Kaivalya Upanishad, Chapter 31

Mind can reason, mind can think, but thinking is a limitation - and reason also. So the moment mind encounters the unlimited, the infinite, difficulties arise, because mind itself is a limitation. Mind has a window to look at the sky, but then the window is imposed on the sky, and the the sky is cut by the window. Then whatsoever you look at from the window is not the infinite sky, it is a windowed sky, a patterned sky. You have given a pattern to it; it is not real. It has been cultivated by you, and your boundaries of the window will become the boundaries of the sky.

The same thing happens with the mind: mind is a window to look at the world, mind is a pattern to look through. When you look from the mind, through the mind, the whole universe is distorted. You give your pattern to the universe. You look at the universe with an attitude, with a thought-system, with a reason, with a logic, with a method.

If you really are interested to know the world as it is, to know existence as it is, then throw away this mind totally, then discard this window; then don't give any pattern to your experience. Let the experience happen as it is, and don't give any limitations to it - don't cling to your stupid logic. Every logic is stupid. Why? It is stupid because that which you are going to encounter, to know, is illogical.

Logic is man-made; the universe is not.

Logic is yours; the universe is not. Logic has all the limitations which a human mind can give to it.

Logic is a by-product of humanity. There was a time there was no humanity, no human mind, but the universe was. It existed without your mind, it existed without your logic - it existed without you! And it existed quite at peace. It will exist when you are not. If there is no mind, the universe will still exist, but the mind cannot exist without the universe. The universe is greater, existence is original; mind is just a by-product, mind is just a flowering.

The tree can exist without this flower, but this flower cannot exist without the tree. Remember this:

don't go on imposing things from the flower on the tree. If the flower wants to know the tree, the flower must go deep down into the tree, into the sap of the tree, be mingled with it, be in a deep communion with it. It should not be an observer from the outside. The flower can observe the tree from the outside. The flower can look down at the tree and begin to think that the tree is ugly, because the flower has its own conception of beauty. But the flower has come out of this tree, so how can something like a flower come out of an ugly tree? And the flower is there because of the tree, and the tree is helping, every moment - the tree is giving life every moment to the flower. And now the flower has it own conception, its own mind. Now the flower says that the tree is ugly, now the flower says that the tree seems meaningless, now the flower says that the tree exists illogically.

Mind is a flowering in the universe. It is good, it is beautiful if you accept the universe as it is. It is beautiful; it a great value. Mind is a great value added to the universe if you look into the universe, not through the mind as an outsider, but in a deep communion. This deep communion happens only when you drop your patterned thinking, when you drop your windowed outlook, when you drop your thoughts, concepts, theories, reasonings, rationalizations. When you drop everything of the mind, you just become conscious - thoughtlessly conscious, free from prejudices, conceptualizations, philosophy, religion, theology. When you just become conscious and become an insider, not an outsider, when you drop into the universe with your mind purified of its patterned thinking, then you come to know a different phenomenon. If you look from the mind as an outsider, you will know only the part, never the whole; and you will not be able to connect even, to relate even to the part. Then the experience will be atomic - that is what is happening to science.

Science is bound to come - reducing everything to its atomic existence - to the minutest part. Then the whole world becomes a chaos; there is no inter-relatedness. Really, with science there is no universe. Universe means one. Science has created multi-verses. The very word universe means one - "uni" means one. Science has created multi-verses. Every science has its own universe, and no two sciences are in any way related. Every science goes into its own specialization, more to the part, and then the whole is lost. You can know a part, but a part is always dead. Life exists in the relatedness of the total.

Life is always of the whole.

That's why life is holy.

Both the words mean the same thing. Holy means of the whole, belonging to the whole. The moment you begin to feel a belonging to the whole, you become holy.

But science goes on dissecting, analyzing, cutting every phenomenon into its parts. The moment you have cut any phenomenon any wholeness, into parts, you have dead parts. Life belongs to the whole; it runs through the parts, it belongs to the whole. The whole is not just a combination, accumulation, or a totaling of the parts. The whole exists in its own right. The whole is something more than its parts; only then is there life. If the whole is just the parts, then the whole is dead. The whole is alive only when it is more - more than its parts, more than its constituent parts. It must go beyond the parts, only then life is there.

That's why science cannot encounter life. The very method debars it; the very approach closes the door. Science cannot come to consciousness, because consciousness exists as a whole. For example, my hand and my mind - they are not related physically, they are related in consciousness.

My eyes see and my legs move accordingly. Somewhere deep down, seeing is related to my moving.

The moving center is related to my cognitive center somewhere. Where is it related?

My body has parts the same as any mechanical thing. The parts are related mechanically, but they are deeply related as a conscious unit also. That consciousness is not centered anywhere in the body; that consciousness is just wholeness. It is everywhere in the body and nowhere. You cannot pinpoint where it is, it cannot be figured out - it is everywhere. Every part of your body is conscious; every part is related in a wholeness.

That wholeness cannot be found by scientific methodology, because the very methodology is based on analysis, on cutting, on dissecting. So science will never encounter life, and science will never encounter consciousness. And science is unable intrinsically to encounter the divine in the world, because all these things - life, consciousness, divinity - belong to the whole, not to the part.

Religion is the search for the whole.

Science is the search for the part.

So science ultimately comes to the atom, and religion ultimately reaches to God, to the whole.

But mind is the difficulty, the problem. Our minds are trained scientifically. Our minds are trained analytically. And the method of analysis has some basic qualities: one quality is always to be the outsider.

For example, someone came to me last night, and he said... he was here for the first time; he observed your meditation, he came to me and he said, "This looks absolutely foolish." He is right in a way; it LOOKS foolish whether it is or not. But when he says it looks foolish, he is saying something about himself, not about the meditation. It looks foolish to him. But how could he judge? He was not a participant; he was not in it, he was not doing it - he was observing.

