Every Buddha Enriches The Universe

The first question:

Question 1:

The enlightened man, even while he is alive in the body, has already dissolved. He knows that he is no more, he knows that he is a nothingness. The dissolution has already happened. In fact, nothing has dissolved, because nothing had been separate from the very beginning. Separation was an illusion.

The feeling that 'I am separate from existence' is just illusory, it is not a reality. The enlightened man comes to realize only that he never existed before, that he does not exist now, and that he will not exist in the future. The whole exists, not the parts.

You may think that you are separate, but that is just a dream. Only the dream dissolves - nothing else; only the ignorance is lost - nothing else; only sleep dissolves - nothing else.

But the question is relevant. What happens to the uniqueness of a Buddha, a Lao Tzu, a Jesus?

Where does it go? The universe becomes unique through it. Every Buddha enriches the universe - just as every sleepy man impoverishes it. Every sleepy man is making part of the universe sleepy, dull, dead, and when millions of ignorant people exist the whole existence is sad, serious, ill.

A single Buddha helps the world to flower again to its very peak; to sing again to its utmost; to dance again to its utter possibility; to bring its whole potentiality to a manifestation, to a celebration. So when a Buddha dissolves - as there is no other way to say it in language - when a Buddha dissolves the uniqueness becomes the uniqueness of the whole.

Then the whole is enriched. Then the whole will never be the same again. It will never be.

That is the meaning of Christians deciding on Jesus' birth as a dividing factor in history. The whole calendar of Christians, and of non-Christians, is based on Jesus' birthday. It is very symbolic. It means that history will now never be the same again because Jesus was born and because Jesus was crucified, and because Jesus has overcome death, is resurrected. Now the whole world is totally different - you may know it or you may not know it. If you were born before Jesus you would have been born in a totally different world. Jesus has given his quality to the world. It is a historic moment.

Mahavir, Buddha, Lao Tzu, are all historic moments. Through them the universe is reaching higher and higher, the universe is reaching to a crescendo.

Through them the universe is already reaching; through you it has yet to reach. The universe is a vast phenomenon: it is possible that although my head has touched the roof, my feet are not at all aware about it. It is possible that my feet will take a long time to recognize that my head has touched the roof. And I am one body.

The whole is one body. In Buddha, in Christ, in Zarathustra, something has already touched the crescendo, but in you it is lagging far behind. You have not even heard the news; you don't know what has happened. But by and by, by and by, a few will escape from the prison of sleep. And then they know. One day the whole existence is going to become enlightened, because every enlightened being goes on giving his enlightenment, his uniqueness, his flavor and fragrance to the whole.

There is a beautiful story - it is a story, but very significant. It is not a fact, in religion we are never worried about facts, in religion facts are fictitious. In religion we are worried about the significance of a fact, the value factor, not the fact itself - hence religion speaks in parables, stories, metaphors, analogies, allegories.

It happened that Buddha finally reached the door of nirvana. For thousands of years the door and the doorkeeper had been waiting and waiting and waiting for him. He had been coming and coming, but at last the news came that now Buddha had reached there. The door was opened and the doorkeeper welcomed him, but Buddha said: Close the door, I am not coming in. The doorkeeper asked: Why? You struggled so hard to attain and now you have attained. Now why are you rejecting? The story says that Buddha said: I am not rejecting, but I will have to wait for my other fellow travellers. Until and unless everyone has passed through this gate I will have to wait.

My compassion does not allow me to go alone. It will be too selfish. And now that I don't have any self, how can I be so selfish?

The story says that the Buddha is still waiting for all you fellow travellers. You may not even have heard the news but he is waiting and waiting and waiting. When everybody has passed through the gate, he will go - he is going to be the last man.

The story is meaningful. How can the head alone enter if the feet have not followed? If we are an organic unity how can a part alone enter into enlightenment and leave all else behind? If we are a real unity, an organic unity, then of course Buddha has to wait. He may have become enlightened, he may have reached the door, but if all those who are following are an organic unity, he has to wait.

