Your Childhood - an Education in Psychological Slavery

Question 1:

Belief is blind. It has no rational proofs for it. It is based in your psychological need, it has no objective proof. You want to believe because without belief you feel empty, just a driftwood going nowhere. Without belief you feel empty, so utterly empty that you can't even dare to live. Look withinwards; that emptiness looks like death.

It is your psychological need that somebody should give you a hope, a belief, some kind of opium, so you can go to sleep. At least for the time being you can put aside all your fears. You have the messiah with you, the son of God - now, what fear is there? Or the messenger of God - now, what more do you need, to have a meaningful life? He gives you meaning, he gives you hope, and he has authority. But these are all projected by you... and exploited by him. It is a mutual phenomenon.

The messiah, the tirthankara, the avatara, the paigambara, they know your psychological need, everybody's psychological need; they exploit it. They say, "You need not be worried. You have only to believe in me." They make it so simple - no risk. You have nothing to do, other than believe - can't you do even this much? And in the bargain, what are you getting? Everything that you always needed: a hope, a future, a meaningfulness... otherwise you are bored, otherwise you start thinking, "Why go on living?"

The messiah shows you the way, shows you the goal, makes you feel significant, that you are not an accident, that God has something special to be fulfilled through you. He fulfills your psychological need. He does not destroy your fear, your meaninglessness, your hopelessness. He simply gives a beautiful cover; he covers your psychological vacuum.

And you fulfill his psychological need. The more you gather around him, the more followers are there, the more he is convinced that he is not insane. Otherwise the suspicion is bound to be there:

"What proof have you got that you are the son of God? It may be just your mind projection." But now he has got some proof: the believers. As they go on increasing, as the following becomes bigger and bigger, now he has solid proof: so many people, millions of people, cannot be wrong.

Do you see the vicious circle? He becomes more authoritative, more determined, more fanatic. And the more he becomes authoritative, determined, fanatic, the more people are bound to fall in the trap because they need authority. They need a father figure, somebody to lead them. On their own they don't know where to go, what to do, what to be.

That's the way every child is being brought up, so that the psychological need arises, is bound to arise. Everything is told to the child, that he has to do this, not to do that. Of course the parents think they are doing it for the child's own good; it is not so. It is just the opposite. They don't mean it.

They really mean that they are doing good for the child, because how can the child decide what is right and what is wrong? So they have to decide. And naturally, the child is so small and in his eyes the father, grandfather are so big, so powerful, so wise - he can believe in them.

So from the very beginning the child is not taught, not brought up, to be an independent individual.

He is brought up to be a follower. He is brought up to remain a mental slave for his whole life. His father was brought up in the same way. His father's father was brought up in the same way. He will do the same to his children. That's how stupidity goes on from generation to generation: one generation passes it to another generation - that becomes your inheritance.

So you are waiting, waiting for Godot... somebody who should come and fulfill all your psychological needs. He will be a father, a guide, a philosopher, a wise man; and then you can relax, you need not worry. You need not use your intelligence, you need not use your reason. You can put all your intelligence aside, you can now be blind - and follow the messiah. And when you see more and more people are coming, of course that becomes for you too a proof that the man must be right.

Put the messiah alone, and you will see him wavering, all his authority gone. Put the believer alone:

you will be surprised that in just twenty-one days of absolute isolation you will go mad. Not more than that is needed for you to go mad. Just twenty-one days of absolute isolation - disconnected from the world of your belief, of your religion, of your society, of your club, of your university, of this and that - completely cut off for twenty-one days, just alone, and you will see slowly slowly underneath your feet the earth is disappearing; fear is arising, trembling is arising. In twenty-one days you will be insane.

Hence people are afraid to be alone. They will do anything not to be alone. They will go to any rotten movie, just not to be alone. They will play any stupid game, they will watch any idiotic thing: a football match.... Now, can you think of anything more idiotic? A few idiots kicking a football beyond a line to the other side, and a few other idiots kicking it back... and millions of idiots watching as if something of immense significance is happening. No, the psychological reason is that they want somehow to forget themselves, to forget that they are alone. In the crowd they feel good, healthier, saner, because people just like themselves are all around. Millions of people are watching the game - it cannot be idiotic. Even the president of the country is watching - it cannot be idiotic.

