Osho on Tantra

 

 

Tantra Is the Science of Transforming Ordinary Lovers Into Soul Mates

 

In the East we have developed a science: if you cannot find a soulmate, you can create one. And that science is Tantra. To find a soulmate means to find the person with whom all your seven centers meet naturally. That is impossible. Once in a while, a Krishna and a Radha, a Shiva and a Shakti. And when it happens, it is tremendously beautiful. But it is like lightning -- you cannot depend on it. If you want to read your Bible, you can't depend on it that when the lightning is there you will read. The lightning is a natural phenomenon, but undependable.

 

If you wait for your natural soulmate to meet with you, it will be just like waiting for lightning to read your Bible. And you will not be able to read much either. For a moment it is there, and by the time you have opened the Bible it is gone.

 

Hence Tantra was created. Tantra is a scientific approach. Tantra is alchemy: it can transform your centers, it can transform the other's centers; it can create a rhythm and harmony between you and your beloved. That is the beauty of Tantra. It is like bringing electricity into your house. Then you can turn it on and off whenever you want. And you can have a thousand and one uses of it: it can cool your room, it can heat your room.... Then it is a miracle. These seven centers in you are nothing but centers of body electricity. So when I am talking about lightning, don't think of it only as a symbol -- I mean it literally.

 

In your body there exists a subtle current of electricity, very subtle. But the more subtle it is, the deeper it goes. It is not very visible. Scientists say that all the electricity that is in your body, if put together, can be used to light a five-candle bulb. It is not much. Quantitatively it is not much; quantitatively the atom is not much, but qualitatively... if it explodes, it has tremendous energy in it.

 

These seven centers, these seven chakras, Yoga and Tantra have talked about down the ages, are nothing but five knots in your body electric current. They can be changed, they can be rearranged. They can be given a new shape, form. Two lovers can be transformed so deeply that all their seven centers can start meeting.

 

Tantra is the science of transforming ordinary lovers into soulmates. And that is the grandeur of Tantra. It can transform the whole earth; it can transform each couple into soul-mates. It has not yet been used; it is one of the greatest treasures that is Lying there, unused. The day humanity uses it, a new love will surround the earth; the earth will become aglow with a new love. Only the new man can use it -- Homo NOVUS CAN use it.

 

-Osho, “Philosophia Perennis, Vol 1, #8, Q2”

 

 

 

 

Real Tantra is not technique but love.

 

Tantra says: The appeal of sex is because it gives you a moment of egolessness, timelessness, meditation. Because of ego-gratification, sex has become very very superficial, it only scratches the skin. It does not go deep, it has no depth. So many people are worried about premature ejaculation. The reason? They don't love. If they love, then naturally they can make love for longer periods -- the more you are in love, the longer the period will be. For hours you can be in love, because there is no hurry, the ego is not controlling.

 

In a Tantra coitus you can remain for hours. It is a kind of melting with the woman or with the man, it is a kind of relaxation into each other's being. And it is meditative, because there is no ego, no thought stirs. And time stops. This is a glimpse of God. Tantra is the natural way to God, the normal way to God. The object is to become so completely instinctual, so mindless, that we merge with ultimate nature -- that the woman disappears and becomes a door for the ultimate, the man disappears and becomes a door for the ultimate.

 

This is the Tantra definition of our sexuality: The return to absolute innocence, absolute oneness. The greatest sexual thrill of all is no search for thrills, but a silent waiting. Utterly relaxed, utterly mindless. One is conscious, conscious only of being conscious. One is consciousness. One is contented, but there is no content to it. And then there is great beauty, great benediction.

 

The questioner asks: WHAT IS TANTRIC SEX...A SEX WHICH IS A MEDITATION BASED ON CERTAIN TECHNIQUES?

 

If you are too much technique-oriented you will miss the mystery of Tantra. That is pseudo Tantra that is based on techniques. Because if techniques are there, ego will be there, controlling. Then you will be DOING it. And doing is the problem, doing brings the doer. Tantra has to be a non-doing; it cannot be technical. You can learn techniques -- you can learn a certain breathing so that the coitus can become longer. If you breathe very very slowly, if you breathe without any hurry, then the coitus will become longer. But you are controlling. It will not be wild and it will not be innocent. And it will not be meditation either. It will be MIND -- how can it be meditation? The mind will be controlling there. You cannot even breathe fast, you have to keep your breathing slow -- if the breathing is slow then ejaculation will take a longer time, because for ejaculation to happen the breathing has to be fast and chaotic. Now, this is technique but not Tantra.

 

Real Tantra is not technique but love. Is not technique but prayer. Is not head-oriented but a relaxation into the heart. Please remember it. Many books have been written on Tantra, they all talk about technique. But the real Tantra has nothing to do with technique. The real Tantra cannot be written about, the real Tantra has to be imbibed. How to imbibe real Tantra? You will have to transform your whole approach.

