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the world. I had not come to the mountains as an anti-life escapist. I had come to the mountains to find myself, my aloneness, my freedom, my wisdom. I have found it.
"Now there is no need for me to remain on the heights. On the contrary, I am so full that I need people to share with. I want to share my love, I want to share my wisdom, I want to share my freedom. I am too overloaded -- I am overflowing."
`WHY,' SAID THE SAINT, `DID I GO INTO THE FOREST AND THE DESERT? WAS IT NOT BECAUSE I LOVED MANKIND ALL TOO MUCH?' The saint says, "I have also gone into the mountains, into the forest because I also loved mankind all too much, that has become a slavery, and that has become a dependence, and that was bringing only misery to me and nothing else."
But there is a difference. He loved mankind "all too much" when he was ignorant, when he himself was asleep. Zarathustra loves mankind when he is fully awake, when he is enlightened. The love of the unawakened is nothing but lust. Only the awakened knows the beauty and the spirituality, and the divinity of love. It is no longer a bondage.
The love of the awakened gives you freedom.
The love of the unawakened is that of a beggar's love: he wants you to love him, he wants to get more and more love.
The love of the awakened is just the reverse. It is the love of an emperor. He wants to give to you -- he has so much, such an abundance. It is giving, it is sharing without any desire to be rewarded and without any desire to get anything in return.
The saint said, `NOW I LOVE GOD. MANKIND I DO NOT LOVE.' In this statement is contained the whole attitude of all the so-called religions. They have been creating a division that if you love mankind you cannot love God. The Old Testament God says, "I am very jealous. If you love me, you cannot love anyone else."
But that is the attitude of almost all religions. Either you can love this world; then you have renounced the other world.... If you love man, you have forgotten God. You can choose. If you love God, you will have to withdraw your love from mankind. In fact, you will have to hate mankind, you will have to hate life, you
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