God has no hands

Question 1:

Anand Tarika, it is easy with me not to be disappointed, not to be frustrated, for the simple reason that you never expect anything from me. The whole problem is: the moment you start expecting, you are bound to be disappointed, frustrated.

With me, your love is not that of expectation, not that of any demand. Whatever I have, I give you - not because you expect it, but because I am so overburdened with it. It is so abundant in me that I have to give - it does not matter to whom; whoever is ready to receive, I am available.

It is not something in me that does not disappoint you; it is something in you that does not expect anything from me. The day you do not expect anything from the world, there will be no frustration for you.

Being with a master, you have to learn just a simple lesson: why you are so ecstatic, why you are so happy. Your happiness, your ecstasy, is not dependent on me; I am no more than an excuse. It is your own. Just behave with the outside world in the same way as you behave with me, and you will be surprised: the same people, the same situations which have been very frustrating, disappointing, are no more so. On the contrary, they become a tremendous source of nourishment.

It all depends on you - not on me.

That is a fallacy, and if you go to your so-called priests, preachers, they will all say you are happy because of them - because of Jesus Christ, because of Gautam Buddha, because of the great tradition you belong to. They go on poisoning you. It is very fulfilling to their egos that so many people are happy because of them. The reality is - you are not happy because of anybody else.

At least I can say to you that you are not ecstatic because of me. You are ecstatic because you don't have any expectations from me. Learn the lesson, and use it in the outside world, in your other relationships. Don't expect, don't demand. Give as much as you can, and never even think of your reward.

Even your greatest saints are not in the purest state of consciousness; they are hoping and expecting that for all their austerities, for all their so-called virtues, they will be immensely rewarded in the other world.

I want you to remember it: all these saints are going to be very disappointed in the other world. Here, they suffer in order to be fulfilled in the other world; and in the other world they will suffer because the mind that demands, the mind that expects, can never be blissful - either in this world or in any other world.

You say, "You seem to be the only person in the world who never disappoints me." I may be the only person in the world with whom you don't have any expectations. Just try... and you will find many people who will not disappoint you. The seeds of disappointment are in your expectations.

There may be a few people even here who may be disappointed in me, if they are carrying in their unconscious some desire, some longing that should be fulfilled.

I am not going to fulfill anybody's expectations.

I am not here to fulfill your expectations; Neither are you here to fulfill my expectations.

I have to be myself, and you have to be yourself.

We create bridges of expectations, not knowing that expectation can never become a bridge - it always becomes a wall. The more you expect, the more frustrated you are.

Don't expect anything, and suddenly you find a tremendous contentment arising within your own self. This is the essential core of religion.

But even a man like Jesus was expecting on the cross that God was going to do some miracle, and the miracle was not happening. Naturally, he must have felt very disappointed in the God for whom he was sacrificing his whole life. And he shouted at the sky, "Father, have you forsaken me?" This is the language of expectation and demand. Then, even God is going to disappoint you.

But he must have been a man of sharp intelligence. He must have understood that he was carrying a wrong desire. You cannot demand anything from existence. You can only give. Existence returns a thousandfold, but not according to your expectation. He must have seen that there has been, in his unconscious, a demand. He dropped the demand at the last moment. At the very last moment he looked again at the sky and said, "Father, thy will be done, not mine." And a great serenity and silence descended upon the man, even though he was suffering on the cross.

In a certain way, everybody is suffering. The only difference is that in the case of Jesus the cross was made by other people, and he was crucified. In your case, you are the cross, you are the crucifier, and you are the crucified. Except you, everything else is irrelevant. If you want to get out of your miseries, your frustrations - just drop expecting. Who told you that you have a right to expect? But we are all carrying subtle expectations in every relationship, and then small things become frustrations.

You are saying, "You never abandon me." I cannot, because it is not that I have imprisoned you - it is not in my hands either to imprison you or to make you free. You are here of your own accord, and you can leave at any moment. Within you is the whole source of your being here, or going away. I have never abandoned anyone, for the simple reason that I don't dominate anybody.

Nobody is my possession.

People have to abandon each other because the possession becomes too heavy; the burden becomes intolerable. It is almost like - you can say, "You never divorce me." Even if I want to divorce you, no court is going to accept my application because I've never married you. Who am I divorcing?

