THE EIGHTH SAYING

JESUS SAW CHILDREN WHO WERE BEING SUCKLED. HE SAID TO HIS DISCIPLES: THESE CHILDREN WHO ARE BEING SUCKLED ARE LIKE THOSE WHO ENTER THE KINGDOM.

THEY SAID TO HIM: SHALL WE THEN, BEING CHILDREN, ENTER THE KINGDOM?

JESUS SAID TO THEM: WHEN YOU MAKE THE TWO ONE, AND WHEN YOU MAKE THE INNER AS THE OUTER AND THE OUTER AS THE INNER, AND THE ABOVE AS THE BELOW, AND WHEN YOU MAKE THE MALE AND THE FEMALE INTO A SINGLE ONE, SO THAT THE MALE WILL NOT BE MALE AND THE FEMALE NOT BE FEMALE, THEN SHALL YOU ENTER THE KINGDOM.

This is one of the deepest sayings of Jesus, and one of the most basic to be understood by a seeker. It is also one of the most difficult to achieve, because if this is achieved nothing more is left to achieve. First try to understand a few things and then we will enter into the saying.

Man, if he lives with the mind, can never be innocent -- and only in innocence does the divine descend, or do you ascend to the divine. Innocence is the door. Mind is cunning, calculating, it is clever, and because of this cleverness you miss -- you miss the kingdom of God. You may attain to the kingdom of this world through the mind, because here cunningness is needed. You have to be cunning: the more cunning, the more successful; the more calculating, the more efficient in the ways of the world.

But the door for the kingdom of God is exactly the opposite. There, no calculation is needed, no cleverness is needed. Mind is not needed at all, because mind is just a mechanism to calculate, a mechanism to be clever. If you don't need any cleverness, any calculation, mind is useless. Then the heart becomes the source of your being, and heart is innocence.

Why do we go on being clever? Why does the mind go on thinking about how to deceive? -- because that is the only way in this world to succeed. So those who want to succeed in this world will be failures in the kingdom of God. If you are ready to accept your failure in this world, then you are ready to enter the other world. The moment one is ready to recognize that, "The success of this world is not for me, I am not for it," immediately a conversion happens, a turning. Then the consciousness doesn't move outward, it starts moving inward.

Jesus emphasizes innocence very much. Hence, he goes on talking about the beauty of children, or the innocence of the flowers, of lilies, or the innocence of the birds. But that type of innocence won't help, you have already lost that. So don't imitate him verbally, don't try to understand literally, it is just symbolic.

You cannot be a child again -- how is it possible? Once you have tasted knowledge you cannot fall back. You can transcend it but you cannot go back, there is no way to go back. You can go ahead, you can go beyond it, but you cannot go behind it now -- there is no way. You cannot be an ordinary child again. How? How can you lose that which you have known? But you can go beyond, you can transcend.

Remember this, otherwise you may start imitating a child and that imitation will be a cunningness, it will again be a calculation... because Jesus says, "Be like a child," so you start practicing how to be like a child. But a child never practices. A child is simply a child, he doesn't even know that he is a child, he is not aware of his innocence. His innocence is there, but he is not self-conscious about it. But if you practice then self-consciousness will be there. Then this childhood will be a false thing. You can act it but you cannot be a child again -- in the literal sense.

A saint, a sage, becomes like a child in a totally different sense. He has transcended, he has gone beyond mind, because he has understood the futility of it. He has understood the whole nonsense of being a successful man in this world -- he has renounced that desire to succeed, the desire to impress others; the desire to be the greatest, the most important; the desire to fulfill the ego. He has come to understand the absolute futility of it. The very understanding transcends. The very understanding -- and immediately you are transformed into a different dimension.

Then there is again a childhood; that is called the second childhood. Hindus have called that stage 'the twice-born', dwij. Again you are born, but this is a different birth, not out of a father and a mother. This is out of your own self, not out of two bodies meeting, not out of duality. It is through your self that you are born.

This is the meaning of Jesus' birth -- that he was born out of a virgin. But people take everything literally and then they miss. Out of the virgin means out of the one: there is no other, so who can corrupt it? Who can enter into it? The virginity remains absolutely pure because there is no other. When the other is there you have lost your virginity. If in the mind the other is there, you have lost innocence. So the consciousness of the other, the desire for the other, is losing virginity. This second birth can be virgin; the first birth is bound to be out of sex -- there is no other way, there cannot be.

Jesus is born out of sex like anybody else, and it is right that it should be so. Jesus is just like you in the seed, but in the flowering he is absolutely different, because a second birth has happened; a new man is born. Jesus who was born out of Mary is no longer there, he has given birth to himself. In the old Essene sect it is said that when a man is transformed he becomes his own father. This is the meaning: when we say Jesus has no father, it means Jesus has become his own father now. This looks absurd but this is how it is.

The second birth is a virgin birth -- and then you are innocent again. And this innocence is higher than a child's, because the child will have to lose his innocence. It is a gift of nature, it is not earned by the child, so it has to be taken away. When the child grows he will lose his innocence -- and he has to grow! But a sage remains innocent. Now this innocence cannot be taken away because it is the climax, the crescendo of growth; there is no further growth. If there is growth then things will change; if you have reached the goal beyond which nothing exists, only then will things not change.

