Osho,
Once there was a Zen master named Sekito, meaning stonehead, so called because he constructed a hut on a big, flat stone which he found in a mountain, and lived there.
One day a young monk in training came to see him.
Sekito asked: “Where have you come from?”
The monk answered, “From Kosei, master.”
Sekito then said: “In Kosei, the famous Zen master, Baso, lives. Have you ever seen him?”
“Yes, I have,” the monk replied.
The master, pointing at a big piece of firewood nearby, then asked a most extraordinary question: “Does Master Baso look like this?”
Unfortunately, the monk, with whatever Zen ability he might have had, was no match for Sekito. He blinked his eyes, and could not utter a word.
The astonished monk returned all the way back to Kosei, met the great teacher Baso, and told him of the story.
Hearing it, Baso asked, “Was the firewood you saw big or small?”
“It was very big,” the monk answered.
“You are a man of great strength,” was Baso’s unexpected reply.
“Why, master?” queried the monk, at a loss as to how to take it.
Baso then said: “You have brought here such a big piece of firewood all the way from Sekito. You surely are a man of great strength, aren’t you?”
Maneesha, before I discuss the anecdote, concerning a Zen master named Sekito, meaning stonehead, I have to answer Quick magazine in Germany. As far as Stonehead is concerned, he is standing behind you – Zen master Niskriya. Can you find a bigger stonehead?
[Niskriya keeps on looking in his camera, shyly looks up for a second and returns back to his camera.]
Quick magazine needs a quick reply. Because I have been talking about one world, one humanity, I knew some idiot was going to ask this question. Quick magazine has asked: “If you would offer yourself personally to be the world emperor… With eighteen hours a day sleep you could rule, but that would be in a dream.”
It raises many questions. I have talked about one world, but I have never meant that I would be the emperor of this insane world. Jesus has replied for me, “My kingdom is not of this world.”
There is a vast universe beyond the small mind of the politician – and those who become themselves, also become emperors of the universe. There is no competition between Baso and Buddha. At the highest peak of consciousness there is no competition, everybody is an emperor.
So first, to remind Quick and its readers that I am already the emperor of my own consciousness. I don’t want to come down from my peaks to the dark valleys of your unconsciousness. But I can point the way: how you can also become an emperor. To be an emperor, an empire is not needed, but enlightenment is. That is the only empire that remains. All other empires are made of the stuff that dreams are made of.
As far as I am concerned, even in my dream I would not accept being the emperor of this insane asylum you call the world.
Secondly, it has to be understood that my eighteen hours of sleep are not of the same quality as your sleep, just as my waking hours are not of the same quality as your waking. I am awake even in my sleep, you are fast asleep even in your waking. Don’t forget it!
My statement for one humanity, for one world, does not imply an emperor in it. The world has been tortured by people who wanted to be emperors, Alexander, Genghis Khan, Tamerlane, Adolf Hitler. It is time to understand that the world can only be one in the hands of something like the U.N., in which every part of the earth can be represented. And the most intelligent people can be chosen from different sections of humanity to join hands together; not to choose an emperor, but to create an intelligent committee which can have artists, scientists, poets – only not including the politicians.
Creative people are not interested in dominating, they want to create. Whatever is their dimension of creation… It may be science, it may be painting, it may be music, it may be poetry. It may be anything that beautifies and makes the world rich, saner, more intelligent, more comfortable – richer in every possible way.
