Читать книгу OSHO: The Buddha for the Future - Maneesha James - Страница 12

Death should be welcomed. It is one of the greatest events of life, so accept it, rejoice in it, delight in it…. Go on dancing ecstatically! You may never attain to that deep meditation again. ~ Osho

As a sannyasin, my first experience of death is a far cry from death as I’ve encountered it in my nursing days. I’ve seen elderly people die after a chronic illness and young people dying from seemingly unnecessary accidents.

Once a sailor was admitted to the ward where I was on night duty, at three in the morning. A big-bodied, otherwise healthy looking man of perhaps thirty, he was badly bruised and unconscious after being involved in a brawl, and he died some hours later. My job was to “lay him out”: removing the catheter drainage and the intravenous tubing; then washing his body, placing a white gown on him, and bandaging his jaw closed before rigor mortis set in. Working in the Emergency Department—on the night of my eighteenth birthday, as it happened—I had to lay out a month-old baby that had been battered to death. In both instances, in fact in any involvement with death as a nurse, as was recommended to us I managed to create a barrier between my feelings and what needed to be done. Death had first really touched me when Scampy, the family dog with whom I had grown up, was run over—an event that catapulted me into days of all-consuming, grief-stricken crying. I experienced for the first time what it is to feel broken-hearted…how, literally, the heart falls apart.

In the ashram, in March of 1976 Vipassana, a lively, outgoing and Dutch sannyasin in her mid-twenties, has a series of migraines. Tests are carried out and she is diagnosed as having a brain tumor. (Apparently there is a familial tendency toward cerebral tumors; some years later her sister dies with the same illness.)

During the days she spends in the hospital on life-support, sannyasins are with Vipassana constantly. A twenty-four-hour-a-day rota of ashram doctors and nurses supplements the hospital’s own nursing and medical staff. Her close friends come to sit with her; although she is unconscious we want to surround her with loving energy. However much we realize that we cannot reverse events or forestall the inevitable, it is a way of dealing with our collective shock.

I only realize now with Vipassana’s impending death that, unconsciously, I had presumed that being with Osho made us immune to such disasters. Life is so vitally evident in our community that death just isn’t part of the picture. Yet here it is.

Now that death is staring me in the face, I realize I view it as a “mistake”: it means something has gone wrong. A sinister force, an unwelcome hand has suddenly descended in our midst to pluck one of us out of the stream of life. But others are experiencing something quite different.

One sannyasin, present by her bedside in the preceding days, recalls: “I looked at her as she was dying and suddenly I felt that she wasn’t there anymore. It was just a body there—and the body meant nothing. When we left the hospital and began walking back to the ashram, suddenly we found that we were singing! And I thought, ‘Now wait a minute—Vipassana is dying and I’m not supposed to be singing.’ But from then on I didn’t feel sad. I just felt it was wonderful, and that she was getting the best send-off that anyone of us could have.”

Someone else comments, “All this week I’ve accepted that Vipassana is leaving her body. For me it is Vipassana’s body—it isn’t Vipassana. Vipassana is something to do with sunlight and air.” Many others express gratitude—a sudden recognition of how amazing is the gift of life. Some remain numb from the shock for days; others feel a mixture of changing emotions.

One of Vipassana’s friends, distraught, tells Osho how impotent Vipassana’s dying makes him feel. This state of feeling helpless is beautiful and can be used, Osho tells him gently. Out of that sense of helplessness arises real prayer and the recognition that all our illusions of control over life are nothing but a facade of power, born of the ego. The impending death of someone very intimate to us reminds us of our own approaching death, Osho adds, but the life that ends is not the real life. If we simply feel sorry for Vipassana we will be wasting a great opportunity. For her part, Vipassana achieved all she could in this life. He gave her the name, Vipassana—which means “awareness of the breath”—because he recognized when she first came to him that something was not right with her breathing.

By lingering on the threshold of death, Vipassana has allowed us to go through our own private doubts and fears. She is, as Osho puts it, a door for us through which we all at some stage will have to pass:

In her death, try to learn how to die. In her death, let your death also happen. Make it an opportunity to move and see what death is so you can have some taste of it, some flavor of it.

Death should be welcomed. It is one of the greatest events of life, so accept it, rejoice in it, delight in it. But before she dies, Vipassana is giving you the opportunity to be cleansed and pure and meditative. So when she leaves the body, you can all delight in that phenomenon, mm? I would like you all to go dancing around her body on the fire, mm? till she is reduced to ashes. Go on dancing ecstatically! You may never attain to that deep meditation again.

As there is no chance of recovery, before the week’s end—on Friday, March 12th—Vipassana is removed from the life-support system. Her brother, Viyogi, is holding his sister’s hand in her last few moments of life. The life-support is switched off. A recording of Osho’s recent discourse about Jesus’ crucifixion and pending death is playing at her bedside and, as it draws to a close, Vipassana’s breathing wavers. Then, as Osho’s voice says, “Enough for today?” the recording ends and Vipassana breathes out for the last time.

