Just minutes ago I was looking at your questions.

It saddens me to know that India’s intelligence has fallen into such a muddy mire that it can’t even ask questions. And the kind of questions it asks are rotten; they stink.

If you want, I will answer. But then brace your hearts. If you are hit, don’t be disturbed. And not a word should be edited out from what I say, not a word should be added to what I say, so that your reality is revealed not only in front of India but in front of the whole world. If even asking questions is so difficult, there is not much hope that you will understand the answers.

But I will try. Now start.

Osho,
Which is the best country in the world? And which do you believe to be the worst country?

India is both – because I am here, and you are also here. India has touched the heights of consciousness, and now I also see you in the gutters. And you have become so accustomed to the gutters that you have turned them into temples. You don’t even want to get out of them.

When the revolution happened in France, there was a central prison there, the Bastille, where only prisoners sentenced for a life term were kept. Their handcuffs and fetters were only broken after they had died. Once their handcuffs and fetters were locked onto them, the keys were thrown down a well. Thousands of heavily chained prisoners had been living in the dark cells of the Bastille. When the revolution happened the idea naturally came in the revolutionaries’ minds to free these prisoners; that this should be their first act because these prisoners had suffered the most.

They broke down the gates of the Bastille, but the prisoners of the Bastille were not ready to leave the prison – because someone had been there for sixty years, someone for fifty years, with no responsibility, with food at fixed times, even if it was rubbish. And after such a long time those fetters had become part of their bodies.