pray tell me of anything in which there is no Tao, a law or right way. In thieving there is
the wisdom by which the booty is located, the courage of going in first; the heroism of
coming out last, the insight of calculating the chances of success; finally, there is justice
in dividing the spoils equitably among the robbers. There never was a successful thief
who did not possess these five qualities.’
There are principles to be learned in every activity of life, even in thieving. An ap-
prentice in any profession needs training. This is all the more true of spiritual life. The
disciple of Lao Tsu continues, ‘The doctrine of the wise is equally indispensable to the
good man and to the robber. . . . Since good men are few and bad men are in the major -
ity, the good the sages do in the world is little and the evil done by the rest is great.’ In
the course of my travels in the West I have been amazed at the amount of energy which
is constantly expended on destructive activities. How many soldiers, pilots, technicians
and even scientists are being trained for war? Why can’t even a fraction of the same
time and energy be used for training in the spirit, in making ourselves receptive to di -
vine illumination, bliss and peace?
The ideal which the great sages of the Upaniṣads place before us as the goal of life is
Self-realization. But this ideal cannot be realized without spiritual awakening. However,
in the religious field we see too much of ritual and ceremonial and too little of true spir -
itual awakening. Real religion, which is Self-realization, has for this reason become dis-
credited. And there is now an over-abundance of religious pretenders who claim super-
natural powers and promise easy passports to heaven, while parasites unwilling to strive
for moral purity want to attain salvation easily.
The highest goal can be shown only by a person who has attained it or by one who has
at least gone very near it. Regarding the importance of right guidance in spiritual life,
the Upaniṣads declare:
Many do not hear about the Self. Many others, though they hear of it, do not under -
Med%SoirKLife Chp.8 – The Guru & Spiritual Guidance
stand it. Wonderful is he who speaks of it. Wonderful is he who learns of it. Blessed is
he who, taught by a good teacher, is able to realize it.1
The truth of the Self cannot be fully understood when taught by an inferior person,
for there are different opinions regarding it. Subtler than the subtlest is this Self,
beyond all logic. When taught by a teacher who has realized himself as one with Brah-
man, a person attains the goal and becomes free from transmigration.2
Let a man devoted to spiritual life examine carefully the ephemeral nature of heav-
enly enjoyment. To know the Eternal, let him humbly approach a guru established in
Brahman and well versed in the scriptures. To a disciple who approaches reverently,
who is tranquil and self-controlled, the wise teacher gives that knowledge, faithfully
and without stint, by which is known the truly existing, changeless Self. 3
Function of the Guru
What does Self-realization mean? It means the union of the individual spirit with the
supreme Spirit. After passing through various experiences and sufferings in life, the indi-
vidual soul draws closer to the Oversoul and finally realizes its oneness with It. The Up -
aniṣad gives a picturesque description of this process:
Two birds of golden plumage, inseparable companions, are perched on the branches
of the same tree. One of them tastes the sweet and bitter fruits of the tree; the
other, tasting neither, calmly observes. The individual self, deluded by forgetfulness
of its real divine nature, gets involved in worldly life arid suffers. But when it recog-
nizes the worshipful Lord as its own true Self and beholds His glory, it becomes liber-
ated from sorrow.4
We have forgotten our true divine essence. So instead of moving closer to God, we get
drowned in worldly existence more and more. Somebody must remind us of our real
nature. He who does this is the guru or spiritual teacher. The function of the teacher is
to awaken the disciple from his age-long sleep and show him the way to the Divine. The
guru is not like the Christian priest who stands between man and God. The word guru
etymologically means a spiritual guide who removes darkness and brings light. He helps
us to dehypnotize ourselves by removing the false notions we have been entertaining
about ourselves.
In one of his parables Sri Ramakrishna speaks of a tiger-sheep. Once a tigress attacked
a flock of sheep but, as the shepherd resisted, she fell on her side, gave birth to a cub
and died. The shepherd took pity on the little creature and raised it along with the
flock. The little tiger drank sheep’s milk and learned to bleat and eat grass like sheep.
Years later another tiger attacked the same flock and was astonished to see a tiger be-
having like a sheep. He caught hold of the tiger-sheep, dragged him to a pool and forced
him to look at his reflection in the water. Then the old tiger put a piece of meat into the
mouth of the young tiger-sheep, and told him that he was not a sheep but a real tiger.
