The whole existence waits for the right moment

Maneesha, before we enter into the world of Zen I have to say a few absolutely essential things concerning this country, its politicians and its priests.

Nobody seems to be interested in the actual problems of the country, of today and tomorrow.

Everybody seems to be concerned with such trivia. The priests are worried that the untouchables should not enter into the temples, as if that was anything very important to human existence.

A few friends from Delhi have reported to me that now Delhi looks almost as if it has been in a war or as if it is ready for a war. Rajiv Gandhi, the prime minister, has surrounded his home with machine guns, and with sand bags for the people holding the machine guns to hide behind. Those machine guns and those sand bags are not only at his home, but wherever he goes. If he goes to the club, or if he goes to the parliament - all over the place, it is the same scene. It seems he is suffering from paranoia.

Not a single politician has raised the question, "What is the meaning of this? This is a war arrangement! Why are you so afraid? You can have a bodyguard, that's okay, but it does not mean you have to fill the whole city with machine guns. Is there any intention to kill thousands of people?"

There seems to be a tremendous fear. And he is concerned only with his own life. But I want this country to know the reality which every politician and priest is avoiding. The priests are concerned that cows should not be slaughtered, as if that is the problem; that the untouchables should not enter into the temples, as if that will solve every problem.

A recent World Bank Report stated that by the turn of the century, fifty-four percent of the world's illiterate population would be in India.

Also by that time, sixty-two percent of India's women would not go to school, seventy-five thousand villages - I repeat, seventy-five thousand villages - would be without water, and forty percent of India's population would be living below the poverty line.

Within these coming twelve years, India's population is estimated, by very conservative estimators, to become one billion. But I suspect that more neutral observers would say that it will reach to double the population of today. When India became free, forty years ago, its population was only four hundred million. And just within forty years ... today it is nine hundred million. Five hundred million in forty years - it has more than doubled.

It seems to be more accurate that by the end of this century India will not have just one billion, it will have one billion and eight hundred million, double the population that it has today.

But nobody is concerned about it. The politician is afraid because the Shankaracharyas are against birth control, the Jaina Acharyas are against birth control. And their fear is that if they talk about birth control they will be condemned as teaching immorality to the country. But without birth control - a very strict birth control - there is no way out.

It seems that nobody is concerned. Everybody is interested in becoming a chief minister, or a cabinet minister, or a chief of some other kind. Nobody seems to ... when half of the country will be dying by your side, how will you be able to live sanely? Five hundred million people dying - the whole country will become a graveyard!

But it seems to be intrinsic to the human mind to always avoid the real problems and get involved with trivia. Knowing that the big problems need guts and intelligence to solve them, it is easier not to even talk about them, to keep people unaware of what they are going to face soon. Let them just fight over stupid things, whether this state should remain divided or undivided, whether this district should remain in this state or another state.

Forty years ago, India's constitution declared that Hindi was to be the national language, but they have not been able to implement it in forty years. And I say that even in four thousand years they will not be able to implement it. It will remain written in the constitution, because nobody wants to take the risk to say anything.

There are thirty languages in India. Hindi is the major language, and it is even understood by speakers of other languages, but as far as making it a national language there is great resistance from the other twenty-nine languages. If they are considered together Hindi becomes a minority.

There have been riots on stupid things .... In Madras you cannot write a shop sign or a restaurant sign in any language other than Tamil. Particularly in those places where Hindi was written - on railway stations, on buses - they were burned, they had to be changed. Now a train moves through many states; do you want it to change its boards at the border of every state? When it enters Gujarat it should have Gujarati and when it enters into Maharashtra it should have Marathi? - and then it goes into Karnataka and then it goes into Tamil Nadu - a train moves all over the country.

This is just trivia. Thousands of people have been killed because they resisted - they would not change their signs; their houses were burned.

And just now in the assembly there has been a great turmoil, because so much has come to be revealed against the police forces, that they are behind many crimes. In North India they have burned complete villages of harijans, raped their women, taken away their daughters and sold them for fifty rupees or a hundred rupees at the most.

Just in this state, Maharashtra, behind every crime there is the hand of the police. It seems that the police protect the criminal, because crime is paying - those criminals bribe! And of course, only the poor suffer, because nobody is going to listen to them, they don't have any voice.

Their situation is so miserable ... just today Anando was reading about two districts in Maharashtra, where every man changes his wife at least ten times. The wife seems to be just a model of a machine; whenever he has money he purchases a new wife - fifty rupees, sixty rupees, at the most a hundred rupees - and sells his old wife. He has used the old wife for one year, that's enough.

