My beloved Atman! In a dark night, in a desolate desert, a caravan came upon a wayside inn and halted. It was night, it was darkness, and the caravan had lost its way. Around midnight, searching and searching, they reached that inn. The travelers were tired; their camels were tired too. In haste they drove in the pegs, took out the ropes, and tied the camels. There were a hundred camels with that caravan. But in the hurry and in the night’s darkness, the peg and rope for one camel were somehow lost. One camel remained untied. It was a dark night, and it was not wise to leave the camel loose—there was every chance of its straying away. The caravan leaders went to the old innkeeper and said, If we could get one peg and one rope, it would be a great kindness. One camel of ours remains free; the rope and peg are lost somewhere. The old man said, There is no need at all for a rope and a peg. Just go, drive in the peg and tie the rope. What he said was so foolish, so pointless. If we had a peg and rope—said the caravan men—we would have tied him ourselves. It is precisely because we don’t have a peg and rope that we have come to ask. But the old man said, Drive in a false peg. In the dark how will the camel know whether a real peg has been driven or a false one? Tie a false rope as well. They did not understand his saying, but there was no other way either. They thought it right to try an experiment. They went and hammered a peg in the darkness—a peg that was not there at all. Only the sound of hammering. The camel was standing; he sat down, thinking perhaps a peg had been fixed. Then they performed the motion of tying the rope. There was no rope—but as they would have tied it if there were, in the same way they performed the act. And then they went to sleep. In the morning they saw—the camel was sitting in his place; the tied camels were seated, and the untied camel too was seated. They untied the camels that had been tied; they had to begin a new day’s journey. There was no question of untying the untied one; they tried to make him rise without untying him. But that camel refused to get up. He was tied. They went to the innkeeper and said, What a wonder! The camel will not rise. What magic have you done? We suspected it even at night—who knows what magic is being worked! Can a camel be tied to a false peg? Can anyone ever be bound by an unreal rope? And now the trouble is worse, for the camel has refused to rise. The old man said, First pull up the peg and untie the rope. But they said, If there were a peg, we would pull it up! The old man said, If there was a peg when you tied him, then the peg is still there. They were compelled. It was sheer madness. But they went and pulled up the peg, untied the rope—and the camel stood up. They thanked the old man, and said, Many, many thanks. It seems you are a great knower of camels. The old man said, Forgive me! I know nothing about camels. About men—yes, I know much. Then I thought, since even man is bound by false pegs and ropes, the poor camel—he can certainly be bound. With this story I want to begin my second talk today. Why with this story? Because man’s whole life is a life tied with false ropes and false pegs. Man’s entire misery is bound by untruth and imagination. All his anxiety is manufactured by his own imagination. And man has fastened so many false pegs and so many ropes around himself that today, apart from these false ropes and pegs, nothing much remains of his life. Yesterday I had said to you that man fills himself with useless things. What do I call useless? What do I call rubbish? I call the untrue rubbish, I call it useless. And we all have stuffed ourselves with untruth. We have been able to fill ourselves with untruth—by a trick, a secret! Why could that camel be tied to a false peg? Because he took that peg to be true from his own side. The camel was bound only to a true peg—on his side; even the untrue he accepted as true; he believed what was not, to be. If the camel had opened his eyes and seen there is no peg, then bondage would have been impossible. We too are bound by untruths and carry headloads of rubbish only because we do not take them as rubbish. If it becomes visible to us that it is untrue, false, a lie—perhaps we will drop it that very instant and step out of it. The moment untruth is seen, it becomes useless and man is freed of it. Nothing else need be done to abandon untruth except this—that we know it as untruth. To know untruth as untruth is to be free of it. Ah! had that camel come to know there was no peg, he would have been free the whole night. But no; he believed there was a peg. Man too is bound by just such futility, such non-essence, such untruth as he takes to be essential, true, treasure. No one carries garbage unless he is under the illusion that it is wealth. With what untruths have we filled our lives? I want to speak to you of three untruths. And the man who circles around these three untruths—his life turns futile. How can meaning be found near the untrue? How will the taste of life come from what is not? How can truth be attained through dream? Which three untruths are those around which man wanders, goes astray, and is ruined? The first untruth: man’s ego. We are all tied to a strange peg—the peg of “I,” the ego. And around this peg of I we live our whole life, around it we bring it to an end. And never does it occur to us to ask whether that for which we are dedicating our entire life—is it at all? One morning, an emperor who had gone hunting at night in the forest lost his way. Toward dawn he reached a village. He reined in his horse before a small hut. He was tired, hungry, thirsty. He asked the hut’s old owner, Could I get a little milk or a few eggs? I am very hungry and tired. The old man came out with three eggs and a little milk. The emperor had his morning meal. Then he asked the old man, How much do I owe you? The old man said, Not much—only a hundred rupees. The emperor had bought many expensive things in life, but a hundred rupees for three eggs! He was astonished. He said, You must be joking! Are eggs so rare here? The old man said, No, eggs are not rare, sir—but kings are! Eggs are not hard to find; but a king is very hard to find. The emperor took out a hundred rupees and gave them to him. The old man’s wife was amazed to see that three eggs could fetch a hundred rupees. She asked her husband, What magic did you do? A hundred rupees for three eggs! One hardly gets three paisa. By what trick did you extract a hundred rupees? The old man said, I know man’s weakness. Touch the weakness, and you can take anything. The old woman said, I don’t understand—what is man’s weakness? The old man said, I’ll tell you another incident from my life; perhaps you will catch what man’s weakness is, the human weakness. Around that very weakness man lives and dies. The old man said, When I was young I went out in search of wealth, but I had only five rupees. And how can wealth be earned with five rupees—except by exploiting man’s weakness? I bought a five-rupee turban, and went to the court of a very great emperor. The turban was very gaudy—as cheap things usually are. In truth, to hide cheapness, glitter and color are necessary. Whatever is truly significant in life is utterly simple; what is useless is very gaudy, very colored. He bought a glittering colored turban and presented himself in the emperor’s court. As soon as the emperor saw it, the turban was so resplendent that naturally he asked, What is the price of this turban? The old man said, Do not ask the price; you might not believe it. The emperor said, Still, what is the price of this turban? Don’t be afraid; do you know before whom you stand? His treasuries are filled with immeasurable riches. Speak—how much is the price? The old man said, The price? Ten thousand rupees. The emperor began to laugh—the old man seemed mad. But just then the prime minister bent to whisper something in the emperor’s ear. The old man told his wife, I immediately understood what the minister was saying. For those who are used to robbing others do not like another robber to intervene. I understood what the minister must be saying. And I at once spoke out loudly, Shall I go then? The man from whom I bought this turban said to me, “Don’t worry! On this earth there is still one emperor who can pay ten thousand for it.” I am in search of that emperor. Forgive me, it seems I have come to the wrong court, to the wrong emperor. The emperor said, Buy the turban—and not for ten thousand, for fifteen thousand. And the turban was bought. The old man asked his wife, Do you understand now what man’s weakness is? Man’s weakness is ego. And it is the greatest weakness, because it is the greatest untruth. The whole life we live trying to prove, “I am something.” Without knowing who I am, I go on trying to prove that I am somebody, I am something. If someone is jostled, he says, Don’t you know? Are you blind? Don’t you know who I am! And the wonder is that perhaps he himself does not know who he is. Who knows who is who? But lifelong there is only one endeavor of man—to prove that I am something—without knowing what I am, without recognizing who is within. The whole life we live around this untruth—that I am—someone special, somebody, a very particular person. And lifelong we have one effort—to sign our names on stones so that life can never forget us. Small children go to the seashore and sign their names upon the sand; and elders instruct them, Fools, what is the use of signing on sand? The winds will come and the sand will fly away and the signatures will be erased. But elders too do nothing else but sign upon rocks. And the greater wonder is, perhaps they do not know that what they call sand was once a rock, and what they call a rock will one day be sand. Even names carved upon the strongest rock are no more than names written on sand; for rock is nothing more than sand joined together, and sand is rock in a broken condition. Yet man lives with the effort to sign his name. For whom? Whom do you want to show it to? Having erased the whole of life, you want to prove that you are something. But before whom? For what purpose? And no one ever turns back to think—could it be that there is no greater untruth, no more false entity than this I? But we have taken the false for true in such a way… A child is born, and we give him a name—Ram, Krishna, or something else. No one is born with a name; all are born nameless. Name is entirely untrue. But once we give a name—Ram!