Festival of Diwali

31^st October is the glittering festival of Diwali. Celebrated with great exuberance throughout the Indian sub-continent, Diwali represents the triumph of light over darkness; of good over evil; of knowledge over ignorance.

Diwali occurs on a no-moon night in the month of Oct-Nov (Amavasya of the Hindu luni-solar calendar month of Kartik) and this has a special significance too. Jainas celebrate it as the night when Mahavira became enlightened.   Osho says When there is no darkness within you; when your whole inner temple has become enlightened; when light has reached to every corner and no part of your inner house is in darkness; when your consciousness becomes a continuum with no gaps – Then you are a mukta, a free man. And Meditation is method to transform your unconsciousness into consciousness; your darkness into light.

The last words of Gautama the Buddha on the earth were: Be a light unto yourself. Do not follow others, do not imitate, because imitation, following, creates stupidity. You are born with a tremendous possibility of intelligence. You are born with a light within you. Listen to the still, small voice within, and that will guide you. Nobody else can guide you, nobody else can become a model for your life, because you are unique. Nobody has there been ever who was exactly like you, and nobody is ever going to be there again who will be exactly like you. This is your glory, your grandeur — that you are utterly irreplaceable, that you are just yourself and nobody else.

The person who follows others becomes false, he becomes pseudo, he becomes mechanical. He can be a great saint in the eyes of others, but deep down, he is simply unintelligent and nothing else. He may have a very respectable character but that is only the surface, it is not even skin-deep. Scratch him a little and you will be surprised that inside he is a totally different person, just the opposite of his outside. By following others you can cultivate a beautiful character, but you cannot have a beautiful consciousness, and unless you have a beautiful consciousness you can never be free.

You can go on changing your prisons, you can go on changing your bondages, your slaveries. You can be a Hindu or a Mohammedan or a Christian or a Jaina — that is not going to help you. To be a Jaina means to follow Mahavira as the model. Now, there is nobody who is like Mahavira or ever can be. Following Mahavira you will become a false entity. You will lose all reality, you will lose all sincerity, you will be untrue to yourself. You will become artificial, unnatural, and to be artificial, to be unnatural, is the way of the mediocre, the stupid, the fool. Buddha defines wisdom as living in the light of your own consciousness, and foolishness as following others, imitating others, becoming a shadow to somebody else.

The real master creates masters, not followers. The real master throws you back to yourself. His whole effort is to make you independent of him, because you have been dependent for centuries, and it has not led you anywhere. You still continue to stumble in the dark night of the soul. Only your inner light can become the sunrise. The false master persuades you to follow him, to imitate him, to be just a carbon copy of him. The real master will not allow you to be a carbon copy, he wants you to be the original. He loves you! How can he make you imitative? He has compassion for you, he would like you to be utterly free — free from all outer dependencies.

But the ordinary human being does not want to be free. He wants to be dependent. He wants somebody else to guide him. Why? — because then he can throw the whole responsibility on the shoulders of somebody else. And the more responsibility you throw away onto somebody else’s shoulders, the less is the possibility of your ever becoming intelligent. It is responsibility, the challenge of responsibility, that creates wisdom. One has to accept life with all its problems. One has to go through life unprotected; one has to seek and search one’s way. Life is an opportunity, a challenge, to find yourself.

But the fool does not want to go the hard way, the fool chooses the shortcut. He says to himself, “Buddha has attained — why should I bother? I will just watch his behavior and imitate. Jesus has attained, so why should I search and seek? I can simply become a shadow to Jesus. I can simply go on following him wherever he goes.” But following somebody else, how are you going to become intelligent? You will not give any chance for your intelligence to explode. It needs a challenging life, an adventurous life, a life that knows how to risk and how to go into the unknown, for intelligence to arise. And only intelligence can save you — nobody else — your own intelligence, mind you, your own awareness can become your nirvana. Be a light unto yourself and you will be wise; let others become your leaders, your guides, and you will remain stupid, and you will go on missing all the treasures of life — which were yours!

And how can you decide that the other’s character is a right character for you to follow? A Buddha lives in his own way, a Mahavira in his, a Jesus still different. A Mohammed IS Mohammed, he is not Mahavira. Whom are you going to follow? Just by the accidents of birth you are going to decide your life, your destiny? Then you will remain accidental. And the fool IS accidental. The wise man never lives by accidents. He does not become a Hindu because he is born in a Hindu family; he does not become a Christian because his parents are Christian; he does not become a communist because he is born in Russia. He seeks, he inquires. Life is a tremendously beautiful pilgrimage, but only for those who are ready to seek and search.

Jesus says: Seek and ye shall find; ask and it shall be given to you; knock and the doors shall be opened unto you. He is not saying: Follow, imitate. He is not saying: Be a Christian and the doors shall be opened unto you. He is not saying: I have knocked on the doors and opened them for you. He is saying: Knock and the doors shall be opened unto you. And everybody has to knock, because everybody has to enter by different doors. People are so unique, people are individuals. This is your glory. Don’t deny it; otherwise you will remain a fool. That does not mean don’t learn from the Buddhas, the awakened ones — learn! Imbibe the spirit! Drink out of their springs, fresh springs of joy. Be in their company, become attuned to their inner music, listen to their harmony, and be filled with great joy that a man like you, just like you, has achieved, so you can also achieve. Become thrilled that a man just like you, made of blood and bones, has become enlightened, so you can also become enlightened.

A Buddha has not to be followed but understood. A Buddha has not to be imitated but listened to — listened to in tremendous silence, love, trust. And the more you understand a Buddha, the more you will feel he is speaking not from the outside but from within, from the very core of your being. He is a mirror who reflects your original face — but he is only a mirror. All great masters are mirrors, they reflect your original face. But don’t cling to the mirror. The mirror is not your face!

Source:

Listen to complete discourse at mentioned below link.

Discourse Series: The Dhammapada: The Way of the Buddha, Vol 2 Chapter #9

Chapter title: Sowing seeds of bliss

9 July 1979 am in Buddha Hall

References:

Osho has spoken on ‘light, awareness, intelligence, wisdom, consciousness’ in many of His discourses. More on the subject can be referred to in the following books/discourses:

1. Bodhidharma: The Greatest Zen Master
2. From Misery to Enlightenment
3. From Personality to Individuality
4. The Invitation
5. The Osho Upanishad
6. The Path of the Mystic
7. The Secret of Secrets, Vol 1
8. The Zen Manifesto: Freedom From Oneself
9. The Ultimate Alchemy, Vol 1
10. Vigyan Bhairav Tantra, Vol 2
11. The Heart Sutra
12. Tao: The Three Treasures, Vol 1
13. Zen: The Path of Paradox, Vol 1