Man Hi Pooja Man Hi Dhoop #4

Anand Maitreya, first thing: in the past the priest did what, in the present, the so‑called psychologist is doing. He is the modern age’s priest. Priests used to speak the language of religion; the psychologist speaks the language of science. The difference is only of language. The bottle has changed; the wine has not. And even if the bottle changes a thousand times, if the wine remains the same, nothing essential changes.

In the name of religion, priests exploited human beings for centuries; now psychology is doing the same. It speaks modern language, but its way of thinking, its grip on life, is very old. It looks new, but it isn’t. That is why both priests and the so‑called psychologists oppose me. In fact, the psychologists oppose me more, because the priest is already a beaten force—almost on his deathbed, raving. The psychologist’s shop is new; the threat to him is greater. Just as I am taking away the priest’s customers, I am also taking away the psychologist’s. Naturally, the owner of a new shop gets angrier.

But note, the psychologists who oppose me are Indian; non‑Indian psychologists do not. There is a reason for that too. India lags behind in everything. In India, “psychology” still means Freud. In the West, Freud is gone; his days are over—so are Adler’s and Jung’s. Today the influence is of Assagioli and the new humanistic psychologists—Erich Fromm, Carl Rogers, Fritz Perls... Indian psychologists scarcely have any connection with them.

I have been both a student and a teacher at university. Psychology was my subject. I know the Indian psychologists whose books are on university syllabi. They still talk the psychology of fifty years ago. There’s a reason: whatever they learned thirty, forty, fifty years back, there they stopped. In this country, after leaving the university, nobody studies; even while at university, who studies? People read cram guides. Once they somehow escape with a degree, they never look at a book again.

In the West, psychologists are not against me. Among my sannyasins, the most represented profession is psychology. Established psychologists have taken sannyas. But the Indian psychologist still speaks the stale, decaying language of Freud. Understand Freud and you will understand their opposition. This needs a little attention.

For centuries, religious leaders taught: there is Ram, there is no kama; heaven is, earth is not. Earth is illusion; sky is truth. The world is false; Brahman is true. The body is false; the soul is true. The visible, which is seen, is unreal; the invisible, which is not seen, is real.

Thus an inverted lesson took hold—of life‑denial, life‑rejection. The consequences were bound to be disastrous. How can you deny what is? And if you try, there is only one way: close your eyes and stand like an ostrich; the enemy won’t be seen—assume he isn’t there.

The priests made human beings blind to sex. And the blinder one became, the more one fell under sex’s sway. A man with eyes may find his way; how will the blind? He cannot even see what he should avoid! And if you label something “illusion,” why bother to be free of it?

By calling it maya, you tried to reject a vital truth of life. That truth took its revenge. The whole of humanity became sex‑ridden. Your stories, your poems, your films, your novels, your plays—not just modern but ancient, whether Kalidasa or Bhavabhuti—are saturated with sexual imagery. Kalidasa, seeing fruit hanging on a tree, thinks only of a woman’s breasts—nothing else. Your temples, your shrines—look closely—are sickly expressions of sex. Your escapist sannyasins—sex doing a headstand!

This had to happen, because no truth can ever be denied. Truths can be transformed; they cannot be suppressed. Those who suppress will repent, because what you push down will take revenge. What you repress settles in your unconscious like gunpowder; a single spark and there is an explosion.

Because of the stupidity of priests over centuries, humanity has not been able to be free of lust. Freedom from lust is possible—but not by sitting on its chest. It comes by understanding sex, meditating on it, making it an experience of witnessing, giving it a path upward. The very energy of sex becomes the foundation that one day takes you to Ram.

You have only one energy—flowing downward, its name is kama; flowing upward, its name is Ram. When your sexual energy gives birth only to children, it is kama; when it begins to give birth to you—when your soul is born of it—the very same energy is called Ram.

The priests denied sex, earth, the earthly. The consequences were so dire that Freud swung to the other extreme. The three thinkers who most shaped this century are Freud, Marx, and Nietzsche. All three denied God. Each, for different reasons, rejected Ram.

Freud denied Ram because, in Ram’s name, the repression of sex made people sick and deranged. He was searching for health. So he denied God to affirm sex. Priests had denied sex to affirm God; Freud denied God to affirm sex. Same story, the other extreme.

Marx did something similar. Priests invented theories of karma and fate to keep people poor and downtrodden—on their basis exploitation continued for centuries; no revolution could happen. So Marx denied God: if there is no bamboo, there will be no flute. Break the center that supports the web of fate and karma, and the web collapses—that was the hope.

Nietzsche denied God in the hope that God had created a slavish mentality in man—“we are nothing, you are everything!” How can a man with a slave mind realize his own being?

These three thinkers denied God for different reasons, but they agreed on one point: God is false, the world is true. The old sutra was: the world is false, Brahman is true. These three said: Brahman is false, the world is true. In my vision, both are incomplete. One accepted the sky and denied the earth; the other accepted the earth and denied the sky. Man remained half.

Man is born of the meeting of sky and earth, the embrace of the visible and the invisible, the union of the earthly and the unearthly. To reject half of man is to keep him sick.

So the old disease was changed—Freud bravely changed it—but a new disease arose. By rejecting Ram, life lost meaning; a great emptiness, a temple without a deity.

Imagine: priests accepted the flowers and denied the roots. Without roots there can be no flowers. In reaction, Freud, Marx, Nietzsche denied the flowers and accepted the roots. But what is the point of roots without blossoms? Roots are meaningful only when flowers bloom in the sky, and flowers can bloom only when roots plunge into the earth.

I accept the roots and the flowers. Hence I must bear opposition from both sides—the priests oppose me because I accept the roots; the so‑called psychologists oppose me because I accept the flowers. Nothing surprising.

