Belief is a blind doorway. That is to say: belief is not a doorway at all, only a false mirage of a door. What man does not know, he takes to be as if he knows. What he does not have, he assumes as if it were already in his hands. And then—if the search stops—do not be surprised.
I have heard: on a dark night two sannyasins were passing through a forest—one old, one young. A desolate jungle, the night unlit, the path unfamiliar. No sense of how far the village might be. The old sannyasin is hurrying ahead, clutching tight the shoulder-bag hanging from his shoulder. Again and again he asks his young companion, “There isn’t any danger, is there? Any fear? Any worry?” The young one is puzzled—how can a sannyasin be afraid? And if even a sannyasin is afraid, then who will there be who is not? He is amazed: why does the old monk keep asking today, “There isn’t any fear, is there? Any danger?” “There aren’t bandits in these woods, are there? How long until we reach the village?”—and he rushes on.
They stop at a well to drink. The elder draws water and drinks; handing his bag to the youth he says, “Keep this carefully.” A thought arises in the youth—surely the danger must be inside this bag. He slips in his hand: there is a brick of gold. That is the fear, that is the danger. He takes out the gold brick, tosses it by the well, and puts a piece of stone in its place.
The old man finishes drinking, climbs down from the well, quickly takes the bag, hefts it, feels the “brick.” The brick is there. Again he hurries on. On the way he keeps asking, “There isn’t any danger, is there? Any fear?” The youth says, “Now be fearless. I threw the danger away two miles back, by the well.” Startled, the elder thrusts his hand into the bag: there is no gold brick, only a piece of stone! Yet for two miles he had kept that stone as if it were a brick of gold, and remained afraid. Then he flung the bag right there, began to laugh and to dance, and said, “Now there is no hurry to reach the village. Now there is no danger. Let us sleep here. Let us rest here this night.”
If a stone brick is believed to be a gold brick—it creates the fear of gold. But the stone does not become gold. If what is not our knowing is taken to be knowing, it breeds the illusion of knowledge; but it does not become our knowing. What we do not know—no matter how much we believe—we gain only the illusion of knowing, never knowledge itself. Belief is untrue. Belief is ignorance. And danger lies not so much in ignorance as in belief, because ignorance knows that it does not know.
Belief is that kind of ignorance which does not know—and yet thinks it knows. When ignorance thinks, “I know,” it becomes belief. If ignorance becomes aware of itself, then the effort arises to break it. But when ignorance is unconscious, there remains no reason to break it.
Humanity has been kept in ignorance by belief more than by anything else. If the human race is so filled with ignorance, ninety-nine percent of the reason is the teaching of belief for thousands of years. Belief becomes the security of ignorance. It does not allow ignorance to be destroyed. For once the notion takes hold that we know—without knowing—then the journey to know, the inquiry, is bound to stop.
Yesterday I said: belief is not the door. Today I want to say: thought is the door. And thought is the very opposite inner direction from belief.
What are the constituents of thought?
The first element of thought is doubt. Without doubt there is no thought. The first element of belief is: no doubt. The first element of thought is doubt. Only one who can doubt will think; in fact, whoever gathers the courage to think—doubts. One who is afraid to think does not even doubt; he closes his eyes and believes. Doubt—let me explain with a small anecdote.
Aristotle was a great thinker; yet even the so-called greatest thinkers carry pockets, hidden corners of belief. Many of those called the greatest still have much of their minds inhabited by belief. A keen intellect like Oliver Lodge—scientist—yet he will sleep wearing an amulet, afraid of ghosts. Picasso—you know the name—the great painter, so intelligent, so reflective, yet wearing who knows how many charms and talismans, and fearing ghosts. Somewhere, a corner of belief remains.
So also Aristotle thinks much, but he has corners of belief of which he is not even aware. In his book he wrote: women have fewer teeth than men. Because in Greece for thousands of years it was accepted that women’s teeth are fewer than men’s. In truth, men are simply unwilling to concede that women could be equal in anything. How could teeth be equal? Women’s teeth equal to men’s? How would men accept that? It would hurt male ego. The wonder is that no one ever bothered to count a woman’s teeth. The belief circulated—was accepted—and people believed it. Teeth are so easy to verify. There are women in every house—more women than men, not fewer—and Aristotle had two wives, not one. He could have said to either Mrs. Aristotle: “Sit a moment, open your mouth, let me count.” But he never said so. He simply believed. It was current that women have fewer teeth. So a man as intelligent as Aristotle wrote it. And once Aristotle wrote it, what to say of others—Aristotle’s word is proof. For a thousand years after Aristotle’s death it continued: women have fewer teeth. It is hard to imagine that among so many people, no one doubted enough to count.
Traditions of belief do not doubt. And when for the first time someone counted and said, “Women have as many teeth as men,” people answered, “Are you sane? Have women’s teeth ever been equal? Have you ever heard such a thing? Have you seen Aristotle’s book? Would Aristotle write wrong? Is Aristotle ignorant? You must have miscounted. Or you have come upon an aberrant specimen. Generally women’s teeth are fewer—so it is written.” When the attitude of doubt is absent, the backward knowledge of the past becomes a chain for the developed mind of the future. Remember: today we know more than we knew yesterday; and tomorrow we will know more than we know today. A thousand years ago we knew far less than we know now.
The sources of knowledge are not behind us; they open continually into the future. But a non-doubting attitude gets shackled by the backward knowledge of the past. New doors close. Opening becomes difficult. Doubt is a marvellous quality. Doubt means: what has been said, what has been heard, what is believed—put a question mark to it again. Raise the problem again. Do not accept anything important in life without questioning. Ask, seek, investigate, examine. But if doubt is never raised, then all this stops at the very first step; if there is a crazy tendency to believe, a weakness, everything stops. Then no one asks, everyone believes. Thousands of questions in life remain where they were left thousands of years ago, because no doubt was raised, no thinking stirred. And we go on repeating, repeating—and repetition has an hypnotic effect upon the human mind. Keep repeating something without caring whether anyone believes or not—by repetition he begins to believe. He forgets that he did not believe. The question dissolves. All advertisers are doing precisely this.
You walk the road; in big electric blazing letters: Hamam soap. Earlier it was written in plain letters; now it is in flashing lights. Psychologists have said: if you write it without blinking lights, a man reads it once; if the letters go dark and light again, as long as he passes the board he must read it as many times as the sign flashes. In his mind it gets repeated: Hamam soap, Hamam soap, Hamam soap. It is being driven into the mind. Turn on the radio—Hamam soap. Open the paper—Hamam soap. Wherever he goes—Hamam soap. Do not tell him anything, only go on repeating the word Hamam and implant it. Tomorrow he goes to buy; hundreds of soaps are on the shelf. The shopkeeper asks, “Which do you prefer?” He says, “Hamam soap.” He speaks in a kind of sleep; he does not know what he is saying. He is not conscious—he has been hypnotized. He simply mutters: “Hamam soap.” The words have been filled into the fibres, the threads of his brain. Now they slip off his tongue. He thinks “I am saying this—I have thought and decided.” He has not thought at all; it is only the art of advertising installed within.
