Books I Have Loved ch.7

1984 in Lao Tzu House, Rajneeshpuram, Oregon, USA
Okay. I have heard your notebook open. Now it is my hour, and my hour does not consist of sixty
minutes. It can be anything – sixty, seventy, eighty, ninety, one hundred... or beyond numbers even.
If it is my hour then of course it has to be consistent with me, not vice versa.
The postscript continues.
The first name today is one not even heard in the West: Maluka. He is one of the most significant
mystics in India. His full name is Malukdas, but he only called himself Maluka as if he were a child
– and he was a child really, not ’as if’.
I have spoken on him in Hindi, but it will take a long time for it to be translated into other languages
for the simple reason that Maluka is so strange, so mysterious. You will be surprised that in a country
like India, which is full of commentators, scholars, pundits, nobody has even bothered to comment
on Malukdas because it is so difficult. He had to wait for me. I am his first commentator, and who
knows, maybe the last too.
Just an example:
Ajgar karai na chakari panchhi karai na kam das maluka kahi gaye sab ke data ram.
Now I will try to translate it. It will not be exactly the same but I am not responsible for it. The poor
English language cannot contain such richness. Maluka says: The snake never goes out to work at
a job, nor does the bird ever work. And, says Maluka, there is no need, in fact, because existence
provides for all. He was a man Zorba would have liked. He was the man with a little madness and a
lot of meditation.
He was so deep in meditation that he says:

Mala japon na kar jibhya japon na ram, sumiran mera hari karain main paya bisram.
He says: I don’t chant the name of God, nor do I use a rosary for worship. I don’t worship at all –
who cares for such stupid things! He continues: In fact, God remembers my name, there is no need
for me to remember him.... Do you see? A little madness and a lot of meditation. Malukdas is one
of the men of whom I can say without any hesitation that he has gone beyond enlightenment. He
has become the picture on the tenth card of the Ten Zen Bulls.
Second, the book of the Sikhs: GURU GRANTHA SAHIB. It was not written by one single man so I
cannot tell you who the author is. It is a compilation from generation to generation. It was compiled
from all sources, as no other book in the world. THE OLD TESTAMENT is only Jewish, THE NEW
TESTAMENT is only Christian, BHAGAVADGITA IS only Hindu, DHAMMAPADA is only Buddhist,
JIN SUTRAS only Jaina; but GURU GRANTHA SAHIB is the only book in the world taken from all
the sources possible. Its sources come from Hindu, Mohammedan, Jaina, Buddhist, Christian. Such
openness, no fanaticism.
The title GURU GRANTHA means ’the book of the masters’, or ’the master book’. In it you will find
Kabir, Nanak, Farid, and a long line of mystics belonging to different traditions, different schools, as
if thousands of rivers are meeting in the ocean. GURU GRANTHA is like an ocean.
I will translate only one sentence of Nanak. He is the founder, so of course his words are compiled
in GURU GRANTHA. He was the first master of the Sikhs; then followed a line of nine other masters.
Sikhism was produced by ten masters. It is a rare religion because every other religion was created
by only a single master.
Nanak says: The truth, the ultimate truth is unspeakable, so please forgive me, I will not speak about
it but only sing it. If you can understand the language of music, then perhaps a chord in your heart
may be touched. The transmission of the lamp is beyond words.
GURU GRANTHA SAHIB... the Sikhs call it SAHIB because they respect the book so much, almost
as if it is alive, as if it were the very spirit of the master. But a book is a book, and the moment the
masters depart the book is dead, the word is dead. So they are carrying a beautiful corpse, just as
all the other religions are doing. Remember, by the way, that religion is alive only once in a while,
alive only in the presence of a master. When the master is no longer alive it becomes a creed, and
a creed is an ugly thing.
The Dutch parliament has appointed a commission to inquire into ’cults and creeds’. Obviously I
am the first on their list of inquiries. I have informed my people in Holland to tell the commission,
”We are not going to cooperate with you because in fact we are neither a cult nor a creed; we are a
religion. If you want to look for cults and creeds, then there are many: the Christian, the Judaic, the
Hindu, the Mohammedan, and so on ad infinitum.” In fact I was going to say ad nauseam....
The commission has become very worried. They wrote a letter to the orange people in Holland
saying, ”Please cooperate with us.” Our people have again asked what to do. I told them, ”I have
already told you what to do. Unless they appoint a commission to inquire into the very spirit of
religion, do not cooperate.”

Look at the absurdity: the Dutch parliament is dominated by the Christian Democratic Party, and the
people who are appointed to serve on the commission are all Christian Democrats. Now, it is they
who are the creed, they are a cult. My people are not a cult. I am still alive and kicking! A religion
exists only when a master is breathing. His breath is what religion is made of.
GURU GRANTHA has compiled the sayings of ten living masters, ten enlightened ones. I say that
no other book can be compared to it. It is incomparable. Nanak says, ”Ek omkar satnam – only one
thing is true, the name of the inexpressible.” In the East we call it omkar, om – only that is true. The
sound of the soundless... the silence that pervades after the sound has left...ek omkar satnam.
Third: The book by Mabel Collins, LIGHT ON THE PATH. Anybody who wants to travel towards the
heights has to understand LIGHT ON THE PATH. It is a small book as far as quantity is concerned,
just a few pages, but as far as quality is concerned it is one of the biggest, the greatest books. And,
wonder of wonders, it has been written in the modern age. Nobody knows who the author Mabel
Collins is. The author never even writes the name Mabel Collins in full, but only M.C. It is just by
chance that I have come to know the full name through a few friends of M.C.
Why M.C.? I can understand the reason. The writer is only a vehicle, and more particularly so in the
case of LIGHT ON THE PATH. Perhaps the Sufi, Khidr – I have told you about him: the spirit who
leads people, guides people, helps people – was behind M.C.’s work too.
M.C. was a Theosophist. He or she would – I don’t know whether the author is a man or woman, it
does not matter anyway – or may not have liked to have been guided by Khidr, the Sufi idea of the
ultimate guide. But M.C. would be immensely happy if I use the parallel Theosophical name: they
call it K.H. Any name will do. What you call it does not matter... Master K.H. or the mystic Khijra, it is
all the same. But the book is immensely helpful. Whosoever wrote it, whosoever guided the writer,
that’s beside the point; the book itself stands like a golden tower.
Fourth: I am perfectly okay, don’t be worried just because I am numbering correctly. Once in a while
it happens just by accident. Fourth is the Kashmiri woman Lalla. The Kashmiris love Lalla so much
that they say out of respect for her that they have only two words: one is Allah and the other is Lalla.
The Kashmiris are ninety-nine percent Mohammedans, so when they say they know only two words,
Allah and Lalla, it is important.
Lalla never wrote a book. She was illiterate, but so courageous.... She remained naked all her life
– and remember this was hundreds of years ago in the East – and she was a beautiful woman.
Kashmiris are beautiful; in India they are the only really beautiful people. They are the lost tribe
Moses was searching for. They are basically, originally Jews.
When Moses was leading his people towards Israel... and one wonders what that madman was
doing: why to Israel? But madmen are after all mad, there is no explanation. Moses was searching
for a place for his people. He wandered for forty years in the desert, and then found Israel.
Meanwhile he had lost one of his tribes. That tribe had reached Kashmir.
Sometimes at least it is fortunate to be lost. Moses could not find them. Do you know that in his
search for the lost tribe Moses finally reached Kashmir... and he died there. His tomb is not in Israel,
it is in Kashmir.

Strange, Moses died in Kashmir, Jesus died in Kashmir. I have been to Kashmir many many times,
and I know it to be a place where one says, ”Aahhh, could I die this very moment, here and now...!”
It is so beautiful that to live afterwards will not be worthwhile.
Kashmiris are beautiful people – poor, but immensely beautiful. Lalla was a Kashmiri woman,
illiterate, but she could still sing and dance. So a few of her songs have been saved. She, of
course, could not be saved, but her songs have been. I include them in my postscript.
Fifth: Another mystic, Gorakh, a tantrika, a man so versed, so efficient in all the methods of Tantra
that anybody in India who knows many businesses is known as doing gorakh-dhandha. Gorakhdhandha means ’in the business of Gorakh’. People think one should stick to one’s own business.
Gorakh moved in all directions, in all dimensions.
Gorakh’s full name was Gorakh-nath. It must have been given by his disciples, because nath means
lord. Gorakh has given all the keys possible to enter into the inner mysteries. He has said everything
that can be said. He is, in a way, a full stop.
But the world continues, so do I. The world knows no full stop, neither do I. I will die only in the
middle of a sentence; then people will wonder forever what I was going to say, how I was going to
complete the sentence. I respect Gorakh-nath. I have spoken much about him. One day it will be
translated, so I need not waste any more time on this fellow.
Sixth: It is very rare that a man, a single man, produces two masterpieces, but that is the case with
Hubert Benoit. I don’t know how the French pronounce it... and they are so snobbish about their
pronunciation, and I am so sloppy! But I don’t care – what does it matter if a word here and there is
mispronounced? My whole life I have been mispronouncing.
This man Hubert Benoit – I have mentioned his first book, LET GO. In fact that was his second book.
Before writing LET GO he had written another book called THE SUPREME DOCTRINE. I would like
to include that too; otherwise I will feel really sad not to have mentioned it. It is a tremendously
beautiful book but very difficult to read, and much more difficult to understand. But Benoit tried his
best to make it as simple as possible.
Seventh. A great esoteric number, seven. I want it to be given to a really esoteric fellow, Shiva, the
Hindu concept of Ultimate Goodness. Many books carry the name of Shiva; many of them are not
true, they are just using the name to become respectable. But this book is one of the most authentic,
SHIVA SUTRA. I have spoken on it in Hindi; I am thinking of speaking on it in English too. I have
even decided the date, but you know me....
This book SHIVA SUTRA contains the techniques of all meditations. There cannot be any other
technique that is not included in this book. SHIVA SUTRA is the very bible of meditators.
Ashu, I know why they are laughing. Let them laugh. I know I am speaking very, very slowly, that’s
why they are laughing. But I am enjoying it and they are enjoying their laugh. So good, Ashu... only
once in a while one can find such a good woman. There are many beautiful women in the world but
good women are, my God, very difficult to find. Let the fools laugh. I will speak as slowly as I want.
I was talking about SHIVA SUTRA. This book is like no other, it is unique, incomparable.