We are taught in the schools and universities that this is a great civilization - and women are being sold like cattle! The survey in these two districts has revealed that every man has changed almost ten times. And what happens to the children? Eight out of ten die, because the mother has been sold and a new woman has been purchased who has no concern for these children. By seven years of age almost eighty percent are finished.

These are the real concerns, not the political games! And particularly in a situation where war seems to be coming closer every day. Iraq and Iran have been fighting for eight years continuously and have killed one million people. Both are Mohammedan states, but a small difference in their theology ... it is so hilarious that in the fourteen hundred years since Mohammed, millions of people have been killed for that small difference.

The difference is that Mohammed had one son and one daughter; obviously, with one daughter there was one son-in-law. The son-in-law was more intelligent, more capable. The son was not so intelligent or capable, but traditionally he was the successor of Mohammed. So a division immediately happened on the grave of Mohammed. A few people remained with the tradition that the eldest son should be the successor and the others said, "It is unintelligent, seeing the situation.

We have a better alternative, and he is close by, he is the son-in-law."

This difference has created two sects of Mohammedans and they have been killing each other. What do you want by killing each other, can you decide it now who was the real successor? And what does it mean, what does it matter who was the successor?

This trivia .... Just two days ago they came to a point of cease-fire. And within two hours, Iraq again attacked. The cease-fire remained for only two hours under the observation of the U.N., but what can the U.N. do? It has no armies of its own, no power of its own; at most it can send observers, and what can they do? They can go on observing, but at most they may be killed in the fight.

All the big countries need small wars to continue everywhere, because that is their market. Science goes on improving destructive weapons; every year new weapons are available. What are you going to do with the old weapons which you have piled up for years? Now they have become absolutely useless and you have wasted so much money. Almost seventy percent of every large nation's money goes into creating armies, destructive weapons, nuclear weapons. They need the small nations to go on fighting, because they purchase the old out-of-date weapons.

It is a strange economy. If all wars ceased America would lose its power immediately; the dollar would fall down to the earth, because it would lose its market. It is a good conspiracy, a great partnership with the Soviet Union. The Soviet Union goes on supplying one party with its old weapons and the other party gets weapons from America. Both have a good market all around the world.

It seems to be unbelievable, but since the second world war there have been nearabout three hundred wars. They have been small wars, because big nations need them. Wars are their market; otherwise all the money is lost which they have invested in arms which have become out of date.

It became a strange situation when America a few days ago attacked Iran. It was not only foolish, it was also inhuman, because rather than attacking Iran, they attacked a jumbo jet airplane of civilians, two hundred and ninety people. And now they say that they could not recognize it. Among those people, there were about fifty children, and twenty small babies and old men and women. None of them were interested in any war, they were traveling; it is just that the plane belonged to Iran.

And in that fight with Iran, that lasted only two days, America had to step back for a very strange reason. America had sold its old weapons, not to Iran directly, but to Egypt, and Egypt had sold those weapons to Iran. Those old weapons - the soldiers were absolutely familiar with how to use them. But American soldiers were not expert with the latest computerized mechanisms - just a slight wrong button pressed and you explode yourself. Within two days America had to back off for the strange reason that they had better weapons but they did not know how to use them.

Meanwhile the old stockpiled weapons have to be sold. Somebody, somewhere has to continue to fight. It is a strange fact of history that people think that the Soviet Union and America are enemies.

They are enemies on the surface, but underneath it is a partnership. Both use the market, one from one side, the other from the other side, and both are interested that wars should continue.

In Afghanistan, America was sending arms, and the Soviet Union was sending soldiers and arms. It seems that the whole earth is just a market for a few idiots who have collected unnecessary arms.

But nobody is concerned with the real problem. With this seventy percent of energy that is wasted on arms, we can make this whole earth more alive, more long-living, more intelligent, with better facilities in every direction. Science has brought us to a moment in history where this planet can be transformed into a paradise, but rather than turning it into a paradise, all our politicians and priests are trying to turn it into a hell fire. And perhaps hell fire will not even be nuclear; it will be an ordinary old-fashioned wood fire.

Up to now it was thought that India belongs to the Third World. Now the World Bank is saying that India has admitted itself to the Fourth World. And it will go on falling down and down, because those who are in power know nothing of economics, they know nothing about humanity and compassion.

The whole country and the whole world has to be made aware of the situation that is going to come.

