The great affair

Question 1:

Antar Farid, the question you are asking is certainly significant. Its significance is very subtle. I will have to go step by step to make it clear to you.

These are the stages a seeker moves through: the student, the disciple, the devotee. The fourth is also there but it does not belong to the seeker, it belongs to the one who has arrived; that's why I am not counting it. The seeker is on the path. The student is not aware that he is a student. He may think he is a disciple, he may think he is a devotee; his functioning is absolutely unconscious.

I am reminded of a case - it happened in the life of a Sufi mystic, Junnaid. A man came; he wanted to be a disciple. Junnaid looked at him for a long time. The man started feeling a little nervous: Why is he looking so long and so silently?

Finally Junnaid said, "To be a disciple is very difficult."

The man said, "Then I am ready to be a devotee."

Junnaid said, "That is even more difficult. The only thing that is not difficult here is to be a master."

The man said, "If that is the case I am ready to be the master."

Junnaid told his disciples and devotees, "This is a case of unconsciousness. He is not even a student, but the longing is to be a master if it is easier."

The student comes almost accidentally. Perhaps he reads a book, perhaps a friend talks to him and he becomes curious. But curiosity is so superficial; it cannot make you committed and devoted for a long journey. It is very momentary. Hence the student is not accepted in the mystery schools.

He is too unripe; he has to wander a few days more or perhaps a few lives more before he can be accepted by a master as a disciple.

Another Sufi story will explain it to you clearly. A man left his home and his village in search of a master. Just outside the village he met an old man sitting under a tree so silently and so peacefully that he thought, "Perhaps he may know somebody who is a master; otherwise, how I am going to find...

Each master is so unique that there are no symptoms that can be recognizable. The young man went to the old man sitting under the tree and asked him, "Do you know a master?"

The old man said, "Certainly. Do you also want to know him?"

He said, "That's why I have asked you. Show me how I can reach the master and how I will recognize him."

The old man said, "It is easy. He will be very old - at least thirty years older than me - and he will be sitting under a tree." And he described the tree, what kind of tree it is, and he described the moment of meeting. He described even the movement when they will meet in such detail that the young man was puzzled how he could manage this.

"But," the old man said, "it will take at least thirty years for you to find him."

The young man thanked the old man and went on in search. Now he has some symptoms, a certain tree that he can recognize: in the evening when the sun will be setting... an old man who will be thirty years older than the man he has just left. Of course it is going to be a long journey, wandering here and there. But the old man had said things with such authority, with such certainty that it was almost indubitable.

He wandered in the desert, and he never came across the same tree again that was described. He never met a man who was thirty years older than the old man. Every evening when the sun was setting he looked all around - and no master appeared.

Utterly frustrated and disappointed, now he himself becoming old, tired, tattered with the journey in the desert, he came back home. Strangely enough, the old man was still sitting under the tree.

The last time when he was there and the old man was describing the tree - its leaves, its flowers, its fruit, its height, its foliage, its deep shadow even in the middle of the sunny day - he never looked at the tree under which the old man was sitting. He was describing the same tree... but now he recognized it. After wandering for thirty years looking at every tree, he had become accustomed to look first at the tree.

"My God," he said, "this is the tree! I never came across the same tree anywhere" - and the old man was certainly thirty years older. And all the descriptions that he had given about the master were absolutely apparent in the old man.

The sun was setting and the old man said, "So you have come. I had to wait so long. I was already old enough and ready to die, but just for you I had to wait thirty years."

The young man said, "This is so stupid. Why did you not tell me the first moment I met you, that this is the tree and you are the master?"

The old man laughed. He said, "I told it in every possible way, but you were not ripe. Your understanding was almost absent. These thirty years have ripened you and now you can recognize that which you failed to recognize when you met me. I am your master."

The student is very accidental; there is every possibility that he will never become a disciple. He may go from one place to another, he may gather much knowledge. But he will never become aware of his own being, which is the only true knowledge in existence, the only knowledge that takes you away from darkness to light and away from death to immortality and away from ignorance to innocence - the only knowledge that is not information but transformation.

The student is not aware that he is accidental, that he is only curious, that the search has not begun yet because deep in his heart he is not ready to go on a long pilgrimage.