The psychologists who oppose me are Indian. They have no idea of the new methods and fresh waves rising in psychology. From the West, psychologists are being drawn toward me. Hundreds have become sannyasins—established, well‑known names. But the Indian psychologist is, after all, an Indian psychologist! His being a “psychologist” is not worth much. Inside he is full of stale beliefs; he merely plasters psychology on the surface.

Chandulal saw Dabbuji’s new umbrella and said, “Friend, where did you get this new umbrella? The season hasn’t even started; even the temples aren’t crowded yet.” Dabbuji replied, “Chandu, it isn’t new—twenty years old.” Chandulal exclaimed, “Twenty years! But it looks brand new.” Dabbuji said, “I’ve had it repaired dozens of times, and swapped it with friends’ umbrellas by mistake who knows how many times—but it’s still twenty years old.”

That’s the Indian mind. Repair it, swap it, hammer it, paint it—the old remains old; it won’t become new. We’ve made a habit, a nature, of staying ancient. We’ve fallen in love with the decrepit. The older a thing, the more respect we give it.

So every religious leader here tries to prove, “Our religion is the oldest.” Hindus say the Vedas are oldest—five thousand years at least; Western historians also grant that. But Hindus are not satisfied with five thousand. Lokmanya Tilak tried to prove they are ninety thousand years old—at least!

What need to drag so far back? Here, age is prestige. Ask the Jains and they’ll say: the Vedas are ancient, but Jain dharma is older still. The Rigveda mentions the first Tirthankara, Adinatha, with great respect; so Adinatha must be older than the Rigveda. And such reverence isn’t shown to living sages—so the Jains have a point: at least five hundred or a thousand years must have passed since Adinatha when the Rigveda mentions him. We have strange customs: while alive we abuse; once dead, we begin to praise.

A man and Rousseau were bitter enemies all their lives. One morning someone told Rousseau, “Your arch‑enemy died last night.” Rousseau said, “If this news is true, I can say the man was great—provided he is really dead! If he’s still alive, I take my words back.”

In a village, a politician died. The whole village was relieved—he had sucked them dry. Outwardly people looked sad. At the cremation ground there was a custom—almost in every caste—that two words of praise be spoken for the deceased. But the man had no praiseworthy quality. People wracked their brains: what to say? Even the big orators stared at one another, helpless.

Finally they begged Mulla Nasruddin to speak. “You are the wise one here; find a way.” Mulla stood and said, “Brothers, we are very sad at the leader’s death. He was what he was, but let me remind you—he leaves behind five brothers, compared to whom he was a saint.”

Thus praise had to be done!

The Indian “psychologist” is not a psychologist. He may be a psychology teacher, a writer of textbooks, but not a psychologist. The Indian mind has not passed through those processes from which psychology is born. It is deeply burdened with worn‑out traditions. So the so‑called Indian psychologist will oppose my words. He also opposes because no psychologist from the West is coming to him; he goes West to massage their feet. He picks up dry crumbs fallen from their tables and lives on them. At my door there is a queue of Western psychologists. That breeds envy, unease, bewilderment. He cannot believe his eyes.

At least two hundred Ph.D.s in psychology in the West are my sannyasins. Some are here now; some have become residents. They have written books; they are known. And here one may be working in the garden, digging a pit; another cleaning toilets; another sweeping. The Indian psychologist cannot believe it—why are so many psychologists coming here, surrendering like this? Envy grips him. He is troubled.

Just a few days ago, the well‑known Indian writer Mulk Raj Anand came to the ashram. He has written beautiful books. He told Laxmi, “Bhagwan is the first person I have come to listen to; I never go to hear anyone. I came because his ideas are exactly what my ideas are. It’s as if he is speaking my thoughts.”

Laxmi asked, “His waves have reached to the corners of the earth. Millions are stirred. If you have been saying the same things, and you are older—how many people came to you?”

He lowered his head; not a single person had come. Naturally, it’s unsettling. Even his coming was inverted: he is not impressed by me, he is impressed by himself. He feels I am saying what he says; that’s why he came.

I am not saying what he says. Perhaps he has not read, not pondered, not understood—some stray talk reached his ears.

There is a famous Indian psychologist—Dr. Lalji Ram Shukla. I was a student then, thirty years ago. He chaired psychology at Banaras Hindu University. I had gone for a debate. A young man who knew me lived in his house. He told Dr. Shukla about me. Shukla said he would be happy to meet. Next morning, a cold morning, he was sitting in the sun on the terrace. Ten‑twenty disciples were there; some teachers too—curious what might happen between a young student and a renowned professor, author of many books.

We began talking of God. Dr. Shukla said, “I have faith in God.” I asked, “Faith or experience?” The talk broke, and could not be made again. I said, “Put your hand on your chest, swear by God—do you have faith or experience? If it is only faith, not experience, faith can be wrong. Faith is borrowed. What is the guarantee of faith? Only experience carries certainty.”

He looked here and there. He did not have the courage to place his hand on his chest and swear. He said, “No, I have belief, not experience.” I said, “Then your belief is like a blind man believing there is light. What value has it? I say I have experience. Please step down from the dais; let me sit there. Show at least this courtesy!”

He flared up, stood at once, “I don’t want to talk further.”

I said, “Why so angry about God? Why so upset? All right, you sit on the dais; I’ll sit below—because wherever I sit, there is the dais. But one thing is clear: I speak from experience; you speak from belief. Belief is only a possibility—maybe, maybe not. I say: is! And let me add, God is not a person. Existence is full of godliness; ‘God’ as a person is nowhere.”

The teachers and students who had gathered grew interested in me. The more they listened to me, the more Shukla boiled. Finally he burst out, “Leave my house at once!”

I said, “You invited me, so I came; you ask me to go, so I go—it’s your house. I didn’t take it as a favor when you invited me; I don’t take it as an insult when you ask me to go. Namaste.”

