Bhagwan

Why do you call yourself bhagwan ? Why do you call yourself god?

The last thing about it. I am not a philosopher. Always remember me as a poet. My approach towards life is that of poetry, is that of romance. It is romantic, it is imaginative. I would like you all to be gods and goddesses. I would like you to reveal your true being. Calling myself god is a challenge. It is a subtle challenge. There are only two ways to settle with it. One is, you say, 'This man is not god, and go away, because then what are you doing here? If this man is not god, then why waste your time? You go away. Or, you accept that this man is god, and then you start being with me, and your own godliness starts flowering. One day you will also be a god, a goddess. Accepting me as god is in fact deep down accepting the possibility that…

Question: BELOVED OSHO, IF THERE IS NO GOD, WHY WERE YOU BEING CALLED BHAGWAN? Buddhists and Jainas don't believe in God, don't believe that anybody created the world, but they use 'bhagwan'. They have a different origination for their word. In Jaina and Buddhist reference bhag means fortune, and bhagwan means the fortunate one, the blessed one; one who has attained to his destiny, who has matured. So when I started talking thirty-four years ago, people started using it... because in India, if you respect a man you don't use his name; that is thought to be disrespectful. That's why a wife will not use her husband's name. When there is a census, it is such a trouble in India because the husband is not at home, he has gone to the office and the officers come and the wife cannot say the name of her husband.

As you call yourself 'god', what is the meaning of this word? And are there more gods? Who are they?

Joey, I am God because I am not. And the moment you are not, you are also a God. God is not something special; God is our very being, God is our very existence. When I say I am God I am simply saying I exist. Existence and God are synonymous in my language. I say the trees are also God, and so are the rocks, and so are you. Yes, Joey, even a journalist is a God! He may not know. You may not be aware of your godliness. I am aware of it! And the moment I became aware of my godliness I became aware of everybody else's godliness. So it will be difficult for me to tell you how many Gods there are. Infinity... All beings are Gods at different stages of recognition, realization, awareness. But I can understand your problem. Joey is a Dutch journalist. People…

A friend has said: Osho, why do you call yourself Bhagwan? And he is a very bold man, because he also wrote: If you are really bold, you must reply to my question.

You ask, “Why do you call yourself God?” I have never said it. But now that you say it, I will say: I am God. And I say this because there is no way to be anything other than God. You are God too. In this whole existence there is nothing but God. So if someone claims, “I am God and you are not,” then that claim is criminal. I have never made any claim. I have never even said it. But I cannot say the opposite either—that I am not God—because that would be downright untrue. I can only say there is nothing but God. And what can I do, since there is nothing but God? You too are God. It may be you don’t know it; it may be you do. One who doesn’t know should try to know. God means: existence—purest existence. That which we are in…