It Is Up To You

[NOTE: This discourse is published in the book: The Last Testament, Volume 1, as Chapter 16.]

ANSWER: One never becomes ordinary. You can become extraordinary. The very process of becoming leads you away from being ordinary. So there is no how as far as being ordinary is concerned. You are ordinary. You don't have to become. You have to drop becoming, you have to start living. These are the two types of people in the world: those who are continuously becoming and in their very effort of becoming this and that, they are losing being what they are. They are losing time, life, energy, and their becoming is never going to end.

It is just like the horizon there, appearing so close that you can reach it -- just a few more miles to go. But as you reach the few miles, you find the horizon has receded again, the distance remains always the same. The person who is caught in the net of becoming wastes his whole life, dies unfulfilled, in tremendous despair, because he can see that the whole life was there for him to live, but because of his desire to become something, someone, he sacrificed all that was freely available to him.

One does not become ordinary. You are ordinary. You are born ordinary, just like everything else in existence: animals, birds, trees. No bird needs to be ordinary. No tree asks, inquires how to be ordinary. But man asks it. And this very process of becoming makes you insane.

Drop becoming anybody else. Drop the very idea that you have to be according to some discipline, some scripture, some theology. Forget completely that you have to be like Jesus or Buddha or Mahavira, and suddenly you will find you are

who you are. Live it joyously, without any guilt. Existence wanted you to be what you are. If existence wanted another Jesus he would have created thousands of Jesuses, there is no problem. He would have made Jesuses on an assembly line. But he makes only individuals. Existence never duplicates, never makes anybody similar to somebody else.

This is the beauty and the glory of existence. This is a blessing, that nobody like you has ever existed and will ever exist again. You are simply unique. Don't waste this uniqueness in running after some goal, some shadow.

Now, because I am telling you it is so beautiful to be ordinary, it is so joyous to be ordinary, you have made being ordinary also a goal. Your question would have been perfectly right if you had asked how to become a Jesus Christ, how to become a Buddha, how to become a great celebrity.

But the very processes of becoming and being ordinary are absolutely diametrically opposite to each other. You are where you are trying to reach.

There is nowhere to go. You have not to become anybody. This very moment you are what existence wanted you to be. Don't miss it. Enjoy it. All the religions have deceived humanity and created the idea of becoming in the mind of man.

Once you get caught in the idea of becoming, then there is only misery, suffering, anxiety, anguish, despair, defeat, death.

That's what has been happening to millions of people for thousands of years.

Everybody was trying to become something. You cannot go against nature. You cannot in any way be anything other than what you are. The very effort of becoming something, someone, is absurd. But how have the religions managed to make this whole earth a madhouse? They gave you goals, they gave you great ideals you have to fulfill. It is impossible. By the sheer nature of things, it is impossible. But because it is impossible, far away, it becomes a challenge to your ego. The impossible has a tremendous attraction, but you are forgetting that it is impossible. It may have tremendous attraction because of its impossibility, but you are going to be a failure finally.

There are so many people who realize that they were alive only when they die.

When they were alive they were so busy with so many things, they completely forgot about life. They remembered it only when they knew that only a few breaths are left -- the heart is sinking, only a few beats more -- that is the moment the realization occurs to them, "What a fool I have been. The whole life has simply passed by my side. I have not drunk from its wine, I have not eaten its fruits, I am not even acquainted with its fragrance. What was it? And now it is too late."

That's why I say only the ordinary being is capable of rejoicing, because his energy is not involved in any process of becoming. It is all available, it is overflowing. What can you do with overflowing energy? Sing, dance, rejoice.

My insistence for ordinariness has tremendous implications you may not be aware of. By telling you to be just ordinary, I am making you free from all strategies of religions, theologies, political ideologies. I am cutting their very

root, even without mentioning it. If you are ready to be ordinary, nobody can exploit you. Nobody can push you in a direction which is not for you. Nobody can create a guilt in you. Nobody can say that something is wrong in you. I am making you free from all kinds of parasites.

