Karl Renz - Heaven And Hell

T he moment I started writing this Introduction, I knew that it would be far more difficult than transcribing conversations for an entire book. How does one describe careless or irrelevance? The question that popped up was: why am I short of words in describing a man who can talk on non-duality endlessly at a stretch without tiring or getting bored?

Karls rendezvous with Mumbai, for the conversations recorded in Heaven And Hell, started at the beginning of March 2012 after his long tour to Koh Samui. The talks were hosted at Chetana Book Centre, publishers of Nisargadatta Maharajs classic I Am That also a prime location in the heart of the cityjust the perfect venue.

For Karl, this Mumbai sojourn was almost akin to a pit stop on his way back to Berlin. And Behold! So many new visitors with new questions! Karl is delightednew ducks to shoot! As he puts it, There is no shortage of ducks and I can shoot forever. He proves his point. After a long and arduous retreat from Koh Samui, which would have burnt out anyone concerned with what he is talking about, Karl has longer and denser talks with the fresh meats, in a country which has no paucity of spiritual concepts.

Welcome to the fireworks of carelessness where age-old concepts are shot down by fresh pointers with utter nonchalance. The visitors at these meetings vary from newcomers to veteran seekers, spiritual voyagers, spiritual window shoppers, people with half- or partly-baked understanding, but mostly the dissatisfied souls who are fed up with what theyve got elsewhere The leftovers. A shadow dance of creation and destruction of the concepts seems to happen at these meetings leading to a feeling of emptiness where people cry and laugh at their most profoundly held concepts being blown to bits.

The closest analogy to what happens here is the Buddhist process of creation and destruction of Mandala. The monks bend over the piece for hours on end, dropping one grain of sand after another into intricate symbolic patterns. When the Mandala is finally completed, however long it takes for the monks to deal in this divine geometry of the heavens, they destroy it. They sweep it up, every last grain of sand and give handfuls of it away to those who participate in the closing ceremony as a final memory of sublime possibility. Then they throw the rest of the sand into the nearest living stream to be swept into the ocean. And thats it. Its gone. In an instant, after all that artistry, all that work... its all over.

Why?! Because the underlying message of the Mandala ceremony is that nothing is permanent. Nothing. All things are in flux, it says, beautiful but ephemeral, moving but temporary, more a plateau than the summit.

With Karl, there is no before and after, no careful deliberation of words and no decoration. There is no story worth telling because any story is still a story of an imaginary me. For any of such things, there is still a caretaker who takes care about trying to be accurate or is trying to describe things to the best possible extent. This is contradicting to the basis of carelessness and irrelevance that is so apparent in these talks.

Then again one is left with the question Who cares about the carelessness? With this perspective, one wonders how Karl can talk for hours on that which cannot be talked about or why he travels so much when he knows there is no one who will get it!

So, relax, take your popcorn and buckle up for the joyride of irrelevance!

Manjit Singh Achhr a

Mumbai, July 2012

Q : When you use the phrase Realization of the Self, would it be the same as maya ?

K: Maya is only when you want to realize yourself in that realization thats the maya . The dream is only when you set to find yourself in the realization thats the maya .

Q: When the Self is realizing itself...thats not maya ?

K: No. Maya is the illusion that you can find yourself in that realization that you are something that can be found in that realization. That is what I would call as maya . That you are the realizer different from what is realized that is maya .

So when you found yourself in realization, if you are an object of realization, thats the maya . Otherwise there is no maya , there is only the Self.

Q: In that sense, you are what is the maya ...

K: You are That what is the maya but not knowing any maya . That what is ignorance not knowing any ignorance. But when you are in the maya then you are someone who knows maya and then there is maya . It needs one who defines maya .

Q: Knowing maya is maya ...

K: Yeah. And there is a knower, knowing or not knowing thats maya . When the definer is there defining something thats maya . Otherwise there is no maya . Theres not even Self.

Q: In that sense, there is no realizing of the Self other than the Self...

K: There is not even realization.

Q: Does not need to realize...

K: In that absence of anyone who defines anything, there is no real and no realization.

Q: Neither knowing nor not knowing...

K: Neither-neither. Neti-neti .

Q: [Another visitor]: Being what-you-cannot-not-be, is that a technique or a koan?

K: Both! [Laughing] Its a koan and a technique. Its an absolute technique, something what cannot be done. So its an absolute technique. Its like try not to be. And that you do as a seeker, you try not to be. And you never succeed. Or did you succeed? [Laughing]

No, its just a pointer to that what you are which never needs to know what-it-is. Because its in nature: what-it-is. And what you now believe to be will never become That.

So, Im not talking to the one who now tries to make a technique out of it. But for sure, you will try to make a technique out of it. What can you do? You make it a concept again. And then you would ask How can I really be what can I not not be? Comes again and again. So what to do?

You will survive!

Q: [Another visitor]: You stripped me yesterday...

K: [Laughing]: That sounds good, this is a strip tease here. [Laughter]

Q: Youre the owner of a strip tease bar... [Laughter]

K: This is a night bar. This is a deep-deep sleep bar.

Q: First the outer garment, then the underwear, then whatever was leftover that also... [Laughter]