Question

Beloved Osho,

What is the difference between esoterics and esoteric nonsense?

 

 

Whatever I have been telling to you, is esoterics. I am trying to make you mystics, masters of your own, helping you to find the mystery of life without giving you any map, without giving you any guide-book. Because that spoils the whole game.

 

It is like you see a beautiful film. And you start telling the story to the friend. And you love the friend. And you have brought tickets for the friend for tomorrow.

 

That's a good gesture. But please don't tell the story. Otherwise that friend will be simply bored in the film -- the same beautiful film will become just a boring experience. Because he will already what is going to happen. There will be no curiosity, there will be no possibility of anything new to happen.

 

He already knows. I have heard when for the first time films started in India in a small village, there were three shows: the matinee show. And one old man watched it. Then the show was finished but he won't move. He said, "I want the ticket for the first show." The manager said, "But you have seen." He said, "You wait, you don't interfere. This is none your business. This is the money. Give me the ticket. I will see the first show also." After first show he said, "Now I want to see the second show also."

 

The manager said, "You seem to be a strange fellow. You are seeing the same story again and again. And you don't seem to be bored."

 

He said, "You will not be satisfied unless I answer you. There is a scene in the film. A beautiful woman by the side of a lake is undressing. She has almost undressed and at that very moment, a train passes by." The old fellow tries every way to see to the other side, but the woman is other side and by the time the train has passed, the woman is swimming in the lake and he could not see her undressed completely. He said, "I will not leave this place, because I know these Indian trains sometimes go late. How long this train is going to be in time?"

 

Don't tell the story. Tickets are good. I give you every incentive, every challenge to go on the journey. But I don't tell you what you are going to meet what is going to happen on the journey. That will spoil the whole mystery of it. Esoterics is the science of challenging people that life is not appears. It is much more. It is always much more. You will never come to a place where you can say, "Now it is enough." It is never enough. What I call esoteric nonsense, is those people who start giving you charts, maps, guides -- start in detail telling you every phase of your journey. They kill, even the desire to go on the path.

 

I was in Agra. There is a small religion called Radhaswamis. You can see in Radhaswamis how religions had been fighting egoistically with each other. For two hundred yeas, Radhaswamis have been making a temple in the memory of their guru, but the idea is to make a temple which defeats Taj Mahal, because both are in Agra. Two hundred years continuously, only the ground floor is ready. Only the pillars. They have done tremendous job, and if they succeed, there are very remote possibilities to complete it; because two hundred years they have already worked. They are pouring all their money, from all over the country, wherever their followers are. But whatever they have made gives an indication that if they succeed, Taj Mahal will become secondary.

 

When I was in Agra, speaking they invited me to see their incomplete temple. They are in a very great despair because money is running out, no more sources. There is not even a roof. But even on the pillars, the work that they have done -- perhaps marble has never found such great artists. When I was looking at their temple, I came across a map that was hanging on the wall. I said, "What is that? I have never seen such a map." They said, "This is the map of the higher stages of consciousness." There are sixteen stages, and on the map, on the fifth stage -- Mohammed, Moses, people like that, names are written, somewhat higher. On the seventh stage Nanak, Kabir, Dadu and others. Somewhat still higher, on the tenth, Krishna, Ram. Still higher on the eleventh, Gautam Buddha, Mahavira. On the sixteenth, only their guru, their master, has reached. They said, "What do you say?" I said, "Absolutely right. Your guru is on the sixteenth." They said, "You are the first man who do not belong to our religion, who are so absolutely certain." I said, "I have to be absolutely certain because I am on the seventeenth, and I see your poor guru on the sixteenth. he tries to get on on the seventeenth and I go on pushing him down. Seventeenth is the last, and I am not going to allow anybody else there. I don't like anybody. I want to live alone, peacefully, your guru has to remain on sixteenth. He can go downwards, fifteenth, fourteenth -- which are vacant, there is nobody."

 

They were shocked. They said, "Are you serious?" I said, "I'm always serious, and I have to be serious, because your guru is trying every possible way somehow to enter in the seventeenth. And I have to make all arrangements to block his path. In fact I have removed the staircase also. There is no hope for your guru to enter in the seventeenth." They said, "This is strange. But we have never heard about the seventeenth." I said, "Who had heard about the sixteenth?"

 

This is esoteric nonsense. Esoterics is a mystic phenomenon. Esoteric nonsense is expressed in such things. You will not believe that in Jaina temples there used to be maps. I don't know whether there are still or not, because I have not entered a Jaina temple for twenty years. It is not right to say I have not entered -- they will not let me in!

