Idiocy

Beloved Osho, before telling us to sing the song of the divine why do you and shankara address us as 'idiot' every time?

Because you are! To call you anything else will be a lie! When Shankara says: OH IDIOT! SING THE SONG OF THE DIVINE, he says this with great love, he says this because of his compassion. He is not cursing you, he is not calling you names, because Shankara just cannot curse or call names; it is impossible for him. He is shaking you, he is waking you up. He is saying "Get up! It is morning and you are still sleeping." He is calling you 'idiot' because until he uses some strong words your sleep is not going to be disturbed and you are not going to wake up. He is calling you 'idiot' because this is true, this is a fact. Idiocy means unconsciousness. Idiocy means to live in sleep. Idiocy means to be without discretion. Idiocy means not being wakeful, not being conscious when you are angry.…

Question: BELOVED MASTER, ARE IDIOTS BORN OR TRAINED? I call this whole history of mankind a long, unjustified crime against every human individual. It has served the vested interests: the people who are in power, the people who are scholars, which is another kind of power, the people who are rich, which is another kind of power. They would not like everybody to be centered in himself because a man centered in himself cannot be exploited, cannot be enslaved, cannot be humiliated, cannot be forced to grow a cancerous sense of guilt. These are the reasons humanity has not been allowed its growth. In Japan they have very ancient trees, four hundred years old... and they think that it is an art because the tree's height is only six inches and it shows signs of old age.

Why is religion a dirty word for me, and why does it threaten me far more here in poona than it ever did before?

Religion HAS become a dirty word. It has been used too much and abused too much. It has passed through thousands and thousands of hands. It is just like an old coin or an old currency note which has been passing through many hands and has become dirty. Everything used too much becomes dirty -- not only religion. All beautiful words have become dirty.'God','love','ecstasy' -- all have become dirty. The reason is natural, obvious. Because the words are so beautiful, humanity tends to use them too much. Just look at advertisements and you will find all the beautiful words -- used for cigarettes, soaps, cars, furniture. All beautiful words. The advertisement for a cigarette can even say that the cigarette is ecstatic. Now, a beautiful word is being dirtied. Every film, every movie, is thought to be'marvelous','fabulous'. If everything is fabulous, and every movie is fabulous, then nothing is fabulous.…

Osho, sometimes I do not know whether I am stupid or just mad. What is the difference between stupidity and madness?

But there is a clear-cut difference between madness and stupidity. Mad people are the people who are really more sensitive than others, that's why they go mad. They are more intelligent than others, that's why they go mad. They are so intelligent that they cannot cope with all the stupid masses around and they are so intelligent that they cannot force themselves to behave stupidly. They start functioning like individuals and that creates trouble. They are so intelligent that they can see the futility of many projects that have been imposed upon you. You have been taught to be ambitious. An intelligent person can immediately see that this is nonsense -- it can never give you any joy. Yes, it will destroy many other people's lives -- it is violent, it is ugly, it is destructive -- and it is not going to give you anything in return. The ambitious…