Viyogi describes an onrush of energy passing from the body of his sister to him, filling him with such vibrancy that his whole body literally shakes for over half an hour. He is possessed with crying, then with shouting and laughter: a totally orgasmic experience, he says, unlike anything he has ever known. In those moments he experiences the reality of Osho’s words—that death is the ultimate orgasm, and that life is just a prelude to the final crescendo and its release that we know as death.

*

Vipassana’s body is brought to the ashram, placed in Radha meditation hall, and decked with garlands of flowers. We then gather in Chuang Tzu Auditorium where Osho is to speak to us. Unconsciously I anticipate him also being shaken by Vipassana’s death, so I feel some trepidation when we gather to listen to him talk in Chuang Tzu Auditorium.

He enters, his hands folded in namaste, as imperturbable and gracious as always. Sitting down, he gazes over the sea of faces upturned to him and gently begins: “I know your hearts are heavy, sad—that’s natural. These moments are rare. In these moments you can sink very deep; you can also soar very high. The energy is the same—it depends on how you use it, how you transform it.”

He talks of how death is the only phenomenon left uncorrupted by man; it remains too elusive, unknowable. Hence it provides an opportunity to see that our lives feel meaningless, to see that in death we are all equal, that this life is not our home but an overnight’s stay. Vipassana has died beautifully, accepting death, unafraid, he comments. She has attained to something of which we should be jealous! Then he adds, “Remember, not only you are here, she is also here. I would like to tell a joke for her. It is not for you!”—at which we all burst out laughing.

The gist of the joke is about a séance at which a little boy is present. He asks to speak to his grandfather and, after the medium makes the appropriate passes and says that his grandfather is now present, the little boy pipes up, “What are you doing here, grandpa? You ain’t dead yet!”

“That’s I would like to say to Vipassana,” Osho says, chuckling. “What are you doing here, Vipassana? You aren’t dead yet!”

The entire discourse is devoted to Vipassana, with instructions on how we can give her a farewell befitting her and us:

When you go to give her the send-off, give the send-off as one gives to somebody who is departing on a long journey—not to a dead person, to an alive person. Let this be a send-off of dancing, celebration, festivity. She was a musician and a dancer, and she would love it.

When fire starts consuming her body, dance as much as you can around her funeral pyre. Let your whole energy become a dance. Dance to orgasm. Forget yourself completely. And give this send-off for her as if she were alive. She is alive—and if you really dance, many of you will feel her alive presence. A few of you—if you really celebrate the moment—will be able to see, actually be able to see her …. And for this moment, deep clarity is needed so that you can see the body burning on the funeral pyre, and you can also see the spirit moving away… further away… to the other shore.

If you dance, and happily, gracefully sing… it will be difficult I know, but not as difficult as you think. But once you start, the energy starts melting and soon you will see you are dancing and the sadness has disappeared and your eyes are glistening with a new light—and you will be able to realize something. I am giving you a particular meditation for this night….

If you are happy you help the other person to move easily into the unknown. If you are sad it becomes difficult for the other to move away. Your sadness becomes heavy on the other person…. Be happy! And let the other person also feel that she is remembered, that she is loved, that she is accepted, and that she is leaving happiness behind her, gladness behind her. In that moment it is easier for the other to move…very easy to move. Then there is no repentance and one doesn’t want to cling.

All have to go—man, woman, all. In India, women are not allowed but I would like everybody to go. Death is for all. Even small sannyasins, kids—if they want to go, take them with you. Let them also face the truth, let them also experience. Let them also start thinking along the lines that even death is not bad, that even death is beautiful, so that they can accept it.

… I would not only like to teach you how to live—I would also like to teach you how to die. If you can give a beautiful farewell to Vipassana something about death will settle deep within you. You will start accepting it and you will know deep down in your heart that death is also beautiful….

Go happily, with deep prayer. If you cry, cry, but with deep happiness. If tears come, let them, but let them be tears of prayer, love, gratitude. Let them be tears of celebration….

Vipassana is going to be there. It is good for her that she can see her body being burned and turned dust into dust. It is good for her. It is good for you, because the same is going to happen to your body also. Let it be a great meditation.

Osho concludes, “Now I will not delay you anymore. She has to go a long way—beyond the stars. For ten minutes sit in silence with me, and then you go.”

Our silence is complete—a silence that is not somber or funereal. I can hear no tears, no sobs of anguish. Instead there’s a very deep calmness and a feeling of our having become one with Osho, with each other, and with Vipassana. Then singly or in twos or threes we file out of Chuang Tzu Auditorium and back to Radha Hall, where Vipassana’s body lies.

Magically a flute, a tambourine, a guitar, and castanets materialize, and spontaneously the music and our dance begin. The musicians are mingled with the procession, some sannyasins bearing Vipassana’s garlanded body as it makes its way down to the ghats by the river where we will celebrate the burning. A car draws alongside the procession at one point to ask whose wedding we are celebrating!

Vipassana’s body is gently lowered into the specially designated area, and wood lovingly placed over it. The pyre, set alight by her brother Viyogi, burns vigorously, and our dancing becomes even more animated so that we become, as one sannyasin puts it, “just a mass of orange flames and figures.”