Divorce necessarily has to be preceded by marriage, and vice versa: marriage necessarily brings divorce in. Whether you are courageous enough to go through the whole process or remain in limbo, it is going to be a suffering.

You say, "You never lie to me." Why should I lie to you? I don't have any business with you. I am not asking you to give anything; on the contrary, I am simply asking you to receive something. I am not a beggar. In all your relationships, you are all beggars - everybody wants to get something from the other.

I say emphatically: I am an emperor. I don't ask you to give me anything. I am available; if you want to take something from me, I will be grateful to you. Remember, you need not even be grateful to me, because that too becomes a deep expectation.

Even if you are waiting for somebody to say, "Thank you" to you, you are bound to feel frustrated.

I don't want any gratitude. On the contrary, I am grateful to you because you were so generous in receiving. You have heard of the generosity of giving; you have not heard of the generosity of receiving.

Tarika, the love, joy, bliss and ecstasy you sometimes feel inside yourself when you feel close to me, "feels like the only real thing in the world." It is. The purity of love is the only real thing in the world - uncontaminated, unpolluted by any desires. When love is pure, you are in paradise. Your paradise is within you. Just let your love be absolutely pure.

Being close to me is simply a taste of the only real thing in the world. It is not the whole thing, but even the taste is so fulfilling. Just think: the moment you become just a flame of love, you will know reality in its wholeness.

Question 2:

Devageet, being with a girlfriend, everybody behaves like a gorilla. Otherwise, the girlfriends feel very much frustrated. The more you behave like a gorilla, the more they feel satisfied. Just watch:

your behaving like a gorilla is such a joy, no girlfriend is going to miss it. If you behave very gentlemanly, the girlfriend is going to be very frustrated.

But enlightenment is still one step away from the gorilla. It makes no difference where you are, enlightenment is always at a constant distance of one step. Just get out of the gorilla and you are enlightened.

Sometimes it is easier to get out of the gorilla - because who wants to be gorilla? It is more difficult if you are President Ronald Reagan or a prime minister of a country or the richest man in the world. It is more difficult for you to get out of that role - these are all roles played on the stage of life's drama.

Enlightenment becomes easier when you are playing a role which you don't like; you hate it from your very guts - but because of the girlfriend, you have to play the role. The girlfriend is also trying to play her role - but two gorillas in one bed will be very difficult to contain; so man has managed that the girl should be ladylike, with closed eyes, lying almost dead, so he can jump like a gorilla all over the bed.

But you don't like the role. It would be good for you to have a camera fixed up to film you when you behave like a gorilla. And later on, seeing it, you will feel so ashamed: What are you doing? What kind of idiot are you? It is good that people put the light off. And every society in the past has been against people making love in the open, on the sea beach, or in the park. Every society in the past has been very much against it, for the simple reason that anybody behaving like a gorilla on the sea beach reminds every man on the beach that, "this is what I am also doing. Just, I do it in the darkness of the night."

But, Devageet, the step from being a gorilla to enlightenment is just a single step of becoming aware of what you are doing, and slipping out of your act just the way a snake slips out of its old skin. Jump out of the bed and become a buddha. Tonight, try it! Just in the middle of being a gorilla, immediately jump out of the bed, sit in a lotus posture and become a buddha! And I promise you, your girlfriend will be even more blissful and more happy: "At last some sense has happened to you."

And you will find it a surprising fact that the distance is so close. You can become in your sleep a gorilla; you can become in your sleep a president; you can become in your sleep the richest man - but these are all dreams.

In fact, when you become a gorilla in your sleep, it becomes a nightmare. All love affairs turn into nightmares. And to get up from the nightmare also seems very difficult, but people only try to get up when their dreams start turning into nightmares. If the dream goes on, sweet, beautiful - who wants to get up?

It is good that you have recognized one thing - that you behave like a gorilla. This is a great understanding. Now, tonight, take the first step of becoming enlightened; and tomorrow morning everybody will see that Devageet - who used to be a gorilla - has become enlightened. Miracles still happen.

Question 3:

Prem Shunyo, problems are never solved. They remain in different forms; you go on solving them, and they go on appearing in different forms. That is the way of philosophy where every question that was asked at the very beginning of human thinking, is still asked. Millions of solutions have been proposed, but the problem is as fresh and as pertinent as ever.