The head has reached, but the head has to wait for the tail.

When an enlightened being dissolves he gives his fragrance to the whole of existence. You are a little more enlightened because of him. Every Buddha has added something to you. You are not alert, but every Buddha has been pouring and pouring his riches onto you. In a thousand and one ways the existence has been accumulating speed, because every Buddha gives his own achievement to it. You are totally different because of Jesus, Zarathustra, Buddha.

Hence the attitude of deep gratitude of religious people towards their masters, because without a Buddha they would not have been possible.

Without me you would not have been here; without previous Buddhas even Buddha was not possible.

It is a great chain, the chain of existence - and everything is linked with everything else. It is a great pattern, nothing is separate.

Even Buddha pays his respects to past Buddhas. Somebody asked him: Why? Why do you pay respect? You have become enlightened; nobody is higher than you. To whom are you paying respect? Buddha said: Because of them I am what I am. Without them the possibility would not have been there. They created the ladder, they became the rungs, and I have progressed through them. They are my past. This moment of enlightenment has come because of the whole past.

You are the past - be grateful to it; you are the future also - be hopeful about it. You are a link. In you the whole existence passes this very moment into the future.

The second question:

Question 2:

Gurdjieff has given a beautiful classification of man. Whenever anybody would ask him about man he would immediately stop and say: Don't ask about man. First tell me the number. Man number one? Man number two? Man number three? Man number four? Or man number five? Which man do you mean when you say man?

He had seven 'mans'. And he was perfectly right. Nothing can be said about man because nothing exists like man. A few are man number one, a few are man number two, a few are man number three.

These first three are simple to understand because you all belong to them. The man who lives in his body is man number one, you can find him everywhere. He lives for the body; he does not eat to survive, he survives to eat. That is the first number.

Number two man is emotional; he lives through his emotions - always excited or depressed, moving up and down. When people come to me and I ask them how things are going they say, 'Up and down.' Number two man. Sometimes he feels very, very good, euphoric, and sometimes he is as dull as death; sometimes he is in hell and sometimes in heaven; sometimes laughing very beautifully and sometimes crying.

This second type of man is also available everywhere. You need not go very far, he may be within you.

I was just reading a dictionary - I love dictionaries because I love words and their biographies - and I came across the word 'maudlin'. That is the second type of man: emotional, always ready to weep and cry, sentimental.

I looked into the etymology of the word, from where it came, and really it was a discovery. It came from 'Mary Magdalen'. You must have seen pictures of Mary Magdalen washing Jesus' feet with her tears - crying and weeping, eyes red. 'Magdalen' by and by became 'maudlin'. That is the second type of man.

The third type of man is intellectual. He lives through his intellect. He is only a head; he has no body, he has no heart. He is a great controller from the head. He goes on manipulating his heart and body and everything through the head; he is the scholar, the ascetic, the pundit, the man of knowledge, memory, logic, philosophy. This third type of man controls the whole world.

But these types are all on the same level - their level is not different. These three types of men are available everywhere: the third type exists more as male, the second type exists more as female, the first type exists as both. And these three types are also you - you cannot find them in their purity, they are mixed, a hotchpotch. These three types you cannot find in purity.

If you can find a man who has these three things absolutely separate, he is the fourth type of man:

the yogi, the fakir, the mystic. He has separated his being into different layers. Now, when he is in the body he is in the body, he does not allow emotions to interfere with it or the head to control it. When he is in his emotions he does not allow his head or the body to interfere in it. He is not a mixture, he is not adulterated; everything is clean and clear in him. You can rely on him. When he thinks he thinks, he doesn't allow his emotions to interfere - because emotions become clouds.

They don't allow clear thinking.

That's why women cannot think as clearly as men. They belong more to the second type, they belong to Mary Magdalen, because they have so much emotion. I have never come across a woman whom I could say is intelligent. It is almost impossible because whatsoever she thinks... in fact she never thinks, it is her emotion that creates the phenomenon of thinking. Deep down is emotion. She 'emotionalizes', and reason simply follows like a shadow.

