My beloved Atman! Science is the search for truth, religion is the experience of truth, art is the expression of truth. Science is primary, the first step. And science can live for a long time without religion—because its goal is the search for truth. I said: it can live long without religion. And up to now science has lived without religion. Not only without religion, it has lived by denying religion. It can live so—just as a path may exist without a destination if it so chooses. But as science matures, man will not be content only to know truth, he will also long to be truth. Therefore, even science cannot remain without religion for very long. And the impossibility of remaining without it is becoming more apparent day by day. The greatest scientists of the last century—be it Einstein, Max Planck, Eddington, or others—were all found speaking of religion in the final moments of their lives. These are precious possibilities. In the coming century science will become more and more religious—daily—because a road may remain without a destination, but no road can be complete without a destination. And if a road has no destination, it becomes meaningless, inconsistent, absurd. A path that leads nowhere is hardly worthy of being called a path. One day the path has to accept the destination. No means can be meaningful without an end. Therefore, in the West, where the influence of science is deep, meaninglessness has expanded day by day. Science will have to become religion. Religion means: the longing to be one with truth, the experience of truth. Man cannot be satisfied merely by knowing what truth is. Fulfillment comes only when he becomes one with truth. We will not want only to know what love is; we will want to be love. We will not want only to know what wealth is; we will want to be wealthy. We will not want only to know what truth is; we will want to be truth. Knowing is always a step toward being—nothing more. Therefore the second step in man’s quest is religion. Religion can live long without art—just as science may long live without religion. Religion too can live for long without art. But when the experience of religion deepens, what has been known longs to be expressed. It is not enough that we have become something; what we have become longs for expression. We will not be content merely to know how light is born; we will want to be light. Yet becoming light will not silence us; we will want its rays to spread far and wide. On the day the experience of religion becomes so deep that it starts overflowing—when it begins to flow out of us, to spread on all sides—on that day art is born. Religion can avoid art for a long time, but not indefinitely. When experience deepens, it wants to be shared. When the clouds grow heavy, they want to rain. When the river gains force, it rushes toward the ocean. When love fills the heart, it wants to shower in all directions. When the seed matures, it longs to break open and sprout. With the experience of truth the matter does not end; the expression of truth is also inevitable. And it is a great wonder that what we gain by experiencing truth returns a thousandfold when we express it. For whatsoever we give comes back to us multiplied. Whatever we make others a partner in—whatever we share with friends—returns to us in abundance. The experience of truth ultimately becomes the expression of truth. Science is the first stage of man’s journey, religion the second, art its last. But this is a difficult truth as I state it—history has unfolded the reverse. In history, religion came first, art after, and science last. Therefore I must say something more. The religion that comes before science will be unscientific, superstitious. The religion that reaches man before science will be close to blind belief; it cannot be scientific. Thus the religion that came to the earth before science—those who truly experienced it were very few: a Jesus, a Krishna, a Buddha, a Mahavira, a Confucius—ten or five rare souls. In their lives, religion was there in a deep sense. But for the rest of us it could not be more than superstition. Only the religion that arises after the proper development of science can be scientific. This is why, though there ought to have been one religion in the world, there came to be many. Diseases can be many; health is not many. I may fall ill in my way; you in yours. There are thousands of names for disease—one falls ill of TB, another of cancer. But when you become healthy, health has no name. You cannot say in what manner you are healthy—you are simply healthy. Irreligion can be of a thousand kinds; religion cannot. Irreligion is disease, religion is health. Hence religion can only be one—but it could not be one. Because whatever comes before science is superstition; it cannot become a science. For the first time the earth is now being prepared properly for the descent of religion. And the religion that will descend in the future—will be neither Hindu nor Muslim nor Jain nor Christian—it will be only religion. And only on the day religion descends upon humanity as religion will we be freed of the foolishness that takes place in the name of religion—not before. It is strange that the ordinary religious person is Hindu or Muslim—this is understandable; but even the sannyasin is Hindu, Muslim, Christian, Jain! At least the sannyasin should be only religious! That too has not been possible. It is astonishing. The truth is: the diseases of society catch hold of the sannyasin too. The limits and labels of society surround the sannyasin as well. The slaveries and bonds of society fetter the sannyasin also. Religion was born; in a few lives its experience was deep. But it could not reach collective life until science cleared the ground properly. Now science has cleared the ground well. Religion will no longer be accepted in unscientific ways—hence the difficulty. Those who clutch superstitions think the whole world is becoming irreligious. They are in great illusion. The world is not becoming irreligious; it is struggling to be free of superstition and preparing the possibilities for the birth of a new religion. Today there is a strange situation. The one who does not go to the temple, who does not accept our old scriptures and doctrines—we would call him irreligious. Yet the situation has reversed: it is very possible that there is a little more religion in the life of that man than in the lives of those who go to temples, perform worship, and pray. The truth is: in this century the intelligent and thoughtful are no longer ready to stand in the prisons of religion. The reason is not that people have become irreligious; the reason is simply that religion is striving to become scientific, and it must abandon unscientific currents. It is abandoning them. Hence, the reversal. If we return to the time of Buddha or Krishna, the most refined and intelligent were religious. Today, looking at religion, it appears the least developed are religious—the least educated, the least intelligent, the most backward. In Krishna’s time, the most developed and intelligent appear religious. This is surprising. Why is it that today the well-educated, the thoughtful, suddenly become irreligious? We might say education is wrong; we might say the arguments given today are wrong, hence people become irreligious. No, not so. The matter has reversed: religion is attempting to become well-considered and scientific. And when religion strives to be well-considered, the thoughtful cannot remain within fixed streams. Now religion can be scientific because science has matured. A hundred years ago a scientist could deny God; today’s scientist cannot deny with the same boldness. Einstein said before dying: when I began my scientific search, I imagined that today or tomorrow everything would be known. And perhaps Einstein is among the few in human history who have known the most. Two or three days before his death, he told a friend: whatever I have known only reveals my ignorance—nothing more. And what remains to be known is so vast that what we have known cannot even be compared with it. He said: I am dying like a mystic, not like a scientist. The world has become more and more mysterious to me, more and more filled with wonder. The more I have inquired, the more I have found new dimensions opening. The more doors I opened, the more I found myself before greater doors. The more paths I took, the more I was led to grand highways. The keys I found opened locks, but beyond them hung even greater locks. Eddington wrote in his reminiscences: when I began to think, I believed the world to be a thing. But now I can say: more and more the world is looking not like a thing but like a thought. If the world is a thought, science has leapt into religion. And if the world is an infinite mystery, whether we use the word God or not, we are standing