Osho Quotes on Mahavira

Osho Quotes on Mahavira

1. Gautam Buddha says, “Do not harm anybody. Do not hurt anybody, because that is a sin.” Mahavira says, “Violence of any kind is a sin.”
2. Mahavira says, ‘Be independent, leave aside all dependence’.
3. The whole pattern of society is fabricated on greed and fear. Whoever tries to rise above it poses a threat to society. Mahavira says, “I have dropped all greed.” He says, “I have discarded all fear.” When is this possible? When can a person free himself from the throes of greed and fear? It is only possible when a person expects nothing from others. When I become self-satisfied, when I become so fulfilled within myself that I need nothing outside me and I can still live, when my wholeness, my fullness, is perfect within me, my greed and fear dissolve on their own.
4. Mahavira says, “He who becomes empty, becomes the lord of perennial energy.”
5. Mahavira says there is atman (soul), but without the ego: there is no ego — atman is.
6. Effort is the way for Mahavira. Even to mention the word `let-go’ is to support laziness. `Mahavira’ is not his name; his name was Vardhamana. He is called Mahavira because his attitude and approach is that truth has to be conquered. It is not a love affair, it is a war. And Mahavira has won the war; that is why he is called the great warrior. `Mahavira’ means the great warrior.
7. Mahavira says that truth itself is relative: he has no ultimate truth. Buddha has no ultimate truth. Again the difficulty is that Mahavira and Buddha can be misunderstood when they say that there is no ultimate truth but that every truth is relative: it can be one thing in one situation, it can be another thing in another situation, and because it is related to situations it cannot have any ultimacy. This goes against all the great mystics. Only Mahavira and Buddha, two people… But I know both, and I understand both better than their own followers, because none of their followers have been able to make any sense out of it: either all the mystics are wrong, or Buddha and Mahavira are wrong! I say nobody is wrong. What Mahavira says is that truth has seven aspects, and Buddha says that truth has four aspects. They are really referring to the expression of truth. Truth can be said in seven ways according to Mahavira. He is really a logician. But what he is saying is not about truth — there is a misunderstanding. What he is saying is about truth expressed, not experienced. When you experience it, it is always ultimate, but the moment you say it, it becomes relative.The moment you bring it into language it becomes relative, because in language nothing can be ultimate. The whole construction of language is relative. Buddha is not a great logician, so he stops at four, but the situation is the same. They are not speaking of the truth which you experience in silence, beyond mind. Nothing can be said about it. The moment you say something about it, you drag it into the world of relativity, and then all the laws of relativity will be applicable to it.
8. Mahavira was so deeply rooted in the attitude of being multidimensional that he was the first man in the whole history of mankind to bring in the theory of relativity. It took twenty-five centuries for the West. Only Albert Einstein, through a very different path as a scientist, brought the same message, the same philosophy of the theory of relativity. Mahavira says that whatever you say is only relative. He was so much in his theory of relativity that he never made a single statement about anything — because any single statement will only show one aspect. What about other aspects? He found that every truth has seven aspects. So you ask him one question and he will answer with seven answers, and those seven answers will be contradicting each other. You will come back from meeting Mahavira more confused than you have ever been — and he was the most clear person who has ever walked on the earth. But his approach was multidimensional.
9. Mahavira, twenty-five centuries ago, used to make each of his statements with a ‘perhaps’. If you asked him, “Is there a God?” he would say, “Perhaps.” In those days it was not understood at all — because how can you say, “Perhaps”? Either God is or is not. It seems so simple and so logical: “If God is, God is; if he is not, he is not. What do you mean by ‘perhaps’?” Now it can be understood. Mahavira was using the same language in religion that is being used by Albert Einstein in physics. Albert Einstein calls it the theory of relativity. Mahavira has called his philosophy exactly the same: SAPEKSHAWAD — the theory of relativity. Nothing is certain, everything is flexible, fluid. The moment you have said something, it is no longer the same. Things don’t exist, Mahavira says, but only events.
10. If you ask Mahavira about God his answer will be sevenfold. Of course you will not get any answer. You wanted an Aristotelian answer, yes or no. Mahavira says yes, God is. Then, he says, wait; don’t run away with that statement, it is only the beginning. The second statement is: God is not. But don’t be in a hurry. The third statement is: God is both — is and is not; and the fourth statement is: God neither is nor is not. The fifth statement is: God is indescribable. And the sixth is: God is, and is indescribable. And the seventh is: God is not, and is indescribable. You cannot get anything out of it, you will think this man is crazy. If you had come confused, you will return worse. At least you were only puzzled abut two things: whether God is or God is not. Now there are seven openings. But modern science is coming very close to such openings. Physicists, digging deeper, have reached into matter they have found very strange …. They had never expected that they would find something in the deepest core of matter which would defy all their logic, all their laws. First they tried somehow to manipulate matter according to their logic — but you cannot manipulate reality. Finally, Albert Einstein had to say that whatever reality is, whether it goes against our laws and logic does not matter. We will have to say good-bye to our laws and logic and listen to reality. We cannot force reality to follow our laws and logic. But reality has logic and laws of its own. It is not freedom.
