THE FIFTH SAYING

JESUS SAID TO THEM: IF YOU FAST YOU WILL BEGET SIN FOR YOURSELVES; AND IF YOU PRAY YOU WILL BE CONDEMNED; AND IF YOU GIVE ALMS YOU WILL DO EVIL TO YOUR SPIRITS.

AND IF YOU GO INTO ANY LAND AND WANDER IN THE REGIONS; IF THEY RECEIVE YOU, EAT WHAT THEY SET BEFORE YOU, AND HEAL THE SICK AMONG THEM.

FOR WHAT GOES INTO YOUR MOUTH WILL NOT DEFILE YOU, BUT WHAT COMES OUT OF YOUR MOUTH, THAT IS WHAT WILL DEFILE YOU.

This is a very strange saying, but very significant also. It looks strange because man is not real, he lives in falsity. So whatsoever he does, it is going to be false.

If you pray you will pray for the wrong reasons; if you fast you will fast for the wrong reasons -- because you are wrong. So the question is not what is right to do, the question is how to be right in your being. If your being is right, then whatsoever you do will be right automatically; but if your being is not right, not centered, not authentic, then whatsoever you do, it is going to be wrong.

Finally everything depends not on what you do, but on who you are. If a thief goes to pray his prayer is going to be wrong, because how can prayer be born out of a heart that has been deceiving everybody -- stealing, lying, harming? How is prayer possible out of the heart of a thief? It is impossible. The prayer can change you, but from where will the prayer come? It will come from you. If you are sick, your prayer is going to be sick.

Mulla Nasruddin once applied for a job. In the application he mentioned many qualifications. He said, "I stood first in my university, and I was offered the vice-presidency of a national bank. I refused because I am not interested in money. I am an honest man, a true man. I have no greed, I'm not bothered about the salary; whatsoever you give me will be okay. And I love work -- sixty-five hours per week."

When the superintendent who was conducting his interview looked at his application, he was surprised and said, "Lordy! Don't you have any weaknesses?"

Nasruddin said, "Only one: I am a liar!"

But that one covers all the rest. No need to have any other weakness, one is enough. There are not many weaknesses in you, you have only one weakness -- out of that one all are born. And you have to remember your weakness, because that is going to follow you wherever you go like a shadow; whatsoever you do, it is going to color it.

So the basic thing in religion is not what to do, the basic thing is what to be. 'Being' means your innermost core, 'doing' means your surface activities on the circumference. 'Doing' means your relationship with others, with the outer world, and 'being' means you as you are, unrelated, as you are within.

You can be without doing anything, but you cannot be without the being. Doing is secondary, dispensable. A man can remain inactive, not doing anything, but a man cannot be without being -- so being is the essence. Jesus, Krishna, Buddha, they all talk about being; and the temples, churches, mosques, organizations, sects, the so-called gurus and teachers and priests, they all talk about doing. If you ask Jesus, he will talk about your being and how to transform it. If you ask the pope of the Vatican he will talk about what to do, about morality. Morality is concerned with doing, religion with being.

This distinction has to be kept as clear as possible, because everything else depends on it. Whenever a person like Jesus is born we misunderstand him. And the misunderstanding is because we miss this distinction: he talks about the being, and we listen to him and interpret as if he is talking about doing.

If you understand this, then this saying will be very clear, very useful. It can become a light on your path. Otherwise it is very strange and contradictory and will look anti-religious. When Jesus spoke it must have seemed to the priests that his sayings were anti-religious, that's why they crucified him. They thought he was the man who was going to destroy religion.

Look at the saying -- apparently it appears so:

JESUS SAID TO THEM: IF YOU FAST YOU WILL BEGET SIN FOR YOURSELVES  .

And we have always heard that religion teaches fasting, because it has been told again and again that when you fast you are purified through it. The whole religion of the Jainas depends on fasting. If they hear this saying from Jesus they will say, "This man is dangerous, and the Jews did well to crucify him!"

The Jews were also disturbed: such sayings are rebellious and their whole morality would be lost. If you say to people: IF YOU FAST YOU WILL BEGET SIN FOR YOURSELVES -- fasting becomes a sin! -- AND IF YOU PRAY YOU WILL BE CONDEMNED. Have you ever heard that if you pray you will be condemned? Then what is religion? We think religion is going to church and praying to God, and Jesus says:

IF YOU PRAY YOU WILL BE CONDEMNED; AND IF YOU GIVE ALMS YOU WILL DO EVIL TO YOUR SPIRITS.

The strangest of sayings, but very meaningful. Jesus is saying that as you are you cannot do anything right. The emphasis is not on fasting or not fasting; the emphasis is not on giving alms or not; the emphasis is not to pray or not -- the emphasis is: whatsoever you are right now, as you are, everything will go wrong.

Can you pray? You can go to the temple because that is easy, but you cannot pray. Prayer needs a different quality; that quality you don't have, so you can only deceive yourself that you are praying. Go and look in the temple at people who are praying: they are simply deceiving themselves, they don't have that quality of prayerfulness. How can you pray? And if you have the quality of prayerfulness, what need is there to go to the temple or the church? Wherever you are prayer is: you move, you walk -- and it is prayer! You eat, you love -- and it is prayer! You look, you breathe -- and it is prayer!  Because the quality of prayerfulness is always there, it is just like breathing. Then you cannot be in a moment of non-prayer. But then there is no need to go to the temple or to the church. Churches and temples exist for those who want to deceive themselves, for those who have no quality of prayer and still would like to believe that they are praying.

