Tao Upanishad #60

This sutra is immensely significant for this century.
Lao Tzu has said: there are people who would like to conquer the world and mold it according to their minds.
The day Lao Tzu uttered this, those who wished to shape the world to their convenience had only just begun their journey. Today they have gone very far in conquering the world. They have also tried to fashion it. And the strange thing is that Lao Tzu’s prophecy is proving right, day after day.
Lao Tzu says: I see that they will not succeed.
And they are not succeeding.
He also says: I see that instead of making it, they will spoil the world.
And this too is true. Those who are shaping the world are succeeding only in damaging it. Today, there are direct proofs. When Lao Tzu said it, it was a prophecy. Today it is not a prophecy. It has happened; it stands before us as our condition.
Let us understand this a little, then enter the sutra. In Europe and America a movement is afoot: ecology. The movement is gathering speed. Its call is: there is a music in nature — do not destroy it. If, from any side, we disturb this music, we dislocate the whole order. And we do not know what we are doing, nor what its consequences will be. Because the world is an order, not a chaos; not anarchy, but an order. In this order of existence, the smallest is linked to the greatest. Nothing here is isolated, severed, separate. When you make even a tiny change, you bring a change to the whole system. Even removing a stone becomes the beginning of a transformation of the entire arrangement. And how far-reaching its effects will be — hard to say.
It happened that in a small, far-off Burmese village, to save people from plague, the rats were killed. With the rats gone, the village cats began to die; because rats were their food. With the cats dying, a disease spread in the village that had never appeared there before. The presence of cats had prevented certain germs from developing; once the cats died, those germs flourished. The mission that had eliminated the rats to check the plague now fell into great difficulty. The village headman had been persuaded with great effort to allow the killing of the rats.
The headman said: Now what shall we do? The cats have died, and this new disease has spread — and for this new disease there is no cure. This is an incident of about forty years ago. The missionaries said: we shall find out. But the old men of the village said: by the time you find out, this disease will take our lives. The plague we were used to. We had developed a certain resistance to plague. For thousands of years there had been plague; we had even learned to fight it. This new disease cannot yet be resisted. Our bodies had become capable with regard to plague. This new disease is taking our lives. So quickly it cannot be removed.
And the elders also said: even if you rid us of this new disease, what guarantee is there you will not become the cause of other diseases? Better that we ask the neighboring village for rats. There was no other way. Rats were brought from the neighboring village. The cats followed the rats. As soon as the cats returned, the disease that had spread took leave.
Ecology means: life is an order. Even a slight shift anywhere brings an immediate shift in the whole. And of the whole we have no awareness. Of the whole, we know nothing.
It is a strange thing that today the earth has the most medicines — and the most diseases. Today there are the most devices to bring comfort to man — and never before has man been so miserable. Why? Only one reason appears: we arrange for one thing and spoil ten; by the time we arrange for those ten, we have spoilt a thousand.
Just now — exactly as in that Burmese village — an event occurred in Los Angeles, America. Because of the extremity of cars there, and their exhaust fumes, the air has become so toxic it seems a miracle that people live. Scientists say the poison in the air has become three times what a human being can bear — and yet people live. But to live so is to live in trouble. When life has to endure triple death, it becomes corpse-like, withers. So efforts were made to build cars that emit less exhaust, and to alter the petrol so less poison disperses into the air.
Alterations were made. Then other elements spread into the air, more lethal than before. What can be done? And if a man survives so much poison, he will be tense, sick, troubled. He will live, yes — but the sparkle and rhythm of living will not remain within him.
We sent man to the moon. For the first time we perforated the envelope of atmosphere around the earth — for the first time. No one had imagined that a hole in the atmosphere could have any meaning. Only after doing it did we think. Naturally, some things are known only afterwards.
Understand it thus: if there is an ocean, that ocean is the atmosphere for fish. Water is their environment. Fish live in water; they cannot live outside it. We live in air; we cannot live outside air. For two hundred miles the earth is swathed in air. Consider that we are in an ocean of air, two hundred miles deep. Beyond it we cannot live — as a fish flung on the bank cannot live.
Ordinarily we think we are on the surface of the earth. Better to think we are at the floor of the ocean of air. More appropriate, more scientific. As a creature might live at the sea’s floor with two hundred miles of water above, exactly so man lives at the floor of an ocean of air, with two hundred miles of it above. This ocean of air for two hundred miles filters the rays coming from the cosmos. Only those rays reach us which are not fatal to life. Around us there is a protective aura for two hundred miles. All rays heading toward the earth cannot enter. This atmosphere sends back ninety percent of them, renders eight percent harmless through this two-hundred-mile filtration so they do not take our lives; and two percent, necessary for life, reach us as they are. Consider that for two hundred miles there is a mechanism of sieving around us.
For the first time, when we journeyed to the moon and sent travelers into space, we broke this atmosphere at several points. From where it was broken, for the first time rays entered the earth that for billions of years had not entered. Scientists coined a new expression: holes in the atmosphere. And those holes are difficult to mend. Through them radiations are streaming in. What will be their consequences? Hard to say. How lethal they will be to life? Hard to say. What kinds of illnesses will spread? Hard to say.
