According to Osho, Italy's essence is a pagan, life-affirming spirit: lively, earthy, loving, and gloriously nonserious. Italians carry their land's youthfulness, celebrating the here-and-now rather than afterlife fictions. Though Christianity overlays them through historical guilt, their real soul remains the pagan art of living: song, dance, and tasting each moment fully, where nonseriousness is a religious quality and knowing how to live also teaches a beautiful way to die.
Italians, at heart, love life right now: joyful, playful, earthy, and any Christian layer is mostly a mask over their original celebratory spirit.
From the Discourses
Passages where Osho speaks to this question — each links to the complete discourse.
What do you know about italy and the italian people?
I know everything about the Italian people. My first Western sannyasins were Italians; they introduced me to the West. I have thousands of sannyasins in Italy. They have a special quality to them; they are the most lively people on the earth, most earthly, most loving, most nonserious. To me, seriousness is sickness, and nonseriousness is a religious quality. I don't know anything about Italy because I have never been there. But to know the people is to know their land, is to know the earth where they have been born, is to know the trees, is to know the rivers and the mountains -- because they carry the taste of their atmosphere with them. Italy must be a very living, very alive, very young, youthful country. One thing I know was that in the past Italy had one of the biggest empires in the world -- the Roman empire.…
Question: BELOVED OSHO, IS IT TRUE THAT YOU ARE REALLY AN ITALIAN? That's why I am so much in love with Italians -- every moment they are coming closer to enlightenment. The deeper they become Italians, the closer they are coming to enlightenment; then the jump can happen at any moment. There are people who are just in the middle -- neither here nor there; they don't have much hope. For example, Indians -- they don't have much hope. They are middle-of-the-road walkers -- very careful, very cautious; they never go to the extremes. Keeping themselves in the middle they miss both the ultimate in misery and the ultimate in ecstasy. To be an Italian is to be in ultimate misery. The only hope is spaghetti; otherwise all is misery!
Osho, why and how did god create the italians?
ARE YOU IN LOVE with some Italian guy? Otherwise why this question? And this is really a great question! When I read your question I had to consult the Akashic records because neither the Bible says anything about it nor the Koran nor the Vedas! And really it is something very important. The keeper of the Akashic records is Master Kuthumi, well known to the Theosophists as Master K.H. He is the keeper -- I had to ask his permission. "Let me see just a little thing, because I don't know the answer: Why and how did God create the Italians?" He was also puzzled. He said, "Nobody has ever asked this, neither Blavatsky nor Annie Besant. Who is this Sanjayo? Seems to be very esoteric!" I said, "My sannyasins are very esoteric, very metaphysical! They ask such questions that if they were to ask any other saint, either the…
What will be the next step after you have taken over the vatican and the pope is living in permanent exile in india?
In the first place, I am not going to take that rotten place, the Vatican. I have some taste! Let the pope remain in the Vatican; he fits there. So the question of a next step does not arise -- I am not going to take the first step even. And I don't belong anywhere: no country seems to be courageous enough to let me live there. I am reminded of my university days when I was a student. I was expelled from one college, from another college -- I have so much experience about expulsion. Finally one principal said, "Listen, wherever you go you cannot last more than two months; you will be expelled. I can take you in my college on one condition: that you will never attend the classes." I said, "This is a strange condition. Then why am I joining the college?" He said, "That's how…
And that background is still present in every Italian. It needs just a little provocation. Christianity is very superficial and foreign. It does not belong to Roman culture at all. In fact, it has destroyed the uniqueness of Roman civilization, Roman thinking, Roman approach to the life. In a single word it can be said that Roman approach was pagan, and to the Christians the word pagan is heretic. It is still time. Italy can recover itself from this nightmare. And this whole mess that you see in Italy is because of this mixture of two things which are not mixable. So there is a very deep split and every Italian feels confused. If he can get rid of Christianity, can get rid of Vatican, it will find back its health. And to be a pagan is perfectly good. That means to be a Zorba.