Eighth: The most immensely beautiful work of an Indian mystic, Gaurang. The word gaurang itself
means ’the white one’. He was so beautiful... I can see him standing right before me, just white, or
rather snow-white. He was so beautiful that all the girls in the village fell in love with him. And he
remained a bachelor. One cannot get married to millions of girls. One of them is too much; millions,
my God! – that will kill anyone! Now you know the secret of why I am a bachelor.
Gaurang used to dance and sing his message. His message was not of words, but much more –
of a song. Gaurang has not written a book; his lovers – and there were many, too many in fact –
they collected his songs. Those songs are one of the most beautiful collections; I have never come
across anything like it before or after. What to say about them... just that I love them.
Ninth: Again another Indian mystic, you may not have heard about him. He was called Dadu, which
means the brother. He was so loving that people forgot his real name and simply remembered him
as Dadu, the brother. There are thousands of songs that Dadu sang, but they were not written down
by him, they were collected by others, just like a gardener collects flowers long fallen.
What I say about Dadu is true about all saints. They are averse to writing. They sing, they speak,
they dance, they indicate, but they don’t write. To write something is to make it very limited. A word
is a limitation; only then can it be a word. If it is unlimited it will be the sky, containing all the stars.
That’s what a saint’s experience is.
Even I myself have not written anything... just a few letters to those who were very intimate to me,
thinking, or perhaps believing, that they will understand. I don’t know whether they understood or
not. So my book A CUP OF TEA is the only book that can be said to have been written by me. It is
a compilation of my letters. Otherwise I have not written anything.
Dadu’s songs have been collected. I have spoken on him. He reaches to the very heights one can
aspire to.
Tenth, and the last. The last today is one of the strangest men that has ever walked on the earth,
Sarmad. He was a Sufi, and he was murdered in a mosque by order of the Mohammedan king.
He was murdered simply because of a particular Mohammedan sutra, one of their prayers. The
prayer is: ”Allah la il allah – Allah, God, is the only God.” And that is not enough for them; they want
something more. They want to declare to the world that Mohammed is the only prophet of God:
”Allah la il allah; mohammed bismillah. God is the only God, and Mohammed is the only prophet of
God.”
Sufis deny the second part, that Mohammed is the only prophet of God. That was the sin of
Sarmad. Obviously nobody can be the only prophet; nobody absolutely can be the only one –
neither Mohammed, nor Jesus, nor Moses, nor Buddha. Sarmad was killed, murdered, butchered,
by the Mohammedan king of India, in conspiracy with the Mohammedan priests. But he laughed,
and said, ”Even after my death I will say the same thing: Allah la il allah – God is the only God.”
The great mosque in Delhi, Jama Masjid, where Sarmad was killed, is still standing, a monument
to this great man. He was killed in a very inhuman way: just his head was cut off. His head rolled
down the steps of the Jama mosque. The thousands who had gathered there heard the head rolling
down the steps clearly shouting, ”Allah la il allah – God is the only God....”

I don’t know whether the story is true or not, but it must be. It has to be. Even truth has to
compromise with a man like Sarmad. I love Sarmad. He has not written any book, but his statements
have been compiled and the most significant is: God is the only God, and there is no prophet, there
is no one between you and God. There is no mediator, God is immediately available. Just all that is
needed is a little madness and a lot of meditation.
I was going to say something then, but I will not say it... it is unsayable. It has never been said
before, and I should not say it either.
It is still beautiful
like a sunset...
the birds are coming home,
the first stars are coming,
their colors are in the sky.
Can you see
the smile on my face?

Books I Have Loved ch.6

1984 in Lao Tzu House, Rajneeshpuram, Oregon, USA
Now the postscript. In the last session, when I said this is the end of this series of fifty books that I
wanted to include in my list, it was only arbitrary. I don’t mean the end, but the number. I had chosen
fifty because I thought it would be a good number. Anyway one has to decide, and all decisions are
arbitrary. But man proposes and God disposes – God, who is not.
When I said this is the end of the series, the crowd that was bugging me – Jaydeva of GEET
GOVIND, Madame Blah-Blah Blavatsky of THE SECRET DOCTRINE, and the whole company,
many of whom I know but don’t even want to recognize, what to say of including them in my list.
Hearing that this is the end, they all dispersed.
Then, to my utter joy, I saw the meaning of Jesus’ saying: Blessed are the meek, for theirs is the
kingdom of God. He also says: Blessed are those who stand at the end, the last, who don’t try to
push – in short, who are not pushy, who just stand and wait. When the crowd dispersed I saw those
blessed few; hence the postscript.
Even I myself could not believe that I had not included Gautama the Buddha’s DHAMMAPADA.
Gautam Buddha was sitting there silently in the last row. I love the man as I have loved nobody
else. I have been speaking on him throughout my whole life. Even speaking on others I have been
speaking on him. Take note of it, it is a confession. I cannot speak on Jesus without bringing Buddha
in; I cannot speak on Mohammed without bringing Buddha in. Whether I mention him directly or not
that’s another matter. It is really impossible for me to speak without bringing Buddha in. He is my
very blood, my bones, my very marrow. He is my silence, also my song. When I saw him sitting
there I remembered. I cannot even apologize, it is beyond apologizing.
DHAMMAPADA literally means ’the path of truth’, or even more accurately ’the footprints of truth’.
Do you see the contradiction?

Coming in
going out
the waterfowl
leaves no trace behind,
nor it needs a guide.
Truth is unspeakable. There are no footprints. Birds flying in the sky don’t leave any footprints... and
buddhas are birds of the sky.
But buddhas always speak in contradictions, and it is beautiful that at least they speak. They
cannot speak without contradicting themselves, they cannot help it. To speak of truth is to contradict
yourself. Not to speak is again to contradict, because even when you are trying not to speak, you
know that your silence is nothing but an expression, without words maybe, but an expression all the
same.
Buddha gave the name DHAMMAPADA to his greatest book, and there are contradictions upon
contradictions. He is so full of contradictions that believe me, except me nobody can defeat him. Of
course he would enjoy being defeated by me, just as a father once in a while enjoys being defeated
by his own child. The child sitting on his father’s chest victorious, and the father has simply allowed
him to win. All the buddhas allow themselves to be defeated by those who love them. I allow my
disciples to defeat me, to go beyond me. There cannot be anything more joyous than seeing a
disciple transcend me.
Buddha begins with the very name DHAMMAPADA – that’s what he is going to do: he is going
to say the unsayable, to utter the unutterable. But he uttered the unutterable so beautifully that
DHAMMAPADA is like an Everest. There are mountains and mountains, but not one rises to the
height of Everest.
I saw Buddha sitting. I saw others also, the most beautiful ones, the meekest – not like Blavatsky
hammering on the door shouting ”Let me in!” I saw Mahavira naked... because truth is naked,
standing in utter silence. His disciples were holding his book, not he himself.
Second: JIN SUTRAS – The Sutras of the Conqueror. Jin is a beautiful word, it means conqueror:
one who has conquered himself.
I have spoken of these sutras in many volumes, but they are as yet untranslated into English. One
thing I would like to say: that I include the JIN SUTRAS in the postscript.
Nobody has been so silent as Mahavira, nor as naked. Only silence can be so naked. Remember,
I am not saying nude, I am saying naked. Both words are totally different. ’Nude’ is pornographic;
’naked’ is just utterly open, vulnerable, uncovered. A child is not nude, but only naked. Mahavira in
his nakedness is so beautiful.

It is said that he never spoke his sutras to anyone; only the intimate ones sitting by his side heard
these sutras within themselves. They simply heard. It is one of the most miraculous things.... There
was an inner circle of eleven intimate disciples around Mahavira, and when they all simultaneously
heard the same word, then they thought that the word was worthy to be recorded, although Mahavira
had not said anything openly, but in some subtle way, through a vibe.
The JIN SUTRAS were written in a totally different way from any other book in the whole world.
The master remained silent, and eleven disciples simultaneously hear – emphasize the word
simultaneously – the same word, then they record it. That’s how the JIN SUTRAS were born. What
a birth for a book! One cannot conceive of a more beautiful beginning, and they certainly contain
the highest light man is capable of, and the whole science of conquering oneself.
Third... I saw a man whom I could not recognize. ”Strange,” I thought. ”Through thousands of
lives I have been a traveler on many paths, with many people, in many schools. Who is this man?
He is so unrecognizable.” He was not a master, that’s why I could not recognize him, but he was
meek enough to be included. I have always loved his book. I cannot in any way find any reason
why I forgot to include it in the list of fifty-one. The man was a Greek, Kazantzakis, the author of
ZORBA THE GREEK. I don’t even know how his name is pronounced but ZORBA THE GREEK is
a masterpiece. The man who produced it is not a Buddha, nor a Mahavira, but is capable of being
either at any moment. He is almost ready, ripe, just waiting as if for his season.
Zorba is one of my love affairs. I love strange people. Zorba is a very strange man – not even a
real man, only fictitious, but to me he has become almost a reality because he represents Epicurus,
Charvaka, and all the materialists of the world. He not only represents them, but represents them in
their best form.
In one place Zorba says to his boss, ”Boss, you have everything but still you are missing life, because
you don’t have a little madness in you. If you can manage a little madness you will know what life is.”
I can understand him; not only him, but I can understand all the Zorbas down the ages, with their
’little madness’. But I don’t believe in a little of anything. I am as mad as one can be, totally mad.
If you are only a little mad, of course you will understand only a little of life, but it is better than not
knowing at all.
Zorba, poor Zorba, illiterate Zorba, a laborer... he must have been huge, strongly built, and a little
mad. But he gave great advice to his master: ”Be a little mad,” he said. I say being a little mad won’t
do; be totally mad! But you can allow total madness only in meditation, otherwise you will freak
out. You won’t be able to consume it; on the contrary, it will consume you. If you don’t know what
meditation is you will be burned. Hence I have coined a new name: Zorba the Buddha.
Zorba the Buddha is my synthesis. I love Kazantzakis for creating a great work of art, but I feel
sorry for him too because he is still in darkness. Kazantzakis, you need a boss, a little of meditation;
otherwise you will never know what life is.
Fourth, I saw one of the most beautiful fellows. I have talked about him, but not mentioned him in
the list of fifty, the arbitrary list. The name of the man is al-Hillaj Mansoor. Al-Hillaj has not written a
book but only a few statements, or rather declarations. People like al-Hillaj only declare, not out of
any egoism – they don’t have any ego, that’s why they declare, ”ana’l haq!”