In the West, where science has made the greatest efforts to alter the environment and life, the top thinkers have begun to agree with Lao Tzu. They say: having done it, we see man has not become happy; he has become miserable. Life has fallen into kinds of sufferings we had not imagined.
Consider: we try that man live longer. We try that no child who is born should die. A thousand years ago, if ten children were born, nine would die and one survive. That was nature’s order. It seems very cruel — nine children die and one survives. So in a thousand years we tried — today if ten are born, nine survive and one dies. We reversed it. But what is the result? Astonishing. Those nine who would have died a thousand years ago now survive. Why would they have died? Because their vitality was less. Today they survive. Their vitality is poor. They live — but sickly. And they alone do not live; they will breed. Their children’s children — for thousands of years — will become citadels of disease.
A great physician, Kenneth Walker, has said: given our arrangements and discoveries in medicine, after a thousand years it will be impossible to find a healthy man.
So it will be. Those nine who survive are procreating. Gradually all humanity is becoming infirm. Among those nine will be the feeble-minded, the deranged, those with deficits, the blind, the crippled, the lame. They too will survive. And those who have saved them are humanitarians. There is no reason to doubt their compassion. But they lack the depth of understanding Lao Tzu is speaking of. All those children who are feeble, sick, deranged, insane — all will survive. And they will keep breeding. No wonder if within five thousand years humanity is filled with disease, derangement and madness. Today if in America they say one in four is mentally ill — it will not remain at one for long; it will spread till all four are ill.
We have lengthened life. In America there are thousands over one hundred. In Russia even more. But a great difficulty has arisen. Whoever lives beyond a hundred has lost all life-force. He is of no use to life. He has no real relationships left with life. His third or fourth generation is at work — the gap so great that even affection cannot remain. He hangs like a corpse in hospitals, or in homes for rest, or special places for the aged. His life is only this: to keep taking medicines and be kept going. No love surrounds him, no family; nor can there be. He cannot even die — suicide is illegal. Even if doctors know there is no point in keeping him alive, they cannot assist him to die. The doctor’s role is to save, not to kill.
The old definition of the physician — to save — still holds. But man has gone so far in age that the physician’s work should also include helping one to die. Because if a man at one hundred and twenty lies only on a cot, becomes a fossil, of no use to anyone — not to others, not to himself — and still can be kept alive, and he cries: let me go; yet our laws make no provision. Even if a doctor thinks: do not give a drug — not to kill, but do not give drugs to keep him going — his conscience will feel guilty: a man who could have been saved, I allowed to die.
World medical associations are discussing euthanasia every day: whether to help man to die or not — is it moral or immoral? Today it is a matter of a hundred years; tomorrow, we will keep people alive two hundred, three hundred years. What will come of this saving? It becomes a burden of all kinds. Economically he is no longer productive. At fifty-five you retire a man. If he lives to one hundred and ten, for the remaining fifty-five years society feeds him, gives him drink; keeps him alive to be troubled, sick, suffering. His friends and loved ones wish he would depart — because now he feels like a burden. If you wish to give him meaning, you must keep him in work. If you keep him working, there is no work left for the new children. Already there is less work for more children. The old will have to be removed — to the junkyard.
And when they lie in the junkyard, they have no right even to die. No arrangement to live, no right to die. And these old people will weigh heavily upon everyone’s mind. Their numbers will grow. As science advances and medicines improve, the number of the old will increase. Today you are troubled by youth’s rebellions; tomorrow you will be troubled by the upheavals of the old.
You have no idea how upheavals arise. Today the world is troubled by youth, by students. Vandalism, disorder, revolution. Why? Children have always been there. What has changed? They have always existed. Why this upheaval now?
The reason is this: they were never gathered together. Today there are vast universities, colleges, schools — all concentrated. In one city a hundred thousand students gather. Never before were youths clustered in one place. When a hundred thousand youths gather, upheaval begins.
Tomorrow the old too will gather in their hundreds of thousands in one place. A new kind of upheaval will begin, more costly than the students’. Because it will be done by more experienced people. Harder to handle. New obstacles will arise. If the old live, they will demand meaning. And a life is meaningful only when it is engaged in meaningful work. If there is no meaningful work, self-respect is lost. The feeling ‘I am of no use’ is the greatest agony. ‘I am nobody’s use, of no use to anything’ — this enters the mind like a heavy stone; self-reproach and a wish to self-destroy deepen.
Yet we have saved them. And even now no one will say: there is some harm in longer life. We too would like a long life. But strange events occur.
I was reading: in 1918, New York ran on horse-carts. Their speed: eleven miles an hour. Today in New York the speed of cars is seven-and-a-half miles per hour. Astonishing! What happened? The car was to increase speed. Today the car has reduced speed — because it jams traffic everywhere. If cars keep increasing as they are, a pedestrian will soon walk faster. Easily; a man can walk seven miles an hour. Soon four miles — anyone can do that in an hour.
