Osho's perspective on Friendship
When Osho Spoke About Friendship
Passages from the discourses where this theme comes alive.
Beloved Osho, what is the difference between the emptiness of the child before the formation of the ego and the awakened childlikeness of a buddha?
Whether you are for it or against it doesn't matter -- your concern shows where your ego is hanging. And I will include the capitalist in it also: his whole concern is how to gather money, hoard money -- because money has power over matter. You can purchase any material thing through money. You cannot purchase anything spiritual, you cannot purchase anything that has any intrinsic value; you can purchase only things. If you want to purchase love, you cannot purchase; but you can purchase sex. Sex is the material part of love. Through money, matter can be purchased, possessed. Now you will be surprised: I include the communist and the capitalist both in the same category, and they are enemies, just as I include Charvaka and Mahatma Gandhi in the same category, and they are enemies. They are enemies, but their concern is the same. The capitalist is trying…
Osho, you have said that Krishna neither makes friends nor enemies. Yet his love for his childhood companion Sudama is such that he leaves the throne and rushes to him; and for three fistfuls of rice he grants him the splendor of the three worlds. Please shed light on this special friendship between Krishna and Sudama.
It isn’t a special friendship; it is simply friendship. Here again the trouble is ours. It seems to us that giving the sovereignty of the three worlds for three fistfuls of rice is a bit much. But for Sudama, giving three fistfuls of rice was as difficult as it was not difficult for Krishna to give away the sovereignty of the three worlds. That we do not consider. For Sudama, even three fistfuls of rice were a very big thing, very difficult. If in this incident there is any giving, it is Sudama who has given. The giving is not Krishna’s. But ordinarily we see it the other way around: that Krishna is the donor. What had Sudama brought? Only three fistfuls of rice! Tied up in a torn cloth! We do not know how much poverty Sudama was living in. For him even gathering a single grain was difficult.…
ओशो, आपने कहा है कि कृष्ण न मित्र बनाते, न शत्रु बनाते। लेकिन अपने बालसखा सुदामा से उनका इतना प्रेम है कि सिंहासन छोड़ कर उसके लिए भागे आते हैं। और तीन मुट्ठी चावल पाकर उसे त्रिलोक का वैभव दे डालते हैं। कृपया, कृष्ण-सुदामा के इस विशेष मैत्री-संबंध पर प्रकाश डालें।
विशिष्ट मैत्री-संबंध नहीं है, बस मैत्री-संबंध है। यहां भी हमारी ही तकलीफ है। हमें लगता है कि तीन मुट्ठी चावल के लिए तीनों लोक का साम्राज्य दे डालना, जरा ज्यादा है। लेकिन सुदामा के लिए तीन मुट्ठी चावल देना जितना कठिन था, कृष्ण के लिए तीन लोकों का साम्राज्य देना उतना कठिन नहीं है। उसका हमें खयाल नहीं है। सुदामा के पास तीन मुट्ठी चावल भी बहुत बड़ी बात थी, बहुत मुश्किल था। इसमें अगर दान दिया है तो सुदामा ने ही दिया है। इसमें दान कृष्ण का नहीं है। लेकिन आमतौर से हमें यही दिखाई पड़ता रहा है कि दान दिया है कृष्ण ने। सुदामा क्या लाया था! तीन मुट्ठी चावल ही लाया था! फटे कपड़े में बांध कर!
Beloved master, in my heart I feel full of devotion and respect for you. Slowly, something inside is opening up towards friendship with you. Do I have to pass through devotion to become your friend? I shall remain respectful and pass both of them together.
They only can exist together. The friendship with a master is no ordinary friendship. It has a reverence in it, love in it, devotion in it, tremendous gratitude in it. It is a multidimensional phenomenon. The ordinary friendship is a worldly thing, mundane. The spiritual friendship is not of this world, it belongs to the beyond. I have to use the same words which are used for the mundane because there are no other words, so you have to be alert and aware that whatever I say, you cannot find its meaning in a dictionary. It has much more in it. It is immensely rich. The word is small and very soft and the experience is vast and very infinite. And I can see in you it is not just an intellectual question, your heart is feeling immense pain because you are thinking that friendship means you have to bypass…
Beloved Osho, why is it so difficult for men and women to be friends? It seems so ordinary, and turns out to be almost impossible. Either there is an ugly compromise -- like man and wife -- or else passion that eventually turns into hate. Why is there always ugliness between men and women?
It is very simple to understand. Marriage is the ugliest institution invented by man. It is not natural; it has been invented so that you can monopolize a woman. You have been treating women as if they were a piece of land, or some currency notes. You have reduced the woman to a thing. Remember that if you reduce any human being to a thing -- unaware, unconscious -- you are also being reduced to the same status; otherwise, you will not be able to communicate. If you can talk with a chair, you must be a chair. Marriage is against nature. You can be certain only of this moment that is in your hands. All promises for tomorrow are lies -- and marriage is a promise for your whole life, that you will remain together, that you will love each other, that you will respect each other till your…
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definitionProfound Quotes on Friendship
Explore our structured collection of meaning-mapped quotes regarding Friendship.