Tao Upanishad #124

In life, the question of responsibility is the greatest question. And if the right resolution is not found, the whole journey of life can become confused and lost. Ordinarily the mind always wants to declare the other guilty, because that alone gives gratification to the ego. I — how could I be wrong? I am never wrong. I stand on the very wall that a mistake cannot be mine.

The moment the understanding dawns that a mistake can be mine too, the edifice of I begins to crumble. And the day it becomes visible that I alone am responsible for all the errors, that day the ego disappears as dew disappears with the morning sun. The ego is nowhere to be found the moment it is understood that the responsibility is mine. The one who has known that the responsibility is mine — his ego dies. And the one who keeps trying, in every circumstance, to make the other responsible — his ego becomes ever more secure.

First thing to understand about the ego: why do we thrust responsibility onto the other? Whenever a mistake happens, why must it be the other’s? And the same is true of the other; he too is thrusting the blame upon someone else. Then conflict arises, quarrels arise. Even if a settlement is reached, the smoke of quarrel remains. Because no settlement can be true unless, fundamentally, I have known that I am responsible. Until then every settlement is makeshift, superficial. It is as if we have pressed the fire under ash; the embers remain, and any time there can be an explosion again. There will be a search for opportunity; the settlement will crack; the conflict will rise up again. Because in the settlement we never accepted in our depths that the fault is ours. If we had known the fault is ours, there would be no question of settlement. Then we would simply bow down; then we would wholly accept. Then there would be no one to forgive. The fault was ours.

They say, when Napoleon was defeated and taken to the island of St. Helena, a friend said to him, ‘Now do not carry this burden of worry; what has happened has happened. Forgive your enemies, and live the last days of your life in peace.’ Napoleon’s words are very significant. He said, ‘I can forgive them, but I cannot forget.’

And if you cannot forget, what kind of forgiveness is this? This is forgiveness out of helplessness. This is the forgiveness of the powerless. Nothing else can be done now, so Napoleon forgives. But the fire smolders within. Inside, he is still enraged. And if ever the opportunity arises, if convenience presents itself, he can once again be ready to fight.

If you have made blaming the other your style of living, you will never become religious — this is certain! In the world you may succeed as much as you like, you may accumulate wealth and fame, but in truth you will remain a failure. Because no revolution will be able to happen within you. And there is only one revolution — the inner revolution. What you gain on the outside is of little value; within you do not grow, within you remain childish. The means outside increase, but the master within stays closed like a bud. And until the bud blossoms there will be no fragrance in life. Heaven is far away; even fragrance will not be. And the inner bud will not blossom until a transformation comes into your vision: that the fault is mine.

Religion begins with the awakening that the fault is mine. Not that sometimes the fault is mine. If you keep accounts of ‘sometimes,’ who will decide? If you think, ‘Sometimes the fault is mine, sometimes it is another’s,’ then you will remain half-and-half. The question is not whose the fault is — of course the other’s fault exists too. But the very foundation of the religious vision is this: whenever and wherever some mischief is occurring, the fault is mine, wholly mine, utterly mine. The moment such awareness arises, the ego falls, and a revolution begins within; you begin to change.

This is the difference between the Eastern and Western visions. The West has embraced, so deeply, the notion that the fault is another’s, that great philosophies, sociologies, psychologies have been built upon it. If you go to Freud or to a Freudian analyst, for your illness he will always hold someone else responsible. If you are afraid, he will search in your childhood — perhaps your father frightened you. If you are unable to love and love does not flower within you, then surely your mother did something; she did not give you love, she rejected you, did not accept you; she withdrew her breast from you too soon. But Freud will always find the fault in another.

This is a vicious circle. If your father misbehaved with you and therefore you are enraged, then there is no way to transform your anger — for your father must be changed. Perhaps your father is already dead. Even if he is living, if your father goes to Freud, he too will be told, ‘Your father did something wrong to you; your mother, someone else in childhood, society, environment...’ But the basic premise is: the fault cannot be yours. The fault will always be someone else’s. And if you walk backward in this way, you will find that in a mind like Freud’s too a very ancient Christian doctrine is at work: Adam committed the original sin; its fruit human beings are suffering.

Christian thought holds that if you are suffering, it is the fruit of Adam’s sin — of the first man. And if we pull Freud’s line of thought — though he does not seem Christian — to its logical end, the result will be the same. Your fault goes to your father, your father’s fault to his father, his to his, and in the end Adam will be caught. And how will Adam be changed now? It means there can be no transformation.

Therefore, as Freud’s influence increased in the West, the possibility of religious revolution dwindled. How will you change? You are not at fault; your fault does not exist. The fault is someone else’s. And until the other changes, you cannot change.

It is astonishing — and I say that beliefs work from the unconscious — however much Freud may try to keep away from Jewish and Christian notions, they lie hidden in his unconscious. He never said that we suffer the fruit of Adam’s sin; yet the logical outcome of his theory is exactly that.

