Two types of people are needed to run a temple: a learned person and a very stupid one. And this is how all temples are run—two types of people: the learned who have become the priests, and the stupid who follow them. This is how every temple is run. If stupid people disappear from the earth there will be no temples. If learned people disappear from the temples there will be no temples. A duality is needed for a temple to exist. That’s why you cannot find God in a temple—because you cannot find him in a duality. These temples are inventions of the clever people to exploit the stupid. All temples are inventions—clever people exploiting… they have become the priests.

Priests are the most clever people, they are the greatest exploiters, and they exploit in such a way that you cannot even revolt against them. They exploit you for your own sake, they exploit you for your own good. Priests are the most clever because they spin theories out of nothing: all the theologies, all that they have created—tremendous! Cleverness is needed to create religious theories. And they go on creating such big edifices that it is almost impossible for an ordinary man to enter those edifices. And they use such jargon, they use such technical terms, that you cannot understand what they are talking about. And when you cannot understand you think they are very profound. Whenever you cannot understand a thing you think it is very profound—‘It is beyond me.’

Remember this: Buddha speaks in a very ordinary language which can be understood by anybody. It is not the language of a priest. Jesus speaks in small parables—any uneducated man can understand it—he never uses any religious jargon. Mahavira talks, gives his teachings, in the language of the most ordinary and common people. Mahavira and Buddha never used Sanskrit, never, because Sanskrit was the language of the priest, the brahmin. Sanskrit is the most difficult language. Priests have made it so difficult—they have polished and polished and polished. The very word SANSKRIT means polishing, refining. They have refined it to such a pitch that only if you are very very learned can you understand what they are saying, otherwise it is beyond. Buddha used the language of the people, Pali. Pali was the language of the people, of the villagers. Mahavira used Prakrit. Prakrit is the unrefined form of Sanskrit; Prakrit is the natural form of Sanskrit—no grammar, not much. The scholar has not entered yet, he has not refined the words so they become beyond common people. But the priests have been using Sanskrit, they still use it. Nobody understands Sanskrit now, but they go on using Sanskrit because their whole profession depends on creating a gap, not a bridge—in creating a gap. If the common people cannot understand, only then the priests can survive. If the common people understand what they are saying they are lost, because they are saying nothing.

Once Mulla Nasruddin went to a doctor—and doctors have learned the trick from the priests: they write in Latin and Greek, and they write in such a way that even if they have to read it again it is difficult. Nobody should understand what they are writing. So Mulla Nasruddin went to a doctor and he said, ‘Listen, be plain. Just tell me the facts. Don’t use Latin and Greek.’ The doctor said, ‘If you insist, and if you allow me to be frank, you are not ill at all. You are just plain lazy.’ Nasruddin said, ‘Okay, thank you. Now write it in Greek and Latin so I can show it to my family.’

The clever have always been exploiting the common people. That’s why Buddha, Jesus and Mahavira were never respected by brahmins, scholars, clever ones, because they were destructive, they were destroying their whole business. If the people understand, then there is no need for the priest. Why?—because the priest is a mediator. He understands the language of God. He understands your language. He translates your language into the language of God. That’s why they say Sanskrit is DEV-BHASHA, the language of God: ‘You don’t know Sanskrit?—I know, so I become the intermediate link, I become the interpreter. You tell me what you want and I will say it in Sanskrit to God, because he understands only Sanskrit.’ And of course you have to pay for it.

— Osho (No Water, No Moon)

All the priests of all the religions are exploiting you because you are not enlightened, because you are not conscious. They have been sucking your blood all over the earth for thousands of years for the simple reason that you are asleep. And they go on giving you ideas, concepts which keep you asleep.

— Osho (The Sword and the Lotus)

It is said that when Buddha attained his first glimpse of enlightenment, he roared like a lion. The metaphor is significant. In that very roar, that lion’s roar, his whole past, the sheep-like past, was dissolved. He was no more part of his society, no more part of a country, no more part of any kind of crowd—religious, political, ideological. For the first time he was alone. That aloneness is the spirit of the lion.

— Osho (Zorba the Buddha)

The way, the path, is very simple and can be made even more simple. But simplicity is against the priests, they want it to be complex—so complex that they are needed to interpret it; so complex that without a mediator it is impossible to grow in your understanding. The reason why religion looks so complex is because religion became a business, and priests found that unless it is complex enough, it will not be attractive enough either. It has to be complex, it has to be challenging, it has to be far away, and then the priest becomes an absolute necessity. And they have been exploiting in every possible way.

— Osho (Sermons in Stones)

The priests are against, have always been against, real spirituality. This has to be understood. Jesus was crucified by the rabbis—the priests. Buddha was opposed by the brahmins—the priests. Attempts on the life of Mahavira were made by the priests. Strange… it seems whenever they find a man who is genuinely spiritual, they want to kill him. There must be some reason behind it. The reason is that if real spirituality spreads, religion will disappear. Religions are substitute spirituality, saccharin. And if you can get real sugar, who bothers about saccharin? And the latest findings say saccharin creates cancer! The priest is pretending to be your spiritual leader, just pretending. He knows nothing of silence, he knows nothing of reality. He is still talking like primitive people five thousand years ago to a God who does not exist. He is preaching to you from books which are complete rubbish. Just look in the Bible, anywhere—you need not try to find rubbish, it will find you. And it is not only the Bible, the same is true about the Koran, about the Vedas. But priests are imposing the Bible, the Koran, the Vedas, on people. And on every child when he is innocent, when he is a clean slate, parents start writing Catholicism, communism, or anything they want. The priest starts programming the child. By the time he can think on his own, he has lost his thinking intelligence. The program, the conditioning has created a big wall between himself and his being. Now he will remain always outside the home, somewhere on the porch, thinking, ‘This is my palace.’ America is dominated too much by Christian priests, Jewish rabbis. And if a few young people escape from the rabbis and the Christian priests, then they get caught by people like Esalen, EST, Muktananda, Satchidananda. These people—Satchidananda, Muktananda, Hari Bhajan—they are in the same profession as the Christian priest. And in a way they are more dangerous, because they bring you new words, a new language, and you start thinking, perhaps you have found the way. EST and Esalen-type movements exploit the youth.