When it comes it will be too late to do anything, but right now a very small margin is still possible that things can change for the better.

I had to say this because this country contributed a new dimension to the world; it gave birth to buddhas, the highest peaks of consciousness. It deserves a certain respect in the sense that many mystics in this country entered into the most miraculous spaces of human consciousness and left keys, indications, footsteps pointing the way.

The rest of the world remains materialistic, but the present-day India is no more the same India in which Buddha was born. It is now more materialistic than any other country. And the reason is three hundred years of British rule, which destroyed everything that was India's genius and forced an education on it which was materialistic.

You will not believe it, but India used to produce the best garments in the world, particularly in what is today Bangladesh. They could make such thin material that you could cover a whole elephant with a piece of it and still it would pass through a small ring from your finger. Thousands of people's hands were cut off by soldiers of the British Empire, just because those craftsmen's skill was so great that machine-made cloth from Manchester could not compete. They had inherited their craftsmanship for centuries, but to sell British cloth in India these people's hands had to be cut off.

Such inhumanity to human beings! Rather than respecting these craftsmen, they were destroyed completely. And it was not new; you will not be aware of it, because these things are not mentioned - whoever mentions them is condemned. The Taj Mahal was made in thirty years and almost ten thousand craftsmen worked continuously during that time. Generations changed; a man's father had come to work and now his grandson was working. And when it was completed, ten thousand people's hands were cut off by the Mogul emperor Shah Jehan. They created the Taj Mahal and this was their reward. Their hands had to be cut off so that they could not create another Taj Mahal, so that it would remain unique, a miracle in architecture.

It seems we are living in a very insane world. At least bring yourself to sanity - and there is only one sanity, that arises with your awareness - and spread it wide around the world. Perhaps this small commune of seven thousand people here can still save the world, because you come from all over the world. Just understand the responsibility of the time. If you can become a message ... but never a missionary, that is an ugly and dirty word. Become a message; your very being should radiate your meditation, your silence should touch people's hearts like a cool breeze.

These anecdotes happened in a very different climate. Man was reaching toward the stars, but the Western powers were able to stop it, because the East was never ready to fight, to be violent. So the Western powers - English, French, Portuguese, Spanish, Russian - they all spread over the East without any fight. The East was never thinking of fighting, it was thinking of meditation; it was thinking that if you conquer yourself, what is the point of conquering others?

So it was a good opportunity for all kinds of robbers, because I cannot consider these people - Spanish, Portuguese, English, French, whoever have been involved in spreading their political or economic empires - as anything more than robbers, to be condemned. But strangely enough they make the history, they become the heroes, their names are written in gold.

The Prime Minister of Greece, Andreas Papandreou, who was responsible for illegally forcing me to leave Greece, said that it was because my being there was dangerous to the morality of the country.

And now he is known to be guilty of adultery, and his wife is suing him because he was unfaithful to her - and this man was talking about morality.

And the Attorney General of America, Ed Meese, who said that they were determined to destroy the commune at Rajneeshpuram in Oregon, has been found to have done hundreds of crimes. He said that he wanted Osho's voice to be silenced. Now he has to retire, he is almost forced to retire.

Retirement is just a show, he is being kicked out. Now he must know whose voice is silenced.

It is something very miraculous, that the whole of Oregon, which we had put on the map of the world ... otherwise who has ever heard of Oregon? No Socrates was ever born there, no Jesus was crucified there, they have had no Lao Tzu, no Confucius. The University of Oregon itself has come out with a survey showing that the Oregonians have only half the intelligence of the people of Rancho Rajneesh. They have a mental age of seven and the people of the commune they destroyed had the mental age of fourteen.

It always happens, rocks can destroy roses. But nature has its own ways. Today now, the whole of Oregon is suffering from no rains, except Rancho Rajneesh, which they destroyed, where all the clouds have showered. Friends have sent pictures of it to me. When I went there for the first time, it was just a desert. It had long been a desert; for forty years it was for sale and nobody was ready to purchase it - what will you do with a desert? - although it was big, one hundred and twenty-six square miles. But my people managed to convert it into an oasis, with tremendous labor, with love, with dance. We have a certain affinity with that land. And certainly the clouds have proved that they would rather shower on this desert. It is a strange communication; existence always supports innocence, but it may be a little late.

ONE DAY EJO, MEANING SOLITARY CLOUD, CALLED ON THE ZEN MASTER, DOGEN. DOGEN CITED THE SAYING, "ONE HAIR PIERCES MYRIAD HOLES," TO QUESTION HIM CLOSELY. EJO TRUSTED IN DOGEN AND SURRENDERED TO HIM.