There is Marx, who thinks himself utterly anti-religion, a staunch enemy of Christianity; yet his notion too is that whenever there is some fault, society is responsible, not you. Someone else is responsible. And until society changes, you cannot change. And when will society change? You are here for a short while; when will society change? If you wait for society to change, you will turn to dust. Society will remain; you are here today and gone tomorrow.

And when will society change? Ten thousand years of history lie before us; society never changed. Even when it changed, it did not change. Great changes occurred, and yet the basic form of society remained the same. Social change appears like colors changing on the surface; the soul within is untouched. It is like the chameleon, changing colors; the chameleon remains a chameleon. When will society change?

In English there is a word: utopia — the name for an imagined society that someday will be, what Gandhi called Ramrajya. The word utopia is valuable. From its Latin root it means ‘no-where.’ Utopia means ‘no-where’: it does not exist anywhere, nor will it be; it is only in thought. Ramrajya means: that which never was, is not, and will never be; mere imagination.

Will you wait for Ramrajya to change yourself? When everything is right, then you will change?

Then you will never change. This is a device to avoid the transformation of the soul. Neither will society change, nor will you need to change. You have found a pretext — and you long for pretexts, because transformation is arduous; transformation is tapas, it is an ascetic fire; the journey is difficult. The journey climbs toward the mountain peak, not down the slope. The passions run downhill. To descend into passions you need do nothing; as water flows downward, so you flow into passions. As a stone rolls from the summit into the valley, the stone needs do nothing; gravity does it all. But to carry the stone up the mountain is laborious. To reach the summit of life requires tapas.

But these excuses — that only when the whole society changes will you be able to change — will never allow you to change. And such a society will never be. Suppose, theoretically, for the sake of argument, such a society does arrive someday, then I tell you: if it arrives and you change then, your change will be worth two pennies. First, such a society will never be; second, even if it were, and you then changed, your change would be cheap. For it would mean that because of society you were bad, now because of society you are good; not that you were bad out of yourself, nor are you good out of yourself. How will your Atman arise from this? If all are good, you are good; if all were bad, you were bad. You are a reflection of others. How will you have a soul of your own? You are only an echo.

And Atman means: you are something in your own right, there is a dense-consciousness within you. Its single meaning is this: even in adverse circumstances you remain yourself. Circumstances cannot change you — that is what Atman means.

Therefore Marx and Freud are thinkers who gravely damage the possibility of inner revolution. Because they place the blame on the other. And no one ever pauses to consider whom you are blaming.

Consider this: there is a seven-story building, and a man jumps from a window and commits suicide. Who is to blame? Ask Freud; he will search in childhood. He will not say, ‘This man has committed suicide’; he will search childhood for some trauma, some sad event that made him self-destructive. He will look for the mother and father. Among Freud’s deep disciples there is Otto Rank; he does not stop at childhood — he goes back to the womb: something happened in the womb — the mother fell, was hurt, was sorrowful; her wound remained upon the child.

Ask Marx and he will say, some economic, social misery — perhaps his shop was near bankruptcy. Marx will search in money; Freud will search in past memories. But no one will say plainly: this man is responsible. And if we begin to search in this way, great difficulties arise.

Who is responsible? The wife who keeps the house in quarrel twenty-four hours a day? Or the mistress who, trying to separate him from his wife, fights with him night and day? Or the son who has become a drunkard and causes him pain? Or the daughter? He is a Hindu and the daughter has married a Muslim; it pierces his heart like a knife. Or his business which keeps failing day by day, and his financial situation grows tangled? Or the architect who put a window exactly behind his chair? For the psychologists say that if the window had been farther away he would have had to walk to it, and in that little time the mood might have changed. The window was exactly behind him; there was not even a moment — the impulse to die seized him, a straight window, he leapt. Or is the manager responsible who insisted the office be on the seventh floor and would not agree to the first? Or the electricity company, which suddenly cut the power, his fan stopped, he was drenched in sweat and distressed, and in that moment the thought of suicide seized him? Or the fly whirling around his head — which he kept trying to swat away but it would not go? Flies are very stubborn. In their past lives all flies must have been hatha yogis. Shoo them from one place and they return to the same spot. The fly irritated him. Who is responsible? If you set out to search, you will find the whole world responsible — except this man. Such searching!

But the whole emphasis of the West is that the responsibility is the other’s. Because in the West an effort has been made to strengthen the ego. The entire Western psychology strives to ripen the ego. The psychologist says: if someone’s ego is not mature, he has not become properly adult. The ego must mature, must be aggressive. And the meaning of the ego’s aggression is this: the whole world is responsible — except me.

No wonder the West has gone neurotic. No wonder that while all comforts are available there — money, splendor — inner revolution is not possible. There is a block like a stone. They have come near the temple; yet the door seems shut, only a wall visible.

Before his death, Freud stated: ‘I have no hope that man can ever be happy. It is not possible. Because the causes are endless. Until all causes are set right, until the whole existence is set right, how can anyone be happy?’

