Two spiritual wanderers—let’s call them Bedouins—feel very downtrodden in their friendship because they have lost their essential inspirational path to God. They feel that they used to have it, the goal easily given from their spiritual master and by living as children in the tradition, in the family. What is it exactly that has deviated them from it they do not know, but they are very sad. They see others are still pursuing it heartily. They have not become atheists, but they have become lethargic and lost fire. In my much- repeated analogy, the gold that has come so easily has now turned into a leaden patience, and now all they have is the soul’s own patience. (This is supposedly from both Rilke and Theresa of Avila.) Wait, dependent and sure on God’s mercy to return to them and looking for what they can do on their side to regain it. But it seems like it may be a long, long time before they will recover it, if at all. Their main work now is the soul’s own patience.

So in my imaginary Eastern story, the Bedouins come to a river bank, and they meet a reputed holy man. In desperation, they ask him how they can again find both the topographical and inner path to their salvation. By topographical, perhaps they mean the road to Mecca, just as we might be lost trying to find Vrndavana. And by inner they mean the qualification, the inspiration to enter the holy dhama and have their spiritual interests reawakened. Their faith has waned. They know people have looked up to them in the past, and now people are disappointed and even angry with them. But they cannot do anything about helping other people unless they can first help themselves. They sincerely ask this holy man who seems to emanate a trust and humility. They ask him how they can find the outer and inner paths. He is much older than they, with heavy eyebrows and deeply tanned face from living the desert. He smiles compassionately, knows how to help them, but cannot help but smile at their dilemma. He knows it is not too late.

"Your problem obviously is that you are lost. Like sheep you have wandered from the path. You were doing so well and you don’t know how you have wandered astray. Was it some scenery sight, was it an attractive lamb? Was it some evil spirit, evil association? That is ancient history now. Now you have to find your way back because you have wandered far away. I think I can help you. First of all, you have to become topographically refound. Actually, these things will occur simultaneously—topographically and inner return." The man took out a very handsome scrawl from his robe and laid it on the hard sand. With a sturdy pen he began sketching what looked like a very large area located somewhere between northern Africa and Egypt, what people sometimes call the "cradle of civilization." He had a very steady hand and seemed to be not only a spiritualist but a geographer by practice, well aware of the maps of the past and present even without the use of compasses and intricate tools. He started by saying, "We are here, by this river bank." He drew a dot in the river, then he began to draw the river as it meandered northward forming a rough semicircle. It headed toward what he said was Ethiopia and Egypt. As he paid attention to the map, he also told of some other history of Africa.

"The first persons on earth were Africans," he said, "and they left their history not in books but in spoken words." He said, "They were later invaded by the white Portuguese, who killed them in large numbers, but the Africans remained and kept their secret knowledge in silence. A few of the wizards kept it among themselves and took other wizards to special secret places where they passed it on and said ‘Do not to tell this to anyone but this very place is special and I have spoken it to you here, so never bring anyone here and never speak it to anyone.’ Thus the knowledge by words was preserved in these secret places."

As he spoke these little anecdotes, the draftsman-wiseman continued to trace the rivers and side paths, detours, and hills that covered the region of desert and hills and detours that covered that area. He told how some of the first white men, the Portuguese, came and killed some Africans. But the black men persevered and developed a very high culture before it was developed anywhere else in Europe. And they preserve it again by the word, not by books, by word, which was kept silent except to trusted ones."

As the two doubtful mendicants accompanied their new leader, their faith grew, and they became jubilant to know of their past—the ancestry, the parampara and all the wonderful things from their past. They began to remember some of these things that had been told to them by their great grandfathers, and they saw no reason why they have abandoned it for trivial things. But the walk became exhausting. The guru lay down each night on the sand and seemed not to be tired for it, but they became more and more tired and thirsty. One of them asked him, "O master, how long will this trip take?"

He said, "It will take three months."

"That is a long time. I hope we will be able to hold out before we die."

"Don’t worry. Pray for determination and we will also reach some spots of oasis, where you can drink sweet water." Gradually the mendicants grew strong in their legs and reached the places of the oasis where they were also able to get fruits which replenished them. Nevertheless, it was an ordeal. After many months the guru left them, saying, "Now I will leave you to go on on your own, using your own bearings and the map. You must learn to do these things on your own." The mendicants were afraid, but they took it that the guru felt they were ready, so they proceeded. Following the map scrupulously, they began to notice some other features of the land. They had been through cities and desolated places, and now they came through places that had a few towns and shops. One shop had a big sign on it: Maps and Topographies. They stopped there to compare their crude map with carefully drawn maps of professional mapmakers. They showed their map and said to him, "Does this resemble anything in this area?"

The mapmaker studied it and then burst out laughing. He said, "You have done a very good job! This is the very exact area where you are now. Where did you start out from?"

They pointed to the dot where they had started three months ago, advised by a man that they found on the river bank.

The cartographer said, "Ah, he has sent you on the wild goose chase. You have made a complete circle, and now in just a few hours you are going to return to that circle, and if you are lucky you will meet that same man because you are returning to the same spot."

The mendicants were aghast, and happy too, because they had learned many things, not just in covering the same ground. They have seen many religions and deserted temples and heard different doctrines about the inner way. But gradually they had become convinced that the way that they have been thought in childhood and by the different teachers of their denomination was something special and something they wanted to stay on, and that they could only learn it by going to see all the other paths. So they broke into a trot, hurrying back to the spot where they met the man of their original faith, hoping he would still be there. Fortunately he was standing there waiting for them with open arms and a big smile. "So you have come home!" He came and embraced them.

"Why did you send us on this long journey?," they asked with a big smile that stretched from ear to ear.

"You know why," he said, laughing.

"Because you wanted us to see everything for ourselves. We could not appreciate it by your telling us. We had to see for ourselves and compare for ourselves what was actually best. And now we are completely convinced that although there are wonderful things and all the spiritualities and lands and gurus and wonders in the world, we want to stay with our spiritual kinfolk and follow this highest path that we have been born into and cultured into. They bowed at his feet. "Thank you for sending us all over the world for finding the highest jewel right in our own backyard."