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

CHAPTER 22. SANNYAS IS OF THE HIGHEST
begging outside his kingdom, but the fakir refused him with a curt warning, ”If you cannot go begging,
it is better you return to your palace right now, and never come to me again to talk about God.” After
some hesitation the king ultimately decided to live with the fakir for a week. And for a week he
was on the streets of his own city with a beggar’s bowl in his hand, visiting the houses of his own
subjects, asking for alms.
After seven days the fakir sent for him and said, ”Now you can ask about God.”
The king said, ”I now have nothing to ask. I had never dreamed I would find God only after a week’s
begging.” Then the fakir asked what had happened in the course of the begging. The king said, ”Just
a week’s begging destroyed my ego; it is now nowhere. I had never thought that I would attain as a
beggar what I had never had as a king.”
The moment humility is born, the door to the divine opens.
It would be a great experience if someone takes sannyas for a month or two every year and then
returns to his householder’s world. This experience will enrich his life in a great way; it will go
with him for the rest of his life. And if a person, in his sixty or seventy years’ life, takes short-term
sannyas – say twenty times – he will not need to be a sannyasin again; he will be a sannyasin as he
is. Therefore I think that every man and woman should have the opportunity of sannyas in his or her
life.
A few things more and then you can put your questions.
Up to now every kind of sannyasin in the world has belonged to some religion, to this or that religion.
And this has done immense harm to both sannyas and religion. It is utterly absurd that a sannyasin
should belong to some sectarian religion; a sannyasin at least should belong to religion alone, and
not to this or that religion. He should not be a Christian, or a Hindu, or a Jaina; he should be a
sannyasin of ”religion”, with no adjective attached to it. He should be the one who, in the words of
Krishna, gives up all religions and takes shelter in the only religion there is. Religion, like truth, is
one; it cannot be many. And it will be great if we can give birth to a sannyas that belongs to religion
and not to religions, not to communal and sectarian religions. The sannyasin of true religion can be
a guest everywhere, whether it is in a temple or a church or a mosque, none will be alien to him.
Another thing to bear in mind is the role of the Master, the guru, in sannyas. Up to now sannyas has
been tethered to a Master who initiates someone into it. But sannyas is not something which anyone
can give you as a gift; it has to be received directly from the divine. Who else but God can initiate
you into sannyas? When someone comes and asks me to initiate him into sannyas, I tell him, ”How
can I initiate you into sannyas? Only God can initiate you. I can only be a witness to your being
initiated. Get initiated by the divine, the supreme being, and I will bear witness that I was present
when you were initiated into sannyas. My function is confined to being a witness, nothing more.” A
sannyas tied to the Master is bound to become sectarian. It cannot liberate you; instead it will put
you in bondage. Such a sannyas is worthless.
There are going to be three categories of sannyasins. One of them will consist of those who will
take short-term sannyas, say tor two or three months. They will meditate and go through some kind
of spiritual discipline at some secluded place and then return to their old lives. The second category
Krishna: The Man and His Philosophy 423 Osho