The Dhammapada: The Way of the Buddha, Vol 1 Talks given from 21/06/79 am to 30/04/80 am

The minister says, "I was told you had a party here tonight."

"We do," says the man. "We are playing guessing games right now. The women are blindfolded trying to guess the men's names by feeling their pricks. You ought to come on in, Reverend, your name has been guessed eight times already!"
The whole priesthood down the ages has proved only one thing: that you cannot fight against nature. Although there is a way to surpass it -- but the way does not go against it; it goes through it.

That is my first and most fundamental difference: I affirm life as it is. That does not mean that there is no growth possible beyond life -- there is immense possibility of growth -- but all growth has to be founded on a deep, passionate love of life. It is only through experiencing life that transcendence happens.

I would like you to go beyond sex, but I don't condemn sex. Sex is a natural desire, and is good in its own place. But one should not stop with it; it is only a beginning, a glimpse -- a glimpse of the beyond. In deep sexual orgasm, you become aware for the first time of something which is not of the ego, of something which is not of the mind, of something which is not of time. In deep orgasm, mind, time, all disappear; the whole world stops for a moment. For a moment you are no longer part of the material world; you are just a pure space.

But this is only a glimpse -- and at great cost. You should move ahead. You should seek and search for ways and means so that this glimpse becomes your very state. That's what I call realization, enlightenment. An enlightened person is in a state of orgasmic joy twenty-four hours a day. What the sexual person attains only once in a while, with great effort, the spiritual man attains without any effort and without any wastage. The spiritual man simply lives there; on those ultimate peaks is his abode. You only see those peaks from thousands of miles away.

I am not against sex, because sex is the first window into spiritual existence. I am not against food, because I am not against any enjoyment. There are all kinds of experiences that you will come across through enjoying things -- food, love, music, dance, nature...it is only through enjoying all these things that you will, slowly slowly, become aware of the invisible.

It is because of this that the Upanishads say: annam brahma -- food is God. A tremendously significant statement: food, and God? made synonymous? -- annam Brahma. Food is God? What are they saying? These people knew, they knew what they were saying -- the taste of food is the taste of God. The taste of any joy is the taste of God -- howsoever far away, howsoever much a reflection.

The moon reflected in the lake is still a reflection of the moon, although you will not find it in the lake. If you jump in the lake you will only disturb the reflection and you will not find the moon there. The reflection is not the moon, the reflection reflects the moon. And if you are a little intelligent you will not jump into the lake, you will look up into the sky where the real moon is.

God is reflected when you enjoy food. God is reflected when you enjoy sex. God is reflected in a thousand and one lakes of life. Take the key from the reflection; take the indication, the clue, and start moving to the original.

That's my fundamental difference. I am not against life or anything that life implies -- neither sex nor food, neither the body nor bodily pleasures. I am not averse to comfort, I am not against luxuries either.

Just the other day there was a question. Somebody has asked -- he must be a newcomer and an Indian -- he has asked, "Are you not a hypocrite? Why do you live in luxury?" He does not know the meaning of the word 'hypocrite'. I may be the only person in the world who is not a hypocrite.

A hypocrite is one who says one thing and does another. A hypocrite is one whose inner and outer lives are different -- not only different but diametrically opposite. I am not against luxury, so why should I be a hypocrite? I am not against comfort -- I am not a masochist, that's all. I don't believe in torturing myself or anybody else. I don't believe in torture.

I would like the whole earth to live in luxury. Certainly, I know that today that is not the case. The whole earth is not even getting the minimum necessities of life. But I am not going to torture myself just because of that, because that is not going to help them either. If there are one thousand people in misery, there will be one thousand and one people in misery -- that's all.

I don't believe in misery. And I am not living a double life. My life is very simple -- simple in the sense that it has a kind of integrity. I am doing what I am saying. I believe in luxury; to me, religion is the highest form of luxury. If I cannot make everybody live in luxury, at least I can manage to live in it myself. Otherwise people will say to me, "Physician, first heal thyself."

