Q: Can you explain why Osho says that Brahman is behind all worldly activities and I am that Brahman, meaning ‘I am the doer’?
This means that the thief, the man who is blinded by lust, the greedy person who is sitting on a pile of money like a snake – all this worldly activity arises from Brahman. If I am this brahman, then I am the one who is stealing through the thief, I am the greed in the greedy person and the lust in the lecher!
Yet religious people say: “You are a thief, you will go to hell” They don’t realize that they are sending themselves to hell!
Can you explain how Advaita can say that ‘I am not the doer ego’, while Osho says if I am brahman then I am the doer?
A: Osho is not a reliable source of teaching according to Advaita. I have read a few of his books and was most impressed by his breadth of knowledge. But his sources are many and he does not always differentiate. There are several non-dual teachings and any may take you to the final understanding. But my own knowledge is now strictly oriented towards traditional Advaita (Gaudapada-Ṥaṅkara-Sureshvara).
Advaita teaches that there is only Brahman. You are That. I am Brahman. The world is name and form of Brahman. The ‘things’ in it and the ‘things that happen’ are appearances only, which we treat as separate and consequently regard as ‘good’ or ‘bad’. Religions are attempts to make sense of what is only an appearance. They provide interim explanations which have to be dropped when there is the final realization. If they help you along the way, that is fine. If not, ignore them. Ultimately, there is no heaven or hell, no you and me, no world, no creation; there is only Brahman or Consciousness – whatever you want to call it (as long as you realize that there is no ‘you’ and ‘it’!).
Brahman is not a ‘doer’! That would be duality. There is no ‘doing’ at all. Nothing ever ‘happens’ in reality.
I suggest you stop reading Osho!
Q: When Osho was asked to explain ‘action through inaction’, he answered:
“I think if there is a true sannyasin on this earth and if a war is going on in Vietnam – as it is in fact happening, where people are being mercilessly slaughtered – he will share the responsibility for the Vietnam War. Although he is thousands of miles away, he actually has nothing to do with what is going on in Vietnam, still he will take the responsibility on himself meaning this is action through inaction – one is not doing anything but is still a doer.”
A: ‘Desireless action’ is the essence of karma yoga. One acts (or does not act) purely in response to the situation in front of one, without any personal desire for the outcome. But this is still only a preparatory practice for going to a qualified guru and listening to his explanations of the scriptures. Only Self-knowledge can give enlightenment and nothing else. And worrying about what is happening in the world will not help in the slightest. The world is mithyA.
Give up Osho and read one of the books I recommended!
Q: I just want you to clarify for me the interpretation of this text of Osho because he says that I am responsible for any war even if I am not a participant (which he calls action through inaction meaning to be a doer when one is not doing anything).
I am asking you this because listening to his interpretation taken from the Gita made me feel guilty and responsible for all wars that are happening, or for a child drowning, even If I am not a participant directly, because we are all one consciousness.
If you can read the whole article please and tell me where are the errors of Osho’s interpretation: https://www.osho.com/osho-online-library/osho-talks/desire-responsibility-inaction-1dcbed2d-cd7?p=43af3c746ea5d2e61ef40a26645a9277.
Also, Osho says that not to be a doer when one is doing something is not that difficult (karma yoga), whereas to be a doer when one is not doing anything is taking responsibility for everything that happens anywhere in this wide world, even though one has no direct hand in any of it, is the right attitude of a sannyasin, even though it is a more difficult role to play.
Can you please tell me what are the errors of Osho’s interpretation and my feeling guilty?
A: The first sentence is misleading. ‘Desireless action’ does not mean ‘action through inaction’; it means acting without any desire for a particular result. The rest of the paragraph is fine.
If a sannyasin knowingly ate stolen food, no doubt he would feel partly responsible. But the idea that he would feel responsible for a remote war is silly. If he did, it would indicate that he was not enlightened.
Enlightenment means knowing that there is only Consciousness – no world, no people, no wars, no action of any kind IN REALITY. The appearance is just that – an appearance, whose reality is the unchanging Consciousness. The body-mind appearance of a jñānī continues until expiry of the prārabdha karma so that the jñānī appears to continue to act in the world. And any apparent actions would naturally now be ‘desireless’.
I think that the ‘bottom line’ answer to your concerns is that there is only Consciousness and Consciousness does not act. The sort of metaphor that is used to convey this idea is that the movie cannot take place without the screen but the screen has nothing at all to do with what takes place there, whether romance, comedy or horror.
‘Responsibility’, in the sense in which Osho is talking about it, relates to karma. The body-mind did something in the past and is now facing its consequences in the present. I.e. responsibility is associated with the body-mind (the movie) and not with Consciousness per se (the screen).
So, to continue in the metaphor, if you are playing a role in one movie, you cannot take any responsibility for what is happening in another.
Hope this resolves your anxieties!
