Question 4:
Osho,
Why did the great masters of tantra call their teaching "the whispered transmission"?
The system of tantra is one of the most important things that has ever happened in the history of man. Everything else is secondary because tantra is an effort to transform living energy into its ultimate form, of enlightenment. But because the living energy is sexual, tantra became condemned - condemned by the sex-repressive society, the sex-repressive religions. It became so condemned that tantrikas have suffered more than any other system of thinkers, philosophers, seekers.
One Indian king, Vikramaditya, killed ten thousand couples. It was a special sect of tantrikas, really daring people. A man and a woman lived in one robe, naked. Inside they were naked - just covered by one robe. They used to wear a blue robe, signifying that "because of the stupid society we have to wear something; otherwise the sky is our only robe" - hence the blue color. Because of the blue color they were called neela tantrikas. Neela means blue.
The couples moved around the country teaching, but what they were teaching was too outrageous for the mediocre mind to understand. Vikramaditya ordered that not a single neela couple should be left alive. Ten thousand couples - that means twenty thousand people - were simply massacred.
They were massacred all over India, wherever they were. Not a single one was left alive.
Other sects of tantrikas had to hide in the forests to do their meditation of transforming energy.
The society at large was absolutely against these people. Their scriptures were burned. The most valuable scriptures in the world have been burned. Only a few rare unburned copies have survived somehow. Naturally they started calling their teaching a "whispered teaching."
Jesus says to his followers, "Go and shout from every housetop to the people that the son of God is here. Spread the message." Why are the tantrikas saying that their teaching is the whispered teaching? They have suffered much; Jesus knows nothing about that. Thousands of their masters have been killed, but the teaching itself was so powerful and so practical, so scientific, that it went on attracting intelligent people. But they had to decide that their teaching had to be just a whispering:
"Don't say it aloud; otherwise you will be killed." And what is the point? It was a very different situation.
When you kill a man like Socrates, his death becomes a condemnation of the whole society for centuries. As long as humanity will live, the Greeks will not be able to erase the condemnation which is written on their faces - that they poisoned their best, their highest, flowering.
But in India the situation was very different. There was not one Socrates, there were many. Each school had its own Socrates, one or many. The siddhas have eighty-four masters. Even to remember their names is difficult. I have tried many times to remember their names, but eighty-four names is difficult. At the most I can remember a few who were very prominent, and who have left some scriptures: Siddhapad, Konapad... and I have spoken on the sutras of Saripad - that is Sarapa, called lovingly Sarahapa.
Jainas have twenty-four tirthankaras, all masters of the same caliber and quality as Socrates. Hindus have their own masters, and Hindus have many sects. India was full of enlightened people, because the whole genius of India moved in one direction and that was to enlightenment. Everything else suffered, but enlightenment became the only challenge for anybody who was a genius.
The tantrikas were killed, burned alive, but nobody has taken note of it for the simple reason that there were so many people. Socrates was alone. Never again could the Greeks manage to produce another Socrates. Jesus was alone. Neither the Jews nor the Christians have been able to produce another Jesus.
The situation in India was totally different. Naturally the tantrikas decided to whisper their teaching.
"Don't shout. You will be killed, and it will not serve any purpose as far as spreading the teaching is concerned."
And they were right. In that situation in India that was the best they could do to keep their teaching alive - whispering from master to teacher. They stopped even writing because that was dangerous.
So just talking to the disciple in secrecy, in private, the master gave him the message: "Our whole philosophy is a whispered philosophy, so never go to the masses. Don't try to change them. It is enough that you have changed. It is more than enough if you can change a few other people.
But unless you are aware that those people are friendly, loving, and will not betray you, don't say anything." And they started living in disguise.
Still there are tantrikas, but you cannot enquire, "I want to meet a tantra master." Nobody can help you. You will have to find him yourself, moving in the areas where they are suspected - in Bengal, in Bihar. Those are the two provinces that have been their stronghold. You have to move, meeting many people. Perhaps you may find some clue. Somebody may whisper to you, "I will take you to the master."
The same thing happened after al-Hillaj Mansoor was killed. Sufis went underground, particularly the Sufis of the same school as al-Hillaj. Now, if you want to find a Sufi master it is not easy. You have to look for him for months, not knowing if anybody exists as a Sufi master or not. But you go on going to restaurants, talking about the fact that you have come here to find a Sufi master. In shops, in markets - anywhere you meet somebody - you just go on throwing your arrows in the dark.
Somebody may say, "Are you really interested? I can take you to my master. You meet me at a certain place in the night." It may take two or three years to find such a man. And he takes you to the master in the night. They meet in secrecy.
And the master is sitting there. They use only white wool robes; that's why they are called Sufis: suf means wool. So the master is sitting there in a white woolen robe, and twenty or thirty disciples in the same kind of robes are sitting there, and you are introduced to the master.
He asks, "How long have you been enquiring about me? - because this is not the first man who has informed me about you. Many others have informed me. But patience is needed. I was waiting to see whether you have enough patience, and then I allowed this man today... I told him, ?He has been waiting for three years, moving here and there without any direction, asking about a Sufi master. You bring him to me!' "
The organized religions have killed the real religious people, and they have used organized religions to exploit the masses. They pretend to be the really religious people. The reality is, the real ones have been killed by these same people. These are criminals.
Now when Vikramaditya killed twenty thousand people... They had done no harm to anybody - what business is it of yours if they like to be naked under one gown? Everybody is naked under his gown.
And if they choose to live together in one gown... It was a tantra method: if a woman and a man simply remain in one gown, their energies continuously go on making a certain organic whole and that organic whole can be used for higher development.
And they were not harming anybody - it was just the same crime, that of corrupting the youth.
Seeing them in this position, the youth will start having the same kind of clothes and that will destroy the whole dignity of the society, the respectability of the society. I don't see how it can destroy the morality of the society. But you don't allow people to be themselves, so anybody who is trying to be an individual has to be destroyed. Hence the tantrikas started working silently, in a whispered way.
-Osho, "The Path of the Mystic : #36, Q4"