A child has to grow every day: he will lose innocence, he will become experienced; he will have to attain knowledge, he will have to become clever, calculating. But if you get too obsessed with your calculating mechanism, then you remain born out of sex, out of duality. And then there is always a continuous conflict inside -- because you are two.

When you are born out of two you are going to remain two, because both are there: a man is not only man, he is woman also; a woman is not only woman, she is man also -- because both are born out of two. Your father goes on existing in you, your mother goes on existing in you, because they both participated, they both meet in your body and their streams go on flowing -- you are two. And if you are two, how can you be at ease? If you are two, there is going to be a constant conflict. If you are two opposite polarities together, a tension is always going to remain. This tension cannot be lost, yet you go on trying to find out how to be silent, how to be peaceful, how to attain bliss. It is impossible, because you are two!

To be silent, oneness is needed, so you have to be born again -- that's what Jesus said to Nicodemus. Nicodemus asked him, "What should I do?"

Jesus said, "First you have to be born again. Only then can anything happen. Right now, as you are, nothing can be done."

And the same I say to you: Right now, as you are, nothing can be done. Unless you are reborn, unless you become your own father, unless your duality disappears and you become one, nothing can be done. When the woman within you and the man within you meet, they become a circle. They are not fighting, they disappear, they negate each other, and then oneness is left. This oneness is virginity.

That is what Jesus means when he says, "Be like children." Don't take it literally. But why "like children"? -- because when a child is conceived, for the first few weeks he is neither male nor female. Ask the biologists, they will tell you that he is neither. For a few weeks the child is neither male nor female -- he is both or neither: the division is still not distinct. That's why medical science is now able to change the sex of the child. A few injections can change it, because both are there -- the male and the female. The balance will soon be lost, either the male will predominate or the female will predominate. And whichever predominates will become the sex of the child. But in the beginning there is a balance, both are there. It will depend on hormones now.

If we inject male hormones the child will be male; if we inject female hormones the child will be female. The sex can be changed because sex is an outer thing; it does not belong to the being, it belongs only to the circumference, to the body; it is a hormonal thing, physical. The being remains totally different from it. But soon the distinction arises: the child starts becoming either a male or a female.

In the beginning the unity. Then the child is born: bodily now he is either a male or a female. But deep in the consciousness the distinction has still not penetrated; in consciousness he is still neither -- the child does not know whether he is male or female. A few more months and then the distinction will enter into the mind. Then the child will have a different outlook -- immediately he will become self-conscious.

In the beginning the body was one, then the body separated. But even when the body separates the child is one. Then the child also separates: the human being disappears; you are identified with being male or female, and that continues your whole life. That means you never reach the source again, the circle remains incomplete. A sage reaches the source again, the circle becomes complete. And first the distinction disappears in the mind -- just the reverse!

In the child, first the distinction comes into the body, then into the mind. In the sage, first the distinction disappears from the consciousness, then from the body, and before he dies he is again one. This is the second childhood: again he becomes innocent -- but this innocence is very rich.

The innocence of a child is poor because there is no experience; the innocence of childhood is just like an absence of something. But the innocence of a sage is a presence of something, not an absence. He has known all the ways of the world, he has moved, he has experienced all that was to be experienced. He moved to the very opposite end: he became a sinner, he delved deep, he indulged, he experienced all that this world can give, and now he has come out of it. His innocence is very, very rich because experience is there. You cannot destroy it now, because he has known all that can be known -- how can you destroy it now? You cannot motivate him any more, all motivation has gone.

If you reach this stage -- in the beginning you were a child, in the end you can become a child -- your life has been a circle, complete; this is what perfection is. If you don't reach the source again, your life has been incomplete. Incompletion is suffering. That is what Buddha calls dukkha, misery. If you are incomplete there is misery, if you are complete you are fulfilled.

A sage dies fulfilled -- then there is no more birth, because then there is no need to come back to the world of experience. You die incomplete, and because of that incompleteness you have to be born again. Your being will persist, again and again, to be complete; and unless you are complete you will have to move again and again into birth, into death. That is what Hindus call the wheel of life and death. A sage jumps out of the wheel, because he himself has become a circle and now no wheel is needed.

But what happens to the ordinary mind? The distinction remains to the very end, sex remains to the very end. Even if the body becomes weak, the mind goes on -- and sex is the basic duality. So unless sex disappears, the oneness, the nondual, the Brahma is not going to happen. Remember, the nondual -- the adwaita, the Brahma, the one -- is not a hypothesis, it is not a theory, it is not a doctrine. It is not a philosophical thing you can argue about, it is not a belief -- it is a transcendence of sex. It is a very deep biological phenomenon, it is alchemical, because your whole body needs a transformation.

Three old men were sitting in a garden on a bench discussing their miseries -- because old men have nothing else to say. One old man, who was seventy-three, said, "My hearing is going. People have to shout into my ears, and even then I cannot hear rightly!"

Another, who was seventy-eight, said, "My eyes are becoming weak, I cannot see rightly, and moreover, I cannot even make a distinction between a blond and a redhead!"

