Does a devotee ever quarrel with God?

Question: Third question: Osho, does a devotee ever quarrel with God? Only the devotee quarrels! Who else would? Only the devotee can quarrel! Who else has such strength? A devotee knows no fear. Where is there fear in love? That is why I say: Tulsidas’s statement is wrong when he said, “Without fear there is no love.” Tulsidas did not know love. Where there is fear, how can there be love? And whatever arises out of fear will be something else—it is not love. Someone stands over you with a stick and says, “Love me!” You will obey because you see the stick—otherwise he’ll crack your skull. A mother says to her son, “Love me, I am your mother! Otherwise I won’t give you milk; you will starve.” The son thinks, “I’ll have to love.” This “love” is born of fear. A father says, “Love me, I am your father!

Now I will quarrel only with You. You alone are—there is nothing else. If it must be—let the quarrel be with You; let dispute be with You; complaint be with You. Understand the difference: You too complain; the bhakta too complains. But in your complaint there is no prayer. In the bhakta’s complaint, there is prayer. You go to God to ask something, to complain—This is like this, it should be like that… The great Western thinker Emerson said: The essence of man’s prayers is only this: people go to God and say that two and two should not make four. You have stolen—there should be no punishment. You have sinned—there should be no suffering. Man’s prayers are that what should be—should not be. Let something else be, what you want should be. You want the arrangement changed. Your prayer is desire. Your complaint is filled with anger.

Osho, in the pangs of separation from the Beloved, the devotee sometimes weeps and sometimes laughs. What kind of contradiction is this?

Or tell me outright that relief is not in my fate. If You must give, then give today—not on the Day of Judgment. How long is one to wait? And yet he knows too, he understands too— To complain to Him is futile, Seemab: It is you who are not yet worthy of His gracious glance. He knows this as well: What cause for complaint? What is my worthiness? I am not yet even fit for His compassion! So wearied am I by these mirage-like thoughts, My heart wishes even you would not come into thought. Exasperated, I would break this enchantment of thought— Or make me certain that it is You who dwell in my thought. Sometimes he becomes so harried by remembering and remembering, by weeping and weeping, that he says: I am so tired, so afflicted...so wearied am I by these mirage-like thoughts—by thoughts of you, by…

The woman could not trust this. She asked, ‘Do you have a son? Can you honestly say you have never been angry with him, never raised your hand?’ The psychologist said, ‘If you must know the truth—the truth is, I never lift my hand against my son—except sometimes, in self-defense. In self-defense!’ In love even anger becomes glorified. Remember this alchemy: even soil joined with love turns to gold. But if you cut anger off, you will find you have severed love’s wings. The man who cannot be angry cannot love either. This is why your so-called saints turn loveless. Because all their effort has been that anger should not happen—somehow to repress it. Anger is repressed; love is repressed along with it. In their garden, thorns no longer grow—but flowers do not grow either. What kind of bargain is this?

Question: The last question: Osho, can a devotee live only by the support of belief? Belief is a hollow thing, a false thing. A devotee lives by love, not by belief. Belief is needed by those in whose lives love is absent. In a devotee, love wells up on seeing existence. Seeing green trees, the desire to embrace them arises. Hearing music, there is a longing to become musical. Seeing the stars, one feels like dancing with them. In a devotee, love toward existence has awakened. A devotee has no need of belief. In a devotee, trust has arisen. And there is a great difference between trust and belief. Belief belongs to the head, trust belongs to the heart. Belief is of doctrine. If you are born in a Hindu home, your beliefs are Hindu; that does not make you a devotee.