To know the timeless

Maneesha, before discussing the sutras of Joshu I have to introduce to you something very modern, but relating to the ancient gods. Before I call Avirbhava and Anando to show you, I will say a few things about lightning. * Anything mysterious that man could not understand became a god. Lightning is very mysterious:

from where does it come, and where does it go? Suddenly it appears and suddenly it is gone. And it is dangerous too; it kills people, it kills trees, it kills animals - so it must be in the hands of a certain god; a power that he throws against the enemies.

In India, the god Indra has been worshipped for centuries. He is the god of lightning and clouds and rains. Even man has been sacrificed to satisfy him so that he does not destroy their crops, so he does not kill their animals, so he does not send those lightning thunderbolts to their villages. It is out of fear that all gods are born, out of fear and out of ignorance. So first, something about lightning....

Associated with this is a very ancient concept, the concept of the aura. It is now a scientific fact that man also has his own energy which is electrical. In an accident in Switzerland a few years ago, a woman became so electrified that even her husband would not touch her. Even her children escaped from home, because whomsoever she would touch would get a great electric shock. She was brought to the hospital: just by holding it in her hand, an electric bulb would start to light up.

There was no need of any wiring or any electricity.

Her body was too full. This energy of the body radiates about one inch around the body, around every healthy body. The more radiant you are, the bigger the aura around the body becomes. The more sickly you are, the more the aura shrinks. As a man dies the aura disappears.

And now, because of Kirlian photography, your photograph can be taken showing the aura. You have seen statues, photographs, paintings of Krishna, Jesus, Buddha; you will always see an aura around their heads. It was thought this is just mythology - it is not. There is an energy field around them. To indicate that energy field, all the pictures of all the gods around the world have that aura. It is very symbolic. It is not confined to the head, but certainly the ancient man had come to recognize that there is a certain kind of radiation.

As a man becomes more enlightened, the area of his field of energy also becomes bigger. Anybody who enters into that area suddenly finds that it is as if he has entered into a different climate, a different air, a different silence, a different peace. This has been the criterion to find the master.

There are no visible signs for how to find the master. The only way is, if you come close to a man and inside you something starts changing, flowering, blossoming... suddenly you feel as if the spring has come. The man has not done anything. The aura is invisible. But the aura can do miracles in the disciples who come close to the master.

By the way, I would like to tell you that this is what in Zen is called the transmission of the lamp.

Nothing is given by the master, but something is received by the disciple. Where there was darkness in the house, now there is light.

Avirbhava has brought a mechanism which creates an aura. You cannot see the aura, but you can bring a light bulb close to the mechanism and suddenly the light bulb flares up, with no connection.

Not only is there no connection with the machinery, but even if you put a hindrance, like a book, between the two, that will not make any difference. You cannot prevent the aura even with stone walls. It passes through without any doors.

Before they bring their new addition to the Museum of Gods, it will be good to know something more about the aura.

It is certainly like a breeze. You cannot see it but you can feel it.

Now Avirbhava and Anando, bring your mechanism.

(SURE ENOUGH, THE MYSTERIOUS BOX ILLUMINATES THE BULBS HELD BY ANANDO AND AVIRBHAVA. THE ASSEMBLY CHEERS THE NEW ADDITION, AND IT IS WHEELED AWAY.) Maneesha has brought these sutras.

What he is saying is all symbolic. First you have to understand that Nansen stayed with his disciple Joshu for thirty years, waiting for the time when Joshu completely and totally opens up and becomes a flower of spiritual splendor. What you have to note about it is that neither is the master in a hurry, nor is the disciple in a hurry. Nowadays, to tell somebody that, "You will have to stay here thirty years, then you can hope - perhaps, it cannot be guaranteed - that you may become enlightened"...

The world has changed in many ways. The most important way is that everybody is in a hurry, not knowing for what. Everybody is running, not knowing where and why. Everybody is collecting money, power, prestige, without ever thinking - what are you going to do with all this? Soon, death will knock on your doors and everything will be taken away.

That which can be taken away by death is worthless to accumulate. Accumulate something that death cannot destroy. There were times when people were interested only in the immortal. That which dies is already dead; it is only a question of time, whether it is today or tomorrow. The body dies, the mind dies, they are of interest no more. The interest has to go deeper - is there something in you, hidden deep in your empty heart, which does not die? Discover it while there is time.