Ana’l haq! is his declaration and it means ”I am God, and there is no other God.” Mohammedans
could not forgive him; they killed him. But can you kill an al-Hillaj? It is impossible! Even while they
were killing him he was laughing.
Somebody asked, ”Why are you laughing?”
He replied, ”Because you are not killing me, you are killing only the body, and I have said again and
again that I am not my body. Ana’l haq! I am God himself.” Now these men are the very salt of the
earth.
Al-Hillaj Mansoor has not written any book; just a few of his declarations have been collected by
his lovers and friends. I will not even say followers, because men like al-Hillaj don’t even accept
followers, imitators – they only accept lovers, friends.
I am sorry, I forgot about him completely. That is not good of me. But, al-Hillaj, you should
understand my difficulty. I have read more books than you may have heard of. I have read more
than one hundred thousand books. Now, to find only fifty out of them all is really a difficult job. I have
chosen only a few, and naturally I have had to leave out many, with tears in my eyes. I would have
liked to choose them too... but I put you on record in the postscript.
Fifth: This man is known only to very few people, for the simple reason he never wrote and he never
spoke. Mahakashyapa. All that is known of him is this anecdote.
One day, Buddha came to his morning discourse with a lotus flower in his hand. He sat silently
looking at the flower, not saying a single word. The assembly of ten thousand sannyasins was
bewildered. This was unheard of. In the first place Buddha, who had never before come with
anything, comes with a lotus flower; secondly, he used to speak immediately, but today minutes and
hours have passed, and he is just looking at the flower. Many must have thought he must have gone
mad. Only one man did not agree. He laughed. That man was Mahakashyapa.
Buddha raised his eyes, laughed, and called Mahakashyapa to him, gave him the flower, and told the
assembly that the sermon was over, saying, ”I have given to you what you are entitled to, and I have
given to Mahakashyapa what he deserves, and rightly so. I have talked to you for years in words,
and you never understood. Today I have spoken in silence, and the laughter of Mahakashyapa has
shown that he has understood.” In this mysterious way the successor was found. Mahakashyapa
became Buddha’s successor. A strange way....
The disciples of Mahakashyapa have written a few things about him which can be called his book.
But really he has not written them, nor have his disciples signed them. They are anonymous. But
whatsoever was written is of immense beauty. A few fragments, just like pieces of the full moon:
if you can put them together there will be the full moon again. The secret to put them together is
meditation.
The tradition that followed Mahakashyapa is Zen. He is the first patriarch of Zen, of dhyana.
Strange... not even Buddha, but Mahakashyapa is the first. ... Because Buddha spoke for forty
years, Mahakashyapa never spoke; the only noise that he ever made was that of laughter. If you
can call it speaking, that’s another matter. In a way it is speaking – it is saying that the whole
existence is a joke. It is saying to Buddha, ”What a joke!”

The moment you understand that the whole existence is a joke, you have understood. There is no
other understanding, no other enlightenment. Everything else is pseudo.
Can you, Devageet, remind me of the number? – because even in the posthumous record, the
postscript, I have to make it ten. What is the number you said?
”Number six, Osho.”
Good. It is so beautiful that I said posthumous. I am really dead, that’s why I allow you to call me
Blessed One. If I am not dead then to call me the blessed one is not right.
The word posthumous came to me accidentally. I was going to say postscript, but sometimes truth
comes out accidentally. It is not arranged, ordered, it just erupts like a volcano. I was not going to
say it, but it came out on its own. Truth has its own ways. I am really a posthumous man; I died long
ago.
Sixth, I saw Hermann Hesse. He was not an enlightened one, what to say about those who have
gone beyond enlightenment. He was just an ordinary human being, but in a poetic flight he has
written one of the greatest books in the world, SIDDHARTHA.
Siddhartha is really the name of Gautama the Buddha, given to him by his parents. He became
known as Gautam Buddha. Gautama was his family name; Buddha simply means ’the awakened’.
Siddhartha was the real name given by his parents in consultation with the astrologers. It is a
beautiful name. Siddhartha also means ’one who has attained to the meaning’. Siddha means ’one
who has attained’; artha means ’the meaning’. Combined together Siddhartha means ’one who has
come to the meaning of life’. The astrologers, the parents, the people who gave him this name must
have been wise people – if not enlightened, at least wise... worldly-wise at least.
Hermann Hesse’s SIDDHARTHA repeats the story of Buddha in a different way, but in the same
dimension, with the same meaning. It is unbelievable that Hermann Hesse could write it but could
not become a siddha himself. He remained a poor writer – yes, a Nobel prizewinner, but that does
not matter that much. You cannot give a Nobel prize to a buddha; he will laugh and throw it away.
But the book is immensely beautiful, and I include it.
Seventh: It is not known that even in the very traditional, orthodox Judaism there have been a few
utterly enlightened masters – even some who have gone beyond enlightenment. One of them is
Baal Shem Tov. I cannot forgive myself for not including him, and there is nobody to whom I can ask
forgiveness.
Baal Shem Tov. Tov was the name of his town. His name simply means ’Baal Shem from the town
of Tov’; so let us call him simply Baal Shem. I have spoken about him because when I was speaking
about Hassidism, I have not left anything essential unspoken. I have spoken of Tao, of Zen, of
Sufism, of Hassidism. I am not a man of any tradition so I am free to move in any direction I decide
to. I don’t even need a map. Let me remind you again:
Coming in,
going out,

the waterfowl
leaves no trace behind,
nor it needs a guide.
Baal Shem Tov has not written any treatise – treatise is a dirty word in the world of mysticism – but
he told many beautiful stories, so beautiful that I would like to relate one of them to you just as an
example so you can taste the quality of the man.
A woman comes to Baal Shem. The woman is childless; she wants a child. She bugs Baal Shem
continuously saying, ”If you bless me everything is possible. Bless me please. I want a child.”
Finally, tired – yes, even Baal Shem can get tired of a nagging woman – he says, ”Do you want a
boy child or a girl?”
The woman was tremendously happy; she said, ”A boy, of course.”
Baal Shem said, ”Then listen to this story. My mother was also childless, and she bugged and
nagged the rabbi of the town continuously to bless her. Finally the rabbi said, ’First bring me a
beautiful cap.’ My mother,” Baal Shem said, ”made a beautiful cap and went to the rabbi.”
The cap was so beautiful that Baal Shem’s mother said, ”I don’t want anything in return, just to see
you in this cap is so beautiful. I am tremendously gratified. You are not obliged to me, I am obliged
to you. Thank you, rabbi.”
”And my mother went away. That’s how she became pregnant,” Baal Shem said, ”and I was born.”
The woman said, ”Great. So tomorrow I will come with a beautiful cap.”
The next day she returned with a very beautiful cap. Baal Shem accepted and did not even say
”Thank you.” The woman waited and waited, then she said, ”What about the child?”
Baal Shem said, ”Forget all about the child! The cap is so beautiful, I am obliged to you. I must say
thank you to you. Do you remember the story I told you? The woman did not ask anything in return,
that’s why she conceived a child, and a child like me” – like Baal Shem.
”But you have come with the desire to get something. Just because of this cap do you want a child
like Baal Shem? Forget all about it,” he said, ”and don’t come again – ever.”
There are many things that can be said only through stories. Baal Shem has said the fundamental:
Do not ask and it shall be given. Do not ask – that is the basic condition.
The Hassidism that arose out of Baal Shem’s stories is the most beautiful flowering that has ever
happened. Jews have done nothing comparable to Hassidism. Hassidism is a small current, but is
still alive, still flowing.

