.... He does not shun love; being a man he does not run away from women. As one who has known and experienced God, he alone does not turn his face from war. He is full of love and compassion, and yet he has the courage to accept and fight a war. His heart is utterly non violent, yet he plunges into the fire and fury of violence when it becomes unavoidable. He accepts the nectar, and yet he is not afraid...

... of poison. In fact, one who knows the deathless should be free of the fear of death. And of what worth is that nectar which is afraid of death? One who knows the secret of non-violence should cease to fear violence. What kind of non-violence is it that is scared of violence? And how can the spirit, the soul, fear the body and run away from it? And what is the meaning of God if he cannot take the...

.... So for their adoration of Krishna, different people have chosen different facets of his life. Those who love the Geeta will simply ignore the BHAGWAD, because the Krishna of the GEETA is so different from the Krishna of the BHAGWAD Similarly, those who love the BHAGWAD will avoid getting involved with the GEETA. While the Krishna of the GEETA stands on a battlefield surrounded by violence and war...

..., the Krishna of the BHAGWAD is dancing, singing and celebrating. There is seemingly no meeting-point whatsoever between the two. There is perhaps no one like Krishna, no one who can accept and absorb in himself all the contradictions of life, all the seemingly great contradictions of life. Day and night, summer and winter, peace and war, love and violence, life and death - all walk hand in hand with...

... him. That is why everyone who loves him has chosen a particular aspect of Krishna's life that appealed to him and quietly dropped the rest. Gandhi calls the GEETA his mother, and yet he cannot absorb it, because his creed of non-violence conflicts with the grim inevitability of war as seen in the GEETA. So Gandhi finds ways to rationalize the violence of the GEETA: he says the war of Mahabharat is...

... symbolizes the inner conflict and war of man, and so it is just a parable. Gandhi has his own difficulty. The way Gandhi's mind is, Arjuna will be much more in accord with him than Krishna. A great upsurge of non-violence has arisen in the mind of Arjuna, and he seems to be strongly protesting against war. He is prepared to run away from the battlefield and his arguments seem to be compelling and logical...

.... He says it is no use fighting and killing one's own family and relatives. For him, wealth, power and fame, won through so much violence and bloodshed, have no value what soever. He would rather be a beggar than a king, if kingship costs so much blood and tears. He calls war an evil and violence a sin and wants to shun it at all costs. Naturally Arjuna has a great appeal for Gandhi. How can he then...

... understand Krishna? Krishna very strongly urges Arjuna to drop his cowardice and fight like a true warrior. And his arguments in support of war are beautiful, rare and unique. Never before in history have such unique and superb arguments been advanced in favor of fighting, in support of war. Only a man of supreme non-violence could give such support to war. Krishna tells Arjuna, "So long as you...

... violence has become meaningless in Krishna's life. Now, violence is just not possible. And where violence is meaning less, non-violence loses its relevance too. Non- violence has meaning only in relation to violence. The moment you accept that violence is possible, non-violence becomes relevant at once. In fact, both violence and non-violence are two sides of the same coin. And it is a materialistic coin...

.... It is materialistic to think that one is violent or non-violent. He is a materialist who believes he can kill someone, and he too is a materialist who thinks he is not going to kill anyone. One thing is common to them: they believe someone can be really killed. Spirituality rejects both violence and non-violence. it accepts the immortality of the soul. And such spirituality turns even war into play...

... whenever a laughing, singing and dancing religion comes into being it will certainly have Krishna's stone in its foundation. Question 2: QUESTIONER: KRISHNA PLAYED A GREAT ROLE IN THE WAR OF THE MAHABHARAT. IT MEANS HE COULD HAVE PREVENTED IT IF HE HAD WANTED. BUT THE WAR TOOK PLACE, BRINGING HORRENDOUS DEATH AND DESTRUCTION IN ITS WAKE. NATURALLY THE RESPONSIBILITY SHOULD BE WITH HIM. DO YOU JUSTIFY HIM...

... than the last. And the two countries - Germany and Japan - that suffered the worst destruction and defeat in the last war have emerged, amazingly, as two of the most affluent countries in the world. Who can say, after visiting today's Japan, that only twenty years ago atom bombs fell on this country? Of course, after visiting present-day India, one could say that this country has been subjected to...

... recurring atomic bombardments. One look at our wretched state can make one think that, down the ages, we have been through unending destruction brought about by war after war. The Mahabharat is not responsible for India's degradation and misery. The long line of teachers that came in the shadow of that war were all against war, and they used the Mahabharat to further their anti-war stance. Pointing to...

... that great war they said, "What a terrible war! What appalling violence! No, no more of such wars! No more of such bloodshed!" It was unfortunate we failed to produce a line of people of the caliber of Krishna and also failed to fight more Mahabharats. Had it been so, we would have reached, in every succeeding war, a peak of consciousness much higher than the one reached during the...