She is never unprejudiced, never. She cannot be just a watcher, a judge, a spectator, no. She will get involved. A man can be a watcher. That's why more scientists, more philosophers, more logicians are men. Except for Madame Curie, women have not produced anything. And I suspect that Madame Curie must have had more male hormones than other women.

Some day a study has to be done on hormones. Indira Gandhi must have more male hormones than Morarji Desai. One should not be deceived by the appearance.

These three layers are on the same ground. They are not like storeys, one on top of another. They are divisions on the same plane, and they have got mixed. They have to be separated.

The fourth type is the man who has separated his being, who has given to each center its own work.

Unless he does this everything is intermixed and nothing functions well.

Your sex center is a body center. You can fall in love with a woman but you are a Brahmin and she is a Shudra, an untouchable. Emotions don't know who is a Brahmin and who is an untouchable.

A Hindu can fall in love with a woman who is a Mohammedan. Now, emotions don't know but the reason knows that she is untouchable. The body knows nothing, the emotions are not rational, but the mind reasons it out. And the mind will immediately interfere. It will say: Look somewhere else.

This woman is not for you. She is a Mohammedan and you are a Hindu. How can you marry a Mohammedan woman? Or, she is so poor and you are so rich. How can you marry such a poor woman? What will people say?

The head interferes in the emotion. Now you suppress it and you try to fall in love with a woman who is a Brahmin of your own caste. Nobody can fall in love with effort. With forced effort it can at the most be a marriage, never a love affair. It will always be impotent, it won't have that intensity.

You are continuously interfering. The body says: 'I'm hungry,' but you say: 'This is not the time.'

When the body says: 'I am not hungry,' you go on forcing food into it because you say: 'This is lunch time and I have no other time so this is the time and you have to eat.'

Gurdjieff used to say that all these three centers are intermixed and that's why you are so confused.

No clarity exists in you. Everything is a confusion and a smoke. No flame exists in you. So the first thing Gurdjieff used to do was to bring each center to its own functioning.

Stop trespassing. Let the body function as the body; let the emotion function as the emotion; and let the head function as the head. And don't allow them to interfere with each other, otherwise you will be a hotchpotch man, you won't have a center. Then you will live in confusion and you will die in confusion. You will be a sheer wastage.

The fourth type of man comes into existence when the centers start functioning in their own territory and they don't trespass. This takes long effort.

The fourth type of man will be rare for you to find, but in some yogis and in some Sufi mystics you can find the fourth type of man. Still the fourth type exists.

The fifth type is still rarer. The fourth simply sorts out the three levels, the three layers, and makes them function according to their original nature with no interference, no outside domination. The fifth man becomes aware of it. The fourth man can work without awareness, the fourth man can work through a teacher, or through a discipline, or through a methodology and sort them out. Much awareness is not needed, a little understanding will do.

The fifth type is the man of awareness. He becomes aware of the whole phenomenon - the three different centers and the fourth's effort to bring them to their own territories. The fifth becomes a watcher, a witnesser. It is very rare to find a man of the fifth category.

Ouspensky, Gurdjieff's greatest disciple, belongs to the fifth category. But he is only aware - awareness will sometimes be there and will sometimes be lost. He cannot be constantly aware because for a constant awareness an integrated center, which is lacking in the fifth type of man, is needed. That's why Ouspensky went astray. He became aware, but he had no integrated center in him, so he was aware only sometimes. When he was aware, he was one man, but when he was not aware he was a totally different man. He became a good teacher but he couldn't become a master because a master needs total awareness, twenty-four hours' awareness, even in sleep.

The sixth type of man is very, very rare. Centuries pass, then the sixth type of man becomes available. The sixth type of man is one who is not only aware but who has become centered, who has attained to his center. The fifth type of man watches; the sixth type of man watches from an eternal center: he has attained to a tower inside. And his awareness is never wavering, his inner flame remains unwavering.

And then there is the seventh type of man about whom nothing can be said. Up to the sixth, description is possible but with the seventh there is no description. You have to be near to the seventh type to know what he is. And the more you know about him, the less you will know. The more you know, the more you will feel that much more is still left to be known.