 

Pray with your woman, sing with your woman, play with your woman, dance with your woman, with no idea of sex. Don't go on thinking 'When are we going to bed?' Forget about it. Do something else, and get lost into it. And some day love will arise out of that being lost. Suddenly you will see that you are making love and you are not making it. It i.s happening, you are possessed by it. Then you have your first Tantra experience -- possessed by something bigger than you. You were dancing or you were singing together or you were chanting together or you were praying together or meditating together, and suddenly you find you both have moved into a new space. And when you have started making love you don't know, you don't remember either. Then you are being possessed by Tantra energy. And then for the first time you will see a non-technical experience.

 

When you are making love don't control. Go into uncontrol, go into chaos. It will be fearful, frightening, because it will be a kind of death. And the mind will say 'Control!' And the mind will say 'Jump in and keep control, otherwise you will be lost in the abyss of it.' Don't listen to the mind, get lost. Abandon yourself utterly. And without any technique you will come to see a timeless experience. There will be no two in it: oneness. A consciousness will be there, a lucid passive consciousness will be there, you will know what is happening, because you will be fully aware.. But you will not be there. Awareness will be there.

 

You have to imbibe the Tantra spirit -- it is not a technique to be learned.

 

-Osho, “This Very Body the Buddha, Vol. 1, #8, Q2”

 

 

 

 

Tantra does not deny anything, but transforms everything.

 

This Tantra vision is one of the greatest visions ever dreamt by man: a religion without the priest, a religion without the temple, a religion without the organisation, a religion which does not destroy the inpidual but respects inpiduality tremendously, a religion which trusts in the ordinary man and woman. And this trust goes very deep. Tantra trusts in your body. No other religion trusts in your body. And when religions don't trust in your body, they create a split between you and your body. They make you enemies of your bodies, they start destroying the wisdom of the body.

 

Tantra trusts in your body. Tantra trusts in your senses. Tantra trusts in your energy. Tantra trusts in you -- IN TOTO. Tantra does not deny anything, but transforms everything.

 

How to attain to this Tantra vision?

 

This is the map to turn you on, and to turn you in, and to turn you beyond.

 

The first thing is the body. The body is your base, it is your ground, it is where you are grounded. To make you antagonistic towards the body is to destroy you, is to make you schizophrenic, is to make you miserable, is to create hell. You are the body. Of course, you are more than the body, but that 'more' will follow later on.

 

First you are the body. The body is your basic truth, so never be against the body. Whenever you are against the body, you are going against God. Whenever you are disrespectful to your body, you are losing contact with reality, because your body is your contact. Your body is your bridge. Your body is your temple.

 

Tantra teaches reverence for the body, love, respect for the body, gratitude for the body. The body is marvelous. It is the greatest of mysteries.

 

-Osho, "Tantric Transformation, #7"

 

 

 

 

Tantra Says, First Purify the Body

 

Tantra is really juicy, very alive.

 

The first thing is to learn respect for the body, to unlearn all the nonsense that has been taught to you about the body. Otherwise you will never turn on, and you will never turn in, and you will never turn beyond. Start from the beginning. The body is your beginning.

 

The body has to be purified of many repressions. A great catharsis is needed for the body, a great RECHANA. The body has become poisoned because you have been against it; you have repressed it in many ways. Your body is existing at the minimum, that's why you are miserable. Tantra says: Bliss is possible only when you exist at the optimum -- never before it. Bliss is possible only when you live intensely. How can you live intensely if you are against the body?

 

You are always lukewarm. The fire has cooled down. Down the centuries, the fire has been destroyed. The fire has to be rekindled. Tantra says: First purify the body -- purify it of all repressions. Allow the body energy to flow, remove the blocks.

 

It is very difficult to come across a person who has no blocks, it is very difficult to come across a person whose body is not tight. Loosen this tightness -- this tension is blocking your energy; the flow cannot be possible with this tension.

 

Why is everybody so uptight? Why can't you relax? Have you seen a cat sleeping, dozing in the afternoon? How simply and how beautifully the cat relaxes. Can't you relax the same way? You toss and turn in your bed, you can't relax. And the beauty of the cat's relaxation is that it relaxes utterly and yet is perfectly alert. A slight movement in the room and it will open its eyes, it will jump and be ready. It is not that it is just asleep. The cat's sleep is something to be learnt -- man has forgotten.

 

Tantra says: Learn from the cats -- how they sleep, how they relax, how they live in a non-tense way. And the whole animal world lives in that non-tense way. Man has to learn this, because man has been conditioned wrongly. Man has been programmed wrongly.

 

From the very childhood you have been programmed to be tight. You don't breathe... out of fear. Out of fear of sexuality, people don't breathe, because when you breathe deeply, your breath goes exactly to the sex centre and hits it, massages it from the inside, excites it. Because you have been taught that sex is dangerous, each child starts breathing in a shallow way -- hung up just in the chest. He never goes beyond that because if he goes beyond it, suddenly, there is excitement: sexuality is aroused and fear arises. The moment you breathe deeply, sex energy is released.

 

Sex energy HAS to be released. It has to flow all over your being. Then your body will become orgasmic. But afraid to breathe, so afraid that almost half the lungs are full of carbon dioxide...

 

-Osho, "Tantric Transformation, #7"

 

 

 

 

Tantra Is Not a Philosophy

 

Tantra is not a philosophy. Tantra is absolutely existential. And remember, when I say that Tantra is existential, I don't mean the existentialism of Sartre, Camus, Marcel, and others. That existentialism is again a philosophy, a philosophy of existence, but not the Tantra way. And the difference is vast.

