Tao Upanishad #16

Among all who have ever known, Lao Tzu is utterly unique.
In Krishna’s Gita even an average mind could add a few lines. Into the sayings of Mahavira, or the statements of Buddha and Christ, anything can be inserted—and it would be hard to detect. For their statements do not go against ordinary morality and common sense. And so the scriptures of the world become filled with interpolations; later generations add much to them. To keep those scriptures pure is almost impossible.
But Lao Tzu’s book is one of the very few on earth that have remained absolutely pure. Nothing can be added to it. The reason nothing has been added is simple: only a person of Lao Tzu’s stature could add to what Lao Tzu says. For what Lao Tzu says is so opposed to common sense that an ordinary man cannot add even a single line. If someone wants to add, he will have to be a Lao Tzu. And if one is Lao Tzu, there is no harm in his adding.
This statement is of that caliber. You must never have heard that a saint is not compassionate. All that you have heard about saints is surely that they are supremely compassionate. And Lao Tzu says: the saint is not benevolent. To add to such a statement is very difficult. Lao Tzu says: as we behave with straw-dogs, so do saints behave with us. It sounds very strange—and therefore it deserves to be understood. And none perhaps has known saints as well as Lao Tzu. In truth, what we say about saints is our understanding of them; what Lao Tzu says is the understanding of the saints themselves.
Let us understand this sutra from the beginning.
“Heaven and earth are not moved by the desire to be benevolent.”
Nature is utterly without compassion. Whether nature appears on the earth or in the sky, whether on the plane of body or on the plane of Atman—nature is not benevolent. Do not take this to mean that nature is harsh. Normally that is how we understand: if one is not benevolent, one must be cruel, hard.
No. He who can be hard can also be kind; he who is kind can also be hard. But nature is neither. It is neither compassionate towards anyone nor harsh towards anyone. In truth, nature does not take any concern for you at all. You are—your very existence is—and nature has no use for it. Tomorrow you will not be and the sky will not weep, the earth will not shed tears. And the day before you were not, the earth had no knowledge of your absence. And today you are, and nature has no knowledge of your presence.
Whether you are or are not makes no difference. The rains will continue as they do; the sun will rise as it does; flowers will go on blooming. The day you die, flowers will bloom just the same as they always have. The moon will rise with no reduction in the coolness of its moonlight. The clouds running in the sky will continue to run; there will be no change in their exuberance. Your being or not being is irrelevant. Nature does not even know that you are.
But we do not know such a nature. The nature we think we know is only our projection. If I am unhappy, the moonlight begins to look sad to me. The moonlight is not sad—on that very night someone met his lover and is singing. The same moonlight is bliss for someone and sadness for me. It may be that on this side of the wall the moonlight seems to me full of tears and on the other side flowers are opening in it.
But neither do flowers open in the moonlight, nor is moonlight sad. Moonlight knows neither me nor anyone else. Were we not here, it would still be the same. When we are gone, it will be the same.
When Lao Tzu says nature is not benevolent, he is saying: do not go begging for compassion. Neither on earth nor in heaven will you find mercy. Do not fold your hands before temples and mosques. Do not pray to Paramatma in the hope that prayer will make a difference. No—praise will not change anything on the side of Paramatma; eulogy can bring no difference because even abuse brings none. Praise is meaningful only where abuse is also meaningful. If my abuse of Paramatma can disturb him, then my praise can also be meaningful. And if, when I do not pray, Paramatma becomes angry and harsh, then my praise can melt him, persuade him, coax him, appease him. If I can persuade Paramatma to be benevolent, then I can also persuade him to be cruel. In that case Paramatma is no longer Paramatma; he becomes a puppet in our hands.
Lao Tzu says the truth is the reverse: we are puppets in his hands; he is not a puppet in ours. If he were benevolent, we could play games with him also. Therefore Lao Tzu says nature is not benevolent. He does not say it is harsh. Even the harshest man is also kind. However harsh—Tamerlane, Genghis Khan, Hitler—the harshest man still has a soft corner in his heart. He loves someone; he suffers at someone’s pain. The differences are of degree. The harsh man’s compassion will be limited and his harshness large. The compassionate man’s compassion will be large and his harshness small. But even the most compassionate man is harsh in some measure. There are hard places in every heart.
