Lagan Mahurat Jhooth Sab #2
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Read in Original Hindi (मूल हिन्दी)
Questions in this Discourse
First question:
Osho, there is a Punjabi tappa in which a lover says to his beloved—kacchi kândh utte kâna ae, milṇā tā̃ Rab nū̃ hai, terā piār bahāna hai. That is: a crow sits on a crumbling wall; union is with God, your love is only a pretext. Osho, is worldly love a means to divine love? Please explain.
Osho, there is a Punjabi tappa in which a lover says to his beloved—kacchi kândh utte kâna ae, milṇā tā̃ Rab nū̃ hai, terā piār bahāna hai. That is: a crow sits on a crumbling wall; union is with God, your love is only a pretext. Osho, is worldly love a means to divine love? Please explain.
Vinod Bharti, the tappa itself is lovely:
“Kacchi kandh ute kaana ae—on a crumbling wall a crow sits.”
Most people’s lives are just like that—an unbaked wall, and on that unbaked wall a crow. Life is both unbaked and black. Not a swan perched there, but a crow; and the wall is made of sand—here now, gone the next moment. No telling when it will fall, in which instant it will end; no one can predict it. And who sits upon this flimsy wall? Nothing of value. All of it, two-penny stuff.
“Kacchi kandh ute kaana ae.”
Such tappas sprang up in the folk mind over centuries. No single person wrote them; they are the distilled human experience of ages. The essence of centuries. In such short little verses even the Upanishads are contained. And the truth is, often the Upanishads sound pale beside them—because a simple man sees simply. As he sees, so he says. No pedantry, no word-weaving, no web of theories, no anxiety for scriptures—just as life flashes in his mirror, that is what he says.
Village folk must have voiced this in their straightforwardness. And then over centuries it was honed. Like a stone that starts at Gangotri and rolls down the Ganga—battered by blows, tumbling down hills, plunging over waterfalls—the more it flows, the more its sharpness is smoothed away; a roundness comes, a beauty appears. Stones sliding along in the Ganga become shivalingas—they attain an exquisite beauty, become divine, idols of the Supreme.
These tappas are like that—flowing for centuries in the Ganga of human consciousness. Sweetness has suffused them; their jaggedness has been cut away. When a thinker first births a doctrine, there is some slant in it; some ego, some stiffness—“I am right, others are wrong.” But such tappas are not born of some pundit; no individual has signed them; no one made them—they have grown, evolved naturally. Therefore they are very simple, very direct, and yet brimming with rasa.
“Kacchi kandh ute kaana ae.”
The wall is crumbling, and a crow sits upon it. How sweetly said, and how simply! No Jainism, no Hinduism, no Islam—this is a matter beyond religions, a transgression of scriptures. This is exactly the case, this much is the whole matter: the wall of life is unbaked, very unbaked. This boat is paper—you won’t cross the ocean of becoming in it. Try what you may, it is bound to sink; its sinking is certain. You will wear yourself out trying to save it from here and there. The boat itself is paper; it only appears to be a boat.
One sits relying on wealth—what a crumbling wall! Another on position—what a crumbling wall!
When Alexander came to India and Porus lost in battle, Porus was brought in chains to Alexander’s court. The battle was fierce; Porus was no weakling—perhaps more powerful—but he lost due to Indian foolishness. India has always suffered from its foolishness. Neither is there any lack of strength, nor of capability; but foolishness rides so hard upon strength and capacity that it destroys strength and distorts capacity. Porus lost for one reason: Alexander came to fight on horses; Porus went to war with elephants.
Elephants are good for wedding processions, for the entourages of sadhus and saints, for a pontiff’s pageantry—but for war they are useless. An elephant is not made for battle—he takes too much space; even to turn he needs room; and if he goes berserk—and there’s every chance of that: arrows pierce, bullets strike—once crazed he loses all sense and tramples his own army. And that is what happened. Horses are more alert, swift, agile; they turn in little space, wheel about quickly, fight with the flash of lightning; attack and retreat are easy; no danger of crushing their own ranks; they can be mastered more readily.
In that fight neither Alexander truly won nor Porus truly lost—horses won and elephants lost. But such is India’s misfortune. Even today the state is the same—always behind. We still trust in bullock carts; our leaders are still spinning the charkha. If you don’t lose, what else will happen? If you don’t perish, what else can be?
When Porus was brought captive, Alexander asked, “Tell me, how should I treat you?” Porus replied with a line worth weighing against diamonds and jewels: “How should you treat me? As one emperor treats another! And remember—till yesterday I too was an emperor; today I stand before you in chains. Today you are emperor—think of tomorrow; nothing about tomorrow is certain. Yesterday I had no inkling that the next day I would be in this plight.”
Alexander understood. It is said he closed his eyes, was silent a moment, then said, “Remove his chains, break his fetters, bring a second throne—seat Porus by my side; he speaks rightly.”
“Kacchi kandh ute kaana ae.”
A crow sits on a crumbling wall. When will it fly away? There’s no knowing. The wall is so flimsy that even if the crow doesn’t fly, it will fall anyway. And the crow must fly. Yet how people strut! Let them have a position and how they stiffen! Feet don’t touch the ground; wings sprout. All awareness is lost. Nothing intoxicates like position. Let wealth come, and they go mad—as if all has been attained! And all will remain here; nothing goes along with you when the wanderer shoulders his bundle and departs. Everything stays. And all the effort spent gathering it—wasted. People are drawing lines on water, signing their names on water.
There is a lovely story in the Jain scriptures. You’ve heard the word chakravarti, but perhaps not grasped its precise meaning. Chakravarti means one who is emperor over all six continents, the whole earth—whose rule ends nowhere, whose realm has no boundary, whose chariot wheel circles the earth. Such a universal emperor is scarcely possible—almost impossible.
One man did become a chakravarti. The joy knew no bounds. He had one yearning: to sign his name on Mount Sumeru in heaven—because anywhere else, signatures are erased. If the mountain itself disappears, where will the signature remain? Sign on water and it vanishes quickly; sign on a mountain and it will fade a bit later—but fade it will. Sooner or later.
