Kabir says: “the guru is great beyond words, and great is the good fortune of the disciple.”
Osho on above Kabir words – Yes, to become a disciple is to be fortunate. To find a Master is the greatest blessing that can happen to a man on the earth. It is very rare to find a Master and it is very rare, when you have found one, to surrender to him. But if it happens at all, the greatest thing has happened. More than that is not possible in life. Let me explain it to you, what the Master exactly means.
God is far away — just a word, we have never experienced him. The Master, or guru, functions as a midway station. God is superhuman, far away, difficult to conceive of. The guru is human, and yet divine. The guru is like us, and yet not like us. He is a bridge between man and God; he is just at the middle point. Exactly, the guru balances existence. The disciple is man; the God is not man; the guru is both. On one side, he belongs to humanity; on another side, he belongs to God. One of his hands is with the humanity; his other hand is in the hands of God. He becomes the bridge. That’s why we call the guru a god-man or a man-god. That’s why Jesus goes on saying, again and again, “I am the son of God, and I am the son of man.” He is a guru, he is a Master.
It is very difficult for Christians to explain why he says, again and again, “I am the son of man.” It would have been more logical if he had said only one thing: “I am the son of God.” But why does he say, “I am the son of man”? If he is the son of God, then he is no longer part of humanity; then he is as far away as God himself. Then what is the point of his coming to the world? It is meaningless. He had to become the son of man; only then does he relate to us. Then he is a relative, then he is a brother, then he is part of our family.
That is the mystery of the guru. The guru is more mysterious than God. God is simple. Man is simple. The guru is very mysterious — because paradoxes meet in him, contradictions meet in him. The guru is a meeting place of man and God, a crossroads, a SANGAMA, a meeting of the two rivers, of two different dimensions.
The seeker is ignorance; God is knowing, wisdom. The seeker is darkness; God is light. The guru is a twilight. In India we pray at the time of twilight. The Sanskrit word for twilight is SANDHYA, and by and by it became synonymous with prayer. Twilight is prayer, the moment to pray. Twilight is representative of the guru. In India the sayings of the saints are called SANDHYA BHASHA, “the language of the twilight.” They speak in metaphors which belong to two worlds: to the human and to the divine.
There is a story about Kabir that when he arrived home and faced God, he was very much puzzled because the guru was standing there with God. He was very much puzzled about whom he should bow down to first, the priority — to God, or to the guru? And then he touched the feet of the guru and said, “Because without you, I would have never known God. So you come first. Through you I have known; so you come first. God can wait, because without you there was no God for me. It is only through you he has become a reality. I bow down to you.”
“KABIR SAYS: ‘THE GURU IS GREAT BEYOND WORDS, AND GREAT IS THE GOOD FORTUNE OF THE DISCIPLE.”‘ There are millions of people; very few become seekers. There are thousands of seekers; very few become disciples. To become a disciple is a rare privilege because only by becoming a disciple does one become connected, linked, with a Master. Then your destiny is not alone; then your destiny is linked with a Master.
People come to me and they say, “We don’t want to take sannyas. Won’t you help us?” I say, “I will help you, but you will not be able to receive it. My help will not be of much use, because you will not be there to receive it.” By becoming a sannyasin, you become “response-able.”
And the word “responsible” I use in the literal sense: “response-ability.” By becoming a sannyasin, you become response-able towards me, you become receptive towards me, your heart opens, you can trust me, and you become vulnerable. And then, only then, I can shower on you and I can lead you to the unknown — the land where there is no moon and no sun and no day and no night, and the land where there is no space and no time, and the land where you will be flying without wings and you will be seeing without eyes, and the land where nectar is flowing but no mouth is needed to drink of it.
That is possible only if you have taken the jump of disciplehood. Yes, blessed is the man who is courageous enough to become a disciple. It needs courage, it needs guts, it needs tremendous willpower, to surrender. Never think for a single moment that it is weaklings who surrender. Never. Weaklings cannot surrender. Cowards cannot surrender. It is only very, very strong people who can surrender. Surrender is possible only if you are very much grounded, centered: you know that you can surrender and yet you will not disappear into the surrender. You know that you can surrender and yet surrender is going to bring freedom to you.
Source – Osho Book “Ecstasy – The Forgotten Language”