This is inevitable, because all we know within life is dual—duel, divided into twos. He who loves will also hate. He who is angry will also forgive. As there is morning and there is evening, so on the mind’s horizon dualities come and go.
Lao Tzu says nature is without duality. He says there is a single flavor, a single law, which does not change. It will neither show compassion nor be harsh. It will not cut off the heads of the wicked nor install the virtuous on thrones. Which means: whatever we do and whatever we receive is our own doing and our own receiving. Nature lends no hand in it.
If thorns enter my feet, it is not because nature is eager to pierce my feet with thorns; it is because I am eager to walk on paths where thorns are. And if flowers shower on my head, it is not because the gods of the sky are itching to shower flowers on me; it is only because I have found those trees beneath which, if one sits, flowers shower. It is coincidence. It is my search—whether of thorns or of flowers—whether I receive abuse or love—whether I rot in hell or the music of heaven resounds around me—this is my own search.
Nature is neutral. No, nature is not even a little eager. Nor should it be; for if nature were eager about us, there would be chaos.
Lao Tzu says, this is nature’s order: it is not eager about you. If nature had eagerness for you, you would begin to misuse its laws. If you had eagerness for nature, you would try to keep nature in human hands.
But nature has no eagerness for you; therefore it always remains beyond your hands. And if ever your prayers are fulfilled, it is not because someone heard them, but because you did something else through which they could be fulfilled. If your prayers are not fulfilled, it is not because Paramatma is angry; it is because you are uttering empty prayers with nothing behind them. If strength comes through prayer, it arises in you and is yours. If you stood before a temple and prayed, and while returning you found more vitality in your being, a clearer resolve, firmer steps—this strength has not come from somewhere else; it is the result of standing before the temple and praying. It is your own. And it can happen outside a temple as well, where there is nothing inside the temple at all.
Hence many times it happens that even a stone can successfully fulfill your prayers. And many times it happens that a Buddha, a Mahavira, a Lao Tzu is standing in front of you and your prayer remains unfulfilled.
No—the matter is not on the other side; it is on your side. To make this clear Lao Tzu says: nature is not benevolent.
In one sense this sounds very hard, because we become shelterless. All our power seems to break if someone declares that nature is not benevolent. If I am falling into a pit, no voice will come from nature saying: stop. It sounds harsh; it shocks the mind.
Because of this very shock Lao Tzu remained beyond the understanding of many. He promised no consolation for your weakness. It is difficult to build a religion around Lao Tzu—religions arise when your weakness can be exploited. If what you want to hear is told to you—that Paramatma too wants what you want, that he is ready to give you what you desire—then religions are manufactured.
No religion could be manufactured around Lao Tzu. He alone is that man around whom no religion arose, no church was raised. How could it be raised? Lao Tzu says nature is not benevolent. Prayer is cut, praise is cut, Paramatma is cut—you are left alone. And we are so frightened of aloneness that even a false companion gives us relief. If no companion is there—my boat is utterly empty, only I am—then even if I close my eyes and daydream that someone is in the boat with me, I feel relieved. Perhaps that is why man dreams. And not only in sleep—he dreams awake too.
What we call religions are our large-scale dreams. Therein we merely see what we want to see—and very cheaply. Because one man takes one meal a day, or one man wears a loincloth, or one man stands naked, or one man rings the temple bells daily—he thinks liberation is assured, heaven is guaranteed.
No—nature is not benevolent.
And who asks for the charity of compassion? Always the wrong people ask for it. The right person will not beg for compassion. Even if it is offered he will refuse—because what is obtained by pity is never truly obtained. What is given by compassion never becomes a part of our being. Only what is evoked by our own effort is our real wealth.