“Kacchi kandh ute kaana ae—on a crumbling wall a crow sits.”
This emperor was very pleased—even on his deathbed. Someone asked, “You are so pleased—why?” He said, “I had one desire, and it is about to be fulfilled—that I will sign my name on Mount Sumeru—for there signatures never fade. They never fade, because Sumeru itself never fades.”
His vizier laughed. “Why are you laughing?” asked the emperor. The vizier said, “If I tell you now, you won’t understand. When you reach Mount Sumeru, you will understand why I laughed.”
A riddle! The emperor died, but he remembered the riddle. The vizier had laughed—why? The secret will open at Sumeru. At the gate of Sumeru, the guards said, “Stop. You may enter alone.” He had brought his wife, his children, his friends—they all had been arranged to die with him. For what fun is it to sign on Sumeru alone? If there is no one to see—no one to witness—what fun! If the wife can’t see her husband signing on Sumeru, what fun! The children should see, the friends should see; he must have brought the press, photographers, public relations officers! But the guard said, “You may go alone; leave them outside. That is the rule.”
He felt very sad. “What sort of rule is this! I toiled all my life for this one hope—to show them! And now I must leave those for whom I wanted to show?” The guard laughed—the same kind of laugh as the vizier’s. The vizier came to mind. The emperor asked, “Why do you laugh?” The guard said, “When you reach Sumeru, you will understand. But heed my advice: do not insist on taking them in, or you will regret it.”
Hearing this, the emperor went alone, carrying chisel and hammer to carve his name on Sumeru. And when he arrived, he was astonished! Then the vizier’s laughter made sense; then the guard’s laughter made sense; then he realized it was good he had obeyed the guard and not brought his companions, or great embarrassment would have ensued.
Why had the vizier laughed? The old man was wise. And why had the guard stopped him? The rule was apt. The matter was this: Sumeru was indeed a vast mountain—without beginning or end, immense, infinite—but there was no space left anywhere to sign! So many signatures—so many chakravartins had come before! He searched and searched, to exhaustion—no place! He had planned to sign in huge letters, larger than anyone’s—but there was no room. He returned to the guard and asked, “What shall I do? There is no space!”
The guard said, “My father also served as guard here, and his father before him; it is our hereditary work. And it has always been this way—nothing new. As far back as I remember, and my father remembered, and his father remembered—whenever a chakravarti comes, this trouble arises: there’s no room. The remedy is one: you must first erase some older names and then write your own. That’s how it has always been. Old names must be wiped, and the new name written.”
The hammer and chisel fell from the emperor’s hands. “The vizier laughed rightly,” he said. “Then what is the point! Today I will sign and go; tomorrow someone will wipe off my name and sign his. Someone wrote yesterday; I will wipe off his and sign mine. The fun has gone.”
Whether you sign on water or on Mount Sumeru—kacchi kandh ute kaana ae—this wall itself is unbaked. And on this crumbling wall a crow sits.
In the folk mind the crow symbolizes trickery—cunning. Very crafty. They say a crow has only one eye, yet looks both ways—with the same eye. A perfect trickster! Half-blind, yet deceives the world that he has two eyes—glancing left and right with the same eye, doing his gutter-patter, darting his eye here and there. In summary: politics, diplomacy.
So much diplomacy, so much trickery, so much dishonesty—what will you gain? This crumbling wall! At any moment the time will arrive; the news will come that the time is up, now go; Yama’s messengers have arrived at the door. In a life of four days, how much deception do you practice! How much dishonesty! And what do you get? Nothing at all. Yes, in the craftiness you surely lose something—the simplicity you brought into the world, that you lose.
The symbol of simplicity is the swan—of whiteness, purity. Hence when someone attains knowledge, we call him paramhansa—the supreme swan. He has again become as simple as a child—like a blank book on which nothing has yet been written; such a mind is called hans. To regain it is the state of the paramhansa.
A child will have to be distorted; his distortion is certain—because he must fall into the hands of old crows—one more cunning than the other!
My grandfather—my father’s father—spoke only a few things. He was a simple, rural man, but what he said mattered. He ran a small cloth shop. His intent was not to waste time in haggling. So he would ask a customer, “What do you prefer—bargaining? Then remember: no matter how much you haggle—whether the melon falls on the knife or the knife on the melon—it is always the melon that gets cut. Haggling won’t profit you. You can’t cut us. We know what a thing costs; we won’t sell below that. So you decide! And if you agree to one straight price, we’ll tell you the minimum we can take.”
The straightforward people would say, “That makes sense. There’s no substance in haggling. In any case we get cut. So you tell one price.” But the crafty ones would say, “How can a deal be done without bargaining!”
Then he had a second saying: “Fine then—let’s haggle. But remember: a clever crow perches on a filthy dung heap.” These two proverbs I heard him tell customers again and again. “A clever crow perches on a filthy heap! You seem a clever crow—you’ll sit on some stinking heap; you cannot sit in a clean place. So be it—let’s bargain.”
Some people insisted so much on bargaining that they would come and ask—because my father had no such habit; he would quote one price—so they would ask, “Where is Grandfather? With you there is just one price—no fun at all! The fun of buying and selling! Where is Grandfather? A little rubbing-and-scraping—then shopping feels like something! Otherwise it takes no time—you say so much, we pay and go! Call Grandfather!”
That clever crow will bargain—he will be crafty. He will not only deceive others; he will deceive himself. Deception becomes his way of life; he cannot survive without it. Hence the crow, Vinod!
“Kacchi kandh ute kaana ae.”
First a crumbling wall—and upon it so much crow-ness, so much cleverness, such smartness, such trickery, so much politics, so much diplomacy! Whom are you cutting? What will you gain?
“Milṇā tā̃ Rab nū̃ hai,
terā piār bahāna hai.”
Truly a lovely line! Union is with the Divine, and your love is a pretext. Those who know will agree: our love is like the full moon reflected in a lake. Granted, the moon in the lake is not the real moon, but it is the real moon’s reflection. Granted, if you jump into the lake you won’t find the moon—on the contrary, the very reflection will vanish. To attain the moon, diving into the lake is useless—no matter how many plunges you take, the moon isn’t there.