One man was dying, a sinner. He had never been to the temple, never prayed, never listened to what the priests said, but at the moment of death he became afraid. He asked the priest to come, he begged. When the priest came there was a crowd. Many people were around because the sinner was a great, successful man; he was a politician, he had power, he had money. So, many people had gathered.

The sinner asked the priest to come near because he wanted to say something in private. The priest came near and the sinner whispered in his ear, "I know that I am a sinner and I know well that I have never gone to church, I am not a churchgoer. I am not a religious man at all, I have never prayed, so I know well that the world is not going to forgive me. But help me, and give me a little confidence and tell me that God will forgive me! The world is not going to forgive me, that I know, and nothing can be done about it now -- but tell me one thing: that God is going to forgive me!"

"Well," said the minister, the priest, "perhaps he will, because he didn't get to know you the way we have come to know you. Perhaps he will, because he does not know you the way we have come to know you."

But if you cannot deceive the world, can you deceive God? If you cannot deceive ordinary minds, can you deceive the divine mind? It is just a consolation, a comfortable thing: 'Perhaps'. But that 'perhaps' is absolutely wrong; don't hang on such 'perhaps'!

Prayer is a quality that belongs to the essence and not to the personality. Personality is that which you have been doing, it is a relationship with others. Essence is that which has come to you -- it is nothing of your doing, it is a gift of God. Prayer belongs to the essence: it is a quality, it is nothing you can do.

What is fasting? How can you fast? And why do people fast? Jesus' saying is very deep, deeper than any assertion of Mahavira about fasting. Jesus is saying a very deep psychological truth, and the truth is that the mind moves to the extreme: a person who is too obsessed with food can fast easily. This will look strange, paradoxical, that a person who eats too much can fast easily, that a person who is too greedy for food can fast easily. But only that type of person can fast easily. A person who has always been balanced in his diet will find it almost impossible to fast -- why? To answer this we have to go into the physiology and psychology of fasting.

First physiology, because that is the outer layer. If you eat too much you collect too much reserve, you collect too much fat. Then you can fast very easily, because fat is nothing but a reservoir, it is a reserve. Women can fast more easily than men, and you know it. If you look around at people who go on fasts, particularly Jainas, you will find that if one man fasts, then four or five women can fast: that is the ratio. The husband cannot fast but the wife can. Why? -- because the feminine body accumulates more fat, and it is easier if you have much fat on you, because on a fast you have to eat your own fat. That's why you lose one or two pounds in weight every day. Where does that weight go? You are eating yourself, it is a sort of meat-eating.

Women can fast easily -- they collect more fat than men, that's why their bodies are more round. For them there is not so much difficulty. Fat people can fast very easily, they can go on diets, they are always in search of diets. A man, an ordinary healthy man, can collect so much fat that for three months he can fast and he will not die; ninety days -- that much reserve can be collected. But if you are lean and thin -- that means if you have been eating in a balanced way, only that much which is needed for the day-to-day activity of the body, and you have not collected much fat -- you cannot fast. That is why the cult of fasting is always around rich people, never the poor.

Observe: whenever a poor man celebrates a religious day, he celebrates by a feast; and whenever a rich man celebrates a religious day, he celebrates it by a fast. The Jainas are the richest people in India, hence their fasting. But a Mohammedan, a poor Mohammedan, or a poor Hindu, when the religious day comes, he has a feast because the whole year he is hungry, so how can he celebrate the day of religion with more fasting? He is already fasting the whole year, and the religious day must be different from the ordinary days. So that is the only difference: he will put on new clothes and he will have a good feast and enjoy himself, and give thanks to God. That is a poor man's religion.

Now, in America, fasting and the cult of fasting will develop rapidly. It is developing already because America has become so rich and people are eating so much that now, from somewhere, fasting has to come in. In America all the cults of fasting are growing fast -- they may have different names but, physiologically, your body must have more fat than is needed, then fasting is easy.

Secondly, psychologically, you must be obsessed with food. Food must be your obsession: you must be eating too much, eating and eating, and thinking about eating more and more. That type of mind one day gets fed up with food and thinking about food. If you think too much about anything you will get fed up with it. If you get too much of anything you will get fed up with it. Then the opposite becomes attractive: you have been eating too much, now you need to fast. Through fasting you will be able to eat again with taste, the appetite will come back -- that is the only way.

And mind has a basic law: that it can move to the opposite very easily, but it cannot remain in the middle. Balance is the most difficult thing for the mind, extremes are always easy. If you are an overeater you can become a faster, because that is another extreme -- but you cannot remain in the middle. You cannot be on the right food, the right diet. No! Either this side or that -- mind always leans to the extreme. It is just like the pendulum of a clock: it goes to the right, then to the left, then to the right; but if it stops in the middle then the clock stops, then there is no possibility for the clock to move. If your mind stops in the middle then thinking stops, then the clock stops. But if you go to the extreme, sooner or later the opposite will again become meaningful, attractive, and you will have to go to the opposite.

