Tao Upanishad #117

Society is against the fearless, because with the fearless comes insecurity. The fearless can lead into danger. The fearless can take you onto roads that go nowhere. The fearless delights in stepping off the beaten track. Rules, order, tradition—breaking them gives the fearless a peculiar joy. Society protects the frightened and destroys the fearless. For society feels the frightened save society, and the fearless will ruin it.

Let us understand this a little rightly. It is the fearless who becomes the criminal. It is the fearless who becomes the revolutionary. The fearless has ugly faces too, and the fearless has beautiful faces too. Criminal and revolutionary have one similarity—they both break. The criminal is wanton; he does not break in service of any higher order: he breaks for the sheer relish of breaking—he is destructive. The revolutionary also destroys, but with the hope that perhaps by destroying, something better can be built. Whether it happens or not is not certain.

Society looks at the criminal and the revolutionary with the same eye. For society, both open the door to fear. Society wants to live with the familiar—the road whose contours are known, whose map exists; the sea that has been sailed many times, with no fear left—no fear of being lost, erased, ruined. Only then does society take steps. That is why society is always bound to tradition, custom, the line.

The fearless wants to go into the unknown; he wants to voyage across uncharted seas; he wants to leave footprints where no one has ever gone. Society sees danger in this.

Society is against the criminal as well, because he breaks rules. And once rules begin to be broken, society’s very existence cannot survive. Society is ultimately a net of rules. And once people’s faith in rules begins to waver, it is difficult to steady that faith again.

Therefore, whoever shows such audacity, society punishes him fiercely. And the greatest punishment is to snatch life away—the death penalty—the very possibility of that man’s life is destroyed. This means society has decided there is no hope left in this man; therefore no privilege to live can be given to him. Society has accepted that this man is incurable. So long as he seems curable, society gives lesser punishments; when he looks incurable, impossible, then society takes his life away. To take life away means: we are utterly disgusted with you—there is no hope that you will return to the path. To walk the wrong path has become your style of living. It is no longer a stray act; it has become your very manner of being. Therefore we will erase your being.

When society makes this decision, a second decision is linked with it. Just as it erases the fearless, the audacious, so at the same time it saves the timid.

Lao Tzu calls him courageous as well. And it is worth seeing.

Lao Tzu says: some are brave in attacking, and some are brave in not attacking. The timid also has his kind of courage. When the unknown sends its invitation, when untrodden, unrecognized roads call, then by courage he stays on the line. That too is courage. The audacious says: you have no courage—because he is opposite to him. But when from all sides the call comes for unrestrained wandering, when the invitation comes to go by untrodden paths, when the unknown sea beckons, to remain tied to the shore—that too is courage; it is to restrain temptation, excitement.

Lao Tzu says, the timid too is brave. He clings to fear, come what may; does not leave the path; does not break rules; with eyes closed he assumes that custom is right. Society saves him, because society is saved by him. Society greatly praises the timid. It calls him gentleman; it calls the audacious wicked. It calls the timid virtuous; it calls the audacious unvirtuous. For the timid is the armor of society.

Therefore the whole effort of society is that as soon as a child is born he be made fearful, he be frightened; a thousand fears be planted in his mind. Only then can he be of use to society. Only then will he respect state, society, culture. He should be so frightened that no capacity is left in him ever to step contrary to society. Hence the fear of hells, the lure of heavens. Hence here too, on Earth, there are a thousand kinds of punishments, a thousand kinds of rewards.

Whom do you call good? Who is auspicious?

If you watch closely, all your auspicious is built around fear. You say: this man is not a thief. But have you ever considered whether the one who is not a thief has refrained because the very impulse to steal has disappeared from his inner being, or because he could not gather the courage to be a thief? To be a thief is not ordinary; it is an extraordinary act. To be a thief needs a certain talent and capacity. One is afraid to walk in one’s own house at night; to break into another’s strange house in the dark, to walk as if it were your father’s house, to lift things in such a way that no sound is made, the heart does not pound—your chest would pound so much your limbs would freeze.

Thievery is also a proficiency in audacity. Murder too is a proficiency in ultimate audacity. To conceive of erasing another requires tremendous preparation; to erase another you must be ready to erase yourself, because when you go to erase another, you stake yourself too. You cannot erase another without staking yourself. Even the criminal has qualities.

The non-criminal whom you call virtuous, the so-called sadhu, has deep defects. Mostly people are virtuous because of fear. They cannot steal—not because they have attained to non-stealing, but because they are so frightened they cannot muster the courage toward theft. If someone gave them firm assurance that there is no police on the road, no judge in the court, no God above, no hell below—if someone freed them from fear altogether, they too would go out to steal. This is exactly society’s fear: people might become free of fear. So society raises a thousand kinds of fears. Society knows only one device to keep man under control—fear. Ninety-nine percent of so-called virtue is out of fear. Is that any virtue?

Ninety-nine percent of vice is out of fearlessness. If you focus on fearlessness, you will see qualities even in the unvirtuous; if you focus on fear, you will see defects even in the virtuous. If you focus on acts, you will see virtue in the virtuous, vice in the unvirtuous.

Society cares for acts, not for your inner being. Therefore it honors the so-called virtuous and dishonors the unvirtuous. Because society relates only to what you do. Only when you do something does anything enter society’s life. If you only think, there is no harm. If a man sits and contemplates theft day and night, even then the courts cannot prosecute him, because contemplation is private, thought is personal. You may murder the whole world every day in your mind, yet you cannot be charged with killing anyone. Because as long as you only think, you do not enter society. Only when thought becomes act does it become social; while it is thought, it is private.