All over the world they have been using the same methodology just to make you feel guilty. What you eat is wrong, how you live is wrong, how you sit is wrong, how you walk is wrong. They have not left anything for you to decide for yourself. Somebody else -- Manu, five thousand years ago -- has decided for Hindus how they should be, and for five thousand years Hindus have been imprisoned by that man Manu. And it is so stupid.

You just be what you are... no becoming. Being is my message. Up to now becoming has been the message of everybody. Being is my message. Becoming has created guilt, sadness, despair, because you cannot do it. On each step you fall, and on each step you realize how poor, how inferior, how powerless you are. On each step you are forced to recognize that you are unintelligent, stupid; otherwise, why are you not succeeding?

You are not stupid, you are not unintelligent, you are not powerless. You are just trying to do something which simply cannot be done.

Have you seen sometimes a dog trying to catch his tail? A dog is sitting, is in a thinking mood, contemplating; he sees the tail, becomes curious: "What is this?"

Naturally, if human beings are doing such stupid things, you cannot expect a dog not to do a stupid thing. He tries to catch hold of the tail that is lying there, but as he tries, the tail moves away. He tries harder -- that is logical -- he jumps with as much force as possible, but he is simply amazed that the tail also jumps in the same proportion and the distance remains the same. But I think dogs are not so idiotic. After a few efforts he realizes that this is not possible. He drops the idea, forgets about the tail. It is his own tail, there is no problem. But man goes on and on, chasing something, a shadow.

No, don't make ordinariness a goal somewhere away from you, so that a path is needed, a discipline is needed; so that you have to follow a leader, you have to listen to a priest, you have to change your habits, you have to fit with the goal.

Nobody in the whole history has ever succeeded in becoming anybody else. And it is good that everybody has failed, because even if one man had succeeded, he would have proved all the religions right. One exception would have been enough. If one can succeed, then why not others? History totally supports me.

Without exception, everybody has failed-except those few rare people who have never tried to become anybody, who simply lived ordinarily without any plan, without any tomorrow, without any ideals, without any philosophy, who have simply lived.

Living is my religion. Living herenow, and living as you are without any conditions, without any qualification, that's my message.

Q: BHAGWAN, WHY DO RAJNEESHEES, WHEN THEY GO OUT INTO THE WORLD, INTO THE COURTS, ALREADY FEEL AS IF THEY ARE GUILTY?

WHY DOESN'T OUR CONVICTION COME OUT? WHY AREN'T WE PROUD OF OURSELVES? WHY DO WE BEHAVE LIKE SUCH WIMPS?

A: For the simple reason that you are not yet what I am trying to get you to understand. When you go out, you try to prove you are somebody special. You try to prove that you are no ordinary human beings. You are somebody chosen, you have a message, you have a special way of life. You have certain understanding which everybody else is lacking. Naturally you will feel in difficulty because they are in the majority and you are alone.

Here in the commune you can rejoice in being special, because everybody is rejoicing in being special, there is no problem. And nobody cares what anybody thinks, nobody is trying to impress anybody. In the commune you are living simply. There you become tense, tight, afraid of public opinion; you want to prove in the public's eyes that you are a superior being to them, which you cannot prove. Nobody is superior or inferior. There is no question of comparison.

And the very tension, tightness, anxiety makes you feel guilty, as if you have betrayed me, as if you have not been the way you were expected to be.

I have no expectations of you. Go to the courts, to the marketplace, anywhere, but remain ordinary, with no attitude of holier than thou. And you will be surprised: there is no tension, there is no anxiety, there is no guilt. And your intelligence will function more efficiently because you will be so relaxed.

It is a miracle to know the beauty and the power of being relaxed. Suddenly your intelligence has a sharpness that you were not aware of Your capacities come to their very peak. You function not just on the minimum survival level, but on the maximum. Your torch of life burns from both ends together.

It is a strange thing. You were trying to be special and you felt guilty. You were trying to prove yourself holier, higher, and you were feeling a failure. Now you are not trying to be higher, and you are. You are not trying to be better than anybody else, but you are, because they are not relaxed and you are relaxed. And that small difference makes such a great difference that it is immeasurable.

In my whole life I never felt guilty about anything. I don't have any idea how you feel guilty. What kind of thing is guilt? Intellectually I understand, but existentially I have never experienced it, for the simple reason that I have never tried to be anything other than I was.