Jesus understands this well, very well. And he says: IF YOU FAST YOU WILL BEGET SIN FOR YOURSELVES.

What is sin? In Jesus' terminology the extreme, to move to the extreme is sin. To remain just in the middle is to be beyond sin. Why? Why is it sin to move to the extreme? To move to the extreme is sin because in the extreme you have chosen half and half has been denied -- and the truth is whole. When you say, "I will eat too much," you have chosen half. When you say, "I will not eat at all," you have again chosen half, you have chosen something. In the middle there is no choice: you feed the body, and you are not obsessed either this way or that; you are not obsessed at all, you are not neurotic. The body gets its needs, but you are not overburdened by its needs.

This balance is going beyond sin. So whenever you have an imbalance you are a sinner. Jesus' idea is that a person who is too much in the world is a sinner, but if he moves to the other extreme, renounces the world, becomes too much against the world, then again he is a sinner. A person who accepts the world, without choosing this way or that, transcends it.

Acceptance is transcendence. Choice means you have entered in, your ego has come in, now you are fighting.

Whenever you go to one extreme you have to fight continuously, because an extreme can never be at ease -- only in the middle can you be at ease. At the extreme you will always be tense, worried, anxiety will be there. Only in the middle, when you are balanced, is there no anxiety, no anguish; you are at home, nothing worries you because there is no tension. Tension means the extreme. You have tried many extremes, that's why you are so tense.

Either you are after women and then sex continuously moves in the mind, or you become against them and then too sex moves in the mind. If you are existing for sex, then sex will be the only thing in the mind, the smoke. If you are against it, an enemy, then again sex will be in the mind -- because friends you remember, but enemies you remember more. Sometimes friends can be forgotten, but enemies never, they are always there; how can you forget your enemy? So people who go on moving in the world of sex are filled with sex. And go to the monasteries, look in the monasteries where there are people who have moved to the other extreme -- they are continuously with sex, their whole mind has become sexual.

Eat too much, become obsessed with food as if your whole life exists to eat, then continuously there will be food in the mind. Then fast, then too continuously food will be in the mind. And if something is continuously on the mind, it becomes a burden. The woman is not the problem, the man is not the problem -- sex continuously on the mind is the problem. Food is not a problem: you eat and it is finished; but food on the mind continuously  then it is a problem.

And if there are many things on the mind continuously, the mind is dissipating energy; the mind becomes dull, bored, so burdened that life seems just meaningless. When the mind is unburdened, weightless, fresh, then intelligence happens, then you look at the world with a fresh eye, with a fresh consciousness, unburdened Then the whole existence is beautiful -- that beauty is God. Then the whole existence is alive -- that aliveness is God. Then the whole existence is ecstatic, every moment of it, every bit of it is blissful -- that bliss and ecstasy is God.

God is not a person somewhere waiting for you; God is a revelation in this world. When the mind is silent, clear, unburdened, young, fresh, virgin -- with a virgin mind God is everywhere. But your mind is dead, and you have made it dead through a particular process. That process is moving from one extreme to another, then again moving from this extreme to another, but never staying in the middle.

I have heard about one drunkard who was walking on a street, a very big street, very broad. He asked a man, "Where is the other side of the street?" It was so broad and the night was descending, the light was disappearing, and he was completely drunk. He couldn't see well so he asked, "Where is the other side?" The man took pity on him and helped him to move to the other side.

When he reached the other side he again asked another man, "Where is the other side?" The man tried to take him to the other side. The drunkard stood there and said, "Wait! What type of people are here? I was there and I asked: Where is the other side? They brought me here, and now I ask: Where is the other side? Now they say it is there! And you are taking me again to that side. What type of people are here? Where is the other side?"

Wherever you are it makes no difference: the opposite extreme becomes the other side and becomes attractive, because distance creates attraction. You can't imagine the attraction of sex for a man who is trying to be celibate -- you cannot imagine! You cannot imagine the attraction of food for a man who is fasting. You cannot imagine because that is an experience: continuously one thing in the mind -- food, sex. And this can go on to the very end. Even when you are dying, if some extreme is there you will be obsessed.

How to be at ease and relaxed? Don't move to the extreme, that's the meaning of the saying. Don't move to the extreme! Jesus knows well that you are food addicts -- don't go on a fast, that is not going to help.

IF YOU FAST YOU WILL BEGET SIN FOR YOURSELVES; AND IF YOU PRAY YOU WILL BE CONDEMNED.

What is prayer? Ordinarily we think prayer is asking for something, demanding, complaining: you have desires and God can help you to fulfill them. You go to God's door to ask for something, you go as a beggar. For you prayer is begging, but prayer can never be begging; prayer can only be a thankfulness, a gratitude. But these are totally different: when you go to beg, your prayer is not the end, it is just a means. The prayer is not significant because you are praying to get something; that something is significant, not prayer. And many times you go and your desire is not fulfilled. Then you will drop praying, you will say "Useless!" For you it is a means.

Prayer can never be a means, just as love can never be a means. Love is the end: you love, not for something else; love in itself has an intrinsic value -- you simply love. It is so blissful. Nothing is beyond it, there is no result to be sought through it. It is not a means to some end, it is the end. And prayer is love -- you simply go and enjoy it, not asking, not begging.

