From Ignorance to Innocence

CHAPTER 1

Pseudo-religion: the stick-on soul
29 November 1984 pm in Lao Tzu Grove

Question 1

OSHO,

WHY IS HUMANITY TODAY BECOMING MORE AND MORE MISERABLE?
THE cause is very simple, perhaps too simple. It is very close, very obvious, and this is the reason
why most of the people go on missing seeing it. When something is very obvious you start taking it
for granted. When something is too close to your eyes you cannot see it. For seeing, some distance
is needed.

So the first thing I would like you to remember is that it is not only today that humanity is miserable.
It has always been miserable.

Misery has almost become our second nature. We have lived in it for thousands of years. That
closeness does not allow us to see it; otherwise it is so obvious.
But to see the obvious you need a child’s vision.

And we are all carrying thousands of years in our eyes. Our eyes are old; they cannot see afresh.
They have already accepted things, and forgotten that those things are the very cause of misery.
The religious prophets, the political leaders, the moral lawgivers – you have respected them, not
even suspecting that they are the cause of your misery. How can you suspect them? Those people
have served humanity, sacrificed themselves for humanity. You worship them; you cannot relate
them to your misery.

The causes of misery are camouflaged behind beautiful words, holy scriptures, spiritual sermons.
It happened when I was a student, the first prime minister of India came to visit the city. In Jabalpur,
just in the middle of the city flows all the dirt of the city. The city is very big – ten times bigger than
Portland – and just in the middle of the city, the whole dirt flows like a river. There is a bridge over it,
and to pass that bridge is to know something about hell. I have never seen any place so stinking.

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