Then they asked the third man, they said, "Mulla Nasruddin, and what is your trouble?"

Nasruddin, who was ninety-three, said, "My trouble is deeper than both of yours. Last night it happened: we had dinner, then some wine, then I rested on the sofa and I fell asleep. About half an hour later I became aware that the wife had gone to bed. So I went into the bedroom and I told the wife, 'Give me a little space, let me come into bed and we will have a little fun!' The wife said, 'What? We had a little fun just twenty minutes ago!'"

And then Nasruddin tapped his head very sadly and said, "Gentlemen, my problem is that my memory is slipping!"

Sex goes on following you to the very end, to the last. And you may not have observed, you may not have thought about it, but if a man has not transcended mind, the last thing in the mind when he dies will be sex -- because that was the first thing when he was born. It is bound to be the last thing, it is natural -- try it!

When you go to sleep at night just watch the last thought -- the last, the very last; after that fall into sleep. Remember it, and in the morning you will be surprised: that will be the first thought in the morning -- if you observe. Or do it the other way: in the morning, observe the first thought and remember it. In the night that will be the last thought, because life is cyclic. Sex is the first thing in life and it is going to be the last. If you don't transcend it you are just victims, you are not your own masters.

Do you know what happens whenever a person is hanged? If a male is hanged, the semen is released immediately. This happens in every prison, wherever people are hanged. The last thing, when he is dying, semen is released. What is the meaning of it? Why should it be so? Life is a cycle, it completes itself: that was the first thing, through which he entered life; that is going to be the last thing, through which he will again enter into another life.

A sage transcends sex -- but a sage has not repressed sex, remember, because repression is not transcendence. If you repress you are still in it; if you repress you are still divided. A sage has not repressed anything. Rather, on the contrary, the male and the female energy within him have become a unity; now he is neither male nor female. That is what Jesus has called 'eunuchs of God'. That is what Hindus mean when they depict Shiva as ardhanarishwar -- half-man, half-woman: he has become one. And Hindus say Shiva is the most perfect god, the greatest -- Mahadeva. Why do they call him Mahadeva, the greatest? -- because he is half-man and half-woman, and when you are half-man and half-woman consciously, both become one circle and both disappear. The duality has disappeared, he has become one.

Jesus is talking about this oneness -- ardhanarishwar, half-male, half-female. Then you are neither, then a new childhood has started, the second childhood; you are dwij, twice-born. A new world of innocence is discovered.

Now we will enter this sutra.

JESUS SAW CHILDREN WHO WERE BEING SUCKLED. HE SAID TO HIS DISCIPLES: THESE CHILDREN WHO ARE BEING SUCKLED ARE LIKE THOSE WHO ENTER THE KINGDOM.

THEY SAID TO HIM: SHALL WE THEN, BEING CHILDREN, ENTER THE KINGDOM?

This is how disciples always miss: they take things literally, they understand words too much -- and the message is wordless. They cling to the symbols too much, they make them too concrete, while when a Jesus speaks his symbols are not concrete, they are liquid. They show something, they don't say anything. They are like indications, fingers pointing to the moon, not saying anything.

Once Jesus says: THESE CHILDREN... ARE LIKE THOSE WHO ENTER THE KINGDOM, immediately we think that if we become like these children, then we will be capable, then we will be able, then we can enter into the kingdom of God.

The disciples said: SHALL WE THEN, BEING CHILDREN, ENTER THE KINGDOM?"

Jesus said, "No! Just being children won't help."

JESUS SAID TO THEM: WHEN YOU MAKE THE TWO ONE, AND WHEN YOU MAKE THE INNER AS THE OUTER AND THE OUTER AS THE INNER, AND THE ABOVE AS THE BELOW, AND WHEN YOU MAKE THE MALE AND THE FEMALE INTO A SINGLE ONE, SO THAT THE MALE WILL NOT BE MALE AND THE FEMALE NOT BE FEMALE, THEN SHALL YOU ENTER THE KINGDOM.

This is what he means by being children again. Try to understand every sentence: WHEN YOU MAKE THE TWO ONE....

This is the basic problem. Have you observed that if a sunray enters a prism, immediately it becomes seven? Then all the colors of the rainbow appear. That is how a rainbow happens: in the rainy season, whenever the air is filled with vapor or tiny drops of water, those drops of water hanging in the air behave like a prism. A sunray enters and it is immediately divided into seven -- that's how a rainbow happens. In the rainy season, when the sun is out of the clouds a rainbow will be there. The sunray is white, pure white, but through a prism it becomes seven; the whiteness is lost, seven colors appear.

Your mind functions as a prism; the world is one, existence is pure white, and through your mind it is divided into many. Everything seen through the mind becomes many. If you are very alert, you will see seven things in every mental concept. Mind divides just like a prism -- into seven. That's why we have divided the week into seven. Mahavira, because of this attitude of the mind, divided his whole logic into seven steps. They are called 'seven aspects of logic', and if you asked Mahavira a question he would give seven answers.

