YOU CRAFTY OLD BUGGER! WILL I EVER LEARN YOUR WAYS?
There is no possibility, sir — because I have none. I am the Way. If you see through me, through and through, only then will you find. If you listen to my words — and that’s what you are doing; the questioner is not a sannyasin — if you are just standing outside me….
To become a sannyasin means to stand inside me, to become part of my family, to belong to me. I AM THE WAY. I am not preaching some way to you, I am simply preaching myself. I am not giving you, handing over, some technique, some method, some way. And if you are trying to figure it out, you will become more and more confused. I can drive you crazy. Either be a sannyasin, or escape.
If you are a sannyasin, then your madness has a method to it. If you are not a sannyasin, then you will become more and more confused. You will become mad without a method. And when you have become too confused, if you escape from here that won’t help. I will go on haunting you.
You say, “Will I ever learn your ways?” There is no possibility, sir. It is impossible, because there are no ways I am preaching here. In fact, I am destroying all ways. I am trying to take all ways from you. Here, my whole effort is to create an anarchy in you, a chaos — because YOUR ways are the hindrances to God. When you are in an anarchic state — not knowing who you are, not knowing where you are going, not knowing what is what — in that beautiful chaos, freedom exists. In that freedom only is God possible. I am trying to create a space here, not a way.
I am not making a superhighway so people can follow on it. I am throwing you into the wild where no map exists, and I am not going to give you any guide. Here I am not teaching you a certain doctrine — no, not at all. I am trying to take away all the doctrines that you have already learned. Here, I am trying to help you unlearn, to unlearn the ways so that the Way can exist. And the Way is not one of the ways. The Way has nothing to do with your choice, or with your mind, or with your reason, or with your logic. When you are completely at a loss, the Way exists, God exists.
Here, it is not a question of any theology, it is a question of love. And if you stand outside just like a spectator, and observer, you will get something, but that will not be the true thing — and you will get it in a very fragmentary way, and you will get it according to you.
And you cannot get me according to you, remember: make it a point. You can get me only according to Me, not according to you. That is the meaning of becoming a sannyasin: that you say, “Okay, now we will take you as you are, according to you.” If you take me according to yourself, that will be simply a misunderstanding. Then we are poles apart.
If you are trying to understand me with your own understanding, you will not understand me at all. You will get some wrong conceptions, notions, and whatsoever you carry from here will be a burden to you rather than a relief. It will disturb you, and it will ALWAYS create trouble for you. Never be anywhere halfheartedly. Either be or don’t be, but never be halfhearted — otherwise you are committing some wrong against yourself.
You can hear me, certainly, without becoming a sannyasin; you can meditate here without becoming a sannyasin; you can remain an outsider, aloof, neutral, and you may think that you are very clever — but you will get into trouble. And I am warning you: then it is at your own risk.
The trouble will be that something will start happening, and it will never be the right thing. Because I don’t trust much in techniques: techniques are just devices to bring you closer to me. Techniques are just devices for you to play with so that you remain occupied.
I talk to you, but talking is not the goal. I have to deliver something which cannot be talked about. That I can deliver only when I feel that your heart is open. Till the heart is open, I will go on persuading your mind — but whatsoever I am doing with the mind is not the real thing.
The real thing has to be delivered to you when your heart is ready, when you are in a deep trust, when you have accepted me.
And remember, you will think, “That’s what I’m thinking: whether to accept you or not.” If you accept me through your rationalizations, thinking, that will not be acceptance. You will still be accepting yourself, your own thinking.
If you decide, “Yes, this man seems to be right, and now I am going to take the jump,” it is no more a jump at all. You have missed the jump. Now you are still trusting your own thinking: you have decided, concluded, that this man is right: “Now I go into the journey” — you are still not going. The step has to be taken in innocence, not in cleverness. The step has to be taken like a child. The step has to be taken in trust, in foolishness.
Yes, I repeat it: only those who are foolish enough to take the jump will ever be able to find out what the Way is.
Have you not watched? Down through the centuries, this has been happening: when Christ was on the earth, only a few foolish people believed in him, a few foolish people. You may call them apostles now, but they were foolish people: somebody was just a fisherman, another was a woodcutter, somebody was a shoemaker — just those types of people.
Not a single rabbi followed him, not a single professor, not a single pundit, not a single respectable man. All were unknown, ordinary people: a fisherman, a woodcutter, a farmer, a prostitute, a drunkard — that type of person followed him, and that too was a very limited number. And all the rabbis were against him.
They were clever people: they knew, they already knew. All the scholars were against him. In fact, all the scholars, all the rabbis, all the learned people, they conspired. They arranged it that this man should be killed, because this man was a danger, and they were afraid. His very presence was fear-creating — because he was such an alive scripture; who would listen to these dead rabbis who talk about dead scriptures? He was the Way. And these rabbis were teaching so many ways to reach God, and here was the man who declared: “I am the Way, and I am the Truth. Come, follow me. All those who are heavily burdened, come to me and rest in me.” Now this was too much!
You can be here like a learned man, standing by the side, looking from the corner of the eye, not looking directly. Then you will miss.
OSHO
