• To bring the beyond is creativity. To bring the beyond into the known is creativity. To help divine to be manifested in some form is creativity.
    - Osho

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Question 1:

Osho,

When i came to greece to see you, everything reflected more and more of the zorba.

Now, being here in india, everything around you is reflecting more of the buddha.

Osho, does this depend on being in greece or india?

 

 

Human history has been a tragedy.

 

And the reason for it being a tragedy is not very complex. You have not to go very far to find it out, it is in everybody.

 

The whole past of man has created a split in man; there is a constant civil war in every human being.

 

If you do not feel at ease, the reason is not personal. Your disease is social.

 

The strategy that has been used is to divide you into two enemy camps: the zorba and the buddha, the materialist and the spiritualist.

 

You are not divided in reality. In reality you are a harmonious whole. But in your mind the conditioning is that you are not one whole, one piece: you have to fight against your body. If you want to be a spiritual being, the body has to be conquered, defeated, destroyed, tortured in every possible way.

 

This has been the accepted ideology all over the world. In different cultures, different religions, the formulations may be different, but the basic rule is the same: divide man, create a conflict in him so one part starts feeling higher, becomes holy, starts condemning the other part as the sinner.

 

And the trouble is that you are one, there is no way to divide you.

 

Every division is going to create misery in you, every division will mean that half of your being is fighting with the other half. And if you are fighting within yourself, how can you be at ease?

 

The whole humanity up to now has lived in a schizophrenic way. Everyone has been cut into pieces, fragments. Your religions, your philosophies, your ideologies have not been healing processes, they have been root causes of inner conflict and war. You have been wounding yourself. Your right hand wounds the left hand, your left hand wounds the right hand; both your hands become wounded.

 

The West finally chose to go with the zorba. There was no other way to remain sane -- one part had to be completely destroyed, ignored, forgotten. The West denied the inner reality of man, his consciousness: man is only body -- there is no soul -- and eat, drink and be merry is the only religion. This was simply a way to find some peace of mind, to get out of the conflict, to come to a decision and a conclusion -- because this is accepting that you are one: just matter, just body.

 

The East has chosen the other way, but the basic problem is the same: the East has chosen that you are the soul and the body is an illusion.

 

Matter does not exist, the world is made of the same stuff as dreams are made of, so don't be bothered about it. Renounce it, forget all about it -- it is not worth taking note of.

 

On the surface it seems that East and West are doing different things, but essentially they are not doing different things. Essentially they are trying to find a rational way to be one.

 

Because to be two means a constant dis-ease, a conflict -- it is better to drop the idea of the other.

 

The East says that the body is illusory, it is only an appearance, a shadow, it has no reality.

 

The West says that consciousness is a byproduct -- it does not exist in itself, it is an appearance. When the body dies nothing remains, the body is all, and the consciousness that you feel is just the combination of all the elements of the body.

 

For example, if you take all the parts of your car separately, or all the parts of your watch separately, do you think something like a soul will be released out of the watch? Who was running the watch? It was just because of the combination of the parts in a certain way that the watch was running, the car was running, that all machines are working; it is a byproduct. Put all the parts together again and the watch will start ticking -- the soul has not gone anywhere, there has been no soul in the first place.

 

As far as I am concerned, I see that the fundamental reason is to somehow choose one and decide that the other is illusory, so that you can be at peace, so that there is no need to fight, torture, and be in constant fear of being defeated.

 

Why have the East and the West chosen differently? That also has to be understood.

 

The Eastern mind, in search of a unitary being, tried to find out: what exactly is this inner consciousness that the Eastern mystics, saints and sages have been talking about, and calling the body illusory? To us the body seems to be real, and consciousness is just a word. But because all the saints in the East were insisting that this word `consciousness'

 

is your reality, the East has tried to find out what this reality is before deciding in favor of the body.

 

The natural tendency will be to decide in favor of the body, because the body is there, already appearing real -- consciousness you have to search for, you have to go into an inner pilgrimage.

 

The East, because of people like Gautam Buddha and Mahavira, could not deny that these people were sincere. Their sincerity was so clear, their presence was so impressive, their words were so authoritative... it was impossible to deny. No argument was enough, because these people were their own argument, their own validity.

 

And they were so peaceful and so joyful, so relaxed, so fearless. They had everything that every human being desires... and in a way they had nothing. Certainly they had found a source within themselves, a treasure. And you cannot just deny it without giving enough time to the search. Unless you find that there is no consciousness, you cannot deny it.

 

We had people so fragrant... we could not see their roses, but the fragrance was so much that the East tried to look inside, and found that the soul is far more real. The body is just an appearance.