Do you see the strangeness that this series is dedicated to the clouds and this anecdote is about Ejo, which means 'cloud' - and not only cloud, but 'solitary cloud'. A solitary cloud has a beauty, shining in the sun, moving in freedom.

Dogen was one of the most famous Zen masters.

DOGEN CITED THE SAYING to Ejo, "ONE HAIR PIERCES MYRIAD HOLES ..."

Anybody would have asked him what was the meaning of it. Ejo was also filled with the desire to ask, but this is how a disciple behaves. ... TO QUESTION HIM CLOSELY. EJO TRUSTED, because to ask a question to a master you first must be ready to receive the answer. It is a totally different process from what you have been taught in your schools and colleges and universities. In Zen you can ask the question only if you are ready to receive the answer. So first cleanse yourself.

He remained with Dogen, TRUSTED IN DOGEN AND SURRENDERED TO HIM.

This word 'surrender' is one of the difficult ones, because in the West it always means humiliation - armies surrender, nations surrender - it does not have a right connotation. In the Eastern languages it has nothing to do with armies or nations surrendering, it means that you have seen into the eyes of the master, you have felt his presence, he has touched your heart. Nothing is said, but he has overwhelmed you. You were just a stranger, but he opened his whole heart. Out of gratitude you bow down to him.

It is just a symbolic gesture that you are ready to receive; that you will not resist, you will trust; that it is not going to be a relationship between teacher and student. "I want to be a disciple, I am in search of a master and in you I feel the freshness, the breeze, the radiation. Although much has to be asked, and I have many questions, I surrender."

This is exactly the way you surrender to a surgeon; you don't inquire about his character, what kind of man he is.

I used to know a great surgeon in Nagpur. I have never seen a greater hypocrite, but he was certainly the best surgeon. Even in his old age, doctors from far away used to come to see his surgery. He had a miraculous hand. To be able to find the right spot in the brain - he was a brain surgeon - is not an ordinary phenomenon. And to cut anything in the brain you need a hand that does not waver.

If it wavers, trembles just a little bit, you may cut many other nerves in the brain, because the brain is almost like Tokyo, there is no space anywhere.

One billion cells ... you have to be very careful, because when even one cell is cut it will affect something in your body. Your whole body is controlled by those one billion cells, so only the cell that is disturbing you has to be removed. It needs the most careful craftsmanship.

He was certainly able to do it, but he was a cheat, a fraud. His fees were very high, only the richest people could afford them. And he would open someone's brain and then would ask the relatives waiting outside - the patient is on the table, the brain has been opened - for a few thousand rupees more, because he has found that the problem is more difficult than he thought.

Already they were giving him more than was right. But in such a situation, of course, whether they could afford it or not, even if they had to sell their houses and their lives, they would have to say yes.

I used to stay with him because of a common friend. I said, "This is absolutely inhuman. If you want ten thousand rupees, ask before. But this is absolute exploitation, that you ask for five thousand and then you come out and ask for five more."

He said, "It does not matter, you don't know my greed. If I ask ten in the beginning, that does not make any difference; I will again ask for ten in the middle. In the middle I have to ask, because that is the right moment, they cannot say no."

I said, "But do you consider humanity at all?"

He said, "Money is the god; people don't say it clearly, but I say it clearly. I will make every opportunity yield as much money as possible. It is just like milking the cow; I go on milking as long as even a drop of milk remains."

I said to him, "You have been educated in the West, in the most prominent medical institutions, but that does not mean that you have to forget completely the Eastern attitude that man is the ultimate value."

He said, "On that point I cannot agree with you. I agree with you on all points, but about money don't say anything to me."

And I know that it is not only him, but almost everybody has fallen so low that nothing matters in life except money. You can purchase anybody - prime ministers are purchased, presidents of countries are purchased. You can purchase anybody, you just have to give the right amount of money.

These stories are of the time when man was dignified and was in search of his inner source.

AFTER THAT, HE HAD NO DESIRE TO GO ANYWHERE ELSE - once you have found your master, the desire to go anywhere else disappears - SO HE CHANGED HIS ROBE AND STAYED THERE.

He took on the robe of Dogen's disciple.

BEFORE LONG, DOGEN MOVED TO ANOTHER PLACE AND EJO WENT ALONG WITH HIM.