... Krishna rightly. But we have covered all our ugliness with beautiful words. Our cowardice is hiding behind our talk of non violence; our fear of death is disguised by our opposition to war. But war is not going to end because we refuse to go to war. Our refusal will simply become an invitation to others to wage war on us. War will not disappear just because we refuse to fight: our refusal will only...

... our bondage, to continue to live in servitude. This has been the painful consequence of all our opposition to violence and war. But the Mahabharat is not responsible for it, nor is Krishna responsible. Our lack of courage to fight another Mahabharat is at the root of all our misfortunes. Therefore I say it is really difficult to understand Krishna. It is very easy to understand a pacifist, because...

... and non-violence. The pacifists dominate the scene for ten to fifteen years - enough time to tire their single leg, and necessitate the use of another. Then again a hawk like Mao comes with a sten gun in his hands. And thus the drama is kept on going. Krishna has his two legs intact; he is not lame. And I maintain that everyone should have both legs intact - one for peace and another for war. A...

... a war on the earth. If it takes place here it will result in the total destruction of both the aggressor and the aggressed. So a great war in the future will be fought and decided somewhere far away from here. And what would be the result? In a way, the world is facing nearly the same situation India faced during the Mahabharat war. There were two camps, or two classes, at the time of the...

... shaky dance of annihilation On the worship tray the lamp goes on flickering; Beautiful nectar has rained down, O where could you be? The moon has come home; O where could you be? The search for god arises when in the heart it is like a beloved calling for her lover that the monsoon rains of Saavan have come, that clouds have gathered all around, that the cuckoos have started calling, that the peacocks...

... be made into stepping stones, only then can you reach to the pinnacles of ambition. Make the heart hard and you will move ahead. And if you have to destroy others then destroy them. If you have to scatter corpses of others then scatter them. This whole society has been living through violence for centuries. All talk of non-violence is just nonsense, mere talk. Here not even the non-violent are non...

...-violent. Here the non-violent are hidden murderers. Here behind non-violence is planning for all kinds of violence. Here non-violence is also a means of fighting. Look at the ridiculousness of it - non-violence another means of fighting! Mahatma Gandhi has been praised because he made non-violence into a weapon, made it into a means of fighting. This should not be praised, he should be condemned for it...

.... He made even non-violence into a weapon! Please leave something that is not a weapon! You have cast even love as a sword. You have made of peace a dagger. The weapon of non- violence! Non-violence has been made into a way of fighting. But the fight continues. There is violence in fighting, so how can non-violence be made a means of fighting? It is non-violence only in name. Within it is violence...

... and only violence. This is not AHIMSA, not non-violence. People think that Mahatma Gandhi has gone beyond Buddha and Mahavira. It is untrue. The great revolution of Buddha and Mahavira has had water thrown on it. Non-violence has also become a means of fighting. As if only means of fighting have any value in this world. Everything is a means of fighting - love too is a way of fighting. Love so that...

... you can be victorious. Be non-violent so that you can push others down. If a man sits down in front of your house and goes on a fast, saying he will die if you do not do as he says, do you think it is non-violence? If you don't listen to me I will kill myself. This is violence, it is a direct threat. It is blackmail. This man is giving a clear threat that he will kill himself. He is trying to put...

... was failing, finally Ambedkar had to yield. Ambedkar agreed, don't give a separate vote. And the Gandhian historians write: a victory for non-violence! This is very strange: who is the non-violent one in this? Ambedkar is non-violent. Seeing that Gandhi would die, he dropped his insistence. Gandhi is the violent one in this. He forced Ambedkar with this threat of killing himself. Understand it. If...

... you threaten to kill someone else it is violence and if you threaten to kill yourself it is non-violence: but what is the difference? One man holds a dagger to your chest and says take out whatever is in your wallet - this is violence. And another man holds a dagger to his own chest and says take out whatever is in your wallet or else I will stab myself. You start to think this man dying because of...

... the two rupees in your wallet? He is a healthy looking fellow, a life lost... you take out the two rupees, give it to him saying, "Just take it brother, and go. Don't give up your life for two rupees." Who is violent in this? I tell you Dr. Ambedkar is non-violent, not Gandhi. But who has seen this, how can it be explained?? It seems as if it was a victory for violence. Non-violence has...

... been defeated and violence has been victorious. Gandhi is behaving violently. One who cannot give any argument indulges in this kind of behavior. Women have always been doing this in the house, have you noticed? A woman does not beat the husband, she beats herself. But is this non-violence? She cannot beat the husband because the husband is god. The husbands themselves have made it up that they are...

...: one a feminine violence, the other masculine. There is no reason to call Gandhi's feminine violence non-violence. It is only feminine violence. It is only the violence of the weak. There is a violence of the strong, there is a violence of the weak. But there is no non-violence in this. The secret of Buddha and Mahavira's non-violence is something different. But we have made even non-violence into a...