But these so-called godmen, they all live in luxury and they are all against luxury. These are hypocrites! They talk about poverty and the spirituality of poverty, and they all live in luxury -- they are hypocrites.

I hate poverty! I don't respect poverty, I don't appreciate poverty. It is out of stupidity that people are poor; it is out of superstitious minds that people are poor. People need not be poor. It is because of thousands of years of teaching that poverty has something spiritual in it that people are poor.

A very famous German thinker, Count Keyserling, came to India. He wrote a diary while he was traveling in India. In his diary he notes many significant things. One thing he wrote was, "I became aware, visiting India, about two things. One: that to be poor is to be spiritual; and the other: that to be ill, starved, ugly, is to be holy."

I am not teaching these things. I would like my whole commune to live in as much comfort as possible. The commune has to become a model -- a model for the whole world. My sannyasins are to live in every possible joy: physical, psychological, spiritual. The joys of the body and the joys of the mind and the joys of the spirit -- all have to be lived in such a harmony that the fourth man is born out of that harmony.

That's why I say: Be scientific, be aesthetic, and be religious. Out of these three dimensions, out of the meeting of these three rivers, the fourth will be created. And the fourth is my way.

Any kind of unnatural approach towards life creates complexities, creates pathologies. It does not make people sane; it drives them insane.
Patient in psychiatrist's office: "Doctor, you have got to help me. I keep dreaming about food, continually dreaming about food."

Doctor: "Don't you ever dream about girls?"

Patient: "Yes, but I keep pouring ketchup over them."
Now, if you make somebody feel guilty about his food -- that's what so-called religious people are doing -- then he will start dreaming about food. And to eat is healthy, nourishing, good; to dream about it is ugly and pathological. Dreaming about food simply says that you are somehow depriving your body of what it needs.

Who dreams about food? Only a person who represses his desire for food. You can try it: fast for one day and then see what happens.... The whole day you will think about food; from everywhere the mind will come again and again to the idea of food. And in the night you are bound to dream about food.

Repress sex and you will dream about sex. Repress anything and you start becoming pathological. A really healthy man has no dreams -- he has nothing to dream about. He lives each moment totally; he never represses anything. Hence his unconscious remains utterly empty and clean. Repress, and your unconscious becomes cluttered with unnecessary furniture. And in dreams you are bound to face your unconscious. You have to face it; in deep sleep you have to pass through it. It creates a turmoil throughout your whole life.

I am life-affirmative. I am in tremendous love with life, and that's my teaching. The so-called godmen are all against life; they are creating a pathological humanity.

Secondly, they are all otherworldly; I am this-worldly. Not that I don't believe in the other world -- there is no question of believing in it; I know it is -- but one need not worry about it. Worrying is not going to help. The other world is going to be born out of this world. Make this life beautiful, live this life as sensitively as possible, and the other will be born out of it. It will be far more beautiful than this if you can make this beautiful.

Buddha says just in the first sutras that if this life is beautiful, the other is going to be even more beautiful. But if you think of the other life, if you project about the other life, if you dream about the other life, life after death, you will make this life so ugly, so ill at ease, that the other will become more ugly.

You need not think of the tomorrow, the today is enough unto itself. Live this day with such joy and ecstasy...from where is the tomorrow going to come? It will be born out of this ecstasy, it will be more ecstatic. And then you have the key -- the key that unlocks all the doors of life.

Live the moment! I believe in the moment. Those godmen, they talk about the other life, life after death, heaven and hell -- all that is absolutely unnecessary. People are already much too puzzled; don't puzzle them any more.

My teaching is very simple, to the point: live moment to moment, dying to the past, not projecting any future...enjoying the silence, the joy, the beauty, of this moment. And out of this, that will be born. It comes of its own accord. As Buddha says: Just as the shadow follows you, the future follows you. If your present is ugly, the future is going to be hell; if your present is beautiful, the future is going to be paradise.