Someone asked Freud, ‘If no one can be happy, what do you doctors do?’

He said, ‘We do only this much: that people remain normally unhappy; they do not become abnormally unhappy. Beyond that we expect nothing. Let them remain normally miserable; let them not become abnormally miserable. We can reduce pain a little; there is no possibility of happiness.’

And here in the East we have said the very opposite: happiness is of small value; there is the possibility of Ananda. Ananda means the great bliss — a joy that begins but does not end, a joy that is eternal. Then there is a ceaseless shower; one never becomes thirsty again — the one who has once drunk the water of Ananda is satisfied forever. Happiness is momentary; it is here now, and gone the next moment. It has little value — a line drawn on water: before it is made, it is erased. However much you try, it will be erased; there is no way to preserve it. It is not in the nature of happiness to stay. In the East there have been people who said: leave even the talk of happiness, happiness is worth two pennies — we promise Ananda.

What is the basis of this promise? Its basis is: do not put responsibility on the other. Do not put the errors of life, the pains of life, the wounds of life onto someone else’s shoulders. If you do, you will remain miserable. In that very attempt your ego will grow stronger. And even happiness will become scarce — Ananda far away. The East said something else: take the whole responsibility upon yourself; the moment you take responsibility, the birth of the soul begins within you.

Someone abuses you. Certainly, had he not abused you, you would not be angry. This is straightforward. You were walking along humming a song; there was no question of anger. You were very cheerful, your feet were tingling, it was morning, the night’s rest had made you fresh, you had bathed and left the house, you were humming a tune. Someone abused you. Clearly, his abuse made you angry.

But no — do not be hasty. It is not so clear. The East says: if anger were not within you, the abuse would have gone to waste; he would have abused, but within you there would have been no hole to receive it. His arrow would have passed right through. If there were no anger within you, the other could not have produced it. Therefore the root cause is not the other — he is but a condition. The West calls him the cause; the East calls him merely the condition.

Understand it like this: you lower a bucket into a well; there is no water in the well. What will you do? For a while you will scrape and rattle, then pull it up and go home with your empty bucket. If there is no anger within you and someone lowers the bucket of abuse into you — what will he draw? What will he bring up? The bucket will return empty. Only when there is water in the well can a bucket draw water. That the bucket draws water is only a condition; the root cause is that the well contains water.

You may be humming a song, the song is on the surface; beneath, anger is moving, seething. Just a small abuse — gunpowder is present; someone throws a spark and there is an explosion. Sparks do not cause explosions; it is the gunpowder you carry within that explodes. You carry a great quantity of gunpowder. The cause is there.

So when someone abuses you, there are two ways. Either you hold him responsible — ‘This man made me angry!’ — or you hold yourself responsible — ‘There was anger within me; how gracious of this man to show me my inside by abusing me.’ Then you will be able to thank the enemy. And the day you can thank the enemy — ‘Your kindness is great; I had no idea — I was humming a song, and in this humming we remain forgetful — you showed me the inner fire; thank you!’ — the very moment you take responsibility upon yourself, for the first time the birth of individuality happens within you. You become free. You have said, ‘I am the cause.’ You have taken mastery into your own hands; the master is no longer another.

Understand this well: whenever you hold another responsible, you make the other the master. If he abuses, you become angry. If he welcomes you, you become pleased. If he garlands you, your joy knows no bounds; and if he smiles a little in sarcasm, all your buildings collapse. Then the other is the master.

Freud and Marx and all those who say the other is responsible — they are snatching your mastery from you; they are making you slaves. Their entire doctrine will make man a slave, a deeper slave — not a soul. How will mastery be in your hands? If, for everything, the other is responsible, then who are you? A piece of wood tossed by gusts upon the waves. When the waves go east, you go east; when the wind goes south, you go south; when the wind stops, you lie where it leaves you. Who are you? Where is your being? You have not yet received even the first news of your existence; your soul has not yet claimed mastery nor made any proclamation.

The moment you say, ‘I am responsible,’ you begin to become a master; transformation begins within you. Not only in happiness, not only in sorrow — in every state, whatever the mood, you will hold yourself the cause. In the Upanishads the rishis say: no one loves the wife; through the wife one loves only the Self — the Atman. No one loves the sons; through the sons one loves only the Self. Whether love or hate, pleasure or pain, anger or compassion — in every case you return to yourself.

This is the deepest discovery of the East. From you is your beginning, and upon you is your end. The day you know this, recognize this...

And there is no difficulty; the whole of life is its scripture. Learn to read it a little. Learn the meanings of a few signs. Recognize a few indications of life. And you will know you are the master. Then it is your wish — if you want to be angry, be angry; but do not forget and hold the other responsible.

Then you will find you cannot even be angry. Because anger is possible only when the other is responsible. Otherwise, upon whom will you be angry? For what reason? Slowly you will find that the hostility in your life is falling away. You do not settle, nor do you arrange some kind of peace on terms; you become unconditionally your own master, and you remove every responsibility from the other. You become your own world. A center is born in your life. A foundational ground begins to form within you. Upon that ground the ascent of all your heavens, the birth of all your music, becomes possible.

