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‌CHAPTER 13

13 January 1979 pm in Chuang Tzu Auditorium

[Osho gives sannyas to a ten-year-old.]

Gitika means a small song. If life can become just a small song, that is more than enough. That is enough to satisfy all the longing of the heart, that’s enough to fulfil one’s being.

But rarely a person’s life becomes a song. People turn it into a calculation, it becomes more arithmetic than poetry. They think of money and power and things; and all those trips are just meaningless. They are ego-trips; and through the ego the song dies completely. It is only when the ego is not there that one becomes a song, one becomes love, one becomes purity, one becomes a lotus flower.

Uddhava is the name of a friend of Krishna. In the Indian mythology Krishna is the most colourful figure, the most lovable. That is the literal meaning of the word ‘krishna’: it means one who attracts. The word ‘attraction’ comes from the same root as krishna, ‘karshan’: one who is like a magnet, one whose presence immediately creates love in thousands of people.

Uddhava was his very close friend, and his work was to be a go-between between Krishna and his disciples, between Krishna and his lovers. Uddhava was also of tremendous beauty, of great grace. His name is also meaningful.

Indian mythology is woven around names and their meanings. Names are not just names in Indian mythology; they have great significance. Uddhava means festival, festivity, celebration.

And between the disciple and the master celebration can be the only relationship, the go-between; between the lover and the beloved only celebration can be the bridge. Between man and god there is no possibility of any bridge other than celebration. Unless we celebrate to abandon we will not

know what god is. It is only in the peak moments of celebration that we come close to his heights, that we come to his glimpses.

So this parable is beautiful: krishna means one who attracts. God attracts – that’s why everybody is searching for, longing for, knowingly, unknowingly, groping towards god. God is the very centre of existence. Everything is gravitating towards god: even rocks and trees, animals and birds, unconscious man and conscious man – all are striving towards god; the pull is great. One may call it truth, one may call it bliss, it doesn’t matter – that is only a difference of name – but we are all searching for something which we are missing in our being.

Uddhava means the closest friend of god; and the closest friend of god is celebration. It is the climate of celebration that surrounds god, it is festivity, it is utter joy. And between the seeker and the sought, between the lover and the beloved, between the devotee and the deity, it is celebration that functions as a messenger. It brings news from god, it takes prayers from the devotees; that is the meaning of the parable.

My whole effort here is to create the climate of celebration. Only in that climate will people start growing towards god. That is the right soil to grow your potential, your seed, into a great tree of love, prayer, and ultimately into blossoms of divineness.

Prem means love, gianni in Sanskrit means one who knows, the knower. So your name will mean knowing that comes through love, love wisdom.

There is a knowing that comes through logic. It is only intellectual; it does not change you because it never moves your heart, and unless your heart starts moving you remain the same. You go on accumulating knowledge but you don’t change through that knowledge; that knowledge remains a dead weight. You become a scholar, knowledgeable, but you remain the same fool as you have always been. It does not bring wisdom to you, it does not bring insight, it does not bring any mutation, it is not a rebirth. It only goes on accumulating in your memory; and the memory has endless capacities to accumulate. Scientists say that a single man’s memory system can contain all the libraries of the world. That will make you a walking encyclopaedia but not a Buddha, not a Christ.

Unless love happens, and unless knowing happens through love, wisdom does not arise; foolishness persists in the garb of knowledge. Behind the facade of knowledge all kinds of stupidities go on living. In fact they can live in a better way now because they are safer, protected, well protected. And you can even argue for your foolishnesses; that’s what rationalisation is. A knowledgeable person, arguing for his stupidities – that is rationalisation. You can protect it and they can remain hiding in you.

This is one of the greatest dangers that knowledge creates: it does not destroy your ignorance; on the contrary, it protects it. Remember, it is pseudo-knowledge that protects ignorance.

True knowledge is like a light: the moment it happens the darkness disappears, they cannot exist together. But that light comes only out of the flame of love.

So begin with love and end in wisdom. Love is the ladder towards wisdom and the heart is the door.

[Osho gives someone sannyas, keeping his legal hebrew name, for which he does not know the meaning.]

You try to find out the meaning and I will also try!

It is good... it sounds beautiful; and sometimes the meaning is not so significant as the sound. Sound is more meaningful than meaning itself. If it has some melody in it, some music in it, that is its true meaning.

The meanings that we give to words are all arbitrary; they are given meanings, so any meaning can be given to any word. But the sound is more natural; it is there. Each word in the beginning must have been just a sound, then slowly slowly it gathered meaning. Man is a meaning searching animal so he cannot rest unless he finds some meaning. If it is not there he projects it. But all words started in the beginning as just sounds.

It is just as the small child starts mumbling ‘Ma, ma, ma,’ and then it becomes ‘Ma, mother, madre’.

. . All the names for mother in the world come from that mumbling, and that mumbling ultimately decides the word for mother. That’s why it is similar in all the languages, because every child born anywhere finds it easier to mumble ‘M’ than any other sound – so mum, mummy; but they are all coming from the mumbling of the child. Even the word ‘mumbling’ comes from the sound that the child creates: mum, mum; mumbling also comes from the same sound.

Slowly slowly it gathers meaning, and because the mother is the most significant person for the child, the word ‘mother’ becomes very significant. Then mother country and mother language all become significant. But they all come from a small child mumbling nonsensically. He knows nothing, and he is not calling his mother, either; he is simply enjoying the sound that is easiest for him. But because, when he mumbles, he finds always, almost always, that the mother is there. it becomes associated with the mother. Whenever he mumbles the mother runs towards him, so slowly slowly he starts understanding that it must be the name of his mother; somehow it provokes his mother to come to him.