The disciple knows perfectly well that he is a disciple. The first rays of understanding, awareness have penetrated his being. He knows for sure that he is no more a student; he feels it deep in his heart without any doubt that the miracle has happened, he has become a disciple.

He feels the dedication, he feels the love, he feels the commitment. Even if it takes lives to reach, he knows he is on the right path and he will certainly reach. He knows perfectly well that he has found the master. It is not an intellectual understanding; it is something intuitive just like love.

In fact the Zen masters have called it "the great affair." Love is a small affair - but to find a master is a great affair because there is no other love which will be deeper and more fragrant and more profound than that which exists between the disciple and the master. And the disciple is perfectly aware of it.

But the devotee is again a totally different phenomenon. The devotee never knows - but not because he is unconscious like the student. Devotion comes so slowly, not making any noise, that you don't hear the footsteps.

The disciple simply grows just as the child grows and becomes a young man. The young man grows and one day becomes old... but you cannot find when it happened. The disciple grows slowly, slowly into a devotee. And to be a devotee is such a total transformation that only the master becomes aware that you have changed from the disciple to the devotee. You yourself cannot be aware of it.

But the difference between the unawareness of the student and the absence of awareness of the devotee is tremendous. The devotee is so full that there is no place left from where he can stand aloof and be aware what is happening. He is completely enveloped with the experience. It is so absorbing that he cannot be watchful of it.

To be watchful, to be alert, you need a certain distance. The devotee has lost all distance. It is the master who recognizes for the first time the change, that the climate has changed; the disciple is no more a disciple.

Another Sufi story may help you. Sufis have such beautiful stories, unparalleled, that each story opens a new vision.

This Junnaid I mentioned was himself once a seeker. He used to tell his disciples, "When I met my master, the master never looked at me for three years. I was sitting from morning till evening. So many people were coming and going and he was talking to people and he did not look at me, as if I did not exist for him yet. But I was persistent because I had felt the presence of the master and I had tasted the sweetness of his surroundings. I remained - in fact the more he ignored me, the more I became certain that there is some secret in his ignoring me."

After three years the master looked at him for the first time. That was the recognition that he was not a student, but a disciple. A student would have got lost in three years; no student can stay that long waiting just for a look. Then another three years passed and he never looked again.

After three years the master looked again and smiled too, and his smile went almost like a sharp sword into the heart of Junnaid. Why had he smiled? - but the master did not give him a chance to ask. He started talking to other disciples.

Three years passed again, and one day he called him close and kissed his forehead and said, "My son, now you are ready. Now you can go and spread the message."

But no message had been given to him.

For nine years he had been there. The only message was that once he was looked at, once he was smiled at, and once he had been kissed on his forehead.

But if the master is saying you are ready, it must be so. Touching the feet of the master in gratitude he left.

He used to tell his disciples, "I met a very strange man. In nine years he prepared me without even looking at me - but on each change he made the indication. When he became certain that I was a disciple and whatever happened I was going to stay there, he looked at me. But his look was such a shower of love... I could have waited for it for three lives; three years were nothing. The way he looked at me, with such deep love and compassion, I was immensely glad. I was bathed almost in a new experience.

"Without telling me anything... in those three years my mind had stopped functioning. I just went on looking at the master, his every gesture, and slowly, slowly there was nothing to think about. I even forgot for what purpose I was sitting there - and that was the day he looked at me. I knew the purpose and I was fulfilled immensely.

"But then three years again passed, and when he smiled the whole existence smiled. Every fiber of my being felt his smile - such a soft touch, but it went deep into my heart. I knew something had happened, but I was not aware at that time what had happened. I had passed from disciplehood into devoteehood.

"The day he kissed my forehead, he sealed my certificate as a master. His kiss on my forehead was his only final message. It took me years to figure out slowly what he had meant."

The kiss of the master to the disciple, to the devotee, is a declaration that the merger has happened, the melting has happened and now you are ready to spread all around the fragrance that you are filled with.

The student is unconscious. The disciple starts becoming conscious. The devotee is so conscious that he cannot be conscious of his consciousness. It has to be a recognition from the master, because from the devotee the distance between himself and the master is absolutely nil. From the devotee one grows into a master, but it is a spontaneous and natural growth.

Farid, I remember these Sufi stories because of your name. Farid is the name of a great Sufi master.

