Buddha The Dhammapada verse 1-10

Aes Dhammo Sanantano

Osho speaks about the Dhammapada

The way Osho explains it is so unique and so far reaching

that for the ones who can understand,

it can easily transform your life and uplift you to your true purpose in life.

Can you imagine that after 2500 years the time was ripe to transmit this message again and I was there again to receive it. Isn't life really miraculous?

Tears are flowing reading how Osho transmits these great truths.

Count your blessings when you are reading them NOW!

My talking on Buddha is not just a commentary:

 it is creating a bridge.

Buddha is one of the most important masters

who have ever existed on the earth

--incomparable, unique.

And if you can have a taste of his being,

you will be infinitely benefited, blessed.

(Osho)

EXCERPT! You can read the complete text as pdf

My beloved bodhisattvas.... Yes, that's how I look at you. That's how you
have to start looking at yourselves. Bodhisattva means a Buddha in essence, a
Buddha in seed, a Buddha asleep, but with all the potential to be awake. In that
sense everybody is a bodhisattva, but not everybody can be called a bodhisattva
--only those who have started groping for the light, who have started longing
for the dawn, in whose hearts the seed is no longer a seed but has become a
sprout, has started growing.

You are bodhisattvas because of your longing to be conscious, to be alert,
because of your quest for the truth. The truth is not far away, but there are very
few fortunate ones in the world who long for it. It is not far away but it is
arduous, it is hard to achieve. It is hard to achieve, not because of its nature,
but because of our investment in lies.

We have invested for lives and lives in lies. Our investment is so much that
the very idea of truth makes us frightened. We want to avoid it, we want to
escape from the truth. Lies are beautiful escapes --convenient, comfortable
dreams. But dreams are dreams. They can enchant you for the moment, they
can enslave you for the moment, but only for the moment. And each dream is
followed by tremendous frustration, and each desire is followed by deep failure.

But we go on rushing into new lies; if old lies are known, we immediately
invent new lies. Remember that only lies can be invented; truth cannot be
invented. Truth already is! Truth has to be discovered, not invented. Lies
cannot be discovered, they have to be invented.

Mind feels very good with lies because the mind becomes the inventor, the
doer. And as the mind becomes the doer, ego is created. With truth, you have
nothing to do...and because you have nothing to do, mind ceases, and with the
mind the ego disappears, evaporates. That's the risk, the ultimate risk.

You have moved towards that risk. You have taken a few steps -
staggering, stumbling, groping, haltingly, with many doubts, but still you have
taken a few steps; hence I call you bodhisattvas.

And THE DHAMMAPADA, the teaching of Gautama the Buddha, can only be taught to the bodhisattvas. It cannot be taught to the ordinary, mediocre humanity, because it cannot be understood by them.

These words of Buddha come from eternal silence. They can reach you only if you receive them in silence. These words of Buddha come from immense purity. Unless you become a vehicle, a receptacle, humble, egoless, alert, aware, you will not be able to understand them. Intellectually you will understand them --they are very simple words, the simplest possible. But their very simplicity is a problem, because you are not simple. To understand simplicity you need simplicity of the heart, because only the simple heart can understand the simple truth. Only the pure can understand that which has come out of purity.

I have waited long...now the time is ripe, you are ready. The seeds can be
sown. These tremendously important words can be uttered again. For
twenty-five centuries, such a gathering has not existed at all. Yes, there have
been a few enlightened masters with a few disciples --half a dozen at the most
--and in small gatherings THE DHAMMAPADA has been taught. But those
small gatherings cannot transform such a huge humanity. It is like throwing
sugar in the ocean with spoons: it cannot make it sweet --your sugar is simply
wasted.

A great, unheard-of experiment has to be done, on such a large scale that at
least the most substantial part of humanity is touched by it --at least the soul of
humanity, the center of humanity, can be awakened by it. On the periphery, the
mediocre minds will go on sleeping --let them sleep --but at the center where
intelligence exists a light can be kindled.

The time is ripe, the time has come for it. My whole work here consists in creating a Buddhafield, an energy field where these eternal truths can be uttered again. It is a rare opportunity. Only once in a while, after centuries, does such an opportunity exist. Don't miss it. Be very alert, mindful. Listen to these words not only with the head but with your heart, with every fiber of your being. Let your totality be stirred by them.

