Naye Samaj Ki Khoj #2
Available in:
Read in Original Hindi (मूल हिन्दी)
Questions in this Discourse
A friend has asked—
Yesterday I said, “Do not accept any ideals.” He has asked: Osho, couldn’t the very search into anything—violence, sin, or untruth—also become an ideal?
Yesterday I said, “Do not accept any ideals.” He has asked: Osho, couldn’t the very search into anything—violence, sin, or untruth—also become an ideal?
No. Knowing the fact is not an ideal. Knowing the fact is a fact.
There is a thorn in my foot. To know that a thorn is in my foot is simply the discovery of a fact, an awareness of a truth. But the thorn is in my foot and I am reading a book that says one should walk only on paths where the foot is never pricked by thorns—this is to live in the world of ideals. And because there is a thorn in my foot, I read this book to forget the thorn. We dream of a path on which there are no thorns.
An ideal means: that which is not, but should be—that which should be.
A fact means: that which is—that which is.
There is hatred, there is anger, there is sorrow, there is violence. Nonviolence is an ideal; freedom from anger is an ideal. They are not. If they were, there would be no need to talk about them. Violence is a fact; nonviolence is an ideal. And this is what I told you yesterday: if you want to forget violence, the ideal of nonviolence is very good. Then violence can be forgotten; but it will not be erased. And if violence is to be eradicated, there is no need to talk about nonviolence; violence must be recognized totally.
There is a thorn in my foot. To know that a thorn is in my foot is simply the discovery of a fact, an awareness of a truth. But the thorn is in my foot and I am reading a book that says one should walk only on paths where the foot is never pricked by thorns—this is to live in the world of ideals. And because there is a thorn in my foot, I read this book to forget the thorn. We dream of a path on which there are no thorns.
An ideal means: that which is not, but should be—that which should be.
A fact means: that which is—that which is.
There is hatred, there is anger, there is sorrow, there is violence. Nonviolence is an ideal; freedom from anger is an ideal. They are not. If they were, there would be no need to talk about them. Violence is a fact; nonviolence is an ideal. And this is what I told you yesterday: if you want to forget violence, the ideal of nonviolence is very good. Then violence can be forgotten; but it will not be erased. And if violence is to be eradicated, there is no need to talk about nonviolence; violence must be recognized totally.
Another friend has asked:
Osho, how do we recognize violence?
You’re asking it the wrong way round. Do you really not recognize violence? Is your eye the same when you look at a servant? Is it the same eye when you look at the master?
Osho, how do we recognize violence?
You’re asking it the wrong way round. Do you really not recognize violence? Is your eye the same when you look at a servant? Is it the same eye when you look at the master?
When you look at the master, the tail you don’t even have starts wagging. And when you look at the servant, your eyes stay fixed on his tail—which also doesn’t exist—to see whether it is wagging or not. Violence—both are violence. In one case you are being violent to the other; in the other, you are submitting to another’s violence. Both are violence.
When a husband says to his wife, “The husband is God,” he should look closely—violence is happening or not? Violence has happened. Domination in love too? Ownership in love too? Then where in life will anything remain unowned, where mere friendship can suffice?
But for thousands of years husbands have been explaining that the husband is God—husbands themselves explaining it! There is violence there.
A Brahmin says to a Shudra, “Touch my feet!” There is violence there.
A guru says to a disciple, “Show respect!” There is violence there.
If respect arises on its own, that’s different. But when someone says, “Do it! You must do it!” violence has begun. When a father says to his son, “Obey me because I am your father!” violence has begun. Violence is not only plunging a knife into someone’s chest. We wield many kinds of knives that cannot be seen. And the visible knives are not so dangerous, because visible knives can be pulled out; one can defend oneself. The invisible knives, the ones you can’t see, remain lodged, embedded; they can’t be removed, you can’t file a report at any police station, no operation can be performed, no surgery is possible, no case can be filed in any court. Which son will take which father to court?
But the fruits of violence come. So long as the son is weak, the father suppresses him. Then the boat changes sides. The son grows up, becomes strong; the father becomes old, weak; then the son begins to suppress. When the son suppresses in the father’s old age, the father says, “This is very wrong.” He doesn’t see that it is payback for suppression—the violence is returning. All old fathers will be suppressed, because all small children are being suppressed.
A husband will be violent in his way; the wife will be violent in hers. The styles of violence will change, but violence produces only violence. If the husband says, “Consider me God,” she will say, “We do consider you God—but how were you looking at the woman next door? What kind of God are you? We doubt your godliness. How are you smoking a cigarette? And today is Shivratri—why didn’t you go to the temple?” The wife will have her own methods of suppressing; she will suppress in that way. She will keep proving you are not God. The scripture says you are not.
Our violence is subtle. It is hidden in all our relationships.
You ask me, how to know it?
You will have to be aware of your every behavior. From waking in the morning until sleep at night, you will have to watch every gesture, every posture: where is violence? When you walk on the road and there is no one there, you are one kind of person—on an empty road. Let two people appear on the road and you instantly change. In that very moment it is necessary to recognize: what is the thing inside me that just changed? You stiffen, you straighten your tie, adjust your hat.
You are one kind of person in the bathroom and another in the drawing room. In the drawing room you sit stiffly; in the bathroom you were loose, relaxed. In the bathroom a man is a good man; in the drawing room he becomes bad. You leave that good man behind in the bathroom. You put on clothes and become a completely different person.
In every situation of your life you will have to keep inquiring, stay alert, stay awake: What am I doing? What am I saying? How am I looking? How am I getting up? In my rising, in my looking, in my speaking—is my violence lurking anywhere? It’s not about anyone else; I have to see my own. And if it begins to be seen, you will be astonished to find that violence is going on twenty‑four hours a day. It is not that you are violent only sometimes—violence is continuous. And when it becomes completely visible—sitting, standing, sleeping, waking, putting on your shoes, opening a door, talking, keeping silent—when everywhere you see: violence, violence, violence!—then it will be as if flames have engulfed the house; you’ll see flames all around. And you will see: those flames sometimes touch the other, but I am burning in them twenty‑four hours a day.
You will suddenly leap out. You won’t go ask anyone, “How to get outside of violence?” You won’t go ask anyone, “How to practice the ideal of nonviolence?” Only the violent, who want to protect their violence, practice the ideals of nonviolence. But those who see their violence step out of it immediately. Then there is no delay; there is no reason for delay. Because violence is so painful that no one would want to live in that much pain. We just don’t know it; we simply don’t know. And often it happens that we don’t even realize it.
I have heard that once, in America, a man began to feel dizzy; his head would spin. The ground and everything on it seemed to swirl; when he stood up, his legs trembled. He consulted great physicians, met top doctors. In America, what shortage of doctors? What shortage of specialists! Thousands of medicines were tried, thousands of injections given. Blood tests, bone X‑rays, every examination was done. But the man had no disease; if there had been a disease it could have been cured. Since no disease was found, the medicines created more trouble.
At last the doctors were flustered and began to avoid him. At first doctors seek patients; when a true patient is found, then doctors try to avoid him so he doesn’t cross their path. They folded their hands and said, “There’s an even bigger expert—go to him.” But the man didn’t seem to be getting better. He went to the top expert.
The expert said, “As far as I can tell, there is no cure yet for your illness—because your illness hasn’t been identified. What is identified can be treated, but your illness has not been caught. I think you won’t live much longer with this illness; you cannot live more than six months—you’ll die in six months. And it’s certain the cure won’t be discovered in six months, because the illness itself hasn’t been discovered. So prepare to die. In six months you’ll be gone. And now have mercy on us—let us do other work. You cannot be saved.”
On the way out the man thought, “If I can’t be saved, then forget the hassle. Only six months left—live in fun now; what’s the point?” He went straight to a tailor and said, “I have six months to live—make me two hundred suits; I’ll wear a new suit every day. What’s the use of putting on the same stale clothes? That was when I thought I’d live long. Now, get me the finest fabrics, the best cuts.”