So society says: if you want to think, think to your heart’s content. Society even provides opportunities so that you exhaust yourself in thinking and do not do. There are films full of murders, robberies, adultery. Society publicly exhibits them. There are books—the filthiest obscenity, full of murders, immersed in all sorts of adulteries—they are available. Society does not become much concerned.

Psychologists say that seeing a murder film provides a catharsis of the urge to murder. When you watch a murder film, the hidden impulse within you is discharged; you feel lighter. You watch others committing adultery in films or novels; your own urge gets a little relief.

Society gives full opportunity—think freely, feel freely. Total freedom. Just do not bring it into action. Because as soon as it becomes action, society’s foundation shakes.

In religion the matter is entirely different. Religion does not care whether you did or not; religion cares whether you thought or not. Because religion is private, personal. You may do innumerable virtuous acts, yet if your thoughts are unvirtuous, in the eye of religion you are not virtuous—though in the eye of society you are. If your inner feelings are sinful and you perform acts of merit—and often it happens, to hide feelings a man performs opposite acts. Those with great sinful passion in their minds write on their walls: Brahmacharya alone is life. What they have written on the wall, the motto on their desk, their condition will be the very opposite. Think: why would a man to whom the frenzy of lust never arises sit with “Brahmacharya is life” written on his wall? The sick man carries medicine; the healthy does not.

The one who has written on his door: Honesty is the best policy—this man is dishonest. Be a little careful with him, save your pocket. Because the man who sits with a placard that honesty is the best policy—he must be dishonest. Otherwise, what need to write it? You know it well: wherever you see written “pure ghee sold here,” be suspicious. For writing “ghee” is enough—“pure”! In ghee, purity is implied. What question of impure ghee?

In writing “pure” the trick is hidden. “Pure” is written to cover “impure.” Merit is written to cover sin. And the easiest arrangement for writing is action. To hide what you are inside, the easiest way is to do something opposite. You will deceive the whole world.

Thus here the one with an adulterous mind sits as a brahmachari. In action he is celibate, in feeling he is adulterous. Here the man who inwardly longs to possess the wealth of the whole world renounces all wealth and becomes a renunciate. The deception is deep. It must be entered carefully and understood, otherwise you too may do the same. Those who have done it are humans like you. Do not think I speak of someone else—I am speaking to you. It is a plain matter. If you examine, analyze your life a little, you will soon recognize that what you do is a device to hide what you are.

And a saint means: letting what you are be revealed. The so-called sadhu is one who is unvirtuous within and performs virtuous acts outside. The unvirtuous is one who is unvirtuous within and performs unvirtuous acts outside. The saint is one who is virtuous within and performs virtuous acts outside. In this world the unvirtuous is true, and the saint is true; the sadhu is the greatest cheat. The unvirtuous is the same inside and out—inside theft, outside theft. The saint too is the same inside and out—inside brahmacharya, outside brahmacharya. The sadhu is deception—the sadhu is a fraud. The sadhu is the greatest lie in this world. Inside he is unvirtuous, outside he is virtuous. Inside is sin, outside is merit. Inside he wants to press throats, and outside he chants: Ahimsa paramo dharmah—nonviolence is the supreme religion. The unvirtuous is true—just as within, so without. The saint is also true—just as within, so without. Therefore there is a certain similarity between saint and sinner: a similarity of truthfulness. They are very different, utterly opposite, yet they share one thing: authenticity.

Go and look at criminals. You have not looked, because you are so full of condemnation toward the criminal that you never look at him. When condemnation is so much, the eyes give up the effort to see; a curtain falls. Go sometime into a prison and look closely at criminals. You will find in their eyes more saintliness than in your sadhus. A simplicity you will find—they are as they are within. In a sadhu’s eyes you will find complexity—two layers. On the upper layer a smile; on the inner layer sadness. On the upper layer honesty; on the inner layer dishonesty. The sadhu is double. The sadhu is dual.

Therefore Lao Tzu’s total effort is: do not, leaving the unvirtuous, become a sadhu somewhere. If you must rise, rise from the unvirtuous into saintliness. Becoming a sadhu is no rising. The sadhu is an even more socially approved way of remaining unvirtuous. Society will be pleased—your acts have changed. Society cares for nothing else. You do not kill anyone; you do not look at another’s woman with an evil eye; you do not run away with someone’s wife; you do not steal—finished. Society is at ease with you. You may know your inside as you please.

But religion is not yet at ease. Religion says: until you change from within, what meaning is there in changing outside? For religion, act is not important; for religion, feeling is important. Religion is eager to transform your inner being, not your behavior. Yes, from the change of the inner, behavior will change—that is another matter, but that is not religion’s concern. That will happen by itself. It will happen as naturally as your shadow follows behind you.

Have you ever considered or seen: a thief, when he is not stealing, is still in the mood of a thief. He does not steal all twenty-four hours; not every day. When the thief is not stealing, what is he then? Is he a non-thief? The act is not there. But does absence of act make the thief a non-thief? Between two thefts, how is the thief? The underground stream of thieving continues; he is in search of opportunity. When the chance arrives he will be a thief. He is a thief already. The opportunity does not make him a thief; the opportunity only manifests the inner stream. Hidden before, it becomes apparent. Covered before, it is laid bare. But within flows the stream of thieving.

