Can One Hold the Truth?

Can one speak of a fundamental Truth without falling into sectarianism? Between the relative truths each person carries and a fundamental Truth that would escape all possession, this text explores what it means to seek, to find, and then to practise — without ever claiming to hold what, by nature, exceeds us.

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Can one speak of a fundamental Truth without falling into sectarianism? Between the relative truths each person carries and a fundamental Truth that would escape all possession, this text explores what it means to seek, to find, and then to practise — without ever claiming to hold what, by nature, exceeds us.

The word truth is misleading: it seems to say only one thing, when in fact it covers very different meanings. There are, for instance, the truths of criminal cases, scientific truths, the relative truths of journalism, as well as historical truths — and there is fundamental Truth.

To take an example, saying that all living men are not dead is an essential truth, because the essence of a living man is the life that animates him, and that life is a universal, essential truth.

There are many truths, about many subjects, and each person tends to hold their own. Of fundamental Truth, there is only one. This Truth does not cancel out individual truths; it does not stand at the same level.

Fundamental Truth is the force of life, the virtue of the Tao, the Oneness and its underlying harmony, which, like a founding equation, govern everything. Here, it is not a matter of religious truth.

Setting Out on the Path

Certain traditional spiritualities, which are not religions, have been concerned — and still are — with this fundamental Truth, with the source of all life. They do not always speak the same language, nor use the same words to speak of it, but beyond their differences, they all point in the same direction.

These traditional spiritualities are practices more than theories, concepts, or dogmas, and these practices are brought together to form a method: sadhana¹. A traditional, authentic spirituality organised in this way is a spiritual path, or màrga².

The Spiritual Path of Yoga-Originel is a spirituality of this kind.

What must one do to set out on the Spiritual Path of Yoga-Originel? For this, there is one indispensable prerequisite: believing that a fundamental Truth exists. Another is to thirst for the knowledge of this Truth.

This fundamental Truth can neither be spoken nor written. That is why no one can tell it to us, and no book can reveal it to us! There are plenty of people and books who speak of it, myself included, and not all of them say false things.

The Tao-Te-Ching, the Bhagavadgîtopanishad, the Upanishads, the Vedas, the Suttas, the Yoga Sūtra, the Bhaktimàrga, the Guru Granth Sahib, the Dhammapada (the words of the buddha Gautama Siddhartha), the Gospels — all speak of this truth, for example, but are their translations good translations?

Search the web for PDFs of the Yoga Sūtra, for instance… download ten, and you will get ten different versions! Another problem: even with a good translation, how would you judge it? What is more, these books speak of the truth, but they do not reveal it! Because it is, above all, a daily practice.

A Practice

The fundamental Truth of an authentic spirituality is a practice. Knowledge of it comes through practice.

What is an authentic spirituality? It is a practice (sadhana) established on fundamental Truth, capable of allowing its practitioner to kill (in spirit) the old Man within, so that he may be reborn (in spirit) and enter the Kingdom, like a little child. This is what Jesus said to Nicodemus! (John, chapter 3, verses 3 to 7)

The ancient books regarded as holy are not addressed to the seeker of truth; they are addressed to the disciples of a living master, to help them walk the spiritual path (sadhana) that he teaches them. This does not stop seekers from reading them, and thereby gaining a thirst for the knowledge that comes through practice.

At most, these books can inspire a seeker to ask for the Revelation of the meditation techniques — the techniques that all the great masters of the past have taught, and that today's masters still teach. This Revelation must be asked for.

When It Has Been Found

The Spiritual Path is not a search. One seeks the truth as long as one has not found it; once it has been found, one puts it into practice — for example, by practising the techniques of Yoga-Originel and observing sadhana.

I am aware that what I have just said may sound sectarian to anyone reading from the outside. This is a legitimate objection, and it deserves a real answer rather than a dodge: "No one holds the truth!" — that is true. No one holds the truth, but knowing fundamental Truth is not the same as holding it.

No one can hold it: it is Truth that holds everything. To say that such a Truth exists is not to claim to possess it; it is to recognise that it exceeds and precedes us.

"The Tao that can be spoken is not the eternal Tao. The name that can be named is not the eternal Name. The Nameless is the origin of Heaven and Earth. The Named is the mother of all beings. He who is free of desire sees its hidden essence. He who is enslaved by desire sees only its fleeting forms. These two states share a common source but different names. This unity is a twofold depth, the gateway to all mysteries." (Tao-Te-Ching, 1)

"The Tao is a void that can never be filled, yet its usefulness is inexhaustible. It contains everything, the manifest and the unmanifest, light and darkness. It seems to be the mother of all beings. It blunts what is sharp, unties every knot, tempers its own brilliance, and merges with the dust of the world. Its presence is imperceptible. He who knows it masters his conditioning and keeps his virtue hidden. I do not know whether it was created; it seems to have preceded Creation." (Tao-Te-Ching, 4)

A Living Word

The truth I am speaking of here is the Tao, the Oneness, the Whole, and the Tao is not Taoist. The buddha revealed this truth, and he was not a Buddhist; Jesus was never a Christian. A living word is necessary to speak the truth, and for that, a living master is needed to speak it.

This takes nothing away from the legitimacy of those who seek otherwise, or who doubt this very statement: it is a position I hold and stand by, not a verdict on those who do not share it. Each person advances according to their own maturing, and that journey belongs to them alone.

Footnotes:

¹ Sadhana (Sanskrit): a spiritual method or discipline; a structured set of practices leading to realisation.

² Màrga (Sanskrit): literally "path, way"; refers to a traditional spiritual path organised around a sadhana.

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