Lao Tzu says nature is not benevolent. Harsh? Not even harsh. Nature is simply impartial toward you. It has no feeling about you—feelingless. Neither for nor against. We always split it: is nature friend or foe? Nature is neither friend nor foe. Nature keeps no accounts of you. You are not accountable. No ledger is kept. If you were not, nothing would be lacking; if you are, nothing is added. Our being is like lines drawn on water—the water is unaffected. The line is not even drawn before it has vanished. Not benevolent—what does it mean? It means: no feeling about you.
From one angle it feels hard; from another it is immensely joyous. For if existence also had feelings, there too favoritism would arise. Then someone would be able to deceive even there. Then someone could sin and still reach heaven, and someone could do virtue and still rot in hell. If existence has any bias, choices will begin.
Therefore all the world’s religions that stand upon choice and upon the idea that nature is benevolent—these religions decide. Ask a Muslim: what will happen to the non-Muslim? He feels the non-Muslim will wander in hell; there is no remedy. Ask a Christian: what about the non-Christian? Whoever is not behind Jesus will wander in darkness. Paramatma has already sent his son—now those who stand with his son will be saved, those who do not will perish.
If Paramatma has a son, trouble will follow. If the side of Paramatma can be won by being on the side of his son, it is dangerous.
No, Lao Tzu says: existence has no son. Nature has no own, because it has none as other. Nature accepts none, for it rejects none. Nature has no position; it is not partisan.
This is blissful in one sense. Therefore: as is my capacity, as is my strength—so it will be. No favoritism. If there is hell, it is my earning; if there is heaven, it is my earning. I will not be able to blame anyone, nor make anyone responsible. I will not be able to thank anyone, nor abuse anyone, saying: because of you everything went wrong.
The meaning of Lao Tzu’s statement is: ultimately I am responsible; the ultimate responsibility is with me. In the final sense I alone share the burden of my actions—no one else.
Therefore Lao Tzu’s second statement sounds even harsher: “Heaven and earth are not moved to be benevolent; they treat all beings as straw-dogs.”
How will you behave with a straw-dog? If a straw-dog wags its tail, will you be delighted? You will say: it is straw. If a straw-dog barks, will you be frightened and run? You will say: it is straw. A straw-dog cannot provoke you in any direction. You will neither run away nor rejoice.
But if the thought enters you that the straw-dog is real, you will be provoked. Even if it is false—only straw—but you do not know, and you think it is real, then its wagging tail will wag something within you. Something inside will be pleased—overwhelmed.
Man keeps dogs because it is costly to find a person who will wag his tail for you. Not everyone can afford it; it is expensive. Those who can, do. A man keeps a dog. The man returns home tired; the wife—who knows whether she will wag her tail! After becoming a wife there is no certainty at all; earlier there might have been. But a dog will be at the door.
Mulla Nasruddin’s friend once told him: I am in trouble. Until I married, when I returned home the dog barked and my wife brought my slippers. Now everything has reversed—the wife barks and the dog brings the slippers. Nasruddin said: but I see no difference—the same services! Why be worried? The job is getting done; only the doers have changed—why are you bothered? The slippers arrive; the barking arrives.
Even a wagging tail of a dog delights man. And he is frightened by its barking. With a straw-dog the same can happen, if you do not know it is straw. Because we do not live with reality; we live with our beliefs. My belief is my reality.
Lao Tzu says: nature behaves as if we are straw-dogs. It is not provoked by us. There is great depth here, a deep insight. For nature we are indeed straw-dogs. Not merely metaphorically, but factually. For nature—what are we more than straw-dogs?
As far as our usual understanding goes, we are only stuffed with straw. If the straw is taken out of you, nothing remains. The body is only straw—food, water, bone, flesh, marrow—this is the body’s aggregate. And we have no knowledge whatsoever that anything more than the body exists within us. For us the body is all that we are. If this body is opened, you will find nothing but straw.