Prayer itself, intrinsically, is so beautiful, you feel so ecstatic and happy, that you simply go and give thanks to the divine that he allowed you to be, he allowed you to breathe, he allowed you to see -- what colors! -- he allowed you to listen, he allowed you to be aware. You have not earned it, this is a gift. You go to the temple with a deep thankfulness, just to give thanks: "Whatsoever you have given me, it is too much. I never deserved it!" Do you deserve anything? Can you find that you are deserving in any way? If you were not here, could you say that some injustice had been done to you? No! All that you have got is simply a gift, it is out of the divine love. You don't deserve it.

God overflows with his love. When you understand this a quality is born in you: the quality of being grateful. Then you simply go to give him your thanks, then you simply feel gratitude. Gratitude is prayer, and it is so beautiful to feel grateful that nothing can be compared to it, there is nothing in comparison to it. Prayer is the climax of your happiness, it cannot become a means to some other end.

Jesus says:  AND IF YOU PRAY YOU WILL BE CONDEMNED, because your prayer will be wrong. Jesus knows well that whenever you go to the temple you will go to beg something, to ask for something. It will be a means, and if you make prayer a means, it is a sin.

What is your love?  because through love you can understand what happens in prayer. Do you love a person -- really? Do you love, or does something else exist there? A mutual gratification? When you love a person, do you really love the person? Do you give out of your heart, or do you just exploit the other in the name of love?

You use the other in the name of love. It may be sexual, it may be some other use, but you use the other. And if the other says, "No, don't use me!" will your love continue to be there, or will it disappear? Then you will say, "What is the use?" If the other appreciates you, if a beautiful woman appreciates you, your ego is fulfilled. A beautiful woman looks up to you and you feel for the first time that you are a man. But if she does not appreciate you, does not look up to you, love disappears. If a beautiful man, a strong man, looks up to you as a beautiful woman, appreciates you continuously, you feel gratified because ego is fulfilled.

This is mutual exploitation -- you call it love. And if it creates hell there is no wonder about it; it has to create hell because love is just the name, and under the name something else is hidden. Love can never create hell, love is the very quality of heaven. If you love you are happy; your happiness will show that you are in love.

But look at lovers: they don't seem to be happy -- only in the beginning when they are just planning, unknowingly, unconsciously throwing nets to catch each other; but their poetry and their romance and all their nonsense is just to catch the other. Once the fish is caught then they are unhappy, then they feel as if they are in a bondage. Each other's ego becomes a bondage, and both try to dominate and possess each other.

This love becomes condemnation. If your love is wrong your prayer cannot be right, because prayer means love to the whole -- and if you have been a failure in love with an ordinary human being, how can you succeed in your love with the divine?

Love is just a step towards prayer; you have to learn. If you can love a human being, you know a secret. The same key is to be used with the divine, millions of times magnified and multiplied of course. The dimension is great but the key remains the same. 'Love' means this is the end, and there is no ego in it. When you are egoless there is love. Then you simply give without asking, without any return. You simply give because giving is so beautiful, you share because sharing is so wonderful -- then there is no bargain. When there is no bargain, no ego, love flows -- then you are not frozen, then you melt. This melting has to be learned because only then can you pray.

Jesus says to his disciples:  IF YOU PRAY -- and the emphasis is on you -- YOU WILL BE CONDEMNED -- he knows his disciples very well -- AND IF YOU GIVE ALMS YOU WILL DO EVIL TO YOUR SPIRITS.

Have you ever observed what happens inside you when you give something to a beggar? Is it out of kindness or is it out of ego? If you are alone on the street and a beggar comes you say, "Go away!" -- because there is nobody to see what you are doing to the beggar, your ego is not in any way hurt. But beggars also know the psychology; they will never ask you if you are alone on the street and there is nobody around, they will bypass you -- this is not the right moment. But if you are moving with some friends, they will catch hold of you.

In the market when many people are looking they will catch hold of you, because now they know that if you say no, people will think, "You are so unkind, so cruel." So then you give something to save your ego. You are not giving to the beggar, it is not out of kindness. And remember well that whenever you give, the beggar will go and tell other beggars that he deceived you, he befooled you. He will laugh because he also knows why you have given. It is not a question of kindness.

Kindness gives for a different reason: you feel the misery of the other, you feel it so deeply that you become part of it. Not only do you feel the misery, you also feel the responsibility that if one man is miserable, you are responsible somehow -- because the whole is responsible for the parts: "I am helping a society which creates beggars. I am helping a society, a type of government, a structure, which creates exploitation; I am part of it and this beggar is a victim." You feel not only kindness, you feel responsibility: you have to do something. And if you give to this beggar, you will not want him to be thankful to you. Rather, you should be thankful to him if it is out of kindness, because you know this is nothing.

The society continues and you have much investment in the society which creates this beggary. And you know that you are part of this establishment in which poor people exist, because the rich cannot exist without the poor. And you know well that you also have ambitions to become rich; you feel the whole guilt, you feel the sin. But then giving is totally different. If you feel that you have done a great thing because you have given two paise to this beggar, then Jesus says, YOU WILL DO EVIL TO YOUR SPIRITS because you don't know what you are doing.

