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Part V : Osho’s experiences with Suicide
Once I was sitting by the side of the Ganges in Allahabad alone,
in a very lonely spot, and I saw a man jump into the river. I
thought he must be taking a bath, but then he started shouting,
"Help! Save me!" - he was drowning.
I don't believe in saving anybody, but I thought that this is
a totally different case. So I jumped in after him and I pulled
him out. It was hard, he was a very big and fat fellow, but somehow
I brought him out. And he started being very angry with me. He
said, "Why did you save me?"
I said, "This is something! You were shouting, `Save me,
help me!' I am not a person to save anybody, but there was nobody
else here, and I thought that this is a totally different context.
But why are you getting angry?"
He said, "I was really going to commit suicide."
"Then," I said, "why did you start shouting, `Save
me, help me'? You should have committed suicide - I would
not have disturbed you. I was simply sitting silently, I was not
interfering with you."
He said, "What to do? I wanted to commit suicide, and with
a total decisiveness I had jumped in. But when the cold water
touched me, I forgot all that, and when I started drowning and
came up, I don't know how, but I started shouting, `Help me, save
me!'"
I said, "Don't be worried. Come here."
He said, "What do you mean?"
I said, "You just come close to me." He came. I pushed
him back into the water. He went under once and started shouting
again, "Save me, help me! What are you doing?"
I said, "Now I am not going to be worried. I did wrong the
first time - please forgive me for that time. Now I will simply
sit here and see you commit suicide."
He said, "This is not" - and it was difficult to
say anything because he was going down and up - "This
is not a joke! Just save me. I don't want to commit suicide!"
Somebody else jumped in and saved him. I said, "You are doing
something wrong because that fellow wants to commit suicide."
And that fellow said, "No, I have dropped the idea. It is
too difficult, I will find some easier way. This going under water
and coming up - it is too much for me." transm32
Once it happened a friend of mine was bent upon committing suicide,
so everybody was advising him but he wouldn't listen.
His father came running to me and he said, "Now it seems
it is beyond us". The father had always been against me but
now he thought, "Maybe this is the last resort". So
I said, "I am coming."
I went and I listened to the man, and I said, "Perfectly
good! I don't feel it is right, but if still you decide to commit
suicide I will help you because I'm your friend! If you want to
commit suicide, good! I don't feel it is right because if I were
in your place I wouldn't commit suicide because it looks foolish!
Because a girl has refused you, you want to commit suicide. There
are millions of girls and this is not the only woman. Within a
month you will forget; you will fall in love again! But if you
still think to, it is perfectly good! It is your life!"
The father became very much disturbed. He said, "We have
brought you to help him not to do it!"
I said, "Who are you to help him? - because when you
gave birth to him you never asked him if he wanted to be born
or not. Now why should you ask? If he wants to commit suicide
he should be given all freedom."
I took the man to my house. I said, "Come with me. If you
are going to commit suicide, let us enjoy. One night be with me
because maybe we will meet somewhere, maybe we will never meet
again."
So he came with me, and by and by he started thinking, because
I was not trying to convince him. I said, "We will put the
alarm on and at four o'clock I will drive you to a beautiful place
where you can jump into the river...and I can say good-bye
too!"
At four o'clock when the alarm went and I started pulling him
out of his bed, he said, "Are you my enemy or what? I don't
want to commit suicide!"
I said, "This is not right. If you have decided it is perfectly
good!"
He said, "But I don't want to commit suicide. Why are you
forcing me?"
I said, "I'm not forcing!"
And he has not committed suicide! Now he has a wife and children
and he avoids me because whenever he comes to see me I say, "What
has happened now? You were thinking that you would never fall
in love again; you fell in love again!"
And he says, "In fact I am happy that that woman refused;
she was not for me! I would have always been in trouble, her husband
is in trouble. And I have found a better woman." zero19
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