Eight: Farid. This is the man I have spoken of before – but not in English, in Hindi. Farid, the Sufi
mystic, a contemporary of Kabir, Nanak and others. I love him. In his songs he calls himself Farida.
He always addresses himself, never anybody else. He always starts, ”Farida, are you listening?
Farida, be awake! Farida, do this, do that!” In Hindi, when you use the name Farid it is respectable.
When you use the name Farida it is not respectable; one only calls the servants in that way. Farid
calls himself Farida of course because he is the master; the body is the servant.
The great king Akbar used to come to Farid to listen to his songs. Akbar once received a gift, a very
precious gift, a pair of golden scissors studded with diamonds. Gudia would have loved them – any
woman would. Akbar also loved them, so much so that he thought they would be a good present
for Farid. He came and gave the precious scissors to Farid. Farid looked at them, turning them this
way and that, then returned the gift to Akbar saying, ”This is of no use to me. If you want to give
something to me as a gift, bring a needle.”
Akbar was puzzled. He said, ”Why a needle?”
Farid said, ”Because the function of scissors is to cut things into pieces, and the function of a needle
is to join pieces together. My function is not that of the scissors, it is that of the needle. I join things
together, I synthesize.”
Farid would not have agreed with Sigmund Freud, nor with psychoanalysis, because psychoanalysis
is the golden scissors, going on cutting everything to pieces. He would have agreed with Assagioli
and psychosynthesis. Join, put things together, to oneness. Do you see my tears? They are for
Farid... Farida... yes, for Farida. There can be no homage for him. He will understand the tears,
not the golden scissors. Alas, could Akbar have fallen to the feet of Farid and wept, that would have
been the real gift to the master.
Farid has not written a book, but his songs have been written down by his people. His songs are
tremendously beautiful, but you have to listen to them sung by a Punjabi. He lived in the Punjab,
and his songs are in Punjabi, not even in Hindi. Punjabi is very different from Hindi. Hindi is mild, the
language of a businessman. Punjabi is like a sword, the language of a soldier. It is so penetrating.
When you hear Farid’s songs sung in Punjabi your heart starts breaking.
When I used to travel in the Punjab, I used to ask people, ”Can you sing Farid for me?” – and once
in a while I found a singer who was ready, who knew how to sing Farida. And all those beautiful
singers... all those beautiful moments.... Punjabi has a quality of its own. Every language has a
quality of its own. But Punjabi is certainly a sword, you cannot sharpen anything more.
Ninth. I am in a hurry because my hour may be nearly over, or already over, because I have seen
Gudia entering. What a sad thing that the hour follows the same law whether it is yours or mine. It
should not be chronological, it should be relative. My hour should not follow the same law, it should
not belong to the Einsteinian world of relativity. It should be endless. But I know it cannot be, so I
am in a hurry, and you know when I am in a hurry then too I am relaxed.
Ninth, another poet, another singer, another dancer, of a totally different quality: Shiva, and his book
VIGYAN BHAIRAV TANTRA. I have spoken about it. It is very small, only one hundred and twelve
sutras. You can easily write it on one page of a book, or at the most two pages. I have spoken on it

in five volumes, thousands of pages – THE BOOK OF THE SECRETS. I cannot say any other book
exists as condensed as VIGYAN BHAIRAV TANTRA – the book of Shiva. Each sutra is a method
unto itself.
Devageet, please don’t interrupt. Let me finish my work. They call the man in the chair the patient;
they should teach the doctors to be patient. Ashu, you are not a doctor so you need not worry. No
woman ever worries, she makes others worry; that’s another matter. Look, even Gudia is laughing,
which is rare for a proper Englishwoman!
Good. Laughter is always good. I love it, but I have to continue my work whether you laugh or cry; it
does not matter to this man in this chair. I am as hard as rock and as soft as a lotus, but I am both
together. For the sake of clarity let me tell you: first I am a rock; with this I will break your skull. I
cannot be a lotus for you, but what you are doing is so beautiful.
Tenth, I always had the idea of speaking on Uma Swati and his book. Uma Swati is a mystic, but
a very dry mystic – just like my lips at this moment, without any moisture. He has written a very
dry but true description of the ultimate. His book is called TATVA SUTRA. Tatva means ’the ultimate
reality’. Tat means ’that’ – the ultimate. ’This’ is the immediate, and ’that’ is the ultimate.
Devageet, stop interrupting. I know you know more about your machinery. I also know more about
your consciousness – and that’s what matters.
TATVA SUTRA is beautiful and I would have spoken about it but again and again I have postponed.
It is too mathematical, like Kundkunda’s SAMAYASAR. That’s how all Jaina mystics are – dry, utterly
dry.
Laxmi has really chosen a place – Kutch! Mahavira, Kundkunda, Uma Swati, all of these fellows
would have loved it in the Kutch. But for me, what a misfortune! I have always wanted to live in the
Himalayas, but for the sake of my people I have to leave the very idea of being in the Himalayas.
It did not happen to Buddha, Bodhidharma, to Basho; it did not happen to Omar Khayyam, to Kahlil
Gibran, to Mikhail Naimy, but it has happened to me. I know there must be a secret in it. It can only
be that I have to make Kutch as beautiful as the Himalayas. One thing is certain: that wherever I
am, I am going to create the most beautiful spot in the world, whatsoever the challenge.
Eleventh, and the last for the postscript... I mean for today. One never knows about tomorrow. The
last is something so beautiful that I must have been really sane to have forgotten it. Mind you, I am
not saying insane, I am saying sane. I must have been sane to have forgotten it. If I was insane
enough then it would have been impossible to forget it. Then it would have been the first to be
remembered, not the last. It is the SONG OF NAROPA.
I have never spoken about it because I never thought that anything could be said about it, but it has
been in my heart. I only mention it so that those who love me should start searching for it... the
poetry, the song, the dance of Naropa. And it is mine too.
Om Mani Padme Hum
The jewel in the lotus.

Thank you both, with all my joy.

Books I Have Loved ch.5

CHAPTER 5

1984 in Lao Tzu House, Rajneeshpuram, Oregon, USA

Now the work begins.

”Athato brahman jigyasa – now the inquiry into the ultimate...” that’s how Badrayana begins his great

book, perhaps the greatest. Badrayana’s book is the first I am going to talk about today. He begins

his great book BRAHMAN SUTRAS with this sentence: ”Now the enquiry into the ultimate.” That’s

how all the sutras in the East begin, always with ”Now...athato,” never otherwise.

Badrayana is one of those who are bound to be misunderstood, for the simple reason that he is too

serious. A mystic should not be so serious, that’s not a good quality. But he was a brahmin living

thousands of years ago, living among brahmins, talking to brahmins, and brahmins are the most

serious people in the world. Do you know India has no jokes? Is it not strange for such a big country

to be without jokes? Such a long history without jokes! The brahmins cannot joke because the joke

seems too profane, and they are sacred people.

I can understand and forgive Badrayana, but I could not forget to mention that he is a little bit too

serious. I was hesitating whether to include him in my list of books. The hesitation was only because

of his seriousness. I did not hesitate about MIRDAD; I did not hesitate at all about even RUBAIYAT,

by Omar Khayyam. But I hesitated about Badrayana and his BRAHMAN SUTRAS, which in the East

is considered to be one of the greatest books – and it certainly is.

I have read many serious books, even that rascal saint George Gurdjieff’s ALL AND EVERYTHING,

but there is nothing to compete with Badrayana’s BRAHMAN SUTRAS as far as seriousness is

concerned. He is ultimate in his seriousness too. Alas, could he only have laughed a little!

Christians believe that Jesus never laughed. I refute it. I refute it absolutely! It is possible about

Badrayana; he may never have laughed. He is so serious, utterly serious. You could not create a

more serious book. Thousands of commentaries have been written on it to explain what he means.

Truth needs no commentary, but when you put it in a serious garb, naturally commentators follow,

and commentators always serve the devil. It is still a great book; in spite of Badrayana’s seriousness

it is great. Badrayana reaches to the highest, to the ultimate, with great acumen, with great efficiency,

the efficiency of a scientist.

In India a person is called an acharya, a master, only if he has written a commentary on three things:

first, the one hundred and eight UPANISHADS; second, SHRIMAD BHAGAVADGITA, Krishna’s

celestial songs; third, the most important of all, Badrayana’s BRAHMAN SUTRAS. I have never

spoken about him. I was called acharya for many years, and people used to ask me if I had written

all the commentaries – the GITA, the UPANISHADS and the BRAHMAN SUTRAS. I laughed and

said, ”I only tell jokes, I don’t write any commentaries whatsoever. My being called an acharya is a

joke, don’t take it seriously.”

BRAHMAN SUTRA. Brahman is known and understood as God, but it is not so. Brahman has

nothing to do with the Christian idea of God creating the world four thousand and four years before

Jesus Christ. When I say it I think that if Badrayana had heard, perhaps even he might have laughed,

he may have lost his seriousness. Brahman does not mean God; Brahman means godliness, the

divineness that pervades the whole existence... the whole, the holiness of the whole.

Sutra simply means a track. You cannot speak much about Brahman; whatsoever you may say

about it is only a track, a hint. But a hint can become a bridge, a track can become a bridge, and

Badrayana has made a bridge within his sutras.

I love the book in spite of Badrayana’s seriousness. I hate seriousness so much that I have to say

”in spite of Badrayana’s seriousness.” I still love him for creating one of the most significant books in

the world. The ’bibles’ are very far away from Badrayana’s SUTRAS, they don’t even come close to

it.

Second: Narada’s BHAKTI SUTRAS. Narada is just the opposite of Badrayana, and I love to put

opposites together. I would like to put Narada and Badrayana into the same room and enjoy

whatsoever happens between them. Narada always carried an ektara, a musical instrument with

only one string – ek means one, and tara means string. Narada always carried his ektara, playing

on it, singing and dancing. Badrayana would not have tolerated it at all. I can tolerate all kinds

of people. Badrayana would have shouted and screamed at Narada. Narada was not the kind of

person who would have listened to Badrayana; he would have continued to play, singing even more

loudly to irritate Badrayana. I would have enjoyed seeing them both together in the same room.

That’s why the second book I choose is Narada’s BHAKTI SUTRAS.

His sutras begin with ”athato bhakti jigyasa – now the inquiry into love....” To inquire into love is the

greatest exploration, the greatest inquiry. Everything else falls short, even atomic energy. You can

be a scientist even of the caliber of Albert Einstein, but you don’t know what real inquiry is unless

you love. And not only love, but love plus awareness... then it becomes inquiry into love, the most

difficult task in the world.