Thirdly, up to now, these so-called godmen have been dividing humanity into Hindus and Christians and Mohammedans and Jainas and Sikhs and Parsis...there are three hundred religions on the earth and at least three thousand sects within those three hundred religions. These godmen have been creating hatred amongst people. They talk about love, but they create the context in which only war happens. Religions have been fighting with each other, destroying each other, murdering each other, butchering each other. More blood has been shed in the name of religion than in the name of anything else. Not even politics is so criminal as your so-called religions.

Now, all your godmen are either Hindus or Mohammedans or Christians. I am neither a Hindu nor a Christian -- I am nobody. And I help people to become nobodies. I help people to become unburdened of all this nonsense. It is enough to be -- there is no need to be a Mohammedan or a Hindu or a Christian. There is no need to go to any temple, mosque or church. The whole existence is their temple, and the trees are continuously in worship, and the clouds are in prayer, and the mountains are in meditation...just start looking around.

Look rightly! Look without belief in your eyes, look without prejudices, and you will find God. You cannot miss him because he is everywhere! He is not like a target that you can miss; hit anywhere and you will find him, because he is everywhere. It is impossible to miss him. All that you need is an innocent heart. But a Hindu cannot be innocent, a Mohammedan cannot be innocent. He is full of garbage: full of theories, theologies, full of borrowed knowledge -- that's what I call garbage.

I am not saying that Mohammed is not right, I am not saying that Buddha is not right; otherwise, why should I speak on Buddha, on Mohammed, on Christ? They are true, but their truth cannot be your truth -- you will have to find it on your own. Truth cannot be borrowed, truth is untransferable; it never becomes part of your heritage. You have to seek and search on your own; it has always to be individual.

My truth is my truth. It's my experience. I can talk about it, I can sing songs in its praise, I can dance it. I can show you my ecstasy -- but still, that which has been experienced remains unexpressed. No scripture has been able to express it. All scriptures are efforts to express, but all efforts have failed: truth is inexpressible.

The scriptures simply show the compassion of the people who attained, but they don't prove that the compassion has succeeded in expressing the truth.
Rabindranath was dying and somebody said to him, "You should be happy and glad and thankful to God -- you are the greatest poet the earth has ever known. You have written six thousand poems; nobody else has done that. Even Shelley, who is thought to be the greatest poet in the West, has written only two thousand songs. You are thrice great!"

But tears started rolling down from Rabindranath's eyes. The man was puzzled; he could not figure out why Rabindranath was crying. He said, "Why are you crying? Feel thankful to God! He has fulfilled your life. You have attained all that one aspires to attain."

Rabindranath said, "I have not attained anything! Those six thousand songs are proof of my failure." Listen attentively. Rabindranath says, "Those six thousand songs are proofs of my failure. I was trying to say something, but I have not been able to say it. Each time I tried, I failed. I tried again and again and again, six thousand times I tried, and I have failed. The song that I had come to sing is still unsung. I am taking it with me."
That is the case with a Buddha, a Mohammed, a Zarathustra -- with all those who have known. You cannot be a believer and religious together. If you want to be religious, you have to drop all beliefs. That is my third basic difference.

I teach you to be religious, but not believers. You have to be inquirers, explorers. You cannot take things for granted: because so many people say it, then it must be true. Truth has to become your own experience -- you have to be a witness to it. And the moment you are a witness to it, you will not be able to say that you are a Hindu or a Mohammedan or a Christian. These are all philosophies, guesswork, theologies, logic, calculation, cleverness -- but the experience is missing.

My whole approach is existential, experiential. I am not giving you any dogma; I am not trying to give you a certain doctrine. On the contrary, I am trying to take all doctrines away. I would like you to be utterly empty of doctrines and beliefs and prejudices.