The whole effort of a certain golden age that we have passed and completely forgotten... all the intelligent people were interested only in one thing: to find the eternal in man. So thirty years was not a question; nobody counted time. The calendar was not consulted. Nobody said to the master, "Now I have been here for two years and nothing has happened."

It reminds me of Junnaid. He used to say to his disciples, the first lesson to every new disciple, was:

"Remember this anecdote of my life.... I remained with my master for twelve years. For three years he did not look at me. I would sit by his side, people would come and go - and he had hundreds of disciples, with their problems - but he did not look at me. The question of being introduced and the question of asking anything was simply impossible. He behaved as if I were not there, he completely ignored me.

"After three years, for the first time he looked at me. And just his look... as if the first rains had come and I was drenched in a new energy, as if I had been dead up to now. Suddenly, his look made me alive."

New doors, new dimensions opened. And for three years again, there was not any other gesture.

But Junnaid was perfectly happy and satisfied and contented. If nothing more happens, this much is too much. After three more years passed, the master touched the head of Junnaid. And Junnaid used to say, "I felt such a serenity, such a deep silence descending over me. I became completely hollow, just filled by the grace of the master."

And this went on happening. Three years again, but he was perfectly satisfied. After three years the master hugged him. And the moment the master hugged him - and not even a word had passed in all these nine years - he dissolved into the master, he became one with him. Now there was nothing more that he could imagine.

Three more years passed, and the master kissed his third eye. Suddenly, a tremendous lightning, cleansing all his being of all that was ugly, of all that was rubbish; making him completely pure, twenty-four carat gold. And after these twelve years, the master spoke to him for the first time, saying, "Now you can go."

Strange. He has not said a single word to him and now he says, "Now you can go. What I have done to you, try to spread it."

This is transmission: the master is ready to pour down all that is splendorous, but the question is whether the disciple is ready to receive it. Buddha used to say, "There may be a great rain falling - you can put your pot upside down. What can the rains do? - your pot will remain empty. Your pot has to be in a position to receive the rains."

These thirty years, Joshu stayed with Nansen. It has to be understood that it was a totally different kind of calculation about time. People were not interested in time but were interested in the timeless.

I have not come across a single incident in the whole history of consciousness and its evolution where a man was tired because "so many years have passed and nothing has happened." Nobody has ever complained about that. It shows a very unhurried way of life. It shows an understanding that whether we know or not, we are part of eternity. If it is not happening today, it will happen tomorrow; if it is not happening tomorrow, perhaps next life. But immense possibilities are there, so don't be in a hurry. In a hurry you may miss many things which were worth being enjoyed, being tasted. Go slow.

Time went so slow that almost nobody was interested in time. The whole effort was to know the timeless.

Today, time has become very important. People are counting minutes, people are counting hours, because they have forgotten their eternity completely. And particularly Mohammedanism, Judaism, Christianity - these three religions have been helpful in making people too hurried, too tense, because in seventy years so many longings and so many dreams have to be fulfilled. There is no time for anything else.

And all those dreams remain unfulfilled; all those longings remain as far away as the origin. Man runs and runs and reaches nowhere, but more and more he wants.

You must have read Leo Tolstoy's famous story, "How Much Land Does a Man Require?" Leo Tolstoy is one of the greatest men humanity has produced. And just a few days ago I came to know... He was never given a Nobel Prize. Nobody is more worthy of a Nobel Prize than Leo Tolstoy. His creativity is immense, he has not been surpassed by anyone. He was nominated, but the nomination was refused by the committee.

The Nobel Prize committee opens it records to the public only after fifty years, so just this year they have opened their records for the public to see, or for research workers to look into. And I was so shocked! In the records it is said, "Leo Tolstoy cannot be given the Nobel Prize because he is not an orthodox Christian." That was the reason. He IS Christian, but he is not orthodox Christian. He has his own original ideas which are not traditional.

These considerations... His great books ANNA KARENINA, WAR AND PEACE - they are not considered at all. The consideration is whether he's orthodox Christian or not. Then they should make it clear that the Nobel Prize is only for orthodox Christians. Why go on being hypocritical?

But these three religions have created a tremendous difficulty for humanity. They have all given the idea that you have only one life. Not knowing anything about past lives, they have given man a tremendously speedy, hurried way of life. You have to fulfill so much that everything remains incomplete. You cannot complete anything because you are in such a hurry - another thing is waiting, lined up!

People die with empty hands.

All the Eastern religions - Taoism, Buddhism, Jainism, Hinduism - have given a totally different dimension, the whole eternity. You are not confined into seventy years; birth and death are simply episodes in your eternity. Many times you have been born and many times you have died; still, the eternal principle of life continues.

