:: LAUGHTER ::

LAUGHTER: The Most Intelligent Factor

“Laughter is a mystery. It is better to experience it than to hear someone talk about it. But one becomes curious, "What is laughter?"

Laughter is the most intelligent factor in you.

Buffaloes don't laugh, and if you meet a buffalo laughing you will go mad! Then it will be impossible to bring you to sanity. No animal laughs. Laughter needs a very sensitive intelligence. It means that you can understand the ridiculousness of a certain situation.

What are jokes? They are a very clever arrangement. They take you in a direction logically, rationally, you start expecting that now this is going to happen, this is going to happen... and it goes on happening according to your expectations. Then comes a sudden turn and something happens which you could never have imagined. That brings laughter to you.

It is a very internal process of your rational expectation. If what you were expecting happens, there will be no laugh. But if you see something that you could not have conceived and everything went well up to the end -- and then suddenly something happens that makes you immediately forget all your reason, logic, mind...

Laughter is the only ordinary experience when you are no longer a mind, and I use it to give you glimpses of no-mind, of meditation, of a transcendence of mind. Perhaps I am the first man in the whole history of mankind who has been using jokes as a preparation for meditation. Jesus would not laugh; Buddha will not laugh; Lao Tzu is not heard to have ever laughed... They were serious people, and they were doing serious work!

It will be good to understand a small incident which began the tradition of Zen. Those are the people who understand -- the only people on the earth, a small stream who have understood the meaning of laughter because their origin is in laughter.”

The Invitation
# 27

Laughter Time with Osho

1. Mulla Nasruddin went to a psychologist and said, "My wife's condition is very bad. You will have to do something."
The psychologist worked with her for a few weeks, then he told the Mulla, "She has completely lost her head. I am very sorry, Mulla."
I knew she would," exclaimed the Mulla. "Every day she used to give me a piece of her mind and eventually everything has come to an end."

2.
Once I told Nasruddin, "Mulla, the owner of the restaurant at the end of the street says that he is a close relative of yours."
"Certainly not!" replied the Mulla. "That is not correct. He is a distant relation of mine."
"How distant is the relationship?" I asked.
"Well," said the Mulla, "we have the same father, but he is the first child and I am the twelfth. So there! We are quite far apart!"

3.
"Did you know I am a hero?" said Mulla Nasrudin to his friends in the teahouse.
"How come you're a hero?" asked someone.
"Well, it was my girlfriend's birthday," said the Mulla, "and she said if I ever brought her a gift she would just drop dead in sheer joy. So, I DIDN'T BUY HER ANY AND SAVED HER LIFE."

4.
Mulla Nasrudin finally spoke to his girlfriend's father about marrying his daughter.
"It's a mere formality, I know," said the Mulla, "but we thought you would be pleased if I asked."
"And where did you get the idea," her father asked, "that asking my consent to the marriage was a mere formality?"
"NATURALLY, FROM YOUR WIFE, SIR," said Nasrudin.

5.
"I see you keep copies of all the letters you write to your wife. Do you do that to avoid repeating yourself?" one friend asked Mulla Nasrudin.
"NO," said Nasrudin, "TO AVOID CONTRADICTING MYSELF."

6.
Mulla Nasrudin's wife was a candidate for the state legislature And this was the last day of campaigning.
"My, I am tired," said Mulla Nasrudin as they returned to their house after the whole day's work. "I am almost ready to drop."
"You tired!" cried his wife. "I am the one to be tired. I made fourteen speeches today."
"I KNOW," said Nasrudin, "BUT I HAD TO LISTEN TO THEM."

7.
"Mulla, you look sad," said a friend. "What is the matter?"
"I had an argument with my wife," said the Mulla "and she swore she would not talk to me for 30 days."
"Well, you should be very happy," said the first.
"HAPPY?" said Mulla Nasrudin. "THIS IS THE 30TH DAY."

8.
Mulla Nasrudin called his wife from the office and said he would like to bring a friend home for dinner that night.
"What?" screamed his wife. "You know better than that You know the cook quit yesterday, the baby's got the measles, the hot water heater is broken, the painters are redecorating the living room and I don't even have any way to get to the supermarket to get our groceries."
"I know all that," said Nasrudin. "THAT'S WHY I WANT TO BRING HIM HOME FOR DINNER. HE IS A NICE YOUNG MAN AND I LIKE HIM. BUT HE'S THINKING OF GETTING MARRIED."

10.
It was their first quarrel.
"And you tell me that several women proposed marriage to you?" asked the wife.
"Yes, several," replied the Mulla.
"Well, I wish you had married the first fool who proposed."
"I did," said Nasrudin.

11.
Mulla Nasrudin received a note that read: "Leave a thousand rupees under the cottonwood tree in Pizitz Square Tuesday night, or we will kidnap your wife and you will never see her again." The Mulla answered: "I haven't got any thousand rupees, and I am counting on you boys to keep your promise."

12.
Salesman: "Sir, is your wife at home?"
Mulla Nasrudin: "Yes, sir."
Salesman (after knocking in vain): "I thought you said she was at home, sir?"
Nasrudin: "yes, sir, but I don't live here."

13.
"Mulla, dear," said Mrs. Mulla Nasrudin, "such an odd thing happened today. The clock fell off the wall, and if it had fallen a moment sooner, it would have hit mother."
"I always said that clock was slow," said Mulla Nasrudin.

14.
Mulla Nasrudin discovered his wife again and again in the arms of her lover. Finally, he shot her dead. The jury brought in a verdict of justifiable homicide.
Just as Nasrudin was to leave the courtroom a free man, the judge stopped him and asked: "Why did you shoot your wife instead of her lover, Nasrudin?"
"Suh," he replied, "I decided it was better to shoot a woman once than a different man each week."

15.
"You know, dear, your wife doesn't seem to be as well dressed as she was when you married her," a friend said to Mulla Nasrudin.
"That's funny," replied Nasrudin. "I am sure it's the same suit."