Scientists say there are only a few rupees’ worth of material inside a man—some aluminum, some copper, some iron, some phosphorus—mostly water, above eighty percent; then earth. And all this comes from straw—from the vegetable. What we call life today—if you ask a biologist, he will say: it is the evolution of straw, the vegetable. And even today we live on it. In a year a man puts about a ton of grass into the body; only then can he live. Twenty-four hours, grass has to be put in. Each his own kind of grass perhaps, but on that we live. That is our fuel, our existence, our body.
So if Lao Tzu says nature knows us as straw-dogs, there is no need to be offended. We ourselves do not know that we are anything more. It is proper that nature should know thus; but that we also know only thus is not proper. Yet we have no remembrance that there is anything beyond the body—anything beyond the mud? We hear the word Atman, but we do not understand it; because we can only understand what has become our own knowing.
And in other senses too we are like straw. You have seen—farmers erect a fake man in the field, stuff it with straw, hang a pot as a head; it serves to scare animals. Animals think it is real and get frightened. And if the night is dark and the place unfamiliar, even you can be frightened by a straw man standing in a field. Your feeling is projected and rides upon the straw figure. We can be provoked by a straw figure.
Even now, whatever provokes us is a straw figure. If a beautiful body attracts me, have I ever thought that it is only straw which is provoking me? If I am eager to kill someone’s body, have I ever thought that I am eager to stab straw? Someone’s presence gives me joy; someone’s absence fills me with sorrow—have I ever thought that the presence or absence of a straw figure can make such differences within me?
Lao Tzu says: nature has no use for this. It knows you as straw-dogs. You are not—only a house of cards.
But even if we are persuaded about nature, Lao Tzu says something yet more difficult: the sage too is not benevolent. Those who know—the saints—are not benevolent either.
Saints are always compassionate—so we say. We say they are supremely forgiving. The devotees of Mahavira say he is the ultimate forgiver. The disciples of Buddha say he is supremely compassionate. The followers of Jesus say he came to deliver people from their sorrow out of compassion. The devotees of Krishna say: whenever suffering will be there, he will come out of compassion and liberate people. So far we have known that saints are compassionate.
But Lao Tzu says: saints are not benevolent. For a saint is one who has become one with the inner law of existence. Otherwise he is not a saint. If nature—existence—is such that it is not benevolent, how can the saint be? The meaning of saint is that he has attained the truth of existence and become one with it. If truth itself is not benevolent, how can the saint be benevolent? For the saint is one who has become one with truth.
“The saint is not benevolent”—immediately our mind concludes: then he must be harsh.
No—he is not harsh either. Neither harsh nor indulgently soft; he is beyond duality. What he does is not because he is hard upon you; nor is it because he has pity upon you. He does only what his nature silently makes him do—spontaneous and effortless. If you go to a saint and put your head at his feet and he places his hand upon your head, it is not because he has compassion for you. It may happen that he does not place his hand at all—he may push you aside. Even then it does not mean he is harsh towards you.
When Rinzai first went to his master—people said that master was very harsh. People’s news is generally wrong. They themselves do not know whether saints are kind or harsh; they do not know the saint at all. When Rinzai was going, the villagers warned: do not go to that old man; he is hard. Rinzai said: people told me so-and-so saint is very compassionate—I went to him and found no compassion there. Now you tell me this man is harsh; I must also go see him. Most probably you will be wrong again—you always are wrong. The man laughed: you will yourself say so when you return. You are not the first to whom I have given this news; all who have gone have returned saying: you were right; better we had not gone.
Rinzai went. The master sat at the door with a staff in his hand. Zen monks have always kept a staff. I do not know why Shankara gave a staff to his sannyasins; at least India has no idea why. Perhaps Shankara’s sannyasins have never used the staff rightly, because in India our notion of the sannyasin is that of benevolence. He is called a dandi-sannyasin—the staff-bearer—but only one order of monks has truly used that staff—in Japan: the Zen monks. The master sat with a staff. Rinzai bowed before him.
The master said: stop! I do not let everyone touch my feet. First answer my question. Then you may touch my feet.
Rinzai asked: what is the question?