What we do — what will be the result? The results have infinite dimensions; unknown. When we pluck one string, we touch the whole of life. How far the resonance will travel — we know nothing. It is not that we are doing these things for the first time. Man has done them many times. And what Lao Tzu is saying is not merely prophecy — it is the experience of the past. Modern man believes what he is doing is being done for the first time. Not true. If we go into history deeply, we will find that what we are doing today, man has done many times — and then left. Many times done, and then abandoned — because it proved futile.
If you read the Mahabharata, the description of war there — when the atom bombs fell on Hiroshima and Nagasaki for the first time and the scene formed, that very scene is described in the Mahabharata. Before that we took it as poetry. But when at Hiroshima the atom exploded and the cloud rose and spread in the sky like a tree; below, as if there is a trunk, so a column formed; and above, as it rose, it spread, finally forming the shape of a tree — the Mahabharata describes it exactly so. Scientists now say such a description cannot arise out of mere poetic fancy. There is no way — because such a thing happens only in an atomic explosion. There is no other explosion in which this occurs.
The Mahabharata says the smoke spread in the shape of a tree into the sky. The whole sky filled with smoke. And from that smoky sky blood-red rays fell upon the earth. Wherever they fell, all things became poisonous. Food that lay there became poison at once. It says: when those blood-red rays fell, children in their mothers’ wombs died there and then. Children born came crippled. Whatever the rays touched became toxic. Eating those, people died. There is no way a poet could imagine this. Before 1945, we too had no way but to call it poetry. Now we can say it is an eyewitness account of a nuclear blast.
The Mahabharata says: the science of such weapons should not be given to all.
Recently in America there was a case against the great nuclear physicist, Dr. Oppenheimer. The case was that Oppenheimer knew some things he was unwilling to tell even the American government. Oppenheimer was a man of the American state. A special court tried him. The court said: the state you serve has the right to know everything from you. Oppenheimer said: beyond that, my own conscience is my judge. There are things I know which I am not willing to tell any political authority. Because we have seen what happened at Hiroshima. Our knowledge became the cause of the murder of hundreds of thousands.
Surely, when the Mahabharata says that some knowledge should not be handed to all, that some peaks of knowledge can prove dangerous, that must be born of experience. Oppenheimer speaks out of experience: some things I know, I will not divulge.
The history we study in school and college is very incomplete. Man is far older than that history. Civilizations have reached higher peaks than ours and disappeared. And many things we think new were known before and dropped — because they proved harmful. The more research proceeds, the more difficult it becomes to understand. It grows harder. There is no truth science speaks today that was not known in some sense before. In India the Vaisheshikas spoke of the atom in ancient times. In Greece, Heraclitus, Parmenides, very anciently spoke of the atom. And what they say about the atom, our newest research says. We have learned many times the things by which life can be altered — and then left them; because life does not really change, only becomes distorted.
So Lao Tzu’s warning — beware of interference — is worth deep thought. Lao Tzu holds that nature itself is the law. Let man live as nature has made him. Whatever he is — good or bad; pleasure and pain — let him live from nature. For only by living from nature is he in harmony with the cosmos. The moment he moves away from nature, his oneness with the cosmos begins to break. And once that break begins, there is no end. Breaking and breaking, in the end he becomes utterly empty, hollow, futile.
Now let us enter the sutra.
‘There are those who will conquer the world and want to shape it according to their minds. But I see they will not succeed.’
Umar Khayyam has said: How many times the mind longs that the power be in my hands, that I remake the world to my liking.
Every mind harbors that feeling. And those among us who are more ambitious try to bring that feeling into life. Scientists, politicians, social leaders — their effort is to make man fit their mind. And whenever we succeed in such efforts, we discover we have failed badly. All our successes prove to be failures.
For example: would we not want a human being without anger, without hatred? All the idealists of the world have kept thinking thus — all the utopians — the man without anger, without hate, without enmity, without jealousy. Now we have the power to make such a man. And now there is no need to ask man, no need to persuade, to teach, to put him into Yoga or sadhana. In the laboratory we can make him angerless.
B. F. Skinner, a great American thinker, says: what all the ambitious through the ages hoped to do and failed, now is in our hands — we can do it now. But thoughtful people are unwilling to do it — because now we understand. Hormones can be separated; the glands that generate the venom of anger can be removed. They can be cut and taken out. At birth itself — no one will ever know — as we remove tonsils, we can remove that gland. He will never be angry.
But his whole dignity will be lost. He will be utterly emasculated. No fire, no strength, nothing. Spineless — as if he has no spine. You push him and he falls, then gets up and moves on. You abuse him and nothing happens. Because the gland an abuse strikes — it is not there. Would you like such a man?
Some will. Stalin would. Hitler would. All politicians would like it — if only, leaving us aside, all others became like this! Then no rebellion, no opposition, no rage. Man becomes a grass-blade. Cut him and he is cut with humility. But where will man be? Nowhere.
We succeed — and then we find it is a great failure. Today we can do it, but perhaps we will not want to. Perhaps our soul will not agree any longer.
How much we crave that all children have equal talent, equal health. We yearn for equality. Soon we will manage to make children equal. Because after birth, bringing equality is almost impossible. Birth means the journey of inequality has begun. Now biologists say there is no problem. At birth itself, in birth itself, we can orchestrate equality.