—he lives his whole life assuming, I am Ram. Name is utterly false, pasted on. Man is nameless. But if you abuse his name he will be ready to kill or be killed; for what is absolutely false he will be ready to take life and give life. If you praise his name, he will swell and bloom in the sky. A name that has no connection with him at all. We attach a name so that the world can address us. And we begin to call ourselves “I” so that we ourselves can address ourselves. Even “I” is only a name given for self-address, no more than a noun. I has no reality, no truth. I has no ground, no foundation, no substance. A name is so others can call us, and “I” is so I can call myself! “I” is merely a noun. Yet in our life, that alone becomes most important. Let me try to explain with a small incident. By the royal palace there was a heap of stones. Some children passed nearby while playing, and one child lifted a stone and threw it toward the palace. The pile of stones was below, one stone began to rise toward the sky. Stones too have a desire to travel to the sky. Wherever there is ego, the desire to journey to the sky is born. When the stone began to rise, it filled with joy, and with ego; and it said to the stones lying below, Friends, I am going on a journey to the sky. Pay a little attention to its words! It said, I am going on a journey to the sky. It had been thrown. But it began to say, I am going. The fact was not that it was going—it had been thrown—by the hand of some unknown child. But it said, I am going. Between these two statements there seems little difference—“I have been thrown,” “I am going”—but the difference is immense—the same as between egolessness and ego. Ego has arisen. When I am going, when the going is by me, then I have become someone special. Those stones not able to go skyward become worthless, nobodies. I have become somebody. Those lying below are nobodies, they cannot fly into the sky, they have no wings; I am flying, I am no longer ordinary, I have become exceptional, special. The stone rose. The stones below burned with jealousy. And yet denial was impossible—the stone was indeed going. It was difficult to say, You lie; the fact bore witness—it was going. Then the stone rose and struck the palace window of glass. As soon as it struck, the glass was shattered. When a stone strikes glass, the glass is shattered; it just happens. The stone does not shatter the glass; that is the nature of glass, that is the nature of stone. When the two collide, the glass shatters. But when the glass shattered, the stone laughed and said, Fool! Don’t you know—whoever comes in my way I shatter! The glass was shattered; the stone had not done it. It had not had to move a hand or foot to shatter it. The glass simply shattered. Such is the nature of glass—collide and it breaks. The stone did not break it. But the stone said, I shatter! This is the language of ego: Let no one come in my way, otherwise I will shatter him! The shards of glass must have wept. They wanted to say something too, but there was no scope to speak. It wasn’t a lie—the glass had indeed broken. How could it protest that you are wrong? The stone fell upon Persian carpets inside the palace—costly carpets were spread there. The stone sighed in relief and said, It seems the people of this house are very understanding. They must have learned beforehand of my arrival—carpets and all have been spread out. The people of the house had no inkling that a stone would arrive as a guest. Those Persian carpets were not spread in wait for any stone. But the stone said—and who could deny the stone, no one was there—the stone said to itself, Surely the people of the house have come to know I am coming. Why not—after all, I am no ordinary stone; I am a stone that flies in the sky. Naturally they would make arrangements to welcome me. Just then the palace guard must have heard that glass had broken, a stone had come, there was noise; he rushed in and picked up the stone in his hand. The stone said in its own language, Thank you, very obliged. It appears the master of the palace is expressing honor by holding me in his hands. The guard was about to throw the stone out, but the stone said, It seems the master is expressing respect. Ego thinks within itself and lives within itself; it affirms itself within and grows stronger. It is an inner process that feeds itself and steadily fortifies. That stone was strengthening its ego. Every fact was becoming nourishment for it—facts that had nothing to do with its ego, not even a distant connection. The guard threw the stone back out. But the stone did not say, I am being thrown out of the palace. Whenever someone is thrown out of a capital, does he say, I was expelled? He says, I have resigned, I have renounced the capital. Someone is thrown out of Delhi toward Bhavnagar—does he say, I was expelled from Delhi? He says, I was missing home greatly, I like Bhavnagar very much. That stone too said within, I have stayed long enough in the palace; keep your palace! I feel homesick; I want to go home. I miss the stones, I miss my home, I miss my friends. Keep your palace! Perhaps your palace is good; but it is quite another thing to live under the open sky, under the moon and stars. I am going back. The stone was being thrown out, but it said, I am going back. As it began to fall upon its heap again, the stones below were staring, eyes fixed. As soon as it came and fell, it said, Friends, I missed you very much. There were grand receptions in great palaces; great emperors lifted me with their own hands and offered respect and honor. But no—the remembrance of home tormented me so much that I desired to return. I have come back; I remembered you all very much. The stones must have garlanded it, honored it, and said to that stone, You are our incarnate stone, a great soul, a mahatma; we are blessed that you were born amongst us. Our generations are fulfilled. You must write your autobiography, so that it may be of use to the children, they may read and learn from your life. I have heard that that stone is writing its autobiography. Ego turns the whole life into its own journey. Ask yourself: is the birth of our “I” very different from the stone’s journey? We say—my birth! Did anyone ask you whether you want to be born? Did anyone ask where you want to be born? Was there any choice of yours, any decision of yours before birth—because you say, my birth! Some unknown hand throws, and we say—my birth! Some unknown energy flings, and we say—my birth! Unknown currents of wind raise waves in the ocean. Perhaps the waves too say—my birth! Unknown forces of life make hollows in the earth, raise mountains. Mountains too must say—my birth! Unknown forces break the seed and make the sprout. Trees too must say—my birth! Man too is born by the hands of unknown powers. There is no question of “my” birth. As there are waves in the sea, so am I, so are you. A wave rises and falls away. We rise and are gone. Upon the ocean of an infinite power we are no more than waves. Yet our declaration is, I am! What does the declaration of I mean? It means a declaration of separateness, of difference, of being apart from all. Are you separate? Can you be separate even for a moment? Can you live even a moment torn away from life? Not even for a moment. A leaf is bound to the tree, the tree to the roots, the roots to the great earth, the earth to the great sun, the sun to other great suns—just so, each human being is bound like a leaf. There is not the slightest possibility of being separate even for a moment, nor any possibility of living so. Then where is the possibility of declaring “I”? Yet we say—my birth! We say—my childhood! We say—my youth! As if by endeavor we had turned childhood into youth. As if there were any effort of ours, any will of ours, by which we desired to be young and therefore became young. Childhood becomes youth just as a bud becomes a flower. What is mine, what is yours in it? Youth becomes old age just as a seed becomes a sprout. What is mine, what is yours? Where is there any place, any meaning, any purpose for the assertion of my I? But we are such that we even say of breathing—I am breathing. Perhaps you have never reflected that no one in the world has ever breathed. Breath comes and goes—it just happens; you do not breathe. If you were breathing, then dying would become difficult. Death stands at the door and you go on breathing—then death would have to return empty-handed. But we know perfectly well—if one breath goes out and does not come in again, we have no power to call it back. The truth is: the moment breath remains outside, we will also remain outside; we will not even remain inside to call it back. We are not breathing; but ego says, I am breathing, I am living. And thus we keep strengthening a false entity, strengthening it and strengthening it. Whoever fills the house of his life with this untruth of ego is deprived of the truth of the Divine. This is the first peg—and the strongest. It is necessary to understand the nonexistence of this peg, to understand its untruth. To understand the falsity of this peg is essential. And if it becomes clear that “I” is a false entity, then instantly life turns toward the infinite. It moves away from the futile and engages in the search for the meaningful. This is the first peg, the first futility, the first