Fighting 

 

 

We are living in a hypocrite world, not a cultured world. It is not really a cultured or civilized world. H.G. Wells was right.... He was writing a world history and he had almost completed it -- it is one of the greatest histories ever written, by a man of a very clear insight into things. A friend asked, "You know about the whole of world history. What is your idea about civilization?"

 

H.G. Wells said, "It is a good idea, but it has to happen. It has not happened yet. Somebody has to bring it to humanity. Humanity is still barbaric."

 

Just look at your armies, just look at your arms, just look at your nuclear weapons. Even barbarians are not that barbaric; even animals are not that animalistic. Have you seen any animal killing his own species?

 

A dog will never kill another dog. Sometimes you can see them fighting, but watch closely. Be a witness, and you will be surprised to discover... because I have been watching. I have not only been watching human beings, I have been watching all kinds of beings. I have never missed any opportunity to watch, to figure out what is happening.

 

When two dogs are fighting, you can see they are not really hitting each other, they are just barking. Everybody is showing his power and both are watching each other: "Who is more powerful?" This is arithmetic! Once it is decided, both understand clearly that one is weaker, then the weaker one simply puts his tail underneath his legs. Just a symbol, that "There is no point. I am weaker, you are stronger. Finished." And they stop barking, and the stronger does not take advantage of the weaker. That will be too un-dogly.

 

Once the weaker has accepted that he is weaker, then the stronger simply moves away; there is no point in fighting. In fact, they may become friends -- most often they become friends. Once things are settled, that one is weaker and one is stronger, what is the point of fighting, unnecessary killing?

 

And there is no humiliation in accepting your weakness. If you are weak, what can you do? You are weak, you are simply accepting the truth. There is no insult, there is no humiliation. You are simply giving the signal to the other person that "I am weak, and if you want to kill me you can kill." But that will not be fair, and that will not be just, and the stronger person immediately understands that "this poor fellow needs protection rather than attack." They become friends.

 

No animal species kills its own people except man. And no animals have weapons, so the fight is face to face, it is an encounter, direct. It has a dignity in it. It is only man who has invented weapons. And what is the purpose of the weapons? To shoot the enemy from far away, so you don't have encounter him face to face, eye to eye.

 

First, man invented arrows and the bow to kill faraway animals, faraway birds. You don't know... you cannot fight even with a strong dog. You cannot fight with a monkey, although Charles Darwin says you are the evolution of monkeys. But your retarded brothers are far stronger than you.

 

Even a man like Vivekananda, who was really fat, big, and an arch-egoist... He was passing somewhere in the Himalayas and one monkey started threatening him. And Vivekananda started running, forgot all about God, forgot all about spiritual powers. The monkey looked very strong -- they are strong, you cannot compete with them. From tree to tree they go, from house to house they jump. You cannot do that.

 

As far as monkeys are concerned, my feeling is they must be thinking that human beings are a fallen race, not evolved, because you have fallen from the trees onto the ground. They are still higher than you! They must be laughing at Charles Darwin's one-sided judgment. Nobody has asked a monkey -- it is a one-sided judgment. Man is deciding on his own that he is the evolution of apes, of gorillas, of chimpanzees.

 

Have you seen chimpanzees and gorillas and apes? Just one chimpanzee is enough for five men! Within minutes you will be finished.

 

Man started with arrows, but the idea was to be able to kill from a distance. This was a cowardly idea, so that the animal cannot attack you; the animal is far away. Then came gunpowder, even more powerful. And your so-called great hunters sit up in a tree where the lion cannot reach. To deceive the lion they put a goat underneath the tree, so the lion smells the goat, and he comes to catch the goat. And when he is killing the goat, you -- from the top of the tree where he cannot reach -- shoot him. And you are a great hunter! [....]

 

Now there are missiles, which are the ultimate: you can kill somebody in America from here, and you don't have to see the enemy at all. Missiles are computerized -- you simply tell the computer, you press a button. And you don't know where the missile is. It may be somewhere in the ocean on a warship, but the computer knows where it is and the computer knows where it has to go. You can sit inside your house and destroy the whole of America, or the whole of the Soviet Union, or the whole of India, just by pressing buttons on the computer -- it is exactly like a typewriter. This is the remotest way of killing millions of people, not encountering them.

 

Now there are airplanes without pilots; the computer manages the plane. It will go to any city, it will drop the hydrogen bombs, or atom bombs, whatever you want the computer to do. The computer manages the flight, and the airplane will drop the bombs at the right place and turn back and come home. And there is no need for any human being to be inside the plane, because that is dangerous.

 

This is the latest development of the arrow. The arrow was the beginning of remote killing. The highest development of the arrow are the missiles controlled by computers.

 

Man is the most barbarious animal, and he kills man.

 

-Osho, "Communism and Zen Fire, Zen Wind, #6, Q2“