Today's urgency

[Guest guest]

Osho, for some time I have been feeling that you are in a hurry. What is that

hurry and why? I am not able to understand. ... The question also arises whether

the purpose for which you had to take birth has been fulfilled.

 

I am in hurry for three reasons: first, no matter how much time one has, one

will always find it insufficient. Always, any amount of time and energy would be

insufficient -- because the work is as big as the sea, and the energy and the

time one has are like the hollow of one's palm. Even if one is a Buddha or a

Mahavira, a Krishna or a Christ, the effort cannot be greater than the hollow of

the palm, and the expanse of the work is as vast as the sea.

 

This is only ordinary haste, which is usual. But there is haste for another

reason too. Some time periods move slowly so that the time appears not to be

moving at all. As we look to our historical past, we will find that time used to

move very slowly. Then there are some eras that move fast, in which everything

seems to be moving at a high speed. Today we are in such a fast-moving era.

Everything is moving at a high speed, and nothing seems to remain steady or

stable. If religion continues to move at its ancient slow speed, it will lag

behind and die.

 

In the old days, even science moved slowly. For ten thousand years the bullock

cart remained the same. The bullock cart remained a bullock cart and the

blacksmith used the same old tools. Everything moved as slowly as a river moving

on non-sloping plains. You would not know at all that anything was moving. Banks

of such rivers still remain here and there.

 

In such times, religion also moved slowly. There was a sort of harmony in that

movement, and science and religion both were in step with each other. But now

religion moves slowly while science and other things are moving at a faster

pace. Given these conditions, if religion lags behind and walks hesitantly, then

it is no wonder people are not able to keep in step with it. For this reason

also there is hurry.

 

Looking at the speed at which the world's knowledge about matter is increasing

and the speed at which science is making great strides, religion should actually

remain somewhat ahead of science and achieve a higher speed -- because whenever

religion lags behind science it causes great harm. Religion should remain a

little ahead to guide, because an ideal must always remain a little ahead;

otherwise the ideal becomes meaningless. The ideal should always be ahead of

achievement and should remain beyond it. This is the fundamental difference

between these two.

 

If we look back at the era of Ram, religion was always ahead of him. If we look

to the modern era, man is always ahead of religion. Nowadays only that person

can become religious who is very backward. There is a reason for this: it is

only because such a person alone is able to keep in step with religion. Today,

the more progressive a person is, the farther he is from religion, or else his

relationship with religion will remain only formal -- will be just for show. So

religion must remain in the forefront.

 

If we look back to the time of Buddha or Mahavira, it will be very surprising to

know that those who had the best minds in their times were religious. But in our

civilization, if we look to the modern religious man, he has a lesser

intelligence. In those days, those who were the leaders, those who had reached

the top, were religious people. And now, those who are rustic, rural and

backward are religious. The more intelligent minds of our times are not

religious. This means that religion is not able to march ahead of man. For that

reason also I am in hurry.

 

Another reason for being in a hurry is that these are times of emergency, of

crisis.

 

For example, when you are going to a hospital, your footsteps have a faster pace

than when you are going to your shop. The speed you use to go to a hospital is

that of an emergency or a crisis. Today, the state of things is almost as if

some religion is not able to create and put forth a strong vigorous movement it

is possible that the entire humanity may be annihilated.

 

It is a time of emergency, like that of being admitted to a hospital. It is

possible that the patient may die before reaching the hospital or before any

medicine can be administered or by the time the disease is diagnosed, but the

ill effects of this prevalent condition are not affecting any religious

thinkers. Instead, they are affecting the younger generations of the entire

world, and they have hit the younger generations of the developed nations the

hardest.

 

If American parents tell a son to study for ten years in a university so that he

may get a good job, the son retorts by asking whether there is a guarantee that

he will live for ten years. The parents do not have the answer. In America,

there is little trust in tomorrow. Tomorrow cannot be trusted; it is not certain

whether there will even be a tomorrow. Therefore, there is a desire to enjoy

today as much and as fast as one can.

 

This is not accidental. It is like a patient who is lying on his deathbed and

may die any moment. The whole humanity is becoming like that. There is a hurry,

because if the diagnosis is slow there can be no quick remedy. Therefore, I am

in a hurry that whatever is to be done should be done fast.

 

Osho, Dimensions Beyond the Known, Chapter 4