Press interviews show Osho was blind to what was going on at The Ranch. He was outrageous, contradictory, and sometimes factually wrong. But he was still a great teacher, writes Lokesh.
For lack of something to read on a rainy afternoon I had a rummage in a dusty cupboard and found a well-worn copy of Osho’s ‘The Last Testament: Interviews with the World Press’, Volume One. It’s been at least twenty years since I read an Osho book from cover to cover and, if nothing else, this one is definitely good for a laugh.
The interviews were given just before the collapse of The Ranch. One thing is for sure: going by what he was saying at the time, Osho was not a clairvoyant. He did not see what was coming. He did not even see what was going on around him…being enlightened does not mean you know your phone is bugged. He honestly thought there was absolutely no crime taking place in the commune, when, months later, it was revealed that a secretive group led by his personal secretary, Sheela, had engaged in a variety of criminal activities, including the attempted murder of Osho’s physician, wiretapping and bugging within the commune and within Osho’s home, poisoning of two public officials and a whole bunch of locals, and arson. How could a man such as Osho have been so blind and out of touch? I can recall, back in Poona One, that Osho claimed to know everything taking place in his commune and, from what I witnessed, he was not exaggerating. What changed?
Before giving these interviews, Osho claimed not to have read anything for five years, and it shows. He thought that AIDS could be transmitted through the breath and people who ate with their hands from a communal plate of food were leaving themselves open to being infected by the deadly virus. No kissing, babe, pass the rubber gloves. All part of Osho’s ‘prophet of doom’ phase.
Then we have Osho expounding his ultra-conservative views on gay people. All perverts, according to him, whose pathologically sick behaviour all stems back to repressed nuns and monks living in monasteries, having to resort to same-sex couplings to vent their repressed sexual energies. A warped perspective best observed with Socratic detachment, I suppose. I have sannyasin friends who are homosexual and lesbian. They are sensitive, intelligent beautiful people who have never spent time in a monastery. It says much about Osho’s magnetism that they stayed with him, after him expressing publicly such a narrow-minded take on their sexual preferences. It could be viewed with Socratic irony that Osho held Socrates in such high esteem, because Socrates was a man who lost his senses when in the company of beautiful young boys.
On the topic of sex, Osho claimed to be a natural man who followed his carnal instincts in every way. He boasted that perhaps no man had loved as many women as he had. In case one was left unsure as to the nature of the ‘love’ he was referring to he added, “I used to keep count, but dropped it. What is the point?” Osho, the Hugh Hefner of the spiritual world. What I’m left wondering is where did Osho do all his behind-the-scenes shagging? One friend, who lived in Osho’s house for many years, told me that not once did they see any unknown females leaving or entering the master’s room. Perhaps those sexy nymphs sneaked in through the bathroom window, or maybe there was a secret tunnel.
The bottom line regarding Osho’s ‘Last Testament’ is that I really enjoyed reading it. Osho was out to stir controversy and he succeeded. There he is, digging in his war chest and pulling out the verbal equivalent of a cruise missile. “I love Adolf Hitler”, he declares. “He was crazy,” he adds. “’But I am even more crazy!” Bet that got the dogs barking. In a later interview he writes the Nazis off as nonsense, which hardly sets the balance straight. A wee bit of spin needed…quick! Osho telling the world how he loves Jewish people and that two-thirds of the members of his commune are Jews. I always wondered where those rumours started about Osho being a reincarnation of Holy Moses. The way Osho waffled on about the Jews I’m surprised there wasn’t a synagogue built adjacent to Buddha Hall.
What about all those Rolls Royces and fancy watches? Osho makes out that he doesn’t care about such things, which are actually presents from his adoring disciples and he has to accept them because he does not want to upset his disciples. Such was the extent of Osho’s compassion. What to do? A far cry from Sheela´s report about Osho throwing a hissy fit because the commune’s coffers could not afford to fork out a couple of million dollars for a diamond-encrusted watch that he just had to have, although, for once, he did not employ emotional blackmail in the form of threatening to leave his body because he did not get what he wished. Wasn’t the enlightened one supposed to be beyond desire? You have to laugh.
When questioned about what would happen to his commune when he died Osho certainly laughed and said he did not care. He was very clear that creating an organised religion around him after he was dead was the last thing on his no mind-mind. When asked about the obvious contradictions in what he was saying, Osho said it was his right to respond to each moment in the way he saw fit. What he said one day might be quite the opposite the next, depending on who he was addressing etc.
