The drop of water and the ocean were always Shri Nathji’s favourite theme in his sermons and writings. The drop of water was the individual soul of man, and the ocean was God, the Universal Soul. Shri Nathji had composed this beautiful verse on the ultimate union of the human soul with God:
Samundar men katraa fanaa ho gayaa
Fanaa hoke laa-intahaa ho gayaa
A drop of water perished in the ocean
And perishing, it became of infinite dimensions!
The one important question that loomed large before religionists and philosophers was why God had separated the soul from itself in the first place, in the beginning of creation.
Shri Nathji had a very beautiful answer to this ancient query:
Why did the ocean separate the drop of water from itself? Whilst the drop was in the ocean, it was a part of the ocean. When it became separated, its existence took on a multiplicity of shapes and forms. It became a vapour, a wisp of smoke, a drop of rain, and a drop of dew. It fell into the waters of streams that carried it to rivers flowing down to the ocean. The last was the ultimate union with the ocean. The joy of union was supreme–it was like no other joy, unending, limitless and perfect. It was then that the secret of its separation from the ocean dawned upon the drop. The separation had come about only so that the drop might experience the boundless joy of union! It could never have had this experience, had the drop remained forever with the ocean. It was only separation that gave the joy of union!
In later years Shri Nathji gave another novel explanation for the separation of the human soul from God in the following way:
“In the beginning all the souls were in Heaven with God. However they had been there for so long that they no longer derived any happiness from the joys of heaven. And, therefore, God sent them down to earth so that they could experience the misery of the earth, and thus come to yearn for the bliss that was their birthright in Heaven!”