Glimpses of a Golden Childhood
1984 in Lao Tzu House, Rajneeshpuram, USA

Chapter # 41
Chapter # 42
Chapter # 43
Chapter # 44

Chapter # 41

Okay.
I could not even begin to tell you what I wanted to tell you. Perhaps it was not meant to be, because I tried so many times to bring myself to the point, but in vain, and then everything went sane. But it was a most fruitful session, although nothing was said, and nothing was heard either. There was so much laughter, but I felt imprisoned.
You must have been wondering why I laughed. It is good that there is no mirror in front of me. You must arrange a mirror; at least that will make this place what it is meant to be. But it was really good. I am relieved. I have not laughed perhaps for years. Something in me must have waited for this morning, but I was not making any effort in that direction, at least not today -- perhaps someday.
Sometimes these circles overlap each other, and they are going to do that again and again. I try my best to keep clear-cut directions, but those circles, they just go on trying to encircle everything they can. They are mad people, or who knows? -- perhaps they are Buddhas again trying to have a glimpse of the old world, to see how things are going now. But that is not my purpose. I could not get where I was trying to go, and I laughed instead of continuing in spite of your laughter.
Now, these are just the introductions, but I became aware of one thing this morning -- not that I was not aware of it before, but I was not aware that it needed to be told. But now it needs to be told.
On the twenty-first of March 1953, a strange thing happened. Many strange things happened, but I am only talking about one thing. The others will come in their own time. It is, in fact, a little early in my story to tell you, but I was reminded this morning of this peculiar thing. After that night I lost all sense of time. Howsoever hard I may try, I cannot -- as everybody else can at least approximately -- remember what time it is.
Not only that, in the morning, every morning I mean, I have to look out of the window to see whether it was my afternoon sleep or the night sleep, because I sleep twice each day. And every afternoon too, when I wake up, the first thing I do is to look at my clock. Once in a while the clock plays a joke on me; it stops working. It is showing only six, so it must have stopped in the morning. That's why I have two watches and a clock, just to keep checking to see whether any of them is playing a joke.
And one of the other clocks is more dangerous, better not to mention it. I want to give it to somebody as a present, but I have not found the right man to whom I would like to give this clock, because it is going to be a real punishment, not a present. It is electronic, so whenever the electricity goes off, even for a single moment, the clock goes back to twelve P.M. and flashes it... twelve... twelve... twelve... simply to show that the electricity has gone off.
Sometimes I want to throw it out, but somebody has presented it to me, and I don't throw things away easily, it is disrespectful. So I am waiting for the right person.
I have got not only one, but two such clocks, one in each room. Sometimes they have deceived me when I go for my afternoon sleep. I usually go at eleven-thirty exactly, or at the most twelve, but very rarely. Once or twice I have looked out from a peep hole in my blanket, and the clock is showing twelve, and I say to myself, "That means I have just come to bed." And I go to sleep again.
After one or two hours I again look. "Twelve," I say to myself. "Strange... today time seems to have finally stopped. Better to go to sleep rather than to find everybody else asleep." So I go to sleep again.
I have now instructed Gudia that if I am not awake by two-fifteen, she should wake me up.
She asked, "Why?"
I said, "Because if nobody wakes me I may go on sleeping forever."
Every morning I have to decide whether it is morning or evening, because I don't know. I don't have that sense; it was lost on that date I told you.
This morning when I asked you, "What is the time?" you said, "Ten-thirty." I thought, "Jesus! This is too much. My poor secretary must have been waiting one-and-a-half hours already, and I have not even begun my story." So I said, just to finish it, "Give me ten minutes." The real reason was that I was thinking it was night.
And Devaraj also knows, now he can understand it exactly. One morning when he accompanied me to my bathroom, I asked him, "Is my secretary waiting?" He looked puzzled. I had to close the door just so that he could be himself again. If I went on standing there in the doorway, waiting -- and you know Devaraj... nobody can be so loving to me. He could not say to me that it was not nighttime. If I was asking for my secretary, then there must be some reason; and of course she was not there and it was not the time for her to come, so what should he say?
He didn't say anything. He simply kept silent. I laughed. The question must have embarrassed him, but I am telling you the truth, just because time is always a problem for me.
Somehow I go on managing, by using strange devices. Just look at this device: has any Buddha spoken like this?
I was telling you that Jainism is the most ancient religion. It is not a value to me, remember it, it is a DISvalue. But a fact is a fact; value or disvalue, that is our attitude. Jainism is rarely known in the West. Not only in the West, but even in the East, except for a few parts of India. The reason is that the Jaina monks are naked. They cannot move into communities which are not already Jaina. They would be stoned, killed, even in the twentieth century.
The British government, which remained in India until 1947, had a special law for Jaina monks, that before they enter a city their followers had to ask for permission. Without a permit they can't enter. And even with a permit they cannot enter great cities like Bombay, New Delhi or Calcutta. Their followers should surround them in such a way that nobody can see that they are naked.
I am using "they" because a Jaina monk is not allowed to travel alone. He has to travel with a group of monks, at least five; that is the minimum limit. The limit is placed so that they can spy on each other. It is a very what you would call "suspicious" religion -- suspicious naturally, because everything it prescribes to be done is unnatural.
It is winter, and one is shivering, and would like to sit by the side of a fire -- but a Jaina monk cannot sit by the side of a fire, because fire is violence. Fire kills, because trees are needed for it, so they are killed. The ecologists perhaps may agree. And when you are burning a fire, many very small creatures, alive but invisible to the naked eye, are burned. And sometimes even the wood carries ants within it, and other kinds of insects which have made their houses in it.
So, in short, the Jaina monk is not allowed to come close to a fire. Of course he cannot use a blanket -- it is made of wool; that is again violence. Of course something else could be found, but because he cannot possess anything... Non-possessiveness is very fundamental, and the Jainas are extremists. They have taken the logic of non-possessing to its very extreme. It is really a sight to see a Jaina monk. One can see what logic can do to a man.