You are right: "I feel and know in my heart, I am your disciple." I agree with you.

You say "I don't feel I am yet a devotee although I aspire to be one." Just drop the aspiration and you are one. Only the aspiration is blocking the way. Aspiration is simply a beautiful name for desire, greed.

Just drop the aspiration and there is no hindrance for your transformation. You will be transmuted from disciplehood into the wider world of a devotee.

Certainly you have stumbled upon a beautiful fact which cannot be possible just through intellect.

You say, "Is it in the nature of being a devotee that one knows one has become one or does the innocence of the devotee make the awareness of it not possible?"

The second part of your statement is correct; the very nature of the devotee makes it impossible for you to recognize it. There is no space left to stand aside and see. Every knowledge, every awareness needs a distance. You have to stand away; then you can see and watch, and you can know and you can be aware.

But the devotee has lost all distances between himself and his knowing. He himself has become awareness. Now who is there to be aware of awareness?

This has to be understood: you cannot be aware of your awareness, because if you can be aware of your awareness you will be falling into a logical regress. Then you will have to be aware of your awareness of your awareness... and there is no end to it. Always finally you will have to decide that now this is enough. In fact you cannot be aware of your awareness because you are awareness.

It comes from the recognition of the master. He can see the transformation, the change of the climate in your being.

And every master has many things to do. One of the most important things, the final thing, is to give you the indication, the kiss of recognition on your forehead you that you have entered into the most mysterious experience of life.

Farid, you will never become aware of your being a devotee, but your longing to be a devotee is a hindrance. Drop it immediately! Don't take time in dropping it, don't postpone.

There are things which should never be postponed, because the tomorrow is never certain. There are things which have to be done just here, immediately, and you will see many doors opening which your aspiration was blocking.

But once you enter into those mysteries you will not be aware, because you will become the mystery itself.

Question 2:

Anand Niyama, it means many things to be in the middle. I will have to start my answer from Gautam Buddha, because he was the first man to use the words "to be in the middle," and of course nobody has been able to improve upon the meanings that he gave to the word 'middle.'

He called his path the middle path. The first meaning is that if you can avoid both the extremes, the rightist and the leftist - if you can be exactly in the middle of both the extremes, you will not be in the middle, you will have transcended the whole trinity of extremes, and the middle. If you drop both the extremes, the middle disappears on its own accord. Middle of what...?

Gautam Buddha's insistence on the middle is not on the middle; it is in fact a subtle way to persuade you for transformation. But to tell you directly to be transformed may make you apprehensive, afraid.

To be in the middle seems to be very simple.

Gautam Buddha played with the word out of sheer compassion. His own word for the middle is majjhim nikaya, the middle path. Every extreme has to exclude the other extreme; every extreme has to be in opposition to the other polarity. The negative is against the positive, the minus is against the plus, death is against life. If you take them as extremes, they naturally appear as opposites.

But the man who can stop exactly in the middle, immediately transcends all the extremes and the middle together. And from the higher standpoint of the transformed being, you can see there is no opposition at all. The extremes are not opposites, not contradictories, but only complementaries.

Life and death are not enemies, they are part of one single process. Death does not end life, it simply renews it. It gives it a new form, a new body, a new plane of consciousness. It is not against life; looked at rightly, it is a process of refreshing life, of rejuvenating life. The day is not against the night...

In existence there is no opposition in anything; all opposites contribute to the whole. Existence is an organic unity. It does not exclude anything out of it, it is all-inclusive.

The man who can stop in the middle comes to know this tremendous experience, that there are no opposites, no contradictories. The whole existence is one, and in that oneness all contradictions, all oppositions, all contraries disappear into a single unity. Then life includes death, then day includes night.

A man who can experience this organic unity becomes fearless, becomes without any anguish and angst. For the first time he realizes his vastness - because he is as vast as the whole existence.

One of the great disciples of George Gurdjieff, P.D.Ouspensky, has written a book. I must have seen thousands of books, and perhaps no other man in the whole world can claim to know more about books than I know. But in this whole experience of thousands of books I have never come across another book which can be compared in any way with P.D.Ouspensky's TERTIUM ORGANUM.