When you say, “I am a Hindu,” have you thought? The same Hamam soap. When you say, “I am a Muslim,” have you ever thought? The same Hamam soap. There is no difference. Since childhood it is drummed into the brain: “You are a Hindu, you are a Muslim.” Since childhood he is taught: “This is God—Krishna; this is Rama; this is Christ; this is Mohammed, the Prophet; this is the Quran, this is the Gita, these are holy scriptures filled with truth.” It is repeated and repeated—from such an early age that no question could even arise. At such an age that the capacity to question had not appeared. That is why the religious are eager to impart ‘religious education’ to tiny children. Because once questions begin to arise—if you first say to a young man of twenty, “You are a Hindu,” he will ask, “Why? What do you mean? Why am I a Hindu?” But into the mind of a two-year-old you put: “You are a Hindu.” He knows nothing; he does not know the art of questioning. Doubt is not yet awake. You pour it into his infant mind. When questions begin to arise, by then—deep in the unconscious—you will already have planted that which he will never be able to question. He will carry it all his life.
We all grew up within such propaganda. Our whole mind is conditioned, cultured. Now, if someone would set out to search for truth, to find the temple of the divine, he will have to put a question to each and every conditioning. He will have to uproot one by one and ask, “Is it so? Am I a Hindu? For what reason? Because I was born into a certain house? How can birth into some house make one a Hindu? If a son is born in a communist’s house, does he become a communist? If born in a congressman’s, does he become a congressman? If not, then how will one become a Hindu by being born in a Hindu’s house? Or a Jain by being born in a Jain’s? These too are ideologies—what relation has ideology with birth? None at all. What relation has blood with outlook? None. What relation have ideas with sperm? None whatsoever. Whomever your father may be, it has nothing to do with being Hindu or Muslim. It is utterly incongruous—this link that has been forced into your mind. What relation has the rightness or wrongness of the Gita with your birth in a particular home? What relation has Mahavira’s being a Tirthankara or not with which mother and father you were born to? None.” But never was a question raised—never a question mark appended. Never any doubt. Therefore the world is divided. And the day each individual raises questions, the world will become undivided.
Today the whole world is at war. Russia is afraid of America. America is afraid of Russia. And sons do not ask: “What need is there for this fear?” Pakistan is afraid of India; India is afraid of Pakistan. Both, frightened of each other, go on preparing for war. No one asks: “What need is there to be afraid? What necessity is there on this Earth to live in mutual fear?” But no questions are raised. Fear is accepted. Conflicts accepted—and they continue.
Until the mind of society, the mind of the individual, reawakens every single question of life and tears off all the veils of belief—until then a new mind will not be born. And only a new mind can come near to God, not the old mind. By “old mind” I do not mean an old person’s mind. Even an old man can have a fresh mind—if he thinks, searches, reflects; if his mind has not become closed, if its walls and doors are open; if sunlight can enter, new winds can blow, new fragrances can come in; if he has not walled his mind into a prison—then even an old man can carry a young mind. And if a young person’s mind is closed, then he carries an old mind.
In India—in this land—a young mind is hard to find. Hard to find even among the young—so there is no question of finding it among the old. Such an old mind can never enter the gates of the divine. Why? Because God is forever young. Have you ever heard that God became old? The divine is eternally young—ever new. Life is ever new; existence is ever fresh—fresh and new each moment. Look around—existence is new everywhere. Only look into man’s mind—you will find the old. In the world outside you will not find oldness. Leaves that were yesterday are gone today. The sun that rose yesterday did not rise today. The clouds that gathered yesterday did not gather today. The winds of yesterday—where are they? The water in the Ganges that flowed yesterday—where has it reached by now? Nothing is the same as a moment ago. Everything runs in a rush of change—except man’s mind. Why does man’s mind not change with this speed? Unless the mind flows as swiftly as life, unless it keeps pace with life’s movement, life goes one way and man another. Man gets sealed in his capsule of the past, and life runs on. Then their meeting becomes impossible. To meet life one must be in flow, as life is in flow. A questioning mind flows—because to question is to break the old, to open doors, to declare eagerness for the new. But we do not ask questions at all. Asking questions seems to us a cause for fear: “Do not ask.” Whoever wants to think must drop this fear. He will have to ask. He will have to raise doubt—even about those truths which seemed unquestionable to the tellers. Only then will we come to that place where we too can experience an unquestionable truth. Through the path of doubt one reaches the undoubtable. On the path of belief, man lives and dies in doubt. Belief sits on top; doubt remains within. Suppress doubt and go on piling belief.
Ask a person who says, “God is.” Open his chest a little. Say to him, “Search within—might it not be that inside there lingers a suspicion that He is not?” He will say, “No—my belief is firm.” And the more emphatically he says “firm,” know that the deeper his doubt is. To suppress that deep doubt he needs a firm belief—otherwise there would be no need.
Belief is the medicine for what? Belief is the technique for suppressing doubt. Doubt must not be suppressed—it must be dissolved. Let doubt fully manifest—so that, manifesting, it can fly off. Let it come forth, collide with truth, be destroyed. Remember: no doubt can destroy truth. There is no need to fear doubt. Doubt will collide with truth; truth will remain—doubt will vanish. But those who are afraid must be taking doubt to be bigger than truth. All believers, all devotees must be thinking doubt greater than truth—hence they say, “Do not doubt—believe.” Is doubt greater than truth, that by doubting truth would be erased while doubt would persist? What power has doubt before truth? But yes—doubt is greater than belief. Hence the believer trembles: doubt will arise and belief will break. Yet belief is worth nothing. The real issue is that truth before which doubt falls, shatters, and disappears. Before truth, doubt vanishes as darkness vanishes before a lamp. Light the lamp—and darkness is not. But do not light the lamp—shut the doors and windows to hide the darkness. Darkness will not be removed; it will grow denser, since the little light that entered by doors and windows will also cease. Close all doors; set guards at the gate; inside the darkness will thicken.
Within a believer, doubt is deep and thick. If doubt is to be dissolved, open the doors; ask—do not fear. The first step of thought is doubt. The second step is logic—reasoning. Do not only ask—one may ask merely to deliver a set answer. One asks and produces the prefabricated answer. A man asks, “Who am I?” Then a set answer: “I? I am Brahman—Sat-Chit-Ananda. I am the Atman.” The answer is learned from the book. In the same book he has read, “Ask: Who am I?” And in the same book: “Answer: I am Brahman.” This is meaningless. Such asking is pointless. Ask—but reason too—then asking has significance. Weigh—do not give readymade answers. If answers are ready-made, asking becomes futile. You write the question and wipe it out. Labor wasted. If you ask, let the answer arise. Learned answers are not needed. And whatever answer comes—test it upon the touchstone of reason. See whether it appears right.
A fakir came home one evening. Someone had given him some meat in alms on the way. He brought it home and said to his wife, “Prepare it; I’ll go invite a few friends.” The wife panicked: “Hide the meat—let us not be burdened with guests.” The husband returned. “Why are you sitting? The fire not lit?” “Your cat,” she said, “has eaten the meat.” The husband said, “Indeed? Where is the cat?” He fetched the cat, brought a scale from the neighbor. The meat was three pounds. He put the cat on the scale—the cat weighed three pounds. The fakir said, “If this is the meat, where is the cat? And if this is the cat—then please open the doors and bring out the meat.”