Thereupon the tiger-sheep gave up his sheep consciousness and regained his real tiger
1 Kaṭha Upaniṣad 1.2.7
2 ibid., 1.2.8
3 Muṇḑaka Upaniṣad 1.2.12,13
4 ibid., 3.1.1,2
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consciousness.5
Swami Brahmananda used to liken the teacher to a king’s minister. A poor man re-
quests the minister to grant him an audience with the king who lives in a palace with
seven gates. The minister grants his request, and leads him through the gates one after
another. At each gate there stands a richly dressed officer, and each time the poor man
asks the minister if that is the king. The minister answers ‘No’ each time, until they
have passed the seventh gate and have come to the presence of the king seated there in
all his regal splendour. Then the poor man does not ask any more questions. What he
needed was somebody who could guide him through the gates and corridors of the
palace. ‘So is it with the guru’, says Swami Brahmananda, ‘Like the king’s minister, he
leads the disciple through the different stages of spiritual unfoldment until he leaves
him with the Lord.’6
The human personality is like a big palace with buildings and courtyards one within
another. The supreme Spirit comes to us in the form of a teacher, making us realize that
we are not the physical body, not the mind, not the feelings, ideas and emotions, but
the Spirit eternal. When we travel to an unknown country, it is wise to have a guide who
knows the way. The guru is the guide who leads us to our destination and leaves us
there.
Need for a Guru
In India we take the necessity of a guru for granted in spiritual life. When I first went
to Europe I was surprised to hear some religious groups saying that they could commune
with God, hear the voice of God, get directions about spiritual life without any special
training. I studied a few cases and found, as I had expected, that these people were
hearing their own voices which sometimes were good. God and the divine Voice are far
off from an impure soul. A well-trained, pure-hearted person can certainly commune
with God, the indwelling Spirit, but when impure and untrained individuals make the
same claim, they only deceive themselves. And yet they say they need no outside help.
My teacher Swami Brahmananda used to say, ‘One requires a teacher even when one
wants to learn stealing. And this sublime Brahmavidyā, the knowledge of Brahman —
does it not require a teacher to acquire it?’7
There is no mystery in this. People go to Madame Curie to study the properties of ra-
dium; they go to Rutherford to learn about the nature of the atom. As in natural science
the guidance of a competent teacher is necessary, so in spiritual science the guidance of
a guru is absolutely necessary to learn the technique of realizing the Self. Here we are
travelling into regions of which we know nothing. Those who do not feel the need of any
teacher, who are over-anxious to be teachers of others, should remember that the blind
should not try to lead the blind.
Hindu scriptures repeatedly stress the importance of the guru. Take for instance the
Bhagavad-Gītā. In it Kṛṣṇa at first simply takes Arjuna to the battlefield, without giving
5 See The Gospel of Sri Ramakrishna, trans. Swami Nikhilananda (Madras: Sri Ramakrishna Math, 1974),
pp. 306-7.
6 Swami Prabhavananda, The Eternal Companion (Madras: Sri Ramakrishna Math, 1971), p. 250
7 Spiritual Talks (Calcutta: Advaita Ashrama, 1944), p. 42-43
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Med%SoirKLife Chp.8 – The Guru & Spiritual Guidance
him any spiritual instruction. Then Arjuna pleads with Him: ‘Overpowered by grief, my
mind is confused regarding the right path. I supplicate You as Your disciple, instruct me
who have taken refuge in You.’ 8 It is only when Arjuna accepts Kṛṣṇa as the guru does
the divine Teacher begin His teaching. In Ṣaṅkara's Crest Jewel of Discrimination we find
the disciple appealing to his teacher: ‘O Master, I have fallen into the sea of birth and
death. Save me from this misery.’9
The power of spiritual initiation
Sri Ramakrishna says, ‘One must have an awakening of the Spirit within in order to
see the one unchanging imperishable Reality.’ Mere reading and talking about spiritual
truths is not enough. One should directly perceive the Light within.