And after these ten days of silence, it is exactly the right moment to bring
Buddha back, to make him alive again amongst you, to let him move amongst
you, to let the winds of Buddha pass through you. Yes, he can be called back
again, because nobody every disappears. Buddha is no longer an embodied
person; certainly he does not exist as an individual anywhere --but his essence,
his soul, is part of the cosmic soul now.

If many many people --with deep longing, with immense longing, with
prayerful hearts --desire it, passionately desire it, then the soul that has
disappeared into the cosmic soul can again become manifest in millions of
ways.

No true master ever dies, he cannot die. Death does not appear for the
masters, does not exist for them. Hence they are masters. They have known the
eternity of life. They have seen that the body disappears but that the body is not
all: the body is only the periphery, the body is only the garments. The body is
the house, the abode, but the guest never disappears. The guest only moves
from one abode to another. One day, ultimately, the guest starts living under
the sky, with no shelter...but the guest continues. Only bodies, houses, come
and go, are born and then die. But there is an inner continuum, an inner
continuity --that is eternal, timeless, deathless.

Whenever you can love a master --a master like Jesus, Buddha,
Zarathustra, Lao Tzu --if your passion is total, immediately you are bridged.

My talking on Buddha is not just a commentary: it is creating a bridge.
Buddha is one of the most important masters who has ever existed on the earth
--incomparable, unique. And if you can have a taste of his being, you will be
infinitely benefited, blessed.

I am immensely glad, because after these ten days of silence I can say to
you that many of you are now ready to commune with me in silence. That is
the ultimate in communication. Words are inadequate; words say, but only
partially. Silence communes totally.

These sayings of Buddha are called THE DHAMMAPADA. This name has
to be understood. Dhamma means many things. It means the ultimate law,
logos. By "ultimate law" is meant that which keeps the whole universe
together. Invisible it is, intangible it is --but it is certainly; otherwise the
universe would fall apart. Such a vast, infinite universe, running so smoothly,
so harmoniously, is enough proof that there must be an undercurrent that
connects everything, that joins everything, that bridges everything --that we
are not islands, that the smallest grass leaf is joined to the greatest star. Destroy
a small grass leaf and you have destroyed something of immense value to the
existence itself.

In existence there is no hierarchy, there is nothing small and nothing great.
The greatest star and the smallest grass leaf, both exist as equals; hence the
other meaning of the word 'dhamma'. The other meaning is justice, the equality,
the non hierarchic existence. Existence is absolutely communist; it knows no
classes, it is all one. Hence the other meaning of the word 'dhamma' --justice.

And the third meaning is righteousness, virtue. Existence is very virtuous.
Even if you find something which you cannot call virtue, it must be because of
your misunderstanding; otherwise the existence is absolutely virtuous.
Whatsoever happens here, always happens rightly. The wrong never happens.
It may appear wrong to you because you have a certain idea of what right is,
but when you look without any prejudice, nothing is wrong, all is right. Birth is
right, death is right. Beauty is right and ugliness is right.

But our minds are small, our comprehension is limited; we cannot see the
whole, we always see only a small part. We are like a person who is hiding
behind his door and looking through the keyhole into the street. He always sees
things...yes, somebody is moving, a car suddenly passes by. One moment it was
not there, one moment it is there, and another moment it is gone forever. That's
how we are looking at existence. We say something is in the future, then it
comes into the present, and then it has gone into the past.

In fact, time is a human invention. It is always now! Existence knows no
past, no future --it knows only the present.

But we are sitting behind a keyhole and looking. A person is not there, then
suddenly he appears; and then as suddenly as he appears he disappears too.
Now you have to create time. Before the person appeared he was in the future;
he was there, but for you he was in the future. Then he appeared; now he is in
the present --he is the same! And you cannot see him anymore through your
small keyhole --he has become past. Nothing is past, nothing is future --all is
always present. But our ways of seeing are very limited.

Hence we go on asking why there is misery in the world, why there is this
and that...why? If we can look at the whole, all these whys disappear. And to
look at the whole, you will have to come out of your room, you will have to
open the door...you will have to drop this keyhole vision.

