Life is such a puzzling affair

Question 1:

Maneesha, the space, the connection, the merging and the melting that can be called communion, is one of the great secrets of religious life. We have to understand another word before we can comprehend the meaning and the fragrance of the word "communion", and that word is "communication". We all know what it means. When two persons are meeting without meeting, without any merging, without any melting - both are keeping a safe distance from each other - it is called communication.

They may be talking, but nobody is hearing. They are talking almost as if in sleep. Their talk may be apparently relevant, rational, but deep down, it is something totally different. When one is speaking, the other is pretending to listen, but he is really preparing what he is going to say after the other stops. He is not silent, he is not absorbing, he is not allowing the other to approach his heart.

In fact, when two persons are meeting, there are four persons, not two. Two are the real persons which are hidden behind two false personalities; both are pretending to be what they are not. Both are trying to show their best, both are on exhibition, both are showmen. The real persons are hidden behind; they are unapproachable. You can at the most have contact with the mask, with the personality.

And because the personality is false, all its promises are false, all its commitments are false - it says something, it does just the opposite. It says something, it means something else. To watch two persons, just as an observer, you will be surprised: nobody is hearing anybody, and yet both are pretending that they are not only hearing, they are understanding, they are responding. And what is their response? They just catch a word, and they jump in and start talking. It seems to be related, because they have caught a word from your talk. But they are not responding to you; they have been preparing what they are saying without hearing you.

I have heard ... An old man is sitting in a railway compartment and a young man in front of him asks, "Can I know the time?" The old man has a watch, but the old man thinks for a while. The young man thinks, "It is strange, I have just asked about the time - what is he thinking? Perhaps he is deaf, he is old." So he shouts loudly, "I want to know, what is the time?"

The old man said, "Listen, young man, I am not deaf. I have heard that you want to know what the time is, but I was thinking whether to tell you the time or not, because life is such a puzzling affair, and I am so experienced."

The young man said, "This is such a simple question. You have a watch, you can just tell me the time; there is no problem, no puzzle, nothing."

He said, "You don't understand. Once I tell you the time, one thing leads to another. I will ask you, "Where are you going?" And you will say, "The next station," and I will say, "That"s strange, I am also going there. In fact I live there, so why don't you come and have a cup of coffee with us?" But I have a young girl, very beautiful, and it is absolutely certain that you will fall in love with each other. And I don't want my daughter to be married to a man who does not have even a wristwatch. So I was thinking, "Now this young man is trying to create a trouble for me.""

Life is certainly puzzling.

And these people are conversing with each other!

Two professors were in the same madhouse, and the superintendent wanted to know what would happen if they were both put in the same cell. Both were great intellectuals, well-known writers.

So he puts them both in one cell, and he has a small window from where he can watch but they cannot see him. And they immediately get into a very involved conversation. He is puzzled because one is talking about the earth and the other is talking about the sky, and the conversation is going perfectly well; there is no connection at all. It is impossible to find at what point they connect. They are like parallel lines which never meet, but go on running side by side.

Finally he opens the door. He cannot resist the temptation, and he tells them, "I cannot understand.

You are both talking, and talking beautifully, but you are not relating with each other." And they both say, "You need not be worried, we know the art of conversation: I wait while he talks; when he stops, I talk. He waits, he is a very polite fellow. When I stop, he starts - this is the art of conversation."

But the superintendent said, "But you don't connect with each other." And both laughed; they said, "Who does connect with each other?"

In the whole world people are only pretending to connect; otherwise everybody is waiting for the other to stop, so he can start. He says what he wants to say; it has nothing to do with the other person and what he has said. You just watch yourself talking to people, and you will be surprised:

those two mad professors were not wrong about everybody.

Paddy and Mick met in the street. "Have you seen Mulligan lately?" asked Paddy.

"Well," answered Mick, "I have, and I haven"t."

"And what do you mean by that?" asked Paddy.

"Well," said Mick, "it"s like this: I saw a chap that he thought was me, and when we got up to one another, it was neither of us."

It looks insane, but whenever you are meeting with people, neither you are you, nor the other person is himself. Both are wearing a facade, a mask. Both are hiding behind it; the realities don't come in contact, only the hypocrisies communicate. And communication is the only thing we ordinarily know.

Communion is possible when the personalities are dropped and instead of four there are only two - the real and authentic beings.

