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Rajneesh

62 quotes

• “Buddha declared before his death that he would be coming again after twenty-five centuries, and that his name would be Maitreya. Maitreya means the friend. Buddhas don't come back; no enlightened person ever comes back, so it is just a way of saying... What he was saying is of tremendous importance. It has nothing to do with his coming back; he cannot come back. What he meant was that the ancient relationship between the Master and the disciple would become irrelevant in twenty-five centuries. It was his clarity of perception — he was not predicting anything — just his clarity to see that as things are changing, as they have changed in the past and as they go on changing, it would take at least twenty-five centuries for the Master and disciple relationship to become out of date. Then the enlightened Master will be only the friend. I had always wanted not to be a Master to anybody. But people want a Master, they want to be disciples; hence, I played the role. It is time that I should say to you that now many of you are ready to accept me as the friend. Those who are in tune with me continuously, without any break, are the only real friends...”

  Rajneesh (1931–1990) first seen 1986 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source

  Recorded in: The Last Testament : Interviews with the World Press (1986)

• “It was good of Friedrich Nietzsche to declare God dead — I declare that he has never been born. It is a created fiction, an invention, not a discovery. Do you understand the difference between invention and discovery? A discovery is about truth, an invention is manufactured by you. It is man-manufactured fiction. Certainly it has given consolation, but consolation is not the right thing! Consolation is opium. It keeps you unaware of the reality, and life is flowing past you so quickly — seventy years will be gone soon. Anybody who gives you a belief system is your enemy, because the belief system becomes the barrier for your eyes, you cannot see the truth. The very desire to find the truth disappears. But in the beginning it is bitter if all your belief systems are taken away from you. The fear and anxiety which you have been suppressing for millennia, which is there, very alive, will surface immediately. No God can destroy it, only the search for truth and the experience of truth — not a belief — is capable of healing all your wounds, of making you a whole being. And the whole person is the holy person to me.”

  Rajneesh (1931–1990) first seen 1989 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source

  Recorded in: God is Dead, Now Zen is the Only Living Truth (1989) YouTube video of the lecture

• “I believe and trust absolutely in existence. If there is any truth in what I am saying, it will survive. The people who remain interested in my work will be simply carrying the torch, but not imposing anything on anyone, either by sword or bread. I will remain a source of inspiration to my people and that is what most sannyasins will feel. I want them to grow on their own. Qualities like love, around which no church can be created, like awareness, qualities which are nobody's monopoly, like celebration, rejoicing, and maintaining childlike fresh eyes. I want people to know themselves, not to be according to someone else, and the way is in.”

  Rajneesh (1931–1990) first seen 1989 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source

  Recorded in: Italian TV Interview (1989)

• “Just a few days ago a man came to see me and he said, "I am a humble man. I am just like the dust on your feet. I have been trying for almost twenty years to achieve higher consciousness, but I have been a failure. Why can't I attain?" And on and on he went. Every sentence started with I. If the grammar allowed, every sentence would have ended with I. And if everything was allowed, every sentence would have consisted only of I's. "I etcetera, I etcetera, I etcetera," it went on and on. You are filled too much. There is no room, no space for God to enter in you. You are too crowded. A thousand I's milling inside — they don't leave any space for anything to enter in you.”

  Rajneesh (1931–1990) said by 1990 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source

  Recorded in: Just Like That: Talks on Sufism (1993)

• “Tao mystics never talk about God, reincarnation, heaven, hell. No, they don't talk about these things. These are all creations of human mind: explanations for something which can never be explained, explanations for the mystery. In fact, all explanations are against God because explanation de-mystifies existence. Existence is a mystery, and one should accept it as a mystery and not pretend to have any explanation. No, explanation is not needed — only exclamation, a wondering heart, awakened, surprised, feeling the mystery of life each moment. Then, and only then, you know what truth is. And truth liberates.”

  Rajneesh (1931–1990) said by 1990 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source

  Recorded in: Never Born, Never Died (2002)

• “Nobody can teach you love. Love you have to find yourself, within your being, by raising your consciousness to higher levels. And when love comes, there is no question of responsibility. You do things because you enjoy doing them for the person you love. You are not obliging the person, you are not even wanting anything in return, not even gratitude. On the contrary, you are grateful that the person has allowed you to do something for him. It was your joy, sheer joy. Love knows nothing of responsibility. It does many things, it is very creative; it shares all that it has, but it is not a responsibility, remember. Responsibility is an ugly word in comparison to love. Love is natural. Responsibility is created by the cunning priests, politicians who want to dominate you in the name of God, in the name of the nation, in the name of family, in the name of religion -- any fiction will do. But they don't talk about love. On the contrary, they are all against love, because love is unable to be controlled by them. A man of love acts out of his own heart, not according to any moral code. A man of love will not join the army because it is his responsibility to fight for his nation. A man of love will say there are no nations, and there is no question of any fight.”