This is what mind is: a keyhole, and a very small keyhole it is. Compared to
the vast universe, what are our eyes, ears, hands? What can we grasp? Nothing
of much importance. And those tiny fragments of truth, we become too much
attached to them.

If you see the whole, everything is as it should be --that is the meaning of
"everything is right." Wrong exists not. Only God exists; the Devil is man's
creation.

The third meaning of 'dhamma' can be God --but Buddha never uses the
word 'God' because it has become wrongly associated with the idea of a
person, and the law is a presence, not a person. Hence Buddha never uses the
word 'God', but whenever he wants to convey something of God he uses the
word 'dhamma'. His mind is that of a very profound scientist. Because of this,
many have thought him to be an atheist --he is not. He is the greatest theist the
world has ever known or will ever know --but he never talks about God. He
never uses the word, that's all, but by 'dhamma' he means exactly the same.
"That which is" is the meaning of the word 'God', and that's exactly the
meaning of 'dhamma'. 'Dhamma' also means discipline --different dimensions
of the word. One who wants to know the truth will have to discipline himself in
many ways. Don't forget the meaning of the word 'discipline' --it simply means
the capacity to learn, the availability to learn, the receptivity to learn. Hence the
word 'disciple'. 'Disciple' means one who is ready to drop his old prejudices, to
put his mind aside, and look into the matter without any prejudice, without any
a priori conception.

And 'dhamma' also means the ultimate truth. When mind disappears, when
the ego disappears, then what remains? Something certainly remains, but it
cannot be called 'something' --hence Buddha calls it 'nothing'. But let me
remind you, otherwise you will misunderstand him: whenever he uses the word
'nothing' he means no-thing. Divide the word in two; don't use it as one word -bring
a hyphen between 'no' and 'thing', then you know exactly the meaning of
'nothing'.

The ultimate law is not a thing. It is not an object that you can observe. It is
your interiority, it is subjectivity.

Buddha would have agreed totally with the Danish thinker, Soren
Kierkegaard. He says: Truth is subjectivity. That is the difference between fact
and truth. A fact is an objective thing. Science goes on searching for more and
more facts, and science will never arrive at truth --it cannot by the very
definition of the word. Truth is the interiority of the scientist, but he never
looks at it. He goes on observing other things. He never becomes aware of his
own being.

That is the last meaning of 'dhamma': your interiority, your subjectivity,
your truth.

One thing very significant --allow it to sink deep into your heart: truth is
never a theory, a hypothesis; it is always an experience. Hence my truth cannot
be your truth. My truth is inescapably my truth; it will remain my truth, it
cannot be yours. We cannot share it. Truth is unsharable, untransferable,
incommunicable, inexpressible.

I can explain to you how I have attained it, but I cannot say what it is. The
"how" is explainable, but not the "why." The discipline can be shown, but not
the goal. Each one has to come to it in his own way. Each one has to come to
it in his own inner being. In absolute aloneness it is revealed.

And the second word is PADA. 'Pada' also has many meanings. One, the
most fundamental meaning, is path. Religion has two dimensions: the
dimension of "what" and the dimension of "how." The "what" cannot be talked
about; it is impossible. But the "how" can be talked about, the "how" is
sharable. That is the meaning of 'path'. I can indicate the path to you; I can
show you how I have traveled, how I reached the sunlit peaks. I can tell you
about the whole geography of it, the whole topography of it. I can give you a
contour map, but I cannot say how it feels to be on the sunlit peak.

