Law is for the society; love is for the individual. Law is how you behave with others; love is how you behave with yourself. Love is an inner flowering; law is an outward performance. Because you live with people you have to be lawful, but that is not enough – good, but not enough. If a person is simply lawful, he will be dead. He will be a good citizen, but he will be dead. Law can be the foundation of the society, but it cannot be the very building. You can live on the law, but you cannot LIVE in it. It has no space for that. For that, love is needed.
Jesus was the fulfillment of Moses. What Moses started Jesus was completing, but Jews denied him; what Manu started Buddha was completing, but Hindus denied him. Marx still needs a Buddha or a Jesus in the world. Someday he will come, but Communists will deny him. They become law-oriented. Then love seems to be against law. In fact, law is needed only so that love can become possible. Law is needed so that people can live peacefully and love; law is not, in itself, the end. It is the means; love is the end. But when people become too law-abiding, then love itself seems to be unlawful.
They become afraid of love because who knows? – you are moving on a dangerous path. Love is mad; law is calculation. Law is dependable, the society can decide on it. But love is not reliable – who will decide? Love knows no rules: it is not arithmetic, it is poetry. It is dangerous. Love is always wild, and law is social. Remember this: be lawful but don’t end there, otherwise you lived in vain. In fact, you lived not. Be lawful because if you are not lawful you will be in trouble. You have to be in the society, you have to follow certain rules, but they are only rules. There is nothing ultimate about them, there is nothing from God about them.
Let me tell you this:
the Ten Commandments were created by Moses. They were not from God, they cannot be. Those Ten Commandments are human rules of the game. “Don’t steal! ” – because property is individual. But if the game changes and the property becomes shared, then “Don’t steal!” will not be much of a law. Or if someday the world becomes really affluent then there will be so much that nobody steals. Stealing is possible only if poverty is there. People are hungry and poor – they steal. But if the society is affluent, as it is going to be someday, and there are too many things – whatsoever you need, more is available – then who will be a thief? Then the commandment will disappear. there will be no need for it. The Ten Commandments are social. Moses brings the law; Jesus brings truth, grace, love. Love is from God, law is from the mind. Love is of God, law is of man.
And with love, grace happens. And with love – truth. Remember this, because to understand Jesus is to understand the phenomenon of love. To understand Jesus is to understand the intricacies of grace. To understand Jesus is to understand truth. Remember, if you can understand truth, truth liberates. And there is no other liberation.
Come Follow To You Vol 1
And the Word was Made Flesh
Osho
