Osho – Man remains a beggar unless he knows what the truth is. And the truth is only one. It is neither mine nor yours; it does not belong to anybody, to any religion, to any ideology, to any church, to any country, to any time. It is eternal, it is the very centre of the whole existence. It is also our centre, everyone’s centre. They are different on the circumference, we are all joined at the centre. As we start moving towards the centre we start moving towards oneness of being.
First the personality is lost. The personality is a very circumferential thing, a peripheral thing, cultivated, conditioned, taught; it is something imposed from the outside. And when personality disappears, individuality appears. Individuality remains for the whole journey between the circumference and the centre. Then you enter the centre even individuality disappears; you become universal.
To reach that centre is to be crowned, is to become an emperor. That’s what Jesus was talking about when he said ‘I am a king’ and ‘Blessed are the meek’ for theirs is the kingdom of god.’ But he was totally misunderstood. The woman emperors thought that he was trying to take power from their hands, that he was trying to make a political rebellion and hiding his political philosophy behind religious words. That’s why they conspired with the rabbis, with the Jews, otherwise they were not at all interested in whether he was the messiah or not. The rabbis were angry because he was saying ‘I am the messiah. I have come to deliver people from their misery.’
And he was right: every man who has attained to truth is a messiah, and the man who has attained to truth lives only to liberate people. His whole life is nothing but a sharing of his joy, he has nothing else to live for. All his desires have disappeared; he has no motivation of his own. As long as he lives and breathes he breathes for all, he lives for all.
He was saying absolutely the right thing. But the rabbis were angry because he was trying to possess their religion, he was trying to convert Jews into his followers. And the Romans were afraid because he was talking about a kingdom and a crowning and saying that the people who listened to him and followed him would inherit the earth. They thought he was a political person camouflaging his political philosophy with a religious ideology. Hence the Roman emperor and the rabbis conspired together to crucify Jesus.
But he was simply stating a fact: every man of truth is an emperor. He is certainly crowned, because he reaches the ultimate height of glory, splendour, freedom, blissfulness. That is the goal of sannyas too: to help you to become emperors, to help you to attain the kingdom of god, to help you to inherit the whole existence.
My sannyas is not for beggars, my sannyas is for emperors, those who really want to be crowned, those who really want to know the ultimate peak of bliss and benediction. It is possible, and it is possible for everyone, whosoever is ready to go on the inner pilgrimage, whosoever is ready first to risk his personality to attain individuality and then to risk even individuality to attain universality. He deserves to be crowned!
Source – Osho Book “The Golden Wind”