I went down the stairs. The teachers and students, pained by his discourtesy—first inviting me, then neither maintaining decorum nor answering arguments, and instead getting angry—came down with me in remorse to see me off. Shukla was left alone on the terrace. He grew even more enraged and shouted from above, “You go down with him! He will leave tomorrow; I will remain. You, my students, betrayed me!”

All his life he remained my enemy. There was never another occasion to meet—impossible now—but the enmity persisted. And all over a simple point on which no enmity need be.

Do not ask about the state of the Indian psychologist. This is not an isolated story. They are not used to speaking with Buddhas, nor capable of understanding the words of Buddhas. Inside they carry Indian junk they cannot drop. They talk Freud and recite Tulsidas—some khichdi. Where is Freud and where is Tulsidas! What harmony can there be? But Tulsidas’s couplets are in their veins, and Freud’s teaching is just a coat of paint. The amalgam creates a strange condition. Their tradition, Vedas, Upanishads, Gita, Ramayana—all present—and along with them Freud, fundamentally opposed. They don’t see the contradiction; they cover it up.

I do not wish to hide anything from my eyes, nor to falsify. I want to state facts as they are.

We have lost the habit of hearing truth. For centuries we have preferred pleasant lies, consoling lies. Our chests carry so many wounds that we look for ointment and bandages; we have no longing for revolution. We are dead, and if we can somehow drag life along, we think we have done much.

So, Anand Maitreya, those whom you call “educated and familiar with modern psychology” are neither familiar with modern psychology nor discerning. They are not even in possession of themselves—how will they be “discerning”?

Modern psychology has gone far beyond Freud. It is coming closer to religion. It is beginning to suspect that man does not end with mind; there is something beyond—soul, and who knows, perhaps the divine. First glimpses are appearing, and new directions are opening.

What is happening in this ashram is happening in no ashram in India. Around sixty therapeutic groups are running here. Leave aside India: nowhere in the world—not even in centers devoted to psychology—are sixty therapy groups running. Slowly, without fanfare, this ashram has become the world’s largest psychological center. That breeds jealousy, unease, pain.

It’s not that no psychologist opposes me in the West; some do—ten percent perhaps. Not a large number. They are those afraid I am taking their clients. Patients they could not help for years come here and are healed by meditation within months.

A very well‑known Dutch psychologist and writer, Deva Amrito—himself a psychologist, with a Ph.D.—took therapy from the biggest names, yet found no resolution. Here, plunging into meditation, his problems washed away like debris swept off a riverbank by a flood. He wrote a book on his return. It reached every home in Holland. Sixty thousand copies sold in three weeks—records broken! Naturally, many patients left their therapists and set out for Pune. Those who lost clients—without my intending it—felt their trade hurt.

So a group of psychologists sent a woman here—she too a psychologist—to write a book against me, to counter Amrito’s book and stem the flow to India. My name had reached every home there. Today, there are more people here from Holland than from any other country—because of Amrito and his joy. People saw him before and after.

The woman came and went—neither informing anyone, nor joining a therapy group, nor doing any meditation. She merely took a look around. Then she wrote to me, “Although I came, I couldn’t meet you, nor see much of the ashram because I sat in the Blue Diamond hotel writing a book about it; I had no time.”

Is that how you write a book about an ashram? No time to come to the ashram, yet writing about it from a hotel room! Her book is being printed this month. What weight will that opposition have? She was sent; the sending is only a formality. She arrived with bias. If one could write the book sitting in the Blue Diamond, why come at all? Only for show, to claim she had “seen.” But seeing cannot happen that way. She did not do Vipassana, nor Zazen, nor Sufi dance. She neither danced nor sang. She did not drink even a single sip in the ochre tavern here. What force will such a book have? It will be impotent.

Amrito has just returned to Holland. People asked him, “What do you say about the book written against Osho?” He said, “Many books will be written in favor and many against. This is a man who will divide the whole world into two camps—pro or con.”

He spoke truly. He also said, “More and more commotion is coming.”

We will not leave anyone neutral—either with me or against me; you must decide. In both cases you connect with me. And if you must connect, better on the side of the affirmative—what will you gain by connecting through opposition?

The Indian psychologist still lives in a bullock‑cart world—or if he rises a bit higher, it is only to the bus.

Mulla Nasruddin was flying for the first time. The plane hadn’t yet taken off. He kept calling the air hostess: “Are all parts okay? Filled the petrol? Engine working?” She got exasperated. “Why are you so worried? Everything’s in order. You needn’t fuss about parts, petrol, engine.” Nasruddin said, “I say it’s better to check now, otherwise don’t ask me to push once we’re up there. Many times in buses I’ve had to get down to push when they stall.”

I do not place much value on the Indian psychologist. I have yet to see a true Indian psychologist. Yes, there are psychology teachers—but teaching psychology and being a psychologist are different things. Teaching philosophy and being a philosopher are different. Teaching theology and being religious are different. Teaching poetics and being a poet are different.

And the few who do psychotherapy in Bombay or Delhi rely on tired notions thirty or forty years old, which in the West are worthless; the West discarded them long ago. Our misfortune is that we lag in everything. By the time we hear that something has become useless there, thirty years have passed. What they throw in the trash, we put on a pedestal. Their pace speeds ahead; we stop where we are.

I was thrown out of colleges and a university when I was a student—for “creating trouble.” What trouble? If they had been teachers, they would have honored what I was saying. I simply said, “What you are teaching might have been considered correct thirty or forty years ago; those times are gone. Look at the new literature.” I would bring new books. But no one admits ignorance, least of all a teacher.

A professor kept teaching Hume, Locke, and Berkeley—the three old English thinkers—on whom he had written his thesis forty years earlier. I said, “Hume is in the same condition as Hume pipes. Who cares for Hume now! Since we are in Jabalpur, and there’s a Hume Pipe factory here, why don’t you open a Hume pipe factory? In the West, thinkers are discussing Wittgenstein, Jaspers, Heidegger, Jean‑Paul Sartre, Gabriel Marcel, Berdyaev.” He hadn’t even heard the names. “Where do you invent these names from!” he said.