 

The existential philosophers in the West have only stumbled upon the negative: anguish, ANGST, depression, sadness, anxiety, hopelessness, meaninglessness, purposelessness -- all the negatives. Tantra has stumbled upon all that is beautiful, joyful, blissful. Tantra says: Existence is an orgasm, an eternal orgasm going on and on and on. It is forever and forever an orgasm, an ecstasy.

 

They must be moving in different directions. Sartre goes on THINKING ABOUT existence. Tantra says: Thinking is not the door; it leads nowhere, it is a blind alley. It brings you only to a cul-de-sac.

 

Philosophy is great if you are just fooling around. Then philosophy is great: you can make mountains out of molehills and you can enjoy the trip. [....]

 

Philosophy is creating mountains out of molehills. You can go on and on -- there is no end to it. For at least five thousand years man has been philosophising about each and every thing: about the beginning, about the end, about the middle about each and every thing. And not a single question has been solved. Not a single, not the smallest, question has been solved or dissolved. Philosophy has proved to be the most futile of efforts. But still man continues, knowing perfectly well that it never delivers anything. Why? It goes on promising, but never delivers anything. Then why does man continue with this effort?

 

It is cheap. It does not require any involvement, it is not a commitment. You can sit in your chair and go on thinking. It is a dream. It does not require that you should change in order to see reality. That's where courage is needed; adventurous courage is needed. To know the truth, you are moving into the greatest adventure there is.. You may be lost, who knows'? You may never come back, who knows? Or you may come back utterly changed, and who knows whether it will be for the good or not?

 

The journey is unknown, the journey is so unknown that you cannot even plan it. You have to take a jump into it. Blindfolded, you have to take a jump into it, in the dark night, with no map, without knowing where you are going, without knowing what you are going for. Only a few daredevils enter into this existential quest.

 

So, Tantra has only appealed to a very few people, but those were the salt of the earth; Saraha is one of them.

 

-Osho, "The Tantra Vision, Vol 2, #9“

 

 

 

 

Saraha Is the Founder of Tantra

 

Saraha was born about two centuries after Buddha. He was in the direct line of a different branch. One branch moves from Mahakashyap to Bodhidharma and Zen is born -- and it is still full of flowers, that branch. Another branch moves from Buddha to his son, Rahul Bhadra, and from Rahul Bhadra to Sri Kirti, and from Sri Kirti to Saraha, and from Saraha to Nargarjuna -- that is the Tantra branch. It is still bearing fruit in Tibet.

 

Tantra converted Tibet, and Saraha is the founder of Tantra just as Bodhidharma is the founder of Zen. Bodhidharma conquered China, Korea, Japan. Saraha conquered Tibet.

 

These Songs of Saraha are of great beauty. They are the very foundation of Tantra. You will have to understand first the Tantra attitude towards life, the Tantra vision of life.

 

The most basic thing about Tantra is this -- and very radical, revolutionary, rebellious -- the basic vision is that the world is not pided into the lower and the higher, but that the world is one piece. The higher and the lower are holding hands. The higher includes the lower, and the lower includes the higher. The higher is hidden in the lower -- so the lower has not to be denied, has not to be condemned, has not to be destroyed or killed. The lower has to be transformed. The lower has to be allowed to move upwards... and the lower becomes the higher. There is no unbridgeable gap between the Devil and God -- the Devil is carrying God deep down in his heart. Once that heart starts functioning, the Devil becomes God.

 

That is the reason why the very root of the word'devil' means the same as'pine'. The word'devil' comes from'pine'; it is the pine not yet evolved, that's all. Not that the Devil is against the pine, not that the Devil is trying to destroy the pine -- in fact, the Devil is trying to find the pine. The Devil is on the way towards the pine; it is not the enemy, it is the seed. The pine is the tree fully in bloom and the Devil is the seed -- but the tree is hidden in the seed. And the seed is not against the tree; in fact, the tree cannot exist if the seed is not there. And the tree is not against the seed -- they are in deep friendship, they are together.

 

Poison and nectar are two phases of the same energy, so are life and death -- and so is everything: day and night, love and hate, sex and superconsciousness.

 

Tantra says: Never condemn anything -- the attitude of condemnation is the stupid attitude. By condemning something, you are denying yourself the possibility that would have become available to you if you had evolved the lower. Don't condemn the mud, because the lotus is hidden in the mud; use the mud to produce the lotus. Of course, the mud is not the lotus yet, but it can be. And the creative person, the religious person, will help the mud to release its lotus so that the lotus can be freed from the mud.

 

Saraha is the founder of the Tantra vision. It is of tremendous import, and particularly for the present moment in human history, because a new man is striving to be born, a new consciousness is knocking on the doors. And the future is going to be that of Tantra, because now no more dual attitudes can hold man's mind.