He is ugly, because he is undernourished: just bones, almost dead, just his belly is big, though his whole body is shrunken. That is strange, but you can understand. It happens wherever there is famine and people are starving. You must have seen pictures of children with big bellies; such big bellies, and all their limbs, hands and legs, are just bones covered by skin, and that too not very beautiful... almost dead skin. The same happens to a Jaina monk.
Why? I can understand because I have known both. The bellies of both starving children and Jaina monks immediately became my interest. Why? -- because they both have the same kind of bellies, and also their bodies are similar. Their faces too are similar. Forgive me for saying it, but their faces are faceless. They don't say anything, they don't show anything. They are not only empty pages, but pages which have waited and waited for something to be written on them, to make them significant... but they became sore because nobody ever came.
They became so bitter against the world that they turned over -- rolled over rather, because I am using the page as a symbol -- they rolled over and closed themselves against any future possibilities. The starving child has to be helped; the Jaina monk has to be helped more, because he thinks that what he is doing is right.
But an ancient religion is bound to be very stupid. This very stupidity is a proof of its ancientness. RIG VEDA mentions the first Jaina Master, Rishabha Deva. He is thought to be the founder of the religion. I can't say for sure because I don't want to blame anybody, particularly Rishabha Deva, whom I have never met-and I don't think that I will ever meet him either.
If he was really the founder of this stupid cult then I am the last person he would like to meet. But that is not the point; the point is that the Jainas have a different calendar. They count their days not by the sun, but by the moon, naturally, because their year is divided into twenty-four parts, so they have twenty-four tirthankaras. Their whole creation is the circle, in the image of a year, but moon-oriented, just as there are sun-oriented people. It is all arbitrary. In fact the whole thing, at this moment, according to me, is stupid.
Just look at the English calendar and see the stupidity, then you will understand me. It is easy to laugh at the Jainas because you don't know anything about them; they must be idiots. But what about the English calendar?
How come one month has thirty days, another month has thirty-one days, one month twenty-nine days, another month twenty-eight days? What is all this nonsense? And the year has three hundred and sixty-five days, not because you have made a calendar according to the sun, it is not because of the sun.
Three hundred and sixty-five days is only the time it takes the earth to complete its journey around the sun. How you divide it is up to you; but three hundred and sixty-five... ? Three hundred and sixty-five days has created trouble, because it is not exactly three hundred and sixty-five, there is also lingering behind a small part which becomes one day every fourth year. That means three hundred and sixty-five and one fourth days should be the whole year. Very strange year!
But what can you do about it? You just have to manage, so you divide the different months into different numbers of days, and February has to be one day more every four years. A strange calendar! I think no computer would allow this kind of nonsense.
There are, just like sun-oriented fools, moon-oriented fools too. They are really lunatics because they believe in the lunar. Then, of course, the year is divided into twelve parts, and each month has two divisions. And these fools are always great philosophers. They go on building up strange hypotheses. This was their hypothesis in the Jaina tradition of fools. I mean all traditions are foolish. This is only one tradition of fools.
The Jainas believe that there are twenty-four tirthankaras, and each cycle will again and again have twenty-four tirthankaras. Now, Hindus felt belittled. People started asking, "You have only ten, not twenty-four?"
Naturally the Hindu priests started talking of twenty-four avatars. It is a borrowed foolishness. In the first place, foolishness; in the second place, borrowed. That is the worst thing that can happen to anybody. And this has happened to a great country of millions of people.
This disease was so infectious that when Buddha died the Buddhists felt naturally very deceived -- what do you say?... put down, belittled, humiliated. Why had he not told them about the figure twenty-four? "Jainas have it; Hindus have it... and we have only one Buddha," so they created twenty-four Buddhas who preceded Gautam the Buddha.
Now, you can see how far nonsense can go. Yes, it can go on and on... That's what I mean, but I have to end the sentence. Remember, that does not mean that I am putting a full stop on nonsense; it has no end.
If you are stupid, you are as infinitely stupid as they say God is wise. I don't know anything about God and His wisdom, but I know about your foolishness. That's what I am here to do; just to help you get rid of the stupidity you are now carrying. First the Jainas carried it, then Hindus borrowed it, then Buddhists borrowed it, then the number twenty-four becomes an absolute necessity.
I have seen one man, Swami Satyabhakta... he is one of those rare people whom I always have wondered why existence tolerated at all. He thought that he was the twenty-fifth tirthankara. Mahavira was the twenty-fourth; of course Jainas could not forgive Satyabhakta and they expelled him.
I told him, "Satyabhakta, if you want to be a tirthankara, why can't you be the first? Why stand in a queue, just trying hard for your whole life to be the twenty-fifth, the last? Just look behind you, there is nobody there."
He made great effort, and worked very hard writing hundreds of books -- and he was very scholarly. That also proves that he is a fool, but not an ordinary fool, an extraordinary fool.
I told him, "Why don't you create your own religion if you have known the truth?"
He said, "That's the problem, I'm not certain."
I said, "Then at least don't bother others. First be certain. Wait, let me call your wife."
He said, "No, no!"
I said, "Wait. I am calling your wife. You cannot stop me."
But I need not have called, she had come already. In fact I had seen her coming, that's why I had said, "Don't stop me." Nobody could have stopped her, she was already coming. I don't mean the word "coming" as you westerners mean it. She was really coming, and she came with great force.
I mean that she really came in with great force and she asked me, "Why are you wasting time with this fool? I have wasted my whole life, and not only lost everything, but even my religion. Just because he has been expelled, naturally I am expelled too. One is born a Jaina only after millions of lives, and this fool has not only fallen himself, he has degraded me. It is good that he is impotent and we don't have any children, otherwise they would have been expelled too."
I was the only one who laughed, and I told them, "Laugh. This is wonderful. You are impotent. I am not saying it, your wife is. I don't know how much she knows about gynecology, but if she is saying it, and you are listening without even raising your eyes, it is proof enough that she is a gynecologist. You are impotent, great! You are not even able to make your wife your follower, and yet you are trying to prove to be the twenty-fifth tirthankara! This is really amusing, Satyabhakta."