Communion is a silent meeting.

Just as a river disappears into the ocean, two beings disappear into each other, without holding anything back. Two flames come close to each other and suddenly become one flame. Neither loses anything, and both gain all the treasures of the other.

Maneesha, you are saying, "I have tried and cannot find the words that adequately convey the beauty of those moments when you enter the auditorium." Words will always fail whenever something really beautiful, something existential, something of the beyond, something sacred is happening. Words simply fall short.

Always remember, when words fall short, it is a very blissful moment; when you cannot express it, then it has some significance. If you can express it, if it is possible to put it into words and language, then it is just something below mind.

Everything below mind is mundane.

Everything beyond mind is sacred.

But that which is beyond mind cannot be put into language, into words. So whenever you see a moment arising in you that is so big that no word can contain it, you are blessed; you are showered by flowers from the beyond.

You are saying, "I see the heads of my beloved friends bend down: their love and reverence for you is so poignant, and touches me so deeply. And when your eyes fall on mine, I feel as if I am drinking from a chalice full of golden light. This connection between you and us, your devotees, this is the real "holy communion", isn"t it?"

Yes, this is the holy communion, where the egos disappear in a great flood of love, where small minds are left far behind, and you are flying like eagles across the sun, in the infinity of the sky - where you are not bound by your bodies, by your minds; where suddenly, you have become a freedom, a spirit. And if there are many people together in the same space it certainly deepens the mystery, the glory, the magnificence, the divineness of the moment. Yes, Maneesha, this is what I call "holy communion."

I am not.

I have not been there for a long time.

In certain moments you join me, and you are also no more. In this silence, in this nothingness, where neither I am nor you are, but only a silence prevails - this is the "holy communion." This is the greatest beatitude, the highest benediction.

This is the door to the divine. This is the door invisible to the eyes, but perfectly visible to the inner being.

Those who enter this door are no more Hindus, no more Christians, no more Buddhists. They are simply pure spirits, just innocent beings - with a fragrance they have never known, which surrounds them with a light that dispels all darkness ... with a music which is without any sound, and a feeling of dance, although there is not any movement.

This is the great secret of being religious.

Question 2:

Prem Nirvano, I have never spoken on Martin Luther for a particular reason. He was neither rebellious, nor religious; he was a pure politician. He toppled the power of the pope, not because he was against power - he wanted to have it himself, he was jealous of it. Because he could not get it, he created a split in Christianity between those who followed the pope and those who followed him.

His desire for power was so great that as soon as he had created the split in Christianity, he immediately joined hands with the vested interests. This is not possible for a rebel.

A rebel is always a rebel. It does not matter who has the power, he is always against people having power; his whole philosophy is decentralization of power. Power should not be centralized in a few hands, either political or economic or religious. It should be decentralized. It should be given to everybody - to every individual, his own power. Nobody should be in possession of somebody else"s power.

Martin Luther was a cunning politician. It was because of his cunningness and political acumen that he managed to create a rift in Christianity, pretending to be a great rebel. Jealousy finds a thousand and one ways to hide its face.

His whole mind was bent upon becoming the pope, but if it was not possible, then he would not allow anybody else to remain in absolute power. The people who followed him are not accidentally called Protestants. Basically, he was protesting against the power of the pope, not so that the power should be distributed, but so that he should be given the power. And just to show that he does not care about the pope, he married a nun and he translated the BIBLE into the living languages.

The pope was against both: a monk should be a celibate, and the pope was not willing to have the BIBLE translated into the ordinary languages which people use. The reasons are clear - it is not only the pope, all the religions in the world have resisted having their holy scriptures translated into the living languages which people speak. The fear is that if they can understand what is written in the holy scripture, they will pass through a great shock - because there is nothing much holy in it.

And there is so much unholy in it ...

these so-called holy scriptures cannot even be considered great literature. Their standard is so mundane, so mediocre that all the religions of the world have thought it is better that they should remain in languages which nobody understands anymore.

When you hear somebody chanting sutras in Sanskrit, it seems they must have meaning of tremendous significance - particularly all old languages are very musical. They had to be, because writing came into existence very late, and people had to remember. And it is easier to remember poetry than to remember prose. So all holy scriptures are poetic, and all old languages - Latin, Greek, Sanskrit, Arabic, Persian, Chinese - are all very musical. If you don't understand them, they sound great. It feels like there must be a secret hidden meaning in these musical, beautiful words.