... weapon. This society is full of violence. It teaches everyone to be hard - to be like stone. Let the heart dry up. If the heart remains wet, remains soft then you will not be able to conquer the world. Dry up your tears because tears are not manly. Does a man cry? - don't be womanly. Your tears have dried up, your love has dried up. Now you are living only in the head, your heart is no longer beating...

.... This is why you have no experience of virah. For virah you must first experience love. For longing descend into your heart a little. Let your heart vibrate again. Look again at the flowers, at the leaves, at the moon and stars, at people. Let your feelings flow again like a small child's, let them move. Throw away the stones of hardness, of ambition, of violence and let the eyes again become wet...

... upon himself. He is one person without, but quite a different person within. The majority of people who bring moderation upon themselves are like this. Outwardly, this man practises non-violence: he strains the water he drinks; he forgoes food at night; he takes all kinds of precautions not to commit violence and feels proud of his self-restraint; but all the while violence smoulders within. Sex...

... with a vengeance! Wrath revels in castigation. Ninety-eight per cent of those who practise penance are people of violent temperament. They merely revert their anger from others to themselves and begin tormenting themselves with as much relish. There are two types of violence in this world. One is directed towards others: this is sadism. And there is another type of violence that is directed towards...

... over the nature of the person. Both these methods follow different routes. The restraint implanted from without is the outcome of repression: according to this, if there is anger within suppress it; if there is violence within; subdue it and bring forth from outside the opposites of these. The right self restraint does not come this way. By suppressing violence, non-violence is not attained. On the...

... contrary, by understanding and recognizing violence and by seeking the source of violence within, one awakens gradually towards violence, which then subsides on its own. When violence fades, what remains is non-violence. So there are two types of non-violence: (i) what is cultivated by suppressing non-violence; and (ii) non-violence that is born when violence fades from within. But man has been taught to...

... destroyed. Then a moment will come when it will drop off from you, like a dry leaf! Then what remains within is peace, tranquillity. Serenity is never obtained by subduing anger. When anger takes leave of you, serenity results. Remember: violence is not the opposite of non-violence. Non-violence is the absence of violence. In the same way, love is not the opposite of hate so that you could arrest hate and...

... bring about love. Love results in the absence of hate. It is just as we burn a lamp in a dark night. As soon as the lamp is lighted, darkness vanishes. All other means of removing darkness are bound to fail. Darkness can only be removed by light. Violence can also not be removed by fighting with it, nor can anger and hatred be removed this way. But lamps can be lighted - lamps of knowledge. When lamps...

... neither the opposite nor the inverse of its presence. Its absence is its pure non-presence alone. Therefore a man of violence can cultivate non-violence but the violence remains within. A man may cultivate celibacy but sex will rage just as much within. Such self-control is deception and I am against it. I am in favour of that self-control, in which we do not subdue the evil, but awaken the good within...

... the whole development of man. That is why bondage or slavery is the worst state of human existence and freedom its best and most beautiful. And socialism cannot be established without fighting and finishing freedom. It is, of course, possible that the majority may consent to destroy the freedom of the minority. But still it is unfair and unjust. Destruction of freedom can never be democratic...

... glory and grandeur that comes with it. And it came with all the ugly consequences that independence coming as a gift brings with it. Gandhi never tired of preaching non-violence, because a businessman cannot afford violence. Have you cared to note that the Jain teerthankara Mahavira is a kshatriya, a warrior, but the community that gathered around him is entirely a trading community. Mahavira is a...

... warrior, and the twenty-four teerthankaras of the Jains are warriors, but not one Jain is a warrior -- all the Jains are businessmen. What is the matter? There is no other reason than the fact that non-violence made a deep appeal to the merchant community. Mahavira's non-violence made a great impact on the minds of the shopkeepers. Similarly, the businessman's mind in India found itself in accord with...

... Gandhi's non-violence. It said that Gandhi was right: if we are not going to be violent with others, others will not be violent with us. It was because of Gandhi's leadership that non-violence became the basis of a movement for independence. India had to go through tremendous misfortunes because of the non-violent character of its movement for independence. It was a great misfortune that Gandhi did not...

... allow the hatred and violence that naturally surged in India's mind against the British to express itself. He suppressed it. Whenever a little violence showed itself, the businessman in Gandhi panicked and retreated, as if he thought aloud that shopkeepers could not afford violence, they were all for compromise. He always retraced his steps. I remember a story; it is perhaps one of the folk tales of...

... once beat a retreat. He thought it was better that he shaved his mustache. Why fight? The result was that the hatred and violence of the Indian people against the British, which was simply natural, was repressed. And because of this repression, the two major communities of India -- the Hindus and the Mohammedans -- fought with each other, and bloody riots took place throughout the country. If India...

