According to Osho, Christianity should be barred from the Soviet Union because it would reimpose dogmatic conditioning—God, heaven, hell, and extrovert prayer—that the Soviets painstakingly erased. Instead, he urges allowing meditative paths like Zen, which avoid belief and miracles, teach direct inner inquiry, and awaken each person’s unique, creative significance—granting meaning without external authority.
He says don’t let Christianity back in because it brings fear and rules, while meditation like Zen helps people grow by looking inside without believing stories.
From the Discourses
Passages where Osho speaks to this question — each links to the complete discourse.
The second question is from another sannyasin. He has asked: WHY DO YOU NOT WANT TO ALLOW CHRISTIANITY TO ENTER THE SOVIET UNION?
YAKUSAN SAID, "OKAY. YOU COME AND FOLLOW ME, HOLDING UP MY BOWL" -- because I have not finished my breakfast. Now this was a very strange situation, going to the assembly hall... is he going to deliver the discourse, or eat his rice? And the monk felt a little embarrassed: "I am following him with the bowl of rice. What will people think of me? -- `That idiot! Why is he carrying the bowl with the rice, behind the master?'" <q>THE MONK DID NOT UNDERSTAND THE MASTER'S MEANING, AND UNGAN -- WHO WAS ALSO PRESENT -- ASKED, "MASTER, WHEN DID YOU LOSE YOUR ARMS AND LEGS?"</q> Why are you not carrying your bowl yourself? When did you lose your arms and legs? Even Ungan, who finally became enlightened, could not understand the meaning. The meaning was that the discourse is nothing but a nourishment. It is a spiritual nourishment. Just…
Their fourth question is: WHAT WOULD YOU DO IF YOU WENT TO THE SOVIET UNION?
"So it was not so bad that I was hungry and starving; Nansen was always holding out nourishment for me, through the window. And it was not only nourishment for my body; his attention, his care for me was also nourishment. I am nobody, and he took so much care. Every day he remembered me, that I would be standing outside. "Leaving his dining table, he would come and give me food, and he never asked, `Why do you go on standing outside?'" -- because that is one of the fundamentals of Zen: don't interfere into anybody's life. Everybody has a territorial imperative, a certain area. Don't enter into it; that is his dignity, that is his pride. Leave it to his intelligence. "And he was not only giving me food, he was giving me spiritual nourishment. It was not bad, Osho. Don't misunderstand me, and don't misunderstand my master,…
Question: OSHO, ARE YOU ESPECIALLY AGAINST CHRISTIANITY? In Sanskrit nine is nava, eight is asth, seven is Sanskrit sapt, six is Sanskrit cha, three is Sanskrit thri, English two is Sanskrit dwa which became twa in Latin, and from twa turned to two. All these numbers in all the languages come from Sanskrit. Seven thousand years ago they created the basis of mathematics, but they never used their mathematical understanding for destructive purposes. They used it for creative purposes because no religion there was giving them the incentive to war. All religions were saying war is ugly -- about that there was no dispute -- and those countries were not going to support any program, any project, any research, which was going to lead them into war. The first astronomical book was written in India four thousand years ago. Those people were far ahead of the West.
Beloved Osho, it seems so impossible: so many countries have said "no" to you in the west. But even if the so-called democracies accepted you, what can be done about russia and the other communist nations? Unless there is a great awakening there, it looks like the world is doomed.
It is true that so many so-called democratic countries are not courageous enough even to give me a tourist visa. It is a great compliment. They have never given such a compliment to any other man in the whole of history. Their religion is twenty centuries old, so is their morality, so is their tradition; and they are afraid of a man who has no power, and who is coming just like a tourist -- only for three weeks. Their paranoia is apparent. It seems they have made castles in the air. Even my presence will be enough to destroy those castles; otherwise, it is impossible -- a tourist for three weeks cannot destroy a tradition which has been there for two thousand years, a morality they have been conditioning the people in for two thousand years. They have accepted defeat, and they have also shown that they are not…