It is like you can ask Edmund Hillary or Tensing how they reached the
highest peak of the Himalayas, Gourishankar. They can give you the whole
map of how they reached. But if you ask them what they felt when they
reached, they can only shrug their shoulders. That freedom that they must have
known is unspeakable; the beauty, the benediction, the vast sky, the height, and
the colorful clouds, and the sun and the unpolluted air, and the virgin snow on
which nobody had ever traveled before...all that is impossible to convey. One
has to reach those sunlit peaks to know it. 'Pada' means path, 'pada' also
means step, foot, foundation. All these meanings are significant. You have to
move from where you are. You have to become a great process, a growth.
People have become stagnant pools; they have to become rivers, because only
rivers reach the ocean. And it also means foundation, because it is the
fundamental truth of life. Without dhamma, without relating in some way to the
ultimate truth, your life has no foundation, no meaning, no significance, it
cannot have any glory. It will be an exercise in utter futility. If you are not
bridged with the total you cannot have any significance of your own. You will
remain a driftwood --at the mercy of the winds, not knowing where you are
going and not knowing who you are. The search for truth, the passionate
search for truth, creates the bridge, gives you a foundation. These sutras that
are compiled as THE DHAMMAPADA are to be understood not intellectually
but existentially. Become like sponges: let it soak, let it sink into you. Don't be
sitting there judging; otherwise you will miss the Buddha. Don't sit there
constantly chattering in your mind about whether it is right or wrong --you
will miss the point. Don't be bothered whether it is right or wrong.

The first, the most primary thing, is to understand what it is --what Buddha
is saying, what Buddha is trying to say. There is no need to judge right now.
The first, basic need is to understand exactly what he means. And the beauty of
it is that if you understand exactly what it means, you will be convinced of its
truth, you will know its truth. Truth has its own ways of convincing people; it
needs no other proofs.
Truth never argues: it is a song, not a syllogism.

The sutras:

WE ARE WHAT WE THINK.
ALL THAT WE ARE ARISES WITH OUR THOUGHTS.
WITH OUR THOUGHTS WE MAKE THE WORLD.

It has been said to you again and again that the Eastern mystics believe that the world is illusory. It is true: they not only believe that the world is untrue, illusory, maya -they know that it is maya, it is an illusion, a dream. But when they use the word sansara --the world --they don't mean the objective world that science investigates; no, not at all. They don't mean the world of the trees and the mountains and the rivers; no, not at all. They mean the world that you create, spin and weave inside your mind, the wheel of the mind that goes on moving and spinning. Sansara has nothing to do with the outside world.

There are three things to be remembered. One is the outside world, the objective world. Buddha will never say anything about it because that is not his
concern; he is not an Albert Einstein. Then there is a second world: the world of the mind, the world that the psychoanalysts, the psychiatrists, the psychologists investigate. Buddha will have a few things to say about it, not many, just a few --in fact, one: that it is illusory, that it has no truth, either  objective or subjective, that it is in between.

The first world is the objective world, which science investigates. The
second world is the world of the mind, which the psychologist investigates.
And the third world is your subjectivity, your interiority, your inner self.

Buddha's indication is towards the interior most core of your being. But you
are too much involved with the mind. Unless he helps you to become
untrapped from the mind, you will never know the third, the real world: your
inner substance. Hence he starts with the statement: WE ARE WHAT WE
THINK. That's what everybody is: his mind. ALL THAT WE ARE ARISES
WITH OUR THOUGHTS.

Just imagine for a single moment that all thoughts have ceased...then who
are you? If all thoughts cease for a single moment, then who are you? No
answer will be coming. You cannot say, "I am a Catholic," "I am a Protestant,"
"I am a Hindu," "I am a Mohammedan" --you cannot say that. All thoughts
have ceased. So the Koran has disappeared, the Bible, the Gita... all words have
ceased! You cannot even utter your name. All language has disappeared so you
cannot say to which country you belong, to which race. When thoughts cease,
who are you? An utter emptiness, nothingness, no-thingness.

It is because of this that Buddha has used a strange word; nobody has ever
done such a thing before, or since. The mystics have always used the word 'self'
for the interior most core of your being --Buddha uses the word 'no-self'. And I
perfectly agree with him; he is far more accurate, closer to truth. To use the
word 'self' --even if you use the word 'Self' with a capital 'S', does not make
much difference. It continues to give you the sense of the ego, and with a
capital 'S' it may give you an even bigger ego.

Buddha does not use the words atma, 'self', atta. He uses just the opposite
word: 'no-self', anatma, anatta. He says when mind ceases, there is no self left
--you have become universal, you have overflowed the boundaries of the ego,
you are a pure space, uncontaminated by anything. You are just a mirror
reflecting nothing.

WE ARE WHAT WE THINK. ALL THAT WE ARE ARISES WITH OUR
THOUGHTS. WITH OUR THOUGHTS WE MAKE THE WORLD.

