Osho Teachings on Celebration

Osho - That's my whole teaching, celebration; not worship but celebration. When you worship, you start making a hierarchy; the lower and the higher. When you worship you put something on top of other things. When you worship, something becomes sacred and something becomes profane. When you worship you divide, you split existence. Then something is praised but in the wake of it, something is condemned too. So worship is not religious.

The god of the worshipper is not the true god, because to exist it needs a devil. Without a devil the god will not be possible. The more you praise the god, the more you have to condemn the devil. Then the world is tom apart into two enemy forces, and when you divide the world, you are also divided in it, you become split and schizophrenic. A part of you becomes evil and a part of you becomes holy, and then there is constant conflict, repression, and all joy is lost. A worshipper is basically ill-at-ease; he is dis-eased.

Celebration is a totally different dimension. When you celebrate, you celebrate all, you don't divide. For a celebrator, prayer is as beautiful as drinking tea. The tea is not profane and prayer is not separate; all is one. The church, the temple, the mosque and the pub are all one. Making love to a woman or a man or praying to a god is the same.

Celebration does not divide. It unites, it brings things together; it creates a togetherness in the world. The duality disappears and there is unity, and with unity there is joy because there cannot be any conflict. There is no struggle, nothing has to be overcome. All is overcome in the celebration itself. The worshipper has a goal; he has to attain it. The celebrator has no goal; he has attained it already. Worship is always future-oriented; celebration is present-oriented. You celebrate this moment, you worship some other moment.

You worship Christ; now two thousand years have passed. You worship the past -- Krishna, Mohammed, Rama -- or you worship the future -- heaven, god -- which is going to happen. But the celebrator worships this moment, he lives this moment. That is his worship; he lives it totally.

It happened once: a Christian theologian went to see a Zen master who was a painter too. Celebrators are always creators; worshippers are non-creative. The master was painting. He was just going to do something, he was in that moment of waiting when something descends, when something takes possession. The Christian said, 'I would be very happy if you can paint Jesus Christ for me. ' The master said, 'Okay, I will paint Jesus Christ.' And he painted a bamboo!

When the bamboo started coming up, the Christian was a little puzzled; had he forgotten what he had said When the painting was completed it was one of the most alive bamboos ever done. The Christian asked, 'I am sorry; the painting is beautiful, but you had promised to paint christ.'

But the master said, 'This is Christ! Can't you see Christ in it? The fragileness of it is exactly the fragileness of Christ. The wind is moving it; can't you see it? It goes with the wind: thy will be done. It is exactly Christ. And it is so alive and so beautiful; it belongs to god! What more can you expect? This is Christ...this moment this is Christ; Christ has taken the shape of a bamboo. And Christ was a bamboo, a hollow bamboo. He was not there, that is his beauty. He allowed god to exist in him, he allowed god to come through him, he allowed god to have a contact with the world; he became the connection.' But the Christian could not understand. He can only understand a jesus on the cross; how can he understand a bamboo as christ?
Christians have been very much puzzled by the Zen attitude towards life, because it has no worship in it; it has celebration.

A Zen master was asked, 'What is the essential secret of Buddhism? And the master said, 'The cypress tree in the courtyard,' because in that moment that was the only reality for the master.

I have heard another story. A man came, a monk, not belonging to the Zen people. He wanted to be initiated by the master, a Zen master. He was asked, 'From where are you coming?' He said, 'I come from a monastery which is called "the monastery of spiritual light".' The master said, 'Spiritual light? Never heard about anything like that. Strange! I am ninety and I have never heard anything about spiritual light; what do you mean? In the day there is sunlight, in the night there is the lamplight. From where comes this spiritual light, what is this spiritual light?'

The man was at a loss, he couldn't answer. Then the master answered for him. He said, 'Don't be worried. In the day, sunlight; in the night, lamplight. This is what spiritual light is; there is no other spiritual light.'

This is a different vision of life -- as it is, in its suchness, and enjoying each and every moment of it. So don't just remain contented with the name celebration; become celebration!

That's what sannyas is all about: it is a celebration of god, not a worship. And celebrate in your own way, because celebration cannot have any form. Worship becomes petrified into forms; celebration remains alive. And all is divine; there is nothing profane.

Source: from Osho Book "The Sun Behind the Sun Behind the Sun"

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