 

And just by the way, it will be significant to remind you that modern science has come to the conclusion that matter is illusory, that matter does not exist, it only appears. They have come to the conclusion from a very different route. By searching deeply into matter, they have found that, as they reach deeper into matter, it is less and less substantial. And at a point after the atom, there is no matter at all: there are only electrons, which are particles of electricity -- which is not matter but energy.

 

Just a hundred years ago, Nietzsche declared "God is dead" not knowing at all that within a hundred years the whole of science would agree that perhaps God may be alive, but matter is dead.

 

The East has moved inwards and found that the body, matter, is relatively non- substantial. The ultimate reality belongs to consciousness.

 

In the West, development happened in a different way. And there are reasons why it happened in that way.

 

The East is ancient. At least ten thousand years of a constant, consistent search of the inner reality of man -- and all the genius of the East has been devoted to it.

 

When the UPANISHADS were being written in the East, nearabout five thousand years ago, the West did not exist as a human society at all.

 

In India we have Mohenjo daro, Harrapur -- cities that existed seven thousand years ago, with such refined development... they have streets as wide as those in Bombay. They have bedrooms with attached bathrooms.

 

And you will be surprised at why I am saying this: because just a hundred years ago in America, there was a court case against bathrooms which went up to the Supreme Court.

 

The first man who made a bathroom attached to his bedroom... Christianity was against it because this is dirty -- making your bathroom attached to your bedroom. This is un- Christian; cleanliness is next to God. And here is the bathroom next to the bedroom! Just a hundred years ago... and the Supreme Court had to decide that there is nothing unclean in it, and if somebody wants to have a bathroom attached to his bedroom it is nobody else's business to interfere and it has nothing to do with your religion.

 

But the church was fighting.

 

In Harapur, seven thousand years ago, they had bathrooms attached to their bedrooms, they had bathtubs, and they had a very special arrangement for circulation of water in the city. The hot and cold water in your bathroom is not a new thing; it was available in Harapur, in Mohenjo daro. They had swimming pools. It must have been a very highly cultured society.

 

At the time of Gautam Buddha, just twenty-five centuries ago, even then the West was not very evolved. And you can see it. We did not crucify Gautam Buddha, and the West crucified Jesus Christ five hundred years after Gautam Buddha.

 

And what Jesus was saying was nothing compared to Gautam Buddha. Gautam Buddha was saying that there is no God; still, nobody thought of crucifying him. Jesus Christ was not saying anything against Judaism; on the contrary, he was simply saying that he was their lost prophet. And he was repeating everything written in the Old Testament -- he was not saying anything that was contradicting the old religion. And Gautam Buddha was contradicting everything in Hinduism: he said that the VEDAS are idiotic, he said that there is no God, he said that all priests are the most cunning people in the world. And priests in India, the brahmins, are the highest caste. But nobody thought of crucifying him.

 

People challenged him for discussions, people discussed, and because they could not defeat him in argument.... They could not defeat him.

 

When they came in front of him, they were sincere enough to realize and recognize that he knew better, that their knowledge was only bookish, and his knowledge was authentic experience.

 

Western development is childish compared to Eastern development. It begins in Greece.

 

But even a man like Socrates, who was neither denying God nor affirming God, who was simply saying that, "I have not come to experience, hence, I cannot be untruthful -- I cannot say whether God exists or not. And I would like everybody to be sincere about it.

 

Unless you encounter, don't say yes, don't say no; remain agnostic, keep your conclusions suspended."

 

A very reasonable man, but he was also poisoned. He has not denied your tradition, he has not denied your past, he has not denied anything -- he simply argued for a more rational approach, a more logical approach. It is not a crime. And this is the reward that he gets: he is poisoned, society decides that he is a dangerous man.

 

Those people who could have changed Western society towards inner reality are being crucified or poisoned.

 

Naturally, the talented people became afraid even of talking about inner things, mysteries. They started talking only about objective things, matter, because matter cannot be denied. And there is no problem with going into a deep search into matter.

 

The crucifixion of Jesus and the death of Socrates closed the door for Western genius to move inwards. Anybody who had any intelligence became aware that it is simply inviting your death; it is better to use your talents and genius in such a way that the society cannot condemn it.

 

So the whole genius of Western humanity became a servant for creating more comforts for the body, more technology, more machines, more knowledge about matter -- and everybody was happy.

 

Even in these matters, if there was something that went against religion, immediately the church was there to stop it.

 

For example, when Galileo wrote that the sun does not go around the earth as it appears, but that in actuality the earth goes around the sun, as it does not appear, he was called by the pope to his court and asked -- and he was old, seventy-five years old, sick and almost on his deathbed -- "You have to change your book because it goes against the BIBLE. In the BIBLE the statement is that the sun goes around the earth, and we are not ready to listen to any argument. You simply change it; otherwise, death will be your punishment."