But whether in the lake or not, it is the reflection of the real moon. The wise, seeing the moon in the lake, set out on the journey to the real moon. Then the lake’s moon becomes a pointing finger toward the moon. The moon is above, far away; yet the lake’s moon points toward it. One must not descend into the lake; one must journey to the moon beyond. Then the lake becomes a helper; then the lake becomes scripture.
Scripture can be used in two ways. The wise catch the finger of the word and set out toward the wordless: the word points; the journey is to the wordless. The love of the world—and the search for God. For love is love; only its reflection is appearing in the world. The world is a mirror. But the unwise keep diving into the scriptures themselves—they get entangled in words, ensnared in their nets, and forget that words are only pictures—what one has to seek is the one of whom the picture is.
The experience of lovers through the ages is contained here. As if one gathered thousands of roses and distilled attar from them—perhaps only a few drops, but in those drops would be the essence, the fragrance, the spirit, the soul of thousands of flowers.
For centuries humanity’s experience is this: how many have not loved! Who is there who has not, little or much, loved? Even the stingiest loves a little. Even the worst man cannot entirely escape love; some fragrance reaches him, some song resounds in the heart, some anklets begin to chime on his feet. Whether your love is for your son, your wife, your father, your mother, a friend, a beloved, for music or poetry—love will peep at you from somewhere.
The attar of all these loves is this: no love ever fully satisfies. However much you love your wife or your husband, you will not be satiated. From this lack arises a delusion: “This wife isn’t right; this husband is wrong—my misfortune that I got tied to this wretch; some error occurred.” But it is your arithmetic that errs—nothing else. You can change wives—the whole world now allows divorce—you can change wives…
I’ve heard of a man in America who changed wives eight times—and was shocked to find each time that after four or six months he felt: yet again, in a new face—a new model, a new edition—I’ve found the same old wife! The features differ, hair color differs, height, length—everything different—and yet why is the whole business the same? The same quarrels, the same upheavals, the same troubles—what is the matter?
The matter is simple: the one who seeks is the same. He will fall in love with the same kind of woman again and again. Change as many wives, as many husbands, as many friends as you like—satisfaction will not come through worldly love, because you are trying to get the moon by jumping into the lake. If the fact of this dissatisfaction is rightly understood, a door opens—the door of the mystery.
No love in this world can fill you—that is your good fortune, not your misfortune. For if some worldly love could fill you, why would you ever set out to seek God? The love of this world always fails—falls.
Why does it fall? Because deep within you the yearning is to attain God, to attain the Supreme Beloved—and with that very yearning you hold out your begging bowl before some woman or man. What can that poor woman do? How can she fill your bowl with nectar? If she had it, she would give—but she herself is a beggar. She stands before you with her bowl. And you are mad.
I’ve heard—there were two astrologers in a village. Every morning on the way to market they would meet and say, “Brother, have a look at my hand.” They’d read each other’s palm and hand over a quarter-rupee to one another—no loss; the money you give away comes back; your own remains yours, his remains his—and the hand is examined free. And they’d ask each other, “How will business go today?” These are astrologers! Out to tell others’ fortunes!
Of psychologists I’ve heard an even more amazing story.
Two psychologists met on their way to their offices one morning. After greetings, one said, “You are absolutely fine; I guarantee it. Now say something about me.”
No knowledge of oneself—ready to guarantee about the other! Asking the other about oneself.
Psychologists go to each other for analysis: “Analyze me—so much anxiety, so much worry, sleepless nights, thoughts of suicide.”
You’ll be surprised to know that, proportionally, more psychologists commit suicide than people of any other profession—twice as many. Not gamblers, not drunkards, not pimps—none commit as many suicides as psychologists do—double. And psychologists are twice as crazy too; none are so mad—not even politicians; in madness psychologists have outdone them. And these are the folks doing the business of curing the world’s madness!
It is a strange state; beggars holding out their bowls to other beggars: “Give me something; today I won’t go without getting something.” The wife asks you, “Give me love!” You ask your wife, “Give me love!” Who will give love? Both are askers; there is no giver; both beggars. Then both bowls remain empty—and rage arises. You feel cheated.
No one has cheated you! When you are far, you cheat yourself. Distance creates deception. You meet a woman on Chowpatty… who doesn’t go chowpat on Chowpatty? When you meet there, she is all dressed up, and so are you; perfume and scent; neither your real smell is known nor hers. You are hidden in clothes, she is hidden in clothes.
Clothes deceive greatly. We think clothes were invented to conceal nakedness—wrong. Clothes were invented to reveal nakedness, to accentuate it. Naked women are not as beautiful as they appear in dress—because clothes can give many illusions. With the right cut a breast can seem young and firm; a bony chest, but cotton stuffed in a coat can create the illusion that the mighty Hanuman has arrived. Shoulders utterly slumped—one glance would send you fleeing—but padding makes them look broad.
One of my sannyasins is Madhuri. Her whole family is in sannyas. Madhuri is a sannyasin, her sister Sarita is a sannyasin, their mother is a sannyasin. Madhuri’s mother told me she had breast cancer—about fifty-five years old—so both breasts had to be removed. One had to be removed for sure; the other was at risk, so it was better to remove it preventively. She was very troubled. It’s not India, it’s America—there, a woman without both breasts—consider her dead. What is left of “living”! The whole play is about breasts! Not only children live off breasts—old men too. Children drink milk, old men too. So she was distressed. The doctor said, “No need to worry—now plastic breasts are available.”
So both breasts were removed and plastic breasts given. She told me, “I was returning from Mexico and stopped at a crossing to ask a policeman for directions. His eyes got stuck on my breasts. I’m your sannyasin, a joke came to me—I had never joked like that before. But since becoming your sannyasin I have learned to joke. I asked him, ‘Like them?’ He hesitated, sweat on his forehead, got flustered, looked around. I said, ‘No need to be nervous—do you like them? Tell the truth.’ He said, ‘I like them, they’re beautiful!’ So I took both breasts out and handed them to him: ‘Then you keep them!’
