Osho on Muktanand and Franklin Jones

 

 

Even a Muktanand can get followers. Once I passed Muktanand's ashram. and just to see what was happening there, I went in. I have never seen such an ordinary man becoming a great religious leader of people. No potential, no achievement, no insight -- if you saw him walking in the street you would not recognize that there is something there. Just plain ordinary -- and not ordinary in the sense of Zen -- just plain ordinary. But even he can find followers.

 

In the world, millions of fools exist; and they are always ready to believe, always ready, ready to fall into the trap of anybody. In fact, sometimes there is no trap at all, but they fall, because they would like to believe that something is happening. Man is so imaginative, and, because of his imagination, he starts believing that something is happening. These people know at least this much about what to do.

 

Somebody comes to me and says: I have a certain pain in my backbone. Now, if I say that this is simply a pain, go to a doctor, he simply turns away from me and never comes back, because he had not come for that. He had come for an approvaI. If I say: Yes your kundalini is rising, he will be happy. These fools will always find their Muktanands.

 

And not very ordinary people, sometimes very intelligent people come. Just a few days before, a film producer came to me -- a well-known name all over India. His blood sugar has gone beyond all ordinary limits; it has reached five hundred. He should really be dead by now. He is a drunkard, and a great food eater, obsessed with eating, but still he continues and continues eating sweets and drinking alcohol. Now, because of so much blood sugar, his whole body is trembling.

 

It has to, because his whole body is ill, every fibre of it is ill, and there is a deep trembling inside. He was sitting there when I was talking to others, and he was trembling. Then he asked me: What do you think? What is it -- is it kundalini rising?

 

Now what to do with these people? These are the victims, and these are participants in creating deceivers; they are also half responsible. And I know this man also belongs to Muktanand's group.

 

Now the problem arises for me -- what to do? If I say: 'Yes. It is Kundalini rising and this is your last life. Soon, within days, you will be enlightened,' he will bow down, touch my feet and will go away very happy. He will be happy, I will be happy, and everything is settled. And he will go around talking about me, that this is the right, the greatest master that he has come to know. It is good business. Simple. But then I am deceiving him, and not only deceiving. I am killing him, I am a murderer, because I know that he is dying of diabetes, and the diabetes has gone beyond all limits. If I say, 'This is kundalini and enlightenment is coming, and this is like samadhi, that's why you are trembling; it is God descending into you,' or, 'You are rising towards the Divine,' or 'The Divine is descending in you,' he will be very happy, everybody is happy, these is no problem. He will work for me and until he dies he will go on talking about me.

 

But the moment I said: 'This is nothing to do with any enlightenment. This is simple -- too much sugar in the blood. Your whole body is feverish. You don't waste time, you to to the doctors and listen to them,' immediately I could see the change in his face. It changed: This man is not a master at all. How can he be a master, and enlightened, when he cannot understand such simple phenomenon that is happening in me?

 

It actually happened. A man, very well-known in the West, Franklin Jones, was a disciple of Muktanand -- and then his kundalini arose. Muktanand approved: You have become a SIDDHA. Not only did he approve, he gave a written certificate. I simply cannot believe what foolishnesses go on -- a certificate that you have become a SIDDHA, enlightened! So of course the man became a SIDDHA and he changed his name. He was Franklin Jones, now he is Bubba Free John, and he has many followers of his own.

 

Now the trouble came in, because he had become more enlightened than Muktanand ever expected, and he had become a guru in his own right. No he wanted -- he came again just a few months ago -- now he wanted another certificate. Now he wanted to show: There is no need for me to belong to any master, because now I am a master myself, and my karmas with you, with Muktanand, are fulfilled. So, give me a certificate that I am absolutely free.

 

Now Muktanand hesitated -- this was going too far. So he denied, he would not give another certificate. But the thing had already gone too far. The man returned home, wrote a book, and said: Of course Muktanand helped me a little on my way, but he is not an enlightened man and I dissolve all my links with him. He is an ordinary man.

 

This is how things go. He was an enlightened man because he gave me the certificate, he was the greatest master in the world. Now he is no longer. He is an ordinary man -- 'I dissolve all my links with him.'

 

These things go on. Remember this, because you can become a part in such a game yourself. Never believe in yourself too much. Remain aware. When you come to me I will say exactly what is happening. Many have gone from me because I will not support their egos and I will not fulfill their wishes, and I will not say what they want me to say. And once they go away, they are against me, they have to be. There are the traps. Not only do the deceivers create them, you help to create them. Don't be a participant in any deception, be very, very alert.

 

This monk, who was a fraud and had no genuine understanding, called himself 'The Master of Silence'. That's very beautiful, because if you utter something you can be caught. It is simply beautiful to remain silent; then nobody can catch you. They say it is good for two kinds of persons to be silent: the very, very wise have to be silent, because what they know cannot be said; and the very, very foolish, because if they are not silent, they will be caught. So this man, who was a fraud, used to call himself 'The Master of Silence'. He would not utter a single word. But if you don't utter a word you cannot sell anything. If a salesman is silent, how will he sell things? So he devised a plan.

 

-Osho, "The Grass Grows By Itself, #5"