Who are you?

In 2008 publiceerde de Engelse satsang-leraar Premananda Blue Prints of Awakening. Het is een verslag van 16 interviews met hedendaagse Indiase Advaita leraren. Hij stelde hen allemaal dezelfde vragen, ontleend aan de teachings van Ramana Maharshi. Een van de geïnterviewden is Kiran (1941 – 2006). Kiranji (zie foto) studeerde filosofie in Thane en werd in 1967 leerling van Osho. Nadat deze in 1981 naar Amerika vertrok, ging Kiran vooral in de leer bij U.G. Krishnamurti. Sinds 1993 gaf hij zelf satsangs. Premananda begint elk interview met deze vraag: “Sri Ramana Maharshi proposed the fundamental question ‘Who am I?’ Who are you?”

Kiranji antwoordde: “The right answer is silence. There is no answer to this question. The answer that you get to this question most of the time is from the knowledge that you have about yourself. Then you reach that point when this knowledge about yourself ceases and knowing dawns upon you; there is no word which can express who you are. There is just silence. You are that silence. You are that nothingness. There are a lot of labels that you have coined from your language, your profession, your acquaintances, your relations, all the conditioning that you have, but these are not the right answer. Your question is ‘Who am I?’ I would say that the I dissolved and that there is nobody there. There is nobody. There is no I. There is nobody there. That is my answer.”