Silent period

On Mar 24 1981, after speaking in Hindi in the morning in Pune, Osho begins a lengthy period of not speaking in public, which lasts 3 1/2 years, or 1315 days, until he resumes speaking on Oct 30 1984. This figure of 1315 days is not something chosen at random. When he returns to speaking, Osho explains its significance carefully, making sure we understand, how it resonates with an earlier period of 1315 days of relative silence he had gone though when he first became enlightened.

On that first occasion, he had just drifted into silence and was headed into a state nearly impossible to come back from. He was pulled back by Magga Baba, one of the three guru-guides he was blessed with before he woke up himself.

The silent period begins as an apparently normal chicken-pox quarantine but soon becomes an "official" new mode of being with his people. On Apr 10 1981 it is announced that his silence is to be the new phase. On Apr 11, his evening darshan resumes, with other sannyasins appointed to give sannyas on his behalf.

On May 1, morning Satsang begins, wherein Osho comes to Buddha Hall to sit in silence with his people, with alternating periods of music, readings from various books (not his, ranging from The Prophet to Isa Upanishad), Gachchhamis and silence. These Satsangs run from a little over an hour to about an hour and twenty minutes.

On Jun 1, Osho leaves suddenly for the States, ostensibly to get treatment for a back problem, staying for nearly three months in Montclair NJ. while he is there, the Ranch in Oregon is purchased and work begins on developing it.

On Aug 29, Osho flies to Oregon, where he will be for over four years, and where his new mode of public silence will play an important part in creating an increasingly hierarchical and isolated power structure whose "authorities" fall prey to the allure of abuse of power. This theme and its flip side of "surrender" will be explored more fully in the Ranch page.

see also

Silent Period, a "container" for seven interviews and purported statements of Osho reported by Sheela, during this period

Category:Celebration Satsang, an index for all the Satsang audios available