To weigh is reason. Reason means: weigh what is said. Recognize it. It is said, “The idol in the temple protects everyone.” Give the idol a little push and see—can it protect even itself or not? Then it will be known: if it cannot protect itself, how will it protect all? When Somnath’s temple was attacked, what did the priests do? The nearby Rajputs sent word: “Shall we come to defend?” The priests replied, “Will you defend the Protector of all? Are you atheists? Irreligious? He who protects all—you will protect Him?” The poor Rajputs fell silent. What could they answer? They had no capacity for reason. If there had been reason—would this land have fallen on every small matter so? They thought, “If the priests say so, they must be right.” And when the enemy Ghazni attacked, five hundred priests were praying, “O God, protect us!” And Ghazni entered in the midst of their prayers, struck with his mace, and those gods before whom millions had prayed lay flat in four pieces.
Yet even such a small test the Rajputs could have made. They too could have given a nudge to see whether the idol could protect itself—and then all. But there is no reasoning, no reflecting, no weighing—only believing meekly, blindly. Reason means weigh both sides. Examine the claim being made. Seek opposite options and see which stands. There may be twenty-five options—apply the test of intelligence. But unreasoning acceptance is going on. And the so-called religious advise: do not reason. Reasoning makes one an atheist. I tell you: the one who becomes an atheist by reasoning—if he continues to reason to the end—atheism will not last either. Atheism too will fall away. Whoever stops on half reasoning remains an atheist. One who goes with complete reason goes beyond reason. And the one who has never been an atheist can never be a true theist. To be a theist one must pass through atheism. Atheism means only this: that we reason, think, inquire. One who has not gone through atheism has neither thought nor searched; he is frightened, and out of fear he has clutched a God. God has not become his rational outcome, the final conclusion of his inquiry—he has simply grabbed.
The second principle: reason. Think from all sides, search, ask. See all the options—do not quickly grab one. Do not fall into haste or partiality. Search without prejudice: who says what? In this land Charvaka offered arguments—but no one goes to listen. But he who does not listen to Charvaka will never truly enter the divine gate. One who hears Charvaka and then begins the search—he may enter. But one who plugs his ears at the sound of Charvaka—he is deaf; he cannot go further. Why so much fear? Not a single book of Charvaka survives—too full of reasoning, it seems. They were set on fire. Whatever words remain about Charvaka are found in the books of his opponents—few fragments. Astonishing—how we have tried to cut reason at the root. Wherever there is reasoning, thought—finish it, and strengthen unreason, belief. For this very reason science could not be born here. Science is born where reason is honored. Science is the fruit of reason. It was not born here, because we never reasoned. And even today, if we do not reason, science will not arise here. And a country that cannot give birth to science—how will it give birth to religion? Science is the truth of matter. If we are unable even to know matter’s truth, how will we know the truth of the divine? That is far higher, deeper. Matter is outer, gross—visible. The divine is that which is not seen. Those whose grasp cannot hold even the visible—will they catch hold of the invisible? It becomes mere imagination.
Passing through science is necessary, passing through atheism is necessary, passing through reason is necessary. Whoever passes through gains a maturity, a strength of mind. His feet begin to stand upon a solid foundation. Then if one day he knocks at God’s door and enters—he has a base behind him. He cannot be sent back. But one who has not passed through reason and reaches God by imagination—he can be sent back at once. There is no foundation behind him. His house has no foundation—yet the house he has built.
So I say: on each and every matter—reason. That which is inferior to reason is not worthy of acceptance. It should not be accepted. It must be thought through. Belief teaches surrender. Thought teaches struggle. Belief says: leave all, come to my refuge—do not think. Belief teaches refuge—come under someone’s shelter. Reason teaches—be shelterless. Do not go under anyone’s refuge. Think for yourself. Struggle with thought—this is right, that is right; this is not, that is not. Search. It is not necessary that truth be found today. But by searching, the consciousness that searches will grow deeper, stronger, more mature. That is the real issue. That is what matters.
The third step is contemplation—chintan. Reasoning is logic; contemplation is reflection. Listen to all the arguments—pro and con. Listen to the theist and the atheist, the advocate of God and the opponent. Leave the doors open for all the arguments that have been given for truth—let them all come in. But then—think for yourself. Become the decider. Contemplation means: then think—who is right upon the touchstone of my intelligence? Enter contemplation and search the aspects of each thing. There is no hurry—no nervousness—no haste to grasp. Turn each thing over; look from all four sides. The theist says: “Since there is a world, someone must have made it. The maker is God. Without a maker how could the world be?” Hear him. Search: he seems right—how could the world be without a maker? Hear the atheist too: “If the world cannot be without a maker, I ask—who made God?” Hear him. He too speaks meaningfully. “If the world cannot be without a maker, then someone must have made God too. Who made God? And if you say someone made Him, then who made that one?” And then we see that this argument is meaningless for God. By it, God is neither proved nor disproved. Weigh both—and see whether anything is proved, or both dissolve.
Whoever truly contemplates will discover: regarding ultimate truth, no argument proves anything. Arguments offer a case—a thesis. But the opposite argument offers the counter-case—the antithesis. If you do not listen to the other, you will catch hold of the one. But that is not contemplation—you will become a theist or an atheist, but not a contemplative. Contemplation means: each argument is searched impartially. And it becomes clear—no argument can establish truth. What one argument establishes, another disestablishes. Then a great maturity dawns: reasoning too is a play of mind. Belief is below mind; logic works within mind. But logic is also a game. And when the reflective mind sees that logic is a game, the door opens to go beyond logic.
I have heard: a man arrived in a great American city and announced: “I have brought such a horse as has never been on Earth. Its mouth is where the tail should be, and the tail is where the mouth should be. Whoever wants to see—come to such-and-such theatre this evening; tickets are so much.” The whole town rushed. Who could resist seeing such a horse? The hall was packed, people outside too. They shouted, “Bring out the horse!” The man said, “It is no ordinary horse—be patient. It will come.” Inch by inch every space filled. Breath grew difficult. Then he pulled back the curtain. A perfectly ordinary horse stood there. People stared; for a moment they were stunned, breath held. “This is the horse?” Then they shouted, “You are cheating—mocking! This is a common horse.” The man said, “Look carefully—look at my logic.” They looked: nothing special—only one thing: the feedbag that is tied to the mouth was tied to the tail. And the man said, “Look closely—this horse’s mouth is where the tail should be; and the tail is in the feedbag where the mouth should be. This horse is extraordinary. Do you follow my logic? Now, without noise, return home quietly. I have fulfilled my promise.”
Logic is clever—but it can be a trick. That logic can be play is not known before logic; one knows it by passing through logic. Someone may say: “If contemplation reveals logic to be futile, why reason at all? Why not stop beforehand?”
I have heard: at a station there was a big commotion. A group was going on pilgrimage to Haridwar. On the platform there was uproar—people boarding, shouting, “Put the luggage quickly; no one must be left behind; the child must not be left; the wife must not be left.” The train was about to leave—whistle blown, bell rung, flag waved. But around one man a crowd gathered—eight or ten were pulling him into the coach. The man kept saying, “I will board only if you promise that I will not have to get down. If I must get down—why board? If I must get down, better not to get on.” They said, “The train is leaving. We will explain on the way. You will have to get down—but to get down, you must first get up.” The man did not agree: “If I must get down after getting up—why get up?” His logic was fine. His friends forced him in.
Haridwar arrived. All began to disembark—and the same fuss began. His friends said, “Get down.” He said, “We are not of those who board to get down. We are principled. We got on—we will not get off. We are not fickle—something yesterday, something else today. We are firm men. We boarded—now we will not disembark. We said at the start: if we must get down, we will not get up.” Friends began to pull him out; he protested, “This is not right—you are forcing me. If I had to get off, why did you make me get on?” The man is right—but with a small mistake. The place where he boarded was not Haridwar; the place where he is getting down is Haridwar.