I understand where he was coming from. Life is not static. Complications can and do arise when people take what Osho said as gospel and try to live by his words. For me, Osho was never about his words. Osho was a representative of a loving, humorous, playful, illuminating, compassionate and enlightening energy. A non-serious energy that our serious world of today needs more of. I find myself admiring Osho because he had the balls to just get out there and do his dance, and not give a fuck what people thought about his moves. Somehow he understood, without a doubt, that people’s opinions about him were meaningless, that it was all ultimately mind-fuck. He asked, “How could Jesus save anyone? He couldn’t even save himself.” Osho’s penchant for poking fun at all and everything, especially that revered by the masses, knew no limitations, because he understood that none of it mattered in the greater scheme of creation. How liberating!
To conclude. I had a visit from an old sannyasin friend the other day. I first met Anand in Kandahar in 1972. He was headed for Goa…on a horse. A true rebel, he was always in trouble with the ashram administration in Poona One. I think he got away with his wild celebrations at Laxmi Villas because Osho saw him as a true representative of the rebellious spirit of sannyas. Rock and roll! I asked Anand, who has a very down-to-earth approach to life, how he viewed his seven years in Poona One. He laughed and said, “It’s history now and I am glad that I was a part of it.” A view all of my old sannyasin friends share.
I mentioned reading ‘The Last Testament’ and some of the bullshit Osho was coming out with at the time. Anand laughed again and said, “Man, I remember going to Buddha Hall for a discourse. Sometimes there would be a couple of thousand people there. When the talk was over I listened to what people were saying. Nobody saw or heard the same thing, man…everybody is different and sees things they way they see it…not one person the same. People are too hung up on words, man. Osho always said his message lay in the space and silence between his words. Most people don´t want to hear that and instead go around talking in their sleep, repeating what Osho said, blah, blah, blah!”
Anand tugged at one of his dreadlocks and added, “This whole life is a school, man. You come here to learn something and, when you learned it, it´s time to move on. Osho was a great teacher of how to go about doing just that in the best way possible. Celebration, man! He even wanted us to celebrate death. How cool is that, man?”
Amen.
I love Osho and His work.
Without doubt I will use capital H for him.
Still being the disciple in 21st century, it is a good feeling when mask is ripped apart from master, His people and creation. Lokesh does this job thoroughly.
It feels good to hear paper boats can cross the Pacific, yet it is a job of the seekers to accept that their boat sank not because of others but because of pilot and His staff.
Beauty of cults is even if they go bankrupt as company, they exist like corner shops.
“…being enlightened does not mean you know your phone is bugged”
I have already read/heard these words, Lokesh, not from you. I would have put them in quotation marks, even if, by using them, you would have stolen pathos from everything you write after.
Veet, no need for quotation marks. Most sannyasins know Osho said that. It is a memorable quote, humourous and true, well at least according to Osho, whose ideas about truth were…erhm…flexible. I do believe the quote was used in ‘WW Country’.
Lokesh, do you ever suspect that you are part of a ‘religion’ – at least as much as anyone who feels a connection with a Master, as with his teachings and his people? Is not your name the sign of that link?
In my opinion, the care that Osho put into editing his books shows that perhaps he was not indifferent to who would come later: “I leave you my dream…always leave space for new sannyasins…you will feel my presence in a thousand-and-one ways.”
I respect your opinion and that of your Punjabi disciple but I do not believe that the flower garden around Osho burned with him on 19 January 1990 or even before, after the Pune 1 of the reckless explorers.
Being too young in the 70s to be attracted by the ganja, charas or opium available in India in those years, I met ‘incidentally’ Osho ‘only’ later through books, documentaries and people but with the same risk of misunderstanding (as you say) of those who were present at the feet of the Master at his first darshan.
If this is enough to make me a parrot, along with the many who have not met the physical presence of the Master, perhaps I should deduce that even attempts by anyone try to objectively describe that buddhafield or their own spiritual dimension in contact with the buddha, run the same risk of missing the point.
In my opinion, if there is a relationship between the reality experienced, the way in which it is represented in the head through the thoughts and, finally, how it is described in words then the same relationship also exists backwards;
This circular flow of data/energy, if participated in with honesty, sensitivity and skill by the writer/thinker/experimenter can return that certain fragrance/vibration which you speak about, otherwise it would not make sense to read what you write about what happens to you reading Osho. I also have a tabernacle full of dusty books and a pair of glasses.