heap of rubbish that man collects, working hard to heap it up—and then he is tormented by its stench. Then he becomes miserable and anxious. Then he goes about asking, How can I be saved from sorrow? How can I be free from anxiety? I am troubled, I am restless! And never asks—whence comes this trouble, this restlessness, this anxiety—other than from my ego! Can you say that a man without ego can be restless? Do you know a man without ego who can be anxious? Do you know one without ego who can be afraid of death? Worry, fear, anguish—all are by-products of ego, its offshoots, its shadows. He who is not free of ego cannot be free of life’s sorrow and darkness. What is the second peg? The second peg is also very strange. It is exactly the opposite peg of ego. It is the reverse of ego, and to recognize it is even more difficult. Ego is very gross. There is a reverse peg opposed to ego: non-ego. That peg is even subtler than ego. If someone tries to escape from ego, he catches hold of a notion of non-ego. He begins to declare, I am nothing, I am humble, I am a nobody, I am the dust under your feet, I am nothing at all. It does not occur to him that when we declare “I am nothing,” still it is an echo of I that resounds; still, at the subtlest levels, we are saying “I am.” We say, I am humble; I am the dust of your feet; I am nobody. Those who flee from ego begin to erect a marvelous center of non-ego. I stayed for some days with a sannyasin. He invited me to be a guest at his ashram; I became his guest. Once he had been very prosperous and wealthy. Whenever he spoke to me, after a little conversation, by one pretext or another he would certainly hang this one statement upon some peg: I have kicked millions with my foot. Once, twice, ten times I heard him say, I have kicked millions. Then on the day I was to depart, he was saying it again: I have kicked millions. I asked him—if you won’t be offended… And with sannyasins, it is very necessary to ask whether they will be offended, for sannyasins are often more full of anger than ordinary people. I asked, You won’t be offended? I want to ask something. He was already offended. He said, Ask—what is it? I said, I want to ask, this kick you say you gave to your millions—when did you give it? He said, It’s been some thirty years. I said, I am troubled to say it—and for this I feared you might be offended: that kick failed to land properly, otherwise there would be no need to carry it for thirty years. Why are you carrying it for thirty years—that I kicked millions? When the millions were with you, there was an ego—“I have millions.” And when you left them, a new, subtler, opposite ego was born—“I have kicked millions.” I! “Those millions were with me”—that was a gross ego, visible to all. But “I have kicked millions”—this is a very subtle ego; it stands dressed in the guise of humility, robed in renunciation. It is very difficult to see. Others will not see it at all; even for oneself it is difficult to see. The renunciate is as possessed by wealth as the wealthy; the rich man collects, the renouncer abandons—but both eyes remain fixed upon wealth, fixed upon wealth. I was in Jaipur. Some friends came and said, There is a very great muni here—have you not met him? I said, I will certainly meet him, but I want to ask one thing: how did you come to know that he is a very great muni? By what scale did you weigh him? What is your criterion? They said, What is there to know? Even the Maharaja of Jaipur bows at his feet! I said, Is the respect in your heart for the Maharaja of Jaipur or for the muni? What is your measuring rod? The criterion is that the Maharaja touches his feet. The criterion is wealth! Even renunciation is weighed by wealth. That is why, if you look in India, the Hindu gods are princes; the Jains’ twenty-four tirthankaras are princes; the twenty-four avatars of the Buddha are royal incarnations. Till today in India, a poor man has not been able to earn the stature of attaining supreme sannyas. Why? Not because a poor man cannot become a sannyasin, but because if a poor man becomes a sannyasin, we have no measure by which to weigh him. How to call him great? He has left nothing! Had he left much, he could be great. The more he leaves, the greater he becomes. Even sannyas, in the end, is measured by money. Then it is no longer sannyas; it is wealth come back round as prestige. Even humility becomes a proclamation of ego. If someone in a village says, I am a very humble man; there is no ego in me; and you say to him, I know a man even more humble than you—he is instantly hurt. Ego is hurt whenever it sees anyone beyond itself. Say to a sannyasin, You are fine—but that other sannyasin is even greater—and he is hurt. Why? If there is no ego, there remains no cause for hurt. Where there is no ego, there is no question of comparison. Because only where ego is can comparison exist: that I am smaller than someone, greater than someone. Where ego is not, man has become incomparable. There is no comparison there. Where ego is, we can say, I am great; there we can also say, I am small—but the ladder of ego remains the same, whether you climb from bottom to top or descend from top to bottom. Ego drops only on that day when even the thought does not remain that I am—neither small nor great; neither proud nor humble—where the very sense of being an I dissolves. Only there can one be saved from rubbish. Otherwise we create reverse rubbish. We have become very skilled at binding life from the opposite side. We avoid the ditch and grasp the well; we avoid the well and grasp the ditch. A man escapes indulgence and grasps renunciation—with the same intensity with which he had held indulgence. A man leaves wealth and grasps poverty—with the same intensity with which he had held wealth. But the clinging remains exactly the same; clinging does not change. I have heard of a great sannyasin. He went naked. His fame spread far and wide, to the corners of the earth. The songs of his renunciation were sung everywhere; he was utterly desireless, nonpossessive; naked—no thing with him, not even a cloth. Then he returned to his country, to his capital. The emperor of that capital was his childhood friend; they had studied together. The emperor thought, My friend returns—having earned renown and glory; having attained supreme renunciation; having left everything—so let me arrange a welcome. He decorated the whole capital with light, fragrance, splendor. On the day the sannyasin was to arrive, flowers were strewn on the roads; lamps were lit throughout the city. On the way, some travelers told the sannyasin, Do you know? You are going to the capital—but your childhood friend, who is now the emperor, wants to show off his wealth. He has made the capital shine; there are lights throughout; flowers are strewn on the roads. He wants to stun you by showing: “You—a naked fakir! Look what I have made of my life—so much wealth, so much prosperity, a city of gold!” He wants to make you feel small by showing his gold, his splendor. The sannyasin’s eyes filled with anger, and he said, No worry—we shall see what he wants to show. The day came, evening fell, and the sannyasin arrived. The emperor stood at the city gate to welcome him. The whole city, hands folded, stood along the roads to bow. But the emperor was astonished! The sannyasin came—dry days, no sign of rain anywhere, not a drop had fallen—yet the naked sannyasin’s legs were caked with mud up to the knees. The emperor was surprised: the roads were dry, dusty, nowhere was there any mud—how then mud up to the knees? But it was not proper to ask in front of everyone. Then on the palace steps—on precious carpets—that muddy-legged naked sannyasin walked. When the two were alone in the chamber, the emperor asked—after inquiring of his welfare—he said, I am very saddened and troubled; it seems you suffered on the way. But there was no sign of rain, no cloud in the sky; the roads are dry—how were your legs filled with mud—up to the knees? The sannyasin said, What do you think? If you can spread costly carpets on the roads to display your wealth, then we too are sannyasins—we can walk with muddy, naked feet over your things worth millions! The emperor was taken aback; he ran and embraced the sannyasin and said, I was mistaken—I thought you might have changed. But you are exactly as you were when I left you in childhood: the same ego! The same, “We are sannyasins; we will walk with muddy feet in your palace; we kick your wealth; we think your wealth is worth two pennies.” What difference has happened? What distinction? What change? Ego has taken a new knot, a new form—of humility, of renunciation, of sannyas. But it stands there still. It has not vacated its place. It has begun to feed itself on renunciation itself. So I want to tell you—between two dangerous pegs we must be saved: the peg of pride and the peg of humility—both are pegs of ego. The first peg of ego we all know; the second we are very unfamiliar with. That is why true sannyasins have not been born in the world. Even the sannyasin says, I am a Hindu. The sannyasin says, I am a Muslim. The sannyasin says, I am a Jain. Strange! If the I is lost, where is the space to be Hindu, Muslim, or Jain? Who is claiming to be who? Even the sannyasin claims, I am a world teacher; I have so many disciples, so many followers. Who is making all these claims? All these claims are claims of ego. They stand dressed in the garb of humility. Often a wolf stands draped in a sheep’s skin, but that does not change its nature. Often a proud man folds his hands, becomes a public servant, but that changes nothing. This second false peg of humility—being free of it is just as necessary as being free of the peg of pride. And the moment you are free of both pegs, there remains no “I” with you. You remain—but not the I. And that which you are—free of I—its very name is Atman. The day the I is not, the day ego is not, the