The master said: I will ask the question later; first let me tell you this—if you answer yes, this staff will fall on your head; if you answer no, this staff will fall on your head. In truth, whatever you answer, the staff will fall. Consider first.
Rinzai said: then let me first touch your feet and you may hit me with the staff; questions and answers can come later. If the blow is certain, it is good to settle that account first. He placed his head at the master’s feet and said: now hit me, so the business of the staff ends; afterwards you may ask.
The master put down the staff and said: perhaps I will not need to hit you.
Rinzai asked: what is the matter?
The master said: whoever comes to me begging for compassion—my very being becomes hard towards him. I am not there; it simply happens. If there is begging on that side, on this side hardness arises. If there is mastery on that side, on this side I become benevolent. But the real thing is—I have gone beyond both. On my side nothing is deliberate. Whatever happens, I consent to it. If my hand raises the staff, I strike. Just now the hand has left the staff; I let it go.
In fact, the saint is natural. Understand “natural”: without cause, he flows with what his inner being does. Choiceless flowing. There is no choice of his. He cannot be benevolent; he cannot pity. He cannot be harsh either. But sometimes he seems compassionate—that is our understanding. And sometimes he seems harsh—that too is our understanding. And our understanding is that of the mad. What we take to be so rarely is so.
A friend came to me two months ago. For five years he has been coming. He always says: if I do not see you for two or three days, if I do not have your darshan, the mind becomes very restless. He has said this so many times that I ought to accept it as true. He has said it so many times that there seems no reason to doubt. Often I wanted to tell him, but I did not. This time, two months ago, I asked: may I ask something? You say for years that if you do not have my darshan for a few days, the mind becomes restless. Is it not possible that if you cannot give me your darshan for two or three days, you become restless?
He said: what are you saying? Never—such a thought has never occurred to me.
The thought may not have occurred; there is no need that it should. We are so skilled at deceiving ourselves!
I said: still, consider it.
He said: there is no question of considering. If I cannot see you, cannot talk of you, cannot hear your discourse, cannot read your book on a given day—the mind becomes restless.
Fifteen days later he came again—with four friends. I saw the three, not him. I spoke to the three, not to him. I acknowledged that three were in the room, not that he was. He touched my feet, looked at me—I looked as if there was no one there. He became restless, sat in a corner. I saw he was a different man today. Everything had changed. I should have asked: how is your wife? your daughter? your son?—then he would have thought he had come for darshan. Darshan happened that day too, but I did not have his darshan. When he left, he did not touch my feet; when he closed the door I knew he had closed it forever, that he would not enter again.
He did not come. He threw away my books—someone told me. Now he gets along perfectly well without me. Not only that—unless he spends two or three hours a day going to people and abusing me, he does not feel at ease. What happened? For years he had said: without your darshan I feel no peace. I knew it was not my darshan that mattered.
But I will not say he did this knowingly. No—he did not know. We are such deceivers that we do not even allow ourselves to know. That day when for ten minutes I gave him no attention, so much rubbish, so much straw fell out of him into the same room that it is hard to account. After he left, the room became heavy and burdened.
Just now an incident occurred. A woman came to see me. For ten minutes she vomited her anger, jealousy, hostility towards someone. She left light. Just behind her a young man entered, looked around nervously and said: I feel very strange; what is the matter? I told him: do not be upset; sit a little. A woman has just dropped a little straw here; the air is heavy. Her disease is echoing all around. Let it dissipate for five minutes—it will be fine.
Trash is not only in the body; there is more in the mind. And do not be in the illusion that only the body excretes—day and night the mind excretes too. Therefore you cannot remain filled with love for someone for twenty-four hours; otherwise where will you excrete? You will have to display hatred toward him too. As in every house we must arrange a bathroom, in every mind we must arrange a place for hatred. There the filth collects; where will it go afterwards?
