There is no Future God; there is no past

ONCE IT HAPPENED: Aesop, the greatest master of story-telling, was going out of Athens. He met a man who was coming from Argos. They talked. The man from Argos asked Aesop, "You are coming from Athens. Please tell me some thing about the people there: what manner of men they are, what they are like."

Aesop asked the man, "First you tell me what type of people are there in Argos."

The man said, "Very disgusting, nauseating, violent, quarrelsome." And all these qualities flashed on the face of the man.

Aesop said, "I am sorry. You will find the people of Athens just the same."

Later on, he met another man who was also from Argos, and he also asked the same question: "You are coming from Athens and you have lived your whole life there - what manner of men are they there? What are they like?"

And Aesop again asked, "First tell me what manner of men are there in Argos."

And the man became aflame with nostalgia... a very loving memory of the people of Argos. His face shone and he said, "Very pleasant, friendly, kind, and good neighbours."

Aesop said, "I am happy to tell you that you will find the people of Athens just the same."

The story is tremendously beautiful. It tells a very basic truth about man:

wherever you go, you will always find yourself; wherever you look, you will always encounter yourself. The whole world is nothing but a mirror, and all relationships are mirrors. Again and again you encounter yourself - and again and again you misunderstand. You never realize the point, that it is your own face that you have looked at, that it is your own mood that you have come across.

Why have I started with this story of Aesop? - for a very basic reason. You can recognize Jesus only if you have recognized something of the beyond within yourself; otherwise not. You can recognize Buddha only if a part of you has become like Buddha; otherwise you cannot recognize. You cannot recognize that which has not happened to you.

If you are dark, only darkness can be recognized. If you are light, then you become capable of recognizing light. Your eyes can see light because they are part of the sun, because something within you has become of the nature of light.

A deep transformation has happened within you. Only then is it possible to recognize a Jesus, a Buddha, a Krishna, a Mohammed. Otherwise you will misunderstand them; you will think that you have understood them. It will be nothing but your own reflection, it will be nothing but your own echoes. It is your own voice that you have heard coming from them; it is your own face that you have looked at in their mirror.

So before you can understand Jesus, you have to understand yourself. Before you can have the vision that Jesus has something, at least something of the same vision has to be allowed within you.

These sutras are very significant.

WHEN JESUS CAME INTO THE COASTS OF CAESAREA PHILLIPI, HE ASKED HIS DISCIPLES, SAYING, WHOM DO MEN SAY THAT I, THE SON OF MAN, AM?

Why did he ask this? The people were saying all sorts of things about him.

People have always been gossiping. They feed on rumours and they go on expressing their opinions without knowing what they are doing.

Have you watched the same tendency in yourself? If you watch and observe, it will drop, and it is one of the basic requirements. If ever you want to know truth, you have to drop all gossiping. If you want to know what truth is, you have to stop making opinions without knowing anything. It is such a foolish attitude.

You don't know anything about yourself, but if you come across a Jesus, you immediately create an opinion about him. Have you ever thought about it - about what you are doing? You go on judging, not knowing anything even about yourself, which is the nearest point of consciousness to you. Who is more close to you than yourself? - and you have not known even that.

Jesus is far away from you. Stop rumouring, because those rumours will cloud your eyes; those rumours, those opinions, will destroy your perception, your clarity.

Why does Jesus ask what people are saying about him? Whenever a man like Jesus happens, the whole world is agog with rumours. People go on talking about him. Sometimes I have come across people....

Once it happened: I was travelling and I had another passenger in my compartment - only two persons, he and I. He was reading a book, so I asked him - he was reading one of my books, but he didn't know me, and he started saying things about me - I asked him, "Are you certain?"

He said, "Absolutely certain."

"Have you seen this man you are talking about?"

He said, "Yes. Not only seen, we have been class-fellows." Once you utter a lie, you have to utter many more lies.

I told the man, "I'm the man you are talking about." He laughed. He said, "You are joking." He wouldn't believe me.

Whenever a man like Jesus is there, a thousand and one rumours spread. People say all sorts of things. Why do they say them? - to show that they know.

