OSHO “EVERY PERSON IN THE WORLD SHOULD KNOW AT LEAST TWO LANGUAGES: ONE IS HIS MOTHER TONGUE, AND THE OTHER IS ENGLISH AS AN INTERNATIONAL VEHICLE FOR COMMUNICATION.

They can also be taught more accurately by television — the accent, the grammar, everything can be taught more correctly than by human beings. We can create in the world an atmosphere of brotherhood: language connects people and language disconnects too. There is right now no international language. This is due to our prejudices. English is perfectly capable, because it is known by more people around the world on a wider scale — although it is not the first language. The first is Spanish, as far as population is concerned. But its population is concentrated, it is not spread all over the world. The second is Chinese; that is even more concentrated, only in China. As far as numbers go, these languages are spoken by more people, but the question is not of numbers, the question is of spread. English is the most widespread language, and people should drop their prejudices — they should look at the reality. There have been many efforts to create languages to avoid the prejudices — the Spanish people can say their language should be the international language because it is spoken by more people than almost any other language…. To avoid these prejudices, languages like Esperanto have been created. But no created language has been able to function. There are a few things which grow, which cannot be created; a language is a growth of thousands of years. Esperanto looks so artificial that all those efforts have failed. But it is absolutely necessary to create two languages — first, the mother tongue, because there are feelings and nuances which you can say only in the mother tongue. One of my professors, S. K. Saxena, a world traveler who has been a professor of philosophy in many countries, used to say that in a foreign language you can do everything, but when it comes to a fight or to love, you feel that you are not being true and sincere to your feelings. So for your feelings and for your sincerity, your mother tongue… which you imbibe with the milk of the mother, which becomes part of your blood and bones and marrow. But that is not enough — that creates small groups of people and makes others strangers. ONE INTERNATIONAL LANGUAGE IS ABSOLUTELY NECESSARY AS A BASIS FOR ONE WORLD, FOR ONE HUMANITY. So two languages should be absolutely necessary for everybody.” ~~~OSHO