But that seems very sad. Like the new government housing — identical houses, dull, boring — so humans alike, very drab, suffocating. Perhaps we will not be willing. Perhaps we will say: no, not such equality. Because if man becomes so equal, he will be mechanical. Only machines can be equal. In being human, inequality is intrinsic.
But socialists, communists say: make all men equal; bring a condition where there is no class at all.
You do not notice: poverty and wealth are not the only class. There are a thousand classes. The intelligent and the unintelligent; the beautiful and the ugly; the healthy and the sick. These classes are deeper. And the final conflict, the final struggle, is between the intelligent and the unintelligent. Do what you may, the intelligent dominates the unintelligent. Equality cannot hold — arrange anything you like. Who will arrange it? The arranger and the arranged become two classes again. If not rich and poor, then rulers and people. It makes no difference. The organizing class and those to be organized — two classes will always be born.
Look deeply: the intelligent prevails in every situation. Sometimes he dominates as a brahmin, sometimes as a commissar. Sometimes he sits in power as a member of the Comintern, sometimes dominates in a brahmin panchayat. But it is the same man. Nothing in man has changed. Sometimes he dominates through wealth. If he is made poor, he dominates as a fakir. Power does not go. You cannot snatch it. He can kick wealth away, stand naked — and still make heads bow. Someone bows because of money, someone bows because of renunciation. But there is one who makes heads bow, and one who bows. The distance remains. No difference.
The final conflict, the final class-struggle, is between the intelligent and the unintelligent. Only if you erase that will equality be. And the day you erase it, you have erased man. Then perhaps inequality is nature, and equality only a longing; good if we do not succeed, bad if we do.
The sutra says: ‘There are those who will conquer the world; and they will want to fashion it according to their minds.’
Man wants to conquer so he can make it to his mind. Otherwise, what is the joy of conquest? What is the juice of victory? Understand: why does victory taste sweet?
Its sweetness is this: now I am the master — I can break, build, erase, mold it to my mind. Therefore there are two kinds of conquerors in the world. One we call politicians. They first conquer people, then try to break them into their mold.
Stalin killed ten million people. In a country of two hundred million, that is no small matter — one in twenty murdered. No mention in history of one man killing ten million. But what was Stalin doing? Not a mere killer — an idealist. And all idealists turn into killers. He was trying to make people like his ideal. Those who created obstacles, he removed. The intention was good. And when men with good intentions have power, they become most dangerous. Because those with bad intentions are satisfied with power; those with good intentions use power to impose their ideal — they are never satisfied. So until he flattened the country, erased even the faintest voice of dissent, poured the nation into a mold — he kept cutting. Did the killing of ten million not pain him?
No — the idealist does not feel he is killing. For a great goal, those who are obstacles are being put aside. Without a great goal, great killings cannot be done. Little murderers have no goal; great murderers have a goal. So Stalin, in his view, did a great service — and trampled the country. He wanted to create an equal society to his mind.
It is not that this thought came first to Stalin. Alexander wanted to conquer the world to make it one — erase national distances, make the world one. He conquered to unify.
If Hitler wanted to crush the world, it was for a reason, a goal. He said: not all races are fit to survive; only the Nordic, the pure Aryan, deserves to live. The word Aryan tempted Subhash as well; he began to feel some truth in Nazism. His mind leaned toward the Nazis. He fled India to Germany. When Hitler had Subhash given his first salute in Germany, he said: I am only the Führer of forty million; this man Subhas is the Führer of four hundred million.
Hitler believed only the pure Aryan is human; the rest are of lower races — not truly human, sub-human. They must be removed. Because their being in strength is the cause of world disorder. So he butchered hundreds of thousands of Jews — for they were not Nordic. He killed cheerfully — because of a great goal: pure blood, pure man, the superman, to create and preserve a superior human. The greatest bloodbath, the greatest war, circled this great ideal.
And if the German nation fought with him, they were not fools. The German race can be called the most intelligent on earth. How did this madman influence so many intelligent people? Because of the great goal. Even the intelligent became inflamed. It seemed right: the pure human should survive; then the world will be heaven. For that pure human, anything can be done. When an ideal blinds the eyes, a man can do anything.
The politician first brings man under his power, then changes him.
Religious gurus have also done this. They start from the other end. They begin changing the person. As the person changes, their power increases. The politician first establishes power — ‘first power, then revolution’. The religious guru says: first revolution; power will follow. Therefore when you go to a guru, he will not accept you without changing you. He will say: give up cigarettes! Give up wine! Do not eat this, do not eat that. If you obey him, he begins to possess you. As you obey, he changes you. The day you are willing to change completely, his power over you is complete. The guru is traveling the same road as the politician, only from the other side.
Therefore the truly religious person does not want to change you. Keep this distinction in mind. Because when I say ‘guru’ wants to change you, I do not mean Buddha wants to change you, or Mahavira, or Lao Tzu. No. Lao Tzu, Mahavira, Buddha, Jesus — they do not want to change you. They have no ambition to hold power over you. They have known something in their lives; they want to give it to you, to show you, to make you a participant. If, in that sharing, some change begins in you, you are responsible. If in that sharing you change, you are the master of it. You cannot hold Buddha responsible.
