Company

Osho, does the color of company inevitably rub off, or is it only a matter of chance? Please explain!

It so happened: in the French Revolution the Bastille was broken open. There were imprisoned there France’s most heinous offenders. Only those who were sentenced to life imprisonment were confined in that fortress. There were some five thousand prisoners there—some had been inside thirty years, some forty, some even fifty. The chains and fetters put on those prisoners had no locks, because there was no need for locks; there was no key either, because there was no question of opening them—when they died, then their hands and feet were broken to remove the chains. For until death they were to remain in prison. The revolutionaries broke the Bastille and tried to free the prisoners by force, to drag them out of their dark cells. Many flatly refused, absolutely refused; they fought and quarreled—“We don’t want to go!” I understand them. Do not laugh; you too should understand. A man who…

About George Gurdjieff, an opponent spread in France: Avoid Gurdjieff as one avoids plague. There is truth in it — the plague’s victim may survive; Gurdjieff’s victim will not. The one who is struck in satsang is struck forever — he cannot return as he was. Hence people avoid. Or if they come, they go deaf and stone-like; or, if they join, they join half — never whole. And until you are one hundred percent, you are not joined — for less than a hundred, no union happens. Have you seen? Water becomes steam at a hundred degrees. Do not think that at ninety-eight some steam should appear — not even one percent. Even at ninety-nine it does not. Let there be the slightest lack — water will not turn to vapor. At exactly a hundred it does. So it is with His color.

Osho, you have dyed thousands in your color; what is the magic behind it?

The magic belongs to God; there is nothing of mine in it. As long as there is “mine and yours,” magic never comes. Where mine-and-yours vanish, from there the magic begins. That is the one who colors; the color is his. Understand it like this: you take up a brush and paint a picture. The brush does not paint; it is in someone’s hand. I am in his hand. If there is victory, it is his; if there is defeat, it is his. I am utterly carefree. I have no stake in it. I am not making any effort to color people. You see, I don’t even step out of my room—but people keep coming! I don’t know who summons them! I had set out alone toward the destination, but— I had set out alone toward the destination, but— People kept joining along the way, and a caravan formed. I…

Low-born, vile, slow of wit. And yet where have you seated me! Now I understand: I am as much yours as are Ram, Krishna, Buddha, Mahavira. Your compassion makes no distinctions. Your grace showers alike. Whoever opens his vessel is filled. I too, a carder, am filled. In the sky’s great dome the carder sits—my Satguru taught me the art. What art? The art of disappearing. The heart must be pierced by love’s spear. Only one thing must happen at the feet of a true Master; then know you have been with him. Being with a Satguru is not physical proximity. It means: be near by being nothing; be near by disappearing. Wipe yourself out. Do not protect yourself. Lay your whole being at the feet. The leaves of sin and the burrs of bad intelligence fall off—effortlessly, effortlessly. Then miracles upon miracles—I have seen them, says Dariya.