Spread the rumor!

Question 1:

BELOVED MASTER,

EVERYTHING APPEARS TO BE VERY PARADOXICAL: HAVING TO BE TOTAL
AND YET HAVING TO REMAIN A WITNESS, A WATCHER; HAVING TO BE
DROWNED IN LOVE AND YET TO BE ALONE. IT SOUNDS VERY MYSTERIOUS,
AND I FEEL UTTERLY LOST AND CONFUSED. AM I GETTING CONNED?

Prem Urja, life is beautiful because it is paradoxical. It has salt because it is paradoxical - it is not just sweet, it has salt in it too. If it was just sweet, it would become too sugary, saccharin.

Life has tremendous mystery in it because it is based on paradox. You are feeling confused because you have a certain fixed idea about how life should be - you don't allow life to be as it is. You want to impose a certain concept on it, a certain logic on it.

The confusion is of your own creation.

Try to impose some logical pattern on life and you will become very much confused, because life has no obligation to fulfill your logic. Life is as it is. You have to listen to it.

It has all the colors, the whole spectrum - it is a rainbow. But you have a certain idea that it should be only blue or it should be only green or it should be only red - but it is all the seven colors. Then what are you going to do about the six other colors which are not part of your conception? Either you have to ignore them, block them, so that you don't become aware of them; repress them, simply deny them.... But whatsoever you do, life is not going to drop its colors; they will be there - denied, rejected, repressed, they will be there, waiting for the right moment to explode into your consciousness.

And whenever they explode you will be confused. The confusion is your responsibility.

Life is not confusing at all. Life is mysterious but never confusing. Because you don't want it to be mysterious, you want it to be mathematical, you want it very clear-cut so that you can calculate and measure - hence the difficulty. It is not created by life. Drop your conceptions and then look.... Then you will find the storm that comes brings a silence with it - which is illogical! The silence that is felt after the storm is the deepest, the profoundest. If there is no storm, the silence remains superficial, the silence remains dull, it has no depth. After the storm...the greater the storm, the deeper the silence.

Now, it is paradoxical.

It is paradoxical only because you want to impose a certain logic. The storm, and creating silence? It does not fit with your idea - that is true - then you become confused. But why should it fit with your idea? Life has to be perceived - not conceived. See what is the case, don't have ready-made answers. Don't go through life with prejudices, with a prejudiced mind, don't have any a priori conceptions. Go innocent, naked, go ignorant. Function from the state of not knowing. And then...then life is not confusing. It is a tremendous joy, it is ecstasy. Then what appears today as confusing, you will feel thankful for it, grateful for it, that it is so, that it is not logical.

Life would have been utterly boring if God had followed Aristotle. It is a great relief that he is not an Aristotelian; it is a great relief that God knows nothing of Aristotle, that he has not read his books, that he does not believe in logic, that he believes in dialectics.

Hence these paradoxes.

One can be in deep love and yet be alone. In fact, one can be alone only when one is in deep love. The depth of love creates an ocean around you, a deep ocean, and you become an island, utterly alone. Yes, the ocean goes on throwing its waves on your shore, but the more the ocean crashes with its waves on your shore, the more integrated you are, the more rooted, the more centered you are.

Love has value only because it gives you aloneness. It gives you space enough to be on your own.

But you have an idea of love; that idea is creating trouble - not love itself, but the idea.

The idea is that, in love, lovers disappear into each other, dissolve into each other. Yes, there are moments of dissolution - but this is the beauty of life and all that is existential:

that when lovers dissolve into each other, the same are the moments when they become very conscious, very alert. That dissolution is not a kind of drunkenness, that dissolution is not unconscious. It brings great consciousness, it releases great awareness.

On the one hand they are dissolved - on the other hand for the first time they see their utter beauty in being alone. The other defines them, their aloneness; they define the other. And they are grateful to each other. It is because of the other that they have been able to see their own selves; the other has become a mirror in which they are reflected.

Lovers are mirrors to each other. Love makes you aware of your original face.

Hence, it looks very contradictory, paradoxical, when stated in such a way: "Love brings aloneness." You were thinking all along that love brings togetherness. I am not saying that it does not bring togetherness, but unless you are alone you cannot be together. Who is going to be together? Two persons are needed to be together, two independent persons are needed to be together. A togetherness will be rich, infinitely rich, if both the persons are utterly independent. If they are dependent on each other, it is not a togetherness - it is a slavery, it is a bondage.

If they are dependent on each other, clinging, possessive, if they don't allow each other to be alone, if they don't allow each other space enough to grow, they are enemies, not lovers; they are destructive to each other, they are not helping each other to find their souls, their beings. What kind of love is this? It may be just fear of being alone; hence they are clinging to each other. But real love knows no fear. Real love is capable of being alone, utterly alone, and out of that aloneness grows a togetherness.

