Pearls before Swine

A swine, a hog, always lives on refuse and excrement. You may throw before it the best of food-stuffs or invaluable treasures, even diamonds and pearls, but despite this, it would prefer filth and refuse, and only then would it think of partaking of anything else, thus assigning the best to the last place. In other words, refuse means all the world to the swine, and other foods–even the finest– are an after-consideration. Even if you cast pearls before it, the hog would say, “Let me eat the garbage first, and then I will see to these pearls.” Here, “pearls” means the path of Realization, while the state of you humans is like that of the swine. That is, you prefer refuse to pearls, for despite my showing you the “peals” of the path of Realization, you are always attracted to and chase after the worldly Maya—the nark. For whom, then, are these pearls destined? For the Royal Geese!

– “Meher Baba’s Tiffin lectures”, p38
22-May-1926; Meherabad

Share with love

Comments are closed.