Editing Rajneesh (section)

== Teachings ==
Rajneesh's teachings, delivered through his discourses, were not presented in an academic setting, but interspersed with jokes.<ref name="JMF1-2">{{harvnb|Fox|2002|pp=1–2}}</ref><ref name="BM1">{{harvnb|Mullan|1983|p=1}}</ref> The emphasis was not static but changed over time: Rajneesh revelled in paradox and contradiction, making his work difficult to summarise.<ref name="JMF2">{{harvnb|Fox|2002|p=1}}</ref> He delighted in engaging in behaviour that seemed entirely at odds with traditional images of enlightened individuals; his early lectures in particular were famous for their humour and their refusal to take anything seriously.<ref name="JMF6" /><ref name="HBU-ZTB169" /> All such behaviour, however capricious and difficult to accept, was explained as "a technique for transformation" to push people "beyond the mind".<ref name="JMF6" />

He spoke on major spiritual traditions including [[Jainism]], [[Hinduism]], [[Hassidism]], [[Tantrism]], [[Taoism]], [[Sikhism]], [[Sufism]], [[Christianity]], [[Buddhism]], on a variety of Eastern and Western mystics and on sacred scriptures such as the ''[[Upanishads]]'' and the ''[[Guru Granth Sahib]]''.<ref name="BM33" /> The sociologist Lewis F. Carter saw his ideas as rooted in Hindu [[advaita]], in which the human experiences of separateness, duality and temporality are held to be a kind of dance or play of cosmic consciousness in which everything is sacred, has absolute worth and is an end in itself.<ref name=Carter267>{{harvnb|Carter|1990|p=267}}</ref> While his contemporary [[Jiddu Krishnamurti]] did not approve of Rajneesh, there are clear similarities between their respective teachings.<ref name="JMF2"/>

Rajneesh also drew on a wide range of Western ideas.<ref name="BM33">{{harvnb|Mullan|1983|p=33}}</ref> His belief in the [[unity of opposites]] recalls [[Heraclitus]], while his description of man as a machine, condemned to the helpless acting out of unconscious, neurotic patterns, has much in common with [[Sigmund Freud]] and [[George Gurdjieff]].<ref name="JMF2"/><ref>{{harvnb|Prasad|1978|pp=14–17}}</ref> His vision of the "new man" transcending constraints of convention is reminiscent of [[Friedrich Nietzsche]]'s ''[[Beyond Good and Evil]]'';<ref name="CLFNR">{{harvnb|Carter|1987|p=}}, reprinted in {{harvnb|Aveling|1999|p=209}}</ref> his promotion of [[sexual liberation]] bears comparison to [[D. H. Lawrence]];<ref>{{harvnb|Carter|1990|p=50}}</ref> and his "dynamic" meditations owe a debt to [[Wilhelm Reich]].<ref name="Clarke433">{{harvnb|Clarke|2006|p=433}}</ref>

=== Ego and the mind ===
According to Rajneesh every human being is a ''[[Buddha]]'' with the capacity for [[Enlightenment in Buddhism|enlightenment]], capable of unconditional love and of responding rather than reacting to life, although the ego usually prevents this, identifying with social conditioning and creating false needs and conflicts and an illusory sense of identity that is nothing but a barrier of dreams.<ref name="JMF3">{{harvnb|Fox|2002|p=3}}</ref><ref name="HBU-ZTB171">{{harvnb|Urban|1996|p=171}}</ref><ref name=Wallis131>{{harvnb|Wallis|1986|p=}}, reprinted in {{harvnb|Aveling|1999|pp=130–133}}</ref> Otherwise man's innate being can flower in a move from the periphery to the centre.<ref name="JMF3"/><ref name=Wallis131 />