That has given the East a certain restfulness. There is no hurry, you can sit by the side of the master for twelve years. The master can take his own time - three years to look at you, three years to put his hand on you. Three years to hug you. Three years to touch your third eye and send a thunderbolt which transforms your whole being. And not giving you any verbal message... Junnaid was simply told by the master, "Now you can go. My work is complete. And whatever I have done to you, do to others."

This you have to remember. Just the very remembrance that we have been here forever and we will be here forever gives a deep relaxation. There is no hurry; we can do everything as minutely, in as much detail... we can do things to perfection.

He's saying, "There are people, I see the smoke from their chimneys from my mountaintop. But in vain, because nothing ever becomes ripe. Nothing is ever completely cooked. These people are absolutely aware that I am waiting here on the mountaintop and I have something precious to give them."

He does not mean buns or rice cakes. What he means is "Since last year I have not come across a ripe man." That's what his master Nansen has said, that, "He is a very ripe fruit. Give him good treatment. He can fall from the tree any moment."

He is saying, "Just the thought that these people are there, carrying inside a tremendous delight...

and I am sitting here ready to open up the door, but they are absolutely unaware of their own treasures."

Naturally, when you become enlightened you are no more interested in any 'ism'. It may be Buddhism, it may be Jainism, it may be Taoism, it does not matter. Enlightenment takes you beyond all 'isms'. 'Isms' are simply philosophical statements. Enlightenment is the very experience.

So he says, NOT MINDFUL OF BUDDHISM - because Buddhism will not allow what he is doing - I OFTEN SIGH DEEP SIGHS for the people, who are so close to the truth but will remain far away because even the desire, even the quest has not arisen in them.

Just below his mountain there were one hundred houses. Not a single individual from that village has come to inquire, "What is this monk doing here, sitting under his tree, for thirty years?" They are unconcerned.

It is not something new. In Poona there may be more than two million people, and none of them must have ever thought, "What is going in this place in Buddha Auditorium?" They may pass by on the road, they may see something is going on, but no inquiry. They are so involved in the ordinary that they keep themselves completely blind about the ultimate.

EVERY VISITOR ONLY ASKS ME FOR A CUP OF TEA. And even if someone comes by the way, a stranger, he asks me for a cup of tea. I could have given him the whole world, the whole universe.

But such is the poverty of the mind. He does not look at me, he simply wants a cup of tea. He is just passing by: "Perhaps this monk in his temple must have tea. But this monk has something of the divine - that he is not concerned about."

Now, Joshu has no obligation to provide tea for strangers. He himself is a poor monk. He can give something which you have not even imagined in your dreams, but you are completely unaware and blind. People even become angry if he says that there is no tea. "I can give you myself, I can share many other things, but tea is not there. I am a poor monk." They become angry.

While you are listening to these statements and anecdotes, always remember one thing: don't listen to them as if they are about somebody else.

One line of an English poem is, "For whom the bell tolls." In a Christian village, when somebody dies, the church bell rings to inform the farmers around that "somebody has died, come back from the fields."

The poem says: "Never ask for whom the bell tolls, it tolls for thee." It has a great insight. Whoever dies shows you one fact, that you are also going to die.

Before death takes you, do something to find something so that you can defeat death.

It is again an ancient Zen koan: A HAIR'S BREADTH OF DIFFERENCE - AND WHAT HAPPENS?

People are given this koan to meditate upon. Nothing else is said. What are the things in which a hair's breadth of difference makes a great difference? "A hair's breadth"... people meditate on it. As they go deeper... they cannot find any intellectual answer to it, but as they go deeper they find the answer one day.

The answer is, between you and your center just a hair's breadth of difference is a great difference.

Even that much difference should not remain. You should dissolve into your center, utterly and completely. Only then can you be called a fulfilled man, an awakened man, a buddha.

Zen is very special in its ways of dialogue and everything.

THE MASTER ANSWERED, "HEAVEN AND EARTH ARE FAR AWAY." Now this seems to be absolutely irrelevant to what the man is asking.

THE MONK ASKED, "AND WHEN THERE IS NOT A HAIR'S BREADTH OF DIFFERENCE?" Then what happens? And Joshu said, "HEAVEN AND EARTH ARE FAR AWAY," The same answer to both questions, and both answers are absolutely irrelevant to the question! It creates a situation, and that is the whole work of a master. He is saying, "You are asking a question which is not for asking, which is only available to those who enter in themselves and find it. Otherwise, heaven and earth are far apart."