 

Such an idiotic church, which is not even ready to listen to any argument, which only knows to dictate: Do it or be ready to die!

 

Galileo must have had a great sense of humor. He said, "There is no need for you to take so much trouble to kill me. I am going to die anyway. As far as the book is concerned, I will change it, but I want you to remember that by my changing the book, neither is the earth going to change nor is the sun going to change. The earth will still go around the sun, because they don't read my book and they don't care what I write."

 

So he cancelled the statement in his book. And in the footnote he wrote, "I am canceling the statement, knowing perfectly well that it makes no difference. The reality remains the same."

 

When Copernicus found that the earth is not flat as it is said in the BIBLE, but round, he was immediately in trouble.

 

Now, these matters have nothing to do with religion. What has religion to do with whether the earth is round or flat? It can have any geometrical shape -- religion does not have anything to do with it.

 

But Christianity, Mohammedanism, are very primitive religions. They don't have the cultured, sophisticated attitude of Hinduism, Jainism, Buddhism, Taoism. They don't know how to argue, they only know how to fight. Their only argument is the sword; at the point of the sword is to be decided who is right.

 

It is the church -- you will be surprised to know -- that has prevented the West from going in the direction of inwardness. It forced Western humanity to go towards matter.

 

The inner was absolutely the church's monopoly, and they decided everything about it:

 

there was no need to search, there was no need to discover, there was no need to meditate. You were only supposed to believe in God. But if you could do something as far as matter is concerned, there would be no problem; as long as it did not come in conflict with the BIBLE.

 

Copernicus said to the pope, "It is just a small thing, and I have every proof that the earth is round. It is my lifelong work, and it does not affect your religiousness."

 

The pope said, "You don't understand. The question is not whether it affects our religiousness or not; the question is that the BIBLE is God's book, the holy book. If one statement in the BIBLE is proved wrong, that has great implications: first, that God can be wrong. We cannot accept that."

 

They cannot even accept that the pope can be wrong, what to say about God? The pope is a faraway representative. Jesus represents God, and the pope represents Jesus -- not directly, but through hundreds of popes who have died before him. He is connected through them to Jesus, and Jesus has a direct telephone line to God.

 

Just one statement against the BIBLE, if it is proved valid, makes God fallible. And it cannot be accepted -- that's one thing.

 

Secondly, if one statement is proved wrong, what is the guarantee about other statements? It creates suspicion. It destroys the very foundation of belief and faith -- "So we cannot accept anything in the BIBLE as wrong. You can do everything that does not go against the BIBLE."

 

Naturally only matter was left. You can do research in physics, in chemistry, in biology, in zoology, in geology. You can do all these things, you are free.

 

The church has been a great China Wall, preventing people from going inwards.

 

It looks strange, but it is a fact: the Christian church has proved the greatest enemy of religion on the earth. Other religions have also proved enemies, but not that great.

 

Genius was left to work only with matter.

 

In the East, the genius had first preference for the inner journey.

 

Only second-class, mediocre people would work for the outer, material things; real intelligence would always move into meditativeness.

 

Slowly slowly, the distance became bigger. The West became materialist -- and the whole responsibility goes to the Christian church -- and the Eastern humanity became more and more spiritualist. The division, the split that was created in each man, became a split on a wider scale: as East and West.

 

One great poet has written, "East is East and West is West, and never the twain shall meet." And this man, Lord Kipling, was very much interested in the East. He lived in India for years, he was in the government service. But seeing the difference... that the whole Eastern consciousness moves inwards and the Western consciousness moves outwards -- how could they meet?

 

My whole work is just to prove Lord Kipling wrong.

 

I would like to say -- neither West is West nor East is East, and the twain have already met.

 

What do you mean by `East'? In Bombay, Calcutta is east; in Calcutta, Bombay is west.

 

This is nonsense, these words are relative words. You cannot say that a certain place is east and a certain place is west; they are all relative. For the people of Calcutta, Tokyo is east -- and that's what the Japanese think. They call their land "the land of sunrise" and they call their king "the only begotten son of the sun god." The sun god is the real god, and Hirohito, the king of Japan, is his only son.

 

In fact, in the second world war when the Japanese were defeated, they could not believe it. Thousands of soldiers committed suicide just out of shame -- "How can it happen that God's son should be defeated? Now there is no point in living, everything has gone wrong."

 

They believe that they are the real East.

 

Nobody is East and nobody is West.

 

But the attitudes can be understood, and they are very prominent. And my whole approach is to bring a bridge into each individual, so that you are one whole.

 

Don't be against your body; it is your home.

 

Don't be against your consciousness, because without consciousness your house may be very decorated but it won't have any master, it will be empty. Together they create a beauty, a fuller life.

 

Symbolically, I have chosen Zorba for the body and Buddha for the soul.

