Luke 10

1 After these things the Lord appointed other seventy also, and sent them two and two before his face into every city and place, whither he himself would come.

2 Therefore said he unto them, “The harvest truly is great, but the laborers are few: pray ye therefore the Lord of the harvest, that he would send forth laborers into his harvest.”

3 “Go your ways: behold, I send you forth as lambs amongst the wolves.”

4 “Carry neither purse, nor scrip, nor shoes: and salute no man by the way.”

5 “And into whatsoever house ye enter, first say, ‘Peace be to this house.’”

6 “And if the son of peace be there, your peace shall rest upon it: if not, it shall turn to you again.”

16 “He that heareth you heareth me; and he that despiseth you despiseth me; and he that despiseth me despiseth him that sent me.”

17 And the seventy returned again with joy, saying, “Lord, even the devils are subject unto us through thy name.”

18 And he said unto them…

20 “Notwithstanding in this rejoice not, that the spirits are subject unto you; but rather rejoice, because your names are written in heaven.”

21 In that hour Jesus rejoiced in spirit, and said, “I thank thee, O Father, Lord of heaven and earth, that thou hast hid these things from the wise and prudent, and hast revealed them unto babes: even so, Father; for so it seemed good in thy sight.”

22 “All things are delivered to me of my father: and no man knoweth who the Son is, but the Father; and who the Father is, but the Son, and he to whom the son will reveal him.”
Once upon a time…

Two explorers came to a clearing in the jungle. It was a beautiful place: thousands and thousands of flowers were blossoming. One of the explorers said, “There must be a gardener tending these flowers, looking after this plot.” He was a believer.
The other disagreed and said, “I don’t see any gardener here. I don’t even see anybody’s footprints. And there seems to be no point in making such a beautiful garden in such a dense and deep forest. Who will come to look? Who will enjoy these flowers? Nobody ever passes by. No, there is no gardener. The whole garden is just an accident.”
They argued. The second was an unbeliever, a skeptic. But there was no way to decide who was right, so they pitched their tent and waited for seven days.
No gardener ever appeared. The skeptic was very happy and he said, “Look! There is no gardener. Now it has been proved.” But the believer said, “The gardener is invisible. He comes, but we cannot see him. He comes, but we cannot hear his footsteps – because this garden is not possible without a gardener.”
So they set up a barbed wire fence around the garden. They electrified the wires, they brought in bloodhounds and they patrolled day and night. But nobody ever entered. No shriek was ever heard from the shock of the electricity flowing in the wires. The bloodhounds never gave a cry.
After seven days the skeptic said. “Finished! Now it is proved beyond doubt that there is no gardener, visible or invisible.”
But the believer was not convinced. He said, “The gardener is not only invisible, he is intangible, and he has no scent and he is eternally elusive. You cannot catch him with electrified wires, and you cannot catch him with bloodhounds, and our eyes cannot see him. But he is, certainly he is.”
Now the skeptical friend, in great despair, said, “What happened to your original statement? Now, what is the difference between an invisible, intangible, eternally elusive god or gardener, and one who is just imaginary or that does not exist at all? What is the difference between the two?”

