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to a woman. This trick did not work on him because Nanak was not against anything.
When his father told him to get married Nanak readily agreed. He married and had children, but this did not change his ways at all. There was no way to spoil this man, because he saw no difference between God and the world. How can such a person be defiled? If a man leaves wealth behind to become a sannyasin, you can tempt him just by giving him riches. If another has left a wife behind, give him a woman and in no time he falls. But how can you spoil a man who has left nothing? There is no way to bring about his downfall. Nanak cannot be corrupted.
My view of the sannyasin is similar to Nanak's, because he is a formidable sannyasin who cannot be corrupted. He who sits right in your world and yet is not of it can in no way be tempted.
This God Nanak refers to as the creator, the fearless, because fear is when the other is. An expression of Jean Paul Sartre has become famous: "The other is hell." It describes your experience. How often do you want to escape from the other, as if he is the source of all your trouble? When the other is closer to you, the turbulence is less than when the other is more remote, stranger. But the other is always troublesome.
What is fear? Fear always involves the other: if someone can take something away from you it destroys your security. Then there is death and there is illness -- both are the other. Hell is being surrounded by the other; hell is the other.
But how can you escape the other? Should you run away to the Himalayas you will still not be alone. Sit under a tree; a crow's dropping falls on your head, and you are filled with anger towards the crow. There are the rains and the sun -- irritations everywhere. How will you escape the other who is present everywhere? The only way to escape the other is to seek the one; then no other remains. Then all fear fades away. There is no death, no illness; there are no inconveniences, because there is no other. Finally you are alone. Fear persists as long as the other remains the other for you.
Ek Omkar Satnam. Once this mantra has penetrated your being, where is fear?
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