Seeing double

YES, THE WAY IS RIGHT before your eyes. But your eyes are not right before the way -- they are closed, closed in a very subtle manner. They are clouded. Millions of thoughts are closing them, millions of dreams are floating on them; whatsoever you have seen is all there, whatsoever you have thought is all there. And you have lived long -- many lives, and you have thought much, and it is all gathered there in your eyes. But because thoughts cannot be seen you see your eyes as clear. The clarity is not there. Millions of layers of thought and dreams are there in your eyes. The Way is right before you. All that is, is right before you. But you are not here. You are not in that still moment where eyes are totally empty, unclouded, and you SEE, and you see that which is.

So the first thing to be understood is: how to attain unclouded eyes, how to make eyes empty so that they can reflect truth, how not to be continuously in a mad rush within; how not to be continuously thinking and thinking and thinking, how to relax thought.

When thought is not, seeing happens; when thought is, you go on interpreting and you go on missing.

Don't be an interpreter of reality, be a visionary. Don't think about it, see it!

What to do? One thing: Whenever you look, just be the look. Try. It is going to be difficult, difficult just because of old habit. But try. It happens. It has happened to many, why not you? You are no exception. The universal law is as available to you as to a buddha or to anybody. Just make a little effort.

You see a flower: then just see, don't say anything. The river is flowing: sit on the bank and SEE the river, but don't say anything. Clouds are moving in the sky: lie down on the ground and SEE, and don't say anything. Just don't verbalize!

This is the deepest habit, to verbalize; this is your whole training -- to jump immediately to words from reality, to immediately start making words: 'beautiful flower,' 'lovely sunset.' If it is lovely, let it be lovely! -- why bring in this word? If it is beautiful, do you think your word 'beautiful' will make it more beautiful? On the contrary, you missed an ecstatic moment. The verbalization came in. Before you could have seen you moved, moved in an inner wandering. If you go too far away in this wandering you become mad.

What is a madman? He who never comes to reality, who always wanders in his own world of words -- and he has wandered so far that you cannot bring him back. He is not with the reality, but are YOU with the reality? You are not either. The difference is only of degree. A madman has wandered very far, you never wandered that far -- just in the neighborhood -- and you come again and again and touch reality and go again.

You have a small touch, a small contact somewhere, uprooted, but still one root seems to be there in the reality. But that root is very fragile; any moment it can be broken, any accident -- the wife dies, the husband escapes, you become bankrupt in the market -- and that fragile root is broken. Then you go on wandering and wandering; then there is no coming back, then you never touch reality. This is the state of the madman, and the normal man is different only in degree.

And what is the state of a buddha, an enlightened man, a man of Tao, of understanding, awareness? He is deeply rooted in reality, he never wanders from it -- just the opposite of a madman.

You are in the middle. From that middle either you can move towards being a madman or you can move towards being a buddha. It is up to you. Don't give much energy to thoughts, that's suicidal; you are poisoning yourself. Whenever thinking starts, if it is unnecessary -- and ninety-nine percent of it is unnecessary -- immediately bring yourself back to reality. Anything will help: even the touch of the chair you are sitting on, or the touch of the bed you are lying on. Feel the touch -- it is more real than your thoughts about God, it is more godly than your thoughts about God because it is a real thing.

Touch it, feel the touch, be the touch, be here and now. You are eating? -- taste the food well, the flavor. Smell it well, chew it well -- you are chewing reality! Don't go wandering in thoughts. You are taking a bath? -- enjoy it! The shower is falling on you? - - feel it! Become more and more a FEELING center rather than a thinking center.

And yes, the way is right before your eyes. But feeling is not allowed much. The society brings you up as a thinking being not as a feeling being, because feeling is unpredictable; no one knows where it will lead, and society cannot leave you on your own. It gives you thoughts: all the schools, colleges and universities exist as centers to train you for thinking, to verbalize more. The more words you have, the more talented you are thought; the more articulate you are with words and words, the more educated you are thought. It will be difficult, because thirty, forty, fifty, sixty years of training... but the sooner you begin the better. Bring yourself back to reality.

That is the meaning of all sensitivity groups. In the West they have become a focal point and all those who are interested in consciousness, extension of consciousness, have to be interested in sensitivity groups, in training to be more sensitive. And you need not go anywhere to learn it, the whole of life is sensitivity. Twenty-four hours a day the reality is just before you, around you -- it surrounds you; you breathe it in, you eat it. Whatsoever you do you have to do with reality.

