Chapter #8

[!info] Note

[NOTE: This is an unedited tape transcript of an unpublished darshan diary, which has been copy-typed on to the computer. It is for reference purposes only.]

Sannyas is not a religion. It is not a church, it is not a sect. It is not an effort to force you According to some pattern. It is just to help you to be totally free So that you can be yourself.

My effort here is To give you a taste of freedom. Once you have tasted freedom Nobody can enslave you. And the politicians and the priests Are all for enslaving people. They don’t want people who are intelligent People who are free, people who are rebels. They want slaves because slaves can be Exploited easily, oppressed easily, Manipulated easily, dominated easily.

And I am creating fire here! Each of my sannyasin has to prove a danger To all the old rotten structures of society. Each sannyasin has to be a sabotage. That’s why I have chosen The colour of fire for sannyas. And we have to make so many sannyasins That they cannot manage so many fire brigades! Sannyas is a rebellion against all conventions Against all conformities, against all ideologies Against all traditions, In short against the whole past.

Unless one gets rid of the past One is never available to the present And only the present exists And only in the present can god be found, Not in the past, not in the future either. Both are non-existential. Past is no more, future is not yet. This moment, this now is all there is.

To rebel against the past means To be herenow And then life has A totally different significance: It is divine, it is ecstatic, it knows no death.

We are all forms of god. Everything is a form of god Because nothing else exists. God and existence are synonymous, Remember it. Looking at a tree remind yourself That you are looking at a god. Looking at a mountain remind yourself. Even looking at a dog remind yourself. Maybe the dog is god a little bit upside down But the energy is the same It is one energy. And the more you remind yourself The more you will start feeling it. It is only a question of constant hammering. And one day when it explodes one is surprised Utterly surprised that one has been living Amidst so many forms of god And yet missing him.

There is no need to go anywhere to search for him He is all around you. He is within He is without. Make it your meditation.

God has no form although all forms are his. He has no colour although all colours are his. He does not exist in some particular place Because he exists everywhere. Only because he has no form Can he manifest himself in millions of forms. If you have a certain form Then you are bound to that form Then you cannot be multi-dimensional. If you are a man then you cannot be a woman. If you are a woman you cannot be a man. If you are a tree you cannot be a rock. If you are a rock you cannot be a river. But he is all Because he is no one in particular.

These two things have to be remembered. All images are false because god has no form. Worship him in his formlessness Worship him an all forms But don’t become attached to any particular form: Christian, Hindu, Mohammedan. Let the whole existence be his temple.

I teach a religionless religion A godless godliness. I don’t make any division between God the creator and the creation. It is the same: god is his creation. God is like a dancer. You cannot separate the dance and the dancer.

So love him an all forms And remember that he has no form. So don’t become attached to any form. If this mindfulness can be carried You will be surprised: It will bring you many many precious experiences And ultimately the goal will be fulfilled, The goal of realising the formless. You will realise it within yourself Because you are also formless. The body is not you, nor is the mind. You are the consciousness Which has no form, no limitation. It is as vast as the sky.

A humble heart is one of the greatest virtues For one who is in search of truth. Only those who are humble can know truth. The egoists are prohibited. The ego itself becomes the barrier. It cuts you away from existence. Ego means you are thinking You are separate form the whole. And you are not! We are not islands, no man is an island. We are part of an infinite continent. The ego gives us a false feeling of separation And because of that false feeling of separation Slowly slowly we become enclosed in ourselves. We become too self-conscious, self-centred Utterly closed to the world. Closed to the sun, to the moon To the wind, to the rain. We become encapsulated. That is a kind of living death. We start carrying our grave around ourselves. It is a very invisible grave But it is a grave all the same.

Sannyas means dropping that grave Coming out of the grave Just as Lazarus came out of the grave When Jesus called him, ‘Lazarus, come out!’

That has been the function Of all the masters down the ages: Calling Lazaruses to come out of graves. It is a beautiful parable, not history Bot one of the most is significant myths, Of tremendous import. Every sannyasin has to go through that myth He has to live it.

When you come to me you are in the grave. When you come to me you are Lazarus, dead. When you start dropping your deadness When you start dropping your ego Which is the cause of your death You start attaining to a new vision of life A new style of life. You are resurrected. But it needs a humble heart, One who is not egoistic One who is ready to surrender One who can say to god, ‘Let thy will be done.’

Jesus says god is love. I say love is god Because when you say god is love It means god may be many more things too. Love may be one of his qualities Among other qualities, with other qualities. But I say love is god, there is no other quality.

So to be loving is to be religious. To be in real love with existence Is to be in prayer. There is no need to go into the scriptures And no need to learn theology And no need to ponder over stupid nonsense Called philosophy. There is no need. One has to love the flowers and the birds And the trees and the stars and the people, And that’s enough! One has to go on improving one’s quality of love. One has to make it more and more Unconditional, unmotivated, undemanding Non-dominating, non-egoistic. When your love is absolutely pure You have attained to god. There is nothing more to it. You have attained To the ultimate perfection of life.

