7 No dialogue, no monologue \-- yaa-hoo!

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‌CHAPTER 7

No dialogue, no monologue – yaa-hoo!

25 March 1988 pm in Gautam the Buddha Auditorium

Question 1 BELOVED OSHO,

ARE WE MOVING INTO THE SOCRATIC DIALOGUE FORM OF DISCOURSES NOW?

BUT I DETECT AN ESSENTIAL DIFFERENCE. SOCRATES SAID: “KNOW THYSELF.” YOU HAVE SAID: “LET GO THYSELF!”

PLEASE COMMENT.

Maneesha, the subject of Socratic dialogue is something special to be discussed. His use of the word ‘dialogue’ was very original; he means by it that truth can be discovered by discussing in a friendly way, respectful towards each other.

This way of finding the truth is bound to be only rational. That’s why Socrates cannot be counted as having reached the same heights as Gautam Buddha because at the ultimate peak of experience there is no dialogue, but only monologue. You are alone. There is nobody to whom you can say something and there is nothing which can be said. And the moment the other disappears, you also disappear because the existence of “I” and “thou” is together; you cannot separate them, they exist as two sides of one coin.

I don’t agree with Socrates. His words are beautiful when he says, “Know thyself.” But Gurdjieff is far more important, because he says, “First be thyself; otherwise what are you going to know? First

become an integrated individual, discover your freedom. In that very discovery you will find your being.”

The words of Socrates have been respected for twenty-five centuries, but they have many flaws. First, the moment you enter into the world of your being there is nobody; hence no possibility of dialogue. And if you think there is a possibility of dialogue between two enlightened people, you are wrong. The moment two enlightened people have ever come across each other, looked into each other’s eyes, the dialogue is finished, because they know that there is nothing to say.

I have told you the incident of Kabir and Farid. Their meeting is immensely important. For two days they were together, and not a single word was uttered between them. They laughed, they hugged, they smiled, they kissed each other, but they did not say a single word.

Hundreds of disciples of Kabir and Farid were present, and they could not believe their eyes what has happened to these people? They are so wise, and they are behaving like small children! And they had gathered from faraway places just to hear the dialogue between these two enlightened persons, but the dialogue did not happen.

After two days, when Farid had left on his pilgrimage, Kabir was asked, “What happened to you? You speak to us every day, but for these two days, when we were so expectant and so ready to listen, so alert not to miss a single word that passed between you two... what happened to you? Why did you become so silent?”

Kabir said, “Whatever I know, he knows. And whoever uttered the first word would have proved that he is still on the way, he has not reached.”

Gautam Buddha and Mahavira were contemporaries; they traveled for almost forty years continuously in the same province of Bihar. The name of the province Bihar comes from their traveling, bihar means ‘traveling’.

They passed through villages hundreds of times and there were so many times when they were in the same village, in the same city. At one moment they were in the same caravanserai: half of the place was occupied by Gautam Buddha and his disciples, and half by Mahavira and his disciples. But no dialogue not even a simple “Yaa-Hoo!”

I would not have remained silent, that I can say to you. Enlightenment or no enlightenment, this much I would have done, because it is so nice... It means nothing, just a beautiful greeting with no meaning attached to it.

It looks a little cold that they did not even say, “Yaa-Hoo!” Whenever I meet them somewhere in the eternal journey it is bound to happen; the time is infinite, everything is possible I am going to give them a good salute, “Yaa-Hoo!” Because just yesterday we discovered the tremendous effect of the mantra.…

I have decided that from now on this will be the sannyasin salute. Wherever two sannyasins meet “Yaa-Hoo!” There is no need to be so cold. Enlightenment is okay, but you should not become inhuman. A salute cannot disturb enlightenment... although “Yaa-Hoo” is very powerful.

I have been dragged into a court because I used to live outside a city where there was a Mohammedan cemetery, and people used to come there to meditate. The Mohammedans came to me again and again, saying that “This is not good; your disciples are disturbing our sleeping ones.”

I said, “Why? How can they disturb?”

They said, “They go on saying, ‘Hoo, hoo.’ Even a dead person feels like getting out of the grave to find out, ‘Who is this fellow?’”

I said, “We cannot change it. And moreover it is really the last part of ALLAH-HOO. It is a Mohammedan mantra!”

They said, “You are very clever, but we have never heard of ALLAH-HOO. ALLAH is okay, but HOO?”

I said, “You can do anything you want to do. If your ghosts come out of their graves, it is our problem, we live here. We will enjoy, we will entertain them; you don’t be worried.”

They said, “This man is difficult we are going to the court.” I said, “That is perfectly good, you go anywhere!”

