According to Osho, great masters are seldom, if ever, recognized by lesser leaders; it is existentially impossible for the lower to perceive the higher. The higher can see the lower, but the blind cannot know sight, nor the well-frog fathom the ocean. Only when one’s consciousness rises—through silence, meditation, and bliss—does true recognition and discipleship become possible.
If you haven’t grown inside, you can’t recognize a true master—like a well-frog can’t imagine the ocean.
From the Discourses
Passages where Osho speaks to this question — each links to the complete discourse.
Beloved Osho, history shows that when a great master appears on the earth, other, lesser leaders recognize him and bring their followers with them. Do you see this happening here?
Except this Nicodemus, no rabbi ever approached Jesus -- and Nicodemus approached him in the night. It would have been better that he also had not approached Jesus, because he shows the cowardliness of your so-called religious people and who crucified Jesus? The high priest and the supreme command of rabbis who overruled the whole community of Jews -- they decided that he should be crucified. There were many attempts made on Buddha's life by religious people, and I have always suspected -- although it is impossible now after twenty-five centuries to find out whether my suspicion is right or wrong, but there is a ninety-nine percent possibility that it is right .... It has to be right because some fundamental principles are involved. Buddha died of food poisoning. I suspect he was given poison, that it was not a coincidence. There were many attempts on the life of Mahavira.…
Beloved Osho, some people are interested in you, some people appreciate you, others recognize you, and some fall in love with you. Please speak about the journey to the master and also the journey with the master.
They admire a novel of Fyodor Dostoyevsky, they admire a painting of Picasso, they admire the music of Mozart -- they admire me. But what can admiring the painting of Picasso give you? That's where it ends. It is a nice, heartfelt feeling, you are overwhelmed -- but then what? Your admiration is not going to change your life, it is not going to become a transformation. And what is your fourth category? OTHERS RECOGNIZE YOU. Right. The fourth category -- of the people who recognize me -- also consists of two types of people. One, which will be the majority.... It is again an ego number. By recognizing me they are trying to put themselves above me, to show that they understand me, that they understand my enlightenment, that they recognize me as a master. But it is almost like a blind man recognizing a man with eyes just…
Beloved Osho, thank you for letting us taste from your ocean of consciousness. Both krishnamurti and gurdjieff were talking about their waves of consciousness. Beloved master, are they the waves of your ocean?
And in the fourteenth there is only one man, their own master, who was not known outside Agra. All his following is centered in Agra. A few people have moved to different places, but basically, it is a one-city-oriented religion. They asked me what was my opinion about this map. I said, "Who has made this map?" They said, "It is in our holy scripture. Our master himself has made this." I said, "Your master is right. He is in the fourteenth." They looked at me, because before me they had shown that map to many people. Everybody disagreed because their masters were put in the fifth degree, somebody's master in the third degree, somebody's master at the most in the seventh. After the seventh, the other six planes are empty. The fourteenth, the highest reach of consciousness, has been achieved by their master. Naturally no Hindu will agree, no…
Question: OSHO, WILL I ONLY RECOGNIZE YOU WHEN I AM ENLIGHTENED? That's why even a man like Sariputra, Mahakashyapa or Moghalan, the great disciples of Buddha, when they became enlightened still remained disciples. Again and again they had been asked, "Now you are enlightened -- why are you yet a disciple? You are a Master on your own!" This is a strange thing that happens: the ego wants to be a Master as quickly as possible; the ego wants to be on its own. It hurts to be a disciple. Just a few days ago one sannyasin wrote to me, "I am going to the West. How to behave there? -- because I cannot say to anybody that you are my Master, that I am somebody's disciple. That I cannot say." Why can't he say that he is a disciple if he is a disciple?
Osho, why is it that a true master has only a few disciples, while around a false master a crowd of followers gathers?
Of the patients who come, by plain arithmetic at least fifty percent will recover anyway—perhaps more. Not all illnesses are fatal. Even a doctor does not really cure; he only supports. There is a saying in the West: if you catch a cold it gets well in seven days without medicine, and with medicine in one week. Medicine or no medicine is not the big issue. Illnesses mostly heal. A person does not die of every disease! It is a matter of time. Just keep sitting. In lawsuits too, after all two people are fighting—one will win. And often it happens that both parties come to the same false master—the one who will lose and the one who will win; one is bound to win. And the game goes on. Those fifty percent who succeed because of your blessings return with garlands, spread your fame, and bring along fifty more…