How is this first awakening to be brought about? An illumined teacher does this for the
disciple through a process of spiritual initiation. In all religions there are initiation rites
consisting of bath, baptism, sprinkling with holy water or oil, reciting of sacred texts,
rituals of worship, etc. These practices make the initiates eligible for the special priv-
ileges of the religious communities into which they are admitted as members thereby.
This formal initiation is very different from the spiritual initiation we are here speaking
of.
This is what Jesus meant when he said, ‘Except a man be born again, he cannot see
the kingdom of God.’10 To be born again means to undergo spiritual awakening, to cease
to identify oneself with one’s body and realize oneself as the Spirit. ‘That which is born
of the flesh is flesh; and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit.’ 11 Later on St. Peter, a
disciple of Christ, explained the meaning of this passage: ‘Being born again, not of cor-
ruptible seed, but of incorruptible, by the word of God, which liveth and abideth for
ever.’12 The guru is one who transmits the word of God. The power of God comes through
the word, the mantra, and through the mantra comes the awakening of the Spirit.
In India we have the ideal of the dvija, the twice-born. The word dvija also means a
bird. First comes the egg, then out of the egg comes the fledgeling which will some day
develop into a mature bird. All eggs do not get hatched; all fledgelings do not grow fully.
Similarly, all people do not attain spiritual realization. People are in different stages of
spiritual growth. A well-known Sanskrit verse says: ‘By natural birth a man is born a
Ṣūdra, an ignorant person; through purificatory rites he becomes a dvija, the twice-
born; through study and knowledge of the scriptures he becomes a vipra, a scholar or
poet; through the realization of the supreme Spirit he becomes a Brāhma ṇa, a knower of
Brahman.’13 The purpose of spiritual initiation is to enable a person to become a true
Brāhmaṇa, a knower of Brahman. The Upaniṣad says, ‘He who departs from this world
knowing the Imperishable, is a Brāhmaṇa.’ 14 Mahapurush Maharaj (Swami Shivananda), a
great direct disciple of Sri Ramakrishna, once told me, ‘Whoever comes to Sri Ra-
8 Bhagavad-Gītā 2.7
9 Vivekacūḑāmaṇi, 139
10 Bible, St. John, 3:3
11 ibid., 3:6
12 Bible, I Peter, 1:23
13 Atri Smṛti 141-42
14 Bṛhadāraṇyaka Upaniṣad 3. 8.10
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makrishna is really a Brāhmaṇa.’
Spiritual initiation brings the individual Self into harmony with the supreme Self. A
Chinese sage demonstrated the principle of natural harmony (Tao) in this way: he took
two lutes and strung them identically. One he placed in an adjoining room, then struck
the Kung note on the instrument he held. Immediately the Kung note on the second lute
responded. When he struck the Chio note on one, the corresponding string of the second
instrument vibrated, because they were tuned to the same pitch. If he changed the in-
tervals on one lute the tones of the second were jangled and out of tune. The sound was
there but the influence of the key note was gone. Similarly, we may read and think and
talk. But all this will be of no avail unless we learn to attune our souls to the Oversoul,
the supreme Self.
The power of initiation becomes manifest only in a pure soul who intensely yearns for
God. Patañjali distinguishes three types of disciples: The soft (m ṛdu) ones who cannot
bear much the rigours of spiritual disciplines; the middling (madhyamā) ones who strive
harder than the first; the intense (tīvra) type including those who struggle intensely for
realization; they have learned the secret of withdrawing their minds from outside dis-
tractions, are always conscious of the divine Reality within them and have deep yearning
for God.’15 Yearning for God should always be regarded as a mark of divine Grace.
At the beginning of my own spiritual life the path seemed very difficult. When I asked
Swami Brahmananda what I should do, his reply was, ‘Struggle, struggle.’ It is not
enough to get directions from a guru; one must struggle incessantly. The disciple must
first of all yearn with all his heart to know the Truth. To those who are prepared for it
the awakening may come all of a sudden. To others who are struggling it comes gradu-
ally.
When we are in a joyous mood, we are able to transmit that joy to others. In a similar
way, a good spiritual teacher is able to communicate spiritual vibrations to his disciple.
We have seen the great disciples of Sri Ramakrishna exercising this power on many occa-
sions. They were great storehouses of spiritual power, but they used it with great cau-
tion. Normally a guru transmits his power through a mantra.