Even the judge said, “This is not a crime. Nowhere in any law book, in any constitution, any statute, is it written that saying ‘HOO’ is a crime. And don’t drag me into something with that man, because I know him.”

But they insisted. They said, “If you don’t take action, there is going to be a Hindu-Mohammedan riot.”

The judge said, “But he is not Hindu, so why bring Hindus into it?”

They said, “Whoever he is... but if near our cemetery anybody says ‘HOO’ there is going to be difficulty. Then don’t tell us that we are breaking the law.” So the judge summoned me. I went there with at least one hundred disciples. First we did “HOO” in the court. The judge was absolutely afraid, he said, “Wait! I cannot say that this is insulting the court, because there is no precedent, nobody has insulted anybody by saying ‘HOO.’ It is perfectly right but you frighten me! Perhaps those poor Mohammedans are right that the way you shout for one hour, even dead people will come alive. And it is natural for them to protect their dead; otherwise the dead will think that perhaps the Judgment Day has come... You can do your meditation somewhere else” because where I used to live there was a great lake, and mountains.

He said, “You can move anywhere. There is nothing that anybody can do against you. But why unnecessarily create trouble?”

And today I have received one question: “I have been doing your meditation, ALLAH-HOO, for ten years, but last night I saw the effect of”Yaa-Hoo!” so I tried it instead of ALLAH-HOO, “Yaa-Hoo!” And it was such a tremendous transformation that a crowd gathered and people started thinking,

‘What to do with this woman?’ I said, ‘I am doing my meditation.’ And they said, ‘Never heard about such a meditation’...”

They are right: they have never heard, because this is absolutely fresh and new, just born last night.

Seeing her question... and there have been many questions like that “Great things hap-pened. We never expected that so quickly, thousands of people could get lost into a let-go.”

I thought it was a very good meditation, but more than meditation it is a great salute. Around the world, wherever two sannyasins meet, greet each other... and let people’s hands shake, let people have heart attacks; let them do that is their problem, not your problem but your “Yaa-Hoo” should be really sharp. And to make it sharp your hand has to be there!

Maneesha, there has never been any dialogue between two enlightened persons. If you are left alone, you can have monologue but monologue is the monopoly of the mad people. Only mad people talk to themselves. You will find them if you stand by the side of the road you don’t have to go to a madhouse, you are in the madhouse. Just sit by the side of the road, and somebody is talking, somebody is making gestures, somebody is thinking, you can see, the lips are moving! somebody is taking a decision: “No...” And there is nobody else on the road. This is monologue.

No enlightened person will do monologue either. And the discovery of truth from dialogue has never been possible. Only two ignorant persons can have dialogue.

These are the three possibilities:

Two enlightened persons, one possibility no dialogue.

Second possibility: two ignorant persons much possibility of dialogue, but no conclusion.

One enlightened person alone he will be silent. What to say about dialogue, there is no question even of monologue.

Dialogue has only one small possibility, and that is between the master and the disciple; one who knows and one who is ready to know. But in the Greek tradition there is no place for the master- disciple phenomenon. It has happened only in the East particularly in this land, it was originated that when somebody comes to know, it is his absolute duty to share his experience with those who do not know. Whether they listen or not should not be the concern.

If you talk to a hundred persons, perhaps one may listen. That is enough reward: you have opened one person’s eyes amongst thousands of blind people. Hence, although dialogue is associated with the name of Socrates, dialogue did not happen in Socrates’ life itself. He himself was not enlightened till the last moment of his life. He became enlightened when the poison was given to him, and there was no time left for any dialogue.

Still, he tried to say a few things because his basic contention was that “Unless I know, how can I tell you? You ask me what death is and I am still alive how can I say to you what death is? Let me die first.”

But people said, “Many have deceived us; they say, ‘Let us die first’ and then they die and they don’t even give a call. They simply disappear. What is the guarantee that when you die you will tell us the truth?”

He said, “I will try my best” and he tried his best. Not after death, but just in between, because his death happened by poison and poison takes a little time. So he was hanging between life and death for a few minutes. In those few minutes he said the most important thing. It is the only dialogue worth calling significant.

He said, as the poison was given, “My feet have become numb, I cannot feel my feet, but I am still whole. Inside I don’t feel that anything is missing. My hands have become numb, I don’t feel that I have hands. I can see them, but they are dead. But inside me I am as whole as I have always been. I don’t see that I am missing anything. My heart is sinking; perhaps I may not be able to say anything more. This may be my last statement, that death only separates the body and consciousness; it does not kill, because I am still absolutely whole. I have not lost anything. My consciousness is as pure, as alive, as it has ever been.”