  Rajneesh (1931–1990) said by 1990 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source

• “I do not ordinarily make prophecies, but about this I am absolutely prophetic: the coming hundred years are going to be more and more irrational, and more and more mystical. The second thing: After a hundred years people will be perfectly able to understand why I was misunderstood — because I am the beginning of the mystical, the irrational. I am a discontinuity with the past. The past cannot understand me; only the future will understand. The past can only condemn me. It cannot understand me, it cannot answer me, it cannot argue with me; it can only condemn me. Only the future … as man becomes more and more available to the mysterious, to the meaningless yet significant … After a hundred years they will understand. Because the more man becomes aware of the mysterious side of life, the less he is political; the less he is a Hindu, a Mohammedan, a Christian; the less is the possibility for his being a fanatic. A man in tune with the mysterious is humble, loving, caring, accepting the uniqueness of everybody. He is rejoicing in the freedom of each individual, because only with freedom can this garden of humanity be a rich place.”

  Rajneesh (1931–1990) said by 1990 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source

• “Just before twenty-first March, 1953, seven days before, I stopped working on myself. A moment comes when you see the whole futility of effort. You have done all that you can do and nothing is happening. You have done all that is humanly possible. Then what else can you do? In sheer helplessness one drops all search. And the day the search stopped, the day I was not seeking for something, the day I was not expecting something to happen, it started happening. A new energy arose — out of nowhere. It was not coming from any source. It was coming from nowhere and everywhere. It was in the trees and in the rocks and the sky and the sun and the air — it was everywhere. And I was seeking so hard, and I was thinking it is very far away. And it was so near and so close.”

  Rajneesh (1931–1990) said by 1990 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source

• “For seven years I remained undisturbed—no one to nag me, to prepare me for the world of business, politics, diplomacy. My grandparents were more interested in leaving me as natural as possible—particularly my grandmother. She is one of the causes—these small things affect all your life patterns—she is one of the causes of my respect for the whole of womanhood. She was a simple woman, uneducated, but immensely sensitive. She made it clear to my grandfather and the servant: "We all have lived a certain kind of life which has not led us anywhere. We are as empty as ever, and now death is coming close." She insisted, "Let this child be uninfluenced by us. What influence can we have? We can only make him like us, and we are nothing. Give him an opportunity to be himself.”

  Rajneesh (1931–1990) said by 1990 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source

• “Nobody should lie — to a child, at least — it is unforgivable. Children have been exploited for centuries just because they are willing to trust. You can lie to them very easily and they will trust you. If you are a father, a mother, they will think you are bound to be true. That’s how the whole of humanity lives in corruption, in a very slippery mud of lies told to children for centuries. If we can do just one thing, a simple thing — not lie to children and to confess to them our ignorance — then we will be religious and we will put them on the path of religion. Children are innocent: leave them not your so-called knowledge. But you yourself must first be innocent, unlying, true.”

  Rajneesh (1931–1990) said by 1990 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source

• “The new man will not be either/or; he will be both/and. The new man will be earthly and divine, worldly and other-worldly. The new man will accept his totality and he will live it without any inner division, he will not be split. His god will not be opposed to the devil, his morality will not be opposed to immorality; he will know no opposition. He will transcend duality, he will not be schizophrenic. With the new man there will come a new world, because the new man will perceive in a qualitatively different way and he will live a totally different life which has not been lived yet. He will be a mystic, a poet, a scientist, all together. (p. 19)”

  Rajneesh (1931–1990) said by 1990 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source

• “My trust in existence is absolute. If there is any truth in what I am saying, it will survive…The people who remain interested in my work will be simply carrying the torch, but not imposing anything on anyone…I will remain a source of inspiration to my people. And that’s what most sannyasins will feel. I want them to grow on their own qualities like love, around which no church can be created; like awareness, which is nobody’s monopoly; like celebration, rejoicing, and maintaining fresh, childlike eyes…I want my people to know themselves, not to be according to someone else. And the way is in. (p. 22)”

  Rajneesh (1931–1990) said by 1990 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source