But the mind moves far away. There exists a gap between your being and your mind -- they are not together, the mind is somewhere else. You have to be here in reality because when you eat you have to eat real bread; thinking about bread won't help. When you take a bath you have to take a real bath; thinking about it is of no use. When you breathe you have to breathe real air; just thinking about it won't do. Reality surrounds you from everywhere, is bumping you from all sides -- wherever you go you encounter it.

That is the meaning of: The way is right in front of your eyes. It is everywhere because nothing else can be -- only the real IS.

Then what is the problem? Why then do people go on seeking and seeking and seeking and never find it? Where does the problem exist? What is the basic core of the whole trouble? The trouble is, mind can be in thoughts. The possibility for mind being in thoughts is there. The body is in reality, but the mind can be in thoughts -- and that is the duality. And all your religions have been in favor of the mind and not in favor of the body. That has been the greatest block that has ever existed in this world. They poison the whole mind of humanity; they are for the mind, not for the reality.

If I tell you: When you are eating, eat with taste, and eat so deeply that the eater is forgotten, simply become the process of eating -- you will be surprised because no religious man will say a thing like that. Religious people have been teaching: Eat without taste -- ASWAD; they have made a great thing out of it, the training for no-taste.

In Gandhi's ashram they had eleven rules. One of them was aswad, no taste -- eat, but without taste, kill the taste completely. Drink -- but without taste. Make your life as insensitive as possible. Deaden your body completely, so that you become a pure mind.

You will become so -- but this is how people go towards madness.

I teach you just the contrary, just the opposite. I am not against life -- and life is the way.

I affirm life in its totality. I am not a negator, I am not a denier -- and I want you to bring your mind back to reality. Your body is more real than your mind. You can befool with the mind, you cannot befool with the body. The body is more rooted in the world; the body is more existential than your mind. Your mind is just mental. It thinks, it spins words, it creates systems -- and all systems are foolish.

Once it happened, Mulla Nasruddin was gambling in a horse race. First race he lost; second, he lost; third -- he went on losing, and two ladies just by his side sitting in a box were continuously winning every race.

Then at the seventh he could not contain his curiosity. What system were they following?

Every race, and it was now the seventh, they had been winners and he had been a loser, and he had been working so hard at it. So he gathered courage, leaned over, and asked the ladies: 'You are doing well?'

They said, 'Yes,' very happily, they were beaming with happiness.

So he whispered: 'Can you tell me about your system? Just a hint.'

One lady said laughingly, 'We have a lot of systems! But today we have decided for long tails.'

But all systems and all philosophies are just like that -- long tails. No system is true to reality because no system CAN be true to reality. I am not saying that some system can be -- no. NO system can be true to reality because all systems are fabrications of the mind, verbalizations, your interpretations, your projections -- mind working on reality.

That's how a system is born; all systems are false.

Reality needs no system. Reality needs a clarity of vision. To look at it needs no philosophy, it is right here and now. Before you start moving into a philosophy it is there; when you come back it will be there and will have always been there with you -- and you were thinking about it. Thinking about it is the way to miss it.

If you are a Hindu you will miss, if you are a Christian you will miss, if you are a Mohammedan you will miss; every 'ism' is a way of missing. If you have the Koran in your head you will miss, if you have the Gita in your head you will miss; whatsoever scripture you carry -- scripture is mind, and reality doesn't fall in line with the mind, reality does not bother about your mind and your fabrications.

Beautiful theories you spin, beautiful arguments you give, logical rationalizations you find. You work hard. You go on refining your theories, polishing them, but they are just like bricks: you go on rubbing, polishing, but they can never become a mirror. But I say:

Maybe bricks can become a mirror, but the mind can NEVER become a mirror to reality.

The mind is a destroyer. The moment it enters, everything becomes cloudy.

Please don't be a philosopher, and don't be an addict of any system. It is easy to bring an alcoholic back, it is easy to bring back a person who has gone deep into drugs; it is difficult to bring a system-addict back. And there exist organizations like Alcoholics Anonymous for alcoholics and other organizations for drug addicts, but there exists no organization for people who have become system-addicts -- and there cannot be, because whenever there is an organization, it itself is a system.

I am not giving you a system. My whole effort is to bring you out of your systematizing mind. If you can become again a child, if you can look at reality without any preconceptions about it, you will attain. It is simple, it is ordinary, nothing is special about it. Reality is nothing special and extraordinary -- it is there, it is everywhere. Only your mind is an unreal thing. Mind creates illusion, MAYA, mind creates dreams -- and then you are clouded in them. And you are trying to do the impossible, that which cannot be done: you are trying to find the real through the mind. You lose the real through the mind, you cannot find it through the mind. You have to drop the mind completely.