I have been in the courts and I have enjoyed it. In fact, the judges became tense, the advocates became tense, my own advocate became nervous about what I was saying, what I was doing. The whole court was full of tension. I could not understand what was the matter. I should have been tense. Why were they in such anxiety? The case was against me, I was ready to face it, because I didn't see there was any crime....

There was one church, specially for British people, which had been closed for many years, because when the British rule ended in India, all the foreigners moved out. The archbishop of England -- thousands of miles away -- was the owner of that church in Jabalpur.

I had a few Christian friends. I said to them "This beautiful church always remains closed." They said, "The congregation of that church is no more here, the nearest authority is in the capital, Nagpur. The bishop of Nagpur is the nearest authority who has the keys. But the real authority is with the archbishop of England."

I said, "You are just fools. Break the lock -- it is already falling apart since ten years. Clean the church. This is your church. Use it."

They became excited, the idea was good. The church was a beautiful building with a very big garden around it, but it had become a jungle, nobody was taking any care. They broke the lock. They asked me to inaugurate the opening. I said, "I am perfectly ready" and so I inaugurated their church.

It took a few days for the bishop of Nagpur to understand what was happening there. Then he inquired of the archbishop of England what to do, "because a few Christians have broken the lock, entered the property, and are worshipping every Sunday there." Of course the archbishop was angry and he told him, "Take legal action against them."

The legal action was taken against them. That's why I was also found guilty. I inaugurated it, I inspired those people to enter into the church, so I was the most responsible person. I said to the judge, "A church, a temple, a mosque, a synagogue belongs to those who worship there. It is no ordinary property. For ten years the church has remained without a single worshipper. The archbishop of England is guilty for that, the bishop of Nagpur is guilty for that. Who are they to lock a church and prevent worshippers?

"I am not a Christian, but I can see that a beautiful place which was meant for worshipping, for prayer, is lying empty. Jesus Christ is still hanging on the cross and nobody comes. He must be getting bored."

I said, "Yes, I inspired these people to make that church again alive. It is dying.

And to make any church alive is not a crime. To keep it locked... locked against whom? In fact, churches and temples should not have doors, so that they are available twenty-four hours for anybody to meditate there. It is a place of silence."

My advocate was getting to the point of nervous breakdown when I said that the archbishop of England should be given an arrest warrant... and these people were going to continue worshipping in the church. The judge said, "Whatever you are saying is absolutely right, but it is not legal. The church is a property owned by the Church of England. Entering into somebody else's property, taking possession of it, using it, is trespass."

I said, "Then I am ready to be punished, to be jailed. But remember, you are doing something absolutely wrong. You are not making any difference between

a place of worship and an ordinary house. A place of worship cannot be owned by anybody, cannot be possessed by anybody. It belongs to those who are ready to worship there. Tell the archbishops of Nagpur and England that either they should come here and bring their congregation, so the church becomes alive, or...

why are they worried? They were happy for ten years. The church was gathering dust, it was going to become a ruin.

"And I am not a Christian at all. I have no concern with that church, just a human concern, a compassion. These people I know, and I told them, 'If you are ready to worship, the church is yours.' And I take the whole responsibility on myself, these people are not in any way responsible. They simply got inspired by me."

There was silence. The advocate sent by the bishop of Nagpur could not figure out what to say. The judge told me that it was legally wrong, but spiritually right: "I cannot give any punishment to you. But please don't do anything like that again."

I said, "That I cannot agree with. I will continue my whole life doing things like that, because I don't care about man-made laws. My concern is with the existential, with the spiritual, with the real. Man-made laws go on changing."

But those Christians who had agreed and opened the church became afraid. The bishop of Nagpur put another big lock. I lived in Jabalpur for twenty years, and by the time I left Jabalpur the church was in ruins, the roof had fallen. This is according to the law.

