Lilian Silburn’s Turning Point: A Rare Testimony of Mystical Awakening

Great Indian Sufi master, Radha Mohan Lal Adhauliya–"Bhai Sahib" and Lilian Silburn in Kanpur circa 1960

In 1950, Lilian Silburn was forty-two years old — almost exactly at the midpoint of her life.

That year marked a decisive turning point. After decades devoted to philosophy, languages, and the study of mystical traditions, she describes the beginning of what she considered an entirely new existence. The past, she writes, suddenly felt remote, almost inaccessible: “there is no more past for me.”

At that moment her Guru asked her to do something she deeply resisted — to speak publicly about her own life and inner experiences. For someone who longed for silence and anonymity, this request felt almost impossible. Yet she ultimately accepted the task.

The text that follows is the original statement she delivered. Written in English — which was not her native language — it preserves the immediacy of her voice and the vividness of her descriptions.

What we read here is not a finished doctrine or a polished spiritual teaching, but the testimony of a seeker at a critical moment of transition: standing, as she herself says, only at the threshold of the mystical life.

For this reason the text is valuable not as a claim of realization, but as a rare and candid document of the inner landscape encountered at the beginning of a profound spiritual transformation.

(from "Lilian Silburn, a Mystical Life: Letters, Documents, Testimonials"):

I came to India to acquire two main things: silence and forgetfulness — perfect silence of all the faculties: mind, heart and so on; complete forgetfulness of my limited self. And by a hard paradox, the one who is giving me both has asked me today to speak, to speak in public even, and to speak about my own self.

I must say a few words about my past, for I could find only what I was looking for, though I found much more than I ever dreamt of.

From my childhood I was only interested in the Absolute. I was not ten years old when I was wondering and discussing about the most important problem for me then: the one of grace. At that time I was reading the Old Testament of the Bible again and again as others read books of adventures. The only adventure I was interested in was how to get to God.

From 15 to 20 years of age I had decided to leave the world and enter a Christian convent where renouncement is the hardest and contemplation the highest, but I had to wait, my family being opposed to it.

Then I studied philosophy, not for the sake of examinations or for mental pleasure, but I tried to live and feel according to most of the philosophical systems: Plato, Plotinus, Spinoza for instance.

Before I was twenty I lost all faith in a personal God and in the Christian religion, though I remained eager to find a way towards the Absolute.

After having studied Western philosophers and mystics I turned towards the East when I was 20 and began a thesis on Indian philosophy. For that I had to learn Sanskrit, Pāli and Avestic.

First I was attracted by the vedāntin Śankara, Rāmānuja and the Upaniṣads. After a few years I discovered Buddhism and gave my heart to the Buddha, Nāgārjuna, and Asaṅga in whom I found the best of masters.

I studied also Ṛg and Atharva Veda and the Brāhmaṇas for many years, and during the war I devoted part of my time to Trika philosophy; it is a Śaivaite system based on very old tantras. It is named also Spanda philosophy, the philosophy of vibrations, and is entirely based on the mystical experiences of the yogin.

In the meantime I was also interested in such old Persian books as the Avesta, the gāthās of Zarathustra, and had deep love for Taoism which is the best expression of Chinese mysticism.

But I never felt attracted towards Arabic culture. It is why I know very little of Sufism.

I translated Pañcadaśī, Aitareya Upaniṣad, wrote two books on Trika philosophy, and achieved my thesis on “Cause and Duration”… from the Ṛgveda, Brāhmaṇas to Buddhism included.

In that work I wanted to show, after the Buddhists, that everything is momentaneous and that duration is our own creation. The Buddha, as well as other mystics, had taught me that the present moment is the only real thing: in the actual instant we live, we die, we are “efficient.”

The creation of past and future is the source of our misery: we only waste our life as we turn constantly towards the past, regretting it, or towards the future in an everlasting expectation, and we do not live and work our deliverance in the very present moment.

Time is a structure, a samskāra. We know how we create it under the impulse of desire, by our mental dynamism. The problem was then to destroy all those structures, to return to childhood, to live in the present.

And so, long before I came here, I knew in the marrow of my bones that to reach the Absolute would be to go above all concepts, all samskāra, vikalpa; that no thought however high it be, no philosophy will help me in the least to reach my goal.

Following Nāgārjuna and St. John of the Cross, our best mystic, I knew that only a being who gets rid of all modes could reach a God without modes.