Osho (From Death to Deathlessness)

Nobody else has used jokes in a spiritual way; hence sometimes people are shocked. When they come for the first time to listen to me, naturally they are shocked because they want to hear something very serious—as if they are not serious enough already! They want to hear something esoteric, something nonsensical, something which makes no sense to them; then they think there must be great meaning in it. When something is incomprehensible to them they think this is great philosophy! Whenever they come across something written in stupid jargon, esoteric, occult, spiritual, they become very much interested. They think they are going to find some treasure in it. The treasure is not hidden in big words, the treasure is hidden in you. And it is to be discovered, not through big words, it is to be discovered through wordlessness, it is to be discovered through silence. And haven’t you felt after deep laughter that a sudden silence comes to you in the wake of it?—the silence after a storm. For a moment it is as if the mind stops functioning… you are utterly relaxed, in a deep rest. Those are the moments when you start feeling the presence of God. Those are the first glimpses that God is. There is no other proof.

— Osho (The Dhammapada: The Way of the Buddha, Vol. 12)

Look at Jesus, he was not a humble person at all. He was not an egoist, but not humble either. That created the problem, that led him to the cross. He was not humble at all. And now many psychologists say that he was neurotic, and they have a point. Many psychologists say that he was an egomaniac; they have a point. If psychologists study Buddha and Mahavira they will conclude the same things—but they have not studied them. They should have been studied very minutely. So they say he was an egomaniac. Why? You can find reasons—because he was not humble. He used to say, ‘I am God,’ or ‘I am the son of God. I and my father in heaven are one.’ To the egoist mind this will appear like ego. And nobody can say that this man is humble who claims that he and God are one, or who claims that he is the son of God. It looks like a claim to us; to Jesus this was a simple fact. And he was not claiming that you are not the son of God: claiming that he is the son of God, he claimed for you all. It is Christianity which claimed the wrong thing; Christianity started to claim that he is the only son of God. That is absurd, that is egomania. But Jesus was saying a simple fact: if the whole creation is out of God, the whole creation is the son, God is the father. He was saying a simple fact with no ego in it, but this disturbed people. They thought a sage must be humble. He used to say, ‘I am the king of the Jews.’ This has been said many times, but to people who were more wise than Jews. Jews were offended that this man who was just a beggar on the street, no more—just a vagabond, just an old hippie—that this man claimed, ‘I am the king of the Jews.’ But he was not claiming anything, he was in a state of mind where there is no ego. Kingship comes into being, but that is not ego. And that kingship doesn’t belong to any worldly affairs, it is not a claim to rule anybody. That kingship is just felt as an inner nature.

Ram Teerth, an Indian mystic of this century, used to call himself Emperor Ram. He was a beggar, but nobody took offense in India because we have known so many beggars saying that, and we know that that happens: a moment comes when a person becomes an emperor without any kingdom. Really, a person becomes an emperor only when there is no kingdom. He went to America, and the American president invited him to visit. The American president felt uncomfortable because Ram Teerth always used to say ‘Emperor Ram.’ Even while talking he would say, ‘Emperor Ram says this.’ So the president humbly asked, ‘I cannot understand this. You don’t seem to have any kingdom, why do you claim that you are an emperor?’ Ram Teerth said, ‘That’s why I claim—because I have nothing to lose, nobody can defeat me. My kingdom is of the eternal, you cannot take it from me. Your kingdom can be taken, your presidency can be destroyed. Nobody can destroy me, I have nothing to lose. I am an emperor because I have no desires.’

If you have desires you are a beggar. So there are two types of beggars, poor beggars and rich beggars. When Jesus said, ‘I am the king of the Jews,’ he was saying this. But people got offended. They said, ‘This is too much. This man cannot be tolerated—he must be crucified, he must be killed.’ But Jesus was a humble man, humble in this sense, that even humbleness was not there—egoless, egolessness was not there—truly humble. But then one starts saying facts. And you live in a world of ego, you interpret because of your egos. So people thought, ‘This man is claiming something—that he is the son of God, he is the king of the Jews—and he is nothing, just a beggar, a vagabond!’ In India nobody would have taken any offense. India has seen so many Jesuses, nobody would have taken offense.

In India every sannyasin is called SWAMI; swami means the master, the king. We call a man swami; swami means the lord. When he leaves everything, when he doesn’t claim anything, when he has nothing, then he becomes swami, then he becomes the lord. Jesus was claiming something Indian in a country which was not India; that became the problem.

— Osho (Vedanta: Seven Steps to Samadhi)

‘Osho, the word esoteric has been used in a very sacred sense. Would you please tell us what inspires you to use it in a ridiculous and humorous sense?’

The word esoteric means the hidden—it is ridiculous because nothing is hidden. All is obvious, God is obvious; if you cannot see, it is not because God is hidden, but because you are keeping your eyes closed. The sun is there, the light is there; if you keep your eyes closed and then you call the sun esoteric, that means you don’t even want to accept that you are keeping your eyes closed. You are throwing the responsibility onto the sun itself. ‘What can we do? If God is hidden, what can we do? It is his responsibility.’ Priests have loved the word esoteric very much because if God is obvious, then what will be the need for the priests? God has to be hidden. If he is not, then he has to be forced to hide somewhere! Then the need for the priest arises—a mediator who will make you aware of things which are hidden, who will help you, who will guide you to the secret world of the truth. Truth is very obvious. In Zen they have a saying: from the very beginning nothing is hidden. It is the declaration of truth; hence the word esoteric is ridiculous, stupid.

You ask, ‘The word esoteric has been used in a very sacred sense…’ There is nothing sacred either. Life is simple; there is nothing sacred and nothing secular. My whole effort here is to help you to dissolve the distinction between the sacred and the secular. The secular should become the sacred and the sacred should become the secular. That’s why I insist that you should remain part of the market world and meditate. Meditation should not be a thing apart from life; it should be amidst life, it should be a part of life, an organic part, nothing made separate. The temple should exist exactly in the middle of the market, and all distinctions between the sacred and the secular should be dissolved. Life is one. But again the priest comes in. He wants to make distinctions; he wants to tell you that your life is ugly, that your life is mundane, that you are a worldly being. He is spiritual; he is something superior beyond you, beyond your reach. He is holy, you are unholy; he is a saint and you are a sinner. These distinctions have to be created. These are ego distinctions: somebody is rich, somebody is poor—then the ego can exist. Somebody is holy and somebody is not holy—again the ego can exist. The ego can exist only through distinctions of inferiority and superiority. ‘This world is inferior.’ A man who lives an ordinary life—loves his wife, children, goes to work, is an ordinary human being condemned by the priests, by the so-called mahatmas. They exploit this same ordinary man, they live on him, they are suckers—but they are holy, they are spiritual. Their hands are never muddied because they don’t work, they don’t move into life. They remain far away; they are ‘holy.’ And the man who lives is ‘unholy.’