 

-Osho, “The Tantra Experience, #1”

 

 

 

 

Samadhi and Sex Are Both Expressions of the Same Energy

 

Tao has its own tantra. The first thing: Tao never pides into the lower and the higher, that is the beauty of it. The moment you pide reality into the lower and the higher you are getting schizophrenic. The moment you say something is sacred and something is profane you have pided. The moment you say something is material and something is spiritual you have pided, you have split reality. Reality is one. There is neither matter nor spirit. Reality is one. It expresses itself in many forms: on one level as matter, on another level as spiritual. The spiritual is not higher and the material is not lower -- they stand on the same level. That is the Taoist attitude. Life is one. Existence is one. It is a tremendous oneness and there is no evaluation.

 

The first thing in Tao is to drop duality. Sex is not lower and samadhi is not higher. Samadhi and sex are both expressions of the same energy. There is nothing laudable about samadhi and there is nothing condemnable about sex. The Tao acceptance is total, absolute. There is nothing wrong about the body and there is nothing beautiful about the spirit -- they are both beautiful. Devil and God are one in Tao, heaven and hell are one in Tao, good and bad are one in Tao -- it is the greatest non-dual understanding. There is no condemnation and no preparation. To prepare for what? One has simply to relax and be.

 

If you can love a woman spontaneously.... In fact, Tao will say that Tantra has a wrong attitude, because you have to prepare. Preparation means that you are preparing for the future. Tao knows only one time -- which is now; and only one place -- which is here. Now is the only time and here is the only place. Here is heaven and now is nirvana. So don't prepare.

 

-Osho, “Tao: The Pathless Path, Vol. 2, #4, Q1”

 

 

 

 

From Sex to Tantra: a Great Revolution

 

Now, one thing to be remembered always: if you are not very alert you may go on believing that you are moving into tantra, and you may be simply rationalizing your sexuality -- it may be nothing but sex, rationalized in the terminology of tantra. If you move into sex with awareness, it can turn into tantra. If you move into tantra with unawareness, it can fall and become ordinary sex. It has happened in India -- because only India has tried it.

 

All tantra schools in India, sooner or later, were reduced to sex orgies. It is very difficult to keep aware... it is almost impossible to keep aware. If from the very beginning the discipline has not gone very deep in you, there is every possibility that you will start deceiving yourself. Tantra schools arose in India with great energy, with great insight. And they had something -- because that is the last center humanly available: the seventh is superhuman, the seventh is pine. The sixth is the spiritual center.

 

From sex to tantra: a great revolution, a mutation, is possible in man. And in the Eat, people became aware that if you become meditative while making love, the quality of sex changes and something new enters into it -- it becomes tantric, it becomes prayerful, it becomes meditative... it becomes SAMADHI. And a natural flow happens: from the third you can jump to the sixth -- you can bypass the fourth and the fifth. It is a great temptation, a great leap -- you can bypass, a shortcut -- but dangerous too, because you may be simply deceiving yourself... and man is very clever -- very clever in finding rationalizations.

 

-Osho, “The pine Melody, #6, Q1”

 

 

 

 

Tantra Uses Sex to Rise Higher than It

 

Tantra uses sex to rise higher than it, but it uses it. Sex becomes instrumental. Bauls say that is not very respectful: "How can you USE some energy? How can you use some energy as a means?" They don't use sex as a means; they delight in it, they enjoy it. They make a worship out of it, but without any technique. It is not technological. They love it, and through love the transformation happens on its own accord.

 

In Tantra, you are to remain unattached. Even while using sex as a means to go towards SAMADHI, you have to remain unattached to sex, absolutely neutral, absolutely like an observer, a witness, just like a scientist working in his lab. In fact, Tantras say that Tantra techniques cannot be used with the woman you love, because love will be a disturbance. You will be too attached. You will not be able to remain detached and outside it. So Tantrics will find women with whom they are not in love at all so the attitude can remain absolutely of the observer.

 

-Osho, “The Beloved, Vol. 1, #1”

 

 

 

 

Tantra is the natural way; the loose and the natural is the goal.

 

It is very difficult to find a yogi who is not an egoist; very difficult, rare. If you can find a yogi who is not an egoist, it is a miracle. It is difficult because the whole effort creates the ego, the fight. You may find humble yogis, but if you watch a little deeper, in their humbleness you will find the most subtle ego hidden, the most subtle ego. They will say, "We are just dirt on the ground." But look in their eyes -- they are bragging about their humility. They are saying, "There is nobody more humble than us. We are the humblest people." But this is what ego means.

 

If you move against nature you will be strengthened in your ego -- that is the challenge, that's why people like challenges. A life without challenges becomes dull because the ego feels hungry. Ego needs food, challenge gives food -- so people seek challenges. If there are no challenges, they create them; they create hurdles so that they can fight with the hurdles.

 

Tantra is the natural way; the loose and the natural is the goal. You need not fight with the current; simply move with it, float with it. The river is going to the sea so why fight? Move with the river, become one with the river, surrender. "Surrender" is the keyword for tantra; "will" is the keyword for yoga. Yoga is the path of will; tantra is the path of surrender.

 

That's why tantra is the path of love -- love is surrender. This is the first thing to understand, then Tilopa's words will become very very crystal-clear. The different dimension of tantra has to be understood -- the vertical dimension, the dimension of surrender, of not fighting, of being loose and natural, relaxed -- what Chuang Tzu says, "Easy is right." With yoga, difficult is right; with tantra, easy is right.