“His condition was worth seeing—standing there with plastic breasts in his hands, utterly bewildered what to do. I drove off—who knows what he went through!”
Clothes keep things hidden. You meet someone on Chowpatty—there’s no certainty who is what; the reality will be known later—when you come close. No one is out to cheat anyone; but distance creates deception—mirage. You think you have found the woman you have been seeking for lifetimes; the woman thinks she has found the man she has sought for lifetimes. Come near, and you see: an ordinary woman, an ordinary man—nothing found; cheated again. And this cheat you have been enduring for lifetimes.
“Kacchi kandh ute kaana ae.”
A crow sits on a crumbling wall.
“Milṇā tā̃ Rab nū̃ hai.”
Union is with the Divine. With anything less the heart will not be filled. Until the ocean pours into the drop, satiation is impossible. And—
“Terā piār bahāna hai.”
If this is understood, there is no fault in love either.
“Your love is a pretext.”
If you love your wife as though through her you are loving God, there is no harm. This is my teaching, Vinod—this is what I am teaching! Do not run away from love. In love, inquire: what is it you truly seek? Then in your son, your mother, your wife, your husband, your friend—the same search continues.
When the sun rises and the sky fills with beautiful clouds and colors fly in all directions like Holi powders, birds sing and flowers open—remember: this beauty is His. When at night the sky fills with stars—remember: those eyes are His. When someone plays a tune on the flute and your very life begins to dance—remember: that flute is His, that song is His.
Wherever your love moves—toward poetry, music, art, dance, toward woman or man—keep only this remembrance: this love is an arrow pointing to Him. The going is to Him.
“Milṇā tā̃ Rab nū̃ hai.”
The going is to Him, the meeting is with the Beloved.
“Terā piār bahāna hai.”
Everything else is a pretext. And pretexts are not bad, if taken as pretexts—they are pegs. Hang upon those pegs—but let what you hang be love for God. If only you could see God in your wife, in your husband—then there would be no need to go to any other temple.
What madness! In living children they do not see God, and they sit listening to the Bhagavata—which is only the story of one living child, nothing else. The story of a marvelous child, nothing else. They hum Surdas’ verse: “Mother, I did not eat the butter.” Yet at home when your child says, “Mother, I didn’t eat the butter,” he gets a beating—“Who else ate it, you wretch? Where did the butter go?”—and you hum Surdas! What a wonder!
Krishna throws stones and breaks someone’s pot—devotees melt; Dongre Maharaj’s eyes stream with tears. Devotees’ eyes grow wet—tears don’t drop, boondi drops! But if your own boy breaks someone’s water pot—he gets a beating: “Come down, you rascal! Now I’ll teach you a lesson you’ll remember!” Then go beat Dongre Maharaj! Catch Surdas lest he escape—set him straight!
Love life! You are entangled in stories. This life is very lovely. From all sides, God’s glimmer shines—but you are stuck in trash. The tappa is lovely—remember it:
“Kacchi kandh ute kaana ae,
milṇā tā̃ Rab nū̃ hai,
terā piār bahāna hai.”
Life, what is it? A riddle—
now an enemy, now a friend.
I touched it and saw—the lovers’ assembly,
each at his own place is alone,
now an enemy, now a friend.
In the desert of the heart the boat of companionship,
shoved along, tottering—
now an enemy, now a friend.
Read it with great attention—
it is the very palm of destiny,
now an enemy, now a friend.
Fingers were skinned just touching it—
who told you it was jasmine?
Now an enemy, now a friend.
Life, what is it? A riddle—
now an enemy, now a friend.
But it all depends on you. Life is neither enemy nor friend. Understand—and it is a friend; don’t understand—and it is an enemy. Understand—and there is nothing but God; don’t understand—and it is “kacchi kandh ute kaana ae”—a crumbling wall and a crow perched. Understand—and it is the eternal, and lines of swans are winging across—the lines of paramhansas. It is all in your hands.
Yes, I am a mad lover; if I wish, I can surge and sway.
I can overturn the laws of the secret bower of beauty.
Thorns are only thorns—I can walk on embers.
My beloved, my friend—no, not even that—
the demand of my frank nature is something else:
Shall I let the world pass by at this same pace,
let desires choke and die within my heart,
let your tresses scatter bare upon your shoulders?
My beloved, my friend—no, not even that—
the demand of my frank nature is something else.
One day let me snatch away the zeal of the heedless,
let me break, break the glamour of the world,
and here let the pulse of jealousy’s veins run out—
the pride of love demands this spectacle,
the demand of my nature, my friend, is this.
Yes, I am a mad lover; if I wish, I can surge and sway.
I can overturn the laws of the secret bower of beauty.
Thorns are only thorns—I can walk on embers.
My beloved, my friend—no, not even that—
the demand of my frank nature is something else.
Do not end in the petty. Attain the Vast. Do not finish in time. Build your home in the Eternal.
The demand of my frank nature is something else.
“Kacchi kandh ute kaana ae—on a crumbling wall a crow sits.”
Most people’s lives are just like that—an unbaked wall, and on that unbaked wall a crow. Life is both unbaked and black. Not a swan perched there, but a crow; and the wall is made of sand—here now, gone the next moment. No telling when it will fall, in which instant it will end; no one can predict it. And who sits upon this flimsy wall? Nothing of value. All of it, two-penny stuff.
“Kacchi kandh ute kaana ae.”
Such tappas sprang up in the folk mind over centuries. No single person wrote them; they are the distilled human experience of ages. The essence of centuries. In such short little verses even the Upanishads are contained. And the truth is, often the Upanishads sound pale beside them—because a simple man sees simply. As he sees, so he says. No pedantry, no word-weaving, no web of theories, no anxiety for scriptures—just as life flashes in his mirror, that is what he says.
Village folk must have voiced this in their straightforwardness. And then over centuries it was honed. Like a stone that starts at Gangotri and rolls down the Ganga—battered by blows, tumbling down hills, plunging over waterfalls—the more it flows, the more its sharpness is smoothed away; a roundness comes, a beauty appears. Stones sliding along in the Ganga become shivalingas—they attain an exquisite beauty, become divine, idols of the Supreme.