If you look deeply, you will find that the very word sacred is based on ego distinctions. What is sacred and what is not sacred? If God is everywhere, then everything is sacred. If God is in the rock and in the tree and in the man and in the woman, then everything is sacred. God is everywhere, in everything; God is the only reality—then how can anything not be divine? Even the Devil has to be divine. And that is the beauty of the word devil: it comes from the same root as divine. The Devil has to be divine otherwise he cannot be. I want to dissolve all distinctions because through distinctions egos exist. So I don’t say what is sacred and what is ordinary.

To me the ordinary is extraordinary, the mundane is sacred. Day-to-day life is holy life—hence I use the word esoteric as a ridiculous word. It hurts too many people because there are many people who think that if religion is obvious, then where will they find their ego trip? If everything is unhidden from the very beginning, then their ego has no challenge. Ego is challenged only by the difficult. This is my observation: if you find one hundred persons interested in religious inquiry, ninety-nine will be there only because God is almost impossible. That gives the thrill; that makes them feel good—that they are going to attain the impossible. Others are only working for the possible and they are working for the impossible. They feel very good; their ego is strengthened. Here with me, God is the only possibility; nothing else is possible. God is not impossible. He is just in front of you; he is not hidden. He is holding your hand; he is sitting by your side. He is in your child, in your wife, in your husband. He is in your friend, and he is in your foe. He surrounds you from everywhere: you exist in the ocean of God. But then the egoist feels dull. He says, ‘Then what is the point?’ The egoist wants to go to the moon because it is impossible. The egoist wants to go to Mt. Everest because it is impossible. When somebody asked Edmund Hillary, ‘Why? Why in the first place did you become interested in going to Mt. Everest? And what was the point? There was nothing to gain.’ Edmund Hillary said, ‘I had to go, man had to conquer it.’ ‘But why?’ the questioner asked. Hillary said, ‘Why? Because it is there, standing there so aloof, so impossible. Man had to conquer it for no other reason—just because it is a great challenge.’ When God is far away in the heavens the ego feels thrilled, then there is adventure. And when I say he is very close by, then the ego feels no interest. Remember this trip of the ego. Ego can play such beautiful games, such beautiful, subtle games, that if you are not aware, you will never get out of it. And unless you get out of it, you will never see God.

Ego is what I mean when I say your eyes are closed: it is the curtain of the ego that is keeping them closed. Drop the curtain and you will know that from the very beginning nothing is hidden, and there is nothing that is not sacred, so what is the point in making such distinctions? I don’t make them.

I am not a priest, I am not a mahatma; I am not a saint. I am a very ordinary person, as ordinary as you are. My whole work consists in this: to declare that ordinary human beings are divine. Ordinary human beings like me are divine. You are also divine.

— Osho (Tao: The Pathless Path, Vol. 1)