The power of the Mantra
A monastic disciple once asked Mahapurush Maharaj, ‘All persons do not get spiritual
awakening as soon as they are initiated. Will they not be benefited nevertheless?’ Ma-
hapurushji replied, ‘Even though they may feel nothing at the time of initiation, the
power of the holy Name given by an illumined teacher is unfailing. The spiritual power
transmitted to the disciple in due course transmutes him and spiritual awakening fol-
lows.’
What about the initiation given by an advanced soul though not fully illumined? The
ordinary advanced soul is about on a par with a senior in high school who, before he is
ready for college himself, can still give elementary instruction to his juniors. As he him-
self progresses towards Truth; he strives to awaken spiritual consciousness in others. The
initiation given by an ordinary guru who is sufficiently advanced in spiritual life also
15 Cf. Patañjali, Yoga-Sūtra 1. 22
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Med%SoirKLife Chp.8 – The Guru & Spiritual Guidance
brings about spiritual awakening in the course of time, if the recipient sincerely follows
the spiritual path. The mantra or the divine Name itself contains tremendous power. Ṣrī
Caitanya teaches us this truth: ‘Various are Thy names revealed by Thee into which Thou
hast infused Thine own omnipotent powers, and no limitations of time for remembering
those names are ordained by Thee.’16
Patañjali, speaking about the effect of repeating Om and other holy Names, says that
it removes the various obstacles on the path and leads to the awareness of the indwell-
ing Spirit.17 What are these obstacles? They are illness, doubt, mental disturbances, etc.
Repetition of the mantra introduces a new rhythm, harmony, into the personality, which
calms the nerves and unifies the powers of the mind. And in due course, this leads to the
awakening of the Spirit within. A beginner in meditative life may not be able to under-
stand the power of the mantra. But if he sincerely repeats it, he will gradually realize its
power. Swami Brahmananda says, ‘Japam —japam — japam! Even while you work, prac-
tise japam. Keep the name of the Lord spinning in the midst of all your activities. If you
can do this, all the burning of the heart will be soothed. Many sinners have become pure
and free and divine by taking refuge in the name of God. Have intense faith in God and
in His name, know that they are not different.’18
As the saints showed in the past, so in the present it has been proved time and again
that the power of God does manifest through the divine Name. When the mantra given
by a guru is treasured up within and constantly meditated upon, this power develops
more and more in the aspirant. Sri Ramakrishna used to liken this process to the forma-
tion of a pearl. According to popular belief, the pearl-oyster waits until the star svāti
(Arcturus) is in the ascendant. If at that time rain falls, the oyster will open its shell and
collect a drop of that water. Then it will dive down to the seabed and remain there for
several months until the rain drop is converted into a beautiful pearl. 19 In the same way
the heart of the devotee must be open to Truth and after receiving spiritual instruction
from the guru, he must work on it with one-pointed zeal until the pearl of spiritual illu-
mination is born.
The pure mind as Guru
Swami Brahmananda used to say, ‘There is no greater guru than your own mind.’ The
human guru is not always at hand. Even if we are fortunate enough to secure the bless-
ings and instructions of an advanced teacher, he may not be always available when we
need him. But there is an inner teacher, our own purified mind, who is always present
within us. Says Swami Brahmananda, ‘When the mind has been purified by prayer and
contemplation it will direct you from within. Even in your daily duties, this inner guru
will guide you and will continue to help you until the goal is reached.’20
What does this mean? How does the mind act as the inner guru? The supreme Spirit,
the source of all knowledge, the Teacher of all teachers, is ever present within the heart
of everyone. When the mind is purified through moral life, prayer, meditation, etc., it
16 Ṣikṣāṣṭakam, 2
17 Yoga-Sūtra, 1.29
18 The Eternal Companion, op. cit. p. 297
19 Teachings of Sri Ramakrishna (Calcutta: Advaita Ashrama, 1975), pp. 180-181
20 The Eternal Companion, op. cit. p. 251
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Med%SoirKLife Chp.8 – The Guru & Spiritual Guidance
comes in touch with the inner Light of the supreme Spirit. The purified mind becomes a
channel for the flow of divine Knowledge. It receives spiritual guidance directly from the
Teacher of teachers. When the mind thus learns to open itself to the inner Truth, it can
receive instruction from many sources. The Bhāgavatam speaks of a wandering Avadhūta
or ascetic who accepted so many natural objects as his upagurus, subsidiary teachers.