... had fought the British openly -- with swords -- the Hindus and Mohammedans would not have fought among themselves. As we could not fight the British, the repressed hatred, the unspent violence, had to find an outlet somewhere. Where could it go? And it found an outlet in the Hindu-Mohammedan riots, in violent infighting. It is generally believed that Gandhi tried his best to prevent the infighting...

... between Hindus and Mohammedans. But I say that he was responsible for the whole tragedy. You can understand this easily if you are familiar with the findings of modern psychology. The feeling of hatred and violence against the alien rulers was so powerful -- and very natural at that -- that it could have set fire to the British regime and thrown it out of India. Such a tremendous energy was suppressed...

... task, he thrashes her. In reality he had to thrash the boss, but he dared not. So the anger deviates and makes the wife its target. Hatred is stored in his mind; it is bursting. If you close the drainage of your house, then filth will be all over the place. As a house needs a drainage, so also our violence needs a let-go. And if it is not allowed a right outlet, it will find a wrong one. And the...

... violence expressed the wrong way will do you more harm than one expressed the right way. It proved to be so. But the wife is also helpless; she cannot beat the husband in retaliation. Up to now the wife has not gathered that much courage... but she should. Husbands themselves have taught the wives that husbands are their gods. Now it is dangerous to beat a god, although the wife has her doubts too. What...

... son do? Should he hit his mother back? But the world has not become that civilized yet. So he goes inside his room, picks up his doll and tears it to pieces. The mind has its own energy. Gandhi caused deviations in the way of India's natural energy by thwarting it, suppressing it. If India's violence had been directed against the British -- which was its natural course -- a splendored country could...

...; it would have made our life lively, juicy and beautiful. But that could not happen. But we had to use the sword nonetheless, and we used it against our own people. This is how the Hindus and Mohammedans clashed, and clashed like savages. And who is responsible for the massive violence that blasted this country after it became independent on August 15, 1947? People are dishonest who say that the...

... British government engineered the communal riots and infighting. Some people say that Mr. Jinnah was responsible for it. Others say other things. No, this is wrong. None of them, neither Jinnah nor the British were behind the holocaust. The real reason was that a volcano of hate and violence was smoldering in India's mind, but it had no outlet. So when India was partitioned, the suppressed volcano found...

... that there was contradiction in Gandhi's professions and his practice. I would like to give a few examples. Gandhi preached non-violence throughout his life, but his own personality was violent, utterly violent. He never tired of talking of non-violence. You may ask how I say it. We need to understand this thing carefully. If I point a knife at your chest and say that I w ill kill you if you don't...

... that he would kill himself if his point of view was not accepted. This is coercion, this is violence. Gandhi coerced Dr. Ambedkar through fasting. He could not bring about one change of heart, though he resorted to any number of fasts and fasts-unto-death. Not one heart was changed, although he always talked of"change of heart" as the object of his fasts. Ambedkar just gave in under duress...

... along. Whether you threaten to kill yourself or kill others, it is all the same and it is violence. Both kinds of threats are violent. But we fail to observe it, and we think that the threat to kill oneself is non-violent. Truth is otherwise; it is subtle violence. It is not non-violence. Non-violence is very different. Non-violence means that there should be no threat, no coercion whatsoever, to kill...

... oneself or others. Ask the people who were associated with Gandhi. Ask his own sons. Ask Haridas Gandhi if his father was non-violent. If so, then why did he become a Mohammedan? If Gandhi was non-violent, why did his son take to drinking and meat-eating? If Gandhi was non-violent, why did he have to fight his father all his life? It was because Gandhi's non-violence was so sadistic, so torturous that...

... Kasturba by her wrist and threw her out of the house at midnight, on the grounds that she did not follow his principles. This man is not non-violent; he is utterly violent. But he swears by non-violence; it is his ideal. And it is on account of his ideal of non-violence that it becomes so difficult to understand his personality. Life is a very complex affair; it is not that simple. So when I say...

... been much violence directed at persons, instead of on a pillow. He himself had much violence and had hurt someone. He was very shocked and had decided to leave. He felt this structure could lead to someone getting killed. He had decided to leave the ashram.] No, it has never happened, and it is a very rare possibility. There are a few things to be understood. The society has conditioned you to...

... repress violence not against pillows, not against the wall - society has repressed your violence against persons, so pillows are a very poor substitute. The whole mechanism of the Encounter group is to relieve you of all the repressions that society has given to you. I understand your problem because there can be so much violence repressed that it can become almost murderous. But there is another in...

...-built mechanism in the human mind. If you go on repressing your violence, one day it can explode and can be murderous, but that will be unconscious. If you allow this explosion consciously - and that is what an Encounter group is supposed to be for: to consciously allow it - you will go to a certain extent and suddenly compassion will arise. That is an in-built mechanism in all animals and in man also...

... a certain moment the whole energy turns back; something stops the dog from within. The same happens in human beings if repressions are allowed. And that's the whole theory behind Encounter groups. If you are allowed your violence, you may feel that it is going to be too much, that you can murder. But you cannot murder because you are a human being and you also carry, howsoever repressed, an inner...