‘Beloved master, am I wasting energy by looking to occultism as a way to explore inner space?’ Mark, occultism is for stupid people. God is not hidden; God is very much manifested. He is all over the place: singing in the birds, flowering in the flowers. He is green in the trees, red in the roses. He is breathing in you. He is talking through me and listening through you right this very moment. But you don’t want to see the obvious. Man has a very pathological interest in the occult. Occult means that which is hidden. Man wants to be interested in the hidden—and there is nothing hidden! As far as God is concerned nothing is hidden. Just open your eyes and he is standing before you. Be silent and you will hear the still, small voice within yourself. Why go into occultism to explore inner space? Why not go directly into inner space? Occultism is so much nonsense, and there is no end to it because it is all invention. It is religious fiction. Just as there is science fiction, occultism is religious fiction. If you love fictions, it is perfectly okay. But then don’t think that by reading science fiction you are studying science. And don’t believe in science fiction, and don’t act out of that belief; otherwise you will end up in a madhouse. Occultism is exactly like science fiction. People love fiction; there is nothing wrong in it, but you should know that it is fiction. Enjoy, but don’t take it seriously. In Buddha’s time there were eight great masters. Mahavira is well-known—he was the last enlightened master of the tradition of the Jainas. He used to say there are three hells. One of his disciples became a renegade, betrayed him, declared himself to be a master, and he started talking about seven hells. He used to say to people, ‘Mahavira does not know much; he knows only about three hells and I know about seven.’ And naturally people were impressed. Mahavira talks only of three hells and he talks about seven! One great master was Sanjay Belattiputta, another contemporary of Buddha. He must have been a man something like me—nonserious. He started talking about seven hundred hells. He said, ‘What is this Gosalak talking about?—only seven? There are seven hundred, and there are seven hundred heavens too.’ He was joking, but people were very interested. This seems to be the right man, who has gone so deep into occultism. Once a follower of Radhaswami, a small sect which is confined to an area near Agra, came to see me. I was in Agra. He was some kind of a priest, and he said, ‘Do you know?—our master has said there are fourteen planes of existence.’ I said, ‘Just fourteen?’ He said, ‘What do you mean, ‘Just fourteen’? Are there more?’ I said, ‘Certainly.’ He said, ‘But our master has said there are only fourteen. Mohammed has reached only up to the third,’ he said—he had brought a map—‘Kabir and Nanak have reached up to the fifth. And Mahavira and Buddha up to the seventh,’ and so on, so forth. But there has never been another who has reached up to the fourteenth except his so-called master. I said, ‘I know your master. I have seen him struggling in the fourteenth. He is trying hard, but he cannot get out of it. I know it because I exist at the fifteenth. There are fifteen planes of existence.’ He said, ‘But you are the first man…’ And he was much impressed. When he was leaving he touched my feet and he said, ‘You have revealed a new secret.’ I said, ‘Don’t be foolish. I was just joking! There are only two categories of people: the people who are not aware and the people who are aware. The people who are aware have no hierarchy that one is more aware than the other, that somebody is at the fifth, somebody at the seventh, somebody at the ninth, somebody at the fourteenth. There is no higher and lower in awareness. Awareness is simply awareness.’ But he was not much interested in that. He was more interested in my being on the fifteenth plane. People are interested in religious fictions. Mark, don’t waste your time in occultism, unless you are interested in novels, fictions. Then it is okay, then there is no problem… The lecturer on the occult was warming to his subject of supernatural manifestations. ‘Ah, my friends,’ he exclaimed, a look of dedicated zeal animating his face. ‘If you could but be made to believe! If only the world would cease its scoffing and come to realize that visitations from the Mystic Shore happen all the time.’ The lecturer searched the faces in his audience to find those sympathetic souls who agreed with his philosophy. ‘I have told you about my own experiences,’ he continued, ‘but surely one of you has also had direct communication with a departed spirit. If there is any such person here in this audience who has been in touch with a ghost, I would appreciate it if he or she would stand up.’ From her seat in the front row, Mrs. Faigel Frume got to her feet. ‘Me,’ she said loudly. ‘Such a experience I had you would not believe.’ ‘This is very gratifying,’ said the delighted speaker when the applause died down. ‘Behold, a volunteer witness; one who is a total stranger to me, arises to give her testimony. My dear lady, do I understand you to say that you have been in touch with a ghost?’ ‘In touch with him?’ echoed Mrs. Frume. ‘Better even than that. When I was a little girl in Russia one of them butted me till I was black and blue.’ ‘A ghost BUTTED you?’ ‘A GHOST, you said? Gosh! I thought you said a GOAT!’ Don’t waste your time in ghosts and goats. If you want to explore inner space, explore inner space. How does occultism come in? That’s a way of escaping from inner space, not exploring it. That’s a way of keeping yourself engaged in sheer nonsense! And theosophy, particularly in this age, has released so much nonsense: hundreds of books and all kinds of foolish things. People are so gullible that they are ready to believe anything. Man today exists in a kind of vacuum. Old religions have died or are almost dying. Either they have died or they are on the deathbed; hence new creeds are cropping up everywhere, and all the new creeds need new fictions to allure you. I cannot give you any occult fiction. I am not interested in anything esoteric. I am a very down-to-earth man. I am simply stating the facts. I don’t want to decorate them. I don’t want to create illusions in your mind; I don’t want to create projections in your mind. My effort here is to help you to go beyond the mind and all your occultism and esotericism, theology, anthroposophy—and there are so many schools. You can create your own; there is no need to believe in anybody else’s, you can create your own. All that you need is a pencil and paper; you can just go on writing your own fiction. That will be far more enlightening. At least it will be something creative. Then give your copy to somebody, and you will find a few believers. Then you will know how people go on believing in any kind of thing. J. Krishnamurti was brought up by theosophists. He was fed, spoon-fed with all kinds of occultism. He became so fed up that when the theosophists were going to declare him to be the world teacher… The day they had gathered from all over the world—six thousand leading theosophists—when they asked Krishnamurti to declare, he stood up and said, ‘I dissolve this organization. I am nobody’s teacher. I am finished with it all, and I don’t want to say anything more!’ They were shocked, but as far as I see it, it is a logical conclusion. For years he was taught all kinds of nonsense by all kinds of stupid people. He was getting fed up with the whole thing. But old ladies, and particularly retired old people, were very interested. They were the majority of the theosophists—retired people and old ladies who now had nothing else to do—and they would gather and talk nonsense about ghosts and about Tibetan masters who come flying in the air, and about letters that Master K.H… Now nobody knows who this K.H. is. His full name is Koot Humi. That too, nobody knows what it means. The less you understand, the better. Koot Humi—in short K.H.—used to write letters, until finally it was found that those letters were written by Blavatsky herself. A servant used to hide on the roof—just think, just on the roof of Buddha Hall!—and there was a small hole from where, when the theosophists would be sitting with closed eyes waiting for Koot Humi, he would drop a letter. Now, people are so foolish… Just ordinary paper—they could have seen what brand it was, in what factory it had been made—ordinary ink, and the handwriting was Blavatsky’s. Then the letter would be read, and those letters were collected, and they were great treasures. But in the High Court there was a case against one of the great theosophists, Leadbeater. He was a colleague of Annie Besant, and he was suspected of homosexuality. Just a dirty old man, that’s all! So there was a case in the High Court against him, and in that case his servant confessed that he was the man who used to hide on the roof. He went and showed the hole and the place where he used to hide, and everything was discovered. Still, people go on reading those letters believing that Koot Humi wrote them. When people WANT to believe, when they are feeling empty, some belief is needed. They cling to anything, they don’t listen… they don’t listen to their own heart. They just need belief; so anybody is ready to supply it. Wherever there is demand there is supply. People need fictions, so there are other people—clever, cunning people—who go on supplying fictions. In a Catholic school, little Hans was asked to give an example of a dependent clause. ‘Our cat has a litter of ten kittens,’ he replied, ‘all of which are good Catholics.’ ‘That’s excellent,’ said the teacher. ‘You have a good grasp on grammar as well as on our religion.’ The following week the bishop visited the school and the teacher called on Hans. ‘Our cat has a litter of ten kittens,’ said Hans, ‘all of which are good sannyasins.’ ‘That is not what you said a week ago!’ snapped the teacher. ‘Yes,’ replied Hans, ‘but my kittens’ eyes are open now.’ Be a little alert, be a little watchful. There are deceiving people all around; you can be easily deceived. Morrissey, the ventriloquist, was on his way down to a bar for a drink when a big shaggy dog fell in at his side. They went in, the ventriloquist ordered a scotch, and for a laugh he looked at the dog and said, ‘Well, are you having the usual?’ ‘No, thanks, I have had enough this morning,’ said the dog. The barman was flabbergasted. He offered fifty dollars for the animal. ‘No, sir!’ said Morrissey. ‘I have had him since he was a pup.’ ‘I’ll make it a hundred dollars!’ said the bartender. Morrissey shook his head. When the offer went to five hundred dollars the ventriloquist grabbed the money and headed for the door. ‘Alright,’ he added, ‘take good care of him.’ And with a last look at the dog, ‘Farewell, old pal!’ he exclaimed. ‘Old pal, my foot!’ said the dog. ‘After what you have just done I will never speak to another human being as long as I live!’ Be aware of the cunning people, they are all around. Don’t be exploited. Long enough humanity has been exploited by the cunning and the clever; it is time to put a full stop to it. Be a little more mature. If you want to explore inner space, meditate. Listen to what Buddha says: Quieten the mind, reflect, watch, and all darkness will disappear on its own accord, and you will be full of light.