One of the great misfortunes of this country is that we cannot keep step with the world. Western science walks on the moon; our condition? Three thousand years behind. Forget the moon; even living rightly on earth is becoming difficult. The same in psychology: the West is taking great flights; revolutionary ideas are being proposed.

R.D. Laing stands at the peak right now in the West. Laing is influenced by me. He has met my sannyasins, visited our London center. He sent me his books, saying I should see them; someday he wants to come. But the Indian psychologist may not even know Laing’s name.

This mismatch explains why priests oppose me, and so do the so‑called psychologists. The root reason, let me repeat: I accept life in its totality—from roots to flowers, from kama to Ram, from matter to the divine. Materialists oppose me because I bring in the divine; theists oppose me because I bring in matter. What am I to do? Matter is, and the divine is. They are two sides of one coin; you cannot drop either. Whoever drops one remains incomplete—and the incomplete man is sick. We need the whole man, the integrated man. This wholeness I call holiness.

Therefore I will be opposed from many sides. The theist will oppose me because some of my words sound atheistic, and the atheist will oppose me because some sound theistic. Only the one who can look beyond both theism and atheism, who can transcend the duality, can stand with me. Those caught in dualities cannot understand me; they can only misunderstand me—and in me they will see only what they want to see.

Chandulal once went to a painting exhibition. Many famous paintings by renowned artists were displayed. To him they all looked crude—like a child had smeared colors on paper. As he moved along, he grew angry at the stupidity of the painters. In the last corner, he saw a portrait of a bald, crusty fellow, and his anger knew no bounds. He called the curator: “Sir, what was the need to hang this painting of this bald, mean man? Is this worth showing?”

The curator replied, “Sir, you are standing in front of a mirror. This is not a painting.”

Mukesh Bharti, ‘guru’ is a neutral word. A guru can be a false guru or a true guru. A guru can be spurious or genuine. So the word ‘guru’ by itself does not suffice. ‘Sadguru’ means: the true guru.

What is the difference between a pseudo-guru and a sadguru? The pseudo-guru may speak beautifully, but all his words are borrowed—secondhand, not his own, not from his own experience. The pseudo-guru is the one who is a Hindu, a Muslim, a Christian; who keeps repeating the Quran, the Bible, the Vedas. He thumps some tradition. The sadguru speaks from his own innermost being, whose inner consciousness has blossomed, in whose inmost core spring has arrived; who does not quote any Veda, any Dhammapada, any Quran; whatever he says, he says on his own strength; he himself is the proof and the witness of his words.

“Not what is written, but what is seen”—remember Kabir’s saying. One who speaks from seeing, not from writing. One who has beheld the self with his own eyes; who has descended the steps of his own innermost core; who has tasted the life hidden within—he is the sadguru. In him the inner lamp is lit.

The false guru is the one who holds in his hand a picture of a lit lamp; the sadguru is the one who holds in his hand a lit lamp. And sometimes it can happen that both look alike. Sometimes the picture of a lit lamp may even look more beautiful than the lit lamp itself—filled with rich colors. At times a picture can outshine the real. It can even be three-dimensional.

When three-dimensional films first appeared and were shown for the first time in London, there was great amazement. In ordinary films you see pictures as pictures; in three-dimensional films you see them like actual persons—with length, breadth, thickness, depth. Just as a person is. In that first 3D film shown in London, a horseman comes charging with a spear. Everyone in the theater suddenly ducks, because when he throws the spear it feels as if it might strike their skulls. Right down the middle a passage opens—some people lean this way, some that—because the horse seems to be coming straight through, so let it pass between! It is only a film, but it appears so alive.

Those who carry pictures in their hands are the false gurus. The sadguru holds the lamp. Even if the lamp is made of clay and the picture is made of gold, the clay lamp will give you light; the picture will not.

A queen once came to test King Solomon. In one hand she held a bouquet of artificial flowers, and in the other a bouquet of real flowers. It was said of King Solomon that he was the most brilliant man in the world. The queen set many tests; among them this: she entered the palace, came into court, and said, “Your Majesty, I have heard many tales of your wisdom. Can you tell which of these flowers are real and which are fake?”

Solomon was a bit perplexed. The flowers looked exactly alike—exactly alike. Solomon said, “I have grown old; my vision is a little dim. Come a little closer.” She did. Still, it was difficult to decide. Then the king said, “Do this: open all the doors and windows; I do not see well. It is a little dark here.” The doors and windows were opened. Within two minutes the king said, “In your left hand are the real flowers.”

The queen was stunned. She had had the flowers made by a great artist; they were so exact she herself would forget which hand held the real and which the fake. She had written on her wrists—this side real, this side fake—so she would not forget; otherwise how would she decide? “How did the king recognize them?”

She asked Solomon, “Will you tell me the secret—how did you know?”

He said, “The secret is simple. That is why I had the doors and windows opened. A bee flew in from the garden. Whichever bouquet she sat on, that one was real. You can deceive a human being; you cannot deceive a bee. She will recognize the real—the one with nectar. The fake cannot have nectar.”

The sadguru holds a bouquet of real flowers. The false gurus hold bouquets of fake flowers; although their bouquets are venerated by tradition, honored for centuries. And you are all worshippers of tradition, so naturally you fall more easily into the clutches of fake gurus. To relate with a sadguru requires great courage, great daring, because it may be that what he says goes against tradition. It will go against it! Because he does not want to exploit you by leaning on tradition. His words are not formalities; they are essential. He wants to reveal truth. He is not concerned with mere etiquette.