Give out of your love, give out of your kindness. But then you are not giving to a beggar, then it is not alms, then you are simply sharing with a friend. When the beggar becomes a friend it is totally different: you are not higher than the beggar, you are not doing something great to the beggar, the ego is not fulfilled. On the contrary, you feel, "I cannot do anything -- just giving that little amount of money is not of much help."

It happened once: A Zen master lived in a cottage on a faraway hill, many miles away from the town. One fullmoon night a thief entered. The master became very worried because there was nothing that could be stolen except one blanket, and he was wearing that blanket, so what to do? He became so worried that when the thief came in he put the blanket just by the door and hid himself in a corner.

The thief looked all around but in the dark he couldn't see the blanket -- there was nothing. Dejected, frustrated, he was going to leave. So the master shouted, "Wait! Take that blanket! And I am very sorry, because you came such a long way, the night is cold, and there is nothing in this house. Next time you come please inform me beforehand. I will arrange something. I am a poor man, but I will make some arrangements so you can steal. But have pity on me, otherwise I will feel very upset: you take that blanket -- and don't say no!" The thief could not believe what was happening. He was apprehensive; this man seemed strange, nobody had behaved this way before. He simply took the blanket and ran away.

The master wrote a poem that night. Sitting by his window -- the night is cold, the full moon is in the sky -- he wrote a poem, and the gist of the poem was "What a beautiful moon! I would like to give this moon to that thief!" And tears were flowing from his eyes, he was weeping and crying and feeling, "That poor man came from so far away!"

Then the thief was caught. There were other crimes against him, and this blanket was also found with him. That blanket was very famous -- everybody knew that it belonged to that Zen master. So the Zen master had to go to court. The magistrate told him, "Simply say that this blanket is yours, and it is enough. This man has stolen this blanket from your hut -- just say yes, that's all."

The master said, "But he never stole it, he is not a thief! I know him well. Once he visited me, of course, but he has not stolen anything; this is my gift, this blanket I have given to him. And I still feel guilty that there was nothing else to give. The blanket is old, almost worthless; and this man is so good, he accepted it. Not only that, in his heart there was thankfulness towards me."

Jesus says:  AND IF YOU GIVE ALMS YOU WILL DO EVIL TO YOUR SPIRITS -- because you will give for the wrong reasons. You can do a good thing for the wrong reasons and then you miss, then you miss totally.

AND IF YOU GO INTO ANY LAND AND WANDER IN THE REGIONS; IF THEY RECEIVE YOU, EAT WHAT THEY SET BEFORE YOU, AND HEAL THE SICK AMONG THEM.

Two things Jesus says to his disciples: first, "Whatsoever they give, receive it, don't make conditions."

Jaina monks could not go out of the country. Buddhism spread so much -- almost half the world became Buddhist -- but Jainas remained confined to this country, and not more than three million. Mahavira and Buddha were of the same caliber, so why couldn't Jainas send their message outside? -- because of the Jaina monk. He will not go, he has conditions: a particular type of food, prepared in a particular way, given to him in a particular manner. How can he go out of the country? Even in India he can move only through those towns where Jainas live, because he will not accept food from anybody else. Because of this food addiction Mahavira became useless for the world, the world was unable to use a great man.

Jesus says to his disciples:  GO INTO ANY LAND AND WANDER IN THE REGIONS; IF THEY RECEIVE YOU, EAT WHAT THEY SET BEFORE YOU -- don't make any conditions that you will eat only a certain type of food.

Your movement in the world should be unconditional. If you make conditions you become a burden. That's why Jesus' disciples have never been a burden: they will eat whatsoever is given to them, they will wear whatsoever clothes they can get, they will live in all types of climate, with all types of people, they will mix with everybody. That's why Christianity could spread like a fire: it is because of the attitude of the disciple -- he is unconditional.

And Jesus says to do only one thing: AND HEAL THE SICK AMONG THEM. He doesn't say, "Teach them what truth is." No! That is useless! He doesn't say, "Force them to believe in my message." That is useless! Simply "Heal the sick  because if a person is sick, how can he come to understand truth? How can he understand it? When his soul is sick, how can he receive my message? Heal the sick! Make him whole, that's all." Once he is whole and healthy he will be able to understand truth, he will be able to understand Jesus.

"Be servants, healers -- just help people to be healed." Psychologically everybody is ill. Physiologically everybody may not be ill, but everybody is ill as far as mind is concerned, and a deep healing is needed in the mind. Jesus says: "Be therapists, go and heal their minds."

Try to understand what the problem is with the mind: divided it is ill, undivided it is healed. If there are many contradictory things in the mind it is ill, it is like a crowd, a mad crowd. But if there is only one thing in the mind it is healed -- because through the one a crystallization happens. Unless the mind is brought to one it will remain ill.

There are certain moments when your mind also comes to the one. Certain moments sometimes accidentally happen: one morning you get up, it is early, everything is fresh and the sun is rising; the whole thing is just so beautiful that you become concentrated. You forget the market you have to go to, you forget the office you have to go to, you forget that you are a Hindu or a Mohammedan or a Christian, you forget that you are a father or a mother or a son -- you forget this world. The sun is so beautiful and the morning is so fresh, you get into it, you become one. For a single moment, when you are one, the mind is whole and healthy, you feel a bliss surging all over your being. It can happen accidentally, but you can also make it happen consciously.