Osho (The Dhammapada: The Way of the Buddha, Vol. 10)

All democracy is fake, all ideology about freedom, freedom of speech, is fake. All hope that someday man will become human seems to be a far away utopia. I have always believed in non-violence, believed in peace, but after this world tour I have to confess to you that I cannot believe in peace and non-violence any more. I have been against the Third World War, but with great pain I have to tell you that perhaps the Third World War is needed. This humanity is so rotten that it should be destroyed, at least the world should be cleaned of ugly human beings. Existence must find some other way to evolve human consciousness. Scientists say that there are fifty thousand planets in the universe where life exists. So if on this tiny earth life disappears, there is no harm. This kind of life is not the life of man. Darwin was absolutely wrong that man has evolved out of monkeys—man is still a monkey. Perhaps he has fallen from the trees, that’s all. Not evolved, but fallen. My effort from today will be just to work for those few individuals who want to grow into meditation, into peace, into silence; and I drop all hope for humanity and all hope for this planet. It is in ugly hands and it is impossible to change those people because they have all the power. Even in my own country… just yesterday as I entered I saw, written at the airport, ‘Welcome to India.’ I had no luggage, I had nothing to declare except myself, and still I had to wait for three hours. And I asked again and again, ‘What kind of welcome are you giving to an Indian? I am not a tourist.’ This ugly bureaucracy, these ugly governments, these ugly religions, have spoiled a beautiful planet. I have called you simply to say that I am utterly disappointed, disillusioned. I will live only for those people who are individually interested to evolve. As a humanity, there is no hope. Only one thing I can hope—the sooner the Third World War happens the better. Let us be finished with all this garbage.

Osho (The Last Testament, Vol. 6)

Buddha says: ‘Hold your tongue. Do not exalt yourself…’ because when you become enlightened the ego has disappeared—you can become enlightened only when you have fulfilled that condition—but now the experience is so vast, so overflowing, so ecstatic that it starts expressing itself. You have to learn…

It is said of al-Hillaj Mansoor—who, like Jesus, was crucified, but in a far more inhuman and cruel way than Jesus himself—it is said about him that the day he became enlightened, he shouted, ‘ANA’L HAQ—I am the truth! I am God!’ His master, Junnaid, was present. He came close to him, whispered in his ear, ‘Mansoor, keep it inside you. Please keep it inside you! Contain it! I know it is very difficult to contain it, it is so vast, almost uncontainable. It expresses itself. I know you are not uttering it, it is being uttered by some unknown force, by God himself, but still I say to you, hold your tongue.’ And Mansoor promised, ‘I will hold my tongue.’ He understood the point, but again and again he would forget. Again and again he would come into that same state of inner light, joy, bliss. And again the shout—the lion’s roar, as Buddha used to call it—would come out of him in spite of himself. He would come and apologize to Junnaid, his master, but the master would say, ‘Mansoor, something has to be done; otherwise you are going to get into trouble unnecessarily. You could be of great help to humanity, but this way you will be unnecessarily in trouble. And not only you, you will stop my work too. It happened to me too, but I had to contain it and you have to contain it too.’ But Mansoor was not capable of it. Junnaid sent him to Kaaba for a three-year pilgrimage. ‘Maybe on this three-year-long journey, being with many mystics, he may cool down. The experience is so new; by and by he will become accustomed to it.’ But he could not become accustomed to it; when he came back he was again in the same state, proclaiming the same things. Because it was a Mohammedan country and it was one of the greatest crimes, the greatest sins, to call oneself God, to declare oneself God, he was caught by the king, by the people and was killed.

For centuries it has been discussed among Sufis who was greater, Junnaid or Mansoor. Ordinarily one would say Mansoor: he was really a great martyr: he suffered and suffered laughingly. He died with laughter. Even Jesus had gone to the cross a little forsaken. When the last nail was put in his hands he looked at the sky and said, ‘God, have you forsaken me? Have you forgotten me? Why is all this happening to me?’ There must have been a little doubt, just a shadow of doubt. He understood immediately, he apologized. He said, ‘No, forgive me. Let thy will be done.’ But for a moment he had wavered. Mansoor never wavered. And he was killed so mercilessly that Jesus’ crucifixion seems to be very humane compared to Mansoor’s. First his legs were cut off, then his hands were cut off, then his eyes were destroyed, then his tongue was cut out, then his head was cut off. But even though all this suffering was there he was all laughter. Before his tongue was cut out, somebody asked, ‘Why are you laughing?’ He said, ‘I am laughing because you cannot destroy my experience; whatsoever you do is irrelevant. And I am laughing because you are killing one person and I am somebody else. You are such fools, that’s why I am laughing! And I am also laughing at God. I am laughing at him, ‘You cannot deceive me. In whatsoever form you come I will recognize you. I recognize you in the butcher who has cut off my feet, who has cut off my hands. It is you who are in him, and nobody else.’’ In fact, Junnaid seems to be a little cowardly; many people think that he was a little cowardly. Why should he tell Mansoor to keep it inside? But that is not true, he was not a coward, in fact he sacrificed far more than Mansoor. Mansoor’s sacrifice is apparent; Junnaid’s sacrifice is not apparent, it is very subtle. To contain the truth when it happens is a superhuman feat, it is a miracle. And he tries to contain it so that he can help people. He is a bodhisattva and Mansoor is an arhat. He cares nothing for the work, he cares nothing for anybody else. He has attained, now there is no problem. Death is not a problem at all, he knows he is immortal. Junnaid is working silently, in the dark, to help people who are blind. And you don’t know his suffering. His suffering is that he has to contain something which is uncontainable.

Buddha says: ‘Do not exalt yourself…’ Avoid any exaltation, avoid any declaration unless you find it is going to help, unless you find it is going to prepare the way; then it is okay. Buddha himself declared, ‘I am the most perfect enlightened one.’ He knew that this was going to help. But if Jesus had asked him he would have said, ‘No, contain it,’ because Jesus was in a wrong country with wrong people. To declare there, ‘I am God’ was just asking for your death, nothing else. Jesus could only work for three years. Hence Christianity is so poor, because the master lived only three years. Up to his thirtieth year he was working for his own enlightenment. When he was ready he came out of the monasteries, started working, and then lived only three years. By the age of thirty-three he was crucified. Now, three years’ time is not enough at all. Buddha worked for forty-two years; even that is not enough. If Jesus had asked Buddha, Buddha would have told him, ‘Keep quiet, work silently. Just be an ordinary rabbi. There is no need to declare that you are the Son of God. You know it, that’s enough; and God knows it, that’s enough.’ But in India, Buddha himself declared it. It is a totally different milieu, it is a totally different climate. For centuries buddhas have happened in this country, they have prepared the way; hence it is very simple to declare, no problem.