These tappas are like that—flowing for centuries in the Ganga of human consciousness. Sweetness has suffused them; their jaggedness has been cut away. When a thinker first births a doctrine, there is some slant in it; some ego, some stiffness—“I am right, others are wrong.” But such tappas are not born of some pundit; no individual has signed them; no one made them—they have grown, evolved naturally. Therefore they are very simple, very direct, and yet brimming with rasa.
“Kacchi kandh ute kaana ae.”
The wall is crumbling, and a crow sits upon it. How sweetly said, and how simply! No Jainism, no Hinduism, no Islam—this is a matter beyond religions, a transgression of scriptures. This is exactly the case, this much is the whole matter: the wall of life is unbaked, very unbaked. This boat is paper—you won’t cross the ocean of becoming in it. Try what you may, it is bound to sink; its sinking is certain. You will wear yourself out trying to save it from here and there. The boat itself is paper; it only appears to be a boat.
One sits relying on wealth—what a crumbling wall! Another on position—what a crumbling wall!
When Alexander came to India and Porus lost in battle, Porus was brought in chains to Alexander’s court. The battle was fierce; Porus was no weakling—perhaps more powerful—but he lost due to Indian foolishness. India has always suffered from its foolishness. Neither is there any lack of strength, nor of capability; but foolishness rides so hard upon strength and capacity that it destroys strength and distorts capacity. Porus lost for one reason: Alexander came to fight on horses; Porus went to war with elephants.
Elephants are good for wedding processions, for the entourages of sadhus and saints, for a pontiff’s pageantry—but for war they are useless. An elephant is not made for battle—he takes too much space; even to turn he needs room; and if he goes berserk—and there’s every chance of that: arrows pierce, bullets strike—once crazed he loses all sense and tramples his own army. And that is what happened. Horses are more alert, swift, agile; they turn in little space, wheel about quickly, fight with the flash of lightning; attack and retreat are easy; no danger of crushing their own ranks; they can be mastered more readily.
In that fight neither Alexander truly won nor Porus truly lost—horses won and elephants lost. But such is India’s misfortune. Even today the state is the same—always behind. We still trust in bullock carts; our leaders are still spinning the charkha. If you don’t lose, what else will happen? If you don’t perish, what else can be?
When Porus was brought captive, Alexander asked, “Tell me, how should I treat you?” Porus replied with a line worth weighing against diamonds and jewels: “How should you treat me? As one emperor treats another! And remember—till yesterday I too was an emperor; today I stand before you in chains. Today you are emperor—think of tomorrow; nothing about tomorrow is certain. Yesterday I had no inkling that the next day I would be in this plight.”
Alexander understood. It is said he closed his eyes, was silent a moment, then said, “Remove his chains, break his fetters, bring a second throne—seat Porus by my side; he speaks rightly.”
“Kacchi kandh ute kaana ae.”
A crow sits on a crumbling wall. When will it fly away? There’s no knowing. The wall is so flimsy that even if the crow doesn’t fly, it will fall anyway. And the crow must fly. Yet how people strut! Let them have a position and how they stiffen! Feet don’t touch the ground; wings sprout. All awareness is lost. Nothing intoxicates like position. Let wealth come, and they go mad—as if all has been attained! And all will remain here; nothing goes along with you when the wanderer shoulders his bundle and departs. Everything stays. And all the effort spent gathering it—wasted. People are drawing lines on water, signing their names on water.
There is a lovely story in the Jain scriptures. You’ve heard the word chakravarti, but perhaps not grasped its precise meaning. Chakravarti means one who is emperor over all six continents, the whole earth—whose rule ends nowhere, whose realm has no boundary, whose chariot wheel circles the earth. Such a universal emperor is scarcely possible—almost impossible.
One man did become a chakravarti. The joy knew no bounds. He had one yearning: to sign his name on Mount Sumeru in heaven—because anywhere else, signatures are erased. If the mountain itself disappears, where will the signature remain? Sign on water and it vanishes quickly; sign on a mountain and it will fade a bit later—but fade it will. Sooner or later.
“Kacchi kandh ute kaana ae—on a crumbling wall a crow sits.”
This emperor was very pleased—even on his deathbed. Someone asked, “You are so pleased—why?” He said, “I had one desire, and it is about to be fulfilled—that I will sign my name on Mount Sumeru—for there signatures never fade. They never fade, because Sumeru itself never fades.”
His vizier laughed. “Why are you laughing?” asked the emperor. The vizier said, “If I tell you now, you won’t understand. When you reach Mount Sumeru, you will understand why I laughed.”
A riddle! The emperor died, but he remembered the riddle. The vizier had laughed—why? The secret will open at Sumeru. At the gate of Sumeru, the guards said, “Stop. You may enter alone.” He had brought his wife, his children, his friends—they all had been arranged to die with him. For what fun is it to sign on Sumeru alone? If there is no one to see—no one to witness—what fun! If the wife can’t see her husband signing on Sumeru, what fun! The children should see, the friends should see; he must have brought the press, photographers, public relations officers! But the guard said, “You may go alone; leave them outside. That is the rule.”
He felt very sad. “What sort of rule is this! I toiled all my life for this one hope—to show them! And now I must leave those for whom I wanted to show?” The guard laughed—the same kind of laugh as the vizier’s. The vizier came to mind. The emperor asked, “Why do you laugh?” The guard said, “When you reach Sumeru, you will understand. But heed my advice: do not insist on taking them in, or you will regret it.”
Hearing this, the emperor went alone, carrying chisel and hammer to carve his name on Sumeru. And when he arrived, he was astonished! Then the vizier’s laughter made sense; then the guard’s laughter made sense; then he realized it was good he had obeyed the guard and not brought his companions, or great embarrassment would have ensued.
Why had the vizier laughed? The old man was wise. And why had the guard stopped him? The rule was apt. The matter was this: Sumeru was indeed a vast mountain—without beginning or end, immense, infinite—but there was no space left anywhere to sign! So many signatures—so many chakravartins had come before! He searched and searched, to exhaustion—no place! He had planned to sign in huge letters, larger than anyone’s—but there was no room. He returned to the guard and asked, “What shall I do? There is no space!”