 

Relax and be at ease, there is no hurry. The whole itself is taking you on its own accord. You need not make an inpidual striving, you are not asked to reach before your time, you will reach when the time is ripe -- you simply wait. The whole is moving -- why are you in a hurry? Why do you want to reach before others?

 

-Osho, “Tantra: The Supreme Understanding, #6”

 

 

 

 

Sex Energy Is Nothing But pine Energy

 

Christianity understands sex to be just a fall, and tantra thinks sex to be the right answer. Christianity and tantra are just opposed to each other. Not only Christianity: Jainism and many other religions are also opposed to sex. They are opposed for a reason. The reason is the fifty percent possibility of falling down. It is dangerous.

 

So try to travel in some other way where this fifty percent fall is not a possibility. And it is mathematically fifty percent. Actually it is ninety-nine percent, because sex is such an attraction and sex is such an unconscious force that it is difficult to remain alert, meditative. While experimenting in it, you will become unconscious. And if you become unconscious in orgasm it leads you nowhere.

 

Ninety-nine percent is the possibility that you will fall through sex. Only one percent is the possibility that you may rise. But tantra says that that percentage of fall can be reduced through right techniques and a man or a woman can be trained. Then making love becomes an art -- the greatest art. And if you know the art, then you approach very cautiously, very delicately. And then it is not just a temporary release, a relief. It becomes a sacred worship.

 

So tantra trains people first to be nonsexual. Tantra teaches first to come to a point where sex is not a madness for you. Tantra first teaches you to be totally unattached, without desire. A nude woman, a beautiful woman will be sitting before a tantric seeker, a SADHAK, and he has to contemplate on her, on her beauty, but as a pine force. And he has to go on watching inside that no lust arises. If lust arises the point is lost.

 

This is the most difficult thing. For months together the seeker is to practice going beyond lust. And when a beautiful woman appears just like a beautiful flower and he has no lust in the mind, only then will the master allow the seeker to approach this beautiful woman without lust, to enter this woman without lust. Then it becomes a meditation, and the orgasm becomes cosmic. Then inpiduals are not there because inpiduals exist through desire, lust and passion. Then love happens and this love is prayer. And through each other they have entered the greater depth that encompasses all.

 

Sex can give you the answer and if you have become too intellectual then ONLY sex can give you the answer. Any intellectual age will have to ask through sex. If you have moved too much in the head you will have to fall back to the other extreme. Only then do your two opposites within meet and you become a unity. [....]

 

Through deep sex experience, meditative sex experience, you will come to know that this sex energy is nothing but pine energy. Then sex becomes samadhi.

 

-Osho, “The Supreme Doctrine, #14”

 

 

 

 

Tantra Is Not a Religion

 

Remember, that is the basic difference between other religions and tantra. Tantra is not a religion, because religion basically means: for the pine against the animal -- so every religion is part of the conflict. Tantra is not a struggle technique, it is a transcendence technique. It is not to fight with the animal, it is not for the pine. It is against all duality. It is neither for nor against really. It is simply creating a third force within you, a third center of existence where you are neither animal nor pine. For tantra that third point is ADVAITA, that third point is non-duality.

 

Tantra says you cannot reach the one by fighting through duality. You cannot come to a non-dual point by choosing one thing in the struggle in duality. Choice will not lead you to the one; only a choiceless witnessing.

 

This is very foundational to tantra, and because of this tantra was never really understood rightly. It has suffered a long, a centuries-old misunderstanding, because the moment tantra says it is not against the animal, you start feeling as if tantra is for the animal. And the moment tantra says it is not for the pine, you then start thinking that tantra is against the pine.

 

Really, tantra is for a choiceless witnessing. Don't be with the animal, don't be with the pine, and don't create a conflict. Just go back, just go away, just create a gap between you and this duality and become a third force, a witnessing, from where you can see both the animal and the pine.

 

-Osho, “The Book of Secrets, #59”

 

 

 

 

Tantra Says Sex Is Sex

 

Tantra says that "What is basic for others is poisonous for us." For example, there are teachings which are based on non-violence. They say violence is bad, non-violence is good. Tantra says that non-violence is non-violence, violence is violence; nothing is good and nothing is bad.

 

There are teachings which are based on celibacy -- BRAHMACHARYA. They say that BRAHMACHARYA is good, sex is bad. Tantra says sex is sex, BRAHMACHARYA is BRAHMACHARYA. One is a BRAHMACHARI and one is not. But these are simple facts, no values are attached to them. And tantra will never say that BRAHMACHARYA is good -- the celibate is good -- and that the one who is in sex is bad. Tantra will not say that. Tantra accepts things as they are. And why? Just to create a unity within you.

 

This is a technique to create a unity within you, to have a total existence within, unpided, non-conflicting, not opposed. Only then is silence possible. One who is trying to move to some place against something can never be at peace. How can he be? And one who is pided within himself, fighting with himself, how can he win? It is impossible. You are both, so who is going to win? No one is going to win, and you will be at loss because you will dissipate your energy in fighting unnecessarily. This is a technique to create a unity in yourself. Allow valleys to disappear; don't judge.

