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Chapter 26 - Life's aim is life itself
try to force somebody to follow a certain path that you think is right. You can follow it, it is your freedom, but never impose it on anybody else.
The world does not need any organized religion. The world certainly needs religious people -- neither Hindus, nor Mohammedans, nor Christians -- the world simply needs individuals in search of deeper and richer life. Not God, not paradise, not heaven... And as life becomes infinitely deep, it is the paradise; you have entered the kingdom of God. And the doors are within your own heart.
But people are blind, and tradition has been making them more and more blind. Tradition respects blind people, it respects people who don't think, it respects people who never doubt.
It respects people who are not skeptical. It wants people to be just obedient machines. Perhaps machines are, according to the traditional mind, the most religious people in the world because they never disobey.
As far as my insight is concerned, a man who is not rebellious cannot be religious --
rebellious against the past, rebellious against organized religions, rebellious against all those people who want to dominate you. And they have found subtle ways to dominate you: "Our religion is the most ancient!" So what? That means your religion is the most rotten! But they are trying to make it "most ancient" so that you feel an awe; if for ten thousand years nobody has disobeyed, there must be some truth in it.
Every religion uses the argument that it is very old, very ancient. Religions which are not very old naturally have to try the opposite argument; for example Sikhism, which is only five hundred years old, or Mohammedanism, which is only fourteen hundred years old. Their argument is, that older religions are older versions of God's message to man: "We are bringing the latest message of God to man."
Hazrat Mohammed has said that "There have been other messengers before, but after me there will be no other messenger, because I have brought the final
version of the message."
Hence he could say, "There is only one God and one holy book, the KORAN, and one holy messenger, Mohammed. After me, anybody who claims that he has a direct communication with God is committing the greatest sin possible."
It happened in Baghdad once... a man was brought to the Caliph's court in Baghdad. The Caliph is the chief representative of the messenger of God, Hazrat Mohammed. Omar was at that time the Caliph in Baghdad and the man was brought because he was declaring that he had brought an even fresher version than Mohammed.
The Caliph said, "This is unforgivable, but you look so simple and so innocent: I will give you seven days time to think it over, and simultaneously, you will be punished as much as possible so that you come back to your senses. And after seven days, I will come to the prison myself to ask you what you think now." After seven days, he went there. The man was naked, bound to a pillar, and he had been beaten continually for seven days. He had not been allowed to sleep, had not been given anything to eat. They had tortured him as much as possible. When Caliph Omar asked him, "What do you think now?" he said, "What do I think? When I was sent by God, he warned me: 'Listen, my messengers have always been tortured. 'He was right.
Your torture has proved that I am the messenger. Now there is no need of Hazrat Mohammed; I have brought the latest message from God."
And at that very moment, from another pillar, another naked man who had been caught one month before, because he had been declaring himself, "I am God" -- for one month he had Osho - The Hidden Splendor
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