The seventh type of man is absolute mystery, extraordinarily ordinary. Simple, but as mysterious as is possible. A Buddha, a Lao Tzu, a Gurdjieff, they are the seventh type of man. But about them nothing can be said.

People who belong to the first three categories are almost alike. People who belong to the fourth category will be more or less alike. People who belong to the fourth category will be different from the first three categories, but they will not be very much different from each other. Yogis, fakirs, are very different from the first three categories, but very similar to each other. The man of the fifth category starts becoming unique, he becomes something rare. You will find that two persons of the fifth category are as different as possible. The sixth type of person is absolutely integrated. He has become absolutely unique.

And with the seventh all the possibilities of uniqueness have been achieved. It is the highest peak, indefinable and unknowable through the intellect. There is only one way to know the seventh type, Hindus call it satsang. It is just to be in the presence of that type of man.

If you are fortunate to find a seventh type of man, just allow his being to penetrate your being - become receiving ends. And then you will come to a feeling of what it is. It is the greatest diamond of being in the world.

The third question:

Question 3:

SANNYAS is the ultimate game - the last, the final. Beyond it there is no game. It had to be very colorful. The householder, the grihasth, plays a game but it is in black and white. Poor. A sannyasin is playing a game but not in black and white. It is colorful. A sannyasin has to become a rainbow because the moment you know that everything is empty everything becomes possible; because that emptiness has in it all.

To me, sannyas is not renunciation against indulgence. No. It is renunciation in indulgence. sannyas is not leaving the world; it is living in the world as if you are out of it - it is an 'as if' phenomenon. You live in the world but you are not in it; you move in the world, but never, never, do you take a single step in it; you remain in the world but you don't allow the world to enter into you.

Hindus call it the phenomenon of the lotus - the lotus remains in the water but untouched. In the morning go and see the lotus. In the night dewdrops have gathered on the petals, they look so beautiful in the morning sun. Pearls. But you can look and see that they are on the petals, and they are not, because they never touch the petal anywhere. So close and so far away, touching but not touching, just a little breeze, and they drop. The petals do not cling to them they cannot cling to the petals.

A sannyasin lives like a lotus in the world. He does not cling to anything, he has no clinging. He enjoys; in fact, only he enjoys. Only he can enjoy, because without any burden of desires, without any obsessions to cling, there is no hindrance. He can celebrate, he can delight, he can dance. His rejoicing is unconditional.

That's why I call sannyas the last game: on the periphery it may look serious, but at the center it is a deep laughter. My sannyasins are not serious people - not that they are not sincere; they are not serious. In fact, a sincere person is never serious. Seriousness is a deceptive thing, seriousness gives you a feeling of sincerity which is not there. A sincere person can laugh and remain sincere; a serious person cannot laugh because if he laughs the seriousness is broken. Sincerity is never broken, it is authentic; seriousness is just a facet, a mask.

My sannyasins are not serious. That is the whole point to be understood. All other types of sannyasins are serious, they don't have laughter within them. They are afraid of the world; in fact, they are cowards, escapists. If the world is really an illusion, then why escape from it? If in fact you have realized that the whole world is maya then where are you going and for what? Nobody ever renounces dreams. How can you renounce something which is not? When you renounce the world you are into its reality too much. You may call it maya, illusion, but you don't understand what you are saying. You call it an illusion just to console yourself that you have not left a reality - it was an illusion. But these consolations won't do. You know it is real. Otherwise why have you left it?

To me sannyas is an awakening, not an escape. It is an awareness of the whole phenomenon of life - that it is a game.

If it is a game, play it well, that's all. Play it beautifully, and while it lasts, enjoy it. Don't cling to it, because it is a game; don't get mad about it, because it is a game. And when you understand that it is a game, why not let it be colorful?

Red is a basic color. In nature only two colors exist: red and green. They are the basic colors.

Hindus have chosen red, Mohammedans have chosen green. Only two basic colors exist.