The tailor said, “With your kind permission, let me take your measurements.” He measured him; he measured the neck. He told his assistant, “Write sixteen.” The man said, “Wrong! I always wear a fourteen collar.” The tailor said, “If you wear a fourteen, you’ll feel dizzy; the world will seem to spin.” The man said, “What are you saying!” The tailor looked at his neck—he was indeed wearing a fourteen; the neck was squeezed. The tailor said, “You’ll feel dizzy, I’m telling you.” The man said, “Telling me? I am feeling dizzy!” So that was all there was to it! The first thing he did was rip the collar and throw it down. “I was dying—dying under treatments!”
But how would any expert detect a tight collar? The man lived many years, and the dizziness disappeared—because once he became aware of what was constricting his neck, it broke.
Where is our neck constricted? We go asking gurus. And the gurus we ask are themselves wearing a fourteen‑size collar; their necks are stuck.
These days I am quite amazed. Great sadhus and sannyasins sometimes come to see me; in private their throats are choking. In private they ask me, “Please tell us the way to peace.” And they have been telling everyone the way to peace all their lives. I ask, “Then what have you been telling people? You yourself ask how to find peace.”
A great muni meets me and says, “How should we meditate?”
Then what have you been doing all these days? How did you become a muni? Muni means one who has attained silence. Now the muni asks how to meditate, how to stabilize silence, how to find peace.
A sadhu says, “The mind is very restless!” And he has been explaining to everyone. He doesn’t realize that restlessness will not end by being a sadhu. Restlessness ends by recognizing restlessness—where it is, at what point it holds the throat.
If your throat is caught in violence, recognize violence; attend to that. If in anger, attend to anger. If it is worry, look for worry. And what must be done to look?
Nothing is needed except this: begin to live a little more consciously. Tomorrow morning when you get up, get up a little consciously. And watch, from tomorrow morning, what happens in the mind and when—how violence seizes you, how hatred grips, how anger takes hold. A man appears before you and instantly—“This man abused me yesterday”—and inside, the poison of violence rises.
But the man who abused you yesterday—yesterday’s man is gone; this man is not that man. In twenty‑four hours much water has flowed in the Ganga. This man, too, has flowed much in twenty‑four hours. Yet you are ready—“What if he abuses me again?” And he sees that you have stiffened up again, perhaps preparing for yesterday. Because he too lives in yesterday; he too stiffens. The preparations begin; violence begins.
That is exactly how the violence between Russia and America is. India and Pakistan—same way. Here we see a few soldiers drilling, and there panic arises. Here a gun is readied, so there they ready their gun. They ready theirs; we bring a bigger one. Fear spreads and spreads.
Each person fails to see his own violence. Because we don’t see our own violence, we behave violently. The neighbor, out of fear, behaves violently. All around, violence keeps happening—while we stand submerged in it.
No—there is no need to look at any neighbor. I need to look at my violence—to recognize it. And my understanding is this: if you recognize it, you cannot live in violence even for a moment—you will step out. No human being can live in it—there is only one condition: that he not recognize it, not see it, stay occupied elsewhere. And we have many tricks for staying occupied. The biggest of them is the ideal.
The ideal is our very cunning, crafty trick. The ideal gives us this sweet comfort: “A little violence is there—fine—but we’ll fix it tomorrow. We’ll read a book now, study the philosophy of nonviolence, the scripture of nonviolence. We’ll read how to become nonviolent. We’ll strain our water, skip dinner at night, go to the temple daily and regularly—thus we’ll bring in nonviolence.” So today there is violence—no harm—we’ll tolerate it today; tomorrow nonviolence will come.
But if you tolerate violence for twenty‑four hours, in those twenty‑four hours it becomes stronger—because in those twenty‑four hours violence travels even farther. Tomorrow will arrive just like today; the ideal will again move to tomorrow. Ideals are always in tomorrow, and facts are always in today. So whoever wants to change life must have a vision of fact; whoever does not want to change, wants to avoid changing, should sit with ideals—there is no more perfect panacea. Make an ideal and sit; the ideal keeps receding into tomorrow, receding and receding.
I have heard: a man got the idea that he should collect all the greatest scriptures of the world. Some guru told him, “Until you have knowledge you will not find God.” He asked, “How to get knowledge?” The guru said, “Through scripture.”
So he said, “First I’ll collect the scriptures.” He gathered all the scriptures. But in collecting scriptures life passed by. “If even a single scripture is missed, some knowledge may be missed—so first let me collect them all. We’ll do knowledge tomorrow; first the scriptures.” He collected them all. In collecting them, his life passed in ignorance.
The lives of those who collect scriptures pass in ignorance. Because knowledge can happen now, while scriptures can be read tomorrow or the day after; then be understood, then practiced, and only then…
He turned seventy. The scriptures were collected, but life slipped from his hands; he took to bed. Doctors said there wasn’t much hope. He said, “Now it’s a problem—I collected the scriptures; when will I read them? Do something so my effort doesn’t go to waste. Call some pandits to condense them, because so many scriptures can’t be read now; time is gone.”
Ten great pandits were called. The same mistake again. First he made the mistake of collecting scriptures; now he made the mistake of collecting pandits. And it didn’t occur to him that pandits had been collected. Ten pandits! With one pandit something might get done; with ten, nothing can be done. Ten pandits will say ten things; if they condense the scriptures, they’ll condense them in ten ways and get into huge quarrels. The man says, “I am near death; be quick!” But there are ten pandits—how can there be speed? There was more delay. The man panicked. He said, “Call more pandits—these ten won’t do. I’m near death.”
Fifty pandits were called. A hundred. The more pandits there were, the more they forgot the man; he lay on his cot while the pandits battled among themselves. Again and again he shouted, “Brothers, I am about to die—condense quickly!” But his voice could not be heard. Where a hundred pandits are, whose voice can be heard? No voice can be heard there.
At last he asked his doctors, “Will I die? These pandits are stuck in quarrels; the scriptures never get condensed!”
Somehow they condensed. When they brought the condensation, there were still fifty books. The man said, “You’re mad!” By then he was eighty; his eyes had failed. He said, “Now I can’t even read—so read to me.” They said, “There are fifty books—whether we’ll finish or not…” He said, “Condense more—condense so much that you can read it to me.”
They condensed again; five more years passed. They returned with everything compressed into one small book—but the man had lost consciousness; only his breath remained. The doctors said, “You’ve come too late. He can’t hear now; he has no awareness now. Do at least this: shout one divine name in his ear—maybe he’ll hear.”
The pandits began to argue. Which name should be spoken—Ram, or Allah, or Buddha, or Mahavir, or Jai Jinendra? Should we say Om or Ameen? They got tangled in dispute. The doctors said, “He is dying—say it quickly!” The pandits said, “We’ll speak only after it’s decided.”
They kept deciding; the man died. When they finally decided, he was gone. They said, “We have decided—where is the man?” They were told, “His bier has already left.”
One who lives in ideals, in tomorrow, perishes like this.
No—whatever is to be done must be done now, today, here. Leaving it to tomorrow is dangerous, because tomorrow does not exist; what exists is today, now, here. Whatever is to be done. If violence is to be recognized, recognize it now. Leaving it for tomorrow is dangerous—tomorrow you may not be. Are you certain you will be there tomorrow? Nothing is certain about tomorrow. To think “Tomorrow I will become nonviolent”—wrong, dangerous. Now!
“But how will I be nonviolent right now?” For now, only violence can be known. Yet whoever truly knows violence can become nonviolent this very instant. Whoever has known anger, known hatred, attains love. Whoever recognizes his ignorance steps at once into the temple of wisdom.
When a husband says to his wife, “The husband is God,” he should look closely—violence is happening or not? Violence has happened. Domination in love too? Ownership in love too? Then where in life will anything remain unowned, where mere friendship can suffice?
But for thousands of years husbands have been explaining that the husband is God—husbands themselves explaining it! There is violence there.
A Brahmin says to a Shudra, “Touch my feet!” There is violence there.
A guru says to a disciple, “Show respect!” There is violence there.