Veet, I do not see myself as belonging to any religion.
The fact that I keep my sannyasin name has nothing to do with religion. It has to do with the fact that I like my name. It runs deeper than that. As a little boy I always thought I had the wrong name. I always wanted to be called Lucas. The way Osho pronounced my name was very similar to Lucas…with a hissy ssssss at the end. So I kept it.
As for what you imagine your Osho connection to be through reading his books etc., it does not interest me, because it is none of my business.
Currently I am in the north of Scotland, helping an elderly sister move into an old folks home, after having lived in her wee cottage in the highlands for 45 years. Big move for her. Watching the process I very much see that life is about letting go. It is good to practice letting go every day on every level, because one day we have to let go of everything. ‘Nuff said.
Lokesh has written very proudly, “I do not see myself as belonging to any religion.”
Is it an individual courage or the social conviction invading the western mind?
Every second person who has Christianity in the blood does not belong to any religion. Only Christianity has created the ground work for people to transcend religions.
Sannyas is anyway not a religion but a small cult.
Shantam, I assure you that if you’d been brought up with Christian Church teachings during the 50s and 60s and had a bit of ‘the spirit of the age’ about you, then EVEN YOU would have realised it was way past its sell-by date, dead in the water, even then.
As Osho said in ‘The Mustard Seed’, being a Christian “is a lie.”
Yes, Satyadeva,
Being Christian is a lie, being sannyasin is equally a lie and this lie had very short shelf life.
My point is very clear, one needs to be honest with oneself too. Existence is not ruled in the style of British monarchy or Saudi Arabia.
“My point is very clear, one needs to be honest with oneself too. Existence is not ruled in the style of British monarchy or Saudi Arabia.” (25 November, 8.40pm)
Yes, Shantam, which might well be a good idea to reflect upon next time you start up your ‘poor me, look what the bastards have done’ monologue, whether inside your self, on here, or anywhere else.
Shantam declares, “Lokesh has written very proudly, “I do not see myself as belonging to any religion.” ”
A misinterpretation on Shantam’s part. I do not feel proud about this at all. It’s a simple matter of fact.
I guess Shantam said that because he used to feel proud of being a sannyasin (which gave him a personally satisfying ‘self and social’ identity, in the absence of anything else) whereas now he feels he’s lost even that.
Perhaps that’s the price of using ‘sannyas’ to mainly signify a group (a sort of international social club ‘with benefits’, perhaps?), instead of an essentially personal commitment, “the flight of the alone to the alone”, as Osho once said.
Irony is, Shantam, that you’ve been forced to confront aloneness anyway, and, while I don’t want to overlook how difficult it must have been for you, the amount of ‘kicking and screaming’ you’ve been up to for so long suggests a considerable degree of resistance to that condition that both you and Life have created for yourself!
“…being enlightened does not mean you know your phone is bugged.”
Veet, how you will create interpretation of the above statement in various forms of here and now? For example, ‘being enlightened does not mean you know mobile will replace the classic phone.’
Life is not a table of 2, 3, 4 and 5. Its mathematics is more complex than what one reads in the books of primary school.
Strange example, Shantam, we all know about the limits of ‘enlightenment’ in mundane matters by now, don’t we? What exactly is your point here?
Shantam, usually your criterion for interpreting what is written on SN is that one of seniority: the old sannyasins of Pune 1 who knew Osho personally have more reliability than those who arrived after 19 January, 1990.
Now, as you are told, being at the feet of the Master is not enough, even among the veterans of those darshans there were those who clung to the words, missing the point, like any Osho book reader who was not present at the time when those words were pronounced, just like Lokesh interpreting ‘Last Testament’.
Shantam, I hope you do not take Lokesh’s words like a gospel, but do not just ignore them as insignificant except for a laugh on a boring rainy day, as he does with Osho’s words.
Speaking of ‘religion’, here too one must interpret what the word refers to:
1) “The relationship, variously identifiable in the rules of life, feelings and manifestations of homage, veneration and adoration, which binds man to what he considers sacred or divine.”
Or:
2) “Every cult as determined by content of faith: Christian, Protestant, monotheist, polytheist, etc.”
