According to Osho, yes—he does admire Saint Francis of Assisi. His reply is a clear, unadorned affirmation, acknowledging respect for Francis’s example. Though he offers no details here, the concise yes highlights his openness to learn from and honor figures whose lives embody sincerity and lived spirituality, inviting seekers to recognize and be inspired by authentic exemplars.
He simply says yes—he admires Saint Francis of Assisi.
From the Discourses
Passages where Osho speaks to this question — each links to the complete discourse.
Osho, just seeing sadhus and saints makes me bristle, even angry. I see nothing in them but hypocrisy. But with you—God knows what you’ve done—reverence wells up! What is the secret of your influence?
Buddha asked, “What are you doing?” They said, “This is not killing; not violence. The souls of these animals will go to heaven.” Buddha joked, “Then why not kill your parents? Send them to heaven. The door is open—why send animals? Send your parents, your wife, your children. Send everyone—and then go yourself! But don’t send these animals. They don’t want to go—they’re writhing, they want to run. They are pleading for mercy. They cannot speak—look into their eyes, they are beseeching. They are bleating: ‘Let us go.’ They don’t want heaven—and you are sending them. The yajman who is funding this sacrifice wants heaven—send him!” Clever folks have always been around. Tricks kept running; we kept bearing them. Sin and merit are difficult to determine. On one side are people along the Amazon who eat humans—and it is no sin to them. On the other side are the Quakers…
Osho, from what source does such sweetness, such rasa, come into the speech of saints? And why does the speech of saints bring such fulfillment and reassurance?
And who is without thirst? People keep their thirst suppressed, they keep it forgotten. But thirst is in all. Across lifetimes, what have you been seeking? When the Infinite manifests in a saint, you receive assurance that your running is not in vain; that what descended as a shadow into your imaginings and dreams is not merely a shadow, not merely maya—it can be truth. What I have asked for—if someone has attained it, then I can attain it too. If what I desired has been fulfilled in another, it can be fulfilled in me as well. If in someone just like me—in flesh, bone, and marrow—such infinite peace and bliss has dawned, then it will dawn in me too. Hence the reassurance. Sitting near saints, trust swells, reverence awakens. Then you don’t have to “believe.” Belief is something you force. Reverence arises on its own. Those are the feet…
Beloved Osho, as one pair of sparkling eyes after another arrives to be with you here, is it perhaps that you are surrounded for the first time by disciples who love you as you are, or however you want to be -- and who are certainly not looking for any goody-goody saint?
Amrito, the way of love is the way of no-expectation. Love exists only when there is total acceptance and no desire to change anything. The moment you start thinking of how the other should be... whether the other is your lover, your beloved, your child, your master, your disciple... it does not matter who the other is. What matters is a total acceptance of the other As he is. Not tolerance -- tolerance is an ugly word. In the very word "tolerance" there is intolerance. The very word smells as if somehow against your will you are managing it: it is not a loving acceptance but an unloving tolerance. It is true that it has taken me a long, long journey to find only those people who can understand me, accept me, love me as I am. I have never asked anybody to be somebody other than who he is.…
Question: OSHO, IS J. KRISHNAMURTI ENLIGHTENED? Not only cheap, they are selling it without taking anything from you. Not only that, they are rewarding you: if you purchase their truth they are going to reward you. The Christians will call you a saint, the Hindus will call you a mahatma, a sage. Without any effort, without paying anything you gain so much respectability. All that you have to do is to pretend, to be a hypocrite. The whole human society is pretending. What do you know about Christ's experience? Without having some taste of it, you are a Christian? If this is not hypocrisy, then what is hypocrisy? Knowing nothing about God, you believe in God. If this is not dishonesty.... Then what else can dishonesty be? You are not even honest towards God. An honest, sincere person will start from skepticism. He will enquire.
He says, "I love jesus more than anyone." 4 4
He also says -- you have forgotten -- that I have fallen in the same hollow pit as other great masters and leaders. I am neither a great master nor a great leader. I am a simple, ordinary man. I don't want to be categorized with all those fools. Being simple and ordinary has one beauty: you cannot fall. To fall, one thing is absolutely necessary, that you should be high, great, on the top of the world. I do not belong to that category. I live a simple, human life, with all its weaknesses, frailties, mistakes. I cannot fall, there is nowhere to fall. If you want to fall, first go up a ladder. I have been walking my whole life on the plain ground. This is strange. First you make me a great master, a great leader, just to make me fall from there. I know enough logic....…