 

Jesus says somewhere, "Judge ye not so that ye may not be judged." But this was impossible for the Jews to understand, because the whole Jewish conception is morality oriented: "This is good and that is not good." Jesus in his teaching, "Judge ye not," is talking in terms of tantra. If he was murdered, crucified, it is because of this. He had a tantra attitude -- "Judge ye not."

 

So don't say that a prostitute is bad -- who knows? and don't say that a puritan is good. Who knows? And ultimately they both are part of one game. They are based on each other -- on a mutual existence. So Jesus says, "Judge ye not," and this is what this sutra means: "Judge ye not so that ye may not be judged."

 

If you are non-judging, not taking any moral standpoint, simply observing facts as they are, not interpreting them according to yourself, then you cannot be judged. You are transformed completely. Now there is no need for YOU to be judged by any pine power -- there is no need! You have become pine yourself; you have become God yourself. Be a witness, not a judge.

 

-Osho, “Vigyan Bhairav Tantra, Vol 2, #1”

 

 

 

 

Tantra starts with you as you are

 

Tantra says, sex is very deep because it is life. But you can be interested in tantra for the wrong reasons. Do not be interested in tantra for wrong reasons, and then you will not feel that tantra is dangerous. Then tantra is life transforming.

 

Some tantric methods have been used by yoga also, but with a conflict, a fighting attitude. Tantra uses the same methods, but with a very loving attitude -- and that makes a great difference. The very quality of the technique changes. The technique becomes different because the whole background is different.

 

It has been asked, "What is the central subject matter of tantra?" The answer is you! You are the central subject matter of tantra: what you are right now and what is hidden in you that can grow, what you are and what you can be. Right now you are a sex unit, and unless this unit is understood deeply you cannot become a spirit, you cannot become a spiritual unit. Sexuality and spirituality are two ends of one energy.

 

Tantra starts with you as you are; yoga starts with what your possibility is. Yoga starts with the end; tantra starts with the beginning. And it is good to start with the beginning. It is always good to begin with the beginning, because if the end is made the beginning, then you are creating unnecessary misery for yourself. You are not the end -- not the ideal. You have to become a god, the ideal, and you are just an animal. And this animal goes berserk because of the ideal of the god; it goes mad, it goes crazy.

 

Tantra says, forget the god. If you are the animal, understand this animal in its totality. In that understanding itself, the god will grow. And if it cannot grow through that understanding then forget it, it can never be. Ideals cannot bring your possibilities out; only the knowledge of the real will help. So you are the central subject matter of tantra, as you are and as you can become, your actuality and your possibility -- they are the subject matter.

 

Sometimes people get worried. If you go to understand tantra God is not discussed, moksha -- liberation -- is not discussed, nirvana is not discussed. What type of religion is tantra? Tantra discusses things which make you feel disgusted, which you do not want to discuss. Who wants to discuss sex? Everyone thinks he knows about it. Because you can reproduce, you think you know.

 

No one wants to discuss sex and sex is everyone's problem. No one wants to discuss love because everyone feels he is a great lover already. And look at your life! It is just hatred and nothing else. And whatsoever you call love is nothing but a relaxation, a little relaxation, of the hatred. Look around you, and then you will know what you know about love.

 

-Osho, “Vigyan Bhairav Tantra, Vol 1, #32, Q1”

 

 

 

 

Tantra Says, Know the Body

 

So those traditions which are against sex will be against the body. Those traditions which are not against sex can only be friendly toward the body. Tantra is absolutely friendly, and tantra says that the body is sacred, holy. For tantra, to condemn the body is a sacrilege. To say that the body is impure or to say that the body is sin is nonsense for tantra - a very poisonous teaching. Tantra accepts the body - not only accepts it, but says that the body is holy, pure, innocent. You can use it and you can make it a vehicle, a medium, to go beyond! It helps even in going beyond.

 

But if you start fighting with body, you are lost. If you start fighting with it, you will become more and more diseased. And if you go on fighting with it, you will miss an opportunity. Fighting is negative; tantra is a positive transformation. Do not fight with it -- there is no need. It is as if you are sitting in a car and you start fighting with the car. Then you cannot move because you are fighting with the vehicle -- which has to be used, not fought against. And you will destroy the vehicle by your fighting, and then it will be more and more difficult to move.

 

The body is a beautiful vehicle - very mysterious, very complex. Use it, do not fight with it. Help it. The moment you go against it you are going against yourself. It is as if a man wants to reach somewhere, but he fights with his own legs and cuts them. Tantra says, know the body and know the secrets of it. Know the energies of it and know how those energies can be transformed - how they can be moved and turned into different dimensions.

 

For example, take sex, which is the basic energy in the body. Ordinarily, sex energy is just used for reproduction. One body creates another body and it goes on. The biological utility of sex energy is only in reproduction. But that is only one of the uses, and the lowest. No condemnation is implied, but it is the lowest. The same energy can do other creative acts also. Reproduction is a basic creative act -- you create something. That is why a woman feels a subtle well-being when she becomes a mother: she has created something. [....]