The believer says likewise: “If at some point logic becomes useless, why reason at all?” But belief is not Haridwar. Belief is the state before logic. Whoever stops at belief and does not pass through reason never reaches beyond reason—transcendence. He never attains the state beyond logic. Truth is beyond logic. It is not attained by logic; it is transcendental—beyond. But only the one who reasons can go beyond. The believer says, “It is not obtained by logic either—we will stop beforehand.” He becomes illogical—not trans-logical. But the one who passes through logic, through maturity, who explores everything, hears each subtlety of argument—and finally contemplates—then contemplation reveals: belief does not take one there; logic brings one to the door—but stops one at the threshold; it does not let one enter. Belief parks you at a false door. Logic brings you to the true door—but only to stand there; it does not let you cross.
After logic is contemplation—that too is a step of thought. Contemplation means: the impartial movement of all arguments, an impartial review of them all—what is right, what not. And when one sees logic very closely, one finds that what logic establishes it also disestablishes; it proves and disproves the same. Then logic remains a play, a net, a riddle. A riddle which has its joy—but offers no way out. But one who lives this whole riddle—steps out.
In a town a king resolved, “I will not allow untruth to operate. Whoever lies will be hanged.” He called an old sannyasin and said, “Bless me—I have decided to banish falsehood.” The sannyasin asked, “What will you do—what is your method?” The king said, “Each day I will hang one who is caught speaking untruth.” The sannyasin said, “Amazing! For it has not yet been decided what truth is and what untruth is. How will you decide?” The king said, “We will argue—we will think.” “Good,” said the sannyasin. “But will decision happen by argument and thought? Argument and thought will negate the decisions of belief; argument and thought are a negative process. They will uproot belief. But will anything positive be attained? Will it be known what truth is, what untruth is?” The king said, “That is why we have called you—tell us, and we will do so.” The fakir asked, “Where will you set the gallows?” “At the city gate,” said the king. “Tomorrow morning, the first day of the new year, we will hang at the gate one who is caught lying.” “Then,” said the fakir, “I will meet you tomorrow morning at the gate. Come with your logicians so they may decide truth and untruth.”
Next morning the gates opened; the fakir rode in on his horse. “Where are you going on horseback?” asked the king. “I am going to be hanged,” said the fakir. The king said, “Why do you lie? Who will hang you?” The fakir said, “If I am lying, hang me—then what I have said becomes true. And if you do not hang me, you have let a liar go. Now decide—let your thinkers decide—should I be hanged or not?” The king and his pundits were in great difficulty: “If we let him go, he is lying when he says he is going to be hanged. If we hang him, his statement becomes true—and we hang truth for the sake of truth.” “When you decide,” said the fakir, “send word; I will come to be hanged.” He spurred his horse and left. Years passed; no word came. Again and again he sent a message: “If a decision has come—say so.” The king said, “No decision comes. We have argued and argued—and failed. Now we ask you—how shall we know truth?” The fakir said, “Reason—and when you are defeated, rise above reason. But without defeat, no one rises above.”
Reason, thought, contemplation—have only one use: in the last step they cancel themselves. Thought finally arrives where it says: become thoughtless—then the door can open. Through thought only a whirl is created—nothing opens.
Belief is like a thorn lodged in the foot. Say to a man with a thorn, “We will bring another thorn to remove this thorn.” He will cry, “Are you mad? One thorn is trouble enough—and you want to bring another?” We say, “We bring this other to remove the first.” We bring the second thorn, take out the first, and throw it away. And then the man carefully sets the second thorn back into the same wound, saying, “This did me great kindness—I will keep it safely in the hole.” We say, “You are mad—then what was the point?”
I am opposed to belief—in favor of thought. With the thorn of thought, uproot belief from the roots. Without throwing it out there is no way. But do not take me to say: put thought where belief was. As soon as that thorn has done its work, thought too becomes useless. Thought becomes useless only when we pass through thought, labor through it, and discover that thinking gives us concepts, ideas—never Truth. No matter how much we think, at most we reach a notion—‘perhaps the truth is like this.’ But ‘this is the Truth’—that does not come. Thinking says ‘perhaps’—perchance. Thought never takes one beyond ‘perhaps.’ That is why science never goes beyond perhaps. Science says, “Perhaps it is so.” Tomorrow it may change. Newton says one thing, Einstein another; Einstein’s sons will say something else; their sons something else—‘perhaps’ always remains: “From what we know so far, it appears so. Tomorrow we may know more—and it may appear otherwise.” Thought cannot take one beyond probability. It gives a concept—an idea that ‘it could be so.’
The concept of thought is not Truth. Truth lives where all concepts drop. Yet one must pass through thought.
Let me give an image. One man is poor, standing naked on the street. Then there is Mahavira—a prince—who has worn the most beautiful garments, slept on the softest cushions, known all pleasures of life—and then has left all, and stands naked by the road. Both are naked. If you take a photograph, no difference will be seen. But a naked man who has never known clothing is naked in one way; and the one who knew the finest garments and then stood naked is naked in quite another way. One’s nakedness is poverty—compulsion; the other’s is joy, freedom, volition. In the poor man’s nakedness hides a desire for clothes; in Mahavira’s nakedness the door has opened beyond clothing. The two are naked in two different ways. There is a unique beauty in Mahavira’s nakedness; the poor man’s nakedness is an ugliness—because within him there is craving for clothes, a pain for what is not. Mahavira has gone beyond clothing; he too stands naked—there is no demand for garments. That demand is gone. That nakedness is utterly innocent—no imagining to hide himself.
One man believes—he is like the poor man, naked. Another has thought—and gone beyond thought. He is naked like Mahavira. Between the two is the distance of earth and sky. The believer does not think; the one beyond thought has left thinking too. But not to think is one thing; to leave thought is another. Because this difference is not visible, the believer thinks he too is where the thought-free arrives. He is not there. He never can be. Passing through the process of thought is an inevitability—an essential stage. Without it no one ever reaches thoughtlessness.
Thought is the second step. Cut belief—break it into pieces, uproot it root by root with the sharpness of thought. And when belief is thrown out, and you have gone through the full austerity of thinking, and you reach that place where thought sets you whirling and no way appears—concepts in your hand, theories in your hand, but not Truth—then thought itself will say, “Drop me now. Go beyond me. I am of no more use.” The final gift of thought is this: it declares its own futility—“Now transcend me.”
Upon the third step we will reflect—on thoughtlessness, that is, on meditation. First: it is not written on that door—Belief. Belief is not there. And I have said: Thought—and when you pass through thought you will discover: it is not written there either. It is not written upon the door of the divine, “Think—and enter.” By thinking you will reach outside the gate, not within. On the third step we will inquire: what is Dhyana? What is meditation? What is Nirvichar—no-thought? Is ‘no-thought’ written on that door? Tomorrow morning we will contemplate this—on Nirvichar, on Dhyana. And in the fourth talk we will ask whether even meditation must be left. Does it too not take us to the inner sanctum? It does not. Drop belief through thought. Drop thought through no-thought. Then drop even no-thought—then what remains is the state of Samadhi. It takes one to where the divine abides.
Whatever questions you have about today’s talk, I will answer them in the evening.
I am obliged for the love and silence with which you have heard me. In the end, I bow down to the God dwelling in all. Please accept my pranam.