You asked one question -- he would immediately give you seven answers. It was very confusing, because if you asked one question and he gave seven answers, you left more confused than you had come. And because of those seven, Mahavira could not be understood; it was impossible to understand him. But he was absolutely correct, because he was saying, "You ask through the mind, I have to answer through the mind -- and mind divides everything into seven." And those seven contradict each other, they are bound to, because the truth can only be one, the truth cannot be seven.

When you say a thing in seven ways you have to make contradictions. If you asked Mahavira whether God exists, he would say, "Yes, God exists"; and he would say, "No, God doesn't exist." Then he would say, "Yes and no, both -- God exists and doesn't exist"; and then he would say, "Neither" -- and in this way he would go on, up to seven.

Mind divides like a prism. Whenever you look through the mind everything becomes seven. If you look keenly, then seven; if you don't look keenly, then two. If you ask an ordinary man he will say, "Only two answers are possible. If you ask about God, either God is or God is not -- there are only two possibilities." But he is missing five because he is not very alert; otherwise, the possibilities are seven, not two. So two is the beginning of the many, seven is the end of the many.

Jesus says: WHEN YOU MAKE THE TWO ONE....

He is talking to very ordinary people, while Mahavira was talking to the greatest scholars and logicians. That is the difference between the audiences: Jesus is talking to very poor, ordinary people -- just the mass; but Mahavira was talking to a very select few. He could talk about the seven, Jesus talks about the two -- but they mean the same.

Jesus says: WHEN YOU MAKE THE TWO ONE.... Mahavira says, "When you make the seven one, when the seven disappear and one is left, you have attained." Jesus says, "When the two disappear and one is left, you have attained." The difference is in the audience, but they mean the same thing.

How can the two disappear? What should you do? Nothing can be done through the mind because if the mind is there the two will remain. How should the rainbow disappear? How can it disappear? You just throw the prism and there is no rainbow; just take away the drop hanging in the air and the rainbow disappears. Don't look through the mind and the world of the many disappears; look through the mind and it is there.

Don't look through the mind, put it aside and see. Children look at the world without the mind, because the mind takes time to develop. The body comes first, then later on mind follows -- it takes many years really. When the child is born, on the first day he looks at the world and the world is one, he cannot make any distinctions. How can he make any? He cannot say, "This is green and that is red." He does not know red, he does not know green, he simply looks -- the world is one. It is so 'one' that he cannot make a distinction between his own body and the mother's body.

Jean Piaget has worked very much on the developing mind of a child. He has been working on this his whole life, and he has come to reveal many truths: a child cannot make any distinction between his own body and things. That is why he will take his own toe and start eating it, because he cannot make distinctions. He cannot think that this is his own toe and it is useless sucking it, he catches hold of it as he will catch hold of anything -- there is no distinction. He will defecate and start eating it -- no bad, no good. We will say, "What dirtiness!" but for him there is no distinction, so what can he do?

Because of this, for centuries in India many people have existed who have tried to imitate the child. So they will eat food in the same place where they defecate, and foolish people call them paramahansa, those who have attained. They are simply imitating the child, they don't make any distinction -- but they do; otherwise, what need is there to do it? They make the distinction, but they force themselves not to make it. Buddha will not do it, Jesus will not do it, Krishna will not do it, but these so-called paramahansas -- you can find them somewhere or other all over the country -- they force themselves not to make distinctions.

But whether you make distinctions or force yourself not to make distinctions, mind remains the focus: the distinction is there, but you are repressing the distinction. You are behaving in a juvenile way, but you are not innocent.

When the two become one... just like the child. When the child is born, he opens his eyes -- he looks, but he cannot think; the look comes first, thinking will follow. It will take time, sometimes years before the child will become able to make distinctions. A child will immediately snatch a toy from another child's hand, and you will say, "Don't do that! That's not good, that toy is not yours!" You are making a distinction of property because you believe in individual property. You think, "This is mine, and that is not mine." For a child no distinction exists -- a toy is just a toy. He cannot think how it is not his: "If my hand can reach and snatch it, it is mine." 'Mine' and 'thine' are still not clearcut.

A child cannot make any distinction between a dream and a reality. So in the morning a child may be weeping and crying because he had a beautiful toy in his dream: "Where has it gone?" He wants it to be given back immediately. He cannot make a distinction between the dream and the real; he cannot make any distinctions. His innocence is because he is still unable to make distinctions.

And a sage's innocence comes when he has dropped making distinctions. Not that he cannot see that green is green and red is red, not that he cannot make the distinction that this is bread and that is a stone -- but he has dropped the mind. Now he lives through the look and not through thinking. That is why Hindus have called their philosophies darshanas. Darshan means to look, not to think; and philosophy is not a right translation, because philosophy means to think -- it is just the opposite.

Darshan means to look and philosophy means to think -- they are just the opposite of each other, they cannot be joined together in any way. Darshan means a look like a child's, when distinctions have been dropped: WHEN YOU MAKE THE TWO ONE, AND WHEN YOU MAKE THE INNER AS THE OUTER.... Because this 'inner' and outer' is also a distinction.

I myself have to say: Leave the outer, come to the inner; move within, drop the without. But you can misunderstand the whole thing, because when you drop the without, the within will be dropped automatically. When the outer is no more, how can the inner exist? They are relative terms: the inner exists only as the opposite of the outer; when there is no more outer there is no more inner. First you drop the outer, and then the inner drops automatically by itself; there is no 'in', no 'out' -- you have become one. If there is still inner and outer then you are still two, not yet one, you are still divided.