All the trees are green and all the flowers are red.

When I was thinking what color I was going to give to my sannyasins, green was also a competitor, green was also a candidate. But then I decided on red, because in the red the green is involved, but in the green the red is not involved.

I will have to explain it to you: a tree can be without flowers, but flowers can't be without trees. In every flower the whole tree is involved. So behind my red there is green; behind all my teachings - even if the formulation is Hindu - the Mohammedan is hidden. So I talk about the Upanishads and I give examples from Sufis; I give you a meditation - three steps of the meditation come from the Hindu world and one step comes from the Mohammedan world.

I give you the mantra 'hoo'. 'Hoo' is just the last part of 'Allah-hoo'. If you repeat 'Allah, Allah, Allah, Allah, Allah' continuously you will start repeating 'Allah-hoo, Allah-hoo, Allah-hoo'. Then by and by the 'Allah' part drops and only the sound 'hoo, hoo, hoo' remains, and the whole being is filled with it.

I have chosen red because red is the culmination of the whole tree, red is the flowering, the last thing. You cannot defeat Hindus: of course they were first in the world of religion. They have chosen the best, they have not left anything behind - they have chosen the color red.

Red is the flower. Red is the blood. Red is the sun. From everywhere red surrounds you, and in red everything is implied, involved, because it is the flowering.

Let your life be colorful, I don't want you to become colorless. No. I would like you to become like rainbows, all seven colors. And when all the seven colors are there, there comes a moment when they meet and become one. That is white light. This is a miracle - white light can be divided into seven colors; and the seven colors of a rainbow if they meet together, if the alchemy happens, become white. When all the seven colors meet they become white, and when all the seven types of man meet they become white - just a white light, and nothing is left.

Play the game as beautifully as you can; but it is a game - don't get serious about it. And even if sometimes seriousness is needed, let it be a game, nothing more. Sometimes it is needed. It gives a taste to life. Sometimes you need to be serious also. Be serious, but never become serious, let that also be a game. Let everything be a game.

And sannyas is the last game. Beyond it the whole world of game disappears. Then there is reality.

So this is just the last thing you are going to do. Do it as perfectly as possible - delight in it, dance in it, let it be a deep singing, a rejoicing.

The fourth question:

Question 4:

The drum has a special appeal - the reason is very deep rooted You will have to understand it.

When a child is conceived in the womb, the child grows, but he cannot breathe, he has to breathe from the mother. In fact, the mother breathes for him. And for nine months continuously he hears the beating of the mother's heart - continuously. It is the first meeting with music and rhythm.

For nine months the child goes on hearing the heartbeat of the mother. That is the first drum he encounters, and it becomes very deep-rooted in the being of the child. Every pore of him is filled with it, every fibre of his body vibrates with it, he has no life except the mother's heart. And there is the beating continuously for nine months... you just think about it.

And then the child is born. The whole body system, the mind system, carries that desire for the beat, for the rhythm of the mother's heart. And mothers know, knowingly or unknowingly, that whenever a child is restless, crying, weeping, uncontrollable, they have just to put his head on their chest, and immediately the child goes to sleep, falls into sleep. When again he hears the beat - the beat is soporific - he immediately falls into sleep.

And not only a small child - even a young man, when he rests on a woman's heart, falls immediately into sleep, because the woman becomes the mother and the lover, the husband, becomes again a child. The heart goes on having the appeal.

If you don't feel that sleep will come, just close your eyes, put the light off, and listen to the clock, tick, tick, tick.... That will do, no tranquillizer is needed because it almost gives you the feeling of the mother's heart. A closed room, a closed womb, and then the tick, tick, of a clock. And always choose a clock which really gives a 'hearty' feeling - not a metallic sound but more human. Old grandpa clocks used to be that way; now we have more efficient clocks but they are less human.

Old grandpa clocks on the walls are something beautiful. They create an atmosphere.