I was reading this parable. I liked it because this is how the argument has been going on, on this earth. Believers go on talking about an invisible God. Skeptical minds go on disproving any possibility of it. And they both seem to be right, or they are both wrong, because the argument never comes to a conclusion.
From the very beginning, the whole line of inquiry has taken a wrong route. Once you separate the gardener from the garden – God from creation – the problem arises, and then it can never be settled.
The garden is enough proof of the gardener. But the gardener is not separate. He does not come to tend the garden: he is in the garden; he is the garden. He does not look after the flowers: he is in the flowers; he is the flowers. Not that he is invisible – he is visible, but visible as flowers.
If you have an idea of God, you will never find him. The very idea will become the barrier. Only those who have no idea of God come upon him or allow God to come upon themselves. If you have a certain idea, the very idea is going to be the wall, the brick wall, between you and the truth.
The believer was not wrong, but he took a wrong line of argument. He divided the gardener from the garden. This gardener cannot be proved because this gardener doesn’t exist. A gardener separate from the garden is nonexistent.
That’s why the skeptical friend could argue. And his argument is valid: valid not against God or the gardener, but valid against the believer because the believer has taken a wrong route.
To me, God is herenow. All that you see is God. God is not something beyond; God is something within. Or if you like paradoxes, you can call God “the within beyond” or “the beyond within.” But God is intrinsic, is the innermost core of existence.
Unless you start in the right direction, you will go on missing. Never believe in a God who is separate from the creatures and the creation. He is not, he cannot be. He is one with it. He is in it, he is it. Once this is understood, you start flowing. Your whole life becomes a prayer.
That is the basic message of Jesus. That’s why he goes on saying that God is his father. It is a way of saying what I am saying to you. Between the father and the son, or between the mother and the child, there is a continuity. The father goes on living in the son; the mother continues in the child. The son is nothing but the extension of the existence of the father, an extended hand, as if the old body has become incapable of existing and is going to disappear and the father has created a new body to live within.
When Jesus says, “God is my father,” he simply means, “I am continuous with him. There has never been a separation. He is flowing in me. He is flowing in my every cell. Nowhere has there been a discontinuity.” That is the whole meaning of it. But he uses the word father because he is talking to very simple, unsophisticated people. He is talking to real people, not to plastic people. He is not talking in a university. He is talking to real people, people who are alive.
He uses the word father. And it is beautiful in a way because unless religion becomes personal, it remains a philosophy. When religion becomes personal, it becomes life. Religion is something live, not something to brood about. It is something that should become a milieu around you. It is something that should become a continuous breathing, a continuous beating of the heart.
Religion is a way of life, a way of being. It has nothing to do with thinking. When Jesus says, “God is my father,” he means this existence is not alien, this existence is a home. You can rest in it, you can rely on it, you need not be afraid.
This is one of the most significant things to be understood, because modern man is so afraid. Never has this been so. Never in the history of humankind has man been as afraid as he is now. Every day I go on talking to people about their problems and almost always, deeply hidden somewhere, is fear. Whenever they come deeper to their being, finally other problems disappear. Only one problem remains: fear.
Why is modern man so afraid? It has never been so. Something has happened, something like a catastrophe. Once God is not there in your consciousness, you will be afraid – because without God, existence becomes alien. Then you are not at home; then it is as if everybody is against you. If God is not there, then existence becomes inimical – not that it really becomes so, but it looks so to you, it appears to you that it is inimical. Life looks just like a competition, a struggle to survive. A great jealousy surrounds you. Love disappears with God, at-homeness disappears with God.
God is just a symbolic word. It simply denotes an attitude, an attitude that you are at home. If God is the father, then the whole of existence is home and you can be at ease. There is nothing to fear: everything is in the hands of your father.
Religion is personal, and the whole effort is to look at life as if it is a family. The tree, however far away, is related to you. It is a relative – and the rock also, and the oceans also, and the moon and the stars also. Everything is related to everything else. You exist in a related family.
You are a part of it – as if existence is trying to reach somewhere through you to a higher peak of consciousness. Through you, God is trying to reach a new existence, to a new peak of ecstasy, to a new peak of awareness, to a new way – as if God is trying to achieve a breakthrough through you. Suddenly you are accepted. Not only accepted, God is trying to do something through you. History is being created through you, existence is being created through you. You are significant; you have a tremendous significance. Without you, God will lack something.
Just think: without the son, the father will no longer be a father. Without the son, it is not only that the father will lack something, he will no longer be the father. He will be barren, a desert. The son is a fulfillment.
You are the fulfillment. But once you forget God, or you drop the idea of God as modern man has done, suddenly you are alienated. Suddenly you are never at ease. Wherever you move, you move like a stranger – among enemies, not among friends.

A friend of mine was staying with me. He was a vice-chancellor in a university, a very atheistic man. I always like trees, and I always like trees to be so close to the house that they almost touch it and cover it. People don’t like that because there is a danger: the tree may destroy the wall, may destroy the foundations. But to me it is worth it. Even if the building disappears, it is beautiful.
He looked around in the morning and he said, “What have you done? You are creating a jungle. Don’t you know that trees are enemies of man?”
He is right in a way because trees have been constantly fighting with man, and man has been constantly fighting with trees. All the cities you know were once forests. Man has destroyed the trees, cleaned the ground, claimed it. Now, if you don’t do anything with trees for even twenty years, they will overrun and take over, take back the land. They will destroy the buildings and the roads and everything.
So he said, “What are you doing? Trees are enemies.”
For the first time, I heard the idea. It is historically true, existentially false; scientifically true, religiously false.

