There’ s a beautiful Zen story in Osho’ s talks on “Dhammapada: The Way of the Buddha”. The story goes like this: Basho’ s master died — Basho is a Buddha, a Buddha who writes poetry, a Buddha who paints beautiful pictures, a very aesthetic Buddha. His master died, thousands of people gathered. His master was very famous; more famous because of Basho, because Basho was a famous poet and painter and he was Basho’s master. Thousands of people gathered and they were very surprised when they saw Basho crying, big tears rolling down his cheeks.

A few close disciples of his master came to Basho and said, “It does not look right. Thousands of people are coming and they are getting confused. They don’ t think a Buddha should cry and weep. You are the man who has been saying to them again and again: There is no death and the innermost core lives forever. Then why are you weeping? Your master is not dead, he has only moved from the small body to the universal body of God. So why are you weeping?”

Basho wiped his tears and he said, “Listen! This is nobody’ s business. I live according to my inner feelings, I cannot pretend. When my innermost core has disappeared into the universal I don’ t care whether people think it right or not. If they don’ t think that I am enlightened it’s okay, but I cannot pretend. I cannot do something which is not really there. And yes, I have said that the soul is immortal and my master has not died, he has disappeared into the universal. That’ s why I am crying — not crying that he is dead but crying that now I will never be able to see his form. Now he has become formless — and his body was beautiful. I will never be able to look again into those deep eyes, I will never be able to hold his hand and touch his feet. I have lost his form — I am crying for his body, for his form; I am not crying for the formless soul. And I am not concerned whether people consider me enlightened or unenlightened, that is their business. Who cares?”

There is a beautiful book by Osho, Emotional Wellness, and in one of the chapters, the enlightened master explains:

“Emotions cannot be permanent. That’s why they are called ‘emotions’ — the word comes from ‘motion’ — ‘movement’. They move; hence, they are ‘emotions.’ From one to another you continually change. This moment you are sad, that moment you are happy; this moment you are angry, that moment you are compassionate. This moment you are loving, another moment full of hatred; the morning was beautiful and the evening is ugly. And this goes on. This cannot be your nature, because behind all these changes something is needed like a thread that holds all of them together.”

Chinmaya is one of the most adorable sannyasins. Many may already know that he was initiated into Neo-Sannyas by Osho in Manali in 1970, together with the first batch of sannyasins, such as Yoga Laxmi and Dharm Jyoti. At the time he had already been Osho’s secretary for three years, having come to Osho in 1965 when he lived in Jabalpur.

Chinmaya left Pune in October 1990 and has not been in the limelight for many many years as he preferred a life of seclusion and meditation in Bageshwar (Uttarakhand, Himalayas), together with a select group of fellow travelers.

I have always seen him fit and radiant as a real yogi, and soft and serene as a real meditator. Now he is nearing 80, and a year ago he was diagnosed with cancer. For some time he had several treatments and chemotherapy sessions, but very recently he came to a point where he felt that the medical treatment was not proving any good and decided to stop it and live in let-go, surrendering to the divine will.

He took this decision on 5th of April, and the message started spreading like wildfire. Osho’s lovers started arriving in large numbers at Shiroda, a village on the border of Goa where he is living now.

The loving energy of hundreds of Osho’s disciples assembling here is doing him good, and his health is gradually stabilizing and improving. It is really wonderful to sit with him every evening in absolute silence, with gentle live music, followed by Osho’s audio discourse.

This area has become a vibrant energy field filled with Osho’s grace.

There has been a rare enlightened master, one can say “the rarest”, who went from India to Tibet and illumined the whole of the Himalayas with his inner light. It is said about him that he meditated deeply under the guidance of three enlightened masters — Dharmakirti, Dharmarakshita, and Yogin Maitreya — that when he became known to people, he was lovingly called: Atisha, the Thrice Great. The first master Dharmakirti taught him the first principle of meditation. And for the second he was sent to Dharmarakshita, and for the third to Yogin Maitreya.

In his world-famous book, The Book of Wisdom, Osho talks about him: Atisha was born in India, but the moment his love became active he started moving towards Tibet, as if a great magnet were pulling him there. In the Himalayas he attained; then he never came back to India. He moved towards Tibet, his love showered on Tibet. He transformed the whole quality of Tibetan consciousness. He was a miracle-worker; whatsoever he touched was transformed into gold. He was one of the greatest alchemists the world has ever known.