Hence, from this deep biological experience of the child, comes the appeal of the drum. The drum is the oldest instrument of music, everything else has followed it. So whenever somebody is beating a drum the temptation is too much - you start moving your legs, you start swaying your body. If the beater is good and really knows how to create atmosphere through the drumbeat nobody can be there who is not affected. Even a Buddha would like to dance. It is natural. That's why everybody enjoys a drumbeat. And it is very primitive, it is not sophisticated. Go into the jungles of Africa or deep into the Indian forest where only aboriginals live. You will find everywhere the drum.

The drum is the most primitive instrument. When you feel that drum beating, your body responds, sways, you start falling into the beat, moving with the beat, and suddenly you have become a primitive, a natural being: all civilization drops. You are no longer here in this twentieth century and all the nonsense that goes on around - you have moved back almost ten thousand years.

Just the other night, our Ethiopian SANNYASIN, Neeraj, came to show me a few Ethiopian dances.

They were wonderful. He danced with a very primitive beat, very, very primitive. Ethiopia is one of the oldest lands on earth, it is the country of Solomon. Since Solomon they have been dancing with the primitive beat. It has a deep appeal. There is no need to understand it, your body will understand it. Nobody could understand the song that was following the beat but everybody understood the beat.

There were Americans, there were English, there were Indians here and everybody could follow it.

The language of the drum is universal.

It is very unsophisticated, simple, nothing much to it, anybody can learn it. In fact, everybody drums.

Knowingly or unknowingly, if you are sitting at a table you start beating; if you feel good, you start beating the table. It is primordial. Your natural being is called again, and it responds. All the centuries of civilization disappear in a second. Suddenly you are again under the stars, you have moved back thousands of years. Everything is natural, dark, mysterious. That is the appeal.

And the man who does not respond to a drum and its beat has no heart. He lacks something. He has become completely plastic, a twentieth century model, absolutely. He has lost all contact with history, with the past, with the millennia that have passed. In his heart nothing of nature lives any more; it is dead.

And this story is also very, very beautiful:

ALMOST TWO THOUSAND YEARS AGO IN CHINA, A WOMAN DREAMED THAT A WONDERFUL DRUM FELL FROM HEAVEN.

Of course, how can man invent the drum? Such a beautiful phenomenon. It has been so long on the earth that nobody can visualize that there was ever a time when man was and the drum was not.

So God must have created them simultaneously. It is possible that he may have created the drum first and man later, because immediately the man will need the beat, the vibration of it. Otherwise how will he be alive? Every child comes later; the mother's heart is beating first.

The heart is ready to beat and flow with love - and then comes the child. The drums must have been in existence before man was created.

It is not said so in the Christian story of the creation of the world, because that story is not complete.

No creation story can ever be complete. The story of creation is going to be as vast as creation itself.

This story is symbolic. It says: IN CHINA A WOMAN DREAMED THAT A WONDERFUL DRUM FELL FROM HEAVEN. Good, perfectly true. Man cannot make the drum; the beat is biological, it precedes man.

THAT NIGHT SHE CONCEIVED. Now the path of the story is absolutely clear. First she dreamed that a drum was going to fall from heaven, and then she conceived.

SHE BORE A SON AND NAMED HIM TENKO - HEAVENLY DRUM. SOME YEARS LATER A DRUM DID FALL FROM HEAVEN AND WHENEVER TENKO BEAT UPON IT, IT MADE BEAUTIFUL MUSIC.

Man is from heaven and the drum is from heaven. The meaning is symbolic. Man is from heaven and the music is from heaven and whenever you know the keys of how to open the doors of music you have opened the doors of heaven also. The secret lies in the music. If there is a choice between philosophy, religion, science and music; if you ask me to choose one, after which all the remaining ones will disappear from the earth, I will choose music. Because if there is music, religion will follow.

It cannot disappear.

If there is music how is it possible that religion can disappear? Music will give such a mysterious feeling to everybody that people will start thinking about what this mystery is. If music is, philosophy cannot disappear; if music is, science cannot disappear; if music is, literature cannot disappear.

But it is possible for philosophy to be there, and no music. If you choose philosophy, then philosophy will be there, but there will be no necessity for music to be there.