Your relationship to Buddha is less to change you and more to give you something. The changer takes something from you — power. Buddha wants nothing from you. You have nothing he needs. He has something to give. As if you wander in darkness and someone has a lamp and the knack of kindling, and he says: why wander? Here is the knack of lighting. That is all. As if you wander on a road and ask someone: where is the river? If he knows, he says: turn left; that is the way. That is all your relation to Buddha.
The guru is another matter. For him, religion is politics. The Pope — religion is politics. Religion is a kind of empire. Those trapped within are his power.
Lao Tzu says: such people will try to change; but I see they will not succeed.
Not because they lack power. They have much power. Not because they do not know the rules of change. They know them. Even then, they will not succeed. They will not succeed because —
‘The world is the vessel of Paramatma; it cannot be remade by human interference.’
They will not succeed because this world is vast — endless, beginningless spread. And man’s understanding is very narrow. As if someone has seen the sky through the window of his house — not even a window, perhaps a tiny hole. The world is vast; man’s understanding is narrow. Because of this narrowness, the vast cannot be changed. Unless we know the Whole itself, our every alteration will be self-destructive. Because without knowing the Whole, whatever we do, we will have no idea of its consequences. Look around at what we have done — from any corner.
A friend of mine has been working for twenty or thirty years to educate tribal children. A great servant. Big leaders of the nation bow at his feet. All praise his service. He once came to see me. I asked: if you become absolutely successful and educate all the tribals, what will happen? Those in Bombay who are educated now — they too were once tribals. They became educated. What are they doing? Your tribals, once educated, will do the same or something else? Those boys studying at Banaras University — if your tribals graduate, what will they do?
He became restless; perhaps no one had ever asked him such a question. Everybody had told him: you are doing a great work — tell me how I may serve. People give him money, cars, arrangements: go, serve, you are doing a good work. Because to educate the uneducated is good — beyond doubt. No one looks at the educated — what is their condition? If someone truly looked, perhaps doubt would arise whether educating the uneducated is a service at all. But the doubt does not arise because we do not think.
What will we do by educating the tribals? At most, we will make them like those who educate them. What else? But where are those who educate? They sit presuming they have reached moksha. Where are they?
And the strangest thing: we do not see what we are robbing from the tribal by giving him our education. That we do not see. And the poor tribal is not in a condition to resist us, to insist on remaining uneducated. He is prey; he can do nothing. Whatever we do, he must endure. And until we succeed, we will not leave him. And the day we succeed, we will be shocked: what sort of man have we produced! This is the result of our success.
Today America is the most educated country. And what happens in American universities — you will not find a more uneducated state. Those who have educated, after two or three hundred years of continuous labor, will bang their heads: is this what we labored for? When education is complete in America, what is the result?
The result: the fully educated person is full of anger toward your education; full of hate toward teachers; full of hate toward your system, society — all of it. This is the fruit of your education. Toward parents, toward tradition — those who educated him, who pulled him up with great sacrifice — the parents who enjoyed telling themselves they were sacrificing for their children — now the children condemn them. What is the matter?
Some fundamental mistake in your service. We have no idea: life is a very subtle construction. You educate, ambition increases. In truth, you educate for ambition. Even for the tribal you say: if you study and write, you will be a nawab. Then he wants to be a nawab — trouble begins. How many can be nawabs? Then he says: I will not accept anything short of being a nawab. We are giving ambition to every child. By ambition we pull him, push him: study, write, fight, compete — because tomorrow you will be happy. No one asks: if tomorrow this happiness does not come, the hope you created — if it fails — this child’s life will be wasted. Half his life he wasted in education in the hope that education brings happiness; the remaining half he will waste crying that it did not. No one thinks of this.
Today in America the child asks his parents precisely this. A professor-friend told me: my son asks me. He wants to run away. He is in high school and wants to drop out and become a hippie. I try to explain; he asks: at most, if I study, I will become a professor like you. What have you gained?
The father is honest. An Indian father would say: I have gained everything. But he is honest. He says: when I examine myself, my son’s question seems right. I cannot give a false answer. I have gained nothing — though my father told me I would gain much. On that hope I ran this race. Now what can I tell my son? I also fear if he drops out, his life will be ruined. But I cannot say mine is not ruined. That is the difficulty. My life too has been ruined.
There are two ways to ruin life. One is the way of the organized; the other the disorganized. But the boy asks: if I must ruin it, what is the objection to ruining it in disorder? If it must be ruined, what difference — ruin it with a good job or by begging on the street? And if it is to be ruined, at least ruin it with freedom. At least there will be the satisfaction that I ruined it by my own will. Why ruin it by your will?
Note: the uneducated child never asked this. He never doubted his father’s values. Now the father himself is troubled. He does not know that the cause of his trouble is not the boy; it is the fathers of the last two hundred years engaged in educating everyone. Now they are educated. Now the fruit is before us. Now they have begun to question, to argue, to think. Now life seems futile without thought. Now whatever they do, they will do after thinking. Now they cannot accept anything without thinking. And parents and teachers cry: there is indiscipline.