Everybody is supporting everybody else to remain sane. Just twenty-one days of absolute isolation - no newspaper, no television, no radio, cut off from your world completely; no wife, no husband, no children, no love affair - and you will be amazed, seeing yourself in your utter aloneness, that what you have been doing your whole life was nothing but covering holes in your being, wounds...

of course with beautiful flowers. But those wounds don't heal. Perhaps uncovered, they may have healed. Covered, they gather more pus; covered, they become more canceric. Belief is blind. All belief is blind.

Trust is a totally different thing. Trust has the same meaning as belief in the dictionaries, but the people who have been writing those dictionaries have not tasted trust, they don't know what it is.

For one thing there is no messiah, no avatara, no one claiming, "I am God's only begotten son, I am the only messenger, the true messenger."

When I say I'm just an ordinary man, I'm cutting the very root of belief.

I don't want you to believe in me, because believing has destroyed millions of people down the ages.

It is time that believing should be destroyed. From my side I am saying I am just an ordinary man. I don't give you any support to believe in me. In fact, I make every possible effort for you not to believe in me.

Look: Mahavira fulfills the conditions that Jainas ask of a tirthankara - painful conditions, arduous conditions. But to be so special, a tirthankara... the word tirthankara means one who makes his way to the other world, or to the other shore. He is the last tirthankara. Now, for millions of years people will be treading on the path that he is making. For millions of years now, he is going to dominate millions of souls - so he is ready to fulfill any condition. If they say that the tirthankara has to live naked, he lives naked. If they say he has to eat once a day, he eats once a day. If they say he has not to take a bath, he does not take a bath. If they say he should not clean his teeth, he will not. He must have been stinking.

I have known Jaina monks... it is so difficult to talk to them. And you know, I am a straightforward man, I will say simply, "You stink. You sit twenty feet away. I cannot talk sitting that close to you."

Their breath smells, it is bound to; their whole life they have not cleaned their mouth. Their body stinks. But they are ready to fulfill any stupid demand, because what they are gaining in reward is tremendous psychological fulfillment. It is only psychological, just ego fulfillment.

I am saying to you, I am an ordinary man, just like you, with no difference at all.

I am cutting the very root of your believing in me; hence my insistence on being ordinary.

I don't want you to cling to me in any way. I am not your enemy. I don't want you to remain crippled, blind, dependent, a slave, because of me. I don't want to take that responsibility. So from my side I am completely clear. I don't give you any support. And from your side I am continually hammering you, sometimes even hurting you, because whatever you think is meaningful may not be so, and I have to destroy it. Before I can make you completely clean I have to remove many many rocks that are in the way of my reaching you and are not allowing you to reach me.

Trust is a totally different matter. It has two steps. First is hypothetical trust. 'Hypothesis' is a scientific term. When you start an experiment you hypothetically take it for granted that it will succeed - only hypothetically, there is no guarantee. It is not a belief, you are not risking anything on it. Just to do the experiment you hypothetically accept that perhaps this is the case - let us look into it, go deep into it, experiment with it. It may turn out right, it may not turn out right. The hypothesis does not close the door. The hypothesis is not the answer, it is only the beginning of the search. It is a question mark.

Belief begins with no doubt; hypothesis is full of doubt. A man who has no doubt cannot experiment.

For what reason is he going to experiment? It is the doubt - he wants to find the truth. Now, the doubt can be covered by a belief, or it can be removed by the search for the truth. These are the only two ways. If you believe, then there is no need for experiment. So anybody who does not want to risk anything, who has not the intelligence to search - any mediocre - is bound to believe. Only mediocres believe. The greater their stupidity, the bigger is their belief The greater their mediocrity, the stronger is their fanaticism.

The other way is to start with the doubt, don't cover it. But to start you need a hypothesis. If I say that water is composed of oxygen and hydrogen - now, either you can believe me or you can take it as a hypothesis. If you take it as a hypothesis you are not believing in me. What I have said, you have accepted only to experiment whether it is true or not.