Whenever the mind is one, a higher quality expresses itself and the lower immediately settles itself. It is just like in a school: when the principal is in the school, then the teachers are working well and the students are learning well and there is order. But when the principal has gone out, then the teachers are the highest authority, and then there is not so much order because the teachers are at liberty. A lower energy starts functioning: they will start smoking, they will go and take tea and they will start gossiping. Still, if teachers are there, the students are disciplined. But a class becomes a chaos if the teacher goes out; it is a crowd, a mad crowd. The teacher enters the class -- suddenly everything changes, a higher force has entered, the chaos disappears.

The chaos simply showed that the higher force was absent. When there is no chaos, when there is harmony, it simply shows that the higher force is present. Your mind is in chaos -- a higher point is needed, a higher crystallization is needed. You are just like schoolchildren, a class, a mad class, and the teacher is not there. Whenever you become concentrated, immediately a higher function enters.

So Jesus says, "Heal." The word heal comes from the same root as the word whole comes from; and 'heal' and 'whole' and the word holy also comes from the same root. Heal a person and he becomes whole, and whenever a person is whole, he becomes holy. This is the whole process. Mind is in a disease because there is no center in it. Have you got a center in the mind? Can you say, "This center is me"? Every moment it changes: in the morning you are angry, then you feel that anger is you; in the afternoon you become loving, then you think, "Love is me"; by the evening you are frustrated and then you think. "The frustration is me." Is there any center in you? Or are you just a moving crowd?

There is no center as you are, there is no center yet -- and a man without a center is ill. A healthy man is a man with a center. Jesus said, "Give people centers!" so whatsoever the chaos around you, the center remains there, you remain centered twenty-four hours a day; something remains continuous. That continuum will become your self.

Look at it in this way: there are three layers of existence. One layer is of objects, the objective world; all around, your senses report about it -- your eyes see, your ears hear, your hands touch. The objective world is the first layer of existence, and if you get lost in it you remain content with the most superficial. A second layer exists within you, the layer of the mind: thoughts, emotions, love, anger, feelings -- that is the second layer. The first layer is common -- if I have a stone in my hand you will all be able to see it -- it is a common objectivity.

When you see me, you never see me, you only see my body; when I see you, I never see you, I see only your body. But nobody can see what is inside your mind. Another person can see your behavior: how you act, what you do, how you react. He can see anger on your face, the redness, the cruelty that takes over, the violence in your eyes, but he cannot see the anger within your mind. He can see the loving gesture that you make with the body, but he cannot see the love. And you may only be making a gesture, there may be no love. You can deceive others just by acting, and that is what you have been doing.

Your body can be known by everybody else, not your mind. The objective world is common and that is the world of science. Science says that is the only reality because, "We can't know about your thoughts -- whether they exist or not nobody knows. Only you say they do, but they are not common, objective; we cannot experiment with them, we cannot see them. You report them but you may be deceiving us -- or you may be deceived, who knows?" Your thoughts are not things but you know well that they exist. Not only do things exist, thoughts also exist. But thoughts are personal, private, they are not common.

The outer layer, the first layer, the reality on the surface, creates science. The second layer, of thoughts and feelings, creates philosophy, poetry. But is this all? Matter and mind? If this is all then you can never be centered, because mind is always a flux. It has no center: yesterday you had certain thoughts, today you have other thoughts, tomorrow you will have other thoughts again; it is like a river, there is no center in it.

In the mind you cannot find any center: thoughts change, feelings change, it is a flux. So you will always remain ill, ill at ease, you can never be whole. But there is also another layer of existence, the deepest. The first is the objective world -- science and its world; the second is the thought-world -- philosophy and poetry, feelings, thoughts. Then there is a third world which is of religion, and that is the world of the witness -- the one who looks at the thoughts, the one who looks at the things.

That one is one, there are not two. Whether you look at a house or you close your eyes and look at the picture of the house inside, the looker remains the same. Whether you look at anger or you look at love, the looker remains the same. Whether you are sad or happy, whether life has become a poetry or life has become a nightmare, makes no difference -- the looker remains the same, the witness remains the same. The witness is the only center, and this witness is the world of religion.

When Jesus says, "Go and heal people," he is saying, "Go and give them their centers, make them witnesses. Then they will neither be involved in the world, nor involved in their thoughts; they will be rooted in their being." And once you are rooted in the being then everything changes, the quality changes -- then you can pray.

But then you will not pray for the wrong reasons, then your prayer will be a gratitude. Then you will pray, not like a beggar, but like an emperor who has too much of everything. Then you will give, but you will not give for the ego, you will give because of compassion, you will give because giving is so beautiful and makes you so blissful. Then you can fast, but that fasting will not be an obsession with food, that fasting will be totally different.