Kahlil Gibran says: Two lovers are like two pillars of a temple - they support the same roof, but they stand separate; together as far as supporting the same roof is concerned, but utterly separate as far as their own being is concerned. Be pillars of a temple, supporting the same temple of love, the same roof of love, yet rooted in your own being, not distracted from there. And then you will know both the beauty, the purity, the cleanliness, the health, the wholeness of aloneness, and you will also know the joy, the dance, the music of being together.

There is a beauty when somebody is playing a solo instrument - a solo flute player - there is tremendous beauty in that. And there is also beauty in an orchestra. And love knows both together: it knows how to be a solo flute player and it also knows how to be in rhythm, harmony with the other.

There is no contradiction in reality - the contradiction appears only because you have a certain idea. Drop the idea and then where is confusion? Confusion comes only out of conclusions. If you have a conclusion already and then life appears as something else, you are confused. Rather than trying to fix life, drop your conclusions.

Never function out of conclusions! - that's what I go on repeating every day to you:

don't function from the state of knowledge. Knowledge means conclusions, and all conclusions are borrowed. Life is so vast that it cannot be condensed into a conclusion.

All conclusions are partial. And whenever the part claims to be the whole, it creates a kind of fanaticism, orthodoxy; it creates a dull and stupid mind.

Urja, you say, "Having to be total and yet having to remain a witness, a watcher...seems to be very paradoxical."

It only seems, the paradox is only apparent; otherwise, to be total is to be a watcher.

Whenever you are totally into something, a great awareness is released in you - you become a witness. Suddenly! Not that you practice witnessing. If you are totally in it...one day, dance totally and see what I am saying.

These are not logical conclusions that I am giving to you: these are existential indications, hints. Dance totally! - and then you will be surprised. Something new will be felt. When the dance becomes total, and the dancer is almost completely dissolved in the dancing, there will be a new kind of awareness arising in you. You will be totally lost into the dance: the dancer gone, only dance remains. And yet you are not unconscious, not at all - just the opposite. You are very conscious, more conscious than you have ever been before.

But if you start thinking about it, then the paradox will come. Then you will not be able to manage, and you will become very confused.

Experience it. Whatsoever is being said here is to help you to experience. I am not handing over to you any knowledge, any information - just a few hints to taste the multidimensional qualities of life.

You say, "It seems paradoxical...having to be drowned in love and yet be alone." It is not - it only appears. But you seem to be too much attached to your conclusions; hence the idea arises: "Am I getting conned?"

In a way, yes, you are being conned out of all your prejudices, out of all your conclusions, out of all your knowledge. I am trying to take you into the world of innocence again. I am trying to give you a new birth, so that you can become a child again - full of awe and wonder.

The child never sees any paradox anywhere - and that is the beauty of the child. The child can be in tremendous love with you and can say, "I cannot live without you even for a single moment," and the next moment he is angry and says, "I will never see your face again." He is total in both his statements, and after a few moments he is again sitting in your lap with great joy - and that too is total.

The child is total each moment, and the child never sees any contradiction. When he is angry, he is really anger; and when he is loving, he is really love. He moves from one moment to another moment without creating any confusion for himself. He is never confused. He never brings this paradox, because he has not yet arrived at conclusions.

He does not know how one should be. He simply allows himself to be whatsoever is the case - he flows with life.

Urja, you have become stagnant somewhere. You have too much knowledge, and that is functioning as a barrier. It won't allow you to flow with me, and it won't allow you to flow with my people. It won't allow you to flow with life, it won't allow you to flow with God.

God is both day and night, summer and winter, birth and death...and you have to be capable of absorbing all these so-called paradoxes. If you can absorb all these so-called paradoxes, without becoming confused, enlightenment is not far away.

Enlightenment is the state when all paradoxes have disappeared. One simply takes note of life as it is. One has no conclusions to compare with, no ideas to judge with. Then how can you be confused? You cannot confuse me - it is impossible - because I have no conclusions. Without conclusions, without knowledge, just taste life as it is. It is a mystery, not a paradox.

The second question:

Question 2:

BELOVED MASTER,

I DON'T BELIEVE A WORD ABOUT THIS MYSTERY. NOTHING LIKE THAT EXISTS!
MY GUESS IS THAT YOU ARE ADVERTISING YOUR NEW COMMUNE BECAUSE
THE PRESS OFFICE IS TOO LAZY, AND NOT AS CLEVER AS YOU CAN BE.

Sarjano, it is not a question of believing or not believing - it is so. The question of belief arises only because you are not aware of it. Belief is significant, and disbelief too - when you are not aware of the reality. Then either you believe or you disbelieve.

I am not saying believe in the mystery I am talking about. I am not saying disbelieve either - I am saying: Come with me! It is so! Let me wake you up...it is so.