Q: Yes thank you for clarifying that for me and the metaphor of screen and image is clear to me now, but I want to know more because you said that only the unenlightened thinks there is really a world war etc. Could you explain Osho’s further quote:
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“What is generally taken to be sannyas is not real sannyas, it is simple aversion. The sannyas of Krishna’s concept is a much different and more difficult affair. He lives with this awareness, that he is fully responsible for his inaction which is ‘action through inaction’ – just because he exists as part of ‘Cosmic consciousness’. He knows that consciousness is united and one.
“You have seen waves in the ocean; they seem to be constantly moving towards the shore. But you will be surprised to know they never move to the shore; they are virtually stationary. You will say it is unbelievable; you have seen with your own eyes how they travel a mile-long distance to come to the shores. You might have even played with waves that Come rolling over the ocean.
“But those who know the ocean will say that no wave moves; it only appears to be moving. The fact is that one wave gives rise to another and another and the process goes on ad infinitum. It is not that a wave rising at a mile’s distance from the shore moves toward the shore, really it dies as soon as it rises, but it gives rise to another wave which in its turn gives rise to another. What really happens is that when a wave rises it depresses the water on either side, which causes another wave to rise. Thus one wave causes thousands of waves to rise. They don’t move even a millimeter, but they appear to be moving because they are so contiguous and continuous.
“Now suppose a child is drowned in a wave near the seashore, can you hold a distant wave responsible for his drowning? It will deny responsibility on the grounds that it never moved to the shore; there was a mile’s distance between the wave and the drowned child. But Krishna thinks that if the distant wave is a sannyasin, it will own the responsibility for the child’s death, because integral part of the ocean. Whether the distant wave visited the shore or not, it is as much responsible as the wave that drowned the child. The ocean is one and indivisible.
“A right kind of sannyasin takes responsibility for everything that happens anywhere in this wide world, even though he has no direct hand in any of it. This is a very difficult role to play. ‘Not to be a doer when one is doing something is not that difficult’, although this and the other thing are two sides of the same coin. We have lost sight of this side of sannyas, which has as much involvement in ‘inaction’. ‘To do without being a doer’, and ‘to be a doer when one not doing a thing’ are two sides of the coin of sannyas.
“But unfortunately we have a very limited concept of sannyas: to us a sannyasin is one who leaves the world and shuts himself up in a mountain cave or a monastery and ceases to have any relation with the world. Such a sannyasin says now he is not at all responsible for what happens in the world. But this is a very sectarian and mistaken view of sannyas. This world is like waves rising on the surface of the ocean where no wave can say that it is not responsible for what happens to the rest of the waves.”
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Can you please highlight on any misleading sentences here from Osho and explain to me why I should not feel guilty for the child who is drowned by a distant wave in the metaphor? Although I don’t have direct hand in it, he is saying that I am responsible because of “action through inaction”.
This is the text link for the Osho quote:
A: I’m afraid I don’t have time to (or inclination) to analyze and explain the teaching of Osho. As I said, he does not teach traditional Advaita. I suggest that you read a couple of the books that I recommended. If you then have questions, I am always available to answer occasional, specific queries on pure Advaita.
Q: Ok, thank you. The thing is I read all advaita and what you recommended also but I have that issue of guilt responsibility. I wanted to know why he says for example if someone drowns I am responsible even though i was not involved, because I am one cosmic consciousness brahman and it is ‘action through inaction’, as Krishna says in the Gita.
A: Without reading the Osho and answering specifics, the simple answer is this:
As ‘X’, you have no responsibility for the actions of others, only the actions of ‘X’. As Consciousness (which you really are), there are no actions because there is no separate world and people. So the question of ‘responsibility’ does not arise.
So stop worrying!
Q: I have one last question concerning ‘doership’, where in Vedanta Swami Sivananda says:
“Feel I am the all”, and “I am in all. Feel: All bodies are mine. The whole world is my body, my sweet home. I work in all and through all hands. I eat through all mouths.”
Does “I work through all hands” imply that ‘I am the doer Brahman’?
A: I don’t think this sort of statement is helpful.
Since there is only Brahman, then obviously all of the ‘things that we think are separate entities (including ourselves)’ are also Brahman. Therefore, speaking with the knowledge that you are Brahman, you might say all of those things. But the point is that there are no ‘things’ at all – there is only Brahman! So, when you make those sorts of statements, you are ‘mixing up levels of reality’, as it is put. You are confusing the absolute reality (there is only Brahman) with the empirical reality (the appearance of the world and separate people).
When you ‘do’ something, you can say from the empirical standpoint that Brahman is ‘enabling’ you to act, since your body-mind without Brahman is inert. But Brahman isn’t really doing anything, since there is only Brahman!
So you can always answer this sort of question by differentiating between reality and appearance, paramArtha and vyavahAra.