Why should I be afraid or guilty? And I am ready to accept any consequences of my actions. I have been moving for thirty years in the country facing hostile masses -- sometimes fifty thousand people, all hostile. But I have never felt any guilt, because whatever I was doing, I was doing with my totality. And whatever I was doing, I was doing with full consciousness. And seeing me, listening to me, although they had come with aggressive prejudices, I could see slowly, slowly a calmness was descending on them. And by the end, when I left, many were in tears.

In Ahmedabad a man came just after I had finished the meeting, fell at my feet and said, "Forgive me." I said, "But you have not done anything to me, why should I forgive you?" He said, "I have not done what I had come to do," and he showed me a big knife that he was carrying. He said, "I had come to kill you because I had been told that you are against religion, and I am a great devotee of Krishna." He was a fanatic Hindu.

I said, "Then why don't you kill me?" He said, "Listening to you I became aware that what you are saying is religion. You are not against religion, you are against religions. Those religions I have followed up to now, but I want to change. I had come to kill you, but you have killed me!" And that man is a sannyasin since then and has been a very stable, reliable sannyasin.

Just go simply anywhere as you are and present yourself openly. We don't have any secrets; only guilty people have secrets. Only people who are burdened with

the idea of sin have secrets. We don't have any secrets. We don't have any theology, so nobody can contradict you.

There is a saying that man proposes and God disposes. What I am doing here is: I have disposed of God and I am asking you not to propose anything. So both parts of the proverb, "Man proposes...." Why? Why should you propose?

Proposals can be contradicted, better proposals can be produced. There is no need to propose anything. Live whatsoever you feel is right. And it is your life, nobody else's business to interfere. God I have disposed of completely. And if you don't propose, even if God is there, how can he dispose it?

I am making a very strange and unique effort with you. Buddha was making people special, holier, higher than the layman. The layman was almost a word of condemnation. The bhikku, the sannyasin, was truly a man. The layman was not worth anything. Now, he was creating a class, helping their egos to become stronger and stronger.

And these are the methods to make your ego stronger: Do things which are against nature. Do things which other people find very difficult to do. Fast, and then people will respect you. They cannot fast for seven days, and you have fasted for twenty-one days. You have done something superhuman. They cannot drop even one breakfast; they cannot live without eating for just a single day. But whatever you have done is against nature. You have tortured yourself, but it will give you a very sophisticated ego. So do things which are not natural: be celibate, which is not natural. Don't enjoy anything, because every enjoyment iS condemned.

Jainas, Buddhists, Hindus have five great principles of life which can make a man a superman. The first of those five is aswad. The word means tastelessness.

Drop all taste. They are asking of you something absolutely unnatural: don't enjoy your food, don't enjoy eating anything, or, before eating it, destroy its tastefulness.

The Hindu monk begs from houses and then goes to the river, mixes all kinds of food into his begging bowl, gives the begging bowl a dip in the river, so whatsoever is left unmixed, the water does it, and then eats it. Now, in that begging bowl was every kind of thing -- salty, with sugar, sweets. They have all lost their taste. Now it is religious. People will worship you because you have conquered taste. All you have done is destroy a sensitivity that is part of your individuality.

Islam is against music. Strange: "Don't enjoy music." Someone is against the tongue, another is against the ear. And there are Mohammedans who have never listened to any music. Then why not become deaf? Why not give your tongue plastic surgery? Remove those small buds on your tongue which taste things -- which is so much easier and so scientific -- rather than the whole life suffering.

And because these things are unnatural, you are never absolutely successful.

Hence the guilt arises and hypocrisy, because you have to go on pretending that you have succeeded.

I have been very friendly with a few Jaina monks and nuns. They had become very intimate and were almost ready to drop their monkhood. Then I came to know about a few things which no Jaina knows. These monks are not supposed to enjoy taste, but I found that in the temple where they were staying, they were keeping Coca-Cola, Fanta, hidden behind the statue of God, Mahavira. And because I was very intimate and they trusted me, they offered me their Coca- Cola. And I said, "Great, but how do you manage?" They said, "A few laymen love us so much that whatsoever we say, they manage." They all had small transistor radios; no Jaina can suspect their monks are carrying transistor radios, listening to all kinds of film music.

Whenever you ask people to fulfill unnatural things, you are asking for them to be guilty. So on the one hand they are creating a big ego, the ego becomes bigger, becomes a mountain; and on the other hand, side by side, a deep valley of guilt.