That's why Zen monks have said one of the most strange things ever asserted: they say this world is God; they say ordinary life is religion; they say everything as it is, is okay. Nothing is to be changed because the very concept of change creates the two: that which is has to be changed into something which ought to be; A has to be changed into B, the two comes in. They say this very world is divine; God is not somewhere else, because that somewhere else creates a duality. God is not the creator and you are not the creature -- you ARE God. God is not the creator -- this very creation is divine, the very creativity is God.

Mind always tries to make distinctions, that is mind's speciality. The more distinctions you can make, the more clever a mind you have. And mind will always say that these mystics are a little foolish, because boundaries are not clear. That's why they call religion mysticism, and by mysticism they don't mean a very good thing. They mean something vague like mist, something cloudy, something that is not a clear reality, but like a dream.

These mystics are fools to logicians because they don't make distinctions -- and distinctions are everything you have to make; you have to know what is what! And logic thinks the more distinctions you can make, the nearer you come to the reality. That is why science -- which follows logic, which is the application of logic and nothing else -- has reached the atom; making distinctions, by and by, separating everything, they have reached the atom.

Religion, not separating but joining, dropping the boundaries not drawing the boundaries, has reached the ultimate, the one. Science has reached the atom, which means the many, the infinitely many; and religion has reached the one, the infinitely one. The approaches: science uses mind and mind makes boundaries, clearcut distinctions; religion doesn't use mind and then all the boundaries disappear, everything becomes everything else, things are meeting. The trees are meeting the sky, the sky is dropping into the trees; the earth is meeting heaven, heaven is reaching the earth.

And if you look deep into life, you will find that these mystics are right. All boundaries are manmade, there are no boundaries in reality. They are useful, utilitarian, but not true; they help in certain ways, but they hinder also in certain other ways.

Try to find distinctions: for the last week you have been unhappy -- can you exactly pinpoint the moment when you became unhappy? Can you draw a line? Can you say, "Exactly on this day, at nine-thirty sharp in the morning, I became unhappy"? No, you cannot draw a line. If you search, suddenly you will find everything is vague, you cannot say when you became unhappy. Then you become happy -- watch when you become happy again. You may have missed because you were not aware in the past, but now you are unhappy and sometime you will become happy, because mind cannot remain in one state forever. You cannot help it. Even if you want to remain unhappy permanently, you cannot. Then watch: at exactly which moment do you become happy again? You will become happy and you will again miss the moment because it will be vague.

What does it mean? It means happiness and unhappiness are not two things. That's why you cannot make the distinction: they melt into each other, they mingle into each other, their boundaries merge into each other. There are no boundaries really -- they are like a wave, they are like the hill and the valley: the valley follows the hill; the wave comes and the hollow follows the wave. Where does the hill start, and where does the valley end? Nowhere! They are one.

It is your mind which says, "This is the valley and this is the hill." Can you have a hill without the valley? Can you have a valley without the hill? Can you have happiness without unhappiness? If you are trying to, then you are trying for the impossible. Can you have unhappiness without happiness? Drop it! -- because this happiness and unhappiness is more poetic. Health and illness are more physiological. Watch: exactly when did you become ill? Where can you draw the boundary? And when did you become healthy? Nobody can draw any line of demarcation: illness becomes health, health becomes illness; love becomes hate, hate becomes love; anger becomes compassion, compassion becomes anger. It may be uncomfortable to conceive, but mystics are true.

You were a child -- when did you become young? When did youth enter in you? You are young, someday you will become old. Watch, and mark it on the calendar: "This day I have become old." And if you cannot distinguish when you become old, can you make the distinction between when you are alive and when you become dead? Even scientists are in much difficulty about when to declare that a man is dead. All that is known up to now is just utilitarian, not true.

When to declare that a man is dead? When he is not breathing? But there have been yogis who have demonstrated in scientific laboratories that they can remain without breathing even for ten minutes. So, the criterion of death cannot be that a man is dead whenever he is not breathing. He may not be able to breathe again, but this is not the criterion because people have demonstrated that they can remain without breathing for ten minutes. This man may be a yogi. He may not want to come back, but you have no right to declare that he is dead. Still, we have to declare death because the dead have to be disposed of.

When is a man really dead? When his heart stops functioning? Or when his brain stops functioning? Now, in scientific laboratories there are brains without bodies -- and they are functioning. Who knows what they are thinking? -- may be dreaming? They will not even be aware that they have lost the body. And scientists who have been observing brains which have no bodies say they also have the same rhythm: they sleep, they are awake; they sleep, they are wakeful; they show signs that they are dreaming, and they show signs that now they are not dreaming; they show signs that they are thinking, and they show signs that they are sometimes angry and agitated and tense, and sometimes relaxed. Inside, what will they be thinking? They must not be aware that the body is no longer there, but can you call those minds dead? They are functioning well. Which part can be the criterion? Which moment can be the criterion?