Therefore divorces do not happen only between husband and wife; divorces happen between guru and disciple too. No one takes note of it—but they do. Between friends too; between father and son too. They will, inevitably. For whomever we displayed love to—we became without a bathroom in front of him. For him our whole house became a drawing room. Where will the bathroom go? We will have to hide it. Slowly the drawing room shrinks and the bathroom grows—grows, grows. One day the drawing room is squeezed out altogether and filth spreads through the entire house. This will happen—it is inevitable with the mind’s duality.
Lao Tzu says: saints do not live in duality. They love no one—and therefore they hate no one.
Understand this well. Our logic is different. We say: because I love you, therefore I do not hate you. This logic is utterly false. Whenever someone says: I love you—the hidden second half is: therefore I will hate you. The second half is an inevitable logic. But we hide it. Then we have to bear the fruit.
Lao Tzu says: they love no one because they hate no one. They do not pity anyone because they are never cruel to anyone. They never forgive anyone because they never become angry. Understand this duality well. These are two sides of one coin that always come together, no matter if you hide one side. How long can you hide it? Then boredom arises. What you hide, you are eager to see; what you see too much, you long to drop. Then you have to turn the coin. The inevitable outcome of a lover is that he becomes full of hate. If friendship is solid, enmity will be born—if it is solid. If it is flimsy, it can go on.
Hence many come to me and say: such and such person loved you so much, had such reverence; why has he turned against you? I say: for that very reason. This does not occur to them—that it is for that reason; they have come with the idea that one who loved so much should never become an opponent. And I do not even love you that much, they say to me; I am not against you. I say: for that very reason.
See this “for that very reason” clearly and Lao Tzu will be understood. He says: the saint is beyond the dual. Therefore if you think Mahavira has compassion for you—that is your understanding. In this Mahavira is not responsible. And if you think Mahavira’s glance upon you is sharp and harsh—that too is your understanding, your interpretation; Mahavira has nothing to do with it. The saint does not split himself into duality.
Yet Lao Tzu says: “They too behave with all men as one behaves with straw-dogs.”
A saint behaves with people as with straw-dogs! But a saint sees Paramatma in all. How will a saint see a straw-dog in anyone? Even in a dog he should not see a straw-dog; in a dog he sees Paramatma—we have heard so. What is Lao Tzu saying? It seems exactly the opposite.
It is not the opposite; it is the other half of the same truth. He who sees Paramatma in all—he will see in you a straw-dog. Understand a little. In you—he who sees Paramatma in all will see a straw-dog in you—in you, I say. In existence he sees only Paramatma. But you are not existence; you are only a bundle of straw—an agglomeration, a complex. You are not a man; you are a knot of diseases. The man is hidden behind the knot.
When saints say they see Paramatma in all, they are speaking after putting the knot aside; they are speaking after removing you. They are not speaking to you. They are speaking to that which sits beyond you, with whom you have never met. You hear; you assume it is said to you. You are only a knot of diseases—a gland! That gland the saint sees as a straw-dog. The gland is our ego. From it we feel: I am. He gives it no more value than a straw-dog. But the ego seeks ways to get value. It can go to the saints’ feet and come out puffed up: I got the chance to reach the feet—me! When others remained behind, I reached. And when the saint did not even look at others, how loving was his gaze upon me!
That gaze will turn to stone any day. That gaze is your fabrication.
Therefore people like Lao Tzu cannot influence great crowds, because crowds are impressed by those who know how to flatter their ego. Salesmanship is all the art there is in dealing with people. In America, thousands of books have been written in the last twenty years teaching how to influence people, how to win friends—how to catch husbands, how to ensnare wives, how to sell to the customer. Thousands of techniques. The essence of them all is one: how to flatter the other’s ego.
If even the homeliest woman can manage to flatter your ego, Mumtaz and Noor Jahan become worthless. Beauty lies less in the body than in persuasion. Hence many times plain women create miracles while beauties stand waiting in line. Many times an average mind becomes a powerful leader while a brilliant mind finds no listeners. What is the secret? He knows how to flatter the other’s ego.
Nothing can be sold in this world, nothing can be possessed, unless you learn the tricks to touch another’s ego. And what is easier than flattering another’s ego? Very easy—because the other is ready to slip, always eager that you make him slip. You push one step—he is ready to fall ten.