You say, "I don't believe a word about this mystery." It is very good. Please, don't believe a word, because if you start believing you will not be able to experience. I am not interested in believers, I am interested in inquirers. But please don't start guessing either, because a guess is a guess. A guess is not going to help. It will become a belief - if you go on guessing for a long time, and if you go on repeating the same guess again and again, it becomes a belief. You create your own belief then, and that will become a barrier.

And beliefs are such subtle barriers, and disbeliefs too. Remember, whenever I say belief I always include disbelief in it - because that is the other side of the coin. Belief and disbelief, both are barriers. Once you have created a belief system around yourself - - either borrowed from others or guessed by yourself; either borrowed from the Bible, MEIN KAMPF, DAS KAPITAL, BHAGAVADGITA, or guessed by yourself, home- made, it does not matter - a belief becomes a barrier, an invisible barrier. And once it settles, it won't allow you to see anything else that goes against it.

Just the other day I was reading about an experiment. Sarjano, meditate over it.

A certain naturalist made the following experiment: a glass jar was divided into two halves by a perfectly transparent glass partition. On one side of the partition he placed a pike; on the other a number of small fishes such as form the prey of the pike.

The pike did not notice the partition, and hurled itself on its prey with, of course, the result of only a bruised nose. The same happened many times, and always the same result. At last, seeing all its efforts ended so painfully, the pike abandoned the hunt; so that in a few days, when the partition had been removed, it continued to swim about among the small fry without daring to attack them.... Does not the same happen with us?

Now the partition is no longer there - it has been removed - but a belief system has arisen in the pike's mind. Now he believes that there is a transparent partition. Now the belief is enough; he never goes beyond that partition which is no longer there. Now he can go! Now there is nothing to debar him but his belief...he has created a belief. And, of course, out of his experience, Sarjano - not even guesswork - it was his experience, a repeated experience. He tried again and again and again, and each time a bruised nose and pain - of course, a belief has arisen.

You have to forgive him - a poor pike has come to conclude that it is futile: "There is a barrier, transparent, so I cannot go..." and he never tries again. He will never try again his whole life. Now he can go and eat the fishes, they are available, but he will go only up to a certain line, and from that line he will come back.

This is the situation of human beings too. A Hindu has a barrier around himself, a Mohammedan another, a Jaina still another - all people live hidden behind transparent barriers, and because of those barriers they cannot see beyond.

Life is a mystery, Sarjano. And my commune is going to be just an experiment in total living, an experiment in moving into life beyond all barriers - barriers of belief, barriers of ideologies, barriers of Catholicism, and communism...going beyond words.

Man is not what he appears to be: he is far more. Neither are flowers only what they appear to be - it depends on you. When a scientist goes to a flower, he only sees a part of it, the scientific part of it; he has a barrier, a transparent barrier. He never goes beyond that. He will see the scientific part, the material part of the flower. The rose is no longer beautiful, because beauty is not his concept. He will weigh, measure; he will look into the constituents of the flower, how much color, how much water, how much earth etcetera...but he will never think of the beauty.

When the poet goes, he never bothers about the weight, measurement, earth, water, and other elements that constitute the rose. For him, the rose is constituted of pure beauty; it is something from the beyond which has descended to the earth. He has a different kind of vision, far bigger than the scientist's, far more significant than the scientist's.

But when a mystic goes to the same flower, he dances - he dances in tremendous joy, because a rose is nothing but God. A rose contains the whole universe for him - all the stars and all the suns and all the moons, all the possible worlds and impossible worlds are contained in the small roseflower. It is equivalent to God - neither less nor more - exactly equivalent to God. He may pray, he may bow down.

The scientist will laugh, the poet will feel a little puzzled.... The scientist will laugh at the stupidity of the mystic: "What is he doing? - praying to a rose, praying to a tree or praying to a river or praying to a mountain? All nonsense, superstition!" He rejects it.

He simply denies the world of the mystic.

The poet will feel a little puzzled. Enjoying the beauty of the rose he can understand, but praying to the rose, bowing down to the rose, shouting "Alleluia!" to the rose? That he cannot understand. That is beyond his perspective. He will feel puzzled. He will think this mystic a little mad.

The scientist will think him superstitious, ignorant. The poet will think him a little eccentric, a little mad - because he is going beyond his barrier, the mystic is going beyond the barrier of the poet. The mystic is going beyond all barriers - that's why he is called the mystic, because he lives in the mysterious.

Sarjano, what I am saying about the new commune is absolutely true. And I am not saying much about it, because it is dangerous to say much about it. I don't want to attract the wrong kind of people to it. So just a few hints only for those who will be able to understand the hints. I am speaking in a special code which can be understood only by those who are searching for the mysterious and the miraculous. Others will be debarred - not by me, by their own prejudice, by their own transparent barrier.