at the door of the Divine. And if the world does not solve by our knowledge, by knowing alone, then it is not long before we will say: it will not be solved by knowing, but by being. Knowledge is not enough; Being is needed. It is not enough to stand apart and observe; it has become necessary to be one, to be absorbed, to drown—and to know. Perhaps now there is only one way to know—and that is to be. Science is now searching for the way to religion. But art has also arrived in the world. I say art will come when religion has flowered on a vast scale. Then what is it that has come in the name of art? Ninety-nine percent of what goes by the name of art is the uprising of desire. Whether poetry, painting, sculpture, or music—most of what exists as art on earth does nothing but stimulate man’s senses. I say ninety-nine percent—even if it be Kalidasa or Bhavabhuti, Byron or Shelley—what has come in the name of art has served as stimulant to the senses, nothing more. Real art can be born only after religion—but religion itself has not been born rightly yet. I leave one percent aside. In that one percent is a little portion belonging to those who knew religion and then gave birth to art. For example, Meera’s songs are not ordinary hymns—they arise from the experience of religion. There is an inner realization, and then expression. Something has been attained, and now it is being shared. People ordinarily think Meera sang herself into God. I do not think so. Meera began to sing because she had found God. How could one gain God by singing? Is God so cheap that by singing a few songs you attain Him? No—singing is not Meera’s path to God; it is the fulfillment of having found Him, the expression of her gratitude. It is not sadhana. Chaitanya is dancing. That dance is not to attain God—else all dancers would attain. And there are dancers on earth better than Chaitanya; singers better than Meera. But Chaitanya’s dance is of another kind—it is not to attain God, it is the tremor of having attained. God has entered within. Now it is no longer Chaitanya who dances, it is God Himself. The little cup has overflowed. And art born of such overflowing is altogether different. Krishna’s flute... There have been and may be flautists better than Krishna. In a competition it is not certain Krishna would win. But then Krishna’s flute has no comparison. On the surface of flute-playing others may excel; on Krishna’s plane, there is no rival. For the notes arise from a place where Krishna is no more—only Paramatma is. The flute bears news; it spreads outward what has played within, it carries outward the inner resonance. Only one percent of art is what we may truly call art; the remaining ninety-nine percent is no more than the service of man’s desires. And within that ninety-nine percent I also include the so-called art that stands in opposition to desire. This may be a little difficult to understand. Desire stands in two ways. One is upright, which we know. Sometimes desire stands on its head, which we do not recognize. When desire performs a headstand, we think it has become spiritual art. No—desire in headstand remains desire; it does not become spiritual. For example, I saw a picture in Harikishandasji’s diary: a beautiful young woman, and beside her an old crone. The caption below reads something like, “Youth does not last long; attend to old age.” I would not call this spiritual. The mode of thinking here also stands upon youth. If old age is being condemned, it is only because youth does not last long. But if youth were to last? Then what of this picture? Today or tomorrow science will find ways to keep youth and dispel old age. Then what becomes of this message? And the one you tell, “Youth does not last; remember old age,” may think, “What does not last, enjoy more quickly.” Both possibilities are there. And your emphasis is the same: youth does not last. Youth too is precious to you; old age is not. Religious art esteems old age as well. Old age has its own beauty. Who said there is no beauty in old age? Childhood has its beauty, youth its own, old age its own. For the religious man, not only birth is beautiful; death too has its own beauty. The sun is not beautiful only at dawn; it is beautiful at dusk as well. If a man truly grows old—very few do, for youth grips so fiercely that one does not grow old rightly—if a man truly ripens into old age, then no youth has ever been as beautiful. Youth is full of excitation, of storms and tempests. Old age has a serene beauty—the beauty of evening. Morning is the tension of life; the day’s turmoil begins. Evening—the disturbances fall silent, the rest of night draws near. What compares with the sunset? Birds return home, trees move into silence and sleep, the sun sinks, darkness will embrace the earth, all will be still—all, in a sense, merged in Paramatma. Old age is evening. But when we paint youth and old age and warn, “Beware! old age is coming,” two things are certain: youth is precious to us and we too are enemies of old age. Such a picture cannot be spiritual—it is only perverted passion, desire doing a headstand. And the man of craving will not take from it the meaning the enemy of desire intends. Seeing this picture, the sensuous will rush more quickly: “Old age is near, the day is setting—do what you can now.” He will say, “Eat, drink and be merry—drink quickly, eat quickly, dance quickly—for old age approaches.” The logic of both is the same: old age is coming, death is approaching. I will not call this spiritual art. Spiritual art has been very rare on earth. Either it is desire-ridden art, or it is anti-desire art—and the enemy of desire is also desire-ridden. He who says, “Pleasure is impermanent, therefore renounce,” is not really asking you to renounce pleasure; he is saying, “Because it is impermanent, drop it.” But if it were eternal? Then do not drop it. Hence: abandon women on earth, and enjoy celestial nymphs in heaven. Is this religious? Leave wine here, and bathe in rivers of wine in heaven. Avoid women here, and in heaven the apsaras never age—prepare for them. Is this religious? He says: abandon desires here, and sit beneath the wish-fulfilling trees of heaven and desire to your fill. A great joke—renounce desire so that the kalpavriksha may be yours! Is this the attitude of renouncing desire? To me he seems more hedonistic than the hedonist. The hedonist accepts the impermanent—he is a great renouncer! This man says: we leave the impermanent because we want the eternal. We leave the beauty of woman because we want the beauty of liberation. We leave earthly women because they age; we want heaven’s apsaras who never grow old. We leave pleasures because they come and go; we want pleasures that come and never leave. Is this man spiritual—or a pleasure-seeker? A hedonist par excellence! He has built heavens. This is not religion; this is temptation. “Leave women here—better ones await. Leave wealth here—immeasurable wealth awaits. Leave this body—there you will get a more beautiful body, the body of the gods.” No, this is not religious contemplation. This is desire standing on its head. The one who wishes to understand should look carefully—behind all such thinking is our unsatisfied longing, suppressed desire demanding. This will not do; no spirituality is born of this. Spiritual art arises from a spiritual heart—and such a heart is not unless Paramatma is experienced. Therefore I say: real art has been born the least on earth. Science has become a little real; religion even less; art—most difficult to become real. The great poets have not yet been born. Sometimes a glimpse appears in an Upanishad, sometimes in the Gita, sometimes in a verse of the Bible, sometimes in a line of Kabir—but only a glimpse. The great epics are yet to be born; the great sculptures yet to be created. At times a glimmer shows in Ajanta, at times in Ellora—but only a glimmer; the earth is not yet filled with them. What now passes in the name of art is disease, illness—of two kinds: one that arouses desire, the other that tries to suppress desire. Both have desire as their center. If rightly understood, art is the supreme flowering of life. Then it is not necessary that you carve statues, or paint pictures, or play the flute. Nothing is necessary. Your whole life becomes creative. Even your walking will carry poetry. When Buddha walks upon the earth, there is poetry even in the whisper of his feet; when Jesus looks upon the crowd from the cross, there is poetry in his eyes. It is not necessary that Jesus paints—though he could, if he wished. The Zen sages in Japan painted many pictures—none comparable—for they were painted after meditation. In China the Taoist sages carved great sculptures—after meditation. In those sculptures, in the Zen masters’ paintings, in the Sufi dervishes’ dance, in the songs of Kabir and