If respect arises on its own, that’s different. But when someone says, “Do it! You must do it!” violence has begun. When a father says to his son, “Obey me because I am your father!” violence has begun. Violence is not only plunging a knife into someone’s chest. We wield many kinds of knives that cannot be seen. And the visible knives are not so dangerous, because visible knives can be pulled out; one can defend oneself. The invisible knives, the ones you can’t see, remain lodged, embedded; they can’t be removed, you can’t file a report at any police station, no operation can be performed, no surgery is possible, no case can be filed in any court. Which son will take which father to court?
But the fruits of violence come. So long as the son is weak, the father suppresses him. Then the boat changes sides. The son grows up, becomes strong; the father becomes old, weak; then the son begins to suppress. When the son suppresses in the father’s old age, the father says, “This is very wrong.” He doesn’t see that it is payback for suppression—the violence is returning. All old fathers will be suppressed, because all small children are being suppressed.
A husband will be violent in his way; the wife will be violent in hers. The styles of violence will change, but violence produces only violence. If the husband says, “Consider me God,” she will say, “We do consider you God—but how were you looking at the woman next door? What kind of God are you? We doubt your godliness. How are you smoking a cigarette? And today is Shivratri—why didn’t you go to the temple?” The wife will have her own methods of suppressing; she will suppress in that way. She will keep proving you are not God. The scripture says you are not.
Our violence is subtle. It is hidden in all our relationships.
You ask me, how to know it?
You will have to be aware of your every behavior. From waking in the morning until sleep at night, you will have to watch every gesture, every posture: where is violence? When you walk on the road and there is no one there, you are one kind of person—on an empty road. Let two people appear on the road and you instantly change. In that very moment it is necessary to recognize: what is the thing inside me that just changed? You stiffen, you straighten your tie, adjust your hat.
You are one kind of person in the bathroom and another in the drawing room. In the drawing room you sit stiffly; in the bathroom you were loose, relaxed. In the bathroom a man is a good man; in the drawing room he becomes bad. You leave that good man behind in the bathroom. You put on clothes and become a completely different person.
In every situation of your life you will have to keep inquiring, stay alert, stay awake: What am I doing? What am I saying? How am I looking? How am I getting up? In my rising, in my looking, in my speaking—is my violence lurking anywhere? It’s not about anyone else; I have to see my own. And if it begins to be seen, you will be astonished to find that violence is going on twenty‑four hours a day. It is not that you are violent only sometimes—violence is continuous. And when it becomes completely visible—sitting, standing, sleeping, waking, putting on your shoes, opening a door, talking, keeping silent—when everywhere you see: violence, violence, violence!—then it will be as if flames have engulfed the house; you’ll see flames all around. And you will see: those flames sometimes touch the other, but I am burning in them twenty‑four hours a day.
You will suddenly leap out. You won’t go ask anyone, “How to get outside of violence?” You won’t go ask anyone, “How to practice the ideal of nonviolence?” Only the violent, who want to protect their violence, practice the ideals of nonviolence. But those who see their violence step out of it immediately. Then there is no delay; there is no reason for delay. Because violence is so painful that no one would want to live in that much pain. We just don’t know it; we simply don’t know. And often it happens that we don’t even realize it.
I have heard that once, in America, a man began to feel dizzy; his head would spin. The ground and everything on it seemed to swirl; when he stood up, his legs trembled. He consulted great physicians, met top doctors. In America, what shortage of doctors? What shortage of specialists! Thousands of medicines were tried, thousands of injections given. Blood tests, bone X‑rays, every examination was done. But the man had no disease; if there had been a disease it could have been cured. Since no disease was found, the medicines created more trouble.
At last the doctors were flustered and began to avoid him. At first doctors seek patients; when a true patient is found, then doctors try to avoid him so he doesn’t cross their path. They folded their hands and said, “There’s an even bigger expert—go to him.” But the man didn’t seem to be getting better. He went to the top expert.
The expert said, “As far as I can tell, there is no cure yet for your illness—because your illness hasn’t been identified. What is identified can be treated, but your illness has not been caught. I think you won’t live much longer with this illness; you cannot live more than six months—you’ll die in six months. And it’s certain the cure won’t be discovered in six months, because the illness itself hasn’t been discovered. So prepare to die. In six months you’ll be gone. And now have mercy on us—let us do other work. You cannot be saved.”
On the way out the man thought, “If I can’t be saved, then forget the hassle. Only six months left—live in fun now; what’s the point?” He went straight to a tailor and said, “I have six months to live—make me two hundred suits; I’ll wear a new suit every day. What’s the use of putting on the same stale clothes? That was when I thought I’d live long. Now, get me the finest fabrics, the best cuts.”
The tailor said, “With your kind permission, let me take your measurements.” He measured him; he measured the neck. He told his assistant, “Write sixteen.” The man said, “Wrong! I always wear a fourteen collar.” The tailor said, “If you wear a fourteen, you’ll feel dizzy; the world will seem to spin.” The man said, “What are you saying!” The tailor looked at his neck—he was indeed wearing a fourteen; the neck was squeezed. The tailor said, “You’ll feel dizzy, I’m telling you.” The man said, “Telling me? I am feeling dizzy!” So that was all there was to it! The first thing he did was rip the collar and throw it down. “I was dying—dying under treatments!”
But how would any expert detect a tight collar? The man lived many years, and the dizziness disappeared—because once he became aware of what was constricting his neck, it broke.
Where is our neck constricted? We go asking gurus. And the gurus we ask are themselves wearing a fourteen‑size collar; their necks are stuck.
These days I am quite amazed. Great sadhus and sannyasins sometimes come to see me; in private their throats are choking. In private they ask me, “Please tell us the way to peace.” And they have been telling everyone the way to peace all their lives. I ask, “Then what have you been telling people? You yourself ask how to find peace.”
A great muni meets me and says, “How should we meditate?”
Then what have you been doing all these days? How did you become a muni? Muni means one who has attained silence. Now the muni asks how to meditate, how to stabilize silence, how to find peace.
A sadhu says, “The mind is very restless!” And he has been explaining to everyone. He doesn’t realize that restlessness will not end by being a sadhu. Restlessness ends by recognizing restlessness—where it is, at what point it holds the throat.
If your throat is caught in violence, recognize violence; attend to that. If in anger, attend to anger. If it is worry, look for worry. And what must be done to look?
Nothing is needed except this: begin to live a little more consciously. Tomorrow morning when you get up, get up a little consciously. And watch, from tomorrow morning, what happens in the mind and when—how violence seizes you, how hatred grips, how anger takes hold. A man appears before you and instantly—“This man abused me yesterday”—and inside, the poison of violence rises.
But the man who abused you yesterday—yesterday’s man is gone; this man is not that man. In twenty‑four hours much water has flowed in the Ganga. This man, too, has flowed much in twenty‑four hours. Yet you are ready—“What if he abuses me again?” And he sees that you have stiffened up again, perhaps preparing for yesterday. Because he too lives in yesterday; he too stiffens. The preparations begin; violence begins.
That is exactly how the violence between Russia and America is. India and Pakistan—same way. Here we see a few soldiers drilling, and there panic arises. Here a gun is readied, so there they ready their gun. They ready theirs; we bring a bigger one. Fear spreads and spreads.
Each person fails to see his own violence. Because we don’t see our own violence, we behave violently. The neighbor, out of fear, behaves violently. All around, violence keeps happening—while we stand submerged in it.
No—there is no need to look at any neighbor. I need to look at my violence—to recognize it. And my understanding is this: if you recognize it, you cannot live in violence even for a moment—you will step out. No human being can live in it—there is only one condition: that he not recognize it, not see it, stay occupied elsewhere. And we have many tricks for staying occupied. The biggest of them is the ideal.
The ideal is our very cunning, crafty trick. The ideal gives us this sweet comfort: “A little violence is there—fine—but we’ll fix it tomorrow. We’ll read a book now, study the philosophy of nonviolence, the scripture of nonviolence. We’ll read how to become nonviolent. We’ll strain our water, skip dinner at night, go to the temple daily and regularly—thus we’ll bring in nonviolence.” So today there is violence—no harm—we’ll tolerate it today; tomorrow nonviolence will come.
