The sixth question

Question 6

OSHO, SOMETHING IS HAPPENING THAT I CANNOT EXPLAIN. IT IS NOT EVEN SOMETHING I KNOW, ONLY SOMETHING I SENSE.

Yoga Nirmal,

THAT'S WHAT I AM HERE FOR -- to help you to be aware of things which cannot be explained but yet experienced, which cannot be expressed but yet felt. No word is adequate to indicate them, but they can be sensed.

Man can know much more than he can say, and man can sense much more than he can know, and man can be much more than he can sense. And you have to be aware of all these layers.

That which can be said is the most superficial; much more can be known. That which is known and cannot be said i, deeper, but much more can be sensed. That which is sensed and cannot be known is even deeper, but one can be much more than one can sense -- and that is the deepest layer.

The effort is to help you to go into your interiormost core so that the gestalt change, from knowing to the knower, from the seen to the seer, from the object of consciousness to consciousness itself.

Man can live a life either of doing or of having or of being. Doing is the most superficial; better than doing is having. The poor person lives in the world of doing, the rich person lives in the world of having. But the best is the world of being. The poor person can also reach the world of being without passing through having, but it will be very difficult -- very very difficult, because you can renounce only that which you have. If you don't have it, it is very very difficult to renounce it. Only a rare man like Kabir can do that miracle: he can renounce that which he does not have. He can understand even that which he does not possess.

Great intelligence is needed to move from the world of doing to the world of being. If somebody moves from poverty into spirituality, he has great intelligence. And if someone remains in richness and still does not move towards spirituality, he is just stupid and nothing else. Being rich and not being aware of spirituality is stupidity. Being poor and not being aware of spirituality can be forgiven, but the rich person cannot be forgiven -- because he HAS -- can't he see that he has everything and yet he has nothing? Death will be coming and it will take all that he possesses.

Doing is a means to having. When doing succeeds, you have. But when you have, everything starts failing, everything starts looking futile, everything starts looking childish. And to know that everything in this world is futile is the beginning of turning in, of conversion.

Yoga Nirmal, something beautiful is very close by.

You say: SOMETHING IS HAPPENING THAT I CANNOT EXPLAIN.

You are fortunate. There are poor people who can explain whatsoever is happening to them -- that means nothing special is happening to them. All that is happening is so superficial that language is adequate to express it. The deeper the happening, the more dumb you will feel.

Lao Tzu says: "People can say whatsoever they want to say -- except me. Compared to them I look a little muddle-headed. People are very clear, but I am vague." People are clear because they don't have any experience of the mysterious.

Lao Tzu is joking. Lao Tzu is saying: "You are poor because you can say everything that you know and you are so clear about your life -- how can you be so clear about the mysterious?" The mysterious remains in the mist. One only feels it, but one cannot grab it. It is very mercurial. If you try to grab it, you distort it; it falls into pieces, it disappears.

Nirmal, you say: SOMETHING IS HAPPENING THAT I CANNOT EXPLAIN.

There is no need, and don't try to explain it otherwise it will stop happening -- because explanation is done by the head and the happening happens in the heart. And the head is very clever in interfering; don't allow the head to interfere. Accept the unexplained as unexplained -- there is no need to explain it. Live it! Experience it! Taste it! Be drowned in it! There is no need to express it.

You say: IT IS NOT EVEN SOMETHING I KNOW ONLY SOMETHING I SENSE.

Yes, that's exactly how it happens. Knowing means clarity; and if you know, you can explain. Knowing means you have already explained it to yourself -- if you can explain it to yourself, why not to others? Sensing means that you are not even able to explain it to yourself; it is just a feeling. And if you try to grab it, it disappears.

The greater truths have to be approached indirectly, you should not attack them directly; you should be very delicate, very indirect.

Have you seen in the night? -- if you look at the small stars directly, they disappear. Try tonight: if you look directly, if you focus on the small star, it disappears. It is not available to the direct gaze. Then what is the way to see the small star? Look sideways, look just around -- not exactly on the spot. Look at other stars and suddenly the small star starts appearing. It is available only to an indirect gaze, not a direct gaze.

So is the situation with inner experiences: don't look directly -- the inner experiences are very shy. If you look directly they start hiding. And there is no need to know; sensing is enough. Why this obsession with knowing? And when you are obsessed with knowing, you will also be obsessed with explaining. You don't owe explanations to anybody.

Buddha used to declare wherever he would go... his disciples would precede him and they would declare to the town, "These eleven questions are not to be asked of the Buddha -- you can ask everything else except these eleven questions.

Those eleven questions were known as AVYAKHYA -- unex-plainable. But if you observe those eleven questions minutely, you will be surprised: nothing is left out of them. All that is important is included in them, all that is of any significance. Why was Buddha so insistent -- "Don't ask"? Because he cannot explain, and your very asking puts you on the wrong track.

you can ask something, you start expecting an answer. Remember, just by formulating a question, there is no necessity that the answer will be coming from existence. Existence has no obligation to fulfill your questions.

