Is the teaching a cross-breeding between Zen and Sufism?

Yesterday you said that zen is the beautiful result of melting tao and buddhism, and sufism the flower that blooms out of islam and hinduism. Is your teaching the super-flower, the cross-breeding between zen and sufism?

It is not a flower, it is just a meeting of two fragrances. Zen is a superflower, so is Sufism. Nothing can be added to them; they are perfect. As far as flowers are concerned, they have attained to perfection; nothing more can be added to them, they have bloomed. What I am doing here is trying to fuse their fragrances. A rose has flowered and so has flowered a lotus. Both arc spreading their fragrances to the wind. What I am doing here is trying to fuse their fragrance, which is a very subtle phenomenon. A flower is gross, fragrance is subtle. A flower is visible, fragrance is invisible. A flower is material, fragrance is simply spiritual. That's what I am doing here trying to bring together all the flowers of Tantra, of Yoga, of Tao, of Sufism, of Zen, of Hasidism, Jews, Moslems. Hindus, Buddhists. Jains-l am trying…

And remember that life is already there, manifested. There is nothing hidden in it. In Zen they say that nothing is hidden from the very beginning, but people are trying to find it -- and it is just in front of the eyes. The meaning is here in these trees, in the life of these insects, in this railway engine, in you and me. The meaning is here. [In speaking of T'ai Chi, Osho said... ] The idea is to concentrate on the chi energy in the hara. The effort is to conserve energy that is not available to anyone else, inside a citadel in your being. It is available when you need it and it makes you tremendously powerful. [Osho went on to say that once one had accumulated energy, it then has to be shared.

Osho, is tao a synthesis of the paths of love and awareness?

Gandhi chooses only pieces and then makes a hotch-potch which he calls synthesis of all religions. It never happened. Neither the Mohammedans were convinced with him, nor the Hindus. He could not even convince Hindus -- he was a Hindu -- and he was murdered by a Hindu. He could not convince Hindus. He could not convince Jains either, because they continuously believed that Krishna is not a good man. In Jain mythology Krishna is thrown into seventh hell for the simple reason because he distracted Arjuna, who was going to renounce war. He forced him, persuaded him, convinced him, seduced him by beautiful logic -- silenced him somehow -- to fight. And millions of people died. Who is responsible for all this violence, for all this blood? He is responsible -- more responsible than Arjuna. Jains have never forgiven him; not even after Gandhi a single Jain has written…

Is it a mingling of different religious concepts?

It is not a mingling. Rather, it is the essential foundation of all religions. It is not a compromise of all the religions. Rather, on the contrary, it is the essence of all religion. When a Jesus achieves something, the outward behaviour, the outward ritual that evolves around him, becomes Christianity. But the innermost core is lost. When a Buddha achieves something the same thing happens. The unknown is achieved again, but the nonessential begins to be more important and Buddhism is created. So neo-sannyas is not a mingling of Buddhism and Christianity and other religions. Rather, it is a reassertion of the essentials that make a Buddha a Buddha and a Jesus a Jesus. And that essential is one. So I say yes to all religions as religions and no to all religions as sects.

Osho, the twenty-one-day ritual you have hinted at—was that practice or elemental realization in any way traditional? Because from your mode of expression it continually seems that you surely represent some teacher’s or Tirthankara’s method. Within this I also want to dare to ask: do you want to add a link to some established spiritual lineage, or, like Buddha, are you attempting to cut a new path through the mountains?

Nor is the issue one of tolerance. It is a matter of sky-like spaciousness, not tolerance. Not mere forbearance. Not that a Hindu “puts up with” a Muslim or a Christian “puts up with” a Jain. Forbearance already holds violence within it. I do not say the Quran and the Gita say the same thing. The Quran says something quite different; it has its own individual voice—that is its greatness. If it only repeated what the Gita says, it would be worth two pennies. The Bible says something else again, which neither the Gita nor the Quran says. Each has its own voice. Mahavira does not say what Buddha says; they say very different things. And yet from these differing statements one ultimately arrives at the same place. My emphasis is on the oneness of the destination, not on the oneness of the paths. My emphasis is that in the…