Yes, the way is right before your eyes -- but you are not there.

First thing: mind won't help. Try to understand it: mind won't help, it is the barrier. And the second thing: your over-concern about yourself is the greatest barrier. It has been my constant observation that people who meditate miss because they are concerned too much in themselves. They are too egocentric. They may pretend humbleness and they may even want to know how to be egoless, but they are the most egocentric people; they are only worried about themselves, they are only concerned with themselves.

To be worried about others is stupid; to be worried about oneself is even more stupid -- because to be worried IS stupidity; it makes no difference about whom you are worried.

And people who are worried about others, you will feel they are always more healthy.

So in the West psychoanalysts help people to think about others and drop thinking about themselves. Psychologists go on teaching people how to be extroverts and not to be introverts, because an introvert becomes ill, an introvert becomes in reality perverted. He thinks continuously about himself, he becomes enclosed. He remains with his frustrations, worries, anxieties, anguish, depressions, anger, jealousy, hate, this and that -- and he only worries. Think what type of anguish he lives in, continuously worried about things: Why am I angry? How should I become non-angry? Why do I hate? How should I transcend it? Why am I depressed? How to attain bliss? -- he is continuously worried, and through this worry he creates the very same things he is worried about. It becomes a vicious circle.

Have you ever observed that whenever you want to go beyond a depression the depression deepens? Whenever you want not to be angry you become more angry.

Whenever you are sad and you don't want to be sad any more, more sadness descends on you -- have you not observed it? It happens because of the Law of the Reverse Effect. If you are sad and you want not to be sad, what will you do? You will look at sadness, you will try to suppress it, you will be attentive to it -- and attention is food.

Psychoanalysts have found a clue. That clue is not very meaningful in the end; it cannot lead you to reality, it can at the most make you NORMALLY unhealthy. It can make you adjusted -- it is a sort of adjustment to the people around you. They say: Be concerned with others' worries, help people, serve people.

Rotarians, members of Lions Clubs and others, they always say: We serve. Those are the extroverts. But you will feel that people who are in social service, those who are concerned with others and are less concerned with themselves are happier than people who are concerned too much with themselves.

Too much concern with oneself is a sort of disease. And then the deeper you move within -- you are opening a Pandora's Box: many things bubble up and there seems to be no end to it. You are surrounded by your own anxieties and you go on playing with your wounds, you go on touching them again and again to see whether they are healed or not.

You have become a pervert.

What to do? There seem to be only two ways: either be an extrovert -- but by being an extrovert you can NEVER become a buddha, because if you are worried about others, this worrying about others may be an escape. It is. You cannot look at your own worries when you are worried about others. Your focus is others, you are in a shadow. But how will your inner being grow this way? You will look more happy, you may look as if you are enjoying life more, but how are you going to grow? How will your inner being come to that point where it becomes light? If you are not concerned with it at all, it is not going to grow. To be an extrovert is good in the sense that you remain healthy -- you don't become a pervert. To be an introvert is dangerous. If you move wrongly, you will become a pervert and the wrong movement is that you become too concerned. Then what to do?

Treat yourself as if you also are the other; don't be too concerned.

And you ARE the other. Your body is other, why not my own body also? Your mind is other, why not my own mind? The question is only distance: your body is five feet away from me, my body is a little closer, that's all. Your mind is there, my mind is here -- the difference is of distance. But my mind is as other as your mind, and my body is as far away from me as your body. And if this whole world is not a concern to me, why make myself a concern? Why not leave both and be neither extrovert nor introvert? -- this is my message.

If you cannot follow this then it is better to follow the psychoanalysts. Be an extrovert, be unconcerned; you will not grow but at least you will not suffer so much as an introvert suffers. But don't be an introvert and don't play with your wounds. Don't be concerned too much. Don't be so selfish and don't be so self-centered. Look at yourself from a distance; the distance is there, you only have to try it once and you will feel it. You are also the other.

When your body is ill it is as if somebody else's body is ill: do whatsoever is needed but don't be too concerned, because that overmuch concern is a greater illness than the body's. If you have a fever go to the doctor, take the medicine, take care of the body, and that's all. Why be concerned too much? Why create another fever -- which no doctor can treat? This fever in the body can be treated, but if you become too concerned another fever is created. That fever is deeper, no doctor can help with it.

And this is the problem: the body may become well soon, but the other fever may continue; and the other fever may go on continuing, and you may feel that the body is still ill. This happens every day: the disease disappears from the body but not from the mind and the mind carries it on. It has happened many times.