When a compassionate one, an enlightened being, is not performing an act of compassion—he is not pressing someone’s feet; someone has not fallen so he may lift him up; no one is drowning so he may save him; no house is on fire so he may serve—between two acts of compassion, how is the Buddha? There may be no act, but within flows the stream of Buddhahood; within compassion flows. Just as in a thief theft flows, in the lustful lust flows, in the greedy greed flows, so in the Buddha meditation flows, compassion flows, love flows. Between two acts of compassion, the Buddha is still a Buddha. No one becomes a Buddha because of acts; one becomes a Buddha because of the inner stream.

Now imagine: the Buddha is sitting, doing no compassion. And a thief sits near him, doing no theft. Are the two the same at this moment? The Buddha is not doing anything Buddhic; the thief is doing nothing thievish; both sit side by side. From the outside they seem the same. For society, they are equal. Because society recognizes only acts, only conduct. Until something becomes conduct, it does not come into society’s grasp. So for society they are exactly alike. But can you say they are the same? The difference between them is as great as between earth and sky. There may be no act, but the inner stream is present. The thief is a thief; the Buddha is a Buddha.

You are not what you do; your being does not depend on your doing. Your doing arises out of your being. Therefore I say: religion is not a social event; religion is an event far beyond society. Sect is a social event. To be Hindu is social; to be Muslim is social; to be Jain is social. To be religious is not social. Because Hindu, Muslim, Jain, Parsi, Christian—all are concerned with your acts. The Christian Ten Commandments—there is not a single commandment concerning being. Do not steal; do not be dishonest; do not look at another’s wife with lust—all are about acts.

Understand: a man does not steal, does not run away with another’s wife, does not murder. Will he attain Buddhahood merely by not doing? What will happen to his inner stream? Acts can be stopped. The inner stream? To change that is the great revolution. For that one must pass through a great inner life; for that one must pass through a great fire; for that one must change oneself from the roots.

All sects are parts of society. They are parts just as the court is a part. The court frightens you; sects frighten you. Religion is entirely outside society. Religion gives you abhay—fearlessness. Religion takes you beyond fear; beyond even the fearless. Religion leads from darkness into light. Religion is an ascent from self-ignorance to self-knowledge. It is an inner revolution.

Therefore society is also opposed to religion. Because to society, the religious appear like the fearless; though he is not merely fearless—he is abhay. But such subtle things lie outside society’s understanding. Society’s mind is crude, utilitarian. Its arithmetic is marketplace arithmetic. The fine, the subtle, the delicate have no pace there. It is as if you took diamonds to a vegetable vendor’s scales and he weighed diamonds with weights meant for greens. Can diamonds be weighed on a vegetable scale?

Society’s mind is very ordinary, gross. Society is a crowd. Does a crowd have any genius? A crowd has the lowest intelligence. Psychologists say: if the intelligences of individuals in a crowd are measured separately, the sum is still not the intelligence of the crowd. If a hundred friends sit here, and each person’s intelligence quotient is measured, even their total is not the crowd’s intelligence. Stranger still, psychologists say: in a crowd a person loses even his own intelligence; and in the crowd the last person becomes decisive, not the first. In a crowd the intelligent is lost, and the dull become leaders. For a crowd is a kind of fall. You lose your responsibility. In aloneness, the flower of one’s ownness blooms; in a crowd, all genius is lost.

Therefore you may have experienced: whenever you return from a crowd, you feel you have lost something. And the greatest sins in the world have been committed by crowds. Alone, men have not done great evils. What a Hindu crowd can do no single Hindu could do alone. What a Muslim crowd can do as a crowd no single Muslim could alone. Hundreds of thousands can be killed. Ask one Muslim, one Hindu, “What did you gain by burning those Muslims’ houses, by burning those Hindus’ temples?” If you ask one by one, even he will be afraid; he too will say, “No, it was not right. I do not know how it happened! I did nothing—it just happened with the crowd.” The crowd wipes you. It fills your responsibility, your understanding, your genius with dust. A crowd is a great fall.

If Buddha, Mahavira, Christ, Muhammad run toward the forest, the reason is not that society is evil, the simple reason is: they want aloneness. The pull of the crowd drags downward; they want to be alone. Because the supreme flower of life has always bloomed in solitude. No Buddha, no Mahavira, no Krishna has been born in a crowd—it cannot happen. In aloneness! Yes, once the flower blossoms, he returns to the crowd. But the blossoming happens alone.

That is why solitude has such value. It is a way to save oneself from the degeneration of the crowd. Let us understand a few more things, then we shall enter the sutra.

Lao Tzu says: the bad, the unvirtuous, the audacious—society erases them; the good, the gentleman, the virtuous—society saves them. Where then is the saint? With the saint, society remains in great perplexity. Because the saint bears the marks of both—the virtuous and the unvirtuous. He is beyond duality, advaita. In him the virtuous and the unvirtuous have melted into one. He is the music of life’s opposites. What should society do with the saint? Great dilemma arises.