The guard said, “My father also served as guard here, and his father before him; it is our hereditary work. And it has always been this way—nothing new. As far back as I remember, and my father remembered, and his father remembered—whenever a chakravarti comes, this trouble arises: there’s no room. The remedy is one: you must first erase some older names and then write your own. That’s how it has always been. Old names must be wiped, and the new name written.”
The hammer and chisel fell from the emperor’s hands. “The vizier laughed rightly,” he said. “Then what is the point! Today I will sign and go; tomorrow someone will wipe off my name and sign his. Someone wrote yesterday; I will wipe off his and sign mine. The fun has gone.”
Whether you sign on water or on Mount Sumeru—kacchi kandh ute kaana ae—this wall itself is unbaked. And on this crumbling wall a crow sits.
In the folk mind the crow symbolizes trickery—cunning. Very crafty. They say a crow has only one eye, yet looks both ways—with the same eye. A perfect trickster! Half-blind, yet deceives the world that he has two eyes—glancing left and right with the same eye, doing his gutter-patter, darting his eye here and there. In summary: politics, diplomacy.
So much diplomacy, so much trickery, so much dishonesty—what will you gain? This crumbling wall! At any moment the time will arrive; the news will come that the time is up, now go; Yama’s messengers have arrived at the door. In a life of four days, how much deception do you practice! How much dishonesty! And what do you get? Nothing at all. Yes, in the craftiness you surely lose something—the simplicity you brought into the world, that you lose.
The symbol of simplicity is the swan—of whiteness, purity. Hence when someone attains knowledge, we call him paramhansa—the supreme swan. He has again become as simple as a child—like a blank book on which nothing has yet been written; such a mind is called hans. To regain it is the state of the paramhansa.
A child will have to be distorted; his distortion is certain—because he must fall into the hands of old crows—one more cunning than the other!
My grandfather—my father’s father—spoke only a few things. He was a simple, rural man, but what he said mattered. He ran a small cloth shop. His intent was not to waste time in haggling. So he would ask a customer, “What do you prefer—bargaining? Then remember: no matter how much you haggle—whether the melon falls on the knife or the knife on the melon—it is always the melon that gets cut. Haggling won’t profit you. You can’t cut us. We know what a thing costs; we won’t sell below that. So you decide! And if you agree to one straight price, we’ll tell you the minimum we can take.”
The straightforward people would say, “That makes sense. There’s no substance in haggling. In any case we get cut. So you tell one price.” But the crafty ones would say, “How can a deal be done without bargaining!”
Then he had a second saying: “Fine then—let’s haggle. But remember: a clever crow perches on a filthy dung heap.” These two proverbs I heard him tell customers again and again. “A clever crow perches on a filthy heap! You seem a clever crow—you’ll sit on some stinking heap; you cannot sit in a clean place. So be it—let’s bargain.”
Some people insisted so much on bargaining that they would come and ask—because my father had no such habit; he would quote one price—so they would ask, “Where is Grandfather? With you there is just one price—no fun at all! The fun of buying and selling! Where is Grandfather? A little rubbing-and-scraping—then shopping feels like something! Otherwise it takes no time—you say so much, we pay and go! Call Grandfather!”
That clever crow will bargain—he will be crafty. He will not only deceive others; he will deceive himself. Deception becomes his way of life; he cannot survive without it. Hence the crow, Vinod!
“Kacchi kandh ute kaana ae.”
First a crumbling wall—and upon it so much crow-ness, so much cleverness, such smartness, such trickery, so much politics, so much diplomacy! Whom are you cutting? What will you gain?
“Milṇā tā̃ Rab nū̃ hai,
terā piār bahāna hai.”
Truly a lovely line! Union is with the Divine, and your love is a pretext. Those who know will agree: our love is like the full moon reflected in a lake. Granted, the moon in the lake is not the real moon, but it is the real moon’s reflection. Granted, if you jump into the lake you won’t find the moon—on the contrary, the very reflection will vanish. To attain the moon, diving into the lake is useless—no matter how many plunges you take, the moon isn’t there.
But whether in the lake or not, it is the reflection of the real moon. The wise, seeing the moon in the lake, set out on the journey to the real moon. Then the lake’s moon becomes a pointing finger toward the moon. The moon is above, far away; yet the lake’s moon points toward it. One must not descend into the lake; one must journey to the moon beyond. Then the lake becomes a helper; then the lake becomes scripture.
Scripture can be used in two ways. The wise catch the finger of the word and set out toward the wordless: the word points; the journey is to the wordless. The love of the world—and the search for God. For love is love; only its reflection is appearing in the world. The world is a mirror. But the unwise keep diving into the scriptures themselves—they get entangled in words, ensnared in their nets, and forget that words are only pictures—what one has to seek is the one of whom the picture is.
The experience of lovers through the ages is contained here. As if one gathered thousands of roses and distilled attar from them—perhaps only a few drops, but in those drops would be the essence, the fragrance, the spirit, the soul of thousands of flowers.
For centuries humanity’s experience is this: how many have not loved! Who is there who has not, little or much, loved? Even the stingiest loves a little. Even the worst man cannot entirely escape love; some fragrance reaches him, some song resounds in the heart, some anklets begin to chime on his feet. Whether your love is for your son, your wife, your father, your mother, a friend, a beloved, for music or poetry—love will peep at you from somewhere.
The attar of all these loves is this: no love ever fully satisfies. However much you love your wife or your husband, you will not be satiated. From this lack arises a delusion: “This wife isn’t right; this husband is wrong—my misfortune that I got tied to this wretch; some error occurred.” But it is your arithmetic that errs—nothing else. You can change wives—the whole world now allows divorce—you can change wives…
I’ve heard of a man in America who changed wives eight times—and was shocked to find each time that after four or six months he felt: yet again, in a new face—a new model, a new edition—I’ve found the same old wife! The features differ, hair color differs, height, length—everything different—and yet why is the whole business the same? The same quarrels, the same upheavals, the same troubles—what is the matter?