Once somebody was telling me about his friend who is a drunkard -- he walks on crutches, he cannot walk without them. For many years he has been walking on crutches - - some accident some twenty years ago. Then one day he had taken too much drink; he forgot the crutches and went out for a walk. After one hour he came running back in a panic; he said, 'Where are my crutches? I cannot walk without them! I must have taken too much.' But if while you are drunk you can walk, why not when you are not drunk?

All over the world many cases are reported about paralysis. Somebody is paralyzed and then the house catches fire and everybody runs out, and the man who was paralyzed and who couldn't get out of his bed -- everything was done in the bed -- he also runs out, because he forgets. The house is on fire, he forgets completely that he is paralyzed. In that forgetfulness he is not paralyzed. And outside the house the family looks at him and says, 'What are you doing? How can you run?' -- and he falls down; remembering comes back.

You may be creating many diseases, not because the body is ill but because the mind carries the seed. So once a disease happens the mind carries the seed and goes on projecting it again and again and again. Many diseases, ninety percent, have their origin in the mind.

Too much concern about yourself is the greatest disease possible. You cannot be happy, you cannot enjoy yourself. How can you enjoy? So many problems inside! Problems and problems and problems and nothing else! -- and there seems to be no solution. What to do? You go crazy. Everybody, inside, IS crazy.

I have heard -- it happened in Washington -- one man suddenly climbed up a pole, a flagpole. A crowd gathered, policemen came, and the man shouted as loudly as he could, uttered profane words, then came down.

Immediately he was caught by the police and they asked the person, 'What are you doing here?'

The man said, 'Don't disturb me. If I don't do such a crazy thing now and then I will go mad, I will go nuts. I tell you, don't stop me. If I do such a thing now and then everything runs smoothly. And I did not think that anybody would be able to know, because where so much craziness is going on all around, who will bother?'

You also need to become mad now and then -- that's how anger happens: anger is a temporary madness. If you don't allow a leakage now and then you will gather so much you will explode, you will go nuts. But if you are continuously concerned with this you are already nuts.

This has been my observation, that people who meditate, pray, seek and search for the truth are more prone to neurosis than other people. And the reason is: they are concerned with themselves too much, too egocentric, just continuously thinking of this and that, this block, that block, this anger, that sadness, headache, backache, stomach, legs... they are continuously moving inside. They are never okay, they cannot be, because the body is a vast phenomenon and many things go on.

And if nothing is happening then too they are worried: why is nothing happening? And immediately they have to create something because that has become their constant business, occupation; otherwise they feel lost. What to do? Nothing is happening! How is it possible that nothing is happening to me? They feel their ego only when something is happening -- maybe it is depression, sadness, anger, an illness, but if something is happening they are okay, they can feel themselves.

Have you seen children? They pinch themselves to feel that they are. The child remains in you -- you would like to pinch and see whether you are or not.

It is said about Mark Twain that once at a dinner party he was suddenly in a panic and he said, 'Sorry, I will have to leave, and you will have to call a doctor. It seems my right leg has become paralyzed.'

The lady sitting by his side started laughing and said, 'Don't be worried, you have been pinching MY leg.'

Then Mark Twain said, 'Once twenty years ago a doctor said to me, "Some day or other your right side will get paralyzed," so since then I have been pinching myself; I always feel, twenty or thirty times a day, whether it has gone. Just now I was pinching and' ... he was pinching somebody else's leg.

But why go on pinching? Why be concerned with paralysis? It is more of a disease if you have to pinch your leg thirty times a day for twenty years. Count it. This is worse than paralysis! Paralysis happens once; this is happening thirty times a day for twenty years.

They say a brave man dies once and cowards die millions of times -- because they go on pinching and feeling whether they are dead yet or not.

Your diseases help you to retain your ego. You feel that something is happening -- of course not bliss, not ecstasy, but sadness and 'Nobody is as sad as I am,' and 'Nobody is as blocked as I am,' and 'Nobody has such a migraine as I have got.' You feel superior there, everybody else is inferior.

If you are concerned too much with yourself remember, you will not attain. This over- concern will enclose you, and the Way is right before your eyes. You have to open your eyes, not close them.

Now try to understand this parable.

A MASTER WAS ASKED BY A CURIOUS MONK: 'WHAT IS THE WAY?'

