Lila

Osho, why are there so many confusions in philosophy?

There is no confusion in darshan; in shastra there will be confusion. Shastra itself means confusion. Shastra means: doctrines, arguments, words. Darshan is simple and direct. Darshan means vision—the capacity to see—the eye. When the eye is empty, void of ego, free of thought, when the mind does not interfere, what happens then is darshan. To see what is, just as it is—that is darshan. Remember the difference between darshan and darshan-shastra. Darshan-shastra is not darshan; darshan-shastra is speculation, intellectual tussle. Darshan is vision, experience. In philosophy there will be entanglement. In philosophy a single question will carry a thousand questions, and from each answer a thousand more will arise. And in philosophy no question ever gets resolved. In five thousand years of history, philosophers have not solved a single question. For five thousand years they have asked many questions, but not given a single answer. They cannot. A philosopher…

Osho, if the world is lila, a play, then why is there so much suffering in it? Are tuberculosis and cancer, epidemics and death also parts of the lila?

Certainly—everything is part of the lila. Now you will have to think a little. It is said that a Sufi fakir had a wound in his heart and worms had bred in it. When he bent to offer prayer, the worms would fall out. He stopped praying. People asked him, “At your final hour, are you becoming an atheist? Are you leaving religion? All your life you prayed, came to the mosque—why do you not come now?” He said, “How can I come? When I bow down these worms fall off. The worms also have their life.” Seen from one side it is an ulcer and the man is in pain. Seen from another side, that man is life for the worms in the ulcer—the worms are very happy. You think that when you pluck fruit from the trees, the trees are delighted! To them, you are a disease. Seeing…

One of the sannyasins has asked a question: WHAT IS MISSING IN COMMUNISM?

If you really want celibate people, then they need a brain operation. The center of sex should be removed. But then you will be simply impotent -- not celibate. Karl Marx was right, that such religions should be finished. They are against humanity. They protect poverty and they protect the rich. They are against revolution, they are against any change -- obviously, he was right to call them the opium of the people, the hope of the hopeless. If Christianity and Judaism were the only religions, then the Soviet Union would not have any need, any urge to find the inner world! But just think about it. You cannot have the outside world without having the inside world; they exist together like two sides of the coin. And there are scientific methods available. Zen is the most scientific method to inquire into your consciousness. It takes you beyond mind into…

Another friend has asked: flowers bloom in their season, the moon rises on time, water turns to steam at one hundred degrees. If the whole universe is purposeless, then how is there such regularity? If all activity and movement are just lila—play, delight—why is there such profound lawfulness?

Remember: wherever there is play, great care has to be taken about rules. A game endures only by virtue of its rules. There is nowhere else for it to stand; only the rules are there. Two people are playing cards. There are rules by which they must proceed, because in a game there is nothing else—everything rests on rules. If the two card players do not accept even a single rule, the game stops. A game survives only on rules. So keep in mind: if you cheat in your business, people will not condemn you as much. But if you cheat while playing cards and violate the rules, everyone will condemn you. To cheat in a game is much despised, because you are pulling out the very ground on which the game stands. The basis of the game is the rules. There is so much lawfulness in this world precisely…