So society finds a way. When the saint is alive, it opposes him—as it should oppose the unvirtuous. When the saint dies, it honors him—as it honors the virtuous. This is society’s compromise. The saint cannot be opposed wholeheartedly, because society too senses the man is not wrong. Jesus cannot be opposed with full heart; even while crucifying him, the heart hurts, there is a pang. Yet he must be crucified, because this man makes society’s rules break; his outer behavior is the behavior of the unvirtuous. He might be virtuous within, but outwardly whatever he does is shaking the very foundation of society. He is bringing the building down. All rules are broken. This man is dangerous. Yet in this dangerous man’s interior there is a fragrance of some extraordinary happening. But for that happening, one cannot tolerate his dangerous way of living. So Jesus was crucified. Those who crucified him became Christians. Those who crucified him became Jesus’ devotees. And such a happening occurred that Judaism shrank small and Christianity spread like a vast ocean.

Yes, after crucifixion, his life of acts ended, his conduct ended. What remained was only the inside. So the inner can be worshiped. There is no fear from within. Killing Jesus means: your body, your behavior, your conduct society cannot tolerate. Yes—your soul we will worship forever and ever.

Therefore saints are worshiped only when they are dead. To worship a saint while he is alive is the work of a few audacious people. Society and the crowd cannot worship the living saint. The saint puts them in a great dilemma. Because the saint is the sum of dilemmas, the confluence of opposites.

Now let us try to enter the sutra.

“You kill the one who is brave in attacking. You let live the one who is brave in not attacking. In both there are some gains and some losses.”

What are the gains and what are the losses is worth considering. The frightened man has some gains. The greatest gain is that he preserves what has been known. Otherwise the fearless will squander all that has been known over thousands of years. The treasure of knowledge is preserved by the frightened. He coils upon the past like a snake; he will not let you touch it; he will not let tradition be broken; he will not let you step off the line.

The line means precisely this: it is the distillation of thousands of years of experience. The line cannot be left because one person says so. You are one; that is the experience of thousands of years. You may mislead; you may cause the distillation to be lost. And that line too bears the footprints of enlightened ones.

Understand this a little more finely: once upon a time saints walked and created the very road which today the frightened clings to. He will not let it be left. If there were no timid ones, Buddha’s words would not have been preserved. Who would preserve them? If there were no timid ones, there would be no idols of Mahavira in temples. Who would preserve them? If the fearless had been listened to, there would be no temples, no mosques; no memory of Buddha, no memory of Christ. All would have been lost. Because the fearless always takes you off the beaten track.

Understand with subtlety: the timid preserves—he is the conservator. He cannot give birth to the new, but once the new is born, he preserves it. He cannot even assist in the birth of the new—he is an enemy of the new. But he is a lover of the old. Once you give birth to the new, the new becomes old. The moment it becomes old, the timid preserves it.

Understand it so: you have come to hear me. I am saying some new things. Very few will be able to come to hear me—only a few. Because the capacity to hear the new does not exist in the timid. But note: as soon as I depart, what I said you will not be able to preserve; the timid will preserve it. You will go off to hear someone else who is saying something new. The timid will not go. He has not come to hear me now, but tomorrow when he catches hold of my word, he will go to hear no one else. He will be the one to preserve.

The timid is the conservator; the fearless is the progenitor. Understand it so: in the mystery of life the fearless is the mother, and the timid is the midwife. The mother gives birth and departs; the entire charge falls upon the midwife. The fearless is capable of creating; he makes a new path. The timid watches. Until the path is complete, until many have walked on it, until the timid receives news, assurance from trusted sources that yes, this path reaches—until then the timid will not step. As soon as the path becomes certain, maps are available, the timid weighs up the questions of safety and risk, then he steps. Then he preserves that path—just as he is preserving ancient paths.

Another point worth understanding: the timid is a touchstone. When the timid begins to go on a path, it means that path has stood all the tests. The fearless is eager to go on the new without worrying whether that road will go anywhere or not. So out of a hundred times the fearless wanders ninety-nine times. He is ready to go wherever the call of the new comes from. But the new is not always right. Neither is the old always wrong, nor the new always right. The new is often wrong; the old is often right. Right and wrong have no necessary relation with new and old. The timid is a test. When even the timid begins to go, know the path has stood every test. Only then will the timid go; otherwise he will not. The timid preserves; the timid tests.

But he has dangers too. He does not allow the new; he clings to the old. Even if the old is leading nowhere he holds on.

People come to me. They say: we have been chanting a mantra for twenty years. I ask: is anything happening?—Nothing is happening. Drop the mantra, I will tell you something else. They say: how can that be? The mantra was given by our guru. We have done it twenty years; now we cannot leave it. Nothing is happening; nowhere are they arriving. Just as the fearless is obsessed with the new, the timid is possessed by the old. “So many years we have done it—how can we leave?” They never ask whether they are arriving or not. Does the medicine work or not? He is simply addicted to holding.

So the timid preserves, but he preserves rubbish too. He preserves what is wrong. He is simply eager to preserve. He is a blind midwife. He does not even know the child is dead—but still she preserves it, holds it to her breast. Have you seen a she-monkey? She roams for days with her dead baby clutched to her chest. She does not know the baby is dead.

The timid does not know that things that live also die; the path that once led will not lead always. Paths live and die. Religions are born and die. Systems of thought are once young, then grow old, then die. Everything in this world has its season and its stage. Just as there are children and elders, so are religions passing through childhood, youth, old age. Something that five thousand years ago was young has long since died. The timid clutches it to his breast. He cannot accept that what once lived can die. He says: our religion is sanatan—eternal.