During those years of hard studies I always refused to marry so that I could remain free. I could not tolerate the least obstacle in my path towards the Absolute.

In the West I met some people with mystical tendencies, but none had direct experiences in spite of their keen desires.

When I came to India two years ago, I had very little hope of finding a Guru, for I not only expected perfection and greatness, but I asked for someone who was above all religions and creeds, who was not a philosopher, not a Vedāntin — who admired Buddha and Jesus Christ as I did because of their universal love.

I wanted that my guide had renounced everything though he would be living in the world. He must have no prejudices concerning purifications, food, be above all kind of rituals and idol worship.

But how to find such a man in India!

I wanted also what Trika philosophy named samādhi in the world: unmīlana samādhi, ecstasies with opened eyes and that from the very beginning.

Now if I admired the Rāja yoga of Patañjali, I was unwilling to try any āsana, prāṇāyāma, japa, for I put spiritual life at too high a level.

In my heart also I had a mad desire: to realize the Absolute by what the Śaivism of Kashmir calls “anupāya”, which is above all the means of liberation (mokṣa). It comes without any effort, spontaneously, through the grace of God and the Guru — for if I came to India, it was in the hope of finding such a Guru.

I did not require any instruction through words, for then I would find in the books, tantra and others, much more and better said than by any living man.

You see I knew exactly what I wanted and I was not going to make any concession: either I was to meet, by a marvellous Providence, such a man or woman or I shall have no Guru.

Something was to help me in my choice: since my childhood I was very deeply interested in studying people. I did much experimental psychology, with the help of graphology and morphology.

By voice, walking, handwriting, I could judge a man in a short while and see, for instance, by a single movement of the hand how deeply he surrendered to God.

So I was not afraid to take an ordinary man for a saint whatever be his fame or spiritual beauty.

During my travel in India and Kashmir I had the good luck of meeting many of their most famous men. But I was so disappointed by them.

The best were kind, peaceful, but they had nothing to give to their śiṣya except good advice. Others were only keen to teach me āsana, prāṇāyāma… a few were highly intellectual but had very little mystical experience.

Others would try to tempt me by offering me siddhi.

Pāni Mahārāja showed me a difficult āsana where he said that you realize God in half an hour by it… Then acrobats in a circus won’t fail.

Most of them were so vain, so proud. I used to test them in many ways and at once they showed their pettiness, their lack of perfection.

In Kashmir, Lakṣman Brahmacārin helped me explain some difficult problems of Trika philosophy. He is a good scholar and also a yogin.

I tried prāṇāyāma under his guidance and succeeded in originating heat and high lights which never disappeared since then. But he was not a Guru, because he was lacking the power of giving śānti and samādhi.

I tried hard to concentrate during six hours a day but never for three minutes could I stop the work of my mind.

During those five months when I lived alone high on the mountain, I achieved nothing.

Before coming to Kanpur, the problem was for me to realize the mystical state called Brahman through a perfect concentration of the whole being such as is found in sneezing — the northern tantras say, not I — or in a desperate flight when you are pursued by a mad elephant, or in a fit of anger, and also in the paroxysm of love.

The tantras say that the one who is always eager to find Brahman might realise it when under such a violent emotion if he, at once, forgets the cause of it.

I could try only sneezing and the encounter with a wild beast, as there were plenty near my hut during the night, but I did not succeed.

Then I met a man whom I loved dearly at first sight, Gandhiji, and he promised me to take me to the house where a great saint had lived. I was not eager to come as he mentioned a school of Sufi.

The first time I came here with him, it was only for half an hour.

Two things happened. I forgot entirely to study, even to glance at the Guru who was sitting silently here, and I felt somehow that concentration was easier, though I thought that it was an illusion of mine. But I liked the quality of the silence.

A few days after, I came back to see the handwritings and photography of the saint and of his Guru.

I was sceptical, acutely critical, as French people usually are.

But such was my wonder when I saw the face of Chachaji [father of Radha Mohan]. He had what I shall call the divine touch. I mean that a mysterious hand had moulded, malaxed his flesh from inside so that not a parcel of it remained unshaped by the thumb of the sculptor.

I found also the same thing in the face of my Guru, his elder brother, and afterwards in the great Sufi.

That very day also was shown to me the extraordinary handwriting of Chachaji, the striking one of his brother, and the marvellous one of the Sufi, and there were also others I admired much.