And absurd questions can be formulated -- they look very good, very logical, very grammatical. Language-wise they are perfect, but in existence they are just absurd. For example, somebody can ask, "What is the colour of sound?" As a question it is perfect, nobody can find any fault with it -- linguistically: "What is the colour of sound?" But sound and colour are not related at all.

Somebody can ask, "What is the taste of the colour green?" The question is right as A question, but no answer will be possible. And such are your questions. When somebody asks, "Who created the world?" it looks very significant, it looks very philosophical. It is simply absurd, because the world was never created -- so the whole question is nonsense. It has always been there.

God is not the creator: God is the world. He has become the trees, he has become the rocks, he has become the river, he has become you and me. There is no other God except this existence. God is not separate from existence; he is not like a painter who paints on the canvas, and then there is a picture and the painter. God is like a dancer who dances, and the dancer and the dance are always the same -- they cannot be separated. You cannot have the dance separate from the dancer, and you cannot have the dancer separate from the dance, because when he is not dancing he is no more a dancer.

God is the dancer, and the world is his dance -- and you are part of his dancing gestures. But you can ask the question, "Who created the world?" And then there are foolish people who will try to answer you.

The question is absurd in the beginning, in the first place, and then there are foolish people who are ready to answer. Because the question is there, it has to be answered -- so "God created the world." Just ask them, "Who created God?" and then you are falling into an infinite regress and there will be no end -- because the question will always remain the same. A created B, B created C, C created D... but the question remains the same, "Then who created D?" And the question will never be answered.

There are people, even great philosophers have asked, "Who is first -- the egg or the hen?" The question looks perfectly right -- one must be first! But can't you think that things can be standing in a circle. If you think that everybody is standing in a queue, in a line, then somebody is first and somebody is last. But if people are standing in a circle, then who is the first and who is the last?

The mystics say the world moves in circles and they really seem to be hinting at a deep truth. Stars move in a circle, the earth moves in a circle, the sun moves in a circle, the seasons move in a circle, life moves in a circle -- everything moves in a circular way. The straight line is man's creation. In fact, Euclid's whole geometry is wrong!

And now, in the world of higher mathematics, Euclid is no more valid. Something totally different has come into force: non-Euclidean geometry. Euclid believes in a straight line, but non-Euclidean geometry says you cannot draw a straight line -- how can you draw a straight line? If you draw a straight line on the floor, it is not straight because the earth is round. It only looks straight because it is part of such a big circle -- it is an are, not a straight line. If the earth is round and you are sitting on the earth and drawing a straight line, go on extending it from both ends... one day it will become a circle. So it was part of a circle.

Everything is part of a circle. Who is first -- the hen or the egg? Now the question is so patently foolish that only philosophers can ask it. And they argue, and there are people who say the hen is the first.

I used to know an Indian philosopher, a Buddhist philosopher, Rahul Sankrityayana. He believed that the egg came first. He has written many articles to prove that the egg is the first. But how can the egg be the first? Some hen will be needed; and how can the hen be the first? Some egg will be needed. Those who know, they say something else. They say the hen and the egg are not two things -- the hen is the egg's way of producing more eggs; or vice versa: the egg is the hen's way of producing more hens. They are not two but one process: the egg becomes the hen -- so how can one be first and the other second? The hen becomes the egg....

But these questions have persisted down the ages, and people think they are doing great work when they are thinking about such stupid questions. Buddha was right: "Don't ask such questions. Be practical."

Each Buddha is pragmatic. If you asked a question of Buddha, he would ask, "First answer a few things: if I say yes or no, is it going to change your life? You ask, 'Who created the world?' If I say, 'God,' how is it going to change your life? If I say, 'No one,' then is it going to change your life?"

In fact, if you look at the atheist and the theist you will not see any difference in their lives. Both go to the same movie, both see the same TV programme, both eat the same food, both are members of the Rotary Club... you will not see any difference, atheist or theist. Can you tell about somebody, just by seeing his behaviour, whether he is an atheist or a theist? You cannot see any difference. They remain the same person.

So Buddha used to say, "If it is not going to make any real difference in your life, forget about the question -- it is meaningless. Ask me something which will help you to go deeper into meditation; ask me something which will bring enlightenment to you -- ask me something which will make you free from all imprisonments. Ask me something which will take you beyond all misery and death. Ask me something which will take you beyond all time and space, and will make you part of eternity."

There is no need, Nirmal, to know what is happening -- let it happen, don't interfere. And there is no need to explain it -- be quiet. Keep it inside you as a secret. Remember, great things need secrecy. Just as the seed goes into the earth and remains there, then the great tree is born; just as the child has to grow in the mother's womb.... These are great secrets. When they start happening to you, keep them deep down in your heart, let them grow there.

Yes, one day when they have become a great tree, with great foliage, and flowers and fruit, people will become aware of them, and many people will be benefitted, many people will rest in your shadow and many people will quench their thirst and their hunger, and many people will be made aflame by your flowers, and many people will start moving towards God -- just by seeing you, just by feeling you, just by being close to you.