You can see it happening here! People are coming from all over the world - who is debarring the Poonaites? They are welcome, but they won't come on their own - their transparent barriers are enough. And it is good that they are not coming, because they will be only a nuisance here. Only a few people from amongst them are coming who are capable of understanding the beyond, the incomprehensible, who are capable of comprehending something of the incomprehensible.

But whether you believe in it or not, listen to this anecdote:

Two homosexuals are talking. First homosexual: "Have you heard of the latest scientific discovery? Normal intercourse causes cancer."

Second homosexual: "Is that so?"

First homosexual: "No, of course not! But spread the rumor."

Sarjano, whether you believe in it or not, please spread the rumor. The rumor has to reach to the farthest corners of the earth. Let it be a rumor! Don't be worried. It is up to me to make it a truth or not. If I find the right people - and I am finding them - it is going to materialize.

This mystery that I am talking about is going to materialize. But it will be materialized only for those who are ready to risk all their prejudices, who are ready to sacrifice all their conclusions. Sarjano is one of those people. I trust in him. He has not asked this question for himself, he has asked it for others - because I know he is perfectly mad. He is not only a poet, but just on the verge of becoming a mystic. He has asked this question for others, it is not his own heart's question. His heart agrees totally with me.

You cannot hide your hearts from me. The moment you come close to me, the only thing that I am interested in is your heart. I talk to your head and I go on looking into your heart. Even in the first encounter with me, I know what is possible with you and what is impossible with you.

I have loved Sarjano from the very first moment. In his head he may have many theories and much knowledge and information - that is not my concern at all. My concern is that he has a beautiful heart - the heart that can be transformed into the heart of a mystic.

The third question:

Question 3:

BELOVED MASTER,

MY UNDERSTANDING ABOUT MYSELF IS THAT ALL MY DOING ARISES OUT OF
A DESIRE TO COMMUNICATE. EVEN THE SUBTLEST THOUGHT IS A
CONVERSATION, AN ATTEMPT TO HAVE OTHERS EXPERIENCE AND VERIFY
MY EXISTENCE.

WITH THE REALIZATION THAT I AM THE ONLY ONE WHO CAN EXPERIENCE
MY EXPERIENCES AND GIVE THEM VALIDITY, ALL OF THIS UNNECESSARY
DOING SHOULD DISAPPEAR. IT IS SO SIMPLE AND OBVIOUS. WHY DOES NOT
THIS REALIZATION REACH TO MY INNERMOST CORE?

Prem Steven, it is not yet a realization - it is still information, it is still guesswork, it is still thinking; on the right track, certainly, in the right direction, true, but it is not a realization yet. 'Realization' is a great word. One should use that word very cautiously.

You can think great thoughts, but they don't become your realization by thinking. You can think about God and you can come to the conclusion that God is, and you can feel that now there is no doubt in your mind about God's existence - still it is not a realization.

Realization means precisely realization - it should become a reality to you, not just an idea! Even if a good idea is there, it is still an idea. The idea can't transform you, and the idea can't reach to the very core of your being. It remains on the circumference.

All ideas are peripheral - just as all waves remain on the surface. The wave cannot go deep into the ocean; there is no way for it to go. At the deepest core there are no waves.

On the surface a storm may be raging, but at the deepest core, the ocean is calm and quiet - and always so. Only the surface can get disturbed.

All thinking is a disturbance on the circumference of your being. Bad ideas, good ideas, all are peripheral. People have this belief that bad ideas are peripheral and good ideas are central - that's not so. Good or bad, it makes no difference. An idea is an idea, and the idea remains peripheral.

Only witnessing can be at the center.

So the first thing is to realize that you have not realized yet. Once something is realized, it is bound to transform you - instantly it transforms you. Then the question cannot arise: "It is so simple and obvious. Why does not this realization reach to my innermost core?" This "why?" is not possible then. If you realize something, your character immediately changes. Your character is a shadow of your consciousness. Once the consciousness is new, the whole character becomes new.

If you ask why, if you ask how to change, then the realization is only an idea - and don't trust in ideas. They deceive you, they are great deceivers, they are false coins. You can go on accumulating them believing that you are becoming rich, but one day you will be shattered. The repentance will be great and the misery will be great, because all that time you were accumulating those false coins is simply wasted. And it cannot be reclaimed - it is gone forever.

The second thing...you say, Steven, "My understanding about myself is that all my doing arises out of a desire to communicate. Even the subtlest thought is a conversation, an attempt to have others experience and verify my existence."

Why? Why should you want others to verify your existence, to give validity to your existence? Because you are suspicious about it, you are doubtful about your existence.

You really don't know that you are; you know you are only when others say you are.

You depend on others' opinions.

If they say you are beautiful, you think you are beautiful. If they say you are intelligent, you think you are intelligent. Hence, you want to impress people - with your intelligence, with your beauty, with all kinds of things you want to impress people, because if you can see something in their eyes, that becomes a validity for you.