But if you tolerate violence for twenty‑four hours, in those twenty‑four hours it becomes stronger—because in those twenty‑four hours violence travels even farther. Tomorrow will arrive just like today; the ideal will again move to tomorrow. Ideals are always in tomorrow, and facts are always in today. So whoever wants to change life must have a vision of fact; whoever does not want to change, wants to avoid changing, should sit with ideals—there is no more perfect panacea. Make an ideal and sit; the ideal keeps receding into tomorrow, receding and receding.
I have heard: a man got the idea that he should collect all the greatest scriptures of the world. Some guru told him, “Until you have knowledge you will not find God.” He asked, “How to get knowledge?” The guru said, “Through scripture.”
So he said, “First I’ll collect the scriptures.” He gathered all the scriptures. But in collecting scriptures life passed by. “If even a single scripture is missed, some knowledge may be missed—so first let me collect them all. We’ll do knowledge tomorrow; first the scriptures.” He collected them all. In collecting them, his life passed in ignorance.
The lives of those who collect scriptures pass in ignorance. Because knowledge can happen now, while scriptures can be read tomorrow or the day after; then be understood, then practiced, and only then…
He turned seventy. The scriptures were collected, but life slipped from his hands; he took to bed. Doctors said there wasn’t much hope. He said, “Now it’s a problem—I collected the scriptures; when will I read them? Do something so my effort doesn’t go to waste. Call some pandits to condense them, because so many scriptures can’t be read now; time is gone.”
Ten great pandits were called. The same mistake again. First he made the mistake of collecting scriptures; now he made the mistake of collecting pandits. And it didn’t occur to him that pandits had been collected. Ten pandits! With one pandit something might get done; with ten, nothing can be done. Ten pandits will say ten things; if they condense the scriptures, they’ll condense them in ten ways and get into huge quarrels. The man says, “I am near death; be quick!” But there are ten pandits—how can there be speed? There was more delay. The man panicked. He said, “Call more pandits—these ten won’t do. I’m near death.”
Fifty pandits were called. A hundred. The more pandits there were, the more they forgot the man; he lay on his cot while the pandits battled among themselves. Again and again he shouted, “Brothers, I am about to die—condense quickly!” But his voice could not be heard. Where a hundred pandits are, whose voice can be heard? No voice can be heard there.
At last he asked his doctors, “Will I die? These pandits are stuck in quarrels; the scriptures never get condensed!”
Somehow they condensed. When they brought the condensation, there were still fifty books. The man said, “You’re mad!” By then he was eighty; his eyes had failed. He said, “Now I can’t even read—so read to me.” They said, “There are fifty books—whether we’ll finish or not…” He said, “Condense more—condense so much that you can read it to me.”
They condensed again; five more years passed. They returned with everything compressed into one small book—but the man had lost consciousness; only his breath remained. The doctors said, “You’ve come too late. He can’t hear now; he has no awareness now. Do at least this: shout one divine name in his ear—maybe he’ll hear.”
The pandits began to argue. Which name should be spoken—Ram, or Allah, or Buddha, or Mahavir, or Jai Jinendra? Should we say Om or Ameen? They got tangled in dispute. The doctors said, “He is dying—say it quickly!” The pandits said, “We’ll speak only after it’s decided.”
They kept deciding; the man died. When they finally decided, he was gone. They said, “We have decided—where is the man?” They were told, “His bier has already left.”
One who lives in ideals, in tomorrow, perishes like this.
No—whatever is to be done must be done now, today, here. Leaving it to tomorrow is dangerous, because tomorrow does not exist; what exists is today, now, here. Whatever is to be done. If violence is to be recognized, recognize it now. Leaving it for tomorrow is dangerous—tomorrow you may not be. Are you certain you will be there tomorrow? Nothing is certain about tomorrow. To think “Tomorrow I will become nonviolent”—wrong, dangerous. Now!
“But how will I be nonviolent right now?” For now, only violence can be known. Yet whoever truly knows violence can become nonviolent this very instant. Whoever has known anger, known hatred, attains love. Whoever recognizes his ignorance steps at once into the temple of wisdom.
The final question: a friend has asked: Osho, the way you speak—won’t it spread immorality?
As though immorality weren’t already widespread, and now it will spread because of what I say. The situation is such that however much you try to spread it now, it would be very hard to make it go any further than it already has. They say, “Let immorality not spread.” Perhaps they think morality is what has spread. So they ask, “Won’t your words spread immorality?”
This fear haunts us constantly. And it’s rather amusing—a funny kind of fear. Because it is immorality that has spread. If morality had spread, there would be no need for such fear. Even after ten thousand years of effort, morality hasn’t spread; it’s immorality that has. And now we’re afraid that immorality might spread! Our fear is like a beggar sitting nervously beside a police station worrying that he might be robbed.
What is there of yours to be stolen? Roam freely! You don’t need a police station. You are completely safe; you have nothing that can be taken.
There is so much immorality within man—and what do you think immorality is? Can you imagine any new immorality? What new immorality can you come up with? In ten thousand years, what has spread except immorality? And it isn’t that immorality is only spreading today. If you had a little courage, you would be terribly shaken... But out of that anxiety we don’t even look; instead, we go on thinking in our minds that great morality prevails, everything is fine—whereas everything is wrong.
If you read the stories of your ancient rishis and sages, it becomes very hard to decide whether to call them rishis and sages at all. Perhaps you might find one or two who did not run off with someone else’s wife, who did not engage in adultery; it’s hard to find such.
If you look at your old gods, you would be greatly shaken. Brahma created his daughter and became infatuated with her, and from that the world was born.
Now the worship of this Brahma goes on. So am I the one spreading immorality, or is Brahmaji? He is still being worshipped. And to this day no one has said that this point should be rejected, that this should absolutely not be tolerated. He raped his own daughter!
Indra is greeted with folded hands. His principal occupation in life was: wherever there is a beautiful woman, corrupt her. Still people fold their hands to him. Even now yajnas and havans are performed; in them Indra is prayed to: “O, bestow rain!”
Will they bring the rains? If you read the full stories of all these gods and goddesses... Those whom you call the five maidens to be remembered at dawn—not one of them is a maiden. Not a single maiden among them. All bore children before marriage. But the children were fathered by gods. Astonishing!
Yudhishthira is called Dharmaraj. Dharmaraj gambling! Today we punish gamblers, and the ancient Dharmaraj was gambling. And immorality will spread because of my words! And gamblers are called Dharmaraj! He stakes his own wife. No shame even in staking a woman—and still he is Dharmaraj; no difficulty, both things can go together.
What? Which of all these things do you call morality—where is it? For ten thousand years—ever since human history is known—man has lived in immorality. Every kind of immorality is going on. Now the question is to change this. And it will change only when our very outlook on morality changes, when our ethical perspective itself changes. I speak in order to change that perspective. I am saying this so that it becomes clear to us that the structure we created for man, the pattern we designed, has proved wrong. The way we tried to make man moral has proved delusory. It has not succeeded; it has failed. Now we will have to think of man in a different way. And remember: morality cannot be imposed; morality develops. Morality cannot be imposed; morality evolves.
We have been imposing morality. We tell the liar, “Speak the truth!” We tell the violent, “Become nonviolent!” Just as I said, by thrusting ideals upon people we try to fix man. Man doesn’t get fixed.
We have to remove the ideals; we have to know and recognize man as he is. And from that recognition, that knowing, the revolution that arises may perhaps become, in this world, a detonation of morality—an explosion.
Up to now, morality has not been. Occasionally one rare person is born moral. Among billions and trillions, once in a while one person turns out moral. Does that solve anything? If we plant millions of saplings and only one bears a flower, is that any compliment to the gardener? Once in a while a Buddha is born, once in a while a Krishna, once in a while a Christ—what difference does that make? Those who can be counted on the fingers—what difference are they going to make!
No, somewhere a fundamental mistake is being made with man. The system we have given is perhaps itself not allowing man to be moral. And let me put one small point into your awareness—our entire set of moral notions is suppressive, repressive. Therefore whatever we suppress keeps exploding. And life does not change by repression; life changes through knowing.