I had studied in the British Museum and in books the handwritings of most of the illustrious men of the world, but I never saw one of the greatness of Chachaji.

It shows such an immensity and generosity of heart, a humility, simplicity and silence I had never dreamt of.

In him all structures were gone. He had left all limits, and such dynamism associated with the depth of peace.

But the moment you are grasping how great, how exceptional his personality is, you realize that he had lost it, that very loss being his greatness.

Those things you know better than I do for you lived with him, but I have one advantage on you: I can judge him in all objectivity — and though I never saw him, I can merge in him, as the whole being of a man is in the movement of his hand, as it is in his words, his silence, his smile.

That day I had full confidence and faith in the family of my Guru and the Guru of my Guru.

But I had first to test one who is now my Guru.

I teased him, making fun of his God…

I tried so many things, but he had a deep sense of humour — an important condition, for it means that such a person lives on more than one plane of reality.

During a fortnight I came every day with my devilish tricks.

Not much then seemed to happen, maybe some peace…

Then I had to go, not too willingly, to the great Mela of Hardwār.

During the first two days I enjoyed the Mela and I thought that I was going to write about it.

But on this third day I was lost in the forest.

I saw nothing of the Mela, for a new life began for me.

I shall never forget that day, the real day of my birth.

In the morning I was swimming in the middle of the Ganga. Then all desire of swimming left me and I was drifting away in the strong current.

Then I became aware for the first time of my life that the water was flowing and it seemed strange to me.

Only afterwards I understood that from that moment I was myself flowing no more.

I could reach the wood on the bank of the Ganga but was unable to dress. I tried to comb my hair and broke the comb in a desperate effort.

Afterwards I remained for hours without moving, with a piece of comb in my hand, half-naked, and wondering, wondering, in that new śānti, and the sweetness of the contact with my own self was such that I lost consciousness of everything else.

During a fortnight, days and nights I roamed about in the forests of Hardwār, my sari all torn, sleeping under the trees, eating what a naked sannyāsin gave me, forgetting everything.

I was never tired, neither hungry, nor thirsty.

I tried to hide myself in the white thorns, but always I was disturbed by sādhus or pilgrims.

I shall not forget also the kindness of the very poor ones. They used to find me during the night when I was so far away, when it rained, and bring me to their tent.

When sleeping under a tree I felt, there, in the night for the first time and only for a few seconds, that marvellous bliss that you call ānanda.

Back to Kanpur, during a few weeks my Guru made me experience some mystical states as dhyāna, samādhi, but in a bird-flight way.

Here I would like to stop, for my task is becoming impossible.

For those who went through similar experiences, a few hints would be enough. For those who did not, no word of mine will give them an idea of it.

I am leaving aside the essential for it is beyond words and shall only play with small details or symptoms, unable as I am to put the finger on the very life of it.

I have only one desire left: silence.

But I am forced to speak and to write.

So I go on talking.

During the first weeks I used to remain still for hours, without moving an eyelash, perfectly satisfied… I who before could not remain five minutes without working.

Sweetness, delight, peace or śānti are the characteristics of that state.

But śānti is not worldly peace; it is a new state of being, difficult to imagine, difficult to describe.

It is not only the absence of worries but something quite positive.

You are perfectly satiated with the very void you feel in you… void or fullness, śūnyatā or pūrṇatā, it comes to the same.

As compared to that, nothing matters; you renounce spontaneously the joys of the world and there is no merit in it… you can’t do otherwise.

Then also, prāṇāyāma will come in a natural way.

You are bathing in spiritual life without the least effort, even sometimes in spite of yourself.

Two striking things happened during those first weeks.

Firstly, blows at the heart, as if the hṛdguhā, the caverns of the heart, were dug out and an immense presence filled them afterwards, but too immense to be grasped.

Then secondly, the waves of bliss, but so excessive that I could not bear it more than one second, and the waves would come in succession for two hours.

I had to move, jump, to get rid of it at all cost, for if the first second was marvellous, the next one was wounding.

In June, I left for Mussoorie, but I lost there the śānti I had since April from Hardwar.

Again I was in an ordinary state of mind, my śānti gone.

All the misery of life came back to me in spite of the affection of my friends.

I could not concentrate.

During the night I had once more dreams and nightmares, whereas I had none during the three preceding months.

Once in the cinema I felt again in the state of śānti and I saw nothing of the beautiful film.

But that state disappeared.