Let me repeat, it is the most difficult task in the world – love with awareness. People fall in love;

people become unconscious in love. Their love is only biological, it is gravitation. They are pulled

down towards the earth. But Narada is talking about a totally different love: love as meditation, as

awareness. Or in scientific terms, love as levitation, against gravity. Leave gravitation for the graves;

levitate, arise! And when one starts rising to love, flying towards the stars, that is athato bhakti

jigyasa.

Why do you all look so worried? I love the devils – let them work, let them create as much noise as

they can. As far as I am concerned they cannot disturb me, and as far as you are concerned you

are already disturbed, what more can they do? So everything is perfectly okay, it is as it should be.

I have loved Narada’s book tremendously. I have talked about it, but not in English, because English

is not my language, and moreover it is too scientific, mathematical, modern. I have spoken of Narada

in Hindi, my mother tongue, in which I can sing more easily. It is closer to my heart.

One of my professors used to say, ”You cannot love in a foreign language, and you cannot fight

either.”

When it comes to fighting one wants to speak the language of the heart. When it comes to love it is

the same, only more so because it needs more depth.

When I speak in English I am bound to speak it wrongly, because it is a double work. I am still

speaking in Hindi and then translating it into English. A hard task. Speaking directly into English has

not happened to me, thank God! Remember, God does not exist; he is only created so that we can

thank someone. I hope somebody will translate what I have said about Narada.

I have spoken on many things in Hindi which I have not spoken on in English out of necessity,

because it was not possible. And vice versa too: I have spoken in English about many things which

were not possible to speak on in Hindi. My work has been a little strange. When all my books are

translated from Hindi to English, and from English to Hindi, you will be even more bewildered than

you are, more puzzled than you are – and I will have a good laugh. Whether I am in the body or

not, it does not matter; I will have a good laugh, I promise it, wherever I am! I am bound to be

somewhere in the cosmos. Seeing you puzzled, bewildered, shaking your heads, not being able to

believe, because I have spoken in both these languages in different dimensions.... I only chose to

speak in English because there is a dimension which cannot be expressed in Hindi.

The third book is Patanjali’s YOGA SUTRAS. Badrayana is too serious, Narada is too nonserious.

Patanjali is just in the middle, exactly in the middle: neither serious nor nonserious, the very spirit of

a scientist. I have spoken ten volumes on Patanjali so there is no need to say more about him. After

ten volumes it will he difficult to say anything more, to add anything more to it. Only one thing, that I

love the man.

Fourth: Kabir, THE SONGS OF KABIR. Nothing like it exists in the world. Kabir is incredibly

beautiful. An uneducated man, born a weaver – to whom nobody knows – his mother left him

on the bank of the Ganges. He must have been an illegal child. But it is not enough to just be legal;

he was certainly illegal, but he was born out of love, and love is the real law. I have also spoken

much on Kabir too, so there is no need to add anything except again and again to say, ”Kabir, I love

you as I have never loved any man.”

Is my numbering still right?

”Yes, Osho.”

That’s great. Devils cannot disturb me at all!

Fifth: I now bring in a woman. I have been thinking again and again to bring in a woman but the

men were crowding at the door – very ungentlemanly! – and they won’t allow a woman in. And

the woman who has somehow managed to enter... my God, what a woman! Madame Blah-Blah

Blavatsky. That’s how I always call Blavatsky: Blah-Blah. She was great at writing blah-blah – writing

everything about nothing, making mountains out of molehills. And I knew she would be the first

woman to enter. She was a strong woman. She somehow managed to push aside all the Patanjalis,

Kabirs, Badrayanas, and enter with her seven volumes of THE SECRET DOCTRINE. That is my fifth

book. It is almost an encyclopedia, ENCYCLOPEDIA ESOTERICA. Nobody, I think, can compete

with Blavatsky as far as esotericism is concerned – except me of course; I can write seven hundred

volumes. That’s why I have avoided speaking on THE SECRET DOCTRINE: because if I speak on

the seven volumes of THE SECRET DOCTRINE, then, Inshallah, God willing, I will produce seven

hundred volumes, not less than that.

It has been reported to me that I have already spoken three hundred and thirty-six books. My God!

God is merciful – merciful because I don’t have to read them. I have not read any of them. But

Blavatsky would have immediately made something out of it. That’s what I call esotericism. Three

hundred and thirty-six: three-three-six, that means three plus three is six... sixty-six; six plus six

is twelve... one plus two... again three! The moment you come to three then you cannot stop the

esoteric; he has got the key. The esoteric will open doors you have never imagined. Three is enough

to open all doors, locked or unlocked.

Blavatsky, poor woman – I pity her and love her too, in spite of her face, which is not lovable, not even

likable, what to say of love! Her face could only be used to frighten children when they are doing

something nasty. Blavatsky had a very ugly face – but I pity the woman: in the world of men, made

by men, dominated by men, she is the only woman who asserted, dominated, and started the first

religion ever by any woman... Theosophy. She competed with Buddha, Zarathustra, Mohammed,

and I thank her for that. Somebody needed to do it. The man has to be put in his place. I thank her

for that.

THE SECRET DOCTRINE, although so full of esoteric bullshit, has many beautiful diamonds too

and many lotuses. There is much rubbish in it because she was a collector. She went on collecting

all kinds of rubbish from everywhere possible, without bothering whether it was useful or not. She

was great at putting all that useless nonsense in a systematic way. A very systematic woman. But

there are a few – sad to say only a few – diamonds here and there.

On the whole the book is not worth much. I am including it just so that a few women are included in

my list and I am not thought to be a male chauvinist. I am not. I may be a female chauvinist, but not

a male chauvinist at all.

Sixth, THE SONGS OF MEERA. After Blavatsky I have to include Meera just to make things beautiful

again, just to balance. Blavatsky is very heavy and it will take a few more women to balance her.

I will do that. Sixth is Meera’s SONGS; they are the most beautiful ever sung by any man or any

woman. It is impossible to translate them.

Meera says: ”main to prem divani – I am madly in love, so madly loved that I am mad, mad, mad!”

Perhaps this may give you a little hint what kind of songs she sang. She was a princess, a queen,

but she renounced the palace to be a beggar on the streets. Playing her veena she danced in the

marketplace, from village to village, town to town, city to city, singing her heart out, pouring herself

totally. I have spoken of Meera in Hindi; someday some madman may translate what I have said.

Seventh: Another woman. I am just trying to balance that heavy Blah-Blah Blavatsky. She was

actually heavy, literally heavy, must have weighed three hundred pounds! Three hundred pounds,

and a woman! She would have thrown your so-called Muhammad Ali in a single moment. She

would have crushed the so-called greatest under her feet, leaving not a trace behind. Three hundred

pounds – a real woman! No wonder she could not find a lover, only followers. Naturally, obviously,

you cannot love such a woman. If she forces you, you can only follow. To balance Blavatsky, the

seventh, THE SONGS OF SAHAJO.

Another woman, Sahajo. Even the name is poetic, it means ’the very essence of spontaneity’. I

have spoken on Sahajo, again in Hindi because English does not allow me to be so poetic. I don’t

see much poetry in the English language, and what I see in the name of poetry looks so unpoetic

that I wonder why nobody rebels against it. Why are there no people to start English afresh, but

poetically? It is becoming more and more the language of the scientist, the technician, or to put it

better, of the technologist. It is a misfortune. Someday it can only be hoped that what I have said on

Sahajo will be known to the world at large.

Eighth: Another woman, because I have not yet balanced that heavyweight champion, Blah-Blah

Blavatsky. This woman will do it. She is a Sufi; her name is Rabiya al-Adabiya. Al-Adabiya means

’from the village of Adabiya’. Rabiya is her name, al-Adabiya is her address. That’s how the Sufis

named her: Rabiya al-Adabiya. The village became a very Mecca when Rabiya was still alive.

Travelers from all over the world, seekers from everywhere, came searching for Rabiya’s hut. She

was really a ferocious mystic; with a hammer in her hand she could have broken anybody’s skull.

She actually broke many many skulls and brought out the hidden essence.

Once, Hassan came to her searching, seeking. One morning while staying with her he asked for the

Koran for his morning prayer. Rabiya gave him her own book. Hassan was aghast; he said, ”This

is condemnable. Who has done this?” Rabiya had corrected the Koran! She had crossed out many

words in many places. She had even cut out whole passages. Hassan said, ”This is not allowed.

The Koran cannot be edited. Who can edit the prophet – the last messenger of God?” That’s why

the Mohammedans call him the last messenger – because there will be no more prophets after

Mohammed, so who can correct his words? He is correct, and not correctable.

Rabiya laughed and said, ”I don’t care about tradition. I have seen God face to face, and I have

changed the book according to my experience. This is my book,” she said; ”you cannot raise any

objection. It is my possession. You should be thankful that I allowed you to go through it. I have to

be true to my experience, not to anybody else’s.”

This is Rabiya, the incredible woman. I include her in my list. She is enough to put Madame

Blavatsky in her place. Again, Rabiya’s words are not written by her, but are just disciples’ notes,

like Devageet’s. Rabiya would say something out of context – nobody could figure out any context;

suddenly she would say something and it was noted down. So were the anecdotes she related and

the anecdotes that her life itself became. I love that.

Meera is beautiful, but without salt, just sweet. Rabiya is very salty. As you know I am a diabetic,

and I cannot eat or drink too much of Meera – Devaraj won’t allow it. But Rabiya is okay, I can have

as much salt as I want. In fact I hate sugar, and I hate saccharin even more, the artificial sugar

created especially for diabetics – but I love the salt.

Jesus said to his disciples: Ye are the salt of the earth. I can say of Rabiya: Rabiya, you are the salt

of all the women that have existed and will ever exist on the earth.

