Transcription
From Darkness to LightAnswers to the Seekers on the PathTalks given from 28/02/85 pm to 31/03/85 pmEnglish Discourse series
CHAPTER 1Who says humanity needs saving?28 February 1985 pm in Lao Tzu GroveQuestion 1BELOVED OSHO,HOW CAN WE SAVE HUMANITY FROM FALLING EVEN MORE?It is one of the trade secrets of all the religions to propose propaganda that humanity has to besaved.It is a very strange idea, but it is so old that nobody seems to look into the implications. Nobody askswhy you are worried about saving humanity. And you have been saving humanity for thousands ofyears, but nothing seems to be saved.In the first place, does humanity need any saving?To answer this question all the religions have created an absolutely fictitious idea of the original fall,because unless there is a fall the question of saving does not arise. And the religious conception ofthe original fall is just rubbish.Man has been evolving – not falling – in every possible way. The only way the original fall can besupported is by the idea of evolution proposed by Charles Darwin; but religions cannot use that –they are very much offended. Charles Darwin’s idea certainly can be put in such a way – at least bythe monkeys if not by man – that it was an original fall. Certainly if man has evolved out of monkeyshe must have fallen from the trees, and the monkeys who did not fall must have laughed at these2
CHAPTER 1. WHO SAYS HUMANITY NEEDS SAVING?idiots who had fallen. And there is a possibility that these were the weaker monkeys who could notsurvive in the trees.In monkeys there exists a hierarchy. Perhaps the same mind and the same hierarchy are carried byman too; it is the same mind. If you see monkeys sitting in a tree you can know who’s the chief: hewill be at the top of the tree. Then there will be a big group of ladies, his harem – the most beautiful,young. After that will be a third group.I was thinking about this third group for many days but I had no word for it. In India we call that groupthe chamchas. Chamcha means a spoon, and these people are suckers. Just the way you take,with a spoon, things out of a bottle, they go on taking things – power, money – from those who have.Of course, they have to buttress these people, they have to praise these people.But Devaraj has sent by coincidence today the right word – because chamcha cannot be exactlytranslated; ”spoon” loses all meaning. He has sent me a word which is Californian: the brownnose.And he sent me the Webster’s dictionary also because I might not understand what a brownnose is;and certainly I would not have understood what a brownnose is.He sent a note also, thinking perhaps that even the dictionary may not be helpful because Websterwrites it in such a way that it does not look in any way obscene, dirty. So he sent me a note also: ”InEurope we call these people ‘arse-kissers’.” That’s exactly the meaning of chamchas.The chief on the top, then the harem of the ladies whom he controls, then the brownnoses! Andthen you come down to lower categories of the hierarchy. On the lowest branches are the poorestmonkeys, without girlfriends, boyfriends – servants. But perhaps from this very group humanity hasgrown.Even in this group there may have been a few people who were so weak that they could not evenmanage to stay on the lowest branches. They were pushed, pulled, thrown, and somehow theyfound themselves fallen onto the earth. That is the original fall.Monkeys still go on laughing at man. Certainly if you think from the monkey’s side, a monkey walkingon two legs . if you are a monkey and you think from its side, seeing a monkey walking on two legs,you will think, ”Has he joined a circus or something? And what happened to the poor guy? He justlives on the ground; he never comes to the trees, the wild freedom of the trees, the higher status ofthe trees. This is really the fallen one, the downtrodden.”Except for this, religions don’t have any logical support for the idea of the original fall. Stories theyhave, but stories are not arguments, stories are not proofs. And stories can have just the oppositemeaning to that which you wanted to give to them. For example, the original fall in Christianity makesGod the real culprit, and if anybody needs saving it is the Christian God.A father preventing his children from being wise, from living forever, is certainly insane. Even theworst father would like his children to be wise, intelligent. Even the cruelest father would like hischildren to live forever.But God prevents man from eating of two trees – the tree of knowledge and the tree of eternal life.This seems to be a strange kind of God; it is not in any way possible to conceive Him as fatherly.From Darkness to Light3Osho