He never forgave me, just because I found him exactly at the right moment. Satyabhakta is still an enemy, although I sympathize with him. At least he can say that he has an enemy. As far as a friend is concerned, he has none. And the credit goes to his wife.
In the same way Morarji Desai became my enemy. I have nothing against him, but just because he had to wait ninety minutes for a young boy of no political importance at all, naturally, he was immensely offended. When he saw the prime minister opening the door of the car for the boy... I can still see the scene; how to describe it? There was something very slimy, slippery, about the man; you could not catch hold of it. It slips again and again, and every time it slips it becomes more and more dirty. There was something slimy and slippery in his eyes, I remember. I saw him later, on three other occasions. Some other circle may cover them.
Very good. After such an experience only "no" can be any good, because there is nothing like no.
Very good.
Devageet, stop it. I have other things to do. Gudia has opened the door to remind me.

Chapter # 42

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Okay.
What was I telling you? I cannot remember it, remind me.
"We were talking about how Morarji Desai and Satyabhakta became your enemies, and the last thing you said was that Morarji Desai had something in his eyes that was slimy and slippery, which you remember."
Good. It is better to not remember it. Perhaps that's why I cannot remember. Otherwise my memory is not bad, at least nobody has told me that. Even those who don't agree with me say that my memory is just impossible to believe. When I was moving around the country, I remembered thousands of people's names, their faces; not only that, but when I met them again I immediately remembered where we had last met, what I had said to them, what they had said to me -- it may have been ten or fifteen years before. Naturally the man would be astonished. It is good that at least my memory fails exactly where it should, at Morarji Desai, that is.
You cannot believe that even God makes caricatures. I have heard He made creatures, but caricatures? Specially made for cartoonists? Morarji is a walking cartoon. But I had not laughed at him; I was so full of the strange meeting between a boy and the prime minister, and the way they talked together. I still cannot believe that a prime minister could talk that way. He was almost just a listener, only asking questions so that the conversation would continue. It seemed he wanted it to continue forever because many times the door opened, and his personal secretary looked in. But Jawaharlal was really a good man; he had turned his chair away from the door. The personal secretary could only see his back.
Only later on did I understand, when Masto told me that this was the first time he had seen Jawaharlal put his chair this way. He said the personal secretary is meant to open the door to announce that the time for the visitor is now over, and another visitor is ready to enter.
But Jawaharlal was not bothered by anything in the world. It was as if all that he wanted to know about was vipassana. I was a little hesitant to tell him what vipassana is because of the situation. I will have to tell you the meaning of the word vipassana. It means "looking back." Passan means "looking," vipassana means "looking back."
What I am doing at this moment is vipassana.
I was knocking Masto with my leg but he was sitting like a yogi. He was afraid I would do something like that, so he was prepared, in a way prepared for anything to happen. And I really hit him hard.
He said, "Aargh!"
Jawaharlal said, "What is the matter?"
Masto said, "Nothing."
I said, "He is lying."
Masto said, "This is too much. You hit me, and you hit me so hard that I forget that I have to keep quiet, and not become a football in your hands, and now you are telling Jawaharlal that I am lying."
I said, "Now he is not lying but telling you how you can forget, because vipassana means `not forgetting'." And I said to Masto, "I am explaining vipassana to Jawaharlal so I hit you hard. Please excuse me, and don't take it for granted that it was the last."
Jawaharlal really laughed... he laughed so much that tears came to his eyes. That is always the quality of a real poet, not an ordinary one. You can buy ordinary poets, perhaps in the West they are a little more costly, otherwise a dollar-a-dozen will do. He was not a poet of that type -- a dollar-a-dozen. He was really one of those few rare souls whom Buddha has called bodhisattvas. I will call him a bodhisattva.
I was, and still am, amazed how he could become the prime minister. But the first prime minister of India was of a totally different quality from any other prime minister who was to follow. He was not chosen by the crowd, he was not, in fact, a chosen candidate. He was Mahatma Gandhi's choice.
Gandhi, whatsoever his faults, at least did one thing that even I can appreciate. This is the only thing, otherwise I am against Mahatma Gandhi, point by point. But why he had to choose Jawaharlal is another story, perhaps not meant to be part of my circle. What matters to me is that at least he must have been sensitive to a poetic person. He was certainly ascetic; yet with all his nonsense he was still sensible enough to choose Jawaharlal.
That's how a poet became the prime minister. Otherwise there is no possibility for a poet to become a prime minister -- unless a prime minister goes mad, and becomes a poet, but that will not be the same thing.
We talked of poetry. I had thought that he would talk of politics. Even Masto, who had known him for years, was astounded that he was talking about poetry and the meaning of the poetic experience. He looked at me as if I knew the answer.
I said, "Masto, you should know better, you have known Jawaharlal for years. I did not know him at all until just now. We are still only in the process of introducing ourselves. So don't look with a questioning eye, although I understand your question: `What has happened to the politician? Has he gone mad?' No, I say it to you, and to him also, that he is not a politician -- perhaps by accident, but not by his intrinsic nature."
And Jawaharlal nodded and said, "At least one person in my life has said it exactly, as I was not able to formulate it clearly. It was vague. But now I know what has happened, it is an accident."
"And," I added, "a fatal one." And we all laughed.
"But," I said, "the accident has been fatal. But your poet is unharmed, and I don't care about anything else. You can still see the stars as a child does."
He said, "Again! Because I love to see the stars -- but how did you come to know about it?"
I said, "I have nothing to do with it. I know what being a poet is, so I can describe you in every detail. So please, from this moment, don't be astonished. Just take it easy." And he certainly relaxed. Otherwise for a politician to relax is impossible.
In India, the mythology is that when an ordinary person dies, only one devil comes to take him, but when a politician dies, a crowd of devils have to come because he won't relax, even in death. He won't allow it. He has never allowed anything to happen of its own accord. He does not know the meaning of those simple words, "Let go."