A man like Lao Tzu cannot be popular, because he says: your ego is nothing but a straw-dog.
Confucius came to meet Lao Tzu. There was no special seat, no chair, no high seat. Confucius was a great man of rules. He looked around before sitting—where to sit? Lao Tzu said: sit anywhere—this room has no concern for you. The room will not worry—sit anywhere. I have been sitting here so long; the room has not even looked at me.
Confucius sat—but he became uneasy. He had never sat on the floor like that. Lao Tzu said: the body has sat; you too sit down. The ego was still standing behind. Lao Tzu said: if you have sat, then sit down now; the body has sat already.
He sat—but Confucius could not hear what Lao Tzu said. If a hundred words are spoken to you, ninety-nine are not heard. Napoleon Hill, a shrewd American thinker, has said: if you want to enter another’s interior, first give his ego a little flattery; then he becomes ready to listen. Otherwise he does not even hear. Does not hear!
You have come here. If upon arriving I ask: what thought is running in your mind?—if you honestly report, each one will have something running. If I am to speak with you, I must break your inner undercurrent; only then will my words enter. Otherwise your ears will go on hearing me, your eyes seeing me—the inner current will continue.
Napoleon Hill says: if you want to break that inner current, first flatter the ego; then he becomes immediately ready to listen. He has written a memoir. He believes man revolves around four things—fame, wealth, sex, the will-to-live. Around these he goes; they are all parts of the ego, whether you count them four or eight. If you want to win someone, he says, enter from one of these four doors.
He boarded a bus. The bus was running fast. There was heavy rain. He had to get down at stop fifty-five. He told the driver: remember, remind me at stop fifty-five. The night is dark and rain heavy; I might miss it.
The driver said: whom all shall I remind? And because of the rain even I cannot see clearly what numbers are passing. Keep your own track. Many others have told me too. Shall I watch traffic or keep numbers in mind?
Another man would quietly go back. Napoleon Hill thought: let me experiment. He said: and that is why I am saying this more—near stop fifty-five there is a hole dug in the road—drive carefully. He went to the back. The driver forgot everyone’s stops—but not fifty-five. He slowed and asked: but where is the hole? Hill said: there is no hole—but it was necessary to break your inner current and insert fifty-five. If the thought of death comes, the ego is jolted; if of money, it is jolted; sex, jolted; fame, jolted. The current breaks—an opening appears—and you can enter.
How will men like Lao Tzu enter you? They will speak neither of money nor fame nor position nor sex. They will not speak to provoke you. They will tell you: you are a straw-dog. Who will listen? Do you know what Confucius said to his disciples after returning?
He said: never go to that old man. What sort of man is he? He seems like a lion—he will eat someone. Never have I seen such a hard man. I became utterly frightened before him. I do not know what he said—I could not hear, I could not listen. It is very difficult even to raise your eyes towards that man.
Lao Tzu is neither benevolent nor harsh. But Confucius must have felt him harsh. Confucius was a great thinker; his reputation was greater than Lao Tzu’s. More people knew Confucius. In twenty-five hundred years it was Confucius, not Lao Tzu, who shaped the Chinese mind. So Confucius was more prestigious; emperors honored him, stood up to seat him. And an old mendicant said to him: sit down—this room has no concern for you. His mind must have closed further.
Saints are not benevolent. Saints have become so one with existence that existence speaks through them, behaves through them, walks and moves through them—not the saint. Remember this and this strange-looking sutra will become easy. And if only we could look at saints this way, our whole vision about saints would change. We would see and think differently.
But even when we go to a saint, we go with our own vision. We do not go to understand the saint; we go to evaluate our vision. Even if we listen to a saint, we listen to judge what in it is right. What does right mean? Whatever fits with you. What does truth mean? Whatever you have believed to be truth—if it fits, the man is right; if it does not, he is wrong. You move with yourself as the measuring rod. You will never meet the saint.