Ninth: Nanak, the founder of Sikhism, his songs. He roamed around the known world of his day

with a single follower, Mardana. Mardana means manly – ’the really brave’. To be a follower one

has to be brave. Nanak used to sing while Mardana played on his sitar, and that’s how they roamed

around the world spreading the fragrance of the ultimate. His songs are so beautiful, they bring

tears to my eyes. Just because of his songs a new language was created. Because he wouldn’t

listen to any grammar, any rules of language, regulations, he created Punjabi just by his songs. It is

a tremendously strong language, just like the sharp edge of a sword.

Tenth. I have always wanted to speak of Shankaracharya – the first, not the present one – the

original Shankaracharya, the Shankaracharya. I had decided to speak on his famous book, VIVEK

CHUDAMANI – The Crest Jewel of Awareness. At the last moment... you know I am a madman; at

the last moment I decided not to speak on it. The reason was simple: the book is more logic than

love, and I would have had to suffer that logic. It is not a small book. It is a big book and I was going

to speak on it for eight months continuously. It would have been a long journey and it was better to

call it off, so I decided not to speak on it. But it has to be included among the great books that I am

counting.

VIVEK CHUDAMANI, by Shankaracharya, has of course here and there diamonds, flowers, stars.

But the brahmin rubbish in between is too much and too thick, I could not tolerate it. But the book

is great – you cannot renounce a mine of diamonds just because there are too many stones and so

much mud around.

Eleventh, and the last in the series: Hazrat Mohammed’s KORAN. The KORAN is not a book to be

read but a book to be sung. If you read it you will miss it. If you sing it you may God willing perhaps

find it.

The KORAN was not written by a scholar or a philosopher. Mohammed was absolutely illiterate,

he could not even sign his own name, but he was possessed by the spirit of God. Because of his

innocence he was chosen and started the song, and that song is the KORAN.

I don’t understand Arabic, but I understand the KORAN because I can understand the rhythm and

the beauty of the rhythm, of the Arabic sounds. Who cares about the meaning! When you see a

flower do you ask, ”What does it mean?” The flower is enough. When you see a flame, do you ask,

”What does it mean?” A flame is enough. Its beauty is its meaning. Its very meaninglessness, if

rhythmic, is meaningful.

So is the KORAN, and I am thankful that I am allowed by God – and remember, there is no God,

this is only an expression. Nobody is allowing me. Inshallah, thank God I am allowed to end this

series with the KORAN, the most beautiful, the most meaningless, the most significant but yet the

most illogical book in the whole history of humanity.

Books I Have Loved ch.4

CHAPTER 4
1984 in Lao Tzu House, Rajneeshpuram, Oregon, USA
Okay. Get ready for your notes.
The world would have lost much without people like Devageet. We would not have known anything of
Socrates if Plato had not written notes, nor of Buddha, nor Bodhidharma. Jesus too is known through
his disciples’ notes. Mahavira is said never to have uttered a single word. I know the meaning of
why it is said. It is not that he did not utter a single word, but that he never communicated to the
world directly; it was only through the notes of his disciples.
There is not a single case known where an enlightened person has written anything himself. As you
know, to me an enlightened person is not the last thing. There is still a transcendental state which
is neither enlightened nor not-enlightened. Now, in that state of consciousness it is only through
intimate communion – I am not using the word communication knowingly, but communion – a kind
of merger, that the disciple becomes just the hand of the master.
So get ready for your notes, because last time, although unwillingly, I was going to mention the name
of the poet-singer of GEET GOVIND. Somehow though I managed not to mention it. I pretended as
if I had forgotten it, but it is heavy on me. The whole day I felt a little concerned about Jaydeva – that
is the name of the poet-singer of GEET GOVIND.
Why was I not willing to mention his name? For his own sake. He was not even close to
enlightenment. I have mentioned Mikhail Naimy, the creator of THE BOOK OF MIRDAD; I have
mentioned Kahlil Gibran, and many others: Nietzsche, Dostoevsky, Walt Whitman. They are not
enlightened, but very close, just on the verge; one push and they will be in, in the temple. They are
standing just at the door, not daring enough to knock... and the door is not locked. They can push
and it will open. It is already open, it just needs a push, just as they need a push. Hence I mention
their names.

But Jaydeva is not even close to the temple. It is a miracle how GEET GOVIND descended on him.
But no one knows God’s mysteries – and remember there is no God, it is only an expression. Nobody
knows the mysteries of existence, its abundance. Sometimes it pours on barren land, sometimes it
does not rain on fertile soil. It is simply so, nothing can be done about it.
Jaydeva is a barren land. GEET GOVIND, this tremendously beautiful poetry, the song of God,
descended upon him. He must have sung it, composed it, not knowing what he was doing. I don’t
see him anywhere near the temple, that is why I was unwilling to mention his name. It may even
make him more egoistic. That is why I said ”for his own sake,” but I felt it is not the poor man’s fault –
whatsoever he is, he is – but he has given birth to a beautiful child, and if I have mentioned the child
then let me mention the father’s name; otherwise people will think the child is a bastard. The father
may have been, but the child is not.
I feel a great relief because I am finished with Jaydeva forever. But there is a queue standing at the
door. You don’t know what a fix I am in. I had not thought of it before, because I am not a thinker
and I never think before I jump. I jump, and then I think. It was just by the way that I mentioned ten
beautiful books. I was not thinking so many others would start bugging me. So, ten more.
First: The FRAGMENTS of Heraclitus. I love this man. Let me mention it, just by the way, as a note
in the margin, that I love all, but I don’t like all. I like a few and I don’t like a few, but I love all. About
that there is no question. I love Jaydeva as much as I love Heraclitus, but Heraclitus I like too.
There are very few whom I can put in the same category as Heraclitus. In fact, even to say that is not
true; there is no one. Now I am saying what I really wanted to say always. There is no one, I repeat,
who can be put in the same category as Heraclitus. He is just far out – dangerously awakened,
unafraid of the consequences of what he was saying.
He says in these FRAGMENTS – again the notes of a Devageet, a disciple. Heraclitus did not write.
There must be something, some reason why these people do not write, but of that a little later.
Heraclitus says in the FRAGMENTS: ”You cannot step in the same river twice.” And then he says:
”No, you cannot step in the same river even once....” This is tremendously beautiful, and true too.
Everything is changing, and changing so fast that there is no way to step in the same river twice;
you can’t even step in the same river once. The river is constantly flowing; going, going, going to
the ocean, to the infinite, going to disappear into the unknown.
This is the first on my list this evening: Heraclitus.
Second: The GOLDEN VERSES of Pythagoras. He was one of the most misunderstood men,
obviously. If you know you are bound to be misunderstood, that is certain. To understand is
so dangerous, because then you will be misunderstood. Pythagoras was not understood even
by his own disciples, not even by those who wrote down the GOLDEN VERSES. They wrote it
mechanically... because not a single disciple of Pythagoras rose to his heights, not a single one
became enlightened. And the Greeks have completely ignored him. They have ignored their best:
Heraclitus, Socrates, Pythagoras, Plotinus. They had wanted to ignore Socrates too, but he was too
much. So they had to poison him, they could not just ignore him.

But Pythagoras is completely ignored, and he has the same key as Gautam Buddha, Jesus, or any
other enlightened one. One thing more: neither Jesus nor Buddha nor Lao Tzu made so much effort
to find the key as Pythagoras. He worked the most. Pythagoras was the most authentic seeker. He
risked all and everything. He traveled all around the world that was known in those days; studied
under all kinds of masters; entered into all kinds of mystery schools and fulfilled their conditions. He
is a category in himself.
Third: A man who is not known much, not even by his own countrymen. His name is Saraha, and
the book is called THE SONG OF SARAHA; that is its Tibetan title. Nobody knows who wrote it
down. One thing is certain, Saraha never did, he just sang it. But it has the fragrance that the man
knew, that he had attained. The song is not the composition of a poet but a realization of a mystic.
It is just a few lines, but of such grandeur and beauty that the stars can feel ashamed.
THE SONG OF SARAHA is untranslated. I heard it from a Tibetan lama. I would have liked to have
heard it again and again but the lama stank so much that I had to say ”Thank you....” Lamas stink
because they never take a bath. The lama’s stink – and I am allergic to smells – was even too much
for me to hear the whole song! I was worried that I was going to have an asthma attack.
I have spoken much about Saraha; he is the original source of the school of Tantra.
Fourth: Tilopa, and the few notes from his song left behind by his disciples. I wonder, without these
disciples, how much we would have missed. These people who were just writing down whatsoever
was said by the master, not thinking whether it was right or wrong, just trying to put it into words as
correctly as possible. And it is a difficult task. A master is a madman, he can say anything, he can
sing anything, or he may remain silent. He may just make a few gestures with his hand, and those
gestures have to be understood. That was what Meher Baba did continuously for thirty years. He
remained silent, only making gestures with his hands.
Is my numbering incorrect, Devageet?
”No, Osho.”
So good... it feels so good to be correct sometimes. With numbers I am really good. It is a strange
coincidence that I asked at the right moment. I always get mixed up with numbers. I cannot count,
for the simple reason that I am facing the immeasurable, the unaccountable. The truth that I am
facing is neither in words, nor in numbers. The truth transcends all, and it is so wondrous that one
gets mixed up. Everything goes upside down, bizarre. So this is a great compliment that you said I
was right. But now please tell me, what was the number?
”Number five, Osho.”
Thank you.
Fifth: The man I am going to mention is not recognized as enlightened because there was nobody
to recognize him. Only an enlightened person can recognize another. This man’s name is D.T.
Suzuki. This man has done more than anybody else in the modern world to make meditation and
Zen available. Suzuki worked for his whole life to introduce to the West the innermost core of Zen.