In the second world war they experimented in Russia, and at least six persons are still alive who were declared dead because of a sudden heart failure. They were declared dead but they were pumped blood, they were revived, and six of them are still alive. What happened? They have been reclaimed!

Is there really a boundary where life ends and death begins? No! Just a wave phenomenon. Life follows death just like a wave is followed by a hollow. They are not separate, they are one -- the rhythm of the one.

Mystics say that for utilitarian purposes it is okay that you divide, but the reality is indivisible. What to do to know this indivisible reality? Just put aside the mechanism that divides -- this is what meditation is. Put the mind aside and look; look without the mind. Be aware without the mind. See! -- and don't allow thoughts to stand as a screen between you and the universe. When the clouds, the thoughts, are not there and the sun shines with full awareness, the world is one.

WHEN YOU MAKE THE TWO ONE, AND WHEN YOU MAKE THE INNER AS THE OUTER AND THE OUTER AS THE INNER, AND THE ABOVE AS THE BELOW, AND WHEN YOU MAKE THE MALE AND THE FEMALE INTO A SINGLE ONE, SO THAT THE MALE WILL NOT BE MALE AND THE FEMALE WILL NOT BE FEMALE, THEN SHALL YOU ENTER THE KINGDOM.

The greatest and the deepest distinction is between male and female. Have you observed that you never forget that somebody is male or female? You may forget the name, you may forget the religion, you may forget the face completely, but you never forget whether the person is a man or a woman. It is impossible, it seems, to forget. That means the deepest impact on your memory is left by the division.

You met somebody twenty years ago: you cannot remember anything -- the face has disappeared, the name has disappeared, but whether they were a man or a woman?... that remains, that sticks. That made the deepest impact on you, as if the first thing you look for in the other is whether they are a man or a woman; the first thing that you look for and the last thing that remains with you. You may not be so consciously looking for it, but whenever you look at a person the first thing you note deep down is whether they are a man or a woman. If she is a woman you behave differently; if he is a man you behave differently. If she is a woman, then your man inside you is attracted whether you know it or not. You may be unconscious of it, but your behavior becomes more tender.

Now the people who run markets know it well, so all salesmen are by and by replaced by saleswomen. It is bound to be so: if the purchasers are men then it is better to have a saleswoman, because then the purchaser cannot say no so easily as he can say to a man. When a woman puts a shoe on your foot, touches your feet -- a beautiful woman -- suddenly the shoe is not important, the shoe becomes secondary. It may be pinching you but you say, "Beautiful! It is good!" and you have to purchase it. You are purchasing the woman not the shoe.

That's why with every advertisement -- reasonably, unreasonably; related, unrelated; consistent, inconsistent; it makes no difference whether you have to sell a car or shoes or anything -- you have to put a naked woman near it. The car is not purchased, the woman in the car is purchased. Sex is purchased and sold, everything else is superficial.

Deep down you are looking for sex -- everywhere. Jesus says you will not be innocent if this looking for sex remains. Then you will remain divided: if you are a man, then you are looking for a woman; if you are a woman you are looking for a man. Then the looking will go on being concerned with the outer, it cannot become inner; you cannot move within, you cannot be meditative. The woman will disturb you, she will follow you. If you resist, if you fight, if you close your eyes, she will become more and more beautiful, she will tempt you.

What to do? How to transcend this duality? Many methods have been used. Most of them are just deceptions. People say, "Think of every woman as your mother," but it will not make much difference, it is a deception. "Think of every woman as your sister" -- it makes no difference, because she remains a woman. Sister, mother... it makes no difference; she remains a woman and you remain a man. A deep search goes on, and that search is so biological that it goes on behind your consciousness, it is a 'sub-stream'.

Watch: you are sitting in your room and a woman enters. Watch yourself, watch what happens. Suddenly you are a different person. And if she is beautiful then you are transformed even more. What happens? Immediately you are no more, just the man exists; you are no more, just the sex hormones. They start functioning, they put you aside, your consciousness is lost, you are almost unconscious, you behave as if you are drunk.

As yet, we have not been able to discover a greater alcohol than sex, a greater drug than sex: it immediately changes everything. If you take LSD things become colorful -- sex is an inbuilt LSD. Whenever you are sexual things become colorful; everything has a different look, a different shine: you are more alive, you don't walk, you run; you don't say anything, you sing. Your life has become a dance, you are living in a different dimension.

Whenever sex is not there, suddenly you are back into the flat world, the world of things, uncolored, no shine in them. You cannot sing, you cannot run, everything has become lazy. Again a woman or a man enters into your life and everything takes on color, it becomes a romance to be, it becomes poetry to exist. What is happening? And if this goes on happening then you will be again in a duality -- the deepest -- and this duality will not allow you to see the real. And the real is blissful, it is neither happy nor unhappy.

The real is beyond happiness and unhappiness. It is neither tense nor relaxed, it is neither dark nor light; it is beyond. When all duality has ceased then you are blissful. Hindus have called that ananda -- it means 'beyond the two'. You cannot say a sage is happy. He is not happy because happiness has to be followed by unhappiness. You cannot say a sage is unhappy. A sage is blissful, he has passed the duality. Now there are no hills and no valleys; he moves on the ground, he moves on one level. There are no ups and downs because 'up' and 'down' exist as a duality.