TERTIUM ORGANUM means the third canon of thought. He gave this name to this great and incomparably unique book because there have been two other books in the past: the first was written by Aristotle, and he called it the first ORGANUM, the first principle of thought; and the second was written by Bacon, and he called it NOVUM ORGANUM, a new canon of thought.

Then Ouspensky wrote TERTIUM ORGANUM, the third canon of thought, and he declared just in the beginning of the book that "although I am calling it the third canon of thought, it existed before the first canon of thought ever existed."

This book contains so many mysteries that each page, almost each paragraph, each sentence seems to be so pregnant with meaning... This is the only book...

I used to love underlining my books, that's why I have never been interested in reading books from any library. I cannot underline a book that has been borrowed from a library, I cannot put my stamp on it. And I hate to read a book which has been underlined by somebody else, because those lines which have been underlined stand out and they unnecessarily interfere in my own conception, my own flow.

This is the only book which I started underlining and I recognized after a few pages that every line has to be underlined. But I could not be unjust to the book. All my books in the library are underlined.

Knowing perfectly well after a few pages that this book can be left not underlined, but that will be unjustified... so I had to underline the whole book. In that book there are so many things - and one is significant in the reference I am talking about.

P.D.Ouspensky was one of the greatest mathematicians of his time. He knows perfectly well what he is writing, and he says that in mathematics the part can never be bigger than the whole. It is obvious: how can the part be bigger than the whole? But he goes on to say that mathematics is not all, "I have come to know the mystical experience with my master, George Gurdjieff, and now I can say there is a higher mathematics, the mystical mathematics, where the part not only can be equal to the whole, but sometimes it happens that it is bigger than the whole."

Now you are entering into a strange world, where the part cannot only be equal to the whole, sometimes it can be bigger than the whole. It is simply absurd as far as logic is concerned - and from the mouth of a man who is one of the greatest mathematicians, and he knows it. He makes it clear that "I am embarrassed making this statement. As a mathematician I should condemn it. But what can I do against the existential experience? When it comes to experience, then mathematics or no mathematics, I have to state it exactly as it is."

The moment somebody transcends the opposites and comes to know them as complementaries, he is not only part of the whole, he becomes the whole.

And let me tell you the final absurdity. Once in a while - in a man like Gautam Buddha, or in a man like Mahavira, or Chuang Tzu, or Lao Tzu - it happens that the part becomes bigger than the whole.

Absolutely illogical, absolutely unmathematical - but still absolutely right.

A Gautam Buddha not only contains the whole but because of his transformation he is a little bit more than the whole. The whole is not aware of its complementariness. Gautam Buddha is aware of its complementariness, and that's where he transcends and becomes bigger than the whole although he is just a part of it.

Anand Niyama, to be in the middle is one of the great methods of transforming yourself into the ultimate. To prepare yourself for being in the middle you will have to drop all extremist ideas. And all your ideas are extremist - either leftist or rightist, either Christian or Mohammedan, either Hindu or Buddhist. You have chosen; you have not allowed a choiceless consciousness, accepting everything that is.

All your prejudices are your choices. I am against all your prejudices, just to bring you into the middle.

The pope heard that a certain lady in Ireland had produced ten children, so he sent one of his cardinals to grant her his blessings.

When he met the lady the cardinal was disgusted to learn that she was not a Catholic. "Do you mean to say," he thundered, "that I have come all this way to meet a sex-mad Protestant?"

If she had been a Catholic, she would have received the blessings of the pope. But unfortunately she is a Protestant... Immediately the prejudiced mind changes its position from blessings; it starts cursing. He calls that poor woman "a sex-mad Protestant"!

This is the way of all prejudices. A sannyasin is one who has no prejudices, who has not chosen any ideology to be his own, who is choicelessly aware of all that is. In this choicelessness you will be in the middle. The moment you choose, you choose some extreme. The moment you choose, you choose against something; otherwise there is no question of choice. Being in a choiceless awareness is another meaning of being in the middle.

It happened that a very beautiful young prince - his name was Shrona - listened for the first time to Gautam Buddha. Buddha was visiting the capital of the young man's kingdom, but listening to Gautam Buddha, the prince immediately asked to be initiated. He was well known as a sitar player and he was also well known for luxurious living, utterly luxurious.