On this, I will speak to you tomorrow.
I am grateful that you listened to my words with such peace and love. And in the end, I bow to the God dwelling within everyone. Please accept my salutations.
This fear haunts us constantly. And it’s rather amusing—a funny kind of fear. Because it is immorality that has spread. If morality had spread, there would be no need for such fear. Even after ten thousand years of effort, morality hasn’t spread; it’s immorality that has. And now we’re afraid that immorality might spread! Our fear is like a beggar sitting nervously beside a police station worrying that he might be robbed.
What is there of yours to be stolen? Roam freely! You don’t need a police station. You are completely safe; you have nothing that can be taken.
There is so much immorality within man—and what do you think immorality is? Can you imagine any new immorality? What new immorality can you come up with? In ten thousand years, what has spread except immorality? And it isn’t that immorality is only spreading today. If you had a little courage, you would be terribly shaken... But out of that anxiety we don’t even look; instead, we go on thinking in our minds that great morality prevails, everything is fine—whereas everything is wrong.
If you read the stories of your ancient rishis and sages, it becomes very hard to decide whether to call them rishis and sages at all. Perhaps you might find one or two who did not run off with someone else’s wife, who did not engage in adultery; it’s hard to find such.
If you look at your old gods, you would be greatly shaken. Brahma created his daughter and became infatuated with her, and from that the world was born.
Now the worship of this Brahma goes on. So am I the one spreading immorality, or is Brahmaji? He is still being worshipped. And to this day no one has said that this point should be rejected, that this should absolutely not be tolerated. He raped his own daughter!
Indra is greeted with folded hands. His principal occupation in life was: wherever there is a beautiful woman, corrupt her. Still people fold their hands to him. Even now yajnas and havans are performed; in them Indra is prayed to: “O, bestow rain!”
Will they bring the rains? If you read the full stories of all these gods and goddesses... Those whom you call the five maidens to be remembered at dawn—not one of them is a maiden. Not a single maiden among them. All bore children before marriage. But the children were fathered by gods. Astonishing!
Yudhishthira is called Dharmaraj. Dharmaraj gambling! Today we punish gamblers, and the ancient Dharmaraj was gambling. And immorality will spread because of my words! And gamblers are called Dharmaraj! He stakes his own wife. No shame even in staking a woman—and still he is Dharmaraj; no difficulty, both things can go together.
What? Which of all these things do you call morality—where is it? For ten thousand years—ever since human history is known—man has lived in immorality. Every kind of immorality is going on. Now the question is to change this. And it will change only when our very outlook on morality changes, when our ethical perspective itself changes. I speak in order to change that perspective. I am saying this so that it becomes clear to us that the structure we created for man, the pattern we designed, has proved wrong. The way we tried to make man moral has proved delusory. It has not succeeded; it has failed. Now we will have to think of man in a different way. And remember: morality cannot be imposed; morality develops. Morality cannot be imposed; morality evolves.
We have been imposing morality. We tell the liar, “Speak the truth!” We tell the violent, “Become nonviolent!” Just as I said, by thrusting ideals upon people we try to fix man. Man doesn’t get fixed.
We have to remove the ideals; we have to know and recognize man as he is. And from that recognition, that knowing, the revolution that arises may perhaps become, in this world, a detonation of morality—an explosion.
Up to now, morality has not been. Occasionally one rare person is born moral. Among billions and trillions, once in a while one person turns out moral. Does that solve anything? If we plant millions of saplings and only one bears a flower, is that any compliment to the gardener? Once in a while a Buddha is born, once in a while a Krishna, once in a while a Christ—what difference does that make? Those who can be counted on the fingers—what difference are they going to make!
No, somewhere a fundamental mistake is being made with man. The system we have given is perhaps itself not allowing man to be moral. And let me put one small point into your awareness—our entire set of moral notions is suppressive, repressive. Therefore whatever we suppress keeps exploding. And life does not change by repression; life changes through knowing.
On this, I will speak to you tomorrow.
I am grateful that you listened to my words with such peace and love. And in the end, I bow to the God dwelling within everyone. Please accept my salutations.
Osho's Commentary
Regarding The Quest for a New Society, first I will say a few things on the third sutra. Afterwards I will answer your questions.
Till now humanity has been condemning the fleeting and inviting the eternal, opposing the small and calling for the vast. And the wonder of life is this: the vast abides within the small, and the eternal dwells within the momentary. In opposing the momentary we have destroyed the momentary too, and we have not allowed the eternal to come near.
You must have heard the name of the Amazon—earth’s greatest river, bearing the largest volume of water. But if you stand at its source you would not believe that the Amazon could begin there. At its origin, a drop falls now and then from a little mountainside—one single drop, and even that not continuously. One drop falls, and then it takes twenty seconds for the next to fall. With a gap of twenty seconds, another drop.
Looking at this tiny rill of dripping water, no one could even think that this is the very source of the vast Amazon. And if some clever man were to arrive he would say—stop this dripping! How could a sea ever be born of this? But all seas are born of drops upon drops.
The ancient mind formed a notion—which even sounded logical—that if you wish to seek the eternal, the permanent, then drop the transient. Enmity toward momentary pleasures, so that we may attain that which is eternal. The momentary was lost, the eternal never arrived, and man’s life became a continuous sorrow.
The joy of the new man can begin by glimpsing the vast, the eternal in even the smallest, the most momentary. The eternal is not a pleasure—pleasures are all momentary. But the one who learns the art of living the momentary joy enters into the eternal joy. The one who learns the art of living bliss from moment to moment slowly begins to flow in the stream and music of joy.
But the logic we invented drowned us in misery. We went on condemning everything—condemned all the senses, condemned the body, food, clothing, love, friendship, family—condemned all. After all that condemnation, a dry, withered man remained, upon whose life no rain of joy ever falls. And we made such a man the foundation of society. Upon this society and this foundation we have created a world stuffed with sorrow, where there is no news of joy.
The society up to now is a sorrow-filled society—its brick is of sorrow, its foundation is of sorrow. And when society is sorrowful there will be violence in society, for the sorrowful man will be violent. And when society is sorrowful and life is sorrowful, man will be angry; the sorrowful man will be wrathful. When life is dreary and distressed, there will be wars, conflicts, hatreds. Sorrow is the root-source of everything.
If a new society is to be born, then the bricks of sorrow must be removed and replaced with the bricks of joy. And those bricks can be laid only when we can naturally accept all of life’s joys and naturally invite them all.
Of course, joy comes drop by drop; joy does not pour down in one mass. Even water does not fall down in one mass—everything rains as drops. Those drops must be accepted. Only the moment comes into our hands. No one holds more than a moment. It is in that moment that we must live; it is in that moment that we must drink joy to the full. If one leaves that moment empty and waits to attain the eternal—then the moment slips away, and the eternal is not found either. The art of drinking the moment is the art of creating joy.
And we all are anti-moment.
I was once walking through a garden with a sannyasin. It was morning; the roses had opened, and on their petals dewdrops still shimmered. I said to that sannyasin, look—how beautiful the flowers are! He said, what beauty? In no time their petals will wither and fall. We are seekers of that beauty which never fades.
His longing is great. Flowers that never wither—yes, you can make them of stone! But even stone withers. Where is that beauty which never fades? Where is that joy which never fades? Where is that love which never fades?
In this world whatever blooms in the morning must wither by evening. But we have denied this—we will not look at this flower; we are searching for that flower which never withers. That flower is nowhere, and we have turned our back on this one. From our life flowers have taken leave; happiness has taken leave; beauty has taken leave. And when from life happiness and beauty and flowers take leave, remember—only thorns remain, sorrow remains, tears remain.
Man can be happy if, moment by moment, what comes to him he embraces with total grace and total delight. By evening the flower will wither; but right now it is alive! Why worry about evening already? As long as the flower lives, its beauty can be lived. And the one who has truly lived the beauty of a living flower—when the flower withers and falls, he is so filled with a whole day’s beauty that even the flower’s evening and the falling petals appear beautiful to him. When the eye is filled with beauty, the falling of petals is no less beautiful than their blossoming. And when the eye is filled with beauty, old age holds a loveliness even greater than childhood.