Osho's Commentary
Belief is a blind doorway. That is to say: belief is not a doorway at all, only a false mirage of a door. What man does not know, he takes to be as if he knows. What he does not have, he assumes as if it were already in his hands. And then—if the search stops—do not be surprised.
I have heard: on a dark night two sannyasins were passing through a forest—one old, one young. A desolate jungle, the night unlit, the path unfamiliar. No sense of how far the village might be. The old sannyasin is hurrying ahead, clutching tight the shoulder-bag hanging from his shoulder. Again and again he asks his young companion, “There isn’t any danger, is there? Any fear? Any worry?” The young one is puzzled—how can a sannyasin be afraid? And if even a sannyasin is afraid, then who will there be who is not? He is amazed: why does the old monk keep asking today, “There isn’t any fear, is there? Any danger?” “There aren’t bandits in these woods, are there? How long until we reach the village?”—and he rushes on.
They stop at a well to drink. The elder draws water and drinks; handing his bag to the youth he says, “Keep this carefully.” A thought arises in the youth—surely the danger must be inside this bag. He slips in his hand: there is a brick of gold. That is the fear, that is the danger. He takes out the gold brick, tosses it by the well, and puts a piece of stone in its place.
The old man finishes drinking, climbs down from the well, quickly takes the bag, hefts it, feels the “brick.” The brick is there. Again he hurries on. On the way he keeps asking, “There isn’t any danger, is there? Any fear?” The youth says, “Now be fearless. I threw the danger away two miles back, by the well.” Startled, the elder thrusts his hand into the bag: there is no gold brick, only a piece of stone! Yet for two miles he had kept that stone as if it were a brick of gold, and remained afraid. Then he flung the bag right there, began to laugh and to dance, and said, “Now there is no hurry to reach the village. Now there is no danger. Let us sleep here. Let us rest here this night.”
If a stone brick is believed to be a gold brick—it creates the fear of gold. But the stone does not become gold. If what is not our knowing is taken to be knowing, it breeds the illusion of knowledge; but it does not become our knowing. What we do not know—no matter how much we believe—we gain only the illusion of knowing, never knowledge itself. Belief is untrue. Belief is ignorance. And danger lies not so much in ignorance as in belief, because ignorance knows that it does not know.
Belief is that kind of ignorance which does not know—and yet thinks it knows. When ignorance thinks, “I know,” it becomes belief. If ignorance becomes aware of itself, then the effort arises to break it. But when ignorance is unconscious, there remains no reason to break it.
Humanity has been kept in ignorance by belief more than by anything else. If the human race is so filled with ignorance, ninety-nine percent of the reason is the teaching of belief for thousands of years. Belief becomes the security of ignorance. It does not allow ignorance to be destroyed. For once the notion takes hold that we know—without knowing—then the journey to know, the inquiry, is bound to stop.
Yesterday I said: belief is not the door. Today I want to say: thought is the door. And thought is the very opposite inner direction from belief.
What are the constituents of thought?
The first element of thought is doubt. Without doubt there is no thought. The first element of belief is: no doubt. The first element of thought is doubt. Only one who can doubt will think; in fact, whoever gathers the courage to think—doubts. One who is afraid to think does not even doubt; he closes his eyes and believes. Doubt—let me explain with a small anecdote.
Aristotle was a great thinker; yet even the so-called greatest thinkers carry pockets, hidden corners of belief. Many of those called the greatest still have much of their minds inhabited by belief. A keen intellect like Oliver Lodge—scientist—yet he will sleep wearing an amulet, afraid of ghosts. Picasso—you know the name—the great painter, so intelligent, so reflective, yet wearing who knows how many charms and talismans, and fearing ghosts. Somewhere, a corner of belief remains.
So also Aristotle thinks much, but he has corners of belief of which he is not even aware. In his book he wrote: women have fewer teeth than men. Because in Greece for thousands of years it was accepted that women’s teeth are fewer than men’s. In truth, men are simply unwilling to concede that women could be equal in anything. How could teeth be equal? Women’s teeth equal to men’s? How would men accept that? It would hurt male ego. The wonder is that no one ever bothered to count a woman’s teeth. The belief circulated—was accepted—and people believed it. Teeth are so easy to verify. There are women in every house—more women than men, not fewer—and Aristotle had two wives, not one. He could have said to either Mrs. Aristotle: “Sit a moment, open your mouth, let me count.” But he never said so. He simply believed. It was current that women have fewer teeth. So a man as intelligent as Aristotle wrote it. And once Aristotle wrote it, what to say of others—Aristotle’s word is proof. For a thousand years after Aristotle’s death it continued: women have fewer teeth. It is hard to imagine that among so many people, no one doubted enough to count.
Traditions of belief do not doubt. And when for the first time someone counted and said, “Women have as many teeth as men,” people answered, “Are you sane? Have women’s teeth ever been equal? Have you ever heard such a thing? Have you seen Aristotle’s book? Would Aristotle write wrong? Is Aristotle ignorant? You must have miscounted. Or you have come upon an aberrant specimen. Generally women’s teeth are fewer—so it is written.” When the attitude of doubt is absent, the backward knowledge of the past becomes a chain for the developed mind of the future. Remember: today we know more than we knew yesterday; and tomorrow we will know more than we know today. A thousand years ago we knew far less than we know now.
The sources of knowledge are not behind us; they open continually into the future. But a non-doubting attitude gets shackled by the backward knowledge of the past. New doors close. Opening becomes difficult. Doubt is a marvellous quality. Doubt means: what has been said, what has been heard, what is believed—put a question mark to it again. Raise the problem again. Do not accept anything important in life without questioning. Ask, seek, investigate, examine. But if doubt is never raised, then all this stops at the very first step; if there is a crazy tendency to believe, a weakness, everything stops. Then no one asks, everyone believes. Thousands of questions in life remain where they were left thousands of years ago, because no doubt was raised, no thinking stirred. And we go on repeating, repeating—and repetition has an hypnotic effect upon the human mind. Keep repeating something without caring whether anyone believes or not—by repetition he begins to believe. He forgets that he did not believe. The question dissolves. All advertisers are doing precisely this.
You walk the road; in big electric blazing letters: Hamam soap. Earlier it was written in plain letters; now it is in flashing lights. Psychologists have said: if you write it without blinking lights, a man reads it once; if the letters go dark and light again, as long as he passes the board he must read it as many times as the sign flashes. In his mind it gets repeated: Hamam soap, Hamam soap, Hamam soap. It is being driven into the mind. Turn on the radio—Hamam soap. Open the paper—Hamam soap. Wherever he goes—Hamam soap. Do not tell him anything, only go on repeating the word Hamam and implant it. Tomorrow he goes to buy; hundreds of soaps are on the shelf. The shopkeeper asks, “Which do you prefer?” He says, “Hamam soap.” He speaks in a kind of sleep; he does not know what he is saying. He is not conscious—he has been hypnotized. He simply mutters: “Hamam soap.” The words have been filled into the fibres, the threads of his brain. Now they slip off his tongue. He thinks “I am saying this—I have thought and decided.” He has not thought at all; it is only the art of advertising installed within.