The first thing is to understand that the monk is curious, not a seeker. If you are a seeker you inquire in a different way. You inquire with your being, you put yourself at stake, you become a gambler. If you are simply curious it is just like an itch; you feel a subtle itch in the mind but it is nothing, you are not REALLY concerned with it, not sincere about it -- whatsoever the answer you will not bother. It will not change you. And a curious man is a superficial man. You cannot ask such questions out of curiosity, you have to ask them out of a very authentic search. And when you go to a master you feel you have to ask something; otherwise you will be thought foolish.

Many people come to me and I know from where they are asking. Sometimes they are simply curious: because they have come, now they have to ask; otherwise they will be thought foolish. And by asking they prove they ARE foolish, because if the question has not really arisen in you, if the question has not become a deep inquiry, if the question does not put everything at stake, if the problem is not a problem of life and death, if you are not ready to be transformed by the answer, you are foolish if you ask. And if you are not questioning from the heart, it is difficult to give any answer, and even if an answer is given you will misunderstand it.

The monk was a curious monk, that's why in this parable he does not awake. Otherwise...

we have been studying many parables; when the search is true, in the end satori happens, a certain enlightenment comes. Suddenly a disciple becomes alert, as if someone has shaken him out of his sleep. A clarity comes. Maybe only for a split second, but clouds disperse and the vast sky is seen. The clouds will come again -- that's not the problem, but now you know what real sky is and you will carry this seed within you. Rightly taken care of, this seed will become a tree, and thousands will be able to find rest and shelter under you. But if you are curious, nothing will happen. If you are curious, the question has not come out of the heart. It is an intellectual itch -- and in mind, seeds cannot be sown.

Jesus has a parable -- he was continuously talking about it. A farmer went to sow seeds.

He just threw them here and there. Some fell on the road; they never sprouted because the road was hard and the seeds could not penetrate the soil, they could not move in the deeper, darker realm of the soil. ... Because only there does birth happen, only in the deep dark does God start working. The work is secret work, it is hidden.

Some fell by the side of the road; they sprouted, but animals destroyed them. Only some fell on the right soil; they not only sprouted, they grew to their full height, they flowered, they came to fulfillment, and one seed came to be millions of seeds.

If you ask from curiosity, you are asking from the road. The head is just a road -- it has to be, it has such a constant traffic. It has to be very hard, almost concrete. Even on your roads the traffic is not so much as in your head. So many thoughts going here and there at fast speed! We have not yet been able to invent a faster vehicle than thought -- our fastest vehicles are nothing before thought. Your astronauts may reach the moon, but they cannot reach it with the speed of thought, they will take time; you can simply immediately reach the moon in thought. For thought, it is as if space does not exist: one moment you can be here, next moment in London and the next in New York, and hop around the world many times within a second. So much traffic... the road is almost concrete; throw something there, it will never sprout.

Curiosity comes from the head. It is asking a master something just as if you have encountered him in the market and you ask him. I know such people. I was traveling so much it was a problem to avoid such people. Even on the platform -- I am going to catch a train and they are accompanying me and they will ask, 'What about God? Does God exist or not?' These people are curious and they are foolish! Never ask a question out of curiosity, because it is useless, wasting your time and others'.

If somebody had asked this master the question right from the heart, the end would have been different. The man would have flowered into satori, there would have been a fulfillment. But there is no end like that because the very beginning was wrong. A master gives you an answer out of compassion, knowing well that you are curious -- but maybe, who knows, even accidents happen; sometimes curious people also become authentically interested, nobody knows.

A MASTER WAS ASKED BY A CURIOUS MONK: 'WHAT IS THE WAY?' 'IT IS RIGHT BEFORE YOUR EYES,' SAID THE MASTER.

This is absurd because if it is really right before the eyes then why do people seek, why do people inquire? And why can't they see for themselves?

A few things to be understood. One: the closer a thing, the more difficult it is to see it -- the closest almost impossible, because eyes need a certain space, perspective, to see. I can see you, but if I go on coming closer and closer and closer everything will be blurred; your face will be blurred, lines will lose their shape. And if I go on coming and coming and just put my eyes on your face, nothing will be seen -- your face will become a wall.

But still I can see a little because a little distance will be there.

Not even that much distance exists between you and the real. It is just touching your eyes.

It is just touching your skin -- not only that, it is penetrating the skin. It is moving in your blood. It is beating in your heartbeat. It is you. The Way is not only in front of your eyes, the way is YOU. You are one with it. The traveler is not different from the Way, not in reality; they are one.