Scientifically, all of life is a struggle. Everybody else is fighting you, and you are fighting everybody else: “the survival of the fittest.” It is a murderous competition, a cutthroat competition. Nobody is friendly. Even those who you think are friends are not friends. They cannot be, scientifically.
A new child is born. Now he is a new competitor in the world. One more enemy will be there. He will breathe, and he will destroy much oxygen you could have used. Now he will be using it. He will need space, he will need food, he will need water – this and that. Now there is one more enemy.
Whenever a man dies, one enemy is dead. You can celebrate the fact! Now that much oxygen is free, that much food will be available – one competitor is gone. It is scientifically true. Ask Malthus.
Yes, it is true – but religiously? Religiously, the world is a unity. Existence is a family; we exist together. Life is togetherness, and that togetherness is God. If you cannot feel that togetherness, you will feel alienated and you will always be afraid. To a religious man, fearlessness happens spontaneously. To a nonreligious man, fear is the only way to be. “God the Father” can be translated. Then it means: “Existence is one. It is a togetherness, it is a harmony – not a conflict.”
We are members of each other. Whenever somebody dies, something in me also dies. Whenever a new child is born, something is born in me also. Whenever a new child is there, life becomes more alive through him, life smiles. Whenever somebody dies, there are tears. It has to be so because I come out of life, I go back into life. Life was trying to do something through me.
Everybody is a messenger, everybody is a messiah, everybody has a destiny to fulfill – and until you fulfill that destiny, you will never feel fulfilled. You can have a lot of money, but fulfillment will not come through it. You can have a lot of sex, but fulfillment will not come through it. You can have a lot of power, but fulfillment will not come through it.
Fulfillment comes only when you have fulfilled a certain destiny that you were carrying, that was coded within you, that was deep in your blueprint. Unless you have become that for which you were made, unless you have attained being, you will never be fulfilled.
Fulfillment is peace, fulfillment is bliss, fulfillment is contentment. And only a fulfilled heart can pray because only a fulfilled heart can be grateful and can feel the grace descending – the spirit of God, like a dove.
Now the sutras:
After these things the Lord appointed other seventy also, and sent them two and two before his face into every city and place, whither he himself would come.
The gospels are telegraphic because they were meant to be remembered, memorized. Not a even single superfluous word is used. They are very economical. So whatever is said has to be understood with deep trust and reverence because that is the only way to understand things like this. A deep reverence is a basic climate and a basic requirement. Only in that deep reverence can something enter you that hits the heart, stirs your soul.
If you just listen like a skeptical mind – closed, doubting – you will miss because these are not principles, these are poetries. They indicate, and the indication is very subtle. They intimate, but only in deep intimacy can those things be understood.
After these things the Lord appointed other seventy also, and sent them two and two before his face into every city and place, whither he himself would come. Why two and two? Why not three? Why not one? Why two and two? Jesus shows a deep understanding of the human mind. More than two is a crowd, and a crowd is never one. It falls apart. There is every possibility they will start arguing within themselves; there is every possibility there will be a conflict of leadership.
More than two is a crowd; less than two – one is lonely, and in loneliness doubts arise. In loneliness one loses confidence, in loneliness one becomes afraid, suspicious. Jesus says: …two and two… It should not be a crowd, and one should not be alone. “Go two together.”
Two people who are intimate, close to each other, bring to each other whatever is great. That’s why love is so meaningful – because only in love do you touch the optimum. Alone, you exist on the minimum. In love, you touch the maximum.
Have you watched it? Have you seen a single person when he falls in love? Have you observed the change that comes to him? Suddenly he walks in a different way. He walks less and dances more. His movement suddenly takes a new grace. His eyes sparkle, his face becomes more beautiful. Something deep inside relaxes and rejoices. He is more vibrant, radiant. You can see that the energy is flowing. Just a few days before, he was low, shrunken. Now, in love, he has opened, bloomed, is overflowing. What has happened?
The other has given a deep call. That call has touched his soul. It has awakened him. His energies that were lying dormant have become dynamic. Now he has a meaning in life, a purpose. Now life is no longer like a desert. It starts blooming. It gains tremendously. And the beauty is this: the other is not losing, the other is also gaining the same. Two people in love both gain tremendously and nobody loses. Both come to their peaks because each stirs the depth of the other and each calls the most beautiful in the other. Each provokes the divine in the other.
Lovers become gods to each other. And when somebody believes that you are a god, you have to fulfill it. What can you do? When somebody believes that you are a god, unknowingly you start fulfilling it. Unknowingly you attain your destiny: you become a god.
If nobody has ever believed in you, you will miss much. If nobody has ever loved you, you will remain barren. If nobody has loved you so deeply that for him at least you have become divine, then the divine in you will go on lying dormant. It will not become dynamic.
When Jesus says …two and two…, he is saying not to go alone because alone you will be at your minimum, and not to be more than two because then conflict will arise, but two – in deep friendship, in deep love, in deep trust – so you can help each other and provoke each other to the very height it is possible to attain. Potentially, whatever the other can attain he will attain through you. “Go two and two.”
Therefore said he unto them, “The harvest truly is great…”
He speaks in the language of the farmers, the fishers, the carpenters.
“The harvest truly is great, but the laborers are few: pray ye therefore the Lord of the harvest, that he would send forth laborers into his harvest.”
It has always been so. When a Buddha is there it is so, when a Zarathustra is there it is so, when a Mahavira is there it is so. The harvest is truly great, but there are not enough laborers. The treasure is vast, but there are not enough to share it. A tremendous energy is released, but nobody is open to receive it. The flower has opened, but nobody passes by to be filled by its scent. The fragrance is wasted. It could have been used and people would have attained their highest peak, but the fragrance goes on spreading into emptiness of the sky. Yes: “The harvest truly is great, but the laborers are few: pray ye therefore…” Jesus says to his disciples: …pray to the lord of the harvest that he will send forth laborers into his harvest.
The crop is ready to be cut, and if it is not cut in time it will be wasted. There is a time to sow and there is a time to reap the crop. Jesus is ready, the crop is ready, but there is nobody to share it. Why does it happen? Why are people so blind? Why do people want to remain in their unhappiness? And when the door opens to happiness, why don’t they look at it?
They have certain investments in their unhappiness; they have become attuned to their unhappiness. This is my feeling also. You come to me and you say to me that you would like to be happy. But at that very moment I see within you that somewhere a part, a greater part of you, is against it. That part does not want to be happy because that part has invested much in being unhappy. Now the whole investment will be gone.
You want to be happy, but you don’t want to lose the investment you have made in unhappiness. In many, many lives you have tried to use unhappiness for certain ends. Watch – for example, people talk too much about their miseries. They exaggerate. Why do they exaggerate about their miseries? And what is the point in talking? Why go on telling everybody about your miseries?
A certain happiness is attained through this. Whenever you talk about your misery, people show sympathy. This is a way to gain sympathy. Of course you must have missed love – otherwise who bothers about sympathy? Sympathy is a poor substitute for love; it is counterfeit. If you have ever been loved by somebody, and if you have ever loved somebody, you will not ask for sympathy. No, because sympathy is an insult. Love is totally different. But sympathy looks like love. It is a counterfeit. It appears like love; it is not.
When somebody loves you, you are the end; when somebody sympathizes with you, you are not the end. When somebody loves you, you are the emperor; when somebody sympathizes with you, you are the beggar. Sympathy is given to you because you are in such misery; love is given to you because you are so happy. When you are happy, people love you. When you are unhappy, people sympathize with you.
But sympathy gives a false appearance of love, and you have invested in sympathy. Now how can you drop your unhappiness? You cannot. And whenever somebody like Jesus comes and opens the doors of paradise, you don’t listen to him. You say, “There must be some deception. Paradise? It is not possible, and we are not fools. We have also been struggling. Paradise is not possible. Only unhappiness is possible.”
In the last years of his life, Sigmund Freud became very pessimistic. He had been working on the human mind for fifty years. Nobody has worked so hard, so persistently, so scientifically – and he had watched thousands and thousands of human minds: their functioning, their mechanism. In the last years he started feeling that man, as he is, cannot be happy. “There seems to be no possibility that man can be happy. Something seems to be basically wrong.”
Nothing is basically wrong. It is only because man has invested too much. A child is born. Whenever the child is happy, nobody cares about him. But when he is ill, everybody sympathizes, cares, loves. The child learns the trick. If you want sympathy, if you want attention, be ill. Don’t be happy because when you are happy, you create jealousy in others. Jealousy means enmity. When you are unhappy, you create compassion in others. Compassion means friendship.
That’s why you cannot respect Jesus. He is so happy; he is a bridegroom. He is always at a feast, never fasting.
You go to the saints who are fasting, unhappy, because they don’t create jealousy in you. They are so unhappy that they create sympathy in you. And when you sympathize with them, you make their unhappiness even more valuable than it was before.
This is a vicious circle. In India it is happening all over. Go and see your saints: the more unhappy they are, the more they fast, the more they commit suicide, the more they poison their being and body, the more pale and dying they are, the more unhealthy they look – the more they are respected, the more a crowd gathers. People say they are great ascetics. Their unhappiness creates sympathy.
How can Jesus get that sympathy? Impossible! When you go and see him, he is sitting at the dining table with his friends. He enjoys eating and drinking, and he must have enjoyed singing and dancing because I cannot conceive otherwise – a man who enjoys eating and makes eating a sacrament, and says that it is holy, and says that this is a form of prayer because it is God who is hungry within you, and when God is satisfied, you have prayed.
Not only that, he even drinks and allows his disciples to drink, because he says, “Life should be lived in its abundance.” Not only needs should be fulfilled because if only needs are fulfilled, life is only okay, it is not ecstatic. That wine is simply a symbol for ecstasy: life should not only be lived with our needs fulfilled, it should be overflowing, it should be a dance. Wine is not a need; nobody needs it. It is a celebration. Bread is a need; everybody needs it. Wine is not a need, it is a celebration.
Jesus, if you see him, will not create sympathy in you. Rather, he will create jealousy. That’s why he was crucified. He created so much jealousy around him; everybody became somehow inimical to him: “This is not the way to be a saint!”
You always like pessimists, dead people, people who are almost in the grave. Why? And then it is no wonder that, by and by, you also become like them – because you will become like whomever you respect.
Respect people who are happy. Don’t respect people who live in misery and create their misery. That is ill, morbid. Don’t bow down to anybody who is in any way masochistic, creating his own suffering. In that way you will be helping him also.
Just think: if nobody goes to your masochistic saints, do you think they will remain there? They will escape from those temples, they will come to the marketplace, they will say, “What is the point? We go on fasting and nobody comes, no procession is arranged, nobody respects us. What is the point? We go on fasting, dying, and nobody respects us.” Then the whole point is lost.
That will be a great help to them also. That will be real compassion toward them. If you don’t go to them, they will come back to life. But you go on respecting them, you go on fulfilling their egos. Now unhappiness becomes a great investment. And that’s also how you are working in your own life. People cling to their miseries because that is all they have. That’s why it happens: “The harvest truly is great, but the laborers are few…”
Only people who are really understanding, and who are really aware that life exists to be celebrated, will be able to enter from the door Jesus has opened for them. The others will not come. Not only will they not come, they will deny the door exists. Because if they accept the door exists, then it will be a constant uneasiness in their hearts, a restlessness, that the door exists and they have not gone there. No, they will simply deny the door exists. Not only that, they will say, “This Jesus is a deceiver. He is not a true prophet. True prophets are always miserable, they live in unhappiness.” And you can understand their language because you also live in unhappiness.
The language of happiness is absolutely foreign to you. You cannot understand it. You can understand pain and suffering. Ecstasy? “The man must have gone mad!” Ecstasy looks mad. You can understand pain. Pleasure? That you cannot understand.
This is the trouble. I also say to you: “The harvest truly is great, but the laborers are few: pray ye therefore the Lord of the harvest, that he would send forth laborers into his harvest.”
“Go your ways: behold, I send you forth as lambs among the wolves.”
It is very dangerous to send ecstatic people among miserable people – very dangerous. If you dance on the street, sooner or later you will find yourself in the police station. If you are miserable and crying and weeping, even the constable will sympathize with you; but if you are laughing and dancing, something has gone wrong. It doesn’t happen. Ecstasy? “The man is mad!” You cannot be allowed to move in the world. You are dangerous.
Look at the absurdity: a happy person seems dangerous; an unhappy person seems to be okay. The unhappy fits with you, the happy does not fit.
“Go your ways: behold, I send you forth as lambs among the wolves.” Jesus knows he is sending his disciples into a dangerous world. First, people will not understand what they say. People will misunderstand. But even in their misunderstanding, there will be a doubt lurking in the minds of the people that these people may be right.
That creates more danger. Whenever you feel that something may be right, an uneasiness arises. Either you have to cope with it or destroy it – so the proof is destroyed.
Jesus was crucified just so the proof was destroyed that a man can be so happy and so ecstatic. A man can really be a son of God – the proof has to be destroyed. Then you go on asking about proof: “What proof is there of God?” And whenever there is proof, you destroy it.
Jesus was the proof. If you could have understood him, you could have understood that God exists. There is no other way to know about God. You can know the tree only by the fruits. Jesus is the fruit, the crop, the harvest. He was a living proof. But he had to be destroyed because if God exists, how can you go on living in your miserable holes? You will have to come out into the light.
It is better to deny God than to come out of your darkness because you have lived in that darkness so long that you are attuned to it. Yes, it is miserable, but it is your own misery. Yes, it is miserable, but you have lived so long with it that a sort of attachment has arisen. You are attached to it.
Doctors fear that whenever somebody has lived with an illness for long, he clings to it and deep down does not wish to be well again. Then no medicine can help because he is struggling against the medicine. He wants the illness to continue.