Do not declare anyone else guilty. Do not declare anyone else responsible. Draw responsibility from every side. Become your own center. Then revolution is possible in your life. Short of this, no revolution will be. You have tried all other methods. Someone abuses you; you explain to yourself: to quarrel is not proper — it is uncivil, against etiquette. But even if you do not quarrel outwardly, inwardly quarrel has begun. Someone insults you; you think, ‘Let it be; dogs keep barking, the elephant passes on.’

This is the talk of the ego — dogs bark, the elephant moves on. You are the elephant; the rest are dogs. This is no great wisdom; this is great ego. And you are still making the other guilty. You are consoling yourself: others are dogs, you are an elephant. You are manufacturing consolation.

This consolation is not enough; within it lies discontent, and soon it will show. You will not remain peaceful for long. This peace is a patch; these patches will not be able to hide your restlessness. In fact, they will reveal it more clearly.

It happened: a beggar stood at a door asking alms. His shirt was torn. The housewife felt pity and said, ‘Take off your shirt; while you eat I will stitch it. Why do you go about in a torn shirt?’ The man said, ‘No, forgive me. Your kindness is great, but I cannot give you my shirt to stitch.’ The housewife was surprised. ‘Why?’ The man said, ‘A patch shows poverty clearly. A patch means I left home wearing a torn shirt. A tear alone could have happened on the way; I can go home and change. A torn shirt does not prove a man is poor. It only shows perhaps it tore on the way — caught on a branch — and on returning home it will be changed. But a patched shirt declares poverty outright — it means he left home wearing a patched shirt. No, I am poor, but not so poor that I go around declaring it with a patched shirt.’

It is better to be bad than to be good with patches, because through patches your badness peeks out. Even in a bad man there is a kind of truth, an authenticity, that is absent in the patched-up respectable man. Do not put on patches. But all of you have tried this, because it seems easier. To change the shirt is expensive; putting on a patch is easy. Anger comes — people put on patches; instead of changing the root they persuade themselves that anger is unbecoming; they take vows that they will not be angry; if they do get angry they will punish themselves, keep a fast. All this is patching. In the crowd at the temple they vow that from now on they will not be angry.

Observe such people. You, perhaps, get angry now and then; such people seethe in anger twenty-four hours a day. You explode sometimes; in such people you will never see an explosion because they have sworn — but the anger keeps accumulating; layer upon layer it settles. Such a person becomes anger itself. He does not get angry; his very way of being is anger. He burns more than you. He tried to patch.

Always remember: if you want to change life, do not cut the leaves, do not wrestle with the branches; go to the roots. Where is the root? Here it is: to hold another guilty is the root. Behind it your ego stands. Then the net begins. Then the ego will hold the other guilty even more; the more you hold the other guilty, the bigger the ego becomes. Now you have fallen into a trouble from which coming out will seem difficult.

But it is not difficult — nothing is difficult for understanding. For the foolish, everything is difficult; the foolish will cut leaves. He will not fell the root of ego; he will busy himself decorating the ego. He will say, ‘I am the elephant; dogs bark.’

Many of your moral sayings are nothing but ornaments for the ego. Your maxims and fables do nothing but dress up the ego. You give ego to little children. You say to small children, ‘Look, it is not proper to quarrel; you are noble! Remember the family you are born into! You are born in the line of elephants and you are upset by dogs barking?’ You give the child ego: ‘It is not befitting for you to be angry.’ You are not cutting the root; you are watering it. You say to the child, ‘It is not worthy of you.’ You tell him, ‘Your ego is so big; you are born in such a great lineage. Look, your father and his father never got angry, and you get angry!’ You give the child ego. And ego is the root of all mischiefs — and you think you are saving the child from mischief.

But the whole of life goes like this; hence the whole of life is a quarrel. There is no peace. And if ever there is peace, it is a patched peace. Something else lies hidden within; on the surface are patches. If you look closely you will find yourself like a beggar’s rag — patches upon patches. Nothing steady within; holes and patches. How will you become a soul like this!

Understand Lao Tzu’s sutra.

‘Patching up a great hatred is sure to leave some hatred behind.’

If you patch hatred, some hatred will remain; it will remain. Beneath the patch the cloth remains torn; it is not mended. If you attempt reconciliation with an enemy, within the reconciliation the smoldering fire will always remain. Reconciliation means a makeshift. It means this is not the right time to fight. It means circumstances are not convenient for fighting now. Reconciliation means postponing the fight to tomorrow. At the proper moment, when your hand is uppermost, then you will see. That is why so many peace treaties are signed in the world — and all are destroyed in wars. When signatures are affixed to a peace treaty, it is already clear that war is near. Patches are being stitched; nations patch, individuals patch. All try to save face. When you become strong you drop the concern; there is no need to save face.