So how to see it? No perspective, no space...? Unless you attain to a clear intelligence, to a clarity of understanding, you will not be able to see it. Unless you become so intensely aware, you will not be able to see it. The distance is not there, so ordinary ways of looking AT will not do; you need an extraordinary awareness, to be so extraordinarily alert that nothing is asleep in you. Suddenly the door opens. The Way is there -- you ARE the Way. But you miss because it is there already. It has always been there -- before you were born. You were born on the Way, in the Way, for the Way, of the Way -- because the Way is the reality.

Remember, this Way doesn't go to a goal; this Way IS the goal. So in fact there is no traveling, just staying alert, just being still, silent, not doing anything. Just becoming a clarity, an awareness, a silent cool understanding.

'IT IS RIGHT BEFORE YOUR EYES,' SAID THE MASTER.'WHY DO I NOT SEE IT FOR MYSELF?' ASKED THE MONK.

When you are curious, every answer will create another question, because curiosity can never be satisfied. Inquiry can be satisfied, inquiry can come to an end, to a conclusion; never curiosity, because you bring again the same curious mind to the answer, again a new question comes out of it. You can satisfy one who is really in inquiry, you cannot satisfy one who is simply asking: 'WHY DO I NOT SEE IT FOR MYSELF?'

Another thing: a curious person deep down is not concerned with reality, is concerned only with himself. He says, 'WHY DO I NOT SEE IT FOR MYSELF? Why can you see it and why can't I see it? I cannot believe you, I cannot trust, and if it is right in front of my eyes then why can't I see it?'

'BECAUSE YOU ARE THINKING OF YOURSELF,' SAID THE MASTER.

The Way is there, and you are thinking about yourself: 'Why can't I see?' Nobody can see who is filled so much with the ego. Put it aside, because the ego means your whole past, all that you have experienced, all that you have been conditioned for, all that you have known, studied, collected, gathered -- information, scripture, knowledge -- all that is your ego, the whole lot, and if you are concerned with it, you cannot see it.'WHAT ABOUT YOU?' SAID THE MONK.

Whatsoever a master says, every answer could lead to a satori -- if the person is right.

Just the first thing, when he said, 'IT IS RIGHT BEFORE YOUR EYES,' would have become an enlightenment if the right person had been there. But he missed; otherwise the next statement would have been an understanding.

'WHY DO I NOT SEE IT FOR MYSELF?' HE ASKED.'BECAUSE YOU ARE THINKING OF YOURSELF.'

But no. Curiosity cannot be satisfied, it never comes to an end. Suddenly, whenever you touch somebody's 'I', he jumps on you. He said:

'AND WHAT ABOUT YOU... DO YOU SEE IT?'

Ego always feels: If I cannot see it, how can anybody else see it? The ego can never feel that anybody else can be egoless: impossible. And if you can feel this your ego has already started dying. If you can feel that somebody can be egoless, already the grip is loosening. The ego won't allow you to feel that anybody has EVER been without an ego.

And because of your ego you go on projecting egos on others.

Many books have been written about Jesus -- more than about anybody else -- and many books try to prove that Jesus must have been a very deep egoist because he goes on saying, 'I am the son of God; I and my father are one.' He is saying: I am God. Many psychoanalysts have tried to explain that he was neurotic. How can you say you are God?

You must be an egoist.

And that's how Jews felt when Jesus was alive. They also felt: this man is just mad with his ego! What is he saying -- that he is God, or the only son of God? Claiming so much for himself! And they mocked. They mocked, they laughed.

And when they crucified Jesus their behavior with him is simply incomprehensible. They put a crown of thorns on his head and said, 'You, King of the Jews, son of God, you and your father are one -- remember us when we also come to your Kingdom of God.' They forced him to carry his cross. He was weak, the cross was very heavy -- they had made it very heavy knowingly, and they forced him just like an ordinary criminal to carry his own cross. And he was feeling thirsty, because where he was crucified it was a hill; the hill is known as Golgotha. It was uphill, he was carrying his big cross, heavy cross; he was perspiring, feeling thirsty, and people were mocking all around and making jokes about him, and they said, 'Look -- the King of the Jews! Look! The man who claims that he is the son of God.'

Many had gathered there just to enjoy it -- it was a sort of amusement, a merriment. The whole town had gathered there just to throw stones at this man. Why were they taking such a revenge? -- because they felt that this man had hurt their egos. He claimed that he was God himself. They couldn't understand that this man had no ego at all; hence the claim. The claim was not coming from the ego, the claim was simply a reality. When YOUR ego drops you are also a god.

But one can claim from the ego. All our claims are from the ego, so we cannot see how a person can claim without the ego. Krishna in the Gita says to Arjuna, 'Come to my feet.