It is difficult for an educated man to be disciplined. Only the uneducated can be disciplined. Or else there must be a totally different kind of education of which we have no idea. As of now, whenever we educate, indiscipline follows. Yes — a funny thing: he becomes indisciplined and wants to discipline others. See it. The student calls the teacher indisciplined. Ask the vice chancellor — he says the teachers are indisciplined. Ask the president — he says vice chancellors do not listen; all are indisciplined. The one above always calls the one below indisciplined. His own superior calls him indisciplined.
In truth, the educated man does not want anyone above him; he wants everyone below. Whoever is below, he wants to discipline. But the one below does not want to remain below. He too is educated. Education awakens ambition. By spreading universal education we have spread universal ambition. We have awakened everyone’s ego. Now there is no way to satisfy that ego. Hence the flames. The excuses are many.
A friend, a legislative whip, came to see me. He said: earlier one party was in power in our state — we worked hard and changed it. Now the other party has come. Our hopes are gone. What shall we do? Shall we change this and bring in a third? I said: you can — but hopes will be futile all the same. Because what you are doing has nothing to do with hopes being fulfilled. Replace one with another, then bring a third — you get a little relief for a while. For a little while it seems: now give the other a chance; give some time. As time passes, it shows: nothing is happening, nothing is happening. The old Congress went out, the new Congress came in; hope arose. Now it weakens: nothing is happening.
Man does not know what will be the results of his deeds. He does not even know why he is acting. He has no idea of the unconscious motives within. Nor what future consequences will arise. Yet he keeps doing. Then he tangles deeper and deeper in the net.
Lao Tzu says: they will not succeed. Because the world is the creation of the Vast; it cannot be molded by human meddling.
But this is very difficult. Man wants to interfere. He wants to interfere in the smallest things. Where not doing would do, there too he wants to do. Your child asks: may I go out to play? ‘No!’ He could have gone; the world would not have been ruined. But the relish of interference. Otherwise what is the taste of being a father? If you keep saying yes and yes, why be a father? You have borne so many troubles — you produced him, you are raising him — at least enjoy saying no a little... I stay in homes sometimes and I am astonished. ‘No’ is said for no reason. What juice is there? What inner cause? There is an enjoyment in interference. A joy in saying no that is unaccountable.
You stand at a window, ask a clerk: please do this. He says: cannot be done today. Even if he is sitting idle, he says: cannot be done today. Because power is felt in saying no; in saying yes, power is not felt. Say no to anyone — you go up, the other goes down.
Interference is a symptom of ego. The more one says no, the more egoistic he is.
A thoughtful person will first do everything to say yes; only if it is impossible to say yes will he say no. And even then, he will say no in such a way that it does not cut within like a knife. It will have the form of a yes.
Even our yes has the face of no. And we say yes only when no other way is left. The boy who asks to play outside — the father will say yes only when all the joy of yes is gone. And that yes will be poisoned, equal to a no. He has said no. The boy too knows — no one likes interference. He will begin to take revenge inside. He will create a scene indoors, make noise, bang things, run — until the father is forced to say: go outside! But by then ‘go outside’ seems like a yes, yet its form has become a no. It is poisoned. The relationship is distorted. Both egos are given a chance to grow unnecessarily. Because whenever I say no, my ego speaks. And whoever I tell no, his ego will fight. Until he breaks my no, he will struggle. If the father says yes, neither gets the chance to inflate ego.
We have a very natural tendency to interfere. We keep creating obstructions wherever we can. The farther our obstructions extend, the farther our empire seems to reach. But this obstructing mind throws life into misery and hell — whether personally or socially.
If you wish to create hell, make ‘no’ your outlook on life. If you wish to create heaven, make ‘yes’ your outlook — acceptance, tathata. Do not tamper with nature as far as possible. And the great wonder is: if one is ready, it is possible to not tamper unto the infinite. I say: as far as you can, do not meddle. And if you are truly ready, it can be to the very end. There is no question of meddling. And the one who does not tamper with nature, within him is born a compact peace, an incomparable peace of which we have no inkling. For he cannot be disturbed. The man who does not interfere cannot be disturbed. He who accepts cannot be disturbed. Truly, he cannot be dragged into any conflict, any quarrel.
What is man? A little germ. When he interferes with the vast, he is like a straw floating in a river deciding to go against the current, to swim upstream, to fight. He cannot. In the attempt, he will suffer, he will fail.
Lao Tzu says: be like the straw that does not quarrel with the river — that flows with the river.
The one who fights will also flow — note this — there is no way for a straw to flow upstream. Will a straw move upstream? It too will go with the river — but in compulsion, in pain, struggling, losing, defeated at every moment. Filled with gloom. And the other straw next to it will also go — without fighting. Both will go in the current; because the river is vast, the straw is tiny; there is no way to go the other way.
But the one who tries will fall into suffering and waste his strength. For fighting consumes energy. He too will reach the ocean — but as a corpse. And all the joy of the journey — the trees on the banks, the birds’ songs, the sun in the sky, the nights full of stars — he will not see anything. His entire work is fighting. The straw that goes with the river has no enmity with the river; he has made the river his vehicle.
