Neem Karoli Baba, known to devotees as Maharajji, taught almost entirely through short sayings and simple presence rather than formal discourse. His core teaching can be summed up in four words devotees still repeat today: “Love everyone, serve everyone, remember God, and tell the truth.” Below are his most quoted lines, sorted by how well each one is sourced — followed by what “Sub Ek” means, which quotes come from which books, and why Silicon Valley keeps mentioning his ashram.
Who Was Neem Karoli Baba (Maharajji)?
Neem Karoli Baba was a 20th-century Hindu saint from North India, devoted to Hanuman, who died in Vrindavan on September 11, 1973. He is best known outside India through his most famous Western disciple, Harvard psychologist Richard Alpert, whom he renamed Ram Dass (“servant of God”). Ram Dass’s 1971 book Be Here Now introduced Maharajji’s teaching to a Western audience, and later books — Miracle of Love and Love Everyone — collected direct quotes and stories from devotees who sat with him. His main ashram, associated with his later years, is Kainchi Dham in Uttarakhand‘s Kumaon hills.
What Are Neem Karoli Baba’s Most Famous Quotes?
These are the lines with the strongest sourcing — either from Maharajji’s own ashram or from devotees who recorded his words directly.
1. “Sub Ek.” — All is One. His shortest and most repeated teaching. Source: Neem Karoli Baba Ashram (official).
2. “Love everyone, serve everyone, remember God, and tell the truth.” Often called his four-part teaching — the closest thing to a formal doctrine he left behind. Source: Neem Karoli Baba Ashram (official).
3. “It’s better to see God in everything than to try to figure it out.” Source: Miracle of Love, Ram Dass.
4. “We are all God, and to love everyone is to remember that. This now is my only prayer: let me remember.” Source: Love Everyone, Parvati Markus.
5. “Maharajji said to love everyone. Even Monsanto. Even the army.” Recalled by Ram Dass in Love Everyone as a description of how far Maharajji’s “love everyone” instruction actually extended. Source: Love Everyone, Parvati Markus.
What Does “Sub Ek” Mean in Neem Karoli Baba’s Teaching?
“Sub Ek” is Hindi for “All is One” — Maharajji’s shorthand for the idea that God, self, and every other person are not fundamentally separate. He used it instead of theological argument. Devotees describe it less as a philosophical claim and more as an instruction: if all is one, then how you treat another person is how you treat God, and how you treat yourself. It’s the reasoning behind his other core line, “love everyone” — not as a moral rule, but as a description of what’s actually true.
Which Quotes Come From the Book Miracle of Love?
“Miracle of Love” is Ram Dass’s 1979 collection of stories and direct quotes from Westerners who sat with Maharajji between 1967 and 1973. It’s the primary written record of his conversational style. Two more lines from it, in addition to #3 above:
6. “If I tell a man he is a great bhakta, I am planting a seed.” Maharajji’s answer when asked why he called drunkards and liars “real devotees” — his reasoning was that naming a quality in someone helps it grow. Source: Miracle of Love, Ram Dass.
7. “You all live in Thul-Thul, Nan-Nan; you live in the world of judgment. It’s always too big or too little.” From a story where Maharajji repeated the Hindi words for “too big, too little” for an entire day, then explained he was describing how people constantly judge everything. Source: Miracle of Love, Ram Dass.
if this attribution style sounds familiar, it’s the same non-judgment teaching found across Buddhist and Bhakti traditions.
What Are Some Widely Attributed Neem Karoli Baba Sayings?
These lines circulate on quote sites and social media without a specific book or page citation — they may be genuine oral teachings passed down by devotees, but they can’t currently be traced to a single documented source. We’re including them because they’re commonly searched, and labeling them honestly rather than presenting them as verified:
8. “Everything is impermanent, except the love of God.”
9. “Love all men as God, even if they hurt you or shame you. Be like Gandhi and Christ.”
10. “See all women as mothers, serve them as your mother. When you see the entire world as the mother, the ego falls away.”
11. “Love is the strongest medicine.”
12. “The best form to worship God is every form.”
13. “Love everyone, feed everyone, and remember God.” (Note: this is a commonly seen variant of quote #2 — some sources say “feed everyone,” others “serve everyone.” The ashram’s own site uses “serve everyone.”)
Why Did Steve Jobs and Mark Zuckerberg Visit Neem Karoli Baba’s Ashram?
Steve Jobs traveled to India in 1974 hoping to meet Neem Karoli Baba, but arrived after Maharajji had already died in September 1973 — the two never met. Jobs nonetheless visited Kainchi Dham during his seven-month trip and later described the journey as formative. Mark Zuckerberg’s connection is better documented: in a 2015 public town hall with Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Zuckerberg said Jobs personally advised him to visit “this temple” in India during a difficult period for Facebook, and that the trip reinforced his sense of the company’s mission. Zuckerberg’s visit to Kainchi Dham is one reason the ashram is sometimes nicknamed “the Facebook temple” in Indian media — a label longtime devotees find a little reductive, given the ashram’s much longer history as a pilgrimage site.
Why this matters for you as a reader: it’s tempting to repeat the version where “Neem Karoli Baba inspired Steve Jobs to build Apple.” That’s not accurate, and getting it right is part of what separates a serious source from a recycled listicle.
How Can You Apply Neem Karoli Baba’s Teachings in Daily Life?
You don’t need to travel to Kainchi Dham to practice what these quotes point at. Three concrete starting points:
- Practice “Sub Ek” in one interaction a day. Before reacting to someone who annoys you, silently note: this person is not separate from me.
- Treat “tell the truth” as a discipline, not a slogan. Maharajji paired truth-telling with love and service — not as blunt honesty, but as refusing to perform a version of yourself that isn’t real.
- Use “love everyone” as a stretch goal, not a checklist. The Monsanto/army line above exists precisely because the instruction was meant to be uncomfortable — a target you grow toward, not a box you tick.
Frequently Asked Questions
What is Neem Karoli Baba’s most famous quote?
His most repeated teaching is “Love everyone, serve everyone, remember God, and tell the truth,” alongside the shorter “Sub Ek” (All is One), both confirmed on his official ashram’s website.
Did Neem Karoli Baba write any books?
No. He left no writings himself. What we have are books by devotees — mainly Ram Dass’s Miracle of Love and Be Here Now, and Parvati Markus’s Love Everyone — recording his spoken teachings and stories about him.
What does “Maharajji” mean?
“Maharajji” is an honorific meaning roughly “great king,” commonly used in North India for respected holy men. It’s the name most devotees used instead of “Neem Karoli Baba.”
Is it true that Neem Karoli Baba inspired Steve Jobs to found Apple?
Not in the way it’s often repeated. Jobs traveled to India hoping to meet him but arrived after Maharajji had died, so they never met. Jobs’s broader trip through India did influence his thinking, and he later advised Mark Zuckerberg to visit the same ashram.
Where is Neem Karoli Baba’s main ashram?
Kainchi Dham, in the Kumaon hills of Uttarakhand near Nainital, built in 1964 and now his best-known pilgrimage site.
Neem Karoli Baba’s teaching survives almost entirely through short, plain sentences — “Sub Ek,” “love everyone,” “tell the truth” — carried forward by devotees rather than by his own writing. The quotes above are sorted by how solidly they’re sourced, because a quote page that can’t tell you where a line comes from isn’t actually honoring the teaching it’s quoting. If a specific line brought you here, sit with it for a day before moving to the next one — that’s closer to how it was originally taught.
