Man has imprisoned women in the house at a great cost, because he has taken away all other possibilities of ego trips. Now only one outlet is left to her – he himself – and he is suffering a lot. In fact, the Women’s Liberation movement is not only woman’s liberation; if it really happens, it will be far more man’s liberation. Hence I don’t see any intelligent man against it; all intelligent men are for it, because they know if the woman really becomes free they will be free too. It is going to be freedom for both.
It is one of the laws of life: either you can both be free or you will both be slaves. It is not possible that one should be the master and the other should be the slave. The law is that the master is always a slave of his own slave, because his mastery also depends on the slave. Without the slave he will not be a master at all.
The child finds all these people around, running in the same direction. The child is vulnerable, open, ready to be impressed. It is very difficult for the child to find a Buddha, to find a Jesus. He always finds these stupid people living their lives in absolute unawareness. He starts imitating them. By the time he is of age he is already structured, programmed, conditioned.
Unless you make a great effort to get out of this conditioning you will not be free; unless you make a great, concentrated, determined decision that you have to get out of it there is not much possibility. Even if life itself needs to be staked you are ready to stake your life for freedom from all kinds of conditionings. But you can make the decision.
This is what sannyas is: a determination, a decision, a commitment to yourself, a gift to yourself.
Master yourself… because mastering yourself you enter the kingdom of godliness, you enter the real world of peace and bliss. You enter your own treasures, and they are inexhaustible. You come to know for the first time the richness of your being, the beauty of your being and the ecstasy of your being.
Master yourself according to the law. Now, there is a possibility you may misunderstand Buddha, because “according to the law” in the eyes of Christians and Jews and Mohammedans means according to the law prescribed in their books: the Ten Commandments, the Koran, the Bible. That is not Buddha’s meaning. “According to the law” does not mean the law of the state or the law given by the priests. “According to the law” for Buddha means according to the ultimate law of life and existence.
There is a tremendous harmony and anyone just a little bit sensitive, intelligent, can feel it. Life is a harmonious whole; it is not a chaos, it is a cosmos. Why is it not a chaos? – because a law runs through and through it like a thread in a garland. That thread is invisible; you see only the flowers, but the thread is keeping them together. Existence is a garland; there is a thread, a sutra – sutra means thread – a very thin thread, almost invisible, running through the whole existence, that makes it a cosmos instead of a chaos.