Were pagans religious?

Osho, were pagans religious?

I used to sit in the temple with the old man. He never even asked me, "Why? -- because nobody comes here." Just the day he was dying he asked, because that day too only I was there. He told me, "I have thought many times to ask you -- nobody comes here; I am a poor man, just a beggar -- why do you come and sit here for hours listening to my flute? And I don't know how to play it even, I never learned. I don't have any master who has taught me the flute. "I found it just in the street. Somebody must have forgotten it there, it fell or something. I inquired to whom it belongs. Nobody was ready to take it, so I said, okay, I will try. I started playing, and slowly slowly, I came to love the sounds. "But why you? In…

Question: BELOVED OSHO, DOES A PAGAN LIVING A NATURAL LIFE NEED RELIGION? The authentic pagan has no need of religion because, whatever religion can provide, he already has it. Religion gives you only hopes; the pagan has all those hopes realized herenow. Religion tells you that somewhere in the future, in the kingdom of God, you will be happy, continuously playing on the harp and singing, "Alleluia, Alleluia!" But sometimes I think, "How long can you play on the harp?" And in heaven there is no other work, at least no religion says that there is any work; just be happy and go on singing alleluia. Those saints, who must have been doing this for centuries -- feel compassion for them. And the difficulty with heaven is, there is an entrance but there is no exit. Jean-Paul Sartre has written a play, NO EXIT; it is about hell.