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Chapter 4 - This harvest moon
And I absolutely support Ryota. There have been many buddhas in many different places, of different races, from different countries. They may not have been called buddhas, they may have spoken different languages, they may not have spoken at all; their existence may not have been recorded. But it is impossible to believe that in four million years there has been only one man who attained to the highest peak of consciousness.
At least I can say: Forget the one, because I have touched the same peak. From now onwards remember two buddhas! I cannot say anything about any other buddhas; they may have been pretenders, they may have been just imitators. But I can say with absolute authority that I have known myself and I have known myself more than Gautam Buddha himself, because he got stuck at a point.
He himself describes it in a beautiful way ... In China there are ten pictures, just like Tarot cards, which are called, "The Ten Zen Bulls."
In the first card the bull has escaped from his owner. In the second card the owner is searching for him but does not know which way he has gone. In deep mountains, valleys, forests ... which direction has he taken? In the third he finds the footprints of the bull.
In the fourth, following the footprints he finds the bull hiding behind a tree, just his back is seen in the picture. In the fifth he has seen the whole bull.
In the sixth he catches hold of the bull. It is a struggle, the bull does not want to go back home, he has found the freedom of the forest and the mountains and the rivers. But in the seventh the owner is dragging him back. In the eighth he has conquered the bull. In the ninth the bull is in the stable and the man is sitting under his roof, playing a flute. In the tenth, the man is going towards the pub with a bottle in his hand.
Buddha has described that there comes a point when a buddha forgets his enlightenment. It becomes so natural that there is no need to remember it. The tenth is the transcendence beyond buddha.
When this pack of cards came to Japan they dropped the tenth card because it
looks very irreligious. It is perfectly good that the bull has been found -- the bull represents the truth --
that the buddha is at ease playing his flute. But the tenth seems to be very dangerous. So in Japan they dropped the tenth, they brought only nine cards. They were not courageous enough to see a buddha sitting in a pub sipping beer.
But I would like the tenth card to be added again. It is beyond Buddha himself, because he himself said, "I am at the ninth stage. The tenth stage is just to become ordinary and simple, so simple that you can even get drunk. Just a cup of wine, sitting with your friends enjoying ..."
The Japanese priests became aware that this is a very dangerous card; every drunkard will start saying that he has transcended Buddha. But being so afraid of the drunkards ... Anyway they think they have transcended everything, they don't wait for your card. Just look at a drunkard, he believes already that he is a god.
Because of these drunkards they have dropped a very significant point. The bottle and the pub were only symbolic, symbolic of being very ordinary -- just being simple as everybody else is. Once in a while if a buddha takes a little wine, just to give company to other buddhas who may be asleep, I will not object.
Osho - The Miracle 61
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