According to Osho, dates endure or vanish not by the mystics but by their record-keepers. Jesus and Krishna spoke from timelessness; neither kept accounts. Western disciples, time-bound, fixed Christ’s birth; Indian seers, honoring the impersonal and eternal, intentionally erased dates and authorship, letting the message outshine biography. Thus Krishna’s chronology dissolves by design, not deficiency.
Because followers wrote the stories: in the West they stamped dates on a timeless teacher; in India they skipped dates to show the teaching and the divine, not a birthday, mattered.
From the Discourses
Passages where Osho speaks to this question — each links to the complete discourse.
Osho, Christ’s dates could be kept—he lived one thousand nine hundred and seventy years ago—so could Krishna’s not have been kept too?
They could have been. It depends on the people around them. It depended on those who were around Jesus; Jesus himself did not keep accounts. Look at his words and you will understand. There is a saying of Jesus—Abraham was a prophet, hundreds of years before Jesus. Someone asked Jesus, “Abraham lived before you.” Jesus said, “No. Before Abraham was, I was.” What does this mean? Jesus broke time; he shattered the notion of time. Abraham lived hundreds, even thousands of years earlier, yet Jesus says, “Before Abraham was, I was.” But the people around him had a certain notion of time—they had never seen an ocean, only wells. Such sayings must have seemed very mysterious to them. They said, “All right, he says so; it must be some secret,” but they did not understand that he was breaking the concept of time itself. Someone asked Jesus, “What will be…
Questioner: if a record of christ's life could be maintained, we know he was born nineteen hundred and seventy years ago. How is it that a similar record of krishna is not available?
It was possible to keep such a record and it depended on the people who lived with Krishna. The people living with Jesus kept a record of his life, Jesus himself did not do it. If you look at a saying of Jesus' you will understand what I mean. When someone asked Jesus if Abraham happened before him, he said, "No, before Abraham was, I am." What does it mean? By saying it, Jesus denied time altogether. Abraham had happened thousands of years before Jesus, but Jesus says, "Before Abraham was, I am." The people who lived with Jesus had a concept of time, were time-oriented. They had not seen an ocean, they had only seen wells. So they thought Jesus was saying something mysterious, they failed to understand that Jesus denied time itself. Someone asks Jesus, "What will be the special thing in your kingdom of God?" Jesus says,…
Many western historians feel that humanity is constantly making progress. If this is the case, then how is it that human consciousness is so unevolved?
Mark and Luke are contradictory because they are writing history. But Tulsidas and Valmiki are not contradictory. They are not writing history, they are not concerned with history at all. They are reliving, in their imaginations. They say, "We cannot say much. We cannot say enough because we are not capable. All that is said is only a fragment. It is not the whole story." If you yourself see Krishna, you will see something else altogether. But you are at liberty to see it because the event is not historical. So the life of Krishna or of Ram, becomes very rich. Jesus' recorded life was very poor because his followers were obsessed with history. They could not write anything that was beyond history. The eastern mind could see that we cannot do justice to Krishna or Buddha if we limit ourselves to bare events. This will be an injustice because…
Osho, please shed detailed light on Sri Krishna’s rebellious and revolutionary contribution regarding sex. There are two supplementary questions; I will place them later.
This denial of the biological personality in the figures of Mahavira, Buddha, Jesus—this is part of their sadhana. In Krishna’s life, the sadhana is total acceptance—biological included: the sexual being, the erotic body, the erotic mind—all accepted. Krishna says: all is to be accepted; nothing is to be denied. In Krishna’s view, whoever denies is, in some sense, a little or much atheist. In truth, denial is atheism. In what measure one denies—someone says, I do not accept the body: then he is atheist toward the body. Someone says, I do not accept sex: atheist toward sex. Someone says, I do not accept God: atheist toward God. But non-acceptance is the style of atheism; acceptance is theism. Therefore I cannot call Mahavira, Buddha, or Jesus as theistic as I call Krishna. Total acceptance—no denial, no condemnation. Whatever is, has its place in existence. For this reason, if hundreds of thousands…