— Osho (The Dhammapada: The Way of the Buddha, Vol. 11)

You’ve been chasing bliss for your whole life—and there’s the rub: bliss is a butterfly, a bird that can’t be caught; you can only wait until one day you find that it has landed on your shoulder. It happens only when you are in a state of no-desire, with not even the desire for bliss. That is one of the greatest dilemmas. It is a natural desire to be blissful, it is instinctive. It is not only man who is seeking bliss, all beings are in search of it, but the problem is that the search, the very search, is a hindrance. It takes you away from the moment, and bliss can only be found here and now. All seeking and searching takes you away from the present. It creates future. Future is not part of time, future is a projection of our desires. Only present exists; past is memory, future is desire. They are not part of time, they are part of mind. Only the present is time, because only the present is real. There are people who are searching for money and there are people who are searching for God; they are not different people, not at all. They are the same kind of people, although down the ages they have been thought to be very different, almost opposite to each other. One is condemned as worldly and the other is praised as spiritual, but the truth is that both are of the same category. It is not a question of what you are seeking; the object of your search makes no difference—you are seeking, that is more important. You can seek God, you can seek money, you can seek power, you can seek bliss, but because you are seeking you will remain miserable. Modern man is seeking too desperately because money has been achieved. Now money is no longer a relevant goal and the mind feels empty. Now the mind is desperately looking for new objects. Unless the mind finds new desires and new objects, it cannot exist. It exists through desiring, so it goes on creating new objects for you to desire and to rush and to run after. You are running after shadows; you will not find them. You are running after the horizon which exists nowhere; it only appears to. The distance between you and the horizon will always remain the same because it is just an illusion. The future is an illusion like the horizon. You have been searching for bliss too seriously and that has made your whole life a long long anguish, anxiety, tension. My message to you is: drop seeking. There is nothing to be sought, there is nothing worth desiring. Let the future disappear from your being and then it is there! Then you can call it bliss, you can call it love, you can call it truth, you can call it God, or nirvana or whatsoever you wish to call it. I have felt it more and more with the people who come from Esalen: they are searching for bliss too seriously and getting into unnecessary trouble. Hearing, reading that bliss can be found here and now, they try to be here and now. Now that is absurd! You cannot try to be here and now—trying is always then and there. You cannot try and be here and now. It cannot be made a program: it is an understanding, a simple understanding, that there is nowhere to go. The Zen people say: Sitting silently, doing nothing, the spring comes and the grass grows by itself. That has to become your sutra. You have done so many therapies, so many groups, and they are all efforts to find something, to change yourself, to become more integrated, more centered, more rooted, this and that—just new names for old rubbish. This is the whole old spirituality taking on new names, new labels, because the old labels have become out of date; they are no more ‘in currency.’ So people don’t talk about God—it looks a little odd. To talk about God looks embarrassing. People talk about being centered, rooted, integrated. This is the same old game. And the problem becomes more subtle and more complex, when intellectually you understand that, ‘Yes, bliss can be found only here and now, so now I will try to be here and now.’ You are putting legs on a snake. You will destroy the poor snake completely: the snake needs no legs. To be here and now needs no effort: it is a simple understanding—a nonintellectual, existential understanding. It does not need any great logical mind to grasp it, it is a very simple phenomenon. Looking at the futility of desire, one simply recoils from desiring. Not that one starts trying to be in the present: seeing the futility of desire, the desire disappears and suddenly you are in the present. It is a happening. My suggestion for you is that something more like Vipassana or Zazen is going to help you. You have done enough of encounter and gestalt therapy—enough is enough! But this has been the problem with Esalen people: they come full of jargon, modern jargon, psychological, absolutely up to date. They don’t talk about occultism and esoteric, theological things—they bring fresh bullshit! Up to now very few of them have really proved of much worth. The greater lot has proved to be very ordinary—for the simple reason that they think they understand. The greatest barrier in understanding is to think that one understands. Sannyas means dropping all knowledge and becoming a child again. And the second word, ‘Jacob,’ means: may God protect you. Don’t seek bliss, don’t be seriously after it—I am afraid you may be still seriously after it, that’s why ‘Jacob’ is good: may God protect you! Only God can protect Esalen people—there is no other hope!

Osho (Even Bein’ Gawd Ain’t a Bed of Roses)

This is your new name: Swami Gyandas. Gyandas means a servant of wisdom. The only thing to be remembered always it that wisdom does not mean knowledge, it means just the opposite. It means a state of not-knowing. It means innocence. Knowledge is one of the nourishments for the ego, the most vital nourishment. The more you know, the more you feel that you are somebody. Even riches don’t give that much ego, not even political power gives so much ego as knowledgeability does. And ego is the barrier to knowing. Ego is a false phenomenon, and if we cling to it we cannot know the real. The false has to cease for the real to be, and the only way is to detach yourself from all knowledge. Yes, spiritual, esoteric, all kinds of knowledge are included in it. One should become more and more innocent, childlike. Wondering is good, looking into existence with no idea of what it is, is good, living without conclusions is virtue. That is the meaning of your name. You have to transform it into a reality, because this is the only key that unlocks the doors of God’s temple.

Osho (Dance Til the Stars Come Down From the Rafters)

‘Osho, aren’t you ever afraid that instead of the creation of a new kind of man, this is the creation of a new kind of sheep?’

I am not afraid at all because even if a new sheep is created, it is better than the old sheep—at least it will be new! To be new is good, to be new is fresh, to be new opens new possibilities. Hence, I am not afraid. But you must be attached to the old kind of sheep, hence you are afraid.

