Osho’s talks on Jesus in the backdrop of the gospels of John, Mathew and Luke are transcribed in this book. The verses selected for in this first of four volumes are from chapter 1 of John, chapters 3,4 and 9 of Mathew and chapter 9 of Luke.
Jesus was an ordinary man who remained in his father’s workshop, worked and helped his father till he was baptized at the age of thirty by John the Baptist who had been baptizing people near the River Jordan. The baptism, the initiation was done by water and Jesus saw heavens opening and “the Spirit of God descending like a dove, and lighting upon him.”
Jesus came out of the river, went to the bank and started to preach before a crowd that was gathering there and to say: “Repent: for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.” Nobody had known about Jesus before that. Suddenly a new quality of man, a new man altogether fresh, was born. According to Osho Baptism is a birth. “Jesus,” John the Baptist says, “will baptize you with fire. He will take you to God, he will help you to go upward.” John the Baptist prepared people so that God could descend into them, then Jesus prepared people so that they could ascend into God.
The old testament says, “The lord says this” whereas Jesus says, “I say unto you.” People were simple in Jesus’ time. They must have just looked, and when Jesus said:”Follow me” they simply followed. All the apostles, all twelve of the apostles, were very ordinary, uneducated, common people, and upon them he built the whole structure. Osho says, “Jesus touches very ordinary people - a fisherman, Simon called Peter- he touches, and by his very touch this man is transformed into a great apostle, a great human being.”
The key message of Jesus is that man is not responsible unless he is alert and aware. In the gospel we see Jesus goes on saying: “Awake! Be alert! Be conscious! Remember!” Jesus says that one should not be attached and one should not look backward. Jesus became Christ on the cross when he said, “Thy will be done, not mine.”
Two thousand years have passed since Jesus spoke, and his words are still alive and fresh as ever.
Osho’s responses to questions from seekers and disciples are compiled in alternate chapters. Following are some of his observations:
God is a verb. Whatever the grammarians say, I am not concerned. God is a verb, life is a verb.
If you are happy you are right, if you are unhappy you are wrong.
It is not a question of what you have done, it is a question of how you have been.
Learn to laugh at yourself - about your seriousness and things like that.
Osho’s jokes and stories appear in this book are worth noticing. Given below are two of his jokes figuring Mulla Nasruddin in one and a court fool in another:
Mulla Nasruddin’s wife was very angry. Her small boy was making too much of a nuisance, creating too much nuisance. Finally she was exhausted and she ran after him. She wanted to give him a good thrashing, but he escaped, escaped upstairs, and hid himself under a bed. She tried hard, but she couldn’t get underneath, so she said, Wait, let your father come.”
When Mulla Nasruddin came, she told the whole story. He said, “Don’t be worried, leave it to me. I will go and put him right.”
So he went upstairs, walked very quietly, looked under the bed and was surprised - surprised by the way the boy greeted him. The boy said, “Hello, Dad. Is she after you also?!”
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An emperor had a fool. One day the emperor was looking in the mirror. The fool came, jumped, and hit him with his feet in the back. The emperor fell against the mirror. He was, of course, very angry and he said, “Unless you can give some reason for your foolish act which is more foolish than the act itself, you will be sentenced to death.”
The fool said, “My Lord, I never thought that you were here. I thought the queen was standing here.
He had to be pardoned because he had given a reason that was even more foolish. But to find such a reason, the fool must have been very wise.
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