There is a story of Gogol, the Russian master. He tells that in a small town there was a very simple man and people used to think that he was an idiot. A sage visited the town, and the idiot came to the sage and asked, "I'm in constant trouble. The whole town thinks that I am an idiot, and before I have said anything, people start laughing - before I have even said anything, so I cannot say a single word. I am so afraid. I cannot move in the society, because wherever I go people ridicule me. You are a wise man. Help me. Give me some clue as to how I can protect myself. My whole life is destroyed."

The sage said something in his ear. He said, "Do only one thing: whenever somebody says something, immediately deny it; contradict it, negate it.

Whatsoever it is, don't be bothered. Somebody is saying,'Look, how beautiful the moon is!' Immediately say,'Who says so? Prove it!' Nobody can prove it.

Somebody says that Buddha or Christ are enlightened people - immediately deny it; contradict it - 'Who says so? What is enlightenment? - all nonsense, rubbish!' "

The simple man said, "But I may not be able to prove that it is rubbish."

The old sage said, "You need not worry; nobody will ask you. They will be trying to prove whatsoever they are saying."

"Never say anything positively, and you will never be in trouble. Just negate. If somebody says,'God exists,' say,'No. Where is God? Prove it!' " The man tried the trick and after seven days the whole town was simply surprised. People started saying, "We never knew that this man was so wise!"

If you want to look wise, you have to utter nonsenses. And the best way is to deny, to say no, because life is such a mystery that nothing can be proved. If somebody says, "Look, this woman is so beautiful," say, "Who says so? What is there about her? Why do you call her beautiful? I don't see anything." Nobody can prove it. All the poets of the world can stand against you, but you are going to win. Things are so mysterious - they cannot be proved; they cannot be reduced to an argument.

Nobody wants to feel that he does not know. If you say that yes, Jesus is enlightened, it will be difficult to prove, almost impossible. Twenty centuries of constant argument have not proved anything. Jesus remains as mysterious, as riddlesome as he was. Twenty centuries of theology, constant argument, elaboration, explanation, analysis, interpretation - nothing has been proved.

Jesus remains as mysterious as he ever was - maybe even more so - because he is lost in these explanations.

You cannot prove that Jesus is enlightened, because enlightenment is something beyond the mind. You have to taste it; you cannot talk about it; and when you taste it you become silent. But if you want to say that he is nothing, nobody, you can prove it. That is simply very easy.

So people were saying many things, contradicting, negating, arguing that this man is nothing.

WHEN JESUS CAME INTO THE COASTS OF CAESAREA PHILLIPI, HE ASKED HIS DISCIPLES, SAYING, WHOM DO MEN SAY THAT I, THE SON OF MAN, AM?

What are people saying about me?

AND THEY SAID, SOME SAY THAT THOU ART JOHN THE BAPTIST; SOME, ELIAS; AND OTHERS, JEREMIAS, OR ONE OF THE PROPHETS.

This happens always. People have only one criterion and that is of the past. And a man like Jesus is of the present; he is not from the past. He does not belong to any tradition - he cannot belong. A man like Jesus is a rebellion. He cannot be part of any tradition. But the ordinary human mind has no other criteria. At the most, you can think about the past. You can say, "Maybe he is John the Baptist, or Elias, or Ezekiel or Jeremias, or one of the old, past prophets." When those prophets were present, you never understood them. You never looked into them, directly and immediately. You never encountered them, because to encounter them is great daring. No other courage is more dangerous than to encounter a man who has known, because he is deathlike; he is an infinite abyss.

If you look into Jeremias or Ezekiel or Elias, you are looking into a bottomless abyss. You will start shaking and trembling; you will start perspiring, and you will be afraid. One step, and you can be lost forever, and you cannot come back again.

Jesus, Buddha, and Krishna, they are absolute emptinesses. Their ego has disappeared. They are just vast spaces of being - no boundaries, no maps. The territory is uncharted. Look into it and you will lose your balance. The very earth below your feet will disappear. You will find yourself falling and falling and falling - and the falling is endless.