The man had thought perhaps he could ask the question differently. But the answer remained the same. The master, without saying that "You are asking irrelevant things, things which cannot be asked and answered, which can only be experienced"... But this is the way Zen has developed a tremendous language of its own. Replying to him with irrelevant answers, Joshu is throwing him back again and again; perhaps he may get the point. He does not say to him directly, "Experience!"

There is only one thing in life where a hair's breadth will make an immense difference: if you reach so close to your center... but just a hair's breadth and heaven and earth are far apart. The distance is as much as it is between the earth and heaven. It does not matter that you have come very close; even closeness is a distance.

You cannot say, "I am approximately enlightened." Even approximately enlightened you are ignorant.

Either you are enlightened or you are not enlightened; not even a single hair's breadth will make you approximately enlightened. Just think: either you are alive or you are dead, you cannot say fifty-fifty!

Either you are awake or you are asleep, you cannot say fifty-fifty.

Joshu is kind enough to have answered even such a man. Because Zen is a very delicate matter, a very fragile matter: it deals with the ultimate reality. You have to handle it very carefully.

Tetsuan wrote:

Tetsuan is talking about the small hut in which Joshu lived. He is saying, "Too much happens here on this faraway mountain, in a thatched hut. TOO MUCH HAPPENS HERE WHERE NOTHING SHOULD AT ALL, because it is so far away from the world. But still so much happens. A THATCHED HUT IS NOT SUPPOSED TO BE A BUSY PLACE." But it is a busy place because to a Zen master, everything happening around - clouds and flowers and trees - have equal status to man.

Tetsuan lived with Joshu. The world may have forgotten them, their fame and name - but a few seekers find the way, however deep in the forest a man like Joshu hides. A man of awakened soul is a great magnetic pull. Wherever somebody suddenly has an urge to search on unknown paths, they start moving towards the master, not knowing exactly where they are going.

That's how you have gathered here. There is no reason for you to be here, but something goes on keeping you here. Some immense possibility of finding the truth, of experiencing the beauty, of knowing the meaning of life.

Question 1:

Maneesha has asked a question:

Maneesha, a master hits not to hurt but to heal. And a disciple receives the hit with tremendous gratitude, not with anger. Unless a hit is received with gratitude it cannot do its work of healing. You are all full of wounds, and they all need to be exposed to the sun, to the open sky. Unless you allow yourself to be exposed completely, you cannot get rid of those wounds. The normal way in the world is to hide the wounds so nobody knows about them - go on hiding them deeper and deeper in the unconscious, so even you forget them. But to work on the consciousness, cleaning it from all the wounds is absolutely necessary. Those wounds have to be brought into the open.

You are asking, "Has one only received a hit if it hurts?" No, Maneesha. If it hurts you have missed.

If it does not hurt but creates a gratitude, a love, it heals.

LAST NIGHT I DID NOT FEEL HURT.

You are an old sinner, Maneesha. You have been with this strange man long enough. But you don't know that by your side, Zareen was sitting; your migraine immediately jumped on Zareen! Today she is sitting far away from you.

For seven years she had no migraine. Last night she suffered migraine, I saw it jumping on her! But I kept quiet, because she is new and she has to understand many things.

This was also a great experience for her, that this is not an ordinary assembly of people, this is not a Lion's Club or a Rotary Club. We are involved in the greatest experiment of transforming consciousness. If you keep remembering it, you can overcome all the stumbling blocks.

I hope that Zareen has overcome the migraine. But it jumped on her because she is new and she does not know that in such a place, the master hits only when he loves. The master hits only when he finds you worthy enough.

You are saying:

No, Maneesha, fortunately you did not miss.

Look where your migraine has gone! Now, when everybody is in meditation, Zareen has to throw it as far away as possible. Whoever deserves it will get it! And I promise you, Maneesha, whether you need it or not I will hit. Just for sheer joy!

Now today's time is devoted to Zareen....

Little Ernie swaggers into the bar and shouts to the shapely barmaid, "Gimme a triple scotch on the rocks!"

"Hey, kid," says the barmaid. "You don't look to be more than seven years old. Do you want to get me into trouble or something?"

"Maybe later," says Ernie. "Right now I just want the scotch!"

Alfonso, the Italian, is dragging a large, heavy box down the middle of the street when he suddenly stops in front of a house. He knocks on the door and a woman comes to open it.