Music is the most primordial phenomenon because it is in nature, in the breeze passing through the trees, in the birds singing - you will never find a bird being a philosopher but all birds are musicians.

You go and search - you will not find a stream religious, but all streams are musical. Go and ask these winds passing through the trees - they may not have ever heard about the Bible and Koran and Gita but they know music. Music is involved in life itself. It is existential.

So if there is a choice for me to make I will choose music and drop all else, because I know they will have to come back. Music is so vast that it will create them all again. Music is heavenly.

SHE BORE A SON AND NAMED HIM TENKO - HEAVENLY DRUM. SOME YEARS LATER A DRUM DID FALL FROM HEAVEN AND WHENEVER TENKO BEAT UPON IT, IT MADE BEAUTIFUL MUSIC.

If you really want to enter into music you will have to go as deep as the music is. Music is the greatest mystic discipline. Islam has denied music completely, and that's why Islam has remained a crippled religion. How can there be religion without music? It will be very poor. Sufis again revived it, they had to revive it. That's why Islam always feels an antagonism, a deeply antagonistic attitude toward Sufis, because they revived music again after Islam had completely denied it.

There is a story. It happened that one of the Moghul emperors, Aurangajeb - he was a very orthodox, a fanatically orthodox Mohammedan - was very much against music. He was so much against it that in the capital, music started dying. People were afraid to sing, or to dance, or to play instruments, because it was a crime. He prohibited it by law.

One day all the musicians of the capital gathered together, and they created a protest march. They followed an URTHI. When a man dies in India the dead body is bound on bamboo - it is called an URTHI - and then it is carried to the cemetery. So they carried an URTHI of music to the cemetery.

It was a great procession because the capital was filled with musicians, and they were all weeping and crying. They created so much noise that Aurangajeb came out of his palace to see what the matter was, who had died. There were thousands of people, musicians and their lovers and their disciples, because in the Delhi of those days music was a great phenomenon. They all followed, weeping and crying.

Aurangajeb came out and he asked: What is the matter? Who has died, somebody very, very important? I have not heard. The musicians said: Sir, music. Aurangajeb said: Good, it is good that music is dead. Now go and bury him so deep that he cannot revive again.

This has been the Moslem attitude but Sufis again revived dancing and music and everything, because no religion can be without music. Mohammedans feel deeply hurt by the fact. They suspect that Sufis are somehow enemies and they tried to kill Sufis but they could not. And the irony is that Sufis are the real core of Islam, they are the substantial religion: in fact, they are the flowering.

Music is a milieu in which religion arises and develops and grows. Anything that is growing needs music. All your prayers should be musical, your meditations should be musical, your whole being should by and by become musical.

THE EMPEROR DEMANDED THE DRUM. BUT TENKO TOOK IT INTO THE FOREST AND HID.

HE WAS CAPTURED AND DROWNED. THE DRUM WAS TAKEN TO THE EMPEROR'S PALACE BUT IT MADE NO SOUND.

The drum in itself will not make any sound, the drum in itself is nothing. An alive heart, a loving heart, has to be brought to it. You have to put life into it, you have to get involved in it - only then does it make a sound. That sound is the meeting of the man with the drum. The sound is not possible only with the drum, it is not a technical thing. The king could have called technicians, but music is a love affair, it is not technology. You can learn the technique and you can miss the music.

If you love you may not know the technique but you need not worry about it - the music will come.

Life responds to love; God responds to love; and whenever you become technical you miss life and you miss God. You miss all that is beautiful.

Because it was an emperor's court there must of course have been technicians - but you cannot capture the citadel of music by violence. You cannot be aggressive towards truth, towards love, you cannot make an attack on God's house. No. Then you will miss. You have to go surrendered, you have to go there humble.

THE EMPEROR DEMANDED THE DRUM BUT TENKO TOOK IT INTO THE FOREST AND HID.

HE WAS CAPTURED AND DROWNED. THE DRUM WAS TAKEN TO THE EMPEROR'S PALACE, BUT IT MADE NO SOUND.

