Sariputta said, “I could not pay respect before because I was not awakened, and the ego was there. Now I cannot pay respect because I have become awakened. Then when will I pay respect? I could not pay respect before – and even if I paid respect, it was with very great difficulty. And respect paid with difficulty is no respect. Then I could not pay respect because of the ego. Now you say I cannot pay it because I have become awakened. Then when will I pay respect?”
Sariputta said, “Buddha does not need it, but now is the moment. Before it was impossible.”
But these were times when trust was easy. Now, trust has become impossible – that is why religion has become impossible. Religion is bound to be irrational and contradictory. The jump into existence is bound to be irrational. It is a jump from reason into the “unreason.” So, by and by I will have to make you ready and prepared. Little by little, I will make you ready to go into the irrational. Even if I answer you, it is not to convince your reason – but just to shatter it. Even if sometimes I appear to be rational, it is only to begin with. It is only to begin with your mind: if it feels that I am rational, then it is attuned.
The moment I see you are attuned, I will push you into the irrational. There is no way except that one is pushed into the irrational. So this is not much: the more you are ready, the more I will put things on you which will be totally irrational, which will make you look insane in others’ eyes. The moment I see that you are ready to be insane – when you are not afraid of others’ eyes and others’ opinions, you are not afraid even of your own reason – only then can the deeper keys be handed over to you. Not before. Otherwise, you will just throw the keys. You will not be able to appreciate them. And not to say about their use – you will not even be able to understand that they are keys.
So, by and by, all those who have been initiated into sannyas will have to be ready to go into the irrational. Existence is such. It does not reply to questions. Life is such. It gives no explanations. It is. And all our questions and all our answers are only deceptions. Even scientific answers are deceptions, because they never really answer anything. They only push the question one step back. They only go on pushing the questions back – you become tired so you do not ask.
No question is answerable through answers. Through an existential jump, every question is solved. But not through intellect. If you ask a scientist why oxygen and hydrogen combined create water, he will say that it just happens. It is so: “We can say only this – that it happens.” But why does it happen? No one will go to ask the scientist why oxygen and hydrogen can create water: “Why? Why not helium and oxygen?” There is no answer.
The scientist will say, “We can only say how it happens, not why.” But with religion we always ask why. Even science – which claims to be rational – cannot answer why. Religion – which never claims to be rational – is always asked why.
You ask me: “Why this mala? Why this picture?” I say, “Use it in this way, and this will happen.” And my answer is as scientific as possible. If you ask “why?” even science, which claims to be rational, cannot answer. Religion never claims to be rational. The only claim is of being irrational.