 

Krishna is in the seventh hell... because Jainas believe in seven hells. It is a very mathematical idea -- to put all the sinners in one hell, seems to be very unmathematical. Somebody has been only smoking cigarettes and has done nothing wrong to anybody, except to himself. And somebody has killed, like Adolf Hitler, six million people. Now to put them into one place, seems to be absolutely unjustified. So Jainas have seven hells -- seven categories, according to your sin, crime, you will be sent. Krishna is in the seventh, the last, because he was the man who provoked Arjuna for Mahabharata, the great Indian war, in which millions of people died. The whole responsibility goes on him -- and because to Jainas nonviolence is the criterion of religion -- he was the most important person to preach violence.

 

When Mahavira was alive, one of his disciples hoped that he will become the successor of Mahavira. But seeing that Mahavira goes on living, he became frustrated. He propped Mahavira and moved away from Mahavira taking his five hundred disciples with him, because he said this man does not know enough. He says there are only seven hells -- that is wrong. There are seventy-seven hells. Because it is impossible to categorize all crimes and all sins into seven categories -- seventy-seven hells. Now you cannot prove these people; not disprove these people. It is just their imagination.

 

Hearing this, another man, whom I like -- Sanjay Belattiputta -- he said, "This man is an idiot! It is better than seven, but really there are seven hundred hells." He was joking, he was not serious, but he was simply saying, that all these things are simply nonsense. In the name of religion you can go on propagating any kind of nonsense.

 

I have heard that -- At last Morarji Desai died. I don't know whether he has died or not. It is just hearsay. And everyone who dies is first brought into hell, and hell has such a beautiful reception room -- beautiful naked ladies, champagne flowing, all kinds of cold drinks, every kind of food... you say and it is immediately presented by naked women. Morarji said, "This is strange... this is hell? What great pleasures must not be happening in heaven? But this is the root. Hell comes first, then the bus goes to heaven. And he was very much puzzled again. Heaven looked like a ruin -- old skeletons walking; you cannot even recognize who is who, saints, mahatmas, sages, but there is no greenery, no reception place. He said, "This is not a place worth living. Hell was far better. Improved in every way, everything is available. No sign of poverty. He said to the bus driver that, "Please when you go back, I want to go back to hell." He said, "Think twice before you decide." He said, "I have decided." He went to hell and a he entered, the devil caught hold of him and said, "So you have come." But he said, "Where is the reception place?" The devil said, "You are an idiot. That was just a reception place. That is to allure idiots for hell. Now you will see the reality."

 

The bus has gone. There was no way. He said, "Still, because you have come by yourself -- you have chosen it yourself, I will give you again a choice." He took him to the first room. It was so horrible. People were being cut by electric saws and again joined for another cut. It was so painful. Everybody was naked, and one can see that how many cuts a man has gone through. You could count the scars. And they had really invented a glue that you cut the body in two, glue it, put it back, and sometimes those small devils who were doing all this work, they will put two persons' bodies and changes the head of one, the body of another. It was looking very ugly. Everybody was in torture. The devil asked, "Would you like to join this group? It is a group therapy." Morarji said, "No. I would like to see the other two."

 

In the second one, it was even more horrible. There was no electric saws -- people were being cut by old type of axes, like trees are cut. Somebody's leg will be cut and joined to somebody else's leg. Somebody's head will be cut and will be joined to somebody else's head. Morarji said, "What is this?" He said, "This is old type.

 

There are people who like old things, ancient, traditional. Few people like technology, science. For them the first room. This is for the more religious, more traditional, those who go on spinning reels. Perhaps this may suit you. He said, `No, this is too much. I would like to see the third one." And the third one looked a relief. A great relief! Seeing the two, the third was certainly a relief. People were standing into crap of all kinds -- up to their neck. Somebody drinking tea, somebody drinking coffee. It was stinking, but Morarji said, "It is better." And as far as crap is concerned, fifty percent he has prepared already. Whole life drinking of urine, now, he does not smell anything. But it is good that you are provided with coffee and tea. So he said, "This is good. Although it does not look good to stand into this mess that you have collected here. How old it is?" He said, "This is the ancientmost thing. We are great collectors. Antiques we pay very much interest. Nothing is new here. Thousands of years old things. This shit that you are seeing all around. This comes from the days of Vedas. It is sacred. Go into it and enjoy. What do you want, a coffee?" He said, "I don't like coffee or tea. I drink my own urine." Devil said, "That's perfectly okay. That freedom is given to you. You can drink as much as you want."

 

An empty cup was given to him to drink his own urine. Just in the middle when he was drinking his urine, a bell started ringing and a small devil shouting that the coffee break is over. Now throw all your cups and coffees and stand on your head. Now begins the yoga exercises.

 

This was not known to him that this was going to be. It was already too much, and now standing on your head. But you cannot do only this. Three places are there and you have chosen itself.

 

All religions have ideas about heaven, about hell. This is all esoteric nonsense. Real esoterics simply means the science of knowing thyself.

 

Okay?

 

-Osho, "The Last Testament, Vol 6, #13"