"For Patanjali there is a utility in the laws, but they are not ultimate or absolute in any sense. Man doesn't exist for them; they exist for man. They are means, and one has to go through them – and go beyond them. That has to be remembered; otherwise you can carry a wrong impression about Patanjali.

"Ordinarily, religions have been very destructive. They have crippled the whole of humanity. They have made everybody guilty – and this is the greatest crime that can be done against man. And the whole trick is: first, you make people guilty; when they are trembling with guilt – afraid, scared, burdened, living in a hell – then you help them out of it, then you come and teach them how to be free. In the first place, why create guilt? And when man is guilty he becomes so crippled and so afraid of growth, so afraid to move and grow, so afraid to go into the unknown and the unfamiliar and the strange that he becomes static. a dead thing; then everybody is there working for his salvation.

"Patanjali never makes you guilty about anything. In that sense he is more scientific than religious, more a psychologist than a religious priest. He is not a preacher. Whatsoever he is saying, he is simply giving you a blueprint of how to grow; and if you want to grow you need a discipline. The discipline should not be imposed from the outside; otherwise it creates guilt. The discipline should come out of inner understanding, then it is beautiful. The difference is very subtle. You can be told to do something, and then you do it, but you do it like a slave. You can be helped to understand a certain phenomenon: through understanding you do it, then you do it as a master. Whenever you are a master you are beautiful; whenever you are a slave you become ugly.

"I have heard one old Yiddish joke. There was a tailor named Zumbach. A man came to him. His suit was ready and he had come to take it, but the man found that one sleeve was longer than the other."