Sound of the Universe

Apr 27, 2010, 12.00am IST

TALK: OSHO.


Om Mani Padme Hum: This mantra has many secrets in it. The first wordless word is Om, and the last is Hum. The first is the flowering and the last is the seed.

The Sufis don't use the whole name of Allah; they say allah hoo, and slowly, they change allah hoo into simply hoo, hoo. They have found that the sound of hoo strikes exactly at the life source just below the navel. You were connected with your life, with your mother, from the navel. Just below the navel is the source of your own life.

"Hum" is the hit to create Om in you. If you hit the seed of your life it starts disappearing in the soil and green leaves, sprouts start growing. Between the two -- Om and Hum -- is Mani Padme. I don't think anybody has been able to express the ultimate experience, the ultimate beatitude, better than mani padme. You have to visualise it. The lotus flower is the most beautiful, big flower. And if you put diamonds on the lotus flower in the early morning sun, you will have a tremendously beautiful experience.

This mantra om mani padme hum has a whole philosophy in it. Start with Hum, the last word, and the first will arise on its own accord. And when your inner being is filled with the sound of silence, you will also have the beautiful experience of seeing a lotus with a diamond in the early morning sun.

You must have seen statues of Gautama Buddha seated on a lotus. They are showing symbolically that he has reached the ultimate; his own inner lotus has flowered. A mantra is not just something to chant. A mantra is something to let sink deep in your being, just as roots go deep into the earth. A mantra is something like a seed to be allowed to go deep into your being so that it can send its roots to the sources of your life and finally to the universal life. Then its branches, its foliage will go high into the sky, and when the spring comes, it will be filled with thousands of flowers.

Unless a tree blossoms, it knows no blissfulness. It goes on feeling something is missing. This "missing" feeling goes on nagging everybody. Only the expansion of your consciousness will help you to get rid of this feeling.

Unless you disappear into the universal ocean just like a dewdrop, you will not find significance. You will not find your real dignity. This Tibetan mantra om Mani Padme Hum is a condensed form of the whole inner pilgrimage. It says how to start, what will happen when the flower opens, what will be your ultimate experience of your inner treasures. Eastern languages are rich in the sense that they have made very condensed statements which can unfold into big scriptures. The reason was that when these mantras were created there was no writing. People had to remember them.

These are telegrams. They can easily be remembered, they can be passed from one generation to another without fear that they will be distorted. You have not to repeat the mantra, you have to understand its meaning and let that meaning sink into you. Sitting silently, be utterly quiet, unmoving. Watch your mind. A few thoughts will be there, but as you become silent those thoughts will disappear, and suddenly you hear a humming sound all around you.

That humming sound is not made by you. It is at the very centre of existence.It is the sound of the universe; it is its indication of being alive. It is vibrating with dance and music. Om is perhaps the greatest symbol in the whole world.

(Excerpted from Om Mani Padme Hum. Courtesy: Osho International Foundation. www.osho.com )