"Are you Widow Jones?" asks Alfonso.

"My name is not Widow Jones," replies the woman. "It is Mrs. Jones."

"Well," says Alfonso, sadly, "just wait till you see what I've got in this box!"

Old Father Fungus is getting very deaf in his advanced years, so he asks his flock to write down their sins on a piece of paper instead of speaking them to him.

Everything is going well with this method, until one day Father Fungus hears someone crash his way into his confessional booth, belch loudly, and blow his nose. The strong smell of whiskey pours from the other side of the box as Father Fungus hears his old friend Paddy fumbling around in his pockets. Finally, Paddy passes a small, crumpled scrap of paper through the curtain into the priest's hand.

The confession reads: Ten cans of beer. One six-pack of Coca-Cola. Half a dozen eggs. Three rolls of toilet paper, two condoms and one box of tampons.

Old Father Fungus looks at the note for a minute, shrugs, and silently passes it back to Paddy.

Paddy stares at the paper in shock. "Oh Jesus!" he cries. "I must have left my goddam sins at the supermarket!"

Prince Charles and Princess Diana of England are invited to be the guests of honor at the All- England Agricultural Show.

After they preside over the opening ceremony, the royal couple dutifully walk around to mix with the farmers and look at the exhibits. Soon Charles gets bored and heads for the beer tent, and Diana walks over to admire the prize bull - and never did a male animal have such splendid equipment!

The princess is shocked and amazed at the size of the beast's machinery, and calls over the bull's attendant, Farmer Cowtit, for a talk.

"That is a fine animal you have there," says Diana.

"Yes, your highness," replies Cowtit. "He is a champion, and the father of champions."

"Really?" says the princess, getting excited. "Tell me about him."

"Well, my lady," continues the farmer, "this bull went to stud three hundred times last year!"

"Really?" exclaims Diana. "That's amazing! I must tell my husband about this." And she runs off to get Charles.

She finds him in the beer tent, boozing with a bunch of farmers.

"Come with me, Charles!" snaps Diana. "I am going to show you an animal that will make you feel ashamed of yourself!" And she drags him over to the bull.

"Now, my good man," says Diana to Farmer Cowtit, pointing to the bull's balls. "Tell my husband what you told me about this bull."

"Well," replies the farmer, "as I was explaining to the princess here, this magnificent bull went to stud three hundred times last year."

"And that, Charles," interrupts Diana, "is almost every day!"

"Very interesting," slurs Charles. "But I bet he doesn't have to screw the same old cow!"

Nivedano...

(Drumbeat)

(Gibberish)

(Drumbeat)

Be silent. Close your eyes. Feel your body to be completely frozen.

Now look inwards, collecting your whole consciousness - with great urgency, as if this moment is your last moment of life. Only with such urgency can one reach to the center of life. And the center of life is the center of eternal, immortal, universal being.

Deeper and deeper, because you are going to meet, at the boundary line between you and the oceanic consciousness, the buddha himself. Your being a buddha is a necessary preparation for taking another step and jumping into the cosmic whole... not leaving even footprints in the blue sky.

The greatest blissfulness is not to be. Thousands of flowers start showering on you.

Just be an empty heart

and you will be filled

with tremendous treasures.

To make it clear, Nivedano...

(Drumbeat)

Relax.

And just remain watchful, witnessing the body, the mind. You are neither of them. You are only the witness. This witness is metaphorically referred to as the buddha, the awakened one.

How cool it feels at the center - a fresh breeze, a new fragrance that you have never experienced.

The whole consciousness becomes full of stars.

This evening was beautiful in itself. But ten thousand buddhas dissolving themselves into the ocean of consciousness have made it majestic. I can see that your consciousnesses have become a lake.

Buddha Auditorium is just a lake of silent witnessing.

In such lakes, lotuses blossom, truth is experienced, love for the first time understood. Beauty is no more a physical thing but an inner grace.

Collect as many flowers as you can before Nivedano calls you back.

This is your true nature.

This is your original face.

You don't have to go to any temple to find the buddha. Your witness is the buddha.

Nivedano...

(Drumbeat)

Now come back. But come back like buddhas, with great peace, with immense grace, with a song in the heart, with a dance in every fiber of your being. And sit for a few moments, just to recollect the whole experience - where you have been, the golden path that you've traveled back and forth.

This path you will have to travel back and forth many many times.

Only then, one day you are ripe.

Only then the time comes

for the ultimate explosion.

Okay, Maneesha?

Yes, Osho.