So Jesus says, "When there is nothing above and nothing below, no up and no down, when there are not two, then you cannot choose, you simply exist." And that existence is on one level: there are no waves, the ocean is absolutely silent and without any waves, not even a ripple, because nothing goes above and nothing goes down. The ocean has become a mirrorlike thing, no ripples, all agitation has ceased.

The whole agitation exists through duality, and sex is the base of all duality. You can leave all other things very easily, but the basic thing to leave is sex. And that is the most difficult because it is in every cell of your body, every cell of your being -- you are a sexual being, you are born as a sexual being. That's why Jesus said, "Unless you are born again, nothing will be of any help." As you are you will remain tense; as you are you will remain miserable.

AND WHEN YOU MAKE THE MALE AND THE FEMALE INTO A SINGLE ONE, SO THAT THE MALE WILL NOT BE MALE AND THE FEMALE WILL NOT BE FEMALE, THEN SHALL YOU ENTER THE KINGDOM.

So what is to be done? Inside, a circle has to be made. Jesus has not said exactly what is to be done because those secrets cannot be given openly, those secrets can be given only to disciples. Jesus must have given them to his disciples, because just by saying, "Become one!" no one is going to become one. Just by saying that the male should be female and the female should be male, no one is going to become one -- because this is the goal, what is the method?

Jesus must have kept that method secret. He must have given it to his disciples as a secret key, because those greater secrets which can make you one are also very dangerous. If you miss, if you apply them in even a slightly wrong way, you will go mad. That is the problem, and that is the fear.

Normally, as you are, you are a divided being: your male energy seeking female energy outside, your female energy seeking male energy outside -- this is the normal human being. The whole thing has to be transformed: your male energy seeking female energy within. The man within you trying to meet the woman within you is very dangerous, because nature has not provided for it. Nature has given you an urge to meet the woman, to meet the man, and that urge is natural. But to try for this happening to occur within you alone, is not natural. The key has to be applied very, very delicately. It can be done only under a master, one who has traveled the path. That's why the deepest secrets of religion cannot be given through scripture, they can be given only through initiation.

I will give you a few hints though, how it can be done. But remember well: if you want to do them be careful not to move away from whatsoever I say, not to move astray, otherwise things can go wrong. It is better then to be normal, because many religious people become mad. This is the reason: you have the key but you don't know how to use it, you can use it wrongly. And if you once use a key wrongly the lock is disturbed; then it will be very difficult to repair the lock.

These methods are to be done only under a master, so that the master goes on continuously watching what is happening with you. I am giving you a few things because I am here, and if you want to work you can work.

The first thing: whenever you make love to a woman or a man, that is the right moment to look for the inner woman or the inner man. Whenever you make love to a woman, do it with closed eyes, make it a meditation. The woman outside always helps the inner woman to become awake. And when you make love your inner energies, both male and female, come to a peak. When the orgasm happens, it is not between you and the outer woman, it always happens between you and the inner woman.

So if you are alert you will become aware of the phenomenon that inside a meeting of energies is happening. And whenever this happens, the orgasm will be all over the body; it will not be local, it will not be confined to the sex center. If it is confined to the sex center it is just masturbation, nothing else. Orgasm means the whole body, every fiber of the body throbs with a new life, with a new energy, because much energy is released by the meeting. The meeting is happening within, but if you go on looking outside you will miss.

The outer woman or the outer man is just a representative of the inner. When you fall in love with a woman or a man, you fall in love only because that woman or man corresponds somehow with the inner. That's why you cannot give any reasons why you are in love with this woman, because it is not a rational thing at all.

You carry a woman within. Whenever any woman fits with that inner woman, suddenly you are in love. That love is not manipulated by you, it is not your mind that is falling in love, it is something very unconscious. In this woman you have a glimpse, suddenly you feel that this is the right person.

What makes this woman the right person? ... Because for others she is not the right person: there are people who will hate her, there are people who will be repelled, repulsed. There are people who will never look at this woman again; there are people who will not recognize that she has anything. And there are people who will laugh about you: "How have you fallen in love with this woman? Are you mad?" But this woman or this man somehow fits with the inner. That's why love is an irrational thing: whenever it happens, it happens -- you cannot do anything about it; if it is not happening you cannot do anything about it.

When you make love to a woman, the inner energy comes to a peak, it comes to a crescendo. At that crescendo, don't go on looking outside, otherwise you will miss something beautiful that is happening, something very mysterious that is happening inside: you are becoming a circle. Your two, male and female, are meeting, you are becoming ardhanarishwar. In this moment, your whole body will vibrate from the toes to the head. Every nerve of the body will vibrate with life, because this circle spreads all over the body. It is not sexual, it is more than sex. Watch it! Watch the reaching of the peak, the meeting of the inner energies. Then watch when the tide has gone and the abyss starts. Watch, by and by, the separation of the energies again.

If you do it a few times, you will immediately become aware that the outer woman or man is not needed. This can be done without the outer, because this is happening without the outer -- the outer is just a trigger-point. That trigger-point can be created inside. And once you know how, you can do it inside. But this has to be experienced, only then do you know -- I cannot say how. You have to observe, watch, and then you will know how the energies come, how orgasm happens; how they separate again, and again the two arise.

