According to Osho, AIDS is a ‘curse from God’ not because of sexual freedom, but because religions—especially churches—impose unnatural celibacy and segregate the sexes, repressing natural love. Such repression breeds guilt, secrecy, and distorted sexual behaviors, creating conditions for disease. The remedy is conscious, natural, and responsible sexuality, free from fear and dogma.
AIDS isn’t from being loving; it’s from fear and rigid rules that twist love—be natural, open, and responsible.
From the Discourses
Passages where Osho speaks to this question — each links to the complete discourse.
Do you feel, as some people do, that aids is a curse from god due to licentiousness?
It is certainly a curse from God, but not due to licentiousness. It is a curse from God because of the teachings by the church of celibacy -- which is unnatural; of keeping monks and nuns separate -- which is unnatural, which is bound to create homosexuality. Homosexuality is a religious disease, and the church is responsible for it. God himself is responsible for it, because in the Christian trinity, God is there, the father, the son Jesus Christ is there -- and who is this guy the holy ghost? There is no woman there; it is a gay group! And I suspect this holy ghost is a boyfriend of God's.
Beloved Osho, aids confronts us with the immediacy of our death. Our seriousness seems to create more disease and paranoia. Instead of feeling like victims, how can we respond through celebration?
It did not answer even Jesus Christ, who was simply nuts -- calling himself the only begotten son of God. He was just a bastard. Every bastard can claim that he is the only begotten son of God, because the ordinary father is not his father. His father lives high above in the sky. Even Jesus Christ's prayer on the cross was not answered. In deep frustration he shouted at the sky, "Have you forsaken me?" Still, no answer. If that is the situation of the only begotten son, what about other poor human beings who are just born out of their father and mother, mortals? This book is holy? Then magazines like PLAYBOY, PLAYGIRL should start calling themselves holy magazines -- of course, in color... glossy. You say, "AIDS confronts us with the immediacy of death...." It is good that you become aware that death is there, absolutely certain.…
Beloved Osho, the other day you spoke against homosexuality and lesbianism. What about bisexuality? A few years ago you said that bisexuality was the hope for the new man, the only freedom in sex. Is it still so?
What happened to those two big cities? They suddenly evaporated. My conclusion is that they suffered from AIDS. Certainly their medical profession was three thousand years behind ours; they may not have been able to figure out what was happening, but people went on dying. By the way, if you allow me a little drift.... There is a Hassidic story.... Hassids are Jews, but not accepted by the orthodox Jews. There is something in Hassids which I appreciate. Hassids are the only people who can be said to be our predecessors. Their religion consists of celebration, dancing, drinking. And their dances are really graceful, their singing is beautiful. Their being drunk cannot be called a sin because out of their drinking they have never committed any crime. They have just danced more joyously, more fully. The story is... it must be a creation of the Hassids because their history is…
Question: OSHO, ARE YOU AGAINST GOD AND JESUS CHRIST TOO? IT FREAKS ME OUT. AIDS may not be a new disease, it may be only a late discovery. It may have been happening before, because it has no symptoms. It is a strange kind of disease, without symptoms. To call it a disease is not right -- it is really a slow death, a very slow death. So you cannot find symptoms. You can only watch a man's life: if he is losing his resistance to diseases then he has AIDS. This is a very complicated phenomenon.
A:* It is absolutely different, because he is trying again to create fear in people. He's not giving a factual analysis of the disease. Let me give you an example: There was an earthquake in Bihar in India. And Mahatma Gandhi said that the earthquake has happened because God has punished the sinners. I was very young. I wrote him a letter that it is very strange only in Bihar God should punish the sinners. What about the whole world? Do you consider Bihar only consists only of sinners, and the whole world consists of saints? And he has not guts neither a gentleman's attitude. He never returned any answer. I wrote a letter to his son: That whether you father -- because he was my friend -- I wrote to Ramdas, his son, that whether your father has received my letter or not?