Is man the purpose of all evolution?

Is not man the purpose of all evolution?

Evolution has no purpose. The very idea of purpose is mediocre; it comes from the marketplace. Existence is playful, not purposive. It is leela; it is not work. But we think in terms of economics, business; we think in terms of the marketplace. Everything has to be with purpose. People come to me and they ask, "What is the purpose of meditation?" They take it for granted that there must be a purpose behind it. There is none. Meditation is its own end; there is no end beyond it. What is the purpose of love? Is love a means to something else, or is love an end unto itself? Purpose means division, division between the means and the end. What is the purpose of these green trees, and what is the purpose of the bird singing, and what is the purpose of the sunrise, and what is the purpose of…

Beloved Osho, if everything is simply happening, then can there be any ultimate purpose to it all, or is life just an accident? Can it be said that life is evolving towards some ultimate goal?

Buddha became a beggar. He was born a king, he became a beggar. Why? Just to live richly... because he came to understand that there are two ways to live: one is to die richly, the other is to live richly. And any man who has any understanding will choose to live richly, because dying a rich man doesn't mean anything; you simply wasted yourself for nothing. But this is possible only if you can conceive that the whole existence is purposeless; it is a cosmic play, a continuous beautiful game, a beautiful hide-and-seek -- not leading anywhere. Nowhere is the goal. If this is the background, then you need not be worried about individual purposes, evolution, progress. This word progress is the basic disease of the modern age. What is the need? All that can be enjoyed is available, all that you need to be happy is here and…

Osho, to be very frank, let me raise this question of a purposeful way of life today. To me it is not very clear: as I see, everything is in constant transformation—whether in the mineral, vegetable, or animal kingdoms, including rational beings, and in natural phenomena. I see nature ever-changing; how can our ready-made formulas serve any purpose? In fact, the purpose of life is not very clear to me. May I expect a detailed account from you on this aspect of life?

Life is its own goal, its own joy, its own meaning, its own purpose. Whoever makes life a means to something else will fall into misery. Some make life a means to money. Money can be a means for life, but life cannot be a means for money. The man who thinks that by accumulating money he has fulfilled life’s meaning is mad. Wise is the one who uses money as a companion, a support in descending into life’s depths. Life is a means neither for wealth nor for religion. There are people who make life a means for religion—worship, ritual, renunciation, austerity, sannyas—and they pour their whole life into these. They commit the same mistake the money-chaser commits. Prayer, worship, sannyas—all of these are for life. There is nothing above life—there cannot be. There is nothing for which you should be ready to lose life. Such a thing cannot…

You said life and existence have no goal, they are a purpose unto themselves. Other masters, for instance, sri aurobindo, teach evolution as the aim of the world, evolution in always reaching for still higher levels of consciousness -- from the kingdom of minerals to the kingdom of vegetables, animal, man, from present man to enlightened man. Are these teachings wrong? Or is there a bridge to purposelessness?

That's exactly what you need: a kick in the pants -- a terrific kick. YOU ARE Buddhas! simply forgotten. You need only a remembrance -- no evolution! It is NOT that you have to become a Buddha. You ARE a Buddha, fallen asleep. Somebody needs to kick you. Somebody needs to SHOUT at you. Somebody needs to hit you. And that is the purpose of a master. Ma Tzu is a master. Sri Aurobindo is not a master; Sri Aurobindo is just philosophizing, giving a consolation to people. Many people came to him, thousands became interested in him -- because it is so cheap to become interested in philosophy. Nothing is lost, nothing is at stake, and you learn beautiful words, and you start dreaming about things, and somebody systematizes the whole thing. He was a great systematizer: he labels things, categorizes them; he goes with such a system that…

Beloved master, could there be an ultimate goal of the physical evolutionary process? If so, what is it?

Children playing, you cannot say that they are evolving; children playing, you cannot say they are achieving something. They are not achieving anything. That's exactly the concept of LEELA in the East. Leela means play -- the world is God's play, and in play there is no question of evolution. The idea of evolution is really Western; the East has never believed in evolution. The East believes in playfulness. In playfulness there is no evolution at all. Nothing is means and nothing is taken as ends. It is a dance of energies, not moving into any particular direction, not meant to achieve something; the joy is in the play itself, the value is intrinsic, not extrinsic. When you start thinking of evolution, the value is extrinsic; the value depends on what you are going to achieve, what you are going to become. If a man becomes a great scientist, a…