| 
Part VII : Zorba the Buddha
In June 1978, Osho coins the phrase Zorba the Buddha. The name
becomes a trademark for sannyasin enterprises around the world,
for example, restaurants and discoteques
Have you read Kazantzakis' Zorba the Greek: Read it!…
Allow me to coin the term 'spiritual hedonism', because ordinarily
you think of hedonism as very earthy. "Eat, drink, be merry"—that
is earthy hedonism. In spiritual hedonism that is there, and more
also. "Eat, drink, be merry" is there—plus God.
Eat, drink and be merry in the name of the holy, in the name of
your God, your Father who is in heaven.
Eat, drink, be merry—make them your prayer. Let your eating
and drinking and merrying be a sort of ritual, a sort of prayer—a
gesture of happiness that "I am okay, and I am happy that
you have given birth to me. I am happy that I am, and my whole
thankfulness goes to you."
A spiritual hedonism is always there when religion is alive.
When the religion becomes dead, hedonism disappears completely
and the religion becomes antagonistic to everything that man can
enjoy. Then religion goes on seeking ways and means of how to
be sad, how to be more and more sorrowful, how to kill all avenues
of delight and joy. Then it becomes ascetic. foll201
Zorba is one of my love affairs. I love strange people. Zorba
is a very strange man—not even a real man, only fictitious,
but to me he has become almost a reality because he represents
Epicurus, Charvaka, and all the materialists of the world. He
not only represents them, but represents them in their best form.
In one place Zorba says to his boss, "Boss, you have everything
but still you are missing life, because you don't have a little
madness in you. If you can manage a little madness you will know
what life is."
I can understand him; not only him, but I can understand all
the Zorbas down the ages, with their 'little madness'. But I don't
believe in a little of anything. I am as mad as one can be, totally
mad. If you are only a little mad, of course you will understand
only a little of life, but it is better than not knowing at all.
Zorba, poor Zorba, illiterate Zorba, a laborer…he must have
been huge, strongly built, and a little mad. But he gave great
advice to his master: "Be a little mad," he said. I
say being a little mad won't do; be totally mad! But you can allow
total madness only in meditation, otherwise you will freak out.
You won't be able to consume it; on the contrary, it will consume
you. If you don't know what meditation is you will be burned.
Hence I have coined a new name: Zorba the Buddha.
Zorba the Buddha is my synthesis. I love Kazantzakis for creating
a great work of art, but I feel sorry for him too because he is
still in darkness. Kazantzakis, you need a boss, a little of meditation;
otherwise you will never know what life is. books06
I am teaching my people to live a single, unitary life. There
is no need to postpone. Be natural. I want Buddha, Gautam the
Buddha, and Zorba the Greek to come closer and closer—to
become one. My sannyasin has to be "Zorba the Buddha."
Bring earth and heaven closer; let God and his world be joined
together. Let your body and your soul be one—a song sung
in togetherness, a dance where body and soul meet and merge.
I am a materialist-spiritualist. secret10
My sannyasins have to take life very playfully—then you
can have both the worlds together. You can have the cake and eat
it too. And that is a real art. This world and that, sound and
silence, love and meditation, being with people, relating, and
being alone. All these things have to be lived together in a kind
of simultaneity; only then will you know the uttermost depth of
your being and the uttermost height of your being. dh0202
|
