Avatar

Osho, what is an avatar?

All are avatars. Every person is an avatar. We begin to worship special avatars and forget the rest. Every person is an avatar. Either God is in everyone, or He is in no one. There cannot be any exclusive monopoly of Rama or Krishna or anyone—that they are avatars while A, B, C are not. Nor is that their claim; it is we who make that claim.

A friend has asked: Whenever there has been a crisis in religion, whenever darkness has descended upon the country, whenever there has been wrongdoing, God has taken birth as an avatar. Why does God not take an avatar now?

Those enamored of the past, those worshipers of death, also worship old age. The older someone is, the more valuable his words become. But donkeys also grow old; they don’t become wise by it. An old donkey remains a donkey; an old mule remains a mule. And a horse even when young is a horse. The truth is that the genius children have, the old never do. Only a very few fortunate ones preserve the genius of their childhood; otherwise society rusts the edge of everyone’s sword. And when the blade is blunted, we say, “Ah, what an ancient sword!” My words are as new as the morning dew, as fresh as a just-opened flower. Pundits cannot understand such words. They need old stones—and the older the better—and if the script upon them is in Brahmi, then nothing more is needed—their head bows to the ground. Worshipers of the ancient,…

Such a one can always be found. This earth is never empty of avatars. Yet you don’t find an avatar—and there is a reason. You are seeking some old avatar who no longer is. Someone seeks Krishna—Krishna is no longer here. Someone seeks Christ—Christ is no longer here. And the jest is: when Christ was here, you were seeking someone else—Moses, who had already gone. When Buddha was here, you sought Rama—Rama had already gone. And when Rama was here, you cared nothing for him; you sought some more ancient figure—Brahma, Vishnu, Mahesh—something else. You always seek the past, therefore you miss. Otherwise, as the sun rises daily, so does the Divine descend daily. But you have fixed an expectation: unless he comes crowned with peacock feathers and with a flute like Krishna, you will not accept him. There is no need for the Divine to fulfill your expectations.

Meher baba has talked about god descending in man (avatar, rasool, christ) and man rising to be god (the perfect master, sadguru, qutub, teerthankara). Would you please talk to us about the same?

God is. He neither ascends nor descends. Where can he ascend to and where can he descend to? God is all. There is nothing in to which God can ascend or descend. There is nobody else other than God. All that is is divine. So the first thing: there is no ascendence, no descendence. But when Meher Baba says it, there must be some meaning in it. The meaning is something quite different. Let me explain it to you. God is, remember. God is a pure isness, pure existence, and there is nowhere for God to go or come. The whole is full of him. He fills his existence, one thing. Second thing: but Meher Baba must be true. Then there must be some other meaning to it -- not God descending and ascending. What can be the meaning? The meaning is there are two ways of man approaching God.…