 

Tantra says, if you move into meditation sex will disappear completely; it can disappear completely. The whole energy is being absorbed at higher centers -- and your body has many centers. Sex is the lowest center, and man exists at the lowest center. The more energy moves higher, the more the higher centers begin to flower. When the same energy comes to the heart, then it becomes love. When the same energy comes higher still, new dimensions and new experiences begin to flower. And when the same energy is at the highest, at the last peak in your body, it has reached that which tantra calls SAHASRAR - the last chakra in the head.

 

Sex is the lowest chakra and sahasrar is the highest, and between these two the sex energy moves. It can be released from the sex center. When it is released from the sex center you become a cause to reproduce someone else. When the same energy is released from the sahasrar, from the head into the cosmos, you give a new birth to yourself. It is also reproduction, but not biologically. Then it is spiritually a reproduction; then you are reborn. In India we used to call such a person "twice-born" - DWIJ. Now he has given himself a new birth. The same energy has moved.

 

Tantra has no condemnations, only secret techniques for how to transform. That is why tantra talks so much about the body -- it is needed. The body has to be understood, and you can start only from where you are.

 

-Osho, “Vigyan Bhairav Tantra, Vol 1, #20, Q2”

 

 

 

 

Tantra Accepts Everything

 

Tantra accepts everything. Whatsoever is, is accepted wholeheartedly. That is why tantra could accept sex totally. For five thousand years tantra has been the only tradition which has accepted sex totally, the only one all over the world. Why? Because sex is the point where you are, and any movement is going to be from the point where you are.

 

You are at the sex center; your energy is at the sex center. And from that point it has to move up, far beyond. If you reject the center itself, then you can go on deceiving yourself that you are moving, but you cannot move. Then you are rejecting the only point from where movement is possible. So tantra accepts the body, accepts sex, accepts everything. And tantra says, wisdom accepts everything and transforms it; only ignorance rejects. Only ignorance rejects -- wisdom accepts everything. Even a poison can become a medicine, but only through wisdom.

 

The body can become a vehicle to that which is beyond body, and sex energy can become a spiritual force. And remember, when you ask, "what are the reasons that the body is given so much importance in tantra?" why do you ask? Why?

 

You are born as a body; you live as a body; you become ill as a body; you are treated, given medicine, helped, made whole and healthy, as a body. You become young as a body, you will become old as a body, you will die as a body. Your whole life is body-centered - centered around the body. You will love someone. You will make love to someone and you will create other bodies; you will reproduce other bodies.

 

What are you doing the whole life? Preserving yourself. What are you preserving with food, with water, with shelter? The body is preserved. What are you doing by reproducing children? The body is being reproduced. The whole life, ninety-nine point nine percent, is body-oriented. You can go beyond, but that journey has to be through the body, by the body, and you have to use the body. But why do you ask? Because the body is just the outer thing. Deep down the body is a symbol of sex.

 

So those traditions which are against sex will be against the body. Those traditions which are not against sex can only be friendly toward the body. Tantra is absolutely friendly, and tantra says that the body is sacred, holy. For tantra, to condemn the body is a sacrilege. To say that the body is impure or to say that the body is sin is nonsense for tantra - a very poisonous teaching. Tantra accepts the body - not only accepts it, but says that the body is holy, pure, innocent. You can use it and you can make it a vehicle, a medium, to go beyond! It helps even in going beyond.

 

But if you start fighting with body, you are lost. If you start fighting with it, you will become more and more diseased. And if you go on fighting with it, you will miss an opportunity. Fighting is negative; tantra is a positive transformation. Do not fight with it -- there is no need. It is as if you are sitting in a car and you start fighting with the car. Then you cannot move because you are fighting with the vehicle -- which has to be used, not fought against. And you will destroy the vehicle by your fighting, and then it will be more and more difficult to move.

 

The body is a beautiful vehicle - very mysterious, very complex. Use it, do not fight with it. Help it. The moment you go against it you are going against yourself. It is as if a man wants to reach somewhere, but he fights with his own legs and cuts them. Tantra says, know the body and know the secrets of it. Know the energies of it and know how those energies can be transformed - how they can be moved and turned into different dimensions.

 

-Osho, “Vigyan Bhairav Tantra, Vol 1, #20, Q2”

 

 

 

 

Tantra Says, Accept Whatsoever You Are

 

Tantra says, accept whatsoever you are. This is the basic note -- total acceptance. And only through total acceptance can you grow. Then use every energy you have. How can you use them? Accept them, then find out what these energies are -- what is sex, what is this phenomenon. We are not acquainted with it. We know many things about sex, taught by others. We may have passed through the sex act, but with a guilty mind, with a suppressive attitude, in haste, in a hurry. Something has to be done in order to become unburdened. The sex act is not a loving act. You are not happy in it, but you cannot leave it. The more you try to leave it, the more attractive it becomes. The more you want to negate it, the more you feel invited.

