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

CHAPTER 21. CHOOSE THE FLUTE OR PERISH
The irony is that if someone opts for suffering he does not suffer alone, he makes many others suffer
with him. And this is where immorality comes into being. Unhappiness is a contagious disease: a
single unhappy person can be the cause of the unhappiness of thousands. It is impossible that an
unhappy man can make another happy. How can he give happiness to another when he refuses to
take it for himself. Remember, we can share with others only that which we have, not what we don’t
have.
One who has turned his life into a bundle of hurts and wounds is going to be the cause of much
suffering in the lives of many people around him. Since suffering has become his life’s breath,
wherever he goes he will carry the germs of suffering with him. So an unhappy man does not suffer
alone, he shares his sorrow with everybody he comes in contact with. Walking or sitting, speaking
or silent, active or inactive, he emits and transmits the vibes of unhappiness like nuclear fallout all
around him. An unhappy person really adds to the unhappiness of the whole world.
Remember, when you choose unhappiness, you are not choosing it for yourself alone, but for the
whole world as such.
As I said, it is man’s preference for pain and suffering which the cross symbolizes. And that has led
him to the doorstep of war – a war that is going to be a total war. For the first time, mankind is on
the brink of committing global suicide. But he has asked for it by opting for misery.
We know very well that sometimes individuals driven up the wall commit suicide in despair. But for
the first time a situation for collective suicide has arisen, when the whole of mankind has become so
miserable that it is going to commit global hara-kiri.
It seems war has become our way of life, and the mounting number of wars are nothing but our
mounting steps to collective death and destruction. And this destruction is the cumulative effect of
mankind’s choice of suffering. Really, war is of our own choosing, it does not descend out of the
blue.
And when we court suffering religiously, when we accept it as something religious, then no thing
remains to be chosen irreligiously. When we turn sorrow into a religion, then there is nothing like
irreligion on the earth. Sorrow is really enshrined when it is made part of religion.
A whole milieu of unhappiness and misery was created around the cross. I don’t say it was created
around Jesus, because Jesus is not necessarily connected with the cross; he could very well do
without the cross. The fact is, that Christianity was created not by Jesus, but by the people who
crucified him.
I always say Christianity was not founded by Jesus; its real founders were those Jewish theologians
and priests who crucified him. Christianity comes from the cross, not Christ. Poor Jesus was simply
hanged on the cross – so he is secondary. First comes the cross in relation to the religion founded
after his name. In fact, it should be called ”crossianity,” not Christianity. It is the cross that occupies
the place of honor in the hearts and minds of people whose life is every day on the cross.
Man as he is, is in suffering; he is perpetually on the cross. It is not much different whether it is the
cross of the family or of relationships, of friendships or of enmities, of religions or of nationalities. For
Krishna: The Man and His Philosophy 404 Osho