All the philosophers of the world have not even been able to make a dent in the problem - because they have moved in a wrong way. Problems are not to be solved; problems need to be dissolved, and that is a totally different path - the path of the mystics. They don't solve the problems, they simply create devices in which problems disappear into thin air.

One great philosopher came to Gautam Buddha. He was known all over the country for his great commentaries on the VEDAS and the UPANISHADS and the GITA. He had thousands of followers.

He had brought his most scholarly followers with him. Still, the number was big enough - five hundred scholars followed him. They were going to challenge Gautam Buddha; and the man had challenged many, many scholars, professors, learned people - and he had defeated them. This was a routine thing in India - that scholars used to move from town to town, challenging; and if anybody who accepted their challenge was defeated, he had to become their follower; or if the scholar was defeated, he had to become their follower with all his followers. The country had remained for almost five thousand years in a very strange philosophical atmosphere.

This man came to Gautam Buddha and said, "I have come here to challenge you. I want to know what is your definition of truth, and from there we can begin our discussion. I have brought with me my five hundred most scholarly followers. If you win we will all become your disciples, but if you are defeated, then this is the condition: you, with all your disciples, will have to become my disciple."

Gautam Buddha said, "There is no problem in it. Before we begin the discussion, I want to ask one question. It is not part of the discussion; it is just to be acquainted with each other. Have you asked this question other scholars and so-called wise people?"

He said, "Yes, I have asked thousands of people. Many of them are my followers, because I defeated them."

Gautam Buddha said, "What have you gained? Have you come to know the truth by discussing it?

Have you come to know the truth by defeating these people? One thing is certain: that you are logically more clever, sharper, than these other people. But it does not prove that you know what truth is - and even if you defeat me, you will not know what truth is. Do you want to know the truth, or simply to waste your life in defeating people?"

The man had never been faced with such a question. He said, "I really want to know the truth."

"Then," Buddha said, "discussion is not going to help; because the truth that I know cannot be brought into words - and you don't know the truth. Otherwise, what was the need to travel thousands of miles to come to me?

"I suggest one thing: you just sit by my side. For two years you have to remain silent - no question, no speaking, and relax so totally that slowly, slowly even your thoughts disappear. When two years are over, I will remind you that now we can enter into the discussion: you can ask your question."

At that very time, Mahakashyapa, who was sitting under a tree, started laughing loudly. The man said, "Is this man mad?"

Buddha said, "He used to be, but now he is not."

The man said, "Then why suddenly... for no reason...? He is sitting alone, and laughing so loudly...

what has happened?"

Buddha said, "You yourself can ask."

And he asked Mahakashyapa. Mahakashyapa said, "If you really want to ask the question, ask now.

This man is a great deceiver. This is the way he deceived me. After two years, when all thoughts have disappeared and the inner silence has blossomed, you will not asked anything - and he will not answer, of course. He has not answered me. But I cannot blame him - because I cannot ask the question. I know the answer - but he has not answered me. He is tricky.

"So I laugh: again, another idiot is going to fall into the trap. I have suffered.... Two years of silence...

everything disappears. Who cares about questions? Such well-being, such ecstasy, such joy arises.

Who bothers about conquering in a discussion... defeating somebody? One has found the greatest treasure, and the greatest kingdom, within oneself. But it is up to you. Right now he will not answer.

And after two years you will not ask."

Buddha said, "It is up to you. If you are really in search of the truth, then sit silently by my side.

Thousands of people will come and go.... Your whole effort for two years is only to be silent, and more silent."

And the man became silent. He forgot even to count the days. When two years had passed, he was not aware. It was Gautam Buddha himself who reminded him: "I know that you have forgotten the calendar. Two years have passed. This is the day two years ago that you came. Do you have any question?"

The man had tears of joy in his eyes, and he said, "You have answered everything, although I have not questioned. This is a strange game that you played - you have not discussed with me, and yet I am defeated. You have not uttered a single word - and you are victorious. But the most mysterious thing is that in your victory is my victory - because in this two years' silence not only have thoughts disappeared; even the idea of myself, the idea of the ego, has dissolved."

This is the way of the mystic: where problems dissolve, disappear into thin air. They are never answered.

Shunyo, you are right when you say, "It seems that problems are disappearing into thin air. They keep trying to come, but cannot take root." They are just old customers; out of old habit they go on coming back. But because you are no longer interested in them - you don't give them any juice anymore - they cannot take root in you. They come from one side, and they get out from another side.