For me, Osho was also his words:
“The time has come to burn all the old and now worn religions and to let emerge a new concept of religiosity that affirms life, a religion based on love not on laws, a religion of nature not of discipline, a religion of totality not of perfection, a religion of feeling not of thinking. The heart should be the head, then everything would settle spontaneously. If you can trust nature, you will gradually become quiet, silent, happy, joyful, festive, because nature is celebrating. Nature is a party.”
His invitation (it is not a dogma) to go beyond ‘the little family’ does not mean that I should forget my sister, but remember that in the Sangha, born around him, I loved and I was loved by many other brothers and sisters, that I do not want to stop loving, as long as he continues to inspire me.
MOD:
Have left out ‘even’ in third paragraph, Veet F to make it clearer. Is that ok?
Lokesh, thanks for stirring this SN pot!
“Celebration, man! He even wanted us to celebrate death. How cool is that, man?”
Now everything He said is becoming more of a ritual than a celebration!
Cool, Kavita.
Kavita, it’s not relevant if it’s becoming a ritual for others.
It’s relevant what it is for you.
Satchit, what Kavita says is relevant, appropriate to the current time, period, or circumstances; of contemporary interest.
Yes, Satchit, it’s relevant to me, especially because I live just 700 metres away from the Osho Commune, which I have not visited in 10 years or so.
What Lokesh said sounds true to me too.
Kavita, Osho commune was being christianised ‘Soso Resort’ 10, 12 years ago. Tell me a single person who has gone into that black hole created by whiter-than-whites.
MOD:
Shantam, please remember SN isn’t to be used to over-advertise personal agendas.
Shantam, there are a few close friends of mine, but they perhaps would not like to be written about on SN.
“Yes, Satchit, it’s relevant to me, especially because I live just 700 metres away from the Osho Commune, which I have not visited in 10 years or so.”
Good. So you follow your energy and don’t go there. As I see it, celebration is the consequence of following one’s energy. Celebration is not related to certain occasions like Christmas or death.
Celebration is not related to certain occasions like Christmas or death – Exactly!
Veet says, Osho says, “Nature is a party.”
Perhaps, if you are a cannibal. Nature is many things on many different levels, and perhaps the worst place to look for compassion, because Nature can be brutal and cruel.
It is not very inspiring to read Osho quotes taken out of context and taken as some kind of end-all Gospel. Osho said many things and I have heard most of them.
Instead of hearing what Osho said, which is the basis for this thread, I would like to hear what commentators have to say about the topic above. Otherwise, what is the sense in writing an article?
“I can recall, back in Poona One, that Osho claimed to know everything taking place in his commune and, from what I witnessed, he was not exaggerating. What changed?”
In my opinion, his witnessing did go deeper. And he did care less about what was going on. He did live in this changeless state where the judging drops more and more.
Good article, Lokesh, but I miss a bit the state of mystery. Remember the reason why you took sannyas and still hang around?
Perhaps you could say more about “the state of mystery”, Satchit? I’m not sure what you mean, except perhaps that ineffable ‘mystery of the mysterious East’ that has always pervaded and surrounded every master from over there, coming as they do from a very different culture to that of the West.
Which is changing of course, the ways of the West now pretty well covering the entire world. Not much longer, in all probability, for that sort of ‘mystery’, exemplified, perhaps, by Sadhguru, well westernised in speech and approach, despite being very much traditonally eastern-looking, beard, robes, hat etc., and surrounded by the usual hordes of adoring disciples.
“Perhaps you could say more about “the state of mystery”, Satchit?”
The unexplainable, synchronicity, the romance, poetry…the Holy Grail
The transmission of Shaktipat.
In your life now, Satchit? Or in your memory (or in your dreams, perhaps)?
My distant diagnosis for you, bro:
You miss a bit playfulness.
How about answering my question (Nov 26, 7.48pm)?
“In your life now, Satchit? Or in your memory (or in your dreams, perhaps)?”
Life is a mystery. And I am part of life, so mystery is in my life too.
Mystery is beyond memory and beyond time. Blessed are the ones who see and understand.
Satchit, it strikes me that you have very little to say that comes across as authentic. Your comments are peppered with tired spiritual cliches. Life is a mystery et cetera. That is a cliche, especially in sannyasinlandia. Just in case you are not certain what a cliche is here is a definition:
A phrase or opinion that is overused and betrays a lack of original thought.
Your writing betrays a lack of original thought. You might overcome that a little on SN by responding to the topics being discussed, rather than reacting to what other bloggers say. It is, of course, up to you.