11. It is because of this multidimensional, relative approach that Mahavira could not get many followers. There can be very few crazy people who don’t care what it means, who simply fall in love with the personality of Mahavira. He is a beautiful man of immense presence and grandeur — so a few crazy people can fall in love with him. They don’t care what he says. They only care what he is: “Don’t be bothered with what he says; just look at his beauty, his light — his eyes with such grandeur and depth, and his whole life such a song, such an ecstasy. Don’t bother with what he says; it is none of our business. The MAN is right. His statements may be right, may not be right. He himself says `perhaps.'”
12. Mahavira was too wise a man for all these idiots. He behaved with people as if they were of his understanding. What he was saying can be understood by Albert Einstein, because what Albert Einstein says is also with a “perhaps.” That’s the whole meaning of the theory of relativity: nothing can be said with certainty because everything is only relative, nothing is certain. Can you say this is light? It is only relative. In comparison to a brighter light it may look very dim. In comparison to a millionfold brighter light it may look like just a black hole, just a darkness.
13. In the whole history of man, only Mahavira has made a distinction to be remembered — which is significant in this reference. He says that there are two ways to reach to the truth. One is the way of the shravaka. Shravaka means one who can hear, one who is able to hear from the heart. Then he need not do anything. Just hearing is enough, and he will be transformed. The other is the way of the monk, who will have to try hard to reach to the truth. My effort has been not to create monks. That’s why I have chosen to speak because just hearing you can be reborn. Nothing else is needed on your part, except a willingness to open the doors of your heart. Just let me in and you will not be the same again.
14. Once the seed of truth falls into the heart, you WILL become a garden, you WILL bloom. Then it is only a question of time and patience. The seed that falls into the soil of the heart is bound to grow. It will sprout when the season comes; it will come to grow great foliage. And when the spring is there, it will bloom in thousands of flowers, it will blossom. That’s why Mahavira says right listening is enough. In right listening, your heart is available to the Master. And once the Master can reach the heart of the disciple, nothing else is needed. Then the flame jumps from one being into the being of the other. Then the lit candle can go on sharing its flame with all those candles which are not yet lit. It is literally a jump of the flame from one being to another.
15. One of the most beautiful sayings that I have loved comes from Mahavira, a contemporary of Gautam Buddha. A very strange statement — Mahavira says, “If you have started the journey you have reached already.” If a seed has started sprouting the spring is not far away. Soon, where there was nothing there will be beautiful flowers, with great fragrance. Mahavira is saying that if you have started the journey you have already reached. You may not see it like that because your comprehension is very limited. You cannot see your own future flowering. But if a man of enlightenment cannot see either, then what is the difference? You are both blind.
16. Buddha says there is no God, Mahavira says there is no God, for the simple reason that the idea of God has been dangerous — dangerous in the sense that people feel protected and they stop growing. If you are unprotected, if you are under the sky, then you have to depend on your own self. Then you have to become stronger, more integrated. Then you are free to live in hell or in heaven; nobody can reward you and nobody can punish you.
17. Mahavira — one of the great masters of the world — has named the ultimate state KAIVALYA. KAIVALYA means absolute aloneness… his word is of tremendous beauty. He says: When you reach to your innermost core you become absolutely free; and that state is of pure aloneness — KAIVALYA. and out of that is wisdom, and out of that is light, and out of that is compassion: everything is born out of that — so don’t avoid aloneness.
18. Buddha says scriptures AS SUCH are false, knowledge AS SUCH is false. Jesus is right, but Christianity is not right. Mahavira is right, but Jainism is not right. With Mahavira there is knowing; Jainism is knowledge. Knowledge is the fall of knowing. Knowing is individual: knowledge is a commodity, a social phenomenon — you can sell and purchase it, it is available in the libraries, in the universities.
19. Nakedness has a deeper dimension: it means no shame, no feeling of being ashamed; it means accepting your body in its totality as it is. No condemnation in the mind, no division in the body — a simple acceptance, then it is nakedness. Mahavira is not nude, he is not a member of a nudist club; he is naked, he is naked like a child. In a nudist club you are not naked. Even your nudity is calculated, it is manipulation from the mind. You are revolting, you are rebellious, you are going against the society — because the society believes in clothes, you are throwing the clothes. But it is a reaction so you are not innocent, innocent like a child.
