THE GOD-MAN The Life, Journeys and Work of Meher Baba with an ...

328 THE GOD-MANbelieve in reincarnation, in innumerable births and deaths until one attains Godhood. The Muslims believein one birth only and one death only, the Christians and Zoroastrians the same. All are right. ""But Jesus, Buddha, Muhammad, Zoroaster, all meant what I mean by real birth and real death. I say youare born once and die once. All the so-called births and deaths are only sleeps and wakings. The differencebetween sleep and death is that when you sleep you awake and find yourself in the same body; but afterdeath you awake in a different body. You never die. Only the blessed ones die and become one with God."When the discourse on Fana was to be read, Baba preceded the reading by saying: 'This is short butdifficult. Those who cannot follow it, must not worry. It's nothing but words. Only love counts. If the mostunintelligent one can love me as I ought to be loved, he is infinitely more blessed than the most intelligentone who doesn't know how to love me.'FanaFana is the state of unconscious consciousness. This is followed by Fana-Fillah where the soul isunconscious of everything except Self being God.Before the soul loses its human state and gains the divine state of Nirvikalp, it has to experience thevacuum state of Nirvan.Nirvan is the infinite vacuum state when the soul is fully conscious of real nothing.Nirvan is immediately and inevitably followed by Nirvikalp or Fana-Fillah, where the soul is fullyconscious of Real Everything. Nirvan and Nirvikalp are so irrevocably linked and tied together that eachcan be said to be the Divine Goal:False Nothing - Illusory everythingReal Nothing - Neither everything nor nothingReal Everything - God the InfiniteFalse nothing leads to false everything; and Real Nothing leads to Real Everything. False nothing islinked to false everything; and Real Nothing is linked to Real Everything. Eventually false nothing ends infalse everything, and Real Nothing ends in Real Everything. In duality false nothing is false everything. Inunity Real Nothing and Real Everything are one.Baba commented: 'If you listen seven times, there is a chance of your