So the first part of trust is the willingness to experiment.

The master's function is not to make you believe. His function is to create the atmosphere around himself, the vibe, that attracts a person to experiment, that pulls you towards him, not to believe but to go with him; not to follow but to go with him, "because," he says, "I have seen something. I have seen a door and through the door I have seen the vast sky."

The master has to be a certain magnetic force, a tremendous impact. And this comes easily. If I have seen the open sky, something of that open sky will be carried by my eyes. If I have seen the stars, then something of those stars is bound to be reflected in me. I need not claim it.

In fact, those who claim it don't have it; hence the claim. Jesus calling himself the son of God - what is the need of it? If you are the son of God, will it not be enough for people to feel the vibe of it? When the sun rises there is no need to declare itself. Even the birds start singing - the sun has not knocked on their doors: "Wake up! It is morning and I have come back." No, there is no need.

Even flowers know that the sun has risen; they start opening. For the night they had closed; now they would like communion with the sun again. It is life! The whole existence understands the sun is there, becomes vibrant with its energy.

What is the need for Jesus to continually claim that "I am the son of God"? He must be suspicious of himself, he must be doubting himself - and it is absolutely understandable. Nor has he seen God...

nobody has ever seen God. On what grounds can he be without doubt that he is the son of God?

The doubt is there. It is to dispel the doubt that he has to claim and shout. He has to convince others in order to be convinced himself that he is the son of God.

A real master claims nothing.

His very being, his presence, is enough to create in you a desire to explore - remember, not to follow, but to explore - to go with this man, perhaps a few steps, and to look on your own whether the sky is there or not.

All that the master does is to create in you a desire to walk with him, to experiment with him with an open mind.

Because he knows - there is no need to tell you to believe in it. The need to tell someone to believe in something arises only when the person himself knows that unless you believe, you are not going to find the 'truth' - because the belief is going to create the truth out of your imagination. It is the belief that is going to project the hallucination. The master tries in every way so that you should not believe, because belief is a barrier in the search. Yes, you should be receptive, ready to explore, available for the new, the unknown, to happen. That I call the first part, the hypothesis.

I have said that my religion is scientific, and every science is based on hypotheses. It is not necessary that every hypothesis will prove right. But for the explorer it is not a sad affair if one hypothesis fails. In fact he rejoices that now there is one hypothesis less: "My search is becoming narrower, closer to the truth."

Edison was working on electricity. It took three years for him... all his colleagues became frustrated.

Many left; many thought, "He is mad, and we will go mad with him." Only a few remained. But they were also hesitant whether to remain with this man or not, whether he is sane or insane - "because every hypothesis that we have tried has failed." But this man begins the search again next day with the same zeal, enthusiasm, as they had seen in him on the first day - no difference. It was this quality that was holding them back from going away.

It is said that nine hundred and ninety-nine times they failed. And the last colleague - because all others by that time had left; it was enough - the last colleague said, "Now what? Nine hundred and ninety-nine times we have failed. In three years it has been nothing but failure, failure, failure. But you are a strange man; you begin next day again with the same gusto."

Edison said, "I am more enthusiastic than the first day we began. You are wrong, it is not the same gusto; it is much more, because I am aware that nine hundred and ninety-nine hypotheses are rejected. Now truth is very close. If there are one thousand doors, nine hundred and ninety-nine doors we have knocked on and found empty. Now only one is left." He was just saying it as an example, and by coincidence it was so. That day they succeeded.

Hypothesis simply means readiness to experiment - that is the half part of hypothesis: readiness on the part of the disciple, openness, acceptance that "we don't know: perhaps we may discover, perhaps we may not. Perhaps we are moving in the right direction, perhaps we are not. But in any case, whether we succeed or fail, we never failed, because even if we fail, that simply means one direction is not right - try another direction; one method has not worked - try another method.

Somewhere, someday, in some moment, the door is going to open."

On the master's part, the business is not to create belief in the disciple but only this enthusiasm, this gusto to go on searching in spite of any failures.