Dadu, in the lines of Nanak and Raidas, in Krishna’s flute, in the sentences of the Upanishads—sometimes a glimpse has come. But the earth is still deprived of art. Even silence can be poetry. In the ultimate sense, when poetry is complete—when art is complete—it becomes silence. But what we have called art I do not call art. What we have taken as art is either the ally of man’s desires or the suppressor of man’s desires. The center of art has been desire. Its center has not yet become the soul. Art’s center can be the soul only when the artist is not eager to produce, not eager to make, but when something begins to be born through him, something begins to be given through him. There must be an abundance behind—one can only give what one has. How can we give the world what we do not have? Thus a strange thing occurs: read a poet’s poems and it seems he must have entered the temple of God. But if you meet that poet in a hotel, there is trouble—the trouble is: were these poems really his? Look at a painter’s painting and it seems he brings news of liberation; meet the painter, and again: was this painting truly his? There is nothing in him from which such work could be born. Then what is this painting? It is not creation; it is only construction. Understand the difference. Creation and construction are vastly different. For construction one need not be an artist; one only needs to be a craftsman, a technician. A man knows how to spread color, how to draw lines. There are schools and colleges that teach color and line. A man learns to draw lines and spread colors—he is a technician, not an artist. He can make anything you want: a beautiful woman or an ugly one; a desire-soaked statue or one opposed to desire. He is skillful, not an artist. He has technique; he can construct. But creativity is not construction. Creation is a greater thing—it may be that the creator has no technique at all. I cannot imagine Krishna attending a school to learn the flute. I cannot imagine Meera going somewhere to learn to dance. I cannot imagine Chaitanya taking lessons in singing and beating his mridang. All of Chaitanya’s learning was logic. He had studied logic; he was a pundit, a remarkable thinker. But one day thought tired; one day logic came to the place where it cannot move further. Chaitanya threw away logic and thought, took up the mridang, and began to dance in the streets. It is essential to grasp the difference between technician, craftsman, and artist. The craftsman makes what he decides to make. The creator gives what has overfilled his heart. The craftsman lives in the head; the artist lives from the heart and the soul. Hence the difficulty: a man may be a good poet, yet good poetry may not be born from him; another may not be a good poet at all, and yet great poetry may be born through him. The seers of the Upanishads do not appear to have been great poets in the formal sense. They kept no accounts of meter and rhyme. These are not minds that keep such small accounts—those who have left all accounting and leapt into the unaccountable! But what has come through them is ambrosial poetry. There is something else in that poetry—it is not merely verse, not a mere arrangement of words, not the arithmetic of syllables; it is the flow of the heart. Something flowed from within and spread—therein lies poetry. Trains run upon iron rails; rivers do not run like trains. Their pathways are awkward, unknown, unfamiliar—there is no ready-made track for the Ganga. But in the Ganga’s run there is life; in a train there cannot be. The technician runs on rails—on learned paths. The artist enters the unknown, the unfamiliar, the uncharted. He knows not what will be. When a technician paints, he knows what he is making, he knows what will be made—he has a plan, a blueprint. But when a creator paints, he is as startled by what appears as those who view it. He himself did not know what would come. He simply places himself in the hands of God. Hence great creators never say, “I made this.” They say, “Through me, something has been made.” They remain only a medium. Finally, I say to you: the one who becomes a medium for God—like Kabir said, “I am only a hollow bamboo, nothing else. The notes are not mine—I am but a reed; the notes are of Paramatma. Yes, it may be that my reed fails and the notes sound off-key—that will be my fault. But if the notes are beautiful and set your life dancing, then give thanks to God.” Kabir says: I am a bamboo reed. Art is born the day a man becomes a bamboo reed. The day he says, “I am not—You alone are.” The day his fingers cease to be instruments of his ego and begin to be instruments of God. A painter took a photograph of Ramakrishna Paramhansa and later brought a portrait painted from it to Ramakrishna. Some twenty or twenty-five people were present. Ramakrishna saw the painting, leapt up, began to dance, and fell at the picture’s feet. It was his own image. The devotees said, “What are you doing?” Devotees are always busy protecting their gurus, for they fear the guru may blunder. They said, “What are you doing—falling at your own picture?” Ramakrishna said, “Good that you reminded me—I forgot it was my picture. I only felt: what a picture of Samadhi, of ecstasy! I began to dance and bowed. You reminded me well—else people would laugh at me.” That he could not even recognize his own picture—what does it mean? In truth, his self-recognition had dissolved—else how would he not know? He is now only a bamboo reed. Even in his own image he saw only God and bowed. He could not see himself—he saw Samadhi. Ramakrishna said, “For thousands of years people will bow to this picture, for it is a picture of Samadhi.” Someone said, “Do not say such things—people will call you an egotist, that you claim people will bow to your picture for thousands of years.” Ramakrishna said, “How did you hear it? I did not say ‘my.’ I said ‘this’ picture. What have I to do with it? It is a picture of Samadhi.” Art is born the day the artist dies. As long as the artist is, art is not. As long as ego is, art is not. As long as the ‘I’ is, there is only construction, not creation. God has been able to create so vast a universe because God is not at all. We carve a small statue and become terribly important. We paint a little picture and are undone by conceit. There was a great sculptor. He carved a statue out of a stone. Passersby would praise him, “You are wonderful—such a beautiful statue!” He would reply, “Are only fools passing this way? I did not make the statue. As I used to pass here, the statue hidden in the stone called to me. I only removed the useless stone. The statue was hidden; it manifested. With my chisel I removed the unnecessary rock. As I passed, it called, ‘Where are you going? Remove a little of the wrong stone.’ And now I can say: the one who called me from within the stone was the same who heard from within me—otherwise how could I have heard? If the one hidden within the stone were other than the one hidden within me, how would communication be possible?” If the sculptor dies, the statue is born. If the painter dies, the painting is born. If the poet dies, the poem is born. When the artist becomes a no-one, art is born. The art of becoming a no-one is called meditation. So a few last words on meditation. Meditation does not mean that you do something. People say, “I practice meditation.” As long as there is ‘I,’ meditation cannot be. People say, “I do meditation.” As long as there is doing, meditation cannot be. Have you noticed—when you say, “I do love,” you speak a wrong language. Can love be done? Has anyone ever done love—except actors? If you too do it, you only act; whether the stage is large or small, whether the actors are permanent or not, matters not. Love cannot be done; love is not an act. How will you do love? If I say, “Begin to love”—how will you? Suddenly you will see—it does not happen. You will say, “How can I?” Love is not an act; it is a state of mind, a condition of consciousness. It is not done; it happens. Therefore those who go deep into love say, “Love happened.” They do not say, “I did love.” Another strange thing: when love happens, you are not. As long as you are, love does not happen. When you are with your beloved, are you there? No—the beloved may be, but you are not. You have dissolved, you are not there; only a silence remains. Thus lovers think, before meeting, “We will say this and that.” But when they meet, they fall silent; all words vanish—just as an empty pot makes noise; when full, it becomes silent. Two lovers together have never truly even said, “I love you.” You will say, “No—many lovers say it.” Note well: when someone says, “I love you,” know that the moment of love has passed. It is only a memory. When love is, there is not even the wish to say, “I do,” or “I am.” When love is, there is only so much love that there is no space for ‘I’ and ‘you.’ Rumi sings: A lover knocks at the beloved’s door. From within she asks, “Who are you?” He answers, “I am. Did you not recognize my voice?” She replies, “As long as you are there, with your voice and identity, how can love’s door open?” The lover returns. Years later he comes again and knocks. She asks, “Who are you?” He says, “Now I am not—only you are.” Rumi says: the door opens. I would not say so—I think Rumi opens the door a little too soon. I would say: she again says, “As long as for you there is a ‘you,’ somewhere deep a ‘me’ must still be sitting. If I were utterly gone within, then you too would vanish without. ‘I’ and ‘you’ are two sides of one coin; where there is ‘I,’ there is ‘you.’” Hence the devotee who says to God, “Only You are; I am not,” is declaring, “I am fully there,” for even to deny requires an ‘I.’ No, the devotee does not even say, “Only You are; I am not.” The devotee says nothing—he simply remains. He does not say ‘You,’ he does not say ‘I.’ He becomes silent. This silence is meditation. If this silence is attained through love, the path is called bhakti. If through knowledge, it is called jnana. If through action, it is called karma. And the name of the silence itself is meditation. Let my ‘I’ fall silent—that which incessantly says “I” with every breath. The eyelid moves—“I.” The foot lifts—“I.” I inhale—“I.” Everywhere this ‘I’—let it grow quiet, be pacified. And let there come a moment when, searching within, I can say, “Where has my ‘I’ gone? Where is it?” Then meditation is attained. But we are strange people. The worldly man has an ‘I’—and the one we call religious has it even thicker. A householder must have an ‘I’; but the so-called renunciate—his ‘I’ has no comparison. The sannyasin’s ego becomes denser. See the devotee on the road—he struts in a special way. He wears the mark on his forehead; he looks upon the unmarked as fit for hell. He thinks the one who did not go to the temple will rot in hell. Astonishing! Meditation means only this: let the ‘I’ not be. But the ‘I’ becomes more and more condensed. The ways of the ‘I’ are infinite, its paths subtle. Flee where you will, the ‘I’ catches you—even if you flee from the ‘I,’ it catches you. The non-egoist stands in the marketplace and declares, “None is more egoless than I!” This is the extremity—an ego’s proclamation that none is more egoless than me. Ego has subtle routes. When it has wealth, it says, “I have so much.” When it renounces wealth, it says, “I kicked away so much.” It stands behind both. It fills itself in the world and fills itself in God too. “My God is right; yours is wrong.” Even God becomes “mine”—a possession. Burn my temple and I will burn your mosque. The mosque-breaker will break temples; the temple-builder will break mosques. The Christian will find the Hindu wrong; the Hindu will find the Christian wrong. The Gita-wala will denounce the Quran; the Quran-wala will denounce the Vedas. What madness is this? Where there is ‘I,’ there is madness. In truth, there is no other madness than the ‘I.’ The bigger the ‘I,’ the denser the madman within. The thinner the ‘I,’ the more the madman departs. The day there is no ‘I,’ there is no madness—then one is religious, and meditation is attained. So lastly I say: recognize the paths of this ‘I.’ Do not fight it—if you fight, the ‘I’ will say, “See—I am fighting.” Do not fight; only recognize the ways by which the ‘I’ extends its hand to seize you. From morning to night, recognize its paths. When it grabs your feet and you strut, when it takes your spine and you sit in padmasana, when it catches your head and you put on the sacred mark, when it catches you in the temple and your gait changes—recognize it: the ‘I’ is grasping. As you begin to recognize the ‘I,’ remember Buddha’s word: when a lamp is lit in the house, thieves do not come; when the watchman is awake, it is very hard for thieves to enter; but if the watchman is asleep and the lamp extinguished, the house belongs to thieves. So when the inner watchman is awake—when the witness is awake—and sees where the ‘I’ is grabbing, the thief’s entry is halted. When the lamp of consciousness is lit within, when the lamp of silence is lit, the thief no longer enters. And there is only one thief—the ‘I.’ He has stolen God from us. Not a petty thief, a great thief—whoever can steal God cannot be ordinary. There is only one wall. I saw a child by the road blowing soap-bubbles through a small bamboo reed. He dipped the reed in soapy water, blew, a bubble formed and flew into the sky. Morning sun, soap-bubble rising, the sun’s rays breaking into waves through it—so beautiful. The child ran to catch it, but it rose higher. A delightful event! The soap lay below and was not beautiful; the same drop spread in sunlight became very beautiful. What we call beauty is such—everything is dust; in the rays of the sun it becomes beautiful: somewhere a flower, somewhere a man, somewhere a woman, somewhere the moon. All becomes beautiful when lifted into light. Beauty is the uprising of what lies below. Beauty is the lifting of what lies in darkness into light. A drop of soap became very beautiful; in the bowl below the soap-drops lay without beauty—spread in sunlight they became very beautiful. And the bubble rose. It seemed as if the bubble rose by itself. You too have seen bubbles rise, but perhaps did not know why. A soap-bubble rises only because the breath from the child’s mouth is warmer than the outer air. Cool air falls; warm air rises. Cool air gives way to warm air—making space; the bubble rises. Although even the bubble wants to fall—everything wants to fall—yet the warm air is rarefied. The surrounding air is cooler, denser—more egoistic, more filled with ‘I.’ Within the bubble the ‘I’ is a little thinner—so it rises. The sense of ‘I’ is a little less; the air is less dense—so it ascends. Another wonder: it rises only a while, but as it rises it grows bigger. Whatever rises grows larger. The bubble grows as the air pressure around it drops and the soap spreads. Then comes a moment—the bubble bursts. We say, “The bubble died.” The child begins making another. But did it die? Did the air within the thin soap-film die? It is still there. Did the delicate film that encircled it die? It is still there. Nothing died. The bubble became so large that the thin film could no longer contain it—the film broke, and the bubble merged with the vast sky. So it is in meditation—rarity increases day by day. And then one day what we call ‘I’—like the soap film—breaks. We do not die; what we called ‘we’ dies. Even that does not die—only our illusion dies. And that vastness that was confined within our bubble becomes one with the Vast. That day there is dance. That day there is music. That day there is art. That day there is creation. That day sorrow ends in a person’s life, and the veena of bliss begins to sound. The notes arising from that veena of bliss are called art. The paintings born of those notes are art. The ankle-bells that chime from that bliss are art. Whatever arises from that bliss—be it silence, dance, music, song, poetry, literature—and even if nothing arises, if one remains silent—his silence too is art. These three things I have said. Science is the first step—the first step of logic. When logic is defeated, religion is the second step—it is experience. And when experience thickens and becomes overfull, the rains begin—that is art. And this art is attained only by those who attain meditation—it is a by-product of meditation. The one who is an artist before meditation is, in some sense or other, centered in desire. The one who becomes an artist after meditation—his life, his act, his creation—become offerings to God and are filled with God. Therefore do not seek art—seek meditation. Let art come as a shadow behind. Do not seek art—seek silence; let art follow. Art always comes like a shadow, from behind. The one who seeks art directly gets lost in shadow-land, only the land of shadows. The so-called artists—painters, sculptors, poets—wander lost in shadow-land. They have no connection with the world of truth. They remain lost in dreams and go on decorating and embellishing their dreams. Art has nothing to do with dreams. As much as science is related to truth, as much as religion is related to truth, so too is art related to truth. These few things I have said. It is not necessary that everything I say be right. It is not necessary that even one thing be right. It is not necessary that you accept what I say. It is enough if you reflect a little. If possible, experience a little. If possible, let your experience spread and be shared. You have listened to my words with such silence and love—I am deeply obliged. And in the end I bow down to the Paramatma dwelling in all. Please accept my pranam.
