There is a great difference and also a great similarity between madness and enlightenment. The similarity has to be under- stood first, because without understanding it, it will be difficult to understand the difference.  Both are beyond the mind — madness and enlightenment.   Enlightenment is above the mind. But both are out of the mind. Hence, you have the expression for a madman ‘out of his mind’. The same expression can be used for the enlightened person; he is also out of his mind.

Mind functions logically, rationally, intellectually. Neither madness nor enlightenment function intellectually. They are similar: madness has fallen below reason, and enlightenment has gone above reason, but both are irrational; hence, sometimes in the East a madman is misunderstood as being an enlightened man. These similarities are there.

And in the West, once in a while — it is not an everyday phenomenon, but once in a while — an enlightened person has been understood as being mad, because the West understands only one thing: if you are out of your mind, you are mad. It has no category for above the mind; it has only one category — below the mind.

In the East the misunderstanding happens because for centuries the East has known people who are out of their mind and at the same time above the mind; hence, they are similar to madmen. For the Eastern masses it creates a confusion, it creates a problem. They have decided it is better to misunderstand a madman as being an enlightened man, than to misunderstand an enlightened man as being a madman —because what are you losing by misunderstanding a madman as being an enlightened man? You are not losing anything. But by misunderstanding an enlightened man as being a madman you are certainly losing a tremendous opportunity. But the misunderstanding is possible because of the similarities…. A madman sometimes can have glimpses which the rational man cannot have because the madman has stepped out of the mechanism of mind; of course on the wrong side, from the back door, but still he is out of the mind. Even from the back door he can have some glimpses which are not available to the people who never come out of the house. Certainly he is not as fortunate as to have come from the front door: that needs tremendous effort.  Madness is disease. It happens to you — you don’t have to make an effort to be mad. It is a sickness and it is curable. Enlightenment happens through tremendous awareness and arduous effort.

Enlightenment is the supreme health.  You should understand the word ‘health’ carefully. It is not only physiologically meaningful.  Of course physiologically it is meaningful, but not only physiologically; it has a far higher meaning too. Health means healing the wounds. It comes from the root which means healing. If your physiology needs some healing then medicine is offered. If your spirituality needs some healing, then meditation is offered. Strangely, ‘health’ comes from the same root from which comes the word ‘wholeness’.

Health means the body is whole, nothing is missing. And from wholeness comes the word holy: the spirit is whole, nothing is missing. Similarly, the word medicine and the word meditation come from the same root — that which cures. Medicine cures Wounds in your physiology, and meditation cures wounds in your spiritual existence, in your ultimate being….  Sufis call the madman masta; masta means intoxicated. The madman and the enlightened man both have to pass through a certain state, that is, getting out of reason, out of their mind. They have to cross the same boundary: by the wrong door or right door, they both cross the same boundary, and while they are crossing the boundary they both become mastas — intoxicated. But the enlightened person soon regains his balance because he has made the effort to get out of the mind; he is prepared to get out of the mind, he is ready to get out of the mind. The madman has got out of his mind unprepared. He was not ready. He has simply fallen out of his mind — it is an accident. Enlightenment is never an accident….

The enlightened man is also always blissful. I am using a different word just so you don’t get confused. The madman is always happy. But there is a possibility he can be cured; then he will become unhappy, then he will start worrying. He will worry more than you because he will see that he had gone mad: now he will worry about madness. When he was mad he had no worry at all, he could not care less. Now he will worry that he had gone mad and he will worry that tomorrow it can happen again because it has happened….

Just see the point: even if you fall below the mind you are happy. It is the mind that is causing you all kinds of misery, suffering, jealousies, hatred, anger, violence, greed; and they all go on making you more and more a pain to yourself. You start hurting all over, everybody is hurting all over. Even to fall below the mind — which is Falling below humanity, because that is the only difference between you and the animals… A madman is really back in the world of animals. He has dropped out of evolution. He has gone back; he has turned his back on Charles Darwin. He has said, “Good-bye. Good-bye to your evolution!” He has simply fallen back to a subhuman level.

The enlightened man is out of his mind but he has full control of his mind. And he does not need a switchboard — just his awareness is enough. If you observe anything minutely, you will have a little experience of the enlightened man — not the full experience but a little taste, just a tongue-tip taste. If you observe your anger minutely, anger disappears. You are feeling a sexual urge: watch it closely, and soon it disappears. If just by your watching, things evaporate, what to say about the man who is continually above the mind, simply aware of the whole mind? Then all those ugly things that you would like to drop simply evaporate. And remember, they all have energy. Anger is energy. When anger evaporates, the energy which is left behind turns into compassion. It is the same energy. Through observation the anger has left — that was the mode, the form surrounding the energy — but the energy remains. Now, the energy of anger, without anger, is compassion. When sex disappears the tremendous energy of love is left behind. Each ugly thing in your mind, disappearing, leaves a great treasure behind.

The enlightened man has no need to drop anything and has no need to practice anything. All that is wrong drops of its own accord because it cannot stand up to his awareness, and all that is good evolves of its own accord because awareness is nourishment for it.

The madman can be helped very easily because he has tasted something out of the mind, but he needs to be shown the right door. In a better world our madhouses will not only be trying to make those people sane — that is meaningless — our madhouses will be trying to help those people to use that opportunity to move through the right door. A madman going into a madhouse will come out enlightened — not just the same old self again, miserable, suffering.  So, to me, madness has immense significance. It can become a way towards enlightenment.”