A master is an inspiration. He is not a belief. He does not support any of your psychological sickness.

He simply shows you how he has arrived. He explains to you the way, the method, the experiment that has been fulfillment to him. His being gives you the feeling of fulfillment, contentment, the feeling that he has arrived - that is something in the air around him that you breathe. And he gives you the way, the method, how it has happened to him.

He never says that it is going to happen to you exactly in the same way. All that he says is, "It has happened to me, so there is no impossibility of it happening to you. I am just an ordinary man, just as you are. If it can happen to this ordinary man, then why not to you? Perhaps from a little different angle you will have to move; perhaps a little different method you will have to use. Perhaps you will have to go a little longer, perhaps from your side the mountain is a little arduous, but - it happens!

So it can happen."

The second part of trust arises when you experience something that the master has given you through his vibe, which is invisible. So only those who are very sensitive and very receptive will be able to feel it. What the master had given you as something felt in the heart - that is not the end, that is only the beginning of the journey. Now you can accept some hypothesis. The second part of trust will happen the day you also taste something the master has been telling you about, talking about, being about.

The day you taste something, that day it will not be a belief, it will be a trust. Now you know. Now you know that you were with a man who knew it. And that was the only difference; now that difference has disappeared. The trust is complete when the difference between the master and the disciple disappears, when the disciple knows the same way as the master knows. He has seen the light, he has smelled the flower. This is the moment of gratitude.

No believer has real gratitude towards these messiahs, avataras - no, because what have they given to you? Just beliefs... unfounded, ungrounded. How can you feel grateful to them? You may pray, and you may praise them, and that is just a policy. Perhaps by their grace, by your praise and prayer - which is nothing but a kind of bribery - they may feel a special compassion for you, they will grant you some miracle. But no miracle ever happens. Yes, truth happens, love happens, but miracles don't happen.

You cannot really feel gratitude towards these people. On the contrary, if you search within yourself you will feel anger. You will be surprised when I say that all Christians, deep down, are angry with Jesus. He promised to redeem them, and nothing is redeemed. He promised, and he was saying, "Soon you will be in the kingdom of God, soon you will be with me in the kingdom of God." And two thousand years have passed; that 'soon' has not yet been completed. When is it going to be completed?

There is anger in every Christian against Jesus. And because of this anger he shows too much fanaticism for Jesus, so that nobody knows that he is angry. In fact he himself does not want to know that he is angry, that he has been deceived, that he has been given a bogus belief, that for two thousand years millions of people have lived with this belief and died with this belief - attaining no growth, reaching nowhere, finding nothing. One is afraid of this anger, this rage. To suppress it, he goes to the church, he prays to Jesus, or to Krishna, or to Mohammed. But every believer, sooner or later, is going to be frustrated because belief is not going to give him the truth. It is not going to give him the living waters of life.

What Judas did, every Christian would like to do. It is another thing that he does not; it is because he has not that much courage. Nobody has tried to understand Judas, because even to try to understand Judas seems to be against Christianity. But the man has to be explored. He was the only one who was educated, cultured - more than Jesus and more than any of his apostles. And naturally, as an educated, cultured man, he must have been full of doubts. I can't think of Judas believing that Jesus is the son of God.

He was with Jesus. The man had a certain charismatic personality, but that is not anything to do with truth. Adolf Hitler had a great charismatic personality, and do you know... at the end of his life he started believing that he is the reincarnation of the old biblical prophet Elijah. His whole life he killed the Jews! In his gas chambers, millions of Jews simply evaporated into smoke. And at the end of his life he started thinking himself Elijah, one of the very significant Old Testament prophets.

You will think he is mad, but there are still people in the world.... I received a letter from somewhere here in America, from the president of the American Nazi Party, threatening me, saying that I should not speak against Adolf Hitler because "it hurts our religious feelings." I was simply amazed.

Religious feelings...! But I was immensely interested too. What religious feelings are hurt? And the man goes on, saying, "Perhaps you do not know that Adolf Hitler was no ordinary man, he was the reincarnation of prophet Elijah. So please don't speak against Adolf Hitler because it hurts our feelings, and it is not good of you to hurt anybody's religious feelings." Adolf Hitler, a religious leader!