After the First World War Germany signed the peace treaty only because it had become weak; the war had aged it. But it was only for preparation. Twenty years were spent preparing — then the second war rose. It was clear from that very day, because within the settlement the fire smoldered.

Pakistan and India may have any number of Shimla agreements — all are patches. Because the fire smolders within. They meet, they extend hands, but inside there is enmity.

Politicians meet and smile; swords are hidden within. The glitter in their smiles is of swords, not of the heart. Inside, preparations go on. All over the world, every moment, preparations for war go on — and every moment there is talk of peace. Politicians keep releasing doves of peace; and every day they enlarge factories for the materials of war. Under the ground tunnels are laid; above, doves are released. Whom is one deceiving? All the politicians talk of peace; then who makes war?

No — they say, ‘For the sake of peace, war is necessary.’ There lies the whole web: for peace, war is necessary. War seems to be the basic thing. Peace is the time between two wars when people prepare for war — nothing more. The Third World War is already smoldering within man. Sometimes a small explosion takes place in Vietnam, sometimes in Israel, sometimes in Bangladesh. These are small tremors. They are the announcements of the coming great eruption. Any day the great explosion can occur and the whole of humanity can be engulfed in fire. And politicians will go on talking of peace. Peace conferences will be held; doves will keep flying. As if by releasing doves any peace happens. How will you put together doves and bombs? The blindness of man has no end.

And the same is the condition of individual to individual. You smile at the neighbor, you say namaste. These are patches. Inside there is conflict; the smile is a way of hiding it. The very meaning of your ‘Jairamji’ is that something is boiling inside that needs to be hidden. If you observe carefully, if you do a little self-inspection, you will find it. And all the reconciliations you have done — behind each, hatred remains. It keeps accumulating. Its ash keeps settling. That ash will become your grave. Better to have let the enmity come out — whatever was to happen, let it be. But do not put on patches. Patching seems like wisdom.

I say to you: either let the enmity run its course — fight — why trouble the doves? What fault is theirs? What harm have they done you? Either fight, but with authenticity. Or, with authenticity, cut the root of conflict. And I tell you: if you are sincerely ready to fight, you will cut the root. Because who wants to fight? Fighting is sheer waste of this precious life which you will not get again; whether it will be given again is not certain — no dead man has returned to tell. This priceless opportunity which has been given to you for nothing — will you waste it in enmity? No, if you become truly authentic, even about fighting, suddenly you will find there is no meaning in fighting.

But you keep hiding the urge to fight; you keep a surface layer of peace. It is this layer that is dangerous. Because of it you cannot see your reality — how much pus of hatred is within. You do not see it; it continues to grow inside. If you see it, you yourself would agree to have it operated upon. It is cancer.

My experience is: if a husband fights heart to heart with his wife, and the wife with her husband, the clouds soon disperse and peace descends — not the peace of reconciliation, but real peace. The clouds came and went. A storm rose and passed. And the peace after a storm is very authentic. Husbands and wives who never fight are dangerous. Those who never fight clearly; who play diplomacy even between themselves — if a wife wants to hit the husband, she beats the son; this is diplomacy. She wanted to hit someone else, she hit someone else. Often the children are beaten from both sides, because they are weak and stand between. If the wife would fight with the husband directly, let what is in her heart come up, not hide it...

But how not hide, when lessons have been taught: to be Sati, Savitri, to be Sita. Sita was thrown into the forest by Ram — without cause, without any basis at all. A washerman said, ‘I am no Ram to accept my wife after she has been out all night. I am no Ram to accept Sita after years away — who knows where, what happened — whether Ravana did this or that — nothing is known — and then accept her!’ On this small statement of a fool! And the story says that Ram had already taken Sita’s fire-test. That too went to waste? On the word of one dullard Sita was flung into the forest — and she was with child! And Sita said nothing.

Such imputations of ideals have been placed upon you. So the wife thinks, ‘I must be Sita, Savitri; how can I fight?’ But within is fight; on the surface is settlement. On the surface she is Sita; inside a fire burns. Ideals have been taught to the husband too. No one is to be true.

Ideals are the progenitors of untruth. The more ideals you have been taught, the more inauthentic you have become. Because the ideal means to enact what you are not; to behave as you are not; to act as you cannot. The ideal means to suppress yourself and display the ideal. You become a lie. And that which you have suppressed will erupt from a thousand places. How will you hold back the pus? By dressing the wound and sticking a flower on top — will anything be solved?

Everyone has ideals. Every woman has ideals. Conflict becomes difficult — and then the real conflict begins, in which lives are drowned. Then quarrel happens at every small turn. The woman sets down the utensils with a thud; the husband opens the door with hostility. Sons are beaten, daughters thrashed. Their lives also become entangled in the net of turmoil. The husband comes home fearful; the wife is afraid of herself lest there be a quarrel, lest the same topic arise again. And it will arise — because what you try to avoid is impossible to avoid. What you suppress will surge up. That which frightens you is obviously stronger than you — that is why you fear it. Then there is quarrel. And we hide quarrel with patches from above. Then love itself is destroyed; for where there is no authenticity, what love can be?