The bigger the mountain, the bigger the valley.

I want you to be just walking on the earth. There is no need to go to Everest. I don't want you to be anybody special. Your dress is not to make you special; on the contrary, it is to remind you that you are an ordinary human being. Behave with that ordinariness and you will be surprised that you are received and welcomed. Your ordinariness will destroy the hostility in the other person. Just go into the whole world. It is ours; why should we feel anxiety and tension in any way? By making you realize your ordinariness, I am giving you the whole kingdom of God here on the earth, and only an ordinary person can enjoy the kingdom of God.

Try. And when I say try, I don't mean make effort. I mean give it a chance the way I am saying. Give it a chance, and something will trigger.

I was in the university, a student of philosophy, and I was never in agreement with my professors because they were all outdated. They had studied in the universities twenty, thirty years before. In these thirty years the whole world of philosophy had changed. They had read Bradley, Bosake, Kant, Feuerbach, but they had not heard about Wittgenstein, Jean-Paul Sartre, Jaspers, Heidegger. I was ahead of them, so there was continuous argument. And because I was ahead of them, they were always in trouble. They had never conceived that Kant can be criticized, that Bradley can be criticized. And after they left the university they had never touched another book of philosophy.

So it was an everyday trouble. I would not agree with their arguments, their arguments were so poor, and they were continuously in a nervous breakdown because the whole class was with me, and nobody was ready to agree with them.

One of my professors, finding it almost impossible to manage me, one day invited the vice-chancellor, the head of the department, the assistant head of the department and all other professors of the department, almost eight persons. As I entered the class I could not believe what was the matter, because in my class there were only three students: two girls and me. What were the vice-chancellor, head of the department and other professors doing there?

And the professor said, "Now I am going to teach, and you, before all these people, bring your arguments." He was thinking that I would become nervous.

The vice-chancellor was there, the greatest authority in the university. The head of the department was there, who could make or mar my whole future. All the other professors were there. Anybody in my place would have collapsed. His mind would have gone berserk, he would not have been able to argue.

But I got so ecstatic that first I thanked the vice-chancellor, the head of the department and the other professors. I said, 'I was waiting for this opportunity to show you what kind of professors you have. This man must have been dead thirty years ago. In thirty years' time philosophy has taken such quantum leaps he is not aware of. He does not know even the names of the latest philosophical minds, developments. I am grateful that he has gathered you; in fact I was going to invite you all one day, but I am lazy. So I waited for some day, but he has done my job. I am thankful to him also." And I told him, "You start."

He was teaching Gautam Buddha at that time and he said, continuing, that the country in Gautam Buddha's time was so moral, so religious, so spiritual, that there was no crime, no theft, no murder. In fact, people never used locks on their houses. Even if they were going for months, their houses remained unlocked, because it was unheard of that anybody would steal. That's what Buddhist scriptures say. He asked me, "Now what do you have to say?"

I said, "They had no locks on their doors for two simple reasons: for the first, there were no locks invented. You will have to give me proof that locks existed.

Otherwise, how do you suppose poor people locked their houses? You will have to give evidence that there were locks in existence. Secondly, I say to you that the people were so poor, they had nothing in their houses. Even if locks existed, they would not have been able to purchase them. And for what? -- there was nothing in the house to be stolen." And he turned to the vice-chancellor and said, "You see, this is how the whole year goes by. Now what am I supposed to do?"

I said, "You are not supposed to do anything, just listen to me a little more and withdraw whatever you have said. If it is true that people were rich and there was nobody who was poor, then why does Buddha continuously teach to help the poor, serve the poor? Why does he make it a great virtue? If there were no poor people, whom are you going to serve? He continuously preached for forty- two years.

"I can bring all the scriptures tomorrow," I said, "and put them before you. Every day for forty-two years he was teaching that stealing is a great sin, never steal. If there were no thieves and everybody was a spiritual saint, who was he talking about, who was he addressing? Where could he get every day for forty-two years people he had to teach, 'Don't steal, don't be violent, don't be jealous, don't be this, that'? It certainly proves people were stealing, people were thieves, people were lying. That's why he goes on insisting, 'Don't lie, speak the truth.' What more evidence do you want?"