But this man Jawaharlal immediately relaxed. He said, "With you I can relax. And Masto has never been a source of tension to me, so he can also relax. I am not preventing him, unless being a swami, a sannyasin, a monk, prevents him."
We all laughed. And this was not the last meeting, it was only the first. Masto and I had thought it was the last, but when we were departing, Jawaharlal said, "Can you come again tomorrow at this same time? And I will keep this fellow," he said, pointing towards Morarji Desai, "away from here. Even his presence stinks, and you know of what. I am sorry, but I have to keep him in the cabinet because he has a certain political importance. And what does it matter if he drinks his own urine? It is not my business." We laughed again, and departed.
That evening, he reminded us again on the phone, saying, "Don't forget. I have canceled all my other appointments and I will be waiting for you both."
We had no work to do at all. Masto had come just to make me acquainted with the prime minister, and that was done. Masto said, "If the prime minister wants it, we have to stay. We cannot say `No,' that would not be helpful to your future."
I said, "Don't be worried about my future. Will it be helpful to Jawaharlal or not?"
Masto said, "You are impossible." And he was right, but I came to know it too late, when it was difficult to change.
I have become so accustomed to being what I am that even in small things it is difficult for me to change. Gudia knows, she tries to teach me in every possible way not to splash water all over the bathroom. But can you teach me anything? I cannot stop. Not that I want to torture the girls, or that they have to be tortured twice every day, because I take two baths, so naturally they have to clean twice.
Of course Gudia thinks I can take a bath in such a way that they don't have to remove water from everywhere. But finally she dropped the idea of teaching me. It is impossible for me to change. When I take my shower I enjoy it so much that I forget, and splash the water all over. And without splashing it I would have to remain controlled even in my bathroom.
Now look at Gudia: she is enjoying the idea because she knows exactly what I am saying. When I take a shower I really take a shower, and I splash not only the floor, but even the walls, and if you have to clean, then of course it is a problem for you. But if you clean with love, as my cleaners do, then it is better than psychoanalysis, and far better than transcendental meditation. I cannot now change anything.
Now, what Masto was talking about has happened. What was future then is now past. But I am the same, and I have remained the same. In fact to me, it seems that death happens not the moment when you stop breathing, but when you stop being yourself. I have never for any reason allowed any compromise.
We went the next day, and Jawaharlal had invited his son-in-law, Indira Gandhi's husband. I wondered why he had not invited his daughter. Later on Masto said to me, "Indira takes care of Jawaharlal. His wife died young, and he has only one child, his daughter Indira, and she has been both a daughter and a son to him."
In India, when the daughter marries she has to go to her husband's house. She becomes part of another family. Indira never went. She simply refused. She said, "My mother is dead, and I cannot leave my father alone."
This created the beginning of the end in their marriage. They remained husband and wife, but Indira was never part of Feroze Gandhi's family. Even their two sons, Sanjaya and Raju, came to belong naturally, because of their mother, to her family.
Masto told me, "Jawaharlal cannot invite them together, they would start fighting then and there."
I said, "That's strange. Even for one hour can't they forget that they are husband and wife?"
Masto said, "It is impossible to forget, even for a single moment. To be a husband or a wife means a declaration of war." Although people call it love, it is really a cold war. And it is better to have a hot war, particularly in a cold winter, than to have a cold war twenty-four hours a day. It even starts freezing your being.
We were again surprised when he invited us the third day. We had been thinking of leaving, and he had not said anything the second day. The morning of the third day, Jawaharlal phoned. He had a private number which was not listed in the directory. Only a few people, those who were very close, could call him on that number.
I asked Masto, "He called us himself; can't he just tell his secretary to call us?"
Masto said, "No, this is his private number; even the secretary has no knowledge that he is inviting us. The secretary will come to know only when we reach the porch."
And that third day Jawaharlal introduced me to Indira Gandhi. He simply said to her, "Don't ask who he is, because right now he is no one, but someday he could be really somebody."
I know he was wrong; I'm still no one, and I am going to remain no one to the very end. To be a no one is so tremendously blissful; one gets really spaced. I must be one of the most spaced-out people in the world. But still, try to be no one, it is far out -- just faaar out.
But nobody wants to be no one, nobody, nothing, and naturally that's why Jawaharlal was saying to Indira, "Now he is no one, but I can predict one day he certainly will be someone."
Jawaharlal, you are dead, but I am sorry to say I could not fulfill your prediction. It failed, fortunately.
And that started my friendship with Indira. She already had a high post, and soon became the president of the ruling party in India, and then a minister in Jawaharlal's cabinet, and finally prime minister. Indira is the only woman I have known who could manage these idiots -- the politicians -- and she managed well.
How she managed it I cannot say. Perhaps she had learned all their faults while she was a nobody, just a caretaker for old Jawaharlal. But she knew their faults so well that they are afraid of her, trembling. Even Jawaharlal could not throw this perfect idiot, Morarji Desai, out of his cabinet.
I told this to Indira, in a later meeting. It may come sometime, or may not, so better that I mention it right now. These circles are not dependable. I told her in our last meeting, that was years after Jawaharlal had died... it must have been somewhere around 1968. She told me, "What you are saying is absolutely right, and I would like to do it, but what to do with people like Morarji? They are in my cabinet, and they are the majority. Although they belong to my party, they would not be able to understand if I try to implement anything you are saying. I agree, but I feel helpless."
I said, "Why don't you throw out this fellow? Who is preventing you? And if you cannot throw him out, then resign, because it does not suit a person of your caliber to work with these fools. Put them right -- that is right side up, because they are doing shirshasana, standing on their heads. Either put them right or resign, but do something."
I have always liked Indira Gandhi. I still like her, although she is not doing anything to help my work -- but that's another matter. I liked her from the moment she told me, rather whispered in my ear, although there was nobody to hear, but who knows? -- politicians are careful people.
She whispered, "I will do something or other."
I could not figure out, at that moment, what she meant -- "something or other"? But after seven days I read in the newspaper that Morarji Desai had been suddenly thrown out. I was far away, perhaps thousands of miles.
