"Zen has nothing to do with the mind... It is the lion's roar. And the greatest thing that Zen has brought into the world is freedom from oneself." The Zen Manifesto is a collection of the last discourses of Osho with his last publicly spoken words. In this culmination of his insights into Zen he makes it clear that the West's comprehension of Zen is still confined to intellectual appreciation. To prove it, Osho takes on such respected members of the Western Zen establishment as D.T. Suzuki, Thomas Merton, Paul Reps, Alan Watts and Nancy Wilson-Ross.

What is the wisdom of the sands? "Allow yourself to be absorbed in the wind," says Osho. He clarifies the Sufi approach to religiousness, which is to become part of the mystery of existence by living meditatively, being total, and transcending experience itself. These commentaries do not carry a philosophical message, but are a gesture towards a world beyond philosophy. Osho describes one of the stories within this collection as belonging to the "very foundation of religious consciousness." Deceptively simple, these Sufi tales have a deeper, underlying significance, and Osho makes it manifest for all to see. These stories are not for those who want entertainment, he shows us, but for those who seek illumination.

Osho describes the pillars of his vision of sannyas, or disciplehood: life-affirmation, meditation, love and "the fourth," that which cannot be expressed through words. In his characteristically up-front way, he slots so-called saints into three special categories - Idiots, Average IQs, and Intellectuals. In addition, he allocates places to such well-known personalities as Satya Sai Baba, Mother Teresa, Maharishi Mahesh Yogi and Krishnamurti, and also speaks on Kahlil Gibran, Gurdjieff, Lama Trungpa and the Antichrist.

Bodhidharma, a disciple of Buddha, was the first patriarch of Zen. The notes collected by his disciples from Bodhidharma's discourses, contain the essential core of Buddha's message. Buddha and Bodhidharma are vastly different in their expression of truth. Osho sees Buddha as the silence of a breeze, Bodhidharma he likens to a storm. This discourse series alternates the eminently readable interchanges between Bodhidharma and his disciples, and Osho's response to questions from his own disciples and other seekers. In the words of one journalist: "Just by reading these discourses there is a risk you may be pulverized by their inspiration."

Osho observes that this Upanishad is one of the most beautiful and also one of the most neglected. He also points out that commentators usually are either on the path of love or the path of knowledge. But the commentator on this particular Upanishad is unique in being neither. Osho is perhaps the first person to discuss these sutras in such a way that the reader can feel a sense of oneness beyond the apparent contradictions. He talks on philosophy as a bridge between science and religion, different dimensions of listening, the role of doubt, the way to know whether one has transcended sex, the difference between projections and authentic feelings, and much more. He also explains how his words are a response to, not a commentary on these sutras. Contained in this discourses are many alchemical secrets - secrets of "the ultimate alchemy," the alchemy of purifying man's gross nature into the pure gold of cosmic consciousness. Many meditation techniques are shown along the way, many efforts to make us aware of our unconscious condition, the source of all our dis-ease.

Discourses on Hasidism, in which Osho responds to stories from Tales of the Hasidim (Die Erzählungen der Chassidim) by Martin Buber, and to questions submitted by disciples and seekers. This book is a mixture of light-hearted storytelling and the penetrating understanding of a true sage. Like the Hassids, Osho's own emphasis is on playfulness and celebration: "Judaism has produced one of the most essential lines of mystics, the Hassids. It is one of the most beautiful ways to find oneself and to find the reality of existence."

Tantra Vision: An Invitation to Silence

This volume captures the fast pace of Osho's six-week stay in Nepal, the birthplace of Buddha. He answers questions from his sannyasins in his hotel suite in the mornings, from representatives of the press every evening in the hotel conference room: What is your message to the modern Nepalese Buddhists? What is your message for the Pope who is in India now? What do you think about the New Age movement? You teach us to be thankful to existence, but how can I be thankful to those who speak against you and try to destroy your work? With no white lies, no beating around the bush, no platitudes and no mincing of words, Osho's truth cuts clean with the skill of a master swordsman, and with the compassion symbolized in the lotus.

To his first Western disciples Osho speaks on the ancient Indian Vedic scriptures. He answers seekers' questions related to using the intellect, transcending the duality of sex, the role of the master on the disciple's spiritual journey, the contribution and limitations of psychoanalysis, the significance of chaotic meditations for the modern man, and much more. Osho says of this book, "I have chosen to talk about the Upanishads because to me they represent one of the purest expressions of the ultimate that is possible, if it is possible at all."

"I HAVE SEEN THE SUN RISING IN THE EVENING, and since then I have been drunk with that which is. You can call it God, you can call it nirvana, you can call it any name—it does not matter. Whether you give it a name or you don’t give it, it remains the same. A rose is a rose is a rose. But one thing is certain about it: that the sun rises in the evening..." - Osho.

Osho talks about the Shodoka sutras, the Song of Enlightenment, by Zen master Yoka Daishi.