Lokesh, you are good in criticising me. Btw, you are also good in criticising others here on SN, if you think your standard is not fulfilled.
Did ever come the thought to you that the world does not only move around you?
“Life is a mystery” is a cliche for you. Well, did ever come the thought to you that it is not a cliche for everbody?
Hmm, maybe not.
I don’t care much about what you call “sannyasinlandia”. You even came here with the idea that I am not a sannyasin. Have you changed your mind?
You sound really sincere to me, Satchit. Namaste.
Mod, isn’t it about time I was off the naughty step, or is everyone pre-moderated now?
MOD:
Everyone’s always been pre-moderated, Arpana.
I can recall returning to the UK from my first journey to Nepal in 1971. I would meet old friends up in Scotland, greet them with a prayer-like hand gesture and say, “Namaste”. Curious, people would ask the meaning of namaste and I would explain saying, “It means I bow to you. We are one etc.” I can remember feeling quite chuffed about knowing all this.
Today, I would never dream of saying namaste to anyone. It’s so played out. I much prefer very normal greetings, like “how you doing?” What I am driving at is that spiritual talk and behaviour is often delivered by people who aren’t really spiritual at all. The great pretenders of our time…led by all those gurus and teachers who, often as not, are only in it for the money.
Satchit is sincere enough. He is also delusional. That is, going by his comments here on SN. Who he actually is in real life is something I am not the least bit interested in finding out.
How come Lokesh’s comments always go on straightaway, Mods?
MOD:
Parmartha felt that he’d earned that as his posts have needed little or no sub-editing. No one’s posts, including Lokesh’s, were ever ‘sacrosanct’ though, in that there were always certain standards to adhere to.
Now, resuming without Parmartha’s guidance, we’re simply aiming to maintain that general policy.
@swamishanti 28 November, 2018 at 6:54 pm
I also have a problem that the high priest of anti-sannyas (or is it high priest of Lokeshism?) has easier access to this site than anyone else.
MOD:
Ok, for the sake of communal harmony we’ll sort that out.
Never forget, Satchit. Not everyone who has a sannyas name is anything to do with Osho Sannyas.
Some of them have more in common with co-dependent Catholic priests.
Namaste.
Yes. Lokesh is funny.
He reminds me of a movie that I have seen long time back.
Its title in Germany was:
‘Highlander – There Can Only Be One!’
If this is not a mystery, what else?
Namaste
MOD:
Ok, folks, let’s get back to commenting on the topic, please.
“High priest of anti-sannyas”.
You give him too much credit. It’s just an ordinary provocation game he plays.
@Satchit
Yes, and acknowledging he exists just feeds his self-importance. Attention-seeking really.
Gee whizz! Arpana is really outdoing himself in the confessions depatment. “Never forget, not everyone who has a sannyas name is anything to do with Osho Sannyas.” Even though stating the obvious, I am curious what has brought this change of heart on. Perhaps you’d care to enlighten the readers, Arpana.
Namaste.
Unlike Osho, I have nothing at all against people being gay. I think it’s great that gay people can now get married.
MOD:
Just wondering what this has to do with the topic?
Wonder no more. During his Last Testament phase, Osho was describing gay people as, and I quote from the topic: All perverts, according to him, whose pathologically sick behaviour all stems back to repressed nuns and monks living in monasteries, having to resort to same-sex couplings to vent their repressed sexual energies.
Which leaves me wondering if Arpana is living or ever lived in a monastary.
“I’m gay and I want to ask if it is a hindrance in my development and if it is, what can I do to get free?”
OSHO says,
“No need to be worried – it is not a hindrance, nothing, mm? Only one thing is a hindrance in spiritual growth – that is a rejection of your self.
Gay or not, that doesn’t matter – if you can accept totally, there is no hindrance. If you reject it, then there is hindrance. The hindrance comes not from your being gay; it comes from your rejecting it. If you accept, it is perfectly okay, mm? It is irrelevant in a way.”
‘This Is It’
Darshan Diary.
Tuesday, May 10, 1977
Then there is Sannyas News, where being into Osho means being treated as second-class.
Sorry, Arpana, I’d no idea that you were gay. No offence meant.
“And Pankaja, you understand perfectly well that your mind is full of garbage. This very understanding is enough to get rid of it. It seems the problem is that this garbage is paying you; it is in some way fulfilling your ego.