From mother earth he learned the secret of patience, from air he learned detachment
(as air remains unaffected by pleasant or bad odour), from the sky he learned freedom
from all limitations, and so on.21
Many of you know how illumination came to Brother Lawrence, the seventeenth-cen-
tury French mystic who spent his life in the kitchen of a monastery. The sight of a leaf-
less tree in mid-winter stirred in him the reflection that leaves would be renewed, and
flowers and fruits would appear on those bare branches. This revealed to him the pres-
ence and power of God lying hidden in all creation. The spiritual awakening that he then
experienced sustained him throughout his life. In all of us the power of God is lying hid-
den, waiting for awakening. We have to discover the centre of divine Consciousness in
us, and call forth the dormant power. It was this inner guru that Buddha asked his dis-
ciples to follow after his passing away. ‘Be a lamp unto yourself (ātmadīpo bhava)’, he
told them.
But we must take care lest we should deceive ourselves. We may think that our mind
has become a good guru that we are getting instructions everywhere, but there is always
the danger of mistaking our own desires and thoughts for divine inspiration, divine
Voice, etc. There is no such danger when we receive instruction from a living teacher
who is spiritually advanced, and are guided by him. The human guru instructs his disciple
to purify his soul by the practice of moral disciplines and selfless work. When the dis-
ciple errs, the guru notices it and brings him back to the right path. Those who are for-
tunate to have the guidance of a true human guru will not go astray. Gradually, through,
the guru’s blessings, the hidden faculty of intuition will awaken in the disciple, and from
there onwards his purified, intuition will act as his guru. That is how one’s own mind be-
comes one’s guru.
Avatāra — the greatest Teacher
The greatest Teacher is, of course, the avatāra, the Divine Incarnation, who is, able
to bring illumination to thousands of people. Swami Vivekananda used to say that
avātara is a kapālamocana, one who can alter the destiny of people, one who can wipe
out what is written on their foreheads, that is, their karma. 22 No ordinary teacher has
such a power of transformation. Jesus had the power to bring divine Light to those
simple fishermen who attained illumination at his touch. He also had the power to trans-
form impure souls whom people call sinners. When he told them, ‘Thy sins are forgiven;
thy faith has made thee whole; go in peace’, they at once felt freed from all impurities.
But Jesus himself passed through initiation. What else was that scene of baptism in
Jordan when, we are told, the heavens opened and he saw the Spirit of God descending
like a dove and alighting upon him and he heard a voice saying: ‘This is my beloved son
21 Bhāgavatam, 11.7.9
22 The Complete Works of Swami Vivekananda (Calcutta: Advaita Ashrama, 1973), Vol. V, p. 324
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Med%SoirKLife Chp.8 – The Guru & Spiritual Guidance
in whom I am well pleased’. In modern times an increasingly large number of people re-
gard Sri Ramakrishna as an Incarnation. He too received initiation from a human teacher.
We are told that before he took up his work as priest in the Kālī temple, he was initiated
by a Tāntric teacher (by name Kenaram Bhattacharya) of Calcutta.When the teacher
uttered the mantra in his ears, Ramakrishna gave 23 a loud shout and was absorbed in ec-
stasy. The teacher said he had instructed many disciples but had never encountered any-
one like Ramakrishna.
The Master in his turn initiated his great disciple Narendranath with the name of
Rāma, and the young man’s spiritual emotions were stirred to great heights. For several
hours he was absorbed in a state of ecstasy. Later on, this disciple in turn became a dy-
namo of spirituality — Swami Vivekananda. In 1892, the year before Vivekananda went
to America, an agnostic professor in one of the colleges of Madras argued with him re-
garding the truths of religion. Vivekananda just touched him, and the doubter was in-
stantly transformed. Later on, this man renounced the world and lived and died a saint.
Sri Ramakrishna had the power to raise others to great heights of higher consciousness
by transmitting spiritual energy even by a mere look or wish. Swami Shivananda (Ma-
hapurush Maharaj) has narrated his own experience as follows: ‘One day I was meditat-
ing when the Master came near me. No sooner had he glanced at me than I burst into
tears. He stood still without uttering a word. A sort of creeping sensation passed
through me and I began to tremble all over. The Master congratulated me on attaining
that state.’