I can only try to give birth to a new man, but the birth cannot be absolutely guaranteed. I will do my best. It does not matter to me whether I succeed or fail. What matters is whether I tried my best or not—and I am trying my best. And that’s all that I am interested in. I am enjoying my work. Who cares about the result? The people who care too much about the result simply waste their energy because caring about the result takes much of their energy. Then they become worried about the result—that is a distraction. Then the end becomes far more important than the journey itself. To me the journey itself is enough, the search itself is more than enough. To me the means and the ends are not separate, they are inseparable. Hence, what I am doing, I am enjoying. What happens, that is not at all a question to me. But why are you worried? You must be interested in keeping people in their old traps.

I can do only one thing… You have heard the old proverb—this is a new edition of that old proverb: ‘You can lead a hippie to water, but you cannot make him bathe.’ I will lead the hippie to the water—that much I can do—I will persuade him, but then it is up to him to take a jump into the river or not. Who am I to throw him into the river? I can show him the way to the river, I can even lead him to the river, then it is HIS freedom. If he chooses to remain the same, I am not going to disturb his freedom, I am not going to do anything against him. I love every person as he is. I love my work; it is not work to me at all because I love it—it is just a play. But with you there seems to be some problem inside you. Your question has nothing to do with my work, it has something to do with your prejudices.

You ask me, ‘Aren’t you ever afraid that instead of the creation of a new kind of man, this is the creation of a new kind of sheep?’ I am trying to create the new man. Even if out of one hundred, one new man is created, that will bring the whole consciousness of humanity a step forward, a step upward. There is a possibility many will become only a new kind of sheep, but then too it is not bad, that too is a gain. It is better to be alive, young, fresh, new, even though you are a sheep. But you must somehow be deeply interested in keeping people in their old patterns, your investment must be there. Your prejudices must be those of a Christian, a Jew, a Hindu, a Mohammedan.

Two musicians were walking in a street, when a large bell from a building being demolished fell nearby with a loud clang. ‘What’s that?’ asked one. ‘I’m not sure,’ said the other, ‘but I think it was B flat.’

People have their own languages, their own prejudices, and they cling to their prejudices. Even though their prejudices have been a sheer misery for them, still they cling.

If you are an old sheep, at least become a new sheep—orange! It will not be a very great revolution, but even a little change is good. Just for that little change—and a little change may open doors for greater changes.

Two hobos sat with their backs against an old oak tree. Before them flowed a rippling stream. It was a delightful day, yet one of them was disconsolate. ‘You know, Slim,’ he said, ‘this tramping through life is not what it used to be. Things are getting tougher every year. I used to hop a freight chugging up a steep grade very easy, but these diesels go like mad. And I’m getting tired of spending my nights in a cold barn and on park benches, wondering where my next meal is coming from. And odd jobs are getting scarcer all the time…’ His voice trailed off as he sighed. His companion turned to face him. ‘If that’s the way you feel, why don’t you hang it all up and find yourself a real job?’ The first tramp raised his head and opened his mouth in amazement. ‘What!’ he cried. ‘And admit I’m a failure?’ Even a tramp, a hobo, a beggar does not want to accept that he is a failure.

The way you have asked the question simply shows that you are an old sheep—Catholic, Protestant—and you are afraid of the new sheep. You are not concerned about the new man. The old sheep is worried because what is going to happen to the old prejudices, the old conclusions, the old ideology? It seems as if it will be a deep discontinuity with the past, as if one dies and is reborn. But those who are ready to drop the old are not sheep. The very courage to drop the old is enough to prove that they are lions. The very courage that they are ready to come out of their old skins, their old prejudices, old ideologies, religions, philosophies, shows one thing very clearly, categorically: they are not sheep. And that very courage is the hope for the birth of a new man.

Just put your old prejudices aside, and then try to understand what is happening here. Get a little bit involved, participate in what is happening here. You have lived according to your old beliefs. If you are contented, I will be the last person to disturb you; but if you are contented, why are you here? For what? You must be discontented. This is one of the strangest things about man: even if he is discontented, he goes on believing, pretending that he is contented. And whenever there is an opportunity to change—and he is LOOKING for an opportunity to change, this is the strangeness—when he finds the opportunity to change, he clings to the past.

A doctor was consulted by a prizefighter, who was troubled with insomnia. ‘Have you tried counting sheep?’ asked the doctor. ‘Yes, but it doesn’t help. Every time I get up to nine, I jump up!’ An old prizefighter! The moment he gets to nine he cannot resist. Instead of giving him a good sleep it will disturb him—he jumps up.

People function mechanically, unconsciously. Your question has come out of your unconsciousness.

The tavern was near an army camp, and the pretty barmaid was popular with the enlisted men, especially since she preferred them to the overbearing officers. One night a polite young private was sitting next to a cocky first lieutenant who tried to date her. When the lieutenant went to the men’s room she put her face close to the private and whispered, ‘Now is your chance, soldier!’ The private looked at the tempting red lips and then cried, ‘That’s right!’ And he hastily drank the officer’s beer.

You are here, but not really here. And the way I talk must be so difficult for you to understand. If you have been listening to the sermons by the priests in the churches or in the temples or in the mosques, then what I am saying here will look very irreligious, will look very strange to your ideas of what spirituality should be. But I cannot talk the way you are accustomed to hearing. You may be waiting for some esoteric bullshit!

Kohn was home from seeing his doctor and meets his friend who asks, ‘Wha-wha-what is wrong wi-with you?’ ‘I’ve got prostatitis,’ replies Kohn. ‘Wha-what…wha-wha-what is that?’ ‘I piss the way you talk!’

The new man can only be created with everything new: the way I talk, the way my people live, the way they behave, all has to be totally different from the old man.

The new man cannot believe in your rotten morality—your morality has only created hypocrites. The new man can live only authentically, he cannot be concerned with your moral and immoral ideas. He can live only meditatively. He cannot be thought as a man of character, the way you have become accustomed to think of religious people. The new man will not be a man of character, the new man will be utterly characterless. But when I say, ‘characterless,’ please don’t misunderstand me. I am not talking the way you understand. To me the characterless man is the only man who has character. I call him characterless because he does not follow any dictates from the outside; he lives according to his own light, he lives meditatively. His character does not come from his conscience.

Conscience is an agency implanted in you by the society; it is not yours. Don’t say the conscience is yours—it is not yours. It belongs to the Christian church, it belongs to the Hindu religion, it belongs to the Jain philosophy, it belongs to the communist ideology. It has nothing to do with you. It is implanted by others in you. It is a very subtle strategy to dominate you from within. On the outside they have put a policeman, the magistrate, the court, and on the inside, they have created a conscience.