Pankaja is a novelist, is well known as a novelist. I have worked with many kinds of celebrities; they are the most third-rate people to work with for the simple reason that their celebrity has become part of their ego. They cannot drop the ego, because if they drop the ego the celebrity disappears. And the celebrity, the famousness, their name, has become so important to them…it has become their identity in the world. Where millions of people are without any identity, they have an identity. For them, to drop the ego is very difficult — and understandably; it is arduous.
A person who is not a celebrity has a small ego. In fact, to have it or not to have it does not make much difference; he is already nobody. He can drop it, and by dropping it he can gain the whole beautiful Existence and all its benediction. By becoming nobody, he can open the doors to the universe and its blessings.
But all the celebrities that have come to me from different fields, have all proved to be failures. They take the most time, but they have a problem because their ego is involved with their name and fame. Even if they understand that it is garbage, the garbage is paying them so much that they want to cling to it a little more — perhaps tomorrow or the day after tomorrow they will drop it. They have understood the point, but just to drop it right now seems too much.”
Osho
‘Beyond Enlightenment’
Chapter 2
Chapter title: ‘Innocence Is A Light Unto Itself’
MOD:
This is more like another topic, Arpana, isn’t it?
Mod,
Not intended as such.
The high priest of anti-sannyas is a celeb on Ibiza. That’s the point!
Mod, are you Jitendra or SD?
MOD:
Is that so? We didn’t realise that.
Re who is the mod, as Satchit (or Osho) might say, that’s one of life’s mysteries, not “a problem to be solved”!
LOL. Thats an sd-ish remark.
When you say ”we” do you mean the royal ”we”?
Mais oui!
Arpana, you got a chuckle from me for that one. All that dropping the ego shite. Who exactly is it that is doing the dropping? Sorry to see your lack of success in that department. Currently I am dropping my ego in a remote cottage in the north of Scotland. Try as I might, I am having a hell of a job maintaing my celebrity status up here, because there is nobody to support my campaign, only shaggy sheep and hairy, big-horned, highland cows.
That is of secondary importance. What’s of vital importance to the world at large is that SN is up and running again. More or less the old gang of misfits has been reunited once more. Hats of to the boffins at SN central for setting the controls to the heart of the matter.
I’ve never claimed to have dropped my ego, big head.
Although not as much of a celeb as he thinks he is.
Couple of days ago, Lokesh, you shared in this Chat:
“For lack of something to read on a rainy afternoon I had a rummage in a dusty cupboard and found a well-worn copy of Osho’s ‘The Last Testament: Interviews with the World Press’, Volume One. It’s been at least twenty years since I read an Osho book from cover to cover and, if nothing else, this one is definitely good for a laugh….”
And then you went on and on, quite well recognizable by and with the points you made after your reading. (Still a bit impatient, it seemed (to me) to get the rest of us all ´Unknowables´(to you) to respond and or show up, as you happened then to express in an update: “Where are all these faithful peep-peeps from the party…” going on SN/UK?).
Well, you stired up a plot-pot, sure – one can say. My first reaction after the first read of your piece came out in words:
…aah yes, a “full plot-pot calling the kettle black” and then I´ve been sitting for two days in that…and everything is changing how you rightly stated it.
Where I am now I don´t know, but I like to share with you and you all where I stayed a bit longer in the digestion room.
It´s in a fabulous story telling a parable of Bert Brecht, later an non-Aristotlean theatre play which he wrote in 1938 in exile whose title is: ‘The Good Person of Szechwan’. Whosoever is interested can google the plot in WIKI.
And to make a long story short it goes on about living and its casualties as Big P*, as you called him, did mention here and there.
Thank you for your inspiration, Lokesh.
Madhu
P.S:
When I´ve been watching the one or the other vids re these interviews (ages ago) I remember, when listening decades ago, I went through a lot of emotional stuff, and yet the most impressive for me has always been that not one of His responses to a journalist´s questioning resembled the other, even though sometimes the words the questioner chose were ´the same´). He mostly responded to the questioner more than to a question. And that was/is kind of familiar for me.
Days did pass now – one could read again – that you have been meanwhile to Scotland, visiting a friend who is passing through a challenging life situation.
How are you doing, wanderers? From the Here and Now,
Madhu
*Parmartha (founder and former editor of SN)
Hi Madhu, good to hear from you. That you felt inspired by the wee article is a plus. Thanks for responding to the article. That is what I personally enjoy to read…responses to the article, not personal reactions, something which becomes uninteresting very quickly, at least for me.
