What is the significance of changing faces in the context of civilization?

Osho, using the example of the onion you said that each person has many faces, masks—stolen masks. And these masks will be there, under all circumstances they will be there. One only needs to distinguish between good masks and bad masks. I hate someone, but when he comes to me I welcome him with a smile. This is an artificial face I present before him. Yet at the same time my mind is filled with immense pain, with sorrow, and still I smile. So this face, this mask, would be my good mask. A mask there will certainly be.

By “mask” I mean: the false faces we impose upon ourselves—do not impose them. That does not mean faces will not change in life. Your face will change every day, but it should be your own face. When darkness spreads, tears will come to the eyes; tomorrow a friend may die—tears will come. And tomorrow a long-lost companion may return—then the heart will throb with joy and songs will arise. Your face will change moment to moment; it should. One should be responsive. But the face must be your face. I am not saying keep one face fixed. That would be a stone face; life cannot move like that. Then you would need a single face of stone. I have heard that an American multimillionaire was approached by a man asking for a small donation. The millionaire said, “I have a rule: one of my eyes is artificial—made of stone—and…

I have heard, somebody approached an American millionaire for alms. The man asked for a small gift, but that millionaire said, 'I have formulated a rule for giving alms and gifts. One of my eyes is artificial -- it is made of stone and the other is real. And I only reward that person who can point out the artificial e)e, but nobody has been successful in this test uptil now. You can try ' That man looked into the eyes and said, 'Your left eye is artificial.' The millionaire said, 'You have surprised me, how did you know it?' The man replied, 'Your left eye shows some mercy, so I thought this must be stone. Faces may change but they cannot be expressionless. Only the faces of dead people can be without any expression, those of living cannot be so.

Question: BELOVED OSHO, WHAT IS CIVILIZATION? And the third thing is the most interesting that he said. He said, "Moreover Osho has not committed any crime; we don't have any proof, we don't have any evidence." This recognition by the U.S. attorney for Oregon ... and still I was fined four hundred thousand dollars! They don't have any proof and they don't have any evidence, they don't think I have committed any crime. For what have I been fined? And they know perfectly well, I don't have a single dollar. I have not touched money for almost thirty-five years! Perhaps they were hoping that because I don't have any possessions ... how was I going to pay? Almost half a million dollars! So naturally, if I could not pay them they would have an excuse to put me in jail for at least twenty years, thirty years.

What do you think about civilization? Are you absolutely against it?

THERE IS NO CIVILIZATION ANYWHERE -- so how can I be against it? It exists not. It is just a pretension. Yes, man has lost his primitive, primordial innocence, but man has not become civilized -- because that is NO way to become civilized. The only way to become civilized is to base yourself on your innocence, to base yourself on your primitive innocence, to grow from there. That's why Jesus says: Unless you are reborn, unless you become a child again, you will never know what truth is. This so-called civilization is fake, it is a pseudo coin. If I am against it, I am not against civilization -- because this is not civilization. I am against it because this is not civilization at all. It is fake. I have heard: Someone once asked the former Prince of Wales, "What is your idea of civilization?" "It is a good…

Osho, it is surprising that among animals there is hardly any hypocrisy or deceit, and among indigenous people it is also very little, whereas in the so-called educated and civilized society it is at its peak. Has humanity’s long and arduous journey from barbarism to civilization then gone in vain? And in that case, is the tribal order preferable?

Animals are without falseness, without hypocrisy—not because they have achieved something, but because they are incapable. They cannot be hypocrites; there is no way for them to be. They have no facility for being bad, no possibility of falling. But precisely because an animal cannot fall, it also cannot ascend to divinity. One who cannot fall cannot rise. And where there is no possibility of sin, there is no possibility of the divine either. The animal is in a kind of stupor; it does as nature makes it do. Its journey is mechanical. It has no free will. Therefore an animal cannot do evil, but it cannot do good either. It simply does what nature impels. It has no individuality of its own. Hence an animal can be neither wicked nor virtuous, neither a great sinner nor a great saint. An animal remains an animal. The animal is born complete.…