Rajneesh viewed the mind first and foremost as a mechanism for survival, replicating behavioural strategies that have proven successful.<ref name="JMF3"/><ref name="Wallis131" /> However, the mind's appeal to the past, he said, deprives human beings of the ability to live authentically in the present, causing them to repress genuine emotions and to shut themselves off from joyful experiences that arise naturally when embracing the present moment: "The mind has no inherent capacity for joy.{{nbsp}}[...] It only thinks about joy."<ref name=Wallis131 /><ref name="JMF3-4">{{harvnb|Fox|2002|pp=3–4}}</ref> The result is that people poison themselves with all manner of [[neurosis|neuroses]], [[jealousy|jealousies]], and insecurities.<ref name="JMF4" /> He argued that [[psychological repression]], often advocated by religious leaders, makes suppressed feelings re-emerge in another guise, and that sexual repression resulted in societies obsessed with sex.<ref name="JMF4">{{harvnb|Fox|2002|p=4}}</ref> Instead of suppressing, people should trust and accept themselves unconditionally.<ref name=Wallis131 /><ref name="JMF3-4" /> This should not merely be understood intellectually, as the mind could only assimilate it as one more piece of information: instead [[meditation]] was needed.<ref name="JMF4" />

=== Meditation ===
Rajneesh presented meditation not just as a practice, but as a state of awareness to be maintained in every moment, a total awareness that awakens the individual from the sleep of mechanical responses conditioned by beliefs and expectations.<ref name=Wallis131 /><ref name="JMF4" /> He employed Western [[psychotherapy]] in the preparatory stages of meditation to create awareness of mental and emotional patterns.<ref name="JMF5" />

He suggested more than a hundred meditation techniques in total.<ref name="JMF5" /><ref name="HBU-ZTB172" /> His own "active meditation" techniques are characterised by stages of physical activity leading to silence.<ref name="JMF5">{{harvnb|Fox|2002|p=5}}</ref> The most famous of these remains [[dynamic meditation]],<ref name="JMF5" /><ref name="HBU-ZTB172" /> which has been described as a kind of microcosm of his outlook.<ref name="HBU-ZTB172">{{harvnb|Urban|1996|p=172}}</ref> Performed with closed or blindfolded eyes, it comprises five stages, four of which are accompanied by music.<ref name="Gordon3-8">{{harvnb|Gordon|1987|pp=3–8}}</ref> First the meditator engages in ten minutes of rapid breathing through the nose.<ref name="Gordon3-8" /> The second ten minutes are for [[catharsis]]: "Let whatever is happening happen.{{nbsp}}[...] Laugh, shout, scream, jump, shake—whatever you feel to do, do it!"<ref name="JMF5" /><ref name="Gordon3-8" /> Next, for ten minutes one jumps up and down with arms raised, shouting "Hoo!" each time one lands on the flat of the feet.<ref name="Gordon3-8" /><ref name="MFLM35">{{harvnb|Osho|2004|p=35}}</ref> At the fourth, silent stage, the meditator stops moving suddenly and totally, remaining completely motionless for fifteen minutes, witnessing everything that is happening.<ref name="Gordon3-8" /><ref name="MFLM35" /> The last stage of the meditation consists of fifteen minutes of dancing and celebration.<ref name="Gordon3-8" /><ref name="MFLM35" />

Rajneesh developed other active meditation techniques, such as the [[Kundalini]] "shaking" meditation and the Nadabrahma "humming" meditation, which are less animated, although they also include physical activity of one sort or another.<ref name="JMF5" /> He also used to organise [[Gibberish]] sessions in which disciples were asked to just blabber meaningless sounds, which according to him clears out garbage from mind and relaxes it.<ref>{{Cite web |date=30 October 2010 |first=Chaitanya|last=Keerti|title=It's all gibberish|url=https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/speaking-tree/its-all-gibberish/articleshow/6836508.cms |access-date=1 May 2022 |website=The Times of India |language=en}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |title=OSHO Gibberish Meditation |url=https://www.osho.com/meditation/osho-active-meditations/osho-gibberish-meditation |access-date=1 May 2022 |website=OSHO – Transform Yourself through the Science of Meditation}}</ref> His later "meditative therapies" require sessions for several days, OSHO Mystic Rose comprising three hours of laughing every day for a week, three hours of weeping each day for a second week, and a third week with three hours of silent meditation.<ref name="TLS198">{{harvnb|Aveling|1994|p=198}}</ref> These processes of "witnessing" enable a "jump into awareness".<ref name="JMF5" /> Rajneesh believed such cathartic methods were necessary because it was difficult for modern people to just sit and enter meditation. Once these methods had provided a glimpse of meditation, then people would be able to use other methods without difficulty.{{citation needed|date=December 2016}}