20. I must tell you, by the way, that there is only one religion in the world which allows suicide — Jainism. It is rare; only Mahavira allows suicide. He says that if you can die very silently, without any emotionality about it, it is beautiful, nothing is wrong with it. But it has to be done over a very long time, otherwise you never know. So you have to stop taking food, that’s all. It takes almost three months for a person to die without food. For three months the body goes on and on, using its reservoirs, energy, and food and everything. One goes on becoming more and more skinny, the flesh disappears, then only the skeleton remains. Nearly three months it takes. So Mahavira says that if you want to die, and if this suicide is going to be a religious dropping out, then don’t do it in a hurry. Do it simply, because you have three months to think, and you can go back, nobody is forcing you. And there have been many people who have done it that way in the past: many people have dropped out of existence after not taking food for three months — simply meditating, lying down. Then that suicide is more beautiful than your ordinary life because they are not really killing themselves, they are moving to another realm.
21. In the Jaina tradition death has also been used to strengthen willpower. Mahavira is the only person in the world who allowed if any seeker wished to use death for this purpose. No one else has given such permission. Only Mahavira has said one can use death as a spiritual discipline — but not the kind of instantaneous death which occurs by taking poison. One can’t build his willpower in one instant; it requires a long span of time. Mahavira says, “Go on a fast, and die of hunger.” It takes ninety days for a normal, healthy man to die of hunger. If he is weak in his resolve — even a little bit — the desire for food will return the very next day. By the third day he will begin cursing at having created such a nuisance for himself, and will start finding ways to get out of it. It is very difficult to maintain the desire to stay hungry for ninety days. When Mahavira said, “Stay hungry and die,” there was no room for anyone to create any deception, because in ninety days… anyone who has even the slightest lack of will would escape much earlier in the process. So there is no way to deceive. If Mahavira had given the permission to die by taking poison, drowning in a river, jumping off a mountain, it would have been a matter of instant death. Of course, we all manage to make a resolve good enough for one moment. But a warrior good for showing only a moment’s bravery is of no use on the battlefield, because he will become a coward the next moment. He will turn out to be a coward with as much resolve as he was brave a moment ago. So Mahavira has given permission to commit santhara, causing death to oneself as a spiritual discipline. If anyone wished to put himself through a final test, even if it meant meeting death voluntarily, Mahavira had given permission for it. This is truly very significant and worth giving a thought. Mahavira is the first person on this earth who has authorized that a seeker can follow this discipline. There are a couple of reasons for it.
22. You remain a watcher in your own place — whether it is day or it is night, whether it is happiness or unhappiness, whether it is defeat or victory. Thus when a person settles in witnessing the doer dissolves; the doing no longer remains yours. You no longer remain the center of doing, you become the center of seeing, witnessing, knowing. The doing goes on happening around you in existence. Mahavira says, “My stomach is hungry, I watch it; a thorn pierces my foot and the foot is in pain, I watch it; the body becomes sick, a sickness has come, I watch it.” Even at the time of death, Mahavira will go on watching that the body is dying. You will not be able to watch that the body is dying, you will feel that you are dying. If you have been the doer your whole lifetime,  then you will have to do the dying also. When you have done everything, to whom can you leave the act of dying? One who disowns life, he also disowns death. One who has kept watching life as a witness, he watches death also as a witness. If the doing dies, in other words if the doer disappears, the anxieties die.
23. Mahavira, a man of tremendous compassion, who brought the concept of non-violence to the world, is very violent about women. He says that a woman cannot become enlightened as a woman. First she has to earn enough virtue to be born as a man, and then there is a possibility of her being enlightened. But as a woman he absolutely denied the possibility.
24. Mahavira says that no woman can go to the ultimate liberation directly from the woman’s body. Strange, because the same person continuously teaches people that you are not the body, you are the soul. If you are the soul, then the question arises, is the soul of a woman also feminine? Is the soul of man also masculine? The soul cannot be feminine and cannot be masculine. Consciousness is simply consciousness, it has no sexuality, it has no genitals. But he forgets when it comes to woman. He says, “A woman has to do austerities, practice virtue; all that will help her to be born as a man in the next life. And then she can make efforts for ultimate enlightenment. Only man can become enlightened. No woman can become enlightened.” You will be surprised to know that in spite of all these teachings, one courageous woman became enlightened. Her name was Mallibai. She lived a few hundred years earlier than Mahavir. The woman had really attained to all the qualities of the enlightened person. She has the tranquillity, the silence, the unconditional love, fearlessness, absolute freedom. They had to accept her.