That is what Mahavira's fast is, totally different. You will sometimes forget the body so much that you will not notice that there is hunger; you will move away from the body so much that the body will not be able to inform you that you are hungry. The word for fast in Sanskrit is very beautiful; that word is upawas. The word carries no sense at all of food or no food, it has nothing of fasting in it, nothing at all, the word simply means 'living nearer to yourself'. Upawas means 'living nearer to yourself', 'being nearer to yourself'. A moment comes when you are so centered that the body is completely forgotten, as if there is no body. Then you cannot feel the hunger and fasting happens; but it is a happening, it is not a doing.

You can remain in this centering for many days. It happened to Ramakrishna: he would go into ecstasy and for six or seven days he would remain as if dead, his body would not move, it kept the same gesture -- if he was standing he would continue standing. Disciples would have to make him lie down, and they would have to feed him forcibly with some water, some milk -- but it was as if he were not there. This is a fast: because you are no longer in the body.

Being in the body, you are no longer in the body. But you cannot do this. How can you do it? -- because all doing is through the body, you have to use the body to do anything. This fast cannot be done because this fast means bodilessness. This can happen: it happens to a Mahavira, to a Jesus, to a Mohammed; it can happen to you too.

Jesus says:

GO AMONG THE PEOPLE. EAT WHAT THEY SET BEFORE YOU, AND HEAL THE SICK AMONG THEM. FOR WHAT GOES INTO YOUR MOUTH WILL NOT DEFILE YOU, BUT WHAT COMES OUT OF YOUR MOUTH, THAT IS WHAT WILL DEFILE YOU.

This is a very significant saying. Don't bother too much if the food is not pure, or if a sudra has touched it, or if a woman who is having her period has passed by and her shadow has defiled it. The question is not what you take in, the question is what you bring out -- because what you bring out, that shows your quality; how you transform what you take in, that's the thing.

A lotus is born in the mud; the mud is transformed and becomes a lotus. The lotus never says, "I will not eat this mud, this is dirty!" No, that's not the question. If you are a lotus nothing is dirty. If you have the capacity of a lotus, if you have the transforming power, the alchemy, then you can remain in the mud and a lotus will be born. And if you don't have the quality of a lotus, then even if you live in gold, only mud will come out of you. What goes in is not the point. The point is that if you are centered in your being, whatsoever goes in is changed, is transformed; it takes your quality of being and comes out.

It happened in Buddha's life: he was once accidentally poisoned, it was food-poisoning, but it was an accident. A poor man had been waiting for many days to invite Buddha to his house. So one day he came early, at four o'clock in the morning, and he stood near the tree where Buddha was sleeping so that he should be the first one to invite him -- and he was the first. Buddha opened his eyes and the man said, "Accept my invitation! I have been waiting for many, many days, and for many years I have been preparing. I am a poor man and I cannot afford much, but this has been a long longing that you should come and eat at my home."

Buddha said, "I will come."

Just at that moment the king of the city approached with his chariot, his ministers, and a long retinue, and he prayed to Buddha, "Come, I invite you!"

Buddha said, "It is difficult; my disciples will come to your palace, but I have accepted an invitation -- and this man was here first. The moment I opened my eyes he was the first to invite me, so I will have to go with him."

The king tried to persuade him that this was not good: "This man, what can he give you to eat? His children are starving, he has no food!"

Buddha said, "That is not the point. He has invited me and I have to go." So Buddha went.

What had that man done? In Bihar and in other poor parts of India, people gather many things in the rainy season; whatsoever comes up and sprouts on the earth they gather. A sort of flower, the kukarmutta -- a white umbrella-shaped plant that comes in the rainy season -- they gather it, dry it and keep it for the whole year. That is their only vegetable -- but sometimes it goes poisonous.

So that man had gathered kukarmutta for Buddha. He had dried and prepared it, but when Buddha started eating it was poisonous, it was very bitter. But that was the only vegetable the man had prepared, and if Buddha had said, "This is bitter and I cannot eat it," he would have been hurt because he had nothing else. So Buddha went on eating and he never mentioned that it was bitter and poisonous. And the man was very happy. Buddha came back and the poison started working. The physician came and he said, "It is a very difficult case. The poison has entered into the bloodstream and it is impossible to do anything -- Buddha will have to die!"

The first thing Buddha did was this: he gathered his disciples and told them, "This man is not ordinary, this man is exceptional. Because the first food was given to me by my mother, and this is the last food -- he is just like my mother. So honor him because this is something rare! In thousands of years a Buddha happens, and only two people will have this rare opportunity: the first is the mother, to help Buddha enter into the world; and the last is this man, to help me enter into the other world. So go and announce to the people that this man is to be worshipped -- he is great!"

The disciples were very much disturbed because they were thinking of killing the man. When everybody had left, Ananda said to Buddha, "This is too much for us to do, to respect that man. He is a murderer, he has killed you! So don't say this -- why do you say this?"

Buddha said, "I know you, you may kill him -- that's why I say this. Go and pay respect to him. This is a rare opportunity that happens only a few times in the world: giving Buddha his last food."

Poison is given to him, but love comes out. This is the alchemy: he feels compassion for this man who has almost killed him.

Even when poison is given to a Buddha, only love comes out.

Jesus says: FOR WHAT GOES INTO YOUR MOUTH WILL NOT DEFILE YOU -- even poison cannot defile you -- BUT WHAT COMES OUT OF YOUR MOUTH, THAT IS WHAT WILL DEFILE YOU. So remember how you transform things: if somebody insults you, he feeds you with an insult, that is not going to defile you. What comes out of you now? How do you transform the insult? Does love come out of you or hate?