It was said that even when he was going upstairs, rather than having a railing on the staircase, naked, beautiful women used to stand all along the staircase so that he could move from one woman's shoulder to another woman's shoulder. That was his way to go upstairs. He used to sleep the whole day because the hangover of the night before was too much; the whole night was a night of celebrations, drinking, eating, music, dance. There was no time for him to sleep in the night.

All these things were known, well known to the people. Gautam Buddha had never hesitated to give initiation to any man before. Now he hesitated. He said, "Shrona, I know everything about you; I would like you to reconsider, think it over. I am still going to stay in this capital for the four months of the rainy season."

For four months, in the rainy season, Gautam Buddha never used to move around, nor did his sannyasins. Eight months of the year they were continuously wandering and sharing their experiences of meditation and higher states of consciousness. But because twenty-five centuries ago there were only mud roads, and Buddha had not allowed his disciples to have any possessions - not even an umbrella, no shoes, and just three pieces of cloth. One was for any emergency, and two so that you could change every day after the bath; more than three was not allowed. In the rainy season when it was pouring it would have been difficult to keep those three cloths dry, and to walk in the mud, in the pouring rain might make many poor sannyasins sick.

For that reason he had made it a point that for four months you remain in one place, and those who want to see you can come. Eight months you should go to every thirsty person; for four months let others come to you.

So he said, "There is no hurry, Shrona."

But Shrona said, "Once I have taken a decision I never reconsider. You have to give me initiation right now."

Buddha still tried to persuade him that "there is no harm in reconsidering it, because you have lived a life of utter luxury. You have never walked on the road, you have been always in a golden chariot.

You have never come out of your luxurious palace and gardens. You have lived continuously with beautiful women, with great musicians, with dancers. All that will not be possible when you become a sannyasin - not even two meals a day" - a Buddhist sannyasin is expected only to have one meal.

... Gautam Buddha's insight has been proved correct by science after twenty-five centuries of criticism. Now science has come to the same conclusion: if you can reduce your food to half, your diseases, sicknesses, illnesses will also be reduced to half, and your life will be doubled. Now it can be said scientifically that Buddha was right. It was not a deprivation; it was really a very healthy measure.

He told Shrona, "You will not be able. And I don't like anybody to return to the world, because that makes him lose his self-respect. That's why I say, 'Consider...'"

Shrona said, "I have considered again and again and I still want to be initiated right now. The more you tell me to consider the more I become adamant and stubborn."

Gautam Buddha had to relent and give him initiation, and from the very second day there was trouble - but a trouble that no sannyasin of Gautam Buddha had expected. A trouble that perhaps Gautam Buddha had expected started happening.

When all the sannyasins had three pieces of cloth, Shrona started living naked - from one extreme to the other extreme. When all the Buddhist sannyasins were walking on the road, Shrona would always walk by the side of the road in the thorns. When the other sannyasins were resting under the shade of the trees, Shrona would always stand in the hot sun in the middle of the day.

Within just six months a beautiful young prince became almost old, a skeleton, black; one could not recognize that this was the man who used to be a great prince and was famous for his utterly luxurious life. His feet were bleeding, his whole body had shrunk, and one night after six months Gautam Buddha went to the tree under which he was sleeping. It is one of the rare occasions when Buddha went in the night to any sannyasin for any reason. There is no other incident, at least in the Buddhist scriptures. This is the only incident.

He woke Shrona up and asked him a very strange question: "I have heard that when you were a prince you were also the greatest sitarist in the country. Is that right?

Shrona said, "You could have asked at any time. I don't see the point in the middle of the night."

Gautam Buddha said, "Just wait a little, you will see the point."

Shrona said, "Yes, it is true."

Buddha said, "Now the second question is, if the strings of the sitar are too tight, will there be any music born out of those strings?"

Shrona said, "Of course not. If they are too tight they will be broken."

Buddha said, "If they are too loose, will there be any music?"

Shrona said, "You are asking strange questions in the middle of the night. When the strings are too loose they cannot create any music. A certain tension is needed. In fact to play on a sitar is simple.

The real mastery is to keep the strings exactly in the middle, neither too tight nor too loose."