Osho's Commentary
Science is the search for truth, religion is the experience of truth, art is the expression of truth. Science is primary, the first step. And science can live for a long time without religion—because its goal is the search for truth. I said: it can live long without religion. And up to now science has lived without religion. Not only without religion, it has lived by denying religion. It can live so—just as a path may exist without a destination if it so chooses. But as science matures, man will not be content only to know truth, he will also long to be truth. Therefore, even science cannot remain without religion for very long. And the impossibility of remaining without it is becoming more apparent day by day.
The greatest scientists of the last century—be it Einstein, Max Planck, Eddington, or others—were all found speaking of religion in the final moments of their lives. These are precious possibilities. In the coming century science will become more and more religious—daily—because a road may remain without a destination, but no road can be complete without a destination.
And if a road has no destination, it becomes meaningless, inconsistent, absurd. A path that leads nowhere is hardly worthy of being called a path. One day the path has to accept the destination. No means can be meaningful without an end.
Therefore, in the West, where the influence of science is deep, meaninglessness has expanded day by day.
Science will have to become religion.
Religion means: the longing to be one with truth, the experience of truth. Man cannot be satisfied merely by knowing what truth is. Fulfillment comes only when he becomes one with truth. We will not want only to know what love is; we will want to be love. We will not want only to know what wealth is; we will want to be wealthy. We will not want only to know what truth is; we will want to be truth. Knowing is always a step toward being—nothing more. Therefore the second step in man’s quest is religion.
Religion can live long without art—just as science may long live without religion. Religion too can live for long without art. But when the experience of religion deepens, what has been known longs to be expressed. It is not enough that we have become something; what we have become longs for expression. We will not be content merely to know how light is born; we will want to be light. Yet becoming light will not silence us; we will want its rays to spread far and wide.
On the day the experience of religion becomes so deep that it starts overflowing—when it begins to flow out of us, to spread on all sides—on that day art is born.
Religion can avoid art for a long time, but not indefinitely. When experience deepens, it wants to be shared. When the clouds grow heavy, they want to rain. When the river gains force, it rushes toward the ocean. When love fills the heart, it wants to shower in all directions. When the seed matures, it longs to break open and sprout.
With the experience of truth the matter does not end; the expression of truth is also inevitable.
And it is a great wonder that what we gain by experiencing truth returns a thousandfold when we express it. For whatsoever we give comes back to us multiplied. Whatever we make others a partner in—whatever we share with friends—returns to us in abundance.
The experience of truth ultimately becomes the expression of truth.
Science is the first stage of man’s journey, religion the second, art its last. But this is a difficult truth as I state it—history has unfolded the reverse. In history, religion came first, art after, and science last. Therefore I must say something more. The religion that comes before science will be unscientific, superstitious. The religion that reaches man before science will be close to blind belief; it cannot be scientific.
Thus the religion that came to the earth before science—those who truly experienced it were very few: a Jesus, a Krishna, a Buddha, a Mahavira, a Confucius—ten or five rare souls. In their lives, religion was there in a deep sense. But for the rest of us it could not be more than superstition. Only the religion that arises after the proper development of science can be scientific. This is why, though there ought to have been one religion in the world, there came to be many.
Diseases can be many; health is not many. I may fall ill in my way; you in yours. There are thousands of names for disease—one falls ill of TB, another of cancer. But when you become healthy, health has no name. You cannot say in what manner you are healthy—you are simply healthy.
Irreligion can be of a thousand kinds; religion cannot. Irreligion is disease, religion is health. Hence religion can only be one—but it could not be one. Because whatever comes before science is superstition; it cannot become a science.
For the first time the earth is now being prepared properly for the descent of religion. And the religion that will descend in the future—will be neither Hindu nor Muslim nor Jain nor Christian—it will be only religion. And only on the day religion descends upon humanity as religion will we be freed of the foolishness that takes place in the name of religion—not before.
It is strange that the ordinary religious person is Hindu or Muslim—this is understandable; but even the sannyasin is Hindu, Muslim, Christian, Jain! At least the sannyasin should be only religious! That too has not been possible. It is astonishing. The truth is: the diseases of society catch hold of the sannyasin too. The limits and labels of society surround the sannyasin as well. The slaveries and bonds of society fetter the sannyasin also.
Religion was born; in a few lives its experience was deep. But it could not reach collective life until science cleared the ground properly. Now science has cleared the ground well. Religion will no longer be accepted in unscientific ways—hence the difficulty.
Those who clutch superstitions think the whole world is becoming irreligious. They are in great illusion. The world is not becoming irreligious; it is struggling to be free of superstition and preparing the possibilities for the birth of a new religion.
Today there is a strange situation. The one who does not go to the temple, who does not accept our old scriptures and doctrines—we would call him irreligious. Yet the situation has reversed: it is very possible that there is a little more religion in the life of that man than in the lives of those who go to temples, perform worship, and pray.
The truth is: in this century the intelligent and thoughtful are no longer ready to stand in the prisons of religion. The reason is not that people have become irreligious; the reason is simply that religion is striving to become scientific, and it must abandon unscientific currents. It is abandoning them. Hence, the reversal.
If we return to the time of Buddha or Krishna, the most refined and intelligent were religious. Today, looking at religion, it appears the least developed are religious—the least educated, the least intelligent, the most backward. In Krishna’s time, the most developed and intelligent appear religious. This is surprising.
Why is it that today the well-educated, the thoughtful, suddenly become irreligious? We might say education is wrong; we might say the arguments given today are wrong, hence people become irreligious.
No, not so. The matter has reversed: religion is attempting to become well-considered and scientific. And when religion strives to be well-considered, the thoughtful cannot remain within fixed streams.
Now religion can be scientific because science has matured. A hundred years ago a scientist could deny God; today’s scientist cannot deny with the same boldness.
Einstein said before dying: when I began my scientific search, I imagined that today or tomorrow everything would be known. And perhaps Einstein is among the few in human history who have known the most. Two or three days before his death, he told a friend: whatever I have known only reveals my ignorance—nothing more. And what remains to be known is so vast that what we have known cannot even be compared with it. He said: I am dying like a mystic, not like a scientist. The world has become more and more mysterious to me, more and more filled with wonder. The more I have inquired, the more I have found new dimensions opening. The more doors I opened, the more I found myself before greater doors. The more paths I took, the more I was led to grand highways. The keys I found opened locks, but beyond them hung even greater locks.
Eddington wrote in his reminiscences: when I began to think, I believed the world to be a thing. But now I can say: more and more the world is looking not like a thing but like a thought.
If the world is a thought, science has leapt into religion. And if the world is an infinite mystery, whether we use the word God or not, we are standing at the door of the Divine. And if the world does not solve by our knowledge, by knowing alone, then it is not long before we will say: it will not be solved by knowing, but by being. Knowledge is not enough; Being is needed. It is not enough to stand apart and observe; it has become necessary to be one, to be absorbed, to drown—and to know. Perhaps now there is only one way to know—and that is to be.
Science is now searching for the way to religion. But art has also arrived in the world. I say art will come when religion has flowered on a vast scale. Then what is it that has come in the name of art? Ninety-nine percent of what goes by the name of art is the uprising of desire. Whether poetry, painting, sculpture, or music—most of what exists as art on earth does nothing but stimulate man’s senses. I say ninety-nine percent—even if it be Kalidasa or Bhavabhuti, Byron or Shelley—what has come in the name of art has served as stimulant to the senses, nothing more. Real art can be born only after religion—but religion itself has not been born rightly yet.