For a single moment the one happens in you. That's why there is so much attraction in sex, that's why so much pleasure is derived out of orgasm -- because for a single moment you become one, the two disappears. And in the moment of orgasm there is no mind. If mind is there orgasm cannot happen. In the moment of orgasm, not a single thought... the whole prism is put aside. You are, but without thoughts. You exist, but with no mind. This happens only for such a single moment that you can miss it easily; you have been missing it for many lives. It is such a small gap that if you are interested outside, you have missed it.

So close your eyes and watch what is happening inside. Don't try to make anything happen, just watch whatsoever is happening. By and by it happens, just like when you come inside a room after walking outside in the sun. You come inside the room and everything is dark, you cannot see anything because your eyes are still not accustomed to this dark room. Wait! Sit down and go on silently looking. By and by the darkness will disappear and you will become aware of things now that your eyes are accustomed to it.

Coming from the outer to the inner is a great problem only because your eyes are accustomed to the outside. The inside looks dark and by the time you are ready the moment has gone. So meditate more and more with closed eyes, and look inside so you can become attuned to the inner darkness. It is not dark, it just appears dark to you because you are accustomed to the outside light. By and by a diffused light comes, things becomes clear; a moment comes when things become so clear that when you open your eyes you will find the outside is darkness.

Arvind is reported to have said, "When for the first time I came to know what is inside, the light that is outside became like darkness. The life that is outside became like death, because now something higher, something greater, something of the source was happening."

Watch how the inner circle comes, how the two energies become one. In that oneness there is no mind and no thought. Look! -- by and by you will be able to see what is happening. And once you know what is happening, the outer can be dropped -- no need to drop it, but it can be dropped.

A woman is beautiful, a man is beautiful. Love is good, nothing is wrong, it is healthy and whole. There is no need to drop it but it can be dropped, and then you are no longer dependent on it. Then you can allow the phenomenon to happen inside, and a moment comes when this inner circle remains forever. With the help of the outer it cannot remain forever because the outer has to separate, the separation is a must. But with the inner there is no need to separate; if the inner marriage happens there is no divorce, there is no possibility because it is always there, both are there. Once they have met there is no question of any divorce. With the outer, divorce happens continuously; one moment you are together, the next moment you have to be separate.

When this circle remains continuously within you, this is the state of ardhanarishwar -- and this is what Jesus means:

AND WHEN YOU MAKE THE MALE AND THE FEMALE INTO A SINGLE ONE, SO THAT THE MALE WILL NOT BE MALE AND THE FEMALE NOT BE FEMALE, THEN SHALL YOU ENTER THE KINGDOM OF GOD.

Then you have entered: you have become perfect, you are not divided, you have become indivisible. Now you have a self: now you have freedom and independence, now you lack nothing, you are complete in yourself. Unless this circle happens you will lack something and you will depend on others to fulfill it.

That is why sex looks like a bondage -- it is! It looks like a dependence, and whenever you feel there is dependence you resent it. Hence the continuous fight with the lover: you feel resentment, you cannot go away from the other because you are dependent.

And nobody wants to depend on anybody, because every dependence is a limitation: the other tries to dominate, the other tries to possess -- and if you are dependent you have to allow the other a certain domination because you are afraid. This is a mutual agreement: "I will be dependent on you, you will be dependent on me, so we both can possess each other in certain ways, and we both can dominate each other in certain ways."

But nobody likes domination and possession. That's why love is such a misery. And if you love a person and also resent them, how can you be happy? Even the most beautiful person becomes ugly.

Mulla Nasruddin was sitting with a friend. His wife came and the friend said, "I suppose this is your most charming wife!"

Mulla Nasruddin looked sad and said, "This is my only wife!"

That sadness is always present with lovers, because no woman can fulfill a man. Even if you get all the women of the world it will not be a fulfillment, because the inner is greater than the 'all'. All the men in the world will not be able to fulfill a woman -- no. It is not possible. Something or other will always be lacking, because no man can be exactly like the inner man. And this problem of time.... Only for a single moment can the meeting happen, and then separation, because no man can be exactly like the inner.

Unless you attain to the inner unity you will move from one misery to another; from one woman to another, from one man to another; from one life of misery to another life of misery. The change may give you the hope -- but it is hopeless, the whole affair is hopeless.

When this circle happens you again become one, innocent like a child -- more than the child, more than any child can ever be -- you have become a sage.

Meditate on these words of Jesus, and try what I have said. But if you want to try let me know. If you start working for the inner circle, then let me know continuously what is happening, because if something goes wrong and two energies meet in a wrong way, you will go mad.

That's the fear of becoming a sage: if you fall, you fall to the very bottom, you become mad. If you reach, you reach to the very top, you become a sage. It is always so. If someone wants to walk on the heights he has to have courage, because if you fall, you fall to the depths. Near the heights the abyss is always there.

So remember that a very balanced effort is needed, and many other things. If you want to work on it I will tell you, but that can only be done personally. That's why Jesus talks about the goal, but never talks about the method. The method is to be given personally, it is an initiation.

Enough for today.