"And if for a moment one settles, it soon looks ridiculous, so fades away." Except silence, everything will look ridiculous... because only in silence do you become part of the immensity of reality.

Any idea, howsoever beautiful, divides you from reality, cuts you away from the whole. And that is the misery of man... just like if a tree has been cut from its roots, soon it will start dying; it cannot live without roots.

Sometimes you may not be so alert and some idea may settle for a moment; but the moment your awareness returns, it looks so ridiculous. You need not throw it away - the very understanding that it is ridiculous is enough to kill it.

"Does the light You share with us dispel even the dark night of the soul?" What do you think, Shunyo?

My light cannot dispel the darkness that surrounds you on the outside - otherwise you will not have the chance to enjoy the electric failures. It is so beautiful when once in a while the electricity fails and you all are waiting in silence... a great peace that passeth understanding envelops you.

Certainly, my light cannot dispel the outside darkness. To dispel the outside darkness, you need an outside light. My light is of the inner; it can only dispel your inner darkness.

So even when the light fails, and you are sitting in darkness, you are connected with me by far more subtle rays of light, which are not visible to the eyes; but your heart feels them, dances with them. So many people suddenly become one... or even better: so many people suddenly disappear. There is only silence. I think that the electric failures must be managed by existence itself to give you some glimpses of the inner light.

You are asking, "What is the dark night of the soul? Is it really true?" First, the dark night of the soul is a state of your being where you are cut off from the whole - because the source of light and life and laughter... all comes from the source that is beyond you. You are not the source of your own life.

And there are moments when you are cut off completely. Because of your jealousy, you are surrounded by a poisonous cloud, and you are cut off from the whole - because of your anger, because of your violent rage. And there are so many things which cut you off from the whole.

Anything that cuts you off from the whole creates the dark night of the soul. So it can be said that to be separate from the whole is to be in darkness; and to be one with the whole is to be in light. And it is an existential phenomenon - it is real.

There are very few significant words uttered in the world: amongst those few words are three small sentences from the UPANISHADS. Those sentences can become a bridge to the divine. Nobody knows who uttered those sentences first. Perhaps thousands of mystics may have uttered them again and again - not repeating, but on their own - and slowly, slowly they became condensed.

Those three sentences are: Lead me from darkness to light; lead me from death to deathlessness....

They appear as if they are a prayer, but they are not a prayer because the UPANISHADS don't have a god. They are invocations to existence itself.

Lead me from the unreal to the real.

Lead me from darkness to light. And, Lead me from death to deathlessness.

In these three small sentences is contained the whole message of the East, a message that can never be out of date - which will always remain significant, meaningful, in every age, in every time.

I cannot conceive of any time, any age in the future when these three statements will have become out of date. When all your scriptures may have become out of date, these three statements will still remain significant.

In Sanskrit they are very beautiful, because Sanskrit is a very poetic language - asto ma sat gamaya:

from the false to the real; mrityorma amratam gamaya: from death to deathlessness.... Just within three words a sentence is complete.

In fact, all the three sentences are three aspects of one reality. And there is no question of any belief; there is no question of becoming part of an organized religion - and whatever is said is the very longing of every human soul. Can you find a human soul which is not longing for light, not longing for eternal life, not longing for ultimate truth?

Being close to a master there is a possibility that you may catch his health and his wholeness.

People think that only sicknesses can be contagious; that is a half truth. Why can't wholeness, well-being, blissfulness, ecstasy, be contagious? You just have to be open, available, fearless. Then truth can enter you and can wake up your own truth, which is fast asleep. Then light can enter you and enkindle your own flame. Then something of the eternal can touch you and destroy your fear of death, and can open your eyes about your own being as part of eternity.

Just the other day I was telling you about the Sufi story: The man is drowning and he refuses the hand of the friend, and he refuses the hand of God - but he accepts the hand of the master. There are so many implications in this story. The hand of the master is the hand of the greatest friend you can find; and the hand of the master is the hand of God, because God does not have his own hands - he uses the hands of those who have realized him.

God has no hands; the ordinary friend has no godliness; the master has both. He has a love that transcends any friendship, and his hand is no more his own; his hand belongs to God. It is beautiful that the master's hand is accepted. One would have thought that God's hand would have been accepted. But God does not have any hands; God is only an experience.