=== ''Sannyas'' ===
Another key ingredient was his own presence as a [[Guru|master]]: "A Master shares his being with you, not his philosophy{{nbsp}}[...] He never does anything to the disciple."<ref name="JMF6">{{harvnb|Fox|2002|p=6}}</ref> The initiation he offered was another such device: "if your being can communicate with me, it becomes a communion{{nbsp}}[...] It is the highest form of communication possible: a transmission without words. Our beings merge. This is possible only if you become a disciple."<ref name="JMF6" /> Ultimately though, as an explicitly "self-parodying" guru, Rajneesh even deconstructed his own authority, declaring his teaching to be nothing more than a "game" or a joke.<ref name="HBU-ZTB169" /><ref name="HBU-ZTB170">{{harvnb|Urban|1996|p=170}}</ref> He emphasised that anything and everything could become an opportunity for meditation.<ref name="JMF6" />

=== Renunciation and the "New Man" ===
Rajneesh saw his "neo-sannyas" as a totally new form of spiritual discipline, or one that had once existed but since been forgotten.<ref name="Aveling94-86">{{harvnb|Aveling|1994|p=86}}</ref> He thought that the traditional Hindu [[sannyas]] had turned into a mere system of social renunciation and imitation.<ref name="Aveling94-86" /> He emphasised complete inner freedom and the responsibility to oneself, not demanding superficial behavioural changes, but a deeper, inner transformation.<ref name="Aveling94-86" /> Desires were to be accepted and surpassed rather than denied.<ref name="Aveling94-86" /> Once this inner flowering had taken place, desires such as that for sex would be left behind.<ref name="Aveling94-86" />

Rajneesh said that he was "the rich man's guru" and that material poverty was not a genuine spiritual value.<ref name="Gordon114">{{harvnb|Gordon|1987|p=114}}</ref> He had himself photographed wearing sumptuous clothing and hand-made watches<ref name="TOI3104">{{cite news|author=Neil Pate |date=3 January 2004 |url=http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/articleshow/403145.cms |title=Celluloid Rajneesh, quite a hit |work=The Times of India |access-date=11 July 2011 |url-status=unfit |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120429204538/http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/articleshow/403145.cms |archive-date=29 April 2012 }}</ref> and, while in [[Oregon]], drove a different [[Rolls-Royce (car)|Rolls-Royce]] each day – his followers reportedly wanted to buy him 365 of them, one for each day of the year.<ref name="Hindu">Ranjit Lal, (16 May 2004). [https://web.archive.org/web/20040907145444/http://www.hindu.com/mag/2004/05/16/stories/2004051600330800.htm A hundred years of solitude]. ''The Hindu''. Retrieved 10 July 2011.</ref> Publicity shots of the Rolls-Royces were sent to the press.<ref name="Gordon114" /><ref name="FF1-47">{{harvnb|FitzGerald|1986a|p=47}}</ref> They may have reflected both his advocacy of wealth and his desire to provoke American sensibilities, much as he had enjoyed offending Indian sensibilities earlier.<ref name="Gordon114" /><ref name=Lewis129>{{harvnb|Goldman|2004|p=129}}</ref>

Rajneesh aimed to create a "new man" combining the spirituality of [[Gautama Buddha]] with the zest for life embodied by [[Nikos Kazantzakis]]' ''[[Zorba the Greek]]'': "He should be as accurate and objective as a scientist{{nbsp}}[...] as sensitive, as full of heart, as a poet{{nbsp}}[...] [and as] rooted deep down in his being as the mystic."<ref name="JMF6" /><ref name="HBU-ZTB175">{{harvnb|Urban|1996|p=175}}</ref> His term the ''new man'' applied to men and women equally, whose roles he saw as complementary; most of his movement's leadership positions were held by women.<ref name="JMF7">{{harvnb|Fox|2002|p=7}}</ref> This new man, "Zorba the Buddha", should reject neither science nor spirituality but embrace both.<ref name="JMF6" /> Rajneesh believed humanity was threatened with extinction due to over-population, impending [[nuclear holocaust]] and diseases such as AIDS, and thought many of society's ills could be remedied by scientific means.<ref name="JMF6" /> The new man would no longer be trapped in institutions such as family, marriage, political ideologies and religions.<ref name="HBU-ZTB169" /><ref name="JMF7"/> In this respect Rajneesh is similar to other counter-culture gurus, and perhaps even certain [[Postmodernism|postmodern]] and [[Deconstructionism|deconstructional]] thinkers.<ref name="HBU-ZTB169">{{harvnb|Urban|1996|p=169}}</ref> Rajneesh said that the new man had to be "utterly ambitionless", as opposed to a life that depended on ambition. The new man, he said, "is not necessarily the better man. He will be livelier. He will be more joyous. He will be more alert. But who knows whether he will be better or not? As far as politicians are concerned, he will not be better, because he will not be a better soldier. He will not be ready to be a soldier at all. He will not be competitive, and the whole competitive economy will collapse."<ref name=":1">{{Cite book|last=Brecher|first=Max|url=https://ildspor.files.wordpress.com/2018/03/159239659-a-passage-to-america.pdf|title=A Passage to America: A Radically New Look at Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh and a Controversial American Commune|year=2013|pages=237, 238|access-date=30 April 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190430142314/https://ildspor.files.wordpress.com/2018/03/159239659-a-passage-to-america.pdf|archive-date=30 April 2019|url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{Cite book|title=Theologica Mystica. Discourses on the treatise of st Dionysius|last=Rajneesh|first=Bhagwan Shree|publisher=Rajneesh Foundation International|year=1983|isbn=0-88050-655-5|location=Rajneeshpuram, Oregon, USA|pages=Chapter 2}}</ref>

