Advaita Vedanta · 1879–1950
Ramana Maharshi on silence
The scriptures all fizzle out in silence
Silence is the most potent form of work. However vast and emphatic the scriptures may be, they all fizzle out in silence.
What this verse points to
Ramana taught primarily by sitting in silence with visitors, and many of them reported that this communicated more than the conversations did. The claim here is not that words are worthless but that they terminate somewhere.
"Fizzle out" is characteristically unsentimental. Even the most exalted text runs out of things to say at exactly the point where the subject begins.
Sit with it
Sit for five minutes with no technique and no mantra. Do not fill the silence with anything, including effort.
About the Ramana Maharshi
Ramana Maharshi underwent a spontaneous experience of death at sixteen that left him permanently established in Self-knowledge, and spent the rest of his life at Arunachala in Tiruvannamalai. He taught mainly in silence, and when he did give a method it was atma-vichara — self-enquiry, holding to the question "who am I?" until the questioner is seen through.