But there are people who still believe it - what can you do?

And what must have happened to Adolf Hitler in the end? The defeat was absolutely certain. He was kept unaware; he was continually told lies because he was not ready to listen to any truth. He was not ready to listen to the fact that "our forces are being destroyed, we are being defeated." No, he was not ready. Anybody who brought this news to him was shot dead immediately: "It is impossible!

- the man must be lying." He killed his own generals for bringing him the advice that "we should step back. Going ahead is simply killing our people." He shot them, then and there! He said, "We are here to be victorious. This is our destiny, the destiny of the Aryan race, of the Nordics, to rule over the world. Nothing can go against it."

So by and by his people understood: let him live his fiction. He was living in an underground shelter.

All was lost - Russian, American, British armies were entering Berlin - and he was still believing that his forces were in Moscow, in London. When he heard the bombs falling nearby, he could not believe what was happening. He inquired, and they said, "What can we do? If we say the truth to you, you shoot us. The truth is we have failed. We are defeated, these are enemy forces; Berlin has fallen."

At that moment the idea arises in him, perhaps as a repentance that he killed so many Jews.... How man's mind works! Perhaps he feels repentant and wants to compensate for it: he becomes the prophet Elijah. That was his last stupidity. He did many in his whole life, but that was his last. But there are people everywhere, even in America, who are forming parties around the religious prophet Adolf Hitler.

Judas remained with Jesus. Jesus certainly had some charisma. There are people who are born leaders, just as there are people who are born poets, there are people who are born painters.

Everybody is born with a certain quality. He may know it, he may not know it. The sooner he knows the better, because then he starts moving in the right direction for his fulfillment. Unless he finds the right direction which leads to the fulfillment of his inborn quality he will never feel content.

So the function of the master is not to make you just like himself; his function is to help you discover who you are. You are not like me. There is no need of a duplicate, a carbon copy. But these messiahs and paigambaras and tirthankaras, they are all trying to make everybody a carbon copy.

They are the original. And by belief, you can become a carbon copy very easily.

Judas remained with Jesus, but he was full of doubts. Again and again he raises questions which are full of doubts. And Jesus always pushed away his doubts, because nobody else was creating doubt. All were believers. They were unsophisticated people, ready to believe, and very happy that they have become apostles. A really great achievement: God's only begotten son, and they are his apostles, his messengers. What more can you expect? So they were simply believing, no question of doubt. But Judas was continuously doubting. And Jesus nowhere tried to understand this man, his doubt. Rather than giving him a belief, he should have been given a way, a door, so that he could trust.

My own feeling for Judas is very different from anybody else's feeling in the world. I am sorry for that man. He was perhaps one of the most genuine seekers amongst Jesus' followers. But Jesus never gave any rational ground to him. It was Jesus' fault if the man became frustrated, fed up with all this game of believing. And in this game of believing he was being defeated by fools, because those fools were absolute believers.

It was his doubt that forced him to deliver Jesus into the hands of the enemies - because this was the only way now, to know whether he is really the son of God or not. He gives no proof, he gives no way to experience. Now, this is the only way: deliver him to the enemies and let him be crucified and that will be the proof. He will be resurrected and then there will be no question of doubt.

Jesus is responsible for forcing him to take this drastic step. But the resurrection did not happen.

And Judas felt really sad, repentant that he had unnecessarily committed a sin, he unnecessarily betrayed him. There was no need; if he was not ready to believe in him he could have left him - what was the need to put him to the cross? He became so repentant that after twenty-four hours he hanged himself, he committed suicide.

Nobody bothers about his suicide. It is as significant as Jesus' crucifixion, perhaps more significant; it has much more mystery in it. Why did Judas commit suicide? If he was really an enemy, there was no need to repent. He should have been happy and rejoicing. But he was not an enemy, and this was not his purpose, that Jesus should be killed. He had not imagined it.