No religion is eternal. Existence is eternal. A religion is the echo of Existence heard in an awakened one. When the awakened one is alive, there is breath and force in the echo he hears. As he departs, tradition sets in; what was knowing becomes scripture. Words that once came out of the silence now remain as a heap of words. What once arose from the emptiness of an awakened one now arises from a pundit’s scholarship. The priest takes over.

Buddha said: my Dharma will not live beyond five hundred years. Yet it is still “living.” How? The she-monkey roams with a dead child. Buddha himself said: my Dharma will not live beyond five hundred years. Now the devout do not agree even with Buddha. They clutch to their chest. The religion has died. Its breath is gone, its living glory has departed; there is no essence left. But it is an ancient path, produced by Buddha. Many walked upon it in ancient days and attained Buddhahood. The timid clings to it; he will not leave it.

The timid preserves. But he has no awareness. He preserves the false; he preserves the dead; he preserves the rotten. He only knows to preserve. He is mad about preserving. He does not see what he preserves. He cannot choose—just as the fearless cannot choose why and where he is going; the call of the new is enough.

Therefore, if the world were in the hands of the fearless, no tree would ever be allowed to set roots. Before it settles, another call comes; before this tree is cared for, another tree beckons. If the world were in the hands of the fearless, there would be fashions, not religion.

That is the condition in America today. America is the youngest of nations, hence very fearless. In the American gait there is a fearlessness not present in any other people’s gait. It cannot be—America’s entire history is three hundred years. What history is three hundred years? A child indeed. So in America everything is like fashion. If something lasts two or four years, that is much. When a storm comes it seems it will swallow the whole of America—sometimes Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, sometimes Meher Baba, sometimes Sufism, sometimes Zen. The current storm is Tibetan religion, because the lamas fled from Tibet; they all reached America. A great storm indeed. But nothing lasts more than two or four years, because America has not yet the timidity to hold. A new voice—anything new—people go. It is like the attraction of new clothes, of a new book; the beauty of a new woman, a new man. The sensation of newness, the run after the new. But it is no more than fashion. How long does fashion last? It has no roots.

One day on the road I saw Mulla Nasruddin running, a bundle tucked under his arm. I asked: such a hurry—where are you running? He said: I bought a sari for my wife; do not delay me in talk, do not stop me, let me go. I said: what is the hurry? The sari will reach. He said: before the fashion changes! Who can trust saris? How long does a fashion last?

In America everything is fashion. For the fearless there is taste in the new. Even if the new is wrong there is taste; even if the new is stale there is taste; even if the new has no essence, is worth two pennies, still there is taste. He can throw away an old diamond for a new shell. This is his danger; this is his defect.

With the old, with the timid, the danger is that even if a new diamond comes to him, he clutches the old shell to his chest; he is frightened of the diamond. He says: it is new—who knows? The old is trustworthy. If you want to convince the timid of something new, you have to pour the new wine into old bottles.

That is why I must speak on Lao Tzu and Buddha and Krishna; otherwise there is no reason. The wine is mine. The bottle could be mine too. But I would like the timid to grow interested. He would not come to hear me; but if I speak on the Gita, he comes to listen. It makes no difference to me—the wine is mine. Let the bottle belong to Krishna. What value is the bottle! So be it—Lao Tzu, Buddha; let your misunderstanding be slightly appeased—fine. If by appeasing your misunderstanding my words still reach your ears, if you come by the bottle and drink my wine—the work is done.

The timid must have the old. Then anything old will do. The ancient is his obsession, his fixation; he is crazy about the ancient. He preserves. He preserves garbage, the dead, the rotten. He does not allow revolution. The danger is clear; the gain is clear. He can preserve. He preserves the living too.

The danger and the gain of the new are also clear. Only the new discovers the living. Only the one ready to err will discover the new. The one afraid of making mistakes cannot discover the new. Only he who is ready to go on a hundred paths, even if wrong, will reach that one path which might be right. What other way is there to discover the right? Courage to go wrong! Audacity to enter the mistaken! He who is ready to wander will bring the diamond. If you are afraid to wander, you will not find the diamond. So the gain of the fearless is that he discovers the new, gives birth to the new. The danger of the fearless is that in the name of the new he gathers junk, brings stones and pebbles. He says: these are new. Why sit with old diamonds? Throw them away!

Therefore Lao Tzu says: “There are gains, there are losses.”

The saint is neither sadhu nor unvirtuous; neither frightened-timid nor fearless-audacious. The saint is not related to the new nor to the old; the saint is related to Truth. Truth can be new or old. In fact, Truth is neither new nor old—Truth is eternal. It is ever ancient and ever fresh—ever-new, ever-old. The saint’s gaze is not intoxicated by the new nor mad about the old. The saint gives birth to the new and also preserves the old. In fact, by giving birth to the new he preserves the old. This is his device. This is the only way to preserve the old—give birth to the new. It has become old because you are unable to give it birth again and again. There is only one way to keep anything new: give it birth every moment. Buddhahood does not bring a new thing; it brings again, in a fresh form, that which always is. The old forms are worn out. The old framework has become decrepit. The old can no longer house that soul. The soul has left the old house; it has become a ruin.

The awakened ones make a new house. The soul is ever the same. They give it a new form; they send a new invitation to the soul to descend again. The awakened ones again and again incarnate Dharma.

Dharma is one. Dharma means the very nature—what Lao Tzu calls Tao. It is one. It is outside time. Whenever we bring it into time, we must give it form. Forms grow old. When forms grow old, the saint breaks them and brings new forms.

