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sannyasin)
Meditation is a state of absolute silence. It is not prayer, because in prayer your mind functions, you are saying something to god, praising the lord. But because you are saying something the mind is there; without the mind nothing can be said. And because you are saying something you are not silent even with god. Prayer is a dialogue, and one thing has to be very deeply understood -- that god understands no language except the language of silence. He neither understands Sanskrit nor Hebrew nor Arabic nor Latin nor Greek.
There are at least three thousand languages on the earth and this is only one of the planets which is populated. Scientists think at least fifty thousand planets are populated -- that is at least, more are possible. This is a very conservative estimate. Three thousand languages on the earth with at least thirty thousand dialects, and then there are fifty thousand planets ... if god is to understand language, he will go crazy.
God understands only silence. Prayer is the last function of the mind. Where prayer ends meditation begins, you drop saying anything to god. What can we say? What have we got to say? Prayer is saying something, meditation is listening. Rather than saying something to god it is better to be silent and to listen. And in silence the message comes, in silence not only the message but god himself comes.
God does not come like a person. He does not come shouting, knocking on your doors. He comes very silently, like a fragrance, making no noise. no fuss. God is not a person but a presence.
A person is bound to be limited. A person can be photographed, an image can be made of a person. No image can be made of god, for the simple reason that he is a presence. You can make a beautiful painting of a rose flower but how will you paint the fragrance of the rose. There is no way at all. So god is not a person but only a presence, a feeling. And that feeling wells up from your innermost core when you are utterly silent, when the mind has gone into complete cessation.
And Zohra is a beautiful word. It is Arabic, It has three meanings. One is the blossoming. It is only in deep meditation
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