Had I no hope that again I should feel that peace, I would no doubt have committed suicide.

If you taste it once, you cannot live afterwards without it.

In July I went to Delhi, and, though far from my Guru, he put me back into śānti and new wonderful experiences began.

I felt something which I called vibration, or spanda in Sanskrit, according to Śaivism of Kashmir.

It is as the scraping of ants, or a slight electric current, and since then I am most of the time half asleep, drunk, diving deep at times, with those vibrations permeating the whole body.

Their rhythm varies; in the presence of my Guru they are extremely intense.

When I am far from him, they usually fill me with bliss.

That bliss or ānanda comes also no matter where and when — during a tea-party, when shopping, on the chair of the dentist — so unexpectedly, and I have no power, no desire to prevent it.

I am absorbed in it, unable to speak, unconscious of what people say, think, do.

It hurts when they shake me.

But for a few days I noticed an important change: even when speaking, laughing, running, I feel that bliss.

Not for a long time perhaps, but it is there in spite of worldly activities and as strong as when I lie down quietly.

I know well that I am only on the threshold of mystical life, and what I felt in ten months is probably nothing compared to what I shall experience.

The most striking thing is that no effort of mine was required; my Guru or his God did everything.

When I asked him in the beginning: “What shall I do?” he always answered: “Do nothing, everything will be done to you.”

And the miracle happened.

Two great obstacles are found in the life of the mystic who struggles alone for perfection.

He cannot concentrate on God all the time — every second (kṣaṇa) of his life as he desires — because his mind is in constant fluctuation during the day and unconscious in his sleep during the night.

In agitation and sleep you feel most acutely the depths of human misery and deficiency, and no effort can bring a remedy to it.

But in Kanpur (this very house), here which is the nābhi (navel) of the world, no need for concentration is required.

You get so absorbed in yourself that if an effort is required, it is to become aware of the external world — for instance how to coordinate the most simple thoughts, as to buy bread, not forget to pay for it.

The new task before me is to remain conscious at times, and my Guru is not going to help me, he told me.

As for the other human curse, sleep, I perceive a time when ordinary sleep might be excluded.

For it happened to me, though exceptionally, to remain a day and night in a special sleep, the nidrā of yoga — it means always conscious and never tired.

As time remains, shall I mention a few queer states?

For instance the one I call ākāśānanta, the infinity of ether.

It is no stage at all, says my Guru, but as the Buddha mentioned it as the first samāpatti, I will say a few words about it.

For hours you are floating in space and it is as if the ākāśa of the heart loses itself perpetually within the great ākāśa.

Those who believe in levitation simply went through that state.

But I knew I was not roaming in the astral world as a friend of mine thinks he does when he is in that mood.

For as I had bricks under the feet of my bed, I would have floated feet higher than head.

At moments also nature and the external world appear so perfectly still and peaceful, as if it had returned to its primordial quietness.

At others the world would seem as full of ānanda.

For when I am myself full of it, I am only one mass of ānanda, ghana, as is written in the Upaniṣad.

There is no more outside and inside.

Something also striking is that the gap between body and soul vanishes the moment the activity of the mind stops.

The bliss you feel is no less sensual than spiritual: it is undifferentiated and it is very important.

Shall I speak also of that soft whirlpool which comes sometimes before samādhi?

There is immensity in it.

I am unable to say more about it.

Unable also to say a word about the divings.

How to express it?

The spell of the great magician.

And also many queer things, as telepathic experiences…

In the past, from childhood I had extraordinary emotions which I never forgot, for I could not explain them.

For instance, someone years ago gave me the definition of what Sufi means: “wool,” and told me about the softness and warmth it implies, and I was so extremely moved by it.

My Guru also told me the same thing afterwards and I then understood my feelings.

In a dream in my youth, I also saw the marvellous handwriting of the great Sufi.

When I saw him, it was as if beforehand I had known every expression of him, the least inflections of his voice.

And other things also even more striking.

There is not only a transformation in the functions of the body but also on the moral side of the character, and it is not without a meaning as you become patient and love for others increases…

How I make mistakes in English for I am not English, but it does not matter.

If I were a nice śiṣya, I would say how grateful I am to my Guru.

But I won’t, because I hated that speaking business he imposed on me.

And also he deserves no thanks, for his God is working through him.

That God I can’t thank for I did not realize him.

Where shall I hang my overwhelming gratefulness… on Chachaji?