That's why it is so enraging when somebody insults you, so damaging to the image when somebody calls you an idiot; otherwise, why should you be bothered? It is none of your business. If he calls you an idiot, that is HIS problem. Just by his calling you an idiot, you don't become an idiot. But you become, because you depend on others' opinions.

That's how we live in the society. We are continuously trying to impress each other.

That's why we live as slaves, because if you want to impress other people you have to follow their ideas; only then are they impressed. You have to be good the way they want you to be good. If they are vegetarians, you have to be vegetarian, then they will be impressed - they will say you are a saint. If they are living a certain kind of life-style, you have to live that; then only will they recognize you.

You can gain respectability only if you follow people's ideas. It is a mutual understanding that you support their ideas so they feel good that their ideas are right; hence they are right. And then they support you and they give you respect because you are following right ideas, you are a right person. They appreciate you, they shower you with honors, they call you a saint, a sage...it feels very gratifying to you. It is gratifying to them because you pay respect to their ideology, and they pay respect to your personality. This is a mutual arrangement. And you are both in illusion. You are supporting their illusion, they are supporting your illusion. You are partners in the same business of hallucination.

Why should one want to be verified, validated by others? If you know on your own, if you have experienced your being and its beauty and its joy and its grandeur and its glory, who cares what others say?

Buddha was passing through a village, and the people of that village were very much against Buddha. Why were they against Buddha? - because Buddha was born in that village, he had lived in that village for many years, and the villagers could not believe that a man who was born amongst them had become enlightened. It was offensive to their egos!

That's why Jesus says: A prophet is not respected, is not loved, by his own people. Jesus himself was thrown out of his birthplace. He went only once - after he became enlightened, he went only once. And the people were so enraged by his assertion, "I have become realized, I am the Son of God," that they took him to the hills to throw him from the mountains. They wanted to kill him. He had to escape somehow from their clutches, from their hands. And he never went back there.

Buddha was passing through the village in which he was born, just somewhere on the border of India and Nepal, and the people gathered and started insulting him, abusing him, calling him names. And he listened silently for half an hour, and then he said, "It is getting hot and I have to reach the other village, and the people will be waiting for me.

More time I cannot give you this time. If you have any more things to say to me, please wait. When I am coming back, then I will have a little more time. You can gather, and you can communicate whatsoever you want to communicate. But this time, excuse me. I have to go."

So cool, so calm, and they were really calling him dirty names. They could not believe their eyes. They said, "We are not saying something to you - we are insulting you, we are abusing you! Can't you understand what we are saying?"

Buddha said, "I can hear, I can understand everything that you are saying - but that is not my problem! If you are angry, that is your problem. It is none of my business to interfere in your life. If you want to be angry, if you are enjoying it, enjoy! But I am not going to take any nonsense from you.

"In fact, you have come a little late. If you really wanted me to be disturbed, you should have come ten years ago. Then I would have been really angry with you. I would have reacted, I would have hit you! But now, a great realization has happened that my being does not depend on other people's opinions. What you think about me only shows something about you, not about me! I know myself; hence I don't depend on anybody's opinions about me. People who are ignorant of their own selves, they have to depend on others."

Steven, this whole mind of communicating with people in an attempt to be verified by them simply shows a deep darkness inside; otherwise, there is no need. And I am not saying that when a man becomes full of light he stops communication - no. Only he can communicate, because he has something to communicate. What have you got to communicate? What is there that you can share with people? You are a beggar, you are begging. When you want to be verified, validated, certified, you are begging. You are telling them, "Please say something good to me, something nice, so I can feel nice about myself. I am feeling very down, I am feeling very worthless - give me some worth!

Make me feel significant." You are begging, it is not communication.

Communication is possible only when a song has burst forth in your being, when a joy has arisen, when a bliss has been experienced - then you can share. Then not only communication, not only verbal communication, but on a far deeper level, communion also starts happening. But then you are not a beggar, you are an emperor.

Only buddhas can commune and communicate. Others have nothing to say, nothing to give. In fact, what you are doing while you are talking with people...and people are continuously talking, chattering, if not actually, then in their minds - just as you say that deep in your mind you are also always talking with somebody, some imaginary person.... You are saying something from your side, and you are also answering from the other side; a continuous chattering, a dialogue inside you.

This is a state of UNsanity. I will not call it a state of insanity but unsanity. The whole of humanity exists in the state of unsanity. The insane person has gone beyond the normal boundary. The unsane person is also insane but within boundaries. He remains insane inside, but on the outside he goes on behaving in a sane way. So for him I have this word 'unsanity'.

Sanity happens only when you become so totally silent that all inner chattering disappears. When the mind is no more, you are sane. Mind is either unsane - that is normally insane, or insane - that means abnormally insane. No-mind is sanity. And in no-mind you understand, you realize, not only your own being but the being - the very being - of existence. Then you have something to share, to communicate, to commune, to dance, to celebrate.