Buddha said, "This is the point I came to make to you. Life is also a musical instrument: too tight and there is no music, too loose and there is no music. The strings of life have to be exactly in the middle, neither too tight, nor too loose; only then is there music. And only a master knows how to keep them in the middle. Because you have been a master sitarist I would like you also to become a master of life. Just don't move from one extreme to another, from luxury to austerity, from pleasures to self-torture. Try to be exactly in the middle."

Gautam Buddha in a sense is one of the most profound psychologists that the world has produced.

To be in the middle in every action of your life - always find the middle and you have found the path of meditation and the path of liberation.

Question 3:

Yoga Suresh, it is natural that when something from the unknown starts happening one feels afraid.

Although you are seekers and you want the whole sky to open for you - you want the unknown to touch your heart, you want the stars to enter in your being - you are not aware that when things start happening you will be afraid and trembling.

Now, whatever is happening to you is absolutely good. But the fear is natural, and you will have to overcome your fear. It is perfectly good to sit with closed eyes when so much is happening around you and you are feeling strange vibrations and a soft touch to your heart.

Don't close your eyes out of fear; close your eyes for deeper exploration. There is nothing to be afraid of. This is our existence, this is our world, and there are many many things of which we are unaware.

As you become more receptive, you will become aware of subtle vibrations and naturally you will start thinking, "Am I going mad or what?" You will start feeling things which, if you are not aware and clear, can drive you nuts.

Close your eyes with love for a deeper contact with those vibrations. Those are the vibrations of a buddhafield. You are fortunate that they are touching you - but your fear can stop the whole process.

If you want to be afraid, be afraid only of your fear. Except that, there is nothing to be afraid of.

Close your eyes. But when you close your eyes, another fear comes - of darkness. There is nothing in darkness to be afraid of. It is so silent, so beautiful, so vast. In the light you are always surrounded by the crowd - of people or trees, but you are always crowded. Only in darkness are you absolutely alone.

That aloneness creates fear.

But our whole effort is to teach you aloneness, to teach you to love without any choice. Light or darkness, both should be explored. Light has its own beauties, its own colors, its own rainbows, its own flowers. Darkness also has its own silences. Light comes and goes, darkness remains.

Darkness is far more eternal than light. It is always there; it does not need any fuel, it is not dependent on anything, on any cause. You cannot destroy darkness; you can destroy light without much difficulty. You cannot do anything directly with darkness; it is there and it will remain forever.

Search for its beauties, search for its depth. Out of fear, first you close your eyes. Then another fear grips you - of darkness - so you open your eyes, but then the whole experience starts disappearing.

Get out of this misunderstanding.

If you can, just trust me a little bit. I give you the guarantee that what is happening to you is for your good, for your well-being. You are not only entering the Gateless Gate, you are really entering into the gateless gate within you.

Allow it to happen. Rejoice in it so that it can happen more. Dance. In welcoming it, allow your whole heart to be receptive to all these vibrations. You have entered a mystery school. You have to prepare yourself for many more mysteries ahead, but if you misunderstand you will lose something great that was beginning to grow within you.

Be absolutely assured that what is happening to you is going to happen to all. These experiences happen like a chain. If one person becomes absolutely immersed in these unknown vibrations, he will become infectious, contagious to others.

Spread your vibrations to others.

Sitting by the side of someone, focus with your eyes closed on the person; particularly, if you can, focus with closed eyes on the neck of the person. Sit behind him. The neck is the most receptive center... and those vibrations will start moving into the other person too. You will see that he is becoming fidgety, looking all around, What is happening?

Every day sit behind somebody else. You have a great and a very enjoyable task. Just sit behind Avirbhava, and you will see the expression... But don't misunderstand what is happening to you.

Welcome it.

A young lady living in Canada received a present from a friend in Mexico. It was a tiny Chihuahua dog, the so-called Mexican hairless breed.

During the Canadian winter the tiny dog, who was used to tropical heat, began to shiver uncontrollably. No matter how many blankets she put on it, the poor dog could not get warm.

In desperation the girl jumped on her bicycle and pedaled down to the village drugstore. She asked the druggist if he could give her something to keep her Chihuahua warm and maybe grow some hair on it.

The druggist blushed and said, " Miss, I think that is something you should see your doctor about."

The girl was about to leave when the man added, "But I will tell you one thing, miss, riding that bicycle is only going to make things worse."

Okay, Maneesha?

Yes, Osho.