Orange-robed, as is everyone else, dancing wildly over the flames while my voice joins in to the singing, I feel like a pagan. The thought arises: “If only my mother could see me now!” and I chuckle inwardly at how aghast she would be and, at the same time, there’s the feeling of how beautiful and how right our celebration is.

Watching, I recall Osho explaining just before we left to bring Vipassana here:

The Hindu way of burning the body is very significant. It is significant for the soul that had departed because the soul can see the body being burned, reduced to ashes. It helps detachment; it gives a last shattering, a last hammering shock, because when a person dies it takes a few hours for him to recognize that he is dead. And if the body is buried underground—as for Christians and Mohammedans—then it takes many days for the person to recognize that he is dead.

That evening I feel so much affection for us as a group. It is as if we have taken a giant quantum leap forward in understanding and in trust. We’ve passed together through a new experience, energy that might have fed sadness and loss becoming instead a tumultuous expression of love and gratitude.

As Osho says, “Life is beautiful … has its own blessings. Death has its own blessings too. Much flowers in life, but much flowers in death also, and something has flowered in Vipassana. Remember, all that God gives us has to be taken in deep gratefulness—even death—only then you become religious.”

*

In October of 1979 Devateerth Bharti (Osho’s father “Dadaji”) is admitted to a local hospital with heart failure, and on three occasions Osho visits him there. On the last visit Osho realizes his father is going to die, because—as often happens to one approaching death—Devateerth appears to be miraculously much better and talks of coming home that night. Osho tells us later that, realizing that his father is close to death, he will be going home that night but to his real home, “beyond the stars.” Those of us who are in the grounds of the ashram at the time see Osho’s car leave for the hospital at 3:30 in the afternoon, to return perhaps half an hour later. On the evening of October 18th, just as darshan draws to a close, the news reaches us that, having attained enlightenment that morning, Devateerth has left his body.

Interviewed just two months earlier for Sannyas Magazine, he and Osho’s mother, Saraswati, are asked how they feel to be the parents of Osho. Devateerth replies, “It feels very blissful… It feels like there is nothing to say about it: just whatever is, is beautiful.” Saraswati is a little more verbose in response to the interviewer’s questions about when they first realized that their son was enlightened and how they had regarded Osho when he was younger. Devateerth simply adds, “I am here, so much now and here, that I don’t remember anything, and I don’t worry about the future, but also the past doesn’t come to the mind.”

Osho’s parents and close members of the family had moved into the ashram and lived in Francis House for some time. Devateerth soon became known for his love of kirtan—the Indian music that is played and sung among the Indians, who often met in his house to perform. He also became a familiar figure around the grounds of the ashram and Koregaon Park, walking statuesquely, cane in hand. Of course we know he is Osho’s father—not least because he has a striking resemblance to Osho—but he obviously regards himself as just one of us and, later, simply as one of Osho’s disciples.

*

The following day, Osho tells us: “Yesterday I went to see [my father]: I was immensely happy that now he could die a right death. He was no more concerned with the body. Yesterday, early in the morning, at three o’clock, he attained his first glimpse of the eternal—and immediately he became aware that he was going to die. This was the first time he had called me to come…because he was certain he was going to die. He wanted to say goodbye, and he said it beautifully—with no tears in the eyes, with no longing for life anymore.”

Devateerth’s body is brought to Buddha Hall, and all of us who live in and around the ashram flock there to celebrate. His wife and sons make their way to where his body lies on the podium. They sit next to him, gently touching and caressing his body for the last time. Osho arrives, walks up the steps to the podium and places a garland of flowers on his father’s chest and a hand on his head. His other hand goes to that of his mother, who is clearly grief-stricken.

As with Vipassana’s, Devateerth’s body is carried in a procession to the ghats to be burned; we are now an even larger group who sing and dance our tribute of love to Devateerth. The following day in discourse Osho answers a question by a sannyasin: she says she feels moved by Devateerth’s becoming enlightened; it brings home to her that enlightenment really is available to all of us.

Osho replies that that is the beauty of being in a commune:

You know this man, he is just like you. You have been drinking tea with him, gossiping with him, reading the same newspaper, listening to the same radio, looking at the same TV, you have been to the same movie. You know him, inside and out; he was just like you. If he can become a Buddha, then why not you? In fact his becoming a Buddha becomes the greatest uplifting force in your life…Many people with whom you were working will one day become buddhas.

My effort here is to help you all to live like buddhas and die like buddhas. The death of a Buddha is both! It is not a death, because life is eternal. Life does not begin with birth and does not end with death. Millions of times you have been born and died; they are all small episodes in the eternal pilgrimage. But because you are unconscious you cannot see that which is beyond birth and death.

As you become conscious you can see your original face. He saw his original face yesterday. He heard the one hand clapping, he heard the soundless sound. Hence it is not death: it is attaining life eternal. On the other hand it can be called a total death—total death in the sense that he will not be coming anymore. Rejoice!