CHAPTER 1. WHO SAYS HUMANITY NEEDS SAVING?He seems to be the enemy of man. Who needs saving? Your God is jealous: that’s what was theargument of the devil who came in the form of a serpent and seduced the mind of Eve.To me, there are many significant things to be understood. Why did he choose Eve and not Adam?He could have chosen Adam directly, but men by nature are less sensitive, less vulnerable, morearrogant, egoistic. Adam may not even have liked to have a conversation with a serpent, may havethought it was below his dignity. And to be persuaded by a serpent’s argument would have beenimpossible for man. He would have argued against him; he would have struggled, fought – becauseto agree with someone seems to the ego as if you are defeated.The ego knows only disagreement, struggle, victory or defeat – as if there is no other way, as if thereare only two ways: victory and defeat. For the ego certainly there are only two ways.But for a sensitive soul there is only one way – to understand whatever is true. It is not a question ofme and you, it is not a question of somebody being defeated or victorious. The question is: What isthe truth?The woman was not interested in arguing. She listened and she found that it was perfectly right.Wisdom was prohibited because, the serpent said, ”God does not want man to become godlike, andif you are wise you will be godlike. And once you are wise it will not be very difficult for you to findthe tree of eternal life.”It is really the other side of wisdom – eternity. And if you are wise and you have eternal life, thenwho bothers about God? What has He got that you have not got? Just to keep you a slave, eternallydependent – never allowing you to become a knowing being, never allowing you to taste somethingof the eternal – in this vast garden of Eden He has prohibited only two trees. The argument wassimply a statement of the fact.Now, the person who brings the truth to humanity is condemned as the devil; and the person whowas preventing humanity from knowing the truth, from knowing life, is praised as God. But the priestscan live only with this kind of God; the devil will destroy them completely.If God Himself becomes useless, futile, by man becoming wise and having eternal life, what aboutthe priests? What about all the religions, the churches, the temples, the synagogues? What aboutthese millions of people who are just parasites sucking humanity’s blood in every possible way?They can exist only with that kind of God. Naturally the person who should be condemned as thedevil is praised as God, and the person who should be praised as God is condemned as the devil.Just try to see the story without any prejudice; just try to understand it from many aspects. This isonly one of the aspects but it is of tremendous importance – because if God becomes the devil, thedevil becomes God: then there is no original fall. If Adam and Eve had declined the devil’s wiseadvice, that would have been the fall, and then there would have been a need to save man. But theydid not decline. And the serpent was certainly wise, certainly wiser than your God.Just see. Anybody knows, even a very mediocre person knows, that if you say to children, ”Don’teat that fruit: you can eat anything that is available in the house but don’t eat that fruit” – the childrenwill become absolutely disinterested in all kinds of foods; their only interest will be in that fruit whichhas been prohibited.From Darkness to Light4Osho
CHAPTER 1. WHO SAYS HUMANITY NEEDS SAVING?Prohibition is invitation.The God of this story seems to be absolutely a fool. The garden was huge, with millions of trees.If He had not said anything about these two trees I don’t think even by now man would have beenable to find those two trees. But He started His religious sermons with this sermon. This is the firstsermon: ”Don’t eat from these two trees.” He pointed out the trees: ”These are the two trees thatyou have to avoid.” This is provocation.Who says that the devil seduced Adam and Eve? It was God! Even without the devil, I say to youAdam and Eve would have eaten those fruits. The devil is not needed; God has done the workHimself. Sooner or later it would have been impossible to resist the temptation. Why should Godprevent them?All efforts to make people obedient simply lead them into disobedience. All efforts to enslave peoplemake them more and more strong to rebel, to be free.Even Sigmund Freud knows more psychology than your God, and Sigmund Freud is a Jew, just inthe same tradition of Adam and Eve. Adam and Eve are his forefathers’ forefathers’ forefathers, butsomewhere the same bloodstream is flowing. Sigmund Freud is more intelligent; and in fact there isno need for much intelligence to see a simple fact.In my childhood, in my neighborhood, lived the richest man of the city. He had the only