 

You cannot negate it, but this attitude to negate, to destroy, destroys the very mind, the very awareness, the very sensitivity which can understand it. So sex goes on with no sensitivity into it. Then you cannot understand it. Only a deep sensitivity can understand anything; only a deep feeling, a deep moving into it, can understand anything. You can understand sex only if you move in it as a poet moves amidst flowers -- only then! If you feel guilty about flowers, you may pass through the garden, but you will pass with closed eyes. And you will be in a hurry, in a deep, mad haste. Somehow you have to go out of the garden. Then how can you be aware?

 

So tantra says, accept whatsoever you are. You are a great mystery of many multidimensional energies. Accept it, and move with every energy with deep sensitivity, with awareness, with love, with understanding. Move with it! Then every desire becomes a vehicle to go beyond it. Then every energy becomes a help. And then this very world is nirvana, this very body is a temple -- a holy temple, a holy place.

 

Yoga is negation; tantra is affirmation. Yoga thinks in terms of duality -- that is the reason for the word `yoga'. It means to put two things together, to `yoke' two things together. But two things are there; the duality is there. Tantra says there is no duality. If there is duality, then you cannot put them together. And howsoever you try they will remain two. Howsoever put together they will remain two, and the fight will continue, the dualism will remain.

 

If the world and the pine are two, then they cannot be put together. If really they are not two, if they are only appearing as two, only then can they be one. If your body and your soul are two, then they cannot be put together. If you and God are two, then there is no possibility of putting them together. They will remain two.

 

Tantra says there is no duality; it is only an appearance. So why help appearance to grow stronger? Tantra asks, why help this appearance of duality to grow stronger? Dissolve it this very moment! Be one! Through acceptance you become one, not through fight. Accept the world, accept the body, accept everything that is inherent in it. Do not create a different center in yourself, because for tantra that different center is nothing but the ego. Do not create an ego. Just be aware of what you are. If you fight, then the ego will be there.

 

So it is difficult to find a yogi who is not an egoist. And yogis may go on talking about egolessness, but they cannot be egoless. The very process they go through creates the ego. The fight is the process. If you fight, you are bound to create an ego. And the more you fight, the more strengthened the ego will be. And if you win your fight, then you will achieve the supreme ego.

 

Tantra says, no fight! Then there is no possibility of the ego. If we understand tantra there will be many problems, because for us, if there is no fight there is only indulgence. No fight means indulgence for us. Then we become afraid. We have indulged for lives together and we have reached nowhere. But for tantra indulgence is not "our" indulgence. Tantra says indulge, but be aware.

 

You are angry... tantra will not say do not be angry. Tantra will say be angry wholeheartedly, but be aware. Tantra is not against anger, tantra is only against spiritual sleepiness, spiritual unconsciousness. Be aware AND be angry. And this is the secret of the method -- that if you are aware anger is transformed: it becomes compassion. So tantra says anger is not your enemy; it is compassion in seed form. The same anger, the same energy, will become compassion.

 

If you fight with it, then there will be no possibility for compassion. So if you succeed in fighting, in suppression, you will be a dead man. There will be no anger because you have suppressed it, but there will be no compassion either because only anger can be transformed into compassion. If you succeed in your suppression -- which is impossible -- then there will be no sex, but no love either, because with sex dead there is no energy to grow into love. So you will be without sex, but you will also be without love. And then the whole point is missed, because without love there is no pineness, without love there is no liberation, and without love there is no freedom.

 

Tantra says that these same energies are to be transformed. It can be said in this way: if you are against the world, then there is no nirvana -- because this world itself is to be transformed into nirvana. Then you are against the basic energies which are the source.

 

So tantric alchemy says, do not fight, be friendly with all the energies that are given to you. Welcome them. Feel grateful that you have anger, that you have sex, that you have greed. Feel grateful because these are the hidden sources, and they can be transformed, they can be opened. And when sex is transformed it becomes love. The poison is lost, the ugliness is lost.

 

The seed is ugly, but when it becomes alive it sprouts and flowers. Then there is beauty. Do not throw away the seed, because then you are also throwing the flowers in it. They are not there yet, not yet manifest so that you can see them. They are unmanifest, but they are there. Use this seed so that you can attain to flowers. So first let there be acceptance, a sensitive understanding and awareness. Then indulgence is allowed.

 

One thing more which is really very strange, but one of the deepest discoveries of tantra, and that is: whatsoever you take as your enemies -- greed, anger, hate, sex, whatsoever -- your attitude that they are enemies makes them your enemies. Take them as pine gifts and approach them with a very grateful heart. For example, tantra has developed many techniques for the transformation of sexual energy. Approach the sex act as if you are approaching the temple of the pine. Approach the sex act as if it is prayer, as if it is meditation. Feel the holiness of it.

 

That is why in Khajuraho, in Puri, in Konark, every temple has MAITHUN, intercourse sculptures. The sex act on the walls of temples seems illogical, particularly for Christianity, for Islam, for Jainism. It seems inconceivable, contradictory. How is the temple connected with maithun pictures? On the outer walls of the Khajuraho temples, every conceivable type of sex act is pictured in stone. Why? In a temple it doesn't have any place, in our minds at least. Christianity cannot conceive of a church wall with Khajuraho pictures. Impossible!

 

-Osho, “Vigyan Bhairav Tantra, Vol 1, #2, Q1”