I leave one percent aside. In that one percent is a little portion belonging to those who knew religion and then gave birth to art. For example, Meera’s songs are not ordinary hymns—they arise from the experience of religion. There is an inner realization, and then expression. Something has been attained, and now it is being shared. People ordinarily think Meera sang herself into God. I do not think so. Meera began to sing because she had found God. How could one gain God by singing? Is God so cheap that by singing a few songs you attain Him? No—singing is not Meera’s path to God; it is the fulfillment of having found Him, the expression of her gratitude. It is not sadhana.
Chaitanya is dancing. That dance is not to attain God—else all dancers would attain. And there are dancers on earth better than Chaitanya; singers better than Meera. But Chaitanya’s dance is of another kind—it is not to attain God, it is the tremor of having attained. God has entered within. Now it is no longer Chaitanya who dances, it is God Himself. The little cup has overflowed. And art born of such overflowing is altogether different.
Krishna’s flute... There have been and may be flautists better than Krishna. In a competition it is not certain Krishna would win. But then Krishna’s flute has no comparison. On the surface of flute-playing others may excel; on Krishna’s plane, there is no rival. For the notes arise from a place where Krishna is no more—only Paramatma is. The flute bears news; it spreads outward what has played within, it carries outward the inner resonance.
Only one percent of art is what we may truly call art; the remaining ninety-nine percent is no more than the service of man’s desires. And within that ninety-nine percent I also include the so-called art that stands in opposition to desire. This may be a little difficult to understand. Desire stands in two ways. One is upright, which we know. Sometimes desire stands on its head, which we do not recognize. When desire performs a headstand, we think it has become spiritual art. No—desire in headstand remains desire; it does not become spiritual.
For example, I saw a picture in Harikishandasji’s diary: a beautiful young woman, and beside her an old crone. The caption below reads something like, “Youth does not last long; attend to old age.” I would not call this spiritual. The mode of thinking here also stands upon youth. If old age is being condemned, it is only because youth does not last long.
But if youth were to last? Then what of this picture? Today or tomorrow science will find ways to keep youth and dispel old age. Then what becomes of this message? And the one you tell, “Youth does not last; remember old age,” may think, “What does not last, enjoy more quickly.” Both possibilities are there. And your emphasis is the same: youth does not last. Youth too is precious to you; old age is not.
Religious art esteems old age as well. Old age has its own beauty. Who said there is no beauty in old age?
Childhood has its beauty, youth its own, old age its own.
For the religious man, not only birth is beautiful; death too has its own beauty.
The sun is not beautiful only at dawn; it is beautiful at dusk as well.
If a man truly grows old—very few do, for youth grips so fiercely that one does not grow old rightly—if a man truly ripens into old age, then no youth has ever been as beautiful. Youth is full of excitation, of storms and tempests. Old age has a serene beauty—the beauty of evening. Morning is the tension of life; the day’s turmoil begins. Evening—the disturbances fall silent, the rest of night draws near. What compares with the sunset? Birds return home, trees move into silence and sleep, the sun sinks, darkness will embrace the earth, all will be still—all, in a sense, merged in Paramatma. Old age is evening.
But when we paint youth and old age and warn, “Beware! old age is coming,” two things are certain: youth is precious to us and we too are enemies of old age. Such a picture cannot be spiritual—it is only perverted passion, desire doing a headstand. And the man of craving will not take from it the meaning the enemy of desire intends. Seeing this picture, the sensuous will rush more quickly: “Old age is near, the day is setting—do what you can now.” He will say, “Eat, drink and be merry—drink quickly, eat quickly, dance quickly—for old age approaches.” The logic of both is the same: old age is coming, death is approaching.
I will not call this spiritual art. Spiritual art has been very rare on earth. Either it is desire-ridden art, or it is anti-desire art—and the enemy of desire is also desire-ridden.
He who says, “Pleasure is impermanent, therefore renounce,” is not really asking you to renounce pleasure; he is saying, “Because it is impermanent, drop it.” But if it were eternal? Then do not drop it. Hence: abandon women on earth, and enjoy celestial nymphs in heaven. Is this religious? Leave wine here, and bathe in rivers of wine in heaven. Avoid women here, and in heaven the apsaras never age—prepare for them. Is this religious? He says: abandon desires here, and sit beneath the wish-fulfilling trees of heaven and desire to your fill.
A great joke—renounce desire so that the kalpavriksha may be yours! Is this the attitude of renouncing desire? To me he seems more hedonistic than the hedonist. The hedonist accepts the impermanent—he is a great renouncer! This man says: we leave the impermanent because we want the eternal. We leave the beauty of woman because we want the beauty of liberation. We leave earthly women because they age; we want heaven’s apsaras who never grow old. We leave pleasures because they come and go; we want pleasures that come and never leave.
Is this man spiritual—or a pleasure-seeker? A hedonist par excellence! He has built heavens. This is not religion; this is temptation. “Leave women here—better ones await. Leave wealth here—immeasurable wealth awaits. Leave this body—there you will get a more beautiful body, the body of the gods.”
No, this is not religious contemplation. This is desire standing on its head. The one who wishes to understand should look carefully—behind all such thinking is our unsatisfied longing, suppressed desire demanding. This will not do; no spirituality is born of this. Spiritual art arises from a spiritual heart—and such a heart is not unless Paramatma is experienced.
Therefore I say: real art has been born the least on earth. Science has become a little real; religion even less; art—most difficult to become real. The great poets have not yet been born. Sometimes a glimpse appears in an Upanishad, sometimes in the Gita, sometimes in a verse of the Bible, sometimes in a line of Kabir—but only a glimpse. The great epics are yet to be born; the great sculptures yet to be created. At times a glimmer shows in Ajanta, at times in Ellora—but only a glimmer; the earth is not yet filled with them.
What now passes in the name of art is disease, illness—of two kinds: one that arouses desire, the other that tries to suppress desire. Both have desire as their center.
If rightly understood, art is the supreme flowering of life. Then it is not necessary that you carve statues, or paint pictures, or play the flute. Nothing is necessary. Your whole life becomes creative. Even your walking will carry poetry.
When Buddha walks upon the earth, there is poetry even in the whisper of his feet; when Jesus looks upon the crowd from the cross, there is poetry in his eyes. It is not necessary that Jesus paints—though he could, if he wished. The Zen sages in Japan painted many pictures—none comparable—for they were painted after meditation. In China the Taoist sages carved great sculptures—after meditation.
In those sculptures, in the Zen masters’ paintings, in the Sufi dervishes’ dance, in the songs of Kabir and Dadu, in the lines of Nanak and Raidas, in Krishna’s flute, in the sentences of the Upanishads—sometimes a glimpse has come. But the earth is still deprived of art. Even silence can be poetry.
In the ultimate sense, when poetry is complete—when art is complete—it becomes silence. But what we have called art I do not call art. What we have taken as art is either the ally of man’s desires or the suppressor of man’s desires. The center of art has been desire. Its center has not yet become the soul.
Art’s center can be the soul only when the artist is not eager to produce, not eager to make, but when something begins to be born through him, something begins to be given through him. There must be an abundance behind—one can only give what one has. How can we give the world what we do not have?