The professor was absolutely dumb. The vice-chancellor stood up and said to the professor, "It will be good for you to learn from that student. And if you don't have any argument, then accept his argument. It does not matter who is arguing, whether he is a professor or a student; the question is whose argument is closer to the truth."

The vice-chancellor was a retired chief justice of the high court. I thanked him. I said, "I was expecting fairness and I am happy that you have not been unfair.

You have not supported the wrong side just because he is a professor. You have supported a student."

In my whole life I have never found there is any problem, any need to be nervous, to be guilty, to be tense. But people are. Everybody is, not only you.

Perhaps you will feel it more because you can immediately be distinguished by your dress, by your mala. You can immediately be distinguished, and you are standing against a thick wall of prejudice.

But remember: truth may be very small, but its power is almost like an atomic explosion. And howsoever big the lie may be, almost as big as God himself -- God is the lie -- a small truth is capable to expose the greatest lie.

I don't say you need conviction, because that is a wrong word here. A Christian needs conviction, because he does not know. Don't make conviction a problem at all. Just say whatsoever you know, and just be whatsoever you are. Don't pretend to be bigger than yourself. Don't pretend to know that which you don't know.

Always be ready to say, "I do not know this." There is no guilt in it because in fact nobody in the whole history of humanity has been able to say that he knows everything. There is always a point where he has to accept and say, "I do not know." So why be afraid? We are ordinary people. If even Socrates has to say, "I do not know," why can't Pratima say, "I do not know"? Conviction is not needed.

Experience, and don't pretend beyond your experience, and you will be always at ease and relaxed.

Can't you see me? I never think what I am going to say to you, because one thing is certain with me: if I know, I will answer; if I don't know, I will say I don't know. What is wrong in not knowing? There are limitations to everything. If I don't have to say I don't know, it is because of you. You cannot find the place, the point, the question, where I will have to say,"I don't know." It is your problem, not my problem. Seek and search and try to find something that I have to answer, "I don't know," and I will say it with the same strength as I say anything that I know. I will not speak out of weakness, I will not hesitate. I will not be wishy-washy, I will not try to divert the subject.

But to ask a question for which I have to say, "I don't know," you will have to come to the same space where I am. And in that space you cannot ask. You yourself know that in this space all questions are futile and no answer is possible.

People are afraid of me. Strange: I am not a Muhammad Ali, and I am not going to do any boxing, so why are they afraid of me? The journalists have been

continuously asking me why people are afraid of me. They are afraid for the simple reason that whatsoever they know, they really don't know. And coming in front of me, they are going to be exposed. They will be standing utterly naked, and that is the fear.

I am not afraid of anybody. What can anybody do to me? At the most somebody can assassinate me. To me it seems exciting. Death is bound to happen, and assassination is not a bad way, in fact perfectly suitable to a man like me. I will enjoy it. I will thank the man; I will not die before thanking him. And I will ask you that that man not be punished, because to me he has not given any pain, he has simply given me an opportunity to move beyond the body. So don't drag him to the court. Don't force him to be sentenced to death. Make history out of it:

be the first people in the whole history whose Master has been assassinated, but you are not against the assassination or against the assassin. And there is every possibility the assassin will become a sannyasin, otherwise he will not be able to survive.

Do you know what happened to Judas? He sold Jesus for only thirty pieces of silver. When Jesus was crucified, he was also expecting a miracle would happen and God would save him. And meanwhile, just being a Jew, if he has earned thirty silver pieces, what is wrong in it? Jesus is not dead; on the contrary, on the cross God fulfills his promise and Jesus is recognized as the real messiah for whom the Jews have been waiting for thousands of years.

So in fact I don't think he was betraying Jesus. He was just being an authentic Jew. It is all profit: Jesus will be recognized as the messiah, God will be known by thousands of people -- an opportunity which is rare -- the ultimate miracle of God descending to save Jesus will be a proof that God is, that Jesus is God's only begotten son. There is no problem in it. Judas believed it; and if he can make some money by the way, it is simply Jewish and human.