Science observes from the outside; religion goes deep. Religion means involvement, looking at things from inside. A religious person will never say, "It looks foolish." He will say, "It looks strange."

He will say, "It looks mysterious." This judgment shows much about the person. He can judge a thing without knowing it; he can judge a thing without experiencing it.

So I told the man, "Rethink the whole thing - whether your judgment is foolish or the persons who were doing it were foolish. Rethink it, because to judge a thing from outside is not good; it is not good, it is fallacious. To judge so immediately is not even scientific. And to judge according to one's own fixed mind and attitude, according to one's prejudices is not just."

But science goes on, logic goes on, mind goes on in this way: judging everything from the outside.

From the outside you can be aware only of parts. You can see my hands, you can see my eyes, you can see my face, you can see my legs, but you cannot see me. I am something else existing inside. Parts exist as my outside. I am the inside of my parts, and that inside is the whole. Someone jumping, crying, weeping or laughing in meditation, may look foolish - but from the outside. You don't know what is happening inside him.

What is happening inside him? How can you know from the outside? If he is weeping, what is going on inside him? What is happening to the whole inside? This weeping, if you take it as a part then it is foolish, it is meaningless. If you take it as a whole, deep down something must be happening there which is being released by the tears. Deep down something must be exploding which is being thrown out by his cries and screams. Deep down something must have been moving which is shown by his mad movements. Deep down something so new is happening, something exploding, some inner energy moving through new centers. But that is something inside, and you cannot observe it.

You have to go through it.

You can be a participant but not an observer in religion.

You can be be an observer in science, never a participant.

Really, for science this is a basic condition: you should not be a participant. Because if you participate you are involved in it, then you become a party to it. So you must be neutral, like a judge - outside. For science it is a basic condition.

For religion, quite the opposite is the basic condition. You must not be the observer, because how can you observe anything which is inside? You can observe only the outside. You must be a participant. This is a basic condition for religion: you must be a participant. For science, non- participation is the condition, because it is a method to observe from the outside.

For religion, deep involvement, deep commitment, participation, is a necessary condition, because it is a knowing of the inside; it is a knowing of the whole. You can know it only when you are in it.

So sometimes it happens that for a scientifically trained mind that which looks foolish, for a religious mind may be the very wisdom. And the vice versa is also true: for a religious mind, that which looks foolish may be very meaningful, rational, and logical for a scientifically trained mind. But it you are aware of the basic difference of approach, of the foundational difference of dimension, then you can say something can be scientifically foolish and religiously wise; and something can be religiously foolish and scientifically wise. And these two are not contradictory.

That is what is meant by the strangeness and mystery of life. If we look at life as a mysterious phenomenon, then contradictions are not there. They only appear, they are related, they are complementary.

A logical approach is good in itself within limitations... illogical approach is also good in itself within limitations.

If you are approaching the whole then approach illogically.

If you are approaching the part then approach logically.

Logic is the door to the part:

Illogic, or meditation, is the door to the whole.

Meditation is illogical; it is a jump from the mind to the no-mind. It is a jump from reason to life itself. It is a jump from thinking to existence, so how can it be logical? It is a jump from thinking to existence. It is not thinking, it is experiencing. So I will say, "Be foolish," scientifically be foolish when you approach religion. That foolishness pays; that foolishness ultimately proves to be wisdom. Be mad when you are approaching the whole.

Be mad, I say, when you are approaching the whole.

Don't cling to so-called sanity, which is based on the experiences of the past.

Be mad!

But this madness is divine, and this madness has a method of its own. Religious madness is methodological. Religious madness is a method to approach the whole, the mystery of life, existence itself; to take a plunge, to take a jump, to suddenly take a jump from the mind - because the mind is your past and mind is your thinking, your thoughts, your culture, your civilization, your theology.

Mind is just thoughts, an accumulation of thoughts, existence is not. And thoughts are dead, all thoughts are dead; existence is alive.

All thoughts are borrowed, and existence is always original. And all thoughts are just dust on the mind, accumulated in your movement, accumulated through your life, death, birth. Existence is ever-fresh just like a flower, fresh, flowering this very moment, a river flowing, this very moment, a sun rising this very moment - existence is ever-fresh.

Don't cling to the dead mind.

Take a jump into the freshness of existence.

Existence is always here and now, and mind is never here and now. Mind is always there and then.

Either the mind is in the past or it is in the future - it is never in the present. Have you ever observed it? Have you ever become aware of the fact that mind is never HERE, it is never NOW; it is always either in the past or in the future. And neither is there past nor is there future. Past is that which has gone dead, and future is that which has yet to be born. Only this moment, here and now, is in existence.

When I say take a jump from the mind, I am saying take a jump from past orientation, from future orientation. Take a jump here, this moment into the present. Existence is here; mind is never here, so they never meet. Mind never meets existence.

Mind is just like a radar - it can look far away; it cannot look just near here. Radar cannot look near; it can only look far. Mind is a radar. It is a useful thing but it always looks faraway. Either the expanse must be in the past or in the future; it cannot look here and now. Here and now is just missed by the radar. It is good for looking to the future, it is good for looking to the past. It is good to go down for memory, it is good to go down for desire; but it is never good - absolutely useless - for going down here and now into existence.

Meditation means a jump - it is foolish, it is mad.

But be mad in it and be foolish in it, and then you will gain a strange wisdom which comes only to the mad mind, the religiously mad mind.

Life is a mystery; it is not a mathematical problem. It is more like poetry than like mathematics, it is more like love than calculation. It is love, not logic.

Now be ready for the madness.