When you say, “I am a Hindu,” have you thought? The same Hamam soap. When you say, “I am a Muslim,” have you ever thought? The same Hamam soap. There is no difference. Since childhood it is drummed into the brain: “You are a Hindu, you are a Muslim.” Since childhood he is taught: “This is God—Krishna; this is Rama; this is Christ; this is Mohammed, the Prophet; this is the Quran, this is the Gita, these are holy scriptures filled with truth.” It is repeated and repeated—from such an early age that no question could even arise. At such an age that the capacity to question had not appeared. That is why the religious are eager to impart ‘religious education’ to tiny children. Because once questions begin to arise—if you first say to a young man of twenty, “You are a Hindu,” he will ask, “Why? What do you mean? Why am I a Hindu?” But into the mind of a two-year-old you put: “You are a Hindu.” He knows nothing; he does not know the art of questioning. Doubt is not yet awake. You pour it into his infant mind. When questions begin to arise, by then—deep in the unconscious—you will already have planted that which he will never be able to question. He will carry it all his life.
We all grew up within such propaganda. Our whole mind is conditioned, cultured. Now, if someone would set out to search for truth, to find the temple of the divine, he will have to put a question to each and every conditioning. He will have to uproot one by one and ask, “Is it so? Am I a Hindu? For what reason? Because I was born into a certain house? How can birth into some house make one a Hindu? If a son is born in a communist’s house, does he become a communist? If born in a congressman’s, does he become a congressman? If not, then how will one become a Hindu by being born in a Hindu’s house? Or a Jain by being born in a Jain’s? These too are ideologies—what relation has ideology with birth? None at all. What relation has blood with outlook? None. What relation have ideas with sperm? None whatsoever. Whomever your father may be, it has nothing to do with being Hindu or Muslim. It is utterly incongruous—this link that has been forced into your mind. What relation has the rightness or wrongness of the Gita with your birth in a particular home? What relation has Mahavira’s being a Tirthankara or not with which mother and father you were born to? None.” But never was a question raised—never a question mark appended. Never any doubt. Therefore the world is divided. And the day each individual raises questions, the world will become undivided.
Today the whole world is at war. Russia is afraid of America. America is afraid of Russia. And sons do not ask: “What need is there for this fear?” Pakistan is afraid of India; India is afraid of Pakistan. Both, frightened of each other, go on preparing for war. No one asks: “What need is there to be afraid? What necessity is there on this Earth to live in mutual fear?” But no questions are raised. Fear is accepted. Conflicts accepted—and they continue.
Until the mind of society, the mind of the individual, reawakens every single question of life and tears off all the veils of belief—until then a new mind will not be born. And only a new mind can come near to God, not the old mind. By “old mind” I do not mean an old person’s mind. Even an old man can have a fresh mind—if he thinks, searches, reflects; if his mind has not become closed, if its walls and doors are open; if sunlight can enter, new winds can blow, new fragrances can come in; if he has not walled his mind into a prison—then even an old man can carry a young mind. And if a young person’s mind is closed, then he carries an old mind.
In India—in this land—a young mind is hard to find. Hard to find even among the young—so there is no question of finding it among the old. Such an old mind can never enter the gates of the divine. Why? Because God is forever young. Have you ever heard that God became old? The divine is eternally young—ever new. Life is ever new; existence is ever fresh—fresh and new each moment. Look around—existence is new everywhere. Only look into man’s mind—you will find the old. In the world outside you will not find oldness. Leaves that were yesterday are gone today. The sun that rose yesterday did not rise today. The clouds that gathered yesterday did not gather today. The winds of yesterday—where are they? The water in the Ganges that flowed yesterday—where has it reached by now? Nothing is the same as a moment ago. Everything runs in a rush of change—except man’s mind. Why does man’s mind not change with this speed? Unless the mind flows as swiftly as life, unless it keeps pace with life’s movement, life goes one way and man another. Man gets sealed in his capsule of the past, and life runs on. Then their meeting becomes impossible. To meet life one must be in flow, as life is in flow. A questioning mind flows—because to question is to break the old, to open doors, to declare eagerness for the new. But we do not ask questions at all. Asking questions seems to us a cause for fear: “Do not ask.” Whoever wants to think must drop this fear. He will have to ask. He will have to raise doubt—even about those truths which seemed unquestionable to the tellers. Only then will we come to that place where we too can experience an unquestionable truth. Through the path of doubt one reaches the undoubtable. On the path of belief, man lives and dies in doubt. Belief sits on top; doubt remains within. Suppress doubt and go on piling belief.
Ask a person who says, “God is.” Open his chest a little. Say to him, “Search within—might it not be that inside there lingers a suspicion that He is not?” He will say, “No—my belief is firm.” And the more emphatically he says “firm,” know that the deeper his doubt is. To suppress that deep doubt he needs a firm belief—otherwise there would be no need.
Belief is the medicine for what? Belief is the technique for suppressing doubt. Doubt must not be suppressed—it must be dissolved. Let doubt fully manifest—so that, manifesting, it can fly off. Let it come forth, collide with truth, be destroyed. Remember: no doubt can destroy truth. There is no need to fear doubt. Doubt will collide with truth; truth will remain—doubt will vanish. But those who are afraid must be taking doubt to be bigger than truth. All believers, all devotees must be thinking doubt greater than truth—hence they say, “Do not doubt—believe.” Is doubt greater than truth, that by doubting truth would be erased while doubt would persist? What power has doubt before truth? But yes—doubt is greater than belief. Hence the believer trembles: doubt will arise and belief will break. Yet belief is worth nothing. The real issue is that truth before which doubt falls, shatters, and disappears. Before truth, doubt vanishes as darkness vanishes before a lamp. Light the lamp—and darkness is not. But do not light the lamp—shut the doors and windows to hide the darkness. Darkness will not be removed; it will grow denser, since the little light that entered by doors and windows will also cease. Close all doors; set guards at the gate; inside the darkness will thicken.
Within a believer, doubt is deep and thick. If doubt is to be dissolved, open the doors; ask—do not fear. The first step of thought is doubt. The second step is logic—reasoning. Do not only ask—one may ask merely to deliver a set answer. One asks and produces the prefabricated answer. A man asks, “Who am I?” Then a set answer: “I? I am Brahman—Sat-Chit-Ananda. I am the Atman.” The answer is learned from the book. In the same book he has read, “Ask: Who am I?” And in the same book: “Answer: I am Brahman.” This is meaningless. Such asking is pointless. Ask—but reason too—then asking has significance. Weigh—do not give readymade answers. If answers are ready-made, asking becomes futile. You write the question and wipe it out. Labor wasted. If you ask, let the answer arise. Learned answers are not needed. And whatever answer comes—test it upon the touchstone of reason. See whether it appears right.
A fakir came home one evening. Someone had given him some meat in alms on the way. He brought it home and said to his wife, “Prepare it; I’ll go invite a few friends.” The wife panicked: “Hide the meat—let us not be burdened with guests.” The husband returned. “Why are you sitting? The fire not lit?” “Your cat,” she said, “has eaten the meat.” The husband said, “Indeed? Where is the cat?” He fetched the cat, brought a scale from the neighbor. The meat was three pounds. He put the cat on the scale—the cat weighed three pounds. The fakir said, “If this is the meat, where is the cat? And if this is the cat—then please open the doors and bring out the meat.”