doors of the Self open. I want to remind you of a third peg. The third peg is the peg of knowledge. We all move about, stand, sit, and conduct ourselves in life as though we know—“I know” is the sense that fills us. It is difficult to find a man who will say, I don’t know. We all seem to know. If I ask you, Is there a God? you will say, Yes, we know. Someone will say, There is no God, I know. Another will say, There is a God, I know. But hardly anyone will say, I do not know, I am ignorant. We collect the garbage of knowledge on loan—from scriptures, from books, from doctrines. We clutch that garbage and assume we have gained the wealth of knowledge. I went to an orphanage. The organizers said, We give our children religious instruction. I was very astonished. In my view, religion can be practiced, but it cannot be taught. Science can be taught; religion cannot. For teaching is from the outside. And whatever is given from the outside becomes an obstacle to the manifestation of what lies hidden within. Religion lies hidden within; it is one’s nature; it is the innermost essence of each one’s life; it is not to be brought from without. Therefore, no religious instruction is possible. Still I said, If you do give it, it is a wonder—I would like to see. They took me to the children. There were a hundred. And they asked the children, Is there God? The children raised their hands: Yes, there is God. Were those hands true or false? Old people do not know whether there is God—how did the children come to know? Those hands went up—one hundred hands—Yes, there is God. Those hands are not true; those hands are utterly false. Those are trained hands, cultivated. These children have been told, When we ask, “Is there God?” you raise your hands—Yes, there is God. The poor children, out of fear, raise their hands that there is God. They were asked, Is there Atman? They raised their hands—Yes, there is Atman. They were asked, Where is the Atman? They placed their hands upon their chests—Here. I asked a small child, Will you tell me where the heart is? He said, That we were not told; what we were told, we have told. I said to the organizers, You are murdering these children; you are giving them their first lessons in falsehood. Regarding what they do not know, you are creating the illusion that they do know. There can be no greater lie than this—that concerning what we do not know, we acquire the idea that we know. In the journey to truth, this becomes the greatest obstacle. For once the idea is established that “I already know,” the quest stops, inquiry ceases, curiosity ends, the journey is over. If the sense of ignorance is there, the journey can be. If the conceit of knowledge arises, there is no need of a journey. That is why scholars seldom attain the Paramatman. It is most difficult for the pundit to attain the Divine. I tell you—even sinners can find God, but the scholar cannot—for the scholar is convinced “I know.” I told the organizers, These children will grow up; they will forget whether what their hands did in childhood was true or false. What has been taught will sink into their unconscious. They will become old. And whenever in life the question arises—Is there God?—their hands, mechanically, like machines, will go up; they will say, Yes, there is God. They will die for God, kill for God, burn temples, set mosques on fire. But they will not know God. Those false hands will always deceive them that “we know.” I ask you—whatever you think you know about the truths of life, do you really know, or are your hands also the hands trained in childhood? Each person must ask himself: Is my knowledge known—or learned? Learned knowledge is false. Learned knowledge is not worth two pennies. Learned knowledge is not a help but a hindrance on the path to liberation. Ask yourself—what I know, do I know? Or have some people taught me a few things? In India you were born and you were taught, There is God. If you were born in Russia—and there too are two hundred million people—they are taught from childhood, There is no God. Two hundred million say, There is no God, because they were taught so. You say, There is God—because you were taught so. And if you think you are in a better condition than they, you are mistaken. Our condition and theirs is exactly the same. What is taught is not the question; whatever is taught is false. The taught truth can never be truth. It is not known. Neither does the Russian child know that there is no God, nor does the Indian child know that there is God. But both are propagandized, both are taught, spoon-fed—Learn that this is so. In a Jain home, one kind of thought is taught; in a Hindu home, another; in a Muslim home, a third; in a theist’s home, one kind; in an atheist’s home, another. But all that is taught comes from outside. And the real experience of life comes from within; it does not come from outside. All the so-called knowledge comes from the outside; therefore it is worth two pennies, it is rubbish. Something from within—of that we do not allow the arising. With the outside garbage we so fill ourselves that the inner springs cannot burst forth; they are blocked on all sides. Let me try to explain this third peg with a small example. One man digs a well; another constructs a tank. In a tank, water appears; in a well, water appears. Yet there is a fundamental difference between them—one as great as between earth and sky. What is the difference? When we dig a well, we go downward, into depth. When we make a tank, we build upward, toward the shallow. The tank must be raised upward; the well must be dug downward. Their directions are opposite. In a well, the stones, earth, rocks must be removed and thrown out. Then water appears by itself; it need not be brought. Only the obstacles have to be removed; water comes. Water is always present; just break through the layers of earth in between and water manifests. Water is not to be brought to a well from elsewhere; it comes from within—only the intervening hindrances must be removed. In a tank? For a tank, mud and stones must be brought to build walls; you do not remove, you add. Even when the tank stands ready, it is empty; no water comes on its own. Then water too must be borrowed—from some well. That borrowed water must be brought and poured in. The tank has borrowed water, not its own. The scholar is like the tank; the knower is like the well. With the scholar, all is borrowed, stale, secondhand. With the knower, something is his own—self-born, dug out, discovered. He has merely removed the obstacles, and from the center of his life the streams of knowing have begun to flow. There are other differences between well and tank. Wells are linked to sources that connect far away to the ocean. A well is not closed and confined; it is open toward the sea—unknown springs connect it to unknown reservoirs. The tank? It is closed, confined—it has no connection with anything. Therefore a tank becomes an ego. A well has no ego of its own. A well always cries out, Draw from me, empty me, take away my water, share it. A tank is never eager to donate. A tank says, Bring more, bring more—keep filling me. A tank is eager to accumulate; a well is eager to give. If a tank says, Share me, it will die; its charity is suicide—for it has nothing of its own. It is a great wonder: when something is your own, distribute as much as you like—it does not end. That is the proof that it is truly yours. If nothing is your own, give—and it is finished. If a tank gives, it will become empty, dry. Therefore the tank fears lest someone take away water. Let water come, come, come. The well cries, Empty me! Because the more a well is emptied, the more fresh sources rejuvenate it; it fills with new water. A scholar accumulates knowledge. A knower? A knower does not accumulate. What is gained through accumulation will always be alien. A knower digs within and frees what is blocked; reveals what is hidden; opens the secret to the free sky. From within the knower, something flows outward; with the scholar, something from outside is pushed within. And finally let me say to you—yesterday I said: some people fill themselves with rubbish. The only definition of rubbish is this: whatever comes from outside to inside is rubbish; whatever goes from inside to outside is treasure. Because what flows from within is our very nature; it is our authentic being, our Atman. And what comes from outside is borrowed, stale, dead. Therefore, do not fill your inside with knowledge from outside—that is false knowledge; that is the third false peg; be free of it. And wait for that which is hidden within to be revealed. And until it is revealed, know that you are holding on to something from outside that is blocking it. Until it is revealed, know that some stones of rock are wedged in the gate of the springs. Those rocks must be removed—then the springs will appear. These three points are to be remembered. This second sutra is complete. A man who fills himself with rubbish cannot be entitled to the wealth of truth. Tomorrow night we shall speak of the third sutra. We have spoken of two sutras. Yesterday we spoke of the first sutra: that some people do not even touch life and die futilely. Today of the second: that some people do touch life, but fill themselves with rubbish and remain poor and wretched. Tomorrow we shall speak of the third direction—how one can touch life and be filled not with refuse but with light; not with futility but with meaning. How life can become illumined, how the extinguished flame of life can be lit again, how life can become a joy, a music, and a dance—that third sutra we shall speak of tomorrow night. And tomorrow morning, if you have any questions concerning what I have said today, we shall talk of them in the morning. You listened to my words with such love and peace—my deep gratitude. And in the end, I bow to the Paramatman dwelling within all. Please accept my salutations.