So people never look directly. When Jesus is there, they talk about John, they talk about Elias, they talk about Ezekiel, they talk about Jeremias, they talk about Abraham, Moses - they can talk about the whole past, but they will not look at this man who is right now here. They have been doing the same to Moses, to Abraham and to everybody. When Moses is there, they will not encounter him.

That is too dangerous and risky. Then they will talk of somebody else.

The disciples said,

SOME SAY THAT THOU ART JOHN THE BAPTIST: SOME, ELIAS; AND OTHERS, JEREMIAS, OR ONE OF THE PROPHETS.

A few things are to be understood. Whenever a Jesus happens, he is absolutely fresh and virgin. He does not come from the past; he comes from above. That is the Hindu meaning of avatar: he descends. He is not part of the chain. He is not horizontal; he is vertical.

Whenever YOU become alert and aware, immediately your whole being turns.

Then you are no more horizontal; suddenly you find yourself vertical. If a man is lying down and fast asleep, he is horizontal. Sleep is horizontal. It is very difficult to stand and sleep - you have to lie down. That is the most comfortable position. If you try to sleep standing up, it will be almost impossible. Sleep is horizontal, unconsciousness is horizontal. But when a man awakes, he sits, he stands up, he becomes vertical. Take it symbolically.

The same happens in the inner world. When a man is unconscious, unaware, he is horizontal; his consciousness is horizontal. When he becomes alert, aware, conscious, he stands. Then the consciousness becomes vertical.

And this is the meaning of the Christian cross: two lines, one horizontal, one vertical. The horizontal line is of unconsciousness and the vertical line is of consciousness. The horizontal line you can call 'of matter', the vertical 'of consciousness'; the horizontal line, the world, the MAYA; and the vertical, the God, the BRAHMA.

The cross is very, very significant and multi-dimensional. You must have seen Jesus on the cross. Have you observed that his hands are on the horizontal line and his whole body on the vertical? Why? - because doing is horizontal and being is vertical. Hands are just representatives of doing. Whatsoever you do, you do with matter. Whatsoever you do, becomes part of the world. Whatsoever you do, moves into history. Whatsoever you do, becomes part of time; it becomes horizontal. But whatsoever you are - the pure being - is not part of the world. It may be in the world, but it is not of the world. It penetrates the world. That's why Hindus have given it a beautiful name - AVATAR. It comes down from above. Like a ray of light it penetrates the darkness. The ray may be in the darkness, but it is not of the darkness. It comes from above.

Zen says that by doing, you cannot attain, because whatsoever you do will move outwards. That's why Zen says even meditation is not to be done - one has to be meditative. Prayer cannot be done; one has to be prayerful. Love cannot be done; one has to be loving. The difference is between doing and being. When you are loving, it is part of the vertical. When you are meditative, it is part of the vertical.

When you start meditating, it becomes horizontal.

All effort, all doing has to cease. That is the meaning of Jesus' hands on the horizontal line. And the whole, except the hands, is on the vertical. Except for what you do, all your being is part of God. Whatsoever you do is part of the world.

But only hands arc seen. If I don't do anything, I will become invisible. You will not be able to see me. Not that you will not see me, but you will not recognize me. If I don't do anything, I will be as if I am not; because you know only one criterion: that something should be done.

That's why in your books of history, Buddhas are just footnotes; not more than that. That, too, seems to be a concession. Alexanders, Napoleons, they make history; Buddhas? - just footnotes. You are so kind towards them that you allow them a small space, a few lines. But they don't become the main part of history because you ask, "What have they done?" And if Buddha is there, and Jesus is there, that too is because they have done something - maybe not much, but something.

There have been Buddhas who have completely disappeared - they have not even left a ripple in the history. Buddha himself talks about twenty-four Buddhas who preceded him. History does not know anything about them. They may have been absolutely silent people, people of being. Nothing is known about them, because how can you know if they don't DO anything? GUNDAS are known - hooligans. Sages become invisible, because unless you do something, you don't leave a trace.

The more you DO, the more the horizontal line receives you. The more you ARE, you disappear. You only see hands; you don't see anything else.