Thus a strange thing occurs: read a poet’s poems and it seems he must have entered the temple of God. But if you meet that poet in a hotel, there is trouble—the trouble is: were these poems really his? Look at a painter’s painting and it seems he brings news of liberation; meet the painter, and again: was this painting truly his? There is nothing in him from which such work could be born. Then what is this painting?
It is not creation; it is only construction. Understand the difference. Creation and construction are vastly different. For construction one need not be an artist; one only needs to be a craftsman, a technician. A man knows how to spread color, how to draw lines. There are schools and colleges that teach color and line. A man learns to draw lines and spread colors—he is a technician, not an artist. He can make anything you want: a beautiful woman or an ugly one; a desire-soaked statue or one opposed to desire. He is skillful, not an artist. He has technique; he can construct.
But creativity is not construction. Creation is a greater thing—it may be that the creator has no technique at all.
I cannot imagine Krishna attending a school to learn the flute. I cannot imagine Meera going somewhere to learn to dance. I cannot imagine Chaitanya taking lessons in singing and beating his mridang. All of Chaitanya’s learning was logic. He had studied logic; he was a pundit, a remarkable thinker. But one day thought tired; one day logic came to the place where it cannot move further. Chaitanya threw away logic and thought, took up the mridang, and began to dance in the streets.
It is essential to grasp the difference between technician, craftsman, and artist. The craftsman makes what he decides to make. The creator gives what has overfilled his heart. The craftsman lives in the head; the artist lives from the heart and the soul. Hence the difficulty: a man may be a good poet, yet good poetry may not be born from him; another may not be a good poet at all, and yet great poetry may be born through him.
The seers of the Upanishads do not appear to have been great poets in the formal sense. They kept no accounts of meter and rhyme. These are not minds that keep such small accounts—those who have left all accounting and leapt into the unaccountable! But what has come through them is ambrosial poetry. There is something else in that poetry—it is not merely verse, not a mere arrangement of words, not the arithmetic of syllables; it is the flow of the heart. Something flowed from within and spread—therein lies poetry.
Trains run upon iron rails; rivers do not run like trains. Their pathways are awkward, unknown, unfamiliar—there is no ready-made track for the Ganga. But in the Ganga’s run there is life; in a train there cannot be. The technician runs on rails—on learned paths. The artist enters the unknown, the unfamiliar, the uncharted. He knows not what will be.
When a technician paints, he knows what he is making, he knows what will be made—he has a plan, a blueprint. But when a creator paints, he is as startled by what appears as those who view it. He himself did not know what would come. He simply places himself in the hands of God. Hence great creators never say, “I made this.” They say, “Through me, something has been made.” They remain only a medium.
Finally, I say to you: the one who becomes a medium for God—like Kabir said, “I am only a hollow bamboo, nothing else. The notes are not mine—I am but a reed; the notes are of Paramatma. Yes, it may be that my reed fails and the notes sound off-key—that will be my fault. But if the notes are beautiful and set your life dancing, then give thanks to God.” Kabir says: I am a bamboo reed.
Art is born the day a man becomes a bamboo reed. The day he says, “I am not—You alone are.” The day his fingers cease to be instruments of his ego and begin to be instruments of God.
A painter took a photograph of Ramakrishna Paramhansa and later brought a portrait painted from it to Ramakrishna. Some twenty or twenty-five people were present. Ramakrishna saw the painting, leapt up, began to dance, and fell at the picture’s feet. It was his own image. The devotees said, “What are you doing?” Devotees are always busy protecting their gurus, for they fear the guru may blunder.
They said, “What are you doing—falling at your own picture?” Ramakrishna said, “Good that you reminded me—I forgot it was my picture. I only felt: what a picture of Samadhi, of ecstasy! I began to dance and bowed. You reminded me well—else people would laugh at me.”
That he could not even recognize his own picture—what does it mean? In truth, his self-recognition had dissolved—else how would he not know? He is now only a bamboo reed. Even in his own image he saw only God and bowed. He could not see himself—he saw Samadhi. Ramakrishna said, “For thousands of years people will bow to this picture, for it is a picture of Samadhi.” Someone said, “Do not say such things—people will call you an egotist, that you claim people will bow to your picture for thousands of years.” Ramakrishna said, “How did you hear it? I did not say ‘my.’ I said ‘this’ picture. What have I to do with it? It is a picture of Samadhi.”
Art is born the day the artist dies. As long as the artist is, art is not. As long as ego is, art is not. As long as the ‘I’ is, there is only construction, not creation. God has been able to create so vast a universe because God is not at all. We carve a small statue and become terribly important. We paint a little picture and are undone by conceit.
There was a great sculptor. He carved a statue out of a stone. Passersby would praise him, “You are wonderful—such a beautiful statue!” He would reply, “Are only fools passing this way? I did not make the statue. As I used to pass here, the statue hidden in the stone called to me. I only removed the useless stone. The statue was hidden; it manifested. With my chisel I removed the unnecessary rock. As I passed, it called, ‘Where are you going? Remove a little of the wrong stone.’ And now I can say: the one who called me from within the stone was the same who heard from within me—otherwise how could I have heard? If the one hidden within the stone were other than the one hidden within me, how would communication be possible?”
If the sculptor dies, the statue is born. If the painter dies, the painting is born. If the poet dies, the poem is born. When the artist becomes a no-one, art is born. The art of becoming a no-one is called meditation. So a few last words on meditation.
Meditation does not mean that you do something. People say, “I practice meditation.” As long as there is ‘I,’ meditation cannot be. People say, “I do meditation.” As long as there is doing, meditation cannot be. Have you noticed—when you say, “I do love,” you speak a wrong language. Can love be done? Has anyone ever done love—except actors? If you too do it, you only act; whether the stage is large or small, whether the actors are permanent or not, matters not.
Love cannot be done; love is not an act. How will you do love? If I say, “Begin to love”—how will you? Suddenly you will see—it does not happen. You will say, “How can I?”
Love is not an act; it is a state of mind, a condition of consciousness. It is not done; it happens.
Therefore those who go deep into love say, “Love happened.” They do not say, “I did love.” Another strange thing: when love happens, you are not. As long as you are, love does not happen.
When you are with your beloved, are you there? No—the beloved may be, but you are not. You have dissolved, you are not there; only a silence remains. Thus lovers think, before meeting, “We will say this and that.” But when they meet, they fall silent; all words vanish—just as an empty pot makes noise; when full, it becomes silent. Two lovers together have never truly even said, “I love you.” You will say, “No—many lovers say it.” Note well: when someone says, “I love you,” know that the moment of love has passed. It is only a memory. When love is, there is not even the wish to say, “I do,” or “I am.” When love is, there is only so much love that there is no space for ‘I’ and ‘you.’
Rumi sings: A lover knocks at the beloved’s door. From within she asks, “Who are you?” He answers, “I am. Did you not recognize my voice?” She replies, “As long as you are there, with your voice and identity, how can love’s door open?” The lover returns. Years later he comes again and knocks. She asks, “Who are you?” He says, “Now I am not—only you are.” Rumi says: the door opens. I would not say so—I think Rumi opens the door a little too soon. I would say: she again says, “As long as for you there is a ‘you,’ somewhere deep a ‘me’ must still be sitting. If I were utterly gone within, then you too would vanish without. ‘I’ and ‘you’ are two sides of one coin; where there is ‘I,’ there is ‘you.’”
