Osho - Why is Gorakh Nath against Pundits?

Osho on Gorakh Nath and Pundits

Question - Why is Gorakh Nath against Pundits?

Osho - What else can he do? A pundit means a parrot who reads and writes, a parrot who repeats the name of Rama. But Rama never enters his heart. The Geeta can also be repeated, the gayathri mantra can be recited, the verses of the Koran can be memorized, but his life will not become juicy. He sits like a stone in the river but he doesn't get wet. If a parrot repeats Rama-Rama do you think Rama has entered his heart?

This is exactly the state of the pundit. The pundit is deceiving himself, the pundit is deceiving others. No experience has happened. No taste has descended in his being, no drop of honey has fallen, no flower has blossomed. But borrowed words have been memorized, he goes on repeating them. And going on and on repeating he stands proud.

Not only Gorakh has opposed them, all enlightened ones have opposed them, because scholarship is the enemy of knowing. Scholarship is pretension of knowing, it is counterfeit, a mockery. No one becomes enlightened through scholarship, ignorance merely gets covered up. Ignorance is not destroyed. Just as darkness is not destroyed by talking about lamps, likewise the inner lamp is not awakened by talking about Brahma. Nor is hunger destroyed by talking about food. It is destroyed by food. And a pundit is immersed only in talking. He has forgotten that food needs to be cooked.

A pundit goes on carrying cookbooks. Even if you keep a thousand cookbooks they are not more valuable than a single piece of dry bread. They are less valuable. Dry bread will fill the stomach, will make flesh and bones. Even if the songs of the mystics are not very embellished... no, Gorakh's songs are not very embellished. They are plain, direct and decisive words, clear and simple, not loaded with metaphors. Perhaps the scholar's language is more refined, more cultured. The very word Sanskrit means refined.

You will be surprised to know that Buddha spoke in the local dialect, Mahavira spoke in the local dialect, Gorakh spoke in the local dialect, Kabir, Nanak, Dadu spoke in the local dialect. No one used Sanskrit. Why? The reason is clear. Sanskrit had become a language only of the pundits. It no longer had any connection with people's lives. Pundits were already using Sanskrit out of cunning. What cunning? Using a language that people cannot understand. When you use a language that people don't understand, then people will never know whether you know or not. You blabber ridiculously, you go on talking meaningless nonsense, and people will listen with great faith. They don't understand. And when people don't understand they think, "Surely he is saying some profound and serious thing, that's why we don't understand."

Truth is simple and direct. Direct, extremely direct, it is immediately understood. To understand truth intricate strategies don't need to be used. Untruth is very subtle. You have seen how when a doctor writes down a prescription he doesn't write it in Hindi or Marathi or English. He writes the name of the medicine in Latin or Greek. There is a reason it is written in Latin or Greek, so you won't understand. And have you seen the handwriting of a doctor? His writing is so bad that if he has to read it again, he himself will get stuck.

Mulla Nasruddin is the only literate man in his village. One villager came to him to have a letter written. Mulla said I can't write it. Today I can't write it. For at least eight days I won't be able to write it. There is so much pain in my knuckles, pain in the knuckles of my toes."

The man said, "Mulla, talk sense. What need do you have of your toe knuckles? The letter is to be written by hand."
Mulla said, "If you don't understand then don't speak. I will write it, but who will read it? Only I can read my writing and sometimes I too get stuck. Once it even happened that a man came to have a letter written..."
Now this is a very strange business, first write the letter then you have to go to the next village to read it, because no one else can read it. One man was having a letter written. After having the whole letter written -- a letter to his beloved -- after having the long letter written down he said, "Nasruddin, now read it out once so my heart can be satisfied that I have said what I want to write."

Nasruddin said, "This is a difficult matter."
He said, "Why? What's the harm in reading it?"
Nasruddin said, "The first thing is that it is not addressed to me so how can I read it?"

The villager said, "It is a legal question. It looks correct. Yes you are right, if it is not addressed to you, so how can you read it?"
Mulla said, "Do you understand? First the letter is not addressed to me. And then why should I bother, it is the worry of the one it is addressed to, let him figure it out. If he can read it then read, if he can't read it then don't read."
Doctors write in Latin and Greek and that too written so it can't be read.

I have heard, a doctor sent an invitation to a patient of his, that my daughter is getting married, and your are invited for dinner tomorrow evening. The patient saw the letter and thought the doctor had sent a prescription. He went to the chemist shop and the chemist quickly prepared a mixture and gave it to him. He drank the mixture for two days. Then the doctor phoned to say, "Friend, you didn't come. My daughter got married. I sent a letter to you too."

Then the whole mystery was revealed. Whether the chemist could read it or not, he quickly prepares a mixture. This is the reason it is written in Latin and Greek. Otherwise you would not pay fifteen rupees at the chemists. For instance if you wrote AJWAN seed extract, then you cannot pay fifteen rupees. Common ajwan extract -- you will say, "You are asking fifteen rupees for a quarter rupee purchase!" But if a long unknown Latin name is written, if it is asked you will have to pay not just fifteen but fifty rupees. You will not know that it is ajwan extract.

Sanskrit is used by pundits, so that people can be fooled. It is not that it only happens in this country -- Popes and priests go on using Latin and Greek. Using ancient languages, that are long dead, that no longer have any life, that people don't know. Mystics speak simply and directly, they speak in the people's dialect. They speak the language you understand. To share one's experience with people one needs to speak the dialect people understand. But those that have no experience, that have nothing to share, it is more appropriate that they speak a language that no one understands. If they are understood they will be caught.

A pundit is phoney, second hand. He has not seen god for himself. Yes, he has read scriptures which discuss about god. He has debated, has thought, considered. He is not meditative. He has not experienced. This is why the opposition. There is no enmity towards scholars in this opposition, but compassion for scholars. They too have to be alerted, they too have to be awakened.

Source - Osho Book "Death is Divine"

Related Osho Links on Gorakh:

Osho on : Chaitanya Mahaprabhu, Dadu, Diogenes, Gorakh, Guru Nanak Dev, Hakim Sanai, Meera, Sarmad
Osho Stories on: Baal Shem, Diogenes, Naropa, Rabia, Ramanuja, Shirdi Sai Baba

^Top Back to Life of Masters