If you really want to know who, in reality, you are, you will have to learn
how to cease as a mind, how to stop thinking. That's what meditation is all
about. Meditation means going out of the mind, dropping the mind and moving
in the space called no-mind. And in no-mind you will know the ultimate truth,
dhamma.

And moving from mind to no-mind is the step, pada. And this is the whole
secret of THE DHAMMAPADA.

SPEAK OR ACT WITH AN IMPURE MIND
AND TROUBLE WILL FOLLOW YOU
AS THE WHEEL FOLLOWS THE OX THAT DRAWS THE CART.

Whenever Buddha uses the phrase 'impure mind' you can misunderstand it.
By 'impure mind' he means mind, because all mind is impure. Mind as such is
impure, and no-mind is pure. Purity means no-mind; impurity means mind.

SPEAK OR ACT WITH AN IMPURE MIND --speak or act with mind -AND
TROUBLE WILL FOLLOW YOU.... Misery is a by-product, the
shadow of the mind, the shadow of the illusory mind. Misery is a nightmare.
You suffer only because you are asleep. And there is no way of escaping it
while you are asleep. Unless you become awakened the nightmare will persist.
It may change forms, it can have millions of forms, but it will persist.

Misery is the shadow of the mind: mind means sleep, mind means
unconsciousness, mind means unawareness. Mind means not knowing who you
are and still pretending that you know. Mind means not knowing where you are
going and still pretending that you know the goal, that you know what life is
meant for --not knowing anything about life and still believing that you know.

This mind will bring misery as certainly AS THE WHEEL FOLLOWS
THE OX THAT DRAWS THE CART.

WE ARE WHAT WE THINK.
ALL THAT WE ARE ARISES WITH OUR THOUGHTS.
WITH OUR THOUGHTS WE MAKE THE WORLD.
SPEAK OR ACT WITH A PURE MIND
AND HAPPINESS WILL FOLLOW YOU
AS YOUR SHADOW, UNSHAKABLE.

Again, remember: when Buddha says "pure mind" he means no-mind. It is very difficult to translate a man like Buddha. It is almost an impossible job, because a man like Buddha uses language in his own way; he creates his own language. He cannot use the ordinary language with ordinary meanings, because he has something extraordinary to convey.

As you go deeper into the sutras you will understand. Impure mind means mind, pure mind means no-mind. And happiness will follow you if you have a pure mind or no mind.... HAPPINESS WILL FOLLOW YOU AS YOUR SHADOW, UNSHAKABLE.

Misery is a by-product, so is bliss. Misery is a by-product of being asleep, bliss is a by-product of being awake. Hence you cannot seek and search for
bliss directly, and those who seek and search for bliss directly are bound to fail,
doomed to fail. Bliss can be attained only by those who don't seek bliss
directly; on the contrary, they seek awareness. And when awareness comes,
bliss comes of its own accord, just like your shadow, unshakable.

"LOOK HOW HE ABUSED ME AND BEAT ME,
HOW HE THREW ME DOWN AND ROBBED ME."
LIVE WITH SUCH THOUGHTS AND YOU LIVE IN HATE.

"LOOK HOW HE ABUSED ME AND BEAT ME,
HOW HE THREW ME DOWN AND ROBBED ME."
ABANDON SUCH THOUGHTS, AND LIVE IN LOVE.

Something of profound importance: hate exists with the past and the future
--love needs no past, no future. Love exists in the present. Hate has a
reference in the past: somebody abused you yesterday and you are carrying it
like a wound, a hangover. Or you are afraid that somebody is going to abuse
you tomorrow --a fear, a shadow of the fear. And you are already getting
ready, you are getting prepared to encounter it.

Hate exists in the past and the future. You cannot hate in the present --try,
and you will be utterly impotent. Try it today: sit silently and hate somebody in
the present, with no reference to the past or the future...you cannot do it. It
cannot be done; in the very nature of things it is impossible. Hate can exist only
if you remember the past: this man did something to you yesterday --then hate
is possible. Or this man is going to do something tomorrow --then too hate is
possible. But if you don't have any reference to the past or the future --this
man has not done anything to you and he is not going to do anything to you,
this man is just sitting there --how can you hate? But you can love.

