When Osho left-his-body on January 19, 1990 he did not appoint a successor to his work. He left an empty chair as his legacy.

In the evolution of religious consciousness, it is important to understand the implications of this. In a remarkable series of discourses called No Mind: The Flowers of Eternity,

Chapter 7, Osho states, "'The age of the gurus has ended ... The world of masters and disciples will not be relevant anymore''. He goes on to say, “a new dawn, a new man

is absolutely needed: one who will destroy what is rotten and old, superstitious, and has no roots in intelligence."

For thousands of years, the master-disciple relationship has been a device used to create a ripe atmosphere for spiritual awakening. Yet I once heard Osho say, as a device it is inherently flawed because of certain assumptions it makes that are not right, such as: the master is somehow higher than the disciple; the master posesses certain qualities the disciple lacks; the master has a higher knowledge the disciple doesn't. Hence, the basic premise of the master-disciple relationship is undignifying and insulting to man’s intelligence.

To understand the significance of Osho's legacy -- the empty chair -- is to understand that humanity doesn’t need the master-disciple game anymore. Man is capable of seeing reality directly without a middleman between himself and existence. Religious methodologies of the past might have been perfect tools for their time, but man's soul has traveled far since the days of Zen in old Japan and the times when great masters like Ramana Maharshi, Rumi, and Buddha graced the earth. The mind of modern man is more sensitive, his intellect more advanced, to such a degree that old fashion, bull-cart methods are more a hinderance than a help on the path of one's spiritual growth and development. Perpetuating out-of-date traditions such as the master-disciple relationship serve only to keep man retarded and his mind stupid.

To accept responsibility for one's awakening is a conscious step forward into a golden future -- free and unfettered from the whole religious past of humanity. One's concern should be not only waking up, but growing up, thus entering spiritual adulthood with all the dignity that is one's birthright. For The New Man, intelligence is the only light.