Tourism and Pilgrimage

 

 

There are millions of tourists in the world but it is very rare to come across a pilgrim. Tourism is not pilgrimage. A tourist is superficial. He is in a hurry, he is rushing from one place to another place. In fact he is not even aware of why he is doing it. Maybe he cannot sit at ease in one place, that's why he is doing it; he is restless. His being a tourist is nothing but an expression of his inner restlessness.

 

The pilgrim is a totally different phenomenon. It has something beautiful about it, something sacred. The pilgrim is not just visiting places; he is searching, he is a seeker. He is not only curious; he has an intense, passionate desire to know. He is not really interested in places; he is interested in energy-fields and he is searching for some energy-field where he can dissolve himself.

 

That is the meaning of a sacred place: a place where you would like to die, to disappear, a place where death is mote valuable than life, a place where the ego can be dissolved, because something higher is available, because you can exist on a different plane, on a higher plane. There used to exist many places on the earth, many energy-fields. They have disappeared because pilgrims are not there so those energy-fields cannot be nourished; those energy-fields have no more function.

 

I am creating here an energy-field, a sacred place, a place for pilgrimage. It is a love pilgrimage. Be ready to dissolve, to put your ego aside. Only then do doors open, only then does communion become possible; and only through communion can truth be conveyed, not through words. Truth can be conveyed only beyond words: it is a transmission without scriptures.

 

-Osho, "Turn On, Tune In and Drop the Lot, #5“