Your pundits and priests are false gurus; they keep up appearances. They ring the bell in the temple, they wave the platter of worship—but there is no devotion in their hearts, no feeling in their breath. Or even if there is feeling, it may be the exact opposite of worship.

A young woman boarded a crowded bus with a heavy suitcase and put it on the overhead rack. Then she stood in the aisle. A young man rose and, very politely, said, “Please take my seat.” After a little protest, the young woman sat down and, with a seductive smile, asked, “Why are you being so kind to me?” “The thing is,” the young man clarified, “you put your suitcase on the rack above this seat, and when the bus starts I’m afraid it might fall.”

What shows on the surface is not necessarily what is inside. He did not stand up to give the woman a seat; he stood up out of fear the suitcase might fall.

Mukesh, ‘sadguru’ means one who has realized truth, who is enlightened, awakened; who has become a Jina—one who has conquered himself; who has become a Buddha—one who has recognized himself. ‘False guru’ means one who is scriptural, hypocritical, formal. He has no wealth of his own.

One afternoon Mulla Nasruddin was coming out of a bank. Suddenly he shouted, “Has anyone dropped a bundle of currency notes?” Some ten or twenty people rushed forward: “Mine! Mine!” He said, “Brothers, don’t get upset. I have only found the string that ties the bundle; I haven’t found the bundle yet.”

The false guru has only the string in his hand. Who lost the bundle, where it fell, whose hands it landed in—no one knows. The wealth is not his—stale, borrowed.

Hence both words are meaningful.

The false guru has not experienced anything himself, but he has understood one thing: people are thirsty for truth, and truth can be turned into a business. And the false guru agrees to give truth cheap.

There was a fair in a village. Two little boys were selling sherbet—twins, it seemed. One was selling at one anna a glass, the other at two paise a glass, and the sherbet was the same. Naturally, the two-paise seller was doing brisk business; the crowd gathered there. At last a man asked the one selling at one anna, “What’s the matter? You are twins; the sherbet is the same; there’s no crowd at your stall and a big crowd at his. Why are you selling at one anna a glass while he sells at two paise?”

He said, “What can I tell you? A mouse fell into his sherbet last night, so he’s selling it cheap. Now his sherbet is good for nothing. My sherbet we can still drink at home.”

People go where it’s cheap. Cheapness has an attraction. The false guru sells cheap—almost free. No turmeric, no alum, yet the color should come out bright! You need spend nothing. But if you go to the sadguru, you will have to stake your life. The sadguru is for gamblers—for risk-takers—not for businessmen.

Seeing a fierce Alsatian at the door, Dhabbuji stopped outside, hesitating. “Come on in, come on in, Dhabbu; don’t be afraid,” Chandulal encouraged his friend. Dhabbuji: “Does this dog bite?” Chandulal: “Friend, that’s exactly what I’m calling you in to find out—let’s see what kind of dog he is! I bought him only yesterday.”

Your pundits and priests are trying their mantras, tantras, yantras on you; they have made you their testing ground. They themselves have no experience. They think, “Perhaps it will work on you; then someday we’ll try it on ourselves.” But if it hasn’t worked on you, it has proved useless.

The sadguru is one who has experienced for himself and now shares the wealth of his experience. But to receive that wealth, some preparation is required; I call that preparation sannyas. Some worthiness must be shown; I call that worthiness sannyas.

Sannyas means only this: you are ready to bow down. The false guru will not make you bow; he will even press your feet, he will bow to you, he will flatter you. The sadguru is ready to efface you, because if you vanish, the divine appears. Let the ego go; vacate the throne, and the divine will come.

Both words have meaning. Not without cause, Mukesh, are the words ‘guru’ and ‘sadguru’ used. ‘Guru’ is neutral; it tells nothing definite—he may be false, he may be true. ‘Sadguru’ is a definitive declaration.

Krishnaraj, whatever I say, you will doubt that too—won’t you? If you are truly gripped by doubt, then anything I say will inevitably be doubted. What will my saying do? You have been given many pieces of advice before. You have heard many wise words before. This is not the first time you have come to me; who knows how many others you have gone to. It is a long journey of lives upon lives.

So the first thing I want to tell you is: if you are doubt-ridden, do not try to get rid of it—you won’t succeed. Because whatever method is given to you, your doubt will pitch its tent upon that very method. Doubt is a very complex and very subtle process.

Therefore I will not tell you “do this, do that, and you will be free of doubt.” First you will wonder, “Will this really work or not? How will it work?” A thousand doubts will arise. I would rather say: make doubt itself your way to discover trust. This is the path. You are not to get rid of doubt; you are to use it so deeply that doubt itself brings you to trust.

What is the fear? You doubt God? Doubt fearlessly. You doubt heaven? By all means, doubt. You doubt hell? Doubt wholeheartedly. Your doubt neither creates nor destroys heaven. Your doubt neither makes God exist nor non-exist. So what is there to fear? It is not as if your doubting will make God gasp for breath or kill God. Your doubt is not that potent. What is, is; what is not, is not. By your believing, nothing will come into being; by your doubting, nothing real will be erased.

But doubt can be used as a process. Doubt whatever you can doubt. Keep doubting. You will find there is only one thing you cannot doubt—yourself. You cannot doubt your own being.

Mulla Nasruddin was sitting in a hotel. He had had a bit too much to drink, and the more he drank, the more he bragged. The talk escalated until Mulla declared, “There is no man in this town more large-hearted and generous than I am.” People said, “Now that’s too much! What kind of generosity, what kind of largeness? You’ve never even invited us for tea! Years have gone by and you’ve never asked your friends to a meal. How many times have you eaten at our houses? You’ve never even reciprocated.”

Mulla said, “Then let’s do it today!” He was drunk; his wits weren’t steady. “Come on, all of you, supper at my house tonight!”

