Taoblog

Once a Hindu monk was brought to Osho. He came with many followers. One of his followers said, "He is a very great scholar; he has written many books. And his whole effort in his life has been to prove that Hinduism is the only scientific religion of the world."

Osho said, "Can he give any example?"

He said, "You can ask anything and he will say why it is scientific."

Osho asked him, "Why do Hindus cut all their hair but keep a small bunch -- the CHOTI -- on the top of their heads?"

He said, "Simple! Have you ever looked at big buildings? They keep there an iron rod."

Osho could not see the point immediately.

He said, "It is to protect the building from electricity. Hindus discovered it long ago: if you keep a choti -- a little bunch of hair -- standing up on your head, it saves you, protects you from electricity."

Now, what nonsense he is talking! But he is known as a great mahatma because he is helping your egos; he is proving that your religion is scientific. He had come to see Osho with all his disciples. They were all wearing wooden shoes, wooden CHAPPALS -- KHARHAON -- and making great noise. The way Hindus have been using those wooden shoes for centuries.... It is really difficult because you have to hold them on with your toes, between your toes. It is heavy.

Osho asked him, "Why this? What science is there?"

He said, "It keeps one celibate. The pressure of it is such that it keeps one's sexual glands non-functioning." Great, just great!

So Osho said, "Then India need not bother about population. Just give wooden shoes to everybody and let them all grow chotis so electricity does not affect them, sexuality does not affect them. They will all be saints. Such simple formulas!"

But Hindus think he is doing a great service to Hinduism. That's how it is with all the religions. Your imagination is truth; others' truth is only imagination.

OUR fiction is a fact and YOUR fiction is fiction -- your fact too is fiction.

Someone was asking Aurobindo, "Do you believe in God?"

Aurobindo said, "No, I don't believe in God at all." The questioner was perplexed because he had come a long way just because he thought Aurobindo was capable of showing him the path towards God. And now Aurobindo says, "I don't believe."

He couldn't believe his ears, so he asked again. He said, "I am perplexed. I have come a long way just to ask you how to achieve God. And if you don't believe, then the problem, the question, doesn't arise."

Aurobindo said, "Who says that the question doesn't arise? I don't believe because I know that God is. But that is not my belief, that is not a conclusion reached by thought. It is not my belief. I know! That is my knowing."

Mind can, at the most, believe. It can never know. It can believe either that there is God or there is no God, but both are beliefs about God. These both are beliefs. Both have reached to these conclusions through "minding", through thinking. They have thought, they have tried to probe logically, and then they have come to certain conclusions.

A Buddha is not a believer -- HE KNOWS! And when he knows, knowing is possible only in one way. It is not through mind. It is through throwing mind completely. It is difficult to conceive because we have to conceive through the mind; that is the difficulty. I have to talk to you through the medium of the mind, and you have to listen to me through the medium of the mind. So when I say it is not to be achieved through mind, your mind takes it -- but it is inconceivable for the mind. It can even create a theory about it. You may begin to believe that the Truth cannot be achieved through mind. If you begin to believe, you are in mind again. You can say, "I am not convinced. I don't believe that there is anything beyond the mind." Then again you are within the mind.

You can never go beyond the mind if you go on using it. You have to take a jump, and meditation means that jump. That's why meditation is illogical, irrational. And it cannot be made logical; it cannot be reduced to reason. You have to experience it. If you experience, only then do you know.