I and Thou is very much respected by the Jews because they think it represents their religion. It does not represent any religion at all, neither Jew nor Hindu; it only represents the ignorance of the man called Martin Buber. But the man was certainly an artist, a great genius. When a genius starts writ ing about something of which he knows nothing, he can still produce a masterpiece.

I and Thou is basically wrong because Buber says it is a dialogue between man and God. I and Thou…! Nonsense! There cannot be any dialogue between man and God, there can only be silence. Dialogue? What will you talk to God about? The devaluation of the dollar? or Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini? What are you going to have a dialogue with God about? There is nothing you can talk about. You can simply be in a state of awe…utter silence.

There is no “I” and there is no “thou” in that silence; hence I refute not only the book but even the title. I and Thou…? That means one remains still separate. No, it is like a dewdrop slipping from a lotus leaf into the ocean. The dewdrop disappears, or in other words becomes the ocean, but there is no I and Thou. Either there is only I or there is only Thou. But when there is no I, there cannot be any Thou, it won’t have any meaning. If there is no Thou, there can be no I either, so in fact there is only silence…this pause…. My being silent for a moment says much more than what Martin Buber tries to say in I and Thou, and fails. But even though it is a failure, it is a masterpiece.

Third…Martin Buber was a Jew, and other Jews are standing in the queue. My God, what a long line, and poor Devageet and Ashu…after all, they have to eat too, they can’t just live on my words. So I will be quick. I will try to disperse as many as I can. But a few are very stubborn, and I know they won’t go away unless I say something about them.

The man second to Martin Buber is one of the most stubborn – not more stubborn than me. Perhaps I was a Jew in one of my past lives; must have been. This man is Karl Marx. The book he is holding in his hand is Das Kapital.

This is the worst-written book ever. But in a way it is a great book, because it dominates millions of people. Almost half the world is communist, and the other half you cannot be certain about. Even people who are not communist, deep down they feel that there is something good in communism. There is nothing good in it. It is the exploitation of a great dream. Karl Marx was only a dreamer – not an economist, not at all – just a dreamer; a poet, but a poet of third-rate quality. He is not a great writer either. Nobody reads Das Kapital. I have come across many famous communists, and I have asked them, looking deep into their eyes, “Have you read Das Kapital?” Not a single one has said yes.