Don't believe in me, be a fellow traveler with me... I don't carry you on my shoulders, I don't want you to be cripples your whole life; I don't give you any crutches, you have to walk on your own.

Yes, I know the way, I have walked on it, I know all the pitfalls on the way. I will go on shouting loudly at you, "Beware, there is a pitfall!" But still it is up to you to decide whether to fall into it or not. If you fall into it I don't condemn you, I respect your freedom. If you don't fall into it I don't reward you, I take it for granted this is how an intelligent person behaves. So there is no reward with me and no punishment with me, there is no hell and no heaven, there is no sin, no virtue. This is my joy -- to share.

-Rajneesh

It is said people die at the age of thirty and are buried at the age of seventy. Death happens very early -- I think thirty is also not right, death happens even earlier.

Somewhere near twenty-one, when the law and the state recognize you as a citizen, that is the moment when a person dies. In fact, that's why they recognize you as a citizen: now you are no more dangerous, now you are no more wild, now you are no more raw. Now everything has been put right in you, fixed right in you; now you have been adjusted to the society. That's what it means when the nation gives you the right to vote: the nation can trust now that your intelligence has been destroyed -- you can vote. There is no fear about you; you are a citizen, you are a civilized man. You are no more a man then, you are a citizen.

-Rajneesh

I need seekers here, inquirers, not believers. Believers are the most mediocre people in the world, the least intelligent people in the world. So forget about belief, you are creating trouble for yourself. You start believing in me, then disbelief arises -- it is bound to arise, because I am not here to fit with your expectations.

-Rajneesh

People don't want truth, they want belief. Belief is cheap. Truth is dangerous, arduous, difficult; one has to pay for it. One has to seek and search, and there is no guarantee that you will find it, there is no guarantee that there is any truth anywhere. It may not be at all; the goal may not exist.

People want belief, and Buddha said... his last message to the world was "appo dipo bhava; be a light unto yourself." He had said this because his disciples were crying. Ten thousand sannyasins surrounding him... of course they were sad, and tears were falling; their master was leaving. And Buddha said to them, "Don't cry. Why are you crying?"

One of the disciples, Ananda, said, "Because you are leaving us, because you were our only hope, because we had hoped and hoped long that it is through you we will attain to truth."

It was to answer Ananda that Buddha said, "Don't be worried about that. I cannot give you truth; nobody else can give it to you, it is not transferable. But you can attain it on your own. Be a light unto yourself."

-Rajneesh

My teaching is: the first thing to be done is not to try to believe. Why? If doubt is there, doubt is there! There is no need to hide it. In fact, allow it, help it, let it become a great quest. Let it become a thousand and one questions -- and ultimately you will see it is not the questions that are relevant, it is the question mark! Doubt is not a search for belief; doubt simply is groping for the mystery, making every effort to understand the un-understandable, to comprehend the incomprehensible.

-Rajneesh