He had just returned from a tour of his constituency to visit the prime minister, and this was his welcome. A rather strange welcome... I should say a "well-go." Can I make a word "well-go"? Then they are giving a good well-go. That will be exactly what people do... who welcomes?
But I was not surprised. In fact, every day I was looking in the newspapers to see what was happening because I had to figure out her meaning-"something or other" -- but she did something. She did the right thing. This man had been the most obstructive, obscurantist, orthodox, and whatnot, and anything wrong that you can think of.
What is the time, Devageet?
"Ten twenty-four, Osho."
Ten minutes for me. This is good but it can be improved. Unless you come to your perfection today I am going to be a hard taskmaster. Go for perfection. Don't ask for continuation; perfection is the word. Although it is not heard, but still perfection is the word, heard or unheard.
Yes, unless I know that you have come to your ultimate capacity I am not going to stop. So be quick!
Good.
The moment I say good, you become afraid. I immediately see your fear and trembling. That's why, once in a while I have to address Ashu, saying, "Don't be bothered about Devageet's fear, just be a simple woman, without knowledge, and go to the heights. Let poor Devageet run behind." He will try hard. I can see him running to get ahead of you, that's why I laugh. Who can be behind one's own assistant?
Don't be worried, today at twelve the world is going to stop anyway. So Ashu, be quick! Before the world ends at least let me have my lunch.
Good. Stop.

Chapter # 43

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Okay.
I have always wondered how God could manage to make this world in only six days. And this world! Perhaps that's why He called His son Jesus! What a name to give to your own son! He had to punish somebody for what He had done, and there was nobody else available. The Holy Ghost is always absent; he is sitting there on the horse seat, that's why I told Chetana to vacate it, because to ride a horse with somebody already riding on it is not good. I mean not good for the horse -- not good for Chetana either. As for the Holy Ghost, I don't care a bit. I don't feel for the Holy Ghost or any other type of ghost. I'm always for the living.
A ghost is a shadow of the dead, and even if holy, what is the use? And it is ugly too. Chetana, I was not worried about the Holy Ghost. If you ride on him, it is okay as far as I am concerned. Ride on the Holy Ghost. But this poor chair is not even meant for a full person. It is not meant to be sat on. It is meant only for half a person, so that you don't fall asleep. That's why it is made in such a way.
In that chair you cannot even sit, what to say of sleeping? And even that chair could not fit in this small Noah's Ark. It is so small that Noah himself has to stand outside, just to make space for all you creatures.
What was I saying, Devageet?
"The Holy Ghost is always absent; he is now sitting on the horse seat." (LAUGHTER)
That I remember. I knew you could not take notes. Concentrate. But I will manage. I managed my whole life without notes.
What Jawaharlal asked me on that last day was certainly strange.
He asked, "Do you think it is okay to be in the political world?"
I said, "I don't think, I know it is not okay at all. It is a curse, a karma. You must have done something wrong in your past lives, otherwise you could not be the prime minister of India."
He said, "I agree."
Masto could not believe that I could answer the prime minister in such a way, nor, even more, that the prime minister would agree.
I said, "That finishes a long argument between me and Masto, in my favor. Masto, do you agree?"
He said, "Now I have to."
I said, "I never like anything that `had to'; it is better to disagree. At least in that disagreement there will be some life. Don't give me this dead rat! In the first place, a rat -- and then too, dead! Do you think I am an eagle, a vulture, or what?"

Even Jawaharlal looked at both of us in turns.
I said, "You have decided. I am thankful to you. Masto, for years, has been in a dilemma. He could not decide whether a good man should be in politics or not."
We talked of many things. I did not think in that house -- I mean the prime minister's house -- that any meeting would have lasted so long. By the time we ended it was nine-thirty -- three hours! Even Jawaharlal said, "This must be my life's longest meeting, and the most fruitful."
I said, "What fruitfulness has it brought you?"
He said, "Just the friendship of a man who does not belong to this world, and will never belong to this world. I will cherish it as a sacred memory." And in his beautiful eyes I could see the first gathering of tears.
I rushed out, just not to embarrass him, but he followed me and said, "There was no need to rush so fast."
I said, "Tears were coming faster." He laughed and wept together.
It very rarely happens, and only either to madmen or to the really intelligent ones. He was not a madman, but superbly intelligent. We -- I mean Masto and I -- talked again and again about that meeting, particularly the tears and the laughter. Why? Naturally we, as always, did not agree. That had become a routine thing. If I had agreed, he would not have believed it. It would have been such a shock.
I said, "He wept for himself, and laughed for the freedom I had."
Of course, Masto's interpretation was, "He wept for you, not for himself, because he could see that you could become an important political force, and he laughed at his own idea."
That was Masto's interpretation. Now, there was no way to decide, but fortunately Jawaharlal decided it himself, accidentally. Masto told me, so there is no problem.
Before Masto left me forever, to disappear in the Himalayas, and before I died the way everybody has to die to be resurrected, he told me, "Do you know, Jawaharlal has been remembering you again and again, particularly in my last meeting with him. He said, `If you see that strange boy, and if you are in any way concerned about him, keep him out of politics, because I wasted my life with these stupid people. I don't want that boy begging votes from utterly stupid, mediocre, unintelligent masses. No, if you have any say in his life, please protect him from politics.'"
Masto said, "That decided our argument in your favor, and I'm happy because although I argued with you, and against you, deep down I always agreed with you."
I never saw Jawaharlal again, although he lived many years. But, just as he wanted it -- and I had already decided it; his advice only became a confirmation of my own decision -- I have never voted in my life and never been a member of any political party, never even dreamed of it. In fact, for almost thirty years I have not dreamed at all. I cannot.
I can manage a sort of rehearsal. The word will seem strange, a "rehearsal" dream, but the actual drama never happens, cannot happen; it needs unconsciousness, and that ingredient is missing. You can make me unconscious, but still you will not make me dream. And to make me unconscious needs not much technology, just a hit over my head and I will be unconscious. But that is not the unconsciousness I am talking about.