The disciples said, "People think that you are an incarnation of John the Baptist, or Elias or Jeremias. They think about you in terms of others of the past" - and that is where you miss. A man like Jesus is absolutely fresh; he does not come from the past. He has no history. In fact, he has no autobiography. He is so fresh, like a dewdrop - so fresh, just the fresh morning. It has nothing to do with the past. But then you will have to face him, then you will have to look directly.

People come to me. One man came who is a follower of Ramakrishna. He said, "I see Ramakrishna in you." Why? Can't you see me directly? Why see Ramakrishna in me? And I know that if this man was to face Ramakrishna, he would see Ram or Krishna in him; but not Ramakrishna; again, the past.

With the past you feel at ease because it is dead. With dead gods you feel very at ease and comfortable, because they cannot change you, and you can manipulate them. You can put your dead gods anywhere you like. They will not even say, "I don't like this place. " They cannot say anything; they cannot assert. They are not there It is good, comfortably good, conveniently good.

In Jesus you can see Jeremias. Jeremias himself was a very dangerous man. You missed Jeremias; then you were seeing Moses in him. Now Jesus comes. By the time Jeremias is dead, he has become a statue, a fossil. Now his words don't carry any meaning to you; you have listened to them so much, they have lost significance. Now you want to see that fossil in Jesus.

Why can't you see the truth that is facing you? Why do you go on avoiding? Why do you look sideways? Why can't you be immediate? Why can't you see that which is? Why are you obsessed with the past and why do you go on translating the present into the past?

If I say something, immediately your mind starts translating it into the past. You don't listen to me; you listen to your translations. I say something - the Hindu immediately translates it and he says, "Yes, this is what Krishna says in the Gita."

The Mohammedan translates it immediately: "Yes, this is what Mohammed says in the Koran." Why can't you listen to ME? What is the need of bringing the Koran and the Gita in?

No, this is some trick of the mind. If you bring the Gita in, you can avoid me.

Then the Gita becomes the barrier. Then you are protected behind a dead Gita; then you need not listen to the song that is happening this moment. Then your ears are filled with the past, your eyes filled with dust. Your being, afraid, is defending itself. This is your armour - the Gita, the Koran, the Vedas, the Talmud this is your armour. You look BEHIND the scriptures. That is a way of not looking. If you want to look really, drop all scriptures, because truth is always fresh and virgin. It has nothing to do with the past.

SOME SAY THAT THOU ART JOHN THE BAPTIST: SOME, ELIAS; AND OTHERS, JEREMIAS, OR ONE OF THE PROPHETS.

There are two types of people who are against. One will say, "You are nothing; just a pretender, a deception, a deceiver." The other - who does not seem against it - will say, "You represent, you are an incarnation of Krishna, Buddha, Jeremias, Moses." Both are avoiding you - one by denying, one by accepting but not looking at you. Not only are enemies against, sometimes even followers are against. Not only are enemies trying to escape, even friends. Maybe the friend is more cunning - because the enemy simply says NO. The friend says YES, but says it in such a way that it ultimately means NO. The friend is more cunning.

There is only one way to see Jesus, and that is to see him as he is; directly. No scriptures are needed to interpret him. He has to be seen untranslated. He has to be seen directly - he has to be faced and encountered, eye to eye, heart to heart.

Dangerous it is, I know, and risky, because you will never be the-same again once you encounter the reality, that which is, the truth.

HE SAITH UNTO THEM, BUT WHOM SAY YE THAT I AM?

Leave people aside. Now he asks his own disciples, "What do YOU think? Whom say ye that I am.?" Only one disciple spoke. The eleven remained silent. Nothing is said about them. They must have been puzzled. What to say? - because whenever you say to Jesus, "You are Jeremias," you think you are praising him.

You are condemning; you are rejecting. You are not explaining - you are explaining him away.

AND SIMON PETER ANSWERED AND SAID...

Only one... a very innocent man. Just the other day we were talking about his story; the man of little faith. But at least a little faith was in him, and even if there is a little faith, it can grow. The mustard seed can become a big plant, a big bush, and birds of heaven can shelter in it. Yes, Peter was a man of little faith, but even a little faith is like a spark. It can burn the whole forest. The spark is never little.