A group of thirty or thirty-five—practically the whole tavern—set out. As they got closer to his home, his sobriety returned. Husbands do sober up as they near their wives. As soon as the thought of his wife arose—“Now there’ll be trouble. I’m in a fix! I’m taking home thirty-five men and I’ve been missing all day. And in the morning I was sent to the market to buy okra—but I didn’t. I didn’t even come home! My wife will be sitting there with the pestle in hand. And when she sees thirty-five hulks… today calamity has come! And in front of these thirty-five I’ll be shamed. How will I even say to her, ‘Feed them’? That’s out of the question. If she doesn’t thrash me in front of them, that’s blessing enough. I must find a way out.”

At the door he told his friends, “Stand here quietly. You’re all married men; I don’t need to say more. Just understand. Keep absolutely silent. I’ll go in first and soften my wife up.”

They said, “We understand. We were wondering the same—thirty-five of us, and we don’t want to be dragged into your domestic mess. We know your wife.”

He said, “Keep absolutely quiet. No noise at all, not a sound. Stay calm.” Then he went inside and forgot them. He had told them to be silent, so they felt they couldn’t even knock or call out. He fell at his wife’s feet: “I’m in big trouble. Forgive me. I forgot the okra, and then I fell in with those rascals and drank too much. In my babbling I invited them all to dinner.”

She said, “Dinner! There isn’t food even for the two of us in the house. Why do you think you were sent? No vegetables, no flour, no ghee. No food for two—where will dinner for thirty-five come from?”

Mulla said, “Don’t worry. I told them to stand quietly. After all, how long can they stand? The moment they make a peep, they will have broken the rule.”

An hour passed. But the thirty-five had been drinking too; they kept standing. Two hours passed; it was nearing midnight. Finally they said, “How long will we stand? This way it’ll be morning.” They knocked. Mulla sent his wife to the door: “Tell them Mulla is not at home.” She went and said, “Mulla is not at home.”

They said, “This is too much! We have been standing here for three hours, and we saw him go in before our very eyes. Thirty-five pairs of eyes don’t get deceived. He is inside somewhere. Let us come in; we’ll drag him out.”

She said, “He isn’t here. He went out in the morning to buy okra and never returned. I am sitting here worried.” But they insisted, “We’ll come inside and look.” Now if thirty-five men entered the house, Mulla would be caught. As the argument flared, Mulla got fired up too. He opened a window upstairs and shouted from the second floor, “Listen! Aren’t you ashamed to quarrel with someone’s wife at midnight? And didn’t I tell you to be quiet? And anyway, it’s perfectly possible that Mulla came with you, went into the house, and slipped out the back door.”

Mulla himself was saying it.

This is a favorite Sufi story—often quoted because it is significant. You cannot sit inside the house and say, “I’m not in the house.” How will you say it? Your statement “I’m not in the house” proves that you are inside. You cannot make the statement “I am not,” because even to make that statement, your being is required.

So there is only one truth that defeats the doubting mind, and that truth is the fact of one’s own being. I am not asking you to believe in the soul. I am saying: try to doubt it. But you will not be able to doubt it. There is only one indubitable fact—the self. “I am” cannot be doubted. If you try to doubt, even that proves “I am”—at least a doubter is needed in order to doubt! If no one is there, who will doubt?

So, Krishnaraj, don’t ask how to be rid of doubt. Drop the very intention of getting rid of it. The more you try to drop it, the more entangled you’ll become. Whatever method is given, doubt will rise against that method. Better to make a staircase out of doubt.

And in my view, doubt and trust are not opposites. Don’t be startled. Scriptures say doubt and trust are opposites, and your so‑called gurus tell you the same. But I tell you: doubt is the staircase to trust. By doubting and doubting, profoundly doubting, one day you find that thread upon which doubt is impossible. Then trust is born. Wherever doubt becomes impossible, trust appears.

No, I cannot give you a method. A method won’t help.

Mulla Nasruddin had a very suspicious nature. When he bought a new car, his friends warned him, “Nasruddin, be careful in hiring a driver. These fellows are crooks. At the first chance they’ll throw dust in your eyes, take out brand-new parts, and replace them with junk-yard scraps.”

Nasruddin said, “Exactly right. I’ll keep a strict watch on the driver.”

In a nearby neighborhood there lived an honest, well-regarded man, Mian Mahmood. Nasruddin hired him as driver. On the very first morning, as they were about to set out, Mahmood said, “Master, better keep a screw-driver in the car; it can come in handy anytime.” Nasruddin roared, “Amazing! If, at the right time, it’s the screw-driver who’s going to be useful, then why did I hire you as the driver? This is rich—hire a driver and on top of that a screw-driver! You haven’t even touched the car and you’ve started cheating!”

Poor Mahmood somehow explained that a screw-driver is not a driver but the name of a tool. Nasruddin’s suspicion congealed into certainty: “This crafty young man is looking for a chance to swap out my car’s precious parts; otherwise why would he need a screw-driver right at the start, on the very first day!” Suppressing his suspicion, he set out anyway, watching Mahmood’s every move with Sherlock Holmes’s detective eyes. When Mahmood did something with a click, the engine’s sound grew louder.

Nasruddin sprang up from his seat: “What did you do? What’s that noise?” Mahmood replied, “Sir, I just changed the gear; that’s why the sound changed.” “My friends were right,” said Nasruddin as he grabbed the poor driver by the neck. “But you’re something else, old chap! If you’re changing the gear in broad daylight right before my eyes, who knows what you’ll change behind my back!”

After a little while, with a sputter, the car rolled to a stop. Mahmood said, “Master, we’re out of petrol. The car can’t go forward now.” Nasruddin thought to himself, “This scoundrel must have done something. From tomorrow I’ll hire someone else.” But aloud he said, “If there’s no petrol and the car can’t go forward, then listen, old man—turn the car around and take us back home.”

