On Devotion

Beloved Master,
    What is the path of devotion and does it have a place in your vision of the rebel?

Rafia, 
   Devotion is not a path. You don't have to travel it. DEVOTION IS A WAY OF MERGING AND MELTING INTO EXISTENCE. It is not a pilgrimage; it is simply losing all the boundaries that divide you from existence -- IT IS A LOVE AFFAIR.

    Love is not a path. LOVE IS A MERGER WITH AN INDIVIDUAL, A DEEP INTIMACY OF TWO HEARTS -- so deep that the two hearts start dancing in the same harmony. Although the hearts are two, the harmony is one, the music is one, the dance is one.

    What love is between individuals, DEVOTION IS BETWEEN ONE REBEL AND THE WHOLE EXISTENCE. He dances in the waves of the ocean, he dances in the dancing trees in the sun, he dances with the stars. His heart responds to the fragrance of the flowers, to the song of the birds, to the silences of the night.

    Devotion is not a path. DEVOTION IS THE DEATH OF THE PERSONALITY. That which is mortal in you, you drop of your own accord -- AND ONLY THE IMMORTAL REMAINS, the eternal remains, the deathless remains. And naturally the deathless cannot be separate from the existence -- which is deathless, which is always ongoing, knows no beginning, no end.

    DEVOTION IS THE HIGHEST FORM OF LOVE.

    It is possible you may love one person, and love becomes so deep that SLOWLY SLOWLY THE VERY QUALITY OF LOVE CHANGES INTO DEVOTION. Then that person becomes only a window for you to take a jump into existence. That is the situation of the Master, as far as the rebel is concerned.

    For my people I AM NOT A SAVIOR, I AM NOT A MESSIAH -- I am just a door, a bridge to pass on into the infinite....

    That's what a Master is, for a rebel. That's what love is, for a rebel. FOR A REBEL, LOVE AND MASTER ARE SYNONYMOUS. When his love becomes so deep with the Master that he cannot think of himself as separate in any way, love has transformed itself into a new height. That height has been known as devotion.

    Devotion is not a path, Rafia. DEVOTION IS ONLY A LOVE AFFAIR, PURIFIED TO ITS ULTIMATE STATE. Then whomsoever you love becomes a door, a bridge to the universal organic unity, the experience of your small identity dissolving in the ocean just like a dewdrop slipping from a lotus leaf.

OSHO
The Rebel
Ch #20: The rebel has no path
pm in Chuang Tzu Auditorium