You are unconscious when you go on doing things without knowing why; during the day, during the night -- the awareness is missing. Once awareness happens, dreaming disappears. Both cannot exist together. There is no coexistence possible between these two things, and nobody can make it. Either you dream, then you are unconscious; or you are awake, aware, pretending to dream -- but that is not a dream. You know and everybody else knows too.
What was I saying?
"For almost thirty years you haven't dreamed. `I never saw Jawaharlal again, even though he lived many years.'"
Good.
There was no need to see him again, although many people approached me. Somehow they came to know through various sources, from Jawaharlal's house, secretaries, or others, that I knew him, and he loved me. Naturally they wanted something to be done for them, and asked if I would recommend it to him.
I said, "Are you mad? I don't know him at all."
They said, "We have solid proofs."
I said, "You can keep your solid proofs. Perhaps in some dream we have met, but not in reality."
They said, "We always thought that you were a little mad, now we know."
I said, "Spread it, please, as far and wide as possible, and don't be so conservative -- just a little mad? Be generous -- I am absolutely mad!"
They left without even saying thank you to me. I had to give them a thank you, so I said, "I am a madman, at least I can give you a good thank you."
They said to each other, "Look! A good thank you? He is mad."
I loved to be known as mad. I still love it. There is nothing more beautiful than the madness I have come to know.
Masto said before he left, "Jawaharlal has given me this man's name, Ghanshyamdas Birala. He is the richest man in India, and very close to the family of Jawaharlal. In any kind of need he can be approached. And when he was giving me this address Jawaharlal said, `That boy haunts me. I predict he can become...'" and Masto remained silent.
I said, "What is the matter? Complete the sentence at least."
Masto said, "I am going to. This silence is also his. I am simply imitating him. What you are asking me, I had asked him. Then Jawaharlal completed the sentence. And I will tell you," Masto said, "what the reason was. Jawaharlal said, `He may become one day...' and then came the silence. Perhaps he was weighing something inside, or was not very clear about what to say; then he said, `a Mahatma Gandhi.'"
Jawaharlal was giving me the greatest respect that he could. Mahatma Gandhi had been his master, and also the man who decided that Jawaharlal would be the first prime minister of India. Naturally, when Mahatma Gandhi was shot dead, Jawaharlal wept. Speaking on the radio, weeping, he said, "The light has gone out. I don't want to say anything more. He was our light, now we will have to live in darkness."
If he had said it to Masto with hesitation, then either he was thinking whether to compare this unknown boy with the world-famous mahatma, or he was perhaps weighing between the mahatma and a few other names... and I think that is more probable, because Masto told him, "If I tell that boy, he will immediately say, `Gandhi! He is the last person in the world I would like to be. I would rather go to hell than be Mahatma Gandhi.' So it is better to let you know how he will react. I know him very deeply. He will not be able to tolerate this comparison, and he loves you. Just because of this name don't destroy your lover."
I said to Masto, "This is too much, Masto. You need not have said that to him. He is old, and as far as I am concerned, he has compared me to the greatest man in his way of thinking."
Masto said, "Wait. When I said this, Jawaharlal said, `I had suspected, that's why I waited, weighing whether to say it or not. Then don't say it to him, change it. Perhaps he may become a Gautam Buddha!'"
Rabindranath, the great Indian poet, has written that Jawaharlal very secretly loved Gautam Buddha. Why secretly? Because he never liked any organized religion, and he did not believe in God either, and Jawaharlal was the prime minister of India.
Masto said, "I then said to Jawaharlal, `Forgive me. You have come very close, but to tell you the truth he will not like any comparison.' And do you know," Masto then asked me, "what Jawaharlal said? He said `That is the kind of man I love and respect. But protect him by every possible means so that he does not get caught into politics, which destroyed me. I don't want that same calamity to happen again, to him.' "
Masto disappeared after that. I also disappeared, so nobody is there to complain. But the memory is not consciousness, and memory can function even without consciousness, in fact more efficiently. After all, what is a computer? A memory system. The ego has died; that which is behind the ego is eternal. That which is part of the brain is temporal, and will die.
Even after death I will be available to my people as much, or as little, as I am now. It all depends on them. That's why I am, by and by, disappearing from their world, so that it becomes more and more their thing.
I may be just one percent, and their love, their trust, their surrender are ninety-nine percent. But when I am gone even more will be needed -- one hundred percent. Then I will be available, perhaps more, to those who can afford -- write "who can afford" in capital letters -- because the richest man is one WHO CAN AFFORD a one hundred percent surrender in love and trust.
And I have got those people. So I don't want, even after death, in any way to disappoint them. I would like them to be the most fulfilled people on earth. Whether I am here or not, I will rejoice.

Chapter # 44

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I was wondering yesterday how God created this world in six days. I was wondering, because I have not yet been able to even go beyond the second day of my primary school. And what a world He created! Perhaps He was a Jew, because only Jews have circulated the idea.
Hindus don't believe in a God, they believe in many gods. In fact, when they first conceived the idea, they counted exactly as many gods as there were Indians -- at that time I mean. At that time too they were not a small population; thirty-three crores, that means three hundred and thirty million, or it may not be so. But it will give you some idea of the Hindus. They believed that each single individual had to have a god of his own. They were not dictatorial, very democratic, in fact too much so -- I mean the previous Hindus.
Thousands of years have passed since they conceived the idea of a parallel divine world, with as many beings as there were on earth. And they did a great job. Even to count three hundred and thirty million gods... and you don't know the Hindu gods! They are everything that a human being can be -- very cunning, mean, political, in every way exploitative. But somehow, somebody at least managed to have a census.
Hindus are not theistic in the western sense. They are pagans; but they are not pagans as Christians want to use the word. Pagan is a valuable word, it should not be allowed to be misused by the Christians, Jews and Mohammedans. These three religions are all basically Jewish; whatsoever they say, their foundations were laid down long before Jesus was born, and Mohammed was heard. They are all Judaic.