To weigh is reason. Reason means: weigh what is said. Recognize it. It is said, “The idol in the temple protects everyone.” Give the idol a little push and see—can it protect even itself or not? Then it will be known: if it cannot protect itself, how will it protect all? When Somnath’s temple was attacked, what did the priests do? The nearby Rajputs sent word: “Shall we come to defend?” The priests replied, “Will you defend the Protector of all? Are you atheists? Irreligious? He who protects all—you will protect Him?” The poor Rajputs fell silent. What could they answer? They had no capacity for reason. If there had been reason—would this land have fallen on every small matter so? They thought, “If the priests say so, they must be right.” And when the enemy Ghazni attacked, five hundred priests were praying, “O God, protect us!” And Ghazni entered in the midst of their prayers, struck with his mace, and those gods before whom millions had prayed lay flat in four pieces.
Yet even such a small test the Rajputs could have made. They too could have given a nudge to see whether the idol could protect itself—and then all. But there is no reasoning, no reflecting, no weighing—only believing meekly, blindly. Reason means weigh both sides. Examine the claim being made. Seek opposite options and see which stands. There may be twenty-five options—apply the test of intelligence. But unreasoning acceptance is going on. And the so-called religious advise: do not reason. Reasoning makes one an atheist. I tell you: the one who becomes an atheist by reasoning—if he continues to reason to the end—atheism will not last either. Atheism too will fall away. Whoever stops on half reasoning remains an atheist. One who goes with complete reason goes beyond reason. And the one who has never been an atheist can never be a true theist. To be a theist one must pass through atheism. Atheism means only this: that we reason, think, inquire. One who has not gone through atheism has neither thought nor searched; he is frightened, and out of fear he has clutched a God. God has not become his rational outcome, the final conclusion of his inquiry—he has simply grabbed.
The second principle: reason. Think from all sides, search, ask. See all the options—do not quickly grab one. Do not fall into haste or partiality. Search without prejudice: who says what? In this land Charvaka offered arguments—but no one goes to listen. But he who does not listen to Charvaka will never truly enter the divine gate. One who hears Charvaka and then begins the search—he may enter. But one who plugs his ears at the sound of Charvaka—he is deaf; he cannot go further. Why so much fear? Not a single book of Charvaka survives—too full of reasoning, it seems. They were set on fire. Whatever words remain about Charvaka are found in the books of his opponents—few fragments. Astonishing—how we have tried to cut reason at the root. Wherever there is reasoning, thought—finish it, and strengthen unreason, belief. For this very reason science could not be born here. Science is born where reason is honored. Science is the fruit of reason. It was not born here, because we never reasoned. And even today, if we do not reason, science will not arise here. And a country that cannot give birth to science—how will it give birth to religion? Science is the truth of matter. If we are unable even to know matter’s truth, how will we know the truth of the divine? That is far higher, deeper. Matter is outer, gross—visible. The divine is that which is not seen. Those whose grasp cannot hold even the visible—will they catch hold of the invisible? It becomes mere imagination.
Passing through science is necessary, passing through atheism is necessary, passing through reason is necessary. Whoever passes through gains a maturity, a strength of mind. His feet begin to stand upon a solid foundation. Then if one day he knocks at God’s door and enters—he has a base behind him. He cannot be sent back. But one who has not passed through reason and reaches God by imagination—he can be sent back at once. There is no foundation behind him. His house has no foundation—yet the house he has built.
So I say: on each and every matter—reason. That which is inferior to reason is not worthy of acceptance. It should not be accepted. It must be thought through. Belief teaches surrender. Thought teaches struggle. Belief says: leave all, come to my refuge—do not think. Belief teaches refuge—come under someone’s shelter. Reason teaches—be shelterless. Do not go under anyone’s refuge. Think for yourself. Struggle with thought—this is right, that is right; this is not, that is not. Search. It is not necessary that truth be found today. But by searching, the consciousness that searches will grow deeper, stronger, more mature. That is the real issue. That is what matters.
The third step is contemplation—chintan. Reasoning is logic; contemplation is reflection. Listen to all the arguments—pro and con. Listen to the theist and the atheist, the advocate of God and the opponent. Leave the doors open for all the arguments that have been given for truth—let them all come in. But then—think for yourself. Become the decider. Contemplation means: then think—who is right upon the touchstone of my intelligence? Enter contemplation and search the aspects of each thing. There is no hurry—no nervousness—no haste to grasp. Turn each thing over; look from all four sides. The theist says: “Since there is a world, someone must have made it. The maker is God. Without a maker how could the world be?” Hear him. Search: he seems right—how could the world be without a maker? Hear the atheist too: “If the world cannot be without a maker, I ask—who made God?” Hear him. He too speaks meaningfully. “If the world cannot be without a maker, then someone must have made God too. Who made God? And if you say someone made Him, then who made that one?” And then we see that this argument is meaningless for God. By it, God is neither proved nor disproved. Weigh both—and see whether anything is proved, or both dissolve.
Whoever truly contemplates will discover: regarding ultimate truth, no argument proves anything. Arguments offer a case—a thesis. But the opposite argument offers the counter-case—the antithesis. If you do not listen to the other, you will catch hold of the one. But that is not contemplation—you will become a theist or an atheist, but not a contemplative. Contemplation means: each argument is searched impartially. And it becomes clear—no argument can establish truth. What one argument establishes, another disestablishes. Then a great maturity dawns: reasoning too is a play of mind. Belief is below mind; logic works within mind. But logic is also a game. And when the reflective mind sees that logic is a game, the door opens to go beyond logic.
I have heard: a man arrived in a great American city and announced: “I have brought such a horse as has never been on Earth. Its mouth is where the tail should be, and the tail is where the mouth should be. Whoever wants to see—come to such-and-such theatre this evening; tickets are so much.” The whole town rushed. Who could resist seeing such a horse? The hall was packed, people outside too. They shouted, “Bring out the horse!” The man said, “It is no ordinary horse—be patient. It will come.” Inch by inch every space filled. Breath grew difficult. Then he pulled back the curtain. A perfectly ordinary horse stood there. People stared; for a moment they were stunned, breath held. “This is the horse?” Then they shouted, “You are cheating—mocking! This is a common horse.” The man said, “Look carefully—look at my logic.” They looked: nothing special—only one thing: the feedbag that is tied to the mouth was tied to the tail. And the man said, “Look closely—this horse’s mouth is where the tail should be; and the tail is in the feedbag where the mouth should be. This horse is extraordinary. Do you follow my logic? Now, without noise, return home quietly. I have fulfilled my promise.”
Logic is clever—but it can be a trick. That logic can be play is not known before logic; one knows it by passing through logic. Someone may say: “If contemplation reveals logic to be futile, why reason at all? Why not stop beforehand?”
I have heard: at a station there was a big commotion. A group was going on pilgrimage to Haridwar. On the platform there was uproar—people boarding, shouting, “Put the luggage quickly; no one must be left behind; the child must not be left; the wife must not be left.” The train was about to leave—whistle blown, bell rung, flag waved. But around one man a crowd gathered—eight or ten were pulling him into the coach. The man kept saying, “I will board only if you promise that I will not have to get down. If I must get down—why board? If I must get down, better not to get on.” They said, “The train is leaving. We will explain on the way. You will have to get down—but to get down, you must first get up.” The man did not agree: “If I must get down after getting up—why get up?” His logic was fine. His friends forced him in.
Haridwar arrived. All began to disembark—and the same fuss began. His friends said, “Get down.” He said, “We are not of those who board to get down. We are principled. We got on—we will not get off. We are not fickle—something yesterday, something else today. We are firm men. We boarded—now we will not disembark. We said at the start: if we must get down, we will not get up.” Friends began to pull him out; he protested, “This is not right—you are forcing me. If I had to get off, why did you make me get on?” The man is right—but with a small mistake. The place where he boarded was not Haridwar; the place where he is getting down is Haridwar.
