Originally, he doubted all this. He did not believe such things exist, and… But somehow there was some strong quest within his heart, that he had to look for something, and didn’t know what. So, there were only three choices in his time, so he had chosen the Essenes. And he went to look for a Master of the Essenes.
The room is very big. It’s uncomfortable, huh? You are not used to it? More used to L.A. (Los Angeles) Three bathrooms for one person, right? Never mind, it’s always something with us. I think Heaven wants us to earn it in a hard way. I don’t know why. I keep looking for a place, and I cannot find. I find some, but there's always something. Like yesterday, they introduced a place in Hamburg. You know what’s in Hamburg? It’s like, belongs to the government. You can buy it cheap but then you have to do what the government wants you to do, like make an old home or young home, all kinds of things. No free lunch!
Hey, guys. Everybody OK? (Yes.) If it’s not OK, it has to be OK. (Yes.) Wow, these are good people. How’s the meditation going? OK? (Yes.) You are not too tired? (No.) You’re OK? (Yes.) Wow, you are tough. I’m really impressed. You’re cool. Very good, very good. Hey, you can peep like that. It’s fine too. I am so sorry. Ah, God. I’m really looking for a place. Do you believe me or not? (Yes.) I have been looking for many years, always something going on. Now, you can squeeze, or just jump in-between. Come, come quickly. We don’t have all day. We have only two days.
There, there, there we are. We’re OK, huh? Do I look good for the camera, cameraman? (Yes, Master. Beautiful.) The director; look good? (Yes.) If I don’t look good, you just have to look at it. Doesn’t matter. I can’t change any more. I did throw some color on, but that’s the best, that’s as good as it gets. Come in, squeeze in, squeeze in, darling, and sit. Wow! That should be very warm. Only English people. I mean, the ones who understand English. Oh, what for we have flowers even? We don’t even have room for humans. If you can, there is over there, behind there. It looks like a big valley. Too bad. Squeezy. Squeezy, squeezy. Brother, I mean, sister called brother, you go over there so they can squeeze over here better. Otherwise, you are already skinny, and the women they are very strong. They’d make a sandwich out of you. Take your stuff. They’d make a sandwich out of this poor guy. It doesn’t matter, anybody, who cares, just sit, sit.
OK. That’s it? The house is full? Packed? Nowhere else? There’s a valley over there. Nobody likes? I don’t know why. How many places? Just raise hand so they can go there. Look at that. The English-speaking, and the ones who don’t speak English, maybe better outside, so can translate. Translate in group. No translation in here. It’s too noisy. Oh, man! It smells so nice also. How come it smells at this time? How come? Is it already lunchtime yet? (No.) OK. That’s a very good idea to cook only twice a day. (Yes.) Two times a day, good enough. (Yes.) And if you’re really dying, you go out and grab an apple. And if there’s no apple, then you just grab nothing. So simple.
I’m going to tell you something. Remember… Is it on, honey? (Yes, Master.) How come it’s so low? Is it good? Yeah, choco. Is it good like that? Can we hear? (Yes, Master.) There are some more places over there. You want to jump in? The English-speaking. It’s too late now to move the non-English. Next time it’s like this. Unless I see them specially, you arrange the English people around here and the people who don’t understand should be outside so they can translate for each other in a group, group, group. In this kind of situation, what to do? And then I always go out and look at them anyway. (Yes, Master.) Now, that’s it. One more place even. Come on, cheap. Wholesale. Or it’s kind of a… Wow! Wow, my God! Is there anybody who’s not here? OK, OK. That’s it. No more space. Right?
Anybody have pain or anything? (No.) Yes? No. (No.) There’s a kind of white Tiger Balm; it’s very helpful. The white one, the one with the white inside. There are two kinds, no, three kinds, one kind is very deep. Deep like caramel. Deep caramel. And one is lighter caramel. Another is white. The white one. Somebody gave it to me, and it helps me a lot. Last night I could not move without screaming. That’s why I ran over there so you don’t hear me screaming, because you would scold me. “We are meditating, and You’re screaming.” Anybody have pain? We can give you some of that. It’s cool now. Much better, much better. When I breathe deep, it doesn’t hurt that much anymore. It’s bearable.
