What is the nature of God in relation to human intelligence?

Nietzsche made the observation that when "ordinary people" are in an unpleasant situation, "they always seek to get out of it with the smallest expenditure of intelligence." is god simply the first and last resort of a retarded humanity?

Yes, absolutely yes. God is the invention of the retarded, of the idiots, of the imbeciles, of the people who want a shortcut so they don't have to exert any intelligence. God is the belief of the unintelligent. God is the belief of the unconscious. God is the belief of those who are still asleep and dreaming. The moment you wake up, all dreams disappear, and with the dreams your God will also disappear. No-mind is waking up from the sleep of the mind. No-mind is a sunrise. Mind has been a long long dark night, and no-mind blossoms into tremendous intelligence, not intellect. Intellect is part of the mind, intelligence is part of no-mind. It is a totally different phenomenon. And when that fire of intelligence rises in you in great flames, you don't find any God anywhere, but you certainly find everything is sacred because everything is alive.…

Osho, what is god?

GOD is not a person. That is one of the greatest misunderstandings, and it has prevailed so long that it has become almost a fact. Even if a lie is repeated continuously for centuries it is bound to appear as if it is a truth. God is a presence, not a person. Hence all worshipping is sheer stupidity. Prayerfulness is needed, not prayer. There is nobody to pray to; there is no possibility of any dialogue between you and God. Dialogue is possible only between two persons, and God is not a person but a presence -- like beauty, like joy. God simply means godliness. It is because of this fact that Buddha denied the existence of God. He wanted to emphasize that God is a quality, an experience -- like love. You cannot talk to love, you can live it. You need not create temples of love, you need…

Osho, I have heard sufis say that there is no god until you have met him. I find it a dramatic and appealing statement. Is this concept connected with the kind of awareness we are seeking? Will you please enlarge on it?

And this will be far more important than it was when you were really a child, because now you have known the ways of the world and the ways of the mind and you are frustrated. You have seen a thousand and one things and nothing satisfies. You have known many things and yet you don't know a thing. Now going back to your childhood, to the source of wonder, joy, mystery, and awe, you will again be able to look around... and then trees will be more green, and the songs of the birds will be more poetic, and the people around you will have auras -- they have! just you cannot see. You yourself will become radiant in your own vision. God is not a person: it is a vision of life in its utter radiance. God is not a person: it is an experience, a psychedelic experience…

Osho, is god really dead?

Remember, those who were ascetic people, who were ready to deny their nature, were very happy to believe in God. And the people who were more natural, more normal, were happy to believe that there was no God. The reason is the same: the natural person will feel afraid because the natural person will have sex, will have anger, will have jealousy. And God is going to punish him; if God is there then punishment is certain. It is better to say that there is no God; at least for the time being he can feel relieved. And the person who can repress his sex, his jealousies, his anger, would like to declare that God is, because all his investment is in God's existence. God's existence is very necessary for his asceticsm. The pathological people declare that God is and the natural people declare that there is no God. And…

Question: THE MAN THAT BREATHES LIVES ON THE AIR, AND THE OTHER, UNSEEN, RESTS ABOVE REACH. BETWEEN THE TWO MOVES ANOTHER MAN AS A SECRET LINK. WORSHIP KNOWINGLY. IT IS A SPORT AMONGST THE THREE OF THEM. MY SEARCHING HEART, WHOM DO YOU SEEK? BETWEEN THE DOORS OF BIRTH AND DEATH, STANDS YET ANOTHER DOOR, WHOLLY INEXPLICABLE. HE WHO IS ABLE TO BE BORN AT THE DOOR OF DEATH, IS DEVOTED ETERNALLY.... Intelligence goes to the higher and higher and the higher, and the whole effort is to reach to the ultimate, to the pinnacle of existence. Because things can be explained only through the higher, not through the lower. You don't explain through the lower, you explain away. And when the lower becomes too important, all beauty is lost, all truth, all good. Everything that has any significance is lost. Then you start crying, "Where is meaning in life?