But Jesus never gave him any rational ground and pushed him to take this drastic step - because this will be the only proof whether he is the son of God or not. If resurrection happens, then he is the son of God, and that will prove everything. Then whatsoever he says is true; then there is no need to doubt, then there is no need to think about it, then there is no question. In fact he was not thinking to help the enemies crucify Jesus; he was trying to find a rational ground to trust, which Jesus has failed to provide.

The master never gives you belief; he gives you a sharing of his atmosphere, so that a hypothesis arises in you, a desire to experiment.

And once that desire is there, he gives you the way that he knows, that he has walked. And you will not find another crazy master like me, for the simple reason that I have traveled on almost all the paths. It is simply crazy, because one path leads to the goal; there is no need to travel on other paths.

There have been masters that traveled a path; they reached the goal, they helped a few people to imbibe their spirit, and if there was somebody ready to experiment, it was okay.

I have never been a follower of anybody, in any of my lives. But I have been traveling with many people, on many paths. One path is enough to know the truth, but my search was not only for the truth, but whether there is only one path to truth, or whether there are many paths also which are as valid as this.

So I have gone to the goal, come back; moved from another direction, come back; moved from another direction, come back; and I have not left a single path untraveled. Hence I say to you, it is simply crazy. I don't want you to follow all these paths, unless that urge arises in you and is authentically yours. Otherwise one path is enough.

The moment you experience, then the trust is complete; then it is no more hypothetical, then it is existential. In that moment there is no master, no disciple; just two flames have come so close to each other that they have become one flame. The disciple starts smelling of the same fragrance as the master. His eyes start showing the same raw light as the master. His vibe becomes the same as the master. And then the tremendous gratitude: the gratitude that this man did not give me a belief, otherwise I was lost. This man did not make me dependent on him, otherwise I was lost. This man did not exploit me psychologically in any way, for his own ego, otherwise I would not have been able even to find what is happening. Because I was sick, I was needful, he could have easily exploited my needs for his own ego. He could have created the vicious circle of fulfilling the ego: you fulfill the master's ego, the master fulfills the disciple's ego.

It happened that I was invited by one of the shankaracharyas in Faridabad; he was holding a big, world religious conference. He must not have known me at all. I became aware of it, he became aware of it; the moment I spoke, within two minutes it was clear he did not know me.

His secretary was interested in me, he was reading my books. He had persuaded him to invite me, and of course it was going to be a world religious conference, so many religious leaders were invited - there was no harm. And the secretary must have done the whole paper work, and the shankaracharya may not have been actually aware of who I am, or what was going to happen.

But when I reached there - I reached in the early morning - the shankaracharya wanted to see me, because in the evening the session would begin and there were at least fifty thousand people gathered, so then there would be no time. And he was to preside at the conference. So I went to his temple where he was staying, from the guesthouse where I was staying.

He was sitting on a wooden platform, three feet higher than everybody else was sitting. By his wooden platform there was another platform, one-and-a-half feet above the floor, one-and-a-half feet below his platform. There, another monk was sitting, very dignified. And on the floor, all the guests who had come to participate in the conference, and address the conference - Hindus, Mohammedans, Christians, Sikhs, Jainas, Buddhists - all were sitting there.

I was also sitting there. The shankaracharya said - he started the conversation: "Do you know the man who is sitting by my side, on a lower platform, who he is? He was the supreme court's chief justice. As he retired, he renounced everything. And he is so humble... I asked him to sit by my side on the same platform, but he refused. He says, 'No, you are my guru, my master. How can I sit with you?' That's why he sits on a lower platform."

I asked the shankaracharya, "I understand - he must be very humble, as far as you are concerned, because he is one-and-a-half feet below you - but what about me and all the people sitting in this room? He is a great egoist, one-and-a-half feet above us. Why cannot he sit with us? If he is so humble, then what is the need of this middle stage? He can sit with us. But he is not sitting with us, he is sitting higher - and don't be deceived that he is humble. He is just waiting. When you die, he will be sitting where you are sitting. He is just waiting for your death." And I said to the man, "If you have any sense of dignity, come down from that platform and sit with everybody."