I know a person and I have watched him. He has been in bed for almost seven years. He was a politician, then he fell ill.
I have been watching him all these years. He fell ill because he was defeated in an election. That illness was psychological: he could not accept the fact that he could be defeated. His ego was shattered; he fell ill. The body was simply reflecting something deep that had happened in the ego.
And so he continued. One illness would disappear; another would come. Another would go, then something else would happen. After a year, everybody in the family became aware that it seemed he was not going to be well again because for the first time, lying down on his bed, he had become relaxed. You can understand the whole misery of a politician’s life: the conflict, the tension, the anxiety. For one year he rested.
Now, somewhere in the unconscious, a deep desire has arisen: “This is better!” And now he knows that if he gets up again he will again be in the same world because that is the only way he knows how to be in the world. He cannot do anything else than be a politician. That is his profession: the only business he knows. Now he is afraid.
Seven years have passed and things are going well. When he was working and was in the world, his son was not at all worried about the family affairs. Now the son is doing well. His wife has taken many things into her own hands. Even his old father has started going to the shop again. Everything is going well, perfectly well – better than ever. So why bother to get up? Now illness is an excuse.
I went to see him and I talked to him. I told him the truth. He became very angry. He said, “What do you mean? Do you mean that I am prolonging my illness? I had hoped at least you would understand. You don’t understand me. Why should I be lying down here?”
But at the very same time I knew he had understood. I said, “Be truthful. There is nobody here. And I will keep this, I will not tell anybody.”
He relaxed and he said, “Maybe. I will think about it.”
The next day I went again and he confessed. He said, “You are right. I thought about it again and again. The whole night I couldn’t sleep. It seems to be the case.
“But I don’t want to get well. Life has never been so good! And now, to go back into politics after seven years will be almost impossible” – because once you are out of politics even for seven days, you have gone. Seven years – people have completely forgotten about him. Just seven days is enough.
A politician has to be constantly in the public eye. He has to go on doing something or other, some mischief or other, some strike or hunger strike – or anything, whatever it is – but he has to be in the public eye, in the newspapers. If he is not in the newspapers for even seven days, he has gone.
The public’s memory is very short. Who bothers? People will not even recognize him – that once he was the great leader. Now there are other great leaders who have replaced him. They won’t allow him to enter.
So he said, “It is going to be very difficult. It was difficult in the very beginning. Now it is going to be almost impossible. And everything is going well.”