Remember: if the small is with the Vast, the Vast becomes the vehicle of the small. If the small fights the Vast, he becomes his own enemy. The Vast does not become the vehicle; only you become your own enemy. Both straws will reach the ocean. One, weeping, full of lament, defeated, tired, angry, burning, life wasted — deprived of the marvels of the way. The other too will reach the ocean — filled with delight, carrying within him all the dance of the way. For him, the path becomes pilgrimage. His falling into the ocean is a great union. Man has only two ways.
Lao Tzu says: those who interfere spoil it.
‘Whoever does so spoils it. Whoever grasps it loses it.’
Whoever tries to change nature spoils it. He can only spoil; in the attempt to change he spoils.
Note: this is true not only for society — it is true for oneself. Some people are not busy changing others; they are busy changing themselves. They say: this is wrong, this should not be in me. That is right, it should increase. I will cut anger, burn lust; let there be only love and love, only truth, only pure virtue; I will cut off all sin. People try to change themselves and fight within. We have called them sadhus — those who cut within and impose saintliness.
Lao Tzu is not on their side either. He calls that man a sage who accepts himself totally — as I am, I am. And the great wonder is: such a man becomes a sage. Virtues shower upon him; vices vanish. His anger dissolves; his love deepens. But he does not ‘do’ it. It is the outcome of acceptance. It is the fruit of total acceptance.
Understand how this happens. If I accept even my anger, I will not be able to be angry. In the very acceptance, anger weakens. Because anger means non-acceptance. Something I do not want — anger arises from that. The wife does not want the husband to throw his clothes anywhere in the room. He does — anger arises. But the one who has accepted even her own anger — will she not be able to accept clothes lying around the room? She will. The husband smokes; the wife cannot accept it. But the wife who has accepted even her anger — will she not accept the husband’s innocent foolishness? Smoke inside, smoke outside — let it be. As soon as we accept our own flaws, note it, we are no longer against others’ flaws.
Therefore those who do not accept their own flaws become very wicked and harsh toward others’ flaws. We call them mahatmas. The mark of the mahatma is that he is harsh — toward himself and others. Toward what is wrong he is severely strict. He wants to cut it out and throw it away.
But Lao Tzu says: right and wrong are not so split. Right and wrong are two sides of one coin. Cut one and the other is cut. Save one and the other is saved. The man who cuts off anger completely will also cut off love. It will not survive. The man who says: I have no enemies in the world — note, he cannot have a friend either. If you want no enemy, do not make a friend. Because no one becomes your enemy without first becoming your friend. Stop at the first step. The one who fears enemies will also not make friends.
We cannot cut by opposition. Opposites are two ends of the same rope.
Lao Tzu says: even the attempt to change yourself — to cut, to fashion — is futile. Modern psychologists say: however much you try, you remain as you are; nothing changes. This is difficult to accept. Gurus will never accept it — because their whole trade depends upon the belief that people can be changed. If I tell you: you will remain as you are, no change can occur — you will not return to me. The business collapses. You come to me with the hope that this man will do something, will change me, make me good — we too will become mahatmas. If I tell you: nothing will happen — Paramatma made you; what greater grace can there be? And who am I to tamper? Paramatma made you so, after much thought. Now do nothing. You are enough, you are a creation of Paramatma, beautiful as you are, fine — then, naturally, you will not return. So gurus cannot speak truth. The business rests upon untruth.
Think: you are fifty. Have you changed a whit? Look back — in fifty years, have you changed?
Eisenhower was sixty when he became President. He made some changes in America’s economic policy. Journalists went to his elder brother. They asked: what do you think of Eisenhower’s policy? The brother said: absolutely useless — it has no substance; it will ruin the country. Reporters went back to Eisenhower: your brother says so. Eisenhower said: since I was five, he has been saying this about me. Nothing new. Since I was five, he has criticized me. This is not about economics. Whatever I do, he calls it wrong. The reporter returned to the elder brother: he says you have been saying this since he was five. The brother said: even now I can rub his nose in the dust. The reporter went back: he says he can floor you with one push. Eisenhower said: this too he has said since I was five. And I tell you: he cannot floor me. That too I have been saying since then.
Look back — you have not changed. Your clothes have grown bigger; the body has grown. Probe a little — your atom is the same. Styles have changed, roads have changed — the deep truths within do not change. Never.
Do not be disheartened: does this mean nothing can happen?
No. If you try to do, nothing can happen. If you accept, much happens. The day you accept yourself and say: I am as I am — bad or good, angry, jealous — as I am — this is the first acceptance of truth; no objection; Paramatma has made me so — with this acceptance, for the first time your smallness disappears and you become a limb of the Vast. And the One who made you begins again to make you from within. In truth, as long as you keep trying to make yourself, the hands of Paramatma are stopped. The day you drop yourself, those hands begin to work again. But that making is of another kind.
Lao Tzu says: whoever does, spoils; whoever grasps, loses. Nature is not caught. But the one who lets himself be in nature, who flows with it — nature does not come into his fist; but it becomes his companion, ally, his very soul.
‘Because some things go ahead, and some follow behind.’
We do not notice that some things go ahead, some come behind. As I said: acceptance goes ahead — revolution follows behind. Tathata goes ahead — to admit ‘I am as I am, I have no objection in the least; for any objection is against Paramatma Himself’.