... mechanism that will not allow you. You will go to a certain extent, almost to the brink, and suddenly a compassion will arise in you and you will see the whole absurdity of it. This person is completely innocent. You may be carrying violence against other persons - maybe against your father, your mother, brother, enemies, friends, society - but not against this person who has accidentally met you in an...

... group is trying to undo. It is risky certainly, but the risk is because of society and its repressions, not because of the group. If the whole world functions on the philosophy of Encounter, there will be no murder, no violence, no war. But it is not, so there is murder, war, and every violence going on, and we are prepared for that violence. Moving in an Encounter group, violence sometimes arises...

... the West, efficiency is thought to be a great value. TM can give you an efficiency, and of course a certain illusion of improvement because it is very ego-enhancing. You feel more controlled. Now I understand what the problem was in the group and how you could not manage to be in it or benefited by it. [The visitor then said he has long training in Aikido, and that to express violence is against...

..., but don't overdo that! [A assistant said he had given massage, and disappeared into it. However, afterwards much aggression came up. Osho suggested that after he had completed his massage, He should immediately take a shower and while doing so, imagine that all anger and violence was being washed away. He should recommend that the people he works on do the same too, immediately the massage is over...

... conscious. For example, millions of people watch boxing or football matches and really get excited; and they never think about what they are watching. In boxing they are watching sheer violence. But there is enjoyment; this is the expression of hidden violence in you. Society has managed man with an absolutely wrong strategy. The idea of the society has been, that if something is thrown into the basement...

.... Suppression has been the way, for the whole history, to keep man civilized - but in fact, it has been the cause of keeping man only superficially civilized, skin-deep civilized. Just scratch anybody a little and you will find the barbarous, the primitive, the animal, all hidden behind him. All your games are, in a subtle way, a satisfaction of your desire to be victorious. In the movies you see violence...

... release happens. That is your joy in seeing a movie, reading a novel. In California, at the University of California they have discovered that for one year continuously, whenever there was a boxing match, crime increased by fourteen percent over the normal rate during that week. What happens? Things which were hidden... seeing violence in boxing, your own violence starts coming up - and that violence...

... has to come to the conscious mind. The conscious mind is your ground floor; only from there can anything go out. So the first thing is: the unconscious should be emptied. But one becomes afraid in emptying it, because it is carrying all kinds of ugly features. How to empty the violence that is there, the anger, the sadness... all kinds of worries that you have dumped there because you could not...

... manage to sort them out? How are you going to bring them to the conscious? And if they come, then what are you going to do with them? The unconscious is not interested in the object of the violence, it is interested only in getting rid of the violence. You can just beat your pillow, and you will feel immense relief. It will look a little awkward to you, that you are beating your pillow and the pillow...

... has done no wrong to you. You think yourself very cultured, sophisticated, intelligent - and what are you doing beating the poor pillow who has not done anything? It is not a question of whether the pillow has done anything or not, but beating it will release the violence in you, because violence has nothing to do with the object. Whether you beat somebody or you beat the pillow, it makes no...

... difference to it. Whether you kill somebody or you just kill a teddy bear, it doesn't matter. But killing has to be done. In many primitive societies even today they sacrifice to their gods cows made of mud - and with great celebration. And they sacrifice other animals - even men - but they are all made of mud. And the strangest thing about these primitive societies is: there is no violence, people don't...

... intelligent, far more innocent. This society - where dreams are taken as if they are real, where something has to be done consciously so that an ugly dream does not come to you and destroy your dignity - has never had any war in its whole history. Its small tribes have never fought with each other - there is no violence in that sense. Nobody fights with anyone. If, even in a dream, somebody insults you or...

... you insult somebody and it has to be settled consciously, it is impossible to have any violence. People are utterly simple. The unconscious simply needs fake objects to get rid of its garbage. There is no need to kill anybody; you can kill a statue, you can kill a photograph, you can burn a photograph - and feel at ease. And slowly, slowly, whatever comes in your dreams or in your waking hours from...

..., "Publicly." That's how things become distorted. Now if you are feeling angry with someone and you start expressing your anger, the other person is not going to be a Gautam Buddha and sit silently. He is not a marble statue; he will also do something. You will express anger, he will express anger. It will create more anger in you - and anger or violence create, from the other side, the same...

... of life or total destruction of all life from the planet. That's why I emphasize that they will have to listen. They will try not to listen, but the situation is such that ultimately they have to listen to me, and they have to understand it also. In fact they will listen only when they are ready to understand. And when they are ready to understand they know perfectly well that it is not a question...

... listen to me or to understand or to transform. But the alternative is such that there is no way out. I am the only way out of this mess that their religions and their political philosophies have created in the world. Q: BHAGWAN, A JOURNALIST ASKED YOU RECENTLY ABOUT YOUR WARNING THAT ONCE A RELIGION BECOMES ORGANIZED, VIOLENCE ENTERS INTO IT. YOU SAID THAT THAT WAS ABSOLUTELY TRUE AND THAT THE EVIDENCE...