This is the situation. Then even unhappiness becomes an attachment, even illness becomes an attachment. Illness can become an excuse for many things. Remember this, otherwise you will never be able to be happy. Don’t play games with yourself.
Jesus says, “…I send you forth as lambs among the wolves.” Why? Why lambs among the wolves? – because he knows that truth is going to be attacked. He knows love is going to be attacked. He knows that ecstasy is going to be attacked.
“Carry neither purse, nor scrip, nor shoes: and salute no man by the way.”
Why does Jesus say this? “Carry neither purse, nor scrip, nor shoes: and salute no man by the way.” He is saying that you are so happy and ecstatic, you are so blissful now that you have tasted something of the divine, that it is enough to create trouble for you. “Now don’t carry a purse. Go like beggars so at least they can sympathize with you. You are emperors, but go like beggars – without even shoes, so you look like beggars. Go barefoot without shoes, like the poorest beggar who has not even shoes, so at least they can sympathize.”
That seems to be the reason why Buddha called his sannyasins bhikkus, beggars, why Mahavira insisted that you move like beggars. “…because you have the quality of an emperor. That is enough to create trouble for you. Now if your appearance is also like an emperor, then you will be immediately attacked. At least let your appearance be that of a beggar. There is no guarantee you will be saved because you will still be like lambs among the wolves – sooner or later they are going to find out that you are an emperor. Your appearance is just a protection.” Jesus says this to protect his disciples.
“Carry neither purse, nor scrip, nor shoes…” Why does he say “nor scrip”? – because he is saying, “Don’t go as knowers.”
These are the two riches: the riches of the outer and the riches of the inner. “Don’t go as rich people and don’t go as people rich in knowledge. Let them think you don’t know anything, then they will sympathize. Don’t carry scriptures with you, otherwise you will be unnecessarily attacked. They will argue and you will be dragged into arguments. That, too, has to be remembered.
“Don’t carry scriptures; don’t carry knowledge. Go like innocent children. That will be a protection. Talk out of your experience, but don’t bring the scriptures in, otherwise those people are very clever about scriptures. Once you bring the scriptures in, you will be defeated. They can argue better than you.”
This is something to be remembered. A man of experience always hesitates because he knows that whatever he has experienced cannot be expressed. He hesitates. But a man who has not known anything except the scriptures is absolutely certain. Only fools are certain. Wise people are always hesitant.
So don’t go with scriptures, otherwise you will be caught in the net of the pundits, the rabbis, and you will be unnecessarily distracted. And then the whole point will be lost.
Jesus says: “I send you like lambs” – pure beings with no corruption: no corruption of knowledge, no corruption of outward things. “I send you virgin, uncorrupted. It is dangerous, but that is the only way you can carry my message,” he says.
“…and salute no man by the way.” Why does he say this: …salute no man by the way? He is saying that on the way there are a thousand and one distractions: “So keep to the goal, where I am sending you. Just keep in mind the goal, where I’m sending you. Even an ordinary salute to a person, a stranger on the road, can become a distraction.”
I will tell you a story. It happened in Tibet…