A doubter will doubt anything. If your mind truly is skeptical, I will not say you can be freed of doubt this way or that. I will say: don’t hurry—use doubt; make doubt your instrument, your sadhana. Doubt. What is the panic? What is the fear? Why be so afraid of doubt?

The truth is: one who has never been an atheist in the true sense can never become a theist in the true sense. And one who does not have the courage to say no—his yes is impotent, limp, without strength. I say: learn to say no. Because the one who can truly say no—when he says yes, he will say it with his whole life.

I say: doubt—doubt to your heart’s content, doubt totally—because there is surely something in existence that is beyond doubt. In doubting and doubting, one day you will arrive at that which cannot be doubted. Then what will you do? If you cannot doubt, what will you do? Doubt will commit suicide. And only when doubt kills itself is trust born.

Do not suppress doubt. This is what people do—they suppress it. Outwardly theist, inwardly atheist. Scratch a little and atheism appears. Outwardly they go to the temple; inwardly they think, “Who knows whether God exists or not? People say so, so perhaps. And if he doesn’t, what’s the harm? What have I got to lose? At most a coconut is offered—what’s the loss? And if he does exist, at least I’ll be able to say, ‘Remember, I offered a coconut!’ Then a place in heaven will be needed!”

I have a friend—an old devotee of Krishnamurti, an opponent of God. “There is no God, no need for belief, no meditation, no worship, no prayer, no method, no ritual—drop all methods and rituals, be free of everything, then the consciousness within will be revealed.” I asked him, “Fine, you’ve said half—no method, no ritual, no meditation, no prayer. Did the revelation of consciousness happen or not?” He said, “It did not.” I said, “Then something is lacking. Something is lacking in your negation.” He said, “No, my negation is complete.” I said, “Then there must be some mistake in Krishnamurti. If your negation is complete, then the revelation of consciousness should happen. If your doubt is complete, I say trust must be born—it cannot be avoided. Or go and tell Krishnamurti: my doubt is complete, my rejection complete; I have negated—neti-neti—fully.”

Neti-neti means: “Not this, not this.” Keep saying it, keep saying it. In the end only one thing will remain: the one who says it. The one who says neti-neti will remain; everything else will drop away. And that is it—call it the self, call it the supreme Self, call it nirvana, samadhi.

But he would not agree. He said, “No, I am completely free of methods and rituals, but the awakening of consciousness has not occurred.”

One day his son came running: “Please come, my father is in a very bad state.” I asked, “How bad?” He said, “He is lying in bed chanting ‘Ram Ram, Ram Ram, Ram Ram!’ He’s had a heart attack.” I went, and he was chanting “Ram Ram, Ram Ram.” I shook his head and said, “Open your eyes! What are you doing? What are you doing at the moment of death? You’re sinking the whole boat at the last moment? Stop this Ram Ram! There is no method, no mantra, no means—drop all that! What are you doing?” He said, “Don’t talk like that now. At the moment of death—who knows, Ram may actually be.” The trader’s mind: “What harm is there? What do I lose by saying Ram Ram? If nothing happens, nothing is lost—just a little exertion. I was lying here anyway. And if something happens, I’ll at least be able to say: look, at the time of death I remembered Ram.”

Remember Ajamil. At the time of death… his son’s name was Narayan. Ajamil was a murderer, a thief, a bandit. He had never paid any heed to Narayan. At the time of death he called his son, “Narayan, Narayan!” Perhaps he wanted to reveal where the looted wealth was buried, or to tell him which enemies were left unfinished so that after he died the son should finish them off—things of that sort; such was his life’s tale. But the story goes that the Narayan above, seated in the heavens, was deceived; he thought Ajamil was calling him. Ajamil died calling “Narayan, Narayan.” The son didn’t come—being Ajamil’s son, he was entangled somewhere. But Ajamil went to heaven because he called Narayan at the time of death.

Beware of the dishonorable ones who fabricated such stories. They are the false gurus. They are deceiving you. They reassure you: “Don’t worry. If at the time of death you say ‘Narayan’ once, the job is done. Pour Ganga water into the mouth at the last moment. If you cannot say it, the priest will whisper ‘Ram Ram’ into your ear. He will blow the mantra, recite the Gayatri—the work will be accomplished.”

So cheap! No. If any strand of doubt remains in you—any trace, even a line—that line is enough; trust will not be formed. That is why I tell you: use doubt; do not suppress it. Sharpen doubt; make it a sword. Do not be afraid. Doubt can cut only what is not. What is, cannot be cut by doubt. That is why the rishis of the Upanishads could say neti-neti.

Neti-neti means ultimate atheism. Neti-neti means the culmination of doubt. “Not this, not this”—keep saying it. Whatever appears, deny it. In the end nothing will be left standing before you. In the end only you will remain—a bare mirror. That bare mirror, that clear mirror of consciousness, that empty sky—that is it! Then trust will surge. Then the lotus of trust will blossom in that limpid lake.

Rampal, saints may proclaim a hundred thousand times that the world is maya, yet ninety-nine out of a hundred of those very saints themselves are entangled in maya. People are not blind. They also see that Maharaj keeps telling us the world is maya—and what about him? He himself is living in it.

The world is not maya; the world is real. If a statement is false, how can it bear fruit? Can the fragrance of truth ever rise from something untrue? For centuries saints have been repeating that the world is maya. Keep repeating it—people, too, have learned to repeat it; they also parrot, “The world is maya.” But repeating is one thing; living is another. Saying is one thing; being is another. One set of teeth for showing, another for chewing.

How do you come to believe the world is maya? The world is not maya; the world is real. From the Real Divine only a real world can arise. How could the unreal be born of the Real? Think a little! If Brahman is true, how can the world be false? For the world is nothing but the descent of Brahman; it is his very waves. He himself has taken form; he himself has taken on color. The attributeless has become the attributed. The formless has descended into form. He has assumed a body. Only if God himself were untrue could the world be untrue.