That was the only authentic dialogue. But that too was happening between a man who was just coming closer to the truth of death, and people who had no idea what death is. And if you don’t have any idea of what death is, you cannot have any idea of what life is. They are all together. The man of meditation...

And Socrates was not a man of meditation. He was a great rationalist, a great philosopher and thinker, but not a mystic. He was a mystic only for those three or four minutes between the poisoning and his death. But he was perhaps the keenest intellect the world has ever known. His saying, “Know thyself,” is perfectly true, but it is not possible to know thyself by dialogue.

With whom are you going to have the dialogue? With your wife? With your husband? With whom? You look all around ask people “Please let us have a dialogue.” And they will say, “Get lost dialogue, my foot! What have I to do with dialogue? Dialogues happen only in movies, this is real life!”

But in the history of Greece, Socrates was the first man to at least indicate towards the ultimate truth of knowing oneself. But he could not devise methods and strategies through which one can reach to oneself. He could not find a way for the pilgrims, for the seekers. He remained a philosopher. He could not become the enlightened, the awakened, the buddha. It is unfortunate that such a great, intelligent man, a giant of the whole of history, wasted his whole life discussing with all kinds of people.

My own understanding is that he was crucified not because he was doing anything harmful people were bored, he was harassing people. Dialogue, that is what killed him. It is said that people would see him and change their routes, because even to meet him meant the beginning of a dialogue. Say something and immediately that becomes a question, and he will go to the deepest roots of the problem. “But,” you say, “we are going to the market and this is not the time to understand these great things that you are talking about! Sometime when we have time we will come.”

Athens became so bored that this old man had to be somehow got rid of. He has not committed any crime, but he has corrupted many people’s minds, puzzled their minds, confused their minds. They

were living peacefully with the consolation that there is a God, and he has created suspicion. He creates doubt in people’s minds about everything. He even says, “What is the proof that the world exists? Can you prove it? What is the proof that you are real?”

Very difficult. Who knows whether you are real, or just some character in somebody’s dream?

One Egyptian pharaoh had ordered in Egypt that “I want everybody to know that nobody should come into my dream, because I don’t want any disturbance in the night. The day is enough; the night is absolutely mine. If anybody comes, soon the next day he will be shot dead.”

People became very afraid. “This is a strange thing; nobody goes into anybody’s dream...” His ministers tried to convince him: “This is not right! And most probably we are the people who will come into your dream. But we are not coming; you are dreaming about us.”

He said, “Don’t befool me. When somebody comes into my dream I will recognize the face and you will see tomorrow that he is hanging on a post outside the gate.”

The ministers said, “We want to resign, because to be close to you is dangerous!”

You don’t dream about people you have not known. Eskimos don’t come into your dreams. In your dreams the neighbor’s wife comes. Certainly your wife never comes into your dreams. I have never come across a man who says that his wife comes into his dreams. But neighbors’ wives are very dangerous, they always harass people all around. Perhaps your own wife will be harassing other neighbors, that’s another matter.

Socrates has left a very wrong heritage in a way, because he founded the very base of the Western mind. What has happened to the West... Socrates is in the roots. It is according to his advice that flowers like Hiroshima, Nagasaki, have blossomed; that nuclear weapons are ready at any moment to destroy the world, although you cannot see a direct connection. But he is the man who insisted on sharpening your reason, your intellect, and this he thought is knowing yourself.

It is not. Although he said, “Know thyself,” he really means, “Know thy intelligence.”

He does not mean the same thing as when I say know thyself the words are the same, but the meaning is different. When I say know thyself, I say put your mind aside, your reason aside, your thoughts aside; your logic, your rationality, put everything aside and know the simple, innocent, silent sky of your being. That was not the meaning of Socrates, certainly.

And Maneesha, you have not heard me right. You say, “I detect an essential difference: Socrates said: ‘Know thyself.’ You have said: ‘Let go thyself!’”

I was simply saying let go. “Thyself” you have heard; I don’t know from where. Thousands of witnesses are here.

If I have to use the word ‘thyself’, I will say, “Kill thyself, so that you can be.” Be. That’s enough.

And in deep silence there is no knowing, but a kind of taste, a kind of fragrance, a kind of beauty, a kind of sense of eternity, immortality. But not very definite knowledge that you can write about to your friend, that “I have come to know these things, one by one, the whole list.”

I have not said, Maneesha, “Let go thyself.”

But if you really want, then we can manage a new meaning to it: Let go thyself, so that you can be. But that will be totally different from Socrates. The small word you have added thyself makes an immense difference. Let-go is a simple phenomenon. It is not a question of who is going into this let-go. And last night when you went into let-go, there was nobody. Everybody was gone.