Yes. I am up in the north of Scotland. Strange place to be at the onset of winter. Still learning every day, meeting interesting people and doing my best to shine a light in this somewhat gloomy part of the world, due to the time of the year.
Unfortunately for you, Lokesh, this virtual space revolves around what you insist on calling a “great teacher”, for this reason rather than commenting on the form of what you write, not having the tools to do it, I’m sorry for you if I must insist on the contents and the frame you used.
I have already commented on part of the topic in your article, such as your clairvoyance that makes you say what is “the last thing on his no mind-mind” about the no need for a structure that would have conveyed his message once he left the body.
Now I would comment on the theme introduced by your Jamaican friend who rides a donkey directed to Goa: “…to learn something and when you learn it, it’s time to move on”.
Since I attended SN many sannyasins have written “it’s time to move on”, alluding to hermitic scenarios or moving from Master 1 to Master 2 to Master 3…
Many others have been captured by the advaita loop of antinomies, reminiscent of the Buridano syndrome.
Someone tried to propose alternative or complementary Mastering models to that of Osho, a less less devotional one, abhorring the word ‘gratitude’.
Almost no one is so naive to write the full name of the perfect Master, only some mythological reference to old masters of whom there is little and uncertain testimony.
But in your article, Lokesh, there seem to be so many proofs that show Osho as megalomaniac, narcissus, homophobic, masculine, inconsistent, capricious, manipulative, etc. that they will finally give you the push ‘to move on’ and become a master of yourself, encouraging all the most daring sannyasins to follow your example.
I hope you do not have a personal reaction if I point out that you can not provide in your article the context of the book because you’ve never been to Rajneeshpuram, but despite this, with the philological sensitivity of which only those who breathe nitrous to full lungs is able, you try to leverage the contents of a book to say that for another 650 the same thesis applies: “Osho was never about his words.”.
I look forward to your next article on the 50 shades of brown on the great teacher’s fingernail.
“Become a master of yourself.” Veet, that is a good idea. Concluding with, “encouraging all the most daring sannyasins to follow your example.” Phew! Definitely not a good idea.
Having been in the Ranch-experience, Lokesh, long and intensely enough, and even later, I never came across ´a book´ where some (or all?) these press interviews have been printed, called then ´Last Testament´ and even if I had come across it I would have never bought it.
The title – indeed – amazing.
As amazing and as amazing as a very shocking. odd spiritual challenge I experienced, which was how that was (for me) to get as a donation the small book of ´Rajneeshism´ which was distributed by Sheela herself and her team (was it 1983? 1984?), given anyway to the flames of some unholy fire-event…
I felt so betrayed by the content anyway; but it has been just one of these bigger emotional-spiritual challenges re awareness & meditation anyway, and these Ranch years were indeed full of them, individually and collectively (challenges, I mean).
So – if such a ´title´ exists, and I won´t doubt it – it’s as hilarious as bringing out a booklet of ´Rajneeshism´, isn´t it?
Anyway – there won´t exist any ´Last Testament´, I´d say, not for anything on any level. Even then, not, if we all (humankind) go down the drain in a very full last blast all together, even then – rather – NOT (a last testament). As we really don´t know and neither have been able or are able to have the ´last word´, so to say, on anything!
That´s essentially good news, for me, I guess. And one of these good-news-essences (flavours) which have helped me survive this and that (so far).
My experience of whom or what ´we´ call Osho by now, was never that of a teacher, but a lot of teaching happened under all these attributes you thouroughly added, like ´outrageousness´, ´contradictoriness´, ´factually wrong-right-wrong-nesses´, etc. and whatsoever-else. In abundance.
And up to this very moment, where I celebrate my failure to find words to send into a viral caravanserai (meeting-place for friends) and give in to just one of the factual Issues re that, to be (also) received as data-prey*.
Your article a la longue is not at all a ´wee article´, as you put it, as it is not a homoepathic dose.
Loving though and wisdom-ing too, works homoepathically on the living and even then, when we all in our own ways and with our own means try to explore a pot-plot, avoiding the best we can to ‘call the kettle black´.
The first wintery days here-now in Munich.
Some snow in the courtyard – not much
Kids are at home.
Sky – milky-grey – still some of the bigger leaves on the pathways
I went out – wobbling….