The days of individuals becoming emperors are over. Only a committee of different creative intelligences can serve the world. Even to use the word rule is not against me…
If the U.N. – or any other organization – is given all the armies of the world, it will naturally have to dissolve them because for whom are you going to have such vast armies? Millions of people unnecessarily doing “Left, right” – for whom will you go on piling up nuclear weapons?
In my conception of one world, there is no place for an emperor. I will refuse, absolutely, categorically, the very idea of a person being the ruler of the world – and I am included.
Nobody has the right to rule over anybody else. Yes, you can serve. And I am serving in my own way. I have got my own empire, my own people, who are trying in every possible way to reach to the Himalayan peaks of consciousness.
Perhaps the poor journalist who wrote this question in Quick will not be able to understand. The days of personal empires, emperors are over. The world needs all kinds of creative people to join together. Forget the very idea of a world emperor. The whole of history has been murderous, full of wars because of this insane desire to dominate.
My whole teaching is just be yourself, never interfere in anybody else’s freedom. Freedom is my ultimate value, my god.
Now about the Zen master Sekito, meaning stonehead… Niskriya, why have you sat down? Stand up, let everybody see what it means to have a stone head!
[Niskriya stands up, turning around to the assembly, which enthusiastically applauds.]
Okay, sit down.
Once there was a Zen master, Sekito, so called because he constructed a hut on a big flat stone which he found in a mountain, and lived there. One day a young monk in training came to see him.
Sekito asked: “Where have you come from?”
The monk answered, “From Kosei, master.”
Sekito then said: “In Kosei, the famous Zen master, Baso, lives. Have you ever seen him?”
“Yes, I have,” the monk replied.
The master, pointing at a big piece of firewood nearby, then asked a most extraordinary question: “Does Master Baso look like this?”
Unfortunately, the monk, with whatever Zen ability he might have had, was no match for Sekito. He blinked his eyes and could not utter a word.
The astonished monk returned all the way back to Kosei, met the great teacher Baso, and told him of the story.
Hearing it, Baso asked, “Was the firewood you saw big or small?”
“It was very big,” the monk answered.
“You are a man of great strength,” was Baso’s unexpected reply.
“Why, master?” queried the monk, at a loss as to how to take it.
Baso then said: “You have brought here such a big piece of firewood all the way from Sekito. You surely are a man of great strength, aren’t you?”
Baso is saying nothing about the firewood. He is talking about the thought the poor monk has carried from one mountain to another mountain. Sekito has not meant the firewood. He simply meant this. It was just by chance that there was a pile of firewood. But he was pointing to this, not to the firewood.
The monk missed the point. He thought perhaps Baso might be able to explain. But again he missed because Baso said nothing about the firewood, nothing about Sekito, but about the strength of the monk – which seemed to be absolutely irrelevant.
But Baso is right. He is saying, “You unnecessarily carried such a load from mountain to mountain.” Sekito has not pointed to the firewood, he has pointed to the thisness of things, the suchness of things.
The whole of Zen is concerned with this…
A footnote:
Baso – also called Ma Tzu – was said to be a strange-looking man. He walked like a cow and looked around like a tiger. He could touch his nose with his tongue and had two rings on the soles of his feet. His chief disciples were Hyakujo…