’Zen’ is only the Japanese pronunciation of the Sanskrit word dhyana – meditation. Buddha never
used Sanskrit; he hated it, for the simple reason that it had become the language of the priests, and
the priest is always in the service of the devil. Buddha used a very simple language, that used by his
people in the valley of Nepal. The name of his language is Pali. In Pali dhyana is pronounced ch’ana.
Simple, illiterate, ordinary people cannot appreciate the subtleties of any language. They make it
according to themselves. It is like a stone rolling down the river, it becomes round. That’s how
every word used by the people starts having a beautiful roundness, a particular simplicity. Dhyana
is difficult for the ordinary people to pronounce; they pronounced it ch’ana. When it reached China,
from ch’ana it became ch’an, and when it traveled to Japan it became Zen. You can see – it happens
everywhere – people always make words simple.
D.T. Suzuki’s book ZEN AND JAPANESE CULTURE is my fifth. This man has done so much service
for humanity that no one can transcend him. His work is immense. The whole world is indebted to
him and it will always remain so. Suzuki should be a household word. It is not... I am saying that it
should be. Very few people are aware, and those who are aware it is their responsibility to spread
their awareness far and wide.
Sixth: I am going to introduce a Frenchman to you. You will be surprised. Inside you are asking
yourself, ”A Frenchman? And being listed by Osho along with Pythagoras, Heraclitus, Suzuki? Has
he really gone mad?”
Yes, I have never been sane, not for these last twenty-five years, or a little more. Before that I too
was sane, but thank God – again remember it is just an expression, because there is no God, only
godliness. I don’t forget to mention it because there is every possibility that even my followers, my
disciples, will start worshipping God – or me as a God. There is no God, there never was.
Nietzsche is wrong when he says, ”God is dead!” – not because God is not dead, but because he
was never alive so how can he be dead? To be dead one has to first fulfill the condition of being
alive. That is where Sartre is wrong: he agrees with Nietzsche. I say ”Thank God!” – I used the word
because there is no other word to use in its place. But it is only a word, contentless. ”Thank God”
simply means it is good, that it is beautiful.
I am feeling so tremendously joyous that, Devageet, you will have to remind me again what was the
sixth book I was talking about.
”A Frenchman, Osho.”
Right. I have not mentioned the name yet. The book is Hubert Benoit’s LET GO. It should be on
the bookshelf of every meditator. Nobody has written so scientifically and yet so poetically. It is a
contradiction, but he has managed it. Hubert Benoit’s LET GO is the best that has come out of the
modern Western world. It is the best book of the century as far as the West is concerned. I am not
counting the East.
The seventh: Ramakrishna, his PARABLES. You know I don’t like saints very much. That does not
mean that I like them a little bit – I don’t like them at all. In fact, to be true I hate them. Saints are
phony, hocus-pocus, the stuff bullshit is made of. But Ramakrishna does not belong to them – again,
thank God! At least there are a few people who are saintly and yet are not saints.

Ramakrishna’s PARABLES are very simple. Parables are bound to be simple. Remember the
parables of Jesus? – just like that. If a parable is difficult then it is no longer useful. A parable is only
needed so that it can be understood by all ages of children. Yes, I mean all ages of children. There
are children who are ten years of age, and there are children of eighty years of age, and so on... but
they are all children playing on the seashore, collecting seashells. Ramakrishna’s PARABLES is my
seventh book.
Eighth: THE FABLES OF AESOP. Now Aesop is not really a historical person; he never existed.
Buddha has used all those parables in his sermons. With Alexander coming to India, those parables
were brought to the West. Of course many things changed, even the name of Buddha. Buddha was
called The Bodhisattva.
Buddha has said there are two kinds of buddhas: one is the arhat, one who attains his buddhahood
and then does not care about anybody else; and the bodhisattva, who attains buddhahood and
then tries his hardest to help others on the path. ’Bodhisattva’ was the word carried by Alexander
as bodhisat, which then became Josephus; then from Josephus it became Aesop. Aesop is not a
historical person, but the parables are tremendously significant. That’s my eighth book today.
Ninth: Nagarjuna’s MULA MADHYAMIKA KARIKA. I don’t like Nagarjuna very much; he is too much
of a philosopher, and I am anti-philosophic. But his MULA MADHYAMIKA KARIKA, his KARIKAS for
short.... MULA MADHYAMIKA KARIKA means the essence of the path of the middle – the essential
middle path. In his KARIKAS he has reached the profoundest depths of which words are capable. I
have never spoken on it. If you want to speak on the essential, the best way is not to speak at all,
just to be silent. But the book is tremendously beautiful.
Tenth: my last for this evening is a strange book; ordinarily nobody would think I would include it at
all. It is the great work of Marpa, the Tibetan mystic. Even his followers don’t read it; it is not meant
to be read, it is a puzzle. You have to meditate over it. You have just to look at it and then suddenly
the book disappears – its contents disappear, and only the consciousness remains.
Marpa was a very strange man. His master Milarepa used to say, ”Even I bow down to Marpa.” No
master has ever said that, but Marpa was such....
Somebody once said to Marpa, ”Do you believe in Milarepa? If so then jump into this fire!”
Immediately he jumped! People ran from all sides to extinguish the fire knowing that Marpa had
jumped into it. When the fire was put out they found him sitting there in a buddha posture laughing
hilariously!
They asked Marpa, ”Why are you laughing?”
He said, ”I am laughing because trust is the only thing that fire cannot destroy.”
This is the man whose simple songs I count as the tenth – THE BOOK OF MARPA.
Is my hour over? I can hear you saying yes, though I know my hour has not even come yet. How
can it be over? I have come before my time, that’s why I am misunderstood.
But as far as you are concerned, you are right; my hour is over. And this is really beautiful. There is
no expression for it. It is so beautiful, it is better to end it now.

Books I Have Loved ch. 3

CHAPTER 3
1984 in Lao Tzu House, Rajneeshpuram, Oregon, USA
Now my work begins. What a joke! The joke of all jokes is that Sosan, the Chinese sage, was
knocking at the door of my consciousness. These mystics are too much. You can never know at
what moment they will start knocking at your doors. You are making love to your girlfriend, and
Sosan comes and starts knocking. They come all the time, anytime, they do not believe in any
etiquette. And what was he saying to me? He was saying, ”Why haven’t you included my book?”
My God, that is true! I have not included his book in my list for the simple reason that his book
contains all that is. If I include his hook then nothing else is needed, then no other book is needed.
Sosan is enough unto himself. His book is called HSIN HSIN MING.
HSIN has to be written not like the English ’sin’ but h-s-i-n. Now you know the Chinese: what a way
to commit a sin! Hsin... HSIN HSIN MING.
Okay Sosan, I include your book too. That becomes my first book today. I am sorry, it should have
been the first from the very beginning, but I have already talked about twenty others. It doesn’t
matter. HSIN HSIN MING whether I said it or not, is the foremost, the first. Write the FIRST,
Devageet, in capital letters.
HSIN HSIN MING is such a small book that if Sosan had known that one day, after him, Gurdjieff
would write a book called ALL AND EVERYTHING, he would have laughed, because that title
belongs to his own book. And Gurdjieff had to write one thousand pages, yet the few words of
Sosan are far more penetrating, far more significant. They go directly to your heart.
I can even hear the noise – not of those words going to your heart, but some mouse, some devil,
doing his work. Let him do his work.

Sosan’s book is so small, just like ISA UPANISHAD, and far more significant. When I say that my
heart breaks, because I would like ISA to be the ultimate book, but what can I do? – Sosan has
defeated it. Tears come to my eyes because ISA is defeated, and also because Sosan is victorious.
The book is so small, you can write it on your palm; but if you try, please remember... the left hand.
Don’t write it on the right hand, that will be sacrilege. They say, ”Right is right, and left is wrong.” I
say left is right, and right is wrong, because the left represents all that is beautiful in you, and Sosan
can enter only through the left. I know because I have entered thousands of hearts through the left
hand, through the left side, through their feminine, their yin – I mean the Chinese yin – I have never
been able to enter anybody through his yang. The very word is enough to prevent anybody: yang.
It seems to say ”Keep away!” It says ”Stop. Do not enter here. Keep off! Beware of the dog!”
The right is like that. The right belongs to the wrong side of your consciousness. It is useful, but
only as a servant. It should never be the master. So if you write Sosan’s HSIN HSIN MING, write it
on your left palm.
It is such a beautiful book, each word is golden. I cannot conceive of a single word that could be
deleted. It is exactly that which is needed, required, to say the truth. Sosan must have been a
tremendously logical man, at least while he was writing his HSIN HSIN MING.
I have spoken about it and I have never loved speaking more. The greatest moments of my speaking
were when I was speaking on Sosan. Speaking and silence together... speaking yet not speaking,
because Sosan can be explained only through no-speaking. He was not a man of words, he was a
man of silence. He spoke just the minimum. Forgive me Sosan, I forgot you. Just because of you I
remember a few more who can knock at my door and disturb my afternoon sleep, so it is better that
I should mention them.
First is Sosan’s HSIN HSIN MING.
Second is P.D. Ouspensky’s TERTIUM ORGANUM. It is a miracle that he wrote it before he had even
heard of Gurdjieff. He wrote it before he knew what he was writing. He understood it himself only
afterwards, on meeting Gurdjieff. His first words to George Gurdjieff were: ”Looking into your eyes
I have understood TERTIUM ORGANUM. Although I have written it, now I can say that it has been
written through me by some unknown agency I was not aware of.” Perhaps it was that rascal Gurdjieff
who wrote it through him, or maybe somebody else whom the Sufis call the Ultimate Rascal, who
has been doing miracles – miracles like TERTIUM ORGANUM.
The title means ’the third canon of thought’. The Sufis give that ultimate agency a name; it is not a
person but only a presence. I can feel that presence right now, here... this very moment. They call it
a certain name, because everything has to be given a name, but I will not say it, not in the presence
of this beauty, this splendor... of this exuberance... of this exaltation... of this ecstasy.
I said it is a miracle that Ouspensky could write TERTIUM ORGANUM, one of the greatest books
in any language of the world. In fact it is said, and rightly so – remember, I emphasize and repeat,
rightly so – that there are only three great books: the first is ORGANUM written by Aristotle; the
second is THE SECOND ORGANUM written by Bacon; and the third, by P.D. Ouspensky, TERTIUM
ORGANUM. ’Tertium’ means third. And Ouspensky has, very mischievously – and only a saint can