There is stillness around even though there is much noise.
Sitting inside here, playing commune-i-cation…
With Love,
Madhu
A late PS – to you, Lokesh:
‘Namaste’ is not at all outdated or obsolete in my eyes and even though I also feel to understand and accept what you wrote about yout annoyance re overuse/misuse etc., the point is (for me) that if you then really meant what you said herewith (you mentioned it), it turned out in the course of time a most challenging insight re greeting the other, the stranger, the unknowable, the unknown:
Embodying such as a peace-promising acknowledgement of ‘the other’, though, may take a lifetime, or may not really be happening ever.
Done with awareness I´d prefer it even now to shakimg hands or similar.
So – when I mostly dropped to fold my hands like this and say it, it was more for the experience of coming to know inside how difficult that can be, to BE what I speak – not for the reason that the mere gesture is without meaning.
The gesture itself is very beautiful.
Comes from ´Graceland….
Namaste, Madhu. Coincidentally enough, I received an email from an old India friend this morning, which opened with “Namaste, Baba”. I kind of liked that. I chucked the namaste thing in the pot to spice up the SN soup. Got a few of the locals on the rampage. Arpana went for it hook, line and stinker, accusing me of being…wait for it…”the high priest of anti-sannyas”. That’s a good one.
If I am anti anything it’s got to be anti-sheep – you know, like idiots…SN would do well to have one of those tester boxes with “Are you a robot?”…a few here would have to tick the box. Wind ‘em up and watch them go. Just a few words and it’s blitzkrieg time. Very much a microcosm of the times. So much identification with words.
I don’t believe for a moment that Osho loved Hitler. Hitler was the anti-thesis of what Osho stood for, love, meditation, celebration of life. Yet Osho will be remembered by some for having said that. I think that particular message has to do with how mechanical humans are: Say the right thing and the people love you. Say the wrong thing and you are an incarnation of evil.
Words…blah! blah! blah! People kill because of words written centuries ago. Allah says…Jesus says…More recently, Hitler says, “Make a lie, keep it simple, repeat it enough and they will believe it.” He wasn’t lying about the große Lüge, the big lie.
When an Indian who sold Himself whole life as Master becomes great teacher among His white followers post-demise…
Life surely is a mystery!
Shantam, what is an even greater mystery is how you equate your racist comments with sannyas. I mean to say, that sort narrow-mided attitude is so lacking in any kind of positive direction I wonder how you manage to find your way home at night. Are you trying to lay claim to my hard-earned title, The High Priest of Anti-Sannyas? Try harder.
Lokesh, yesterday I was thinking to write an appreciation note that you could read this book page to page.
I have not read any Osho book page to page for last 31 years. During first five years, I was reading him intensely.
Grace of masterly energy, once anyone reached around living Osho and His community, books were the first to lose shine.
One more example of racist comment:
Indians have already pushed Osho into the exclusive club of Messiah and prophets. One ambitious young man who is trying to create his space into growing group of semi-enlightened meditation camp leaders has messaged me a poem in Hindi which roughly means:.
“What was Sheela Veela?
It was My Leela
I may not be in the Body
but my work is going on
My Leela continuous
You may not understand
but it is so.”
He requested to share it further.
I wrote crisply, “How you got this idea I endorse such kind of stuff?”
Different races have different responses on the similar situation.
In my understanding, Osho is not a messiah, not a teacher but late master.
Late for what?
There is – very much unfortunately, Lokesh, obviously no way to stop a free-floating madness of a chat troll.
To play it ´cool´ like Satchit did, or to be in a selfish way playing silent, both of the latter seemingly serving their own more or less hidden agendas of a ridiculous jealousy: their own greed to ´be a topdog´ in a chat, without showing themselves, a skill re SHARING, or Honesty IN the sharing.
I feel more than sorry for that today, more so, as one of the trolling IT-entities is situated in BLACK Forest, Germany. (As far as I can know)
“A fucking spade should be called a fucking spade.”
Some here, like Parmatha, like you too , Lokesh, did that. Sometimes.
For the time being.
May such quality continue as to our best capacities.
Even then, when coming to know more and more about that we all have to ´let go´ of everything, eventually.
November-Sky…
Quite foggy today…
Clouds are heavy…
Here.
Madhu
On my car is a sign which means:
“I brake for old ladies.
Keep cool and don’t go for
laughing into the cellar!”