Rabindranath used to say: just as pure snow gathers on the summits of the mountains—on the Himalayan peaks—so too, when someone truly grows old having assimilated all the joys of life, then in his white hair the beauty of a whole life begins to gleam like snow peaks.
But if one has passed through life in suffering, then evening itself becomes ugly. Evening must turn ugly—for it is the sum total of a lifetime.
I can see that if we want to create a new human being—which is necessary for a new society—we must cultivate the capacity to take joy in the moment, and reverence for the moment’s joy, with gratitude. We must stop saying, by evening the flower will fade. By evening all will fade. Evening will come—but evening has its own beauty, morning has its own beauty; there is no need to compare morning’s beauty with evening’s. Life has its beauty, death has its beauty. The lamp’s burning has its beauty, the lamp’s going out has its beauty. Not only the moonlit night is beautiful—the dark new-moon night has its beauty too. And the one who becomes capable of seeing begins to draw beauty and joy from all things.
But why did this mistake happen—why did we make man so sad and miserable?
The mistake happened because we are enemies of the body. Humanity up to now has been an enemy of the body—an enemy of the senses. And the senses are the gateways of life. There is no need for enmity toward the senses. It is enough that there be no slavery to the senses. To have mastery over the senses is wonderful—but there is no need to become hostile to them in order to gain mastery.
In truth, we can never be masters of that which we make our enemy. We can be masters only of that which we love.
By making the body and senses our enemies, we have created a duality within man. We have told him: the body is something else, the senses are something else, and you are something else—and between you and the body there is constant conflict, a war. Now we are fighting with our own doors and windows. As if a man living in a house were to become the enemy of his windows, the enemy of his doors, and accept hostility between himself and his windows. Those windows that open toward the sky—how will he ever look out through them again?
Through those very windows the sun will rise; upon those very windows a bird may sit and sing; through those windows evening will descend; through those windows the moon will peer in. But once a man becomes the enemy of his windows, how will he look out? He will shut the doors—those very doors through which fresh breezes would enter, through which stale air would go out—he shuts them, becomes the enemy of his windows. His house becomes his tomb.
We have made our body our tomb. Our body is no longer our home. In the five to seven thousand years of known history, man has done little besides fight his own body.
We must make the body a doorway. The eyes are a wondrous window, the ears too are wondrous windows—taking enmity with them, enmity with the senses, is sheer foolishness. Nothing could be more self-destructive, more suicidal, than becoming the enemy of our senses. But this has been said to us so often that, slowly, slowly, we have accepted it. If someone says: sensory pleasure—immediately we say: a fallen man, he is taking the pleasures of the senses!
But the senses are only windows. All joy is of the Paramatma—whether it arrives through a flower, or a gust of wind, or the moon, or the sea’s waves, or two beautiful eyes, or a beautiful body—from wherever it comes, all joy is of the Paramatma. But our doors are the senses. Shall we use these doors—or fight them?
If we fight them, we will close up within ourselves, die within, rot within. Man has died and rotted; he is frightened from all sides; he has closed all his windows and doors.
Surdas gouged out his eyes. He was a representative kind of man—a representative mind. He plucked out his eyes because through them beautiful women became visible. Lest beautiful women attract him, he gouged out his eyes. Surdas represents us. We too have plucked out our eyes, our ears; we have broken all the senses. Maybe we have not physically broken them, but we have bent them down; we have shut all the doors of the senses. We have become afraid from every side, terrified lest the senses take us somewhere—lest they push us into a pit.
Eyes do not throw you into a pit—only the blind can fall into pits. Eyes tell you: here is a pit, here is the path. And if the eyes say, this face is beautiful, the eyes are not saying: go and lock that face in your house. The eyes only bring the news—here is a flower, here is a thorn.
What will happen by gouging out the eyes? And if someone plucks out his eyes, do you think desires will cease to arise in his mind?
Desires are a very different matter. What have desires to do with the senses? Desires belong to the mind; the senses only bring reports. The senses are receptive; they are receivers; they bring news of what is around. The senses never tell you what to do—doing is the mind’s affair. The mind has to be transformed—that is a different matter. Man has been busy breaking the senses. Breaking the senses makes no difference. Pluck out the eyes—and beautiful women will still be present inside those blind eyes. At night they appear in dreams—there is no need for the eyes to be open at all.
I have heard: a fakir was crossing a riverbank. An old fakir was with him. They were about to cross. A young woman said to the old fakir, I am very frightened—the river is deep. I have to go across. Please take me to the far bank. For a moment the old fakir thought, all right. But as the thought arose—even though it arose only in his mind—the moment he thought, I will take her by the hand and help her cross, poison flooded his whole mind. For twenty years he had not touched a woman. The moment the thought came—take her hand and help her across—desire awoke in his mind. He scolded himself, how could I think such a sinful thought! He bowed his head. The girl pleaded: won’t you answer me? But he did not answer. For speaking is also dangerous—if her words reach his ears, sweetness may spread in the mind! So with eyes downcast, tightly shut, he hurried across.
He was crossing the river, but his mind remained on this shore. Then he remembered his young companion coming behind—what if he falls into the same mistake? Reaching the far bank, he looked back. Though he was looking towards his companion, deep down his mind still looked at the girl. He was searching for a pretext to see the girl.
When he turned and saw, he was horrified. The young companion was carrying the girl on his shoulders. Then flames arose—double flames. Deep within, the fire was: I missed! I too could have carried her on my shoulders—deep within.
All sannyasins, deep down, such a fire catches. That is why they are angry with householders: those you carry on your shoulders—we could not carry. That is why they declare day and night that householders will go to hell. They are taking revenge: you are in heaven here; at least let us be in heaven after death.
That is the reaction. Though this happened within, immediately—how deceptive, how duplicitous man is—the inner thought was, he is carrying her on his shoulders; I too could have carried her; who knows what bliss he is getting! But at once he changed the tune—and as the youth came close, the old man’s eyes filled with anger, and sermons came pouring. The youth put the girl down. They both walked toward the ashram.
After two miles, as they were climbing the steps of the ashram, the old man said, this was not right—this is sin! Why did you carry that girl on your shoulders? I will have to go and tell the guru—this is a violation of a sannyasin’s life. Touching a woman is forbidden. Touching is forbidden—and you carried her on your shoulders! The youth was startled. He said, what are you saying? I put that girl down long ago—are you still carrying her on your shoulders? It’s been quite a while—two miles have passed!
The youth spoke rightly. The mind is not the senses; the mind is something bigger. The eyes only bring reports; the mind uses them. The body only delivers the news; the mind uses it. How the mind uses it—that is the question. We do not wish to stop the news. Even if we stop it, no difference will be made—the mind will weave its webs within; it will spin its tales within. How many stories the mind weaves, how many images it makes, how many desires it arouses, how many dreams it sees!
No—the fight with the senses has been a mistake. And remember, the one who fights the senses—his senses will grow weak. And as the senses weaken, the mind becomes more diseased.
It is a great wonder: the healthier a man is, the less lust he has; the more unhealthy he is, the more lust increases. Our idea has been upside-down. The ascetics think: do not feed the body, do not clothe it, make it wither, keep it unhealthy—then perhaps lust will be conquered.
Lust will not be conquered. The weaker the body becomes, the more strength wanes, the more the mind gains power. Have you noticed—during illness lust becomes more intense? Feverish, fasting a few days—lust grows intense. Have you noticed—when the body is exhausted, lust becomes intense?
All over the world rich people adopt children; laborers do not adopt children. They grow tired the whole day—tiredness intensifies lust. The poor have more children; the rich struggle to beget even one.
The more the body tires, the more desire intensifies; the weaker the body, the more desire intensifies. The healthier the man, the less lust—yet the more energy he has. And the more energy there is, the more directions can be given to the mind—transformation can happen.
But weakness often deceives. Extreme weakness—so weak that one can do nothing—gives an impression that life has changed.
