What is the significance of finding refuge in Rama?

Beloved Osho, before we ask anything we would like to offer our gratitude and greetings to you. The mystics have always said that "there is nowhere to go but in." you also say the same. We are familiar with the words, but our understanding of it does not go beyond the verbal level. Could you please explain the deeper meaning of it?

Understanding at the verbal level is not worth calling understanding. In the world of religion there is no greater deception than words. The words can be understood, there is no difficulty in that, but that which is hidden behind the words remains uncomprehended, and that is the real difficulty. When the word is understood, but not that which lies behind the word, life becomes a great turmoil. We create the illusion of knowing when we do not know, and nothing is more dangerous than assuming that one knows when one does not. Life begins at the point where knowing happens. Life is transformed through knowing. But if we live under the illusion that we know religion because we know the words, then our mind travels in one direction while our life travels in another, and often these directions are completely opposite. This is why hypocrisy comes to be a daily…

This web has been woven out of words. So it is apt to ask whether understanding comes through words.

Certainly something can be done; but that doing has nothing to do with the laboratory. It pertains to the inner being. As long as there is resolve, will, and “I am,” death is certain. The day “I am” is no more, there is no way for death. The whole never dies; this Vast never dies. Waves come and go; the ocean remains. While I am a wave, I will die; when I am the ocean, there is no way to die. In this aphorism, Ram points toward that vast ocean. It has nothing to do with Hindu, Muslim, or Christian. Ram is the Hindus’ beloved word for the Divine—and a very sweet word. It has no connection with any person, any historical figure. To take refuge in Ram means: effacing oneself and taking refuge in the All. “I am not. This expanse, this immensity, this Brahman—this is.” Apart from this…

Beloved Osho, hearing your discourse on 'rama the only refuge' I remembered your declaration in the anandshila meditation camp: "I have come to awaken, not to teach. Surrender and I will transform you. This is my promise." please explain this immensely reassuring statement to us in detail. Also, please tell us what is the difference between learning and awakening, what is the relation between surrender and transformation?

But while we are in it, it is difficult; and this is so because our investment in the sleep is great. Our great hopes, and the wildest fantasies of our dreams, are all contained in sleep, and if we break out of our slumber, all these hopes and dreams begin to collapse. You say to your wife, "I love you"; but when awareness fills you, you will have to say, "I have never loved you". You tell your children, "I am living for you"; but filled with awareness you will discover that it is not true. You are not living for your children, you are keeping them alive so that you can live on through them when you are dead. Your children are your desire; they are supposed to complete that which you were unable to do. You are trying to travel on their shoulders into the future. Through them…

Osho, for a fortnight, and from many angles, you have helped us see that “there is no refuge without Ram.” We are deeply grateful. In the end, we request once more: please help our discrimination between the essential and the non-essential awaken, and help our living certainty of “there is no refuge without Ram” become deep and unshakable.

So too with all the senses. The eyes gradually lose their relish for form and delight in the formless. Beauty for the eyes will no longer be in form; the body will be felt as a hindrance to beauty. If you could truly see a person, you would find: no matter how beautiful the body, it reduces beauty—for a body, however beautiful, cannot be truly beautiful. The body obstructs beauty. Beauty is perfect only when there is no body—then nothing remains to intrude. In China the sages say: when music is complete, the musician breaks his veena—because then even the veena becomes a hindrance. When the sculptor becomes truly consummate, he throws away the chisel—because whatever is made with a chisel cannot be beautiful in the ultimate sense. The formless cannot be made with a chisel; only form can. However beautiful the form, it will remain incomplete—open to improvement. The…