We talked about him yesterday.

…and Nansen.

We talked about him also.

His disciples numbered in all more than a hundred.

One hundred people became enlightened under Baso. He defeated even Gautam Buddha. He defeated even Bodhidharma. But his method was as unique as his style. Do you see that he walked like an animal? Signifying the natural, the innocent; signifying no head, no headiness, but only a heart that can understand without being told, that can understand without a single word being said.
He was certainly one of the strangest masters who has walked on the earth. Nobody has walked like a cow; not even in ten thousand years has any Hindu – who worship cows – tried to walk like a cow.
But don’t be mistaken about his walking like a cow. It shows his softness, it shows his motherliness, it shows his feminine receptivity. But he also looked around like a tiger. He was soft for those who could understand softness and he was hard for those who can understand only hardness. He was a master of many just for this reason.
Baso was just a cow. Bodhidharma was just a tiger. Baso had the heart of a cow, so soft that he has written the best poetry that exists in the world. His paintings are of immense beauty. His statements contain the very truth. But if you wanted to be a disciple and you were seeking someone to chop your head, Baso was perfect, the right person. To show his strangeness, the story says: He could touch his nose with his tongue.
It is very difficult. I know only one man – and I have traveled around the world – who can move his earlobes. Have you ever tried? It is absolutely impossible because there is no muscular system that reaches to your own earlobes. You cannot do anything – it is just there. Donkeys can do it, but you cannot.
This man was one of my fellow students in the university. He became famous just for the act – that he could move his ears according to his will. When he was introduced to me, I said, “This is nothing because I have seen so many donkeys doing it. It is not worth anything. Just stop it.”
He said, “You are the first man… Rather than appreciating, you are calling me a donkey.”
I said, “That is my appreciation. Because donkeys have such big ears and move their ears so easily.”
I have seen a few people who can touch their nose with their tongue; particularly if they belong to some yogic school. There is a stupid idea that if you can touch your nose with your tongue, you will become immortal! And a few idiots try for years to lengthen their tongue by hanging weights on it. I have even seen people who have cut the tongue inside, where it is joined, so it becomes looser and they can touch their nose. But by touching your nose, you will not touch eternity. Anybody can touch your nose.
Just coming in, I touched Avirbhava’s nose. Anybody can pinch anybody else’s nose. The nose is not immortality. But Baso, just out of playfulness, used to touch his nose with his tongue, saying, “Don’t take religion seriously. Take it as playfully as possible.”
A monk asked Baso, “What is the Buddha?”
Baso answered, “Mind is the Buddha.”
The monk asked, “What is the way?”
“No-mind is the way,” answered Baso.
What a great and beautiful answer! Because even Buddha is a thought in your mind. Even Buddha has said, “If I come on the path in your meditation, just cut my head off immediately, remove me.” That’s what Baso is saying: Buddha is mind, no-mind is the way.
The monk then asked, “Are the Buddha and the way somewhat different?”
Baso replied, “The Buddha is like stretching out the hand, the way is like clenching the fist.”
Opening the hand or closing the hand are not two things, although they appear as two. Just let your mind be silent and settled and you have entered into no-mind.
There is no difference. The difference is only of an open hand and a fist. Not much difference, not a difference that can be called difference. But yet, apparently, it is different, but only apparently.
Maneesha is asking:
Osho,
More than any other understanding of life, Zen is uncompromising. There is no recourse to interesting explanations from the head or moving expressions from the heart. Either you get the experience or you don't. There is no middle way.
Could you please comment?
Maneesha, there is no way, neither middle nor extreme. Way means distance, and you are already there. I teach you the no-way. Just relax and you are there. You have not taken even a step on any way.
Before we enter into thisness, the bamboos are asking for a few laughters. You cannot be hard on the poor bamboos.

Old Daisy Smith dies, and shows up at the Pearly Gates. She is let in by Saint Peter. “You can just settle down anywhere you want,” he says.
“Well,” says Daisy, “I would like to be with my husband who has been dead for many years.”
“Okay,” replies Peter. “What is his name?”
“John,” she says.
“My God,” cries Peter, “we have here hundreds of John Smiths. Is there anything about him that would set him apart?”
Daisy thinks for a while and then says, “Yes, there is. He told me before he died that if I was ever unfaithful to him, he would turn in his grave.”
“A-ha!” says Peter, “I know him. He is the one we call Whirling Smith.”

Kowalski gets a job at a big sawmill but on the first morning he calls the foreman over to where he is working and says, “Boss, one of my fingers has gone with the saw.”
“Well,” demands the foreman, “what did you do wrong?”
“I don’t know,” admits Kowalski, “I just touched it like this… Shit! There goes another one!”

Kowalski comes home unexpectedly from work, and goes upstairs to the bedroom.
He finds his wife, Gertie, lying naked on the bed looking very flushed, and with her hand clutched over her heart.
“My God!” shouts Kowalski, “what is going on?”
“Oh!” moans Gertie, “phone the doctor. I think I am having a heart attack!”
“What?” shouts Kowalski. He turns and races downstairs to the phone and dials doctor Bones.
Just then, his little daughter comes up to him and tugs at his sleeve.
“Dad,” she says, “there is a man hiding, naked, in the bedroom closet.”
“What?” shouts Kowalski.
He drops the phone and races back to the bedroom.
He opens the closet door and finds his best friend standing there without any clothes on.
“George!” shouts Kowalski, “you should be ashamed of yourself. My wife is having a heart attack and here you are frightening little children.”

Now, Nivedano, give your first beat for everybody to go absolutely crazy in gibberish.

[Drumbeat]

[Gibberish]

Nivedano…

[Drumbeat]

Everybody goes into absolute silence.
Gather your energy within yourself.
Close your eyes, no movement.
This. This. A thousand times this.

Nivedano…

[Drumbeat]

Relax.
Just be that.

Nivedano…

[Drumbeat]

Come back to life.
Even the bamboos are silent.

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