A deep love is needed. You may have seen Indian musicians: before they start playing on their instruments they bow down to them. It looks absurd to Western eyes. What are they doing bowing down to their own instrument? It is sacred. It is divine. You have to take its permission: Do you allow me to play on you? Am I accepted?

I have heard about one musician who will actually ask his veena: Am I allowed? And then he will wait. And sometimes it will happen that he will say: No. The veena is not ready. At this moment I am not pure enough. I will have to wait. Today I cannot play.

It will be difficult for the Western mind to understand. What are you saying? A veena is an instrument, there is no need to ask. You can force, you can command - but there you miss. You can force, and there will be a certain kind of music; but it will not be a response, it will be a reaction. If you hit the veena there will be a reaction, of course. But it will not be a response. A reaction is a rape of a woman; a response is the response of your beloved. They are totally different.

TENKO'S FATHER CAME TO THE PALACE AND TOUCHED THE DRUM AND IT SANG. THE EMPEROR REPENTED AND GRANTED A MEMORIAL SERVICE FOR THE SON. TENKO'S SPIRIT APPEARED AND DANCED IN GRATITUDE FOR THEIR PRAYERS.

Everybody who has been violent with life will repent. Don't be violent with life. Persuade it.

Persuasion is needed. Don't be aggressive and violent - otherwise all music will disappear.

I will tell you a story. It happened that in a house there was a very ancient veena. For centuries it had been there. And through the generations the people of the family had by and by completely forgotten what it existed for, what its function was. It had become a nuisance in the house, because it was so big and it needed space. And not only that, sometimes the children would go and play on it and they would disturb the peace of the whole house. Sometimes in the night the cat would jump on it, or the rats would run through it. So it was a nuisance, always creating noise, disturbing the sleep, disturbing the people of the house and the neighbors.

Finally one day they thought: Why are we keeping it here? Throw it out. Every day we have to dust and clean it, and it is useless. So they went and threw it outside the house.

A beggar passed. He saw the veena lying there and he started playing on it. It created such a divine music that the whole neighborhood gathered. Even the people who had thrown it out came running out of their house. They were stupefied, hypnotized. They couldn't believe that this veena could create such beautiful music, so mysterious. It created such a milieu around that all the traffic stopped, houses were empty and whosoever heard, came. The whole town gathered, and when the beggar stopped, the people to whom the veena had belonged for centuries jumped on him and said:

Give this veena to us, this is ours.

The beggar said: The veena belongs to one who can play on it. It is not a possession. It is a love. If you can play on it, play on it - then it belongs to you. If you cannot play on it, don't be possessive - it belongs to me. I was waiting for it and the veena was waiting for me. Now we have met and now nobody can separate us. If you insist, you can take it, but it will be a dead veena and I will be a dead musician. Between us two something meets and mingles, between us two something becomes one and organic. I am half, the veena is half, and when we meet we become one - then there is music and there is love and there is life.

The last question:

Question 5:

If it is your imagination, so what? Why not enjoy it? What is wrong in imagination? Imagination is as divine as anything else. If you feel happy and blissful, enjoy it. Let it be there.

This is the mind which goes on creating trouble. Again and again, if people feel good, if they feel beautiful, they come and ask: We are worried. Maybe it is just imagination. But when they are suffering and when they are in pain, they never come to me and say: Maybe it is just imagination that we are suffering.

This is beautiful! You are so addicted to suffering that suffering is always real, but bliss looks suspicious - it may be imagination.

So what? If it is imagination, let it be an imagination. Enjoy it. Delight in it. And always remember that the criterion of the true is delight, celebration - there exists no other criterion of truth for me. A thing that gives you peace, a thing that gives you bliss, is real. Anything that gives you pain, that makes you suffer, is unreal. That is the only criterion, there is no other criterion.

So if you are feeling happy, don't get disturbed by the mind. The mind is a great poisoner, it immediately creates the suspicion that there is something wrong. 'You - and happy? Impossible!' the mind says to you, 'it must be unreal.'