palatialbuilding – all marble. Around his house there was a beautiful garden, lawn. One day I was standingjust outside his fence, and he was telling something to his gardener. I told him, ”Dada” – he wasknown as dada; dada means big brother. The whole town called him Dada, even people who wereolder than him, because he was rich.I said to him, ”You should remember one thing. Put a few posters around the garden that nobodyshould urinate here, because I have seen a few people urinating around your house.” And it was agood place to urinate because a big garden, trees . you could go behind them.He said, ”That’s right!” The next day he painted a few instructions around the garden: ”No PissingAllowed” – and since that day the whole town has been pissing around his house! He came to seemy father. He said, ”Where is your boy? – he has made my house hell. And who has said to himthat he has to advise me?”My father said, ”But what advice has he given to you? If you had asked me I would have told younever to listen to him; it always leads into some trouble. What happened?”He said, ”Nothing. I was just talking to the gardeners. He said, ‘Dada, I have seen a few peopleurinating.’ I have never seen them myself, my gardeners said, ‘We have never seen anybody,’ butthe idea struck me that it is true: huge trees, bushes . people may be urinating in my garden oraround my garden. This is not to be allowed anymore. So he suggested to me to make a few postersaround the house: ‘No Pissing Allowed.’ So I did that, and since that day the whole town is pissingaround my garden. Where is your boy?”My father said, ”It is very difficult to know where he is. Whenever he comes, he comes; whenever hegoes, he goes. He is not under our control. But if he has started giving advice to you, he will comeFrom Darkness to Light5Osho
CHAPTER 1. WHO SAYS HUMANITY NEEDS SAVING?to give more advice – don’t be worried. If his one piece of advice has worked, he will come; you justwait. And if he comes and I find him, I will bring him to you.”My father caught hold of me in the evening and he said, ”You come. Why did you give this advice?”I said, ”My advice was to prohibit people. Nobody can say that my advice is wrong – I have seen itwritten in many places. And yes, it is true I have seen people pissing there; that’s how I got the idea.And I have enquired why people have started pissing.”They say, ‘When we read the board suddenly the urge . we remember that the bladder is full;otherwise we were engaged in other kinds of things and other thoughts were there. Who thinks ofthe bladder? When it becomes absolutely necessary, then only one thinks of it.”‘But when we look at these boards suddenly the bladder becomes the most important thing, andone feels the place is good, that’s why the board has been put there – people must be pissing here.And we see that there are many marks, many people have pissed already, so we feel it is perfectlyright.’”It is a simple thing: If you prohibit anything, you provoke, you give a challenge.In India it is not any legal problem to urinate anywhere, wherever you can manage: there is freedomof urination. When I was nearabout ten or eleven years old my father became very sick so we hadto take him to a very good hospital, far away in Indore.The hospital in Indore was famous all over the country. We had to live there for six months. Justat the entrance of the hospital was a board: ”No Urination Permitted. Anybody Disobeying Will BeProsecuted.” And there used to stand a policeman. To me that was even more provocative. Theboard was enough but a policeman with a gun standing there!The very first day my father entered hospital and we were given quarters in the hospital to live in, Icould not resist; it was impossible. The board alone was enough but to put a policeman there with agun – this was too much. I went directly.The policeman was standing there; he looked at me. He could not believe it because it had neverhappened: I pissed!He said, ”What are you doing? Can’t you read?”I said, ”I can read – better than you.”And he said, ”Can’t you see me with this gun?”I said, ”I can see that too. It is because of your gun and this board – otherwise I had no need.My house is just a two-minute walk from here, and I have just come from the bathroom. It is reallydifficult to piss because my bladder is empty. But I cannot avoid the temptation.”He said, ”You will ha
From Darkness to Light 4 Osho. CHAPTER 1. WHO SAYS HUMANITY NEEDS SAVING? Prohibition is invitation. The God of this story seems to be absolutely a fool. The garden was huge, with millions of trees. If He had not said anything about these two trees I don’t think even by now man would have been able to find those two trees. But He started His religious sermons with this sermon. This is the .