But the saint is hard to recognize. Because in your language the timid can be understood, the fearless can be understood. The fearless is the revolutionary; the timid is the traditionalist. They both fit into your understanding because they are two sides of the same coin. The saint is hard: traditionalist plus revolutionary. He is both together; he has encompassed all; neither revolution is taboo nor tradition. And when revolution and tradition meet, only then—just as when body and soul meet, life appears—so too when tradition and soul meet, religion appears; the life of religion appears. Tradition is body; revolution is soul.

If you can create such an alchemy that you can hold both tradition and revolution together—revolution in one hand, tradition in the other—only then will you attain saintliness. Then you will have all the virtues of the fearless without his defects; all the virtues of the timid without his defects. Then you have created a synthesis of virtues.

“Though Heaven may dislike certain people, who knows whom to put to death—and why?”

Lao Tzu says: to that ultimate Nature, some will be in tune, some out of tune. Those out of tune will suffer by themselves. But who shall decide whom to kill? Why kill?

“Even the saint takes it as a difficult question.”

For the sadhu and the unvirtuous it is beyond their capacity to decide. The sadhu has decided already: kill the unvirtuous. And the unvirtuous is also decided: erase the sadhus. Their conflict is clear.

“Even the saint takes it as a difficult question.”

Whom to kill? Whom to save? Why? It is a complex question. And the deeper your knowing, the more complex it becomes. Because a moment comes in supreme knowing when you see that things constantly transform into their opposites. The unvirtuous whom you killed today—can you be certain he would not have become virtuous tomorrow? Because we have seen Valmiki become a saint from a sinner. Then what is your decision in killing this sinner—who can say you did not kill the saint-to-be? Many sinners have become saints. In fact, there is only one way to become a saint—pass through sin.

In a small church a pastor was explaining to children: what is the way to reach God, to attain heaven, how can one receive God’s grace? He hoped the children would answer: prayer, worship, meditation, virtuous deeds, good conduct. One small child raised his hand. The pastor asked: what is the way? He said: sin. Because without sin there can be no repentance; without repentance has anyone ever attained?

Whom will you erase? If you erase the sinner, you erase the saint in seed. Because the sinner will surely become a saint. How long can a sinner remain a sinner? If there is pain in sin, it is only a matter of waiting. Be patient—do not kill. The sinner will become virtuous by his own pain. And you cannot make him a saint by killing him. Because in killing him you will fill him with revenge.

Understand this a little. Whoever society decides to erase becomes full of resistance toward society. And his resistance means: he will not change what you want to change. By punishing criminals we have increased criminals, not decreased them. Because punishment hurts the ego. And when you punish someone, the feeling arises: I will do it even more; I will do exactly this—only next time more skillfully so I am not caught. No other feeling arises. Have you ever seen anyone transformed by punishment? Has it ever happened in the world that by punishing someone was transformed?

But our blindness is utter. We keep punishing. The more we punish, the larger the prisons. Every year new prisons are built, new courts rise, new police, new guards—and the chain goes on increasing. There seems no end. It seems, if it goes on like this, one day the entire earth will become a penitentiary. The numbers keep growing.

No one has ever been transformed by punishment. Through punishment man only falls.

Psychologists say: the man once punished comes again and again to prison. And every time he receives a bigger sentence, because every time he returns after a bigger crime. You know too—even small children know—tell them “Don’t do this,” and a powerful urge arises in them to do it. Because when you say “Don’t,” you strike the ego a great blow. Only by doing can he save his ego; otherwise there is no way.

You do not know how many crimes you have created in children by teaching them “Don’t.” In fact, children do not even know that lying is sin. When you say lying is sin, they first learn there must be some relish in lying. Because sin is always juicy. Those things you call sin become juicy; by your calling them sin they become juicier. And the things for which you give punishment, place prohibitions—an attraction is created.

Write on this door: Peeking inside is forbidden. Then no one courageous will go from here without peeking. He will peek. Wherever you see written “Urination here is forbidden,” you will find the marks of a hundred men below then and there. In fact, on the wall where it is written “Urination forbidden,” as soon as you come there, suddenly the urge to urinate arises.

No one has tried, but you try. If you want to save a wall, write upon it: Going from here without urinating is strictly forbidden; if you go, it will be very bad. Even the one who felt the urge will hold it. After all, man is man; it is a question of honor. Who can force like this? Who can compel anyone?

The ego resists compulsion; it retaliates.

Therefore Lao Tzu says: “Who knows whom to kill—and why? Even the saint takes it as a difficult question.”

This decision is hard. In fact it cannot be made. Then who are we to decide? Jesus said: Judge ye not—do not take judgments. Because all your judgments will be wrong.

“The Way of Heaven—the Tao—is skillful in victory without struggle.”

There is no need to kill. Leave it to the Divine. Leave it to life’s ultimate mystery. It can change without killing. How is its art?

Its art is: whenever you sin, you yourself suffer. The punishment is hidden in sin itself. No one punishes you; therefore you cannot retaliate. You are punished by your own actions. If no one punishes you, then upon sinning you will find you have punished yourself. As if you bang your head against a wall though the door was open and you could have gone out without injury. How long will you go on banging your head? It is your head. How long will you immerse yourself in pain? How long will you manufacture hell?

