Alexander the Great

You see many palaces here in India — in Delhi, Jaipur, and other places. You see how comfortably the kings wanted to live. And now they are lying there … dead. Nobody can create permanency. The kings had everything. They even had diamonds.

Not one could take anything with them when they died. Not even the greatest conqueror of the world, Alexander, who had conquered three-fourths of the world, all but China. On his way to China, due to sickness he had to return to Greece, but on the way he died.

It’s a long story. Alexander was in India after he conquered the Punjab, when he saw a yogi sitting on the bank of the river Jilam. Alexander had never seen anybody in this meditative posture, sitting day and night, not moving. He said to his soldiers, “OK, you bring this man to me. I will ask him what is this, what is he doing.”

And so the men took one interpreter and shaking the yogi, they asked him, “The king of this land, Alexander the Great, wants to see you. You please come.” The yogi said, “The tradition of this country, the tradition of India, is whosoever wants to see someone, it is he who should go to the other person. I don’t need to see him. If he needs to see me, let him come and see me.” That’s what the yogi said.

So they said, “OK, he has to be forcefully removed.” Some five or six soldiers tried to lift him by the hands and feet, to take him to the camp where Alexander was staying. But as one man was carrying him by the hand, the hand came off the body. Then the feet and the legs came off the body, and the rest of the body rested on the ground. Horrified, the men saw they were carrying only the yogi’s legs. Overcome with fear, they dropped the body parts and ran away.

Now Alexander himself opted to come and see this yogi, and again the yogi was sitting in the strange posture. Alexander’s teacher, a disciple of Socrates, had told him, “When you go to India you will see yogis.” Alexander was unhappy to hear this because when he told his teacher, “I want to conquer the whole world,” the teacher had replied, “You conquer the mind. You conquer the mind and everything is conquered.” Alexander had shouted, “You are stupid,” and had him thrown into prison.

Alexander’s teacher had a request. “When you go to India, please see some saint. And bring me the Gita, the book of knowledge, and a jar of Ganga water.” That was what he wanted. “OK, I will do that,” said Alexander.

So when Alexander first saw the yogi, the yogi was sitting, while Alexander was standing with his army generals. ”Who are you?” asked the yogi. “I am Alexander from Greece,” was the reply. “Why are you here?” the yogi questioned. “I have conquered all of Europe. Now I have to conquer China. Because of the monsoon this river is in spate, so I am waiting for the river to recede and then I will go to China.” That’s what Alexander said.

“Listen, listen, my dear boy. In twenty days, you have to leave this world,” said the yogi. “That’s how it will be.” Alexander, because he was young, only thirty-three years old at the time, commanded, “Arrest him! Though it may be true, arrest him! My mother told me, ‘When you’re sick and you feel that your death is coming near, you must come to your own country and die.'”

Alexander immediately took very fast horses to return to Greece. On the way at Barbarun, I think that’s where it was, he had very simple diarrhea. He was dying, and the generals asked, “What is your will? What is your last will?” Alexander said, “Keep my hands out of the coffin so that the people will know I am not carrying anything with me.”

That was his desire. And this monarch, Alexander the Great, had to leave this world empty-handed.