 

Your question is that when I was in Greece I was talking more about Zorba, and here in India the atmosphere seems to be closer to Buddha. Your observation is true.

 

In Greece I was talking about Zorba. Still they deported me.

 

If I had been talking about Buddha, you would not have seen me again!

 

I was talking about Zorba because that is the foundation. But I was making it clear that Zorba alone is only the foundation of the house, it is not the house itself.

 

In India I am talking about Buddha, but I have not forgotten Zorba.

 

Each statement that I make -- whether it is about Zorba or about Buddha -- implies the other automatically, because to me they are inseparable. It is only a question of emphasis.

 

To make the Greek mind understand, I emphasized Zorba.

 

The ambassador of Sri Lanka to America wrote me a letter saying that "Your followers around the world are making restaurants, discos, and calling them ZORBA THE BUDDHA. It is very insulting to Buddha. And if you do such thing in a country like Sri Lanka, there can be violence. I advise you to drop this name."

 

I told my secretary to write to him, that "In the first place, nobody has the monopoly on Zorba or on Buddha. Secondly, we are not concerned with Gautam the Buddha; `buddha'

 

is not a personal name, it is a quality. It means the awakened one. Anyone who is awakened can be called the buddha. Gautam Buddha is only one of the millions of buddhas who have happened and who will happen. And you cannot prevent Zorba becoming a buddha. In fact, you should help me to make zorbas into buddhas, because that is the only real revolution -- that a materialist, a zorba, who knows nothing of higher consciousness, becomes a buddha."

 

He never replied.

 

Zorba has his own beauty. And the island in Greece where I was staying is the place where Kazantzakis, the novelist who created the novel ZORBA THE GREEK.... Zorba is a fictitious name, he is not a historical person. But the island where I was staying was the island where Kazantzakis was born.

 

And Kazantzakis is one of the best novelists of this century, and he suffered tremendously at the hands of the church. Finally, when he wrote ZORBA THE GREEK he was expelled from the church. By writing ZORBA he was forced: "You withdraw your book ZORBA; otherwise you will be expelled." Because he did not withdraw the book, he was expelled from Christianity and condemned to hell.

 

Zorba is really Kazantzakis' own individuality, which Christianity had repressed, which he could not live, which he wanted to live. He expressed that whole unlived part of his life in the name of Zorba.

 

Zorba is a beautiful man -- no fear of hell, no greed for heaven, living moment to moment, enjoying small things... food, drink, women. After the whole day's work, he will take his musical instrument and will dance on the beach for hours.

 

And the other part of Kazantzakis which he lived in ZORBA THE GREEK... Zorba is the servant. The other part is the master who employed Zorba as his servant. He is always sad and sitting in his office, doing his files, never laughing, never enjoying, never going out and always feeling deep down jealous of Zorba because he earns a little, not much, but he lives like an emperor, not thinking of tomorrow, of what will happen. He eats well, he drinks well, he sings well, he dances well. And his master, who is very rich, is just sitting there sad, tense, in anguish, in misery, suffering.

 

One day Zorba says to his master -- which is Kazantzakis himself -- "Master, there is only one thing wrong with you: you think too much. You come with me." It was a full- moon night.

 

Kazantzakis tried -- "No, no. What are you doing?"

 

But Zorba pulled him out to the beach and he started dancing, playing his instrument.

 

And he told Kazantzakis, "Try. Jump! If you cannot dance, do SOMETHING." And with Zorba's energy and his vibe, Kazantzakis also started dancing. For the first time in his life he felt that he was alive.

 

Zorba is the unlived part of every so-called religious person.

 

And why was the church so much against it when ZORBA was published? It was just a novel; there was nothing for the church to be worried about. But it was so clear that it is the unlived Christian in every Christian, this book could be a dangerous book. And it is a dangerous book.

 

But Zorba is tremendously beautiful. Kazantzakis sends him to purchase some things from the city, and he forgets all. He drinks and goes to the prostitutes and enjoys, and once in a while he remembers that it seems many days have passed but still, the money is with him. Unless all the money is finished, how can he return? The master will be very angry, but nothing can be done about it -- it is his problem.

 

And after three weeks he comes back -- and he had gone only for three days -- and he does not bring anything that he was sent for. And he comes with all the stories -- "What a great journey it was, you should have been there. I met such beautiful bubalinas... and such good wine."

 

And the master said, "But what about the things? For three weeks I have been sitting here boiling."

 

He said, "When there are so many beautiful things available, who bothers about such small things? You can cut my salary every week, by and by, slowly, and take your money back. I am sorry I could not come earlier. And you should be happy that I have come -- because the money was finished I had to come. But next time when I go, I will bring all the things."

 

He said, "You will never go again. I will send somebody else."