Do not ever do this by mistake. No one has to be Sita; one Sita is enough. No one needs to become a Ram; otherwise washermen will harass you. You have to be yourself — authentically yourself. Then a unique secret opens in life. If husband and wife quarrel heart to heart, say whatever is to be said — naturally, because living together raises dust. Living together twenty-four hours, quarrel happens, conflict happens. Minds do not meet at times; even among great lovers disagreements arise. Not unusual. Boredom gathers; dust settles; smoke comes. Let it out! If your love is strong, it will survive all this. And certainly, if your love survives after passing through all this, it will be refined. All this will come and go; the sky remains. Clouds come, gather, storms rise — the sky remains. Is the sky afraid of clouds? Frightened? If there is love, after every quarrel the clouds will pass and you will find a deep peace has come. That peace is not of settlement; it is real. Two persons have thrown away their uselessness; two have become quiet, and in that quiet they have come close.

Once you understand this, you will know the taste of being authentic. Authenticity itself is religion. And then, slowly, as you become authentic, moments of real peace — not settlements; settlement is the name of false peace — moments of real peace will begin to come; the clouds will begin to lift and the open sky will be seen; as you begin to swim in the blueness of the sky, you will discover that every anger was futile, every struggle unfounded; you were throwing your pain upon the other’s shoulders needlessly.

Only in that peace will you see — because peace is the eye. In it those knots become clear which never become clear through eyes filled with anger. Then you will find you were responsible. You came home angry from the office; the boss had said something, the office had its situation. You came seething and fell upon your wife. You picked some small thing — why is the bread burnt, why is the newspaper torn, why is the button not sewn. A small thing became huge, because you were boiling within and searching for a pretext. And if you keep looking closely, you will realize: no one in the world is making you angry. You want to be angry, others become occasions. You have the coat of anger; you make anyone the peg and hang it there. The day you see this, you have begun to be a soul. You will not need to go to any temple or mosque. Wherever you are, from there the first stirrings of the soul begin. Your rebirth has begun.

Lao Tzu says, ‘After reconciliation in enmity a little enmity remains.’

What use is such reconciliation? What remains — the ember that remains — will kindle fire again. A small spark is enough.

‘How can it be called satisfactory?’

Do not be satisfied with settlement; be satisfied with peace. And understand well the difference between settlement and peace. Settlement means an effort to avoid fighting; peace means going beyond fighting. Peace means the fight is gone, the root cause of fighting is gone. Settlement means the root remains, only it is not convenient to fight now; therefore we settle. ‘We will see tomorrow.’ People say in quarrels, ‘We will see’ — meaning: it is not convenient now; we will see when the time comes. People keep seeking an opportunity all their lives. Certainly the wound within must be kept green, not allowed to dry.

‘Therefore, in a compromise the saint considers himself the weaker party, and does not lay blame on the other.’

This is the very meaning of saintliness — one who does not lay blame on the other, who, in every circumstance, discovers his own fault. You, in every circumstance, discover the other’s fault. And I say — in every circumstance. No matter what the other is doing, you will discover his fault — because you want to. And if you want to find fault, no power in the world can prevent you from finding it. You will find something. However illogical or absurd it may appear to others, it will not appear so to you. But the saint is just the opposite.

Kabir has said: keep the critic close, give him a hut in your courtyard. Keep those who criticize you as guests in your house, always near. Because they do a great work — they always declare you at fault. And the saint is engaged in searching his faults. Whoever points out his error — he is ready, for the moment he sees his error, the process of change begins.

You keep saving your errors; you protect your faults; you even defend them. And then if your life becomes hell, who is responsible? You saved the wrong; you gathered it all; you never accepted that there is any fault in you. Therefore faults kept taking up residence. Had you accepted them, they could have been erased. If calmly you had accepted: ‘I am an angry man’ — remember, the day you accept ‘I am an angry man,’ your angry man starts dying. Do angry men accept that they are angry? Impossible! If you accept ‘I am proud, egoistic’ — do the proud ever accept it? This is the beginning of humility; the shoots of humility are sprouting. If you accept ‘I am insane,’ you begin to be well. Do madmen accept that they are mad? Can you persuade a madman that he is mad? No way.

Psychiatrists say: as long as a madman can be made to understand that he is mad, and he is willing to agree, he is not yet mad. He may be sick, but not mad. Treatment is then very easy. But the day it becomes impossible to make him understand that he is mad, that day he has crossed the boundary; to bring him back becomes very difficult.

You do not accept that you are angry. You do not accept that you are greedy. You do not accept that you are lustful. You do not accept that you are proud. You are protecting all these. Now think for yourself: if you protect thorns, where will you reach except hell? Those thorns you have protected will prick you. If anyone says, ‘There is a thorn,’ you rise to fight him. Kabir says: seat him in your courtyard! For if he shows the thorn, there is a possibility of removing it.