Leave all, and surrender to me.' Hindus are not so bold, and they are very mannerly; they have not written that this man is an egoist. But in the West many have felt the same as with Jesus: What manner of man is this who says, 'Come to my feet!' Our egos cannot feel that when Krishna is saying to Arjuna, 'Come to my feet,' there is no one inside. It is coming to nobody's feet. But egos cannot see this. You can see only that which you are, you cannot see that which you are not.

Immediately the monk said, 'And what about you?' He feels hurt because the master has said, 'Because you are thinking of yourself, that's why you are missing the way -- and it is right in front of you.' Now this man is reacting. He would like to hurt the master also. He says, 'WHAT ABOUT YOU... DO YOU SEE IT?'

He wanted, he expected -- because of his own ego -- that this man would say, 'Yes, I see it,' and then everything would have been easy. He could have said, 'Then you are also concerned with your I; how can you see it? You also assert your ego -- how can you see it? We are just the same.' And he would have gone away happy, because the account would have been closed with this man.

But you cannot close your account with a master. He never fulfills your expectation. He is simply unpredictable. You cannot get him caught in your trap because his ways always change. Your mind cannot give you the answer which he is going to give.

THE MASTER SAID: 'SO LONG AS YOU SEE DOUBLE, SAYING I DON'T, AND YOU DO, AND SO ON, YOUR EYES ARE CLOUDED.'

The master has not said anything about himself. If there had been an Arjuna there the master would have said, 'Yes, I see it -- and please, don't you go around and around, come to my feet.' But this man was no Arjuna -- just a curious man, not really interested.

It was just a problem, not a question. He is not going to change himself in any way. At the most he will have a little more information, he will become a little more knowledgeable.

That's why the master says, 'SO LONG AS YOU SEE DOUBLE, SAYING I DON'T, AND YOU DO, AND SO ON, YOUR EYES ARE CLOUDED' -- because the monk's eyes are clouded by 'I' and 'you'. They are one phenomenon, try to understand this. I and you are two aspects of the same coin: this side I, that side you. If I drops, you drop. If I is there no more, you are there no more, because when the coin drops both the aspects drop together. I -- that is one pole, thou -- that is another pole; they both drop or they both remain. If you are, then all around you is a crowd, a milling crowd of I's, you's; if you are not, the whole crowd has disappeared as if it was just a nightmare -- it was -- and simply silence exists, in which there is no division, not even this one of I and thou.

That's why zen people never talk about God, because, they say, 'if we talk about God we will have to say thou.' Buddha never talked about God, and he said, 'Don't pray, because your prayer will continue the division, the duality, the dual vision -- I and thou.'

At the very peak also you will carry the same disease, in subtle ways: you will say I, you will say thou. Howsoever lovingly you say it, the division exists, and with the division the love is not possible. That is the difference between Jewish thinking and Jesus' way of thinking.

Martin Buber has written a book, I and Thou. He is one of the most profound Jewish thinkers -- but he remains a thinker. He may talk about mysticism, but that talk is also one of a thinker and philosopher, because at the very end he retains the old division, I and thou. Now the thou is not here, in this world, but God has become the thou, but the old division persists.

Jews, Mohammedans have always denied that you can become one with God just because of that fear that the I may claim that it has become God. They have retained the division.

They say that you can come closer and closer and closer, but you will remain you and he will remain he. You will remain an I and he has to be addressed as thou.

And that is the trouble that Jesus created, because he said, 'I and my father in heaven are one.' He dropped the division of I and thou. That has been the trouble with Mohammedans in India -- they couldn't understand the Upanishads, they couldn't understand the Hindu teaching that you are the same as him. Drop the I and he is no more a thou. In fact, suddenly the poles disappear and the energy is one. Here I disappear, there you disappear, and the energy is one.

Sometimes in deep love glimpses happen when neither you are an I nor is your lover or beloved a thou -- but sometimes only, it is very rare, when two energies simply meet and you cannot find the division, where they are divided. They mingle and meet and merge and become one; you cannot feel where the boundary is, suddenly the boundary has disappeared. That's why love creates fear.

Deep love creates deep fear. It looks like death because the I disappears, the you disappears -- and it IS a sort of death. And when YOU die, only then do you enter into the divine. But then the divine is no more a God, you cannot address him; hence no prayer exists in Buddhism. So Christians can't believe what type of religion Buddhism is:

no prayer?'How can you pray?' Buddha said. 'Because the prayer can be possible only with a division -- I praying, thou listening -- how can you pray?'

