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Chapter 1 - The Hidden Harmony
Old pond frog jump in water sound
Finished! He has said everything. Pictorial: you can see an ancient pond, a frog sitting on the bank, and... the jump of the frog. You can see the splash, and the sound of water. And, says Basho, everything has been said. This is all life is: An ancient pond... a jump of the frog, the sound of water -- and silence. This is what you are; this is what everything is -- and silence.
The same way Heraclitus talks in his river fragment. First he uses the sounds of a river --
AUTOISI POTAMOISI; before he says something he uses the sounds of the river, and then he gives the maxim: You cannot step twice in the same river. He is a poet, but no ordinary poet --
a poet Hindus have always called a RISHI. There are two types of poets. One who is still dreaming and creating poetry out of his dreams -- a Byron, a Shelley, a Keats. Then there is another type of poet, a rishi, who is no longer dreaming -- he looks at the reality, and out of the reality poetry is born. Heraclitus is a rishi, a poet who is no longer dreaming, who has encountered existence. He is the first existentialist in the West.
Now, try to penetrate his oracular maxims. THE HIDDEN HARMONY
IS BETTER THAN THE OBVIOUS.
Why? Why is the hidden harmony better than the obvious? -- because the obvious is on the surface, and the surface can deceive and the surface can be cultivated, conditioned. At the center you are existential, on the surface you are social. Marriage is on the surface, love is at the center. Love has a hidden
harmony, marriage has an obvious harmony.
Just go to some friend's house. If you look through the window and the husband and wife are fighting, their faces ugly, the moment you enter everything changes: they are so polite, they are talking to each other so lovingly. This is a harmony that is obvious, a harmony that is on the surface. But deep down there is no harmony, it is just a mannerism, it is just for display. A real man may appear unharmonious on the surface, but he will always be harmonious in the center. Even if he contradicts himself, in his contradictions there will be a hidden harmony. And a person who never contradicts himself, who is absolutely consistent on the surface, will not have the real harmony.
There are consistent people: if they love they love, if they hate they hate -- they don't allow opposites to mingle and meet. They are absolutely clear who their enemy is and who their friend is. They live on the surface and they create a consistency. Their consistency is not real consistency: deep down inconsistencies are boiling; on the surface they are somehow managing. You know them because you are them! On the surface you manage, but this won't help. Don't be bothered too much with the surface. Go deeper -- and don't try to choose between the opposites. You will have to live both. And if you can live both, nonattached, unattached to either, if you can live both -- if you can love and remain a witness, and you can hate and remain a witness, that witnessing will be the hidden harmony. Then you will know Osho - The Hidden Harmony
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