Osho's Commentary
In a dark night, in a desolate desert, a caravan came upon a wayside inn and halted. It was night, it was darkness, and the caravan had lost its way. Around midnight, searching and searching, they reached that inn. The travelers were tired; their camels were tired too. In haste they drove in the pegs, took out the ropes, and tied the camels. There were a hundred camels with that caravan. But in the hurry and in the night’s darkness, the peg and rope for one camel were somehow lost. One camel remained untied. It was a dark night, and it was not wise to leave the camel loose—there was every chance of its straying away. The caravan leaders went to the old innkeeper and said, If we could get one peg and one rope, it would be a great kindness. One camel of ours remains free; the rope and peg are lost somewhere.
The old man said, There is no need at all for a rope and a peg. Just go, drive in the peg and tie the rope. What he said was so foolish, so pointless. If we had a peg and rope—said the caravan men—we would have tied him ourselves. It is precisely because we don’t have a peg and rope that we have come to ask. But the old man said, Drive in a false peg. In the dark how will the camel know whether a real peg has been driven or a false one? Tie a false rope as well.
They did not understand his saying, but there was no other way either. They thought it right to try an experiment. They went and hammered a peg in the darkness—a peg that was not there at all. Only the sound of hammering. The camel was standing; he sat down, thinking perhaps a peg had been fixed. Then they performed the motion of tying the rope. There was no rope—but as they would have tied it if there were, in the same way they performed the act. And then they went to sleep.
In the morning they saw—the camel was sitting in his place; the tied camels were seated, and the untied camel too was seated. They untied the camels that had been tied; they had to begin a new day’s journey. There was no question of untying the untied one; they tried to make him rise without untying him. But that camel refused to get up. He was tied. They went to the innkeeper and said, What a wonder! The camel will not rise. What magic have you done? We suspected it even at night—who knows what magic is being worked! Can a camel be tied to a false peg? Can anyone ever be bound by an unreal rope? And now the trouble is worse, for the camel has refused to rise. The old man said, First pull up the peg and untie the rope. But they said, If there were a peg, we would pull it up! The old man said, If there was a peg when you tied him, then the peg is still there.
They were compelled. It was sheer madness. But they went and pulled up the peg, untied the rope—and the camel stood up. They thanked the old man, and said, Many, many thanks. It seems you are a great knower of camels. The old man said, Forgive me! I know nothing about camels. About men—yes, I know much. Then I thought, since even man is bound by false pegs and ropes, the poor camel—he can certainly be bound.
With this story I want to begin my second talk today. Why with this story? Because man’s whole life is a life tied with false ropes and false pegs. Man’s entire misery is bound by untruth and imagination. All his anxiety is manufactured by his own imagination. And man has fastened so many false pegs and so many ropes around himself that today, apart from these false ropes and pegs, nothing much remains of his life.
Yesterday I had said to you that man fills himself with useless things. What do I call useless? What do I call rubbish? I call the untrue rubbish, I call it useless. And we all have stuffed ourselves with untruth.
We have been able to fill ourselves with untruth—by a trick, a secret! Why could that camel be tied to a false peg? Because he took that peg to be true from his own side. The camel was bound only to a true peg—on his side; even the untrue he accepted as true; he believed what was not, to be. If the camel had opened his eyes and seen there is no peg, then bondage would have been impossible.
We too are bound by untruths and carry headloads of rubbish only because we do not take them as rubbish. If it becomes visible to us that it is untrue, false, a lie—perhaps we will drop it that very instant and step out of it. The moment untruth is seen, it becomes useless and man is freed of it. Nothing else need be done to abandon untruth except this—that we know it as untruth. To know untruth as untruth is to be free of it. Ah! had that camel come to know there was no peg, he would have been free the whole night. But no; he believed there was a peg.
Man too is bound by just such futility, such non-essence, such untruth as he takes to be essential, true, treasure. No one carries garbage unless he is under the illusion that it is wealth.
With what untruths have we filled our lives?
I want to speak to you of three untruths. And the man who circles around these three untruths—his life turns futile. How can meaning be found near the untrue? How will the taste of life come from what is not? How can truth be attained through dream?
Which three untruths are those around which man wanders, goes astray, and is ruined?
The first untruth: man’s ego. We are all tied to a strange peg—the peg of “I,” the ego. And around this peg of I we live our whole life, around it we bring it to an end. And never does it occur to us to ask whether that for which we are dedicating our entire life—is it at all?
One morning, an emperor who had gone hunting at night in the forest lost his way. Toward dawn he reached a village. He reined in his horse before a small hut. He was tired, hungry, thirsty. He asked the hut’s old owner, Could I get a little milk or a few eggs? I am very hungry and tired. The old man came out with three eggs and a little milk. The emperor had his morning meal. Then he asked the old man, How much do I owe you? The old man said, Not much—only a hundred rupees. The emperor had bought many expensive things in life, but a hundred rupees for three eggs! He was astonished. He said, You must be joking! Are eggs so rare here? The old man said, No, eggs are not rare, sir—but kings are! Eggs are not hard to find; but a king is very hard to find. The emperor took out a hundred rupees and gave them to him.
The old man’s wife was amazed to see that three eggs could fetch a hundred rupees. She asked her husband, What magic did you do? A hundred rupees for three eggs! One hardly gets three paisa. By what trick did you extract a hundred rupees? The old man said, I know man’s weakness. Touch the weakness, and you can take anything.
The old woman said, I don’t understand—what is man’s weakness?
The old man said, I’ll tell you another incident from my life; perhaps you will catch what man’s weakness is, the human weakness. Around that very weakness man lives and dies.
The old man said, When I was young I went out in search of wealth, but I had only five rupees. And how can wealth be earned with five rupees—except by exploiting man’s weakness? I bought a five-rupee turban, and went to the court of a very great emperor. The turban was very gaudy—as cheap things usually are. In truth, to hide cheapness, glitter and color are necessary. Whatever is truly significant in life is utterly simple; what is useless is very gaudy, very colored.
He bought a glittering colored turban and presented himself in the emperor’s court. As soon as the emperor saw it, the turban was so resplendent that naturally he asked, What is the price of this turban? The old man said, Do not ask the price; you might not believe it. The emperor said, Still, what is the price of this turban? Don’t be afraid; do you know before whom you stand? His treasuries are filled with immeasurable riches. Speak—how much is the price? The old man said, The price? Ten thousand rupees. The emperor began to laugh—the old man seemed mad.
But just then the prime minister bent to whisper something in the emperor’s ear. The old man told his wife, I immediately understood what the minister was saying. For those who are used to robbing others do not like another robber to intervene. I understood what the minister must be saying. And I at once spoke out loudly, Shall I go then? The man from whom I bought this turban said to me, “Don’t worry! On this earth there is still one emperor who can pay ten thousand for it.” I am in search of that emperor. Forgive me, it seems I have come to the wrong court, to the wrong emperor.
The emperor said, Buy the turban—and not for ten thousand, for fifteen thousand. And the turban was bought.
The old man asked his wife, Do you understand now what man’s weakness is?
Man’s weakness is ego. And it is the greatest weakness, because it is the greatest untruth. The whole life we live trying to prove, “I am something.” Without knowing who I am, I go on trying to prove that I am somebody, I am something. If someone is jostled, he says, Don’t you know? Are you blind? Don’t you know who I am! And the wonder is that perhaps he himself does not know who he is. Who knows who is who?
But lifelong there is only one endeavor of man—to prove that I am something—without knowing what I am, without recognizing who is within. The whole life we live around this untruth—that I am—someone special, somebody, a very particular person. And lifelong we have one effort—to sign our names on stones so that life can never forget us. Small children go to the seashore and sign their names upon the sand; and elders instruct them, Fools, what is the use of signing on sand? The winds will come and the sand will fly away and the signatures will be erased. But elders too do nothing else but sign upon rocks. And the greater wonder is, perhaps they do not know that what they call sand was once a rock, and what they call a rock will one day be sand. Even names carved upon the strongest rock are no more than names written on sand; for rock is nothing more than sand joined together, and sand is rock in a broken condition.
Yet man lives with the effort to sign his name. For whom? Whom do you want to show it to? Having erased the whole of life, you want to prove that you are something. But before whom? For what purpose? And no one ever turns back to think—could it be that there is no greater untruth, no more false entity than this I?
But we have taken the false for true in such a way… A child is born, and we give him a name—Ram, Krishna, or something else. No one is born with a name; all are born nameless. Name is entirely untrue. But once we give a name—Ram!—he lives his whole life assuming, I am Ram.
Name is utterly false, pasted on. Man is nameless. But if you abuse his name he will be ready to kill or be killed; for what is absolutely false he will be ready to take life and give life. If you praise his name, he will swell and bloom in the sky. A name that has no connection with him at all.
We attach a name so that the world can address us. And we begin to call ourselves “I” so that we ourselves can address ourselves. Even “I” is only a name given for self-address, no more than a noun. I has no reality, no truth. I has no ground, no foundation, no substance. A name is so others can call us, and “I” is so I can call myself! “I” is merely a noun. Yet in our life, that alone becomes most important.
Let me try to explain with a small incident. By the royal palace there was a heap of stones. Some children passed nearby while playing, and one child lifted a stone and threw it toward the palace. The pile of stones was below, one stone began to rise toward the sky. Stones too have a desire to travel to the sky. Wherever there is ego, the desire to journey to the sky is born. When the stone began to rise, it filled with joy, and with ego; and it said to the stones lying below, Friends, I am going on a journey to the sky.
Pay a little attention to its words! It said, I am going on a journey to the sky. It had been thrown. But it began to say, I am going. The fact was not that it was going—it had been thrown—by the hand of some unknown child. But it said, I am going.
Between these two statements there seems little difference—“I have been thrown,” “I am going”—but the difference is immense—the same as between egolessness and ego. Ego has arisen. When I am going, when the going is by me, then I have become someone special. Those stones not able to go skyward become worthless, nobodies. I have become somebody. Those lying below are nobodies, they cannot fly into the sky, they have no wings; I am flying, I am no longer ordinary, I have become exceptional, special.
The stone rose. The stones below burned with jealousy. And yet denial was impossible—the stone was indeed going. It was difficult to say, You lie; the fact bore witness—it was going. Then the stone rose and struck the palace window of glass. As soon as it struck, the glass was shattered. When a stone strikes glass, the glass is shattered; it just happens. The stone does not shatter the glass; that is the nature of glass, that is the nature of stone. When the two collide, the glass shatters. But when the glass shattered, the stone laughed and said, Fool! Don’t you know—whoever comes in my way I shatter!
The glass was shattered; the stone had not done it. It had not had to move a hand or foot to shatter it. The glass simply shattered. Such is the nature of glass—collide and it breaks. The stone did not break it. But the stone said, I shatter!
This is the language of ego: Let no one come in my way, otherwise I will shatter him! The shards of glass must have wept. They wanted to say something too, but there was no scope to speak. It wasn’t a lie—the glass had indeed broken. How could it protest that you are wrong?
The stone fell upon Persian carpets inside the palace—costly carpets were spread there. The stone sighed in relief and said, It seems the people of this house are very understanding. They must have learned beforehand of my arrival—carpets and all have been spread out.
The people of the house had no inkling that a stone would arrive as a guest. Those Persian carpets were not spread in wait for any stone. But the stone said—and who could deny the stone, no one was there—the stone said to itself, Surely the people of the house have come to know I am coming. Why not—after all, I am no ordinary stone; I am a stone that flies in the sky. Naturally they would make arrangements to welcome me.
Just then the palace guard must have heard that glass had broken, a stone had come, there was noise; he rushed in and picked up the stone in his hand. The stone said in its own language, Thank you, very obliged. It appears the master of the palace is expressing honor by holding me in his hands. The guard was about to throw the stone out, but the stone said, It seems the master is expressing respect.
Ego thinks within itself and lives within itself; it affirms itself within and grows stronger. It is an inner process that feeds itself and steadily fortifies. That stone was strengthening its ego. Every fact was becoming nourishment for it—facts that had nothing to do with its ego, not even a distant connection.
The guard threw the stone back out. But the stone did not say, I am being thrown out of the palace. Whenever someone is thrown out of a capital, does he say, I was expelled? He says, I have resigned, I have renounced the capital. Someone is thrown out of Delhi toward Bhavnagar—does he say, I was expelled from Delhi? He says, I was missing home greatly, I like Bhavnagar very much.
That stone too said within, I have stayed long enough in the palace; keep your palace! I feel homesick; I want to go home. I miss the stones, I miss my home, I miss my friends. Keep your palace! Perhaps your palace is good; but it is quite another thing to live under the open sky, under the moon and stars. I am going back.
The stone was being thrown out, but it said, I am going back. As it began to fall upon its heap again, the stones below were staring, eyes fixed. As soon as it came and fell, it said, Friends, I missed you very much. There were grand receptions in great palaces; great emperors lifted me with their own hands and offered respect and honor. But no—the remembrance of home tormented me so much that I desired to return. I have come back; I remembered you all very much. The stones must have garlanded it, honored it, and said to that stone, You are our incarnate stone, a great soul, a mahatma; we are blessed that you were born amongst us. Our generations are fulfilled. You must write your autobiography, so that it may be of use to the children, they may read and learn from your life.
I have heard that that stone is writing its autobiography.
Ego turns the whole life into its own journey. Ask yourself: is the birth of our “I” very different from the stone’s journey? We say—my birth! Did anyone ask you whether you want to be born? Did anyone ask where you want to be born? Was there any choice of yours, any decision of yours before birth—because you say, my birth! Some unknown hand throws, and we say—my birth! Some unknown energy flings, and we say—my birth!
Unknown currents of wind raise waves in the ocean. Perhaps the waves too say—my birth! Unknown forces of life make hollows in the earth, raise mountains. Mountains too must say—my birth! Unknown forces break the seed and make the sprout. Trees too must say—my birth! Man too is born by the hands of unknown powers. There is no question of “my” birth. As there are waves in the sea, so am I, so are you. A wave rises and falls away. We rise and are gone. Upon the ocean of an infinite power we are no more than waves. Yet our declaration is, I am! What does the declaration of I mean? It means a declaration of separateness, of difference, of being apart from all.
Are you separate? Can you be separate even for a moment? Can you live even a moment torn away from life? Not even for a moment. A leaf is bound to the tree, the tree to the roots, the roots to the great earth, the earth to the great sun, the sun to other great suns—just so, each human being is bound like a leaf. There is not the slightest possibility of being separate even for a moment, nor any possibility of living so. Then where is the possibility of declaring “I”?
Yet we say—my birth! We say—my childhood! We say—my youth! As if by endeavor we had turned childhood into youth. As if there were any effort of ours, any will of ours, by which we desired to be young and therefore became young. Childhood becomes youth just as a bud becomes a flower. What is mine, what is yours in it? Youth becomes old age just as a seed becomes a sprout. What is mine, what is yours? Where is there any place, any meaning, any purpose for the assertion of my I?
But we are such that we even say of breathing—I am breathing. Perhaps you have never reflected that no one in the world has ever breathed. Breath comes and goes—it just happens; you do not breathe. If you were breathing, then dying would become difficult. Death stands at the door and you go on breathing—then death would have to return empty-handed. But we know perfectly well—if one breath goes out and does not come in again, we have no power to call it back. The truth is: the moment breath remains outside, we will also remain outside; we will not even remain inside to call it back. We are not breathing; but ego says, I am breathing, I am living. And thus we keep strengthening a false entity, strengthening it and strengthening it.
Whoever fills the house of his life with this untruth of ego is deprived of the truth of the Divine. This is the first peg—and the strongest. It is necessary to understand the nonexistence of this peg, to understand its untruth. To understand the falsity of this peg is essential. And if it becomes clear that “I” is a false entity, then instantly life turns toward the infinite. It moves away from the futile and engages in the search for the meaningful. This is the first peg, the first futility, the first heap of rubbish that man collects, working hard to heap it up—and then he is tormented by its stench. Then he becomes miserable and anxious. Then he goes about asking, How can I be saved from sorrow? How can I be free from anxiety? I am troubled, I am restless! And never asks—whence comes this trouble, this restlessness, this anxiety—other than from my ego!
Can you say that a man without ego can be restless? Do you know a man without ego who can be anxious? Do you know one without ego who can be afraid of death? Worry, fear, anguish—all are by-products of ego, its offshoots, its shadows. He who is not free of ego cannot be free of life’s sorrow and darkness.
What is the second peg? The second peg is also very strange. It is exactly the opposite peg of ego. It is the reverse of ego, and to recognize it is even more difficult. Ego is very gross. There is a reverse peg opposed to ego: non-ego. That peg is even subtler than ego. If someone tries to escape from ego, he catches hold of a notion of non-ego. He begins to declare, I am nothing, I am humble, I am a nobody, I am the dust under your feet, I am nothing at all. It does not occur to him that when we declare “I am nothing,” still it is an echo of I that resounds; still, at the subtlest levels, we are saying “I am.” We say, I am humble; I am the dust of your feet; I am nobody. Those who flee from ego begin to erect a marvelous center of non-ego.
I stayed for some days with a sannyasin. He invited me to be a guest at his ashram; I became his guest. Once he had been very prosperous and wealthy. Whenever he spoke to me, after a little conversation, by one pretext or another he would certainly hang this one statement upon some peg: I have kicked millions with my foot. Once, twice, ten times I heard him say, I have kicked millions. Then on the day I was to depart, he was saying it again: I have kicked millions.
I asked him—if you won’t be offended… And with sannyasins, it is very necessary to ask whether they will be offended, for sannyasins are often more full of anger than ordinary people. I asked, You won’t be offended? I want to ask something. He was already offended. He said, Ask—what is it? I said, I want to ask, this kick you say you gave to your millions—when did you give it? He said, It’s been some thirty years. I said, I am troubled to say it—and for this I feared you might be offended: that kick failed to land properly, otherwise there would be no need to carry it for thirty years. Why are you carrying it for thirty years—that I kicked millions? When the millions were with you, there was an ego—“I have millions.” And when you left them, a new, subtler, opposite ego was born—“I have kicked millions.” I! “Those millions were with me”—that was a gross ego, visible to all. But “I have kicked millions”—this is a very subtle ego; it stands dressed in the guise of humility, robed in renunciation. It is very difficult to see. Others will not see it at all; even for oneself it is difficult to see.
The renunciate is as possessed by wealth as the wealthy; the rich man collects, the renouncer abandons—but both eyes remain fixed upon wealth, fixed upon wealth.
I was in Jaipur. Some friends came and said, There is a very great muni here—have you not met him? I said, I will certainly meet him, but I want to ask one thing: how did you come to know that he is a very great muni? By what scale did you weigh him? What is your criterion? They said, What is there to know? Even the Maharaja of Jaipur bows at his feet! I said, Is the respect in your heart for the Maharaja of Jaipur or for the muni? What is your measuring rod? The criterion is that the Maharaja touches his feet. The criterion is wealth! Even renunciation is weighed by wealth. That is why, if you look in India, the Hindu gods are princes; the Jains’ twenty-four tirthankaras are princes; the twenty-four avatars of the Buddha are royal incarnations. Till today in India, a poor man has not been able to earn the stature of attaining supreme sannyas. Why?
Not because a poor man cannot become a sannyasin, but because if a poor man becomes a sannyasin, we have no measure by which to weigh him. How to call him great? He has left nothing! Had he left much, he could be great. The more he leaves, the greater he becomes. Even sannyas, in the end, is measured by money. Then it is no longer sannyas; it is wealth come back round as prestige.
Even humility becomes a proclamation of ego. If someone in a village says, I am a very humble man; there is no ego in me; and you say to him, I know a man even more humble than you—he is instantly hurt. Ego is hurt whenever it sees anyone beyond itself. Say to a sannyasin, You are fine—but that other sannyasin is even greater—and he is hurt. Why?
If there is no ego, there remains no cause for hurt. Where there is no ego, there is no question of comparison. Because only where ego is can comparison exist: that I am smaller than someone, greater than someone. Where ego is not, man has become incomparable. There is no comparison there. Where ego is, we can say, I am great; there we can also say, I am small—but the ladder of ego remains the same, whether you climb from bottom to top or descend from top to bottom. Ego drops only on that day when even the thought does not remain that I am—neither small nor great; neither proud nor humble—where the very sense of being an I dissolves. Only there can one be saved from rubbish. Otherwise we create reverse rubbish.
We have become very skilled at binding life from the opposite side. We avoid the ditch and grasp the well; we avoid the well and grasp the ditch. A man escapes indulgence and grasps renunciation—with the same intensity with which he had held indulgence. A man leaves wealth and grasps poverty—with the same intensity with which he had held wealth. But the clinging remains exactly the same; clinging does not change.
I have heard of a great sannyasin. He went naked. His fame spread far and wide, to the corners of the earth. The songs of his renunciation were sung everywhere; he was utterly desireless, nonpossessive; naked—no thing with him, not even a cloth. Then he returned to his country, to his capital. The emperor of that capital was his childhood friend; they had studied together. The emperor thought, My friend returns—having earned renown and glory; having attained supreme renunciation; having left everything—so let me arrange a welcome. He decorated the whole capital with light, fragrance, splendor. On the day the sannyasin was to arrive, flowers were strewn on the roads; lamps were lit throughout the city.
On the way, some travelers told the sannyasin, Do you know? You are going to the capital—but your childhood friend, who is now the emperor, wants to show off his wealth. He has made the capital shine; there are lights throughout; flowers are strewn on the roads. He wants to stun you by showing: “You—a naked fakir! Look what I have made of my life—so much wealth, so much prosperity, a city of gold!” He wants to make you feel small by showing his gold, his splendor. The sannyasin’s eyes filled with anger, and he said, No worry—we shall see what he wants to show.
The day came, evening fell, and the sannyasin arrived. The emperor stood at the city gate to welcome him. The whole city, hands folded, stood along the roads to bow. But the emperor was astonished! The sannyasin came—dry days, no sign of rain anywhere, not a drop had fallen—yet the naked sannyasin’s legs were caked with mud up to the knees. The emperor was surprised: the roads were dry, dusty, nowhere was there any mud—how then mud up to the knees? But it was not proper to ask in front of everyone. Then on the palace steps—on precious carpets—that muddy-legged naked sannyasin walked.
When the two were alone in the chamber, the emperor asked—after inquiring of his welfare—he said, I am very saddened and troubled; it seems you suffered on the way. But there was no sign of rain, no cloud in the sky; the roads are dry—how were your legs filled with mud—up to the knees?
The sannyasin said, What do you think? If you can spread costly carpets on the roads to display your wealth, then we too are sannyasins—we can walk with muddy, naked feet over your things worth millions!
The emperor was taken aback; he ran and embraced the sannyasin and said, I was mistaken—I thought you might have changed. But you are exactly as you were when I left you in childhood: the same ego! The same, “We are sannyasins; we will walk with muddy feet in your palace; we kick your wealth; we think your wealth is worth two pennies.” What difference has happened? What distinction? What change? Ego has taken a new knot, a new form—of humility, of renunciation, of sannyas. But it stands there still. It has not vacated its place. It has begun to feed itself on renunciation itself.
So I want to tell you—between two dangerous pegs we must be saved: the peg of pride and the peg of humility—both are pegs of ego. The first peg of ego we all know; the second we are very unfamiliar with. That is why true sannyasins have not been born in the world.
Even the sannyasin says, I am a Hindu. The sannyasin says, I am a Muslim. The sannyasin says, I am a Jain. Strange! If the I is lost, where is the space to be Hindu, Muslim, or Jain? Who is claiming to be who? Even the sannyasin claims, I am a world teacher; I have so many disciples, so many followers. Who is making all these claims?
All these claims are claims of ego. They stand dressed in the garb of humility. Often a wolf stands draped in a sheep’s skin, but that does not change its nature. Often a proud man folds his hands, becomes a public servant, but that changes nothing.