==="Heart to heart communion"===
In April 1981, Rajneesh had sent a message that he was entering the ultimate stage of his work, and would now speak only through silence.<ref name=":6" /><ref>{{Cite book|last=Joshi|first=Vasant|title=The Luminous Rebel|publisher=Wisdom Tree|year=2010|isbn=978-81-8328-154-6|location=India|pages=150–151|language=English}}</ref> On 1 May 1981, Rajneesh stopped speaking publicly and entered a phase of "silent heart to heart communion".<ref>{{Cite book|last=Appleton|first=Sue|title=Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh the Most Dangerous Man since Jesus Christ|publisher=Rebel Publishing House Gmbh|year=1987|isbn=3-89338-001-9|location=West Germany|pages=85}}</ref><ref>{{Cite book|last=Joshi|first=Vasant|title=OSHO The Luminous Rebel|publisher=Wisdom Tree|year=2010|isbn=978-81-8328-154-6|location=India|pages=150|language=English}}</ref>

Rajneesh stated in the first talk he gave after ending three years of public silence on 30 October 1984, that he had gone into silence partly to put off those who were only intellectually following him.<ref>{{Cite book|title=The Rajneesh Bible|date=c. 1985|publisher=Rajneesh Foundational International|isbn=0880502002|location=Rajneeshpuram, Or., U.S.A.|oclc=11813128}}</ref><ref name=":8">{{Cite book|last=Joshi|first=Vasant|title=OSHO The Luminous Rebel|publisher=Wisdom Tree|year=2010|isbn=978-81-8328-154-6|location=India|pages=170–171|language=English}}</ref>

{{blockquote|First, my silence was not because I have said everything. My silence was because I wanted to drop those people who were hanging around my words. I wanted people who can be with me even if I am silent. I sorted out all those people without any trouble. They simply dropped out.

Three years was enough time. And when I saw all those people – and they were not many, but they were hanging around my words. I don't want people to just believe in my words; I want people to live my silence. In these three years it was a great time to be silent with my people, and to see their courage and their love in remaining with a man who perhaps may never speak again. I wanted people who can be with me even if I am silent.<ref name=":8"/>}}

=== Rajneesh's "Ten Commandments" ===
In his early days as Acharya Rajneesh, a correspondent once asked for his "[[Ten Commandments]]". In reply, Rajneesh said that it was a difficult matter because he was against any kind of commandment, but "just for fun", set out the following:

#Never obey anyone's command unless it is coming from within you also.
#There is no God other than life itself.
#Truth is within you, do not search for it elsewhere.
#Love is prayer.
#To become a nothingness is the door to truth. Nothingness itself is the means, the goal and attainment.
#Life is now and here.
#Live wakefully.
#Do not swim – float.
#Die each moment so that you can be new each moment.
#Do not search. That which is, is. Stop and see.

He underlined numbers 3, 7, 9 and 10. The ideas expressed in these commandments have remained constant [[leitmotif]]s in his movement.<ref name=10c>{{harvnb|Goldman|2004|pp=128–129}}</ref>