The saint Lao Tzu speaks of—you will not find him. Yes, a candy-giving saint you can find. He will put a sweet on your tongue—you will be delighted. The straw-dog will wag and say: absolutely right! He will sprinkle water on your head and say: blessings! Go—success everywhere. He will give a little tantra-mantra: win your court case, reverse a lost romance, get a lottery number. Those men you will find. A saint like Lao Tzu—you will not find.
You will not—because you can only seek him when you are ready to know yourself as a straw-dog. Only then can you seek him. And the man who is ready to know himself as a straw-dog—such a saint will come to his door; perhaps he will not even need to go. For as our readiness is, existences reveals its secrets in that measure. Everything depends upon our readiness.
The most essential element of our readiness—towards it Lao Tzu points. This indication is not merely metaphysical; it is not the talk of a philosopher of abstractions. He indicates so that we may understand what is needed if we are to seek a saint. We must become clear about ourselves—what we are. If a clear awareness arises in me of what I am, the knot that is loaded upon me will not take even a moment to fall; it will not take long to drop. But we do not remember.
A mother came to me with her daughter—from far, New York. There was great quarrel between them. The mother believed she loved her daughter very much. Two months ago she had also come. She said then: I love my children so much that I can give my life for them. I said: think again, because this is not natural. She said: I love my three girls so much—you cannot even believe it. I told her: think once more.
She began to cry, scream, beat her chest: you are very harsh—take your words back; I truly love my children.
The more she screamed, the more I said: by screaming whom are you trying to convince—me, or yourself? If you love—finished. No need for screaming, crying, beating your chest. You scream so much because you are trying to convince yourself: I cried so hard, beat my chest so much—see how much I love! To prove love—crying and chest-beating must come. Otherwise no one will know that you love. The louder the crying, the more you love. Therefore women prove quickly that they love; men cannot— they do not have such methods.
I said: no—none of this will work with me.
This time she brought her elder daughter. She said: now you see. I saw. In fifteen days, as much enmity as can arise between any two persons on this earth—arose fully. Between mother and daughter there is enmity. Society hides it; the family forces you to hide it. As the daughter becomes young, the mother becomes an enemy. It is natural—our animal heritage. As a son becomes young, the father is filled with jealousy. These cannot be publicly spoken. All fathers know, all sons know. As the son becomes young, he tries to push and remove the father—space must be made. Seeing a young girl, the mother remembers she too was once young. She also begins to remember that because of these children her youth was lost. No one loses it for anyone; without children it is lost too. But the idea takes hold. Now whoever enters the house looks first at the young girl and only later at the aging mother—deep pain arises.
If anyone has devised the plan of sending girls away to the husband’s house after marriage, it is mothers. And since mothers always win, fathers lost. They had to agree to keep the son at home and send the daughters out. If a father shows too much fondness for his daughter—which is natural—then the mother becomes pained and jealous. The daughter ceases to appear like a daughter; slowly she appears as a mere woman.
For fifteen days I tried to draw out their diseases—provoked them both. The diseases increased so much that they would almost throttle each other. When I sat them together and said: open your hearts—say whatever is inside—the disease that came out neither any mother could imagine nor any daughter could imagine—but every mother and every daughter carries it, age after age. The mother could say to her daughter: you are my enemy; whoever begins to love me, you try to snatch him away. And the daughter could say to her mother: you are just a prostitute. And when the mother asked: do you hate me?—the daughter said: yes, I only hate you—at least right this moment, I hate you. The mother could say: you are no one to me; I cannot even bear to see you.
When all this abuse poured out for an hour, I told them: now close your eyes and be silent. They sat five minutes in silence, crying; then they fell into each other’s arms. They slept in one bed that night. Next day the mother said: it was our honeymoon night! After years I could love this girl again. I told her: be aware—this love will again begin to collect hatred.
Where duality is, the opposite collects.
Lao Tzu says: the saint is beyond the opposites—outside both. Neither harsh nor benevolent.
Enough for today. Tomorrow we will take the next sutra.