Thus a long journey has been underway for thousands of years to weaken the senses. Its consequences have been disastrous—so disastrous that it is hard to calculate whom to hold responsible. All our sadhus, saints, and mahatmas stand responsible. Man’s senses have grown feeble. And when the senses grow weak, the rasa—the juice that flowed into life through the senses—also weakens. The flavors, the messages that life brought—those, too, have become dull.
Do you know—when you look at trees along a road, you only see green trees. A painter also looks, with eyes just like yours—but his eyes discern a thousand shades within green. Green is of a thousand kinds. You also hear with ears—but when a veena-player listens, it is altogether different; very fine, subtle distinctions of tone are in his grasp which our ears cannot catch. And when someone who knows how to love takes someone’s hand, that hand speaks. Our hands say nothing. If we hold someone’s hand—nothing comes into our hands; in a moment we only notice sweat. The hands bring no news, nor carry it. Our hands have become blunt; their sensitivity has died.
Our body now experiences very little. Thousands of years of opposition, thousands of years of suppression—the senses have withered, the body has withered, our capacity to experience has diminished. We do not fully hear, we do not fully taste, we do not fully see, we do not fully breathe, we do not fully live—everything is incomplete. The incomplete man hangs like a noose; from all sides everything is half. And our advisers tell us—while eating, do not taste; observe the vow of non-taste. They say—eat with an asvada vow.
One who eats with a vow of non-taste—the taste through which the Paramatma came to him will never come again. If food must be taken with a vow of non-taste, then one will also have to look with a vow of non-beauty through the eyes. Though our mahatmas have not developed that yet—a vow of non-beauty! To see with the eye in such a way that nothing looks beautiful! For just as taste is the rasa of the tongue, so beauty is the rasa of the eye. Then do not smell fragrance; when you go near a flower—observe the vow of non-fragrance. If you embrace someone—observe the vow of non-love. Let only bones touch, nothing else; let nothing within be touched.
These vows and rules have shrunk man from all sides. His expansions have been closed. Man is no longer an expansion—he has become a contraction. This contraction is very painful, deeply depressing, and dangerous.
This deadly personality must be broken, must be bid goodbye. Life must be accepted in all its forms—and all of life’s juices, all of its beauties, all of its music, all of its fragrances, all of its tastes must be received. Then dance and song are born in the personality—and then everything begins to bring news of the Paramatma.
The great marvel is this: the senses do not bring only the news of matter; they bring that because they are weak. If the senses could see deeply, they would bring the news of the Paramatma. If my eyes truly perceive beauty, that beauty ceases to be of skin and body; the deeper the eyes see, the more beauty becomes of the soul. And when the eyes look utterly deep, the stone is no longer stone—the Paramatma begins to peer through from within.
But since we are anti-sense, we see only stone—we do not see the divine. If you wish to see the Paramatma, you will have to see so deeply—deeper and deeper—that nothing remains unseen. We never even thought of it. Have you ever picked up a roadside stone and touched it with your hands? Ever sat by a riverbank and, at ease, taken sand into your hands and felt it? No. Ever cupped river water in your palm and, with eyes closed, tried to understand it? Ever pressed a tree’s pain to your chest and rested awhile? Does a tree speak? It does not, you say. All around, the vast is spread—the same presence is everywhere!
But we have become afraid even of taking a human hand into our hand. If someone were to hold a tree’s hand, we would call him mad. If we find someone embracing a tree, we say—his mind is damaged. Yet if the same man were to circle a brass plate in a temple, performing worship, we would say—he has become religious. And to the living Paramatma present in every direction, he never relates. He has fashioned his own gods, self-made. Before his own crafted gods he stands with folded hands. All his senses have become incapable; he can no longer experience; he has lost all receptivity, lost all sensitivity.
The foundation of religious life is sensitivity. How sensitive one is!
I have heard—at a fakir’s door a thinker came to meet him. He flung the door open with force—he must have been angry. When we are angry, we fling doors open. He threw his shoes down with a thud—he must have been annoyed. People even abuse their pens; he must have abused his shoes too. He slammed them hard. He went in and bowed to the fakir. The fakir said, I will not accept your bow. First go and ask forgiveness from the door—and ask forgiveness from your shoes. The man said, what are you saying? You want me to apologize to my shoes—have you taken me for a madman?
The fakir said, I had not—but from what you did I understand that you are mad. If you can be angry at shoes, why can you not ask forgiveness of them? And if you were not mad when you grew angry at the shoes, how will you become mad in asking forgiveness? The way you opened the door—as if shoving an enemy—go and apologize; otherwise, out of this house!
The man had come to ask something. He said, I have come from far away! The fakir said, no matter how far—this door is not far; walk four more steps and ask forgiveness! The man felt great unease. You would have felt it too. But he had to return. The fakir was stubborn. He said, I will say nothing; we will not speak to such a dead man who does not understand that he has mistreated a door and shoes. We will not speak to you. He had to go; he had come from far. He went and asked forgiveness from the door.
Later he wrote: at first when I asked forgiveness I felt—what am I doing? I had never asked forgiveness of any person in my life; I did not even know how to ask forgiveness; I did not know that asking could bring such peace. And when I folded my hands to my shoes and bowed my head—I had never bowed to anyone’s feet; that I would bow before my own shoes had never occurred to me—but when I bowed, it felt as if a great weight slipped off my head. A most wondrous thing happened—either that fakir was mad, or I was mad, or who knows what happened that day—when I asked forgiveness of the shoes, I found the shoes were different, transformed. And when I touched the door with my hand and asked forgiveness—pardon me, I erred; I was annoyed—the door felt different; it was not the same door.
How could it be! What we are—so becomes the life around us.
But we have shrunk ourselves from all sides, and the sensitivity around us has been destroyed. We must take the momentary joys of the senses too. There is no reason for enmity with the senses. And the one who cannot receive the joy of the senses—how will he receive the joy of the soul? The senses are only a small beginning of joy. One who cannot take that small joy—will he receive the joy of the Atman? One who cannot yet taste food, who cannot yet sense a flower’s fragrance—will he taste the soul’s flavor and fragrance? He cannot!
Umar Khayyam sat one morning drinking wine. Umar Khayyam is among those few who have cast deep satire upon our life. They are stories—who knows whether he drank or not. The story says he sat at his door in the early morning, drinking. The village maulvi passed by, and as maulvis and pundits do, he looked at Umar Khayyam with disgust and anger, with condemnation, and said—you will go to hell!
Umar Khayyam said, when I go, we will see; but you are already in hell. Come—there is enough to drink—have a little, sit in peace.
The man said, what are you telling me? You ask a maulvi to drink?
He looked around lest anyone see him talking to Umar Khayyam; if they found out he spoke with him—who knows what he said!
He said, you seem mad, Khayyam—leave wine! Do not take any pleasure in this life! Wine is a symbol of life’s pleasures. Take no pleasure in this life! Do you not know—those who renounce all pleasures here, the Paramatma has arranged all pleasures for them in paradise. There fountains of wine flow in bahisht.
At the mention of paradise’s wine-fountains perhaps saliva came upon the maulvi’s tongue—it would not surprise me. For he who renounces here burns to attain there.
Umar Khayyam said, your God is very strange! He says—do not take pleasure here, and there I will give you even more pleasure if you renounce here. What a God! What a logic!
Then he said, be that as it may—I do not know your fountains. I know this—joy is arriving to me in this little earthen cup. I take this. When a fountain appears, we shall see.
As he left he said, Maulvi—remember one thing: I shall at least have the habit of taking joy from a cup; perhaps I will be able to take a little from the fountain too—if ever there is one. But you will have no habit at all—never having taken even from a cup, how will you take from a fountain? And since you look upon the cup with such contempt, surely you will be the enemy of fountains.
Umar speaks rightly. In life, joy comes in the small cup of each moment. Through the doors of all the senses, joy knocks upon you. But we refuse it. We reject it. We stiffen within and say—no, we will not take this joy. The joy of the senses is bad, sinful.
No joy is bad, no joy is sin—only sorrow is sin. Why do I say sorrow is sin? Because one who embraces sorrow becomes the basis for giving sorrow to others. If I am miserable, I will give misery—because I can only give what I have. If I am blissful, I will give bliss—because I can only share what I have. We distribute only what is in us.