But the miracle did not happen. Nothing descended from the sky. Judas was hiding in the hills waiting for the miracle. When the miracle did not happen, Judas committed suicide within twenty-four hours. He felt that he had done wrong, just for thirty pieces of silver. If he had really betrayed Jesus, there was no point in his committing suicide. He felt so full of guilt that he had to punish himself with the same punishment that poor Jesus got because of him. He hanged himself from a tree.

Christians never talk about Judas. He is a man of a certain character; I don't see anything in him that has to be condemned. He believed in Jesus, that's why he sold him. His trust was so much that he thought there was nothing wrong in getting thirty pieces of silver. Jesus was going to be saved by God. But Jesus was not saved. He must have thrown those thirty pieces of silver in the mountains and hanged himself out of sheer guilt: what has he done? As far as I can see his crucifixion by his own hand is far more significant than Jesus' crucifixion by others. Judas should be counted among the great names of world history. He is as valuable as Jesus.

But why did the guilt come in? It came because he was convinced. It was not his experience that Jesus was something divine. He had heard Jesus say that he was God's son, but it was not his experience. These were words repeated so often that he started believing in them. The conviction of Judas was greater than the conviction of the other apostles. But conviction is superficial. It is not that you don't have conviction, so you feel afraid; no, it is because you have certain conviction that you feel afraid.

Do you see my point? I am emphasizing continuously: don't believe in anybody, particularly in me. Between Jesus and you is a great distance; Moses even greater. These people are just names to you. But I am not just a name. I am flesh and bones, and as real as you are. It is possible that you can start believing in me; then, that belief will create fear. Facing the hostility of others, your suspicions which you have repressed by the belief may start asserting. Perhaps, if so many people -- and the world is large -- are against Bhagwan, then who knows whether he is right or not? That hesitation will create fear in you, nervousness in you.

I have been surprised giving interviews to the journalists, seeing that they are so nervous. And this must have been their experience also... because whomsoever they go to interview is usually nervous about what they are going to ask. They may ask questions which may create trouble. They may ask questions that if he answers them, he will be exposed; if he does not answer them, then a great suspicion will arise. People are very much afraid of journalists, very nervous.

With me the experience has been totally different. And I have told Isabel, "Now find all the journalists from all over the world, and bring each guy and I am going to give him a good heart attack. This will be his real experience of journalism." If I am open, you cannot expose me. If I am utterly available, if I put all my cards before you on the table, what can you do? In fact, they become nervous because they start feeling the truthfulness of what I am saying. They forget that they are here only as journalists. Their human being is also there in the same search as everybody else, in search of silence, serenity.

One journalist was here. His people wanted only a thirty-minute interview and it went on for two hours. His director was getting very disturbed, but the man forgot completely that he was only a journalist and he was to ask only questions in which the ordinary public and the audience would be interested. He became so involved personally, he started asking questions which were relevant to his growth. Of course the director was puzzled about what he was doing. They had prepared all the questions. He was given the list again and again, and he would hold the list, and carry on with me.

You need not be nervous, afraid. And remember, it is not lack of confidence. It is your belief, conviction, your confidence that you feel here in the commune, where everybody is supportive of you, nobody is hostile to you. Outside, you are alone there with hostile people. But enjoy it. My whole life I have enjoyed facing the hostile public. It is such a beautiful challenge, and if you have something to

say, they are going to hear it. They will have to hear it. If you have something authentic, existential, experiential, their lies will start dropping from their heads.

If you are open to them, soon you will find they start becoming open to you. It is infectious.

Q: WHY ARE WE AFRAID, AND SOMETIMES EVEN RESENT TAKING RESPONSIBILITY FOR OURSELVES, AND WE EXPECT EITHER YOU OR THE COMMUNE TO TAKE THE RESPONSIBILITY?

A: It is because from your very childhood you have been taught not to be responsible. You have been taught to depend. You have been taught to be responsible to your father, to your mother, to your family, to your motherland, to all kinds of nonsense. But you have not been told that you have to be responsible for yourself, that there is nobody who is going to take your responsibility.

