God Is Now-here !-Osho

Where is God? Is God Nowhere? A short story told by Swami Ramtirtha, as narrated by Osho reveals the truth.

Once there was an atheist who argued about the presence of God. He even had it written on the wall of his house, “God is nowhere"

A child was born to him and as the child began to grow, he started teaching language to it. One day as he played with his child he began to teach language. The child had to say “God is nowhere". Since the word 'Nowhere' was too big for the child to pronounce, the atheist father had to break it to make it more articulate. The little child babbled, Now-Here. It went on to say “God is now-here" The atheist could not jump into an argument as his reaction normally would have been as it was a child's babble. Rather he enjoyed playing with the child.

Swami Ramtirtha says that the company of a child is meditative and existential. There is no place for logic while playing with the child. In the company of a child one is just is sans conditioning of logic.

Since he was playful, silent and enjoying the moment with the child, something unaware took hold of him. For the first time it struck him that 'Nowhere' actually contained 'Now-here'

A great transformation took place in him that in due course, people around him caught sight of it. He was not argumentative as before and when he was questioned, he simply said, “Ask this child for I am myself puzzled. Hearing the sentence, “God is Now-Here" has brought about this change in me! Looking into his eyes I got transformed. I am all together a different person now. Since then I have been seeing God Now-Here; when the wind passes through the trees, when rain pitter patters on the roof. When the birds sing I realise God is Now-Here, when the sun rises, I get reminded that “God is Now-here!"

Osho says that the mind is never 'now-here'. It is shuttles between the past and future. To think of the future and past may be logical but it is not existential. Existence is, only in now-here, for once when one starts to think that he caught hold of it logically it has already escaped into the past.

Hence existence is thus Now-here and God is simply existence.