The believer says likewise: “If at some point logic becomes useless, why reason at all?” But belief is not Haridwar. Belief is the state before logic. Whoever stops at belief and does not pass through reason never reaches beyond reason—transcendence. He never attains the state beyond logic. Truth is beyond logic. It is not attained by logic; it is transcendental—beyond. But only the one who reasons can go beyond. The believer says, “It is not obtained by logic either—we will stop beforehand.” He becomes illogical—not trans-logical. But the one who passes through logic, through maturity, who explores everything, hears each subtlety of argument—and finally contemplates—then contemplation reveals: belief does not take one there; logic brings one to the door—but stops one at the threshold; it does not let one enter. Belief parks you at a false door. Logic brings you to the true door—but only to stand there; it does not let you cross.
After logic is contemplation—that too is a step of thought. Contemplation means: the impartial movement of all arguments, an impartial review of them all—what is right, what not. And when one sees logic very closely, one finds that what logic establishes it also disestablishes; it proves and disproves the same. Then logic remains a play, a net, a riddle. A riddle which has its joy—but offers no way out. But one who lives this whole riddle—steps out.
In a town a king resolved, “I will not allow untruth to operate. Whoever lies will be hanged.” He called an old sannyasin and said, “Bless me—I have decided to banish falsehood.” The sannyasin asked, “What will you do—what is your method?” The king said, “Each day I will hang one who is caught speaking untruth.” The sannyasin said, “Amazing! For it has not yet been decided what truth is and what untruth is. How will you decide?” The king said, “We will argue—we will think.” “Good,” said the sannyasin. “But will decision happen by argument and thought? Argument and thought will negate the decisions of belief; argument and thought are a negative process. They will uproot belief. But will anything positive be attained? Will it be known what truth is, what untruth is?” The king said, “That is why we have called you—tell us, and we will do so.” The fakir asked, “Where will you set the gallows?” “At the city gate,” said the king. “Tomorrow morning, the first day of the new year, we will hang at the gate one who is caught lying.” “Then,” said the fakir, “I will meet you tomorrow morning at the gate. Come with your logicians so they may decide truth and untruth.”
Next morning the gates opened; the fakir rode in on his horse. “Where are you going on horseback?” asked the king. “I am going to be hanged,” said the fakir. The king said, “Why do you lie? Who will hang you?” The fakir said, “If I am lying, hang me—then what I have said becomes true. And if you do not hang me, you have let a liar go. Now decide—let your thinkers decide—should I be hanged or not?” The king and his pundits were in great difficulty: “If we let him go, he is lying when he says he is going to be hanged. If we hang him, his statement becomes true—and we hang truth for the sake of truth.” “When you decide,” said the fakir, “send word; I will come to be hanged.” He spurred his horse and left. Years passed; no word came. Again and again he sent a message: “If a decision has come—say so.” The king said, “No decision comes. We have argued and argued—and failed. Now we ask you—how shall we know truth?” The fakir said, “Reason—and when you are defeated, rise above reason. But without defeat, no one rises above.”
Reason, thought, contemplation—have only one use: in the last step they cancel themselves. Thought finally arrives where it says: become thoughtless—then the door can open. Through thought only a whirl is created—nothing opens.
Belief is like a thorn lodged in the foot. Say to a man with a thorn, “We will bring another thorn to remove this thorn.” He will cry, “Are you mad? One thorn is trouble enough—and you want to bring another?” We say, “We bring this other to remove the first.” We bring the second thorn, take out the first, and throw it away. And then the man carefully sets the second thorn back into the same wound, saying, “This did me great kindness—I will keep it safely in the hole.” We say, “You are mad—then what was the point?”
I am opposed to belief—in favor of thought. With the thorn of thought, uproot belief from the roots. Without throwing it out there is no way. But do not take me to say: put thought where belief was. As soon as that thorn has done its work, thought too becomes useless. Thought becomes useless only when we pass through thought, labor through it, and discover that thinking gives us concepts, ideas—never Truth. No matter how much we think, at most we reach a notion—‘perhaps the truth is like this.’ But ‘this is the Truth’—that does not come. Thinking says ‘perhaps’—perchance. Thought never takes one beyond ‘perhaps.’ That is why science never goes beyond perhaps. Science says, “Perhaps it is so.” Tomorrow it may change. Newton says one thing, Einstein another; Einstein’s sons will say something else; their sons something else—‘perhaps’ always remains: “From what we know so far, it appears so. Tomorrow we may know more—and it may appear otherwise.” Thought cannot take one beyond probability. It gives a concept—an idea that ‘it could be so.’
The concept of thought is not Truth. Truth lives where all concepts drop. Yet one must pass through thought.
Let me give an image. One man is poor, standing naked on the street. Then there is Mahavira—a prince—who has worn the most beautiful garments, slept on the softest cushions, known all pleasures of life—and then has left all, and stands naked by the road. Both are naked. If you take a photograph, no difference will be seen. But a naked man who has never known clothing is naked in one way; and the one who knew the finest garments and then stood naked is naked in quite another way. One’s nakedness is poverty—compulsion; the other’s is joy, freedom, volition. In the poor man’s nakedness hides a desire for clothes; in Mahavira’s nakedness the door has opened beyond clothing. The two are naked in two different ways. There is a unique beauty in Mahavira’s nakedness; the poor man’s nakedness is an ugliness—because within him there is craving for clothes, a pain for what is not. Mahavira has gone beyond clothing; he too stands naked—there is no demand for garments. That demand is gone. That nakedness is utterly innocent—no imagining to hide himself.
One man believes—he is like the poor man, naked. Another has thought—and gone beyond thought. He is naked like Mahavira. Between the two is the distance of earth and sky. The believer does not think; the one beyond thought has left thinking too. But not to think is one thing; to leave thought is another. Because this difference is not visible, the believer thinks he too is where the thought-free arrives. He is not there. He never can be. Passing through the process of thought is an inevitability—an essential stage. Without it no one ever reaches thoughtlessness.
Thought is the second step. Cut belief—break it into pieces, uproot it root by root with the sharpness of thought. And when belief is thrown out, and you have gone through the full austerity of thinking, and you reach that place where thought sets you whirling and no way appears—concepts in your hand, theories in your hand, but not Truth—then thought itself will say, “Drop me now. Go beyond me. I am of no more use.” The final gift of thought is this: it declares its own futility—“Now transcend me.”
Upon the third step we will reflect—on thoughtlessness, that is, on meditation. First: it is not written on that door—Belief. Belief is not there. And I have said: Thought—and when you pass through thought you will discover: it is not written there either. It is not written upon the door of the divine, “Think—and enter.” By thinking you will reach outside the gate, not within. On the third step we will inquire: what is Dhyana? What is meditation? What is Nirvichar—no-thought? Is ‘no-thought’ written on that door? Tomorrow morning we will contemplate this—on Nirvichar, on Dhyana. And in the fourth talk we will ask whether even meditation must be left. Does it too not take us to the inner sanctum? It does not. Drop belief through thought. Drop thought through no-thought. Then drop even no-thought—then what remains is the state of Samadhi. It takes one to where the divine abides.
Whatever questions you have about today’s talk, I will answer them in the evening.
I am obliged for the love and silence with which you have heard me. In the end, I bow down to the God dwelling in all. Please accept my pranam.