A lama who was working in a faraway valley wrote a letter to the chief monastery, to his master: “Send one more lama. We need one here.”
The chief of the monastery called all his disciples, read the letter, and then told them, “I would like to send five of you.”
One lama asked, “But only one has been asked for. Why five?”
The old chief said, “You will know it later. I will send five and then too, it is not certain one will reach because the way is long and the distractions a thousand and one.”
They laughed. They said, “The old man has gone out of his mind. Why send five when one is needed?” But the old man was insistent, so five started the journey.
The next morning when they were passing a village, a messenger came running from the chief of the village. “Our priest has died and we need a priest. The salary is good.” The village looked rich and prosperous, so one of the five said, “I would like to stay because this too is Buddha’s work. Why go to the valley? I am going to do the same work there too. You four will be enough. Only one is needed so I will stay here.” One dropped.
The next day they were passing by the outskirts of a town. The king of the town passed them on his horse. He looked at them. One young monk was very beautiful and healthy and radiant, and the king said, “Wait! I am looking for a young man because my daughter is ready to be married. I have been watching and looking, but you seem to be exactly right. Are you ready? I have only one daughter. My whole kingdom will be yours.”
Of course, the young man said goodbye to his friends.
All this happened: two had disappeared. Now the other three became aware the old man was not mad. The way really is long and the distractions a thousand and one!
So now the three decided, “But we will not do such a thing,” – although deep down they were feeling jealous. One man has become a king, another has become a great priest – and who knows about that valley, about what is going to happen there?
The third night they lost the way. Far away on a hilltop only one lamp could be seen, only one house. Somehow they reached there.
There was only a young woman there, and she said, “It is good you have come. You are a godsend because my mother and my father were to come back this evening and they have not come back. I was very afraid to be alone in this house so far away from the town. It is good. You are a godsend. You are sent by Buddha himself. Please stay with me and don’t leave me until my parents come.”
The next morning they had to leave. But one of them, who deep down had fallen in love with the woman, said, “I cannot go until her parents are back. That would not be compassion.” Compassion was not the thing; passion was the thing! But when there is passion, people talk about compassion.
The two said, “This is not good. We have to reach there and you are dropping out. And we had decided that now we would not do that.”
The man said, “I have been taught my whole life to be compassionate and the woman is alone, her parents have not returned. This won’t be good, it won’t be virtuous, and Buddha will never forgive. You can go” – in fact, he wanted them to go – “but I will be here.” The third one dropped.
The next morning in a village a crowd gathered around them and they were challenged because the village was atheistic and didn’t believe in Buddha. “You have to prove that what Buddha says is true.” They had a great atheist scholar there and the scholar challenged them.
One of the two accepted the challenge. The second said, “What are you doing? Who knows how long this will go on?”
He said, “Even if my whole life is wasted, I am devoted to Buddha, and this man has challenged Buddha and his philosophy.” It was not a challenge to Buddha; it was a challenge to his ego! “I cannot leave this village, I will convert this village. You can go, and in fact, only one is needed.”
And that’s how it happened. The man remained there to argue and only one reached!

