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and the ego that knowledge brings, and the gratification, appreciation, that knowledge brings. Who wants to become a child again? But only those who are ready to become children again can enter into the world of truth.
A child is never a coward; cowardice is a learned thing. He learns it from the grownups; otherwise he is courageous, he has infinite courage. He can go into the dark, but he becomes afraid of the dark because grownups are afraid of the dark. He can catch hold of a snake, he can even play with a lion, with no fear.
All fear and all cowardice is learned from others. Slowly slowly he becomes enclosed in all kinds of pathological fears. And the greatest pathological fear is the fear of God, because it prevents you from knowing God. Fear is a barrier, a wall, you cannot see through it. It has to be demolished!
My sannyasin has to be courageous to the utmost, to the maximum. Only optimum courage can create the opportunity to know God; hence I call courage one of the most essential qualities of a religious being. It is divine. God has only been known by courageous people, only by very few people, because courage is so rare.
Prem Andreas. Prem means love; andreas means courageous. Love is courage; without love one is bound to be a coward.
Love and hate are not real opposites, but love and fear are real opposites. Hate can become love very easily: it is really love standing upside-down. It is not very far from love, it is love energy in a disturbed state. The energy can be calmed, stilled. It is only a question of rearranging the energy, and hate can become love. And we know -- it happens every day in life -- love can become hate, hate can become love. You hate the same person and you love the same person. One moment you hate, another moment you love. So love and hate are two sides of the same coin, they are not real opposites.
The real opposites are love and fear. Fear can never become love, there is no way. And love can never be fear, there is no way. Fear has to be dropped, then love arises; or love has to be forgotten, then fear is there. Love and fear are like light and darkness: love is the light and fear is
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