Love is the essence So let that become your path.

Loyalty is one of the qualities That has disappeared from the world. People have forgotten loyalty They have forgotten commitment They don’t know what involvement is any more. All their relationships are hit and run affairs Hence they don’t know what intimacy is. And intimacy grows only in time, it takes time. It is not a seasonal flower It takes one’s whole life. And one needs to be loyal, only then can one grow.

Maturity means the decisiveness To commit yourself to something With your totality. Yes, think as much as you can Before you take the jump But don’t go on thinking and thinking forever. Thinking is only secondary. It should be a help for the jump, not a hindrance. And once you have taken a jump Don’t look back, that is below dignity. Risk all and go ahead. Don’t be worried. Then whatsoever the consequence Whatsoever the sacrifice… Only then can one create a soul within oneself.

It comes only at a certain height of effort At a certain peak of your will. When you are not holding back anything Then only does it happen. But when it happens it is a joy. It is as if thousands of lowers have bloomed In your being. You become full of fragrance Overflowing with ecstasy. Unbounded bliss is yours But the price has to be paid with loyalty.

Silence has two aspects to it. One is silence of the mind When thoughts disappear. That is the first step. As you start meditating you have to begin By watching the thoughts. Just by watching, one day they disappear. Then begins the second step: The silence of the heart That comes by watching the feelings. It is a more subtle phenomenon Far deeper than the first But the process is the same. If one succeeds in the first One will be able to succeed in the second too, It is the same method of watching. And one day feelings disappear too. Then the second silence is achieved.

And when both these silences are there Then for the first time you know That the watcher also has disappeared Because there is nothing to watch. When there is nothing to know The knower disappears. That is the ultimate silence.

The first two are steps towards the ultimate And it is only that silence Which Buddha calls nirvana And Jesus calls the kingdom of god.

There are only two conditions To truly be a follower of Christ.

One is: you should not be a Christian Because Christ was not a Christian. Neither was he a Jew. If he had been a Jew He would not have been crucified. He behaved in a very non-Jewish way He rebelled against the Jewish tradition. And he was certainly not a Christian He had never heard even the word Christian. And if he comes back again He will be crucified by the Christians, This time in the Vatican.

That time it was through the Romans And this time again it will be Through the Italians, the same people. These Italians are dangerous people The Mafia is very ancient!

So the first condition is: don’t be a Christian Don’t be a Hindu. Don’t be a Mohammedan. If one really wants to be a follower of Christ- To be religious-one has to drop all religions.

And the second condition is… Christ became Christ Only because he dropped his being a Jesus. One has to drop one’s small identity With the body, with the mind, with the birth Only then does one become vast.

Christ is no more a Jesus Buddha is no more a Gautam. Those were their old names. When Gautam Buddha came back After his enlightenment His father was very angry Because he had escaped from the house And after twelve years roaming like a hippie He came back home. He was the son of a king And the king was really furious. He was the only son. The old man shouted an told him ‘I never thought that you would do Such a thing to me in my old age. Feel ashamed of yourself!

And Buddha laughed and he said ‘But who are you talking to? The man who left your palace has died. I am no more Gautam, your son is dead I have risen out of his corpse. I am a totally new person. Just look again at me!’

When the father became a little cooler He looked again: ‘Yes, this man looks different He appears the same: The same features, the same body But the depth of the eyes The joy on the face The aroma, the fragrance that surrounds him Is totally different.’ He recognised that. He bowed down and touched Buddha’s feet. He said,‘Yes, now I can see I am unnecessarily getting furious at you. You have changed, you are radically different. The same and yet not the same.’

So with these two things fulfilled One really becomes a follower of Christ. Why say a follower of Christ? One becomes a Christ oneself. And never settle for anything second-rate When you can be first-rate!

A man without meditation becomes mediocre. His consciousness gathers rust. His consciousness becomes covered with dust He loses all brightness, all intelligence. Slowly slowly he completely forgets who he is. He becomes so stupid. That is the utmost in stupidity, To forget who you are. And that has happened to the whole humanity.

Through meditation Consciousness ban be again sharpened Dust can be removed Rust can be washed away. Your mirror can again become bright. And when your consciousness is bright It reflects reality. And god is another name for reality. To know god is to know all Not to know god Is to live in ignorance, darkness, death.

Bliss is the goal of all life. Consciously or unconsciously We are all searching for bliss. To search unconsciously means One is not going to find it. It is groping in the dark Not knowing what exactly you are searching for Where you are searching, how you are searching. One is walking in deep sleep, leke a somnambulist.

Everybody seeks bliss But very few people have found it For the simple reason that very few people Have searched for it consciously. To be a sannyasin means Changing your search for bliss into a deliberate, conscious effort. So from this very moment you have to seek bliss In a very conscious way: Watchful, alert, meditatively.

And we have arranged every kind of device here To help you to become more alert, more watchful So that you don’t go on falling asleep. Sleep is your old habit It takes a little time to get rid of it. But once you have got rid of it Life becomes a dance, a benediction.

[!info] Copyright 1964-1990 Osho (Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh)