Can the great religious scriptures of the world help a seeker in the search for God?

Is it not possible at all that the, great religious, scriptures of the world can help the seeker in his search for god?

The real seeker cannot search for God, because to start a search for God means you have already accepted that God is. You have already concluded. How can you start a search from a conclusion? You are already prejudiced. You are a believer, not a seeker. The seeker cannot search for God, because he does not know. He can only search into existence, not for god. He can inquire into the reality that surrounds him, not for God. Yes, but when you go deep into reality you find God. God cannot be the beginning of your search; it is the end, the climax, the culmination. God is the discovery. How can you begin with God? Once a psychologist and a professor of Jaipur University came to see me. He said, "I am a man of science and I have decided to prove through scientific methods and inquiry, the reality, the…

Osho, everyone sets out in search of a master after reading the scriptures. Is it mandatory to pass through the arduous process of studying the scriptures? Can one not go straight into the search for the master?

And then it is you who gives the scripture its meaning. The one who reads ends up reading himself through the scripture. Therefore no scripture can take you beyond yourself; it will keep you within yourself. No scripture can give you more than you already are. The state of scripture is like this. I have heard: an old villager went to an eye doctor. His vision had nearly failed. The doctor said, “No fundamental defect; glasses will fix it.” The old man asked, “Will my eyes improve so much that I’ll be able to read and write?” The doctor said, “Certainly—you’ll be able to read and write.” He replied, “Then hurry, because I don’t know how to read and write!” If you don’t know how to read, spectacles won’t help. Glasses only enable what you already know; they can’t give you more. How can you read in scripture what you…

A friend has asked: Osho, if creation and the creator are one, and if we ourselves are God, then isn’t the very idea of attaining or seeking God incongruous?

Certainly it is incongruous. There is no greater mistake than someone setting out to search for God. You can only search for what you have lost. What you have never lost, there is no way to search for it. But the search is incongruous only when it has become clear that “I am God”; before that, it is not incongruous. Before that, you will have to search. The search will not give you God; through seeking you will only discover that what you are looking for is nowhere out there—it is where the seeker is. It is the futility of seeking that brings you to God, not the success of seeking. This may be a little difficult to understand, but try to understand it. Here the seeker is the very one who is being sought. What you are looking for is hidden within. Therefore, so long as you keep seeking,…

Why, Osho, isn't knowledge of the scriptures helpful in finding the truth?

Maneeshi, KNOWLEDGE IS NOT YOURS, THAT'S WHY. It is borrowed. And can you borrow truth? Truth is untransferable; nobody can give it to you. Not even an alive Master can transmit it to you. You can learn, but it cannot be taught. So what to say about dead scriptures, howsoever holy they may be? They must have come from some original source; some Master, someone awakened must have been at the very source of them -- but now they are only words. They are only words about truth, information about truth. To be with Krishna is a totally different matter from reading the Bhagavad Gita. To be with Mohammed, attuned, in deep harmony, overlapping with his being, allowing his being to stir and move your heart, is one thing. And just to read the Koran is a far, faraway cry; it is an echo in the mountains. It is not…

Question: The first question: Osho, I want to find God. Where should I look? Vidyadhar! The very idea of searching for God is wrong. Seek yourself, and you will find God. Seek yourself, and God will seek you. If you do not seek yourself, you can bang your head a thousand times in the hunt for God—you may find many things, but God you will not find. One who does not know himself is not qualified to know God; he has no worthiness. First become worthy. Self-ignorance is the greatest unworthiness. It is the only sin. All other sins are shadows of that supreme sin. And people fight all those other sins—fight anger, fight lust, fight greed, fight hatred, fight pride and jealousy—and they forget one thing: inside there is darkness. Snakes and scorpions breed in that darkness. What is needed within is light, illumination, self-knowing.