But neither God is untrue nor the world untrue; they are two aspects of the same truth—one visible, one invisible. Then what is maya? The mind is maya. If you ask me, I do not call the world maya; I call the mind maya. The mind is a lie, because the mind is a net—of desires, cravings, fantasies, memories. Mind is maya.

Had we taught people that the world is not maya, the mind is, this world today would be something else! Its beauty would be something else! Its celebration would be something else! There would be religiosity in it!

When they were told, “The world is maya,” people began to flee the world. Where will you go on leaving the world? Wherever you go, the world is there.

There was a man—hot-tempered. He attended a satsang with a sadhu. The sadhu said: “The world is maya. If you remain in it, anger, greed, attachment, lust, malice—all will surround you. Leave the world. Here anger is natural. I too was angry when I lived in the world. Since I left it, anger never comes. Step away from there and what anger can there be!”

The man said, “All right.” He went into the forest and sat beneath a tree. A crow defecated on him. How would the crow know that Maharaj was sitting below, meditating? Crows are crows—what do they know of religious and irreligious! Why would they distinguish between saint and sadhu! How can they keep accounts of worldly or renunciate! Perhaps it was some atheist crow. It dropped its mess in a flash! As the droppings fell on him, he grabbed a stick: “This is the limit! I left the world for this very reason. If I don’t teach this wicked crow a lesson, my life is wasted.”

Now the crow kept flying around and the man kept chasing it—throwing stones, flinging sticks.

If you run away from the world, what will happen? In the end he said, “This forest is no good either. Sitting under a tree is not wise, because a crow on it can defecate.” He went to the riverbank where there were no trees and sat on the sand. He grew so sad, so dejected, burned so much in his anger—he thought, “This life is meaningless, futile. And if the world is maya anyway, why live—where to live?” So he gathered wood and began to build a pyre: “I will climb on it and finish it—end the matter.” Just as he was about to light the pyre, people from the neighborhood gathered. They said, “Maharaj, it would be better if you perform this act somewhere else, or the police will trouble us. And if you burn, the stench will reach us. And to see a living man burn will bring sin upon us. Please go elsewhere, Maharaj! If you say, we’ll even carry the wood for you to wherever you wish to go.”

The man’s anger knew no bounds. He said, “This is the limit! You won’t let me live, and you won’t let me die! I’ll crack open each of your heads!”

Where will you flee? Here living is difficult, and dying too is difficult. You cannot escape the world. But the belief that “the world is maya” has given people a false notion of renunciation. I say: the world is not maya; the world is the manifest form of the Divine. It is his temple. It is his offering. These flowers tell the tale of his beauty! These birds sing the songs of his love! These stars are the shimmer of his eyes! This whole existence is brimming with him, overflowing!

And yet I know, one thing is maya—the mind. Therefore, freedom from the mind is sannyas. Liberation from the mind is sannyas. For this there is no need to go to mountains, ashrams, or caves. At the shop, in the market, at home—wherever you are—you can drop the mind.

The direct method to drop the mind is this: do not let it go into the past. Whenever it goes, bring it back: “Brother, return.” We do not go into the past. What is gone is gone. What happened has happened; we don’t turn back. And when it moves toward the future, say, “Brother, not that way. It has not yet come—what will you do there? Be here—now. Let this moment be your all.” That’s all—maya dissolves, all infatuation disappears. When the mind dissolves, all entanglement dissolves.

And the moment the mind dissolves, darkness vanishes; light happens. Because both past and future are absences; they have no existence. They are like darkness—darkness has no existence of its own. The present is luminous!

Those rishis who said, “O Lord! Lead us from darkness to light—tamaso ma jyotirgamaya”—they were saying exactly this. They were not speaking of the darkness that surrounds an amavasya night. They were speaking of the darkness that gathers within you because you wander in the past and future. And what luminous realm were they speaking of? Come to rest in the present, stay still in meditation, let the lamp of samadhi be lit—light happens now. And when light is within you, then whatever you see is the truth.

At two in the night Mulla Nasruddin was returning home. He saw a hefty man standing under a roadside tree making love to a woman. Though it was very dark, Nasruddin’s sharp eyes took no time to recognize that the man was none other than his friend, Matkanath Brahmachari.

For a while Nasruddin hid and watched the rasaleela. Once he was certain it was Matkanath, he shouted, “You hypocrite! Staging a love-play openly on the street! Wait, boy—tomorrow morning I’ll announce it to the whole village!”

Hearing this, Matkanath Brahmachari tucked his tail and vanished down a nearby lane. Now only the woman remained—and Nasruddin. What was bound to happen happened. Nasruddin saw the woman was extremely beautiful and enticing. Though it was dark, Nasruddin is a connoisseur of beauty! He recognized from afar. When he went closer, the fragrance from her clothes intoxicated him. The woman was willing too. Nasruddin took her in his arms. Such an extraordinary, arousing, enchanting woman—Nasruddin had never, not even in thought, encountered. He felt Indra must have sent an apsara from heaven to corrupt Matkanath’s austerities.

After about fifteen minutes of love-play, a wretched police constable suddenly turned up to put a bone in the kebab. He shouted, “Who’s there? What’s going on here so late at night?” Nasruddin said nervously, “O constable, don’t you recognize me? I’m Mulla Nasruddin—I live in the house just here.”

“Oh, it’s you, brother!” the policeman said, recognizing him in the beam of his torch. “But what are you doing here so late?”

“Don’t ask, friend—felt a little romantic, so I’m loving my wife.”

“Oh, forgive me, brother—I had no idea you were with your wife! Pardon me, Mulla.”

“No need to apologize, brother,” said Nasruddin. “Until you shone your torch, even I didn’t know I was loving my own wife.”

That’s all for today.