And I told the shankaracharya also, "It is not a meeting which you are going to address; we are your invited guests, and you are sitting higher, and we are sitting lower. Who is the host here? And who is the guest? Neither is he humble - because insistently I have been telling him, 'Come down,' and he is not coming down - nor are you humble. I am saying to you, 'Come down, sit with everybody.'

But you are not coming down. This is all a bogus show.

"You cannot sit with all these people, Mohammedans, Christians. A shankaracharya and sitting with Mohammedans, Christians, Sikhas, Jainas, Buddhists?... although you have invited these people.

You are the host, you should behave like a host. But you don't have the courage to come down.

And it is not a meeting which you are going to address - otherwise it is okay, you can be above. It was going to be a small conversation, a friendly conversation, but you have disturbed the friendly conversation. You get down, otherwise I will get up!"

Then too that fool did not get down. Then I had to get up on the platform and sit by his side. And I asked the other people, "Whosoever wants can come. As many as there is space for can come here - otherwise, the second platform. Be humble, sit on the second platform. I am not a humble man. I am perfectly happy here, I will sit here."

These fools... he has no respect, nor has the man he named. And why did he start this conversation in the first place? I asked him, "You wanted to tell us you have a disciple who was chief justice of the supreme court of India, and if he is your disciple, what to say about you! And you wanted to impress the fact that he is very humble because he refuses to sit with you. Neither you are humble, nor is he humble; you both are playing on each other's psychological need, and exploiting."

Now he became afraid that he had invited, unknowingly, a dangerous person. He tried in every way to arrange that in the open session, where fifty thousand people or more would be present, somehow I should not be allowed to speak. And the arrangement that he had made was this: he kept three persons just behind me with sticks in their hands, so that everybody was aware of them.

The secretary who had invited me and was interested in me, came to me and said, "It seems to be strange, but these three persons are criminals, dangerous people, murderers. And they have been put behind you so that if you speak they can start attacking you and disturb the whole meeting. You will not be allowed to speak."

I said, "Don't you be worried. I know my business perfectly well. Just don't be worried." I looked at those three people. I told them, "Are you all ready?" They looked at each other. I said, "Be ready, I am going to start." And without the shankaracharya announcing my name, I went to the mike and said to the public, "You can see three persons standing behind me with sticks. And you must know these three people; they are from this place, Faridabad. They are criminals and murderers. They have been put there by the shankaracharya so that I cannot speak. If I start speaking they will start attacking me. I would like you to raise your hands: do you want to hear me, or don't you want to hear me?"

Fifty thousand hands were raised. Then I told the shankaracharya, "I don't care about you at all.

Now you are no more the chairman of this conference. These hands have refused you." And I told those three people, "Be alert. If you do anything, neither you nor your shankaracharya, nor anybody, will leave this stage alive. These fifty thousand people are there."

And they shouted, "We are here. If any harm is done to you, we will burn everybody on that stage."

I spoke. I said whatsoever I wanted to say, and those three criminals simply slipped away. And this man was talking about humbleness...!

Humbleness arises only, gratitude arises only, when you have experienced what the master has been trying to express through words, through actions, through silence, through every possibility - because that experience is something inexpressible.

Okay Sheela, one question more.

Question 2:

I am an ordinary person. That's why my commune is absolutely extraordinary, because never around an ordinary person has there been any commune. Yes, there was a small commune around Jesus - but he was the son of God. There was a big commune around Buddha - but he was the suprememost awakened person, past, present, future... nobody is going to transcend him. Of course he had a big commune around him, but he was an extraordinary person. There was a commune with Mahavira - but he was the twenty-fourth tirthankara, a very unique status.

I have no status at all, I am an ordinary person. Hence I say my commune is absolutely extraordinary, because when has it happened that a commune functioned around an ordinary person? This is for the first time. And to be with an ordinary person like me needs tremendous courage, because I don't fulfill any of your childish desires, I don't fulfill any of your fantasies, I don't give you any hope, any promises.

To be with me is enough proof that my commune is absolutely extraordinary - but I am an ordinary person.

Okay Sheela?