In that emptiness you are God -- as much as I am, as much as Buddha is. That emptiness opens the doors to your divinity.

I am not a godman. I am as ordinary as you are, as everybody else is; as ordinary or as extraordinary -- it means the same. I am not superior to anybody and I am not inferior to anybody. Nobody is superior and nobody is inferior. We belong to one reality -- how can we be inferior and superior?
The second question:

Question 2

BELOVED MASTER,

THERE IS A QUESTION I HAVE NEVER BEEN ABLE TO GET AN ANSWER TO. IT IS A STUPID QUESTION AND YET I FEEL THAT I WANT SO MUCH TO KNOW THE ANSWER.

CAN YOU TELL US WHAT IS THE PURPOSE OF CREATION, WHY LIFE EXISTS, WHY EVERYTHING EXISTS? I DON'T BELIEVE IN ACCIDENTS.
Prem Patrick, the question is certainly stupid, you are absolutely right about it. And the question is not answerable. Anybody who answers it will only create a few more questions in you. You have not been able to get any answer because there is none. Life is a mystery -- hence this question cannot be answered. You cannot ask "Why?" If the "Why?" is answered, life is no longer a mystery.

That's the whole effort of science: to destroy the mystery of life. And the way is to find the answer to every why. And science believes -- of course, arrogantly and ignorantly -- that one day it will be able to answer all whys. It is not possible. Even if we answer all whys, the ultimate why will remain: Why does life exist at all? What is the meaning of existence? What is the purpose of all this? This question is ultimate -- it cannot be answered.

If somebody gives you an answer, that will simply create another question. If somebody says...for example, these answers have been given -- a few people believe that God created the world because he wanted to help humanity. Now, what kind of answer is this? He created humanity to help humanity. What was the need to create? A few others say God created the world because he was feeling very lonely. If God too feels very lonely, then there is no possibility of anybody ever becoming a buddha.

And suddenly God started feeling lonely -- what was he doing before he created the world? For eternity he had remained alone...then suddenly one day, one morning, he went crazy, or what? Suddenly he started feeling lonely after breakfast! And what need was there to create the whole world? Just one woman would have been enough!

And now how is he feeling today? Too crowded? Too much in the marketplace? Must be planning to destroy the world soon. What kind of God are you talking about? Is your God a person who can feel lonely?

These are foolish answers to foolish questions.

Then there are a few people who say it is God's play -- his leela. Can't he sit silently? And what kind of play is this? Adolf Hitler and Mussolini and Joseph Stalin and Mao Zedong, Genghis Khan, Tamerlane, Nadirshah...God's play? Millions of people are being massacred and it is God's play? Six million Jews killed by Adolf Hitler and God is playing a game? Why can't he play golf? or chess? Why torture people? So much misery in the world, and these fools go on saying it is God's play? Children are being born paralyzed, blind, deaf, dumb...God's play? What kind of God is this? Either he is nuts or he is not God at all, at least not godly. Must be very evil.

Now, these answers don't help -- they create more questions. Patrick, I can only say this much: that life has no purpose, cannot have any purpose.

All purposes are within life. Yes, a car has a purpose; it can take you from one place to another. And food has a purpose; it can nourish you, it can keep you alive. A house has a purpose; it can give you shelter when it rains and when it is hot. And clothes have a purpose.... All purposes are within life, but life itself cannot have any purpose because it is not a means to some end. A car is a means, a house is a means.

Life has no goal, life is not going anywhere. Life is simply here! It has never been created -- forget that idea of creation. That creates many stupid questions in the mind. It has never been created, it has always been here, and it will always be here -- in different forms, in different ways, the dance will continue. It is eternal. Aes dhammo sanantano -- so is the ultimate law.

There is no purpose -- that's the beauty of life! If there were some purpose, then life would not be so beautiful. Then there would be a motivation, then it would be businesslike, then it would be very serious. Look at the roses and the lotuses and the lilies -- what purpose? The lotus in the early morning sun opening up, and the cuckoo starts calling...what purpose? Is it not intrinsically beautiful? Does everything need a purpose outside itself?

