"You can choose, you may not choose. For lives together you may not choose it – no one is going to force you.

"This has to be understood. And this is a very significant thing, because if everything is caused, then I say there is no spirituality. Then science can cause you to become spiritual. If the cause is present, then the effect will follow. Then a buddha can be caused: we can create the cause and then you will be a buddha.

"But we cannot create any situation in which you can become a buddha. And we cannot create any situation in which you can be stopped from becoming a buddha. You are free. Any moment you can choose to be, and you may not choose for lives together.

"This has been a long discussion between materialism and spirituality. This is the basic debate, not whether God exists or not. That is not the basic debate, because one can be spiritual without any God. Buddha never believed in any God, Mahavira denies any existence of God, but no one is as spiritual as Mahavira or Buddha.

"So God is not the most significant thing, even the soul is not the most significant thing. Buddha says there is no self, no soul, and he is spiritual par excellence. Then what is the basic thing in spirituality? It is the concept of freedom: whether man is free to go beyond humanity or not.

"If everything is caused, then there is no freedom for you. You have a certain body because of certain causes: a certain father, a certain mother, a certain country, a certain climate, a certain heredity. You have a certain body; it has been caused. You have a certain mind because of a certain country, a certain culture, a certain education. You have this mind because of certain causes. You speak a particular language because it has been caused. If you were born in China and were never taught to speak any other language than Chinese, it is difficult to conceive that you could speak any other language. Language is caused. Certain factors are needed, then you will speak a certain language.

"So there is no freedom in these things."