ONE DAY, AS HE WAS SETTING OUT HIS BOWL, HE SUDDENLY ATTAINED ENLIGHTENMENT, AND IMMEDIATELY WENT WITH FULL CEREMONY INTO DOGEN'S ROOM.

Going with full ceremony is a little bit difficult to understand. Radiating the inner light - in the eyes something new, in the gestures a new grace - when a man becomes enlightened he is no more the same, he simply becomes a ceremony.

DOGEN ASKED HIM, "WHAT HAVE YOU UNDERSTOOD? Why are you appearing so ceremoniously? Why have you suddenly become a festival of lights, what has happened?"

EJO SAID, "I DO NOT ASK ABOUT THE ONE HAIR; WHAT ARE THE MYRIAD HOLES?" Years before, Dogen had said this quotation when Ejo came for the first time, and now he had been waiting so long.

We have forgotten how to wait; it is almost an abandoned space. And it is our greatest treasure to be able to wait for the right moment. The whole existence waits for the right moment. Even trees know it - when it is time to bring the flowers and when it is time to let go of all the leaves and stand naked against the sky. They are still beautiful in that nakedness, waiting for the new foliage with a great trust that the old has gone, and the new will soon be coming, and the new leaves will start growing. We have forgotten to wait, we want everything in a hurry. It is a great loss to humanity.

When he first entered into Dogen's temple .... Now years have passed and he has waited, meditated, remained silent, watched the master, and moved with him wherever he went. He just became a shadow, utterly surrendered, and he never raised a question. These are things to be noted down:

that he never asked a question, although there was a question, but he waited. He knew that the master knew; the master knew that a certain question was there in him, and whenever the time was ripe he would answer it.

And the time came. These are the moments which our modern education makes us absolutely incapable of understanding. We cannot understand how ONE DAY, AS HE WAS SETTING OUT HIS BOWL, HE SUDDENLY ATTAINED ENLIGHTENMENT; we cannot understand it. The modern education gives us no clue. There is no reason for him to become enlightened; but enlightenment is not something visible - it is his waiting, silently without asking, in deep trust, that has ripened. The bowl is not the cause of it. It is something inside, just like a small baby growing in its mother's womb.

In silence and waiting something inside you goes on growing, your authentic being. And one day it jumps and becomes a flame, and your whole personality is shattered, you are a new man. And this new man knows what ceremony is; this new man knows life's eternal juices.

Immediately after his enlightenment he went with full ceremony, with great dignity. For the first time he knew himself to be divine, for the first time he knew himself to be eternal, for the first time he was becoming part of the mystery of the whole. The roses had blossomed. He entered with a new breeze, with a new fragrance and with all ceremony. Dogen asked, "What has happened?"

At this moment he thought it was time to ask the question. He has waited long, he deserves ....

He said, "I DO NOT ASK ABOUT THE ONE HAIR."

Why is he not asking about the one hair? Because now he has seen that one hair himself. I have called it the diamond thunderbolt; just like a spear an awareness enters into your being.

Metaphorically Zen has called it 'one hair'. It is very thin, very quick, very sudden; in a moment you die and are born again. He said, "I DO NOT ASK ABOUT THE ONE HAIR - that I have solved - but WHAT ARE THE MYRIAD HOLES? That I cannot figure out yet."

DOGEN LAUGHED AND SAID, "PIERCED."

Slowly, slowly you will become aware, because your spear head has already pierced all those holes; but it has been too immediate, so that you cannot see all the layers of your mind, personality, thoughts, emotions. They all have been pierced. So many holes have been made in you. Just wait a little more and you will understand.

EJO BOWED again. First he bowed in trust, now he is bowing in knowing. His trust has not been wrong, he has trusted the right feet, he has been around the right person.

EJO BOWED. AFTERWARDS, HE ASKED TO SERVE AS DOGEN'S PERSONAL ATTENDANT, TAKING CARE OF HIS ROBES AND BOWL.

That shows the humbleness of the enlightened person. Ordinarily people think that the enlightened person should become very special, almost out of our reach. That is not true. If you find someone pretending to be high, superior, then you can take it for granted that he knows nothing.

Enlightenment, awakening to your being, is also awakening to the being of everyone. The man of enlightenment becomes absolutely humble, a nobody.

Since my childhood I have heard it so many times, from my elders, my father, my uncles, my other relatives: "The way you are growing up you will end up into nothing." Of course their meaning was not the same, but I have ended up in nothing. Without knowing it they have said the truth.

You are here just to learn how to be nothing, how to be nobody.