No, on the contrary, your parents were taking your responsibility. Your family was taking your responsibility. The priest was taking your responsibility for your spiritual growth. You were just to follow all these people and do whatsoever they said. When you are grown up and you are no more a child, a great fear arises because you have to take responsibility and you have not been trained to take responsibility for yourself.

You go to confess your sin to the priest... what kind of stupidity are you doing?

First, to think that you have committed sin; second, feeling guilty that you committed it; third, now you have to go to the priest to confess it, so that he can pray to God to forgive you. A simple thing has become so complex, so unnecessarily long and circuitous.

Whatever you have done, you wanted to do it, that's why you have done it. And who is there to decide what is sin and what is not sin? There is no criterion anywhere, no weighing scale that you can go and weigh how much sin you have committed -- one kilo, two kilos, three kilos. How long a sin have you committed? -- one yard, two yards, three yards? And what was this sin, and who is this priest you are going to confess to?

And this is his strategy: if you go on confessing to the priest, you are certainly afraid of him, because he knows all the ins and outs about you. The priest knows every gossip going in the town; he knows how many husbands are flirting with other people's wives, he knows who is doing what. They themselves go on confessing it. This is the priest's strategy to keep control of his congregation. You cannot leave the congregation because the priest can expose you. And also you are afraid that if you leave the congregation the priest may not ask God for you to be forgiven, and you have committed so many sins.... Now it is too late. You have to remain in the same herd, in the same crowd, for your whole life.

I teach you not to be responsible to anybody; the father, the mother, the country, the religion, the party line -- don't be responsible to anybody. You are not. Just be responsible to yourself. Do whatsoever you feel like doing. If it is wrong, the

punishment will immediately follow. If it is right, the reward will follow immediately, instantly. There is no other way.

This way you will start finding what is wrong, what is right, on your own. You will grow a new sensitivity -- Indians call it the third eye. You will start seeing with a new vision, a new eye. Instantly you will know what is wrong, because in the past so many times you have done it and always suffered in consequence.

You will know what is right, because whenever you did existence showered great blessings on you. Cause and effect are together, they are not separated by years and lives.

You are responsible then. If you want and enjoy a certain act, although it brings suffering, then do it. It is good, because you enjoy it. The suffering is not big enough to deter you from the enjoyment that your act brings. But it is up to you, wholly and solely up to you to decide. If the suffering is too much and the act brings nothing, no joy, and necessarily a long anguish follows it, then it is up to you if you are an absolute idiot, and what can anybody do about it?

This is what I mean by being responsible to yourself. There is no God on whom you can dump your responsibility, but you are always searching to dump on somebody, even on a poor man like me, who is continuously telling you that I am not responsible for anything, for anybody. Still, somehow, deep down you go on carrying the illusion that I must be joking.

I am not joking. He is our Master, you must be thinking, how can He say that He is not responsible? But you don't understand. Dumping your responsibility on me, you will remain retarded, childish. You will never grow. The only way to grow is to accept all good, bad, the joyful, the sorrowful. Everything that happens to you, you are responsible for. That gives you great freedom.

If I am responsible for something, then the key to your actions is in my hands.

Then you are a slave to me. Then you are a puppet and the strings are in my hand. I say dance, you dance; I say stop, you stop. Of course, the puppet cannot be responsible for anything. The puppeteer, who is behind the screen, is always responsible.

God is the great puppeteer. And all these popes and saints and mahatmas are great puppets, just mediators between the big puppeteer and you. They are also puppets, but they are great puppets because they follow every single instruction from on high, absolutely. You are a little smaller puppet. Once in a while you dance on your own, too. Once in a while the puppeteer goes on pulling your strings and you don't dance.

The moment I say there is no puppeteer, no God, no saint, it is all rubbish, I am trying to give you total freedom. I am making you absolutely responsible for everything that happens to you or does not happen. Rejoice in this freedom.

Rejoice in this great understanding that you are responsible for everything in your life. This will make you what I call the individual. And to become the individual is to know all that is worth knowing, is to experience all that is worth experiencing. To be an individual is to be liberated, is to be enlightened.

The Last Testament, Vol 1