Love needs no reference --that's the beauty of love and the freedom of
love. Hate is a bondage. Hate is imprisonment --imposed by you upon
yourself. And hate creates hate, hate provokes hate. If you hate somebody you
are creating hate in that person's heart for yourself. And the whole world exists
in hate, in destructiveness, in violence, in jealousy, in competitiveness. People
are at each other's throats either in reality, actuality, in action, or at least in
their minds, in their thoughts, everybody is murdering, killing. That's why we
have created a hell out of this beautiful earth --which could have become a
paradise.

Love, and the earth becomes a paradise again. And the immense beauty of
love is that it has no reference. Love comes from you for no reason at all. It is
your outpouring bliss, it is your sharing of your heart. It is the sharing of the
song of your being. And sharing is so joyful --hence one shares! Sharing for
sharing's sake, for no other motive.

But what love you have known in the past is not the love Buddha is talking
about or I am talking about. Your love is nothing but the other side of hate.
Hence your love has reference: somebody has been beautiful to you yesterday,
so nice he was that you feel great love for him. This is not love; this is the other
side of hate --the reference proves it. Or somebody is going to be nice to you
tomorrow: the way he smiled at you, the way he talked to you, the way he
invited you to his house tomorrow --he is going to be loving to you. And great
love arises.

This is not the love Buddhas talk about. This is hate disguised as love -that's
why your love can turn into hate any moment. Scratch a person just a
little bit, and the love disappears and hate arises. It is not even skin-deep. Even
so-called great lovers are continuously fighting, continuously at each other's
throats --nagging, destructive. And people think this is love....

You can ask Astha and Abhiyana --they are in such a love that Astha is
having a black eye almost every day. Great fight! But when great fight goes on,
people think something is happening. When nothing is happening --no fight, no
quarrel --people feel empty. "It is better to be fighting than to be empty" -that's
the idea of millions of people in the world. At least the fight keeps you
engaged, at least the fight keeps you involved, and the fight makes you
important. Life seems to have some meaning --ugly meaning, but at least some
meaning.

Your love is not really love: it is its very opposite. It is hate disguised as
love, camouflaged as love, parading as love. True love has no reference. It
thinks not of the yesterdays, it thinks not of the tomorrows. True love is a
spontaneous welling up of joy in you...and the sharing of it...and the showering
of it...for no other reason, for no other motive, than just the joy of sharing it.

The birds singing in the morning, this cuckoo calling from the distance...for
no reason. The heart is just so full of joy that a song bursts forth. When I am
talking about love I am talking about such love. Remember it. And if you can
move into the dimension of this love, you will be in paradise --immediately.
And you will start creating a paradise on the earth.
Love creates love just as hate creates hate.

IN THIS WORLD
HATE NEVER YET DISPELLED HATE.
ONLY LOVE DISPELS HATE.
THIS IS THE LAW,
ANCIENT AND INEXHAUSTIBLE.

Aes dhammo sanantano --this the law, eternal, ancient and inexhaustible.

What is the law? That hate never dispels hate --darkness cannot dispel
darkness --that only love dispels hate. Only light can dispel darkness: love is
light, the light of your being, and hate is the darkness of your being. If you are
dark inside, you go on throwing hate all around you. If you are light within,
luminous, then you go on radiating light around you.
A sannyasin has to be a radiant love, a radiant light.

AES DHAMMO SANANTANO.... Buddha repeats this again and again -
this is the eternal law. What is the eternal law? Only love dispels hate, only light
dispels darkness. Why? --because darkness in itself is only a negative state; it
has no positive existence of its own. It does not exist really --how can you
dispel it? You cannot do anything directly to darkness. If you want to do
anything to darkness you will have to do something with light. Bring light in
and darkness is gone, take light out and darkness comes in. But you cannot
bring darkness in or out directly --you cannot do anything with darkness.
Remember, you cannot do anything with hate either.

And that's the difference between moral teachers and religious mystics:
moral teachers go on propounding the false law. They go on propounding,
"Fight with darkness --fight with hate, fight with anger, fight with sex, fight
with this, fight with that!" Their whole approach is, "Fight the negative," while
the real, true master teaches you the positive law: aes dhammo sanantano -the
eternal law, "Do not fight with darkness." And hate is darkness, and sex is
darkness, and jealousy is darkness, and greed is darkness and anger is darkness.
Bring the light in....