25. Mahavira has a very beautiful word. He used “listener”, shravak, with a very original meaning, and he has given a very new shape, a new nuance to it. He says if you can be simply a right-listener, nothing else is needed. This much will do: if you can be a right listener — samyak shravak. If you can listen attentively with double-arrowed attention, then this much is enough, you will be awakened. No other discipline is needed. Buddha has used the word, “mindfulness” — samyak smriti, right mindfulness. He says whatsoever you are doing, do it mindfully; don’t do it in sleep, do it mindfully — whatsoever you are doing. Do it consciously, then consciousness begins to crystallize in the first state, wakefulness. When you have become conscious, when you are awake, the your consciousness can penetrate the second state, dreaming. It is not difficult then. Then you can become conscious of your dreams; and the moment you become conscious of you dreams, dreams disappear. The moment dreams disappear you become conscious of your dreamless sleep, and the arrow goes on. Now be aware that you are asleep, and by and by the arrow penetrates — and suddenly you are in the fourth.
26. Mahavira says there is no God, because only in the non-existence of God does man become responsible. And I agree with Mahavira, with Buddha, with Nietzsche. The first and the foremost quality of a religious person is self-responsibility, to feel that “I am responsible for whatsoever I am. It is my choice. I have been given all the alternatives. I was born open-ended; nothing was predetermined. Whatsoever I am, it is my responsibility — good or bad. There is no fate, no God.”
27. Mahavira says, “I want you to understand that you are the cause of whatsoever you are.” And this is very hopeful. If you are the cause, you can change it. If you can create the hell, you can create the heaven. You are the master. So don’t feel hopeless. The more you make others responsible for your life, the more you are a slave. If you say, “My wife is making me angry,” then you are a slave. If you say your husband is creating trouble for you, then you are a slave. Even if your husband is creating trouble, you have chosen that husband. And you wanted this trouble, this type of trouble — it is your choice. If your wife is making hell, you have chosen this wife.
28. You will be surprised to know that Mahavira has even defined karmas as material. If you are angry and you kill someone it is an action of anger and of murder. Mahavira says that the subtle atoms of these actions cling to you as the scum of karmas and actions. So actions too are physical, and they also hold onto you like matter. Mahavira calls becoming free of this accumulated conditioning of karmas nirjara — deconditioning. All the atoms of these karmas that have collected around you should fall off. The day you are rid of them all, what remains of you will be absolutely pure. Nirjara means the falling off of the atoms of actions. When you are angry it is an action, then this anger remains with you always in its atomic form. That is why when the physical body falls these atoms do not disintegrate — because they are very subtle. They come along with you in the next birth.
29. Mahavira on the other hand seems to have come to his fullness; his being is complete. That is why he denies the existence of God, but cannot deny the existence of the soul. He says there is no God; God cannot be, because he himself is God. There cannot be yet another God, two Gods. Therefore he declares the self. the soul is God; each one of us is God. There is no God other than us. In utter ecstasy Mahavira declares that he is God, there is no one above him. He contends that if there be another God, a superlord over him, then he can never be free. Then there is no way for anyone to be free in this world; then freedom is a myth.
30. Mahavira dissolves in himself, so he attests that there is no God. The meditator does not need God, because the meditator does not need the other as such. And God is other too, something other than you. So Mahavira says there is no need for God: Appa so paramappa — the soul is God. The one hidden within is the soul, he says, and that soul is God, there is no other God.
31. Beyond the superconscious is the collective superconscious; the collective superconscious is what is known as “gods” in religions. And beyond the collective superconscious is the cosmic superconscious which even goes beyond gods. Buddha calls it nirvana, Mahavira calls it kaivalya, Hindu mystics have called it moksha; you can call it the truth.
32. This is my whole message to you: Dissolve, be in a state of let-go. Then there is no death, then there is no fear. Then you are not alone, the whole universe is within you. Anybody who is awakened to the truth becomes an outsider to all kinds of collectivities. Gautam Buddha is not a Buddhist, Mahavira is not a Jaina, Jesus is not a Christian. There have been very few individuals in history who were part of the whole. Nothing less than that will do. Everything else is just a poor substitute. When I can have a friendship with the flowers and the trees and the birds and the stars, when I can love the smallest blade of grass and the biggest star — because they are mine and I am theirs — then what is the need to belong to a small, tiny group? I am making every effort so that you dissolve, so that you start melting into the whole, so that slowly, slowly you forget yourself and only remember the reality that surrounds you. Just as a dewdrop falls from the lotus leaf into the lake and becomes one with the lake, thirty-two years ago my dewdrop slipped from the lotus leaf into the lake of wholeness.