From Ignorance to Innocence - Osho - Oshorajneesh.com

CHAPTER 21. PERSONALITY: THE CARBON COP-OUT
He said with great feeling, ”I always think that if I had been born in Buddha’s time, I would have gone
and sat at his feet and tried to understand the wisdom, the light, the vision that this man has brought
into the world.”
I was there. I stood up and said, ”Wait a minute, please.”
He said, ”Have I said anything wrong?”
I said, ”Certainly. Have you been to Krishnamurti. You have lived in England; Krishnamurti is often
in England – have you been to this man’s feet to learn the great wisdom, the vision?”
He said, ”No, I haven’t.”
”Then,” I said, ”you would not have gone to Buddha either. Did you go to Raman Maharishi?” – who
had just died a few years before. ”He was alive your whole life, and he was known all over the world
as one of the most enlightened Masters ever. And he was here in India, just living in one place,
Arunachal. He never moved from one small hill in the south, he always remained there, his whole
life.
”He went there when he was seventeen, and he died there; he must have been eighty-five. He never
left, all these seventy years. He was just living on that small hill. From all the world over people were
coming to him. Did you go there?”
He said, ”No.”
I said, ”Then can you repeat that you would have gone to Buddha? I can say with certainty that this
is mere oratory. You are befooling others, you are befooling yourself. You have to accept the fact
that you would not have gone. Why have you not gone to Raman, to Krishnamurti, to Meher Baba?
These people were available your whole life.
”But you think yourself a far higher authority, more and better educated than all these three people.
You have wisdom, you have vision, you have light – what can these people give you? I say to you
with absolute certainty, you would not have gone to Buddha. Do you agree with me or not?”
There was silence for a moment, such silence as rarely happens in a university convocation hall,
pindrop silence. And the man said, ”Perhaps the boy is right. In fact I have no right to speak on
Buddha because I have never been interested in enlightenment, nirvana, meditation. And he is right
that I would not have gone to Buddha. For what? – because my interest is not in these things.
And he has pointed out clearly that I know three persons – these three persons are well-known as
enlightened Masters – but I have not gone. And they have been very close to me.
”Krishnamurti has been very close; just an hour’s drive and I could have seen him many times. I
have been speaking in Madras university, from where Arunachal is only a few hours’ drive. I have
been speaking in Poona university, and Meher Baba lives there in Poona – but I have not bothered.”
He apologized to me before the whole university and asked me sometime to come to his home; he
would like to talk with me. I will say this man was at least intelligent; he was not annoyed.
From Ignorance to Innocence 296 Osho