Before that, it is a desperate effort to somehow collect an image of yourself from others'

opinions. And your image will remain a mess because you will be collecting opinions from so many sources - they will remain contradictory.

One person thinks you are ugly, hates you, dislikes you; another person thinks you are so beautiful, so graceful, that there is nobody who can be compared to you - you are incomparable. Now what are you going to do with these two opinions? You don't know who you are; now these two opinions are there - how can you judge which is right?

You would like the opinion to be right which says you are beautiful; you don't like the opinion which says that you are ugly. But it is not a question of liking or disliking. You cannot be deaf to the other opinion, that too is there. You can repress it in the unconscious, but it will remain there.

You will be collecting opinions from your parents, from your family, from your neighborhood, from the people you work with, from the teachers, from the priests...thousands of opinions clamoring inside you. And this is how you are going to create an image of yourself. It will be a mess. It will not have any face, any form, it will be a chaos. That's how everybody is, a chaos. No order is possible, because the very center is missing which can create the order.

That center I call awareness, meditation - AES DHAMMO SANANTANO. This is the inexhaustible law, the ultimate law, that only those who become aware know who they are. And when they know, then nobody can shake their knowing. Nobody can! The whole world may say one thing, but if you know, if you have realized yourself, it doesn't matter.

The whole world was saying that Jesus was mad. The day he was crucified, there was not a single person...thousands had gathered - not a single person who was in favor of him. All were thinking he was mad.

It was the custom in those days that on particular holidays one criminal could be forgiven. That day was a holiday and three persons were being crucified: two thieves and Jesus. Pontius Pilate asked the people, "We can forgive one person out of the three.

Which one would you like to be forgiven?" He was thinking that they would ask for Jesus to be forgiven, but they didn't ask for Jesus. They asked for a thief to be forgiven - not Jesus but a thief, a well-known thief - the whole city knew about him. But they could not forgive the innocent man Jesus. Why?

But Jesus is not shaken. The whole world may be against him; he knows God is with him. He dies with a calm and quiet mind, undistracted, with a prayer on his lips - a prayer which is unique. The last words of Jesus are: "Father, forgive them, because they know not what they are doing. Amen...." Forgive them, for they know not what they are doing! They are crucifying him, but his heart is full of compassion for all those people.

When you know, you know so absolutely. When realization happens, it is so ultimate that even if the whole world is against it, it makes no difference at all. You don't need any validity from anybody else.

The last question:

Question 4:

BELOVED MASTER,

WHY DO I ALWAYS FEEL THAT SEX AND MONEY ARE SOMEHOW DEEPLY
CONNECTED WITH EACH OTHER?

Nirmal, they are connected. Money is power; hence it can be used in many ways. It can purchase sex, and down the ages that has been the case. Kings have been keeping thousands of wives. Just in this century, the twentieth century, just thirty years ago, forty years ago, the nizam of Hyderabad had five hundred wives!

It is said that Krishna had sixteen thousand wives. I used to think that this was too much, but when I came to know that the nizam of Hyderabad had five hundred wives just forty years ago, then it doesn't seem too much - only thirty-two times more! It seems humanly possible. If you can manage five hundred, why not sixteen thousand?

All the kings of the world were doing that. Women were used like cattle. In the great kings' palaces the women were numbered. It was difficult to remember names, so the king could say to his servants, "Bring number four hundred and one" - because how to remember five hundred names? Numbers...just as soldiers are numbered; they don't have names but only numbers. And it makes a lot of difference.

Numbers are absolutely mathematical. Numbers don't breathe, they don't have any heart. Numbers don't have any soul. When a soldier dies in the war, on the notice board you simply read, "Number 15 died." Now, "Number 15 died" is one thing; if you say exactly the name of the person, that is totally different. Then he was a husband and the wife will be a widow now; he was a father and the children will be orphans now; he was the only support of his old parents, now there will be no support. A family is deserted, the light of a family has disappeared. But when number fifteen dies, number fifteen has no wife, remember; number fifteen doesn't have any children, number fifteen doesn't have any old parents. Number fifteen is just number fifteen! And number fifteen is replaceable - another person will come and will become number fifteen. But no individual human being is replaceable. It is a trick, a psychological trick, to give numbers to soldiers. It helps...nobody takes any note of numbers disappearing; new numbers go on coming and replacing the old numbers.

Wives were numbered, and it depended on how much money you had. In fact, in the old days, that was the only way to know how rich a man was; it was a kind of measurement. How many wives has he?

Now, Hindus, particularly ARYA SAMAJIS, criticize Hazrat Mohammed very much for having nine wives - and they don't think of Krishna who had sixteen thousand wives.