How is the light brought in? Become silent, thoughtless, conscious, alert,
aware, awake --this is how light is brought in. And the moment you are alert,
aware, hate will not be found. Try to hate somebody with awareness....
These are experiments to be done, not just words to be understood -
experiments to be done. That's why I say don't try to understand only
intellectually: become existential experimenters.

Try to hate somebody consciously and you will find it impossible. Either
consciousness disappears, then you can hate; or if you are conscious, hate
disappears. They can't exist together. There is no coexistence possible: light
and darkness cannot exist together --because darkness is nothing but the
absence of light.

The true masters teach you how to attain to God; they never say renounce
the world. Renunciation is negative. They don't tell you to escape from the
world, they teach you to escape into God. They teach you to attain to truth,
not to fight with lies. And lies are millions. If you go on fighting it will take
millions of lives, and still nothing will be attained. And truth is one; hence truth
can be attained instantly, this very moment it is possible.

YOU TOO SHALL PASS AWAY.
KNOWING THIS, HOW CAN YOU QUARREL?

Life is so short, so momentary, and you are wasting it in quarreling? Use
the whole energy for meditation --it is the same energy. You can fight with it
or you can become a light through it.

HOW EASILY THE WIND OVERTURNS A FRAIL TREE.
SEEK HAPPINESS IN THE SENSES,
INDULGE IN FOOD AND SLEEP,
AND YOU TOO WILL BE UPROOTED.

Buddha says: Remember, if you depend on the senses you will remain very
fragile --because senses cannot give you strength. They cannot give you
strength because they cannot give you a constant foundation. They are
constantly in flux; everything is changing. Where can you have a shelter?
Where can you make a foundation?

One moment this woman looks beautiful and another moment another
woman. If you just decide by the senses, you will be a constant turmoil --you
cannot decide because senses go on changing their opinions. One moment
something seems so incredible, and another moment it is just ugly, unbearable.
And we depend on these senses.

Buddha says: Don't depend on senses --depend on awareness. Awareness
is something hidden behind the senses. It is not the eye that sees. If you go to
the eye specialist he will say it is the eye that sees, but that is not true. The eye
is only a mechanism --through which somebody else sees. The eye is only a
window; the window cannot see. When you stand at the window, you can look
outside. Somebody passing in the street may think, "The window is seeing me."
The eye is only a window, an aperture. Who is behind the eye?

The ear does not hear --who is behind the ear who hears? Who is the one
who feels? Go on searching for that and you will find some foundation;
otherwise, your life will be just a dry leaf in the wind.

THE WIND CANNOT OVERTURN A MOUNTAIN.
TEMPTATION CANNOT TOUCH THE MAN
WHO IS AWAKE, STRONG AND HUMBLE,
WHO MASTERS HIMSELF AND MINDS THE LAW.

Meditation will make you awake, strong and humble. Meditation will make
you awake because it will give you the first experience of yourself. You are not
the body, you are not the mind --you are the pure witnessing consciousness.
And when this witnessing consciousness is touched, a great awakening happens
--as if a snake was sitting coiled up and suddenly it uncoils, as if somebody
was asleep and has been shaken and awakened. Suddenly a great awakening
inside: for the first time you feel you are. For the first time you feel the truth of
your being.

And certainly it makes you strong; you are no longer fragile, not like a frail
tree that any wind can overturn. Now you become a mountain! Now you have
a foundation, now you are rooted --no wind can overturn a mountain. You
become awake, you become strong, and still you become humble. This strength
does not bring any ego in you. You become humble because you become aware
that the same witnessing soul exists in everybody, even in animals, birds, plants,
rocks.

WHOEVER IS MASTER OF HIS OWN NATURE,
BRIGHT, CLEAR AND TRUE,
HE MAY INDEED WEAR THE ORANGE ROBE.
 

Aes Dhammo Sanantano.
 

Osho: The Dhammapada: The Way of the Buddha, Vol 1 Chapter #1 Verse 1-10
Chapter title: We are what we think. 21 June 1979 am in Buddha Hall