be so mischievous – introduced the book by saying, without any ego, simply and humbly, that ”the
first exists but not before the third. The third existed even before the first came into existence.”
Ouspensky seems to have been spent, totally and utterly spent, into TERTIUM ORGANUM, because
he never could reach to the same height again. Even reporting Gurdjieff in IN SEARCH OF THE
MIRACULOUS he has not attained to the same height. When he betrayed Gurdjieff he tried finally
to create something better than TERTIUM. As his last effort he wrote THE FOURTH WAY but failed
utterly. The book is good, good for any university curriculum. You can see I have my own ways of
condemning a thing....
THE FOURTH WAY can be part of a regular curriculum in a university course, but more than that it
is nothing. Although he was trying to do his best it is the worst book that Ouspensky has written. It
was his last book.
That is the difficulty with all that is great: if you try, you miss. It comes effortlessly or not at all. It has
visited him in TERTIUM ORGANUM and he was not even aware of it. The words in TERTIUM are
so powerful one cannot believe that the author is unenlightened, that he is still looking for a master,
that he is still searching for the truth.
I was a poor student, working the whole day as a journalist – that is the worst job you can do, but
that’s what was available to me at the time – and I was in such need that I had to join a night college.
So the whole day I worked as a journalist, and at night I went to college. In a way my name belongs
to the night. Rajneesh means the moon: rajni means the night, eesh means God – God of the night.
So people used to laugh and say, ”This is strange: you work the whole day, and go to study at night.
Are you trying to fulfill your name?”
Now I can answer them, yes – write it in capital letters – YES, I have been trying to fulfill it my whole
life. What else can be more beautiful than to be the full moon? So as a poor student in those days,
I used to work the whole day. But I am a crazy man, rich or poor does not matter....
I have never liked to read books borrowed from others. In fact I hate even borrowing from a library,
because a library book is like a prostitute. I hate to see the marks, the underlining of other people. I
always love the fresh, the snow-white freshness.
TERTIUM ORGANUM was a costly book. In India, in those days, I was getting a salary of only
seventy rupees each month, and by coincidence the book cost exactly seventy rupees – but I
purchased it. The bookseller was amazed. He said, ”Even the richest man in our community cannot
afford it. For five years I have been keeping it to sell, and nobody has purchased it. People come
and look at it, then drop the idea of buying. How can you, a poor student, working the whole day
and studying at night, working almost twenty-four hours each day, how can you afford it?”
I said, ”This book I can purchase even if I have to pay for it with my life. Just reading the first line is
enough. I have to have it whatsoever the cost.”
That first sentence I had read in the introduction was, ”This is the third canon of thought, and there
are only three. The first is that of Aristotle; the second of Bacon, and the third, my own.” I was thrilled

by Ouspensky’s daring, that he said, ”The third existed even before the first.” That was the sentence
that caught fire in my heart.
I gave the bookseller my whole month’s salary. You cannot understand, because for that whole
month I had to almost starve. But it was worth it. I can remember that beautiful month: no food, no
clothes – not even shelter; because I could not pay the rent I was thrown out of my small room. But
I was happy with TERTIUM ORGANUM under the sky. I read that book under a street lamp – it is a
confession – and I have lived that book. That book is so beautiful, and more so now that I know that
the man did not know at all. How could he have managed it then? It must have been a conspiracy of
the gods, something from the beyond. I cannot resist anymore from using the name the Sufis use;
they call it khidr. Khidr is the agency that guides those who need guidance.
TERTIUM ORGANUM is the second book.
Third: GEET GOVIND – the song of God. This book was written by a poet very much condemned
by Indians, because in GEET GOVIND, his song of God, he talks too much of love. Indians are so
against love that they have never appreciated this great work.
GEET GOVIND is something which should be sung. Nothing can be said about it. It is a Baul song,
the song of a madman. If you dance and sing it, you will understand it, there is no other way.
I am not mentioning the name of the man who wrote it. That is not important. X-Y-Z... not that I don’t
know his name, but I will not mention it for the simple reason that he does not belong to the world of
the buddhas. Yet he has done a great service.
Fourth: Now be patient, because I have to complete the list to ten. I cannot count more than that.
Why ten? – because I have ten fingers. That’s how the number ten came into existence: ten fingers.
Man started counting on his fingers so ten became the basic number.
Fourth: Kundkunda’s SAMAYASAR. I have never spoken about it. I decided to many times but
always dropped the idea. This is one of the greatest books the Jainas have produced, but it is very
mathematical; that’s why I have always dropped it. I love poetry. If it was poetic I would have spoken
on it. I have even spoken on unenlightened poets, but not on even enlightened mathematicians and
logicians. Mathematics is so dry. Logic is a desert.
Perhaps he is around here among my sannyasins... but he cannot be. Kundkunda was an
enlightened master, he cannot be born again. His book is beautiful, I can only say that much. I
will not say anything more because it is mathematical.... Mathematics too has its beauty, its rhythm,
that’s why I appreciate it. It has its own truth but it is very limited, and very right-handed.
SAMAYASAR means the essence. If by chance you ever come across Kundkunda’s SAMAYASAR,
then please never hold it in your left hand. Keep it in the right hand. It is a right-hand book, right in
every way. That is why I have declined up till now to speak about it. It is so right that I feel a little
aversion to it – of course with tears in my eyes, because I know the beauty of the man who wrote it.
I love Kundkunda, and I hate from my guts his mathematical expression.
Gudia, you can have a little more freedom because I have to talk about four books more. If you want
you can go out again.

Fifth: J. Krishnamurti’s THE FIRST AND LAST FREEDOM. I love this man, and I hate this man.
I love him because he speaks the truth, but I hate him for his intellectuality. He is only reason,
rationality. I wonder, he may be a reincarnation of that goddamned Greek Aristotle. His logic is what
I hate, his love is what I respect – but his book is beautiful.
This was his first book after his enlightenment, and the last too. Although many other books have
appeared they are only poor repetitions of the same. He has not been able to create anything better
than THE FIRST AND LAST FREEDOM.
It is a strange phenomenon: Kahlil Gibran wrote his masterpiece THE PROPHET when he was only
eighteen years old, and struggled his whole life to create something better but could not. Ouspensky
could not go beyond TERTIUM ORGANUM even though he met Gurdjieff, lived and worked with
him for many years. And such is the case with J. Krishnamurti: his book THE FIRST AND LAST
FREEDOM is really the first and the last.
Sixth. The sixth is a book by another Chinese, THE BOOK OF HUANG PO. It is a small book, not
a treatise, just fragments. Truth cannot be expressed in a treatise, you cannot write a Ph.D. on it. A
Ph.D. is a degree that should be given to the fools. Huang Po writes in fragments. On the surface
they seem to be unconnected, but they are not. You have to meditate and then you can find the
connection. It is one of the most meditative books ever written.
In English THE BOOK OF HUANG PO is translated in the English way as THE TEACHINGS OF
Huang PO. Even the title is wrong. People like Huang Po don’t teach. There is no teaching in it. You
have to meditate, to be silent, to understand it.
The seventh is THE BOOK OF HUI HI. Again in English it is translated as THE TEACHINGS OF HUI
HI. These poor Englishmen, they think there is nothing more in life than teaching. These Englishmen
are all teachers. And be aware of Englishwomen; otherwise you will get caught with a schoolteacher!
Hui Hi and Huang Po are both masters. They impart, they don’t teach. Hence I call it THE BOOK
OF HUI HI, although you will not find it in the libraries. In the libraries you will find THE TEACHINGS
OF HUI HI.
Eighth: the last – at least for today, because one never knows about tomorrow. Other devils may
start knocking at my doors. I must have read more than any man alive on the earth, and remember,
I am not boasting but simply stating a fact. I must have read at least one hundred thousand books,
possibly more, but not less than that, because after that I stopped counting. So I don’t know about
tomorrow, but for the eighth today.... I am feeling a little guilty about GEET GOVIND because I
haven’t told you the name of the author. I will tell you, but first let me finish the eighth.
The eighth book that has impressed me immensely is a strange one, obviously; otherwise it would
not have impressed me at all. You will be shocked! Guess what the eighth book can be.... I know
you cannot guess it – not that it is in Sanskrit or Chinese, Japanese or Arabic. You have heard about
it, you may even have it in your home. It is the SONG OF SOLOMON in The OLD TESTAMENT.
This is a book I love wholeheartedly. I hate all that is Jewish except the SONG OF SOLOMON.
The SONG OF SOLOMON is very much misunderstood because of the so-called psychologists,
particularly the Freudians – the frauds. They have been interpreting the SONG OF SOLOMON in


the worst possible way; they make it a sexual song. It is not. It is sensual, that’s true, very sensual,
but not sexual. It is so alive, that’s why it is sensual. It is so full of juice, that is why it is sensual...
but not sexual. Sex may be a part of it, but don’t misguide humanity. Even the Jews have become
afraid of it. They think that it has been included in the OLD TESTAMENT by accident. In fact this
song is the only thing worth preserving; all else is worth throwing into the fire.
Is my hour over? So bad. You say ”Yes,” but what can I do? – this is the very beauty. Thank you
both.
Om Mani Padme Hum
How beautiful to stop at this beauty. No, no, no. This ”No” is what the Indians say when they attain
to enlightenment. Then they don’t want to be born again. They say ”No, no, no....” After this beautiful
experience, what is the point of continuing?