And he is not an exception, he is the rule. In this country, as in other countries, down the ages, the woman has been exploited - and the way to exploit is money! The whole world has suffered through prostitution, it degrades human beings. And what is a prostitute? She has been reduced to a mechanism, and you can purchase her with money.

But remember perfectly well that your wives are not very different either. A prostitute is like a taxi, and your wife is like your own car, it is a permanent arrangement. Poor people cannot make permanent arrangements, they have to use taxis. Rich people can make permanent arrangements - they can have their own cars. And the richer they are, the more cars they can have.

I know one person who had three hundred and sixty-five cars - one car for every day.

And he had one car made in solid gold....

Money is power, and power can purchase anything. So, Nirmal, you are not wrong that there is some connection between sex and money.

One thing more has to be understood. The person who represses sex becomes more money-minded, because money becomes a substitute for sex. Money becomes his love.

See the greedy person, the money maniac: the way he touches hundred-rupee notes - he touches them as if he is caressing his beloved; the way he looks at gold, look at his eyes - so romantic. Even great poets will feel inferior. Money has become his love, his goddess. In India, people even worship money. There is a particular day to worship money - actual money - notes and coins, rupees, they worship. Intelligent people doing such stupid things!

Sex can be diverted in many ways. It can become anger if repressed. Hence the soldier has to be deprived of sex, so that the sex energy becomes his anger, his irritation, his destructiveness so he can be more violent than he ever was. Sex can be diverted into ambition. Repress sex: once sex is repressed, you have energy available, you can channel it into any direction. It can become a search for political power, it can become a search for more money, it can become a search for fame, name, respectability, asceticism, etcetera.

Man has only one energy - that energy is sex. There are not many energies within you.

And only the one energy has been used for all kinds of drives. It is a tremendously potential energy.

People are after money in the hope that when they have more money, they can have more sex. They can have far more beautiful women or men, they can have far more variety. Money gives them freedom of choice.

The person who is free of sexuality, whose sexuality has become a transformed phenomenon, is also free of money, is also free of ambition, is also free of the desire to be famous. Immediately all these things disappear from his life. The moment sex energy starts rising upwards, the moment sex energy starts becoming love, prayer, meditation, then all lower manifestations disappear.

But sex and money are deeply associated. Your idea, Nirmal, has some truth in it.

A wizened little client in a fancy whorehouse is heard shouting from the upper floor:

"No! Not that way! I want it my way, the way we do it in Brooklyn. So quit it! Do it my way or forget it!"

The madam climbs the stairs and erupts into the girl's room. "What is the matter with you, Zelda?" she says. "Give it to him his way."

She leaves, the girl lies down, and the man makes love to her in perfectly routine fashion. She sits up, puts on her dressing gown, lights a cigarette and says,

"That's your way, Hymie, huh?"

"That's it," he says proudly from the bed.

"That's how you do it in Brooklyn?"

"Right you are!"

"So what is so different about it?"

"In Brooklyn I get it for nothing."

People can be so obsessed with money, as much as they are obsessed with sex. The obsession can be shifted towards money. But money gives you purchasing power and you can purchase anything. You cannot purchase love, of course, but you can purchase sex. Sex is a commodity, love is not.

You cannot purchase prayer, but you can purchase priests. Priests are commodities - prayer is not a commodity. And that which can be purchased is ordinary, mundane.

That which cannot be purchased is sacred. Remember it: the sacred is beyond money, the mundane is always within money's power.

And sex is the most mundane thing in the world.

A man enters a modern Chicago whorehouse-nightclub run by the gangland syndicate which is now planning to streamline its image. The whorehouse takes up various floors of a skyscraper hotel, and he is received by a lovely young receptionist in a sexy uniform, who sits him at a teakwood interview desk and asks how much money he wants to spend. She explains that prices range from five dollars up to one thousand dollars, depending on the quality and number of girls wanted. Everything is shown on the television intercom. The higher prices are for the lower floors, which have higher ceilings, mirrors over the beds, three and four girls in bed with you at one time, etcetera. Lower prices are for lesser delights, ending with five dollars for a "coal-black nigger mammy with big nostrils," as the lovely young receptionist explains.

The client thinks it over. "Haven't you anything cheaper than five?" he asks at last.

"Of course," says the receptionist. "Seventh floor - roof garden. One dollar a shot. Self- service."

Money is certainly associated with sex, because sex can be purchased. And anything that can be purchased is part of the world of money.

Remember one thing: your life will remain empty if you know only things which can be purchased, if you know only things which can be sold. Your life will remain utterly futile if your acquaintance is only with commodities. Become acquainted with things which cannot be purchased and cannot be sold - then for the first time you start growing wings, for the first time you start soaring high.