Of course the God you have heard about is a Jew, He cannot be otherwise. That's where the secret lies. If He were a Hindu, He Himself would have fallen into three hundred and thirty million pieces, what to say of creating a world? Even if there was already a world, these three hundred and thirty million gods would have been enough to destroy it.
The Hindu "God" -- no such word can be used because there are only "gods" in Hinduism, not a God -- is not a creator. He Himself is part of the universe. By He I mean the three hundred and thirty-three million gods. I have to use your word, "He," but Hindus always use "That." "That" is a big umbrella, you can hide as many gods in it as you want. Even the unwanted ones can have a little space at the back. It is almost like a circus tent -- vast, big and capable of having every kind of god that can be imagined.
The Jew God really did a great job. Of course He was a good Jew, and He created the world in only six days. This whole mess is what Albert Einstein, another Jew, calls "the expanding universe." It is expanding every second, becoming bigger and bigger, like a pregnant woman's belly, and of course faster than that. It is expanding at the same speed as light and that is the greatest speed yet conceived.
Perhaps someday we may discover more speedy things, but right now it still remains the highest as far as speed is concerned. The world is expanding with the speed of light, and it has been expanding forever. There is no beginning and no end, at least in the scientific approach.
But the Christians say it not only began, but was finished within six days. And of course Jews are there, and the Mohammedans are there, and they are all branches of the same nonsense. Perhaps just one idiot created the possibility for all three religions. Don't ask me his name; idiots, particularly perfect ones, don't have names, so nobody knows who created the idea of creating the world in six days. At the most it is just worth laughing at. But listen to a Christian priest or a rabbi, and see the seriousness with which they are talking about the genesis, the very beginning.
I was wondering only because I cannot even finish my story in six days. I'm only on the second day, and that too because I have left so much unsaid, thinking that it is not important, but who knows? -- it may be. But if I start saying everything without choosing, then what about poor Devageet?
I can see that he will have so many notebooks he will go crazy looking at them. It will be as if he is standing by the side of the Empire State Building in New York looking at his own notebooks thinking, "Now who is going to read them?" And then I think of Devaraj who has to edit them. Whether anybody reads them or not, at least you will have one reader, that is Devaraj. Another, that is Ashu; she has to type them.
In the story of God's creation, there is no editor, no typist. He just created it in six days, and was so finished that nothing has been heard of Him since then. What happened to Him? Some think He has gone to Florida, where every retired person goes. Some think He is enjoying himself at Miami Beach... but this is all guesswork.
God does not exist at all. That's why existence is possible, otherwise He would have poked His nose in -- and a Jewish nose is meant for that. Rather than thinking of God, it is better to forget Him, and forgive Him also; it is time. It may sound a little strange, to forget and forgive God, but only then do you begin: His death is your birth.
Only a madman, Friedrich Nietzsche, had the idea -- but who listens to madmen? -- particularly when they are talking real sense, then it is even more difficult to listen to them. Nobody ever took Nietzsche seriously, but I think his declaration was one of the greatest moments in the history of consciousness: "God is dead!" He had to declare it; not because God died -- He had never been there, never been born in the first place, how could He be dead? Before you can be dead you have to suffer at least seventy years of so-called life. God has never been. It is good, because existence is enough unto itself. No outside agency is needed to create it.
But I was not going to talk about it. You see, each moment opens up so many ways, and you have to walk; whichever you choose you will repent, because who knows what was on the other paths that you have not chosen?
That's why nobody is happy in the world. There are hundreds of successful people, rich people, powerful people, but you don't find a crowd of happy people unless you meet my people. They are a different kind altogether.
Ordinarily everybody is going to be frustrated sooner or later. The more intelligent, the sooner; the more stupid, the later; and if utterly stupid, then never. Then he will die sitting on the merry-go-round, in Dinseyland.
How do you pronounce it, Ashu?
"Disneyland, Osho."
Disnay? Disney. Disney. Good. No woman can hide her feelings from me. A man can do that. I immediately became aware I had said something wrong. But you need not have worried about it. I am a wrong type of man. It is only rarely, by accident, that I will say something right; otherwise, I am always wise.
Now let us continue the story. This was a little diversion, and this is going to be a collection of thousands of diversions, because that's what life is....
Masto was not present to convince Indira Gandhi to work for me, but he tried his best with the first prime minister of India. Perhaps he did succeed, but only in convincing him that here is a man who should not in any way be in the political life of the country. Perhaps Jawaharlal was thinking for my sake, or for the country's sake; but he was not a cunning man, so the second cannot be the case. I have seen him so I know. Not just seen, but really have felt in deep empathy, a deep harmony, synchronicity with him.
He was old. He had lived his life and succeeded, and was frustrated. That was enough for me not to want to succeed in any worldly sense, and I can say I have kept myself intact from any success. In a strange way I have remained as if I have not been in the world at all.
Kabir has a beautiful song which describes what I am saying in a far more poetic way. He was a weaver, so of course his song is that of a weaver, remember.
He says, "Jhini jhini bini chadariya: I have prepared a beautiful cover for the night.... Jhini jhini bini chadariya, ramnam ras bhini: but I have not used it. I have not in any way made it second hand. It is as fresh at my death as it was at my birth."
And can you believe? -- he sang the song and died. People were thinking he was singing the song to them -- he was singing the song to existence itself. But those words were from a poor man, and yet so rich that even the whole of life had not been able to make a single scratch on him. And he has given back to existence what had been given to him by existence, exactly as it was given.
Many times I am surprised at how the body has grown old, but as far as I am concerned I don't feel old age or the aging process. Not even for a single moment have I felt different. I am the same, and so many things have happened but they have happened only on the periphery. So I can tell you what happened, but remember always, nothing has happened to me. I am just as innocent and as ignorant as I was before my birth.
The Zen people say, "Unless you know how you were, what was your face before you were born, you cannot understand us."
Naturally you will think, "These people are mad and they are trying to drive me mad too. Perhaps they are trying to convince me to look at my navel, or do something stupid like that."