The Way of Heaven, the Tao—the Way of Dharma, the Way of Paramatma—is not to punish you, not to reward you. It leaves you free, so that you are punished by your own acts, rewarded by your own acts. No possibility is left for your ego to stand up against someone in retaliation. You are left alone. Full responsibility is given to you. Your freedom is ultimate. Endure suffering if you choose it—but know, you chose it. Receive joy if you choose it. With punya comes joy as fragrance with flowers; with sin comes pain. They are joined. No other gives you; you give yourself. You sow and you reap. No one else comes in between.

This is the skillful Way which Lao Tzu calls “victory without struggle.”

“Without words it rewards sin and virtue.”

Without words! There is no voice that you are being punished—yet punishment happens. There is no judge seated to thank you, to give you a reward—yet reward happens.

“Without words it rewards sin and virtue.”

It happens wordlessly, because punishment is hidden in sin and reward is hidden in virtue. It is not outside; it does not come from outside; it blossoms from within your own act. Therefore it happens without words.

If Lao Tzu could be obeyed, all systems of punishment and reward on earth should be stopped. Because by punishing we have never been able to change anyone; by rewarding, never. Man has kept falling. In truth, society thinks it can create an arrangement superior to the Divine arrangement. There lies the error. Leave people to their own acts, so that they themselves can decide, themselves can know which act leads to misery—on which paths there are thorns and on which there are flowers—let them choose. No one else should interfere. Then the decision will be quick. No delay, they will know by themselves. There will be no entanglement; it will be straightforward; the arithmetic will be clear. But society fears that if people are left, they might go astray.

Thoughtful, intelligent people come to me and say: what you say will spread license. I ask them: can you say that license has not spread? They say: what you say will make people very criminal. I ask them: are people not criminals? What greater sin can there be than what exists? What worse can be than the current state?

They are afraid without cause, frightened in vain. And the irony is: because of their arrangements people are more sinful. Because of their arrangements people cannot see that sin carries its own pain. You inflict pain and they think the judge is inflicting pain, society is inflicting pain. Because of your pain, resistance arises in them. Because of resistance, they repeat the very acts you want to stop—and they repeat them with more skill. And for every man inside prison there are thousands outside doing the same things, but more skillfully.

In truth, the great sinners are always outside; the small sinners get caught. Great sinners sit in the capitals; small sinners rot in the jails. The very skillful cannot be caught by law. Whatever law you make, the skillful finds a way around it. However you arrange, the arranger is man; another man can break it, for both have the same intelligence. In Delhi men sit and make laws—human intelligence. Across the land men sit and break them—human intelligence. Man will never be able to make a law that man cannot break. Only the Divine can make such a rule that man cannot break.

But because of your laws, the Divine laws are pushed into darkness. They are relegated to the rear. You do not let the sinner see that because of sin he is suffering. Your courts deceive him. He thinks: the courts give suffering. “If I had not been caught, why would I suffer? Next time I will try not to be caught.” You are spoiling his very vision. The suffering of sin arises from within; you, by inflicting suffering from outside, hook his eyes outside. He cannot see that he is the one smashing his head against the wall; no court is punishing him. He is drowning himself in sin; he is losing life. And where the dance of bliss could be, there are only tears of pain. And the thorns—he himself has sown them; no other sows them for him. Your social arrangements create the illusion that others are sowing thorns for you. So retaliate, fight, struggle.

Lao Tzu says: “The Tao—the Way of Heaven—wins without struggle. Without words it rewards sin and virtue. Without being called, it appears.”

It does not even need to be called. The court has to be called. The police must be summoned. The law must be invoked—then it comes. The Divine Way does not wait for your call. You do something—there the Divine law is present. You think something—there it is present. Here a ripple of feeling rises—there the fruit begins to ripen. There is not a moment’s delay.

“Without invitation it appears. Without a clear plan it bears fruit.”

It has not cast a net of courts; it has not posted policemen at every crossroads. There is no lawbook, no Indian Penal Code, no sections and subsections. Even if you want to escape, how will you? If there were sections, you could hire an attorney. Between you and the Divine you cannot hire an attorney.

Though you have tried. Some have claimed to be attorneys—your priests, your pundits. They claim: we are advocates. Do not worry—we will arrange it. Give us fees; we will get the rituals done, perform worship, sing praises, please the Divine. You steal freely. Build a small temple in the house; we will come and ring the bell and worship on your behalf.

They are advocates. But advocacy will not work there. For there are no written statutes—how to break them? Where there is a written law, it can be broken. With the woman you married, there can be divorce. But with the woman with whom there was no marriage—only love—how will you divorce? With marriage comes divorce. With law comes the way to break it. If you have written a document, you can be saved. But when nothing is written—everything is unwritten—where will you be saved? Where will you run? From where will you find a device?

Lao Tzu is saying something very significant: “Without any clear plan it bears fruit.”

The Divine has not spread a planned net. Otherwise some clever ones would always escape. There is no net—how will you escape? Wherever you go, you will find it. Its plan is not explicit. All is mysterious. Therefore there is no way to escape.

“Heaven’s net is vast and wide.”

It is everywhere. Wherever you are, it is. You too are a part of Heaven’s net.

“Its meshes are large, yet nothing slips through.”