Jesus says: “…and salute no man by the way.” This is just a way of saying, “Please, remember the goal.”
“And into whatsoever house ye enter, first say, ‘peace be to this house.’”
This is a mantra, a blessing, and it changes the whole atmosphere. Jesus says, “When you enter a house, before you enter, say: ‘peace be to this house.'“ It is not only a saying: feel it, be it. Be at peace. “Bring peace to the house because only in that peaceful milieu can my message be delivered. Create a spiritual vibration of peace; spread the feeling of peace.” And if you are really feeling it, it will spread.
Try it. When somebody comes to see you or meet you, just settle within yourself. Become silent, and when the man enters, deep down just feel peace for him. Feel “peace be to this man.” Don’t just say it, feel it, and suddenly you will see a change in the man, as if something unknown has entered his being. He will be totally different.
Try it. It is experimental, it is absolutely scientific. There is no need to believe in it because thought transference is continuously happening.
Sometimes you destroy yourself by your own thoughts. Somebody comes and you become suspicious: “This man seems to be dangerous!” You are giving a thought to the man. Now he may be dangerous, and if he is dangerous you will say, “I was right!” and in fact you created the vibe. In fact you started it.
The husband coming home starts thinking in his mind that his wife is going to be nasty, so how to answer her, how to find excuses for why he is late? He may be creating doubts in the wife’s mind – and women are very intuitive. You may not be able to transfer a thought to a man, but with a woman it is almost impossible not to transfer it. They are more intuitive. They are less in their heads and more in their hearts. Now the wife is getting ready to be angry and you are preparing her and when she becomes nasty you think, “I was right!” The next time you will be more afraid and your fear will create a circle.
Try just the opposite. While coming back home, think that your wife is going to be perfectly beautiful. Feel it! Just saying it and feeling just the opposite won’t help. Feel it, and one day, suddenly, you will see that it works.
We are joined together by our hearts. We exist as parts of one feeling heart. That heart is God. He beats in our hearts: the beat is his. He lives: the life is his. And if you can create a great, strong thought or feeling around you, the ripples go on and spread. You live in the world you create and you get the world you deserve.
“And into whatsoever house you enter, first say, ‘peace be to this house.’”

“And if the son of peace be there, your peace shall rest upon it: if not, it shall turn to you again.”
Whatever you give, if it is accepted, will be good because in that deep peace you will be welcomed. If it is not accepted, if the people or the person are hard, very closed, not open at all, and your message – your deep love and peace – is rejected, don’t be worried. That peace will fall upon you. You will be showered by it, and it will still be good. Nothing will be lost.
“He that heareth you, heareth me; and he that despiseth you despiseth me; and he that despiseth me despiseth him that sent me.”
Jesus says to his disciples, “If people love you, they love me, because I am coming to them through you. And if they love me, they love that who has sent me, because he has come through me. If they hate you, they hate me. If they hate me, they hate the source of all life.”
Remember: whatever you do, finally you do it to God. Meanwhile you may be doing it to somebody else, but finally it turns out that you have done it to God. If you hate a man, ultimately you hate God. If you love, ultimately you love God because all others are just mediums. Whatever you do to them is not to them; it is finally to the source, to the very seed.
And the seventy returned again with joy, saying, “Lord, even the devils are subject unto us through thy name.”

And he said unto them…

“Notwithstanding in this rejoice not, that the spirits are subject unto you; but rather rejoice, because your names are written in heaven.”
The disciples are disciples; they are not yet awakened. They have come in deep contact with an awakened man. That awakened man has become infectious to them, they are deeply impressed, the impact has gone to their roots – but they are still disciples, they are not awakened themselves.
So when they came back they were very happy. In their happiness, they had completely forgotten God because wherever they went people listened to them with tremendous attention, wherever they went they were received with love. They could not believe what had happened. They came back rejoicing and saying: “Lord, even the devils are subject unto us through thy name.”
Their reach is only up as far as Jesus. They have not yet seen God through him. Jesus is not yet transparent to them; they cannot see God. At the most they see God reflected, at the most they feel something of the unknown, but it has not become a settled, centered feeling in them.
So they have completely forgotten God. They say: “…even the devils are subject unto us…” Now their egos are inflated. But they remember one thing: “…through thy name.” “It is your name that has done miracles. Even the devils are in our power.”
Jesus immediately says: “Notwithstanding in this rejoice not…” Don’t rejoice that the spirits are subject unto you. If you really want to rejoice, rejoice about something else that you are not aware of: “…but rather rejoice, because your names are written in heaven.” Rather rejoice that God has heard your prayers. Don’t think about yourself and don’t think about my name. Rather feel happy that God has heard you and helped you: “…your names are written in heaven.”
In that hour Jesus rejoiced in spirit, and said, “I thank thee, O Father…”
The disciples are aware that they have done miracles. They have become very important. They remember Jesus. But: …Jesus rejoiced in spirit, and said, “I thank thee, O Father…” He remembers God. His name is of no use. If his name is so powerful, it is because of God. He is just a medium, a flute on which God has decided, in his mercy, to play a tune or sing a song.
“…I thank thee, O Father, Lord of heaven and earth, that thou hast hid these things from the wise and prudent, and hast revealed them unto babes…”
These disciples are just babes. They are neither wise nor prudent. They don’t know the scriptures; they don’t know the tradition. They are not priests or scholars. They are just babes: simple, innocent.
“…that thou hast hid these things from the wise and prudent, and hast revealed them unto babes: even so, Father; for so it seemed good in thy sight.”

