Drugs
There are many people who claim that with the use of certain drugs they are able to get closer to God. Of course the Chinese have been using opium for centuries and centuries. How do you feel about using stimulants, drugs, etc., to stimulate the mind in order to get closer to God?
Let me start out by saying that there are two ways of
approaching the Truth. One way is that by meditation
and prayer, we know the real Truth, we feel the real
ecstasy, we see the real Light, we experience Existence-Consciousness-Bliss.
These last three go together and we can come into that
state only through meditation and oneness with God.
But those who are taking drugs are putting the cart
before the horse. They are deceiving themselves into
thinking that they already know the Truth. At the same
time, they are not aware of the fact that by taking
drugs, they are damaging their inner, spiritual faculties
which are of paramount importance in order to enter
into God's kingdom.
Let me make it clear to you. If you throw me into a
sea and plunge me, immerse me forcibly in the water,
not allowing me to come to the surface, then what shall
I see? All blank, all white. And that is what actually
happens to those who have taken to drugs. Through the
effect of chemicals, a violent change of consciousness
is effected. They get an experience – all white!
Even if it is a higher experience, they cannot sustain
it unless they take another dose of chemicals. But when
I pray, when I concentrate, when I meditate, I enter
into the living Consciousness of God and I can learn
to remain there. This is the positive and natural way
of entering into God. God is natural and I am His son,
you are His son; we have to follow the natural process.
But by taking to drugs and using these artificial means,
people are unconsciously, if not deliberately, negating
the real Truth.
To come back to your question, no one can come closer
to God by taking drugs or stimulants. One can come closer
to God only by loving God and meditating on God.