 

Zorba's whole life is a life of simple, physical enjoyment, but without any anxiety, without any guilt, without any botheration about sin and virtue and....

 

I would like this man Zorba to be alive in everybody, because it is your natural inheritance. But you should not stop at Zorba.

 

Zorba is only the beginning. Sooner or later, if you allow your Zorba full expression, you are bound to think of something better, higher, greater. It will not come out of thinking; it will come out of your experiences -- because those small experiences will become boring.

 

Buddha himself had come to be Buddha because he had lived the life of a zorba. That thing has not been noticed by the East -- that for twenty-nine years Buddha lived as no Zorba could ever live. Zorba was so poor.

 

Gautam Buddha's father had arranged for all the beautiful girls to be picked from the whole kingdom for Buddha's enjoyment. He made three beautiful palaces in three different places for different seasons. He had beautiful gardens and lakes. Buddha's whole life was just luxury, pure luxury. But he got bored.

 

One of the most significant experiences that he comes across was when one night beautiful girls were dancing... he was drinking, they were drinking, and then everybody fell asleep drunk. In the middle of the night he woke up and looked around, and he was shocked; and that shock was one of the turning points in his life. Some girl was snoring -- she was a beautiful girl, but her mouth open and snoring... she looked so ugly, the saliva was coming out... somebody's nose was flowing. And he said, "My God, this is what beauty is!" He was finished. Those girls were dispersed the next morning. "I don't want any girls in my palaces. Enough is enough."

 

In fact, it was too much. In twenty-nine years he lived almost the equivalent to four or five lives of an ordinary man. With all that luxury, soon he found himself tired and bored, and a question became very prominent in his mind: Is this all? Then what am I going to live tomorrow for? Life must mean something more; otherwise, it is meaningless.

 

It was out of the zorba that the search, for Buddha, started.

 

Not everybody becomes a buddha; and the basic reason is that the zorba remains unlived.

 

Do you see my argument? My argument is: live Zorba fully, and you will naturally enter into the life of a buddha.

 

Kazantzakis has written ZORBA THE GREEK. He's dead. If he had been allowed to live more.... He was sick, he was very tense, he remained very miserable because he was always afraid of sin. And then when he was expelled from the Christian church -- that means condemned to hell; only Christians can go to paradise -- that was such a shock that he could not survive. He was really killed by the Christian church expelling him.

 

If he were alive, I would have told him: "Your book is half. You need to write another book, ZORBA THE BUDDHA. Then it will be a complete phenomenon. But you can write the other book only if you live your zorba. You have not even lived zorba; how can you live the buddha?"

 

Enjoy your body, enjoy your physical existence. There is no sin in it. Hidden behind it is your spiritual growing, is your spiritual blissfulness. When you are tired of physical pleasures, only then will you ask, "Is there something more?" And this question cannot be only intellectual, it has to be existential: "Is there something more?"

 

And when the question is existential, you will find within yourself something more.

 

There is something much more. Zorba is only the beginning.

 

Once the buddha, the awakened soul, takes possession of you, then you will know that pleasure was not even a shadow. There is so much bliss.... That bliss is not against pleasure. In fact, it is pleasure which has brought you to bliss.

 

There is no fight between Zorba and Buddha. Zorba is the arrow -- if you follow it rightly, you will reach the Buddha.

 

Certainly in Greece there is an atmosphere different from India. The Greek personality has remained materialistic.

 

In India, the basic and the essential atmosphere is that of the awakened soul.

 

Whether you go on sleeping, it doesn't matter, but the atmosphere around you is that of the sunrise. The birds are singing, the flowers are blossoming, and from everywhere the indication is for you to wake up.

 

I will go to Greece again because I have been enjoying all these deportations. And next time I have to talk about Buddha -- because I have talked only about Zorba, and I never leave anything incomplete.

 

And already, the minister of interior in Greece has invited me: "We will make arrangements, you come."

 

I said, "I will come, but at least for three weeks don't deport me" -- because no country seems to be able to have me for more than three weeks. A few countries are so stupid that they cannot even have me for thirty-six hours.

 

England proved to be the worst. They would not allow me six hours to sleep at the airport -- not even entering England, but just the airport lounge. They wouldn't allow me to sleep there for six hours.

 

I said, "What reasons have you got?"

 

And the airport officer said, "We have no reasons. This is the file, the information from the prime minister is that `This man is dangerous and should not be allowed.'" But I said, "I am not entering England, and from the lounge there is no way to enter into England. And you have checked me well -- I am not carrying any bombs or anything.

 

And sleeping six hours in the airport, what danger can I do? You just think...."

 

He said, "Don't put me into trouble, because tomorrow it is going to be in parliament and then I will be answerable -- `Why did you allow him?'" So I had to go to jail for six hours. They said, "The only place we can allow you to remain is in jail."