“All things are delivered to me of my father; and no man knoweth who the Son is, but the Father; and who the Father is, but the Son, and he to whom the Son will reveal him.”
“All things are delivered to me of my father…” He simply says, “I am no more than a medium. If you pay respect to me, don’t pay respect to me. At the most you can pay the respect through me, but the respect should go to God.”
“All things are delivered to me of my father, and no man knoweth who the Son is…” because once you know who the son is, you have already known the father. If you recognize Jesus, you have recognized God. If you crucify Jesus, you have crucified God because whatever you do with Jesus, you do with God.
Not only Jesus was crucified on Golgotha; God was crucified that day. You could not believe in God who was expressing himself through Jesus. You could not recognize the son, you could not see from where the song was coming. You destroyed the flute. But in destroying the flute, the song also disappeared.
“All things are delivered to me of my father; and no man knoweth who the Son is, but the Father; and who the Father is, but the Son…” “Only he knows me,” Jesus says, “and only I know who he is” – because that revelation is possible only in deep love, that revelation is possible only when you become part of God and God becomes part of you. When you are so deeply related to the whole existence that you are no longer separate, then you know who God is.
“…and who the Father is, but the Son, and he to whom the son will reveal him.” And for ordinary humanity there is no other way than to look through the son, to accept the revelation, to see God through he who has become one with him. Once you see it, you have already become a son. Then others can see through you, and the thing can go on spreading.
Every person who has recognized Jesus has immediately become a Jesus. Every person who has recognized Buddha has immediately become a buddha. In your recognition, you have attained. Then anybody who recognizes you is linked, is bridged, with God. One man can transform the whole world. It becomes a chain of openings.
If you recognize me, you have become me. Then somebody recognizes you; he has become you. And this can go on and on. Just a small pebble thrown in the sea, and ripples arise and they go on spreading.
Jesus is just the pebble. You can become Jesus if you recognize him. That is the meaning, the real meaning, of being a Christian: you have recognized Jesus as the son of God and you say, “My eyes are not yet able to look at the sun; the light is too much. I look at the lamp, but I recognize that the light is the same.”
To look at God directly will be blinding. To look at Jesus is beautiful. He is not blinding. But through him you can recognize, and then by and by your eyes can become attuned. Once you have become attuned to Jesus, you can look directly at God because by and by, Jesus will disappear, will become transparent, and will be gone – and only God will be left there. That’s why he goes on saying again and again, “I and my father are one.”
Recognition is one of the turning points in life. The search for a master is the search for a man in whom you can recognize that God is; in whom you can recognize that now there is no need for any proof; in whom you can recognize – not intellectually, but existentially – that yes, God is. That man becomes your master. He becomes the door. That’s why Jesus goes on saying, “I am the door. I am the opening through whom you can come.”
Otherwise you can go on arguing. Your arguments are all futile. Whether you prove that God is, or you prove that God is not, does not matter much. They are all intellectual gymnastics. Nothing is proved. No atheist ever becomes capable of converting a theist, and no theist is ever capable of converting an atheist. For centuries the argument has continued. Nobody seems to win. The whole thing seems to be futile and meaningless. You cannot convince anybody about anything unless he opens his eyes and recognizes something of the beyond.
Once it happened…

Mulla Nasruddin woke up one morning and started crying and weeping. His wife was worried. She said, “What has happened? Have you had a nightmare?”
He said, “No, it is not a nightmare. I have died. I am dead.”
Now, how can he be convinced that he is not dead? The wife tried, the neighbors tried, but there was no way to prove it to him. He insisted that he was dead.
He was taken to a psychoanalyst. The psychoanalyst watched him, talked to him: “A very rational man, argumentative, and he argues that he is dead! And he says, ‘Give me some proof that I am alive!’”
The psychoanalyst thought it over and said, “Yes.” An idea had struck him. He said, “Come with me.”
He took Mullah to the hospital, to the postmortem department, and told the doctors the situation. The dead bodies were cut and the psychoanalyst said, “Look. Is there any blood flowing?”
No blood was flowing. The psychoanalyst had the idea that if Nasruddin could be convinced that dead bodies don’t bleed, something might be possible with the proof that dead bodies don’t bleed and live bodies bleed.
For seven days he took Mulla to see the autopsies, and Mulla was intellectually convinced. When he was convinced, Mulla Nasruddin said, “Now there is no need to continue. I am convinced that dead bodies don’t bleed. But that makes no change in my attitude.”
The psychoanalyst said, “Wait.” He took his hand, took a sharp knife and made a small cut on his finger. Blood started flowing. The psychoanalyst was thinking, “Now there is absolute proof that you are not dead.”
Mulla Nasruddin looked at the blood and said, “My God! So dead men bleed after all!”

No proof can be a proof. If you are convinced that God is not, all proofs will prove that he is not, and if you are convinced that he is, then all proofs will prove that he is. No conviction can be changed. So whether you believe in God or you don’t believe in God, both are bogus, both are head trips – unless you recognize it is not a question of argument, unless you open your eyes and see something that suddenly fills you, your total being, and a certainty arises in you that is not intellectual but existential.
To seek a master is to seek somebody in whom you can recognize something of the divine, who becomes the proof, in whose being you can taste something of the divine, in whose eyes you can glimpse and see something of the divine; in whose love you can feel something being showered, in whose song you can feel – you can know beyond doubt – that the infinite is flowing.
The master is nothing but a reed, a flute, an empty flute, an emptiness. God flows through him. If you can recognize it, already you yourself have become one with him. Then others can recognize it in you and it can spread.
One man attaining God can become the total transformation of the whole humanity. It has not happened because people insist on being miserable, they insist on being blind, they insist on being themselves – whatever they are. They protect their hell, they defend their misery, they are armored against God.
That is why it has not happened. Otherwise one Buddha would have been enough; one Jesus would have been enough. But there have been thousands of Buddhas and Jesuses and Mahaviras, and you go on living in your darkness. It is simply unbelievable, but it has been so.
Don’t wait for the whole of humanity. Nobody can say when the whole of humanity will listen. But if you can listen, if you can recognize, you also become a door.
Enough for today.

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