Translated, they fall flat on the ground; there is nothing much in them. They are so ordinary that sometimes one feels ashamed - this is my holy scripture? Many of the holy scriptures are full of obscenity, full of pornography. The HOLY BIBLE has five hundred pages of sheer pornography.

The pope was afraid because to bring the BIBLE into ordinary living languages, which people know and use, was dangerous. And celibacy was the fundamental attitude of all religions, not only of Christianity.

Martin Luther was so angry because he could not become the pope - and it was not in his hands to become the pope; a pope is elected by the cardinals.

They have a special way of electing a pope: there are perhaps two hundred topmost cardinals who gather in the Vatican whenever a pope dies. There is a special place in the Vatican where there are two hundred small cells. Those cardinals move into those cells for twenty-four hours, fasting, praying, finding the message of God within their hearts: who should be the pope? After twenty-four hours, they write the name of one of the cardinals from amongst those two hundred cardinals, and then all those pieces of paper are collected. Whoever gets more votes, whoever gets his name written by more cardinals than anybody else, is chosen as the pope.

It is a very strange election: you cannot campaign, you cannot ask somebody, "Please give your vote to me" - it is prohibited. And you cannot meet anybody else while you are deciding; you are closed in your small cell. It is hoped that, fasting and praying, you will do something which will be right, which will not come out of political considerations but which will come out of deeper feelings:

who is really capable of being the head of the whole religion? - because he is going to be the representative of Jesus Christ.

Martin Luther had no hope ... but he could create a protest, and he chose two particular points on which people would support him - this is simple politics - because many priests, bishops, and cardinals wanted to get married, but had not the courage to fight against the tradition. When Martin Luther married a nun, immediately so many other priests and bishops followed - not that they were convinced that Martin Luther"s ideology was right, but because he was giving them an opportunity to get married and yet remain a Christian. They were tired of suppressing.

And the masses supported him because he was bringing the BIBLE into the language of the people.

People wanted to know what was in the BIBLE; it was a mystery to them.

Martin Luther could not become the pope of the whole of Christianity, but he became the head of the Protestant Church. He became a second pope of a sect which had broken away from the mainstream. I have never spoken on him consideredly, because I don't count him, in any way, amongst the religious people - he was not rebellious at all. He was simply jealous, and that is the reason why, as he separated from the church and created a new sect, he immediately joined hands with the establishments of other vested interests. He needed power, he needed money, he needed new churches; he needed everything to create a whole religion - and he created it.

It is called in the books of history, Nirvano, "The Reformation." In a very ordinary way, it can be called a reformation - nothing much to brag about. What is great in marrying a nun? Is there some great revolution happening? Millions of people are married. What is great in translating the BIBLE from Latin? It was translated from Hebrew into Greek, from Greek into Latin, so what was the problem?

It had already been translated into different languages; now it could be translated into English, into German. Yes, there was some kind of reformation, but I don't give any value to it.

One man came to me a few years ago with a letter of introduction from one of my old professors:

"This man is very revolutionary, you will like him. I am sending him to you, he always wanted to meet you."

I asked the man, "What kind of revolution have you made? Or what kind of revolutionary thoughts do you have?" He said, "I have married a widow."

I said, "What revolution is this? Every widow should be allowed to be married. What? Is this all the revolution that you have done, or is there any other revolution?"

He said, "Up to now I have done only this revolution."

I said, "This is not much of a revolution."

In another place I met a man who was known in that area as very revolutionary - and what was he doing? He was doing collective marriages. Ordinarily, one man goes to marry a woman, but he would collect a dozen women and a dozen men to cut expenses - just one priest can do the whole process for one dozen couples, there is no need to do it one dozen times. And he was thought to be a great social revolutionary.

I said, "What kind of revolution are you doing?"

But these are the things that are thought to be revolutionary. What Martin Luther has done is just ordinary; it does not make any change in human consciousness. It has not raised the Protestant Christians, in any way, higher in consciousness than the Catholics. It does not in any way contribute to the betterment of humanity. It has just fulfilled the egoistic desire of Martin Luther to be a pope himself, the head of the Protestant religion; he claimed to be the real successor of Jesus Christ. I am not interested at all in these kinds of reformations; basically, they are stupid. But people will start proclaiming such things to be revolution, social reformation.