Even a little spark has tremendous energy, once it starts functioning.

AND SIMON PETER ANSWERED AND SAID, THOU ART THE CHRIST, THE SON OF THE LIVING GOD.

Very significant words - try to understand them.

Thou art the Christ. What does this word'Christ' mean? It has nothing to do with Jesus. Buddha is also a Christ, Krishna is also a Christ. And there is every possibility that the word'Christ' comes from'Krishna'. In Bengali, Krishna is called'Cristo'. There is every possibility that Christ is a form of the same root, Krishna.

What does'Krishna' mean? The word means 'that which attracts'. Krishna is one who has become capable of attracting the divine in him. Christ is also the same. It means the drop has become capable of attracting the ocean in him. Christ is a meeting-point of the drop with the ocean, of the finite with the infinite, of the horizontal with the vertical. Where the horizontal and the vertical meet, that point of meeting is Christ.

When Simon Peter said, "Thou art the Christ," this is what he meant. He said, "In YOU I can see the finite and the infinite meeting. In YOU I can see the Son of man and the Son of God meeting. In YOU I can see boundaries dissolving, matter and no-matter meeting. In YOU I can see time and eternity meeting, life and death meeting." That is the meaning of Christ: where the opposites meet and become one.

Ordinarily the whole of life is divided into opposites - day and night, summer and winter, morning and evening, birth and death. The point of Christ is the meeting of the opposites, where opposites become complementary and are no more opposites. Christ is a paradox, Christ is a very irrational, illogical point. If you try to understand Christ by logic you will miss - you will have to find some other logic. They call it 'the logic by the side' - not on the main road. The main road is possessed by Aristotle; he dominates there. If you want to understand Christ you will have to go down some bypath, but not the main road. No, you will never meet Christ on the superhighway. That is possessed by the logicians, the professors, the thinkers, the philosophers. You will have to get down and run into the wilderness.

I am reminded of an old story. It happened: A merchant, very old man, was in heavy debt, and the money-lender was a very dangerous man. The money- lender came to the merchant's house. It must have been a morning like this, a winter morning. The merchant was sitting outside in his small garden. Where he was sitting the garden was paved with white and black pebbles.

His young and beautiful daughter was also sitting by his side. The money-lender had come to threaten that if the man was not going to pay the money within a certain limit of time, he would be thrown into prison for at least twenty years.

But he softened a little on looking at the beautiful girl. He proposed. He said, "I know that you cannot pay your debts, and I know that legally you can be thrown into prison for at least twenty years. You are almost seventy; that will be the end of your life. But I am kind and I have always been kind to you. I will give you an opportunity, and this is my proposal: I will take two pebbles, one black and one white, and put them in my bag, and then your daughter has to take one pebble from my bag. If she takes the white pebble out, you are freed of your debt, and nothing happens to your daughter. If she takes the black pebble out, then you are freed of your debt, but your daughter will have to marry me."

Very reluctantly the father and daughter agreed, because there was no other possibility. The money-lender took two pebbles. When he was taking the two pebbles, the old merchant could not see, he was almost filled with tears, but the sharp eyes of the young girl could see that he had taken two black pebbles.

Now, ordinary logic fails. What to do?. Two black pebbles in the bag! The obvious thing to do is to expose the fraud, but then he will be annoyed and will take revenge; and the father will be thrown into jail immediately. To annoy him didn't seem to be the right way. Then what to do? - because whatsoever she does, a black pebble will be coming out. Logic fails.

In the West there is one logician, a new type of logician. He calls his logic 'lateral'

and his name is de Bono. He quotes this story again and again. And he says that wherever he quotes it he enquires of people, "Now what to do ~" And he says that only once did a woman stand up and answer the right thing. But she said at the same time, "My husband thinks that I'm illogical."

What happened? What did the girl do? She didn't expose him; she didn't argue about the fact that he had taken two black pebbles. She withdrew one pebble out of the bag, fumbled, dropped the pebble on the path - it was lost. There were many pebbles and it could not be recognized. Profusely, she wanted to be excused, forgiven. And then she suggested a solution: "Look at the other pebble that is left inside. If it is black, then the one that I withdrew must have been white. If it is white, then the other was black." And the old money-lender could not do anything. The failure was absolute.