And there are people who are doing things like that, and with great success, and have thousands of followers. To be with me is not to be on any trodden path. It is, in a strange way, not to be on any path at all... and then suddenly, you are home.
This happened to me, but around it thousands of other things also happened. And who knows who will trigger what? Look at Devageet; now something is triggered in him. Nobody knows, anything can start a process that can lead you to yourself. It is not far away, nor close by; it is just where you are. That's why sometimes the Buddhas have laughed, seeing the utter stupidity of all effort; the stupidity of all that they have been doing. But to see it they had to pass through many things.
What is the time?
"Seven minutes past ten, Osho."
Seven past ten?
"Yes."
Good.
Masto at our last meeting said many things; perhaps some of it may be helpful to somebody somewhere. He was about to leave, so he was saying everything that he wanted to say to me. Of course, he had to be very, very brief. He used maxims. That was strange, because the man was a prolific orator -- and using maxims?
He said, "You don't understand, I am in a hurry. Just listen, don't argue, because if we start arguing I will not be able to fulfill my promise to Pagal Baba."
Of course, when he said "Pagal Baba," he knew that name meant so much for me that I never argued against him. Then he could say even two plus two is five, and I would listen, not only listen but believe, trust. "Two plus two is four" needs no trust; but "two plus two equals five" certainly needs a love that goes beyond arithmetic. If Baba had said it, then it must be so.
So I listened; these were his few words. They were not many, but very significant.
He said, "First, never enter into any organization."
I said, "Okay." And I have not entered into any organization. I have kept my promise. I am not even a part, I mean a member of neo-sannyas. I cannot be, because of a promise given to someone whom I loved. I can only be amongst you. But howsoever I hide myself, I am a foreigner, even amongst you; just because of a promise that I'm going to fulfill to the very end.
"Second," he said, "you should not speak against the establishment."
I said, "Listen Masto, this is your own, and not Pagal Baba's, and I am absolutely sure of that."
He laughed, and said, "Yes, this is mine. I was just trying to check whether you could sort out the wheat from the chaff."
I said, "Masto, there is no need to bother about that. You just tell me what you want to say because you said there is a very great hurry. I don't see the hurry, but if you say it -- I love you too -- I believe it. You just tell me what is absolutely necessary, otherwise we can sit silently for as long as you allow."
He remained silent for a while, and then said, "Okay, it is better that we sit silently because you know what Baba has told me. He must have told you already."
I said, "I have known him so deeply that there is no need to tell me. Even if he came back I would say, `Don't bother, just be with me.' So it is good that you decided, but keep to your promise."
He said, "What promise?"
I said, "It is just a simple promise: being silent with me as long as you want to be here."
He was there for six hours more, and he kept his promise. Not a single word passed through us, but much more than words can convey. The only thing that he said to me when he left for the station was, "Can I now say the last thing? -- because I may not see you again." And he knew he was going forever.
I said, "Certainly."
He said, "Only this, that if you need any help from me you can always inform this address. If I am alive they will immediately tell me." And he gave me an address which I would not have believed had anything to do with Masto.
I said, "Masto!"
He said, "Don't ask, just inform this man."
"But," I said, "this man is Morarji Desai. I cannot inform him, and you know it."
He said, "I know it, but this is the only man who soon will be in power, and will be able to reach me anywhere in the Himalayas."
I said, "Do you think this is the man to succeed Jawaharlal?"
He said, "No. Another man should succeed him, but that man will not live long, and then Indira will succeed, and after that, this man. I'm giving you this address because these are the years when you will need me most, otherwise if Jawaharlal is there, or Indira is there...."
And between the two, Jawaharlal and Indira, there was another prime minister, a very beautiful man; very small as far as the body is concerned, but very great: Lalbahadur Shastri. But he was there only for a few months. It was strange, the moment he became prime minister he informed me that he wanted to see me saying, "Come to see me as soon as you can manage."
I reached Delhi because I knew Masto's hand must be there behind him. In fact I went to find the hand behind. I loved Masto so much I would have gone to hell -- and New Delhi is a hell. But I went because the prime minister had called, and it was a good time to find out where Masto was, and whether he was alive or not.
But, as fate would have it, the date that he had given me.... He was due to arrive in New Delhi from Tashkent, in Soviet Russia, where he had been for a summit conference of India, Russia, and Pakistan, but only his dead body came. He had died in Tashkent. I had come all the way to Delhi to ask him about Masto; and he came, but dead.
I said, "This is really a joke, a practical joke."
Now I cannot ask, and this address of Morarji Desai that Masto gave me, he knew, and if he is alive he knows, that even if there is a need I will not ask Morarji Desai. I will not. Not that I am against his policies, his philosophy -- that is superficial -- I am against his very structure. He is not a man with whom I could have a dialogue, not even a discussion.
It had to happen a few times, just by the configuration of circumstances, but I was not the initiator, and I never approached him about Masto. I never asked, although I have met him in his own home, and there was absolute privacy, but somehow-how to say it -- the very man is sickening; one feels like throwing up. And the feeling is so strong that although he had given me one hour, I left after two minutes. Even he was surprised. He asked, "Why?"
I said, "Forgive me. There is some urgency and I have to leave, and forever, because we may not see each other again."
He was shocked, because at that time he was just coming close to being the prime minister of the country, very close. But you know me: particularly if a person's very presence is sickening, I am the last person to stay there. Even my staying there for two minutes was just out of courtesy, because it would have been too discourteous just to enter the room, smell around a little, then take off.
But in fact that's what I did. Two minutes... just because he had been waiting for me and he was an old man, and certainly of political importance, which means nothing to me, but to him it meant too much. That's what repulsed me. He was too political.
I loved Jawaharlal because he never talked about politics. For three days continuously we met, without a single word about politics, and within just two minutes the first question Morarji Desai asked was, "What do you think about that woman, Indira Gandhi?" The way he said, "that woman" was so ugly. I can still hear his voice..."that woman." I cannot believe that a man can use words in such an ugly way.

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