So Jesus says, "Remember what comes out of you, don't bother much about what goes in." And this has to be remembered by you too, otherwise your whole approach can go wrong. If you continuously think about what goes in, then you never develop that capacity of being which can transform things. Then the whole thing becomes outward: pure food, this type of food and that type of food; nobody should touch you, you are a brahmin, a pure soul. Then the whole thing becomes nonsense! The real thing is not what comes in, the real thing is to remember that you have to transform it.

It happened to Shankaracharya: he was in Benaras, and one morning he went to take his ritual bath in the Ganges, thinking -- the old brahmin type of mind -- that the Ganges can make you pure. When he was coming back after taking his bath, one untouchable, one sudra, touched him. He became very angry and he said, "What have you done? I will have to go and take another bath. You have defiled me!"

It is said that the sudra replied, "Then your Ganges is worthless because if the Ganges purifies you, and right now, fresh, purified, you come and I touch you and you become defiled -- I am greater than your Ganges?"

And the sudra continued, "What type of knower are you?  because I have heard you say that in everyone the one exists. So allow me to ask a question: whether the touch of my body has defiled you? If so, that means my body can touch your soul. But you say the body is illusion, just a dream, and how can a dream touch the reality? And how can a dream defile the reality? That which is not, how can it defile that which is? Or, if you say that not my body, but my soul has defiled you, because a soul can touch a soul, then am I not Brahman, am I not that one you talk about? Then tell me, who has defiled you?"

It is said that Shankara bowed down and said, "Up to now I was only thinking about the one, it was just a philosophy. Now you have indicated the right path, now nobody can defile me. Now I understand: one exists, only one exists, and the same is in me and the same is in you." Then Shankara tried very hard to find out who this man was. He could never find out, it was never discovered who that man was. It may have been God himself, it may have been the very source  but Shankara was transformed.

What goes in you cannot defile you because whatsoever goes in, goes into the body. Nothing can go into you, your purity is absolute. But whatsoever comes out of you carries your quality, the fragrance of your being -- that shows something. If anger comes out of you, that shows that inside you are ill; if hatred comes out of you, that shows that inside you are not whole; if love and compassion and light come out of you, that shows that wholeness has been achieved.

I hope you will understand this strange saying. Misunderstanding is easy, and with persons like Jesus misunderstanding is always possible, understanding almost impossible -- because they speak truths, and truths are always paradoxical because you are not ready to listen, not centered.

You understand through the mind and the mind gets mixed up, confused, and it interprets -- then this saying becomes dangerous. I must tell you that this saying has not been recorded in the authorized version of the Bible. It has been left out, because what he is saying is dangerous! It is recorded, but not in the authorized version, not in the Bible Christians believe in. But when Jesus was speaking many other people were recording and this record has survived. It was just found twenty years ago in a cave in Egypt.

All these sayings which we are discussing belong to that recording. They are not from the authorized version, because the authorized version can never be right -- it is impossible. Once you organize a religion the spirit dies; organized, a thing is dead. And then there are also vested interests. How can the pope of the Vatican say: IF YOU FAST YOU WILL BEGET SIN FOR YOURSELVES? Then nobody would fast. AND IF YOU PRAY YOU WILL BE CONDEMNED? -- then nobody would pray. AND IF YOU GIVE ALMS YOU WILL DO EVIL TO YOUR SPIRITS? -- then nobody would give donations. Then how could this big organization, the church, exist?

Christians have the biggest organization: Catholic priests alone number twelve lakhs -- thousands and thousands of churches all over the earth. Catholic Christianity is the richest organization; not even governments are so rich because every government is bankrupt. But the pope of the Vatican is the richest man, with the greatest organization all over the world, the only international state -- not so visible, very invisible, but with millions of people working under it.

How can this happen? It all happens through donations, and if Christians learn that Jesus says, "Don't give, you will do evil to your spirits"?  And these churches are made to pray in, so if people come to know that Jesus says, "Don't pray, otherwise you will commit sin," who will go to pray there? And if there is no prayer, if there is no fasting, no ritual, no donations, then how can the priests exist? Jesus takes the very foundation out of all organized religion -- then Jesus can be there, but there can be no Christianity.

This saying is not recorded in the authorized version, it must have been left out. You can also misunderstand it, but if you can feel what I am saying you will understand. He is not against prayer, he is not against fasting, he is not against giving and sharing -- he is against your false faces.

The real must come out of your being. First you must change and be transformed, only then whatsoever you do will be good.

Somebody asked Saint Augustine, "What should we do? And I am not a very learned man, so tell me in short, in as few words as possible."

Augustine said: "Then there is only one thing to be said: Love! And then whatsoever you do will be right."

If you love, of course, then everything becomes right; but if you don't love, then everything goes wrong.

Love means, be egoless. Love means, be centered. Love means, remain blissful. Love means, be grateful. This is what the meaning is: live through your being, not through your acts, because acts are on the surface, being is in the depth.

Let things come out of your being. Don't manage and control your actions, transform your being. The real thing is not what you do, the real thing is what you are.