This second false peg of humility—being free of it is just as necessary as being free of the peg of pride. And the moment you are free of both pegs, there remains no “I” with you. You remain—but not the I. And that which you are—free of I—its very name is Atman. The day the I is not, the day ego is not, the doors of the Self open.
I want to remind you of a third peg. The third peg is the peg of knowledge. We all move about, stand, sit, and conduct ourselves in life as though we know—“I know” is the sense that fills us. It is difficult to find a man who will say, I don’t know. We all seem to know. If I ask you, Is there a God? you will say, Yes, we know. Someone will say, There is no God, I know. Another will say, There is a God, I know. But hardly anyone will say, I do not know, I am ignorant. We collect the garbage of knowledge on loan—from scriptures, from books, from doctrines. We clutch that garbage and assume we have gained the wealth of knowledge.
I went to an orphanage. The organizers said, We give our children religious instruction. I was very astonished. In my view, religion can be practiced, but it cannot be taught. Science can be taught; religion cannot. For teaching is from the outside. And whatever is given from the outside becomes an obstacle to the manifestation of what lies hidden within. Religion lies hidden within; it is one’s nature; it is the innermost essence of each one’s life; it is not to be brought from without. Therefore, no religious instruction is possible. Still I said, If you do give it, it is a wonder—I would like to see. They took me to the children. There were a hundred. And they asked the children, Is there God? The children raised their hands: Yes, there is God.
Were those hands true or false? Old people do not know whether there is God—how did the children come to know?
Those hands went up—one hundred hands—Yes, there is God. Those hands are not true; those hands are utterly false. Those are trained hands, cultivated. These children have been told, When we ask, “Is there God?” you raise your hands—Yes, there is God. The poor children, out of fear, raise their hands that there is God.
They were asked, Is there Atman? They raised their hands—Yes, there is Atman. They were asked, Where is the Atman? They placed their hands upon their chests—Here.
I asked a small child, Will you tell me where the heart is? He said, That we were not told; what we were told, we have told.
I said to the organizers, You are murdering these children; you are giving them their first lessons in falsehood. Regarding what they do not know, you are creating the illusion that they do know. There can be no greater lie than this—that concerning what we do not know, we acquire the idea that we know. In the journey to truth, this becomes the greatest obstacle. For once the idea is established that “I already know,” the quest stops, inquiry ceases, curiosity ends, the journey is over.
If the sense of ignorance is there, the journey can be. If the conceit of knowledge arises, there is no need of a journey. That is why scholars seldom attain the Paramatman. It is most difficult for the pundit to attain the Divine. I tell you—even sinners can find God, but the scholar cannot—for the scholar is convinced “I know.”
I told the organizers, These children will grow up; they will forget whether what their hands did in childhood was true or false. What has been taught will sink into their unconscious. They will become old. And whenever in life the question arises—Is there God?—their hands, mechanically, like machines, will go up; they will say, Yes, there is God. They will die for God, kill for God, burn temples, set mosques on fire. But they will not know God. Those false hands will always deceive them that “we know.”
I ask you—whatever you think you know about the truths of life, do you really know, or are your hands also the hands trained in childhood? Each person must ask himself: Is my knowledge known—or learned? Learned knowledge is false. Learned knowledge is not worth two pennies. Learned knowledge is not a help but a hindrance on the path to liberation. Ask yourself—what I know, do I know? Or have some people taught me a few things?
In India you were born and you were taught, There is God. If you were born in Russia—and there too are two hundred million people—they are taught from childhood, There is no God. Two hundred million say, There is no God, because they were taught so. You say, There is God—because you were taught so. And if you think you are in a better condition than they, you are mistaken. Our condition and theirs is exactly the same. What is taught is not the question; whatever is taught is false. The taught truth can never be truth. It is not known. Neither does the Russian child know that there is no God, nor does the Indian child know that there is God. But both are propagandized, both are taught, spoon-fed—Learn that this is so. In a Jain home, one kind of thought is taught; in a Hindu home, another; in a Muslim home, a third; in a theist’s home, one kind; in an atheist’s home, another. But all that is taught comes from outside. And the real experience of life comes from within; it does not come from outside. All the so-called knowledge comes from the outside; therefore it is worth two pennies, it is rubbish. Something from within—of that we do not allow the arising. With the outside garbage we so fill ourselves that the inner springs cannot burst forth; they are blocked on all sides.
Let me try to explain this third peg with a small example. One man digs a well; another constructs a tank. In a tank, water appears; in a well, water appears. Yet there is a fundamental difference between them—one as great as between earth and sky. What is the difference? When we dig a well, we go downward, into depth. When we make a tank, we build upward, toward the shallow. The tank must be raised upward; the well must be dug downward. Their directions are opposite.
In a well, the stones, earth, rocks must be removed and thrown out. Then water appears by itself; it need not be brought. Only the obstacles have to be removed; water comes. Water is always present; just break through the layers of earth in between and water manifests. Water is not to be brought to a well from elsewhere; it comes from within—only the intervening hindrances must be removed. In a tank? For a tank, mud and stones must be brought to build walls; you do not remove, you add. Even when the tank stands ready, it is empty; no water comes on its own. Then water too must be borrowed—from some well. That borrowed water must be brought and poured in. The tank has borrowed water, not its own.
The scholar is like the tank; the knower is like the well. With the scholar, all is borrowed, stale, secondhand. With the knower, something is his own—self-born, dug out, discovered. He has merely removed the obstacles, and from the center of his life the streams of knowing have begun to flow.
There are other differences between well and tank. Wells are linked to sources that connect far away to the ocean. A well is not closed and confined; it is open toward the sea—unknown springs connect it to unknown reservoirs. The tank? It is closed, confined—it has no connection with anything. Therefore a tank becomes an ego. A well has no ego of its own.
A well always cries out, Draw from me, empty me, take away my water, share it. A tank is never eager to donate. A tank says, Bring more, bring more—keep filling me. A tank is eager to accumulate; a well is eager to give. If a tank says, Share me, it will die; its charity is suicide—for it has nothing of its own. It is a great wonder: when something is your own, distribute as much as you like—it does not end. That is the proof that it is truly yours. If nothing is your own, give—and it is finished. If a tank gives, it will become empty, dry. Therefore the tank fears lest someone take away water. Let water come, come, come. The well cries, Empty me! Because the more a well is emptied, the more fresh sources rejuvenate it; it fills with new water.
A scholar accumulates knowledge. A knower? A knower does not accumulate. What is gained through accumulation will always be alien. A knower digs within and frees what is blocked; reveals what is hidden; opens the secret to the free sky. From within the knower, something flows outward; with the scholar, something from outside is pushed within.
And finally let me say to you—yesterday I said: some people fill themselves with rubbish. The only definition of rubbish is this: whatever comes from outside to inside is rubbish; whatever goes from inside to outside is treasure. Because what flows from within is our very nature; it is our authentic being, our Atman. And what comes from outside is borrowed, stale, dead.
Therefore, do not fill your inside with knowledge from outside—that is false knowledge; that is the third false peg; be free of it. And wait for that which is hidden within to be revealed. And until it is revealed, know that you are holding on to something from outside that is blocking it. Until it is revealed, know that some stones of rock are wedged in the gate of the springs. Those rocks must be removed—then the springs will appear.
These three points are to be remembered. This second sutra is complete. A man who fills himself with rubbish cannot be entitled to the wealth of truth. Tomorrow night we shall speak of the third sutra.
We have spoken of two sutras. Yesterday we spoke of the first sutra: that some people do not even touch life and die futilely. Today of the second: that some people do touch life, but fill themselves with rubbish and remain poor and wretched. Tomorrow we shall speak of the third direction—how one can touch life and be filled not with refuse but with light; not with futility but with meaning. How life can become illumined, how the extinguished flame of life can be lit again, how life can become a joy, a music, and a dance—that third sutra we shall speak of tomorrow night. And tomorrow morning, if you have any questions concerning what I have said today, we shall talk of them in the morning.
You listened to my words with such love and peace—my deep gratitude. And in the end, I bow to the Paramatman dwelling within all. Please accept my salutations.