As many of you know, Osho never “wrote” a book … but he was a prolific author with nearly 800 books to his credit because nearly all his discourses have been converted into books. He spoke on Krishna at Manali in 1970 and the book that was published from that discourse is “Krishna – the Man and his Philosophy”. I keep re-reading this book because no one else can explain Krishna or Draupadi the way Osho does. Well, no one can explain any of the Masters or Mystics that came before him and lived during his times better than Osho. That’s the truth !
Today I am very disturbed. I made the mistake of seeing the mob lynch that old sanyasi in Palghar. I didn’t see the whole video but just saw the blow from one of the “lathis” hit the 70 year old man and the rest of the day was just a blur. I picked up “Krishna – the Man and his Philosophy” and randomly started reading whatever I found on a given page after flipping a few pages. I came upon this fable that Osho shared while replying to a question on Krishna’s birth and death and why no records are kept.
“…A frog from the ocean visited his friend living in a small well. The well-frog wanted to know what the ocean was like. The visiting frog said it was much too big to be known from such a small space as a well.
The well frog jumped halfway across the well and said, “Is your ocean this big?” The other frog said, “Excuse me, it is impossible to measure the vastness of the ocean by the tiny yardstick of a well.” Then the well-frog took a bigger jump, jumping from one end of the well to the other, and said, “This large?” But when the visiting frog shook his head his friend grew angry and said, “You seem to be crazy. No place on the whole earth can be bigger than my well. Yet I will try another way to know how large your ocean is.”
And then he made a round of the whole well and said, “It cannot be more than this.” But he still failed to convince the visitor who said again, “In comparison with the ocean this well is nowhere; it is too small to be a measure of the ocean.” The well-frog lost his temper and said to his visitor, “Get out of here! I cannot stand this nonsense. Have you ever seen anything bigger than this well? Even the sky, which is said to be the largest space, is only as big as this well, no bigger. I have always watched it from here; it is no more than the well.”
We all live in the well of time. Here everything appears and disappears, comes and goes. Here everything is fragmented something has become the past, something is future, and in between the past and future there is a tiny movement known as the present, which goes as soon as it comes. And we want to know who happened in what moment. In some moment we experience ourselves imprisoned in some well and we want to know that moment and that well.
No, Jesus, Buddha, Mahavira and Krishna cannot be imprisoned in a moment. We do try to imprison them so, because we are attached to our limitations, to our fragments. …..”
Beautiful story and a deep lesson. Thank you, Master.