... universal law. So you can see here that it is still an organization. An organization will need violence or will be afraid of violence from outside. But I am still here and I would like the organization to completely disappear, not only from this place, but from everywhere in the world. Organization is not needed, just small communes which can function as an organic whole. And if people are joyous, if they...

... feel life as a blessing, they will not commit violence because that is simply a disturbance of their own joy and of the joy of the other person. But if only your commune becomes an organism and you are surrounded by organizations around you, then certainly you will need weapons, not for violence, but simply for self-defense. Organizations are always trying to invade, trying to conquer -- conquer each...

... its secrets to you, and on the other hand you are declaring that you have conquered nature. But that is the language of the organizational man: violence, conquest, victory. But if a commune is there, an organism surrounded by organizations, there is every possibility those organizations will try to invade you, conquer you, destroy you, be violent with you. To me, to do violence is something ugly...

...; but to allow violence to be done to you is also ugly. In both cases you are partners. Violence can be done only with two partners. Either you can be the doer or you can be the receiver. I do not teach any kind of non-violence, like Mahatma Gandhi, which failed tremendously. And it is such a strange world that nobody looks at Mahatma Gandhi and the failure of his non-violence, utter failure. His...

... Pakistan were made free and the people had not been transferred, then there was going to be immense violence. And that violence happened. More than one million people died as independence was declared, because to transfer millions of people from India to Pakistan and from Pakistan to India was not an easy job. Who was going to do it? And when people have no time, and when they are leaving their country...

... government had not even figured out whose department belonged to whom, they had not been yet able to divide the cabinets, the ministers, who was the chief of the army and who was the person responsible for orders. Immediately they had to face such great violence. And after that they have been continuously going down and down. I am not in favor of the philosophy of Gandhian non-violence. I love non...

...- violence, but that does not mean that I will allow my people to be killed. At least they should die with dignity; they should not be just killed like dumb animals. So while the whole world remains organizational, the commune will be an organism inside, but for the outside world it will certainly maintain a tough face. We are not going to harm anybody on our own, but we are not going to allow anybody to...

... body. But every organism naturally, instinctively faces any danger. Our communes will face any danger; we will find ways and means to face it. But we cannot allow anybody to do harm without any response to it, because that means you are helping the invader, you are helping the violent man, you are helping violence. You have become part of the violence and its games. We are not going to become part of...

... violence and its games. If we can prevent through weapons, we will prevent through weapons. If we see that we are a small commune and weapons cannot prevent it, then we will prevent with our open chests, singing and dancing. We will leave those people guilty for their whole lives that they killed innocent, dancing people who were not doing any harm to anybody. If we can protect life, we will protect it...

... the greatest violence in the world up to now. He killed one million Jews in gas chambers, in concentration camps, and for five years continuously invaded countries, butchered people - children, old men, women, who had nothing to do with the military. They were simple citizens. To compare Adolf Hitler with Mahatma Gandhi seems to be absurd, but it is not. Mahatma Gandhi preached nonviolence, but...

... night, a pregnant woman in a country where she does not know any language to communicate with people - do you think of this act as nonviolence? I cannot see it as nonviolent. It is pure violence. In the first place, if Gandhi feels it right to clean toilets, he can do it. But to force it on the wife is trespassing on the freedom of the individual - which also is violence. Gandhi had five sons. The...

...." Haridas must have been a courageous child: he left home. Do you think of this as nonviolence? Violence is not only killing people. Violence is an attitude, an approach. Gandhi was trying to impose his ideology on his son. This is not nonviolence at all. And to tell the small child either to accept his ideology or leave the house and never come back again - this seems to be hard, harsh, ugly...

..., then go with him. Just as I have abandoned him, you are also abandoned." Haridas is standing outside the compartment - windows closed, door closed - Kasturba is crying, and Gandhi will not allow her even to see her son's face. Do you think this is nonviolence, compassion, love? Gandhi had said to an American journalist, Louis Fisher... because Fisher had asked him, "You are against violence...

... any harm. Then we will not be able to gain the sympathy of the whole world." This is simple strategy, and Gandhi succeeded in his strategy; he really confused the British government. What to do with this man? He would not do any violence, nor would he allow his followers to do any violence, and if people are not doing anything, how can you start shooting them? On what grounds? Finally Britain...

... man's energy, could transform his being and make him nonviolent. He had only this ideology: don't be violent. And violence is within you. It is man's inheritance of millions of years, it needs tremendous work to change it. Gandhi had not given any idea how it had to be changed. But "Don't be violent" meant repress it, go on repressing. For forty years he managed to force Indians to repress...