This is logic by the side. It is not on the path; it is illogical, it is lateral. You don't go directly, you zig-zag.

If you want to understand Jesus, you will have to go a little zig-zag. He is a paradox - that is the meaning of Christ. In him the opposites meet. That's why he goes on calling himself son of man, and at the same time son of God.

Anybody who thinks logically will say that you can say only one thing, not two together. Either you are son of man - then finish, and don't say you are son of God. Or you are son of God, and don't say you are son of man. But he says both, he means both, and he is both.

In fact, everybody is both. But you have not looked at yourself, and your mind is caught up in logical patterns. So whatsoever is illogical within you, whatsoever is wild within you, you don't look at it; you simply deny it, you suppress it.

That's how the unconscious mind is created.

You have only one mind.Jesus has one mind. I have one mind, but your mind you have divided in two. You have created a boundary. A small space of the mind you call 'mind' and the remainder you have denied. That denied part has become the unconscious, and it takes revenge. It goes on fighting with you. You are split.

All humanity is schizophrenic. Only sometimes is there a man who is not schizophrenic, who is integrated and one. Jesus is one. That is the meaning *of'Christ'. In him, the infinite and the finite meet.

THIS SIMPLE MAN SIMON, ALSO CALLED PETER,... ANSWERED AND SAID, THOU ART THE CHRIST, THE SON OF THE LIVING GOD.

What does this Peter mean when he says, "Son of the living God"? Is there a God who is dead? Yes! Not only is there a God, there are a thousand and one gods that are dead. The whole past is dead. If you cling to the past, you cling to dead gods. The living God is always here now, because God has only one time, and that is present. He has no past, no future. People believe in past gods, and people also believe in future gods. Jews who crucified Jesus believed in past incarnations - Moses, Abraham, Ezekiel, all the prophets; and they also believed in a messiah who was to come in the future. And Jesus was there. The future had already come and the past was already fulfilled in him. The past and future were meeting in him, the paradox, the Christ, but they wouldn't see. They are still waiting for a future messiah to come.

Remember, God is never in the past. Past is already dead, and God cannot be dead, so all past gods are dead gods. That means they are not there, they are only in your memory. And there is no future for God. For God, only present exists.

From that altitude, from that peak, there is no future - there is only present.

Have you heard about the scientific discovery of the fact that if a watch moves as fast as light, it stops? It is a beautiful phenomenon: time stops itself And all scriptures say that God is light. At that speed, time stops. There is no past, no future, only the present. The hands of the clock don't move. They remain, they always remain, at the same point.

There is no future God; there is no past God; there is only God as life herenow.

That is the meaning of "the Son of the living God". Christians have been misinterpreting it. They say, "The god of the Hindus is dead, the god of the jews is dead, the god of the Mohammedans is dead, only the Christian god is alive."

They have been misinterpreting the whole thing. No, the Christian god is also dead. The past is dead. Whatsoever become past is dead, and whatsoever is part of the future is not yet born. God is. Is-ness is God, present presence, absolute presence herenow.

AND JESUS ANSWERED AND SAID UNTO HIM, BLESSED ART THOU, SIMON BARJONA: FOR FLESH AND BLOOD HATH NOT REVEALED IT UNTO THEE, BUT MY FATHER WHICH IS IN HEAVEN.

Jesus said, "Blessed art thou, Simon. You are blessed. Because: FOR FLESH AND BLOOD HATH NOT REVEALED IT UNTO THEE. Because whatsoever you have seen cannot be seen by the eyes of flesh. Whatsoever you have seen cannot be seen by YOU. It is possible only when God reveals it to you; it is possible only when the infinite descends in you, when the grace happens."

You cannot realize God because you are the barrier. You are not there, God realizes himself in you.

BLESSED ART THOU, SIMON BARJONA: FOR FLESH AND BLOOD HATH NOT REVEALED IT UNTO THEE, BUT MY FATHER WHICH IS IN HEAVEN.

Once Alexander asked Diogenes, "What do you think about God?"