Life is intrinsically beautiful. It has no extrinsic purpose, it is not purposive. It is just like the song of a bird in the dark of the night, or the sound of water, or the sound of the wind passing through the pine trees....

Man is goal-oriented because your mind is goal-oriented. It creates questions like this: "What is the goal of life?" There must be some goal. But if somebody says, "This is the goal of life," then you will ask, "What is the goal of this goal? Why should we attain it? What purpose is it going to serve?" And then somebody says, "This is the goal of this goal." The same question arises again, and you fall into a regress, ad infinitum.

You ask me, "Can you tell us what is the purpose of creation?"

The world has never been created. The word 'creation' is not right. It has always been here, it is eternal. There is no creator. God is not the creator of the world: God is the very creative energy of existence -- creativity rather than a creator. He is not the poet but the poetry, not the dancer but the dance, not the flower but the fragrance.

You ask me, "Why does life exist?"

These questions look very philosophical, and can torture you very much, but are absurd. It is like asking, "What is the taste of the color green?" Now, it is irrelevant. The color green has no taste; color and taste are not related at all. "Why does life exist?" Just look at the words: 'life' and 'existence' mean the same thing; it is a tautology. If you are asking: Why is life life? then it will be clear to you. But when you ask, "Why does life exist?" the language deceives you.

You are asking: Why is life life? You are asking: Why is a rose a rose? Would you be satisfied if the rose were a marigold? Then you would ask: Why is a marigold a marigold? How are you going to be satisfied?

If life does not exist, will you be satisfied? Just conceive of yourself without body, without mind, a ghost, asking the question: Why doesn't life exist? What happened to life? Why did it disappear? The same question will persist and persecute you.

Life is a mystery. There is no why, no purpose, no reason. It is simply here. Take it or leave it, but it is simply here. And when it is here, why not take it? Why waste your time in philosophizing? Why not dance and sing and love and meditate? Why not go deeper and deeper into this thing called "life"? Maybe at the ultimate core you will know the answer. But the answer comes in such a way that it cannot be expressed. It is like the dumb man's taste of sugar. It is sweet -- he knows that it is sweet, but he cannot say it.

The buddhas know but they cannot say. And the idiots know not and they go on saying, and they go on giving you answers. Idiots are very clever in that way -- in finding, fabricating, manufacturing answers. Ask any question and they will answer you.
When Gautama the Buddha used to move in his country from one place to another, a few of his disciples would go ahead of him and declare in the town: "Buddha is coming, but please don't ask these eleven questions." And one of those eleven questions was: Why does life exist? and another was: Who created the world? In those eleven questions the whole of philosophy is contained. In fact, if you drop those eleven questions nothing remains to ask.

Buddha used to say these are useless questions. They are not answerable -- not because nobody knows the answer. They are not answerable in the very nature of things.

Finally Buddha said, "Do you really want to know the answer?"

Maulingaputta said, "Otherwise why should I have come to you? I have traveled at least one thousand miles to see you." And remember, in those days, one thousand miles was really one thousand miles! It was not hopping in a plane and reaching within minutes or within hours. One thousand miles was one thousand miles. It was with great longing, with great hope that he had come. He was tired, weary from the journey, and he must have followed Buddha because Buddha himself was traveling continuously. He must have reached one place and people said, "Yes, he was here three months ago. He has gone to the north" -- so he must have traveled north.

Slowly slowly, he was coming closer and closer and then the day came, the great day, when people said, "Just yesterday morning he left; he must have reached only the next village. If you rush, if you run, you may be able to catch him." And then one day he caught up with him, and he was so joyous he forgot all his arduous journey and he started asking all the questions he had planned all the way along, and Buddha smiled and sat there and asked, "Do you really want to have the answer?"