... their violence. And his logic was appealing: "If you are violent, Britain is never going to leave India. If you are nonviolent, then sooner or later they will be ashamed of keeping an innocent, nonviolent country in slavery." So people remained nonviolent for forty years, and as Britain left India, a tremendous violence exploded in India. And the coincidence is, just one million people were...

... killed in that violence; riots between Hindus and Mohammedans killed one million people - exactly the same number as Adolf Hitler killed in Germany! Of course, they arrived from different directions, but both came to the same conclusion. Who is responsible for one million people killed in India after independence? Gandhi has to accept that he was responsible for forty years' repression, and when the...

... pressure was gone - Britain had moved with her armies out of the country - it erupted like a volcano. In fact, Adolf Hitler's violence with the Jews was far more peaceful, because he killed people in the most up-to-date gas chambers, where you don't take much time. Thousands of people can be put in a gas chamber, and just a switch is pressed. Within a second you will not know when you were alive and when...

... you died. Within a second, you evaporate. The chimneys of the factory start taking you, the smoke - you can call it the holy smoke - and this seems to be a direct way towards God. The smoke simply goes upwards. But the violence that happened in India was really cruel, ugly, barbarous. Children were mutilated, killed; old men were mutilated, killed. Trains were burned, buses were burned, houses were...

... far as the transformation of man is concerned. The Christian saints have been responsible for immense violence throughout two thousand years of Christian history. They have killed Jews, they have killed Mohammedans. They have burned people alive - particularly they have burned millions of women alive. And if Adolf Hitler burned one million Jews in a very scientific, peaceful way - nobody was...

... tortured - what is the difference between these people? Gandhi managed to repress violence - which was bound to explode one day, and it did explode. And in that explosion he himself was assassinated. Strange, a man who has been teaching nonviolence his whole life is assassinated. Not much difference.... Hitler committed suicide, Gandhi was assassinated, but both died in an unnatural way. In fact, before...

... last words of Gandhi when he was assassinated were, "Ah, God!" My feeling is that he felt immensely relieved. He was in a constant torture after the freedom. First the explosion of violence all over the country - one million people dead, many more crippled, blinded, their hands cut, their legs cut; many more made beggars because their houses were burned.... And this man was thinking that...

..., then I don't think there is any difference practicing violence. Adolf Hitler and Mahatma Gandhi both ended the same way. They both landed their countries in the same mess. I have said I have a certain love for Adolf Hitler, for the simple reason that at least he was straightforward; Gandhi was not. Adolf Hitler was not cunning. Whatever he wanted to do he did. He was a little crazy, but a crazy man...

... violence. The people who have come Into power through violence, as they did in Russia - once they are in power, do you think they will suddenly become nonviolent? Their whole training, their whole mind is full of violence, and that 462 violence has been their success. You cannot drop it. Dropping it will mean betraying the revolution, losing the success that was yours. Moreover, the people who have come...

... into power through violence are bound to be violent against each other, because there will be a struggle for power in the inner circle of the communist party. Whoever proves to be more violent, more cunning, more inhuman, will become the most powerful man. That's how Joseph Stallin became the greatest dictator the world has ever known. He w as a nobody in violence as far as the revolution was...

... concerned: he was not even a significant figure, not even a national leader. He belonged to a very backward part of Russia, the Caucasus. And he was not included among the ten most important people who ruled the party and the whole country; he was only the general secretary of the communist party's organization. But he had seen how violence succeeds. He had seen - before his eyes - the world's greatest...

... empire evaporating through violence. He had seen and realized that nothing works except violence, cunningness, cruelty. He learned a great lesson. And he started using the same things in the inner party circles. It is a well-known fact - although there is no way to say whether it is true or not, but every possibility is that it is true - that Lenin was poisoned by Joseph Stalin. Stalin controlled the...

... supported him, they lived - but they lived as nobodies. Joseph Stalin became sole and whole dictator of the great land, one-sixth of the whole world. But one violence leads to another violence, there is no end to it - just as one lie leads to another lie and there is no end to it. This is one of the indications of evil. One evil always leads to another evil, then another evil, and you are caught in a...

... happen.... In India I have seen the Gandhian revolution. Gandhi was aware of the fact that if the revolution became violent then its fate would be the same as that of other revolutions. Revolutionaries, once they are in power, prove to be worse rulers than anybody else. So Gandhi tried to make the revolution non-violent; but he was not aware of many other implications. It was not only the violence, it...

..., Gandhi's instructions were, "You are not to retaliate, you have just to stand here. Let them kill you, but no violence from your side should be possible" - and thousands of people behaved in that way. The British government was in great confusion - no government has ever been in such confusion. If these revolutionaries had been using violent methods, then there would have been no problem; the...

... British government could have crushed them immediately, shot them all. There would have been no problem - they were a nuisance, violent, they deserved it. But these people had not done any violence, had not been a nuisance to anybody. In fact what they were doing were strange things which no revolutionary had ever done. Standing before the governor's house they were reciting form the GITA, reading from...