The real man, the new man, will live according to consciousness, not according to conscience. Of course, whatsoever HIS consciousness feels right, he will do, whatsoever the risk, whatsoever he has to pay for it. Even if he has to pay with his life, he will be ready to pay it because there are higher things than life itself. Consciousness is far higher than life. But he will not follow conscience. The man of conscience is known as a man of character—that’s why I call the new man characterless because he will not have any conscience, he will function out of consciousness. His commandments will be coming from his own center, and when they come from your own center, they give you freedom. Out of freedom life takes a new flavor, a new beauty. You do right, but now the right is not decided by others; it is no longer a slavery, it is absolute freedom. The new man will live out of meditation, out of consciousness, out of his own inner light.

The new man will be an individual, not part of any collectivity. My sannyasins here are not a collectivity. Each of my sannyasins is related to me directly. It is not a church, it is not an organization, it is a love relationship. And because they all love me, of course they start feeling love for each other too. That is secondary. Their love toward me is primary, then their love for other sannyasins is secondary, they are fellow travelers. But nobody is bound to follow me or to follow anybody else. It is a commune of fellow travelers, fellow seekers.

There is no qualitative difference between me and my sannyasins. The only difference is a very slight one, very small one—I am aware of my inner world, they are not aware, but they have the inner world as much as I have it. I don’t have it more; they don’t have it less. They have the whole kingdom of God within themselves. I am not special in any sense. I am not claiming that I am the Son of God, I am not claiming that I am an avatar of God, I am not claiming that I am a TIRTHANKARA. I am simply saying one thing: that I was asleep, now I am awake; you are asleep, and you can be awake also. I have known both states—the state of being asleep and the state of being awake—and you know only one state, of being asleep. But remember, the person who is capable of sleeping is capable of awakening. The very fact that he can sleep is an indication that he can be awake. There is no difference at all.

I will go on trying to help people to be awake. The awakened man will be the new man: he will not be Christian, he will not be Hindu, he will not be Mohammedan, he will not be Indian, he will not be German, he will not be English. He will simply be an awakened being.

But it is possible that there may be a few people who will only turn into a new kind of sheep, but that too is not bad. As far as being the old sheep is concerned, it is better than that. So if you are an old sheep, become a new sheep, and from there the journey starts, a possibility. If the old sheep can become a new sheep, it is a radical change. The sheep deciding to be new—it is a revolution. And if this much is possible, then much more is possible too.

— Osho (I am That: Talks on the Isha Upanishad)

Spirits, demons, or divine beings—these are only fantasies of your mind; they are only hallucinations. There are people who see Krishna, there are people who see Christ, there are people who see ghosts. There are people, all kinds of people, seeing all kinds of illusions. They are your mind creations. There is no need either for respect or for fear. Remember only one thing: your basic nature is absolute silence, serenity, peace, almost a nothingness, an emptiness. And that is your buddha-nature, that is your nature awakened to its own potential. To be aware of it is the greatest experience of life, because it brings liberation from life, birth, death. It takes you out of the wheel that goes on eternally giving you birth and death, and all the agonies and the sufferings. It takes you out into the world of ecstasy, of eternal blissfulness.

Osho (Bodhidharma: The Greatest Zen Master)

Two women are talking in a tea room at four o’clock, over large gooey ice-cream sundaes and little sugary cakes. They have not seen each other since high-school days, and one is bragging about her very advantageous marriage. ‘My husband buys me whole new sets of diamonds when the ones I have get dirty,’ she says. ‘I never even bother to clean them.’ ‘Fantastic!’ says the other women. ‘Yes,’ says the first, ‘we get a new car every two months. None of this hire-purchase stuff! My husband buys them outright, and we give them to the Negro gardener and houseman and like that for presents.’ ‘Fantastic!’ says the other. ‘And our house,’ pursues the first, ‘well, what’s the use of talking about it? It’s just…’ ‘Fantastic!’ finishes the other. ‘Yes, and tell me, what are you doing nowadays?’ says the first woman. ‘I go to Charm School,’ says the other. ‘Charm School? Why, how quaint! What do you learn there?’ ‘Well, we learn to say ‘Fantastic’ instead of ‘Bullshit’!’

You can start calling bullshit ‘fantastic,’ but it makes no difference. You can learn religious, spiritual garbage… There are many people here too who are very expert in so-called esoteric jargon. They always talk of so many planes, so many bodies, so many centers… and they talk so seriously that it seems they know what they are talking about. Avoid esoteric garbage! Avoid esoteric knowledge! It is not knowledge, it is just to befool people. If you are interested in such things you should read the great literature that has been created by theosophists. Anything goes, you just have to talk in such a way that it seems otherworldly. It can neither be proved nor disproved. Now how can you prove how many planes there are? Seven or thirteen?

One man came to me. His religious sect believes in fourteen planes, and he had a chart, he had brought the chart. Mahavira has attained only to the fifth plane, Buddha to the sixth, Kabir, Nanak, to the ninth—because he was a Punjabi he had been a little generous with Nanak and Kabir. But his own Radhaswami guru, he has attained to the fourteenth! Even Buddha is just hanging around the sixth! And Mohammed, do you know where Mohammed is?—just the third! A Hindu and a Punjabi, how can you allow Mohammed to go beyond the third? He keeps him third-rate. Jesus he is a little more generous with—on the fourth; he places Jesus on the fourth. But his own guru—nobody knows about his guru—he has reached the fourteenth! The fourteenth is called SATCH-KHAND—the plane of truth. So I asked him, ‘What about the other thirteen?’ He said, ‘They are just coming closer and closer to truth, only approximately true.’ Now, can there be an approximate truth? Either something is true or something is not true. Either I am here in the chair or I am not in the chair—I cannot be approximately in the chair. So ‘approximate truth’ is a beautiful name for a lie. He had come to ask me what my opinion is about the fourteen planes. I said, ‘I have reached the fifteenth. And just as you are asking about the planes, your Radhaswami guru asks me again and again how to enter into the fifteenth.’ He was very angry. He said, ‘Never heard about the fifteenth plane!’ I said, ‘How can you hear? Your guru has only reached the fourteenth, so you have heard about fourteen. But I have reached the fifteenth!’

Just nonsense! But it can be presented in such a way that it looks very spiritual. Avoid!

— Osho (The Dhammapada: The Way of the Buddha, Vol. 1)