:: MAIN STORY ::

JESUS IS LOVE

Jesus is pure love. That's why he was crucified. He had to be crucified -- such pure love cannot be tolerated, such pure grace is impossible to bear; the very presence is intolerable because it hurts. The very presence of Jesus throws you in confusion, and the only way to protect yourself and defend yourself is to kill this man, destroy this man.
By destroying Jesus the people tried to live with Moses and law alone, and not be bothered by love. The day Jesus was crucified, it was nothing but an indication that the ordinary mind would like to live without love. Love was crucified, not Jesus. He is just symbolic.

There are many complications. Jews have always been puzzled about why this man Jesus influenced the whole world so much and he could not influence the Jews at all. Jews are great scholars, their rabbis are great pundits, and they have been trying to prove that Jesus did not say a single new word, that all that he said is written in Jewish scriptures. Then why has this man become the very axis of humanity? What happened? -- it seems unbelievable.

They are right in a way: Jesus has not said a single word that cannot be found in the sayings of old rabbis. No, he has not said a single new word. But that is not where he is unique, he is unique in the way he has said it -- not the word, but the way he has asserted it. In the Old Testament you come again and again across the expression: "The Lord hath said...." But that is not characteristic of Jesus. Whenever he says this, he says, "I say unto you..." -- not, "The Lord...." He is the Lord. The Old Testament says: "The Lord says this"; Jesus says, "I say unto you." The old rabbis stammer, Jesus speaks; the old rabbis have a borrowed glory, Jesus has his own. The old rabbis speak FROM authority; Jesus with authority -- and that is a great difference.

It is said that once the enemies of Jesus sent a man to catch hold of him and bring him to the temple. He was teaching near the temple and a crowd had gathered. The man went there to catch hold of him, to imprison him, but the crowd was big and he had to enter the crowd to reach the man -- it took time. While he was penetrating the crowd, he had to hear what this man was saying. Then he stopped, he forgot that for which he had come. Then it became impossible to imprison this man. He came back.

The enemies asked, "Why have you come back? Why have you not caught hold of him?"
He said, "I was going to, but his words fell in my ear. And I tell you, no man has ever spoken like this man! The very quality, the authority, the power that he speaks with, overpowered me. I was hypnotized: it became impossible to catch hold of this man."
Jesus is love. Love has authority of its own, it is not borrowed. The old rabbis and the Old Testament people are like the moon -- the borrowed light. Jesus is the sun; he has his own light. Love has its own authority; law never has its own authority. The authority is from Moses, Manu, Marx; the authority is from the scripture, the tradition, the convention. The authority is always of the old, it is never fresh and new.

Love is anti-law. But if you have love, you can be lawful also; there is no problem in it. But then you are more than the law; you have something of love within you.
You live in the society, you have to follow the rules. They are just like: 'keep to the left' or 'keep to the right' -- nothing ultimate about them; just rules to keep the traffic in control, otherwise it will be almost impossible to move. Good as far as it goes, but don't think of yourself that because you always keep to the left you have attained something. Of course it is good as far as it goes, but nothing much -- what have you attained? The traffic will be convenient, that's all -- but what have you attained?

All morality, all law, is good as far as it goes, but it doesn't go far enough. Love is needed. Love is a sort of madness: illogical, irrational.


Come Follow to You, Vol-1
#2, Gods in Exile
Q-4