What factors contribute to the low number of Black sannyasins?

Beloved Osho can you say something about the fact that there are so few black sannyasins? What is keeping them especially from taking sannyas?

The black people have been treated so badly in the past that they have become afraid of getting involved in anything outside the circle of the blacks. It is just their past that is so heavy on them; -- moreover, they are poor, struggling somehow to survive. They cannot be interested in consciousness, in individuality, in the higher values of life. Their poverty prevents it; their past prevents it. I am against all kinds of missionaries, all kinds of conversions, so I cannot send my people there. I will wait. Slowly, slowly they will be coming, but it will take time. It is not only the blacks who are missing in my people. Many people from the poor countries are missing for the simple reason that they cannot think of anything other than bread; bread is all that they can think about. They don't have any question about the meaning…

Beloved Osho, I am one of your black sannyasins. My childhood was spent in africa, my family lives there. I have been with you for ten years, and I've put aside my questions about africa. Now I find that what you are saying about black people and africa makes me feel raw and shaky. I feel ashamed as well. Can you explain what is happening? I am glad that it is happening, but it hurts.

I don't ever discriminate between the black people and the white people. To me, anybody who is trying to seek, search inwards.... Inside nobody is black and nobody is white. Inside there are no colors. Inside it is luminous whiteness. Remember, white is not a color, just as black is not a color. It is strange that we say black people, white people; both are colorless, in different ways. You can see... in the rainbow you will not find white and black. These two colors you will not find in the rainbow; all other colors are there. Why is the rainbow not interested in white and black? -- because they are not colors. Black simply means that all colors have been absorbed. You have to understand a little bit of scientific fact. When you see something black, that means none of the sunrays falling on it are reflected back. It…

Beloved Osho, why haven't people from africa come to you? Most of the people who come are white-skinned. To me, what you say is for everyone. Are the others afraid of you?

Mohammed was a poor man, illiterate; so was Jesus a poor man, illiterate. Buddha was not a poor man and illiterate. He was a prince, the only son of his father; soon he was going to be crowned. He was educated in the best possible way, he was acquainted with all the wisdom available. His intelligence was sharpened in every possible way... because in India, philosophy has developed differently than it has developed in Europe. It was developed not by writing philosophic treatises, it was developed by wandering philosophers arguing all over the country, debating, discussing, winning. And the rule of the game was that whoever wins in an argument becomes the master of the person who is defeated. And the defeated person -- not in any sadness, but with great joy -- surrenders to the master, because the question is not who is winning, the question is: What is…

Beloved Osho, why are there so few american sannyasins? I recall you saying that america would be a very spiritual country because they had already mastered material abundance and found it did not satisfy. Why are they so sleepy? Please comment.

America has no roots. It is just a three-hundred-year-old country; it is passing through its childhood. Compared to a country like India which has been there for at least ninety thousand years, America is a just-born baby. So wait a little; babies don't tend to be spiritual. Secondly, America has promoted itself as being really rich. That is not true. Thirty million Americans are in utter poverty; millions of black people are not first-class citizens, and the people to whom the country belongs, the Red Indians, are kept in reservations. Those reservations are not very much different to the concentration camps in Germany -- in fact, they are more dangerous. In Germany, the concentration camps were made of barbed wire; you could not escape. The American reservations are open. If you want to go out, nobody is preventing you. They have created some psychological barbed wire -- invisible. The Red…

Now the difference between a black man and a white man is so small. In the old days the difference used to be near about four anas. Now prices have gone high -- it may be a difference of one rupee. And remember, that difference is in favor of the black man. The black man has a pigment of color which makes him worth one rupee more than the white man. That black pigment of color protects him from the sun, the white man is unprotected. God seems to be more concerned to protect the black man than the white. The white man's body is weaker, the black man's body is stronger. It was a surprise to me, whenever I entered a jail in America there were black people behind bars who had seen me on the television, because in every jail there are televisions.