Large meshes mean: great freedom. And still you will not escape. Because wherever you go, you will find the same. Its law always becomes the ground beneath your feet. Its law makes the sky. Its law makes you. Your freedom is total—do as you will. Do wrong—the law is present—and instantly you will suffer. Do right—the law is present—and instantly you will find nectar raining around you. You have complete freedom: make hell if you want; make heaven if you want. But you cannot go outside the net. The holes are large. The beautiful thing is: the Divine has not curtailed anyone’s freedom even a little. The Divine has given you such freedom that He does not even stand before you—because His standing might create bondage.

People ask me: why does God not become visible? I tell them: because He wants you to remain free. If He became visible, your freedom would be broken. If God stood before you, how could you commit sin? His presence would become a curb. His very presence would create a check. Like a small boy sitting and smoking, and his father arrives—he quickly hides the cigarette. Freedom is lost. If God were present, His presence, His splendor would destroy your freedom.

Therefore I say: it is His great compassion that you cannot find Him anywhere. And still you cannot escape Him. Your freedom is complete, yet beneath your freedom the base is His. He has given you the open sky—fly wherever you want; even break your wings if you wish—no harm—fly and break them. If you wish suicide, you are free—no one will stop you, no hand will come between and say: what are you doing? I gave you life and you are destroying it? No one will stop you, no echo will be heard. You are absolutely free. And still you cannot escape Him.

“The holes in His net are large, yet nothing slips through.”

This becomes very intricate. You are completely free, yet not licentious. Your freedom is unconditional, yet it is not anarchy. Behind your freedom, too, is Law.

That Law is what Lao Tzu calls Tao. That very Law we in this land have called Dharma—Buddha called it Dhamma. Dharma and Tao mean the same. Dharma means: That which holds you. You cannot escape it, because it holds you—where will you run? Wherever you go, its hands hold you. In hell too it will hold you; in heaven too it will hold you. You can escape everything else; you cannot escape the inner Dharma of your life. Dharma is that which holds you—and will always hold you. It will hold you in your evil; it will hold you in your good. It will not obstruct you by saying “Do not do this.”

Paramatma never tells you what to do and what not to do. Doing is your full freedom. But remember one thing: every act has a result; be ready to endure that too. There is freedom of action; there is bondage of result. You are free to sin, but in suffering you are unfree. You are free to do punya, but in receiving joy you are unfree—you will have to receive it. It has never happened that a man has done punya and escaped from receiving joy. It cannot happen. In sowing seed you are free; then you will have to harvest the fruit. There your freedom is not. Therefore while sowing the seed, be careful.

Our effort is this: we sow bitter seeds and hope to reap sweet fruits. We sin and hope for happiness. This effort will not succeed. For action you are free; the result of every action is fixed.

It happened—an incident most sweet: the disciple Ali asked Mohammed: listening to you, it seems we are utterly free and utterly bound—how can both opposites be true?

Mohammed was a simple man. He was no great philosopher, nor learned. That is why Mohammed’s expression has a precision you will rarely meet—perhaps in a Kabir; you will not find that sting in Mahavira, in Krishna, in Buddha, for they were very refined, sophisticated. Mohammed was utterly uneducated—rustic—he did not even know how to write. His utterance has a sting because his experience is direct; there is no cover of words, no spread of scripture.

Mohammed said: do like this, Ali—stand up and lift any one foot. Ali lifted the left foot. Mohammed said: now lift the right as well. Ali said: now you are being excessive—once I have lifted the left, how can I lift the right? Mohammed asked: when I first told you “lift any foot,” were you free or not? Ali said: utterly free; I could have lifted the right or the left. But now what do you experience? You have lifted the left—now why can you not lift the right? Now you experience bondage. You were utterly free at the start; you could have lifted either foot—but because of lifting one, now you are bound.

Now the consequence is: you cannot lift the other. That other foot is the consequence—result. Mohammed said: such is man’s utter freedom, and such his utter bondage.

You are free to perform the act. Whatever act you performed, you were utterly free—no one told you to do this or that. But once you perform the act, one foot is lifted—the other is bound. That second foot is the result. There is freedom of karma, not of karma-phala.

Therefore, if you want to remain perfectly free, think before acting. After acting you will not remain free. The leeway is great—the holes in the net are large—but you cannot escape it. No one can escape it. Before each act, freedom stands at your door. After each act, bondage stands there.

Therefore the Hindus have said: only he who is free of karma is truly free. He who is free of karma is neither free nor bound—we call him liberated. He is free of both. He has no more coming and going. Then as if he is no longer the fish trapped in the net of God, but the net of God itself—one with God.

We have three very significant words—and such words are not in other languages; it is worth noting. One word is Narak—hell; other tongues have words for it. Swarg—heaven; other tongues have words for it too. The third is Moksha—there is no word for it in any other tongue. Hell is the result of your evil. Heaven is the result of your good. Moksha is when you do nothing, neither good nor evil; neither think good nor evil; neither feel good nor evil—you become without feeling, without thought, non-doer, you sink into akarma. What ripens in that state is Moksha. In that state you become Paramatma. That is the supreme freedom.

Even heaven is bondage, for you will be forced to receive joy; you cannot escape it. You have done punya; you must receive joy. You cannot say: I have done good but I do not want joy. It is compulsion. You must accept it. You do sin—you must suffer. You cannot say I do not want to. One foot is lifted; the other is caught.

There is also a state of consciousness where you neither do good nor evil—where you do not do at all—where you become a non-doer. That is the supreme Samadhi. The one who attains that supreme Samadhi becomes Paramatma.

Enough for today.