Hence the devotee who says to God, “Only You are; I am not,” is declaring, “I am fully there,” for even to deny requires an ‘I.’ No, the devotee does not even say, “Only You are; I am not.” The devotee says nothing—he simply remains. He does not say ‘You,’ he does not say ‘I.’ He becomes silent. This silence is meditation.
If this silence is attained through love, the path is called bhakti. If through knowledge, it is called jnana. If through action, it is called karma. And the name of the silence itself is meditation. Let my ‘I’ fall silent—that which incessantly says “I” with every breath. The eyelid moves—“I.” The foot lifts—“I.” I inhale—“I.” Everywhere this ‘I’—let it grow quiet, be pacified. And let there come a moment when, searching within, I can say, “Where has my ‘I’ gone? Where is it?” Then meditation is attained.
But we are strange people. The worldly man has an ‘I’—and the one we call religious has it even thicker. A householder must have an ‘I’; but the so-called renunciate—his ‘I’ has no comparison. The sannyasin’s ego becomes denser. See the devotee on the road—he struts in a special way. He wears the mark on his forehead; he looks upon the unmarked as fit for hell. He thinks the one who did not go to the temple will rot in hell. Astonishing!
Meditation means only this: let the ‘I’ not be. But the ‘I’ becomes more and more condensed. The ways of the ‘I’ are infinite, its paths subtle. Flee where you will, the ‘I’ catches you—even if you flee from the ‘I,’ it catches you. The non-egoist stands in the marketplace and declares, “None is more egoless than I!” This is the extremity—an ego’s proclamation that none is more egoless than me. Ego has subtle routes. When it has wealth, it says, “I have so much.” When it renounces wealth, it says, “I kicked away so much.” It stands behind both. It fills itself in the world and fills itself in God too. “My God is right; yours is wrong.” Even God becomes “mine”—a possession. Burn my temple and I will burn your mosque. The mosque-breaker will break temples; the temple-builder will break mosques. The Christian will find the Hindu wrong; the Hindu will find the Christian wrong. The Gita-wala will denounce the Quran; the Quran-wala will denounce the Vedas. What madness is this?
Where there is ‘I,’ there is madness. In truth, there is no other madness than the ‘I.’ The bigger the ‘I,’ the denser the madman within. The thinner the ‘I,’ the more the madman departs. The day there is no ‘I,’ there is no madness—then one is religious, and meditation is attained.
So lastly I say: recognize the paths of this ‘I.’ Do not fight it—if you fight, the ‘I’ will say, “See—I am fighting.” Do not fight; only recognize the ways by which the ‘I’ extends its hand to seize you. From morning to night, recognize its paths. When it grabs your feet and you strut, when it takes your spine and you sit in padmasana, when it catches your head and you put on the sacred mark, when it catches you in the temple and your gait changes—recognize it: the ‘I’ is grasping.
As you begin to recognize the ‘I,’ remember Buddha’s word: when a lamp is lit in the house, thieves do not come; when the watchman is awake, it is very hard for thieves to enter; but if the watchman is asleep and the lamp extinguished, the house belongs to thieves.
So when the inner watchman is awake—when the witness is awake—and sees where the ‘I’ is grabbing, the thief’s entry is halted. When the lamp of consciousness is lit within, when the lamp of silence is lit, the thief no longer enters. And there is only one thief—the ‘I.’ He has stolen God from us. Not a petty thief, a great thief—whoever can steal God cannot be ordinary. There is only one wall.
I saw a child by the road blowing soap-bubbles through a small bamboo reed. He dipped the reed in soapy water, blew, a bubble formed and flew into the sky. Morning sun, soap-bubble rising, the sun’s rays breaking into waves through it—so beautiful. The child ran to catch it, but it rose higher.
A delightful event! The soap lay below and was not beautiful; the same drop spread in sunlight became very beautiful. What we call beauty is such—everything is dust; in the rays of the sun it becomes beautiful: somewhere a flower, somewhere a man, somewhere a woman, somewhere the moon. All becomes beautiful when lifted into light.
Beauty is the uprising of what lies below. Beauty is the lifting of what lies in darkness into light. A drop of soap became very beautiful; in the bowl below the soap-drops lay without beauty—spread in sunlight they became very beautiful. And the bubble rose. It seemed as if the bubble rose by itself. You too have seen bubbles rise, but perhaps did not know why.
A soap-bubble rises only because the breath from the child’s mouth is warmer than the outer air. Cool air falls; warm air rises. Cool air gives way to warm air—making space; the bubble rises. Although even the bubble wants to fall—everything wants to fall—yet the warm air is rarefied. The surrounding air is cooler, denser—more egoistic, more filled with ‘I.’ Within the bubble the ‘I’ is a little thinner—so it rises. The sense of ‘I’ is a little less; the air is less dense—so it ascends.
Another wonder: it rises only a while, but as it rises it grows bigger. Whatever rises grows larger. The bubble grows as the air pressure around it drops and the soap spreads. Then comes a moment—the bubble bursts. We say, “The bubble died.” The child begins making another.
But did it die? Did the air within the thin soap-film die? It is still there. Did the delicate film that encircled it die? It is still there. Nothing died. The bubble became so large that the thin film could no longer contain it—the film broke, and the bubble merged with the vast sky.
So it is in meditation—rarity increases day by day. And then one day what we call ‘I’—like the soap film—breaks. We do not die; what we called ‘we’ dies. Even that does not die—only our illusion dies. And that vastness that was confined within our bubble becomes one with the Vast. That day there is dance. That day there is music. That day there is art. That day there is creation. That day sorrow ends in a person’s life, and the veena of bliss begins to sound.
The notes arising from that veena of bliss are called art. The paintings born of those notes are art. The ankle-bells that chime from that bliss are art. Whatever arises from that bliss—be it silence, dance, music, song, poetry, literature—and even if nothing arises, if one remains silent—his silence too is art.
These three things I have said. Science is the first step—the first step of logic. When logic is defeated, religion is the second step—it is experience. And when experience thickens and becomes overfull, the rains begin—that is art. And this art is attained only by those who attain meditation—it is a by-product of meditation. The one who is an artist before meditation is, in some sense or other, centered in desire. The one who becomes an artist after meditation—his life, his act, his creation—become offerings to God and are filled with God.
Therefore do not seek art—seek meditation. Let art come as a shadow behind. Do not seek art—seek silence; let art follow. Art always comes like a shadow, from behind. The one who seeks art directly gets lost in shadow-land, only the land of shadows. The so-called artists—painters, sculptors, poets—wander lost in shadow-land. They have no connection with the world of truth. They remain lost in dreams and go on decorating and embellishing their dreams. Art has nothing to do with dreams. As much as science is related to truth, as much as religion is related to truth, so too is art related to truth.
These few things I have said. It is not necessary that everything I say be right. It is not necessary that even one thing be right. It is not necessary that you accept what I say. It is enough if you reflect a little. If possible, experience a little. If possible, let your experience spread and be shared.
You have listened to my words with such silence and love—I am deeply obliged. And in the end I bow down to the Paramatma dwelling in all. Please accept my pranam.