Rajneeshism

The religion of rajneeshism is dead. What has survived?

Every flower has to die if it is not a plastic flower. Only plastic flowers live for centuries. All the religions that have lived for centuries are plastic. The real flower may have been with Gautam Buddha, but it died; it had to die -- and what remains afterwards is the fragrance. If you have sensitivity enough you can still smell in the air all those people who have blossomed on the earth. They are still your contemporaries. The person who lives in your time may not be your contemporary, but the person you feel, experience, the person who moves your heart into a dance is a contemporary. To me Buddha is a contemporary, Lao Tzu is a contemporary, Bodhidharma is a contemporary, Zarathustra is a contemporary. I can still taste their experience because it is my own experience too. Rajneeshism is dead. I wanted it to be dead before…

Beloved master, I am celebrating the sudden and beautiful death of rajneeshism, and the idea of a bonfire wholly of the book of rajneeshism. But how can we burn the fire to destroy rajneeshism within? Please explain.

That's a very simple matter, because I have never taught you any religion, I have never taught you any belief system. If you have created something inside you, it is your doing. Undo it. Today, we will be burning the book of RAJNEESHISM, symbolizing that we are not a religion but a way of life, a way of religiousness. There are no Rajneeshees, only friends of Rajneesh. Inside you, if you have created any idea of a religion -- if you can create it, you can uncreate it. It is a very simple matter, just give it a try. It is your own imagination, it does not exist; how long can you carry it within you? It will not be supported from the outside. All the props will be taken away from you, and your inner idea will fall flat on the earth. If you cannot manage, I will manage.…

Beloved Osho, rajneeshism is purely a religion of celebration, so why are so many people around the world against it?

The crucified Jesus is your religion. Compared to your misery, his misery is immense. Naturally, Christianity became the biggest religion in the world, because it is the biggest philosophy of being miserable. Jesus said, "Carry you cross on your shoulders. Everybody has to carry his cross on his shoulders." I don't see any point in it. Why carry a cross on your shoulder? Are you mad? Rather, carry a flute with you, a song, a beautiful flower -- a rose I can understand. But then you will be hated by all those who have missed the joys of life. But nobody else is responsible for their missing, they themselves are responsible. Jesus says, "Blessed are the poor." This is sheer nonsense. Wretched are the poor. But it gives solace to the millions of poor people of the world. Jesus says that those who are poor here will be able to…

Beloved Osho, I have heard you say that you would like to sever our relationships with all "isms." does this include rajneeshism as well?

It would be easier to call it something totally new, but then nobody would understand what it is. So until we have enough people to understand, we will have to carry a wrong label on it. Once they have understood, the label will be removed. Once we have our own world around this earth, "ism" is not going to be part of our way of life. So if you think Rajneeshism is also an "ism," throw it away. You have not understood anything. Your approach is still intellectual; otherwise, such a question would not have arisen. You can see -- no dogma is preached, no belief system is given. You are not required to accept anything. The atheist can become part of my communes, the theist can become part, the communist can become part, the capitalist can become part. We don't discriminate against anybody. Our basic approach is such, that…