 

And the next day in parliament the question was there, and I am always surprised that the question is asked and the same answer is given, that "The man is very dangerous," but nobody in the parliament has the intelligence to ask, "What danger could he have been just sleeping in the lounge at the airport? He may be dangerous, but what danger could he have been?" Nobody in the parliament asked.

 

So I have informed the minister in Greece that I will go. I have to go.

 

I was really thinking to stay longer, and I had fifteen more days on the visa to stay, but the archbishop of Greece threatened the government that if they didn't deport me immediately then they were going to burn my house where I was staying, burn me alive and all the people who were staying with me, dynamite the house. And the government became threatened, and they thought that "Some problem may arise, it is better to send this man away immediately."

 

I was asleep when I was arrested. You don't arrest people when they are asleep.

 

And they had no reason, because I had not gone out of the house for fifteen days. I said, "You have to show some reason why you are deporting me."

 

They said, "We don't have any reason, just orders from above." And all the orders were based on the threat of the archbishop.

 

It is the same archbishop that expelled Kazantzakis.

 

And these people are living almost out of date, out of time. They are not contemporaries.

 

Because the day they deported me from the island, the people of the island, who had no idea about me, just rumors.... But seeing the threat of the archbishop they all felt ashamed. And they asked me, "What we can do? We are poor people."

 

I said, "You all go to the airport to show the archbishop how many people are with him and how many people are with me -- although I have been here for only fifteen days and they have been here for two thousand years." And there were only six old women with the archbishop in the church, and three thousand people, the whole island, at the airport.

 

Still they don't understand that they are no longer needed, that their time is finished. And they talk about loving your enemy and loving your neighbor, and God is love -- and they threaten a man who has not done anything that they will burn him alive, with all his friends. At least twenty-five people were staying in that big mansion.

 

This shows that somehow the Western mind has not grown towards inwardness, towards love, towards non-violence. Their whole approach is materialistic.

 

Two thousand years after Jesus is crucified, and this man is threatening me -- Jesus Christ's representative in Greece is threatening me -- that he will burn me alive. Does he represent Jesus Christ or was he also one of the rabbis who crucified Jesus Christ?

 

The mind of the priest in the West has been a hindrance to Western growth towards meditation. But a strange time of revolution has come -- at least for the new generation, because the new generation is not with these old priests and these old churches.

 

And the new generation in the West is looking towards the East. That's a great hope.

 

That is Zorba searching for Gautam Buddha.

 
-Osho, "Beyond Enlightenment, #7, Q1"
 
 
 

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    A new man, a new woman, a new child, who has intelligence

    WE NEED A WORLD - a new man, a new woman, a new child, who has intelligence. Not to imitate, not to deceive, but to stand on his own with power and integrity. Even if it means that he will be condemned by the whole world, it does not matter. What ultimately mat...
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    New Man - I proclaim Homo Novus

    Question 2 Osho, What message do you have for the world symposium on humanity? I TEACH A NEW MAN, a new humanity, a new concept of being in the world. I proclaim HOMO NOVUS. The old man is dying, and there is no need to help it survive any more. The old man is ...
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    Zorba represents to me, every man's, every woman's natural state

    Question 4 What is your relationship with zorba, as invented by kazantzakis, and what does zorba have in common with you? i know that he didn't have any wealth.... Zorba represents to me, every man's, every woman's natural state. It represents to me a perfect h...
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    I am trying to create here not Zorba the Greek but Zorba the Buddha

    Zorba The Buddha Question 2: Sometimes when you speak, I get the vision of living a kind of Zorba the Greek life – eat, drink and be merry – lusty and passionate, and I think this is the way. Other times I feel you are saying that the way is to sit silently, wa...
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    I taught you about trust, the heart, feeling, love; and now I am teaching you about doubt, skepticism, reason, intellect

    I taught you about trust, the heart, feeling, love; and now I am teaching you about doubt, skepticism, reason, intellect, because I would like you to be a whole man. You can be completely satisfied with trusting, with the heart, but you will not be a whole man....
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    Human Rights For The New Man

    Osho on Basic Human Rights 1) Life. 2) Love. 3) Death. 4) The search for truth. 5) A certain atmosphere for meditation. 6) Freedom in all dimensions. 7) One earth, one humanity. 8) Uniqueness of every individual. 9) A world government. 10) Meritocracy. Question...
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    Can Zorba survive the Buddha, or can the Buddha really remain juicy?