Being close to the master, you are close to your greatest lover, your greatest friend; and you are also close to the ultimate truth, which has been known down the ages as God. I call it "godliness,"

because God gives a wrong idea, as if he is a person. He is only a presence.

The master, perhaps, is the most significant link between this world and that; between the known and the unknowable; between the visible and the invisible. And being close to the master means nothing but being consumed in his fire.

A moment comes... you disappear, with all your problems and all your dark nights, and only that which is twenty-four carat gold in you remains.

Question 4:

My God!

Om Saraswati, you are not. You are nowhere. You have never been - and you will never be. Om Saraswati is just a name given to a nameless reality for utilitarian purposes. Otherwise, you are just a presence.

Every child is born as a presence, with no name, with no address. And becoming a sannyasin is a second birth, far deeper and far greater than the first. In the first, at least you are a body. You may not have a name, you may not have an address; but you have an abode - in the body.

The moment you become a sannyasin, you have dropped the idea of being a body, too. Now you are just pure consciousness - either everywhere or nowhere. Both the words mean the same. You can choose. You can choose to be everywhere, or you can choose to be nowhere. In either case, you are not limited anymore; you don't have any boundary, you cannot be caught hold of.

It is a very special question... because people have been asking thousands of times: Who am I?

Om Saraswati is a rare genius - he is asking, "Where am I?"

Nowhere. Or, if you cannot read such a big word - ?nowhere' - then cut it in two: ?now,' ?here.' To me, both are acceptable. But remember that your inner being is without any limits - even the sky is not the limit. So everything can be in you - the faraway stars can be within you - but you are not within any cage, however big, however beautiful, however valuable.

Realization of this truth - that I am ?everywhere,' or ?nowhere,' or ?now,' ?here' - I call enlightenment.

And I am giving you three choices; three choices have never been given by any mystic before. My own choice is ?now,' ?here.' But I am not addicted to any certain opinion. ?Nowhere' will do. But if a negative statement like ?nowhere' makes you afraid, then ?everywhere' will do.

Hence, drop finding where you are; start looking for who you are. The where is not important; the who is important - and if you know who you are, you will know where you are.

In my humble opinion, you will find it now, here.

Question 5:

Anand Tosha, the basic fallacy that you are carrying within you is that you always loved somebody.

This is one of the most significant things about all human beings; their love is always for somebody, it is addressed - and the moment you address your love, you destroy it. It is as if you are saying, "I will breathe only for you - and when you are not there, then how can I breathe?"

Love should be like breathing. It should be just a quality in you - wherever you are, with whomsoever you are, or even if you are alone, love goes on overflowing from you. It is not a question of being in love with someone - it is a question of being love.

People are frustrated in their love experiences, not because something is wrong with love... they narrow down love to such a point that the ocean of love cannot remain there. You cannot contain the ocean - it is not a small stream; love is your whole being - love is your godliness. One should think in terms of whether one is loving or not. The question of the object of love does not arise. With your wife, you love your wife; with your children, you love your children; with your servants, you love your servants; with your friends, you love your friends; with the trees, you love the trees; with the ocean, you love the ocean.

You are love.

Love is not dependent on the object, but is a radiation of your subjectivity - a radiation of your soul.

And the vaster the radiation, the greater is your soul. The wider spread are the wings of your love, the bigger is the sky of your being.

Anand Tosha, you have lived under a common fallacy of all human beings. Now you are asking, "Am I able to love You?" - again, the same fallacy.

Just ask: Am I able to become love?

When you are in my presence, you need not think of loving me; otherwise, you have not come out of your ordinary fallacies. Here, you have to learn... just being loving. Of course your love will reach me too; it will reach others too. It will be a vibe surrounding you, spreading all over; and if so many people are simply broadcasting their love, their song, their ecstasy, the whole place becomes a temple. There is no other way of making a temple. Then the whole area is filled with a new kind of energy, and nobody is at a loss - because on you is showering the love of so many people: on each single person, so many people's love is showering.

Drop that fallacy. And because of that fallacy, another question arises in you: "... or has life brought me to the point where happiness in love does not happen anymore?" Life is nothing but an opportunity for love to blossom. If you are alive, the opportunity is there - even to the last breath.

You may have missed your whole life: just the last breath, the last moment on the earth, if you can be love, you have not missed anything - because a single moment of love is equal to the whole eternity of love.

Okay, Vimal?

Yes, Osho.