Krishna: The Man and His Philosophy - Osho - Oshorajneesh.com

CHAPTER 16. ATHEISM, THEISM AND REALITY
A man of extraordinary memory was once brought to his court from Rajasthan. Even the word
”extraordinary” does not rightly describe his memory; it was really incredible. The man did not know
any language other than his mother tongue – Rajasthani. Thirty persons speaking thirty different
languages were called to the Viceroy House in Delhi to test this man’s memory. Each one of them
was asked to formulate a sentence in his own language and keep it in his mind.
The Rajasthani man, a villager who knew no other language than his own, went to each of the thirty
persons, one after another. Each of them uttered the first word of his sentence, which was followed
by the sound of a gong. Then the villager went to the second man who in his turn said the first word
of his sentence. Likewise all the thirty gave him the first word of the sentences they had in their
minds, and each word was followed by the gong.
Then he returned to the first man who now gave him the second word of his sentence which was
again followed by the sound of the gong. In this way he received the second words from the rest
of them. This is how he collected all the thirty sentences belonging to thirty different languages
interspersed by the sound of the gong. At the end, the man from Rajasthan correctly repeated each
sentence of each language separately before the whole gathering.
When such a person as this Rajasthani villager dies and becomes a ghost he can remember things
not only for eleven hundred years but for eleven hundred thousand years. It is a special kind of
memory.
The other question is equally significant. It takes four hours to go through the whole of the GEETA.
So it is a relevant question: how was such a lengthy dialogue possible in the midst of two inimical
armies standing on the battlefield – ready to begin a decisive war like the Mahabharat? It does
not seem probable How could they have suspended fighting for four long hours? Someone must
have raised the question: were they there to fight or to listen to a four-hour spiritual discourse? The
question deserves consideration.
A historian, would say the dialogue of the GEETA in its original form must have been a brief one,
which was elaborated in the course of time. And if we put this question to one who is an authority on
the GEETA, he will say the GEETA is an interpolation; it looks completely out of context in relation
to the war of the Mahabharat. It seems the Mahabharat in its original text did have the GEETA as
one of its parts, and was extended later by some ingenuous poet. It does not fit in where it is found
in the Mahabharat. Certainly a war is no occasion for such a long spiritual discourse.
But I don’t accept the theory that the GEETA is an interpolation, nor do I believe it to be a later
elaboration of a brief dialogue. I would like to explain it with the help of an anecdote from the life of
Vivekananda.
When Vivekananda visited Germany, he was the guest of Duschen, a great scholar of Indology.
He was as great an authority as Max Muller, and in many respects Duschen possessed deeper
insights than Muller. He was the first western scholar who understood the UPANISHADS and the
GEETA, and his translations of the UPANISHADS became well-known. It was Duschen’s translation
of the UPANISHADS that thrilled Schopenhauer so much that he put the book on his head and went
dancing in the streets of his town.
Krishna: The Man and His Philosophy 314 Osho