When You No Longer Fear Death

A guest at the ashram of the Aghor Foundation in Varanasi

Encounter

By Robin Leo Hoffmann

The day before I meet Sadhu Ji, I sit for an hour with a Naga Baba by the Ganges. He is naked and owns nothing except his guru certificate. Now and then we exchange a few words, now and then we drink a chai. Mostly we just look at the river.

Ceremonies from early until late, every day. Harmonic ones. Wild ones. Funny ones. Creepy ones. All of it veiled in drifting smoke. Sometimes a shallow, stuffy air, sometimes sharp, intense clouds from the ghats, where corpses burn forever, day and night. Ceremonies that affirm life, ceremonies that worship the darkness, ceremonies that honour the cycle. I’ll never forget how the sun fights its way blood-red through the smog over Varanasi, to mirror itself in a sublime, shining gold on the holy river Ganges.

I was 19 when I first came to Varanasi, the last stop of my first trip to India. Back then I often stood in front of temples and knew that something was happening in there that I could not understand yet. Ten years later I am back, and I want to meet an Aghori, ideally interview one. (The Aghoris are an ascetic sect of Hindu sadhus, primarily associated with Lord Shiva in his fierce manifestation as Bhairava. Renowned for their extreme, non-conformist rituals, they operate outside mainstream social norms to cultivate non-attachment and transcend dualistic perception — dvaita). So, I simply ask everyone on the street. I find many Aghoris, many with very broken English or none at all, and some who play with the mysticism that has been built around them. Like a tourist attraction. Look closer, and they want money. Varun, whom I meet on the stone steps by the river, recommends the Aghor Foundation. An ashram on the edge of the city. And so one evening, after the foundation has agreed that I may interview the sadhu of the ashram, I sit at Harishchandra Ghat and stare into the flames for hours. What will be waiting for me the next morning?

The ashram is quiet and peaceful. After a warm welcome, we are soon seated for the interview. Sadhu Ji explains that his guru redefined the Aghori path: if Aghoris inspire only fear, shame, or disgust, they fail in their true purpose. While preserving the core philosophy, his guru transformed their daily practices—directing their path toward serving humanity by caring for the sick, the homeless, street children, and the outcast.

What I experience there is selfless devotion. Sadhu Ji, called by his guru to lead this ashram, lives for the ashram. He plants and works the field himself, on the other side of the river, and when he is not there, he drives from ashram to ashram. He organises, teaches, helps, integrates. The ashram takes children off the street and gives them food, a bed, a school, a family. Everything they eat, they grow themselves. In the morning and in the evening there are ceremonies, open to everyone, tourists and locals alike. If you hadn’t known that the Aghori is an Aghori, you might not have recognized him at all.

The children are in awe of him, and at the same time they are cheeky and open and dare to talk back. He laughs a lot with them; he plays a lot with them. In one of the evening circles he speaks to the conscience of a boy who has lied. But not like a father who says: “You must not lie.” He doesn’t expose the boy. In a loving and yet clearly determined way, he makes him see that certain values are worth cultivating.

During my week in Varanasi, I sleep only four to five hours a night on average — and feel no need for more. Sadhu Ji sleeps just three. Late in the evening, inspired and yet exhausted by my time in the ashram, I notice that I have to sleep, that I can’t keep up with him energetically, while he still seems wide awake. And early in the morning, before sunrise, he has long been up, preparing the day, while some people from the ashram do yoga together. So, I ask him how he does it. He says he has largely let go of all thoughts, doubts, worries and fears, and rarely dwells in the past or in the future. He lives only in the moment. That’s why he has so much more energy. In the morning he opens himself with rituals, in the evening he gathers himself, because, as he says: “All day you meet many people, and parts of you scatter in these encounters, in the world.”

As a test from his own guru he lived for several years on the street, with no possessions or any wealth at all. He wasn’t allowed to beg, only to accept gifts. Sleeping outside. Until his guru decided that he had learned what he was meant to learn and brought him back to the ashram.

One evening we philosophize about idealistic ideas of the world, and I fall into a melancholic exhaustion. I wish for a world in which we all live values like the ones here in the ashram. I notice a slight heaviness spreading in my chest. Sadhu Ji looks at me lovingly and says: “That’s no problem. We just have to do it. We can create exactly this world.” Then he smiles, turns to one of the children, throws him a funny line and plays with them for a while.

It’s as if we humans really have only two tasks. First: recognize your boundless, unfiltered, pure essence. Second: find a form in which you want to serve humanity with all your being, with all your heart, with all your devotion. Sadhana, from Sanskrit, translates as “personal practice.” Because we nourish ourselves, at some point we can be so nourished that our own pot is full, full of love, full of life, and then it overflows. Like a river so flooded that it has more than enough for itself and spills over the surrounding banks, nourishing them, watering them. That is called Seva. Seva means selfless service. It can be art, it can be accounting, it can be cleaning. It can be a devoted bus driver who always drives the same route and makes sure he takes every passenger along, that everyone is okay. Spirituality is no mystery. Be simple and live what you already know.

On the last morning the children come to say goodbye. Sadhu Ji is the last. He looks at me and asks: “Is there anything I can do for you?” Serving, even when saying goodbye. “This is your home. Remember this. You can always come back.” The taxi drives off, and tears run down my cheeks. Tears of relief, of gratitude, of being touched.

An ashram is an idealistic place. A place of absolute devotion to being human, a refuge for everyone, no matter which religion, skin colour or origin. I was there for almost two days and learned more than I usually do in a month in Berlin. Much of it can’t be put into words, it lives between the lines, and maybe that’s just as well.

Berlin-based actor and filmmaker Robin Leo Hoffmann explores how we stay human in a fast-changing world on his podcast, Still Human. Watch his interview with Sadhu Ji:

 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qviDBA4lRRs

Mauritius Times ePaper Friday 6 November 2026