The Upanishads are written in Sanskrit, Sanskrit is the oldest language on earth.¹ The very word Sanskrit means transformed, adorned, crowned, decorated, refined – but remember the word transformed. The language itself was transformed because so many people attained the ultimate, and because they were using the language, something of their joy penetrated into it, something of their poetry entered the very cells, the very fiber of the language. Even the language became transformed, illuminated. It was bound to happen. Just as it is happening today in the West, languages are becoming more and more scientific, accurate, mathematical, precise. They have to be because science is giving them its color, its shape, its form. If science is growing, then of course the language in which the science will be expressed will have to be scientific.

The same happened five thousand years ago² in India with Sanskrit. So many people became enlightened and they were all speaking Sanskrit; their enlightenment entered it with all its music, with all its poetry, with all its celebration. Sanskrit became luminous. Sanskrit is the most poetic and musical language in existence.

A poetic language is just the opposite of a scientific language. In a scientific language every word has to be very precise in meaning, it has to have only one meaning. In a poetic language the word has to be liquid, flowing, dynamic – not static, allowing many meanings, many possibilities. The word has not to be precise at all, the more imprecise it is the better because then it will be able to express all kinds of nuances.

Hence, the Sanskrit sutras can be defined in many ways, can be commented upon in many ways – they allow much playfulness. For example, there are eight hundred roots³ in Sanskrit and out of those eight hundred roots thousands of words have been derived, just as out of one root a tree grows and many branches and thousands of leaves and hundreds of flowers. Each single root becomes a vast tree with great foliage.

For example, the root ram can mean first, to be calm, second to rest, third to delight in, fourth cause delight to, fifth to make love, sixth to join, seventh to make happy, eighth to be blissful, ninth to play, tenth to be peaceful, eleventh to stand still, twelfth to stop, to come to a full stop; and thirteenth God, divine, the absolute. And these are only a few of the meanings of the root. Sometimes the meanings are related to each other, sometimes not, sometimes even they are contradictory to each other. Hence, the language has a multidimensional quality to it. You can play with those words and through that play you can express the inexpressible, the inexpressible can be hinted.

The Sanskrit language is called devavani – the divine language. It certainly is divine in the sense that it is the most poetic and the most musical language. Each word has a music around it, a certain aroma.

How did it happen? It happened because so many people used it who were full of inner harmony. Of course those words became luminous. They were used by people who were enlightened, something of their light filtered to the words, reached the words; something of their silence entered the very grammar, the very language they were using.

The script in which Sanskrit is written is called devanagari. Devanagari means dwelling-place of the gods, and so certainly it is. Each word has become divine because it has been used by people who have known God or godliness. ---

¹ Osho has several times contradicted himself and famously proclaimed in an interview ,“Baby, My whole work is to confuse you.” Thus, He has also badmouthed Sanskrit several times.
² This is a western hypothesis of Sanskrit being only 5000 years old. It's believed to be originated from Brahma in hinduism and also proclaimed to be much older by many scholars.
³ Panini has listed about 2200 primary roots under ten groups, named Daśagaṇī.

There is no other language in the world which is more scientific than Sanskrit. It is so scientific that you cannot find fault with it. Every other language in the world looks very immature compared to Sanskrit.

For example, you can see in English that you pronounce a word in one way, you spell it in another. Now what kind of stupidity is this? In Sanskrit you spell the word the way you pronounce it. There should not be two ways because this is unnecessary and very unscientific; it is creating unnecessary troubles for people. Sanskrit is perhaps the only language you can learn perfectly just by reading. You cannot do that with any other language.

I don’t know much English. I know enough to hit people, but that is not much. But one thing I can see that English grammarians, linguistics experts, are not able to answer: b-u-t is but, and p-u-t is put. That seems to be strange. Either b-u-t should be boot, or p-u-t should be putt. There is no way to explain all these. In Sanskrit you cannot find a single example in which there is any difference between the pronunciation and the spelling.

In English you have only twenty-six letters in the alphabet. Sanskrit has fifty-two¹, just double the amount of English. There cannot be more than fifty-two, that’s why Sanskrit has stopped at fifty-two. That exhausts the possibility of all kinds of sounds – fifty-two is the limit. Twenty-six is just the minimum, not the maximum, hence, it is such a difficulty to translate Sanskrit words into English – or just to write them in Roman letters, because in English there is only one “s”, in Sanskrit there are three. There are very subtle phonetic differences, but they are there.

According to the Western historians, Sanskrit also reached to its ultimate peak of refinement in some prehistoric age; since then there has been no change. Not that they are against change; you cannot change it because it has been refined to the very last. All the finishing touches were done five thousand years ago.² —

¹ Sanskrit has 63 letters. or 64, if you count प्लुत ऌ३.
² This is a western hypothesis of Sanskrit being only 5000 years old. in Hinduism, It's believed to be originated from Brahma and also proclaimed to be much older by many scholars.