Many people have been asking me about Osho’s biography and I tell them that he is a mystic without a biography. They become puzzled and ask me then, why don’t you write his biography. I tell them that I cannot go against his vision, though I can say a few things which I have learned from being in his presence.

Osho has been known with various names — and he is not his names. The first name that he was given after his birth on December 11, 1931, was Rajneesh Chandra Mohan. At the young age of 21 (on March 21st, 1953 to be precise), when he was living in Jabalpur, he attained his enlightenment. And with this existential gift, his biography ended completely. From that moment onwards, he did not exist as a person. Yes, there was certainly an illumined presence, but no person, no ego, just a state of no-mind — an oceanic consciousness in a physical form.

In the Glimpses of a Golden Childhood, Osho himself describes this: The biography is bound to be very superficial, so superficial that it is not worth reading at all. No biography can penetrate to the depths, particularly the psychological layers of a man. Especially if the man has come to the point where the mind is no longer relevant to the nothingness hidden in the centre of an onion. You can peel it layer by layer, of course with tears in your eyes, but finally, nothing is left, and that is the centre of the onion; that is from where it had come in the first place. No biography can penetrate to the depths, particularly of a man who has known the no-mind also.

Talking about enlightenment, Osho says: Mind was disappearing; it was millions of miles away. It was difficult to catch hold of it, it was rushing farther and farther away, and there was no urge to keep it close. I was simply indifferent about it all. It was okay. There was no urge to remain continuous with the past.

Osho talks about that fateful night of enlightenment — the night of 21st March 1953: That night I became empty and became full. I became non-existential and became existence. That night I died and was reborn. But the one that was reborn has nothing to do with that which died, it is a discontinuous thing. On the surface, it looks continuous but it is discontinuous. The one who died, died totally; nothing of him has remained. Believe me, nothing of him has remained, not even a shadow. It died totally, utterly.

He concludes: That night the death was total. It was a date with death and God simultaneously.

As an illumined presence, Osho continued to remain in the body till January 19, 1990. During this period, he has been known as Acharya Rajneesh, Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh — and finally, his disciples started calling him Osho — which simply means: The Oceanic Consciousness. He has explained that the word “Osho” is derived from William James’ expression “oceanic experience” which means dissolving into the ocean.

Our world is full of religious people — and most of them are believers, following the traditional rituals taught to them from their childhood. They make no effort to explore the meaning or significance of the rituals; they simply carry on participating in the rituals in their family or society. And then there is a certain percentage of educated people who will not do anything without going to the root of such rituals. It is not so easy to convince them to continue following the traditional ways. But there are some grave occasions in life when they also toe the line. For example, there’s a death in the family, some rituals have to be performed — and willingly or unwillingly, with some sense of duty, they do participate because they don’t want to feel guilty later on.

This is not a very happy or healthy situation, where people are forced to participate in religious ceremonies either out of ignorance or out of fear. It is the ignorant people or people suffering from fear and greed, who are mostly exploited by the crafty priests. In such a situation, religion does not appeal to the young generation. It will be a great danger to the traditional religions if a majority of people in the world become educated. And pretending to be religious does not mean anything.

The religions all over the world need to go through a deeper transformation if they want to survive and grow. They need an intelligent and creative approach towards it — based on sincerity. And sincerity does not mean seriousness. Most of the religions have already created so much seriousness and grimness in the world, which is sickening and needs to be balanced by humour.

Osho shares his insight on this subject: Knowing brings sincerity, but all seriousness disappears. Knowing brings a playfulness; knowing brings a sense of humour. This sense of humour is a must. If you find a saint who has no sense of humour, then he is not a saint at all. Impossible. His very seriousness says that he has not achieved. Once you have some inner experiences of your own you become very playful, you become very innocent, childlike.

A religious person can joke; he can laugh — not only at others but laugh at himself too. Osho remembers Bodhidharma when he became enlightened, he started laughing — and he never stopped till he died. Many people asked him, “Why do you go on laughing?” He said, “I go on laughing because what I have been searching for was always within me. I was such an idiot; I cannot believe that for so many lives I have been searching for something which was already within me. In fact, the searcher was the sought, the seeker was the goal. There was no other goal except myself to be found. And when I see others are doing the same, I cannot stop laughing at the ridiculousness of the whole search, of the whole spirituality.