Diogenes said, "It does not matter what I think about God. The only thing that matters is what God thinks about me."

Absolutely true: it does not matter what you think about God. How can it matter? The only thing that matters is what God thinks about you. Your philosophy, your thinking, your doctrines, your creeds, are useless, all rubbish, rot.

Be silent. You need not think about God. When thinking disappears, God starts thinking about you, caring about you, fulfilling you. He comes. He becomes a guest.

AND I SAY ALSO UNTO THEE, THAT THOU ART PETER, AND UPON THIS ROCK I WILL BUILD MY CHURCH; AND THE GATES OF HELL SHALL NOT PREVAIL AGAINST IT.

... the man of little faith, but at least of faith. Jesus says, "I will build my church upon your rock, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it."

Jesus gathered very simple people around him. He was a great master who could see deeply into the possibilities and potentialities.

It is said of Michaelangelo that once he came across a great marble rock which was discarded by the builders. He asked the builders, "Why have you discarded this rock?"

They said, "It is useless."

Michaelangelo laughed and said, "Who told you it is useless? I can already see an angel waiting to be released in this rock, an angel imprisoned, an imprisoned splendour. Send it to my studio. The angel needs a little help. It is not useless."

No man is useless. Unless you have decided to remain useless, no man is useless.

If you allow, as the marble ALLOWS the artist, the sculptor, to transform it so that the imprisoned splendour can be released, faith - even a little, that will do - is needed. A little trust is needed, and Christ can release in Simon something which can become the rock for his church, for his family, for his community, for those people who are going to love him, and follow him.

AND I WILL GIVE UNTO THEE THE KEYS OF THE KINGDOM OF HEAVEN:

AND WHATSOEVER THOU SHALT BIND ON EARTH SHALL BE BOUND IN HEAVEN: AND WHATSOEVER THOU SHALT LOOSE ON EARTH SHALL BE LOOSED IN HEAVEN.

THEN CHARGED HE HIS DISCIPLES THAT THEY SHOULD TELL NO MAN THAT HE WAS JESUS THE CHRIST.

... THE KEY OF HEAVEN. He says, "I will give you the keys of heaven, and whosoever is released on earth by those keys, will remain released in heaven; whosoever is freed on the earth will be free in heaven also, because whatsoever happens on the earth is going to happen in heaven also. Wherever you are right now, you will be there."

And Jesus says, "I will give you keys..." What keys? There is only one key in fact, and the key is: how to commit ego suicide, how to commit self-murder, how to become a no-self, how to be, and at the same time be without the'I'. That is the only key and all other keys are just supportive; all other keys are just supports for the main and basic thing - how to be egoless. And the door opens....

I have heard a story that when Jesus died and reached heaven, the angel Gabriel met him at the gate and asked, "What plans do you have, so that the work you have started can be continued on earth?"

Jesus said, "I have left twelve men and a few women who are going to spread my message till it reaches to every heart, to every mind, on the earth."

The angel said, "And if they fail you, have you made other plans also?"

Jesus smiled and said, "I am counting on them. I have no other plan."

Counting on love, counting on these simple villagers - counting on them: there is no other plan, there cannot be.

Meditation is the key. Egolessness is the key, and love is the only plan to spread it all over the earth.

I am also counting on you, on your love, on your trust, on your courage. I am also giving you the key. Don't use it only for yourself - use it first for yourself, then spread the message; because everybody is imprisoned in a rock and everybody needs to be released.

THEN CHARGED HE HIS DISCIPLES THAT THEY SHOULD TELL NO MAN THAT HE WAS JESUS THE CHRIST.

Why? Because these things are revealed in trust and cannot be told to others.

These things are revealed in love.

You call me Osho. That is because of your love. It can be revealed to you. When you talk to others, don't tell it to them. That will offend them and it will be pointless. They will start arguing about it.

You love me. Through your love you have seen something which they cannot see, unless they also love.

Jesus said, "Don't tell them. You have realized the truth. You have seen the vertical in me, but don't go on telling it to others. They will not understand. They will misunderstand. They will be offended: because that which is known through love can only be understood through love."