Seeing that everybody was gone, I was gone too. I was feeling hungry and I said, “I don’t know when these people are going to be back.” And I sent Shunyo to check whether people had come back or gone. She reported, “Don’t be worried; a few have come back, but most are still flat. A few are coming back, a few are moving towards the canteen...” But now I see that everybody has come back.

So this let-go is beautiful; you take a dip, and you come out fresh and young. Last night must have been the most beautiful night in your life.

... So it seems it is time to pray. This time to pray comes too soon and goes too fast.

Hamish MacTavish comes stumbling into the golf clubhouse, enters the bar and orders a large scotch in a shaky voice. “Great Scot!” cries the bartender, “what happened to you?”

“The tenth hole!” gasps Hamish. “I hit a brand new Dunlop ball into the field. I could not find it anywhere. Then I saw a cow standing there, so I lifted up her tail. And there was a ball, stuck in there. But it was a Goodyear ball.

“Just then, a woman came up behind me looking for her ball. I lifted up the cow’s tail again, and said to the woman, ‘Does this look like yours?’ and she hit me over the head with her club!”

Ramananda has asked:

Question 2

I TALK IN MY SLEEP. THE OTHER MORNING A GIRLFRIEND... SORRY “MY GIRLFRIEND” LAUGHINGLY TOLD ME, “YOU WERE SO FUNNY LAST NIGHT. YOU SAID, ‘I AM ENLIGHTENED’ THREE TIMES, AND THEN YOU SANG A SONG.”

BELOVED MASTER, WHO IS ENLIGHTENED?

I think it must be the girlfriend. You were asleep, and certainly you cannot be enlightened in sleep. Only your girlfriend was awake and seems to be a permanent girlfriend, because if she was just a temporary one, she would not have cared at all whether you were enlightened one time or three times. She may have even hit you because you were singing a song in your sleep and disturbing her sleep.

I think, Ramananda... you are certainly not enlightened. Only the girlfriend is left. You just become a disciple of the girlfriend. It will be such a joy... I want a few women to become masters, because in the past man has not allowed them to become masters. Although they have great qualities... Otherwise who cares what you are talking in your sleep? She would have put a pillow on your face and in the morning we would have had to make a celebration!

Strange questions come to me. One question is from Christiane:

Question 3

I CAME ALL THE WAY FROM BELGIUM TO SEE YOU FOR TWO DAYS ONLY. WHY DO I FEEL LIKE A BAT

AMONG THE BIRDS, I FEEL A RAT, AMONG THE RATS, I SAY I AM A BIRD

WHERE DO I BELONG?

I LOVE YOUR BOOKS, THEY MAKE ME LAUGH AND THEY MAKE ME CRY, THEY MAKE ME LIVE ALSO.

It is a very difficult problem. One thing is certain: you are not a bird, you are a rat. That’s what I was wondering who is eating my books? Certainly they are rats; birds don’t eat books. And coming from Belgium just to eat books? And only staying two days? You could have sent a card to ask, “Please, send all the damaged books. I live on them, I laugh, I eat, I am a rat!”

I hope you will not stay longer than a few days. Already you have destroyed many books. This is not nice, and your name is Christiane. It is not even Christian!

And now I think the prayer should begin...

Herbie’s father sends him to New York to learn the undertaking business from the legendary Moishe Finkelstein. Some months later, Herbie returns and his father asks him what he has learned.

“I have learned a lot, dad,” says Herbie. “It has been very interesting, as we had one wild experience that taught me a lesson.”

“What was that, son?” asks his dad.

“Well,” says Herbie, “one day, we got a phone call from the best hotel in New York. A man and a woman had died in their sleep, completely naked.”

“My God!” says his father, “what did Mr. Finkelstein do?”

“Well,” says Herbie, “we got dressed in our best suits and drove over in the limousine. We arrived at the room very quietly and with great dignity.”

“Wow!” exclaims his father, “and then what?”

“Well,” continues Herbie, “Mr. Finkelstein pushed open the door with his gold-tipped cane, and we went quietly inside. Sure enough, there was this naked couple lying on their backs. And immediately, Mr. Finkelstein saw a problem: the man had a large erection.”

“What did you do?” asks his father.

“Well,” says Herbie, “as always, Mr. Finkelstein was ready for the situation. He swung his gold-tipped cane and very stylishly, whacked the prick!”

“And then what happened?” asks his father.

“Well, dad,” says Herbie, “then all hell broke loose! You see, we were in the wrong room!” Okay, Maneesha?

Yes, Osho.

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