But no — you seat in your courtyard those who praise you, flatter you. Those who say, ‘Ah, never has anyone like you been! So beautiful, so refined, so dignified! You are the very statue of ideals!’ Them you want to keep at home. They are enemies, for they fill you with delusion. They will cut you to pieces. They have some purpose — first they inflate you, then they fulfill their purpose.

It is difficult to find a person who does not get entangled in flattery. Very difficult. If you find someone who does not get caught by flattery, understand that he is a saint. For only he who has begun to see his faults cannot be deceived by flattery. He knows he is angry, and you are saying, ‘Never have I seen such a calm man! In your presence there is a shower of bliss! Come close, it feels like a holy bath, the mind is purified!’ If you wish to recognize saints, one test you can use is this: praise them.

It happened, a man came to meet Bayazid — a Sufi fakir. The man began extravagant praise: ‘You are emperor among Sufis! I have seen many fakirs, but none compares to you!’ Bayazid sat with bowed head, tears flowing from his eyes. The disciples were a little surprised.

Before that man could leave, another arrived and began to abuse Bayazid — unrestrained — ‘You are a devil! You are destroying religion! What you preach is not the teaching of the scriptures! You are a messenger of Satan, not of God! You are against Mohammed!’ He hurled many abuses, much condemnation. Bayazid’s tears flowed as before; he sat with lowered eyes.

Both left. The disciples asked, ‘We do not understand — what is the matter? When one man praised you, you wept; when another abused you, you wept. What is the secret? This behavior is very contradictory.’

Bayazid said, ‘When the man was praising me, I was weeping because the poor fellow knows nothing. I know my state. I was weeping because I know how ordinary I am. To call me fakir is not even proper — and he says I am emperor among fakirs. I was weeping because I know my condition.’

The disciples asked, ‘Then why were you weeping when the other condemned you?’

He said, ‘Then also I wept, because he was exactly right. That is my condition.’ The disciples said, ‘What are we to do? To us the first man seemed exactly right and the second completely wrong.’ Bayazid said, ‘Listen well to both, and your mind will find balance. One presses down one scale, the other lifts the other. If you listen well to both, you will arrive at balance in the middle. Remain in the middle — neither praise nor condemnation. They were complements of each other, as if two pictures of the same person. Both are worth hearing — and do not choose between them. If you choose the first, you will be filled with hopes about me; if you choose the second, you will run away as enemies, and you will miss what could have been received from me. Hear both well; let them cancel each other, and you will attain balance.’

A saint suffers in praise — for praise should be reserved for those who are affected by it. You cannot affect a saint. A saint means: one who has taken responsibility for all faults upon himself. You cannot deceive him. Flattery has no meaning there. If you go on condemning, you may be accepted; if you go on praising, you may not be accepted.

‘In a compromise the saint always counts himself the weaker party at fault, and does not lay blame on the other. The virtuous man is in favor of reconciliation; the sinner is in favor of laying blame.’

The sinner’s total effort is to prove that you are wrong. This gives him great relish, because it is the defense, the security, for remaining a sinner — he ever tries to prove you are responsible. The sinner favors blaming; the virtuous man ever favors reconciliation. He is ever ready to count himself at fault. The virtuous is ready to bend; he is soft like water. The sinner is unwilling to bend; he is hard like stone. Therefore in the end he must break; for the flexible wins, the inflexible breaks. The virtuous is like a small child — fresh, soft; the sinner like an old man. All sinners are old. In English there is a phrase: old sinner. In truth, all sinners are old; no child is a sinner. Sin needs much experience; the ups and downs of life must be seen. Sin needs much education. All children are virtuous.

In truth, virtue is nature, not education. Virtue is nature, not culture. Virtue is not a teaching; it is the natural way. Sin is experience. The more ‘experienced’ people become, the more skillful they become in sin — calculating, scheming; mathematics enters their life; their heart is ruined.

‘But the Way of Heaven is impartial.’

Here Lao Tzu speaks something very unique, very paradoxical.

‘But the Way of Heaven is impartial; it sides only with the good man.’

From the second statement it seems it is not impartial. ‘The Way of Heaven is impartial; it sides only with the good man.’ It would seem it is on the side of the good; where is the impartiality? ‘But the Way of Heaven is impartial; it sides only with the good man.’ Understand this paradox.

The Way of Heaven is impartial — up to here there is no difficulty. Rain falls upon the sinner and the virtuous alike. When the sun rises, it gives light to the sinner and the saint alike. When flowers open, they do not open only for saints; they open for sinners too. Had it ended with ‘the Way of Heaven is impartial,’ there would be no problem. But Lao Tzu raises the greatest paradox: ‘It sides only with the good man.’ In the second statement he says: flowers bloom only for the virtuous, the sun rises only for the virtuous, light is for the virtuous, rain for the virtuous — not for the sinner. What can this mean?