The matter is simple: the one who seeks is the same. He will fall in love with the same kind of woman again and again. Change as many wives, as many husbands, as many friends as you like—satisfaction will not come through worldly love, because you are trying to get the moon by jumping into the lake. If the fact of this dissatisfaction is rightly understood, a door opens—the door of the mystery.
No love in this world can fill you—that is your good fortune, not your misfortune. For if some worldly love could fill you, why would you ever set out to seek God? The love of this world always fails—falls.
Why does it fall? Because deep within you the yearning is to attain God, to attain the Supreme Beloved—and with that very yearning you hold out your begging bowl before some woman or man. What can that poor woman do? How can she fill your bowl with nectar? If she had it, she would give—but she herself is a beggar. She stands before you with her bowl. And you are mad.
I’ve heard—there were two astrologers in a village. Every morning on the way to market they would meet and say, “Brother, have a look at my hand.” They’d read each other’s palm and hand over a quarter-rupee to one another—no loss; the money you give away comes back; your own remains yours, his remains his—and the hand is examined free. And they’d ask each other, “How will business go today?” These are astrologers! Out to tell others’ fortunes!
Of psychologists I’ve heard an even more amazing story.
Two psychologists met on their way to their offices one morning. After greetings, one said, “You are absolutely fine; I guarantee it. Now say something about me.”
No knowledge of oneself—ready to guarantee about the other! Asking the other about oneself.
Psychologists go to each other for analysis: “Analyze me—so much anxiety, so much worry, sleepless nights, thoughts of suicide.”
You’ll be surprised to know that, proportionally, more psychologists commit suicide than people of any other profession—twice as many. Not gamblers, not drunkards, not pimps—none commit as many suicides as psychologists do—double. And psychologists are twice as crazy too; none are so mad—not even politicians; in madness psychologists have outdone them. And these are the folks doing the business of curing the world’s madness!
It is a strange state; beggars holding out their bowls to other beggars: “Give me something; today I won’t go without getting something.” The wife asks you, “Give me love!” You ask your wife, “Give me love!” Who will give love? Both are askers; there is no giver; both beggars. Then both bowls remain empty—and rage arises. You feel cheated.
No one has cheated you! When you are far, you cheat yourself. Distance creates deception. You meet a woman on Chowpatty… who doesn’t go chowpat on Chowpatty? When you meet there, she is all dressed up, and so are you; perfume and scent; neither your real smell is known nor hers. You are hidden in clothes, she is hidden in clothes.
Clothes deceive greatly. We think clothes were invented to conceal nakedness—wrong. Clothes were invented to reveal nakedness, to accentuate it. Naked women are not as beautiful as they appear in dress—because clothes can give many illusions. With the right cut a breast can seem young and firm; a bony chest, but cotton stuffed in a coat can create the illusion that the mighty Hanuman has arrived. Shoulders utterly slumped—one glance would send you fleeing—but padding makes them look broad.
One of my sannyasins is Madhuri. Her whole family is in sannyas. Madhuri is a sannyasin, her sister Sarita is a sannyasin, their mother is a sannyasin. Madhuri’s mother told me she had breast cancer—about fifty-five years old—so both breasts had to be removed. One had to be removed for sure; the other was at risk, so it was better to remove it preventively. She was very troubled. It’s not India, it’s America—there, a woman without both breasts—consider her dead. What is left of “living”! The whole play is about breasts! Not only children live off breasts—old men too. Children drink milk, old men too. So she was distressed. The doctor said, “No need to worry—now plastic breasts are available.”
So both breasts were removed and plastic breasts given. She told me, “I was returning from Mexico and stopped at a crossing to ask a policeman for directions. His eyes got stuck on my breasts. I’m your sannyasin, a joke came to me—I had never joked like that before. But since becoming your sannyasin I have learned to joke. I asked him, ‘Like them?’ He hesitated, sweat on his forehead, got flustered, looked around. I said, ‘No need to be nervous—do you like them? Tell the truth.’ He said, ‘I like them, they’re beautiful!’ So I took both breasts out and handed them to him: ‘Then you keep them!’
“His condition was worth seeing—standing there with plastic breasts in his hands, utterly bewildered what to do. I drove off—who knows what he went through!”
Clothes keep things hidden. You meet someone on Chowpatty—there’s no certainty who is what; the reality will be known later—when you come close. No one is out to cheat anyone; but distance creates deception—mirage. You think you have found the woman you have been seeking for lifetimes; the woman thinks she has found the man she has sought for lifetimes. Come near, and you see: an ordinary woman, an ordinary man—nothing found; cheated again. And this cheat you have been enduring for lifetimes.
“Kacchi kandh ute kaana ae.”
A crow sits on a crumbling wall.
“Milṇā tā̃ Rab nū̃ hai.”
Union is with the Divine. With anything less the heart will not be filled. Until the ocean pours into the drop, satiation is impossible. And—
“Terā piār bahāna hai.”
If this is understood, there is no fault in love either.
“Your love is a pretext.”
If you love your wife as though through her you are loving God, there is no harm. This is my teaching, Vinod—this is what I am teaching! Do not run away from love. In love, inquire: what is it you truly seek? Then in your son, your mother, your wife, your husband, your friend—the same search continues.
When the sun rises and the sky fills with beautiful clouds and colors fly in all directions like Holi powders, birds sing and flowers open—remember: this beauty is His. When at night the sky fills with stars—remember: those eyes are His. When someone plays a tune on the flute and your very life begins to dance—remember: that flute is His, that song is His.
Wherever your love moves—toward poetry, music, art, dance, toward woman or man—keep only this remembrance: this love is an arrow pointing to Him. The going is to Him.
“Milṇā tā̃ Rab nū̃ hai.”
The going is to Him, the meeting is with the Beloved.
“Terā piār bahāna hai.”
Everything else is a pretext. And pretexts are not bad, if taken as pretexts—they are pegs. Hang upon those pegs—but let what you hang be love for God. If only you could see God in your wife, in your husband—then there would be no need to go to any other temple.