Man gives one another sorrow, because every man is sorrowful. The miserable man can only give misery. It is futile to explain to a miserable man—do not give sorrow; he will give it! He has only sorrow! What else can he do? Whenever he shares, he will share misery. It may be that he thinks he is gifting joy, may even believe that he is giving happiness. It may be the son thinks, I am giving joy to my mother—but the mother receives sorrow. The husband may think, I am giving joy to my wife—but the wife receives sorrow. The wife thinks, how I serve my husband—how much joy I give him! And the husband’s life is in danger. We seem to be giving joy—but what reaches is sorrow. Because we possess nothing but sorrow.
Other than being miserable there is no sin—because from misery all other sins flow, and sorrow spreads all around. There is no greater virtue than being blissful—because from one who is blissful, rays of joy begin to flow in all directions. In his life the tones of happiness begin to spread everywhere. If ever society is to be freed from the net of sorrow, then we must give each individual those foundations which can make him joyful within, ecstatic within.
But we have taught that ananda, bliss, is not on this earth. Bliss is in Moksha—in liberation—after death. Bliss is always after death. And sorrow? Sorrow is on this side of living, and bliss after death. So in life, one must only be miserable. All our old teachings have been telling people this. They say—treat life as if you were lodged in a wayside inn, a railway waiting room. Have you seen our waiting rooms? People sit there and spit, blow their noses, spit betel, throw peanut shells. And if you say—what are you doing? they answer—this is a waiting room, a rest house. Are we to sit here for life? Our train will come—we will go. Another does the same, the third too. For thousands of years people have been calling life an inn; behave as in an inn—we are not to live here. The train will come and we will go. Then, when for thousands of years such insult is heaped upon life, life becomes dirty, ugly.
No—even if we stay only for a day, wherever we stay becomes our home. Even if we stay for a moment, wherever we are becomes our home. The question is not whether it is a house; the question is our attitude in dwelling. Even if we remain for a single moment—what difference does that make?
Blavatsky came to India. When she traveled by train, she always sat by the window. Many times it happened that no window seat was free—she would ask the passengers to let her sit by the window. They would ask, what is the matter? She would say, I have to keep throwing something outside the window. People, surprised, would let her sit. She kept a satchel and kept tossing something out. People asked, what are you throwing? She said, seeds of seasonal flowers.
Throwing seeds of flowers from a moving train—she must be a madwoman! People would say, her mind is gone! Is this your house? From a moving train, why throw flower seeds? And will you pass this way again? She said, perhaps I may not. In life, when will one pass the same road again! Perhaps never. They said, you are mad! Then why throw seeds? She said, the rains are near; flowers will bloom. But you will not be here to see them! She answered, what difference does it make—someone else will pass on this route and see the flowers. I am filled with joy just thinking that when another passes this way, there will be flowers and fragrance. I may not pass. But the place where I passed even for a little while—that became my home. For a moment, from the train—that place became my home; I dropped a few flowers there.
This life can be beautiful—but we must treat it as home. Even for a single moment, let there be joy, let there be music, let the melody of delight be played where we are. Then perhaps even after death, wherever we are, we will carry so much joy within that that very joy will become our heaven. But the one who has helped turn this earth into hell—remember—for him there can be no heaven. Even if there were one, it would not be for him. And also remember, even if he reaches heaven, very soon he will make it a hell—he will not let heaven remain. How could he?
I have heard of a very unusual man—Berk. He did not believe in heaven, did not believe in hell, did not believe in God, did not believe in the soul. He said—there is no other life; this alone is enough. But Berk was a very good man.
A priest was speaking in London. In his speech he said—those who believe in God and live a good life shall go to heaven. A man stood up and said—perhaps you know of Berk. Berk is a good man, but he does not believe in God. Where will he go? The priest was in trouble. If he said—Berk will go to hell—and he knew Berk was very good—people would say, such a good man and hell? Then what is the meaning of being good? And if he said—Berk will go to heaven—people would say, he does not believe in God or soul; so can one go to heaven without believing in God and soul?
The priest said, pardon me—you have put me in a fix. I will answer after seven days; I need time to think. People said, you are so learned—do you need seven days? The priest said, even if Berk were standing before God, it would take Him seven days to decide. This man is so lovely he ought to be in heaven, but he does not believe in God or soul or religion or even heaven—where should he be sent? Give me seven days—I am a weak man.
He thought for seven days, turned many books, found no answer. What answer could he find! He grew nervous. The seventh day the time for church arrived. He reached an hour early to stand with folded hands before God and pray—tell me, what are Your intentions? You say where Berk should be sent. We never imagined the responsibility would fall on us—where to send Berk! Where will he go?
He had come early; he sat on the terrace, closed his eyes, tried to ask God and ask… No answer came—but he fell asleep. In his sleep he dreamed he was sitting in a train. He asked, where is this train going? People said, this train is going to heaven. He said, good—that is fortunate. We will find out, because some people like Berk have already died—Socrates is dead, he does not believe in God; Buddha is dead, he does not believe in God or soul; Mahavira is dead, he does not believe in God. Where are they? He said, very good—this train is going to the right place; let us find out there.
Reaching heaven, he was shocked. He had thought heaven would be very beautiful. But heaven was desolate; the roads were rough, as if never repaired; there were no flowers on the trees; sadness everywhere. Whoever one met looked lifeless, dead. He asked, is this heaven? They said, yes, this is heaven. He asked, is Socrates here? Is Buddha here? Is Mahavira here? They said, no—we have never heard those names here. They are not here. He said, but this looks so cheerless—so cheerless, dead!
He ran to the station and asked, is there a train for hell? A train was ready; he boarded for hell. He thought, let me find out there—there are only two places anyway. As hell approached, fragrant breezes began to blow. He was astonished—the matter seems to be reversing itself. Perhaps the signboards have been swapped! Something is wrong. Maybe I took the wrong train! What is happening? Near hell were lush gardens—flowers blooming, fragrance everywhere; somewhere a veena was playing, somewhere people were dancing. He said, everything is upside down—what is this?
He got down and asked, what is going on? Is this hell? I cannot believe my eyes. We just saw heaven—it looked like hell. And this hell—this seems like heaven. The man he asked said, yes—this was hell before.
He said, then what happened? Is it no longer hell? They said, the signboard still says hell; but ever since those people—Buddha, Mahavira, Socrates—came over here, everything has become heaven. And ever since your priests and pundits have been dying and arriving in heaven, they have ruined everything. The signboards are old, but everything else has changed. For the rule has changed: earlier the rule was that the good go to heaven—no longer so. The rule now is—wherever the good go, that place becomes heaven. Earlier the rule was that the bad go to hell—now the rule is—wherever the bad go, that place becomes hell. The rules have changed. It seems you were reading old books.
The priest awoke in fright; the bell was ringing below—time had come. He panicked, went down and said, brothers, I am in great difficulty—I do not want to say anything now. People said, what of the answer? He said, that answer has put me in trouble. Now I too am wondering—should I go to heaven or to hell? Where should one go?
The way we live here—upon that we lay the foundations of the life beyond, here on this earth—not in opposition to it. If there is a life of the soul, we lay its foundation in the life of the body—not against the body. If there are suprasensory joys, we lay their foundation in the joys of the senses—not in opposition. Life is not a conflict—life is a harmony. Here nothing is in opposition—neither body and soul, nor matter and Paramatma. Nothing here is opposed—life is one integrated whole.
But man till now has assumed opposition.
In the third sutra I want to say to you: no opposition to the moment, to the senses, to the simple, natural joys of life. Accept them with ease—so that life may be so filled with joy that the very capacity to give sorrow is destroyed. It falls away of itself; it dissolves on its own.
And if one thing happens on this earth—that man ceases to be eager to cause another pain—will it take long for a new society to be born?
What is the meaning of a new society? What does the quest for a new society mean?
It means a society where no one is eager for anyone’s sorrow; where each is eager for each one’s joy. This is possible.
Concerning the other sutras, I will speak tomorrow. It is fitting to answer one or two short questions now.