In Buddhism only meditation exists. Try to understand the difference: prayer continues with the old division of I and thou, meditation drops the division. Prayer has to lead finally to meditation. Prayer cannot be the final thing. It is beautiful, but it is not the ultimate. The ultimate can only be this: when both have disappeared and only oneness exists. Tremendous... vast! You become afraid of it! All the cozy divisions of I and thou disappear. All relationship disappears -- that is the fear; that's what Buber is afraid of.

He's afraid that if there is no I and no thou, the whole phenomenon will be so tremendous and so terrible and fear-creating... because no relationship is possible.

Relationship gives you a home; relationship gives you a feeling of coziness; relationship gives you something which does not look like a TREMENDUM, which is not fear- creating. Meditation has to be the ultimate, because prayer can never lead to the nondual - - and this is what the master is saying. He says:

'SO LONG AS YOU SEE DOUBLE, SAYING I DON'T, AND YOU DO, AND SO ON, YOUR EYES ARE CLOUDED.'

Division is the clouding. Through division is the mist in the eyes, through division is the dust in the eyes, through division your eyes are murky, cloudy, distorted. Drop the division and the Way is there.

But a curious mind goes on and on and on. The monk could have become enlightened at that moment, because enlightenment is nothing but a clarity, an understanding. Such profound truths -- and the seeds go on missing, because the man is just a highway, the man is not a right soil. He said again:

'WHEN THERE IS NEITHER I NOR YOU, CAN ONE SEE IT?'

Look: avoid this tendency of being curious. He is not listening at all, he has not understood a single word, he has not felt anything -- he goes on and on, and on the same surface, at the same level, not even an inch deeper. His questioning is not an inquiry now, rather a reaction: whatsoever the master says, he reacts. Whenever this happens it means that when the master is speaking he is thinking at that moment also, preparing the next question. He is not listening.

'WHEN THERE IS NEITHER I NOR YOU, CAN ONE SEE IT?'

He will again be expecting. Whenever you ask a question of someone you already have an expected answer. If it fits with your expected answer, then the man is right; if it doesn't fit, then this man is talking nonsense.

Never come to me with your expected answers, because if you already have the answer then there is no need to ask. And this is the difference -- if you ask a question without any expected answer, you will be able to hear the answer; if you have a subtle expectation that THIS is going to be the answer, if your mind has already given you an answer, you will not be able to listen. You will simply be listening either to be confirmed that your answer is right, or to be confirmed that this man is wrong -- but in either case you are right.

Never ask a question with the feeling that you are right. If you are right there is no need to ask. Always ask the question from the position of a man who is ignorant, knowing well that 'I don't know,' so how can you expect, how can you create an answer? Knowing perfectly that 'I don't know,' ask -- and you are a right soil, and the seeds will fall in it, and a large crop will be possible.

Asked the man again:

'WHEN THERE IS NEITHER I NOR YOU, CAN ONE SEE IT?'

He's trying to put this master in a corner, as mind always tries -- because now he must say yes. If he says yes then the curious mind can ask again, 'Then who will see it if there is neither I nor you?' And if you say, 'Yes, then the Way can be seen,' then the question will arise automatically, 'Then who will see it? When I am not there and you are not there, then who will see it?'

But you cannot put an enlightened man into a corner. You can put another mind into a corner, then you can play a game of chess, but a man who has no mind -- you cannot put him in a corner and you cannot defeat him, because he is not there. His victory is absolute. With him, either you are defeated or you escape. His victory is absolute because he is no longer there -- who can be defeated? Who can be forced into a corner?

This is a beautiful corner. This man must have been a professor or a logician or a pundit.

He has really brought the master to a corner within three questions -- if a man were there he would have been put in a corner. But because a master is not, how can you force him into a corner? He is the whole sky. How can you force the whole sky into a corner? All corners exist in him, but you cannot force him into a corner.

THE MASTER SAID, 'WHEN THERE IS NEITHER I NOR YOU, WHO IS THE ONE WHO WANTS TO SEE IT?'

Really, when you see... you see only when you are not. When you are not, there is no question of trying to see, wanting to see, desiring to see. Who will desire? When YOU are not, who bothers about the Way? The Way has already happened. Who bothers about God? -- it is already the case!

Here you disappear and there everything is ready, everything that you ever sought, everything that you were seeking, every inquiry fulfilled. Here you dissolve and all answers disappear and all queries dissolve. Suddenly the truth is there.

Your dissolution is the truth. Your 'not being there' is the Way. Your absence is the presence of God.