Remember the story about Jesus that He belonged to a religious order called the Essenes? I happened to grab a book about that. I meant to tell you long ago, but I never had a chance. We always tell jokes instead. OK, now. This account about the Essenes is written by a man called Josephus. And Josephus was a very famous practitioner at that time, and he was even a governor of some place. Oh, we don’t need to go into his details too much, because it’s long. He wrote something. So, I think we don’t need to read his biography. No, we go straight to the Essenes. Because he was the one who had been initiated into that order. Originally, he doubted all this. He did not believe such things exist, and… But somehow there was some strong quest within his heart, that he had to look for something, and didn’t know what. So, there were only three choices in his time, so he had chosen the Essenes. And he went to look for a Master of the Essenes.
At that time, there were the Pharisees (Jewish social movement), Sadducees (socio-religious sect of Jews), and the Essenes (mystic Jewish sect). So, he chose the Essenes. And then he prepared himself in many ways, so that he might be found worthy to be admitted into the Order of the Essenes. You can’t just go in there and register, pay a member fee, and then you become an Essene. It’s not like that. At that time – no! At this time, also no! I guess not. So this man, though he was very earnest, and he was even a governor of some kind, but in order to be admitted, as it is said here, he had to be prepared. Anyway, this book has been written, it’s been compiled by Mr. Edmond Bordeaux Szekely, but it is about a person who wrote the account of the Essenes himself – he, himself, one of the members at that time. This is a long time ago. Long time ago. Under the time of the Romans in 37 AD! His name is Flavius Josephus. He was born in 37 AD in Jerusalem. He was even of royal and sacerdotal [priestly] lineage. He was born from his mother who was from the line of the princess. And his father was a priest of high order. So, he was a somebody. Even then, to be a somebody in the secular world is different from being a somebody in the spiritual world. Therefore, he must prepare himself. I guess he had to be vegetarian for three months, probably read a lot of books or saw a lot of tapes from Supreme Master TV for a while, and then he was prepared – voilà (there you are)!
Now we go straight into where he’s already prepared. We don’t want to talk too much about how he prepared it. So, in his own words, he said that he had resolved to prepare himself in different ways that he might be found worthy to be admitted into the Order of the Essenes. And then, “in order to accomplish this, I turned to a man called Banus, of whom I was told that he belonged to the brotherhood of the Essenes and lived in the wilderness.” This man, Banus… this is the account of Josephus: “This Banus, he made his clothes out of the bark and leaves of trees, fed upon wild fruits…” You know, coco and banana, the story I told you yesterday? Maybe both! But in the wilderness, I don’t think they have coco. Or who knows? Maybe he was on an island, and there might have been a lot of coconuts. Wow! And he fed himself “upon wild fruits, plants and herbs. And from holiness, bathed several times night and day in cold water.” Oh, brrrr…!
You may try! It rains a lot – convenient! No need to worry about shortage of water. Even if it rains, we have to be grateful. In some areas, it doesn’t even rain for long years, many years, and people are very desperate for water. You know that, right? Like in Darfur region and all that. Even though we have donated some money, but I don’t know how quick it goes to them, and how quick it has brought them comfort. We cannot just go in there. We cannot go in there. Not like, you want to go there help, and you can. You see? Some areas are very restricted. And in some countries, even if you help, you have to go in like thieves because worrying that people might think we want something.
In some restricted countries… One time I helped one country, and my people even had gone to jail for that. Yeah, I just don’t know how. They brought a lot of money and a lot of stuff in there: “What are you doing with it?” And they didn't believe that we were going to help the victims. Or maybe they believed, but they just didn't want to. So, they took the money, jailed the people, and made them sign all nonsense, otherwise they would shoot, something like that. It’s horrible! It’s not like, in this world, if you want to be good, then people will applaud you, praise you and give you a Shining World Leadership Award or something like that. Not always. It’s happened not just one time. In different countries. I guess you can know where. Oh, those countries are a little bit more open now. It’s more open now. You can go in without visa, the natives. The natives overseas can go in without visa. But before, it was more restricted. Our people had been jailed and threatened to be killed if they don’t sign – sign a guilty paper. They had done nothing wrong! It’s something like that. Or being on the blacklist. The first time, on a blacklist. Second time, be in jail, or blah, blah, blah…