A poem runs:

A CRASH OF THUNDER OPENS THE CROWN OF THE HEAD, REVEALING ORIGINAL MAN.

And another poem:

WORDS, WORDS, WORDS; FLUTTERING DRIZZLE AND SNOW.

SILENCE, SILENCE, SILENCE; A ROARING THUNDERBOLT.

Maneesha has asked:

Yes, Maneesha. That which pierces to your very innermost core - that is the one hair, the diamond thunderbolt, because it transforms you into an eternity. It gives you the greatest blissfulness possible.

It makes you one, in tune with the whole existence. There is no other religion than this small one hair, the diamond thunderbolt. In our meditations we are waiting only for this thunderbolt, this lightning, that will go on waking you up, making you aware, beyond your bones and beyond your brain.

You are an immense universe of consciousness.

She has also asked another question:

Maneesha, those are the moments when the thunderbolt touches you. It is a very fine experience, that's why they have called it 'the hair'. I have nothing to laugh at, there is nobody inside me to laugh, there is no situation absurd enough to make me laugh. But just to give you company, just not to be an outsider, I laugh once in a while with the permission of all the buddhas here.

Pope the Polack is about to travel by helicopter around Poland to visit his people. Leaving Warsaw for the rural areas, he boards the brand new helicopter for the first time.

The pope approaches the craft, bends down and kisses it. He gets in, sits down, looks around, and then turns to the pilot and asks, "Are you hot?"

"No," replies the pilot.

Then the pope turns to the co-pilot and asks, "Are you hot?"

"No, I am not," replies the co-pilot.

"Okay," says Pope the Polack pointing upwards, "then could we turn off the fan?"

Paddy and Seamus are sitting around the "Nag and Bitch" pub, discussing their wives.

"I have not spoken to my wife in weeks," says Seamus.

"Really?" slurs Paddy. "What is the matter, are you mad at her?"

"Hell no," replies Seamus, "I am afraid to interrupt her!"

It is the Last Supper. Everyone has finished their dinner, and the waiter brings Jesus the bill.

"Heavens above," says Jesus. "I can't afford this!" And he passes the bill to Peter.

"Holy Mackerel!" says Peter, passing the bill to Mark.

"Lord save us!" says Mark, and he passes the bill to Simon. This continues all down the table until at the very far end the bill is passed to Judas.

"Holy Moses!" cries Judas. "And where the hell am I going to get thirty pieces of silver?"

At four o'clock in the morning a drunk named Orvill staggers into the Bowery flophouse shouting, "I'm Jesus Christ! I'm Jesus Christ!"

The sleeping men are all awakened.

"I'm Jesus Christ!" screams the wino again.

"Ah, shut up!" yell the others. "Be quiet!"

"I tell you, I'm Jesus Christ!" slobbers Orvill more emphatically. "If you don't believe me, come downstairs - and I will show you!"

A few other drunks get up and follow Orvill outside, where he walks up to a closed pub, and begins yelling and banging on the door.

The proprietor, who lives upstairs, hears the noise, and comes downstairs.

"Listen," slurs Orvill to the other drunks, "this guy is my witness."

The proprietor opens the door, takes one look at old drunk Orvill and says, "Jesus Christ, are you here again?"

Now, Nivedano, give the first beat ...

(Drumbeat) (Gibberish) Nivedano ...

(Drumbeat) Be silent, close your eyes.

Feel almost frozen, gather your consciousness inwards.

Deeper and deeper, because at the deepest point the diamond thunderbolt passes through, piercing all the layers of ignorance that you have gathered in your millions of lives.

Great is this moment in which seven thousand buddhas are joining at one center.

Nivedano ...

(Drumbeat) Relax, let go.

Be dead, so you can understand absolutely clearly in contrast the living point in you.

This silence, this peace, this centering is the language that humanity unfortunately has forgotten completely.

It has to be reminded of it.

Be soaked in its light, in its love, in its music, in its dance.

Remain aware of it twenty-four hours, whatever you are doing, and your every act will be virtue.

Your silence will be a song, your actions will be your devotion.

Whatever you do, if you can remember this center, is an offering to existence.

You can offer to existence only if you are a buddha; awakened, free, showered with all the ecstasy that the skies contain.

Nivedano ...

(Drumbeat) Now come back, sit for a few seconds, just to collect the memory, the experience, the space you have passed through.

Remember, you are a buddha.

To be a buddha is your birthright.

To be anything else is to go astray.

Okay, Maneesha?

Yes, Osho.

Can we celebrate so many buddhas together?

Yes, Osho.