    Question 3: Beloved Osho, I am a Rasa addict, and I can see how this dependency leads to misery. the coolness of meditation scares me though. Can Zorba survive the Buddha, or can the Buddha really remain juicy? It has not been possible in the past, or only with...
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    ZORBA THE BUDDHA – THE ULTIMATE SYNTHESIS

    ZORBA THE BUDDHA – THE ULTIMATE SYNTHESIS Question 1 Beloved Osho, Many contemporaries and enlightened ones – Raman Maharshi, Meher Baba, George Gurdjieff and J. Krishnamurti – have worked with people, but people get more offended by you than by anybody else. O...
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    That's what rebellion is: Let things be as they are. don't disturb. Let nature take its own course.

    Question 1: Osho, You have been praising rebels, but it seems to me that so far rebellion has changed situations only for the worse. is it not better simply to accept what is? also it seems that whatever happens, the evil in the world becomes more powerful, mor...
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    on Hedonism - The physical hedonist can rise to the higher hedonism

    Question 1 Are there different levels of Hedonism? I suspect ‘eat, drink and be merry’ means different things to different people. Yes, Anurag. There are two levels of hedonism, and they are almost polar opposites to each other. Because of that, much misunderst...
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    The new man will be total

    The new man will be total It is beautiful that the god of the philosophers is dead. I am a brigand. To be with me is to be a brigand, to be a Zorba and a Buddha at the same time. My vision is the vision of the ultimate unity between the Epicurean and the asceti...
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    My people are the first people in the whole of history who are life-affirmative.

    Question 2: Beloved Osho, I heard you say sometime ago that science is of the head and religion is of the heart. i understand that these qualities, being of a polarity, are mutually dependent. one cannot exist without the other, just as man cannot exist without...
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    Journalists can do a tremendous service to humanity if their minds are clear

    Question 1 Beloved Osho, You are the greatest marketing person of a product that gratifies the soul. We are in the business of selling a product that gratifies the mind; there are others who sell products that gratify the body. what lessons can we learn from yo...
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    Zorba is only the beginning.

    Question 1: Osho, When i came to greece to see you, everything reflected more and more of the zorba. Now, being here in india, everything around you is reflecting more of the buddha. Osho, does this depend on being in greece or india? Human history has been a t...
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    A New World and a New Man

    A New World and a New Man Question 1 : Many people are ready to simply change their state of being, but they are terrified of the possibility of the end of the world. I, too, toyed around like a puppet until I searched in the scriptures. I found out that the an...
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    I want you to be a Zorba and a Buddha together; then whatever is ugly in Zorba will disappear on its own accord

    Question 5 Osho, The buddha in me condemns the zorba, and the zorba envies the buddha. how can these two beloveds within me become friends? Just let them fight one day more. Tomorrow we will settle it! - Osho, "Beyond Enlightenment, #19" ◈ I have first to reply...
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    Translucent Darkness

    Man up to now has lived in a very schizophrenic way. The reason why he has become divided is not very difficult to understand. For centuries he has been told that the world consists not of one world but of two worlds: the world of matter and the world of the sp...
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    My message is a new man, homo novus.

    [An ashram press office representative asks: Osho, what is your message to humanity on this new year's day?] My message is simple. My message is a new man, homo novus. The old concept of man was of either/or; materialist or spiritualist, moral or immoral, sinne...
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    A new man is emerging.

    Question 1: Osho, What according to you is the most significant thing that is happening today in the world? A new man is emerging. The image of the new man is not yet clear, but the horizon is becoming red and the sun will soon be there. The morning mist is the...
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    I HAVE CALLED the NEW MAN ZORBA THE BUDDHA

    I have called the new man Zorba the Buddha. Zorba represents the materialist, objective approach. Buddha represents the subjective, spiritual approach. Divided, both are poor. Neither of them is a full circle. Joined, they become immensely rich. Joined together...
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    on The New Man : A new man is emerging

    The New Man Question 1 Osho, What according to you is the most significant thing that is happening today in the world? A new man is emerging. The image of the new man is not yet clear, but the horizon is becoming red and the sun will soon be there. The morning ...
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    The New Man will not be like me or like anybody else. Everybody will be authentically himself

    Question 1: Osho, You have said that you are the new man that the world needs, and that this commune is a preparation for the arrival of the new man. do you see that other people here are going to become, like you, the new man, or are you talking about a prepar...
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    The new man

    The new man is not someone coming from another planet. The new man is you in your freshness, in your silences of the heart, in your depth of meditation, in your beautiful spaces of love, in your songs of joy, in your dances of ecstasy, in your love of this eart...
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    The new man: the very salt of the earth

    Question 1 Beloved Osho, It touches so much when you talk about the new man. when you first mentioned this concept to us many years ago, the new man was simply that to me: a concept that was intriguing, a fascinating possibility. but lately, i feel as if i know...
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    Enlightenment is only a door, and then there is an unending existence

    The Door of Enlightenment Question 1 : I have read that your goal is to make enlightenment available to as many people as possible. Now i have heard that you’re saying that enlightenment is not all its cracked up to be, and that you want to be normal. What’s ha...
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    Go Beyond Through Experiencing

    Go Beyond Through Experiencing Question6 Is the quality and expression of one’s enlightenment richer, deeper and more creative if one allows oneself to complete one’s worldly trips, rather than dropping them in the name of spirituality? Certainly! How can you d...
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    How Can I Become The New Man? : A new man means more conscious, more loving, more creative

    How Can I Become The New Man? Question 2 Beloved Osho, How can I become the New Man that you speak about? Bhagwato, Jesus says: Unless you are born again you will not enter into my kingdom of God. Exactly that’s what I say to you: Unless you are born again…. Th...
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    Rebel or Robot?