Revolution is a big word. It should change some foundations of life. Reformation is not that big, but still it should formulate better life systems.

What has Martin Luther done? He translated the BIBLE into German, and became himself a head and proclaimed, "I am the real representative of Jesus Christ" - because he did not have any hope or any possibility to be chosen as pope. He was so stubborn and so egoistic that nobody wanted him. He was not even a cardinal - the question of being chosen as pope does not arise.

So it was just ambition, and to fulfill his ambition he had to persuade the public mind that he was doing something good for their welfare. Of course nuns liked it, because many nuns were dying to get married; many monks liked it - they were dying to get married and they could not tell anyone.

The people who followed him were the people who were cowards and could not take a stand on their own.

And the masses loved the idea that the BIBLE should be available in their own language, but it changes nothing. Instead of one pope, now there are two popes. Instead of one Christianity, now there are two Christianities. And what is the difference between them? - just these are the differences, not even worth calling differences.

Paddy was dawdling on the way to work, looking half asleep. Mick caught up with him. "What is wrong with you this fine morning?" asked Mick. "You look half asleep."

"I am half asleep," said Paddy. "I was up half the night."

"What was the trouble?" pursued Mick.

"It was the cat," replied Paddy. "I had to sit up till midnight waiting for her to come in so I could put her out for the night."

Reformation, revolution, rebellion - we have to take these words out of the hands of those people who have destroyed their beauty and their meaning.

Question 3:

Avirbhava, I think you have a certain point of significance: misery can certainly be different from suffering - it may not be, but there is a possibility of its being different. Misery is a state of mind when the night is dark and you don't have even a hope of any dawn. When all hopes die, you shrink within yourself.

You want to die, but you cannot die either. You cannot live, you cannot die; you are crushed between the two. This kind of misery does not help growth; on the contrary, it destroys all the possibilities of growth. The night becomes longer and longer, and the dawn goes on receding farther and farther.

Instead of having a breakthrough, you can only have a breakdown.

But there are states of mind when you are in suffering; misery is absolutely negative, suffering has a positive side to it. Suffering means you have a longing, a hope, and you are not finding a way. You are searching, but you are failing again and again. You are trying your best to come out of it - you are struggling with your suffering, you have not accepted it as your fate. Then there is a possibility that the night will end - a new dawn, a new beginning, a new consciousness.

The difference is in whether you have accepted your suffering as your fate - "this is all life is" - then it is misery. If you have not accepted it as your life, but only as birth pangs - that when you are being born you have to pass through a certain pain, but there is a future beyond pain, and the pain is going to help you to reach that state beyond it - then suffering has a possibility of breakthrough.

And Avirbhava, as I know you ... I have been watching you. It is something special - you may start crying, in a moment, tears, big tears, real big tears. And then suddenly all the clouds have moved and Avirbhava starts smiling a beautiful smile. The tears have disappeared. And within a second again - as many seconds as it takes for me to come from the room to my chair, or to go from my chair back to the room - in this small time span, Avirbhava can go into many breakthroughs. I just go on watching her, and she goes on changing.

Any moment, absolutely unpredictable ...

so many seasons come and go, and between all these tears and laughter, she looks absolutely innocent, like a child, utterly pure. Her tears don't look like tears of misery. And her observation seems to be perfectly right. Perhaps what brings tears to her eyes helps her to move towards laughter. And so easy and quick is the change. Everybody once in a while feels such things, but you have old type gears, you have to change by hand. She has automatic gears - just for no reason at all, one moment ...

Just one joke for her:

Hymie Goldberg was stopped on the highway for speeding. The traffic officer was about to book him when he saw there were fifteen penguins sitting in the back seat of Hymie"s car.

"What are those penguins doing there?" asked the traffic officer.

"They were hitching a ride," said Hymie, "so I picked them up. I am taking them to the zoo."

"Okay," said the traffic officer, "I will let you off this time."

The following week Hymie was stopped for speeding on the highway again by the same traffic officer, who recognized the same fifteen penguins in the back of the car. This time all the penguins were wearing sunglasses.

"I thought you said you were taking those penguins to the zoo?" said the traffic officer.

"Yes, officer," said Hymie, "that was last week. Today we are going to the beach."

Okay, Maneesha?

Yes, Osho.