A living master is like a magnet: he draws true friends and loud critics, which makes real love shine, but big egos get upset—so value the love while he’s here.
From the Discourses
Passages where Osho speaks to this question — each links to the complete discourse.
Osho, why do disciples betray the Master? Vijayanand and Mahesh now speak against you. And a sannyasin, Swami Chinmay, has written in Current that when my Master speaks against politics he falls below religion; and also says that since I am a living disciple I can therefore speak against my Master.
He does not understand me. He does not know what I am saying or what is happening here. He has just assumed. These things will happen. As my sannyasins increase and a wave arises, many will dye their clothes, string malas, announce themselves. People flock to a rising sun; they try to profit from it. Such a gentleman has no value. His statements have none—he does not know my vision of life. Religion is not a subject with boundaries. Religion has no limit. Religion is the name of the whole of life. Whatever life includes, religion has the right to speak about. The politician cannot speak about religion, for politics has limits; but the religious man can speak about politics, for religion has no limits. Religion is boundless. It envelops the whole of life, like the sky. Nothing is to be left outside religion. The religious person’s vision applies to…
Beloved Osho, what is the difference between the emptiness of the child before the formation of the ego and the awakened childlikeness of a buddha?
Whether you are for it or against it doesn't matter -- your concern shows where your ego is hanging. And I will include the capitalist in it also: his whole concern is how to gather money, hoard money -- because money has power over matter. You can purchase any material thing through money. You cannot purchase anything spiritual, you cannot purchase anything that has any intrinsic value; you can purchase only things. If you want to purchase love, you cannot purchase; but you can purchase sex. Sex is the material part of love. Through money, matter can be purchased, possessed. Now you will be surprised: I include the communist and the capitalist both in the same category, and they are enemies, just as I include Charvaka and Mahatma Gandhi in the same category, and they are enemies. They are enemies, but their concern is the same. The capitalist is trying…
Beloved Osho, history shows that when a great master appears on the earth, other, lesser leaders recognize him and bring their followers with them. Do you see this happening here?
Except this Nicodemus, no rabbi ever approached Jesus -- and Nicodemus approached him in the night. It would have been better that he also had not approached Jesus, because he shows the cowardliness of your so-called religious people and who crucified Jesus? The high priest and the supreme command of rabbis who overruled the whole community of Jews -- they decided that he should be crucified. There were many attempts made on Buddha's life by religious people, and I have always suspected -- although it is impossible now after twenty-five centuries to find out whether my suspicion is right or wrong, but there is a ninety-nine percent possibility that it is right .... It has to be right because some fundamental principles are involved. Buddha died of food poisoning. I suspect he was given poison, that it was not a coincidence. There were many attempts on the life of Mahavira.…
Beloved Osho, are you a messiah?
I know poor people, utterly poor, who have nothing; it is so difficult for them to even manage one meal a day. Sometimes they have to just drink water and sleep -- water to fill their empty belly so they can feel that something is there. But they are in a certain way satisfied, they have accepted it as their fate, they don't think that things can be better than this. You can provoke them. You can put the fire in their minds very easily -- just give them hope. But then sooner or later they are going to hold you by your neck: "Where are the hopes?" And that was the situation after forty years when Moses left them. The excuse was, "I'm going to find the people who have got lost somewhere." He never came back -- he died in India. I have been to his grave. You…
Osho! Why do disciples betray their master? Just now vijayananda and mahesh are speaking against you. And one sannyasi, swami chinmaya has written in 'current', "when my master speaks against politics he is falling beneath religion" -- and along with this: "I am a living disciple, this is why I can speak against my master."
I will speak on poetry also, because religion has a poetic aspect too. This is why in this country we have given two names to poets: poets and rishis. We have called a rishi, that poet in whose poetry truth speaks, in whose poetry the experience of god speaks. One who has dyed his poetry in religion we have called a rishi. For instance Rabindranath should be called a rishi, not a poet. His GITANJALI should be valued the same as any Upanishad. He is a rishi. What he has said is not only meter, rhythm, grammar and knowledge of language. What he has said is a stream of experience. Nectar has flowed. Nectar -- that is not his! Nectar -- that is coming from above. He is merely like a medium. As if a flute is put on somebody's lip and is played. The illusion may come to the…