Its meaning is straightforward. However twisted Lao Tzu’s words may seem, if you have a little understanding, the key is simple. He says: God is impartial — when the sun rises it does not rise only for the virtuous — but only the virtuous can benefit from it; the sinner stands with closed eyes. When rain falls, no God rains only for the virtuous — but only the virtuous dance in the rain; the sinner hides in the house.

Kabir has said: ‘Lightning flashes in all four directions, servant Kabir is drenched.’ Sinners are hidden in their caves; all around, his light glitters, lightning flashes — servant Kabir is drenched. Some matters of life are such that the fragrance of the flower reaches you not merely because the flower has bloomed; your nostrils must be prepared. If all along you have taken the stench of fish to be fragrance, flowers will bloom but they will not bloom for you — not that they did not bloom for you, but that you deprived yourself with your own hands.

There is a small story of Gibran. A man, walking along a road, fell; it was noon; he fainted. On both sides of the road there were shops of perfumers, sellers of fragrance. The shopkeepers ran over with the finest fragrance — for if the finest fragrance is held to the nose, an unconscious man regains consciousness; the scent reaches his very life-breath and gently rustles his awareness, and he awakens. They held fragrance to his nose — but the man began flailing his arms and legs; he did not come to. When they held fragrances, he seemed more disturbed. A crowd gathered. One man in the crowd said, ‘Stop — you will kill him. I know him; he is a fishmonger and sells fish. I too used to do the same work. He knows only one fragrance — the fragrance of fish. Where is his basket?’

His basket was lying there in the crowd. The man sprinkled a little water upon the basket — from which he had sold his fish — and held it to the unconscious man’s face. He took a deep breath and came to. He said, ‘Who brought this fragrance to me! These people were about to kill me.’

The sun rises — for no one. The sun simply rises. The Way of Heaven is impartial. But you may stand with closed eyes; the sun will not force your eyelids open. Those with open eyes will see; their heads will bow in gratitude. Those with closed eyes will remain deprived.

Therefore Lao Tzu says: the law of Heaven is impartial — yet it sides only with the virtuous.

Not that Heaven takes the side of the virtuous, the saint — it is that only the saint knows how to move with it. The sinner fights the current, swims upstream — he cannot swim; he will be defeated, exhausted, broken. The saint moves with the current. The sinner swims toward Gangotri; he enjoys the fight. The virtuous surrenders into the hands of the Ganga and flows toward the ocean.

To be with God’s Way — that is saintliness. The one who has learned that art — for him the flowers bloom; for him the moon and stars move; for him the sun rises. For him life is blessedness, a song of ah! and wonder.

For you too all this is happening — but you stand inverted. And what you do receive, even for that you offer no gratitude; hence you are deprived of all that might have been given.

I have heard: there was a very rich man. For all the poor and beggars of his village he had arranged monthly charity. One beggar received ten rupees a month, another twenty. They used to come on the first of every month to collect. Years passed. One beggar was very poor, with a large family. He was given fifty rupees a month. He came each first to collect his money.

One first he came. The rich man’s manager said, ‘There has been a slight change. Instead of fifty rupees, you will receive only twenty-five.’ The beggar was very angry. ‘What do you mean? I have always received fifty. Without taking fifty I will not go. Why twenty-five?’ The manager said, ‘The gentleman whose money you receive — his daughter’s wedding is at hand, and there will be great expense — not an ordinary wedding; his only daughter; the expense runs to millions. For now there is a little inconvenience in the property. Only twenty-five will be given.’ The beggar banged the table and said, ‘What do you take me for? Am I some Birla? You will cut my money and spend it on your daughter’s wedding? If you want to squander on your daughter’s wedding, squander your own money!’

For years he had received fifty rupees; he had become habituated, entitled; he considered them his own. When twenty-five were cut, he protested.

What you have received in life you consider your own. When a portion is cut, you protest; but you never gave thanks for what you received. This beggar never came to the rich man to give thanks for the fifty rupees; but when it was cut, he complained.

For life you have no gratitude; for death, great complaint. For pleasure, no gratitude; for pain, great complaint. Have you ever gone to the temple to give thanks for happiness? You go only to lodge complaints of sorrow. Whenever you have called upon God, it has been for some pain, some grievance. Have you ever called to give thanks? You stand with your back even to what you have received. And because of this, the door to what else could be given is closed.

Certainly, God’s law is impartial — but you are ununderstanding. What you could receive — to which you have full right — you are losing. But you lose it through yourself; do not load it upon God.

The Way of Heaven is impartial; it sides only with the good man.

Heaven does not side with the virtuous — it simply goes on; the virtuous learns how to be with it; the wicked turns against it. The wicked delights in going contrary, for there is fight, quarrel, and nourishment for the ego. The virtuous delights in bending, in surrender, for there lies true awe, the music and dance and flowers of life, life’s heaven and ultimate blessedness. There lies, in the supreme sense, what Mahavira and Buddha have called Nirvana — the supreme peace of Nirvana, the great bliss of Nirvana.

Enough for today.