Later in life Swami Shivananda himself, like many of his brother disciples, became a
spiritual teacher of great power, as he was when we met him. This power manifested it-
self in him all the more when he became the head of the Order. About the year 1923 a
spiritual seeker from Sind came to the Swami for initiation. The devotee had received a
mantra in a dream but, as he could not understand its significance, his mind had become
restless. Mahapurush Maharaj took him to the shrine room, initiated him, and asked him
to meditate for a time. Then the Swami returned to his room with his face radiant and
his mind overpowered by divine emotion, for he knew that something significant was
happening in the shrine. The new disciple had a wonderful experience. The moment he
received the holy Name, a new spiritual consciousness awakened in him, tears started
rolling down his cheeks and he entered into deep meditation. When he returned to his
guru, he related how through his grace his heart was filled with divine peace. He said
that the mantra given to him during initiation was the same mantra he had received in
his dream, but only then he understood what it signified. Mahapurush Maharaj then told
him: ‘My child, it is the Lord Himself who has blessed you today. He alone can show
mercy to others. We are only instruments in His hands. The Lord manifests Himself in the
heart of the guru and transmits spiritual power into the heart of the disciple. I have ded-
icated you to the Lord who has taken charge of your life and destiny.’24
23 Cf. Swami Saradananda, Sri Ramakrishna, the Great Master (Madras: Sri Ramakrishna Math, 1970), p.
134 136
24 For more details see For Seekers of God, translated by Swami Vividishananda and Swami
Gambhirananda (Calcutta: Advaita Ashrama, 1975), pp. 164-165
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The eternal Teacher
There is a saying that the human guru utters a mantra in the ears of a disciple, while
the world Teacher speaks in the heart of the devotee. Real initiation takes place when
God awakens the spiritual consciousness of a seeker. The real guru is the immanent God,
the indwelling supreme Spirit who is the Goal, the Controller, the Lord, the Witness, the
Abode, the Refuge, the Friend, the Origin and Dissolution of the universe, its Sub-
stratum, the Repository of all knowledge and the eternal Seed.’25.
When the ordinary teacher and the pupil meet, each tries to see God in the other. The
disciple looks upon the teacher as a visible manifestation of the supreme Spirit, the
Teacher of all teachers, as a channel for the flow of divine Grace. It is in this spirit that
he serves him, obeys him and worships him. The well-known verses repeated by thou-
sands of people in India express this idea:
I bow to the divine guru who, by the application of the collyrium of Knowledge, opens
the eyes of one blinded by the disease of ignorance. I bow to the divine guru who im-
parts to the disciple the fire of Self-knowledge and burns away his bonds of karma ac-
cumulated through many births.26
I offer my salutations to the beneficent Being who is incarnate in the guru, the Light
of whose absolute Existence shines forth in the world of appearance, who instructs
the disciples with the holy text, ‘That thou art’, realizing whom the soul nevermore
returns to the ocean of birth and death.27
The Jīvātman, the individual Self, is interpenetrated and pervaded by the Paramāt-
man, the supreme Self. But, owing to ignorance, the soul does not realize this truth. The
purpose of initiation is to remove the veil of ignorance. Once this veil is lifted, the con -
tact can be maintained through regular spiritual practice.
The old law of supply and demand is at work in spiritual life too. If a seeker feels a
tremendous yearning for the light of Truth, that light must come to him from some
source or other. Something happens to him, his heart opens to divine Grace, divine Light
bursts upon him. And as he moves closer to the ultimate Reality, he sees the Light of the
supreme Spirit shining in all beings. And when he becomes one with the supreme Spirit,
the Teacher of all teachers, he too becomes a channel of divine Knowledge for others.
He serves all beings knowing well that he is serving the Lord alone, the eternal Teacher
who is teaching, awakening, illuminating and guiding souls throughout the ages.
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25 Bhagavad-Gītā, 9.18
26 Guru Stotram.
27 Ṣrī Ṣaṅkarācārya, Dakṣiṇāmūrti-Stotram, 3.