What madness! In living children they do not see God, and they sit listening to the Bhagavata—which is only the story of one living child, nothing else. The story of a marvelous child, nothing else. They hum Surdas’ verse: “Mother, I did not eat the butter.” Yet at home when your child says, “Mother, I didn’t eat the butter,” he gets a beating—“Who else ate it, you wretch? Where did the butter go?”—and you hum Surdas! What a wonder!
Krishna throws stones and breaks someone’s pot—devotees melt; Dongre Maharaj’s eyes stream with tears. Devotees’ eyes grow wet—tears don’t drop, boondi drops! But if your own boy breaks someone’s water pot—he gets a beating: “Come down, you rascal! Now I’ll teach you a lesson you’ll remember!” Then go beat Dongre Maharaj! Catch Surdas lest he escape—set him straight!
Love life! You are entangled in stories. This life is very lovely. From all sides, God’s glimmer shines—but you are stuck in trash. The tappa is lovely—remember it:
“Kacchi kandh ute kaana ae,
milṇā tā̃ Rab nū̃ hai,
terā piār bahāna hai.”
Life, what is it? A riddle—
now an enemy, now a friend.
I touched it and saw—the lovers’ assembly,
each at his own place is alone,
now an enemy, now a friend.
In the desert of the heart the boat of companionship,
shoved along, tottering—
now an enemy, now a friend.
Read it with great attention—
it is the very palm of destiny,
now an enemy, now a friend.
Fingers were skinned just touching it—
who told you it was jasmine?
Now an enemy, now a friend.
Life, what is it? A riddle—
now an enemy, now a friend.
But it all depends on you. Life is neither enemy nor friend. Understand—and it is a friend; don’t understand—and it is an enemy. Understand—and there is nothing but God; don’t understand—and it is “kacchi kandh ute kaana ae”—a crumbling wall and a crow perched. Understand—and it is the eternal, and lines of swans are winging across—the lines of paramhansas. It is all in your hands.
Yes, I am a mad lover; if I wish, I can surge and sway.
I can overturn the laws of the secret bower of beauty.
Thorns are only thorns—I can walk on embers.
My beloved, my friend—no, not even that—
the demand of my frank nature is something else:
Shall I let the world pass by at this same pace,
let desires choke and die within my heart,
let your tresses scatter bare upon your shoulders?
My beloved, my friend—no, not even that—
the demand of my frank nature is something else.
One day let me snatch away the zeal of the heedless,
let me break, break the glamour of the world,
and here let the pulse of jealousy’s veins run out—
the pride of love demands this spectacle,
the demand of my nature, my friend, is this.
Yes, I am a mad lover; if I wish, I can surge and sway.
I can overturn the laws of the secret bower of beauty.
Thorns are only thorns—I can walk on embers.
My beloved, my friend—no, not even that—
the demand of my frank nature is something else.
Do not end in the petty. Attain the Vast. Do not finish in time. Build your home in the Eternal.
The demand of my frank nature is something else.
Second question:
Osho, a little more information regarding Dattabal—three years ago I was in Miraj and he expressed a desire to meet. We met at the home of the female disciple with whom he was staying. The whole time he was so restless that he could not sit in one place even for five minutes. Again and again he would get up and go into his room. When he came back, he would ask to have the furniture in the hall where we were sitting rearranged. Finally he said, let some conversation take place. I said that I had not come here for conversation; if you want to ask something, ask. Otherwise, let us all sit together in silence for ten minutes in satsang. At this, pointing toward me, he said to his seated disciples, “Learn—learn something from him.” But he himself got up and left. The disciples said that because of diabetes he is so restless! When he returned there was the same restlessness—as if he were an animal in a cage. When he sat down he told his favorite disciple, who is also the author of his biography, “Give him the book you wrote.” The disciple got up to bring the book and then he started looking for a pen. I gave him my pen, and in that same agitation, while signing the book, he spoiled my pen—he pressed so hard drawing a line that the page almost tore. I read that biography closely and found that the whole book was full of his conceit. He lays claim to some occult powers—experiments for which that one disciple alone is the witness. He believes that, sitting far away, he moves things by willpower or brings rain from the clouds. The entire book is full of such accounts. Osho, Dattabal is such a godman gone astray that even if you say something about him it ends up honoring him. As I see it, he is only worthy of being ignored. Osho, why do you waste so much effort on these fools?
Osho, a little more information regarding Dattabal—three years ago I was in Miraj and he expressed a desire to meet. We met at the home of the female disciple with whom he was staying. The whole time he was so restless that he could not sit in one place even for five minutes. Again and again he would get up and go into his room. When he came back, he would ask to have the furniture in the hall where we were sitting rearranged. Finally he said, let some conversation take place. I said that I had not come here for conversation; if you want to ask something, ask. Otherwise, let us all sit together in silence for ten minutes in satsang. At this, pointing toward me, he said to his seated disciples, “Learn—learn something from him.” But he himself got up and left. The disciples said that because of diabetes he is so restless! When he returned there was the same restlessness—as if he were an animal in a cage. When he sat down he told his favorite disciple, who is also the author of his biography, “Give him the book you wrote.” The disciple got up to bring the book and then he started looking for a pen. I gave him my pen, and in that same agitation, while signing the book, he spoiled my pen—he pressed so hard drawing a line that the page almost tore. I read that biography closely and found that the whole book was full of his conceit. He lays claim to some occult powers—experiments for which that one disciple alone is the witness. He believes that, sitting far away, he moves things by willpower or brings rain from the clouds. The entire book is full of such accounts. Osho, Dattabal is such a godman gone astray that even if you say something about him it ends up honoring him. As I see it, he is only worthy of being ignored. Osho, why do you waste so much effort on these fools?
Ajit Saraswati, because they are fools—precisely for that reason. They are lost—precisely for that reason. They are asleep—precisely for that reason. And these are not ordinary fools; they are the kind who make others into fools as well. That’s why a little extra effort has to be made with them. Some fools are just fools themselves; their foolishness is limited to themselves. Not much danger. Not contagious. They don’t spread the disease. Their disease is not infectious. But these are among those fools whose disease is infectious.