Sri Sai Baba`S:Charters And Sayings

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SECON^^^K ^ ^ «w I S»SE 21

I Y^Uf^l^

you understand precisely wl^t*wou are talkj/^^out,
but very ^decidedly there ^^ds^r^^^ in
our minds.^ Then again in tti^^^^ ^'^^^^lse^ ^°
speak of this Probationary Path, ^^^^^®f prepara-
tion for Initiation, as being divided into stages.
Those stages correspond simply to the four Qualifi-
cations which are given to you in these books, and
which you know so well: Discrimination, Desireless"
ness, Good Conduct, and Love< There are different
translations of the Samskrit words as there are for
the Pali names. I shall give you those as we go
through it. But you must remember that these
things were spoken of as " stages " and sometimes
a reference was made to <( Initiations" between them.
That is quite a misrepresentation, because the qualifi-
cations are not at all necessarily acquired in a fixed
order. They are written down in that order in the
old Oriental books, but most of us, I take it, are
trying to attain all of them simultaneously—not one
by one. Discrimination has a certain position as
coming first because it means the discrimination
which enables a man to choose to enter upon the
Path at all. The Buddhist name for it is Mano-
dvaravajjana, which means the ci Opening of the
doors'of the mind". It is at this point, in other
worc^, that the man's mind is opened for the first
time to see that the spiritual things are the only real
things and that the ordinary worldly life is a waste
of time. The Christian calls that <( conversion,^