Question – Well, I was brought up as a catholic, So
how come Jesus is a stranger to me?
Osho – Jesus is always a stranger. It does not matter
whether you were brought up as a Catholic or a Protestant or a Hindu or a
Mohammedan. The very being of Jesus is that of a stranger, because he is an outsider.
He lives on a different plane, he lives in a different dimension: he lives in
God, you live in the world. He talks a different language; he talks about
things you have not even dreamt about. You cannot trust him. You cannot even
understand him; he is incomprehensible.
You may have been brought up as a Catholic; that means you
have been taught from your childhood things about Jesus. Those are simply
words; you have not been introduced to Jesus, because that introduction is
possible only through meditation — not through any kind of teaching, not
through the Catholic catechism. It is all rubbish. In fact, rather than helping
you to become acquainted with Jesus it becomes a barrier; you become
knowledgeable. You know many things about Jesus without knowing Jesus. The more
you know about him, the less you think that you need to know him. You become
satisfied by and by; you start feeling that you already know him without
knowing him at all. That’s what Christian teachings do. And the more you have
been taught, the more you become familiar, the more it breeds contempt.
So sometimes it happens that one who has not been brought up
as a Christian may have fresher eyes to see Jesus, because his mind will be
uncluttered. He will not know anything, he will look through innocence. He will
not have any conditionings, he will look empty. He will approach Jesus without
any prejudice for or against. And you can know Jesus only when you go nude,
naked — naked of all beliefs, naked of all prejudices, when you approach him
without any preoccupation, when your mind is utterly silent.
So in fact, the Catholic upbringing has done just the
Opposite. All religions are doing that, it is nothing special to the Catholic
Church. Hindus destroy the possibility of knowing Krishna, Buddhists destroy
the possibility of knowing Buddha — because knowledge becomes more important
than knowing, and knowledge is second-hand. Only knowing can help. And
remember, let me repeat it again: Jesus is a stranger. He may be standing by
your side but he is not there, he is somewhere else. You may be standing in
front of Jesus but you are not there, you are somewhere else. You and Jesus
never meet, because the planes are so different. You never criss-cross — you
cannot! Unless you become something like Jesus, there is no possibility. And to
become like Jesus needs great meditation, needs great intelligence — not a
Catholic upbringing, not a Sunday religion, not foolish dogmas and creeds.
Great intelligence, sensitivity, awareness…
People are fast asleep. Somebody is asleep as a Christian,
and somebody is asleep as a Hindu. That doesn’t matter — sleep is sleep. A
Christian, a Hindu, a Mohammedan — if all these three get too drunk, will there
be any distinction, differentiation between their drunkenness? The Hindu will
behave as foolishly as the Mohammedan; and the Mohammedan will behave as
stupidly as the Christian. Once they are drunk, they are drunk. And people are
asleep. It makes no difference what kind of theology you have used as a pillow
for your sleep. Whether the pillow is white or green or blue or red does not
matter. Once you fall asleep, you fall asleep; the pillow becomes immaterial.
Whether you are sleeping on the Bible, on the Gita, on the Koran does not make
any difference; you are using a pillow. Somebody is using the Bible as the
pillow, somebody else is using the Koran as the pillow. And you are snoring
over your scriptures. And Jesus and Mohammed and Buddha and Krishna remain
strangers. They do not belong to this world, that’s why Hindus call them
avatars. Avatar means one who has come from beyond descended from the beyond,
like a ray of light descends into darkness. It comes from the transcendental
world, from the world of turiya — the fourth.
Jesus LOOKS like you, but he is not like you. Don’t be
deceived by the appearance. He is here on the earth, and not of it. He moves in
the same world, the same market-place, the same people, rubs shoulders with
you, holds your hand, looks into your eyes, but he does not belong to this
world. He belongs to the other shore. He has risen, he has risen in God.
You can also rise, and only by rising will you be able to
understand him; befreind him, otherwise he will remain an outsider.
Jesus is a lotus. You are still the mud. There cannot be any
dialogue between the lotus and the mud — although the lotus is born out of the
mud, although the mud is carrying many more lotuses than have become manifest.
Many unmanifest lotuses are there in the mud, but the mud and the lotus are so
different — strangers to each other. That is the situation. If you want to
understand the lotus you will have to become a lotus. Only a lotus can have a
dialogue with the lotus.
Never become a Christian. If you want to become something,
become a Christ. Never become a Buddhist. If you want to become something,
become a Buddha. Otherwise you will remain unaware of the reality of Jesus. And
because people feel uneasy — uneasy because they cannot comprehend Jesus — they
create theories. Rather than transforming themselves, they load Jesus with
theories, theories which can help them make him comprehensible. No theory can
make him comprehensible. All theology is false. But there are only two ways:
either you wrap theories around Jesus which you can understand… In that way you
feel that you have understood Jesus, but you have understood only the theories
that you have wrapped around him. He remains there, absolutely far away,
distant. He is not even touched by your theories. You can weave and spin
beautiful philosophies around him. That philosophy you will be able to
understand — it is woven by you — it is your creation, it is your invention
rather. But Jesus, who is just standing there hidden behind your philosophies,
is still an outsider. In fact your philosophies, your theories, have made him
more of an outsider than he was. With those theories, there has come a China
Wall between you and him.
If you are a Christian you will never understand Jesus. Your
very Christianity will be an obstruction, a hindrance. How can you understand
Jesus when you are a Christian? Impossible! What does it mean to be a
Christian? It means that you have certain ideas about Christ. You are clinging
to certain theories: those theories become more important than Christ himself!
Naturally, because you can understand those theories and you cannot understand
Christ, those theories become more and more important. You can discard Jesus,
but you cannot discard your theories. That’s why there are so many
Christianities — the Christianity of the Catholic, and the Christianity of the
Protestant, and the Christianity of many, many other sects. They all go on
fighting, they are always at each other’s necks, and they are all followers of
Jesus! So where is the conflict?
The conflict is not between their Jesuses, because Jesus is
one. The conflict is between their theories, and they cling to the theory. They
can discard Jesus very easily — Jesus is discarded, but they cannot discard
their theory. Their theory is more important: it is their invention. Jesus has
become secondary.
No, you cannot understand Christ if you are a Christian or a
Catholic. You can understand Christ only if you are nobody. I am not saying
that you can understand Christ if you are a Hindu. When you are nobody, when
you drop all the curtains and you start moving in that reality called “Christ”
without any preoccupied mind — empty, clean, clear, no smoke around you, just a
clarity and the freshness that clarity brings, and the vitality that clarity
brings — and you start approaching Jesus, with no idea of who he is, then there
will be a meeting. Only if you are a nobody can you meet with Christ or Buddha
or Krishna. And these are different names for the same state of consciousness.
It is the fourth state of consciousness. Theories belong to the third state of
consciousness; and Jesus, Buddha, belong to the fourth state of consciousness.
You will have to drop many things before you can feel Jesus.
Source:wisdompills.com
