Intoxication

Osho, was Chaitanya’s dance and kirtan also an intoxication?

No. Through kirtan and bhajan Chaitanya certainly attained exactly what I am talking about. Chaitanya danced his way to that which Buddha and Mahavira attain by standing still. Both ways are possible. There are two ways to catch hold of the axle-pin. One way is to become so still that no vibration remains in you—utterly unmoving, steady, in a state of just standing; then you reach the pin. The other way is to move so totally, to be in such velocity, that the whole wheel runs and the pin becomes obvious. The second is easier. When the wheel spins fast, it’s easy to spot the pin. Very few can recognize the pin when the wheel is still. Mahavira recognizes it by standing still; Krishna, by dancing. And Chaitanya danced more than even Krishna. There is simply no comparison. There has perhaps been no dance like Chaitanya’s on this earth. The…

Osho, Gurdjieff used to ply his disciples with abundant alcohol to know their innermost being. And when they got intoxicated he would listen carefully to what they said. Why don’t you do the same?

Krishnatirth, you silly fellow! And what do you think I’m doing? I pour it every day—morning and evening. What Gurdjieff poured was gross; what I pour is subtle. And the intoxication of the subtle goes far deeper. The gross can only reach the gross. Grape wine cannot go beyond the body. But there are other wines that go beyond the body. Those I am giving you: there is the wine of music, the wine of silence, the wine of meditation. And the supreme one, the Vedas called soma. Centuries have passed—countless people have been searching for soma. Scientists have tirelessly investigated in the ravines and mountains of the Himalayas: from which plant was soma produced? To this day no one has discovered how soma was made, what soma was. They will not discover it either—because soma is not something gross. Soma was obtained in the presence of the seers, by…

During my dancing meditation I kept having flashes about what you said concerning the society, drugs, etc. And wondering that now that I am intoxicated by the ultimate drug, you, Osho, can anyone take that away from me? Bring me down from that eternal high?

No one except you. You can destroy it, nobody else. It is totally your creation. You can destroy it or you can nourish it. Remember it, because it is very difficult to move on heights. We are not attuned for heights, we are attuned for crawling on the earth. That's why whenever you attain to a high you cannot remain on that altitude for long. Sooner or later you descend back into the dark valley of your life. Then it becomes just a memory. Not only that, it becomes a frustration because now you know that height is possible. And you have lost your path, you are back in the valley. In fact, you were better before, in a way -- you had not known the height, you had not known the light, so you were thinking that the valley is the only life. Now that you have tasted something…

Osho, you sit in the tavern and, every morning and evening, you pour brimming goblet after goblet of wine. I do get intoxicated by your wine, but I don’t lose consciousness. What should I do?

That is why even a Sufi like Omar Khayyam has been misunderstood. Whatever notion you have about Omar Khayyam is wrong. The wine he spoke of is not the wine sold in taverns. The beloved he praised is not flesh-and-bone. He called the Beloved—God. And he called wine—devotion. Fitzgerald, who first translated Omar Khayyam into English, because of whom Omar became world-famous, did not understand him. Fitzgerald thought wine meant wine. He was a Western man. He took two plus two to be four. He took “wine” as wine and “beloved” as beloved. The subtle intention of the Sufis fell into a great misunderstanding. On the basis of Fitzgerald’s version the whole world translated him, and the mistake spread everywhere. Today taverns are named “Omar Khayyam.” Nothing could be more foolish. Temples should bear Omar Khayyam’s name—not taverns. Because the tavern he spoke of is of another kind. There is…