And that’s how all our words have slowly slowly arisen; in the beginning every word is a sound. The Bible says: In the beginning was the word, and the word was with god and the word was god. That is not the right translation. It should be: In the beginning was sound, and the sound was with god and the sound was god. Then it will be far more scientific.

Don’t be worried if you cannot find the meaning. There is nothing to be worried about. The sound is beautiful; it simply has some musical quality in it.

So become blissful music, a blissful sound, a blissful song.

Yogino means one who is in search of being one with existence – the search for unity with existence, the seeker of unity. Yoga means unity.

Somehow we feel separated, somehow we feel that we are not part of existence, that we have fallen apart. And the feeling is true: the mind has come between us and existence, it has surrounded us like a wall. Existence is not far away, but we are behind a wall. The wall is transparent so we can see, but still we cannot reach and touch.

The mind is continuously distorting whatsoever there is, because whatsoever is has to pass through the mind. Before it reaches to us the mind changes its colour, changes its form; the mind makes it adjust with itself; only then does it allow you to know about it.

Scientists say that only two per cent of messages reach to us; out of a hundred, ninety-eight are simply screened out. The mind does not allow them to reach us; they are too dangerous for its existence, for its security.

This mind has to be dropped: that is the search of a yogi. How to attain to no-mind, that is his goal. And when there is no mind, there is no barrier: one is bridged. One melts into the whole and the whole melts into one; the drop becomes the ocean and the ocean becomes the drop. And that is the ultimate orgasmic experience called samadhi.

Saint Francis was one of the most beautiful men who has ever walked on the earth. Very few Buddhas have been born in the West. The East has known many people like Francis, but in the West he is very unique and alone, a solitary peak so high that it cannot have any company. In the East many many people have been like Francis, because the Eastern search has been of the inner; and the Western search has been that of the outer. Just as you can find many scientists in the West and very few, almost none, in the East, the case is the same with mystics: in the East there have been many; in the West, few or almost none. This situation has to be changed, this is not a good situation.

The East should learn a little more science and the West should learn a little more religion, because only when science and religion meet can East and West meet. And the future will depend very much on that great synthesis between science and religion – where love is not against logic and logic is not against love, where they both hold hands together, where they both are married.

That’s my effort here with my sannyasins. The fundamental work is this: to create a synthesis of religion and science, to have as sharp an intellect as possible with as deep a heart as possible. Otherwise humanity is doomed. And this is possible; in fact this should be the natural thing because man has both the capacities, inborn capacities, there is no need to be lopsided.

I will keep your name so that you can move more and more towards mysticism, more and more towards the heart, more and more towards religion.

The Western mind has to move more towards mysticism, then there will be a balance; and the Eastern mind has to move more towards science, then there will be a balance. Both are leaning to the extremes, and the extreme, the excess, always brings misery. The East suffers from poverty, outer poverty; the West suffers from inner poverty. There is no need for anybody to be poor either outwardly or inwardly: we can create a world where everybody is rich in both ways.

[A sannyasin, who is leaving, says: I think there is the feeling of wanting to come forever, but I’m not really ready I don’t feel I was ready this time.]

No, you are ready; no problem is there. That’s what is creating the conflict in you: deep down you want to come here but you cannot trust your own deep voice, that’s the trouble.

It almost always happens that people cannot trust their own inner voices. They have never heard it; how can they trust it? It looks so illogical and it comes without any argument; it is simply there for no reason. The mind wants reasons and arguments – ‘Why?’ And it answers nothing; it simply says ‘Do it!’ It looks mad, and so the mind starts doubting it, condemning it, repressing it, putting it aside, not listening to it. Then you create a rift.

Listen to it, then all fear and this shakiness will disappear. It is because you are divided.…

Just go, and take... however much time is needed to finish things there. And come back forever!

[A sannyasin, who is leaving, says he has always been afraid, mainly to do with contact with people.]

The fear can be dissolved, but don’t be in a hurry to get rid of it, otherwise you will repress it. Be patient, watch it, try to understand it. Accept it as part of you. don’t say that it is something ugly that is clinging to you; that is rejecting it. It is just a part of you; just as love is a part, so is fear; it is just as anger is a part.

Never reject any emotion, because all those emotions constitute you and they are all needed. Of course no single emotion should become an obsession; they should be a kind of orchestra within you, they should remain in a proportionate way. No one single emotion should overwhelm you, that’s all that has to be remembered, but no emotion has to be rejected in toto.

Fear has its own place – it is needed, without it you will lose something – but it should not become a phobia. So one has to keep balance.

There are people who are so full of fear that fear spreads all over their being; that is pathological. And there are people, they are so afraid of fear that they repress it, they condemn it, they reject it so totally that they become almost like rocks; that too is ugly and pathological. Fear has its own place in the inner economy, it has something to contribute of immense importance.

I can see that it is a little too much, but don’t go to the other extreme and reject it completely. It has to be brought in to a normal harmony with other emotions; but it has to remain there.

So do these three things. First: drop this idea of dropping fear. Second: accept it; it is part of you. Third: watch it, observe it; try to understand why it is there and what it is. Between these three things you will bring it to the norm. It will not disappear, it will not be too much either: it will be exactly as much as is needed by you.

Some fear is needed, otherwise you will lose all your flexibility, flow; you will become adamant, stony. And if the fear completely disappears from your life then there will be no challenge left, and without challenge life becomes flat; that is not good.

But remind me when you come next time. Do these three things, and when you come back I will give you particular groups specifically for fear.

Come back. Help my people there!

[A sannyasin has returned to stay forever, and says: I’m a little afraid though.]

That’s natural; it is nothing to worry about. The closer you come to me, the more afraid you will be. Then, one day out of fear one simply jumps to get rid of it and everything disappears!

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