One great king, Bimbisara, reached Mahavira. He had heard that Mahavira had attained DHYANA - meditation, samadhi. In Jaina terminology it is called SAMAYIK - the ultimate state of prayer or meditation. Bimbisara had everything of this world. He became worried: "What is this samayik? What is this samadhi?" He could not rest at ease, because now for the first time he was aware that there was one thing he had not got - and he was not a man to remain contented without getting anything that took his fancy.

He traveled to the mountains, found Mahavira, and said, "How much do you want for your samayik? I have come to purchase it. I can give you anything you desire, but give me this samayik, this samadhi, this meditation - what is this? Where is it? First let me look at it!"

Mahavira was surprised at the whole stupidity of the king, but he was a very polite man, soft, graceful. He said, "You need not have traveled so far. In your own capital I have a follower who has attained to the same state, and he is so poor that he may be willing to sell it. I am not willing, because I don't need any money. You can see I am naked, I don't need any clothes, I am utterly satisfied - I don't have any needs, so what will I do with your money? Even if you give me your whole kingdom I am not going to accept it. I had my own kingdom - that I have renounced. I had all that you have got!"

And Bimbisara knew it, that Mahavira had had all and had renounced, so it was difficult to persuade this man to sell. Certainly, money meant nothing to him. So he said, "Okay, who is this man? Give me his address."

And Mahavira told him, "He is very poor, lives in the poorest part of your city. You may never have visited that part. This is the address...you go and ask him. He is your subject, he can sell it to you, and he is in much need. He has a wife and children and a big family and is really poor."

It was a joke. Bimbisara returned happy, went directly to the poor parts of his capital where he had never been. People could not believe their eyes - his golden chariot and thousands of soldiers following him.

They stopped in front of the poor man's hut. The poor man came, touched the feet of the king, and said, "What can I do? Just order me."

The king said, "I have come to purchase the thing called samadhi, meditation, and I am ready to pay any price you ask."

The poor man started crying, tears rolled down his cheeks, and he said, "I am sorry. I can give you my life, I can die for you right now, I can cut off my head - but how can I give you my samadhi? It is not sellable, it is not purchasable - it is not a commodity at all. It is a state of consciousness. Mahavira must have played a joke on you."

Unless you know something which cannot be sold and cannot be purchased, unless you know something which is beyond money, you have not known real life. Sex is not beyond money - love is. Transform your sex into love, and transform your love into prayer - so one day even kings like Bimbisara may feel jealous of you. Become a Mahavira, a Buddha, become a Christ, a Zarathustra, a Lao Tzu. Only then have you lived, only then have you known the mysteries of life!

Money and sex are the lowest, and people are living only in the world of money and sex - and they think they are living. They are not living, they are only vegetating, they are only dying. This is not life. Life has many more kingdoms to be revealed, an infinite treasure which is not of this world. Neither sex can give it to you, nor money. But you can attain to it.

You can use your sex energy to attain it, and you can use your money power to attain it.

Of course, it cannot be attained by money or by sex, but you can use your sex energy, your money power, in such an artful way that you can create a space in which the beyond can descend.

I am not against sex, and I am not against money, remember it. Always remember! But I am certainly for helping you go beyond them - I am certainly for going beyond.

Use everything as a step. Don't deny anything. If you have money, you can meditate more easily than the poor person. You can have more time to yourself. You can have a small temple in your house; you can have a garden, rosebushes, where meditation will be easier. You can allow yourself a few holidays in the mountains, you can go into isolation and live without worry. If you have money, use it for something which money cannot purchase, but for which money can create a space.

Sexual energy is a wastage if it only remains confined to sex, but it becomes a great blessing if it starts transforming its quality: sex not for sex' sake - use sex as a communion of love. Use sex as a meeting of two souls, not only of two bodies. Use sex as a meditative dance of two persons' energies. And the dance is far richer when man and woman are dancing together - and sex is the ultimate in dance: two energies meeting, merging, dancing, rejoicing.

But use it as a stepping-stone, as a jumping-board. And when you reach the climax of your sex orgasm, become aware of what is happening, and you will be surprised - time has disappeared, mind has disappeared, ego has disappeared. For a moment there is utter silence. This silence is the real thing!

This silence can be attained through other means, too, and with less wastage of energy.

This silence, this mindlessness, this timelessness, can be attained through meditation. In fact, if a person consciously goes into his sex experience, he is bound to become a meditator sooner or later. His consciousness of the sex experience is bound to make him aware that the same can happen without any sexuality involved in it. The same can happen just sitting silently by yourself, doing nothing. The mind can be dropped, time can be dropped, and the moment you drop mind and time and the ego, you are orgasmic.

The sexual orgasm is very momentary, and whatsoever is momentary brings frustration in its wake, brings misery and unhappiness and sadness and repentance. But the quality of being orgasmic can become a continuity in you, a continuum - it can become your very flavor. But it is possible only through meditation, not through sex alone.

Use sex, use money, use the body, use the world, but we have to reach God. Let God remain always the goal.

Enough for today.

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