For example in Sanskrit the word go means cow, and it also means the ray of the sun; it has twelve meanings in all.¹ The English word go is exactly the Sanskrit word that has entered into English. Why has it taken the meaning of going in English? In Sanskrit it also had the meaning of going, because the cow goes every morning to the field, then goes back home every evening. And in those days the cow was so important for nourishment, for agriculture, that its coming and going became the meaning of the word go.²

Thirty percent of the words in English are from Sanskrit, but moving from Sanskrit to English, they have become fixed. Now go in English exactly means one word, has one meaning. In Sanskrit it still means twelve words, has twelve meanings. The poet has more freedom with the old languages. — ¹ वाचस्पत्यम् mentions 22 meanings. It has many more meanings in other dictionaries and usages as well.
² "गो" can refer to both masculine (ox) and feminine (cow) forms. Ox is used in bullock carts for movement and cows help in going to heaven by donating or serving them. This is the primary reason for its meaning to go. However, There are other implications too. It's verbal root is गम् which also means to go.

For example somwar – Monday. Som is the name in Sanskrit of the moon, and in English, Monday is the day of the moon. How som became mon one never knows. Saturday is Sanskrit’s shaniwar. Shani is the name of Saturn; hence it became Saturday. Sunday is the day of the sun. In Sanskrit it is raviwar. Ravi is the name of the sun.

All these names indicate that people at one time must have lived together and have carried fragments of those ancient days with them. All seven days can be found in Sanskrit; all ten digits can be found in Sanskrit – however they have changed, some trace is there or if somebody is mad enough to go after them he can find exactly the whole sequence of change.

For example the English two. The Hindi do and the Sanskrit dwa are the same word. Just one word is missing which is twa; in Mongolian, it is twa. So from dwa to twa, from twa to two. It is not very difficult, these changes are very simple. The English three is Sanskrit tri – not much difference. The Hindi teen is not different; it is the same tri. And you can go on discovering. The English nine is Sanskrit nav, is Hindi nau – in English it is nine. These people must have lived together, then separated.

Sanskrit seems to be the original language of mankind. All languages of the world have a certain percentage of their basic roots in Sanskrit. You will be surprised to know that German has thirty percent of its roots, English has forty percent of its roots, Dutch has forty percent of its roots, Lithuanian has seventy percent of its roots in Sanskrit, even more than Hindi. They are all sister languages. All these people are coming from one source.

संस्कृत से दोनों का जन्म हुआ है, अंग्रेजी का भी और हिंदी का भी। और हिंदी जितनी संस्कृत के करीब है, उतनी ही करीब अंग्रेजी भी है। अगर हम दोनों में थोड़ा प्रवेश करें, तो हमें पता लगेगा कि दोनों के बीच वैपरीत्य नहीं है, एक धारा बह रही है।

हिंदी में आप मां कहते हैं, संस्कृत में मातृ कहते हैं, लैटिन और ग्रीक में मैटर हो जाता है, अंग्रेजी में मदर हो जाता है। वह मदर मातृ का ही रूप है, जैसे मां और माता मातृ का ही रूप है। संस्कृत में पितृ कहते हैं, पितर कहते हैं, हिंदी में पिता कहते हैं; अंग्रेजी में वह फादर हो जाता है; पीटर, पैटर और फिर फादर हो जाता है।

लेकिन अगर कोई पिता कहे, तो हमें लगेगा, हमारी भाषा बोली; और कोई फादर कहे, तो लगेगा, कोई विदेशी भाषा बोल दी। नासमझी है। पिता और फादर जिस शब्द से पैदा हुए हैं, वह एक है। ये फासले कितने ही हो जाएं, इससे कुछ फर्क नहीं पड़ता है। संस्कृत में जो मूल रूप हैं, वे सारी दुनिया की भाषाओं में फैल गए हैं।

इसलिए संस्कृत किसी की भाषा नहीं है, संस्कृत सब भाषाओं की भाषा है।

संस्कृत से संसार की करीब-करीब सभी सुसंस्कृत भाषाओं का जन्म हुआ है। संस्कृत आदि भाषा है। अंग्रेजी हो कि लिथवानियन हो कि फ्रेंच हो कि स्लाव, रशियन हो कि जर्मन हो कि इटेलियन हो, स्पेनिश हो, स्विस हो, डेनिश हो, सारी भाषाओं में संस्कृत की मूल धातुएं उपस्थित हैं।

ओम संस्कृत की आधारभूत ध्वनि है। इस ओम में संस्कृत की जितनी ध्वनियां हैं, सभी का समावेश है। ओम बना है अ, उ और म--तीन ध्वनियों के जोड़ से। ए, यू, एम। ये तीन मूल स्वर हैं। बाकी सारी भाषा इन्हीं से पैदा होती है। सारे शब्द फिर इनसे ही निर्मित होते हैं। ओम मूल है, अ, उ, म उसकी तीन शाखाएं हैं। और फिर इन तीन शाखाओं से सारी ध्वनि का जाल और सारे शब्दों का जन्म होता है। ओम को लोगोस कहेंगे यहूदियों की भाषा में; शब्द कहेंगे ईसाइयों की भाषा में। इस ओम के संबंध में यह सूत्र है।

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