... started doing the same things that the British government had been doing. Now they were shooting communists, they were shooting socialists. They forgot completely about non-violence. What to say about them; you will be surprised to know that even Mahatma Gandhi forgot all about nonviolence. He was asked by an American writer, Louis Fisher, who was writing Gandhi's biography - it is one of the most...

... beautiful biographies of Gandhi - he asked Gandhi, "You are talking about non-violence, but if the country becomes independent, are you going to have armies or not?" Gandhi said, "The answer is obvious. The moment the country is free, there will be no armies." Louis Fisher asked, "If somebody attacks the country - because you have been attacked for two thousand years.... Even with...

... his place I would simply have said that.... If that were my philosophy, non-violence - it is not my philosophy, but if it were my philosophy then I would have gone to the logical conclusion; it is simple. "You all wanted one country and those poor Pakistanis are trying to make it one again; let them do it, help them. The only difference will be, before, if it had remained one it would have been...

... they don't go to a political meeting for a few days then something troubles them; they start feeling that something is missing. Now, the socialist party, the communist party, democrats, liberals - nobody can hold a meeting. The first program of Adolf Hitler was to make it clear to the whole country that the only man who could hold a meeting without any violence to the audience was Adolf Hitler. And...

... came into their hands, it came into the hands of violent people. Naturally, they used that power for more violence. Now they had a great opportunity to destroy as many people as possible. Sometimes their destruction became nonsensical. In the Soviet Union, Stalin killed at least one million people - but these one million people were not the rich people against whom he had rebelled, against whom the...

... Available: N.A. Length: N.A. Question 1: BELOVED MASTER, YOU HAVE BEEN TALKING ON YOUR VISION OF THE REBEL LATELY, AND YET THE ATMOSPHERE I FEEL AROUND US AT THE MOMENT IS PARTICULARLY SOFT, LOVING, PLIABLE. TO ME, THIS FEELS LIKE PART OF YOUR MAGIC - THAT YOU ARE SHOWING US, EXISTENTIALLY, THAT THE REBEL WILL BE BORN NOT OUT OF THE FUMES OF VIOLENCE AND UNHAPPINESS, BUT FROM THE FRAGRANCE OF LOVE AND...

... ECSTASY. Maneesha, the rebels who are born out of violence prove, in the end, to be anti-rebellious. The moment they are in power their rebellion disappears. They become as ugly as the predecessors they have replaced, because through violence you cannot bring flowers of love. By sowing the seeds of poison you cannot hope that the flowers will be anything other than poison. In the past, the great misery...

... been doing to other human beings. Out of their anger, out of their violence, out of their rage, they rebelled. So those who were not capable of rebellion rebelled, and those who were really capable of rebellion escaped. Those people who were full of violence and rage succeeded. But while they were going through the rebellion they were becoming more and more accustomed to violence; and when the power...

... giving their hens, their small pieces of land, their small houses, their horses or their cows... because they resisted, they were simply butchered. Out of violence only more violence is born. Those one million people were the lowest of the low. The revolution killed the poor people. It was a blind revolution, and it was bound to be - because the rebels had no idea of compassion, no love for humanity...

... suffering human beings - not an anger, an envy, a jealousy against those few who have all the money, who have all the luxuries. It is a question of focus: are you fighting for the poor or are you fighting because of your jealousy that you are not one of the fifteen families? Is it your jealousy, envy, anger, violence, that is prompting you to rebel against this structure? If that is the case then, when...

... know how to drive." He said, "Maybe, but nobody told me this." I said, "You should have understood yourself. People are struggling in their own ditches - who is going to care about you?" A rebellion which is religious, which is spiritual, which is not born out of the flames of violence but which is born out of the fragrance of love and compassion, out of meditation, alertness...

..., existentially, that the rebel will be born not out of the fumes of violence and unhappiness, but from the fragrance of love and ecstasy." Exactly that is what I am living for. Exactly that is what I am preparing you for. Question 2: BELOVED MASTER, SINCE CHILDHOOD I HAD A REBEL INSIDE OF ME, BUT I FELT SO POWERLESS THAT I LIVED A LIFE OF SUBMISSION RATHER THAN REBELLIOUSNESS. NOW, LISTENING TO YOU, I SEE...

... disease goes on being transferred from one hand to another hand. With all the good intentions in the world the parents, the teachers, the leaders, the priests all go on forcing ideas of competition, comparison, ambition; preparing every child for the tough struggle that he is going to face in life - in other words, for violence, aggressiveness. They know that unless you are aggressive you will be left...

... first." But it is very rare. Parents give every incentive, "Be first and you will be rewarded." Be first - that is bringing honor to the parents, to the family. Everybody is teaching you to be ahead of others, whatever the cost. Sooner or later the children become feverish, they start running faster. Even if they have to hurt somebody to get ahead, they will do it. Violence is bound to...