    Rebel or Robot? Question 1: Osho, You say the rajneeshees need to be unorthodox, untraditional, unconventional. it is clear what this means in a world full of traditions and conventions, but in your commune i find it more difficult to understand. Would you spea...
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    Only a total discontinuity from the past can create a new man

    Question 3 Beloved Osho, You said that only a total discontinuity from the past can create a new man. how can this happen in practical terms? It looks difficult. It looks almost impossible, but it only looks so; otherwise it is very simple. You just have to wat...
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    The Whole Man

    The Whole Man A man should be just man, a man should be just human – total, whole. And out of that wholeness will arise a new kind of health.” The East is introvert, the West is extrovert. Man is split, mind is schizophrenic. That’s why all the great masters ha...
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    Osho on Zorba the Buddha

    on Zorba the Buddha Zorba is the foundation and Buddha is the palace Zorba is the foundation and Buddha is the palace. Buddha is the peak, but the foundation stones are laid by Zorba. It will be foolish to choose to be a Buddha without having the foundation sto...
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    My vision of the new man is of a perfect man

    My vision of the new man is of a perfect man: perfect in the sense that all his three dimensions are functioning without contradicting each other, but on the contrary, complementing each other. The perfect man will create a perfect world. The perfect man will c...
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    I teach silence - sitting silently, doing nothing - and I also teach dance, music, singing

    One thing has to be understood, when the pendulum is moving to the left it is gathering momentum to go to the right, when it is going to the right it is gathering momentum to go to the left. That momentum is not visible but we can infer it easily. The farther r...
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    The spark will catch like a wildfire in the West, but it has to come from the East.

    Question 3 For some time i have been feeling that you are in a hurry. what is that hurry and why? i am not able to understand. but the fact that you are in a hurry is evident from the letters which you have written to some of your devotees. The question also ar...
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    Last Breath of the Old

    Last Breath of the Old Question : Osho, There seems to be a resurgence of conservatism, not only in politics but in people’s search for inner strength, for truth, peace. Groups such as the Moral Majority appear to be gaining ground, strengthening their influenc...
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    My rebel, my new man, is Zorba the Buddha

    Question 1 Beloved Osho, How is your rebel concerned with "zorba the buddha"? Maneesha, my rebel, my new man, is Zorba the Buddha. Mankind has lived believing either in the reality of the soul and the illusoriness of matter, or in the reality of matter and the ...
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    Buddha and the Beast

    Buddha and the Beast Question 1 What exactly is man? Man is a mere perhaps, a possibility, a potential, a becoming, a longing. Man is not yet. Man has to be. That’s the agony of man, and the ecstasy too. The beast is – there is no growth possible. It is a finis...
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    On Knowing the Eternal Law

    Death is destiny. It has to be so because it is the origin – you come from death and you go to death. Life is just a moment between two nothingnesses, just a flight of a bird between two states of non-being. If death is destiny, as it is, then the whole of life...
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    The New Man

    The New Man I teach a new man, a new humanity, a new concept of being in the world. I proclaim homo novus. The old man is dying, and there is no need to help it survive any more. The old man is on the deathbed: don't mourn for it – help it to die. Because only ...
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    I have been proclaiming the new man as Zorba the Buddha

    I have been proclaiming the new man as Zorba the Buddha Hence, I have been proclaiming the new man as Zorba the Buddha -- which is a meeting of East and West, which is a meeting of science and religion, which is a meeting of logic and love, which is a meeting o...
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    My effort is to make Zorba and Buddha meet together, be one

    First I taught you about trust, the heart, feeling, love; and now I am teaching you about doubt, skepticism, reason, intellect, because I would like you to be a whole man. You can be completely satisfied with trusting, with the heart, but you will not be a whol...
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    My message to humanity is: Create a new man - unsplit, integrated, whole. Buddha is not whole, neither is Zorba the Greek.

    Question 2 Osho, What message do you have for the world symposium on humanity? Krishna Prem, I TEACH A NEW MAN, a new humanity, a new concept of being in the world. I proclaim HOMO NOVUS. The old man is dying, and there is no need to help it survive any more. T...
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