People are amusing. They say: Paramatma made man. Yet they do not accept man. They say: the Atman is within. But you too do not accept your own self. You say: I am the creation of the Lord. But even in that, you want to make improvements, amendments — some tinkering here and there. If Paramatma were to seek your advice, you would never be made — you would change the plans endlessly.
I have heard a joke. A son asked his father: God made man, then took Adam’s rib and made Eve. Why did God first make man? Why not woman first? The father said: when you grow up, you will understand. If God had made woman first, man would never have been made. She would give so many suggestions, so many instructions — he could never be made. She would say: make him like this, make him like that; let him not do this, not do that. He would never get made. So first He made man, so there would be no fuss. Then He made woman.
Even now woman keeps advising man. If you are driving with your wife, you are merely obeying orders; the car is being driven by the wife. If there is an accident, you are responsible; if you return safely, she drove.
When a man talks of changing himself, he denies God.
Lao Tzu says: some things go ahead, some follow behind. Do not try to bring the behind to the front — you will err.
Sow wheat — fodder comes on its own. Along with wheat, chaff is born. If you sow chaff, no wheat will grow; not even chaff. Even the chaff nearby will rot. What is a result cannot be made the seed. Yet we all try to make the result the seed.
People want to be peaceful; people want to be blissful. But these are outcomes, not seeds. You cannot catch bliss directly. Bliss is an outcome. Do something else — the seed — and bliss will come. As I say: acceptance.
Lao Tzu’s most precious sutra is acceptance. He says: accept even sorrow and you will become blissful. And if you do not accept even happiness, you will remain unhappy. Even if someone accepts sorrow, he becomes blissful. Because acceptance does not know sorrow. Acceptance has no idea of sorrow. Therefore the ancients gave deep honor to acceptance, to contentment. Because with acceptance and contentment, outcomes begin to arrive.
We too try — but we want the result first. If I tell you: playing kabaddi, or cards, brings me great joy. You will say: I want joy too; I will come play kabaddi. You will not get it — because you are making bliss the seed. While playing kabaddi you will keep chanting ‘tu-tu’, but inside you will think: joy has not yet come; we are chanting ‘tu-tu’ in vain; joy has not come yet. This man lied that joy comes — still none. You will return — no joy. Only tired. What happened?
One who gets absorbed in kabaddi so that he does not even remember whether joy is coming or not, who becomes so absorbed that the player disappears — joy arrives for him. It is the outcome. You cling to the outcome like a seed: now come, joy, now come! It does not come.
That is why all the methods given for joy — you make them all fail. Your cleverness is boundless. As many methods as the seers taught, you make them fail. Because if you immerse totally, joy comes. The one who goes there to ‘get joy’ does not immerse; cannot. He remains alert: where is joy? That very alertness becomes the barrier. Joy can be found anywhere — but it comes from behind like a shadow. No one can catch it directly. Whoever tries loses it.
‘The same act can bring opposite results.’
If playing gives me joy, it does not mean it will give you joy. It may bring sorrow. Nothing depends on the act. Everything depends on the doer behind.
So if you ask Hanuman, he will say: enough — chant ‘Ram Ram’; supreme joy comes. It comes to Hanuman; it will not come to you. You may go on saying ‘Ram Ram’ — nothing will happen. After a while you will say: leave it; read the newspaper — more joy there. Why get lost in Hanuman! Leave these hassles. This man must be deluded; perhaps no joy came to him either. After all, a monkey — what joy could he have? Why should we be foolish?
But Hanuman had joy.
Many women try to become Sita. They will be in trouble. Joy came to Sita. But it came to Sita. It will be difficult for you. Because one cannot become Sita; either one is, or is not. So when Rama threw Sita into the forest, she remained joyful, grateful. Sita’s heart is hard to understand; her grace is difficult to penetrate. Many books are written by those who take the side of women and write: this is injustice. Rama cast Sita out — injustice! But in her depth Sita knows: there is pain of separation, sorrow in being apart — but in her depths, she knows Rama’s trust in her is so great he can throw her into the forest if needed — without asking. That trust is so deep, that love so deep, there is no reason to fear Sita will think she is abandoned. Therefore Rama could send her easily. If there had been any lack of love, he would have thought a thousand times: what will Sita think?
Wives learn with time. The day a husband brings a present — a watch, a jewel — she knows something in love is amiss. Why is he bringing this? A substitute. The husband brings gifts on the day he is a little afraid. The day he is afraid, he brings ice cream, brings something.
Rama could send Sita with ease — such great trust. But that was possible only with Sita. Then many women try to become Sita. None can.
Becoming is possible — but it does not come by the process of becoming. Whoever accepts himself as he is, drops rejection altogether, removes it even from thought, and is delighted with whatever life brings — sorrow or joy; fame or disgrace — whatever life gives, the heart blossoms in it — anyone can be a Sita.
‘Because some things go ahead and some follow behind. The same act can bring opposite results. As things become hot by blowing, and by blowing become cool.’
There is a story about Mulla Nasruddin. He was searching for a master. Someone told him: in such-and-such village there is a great fakir; go to him — perhaps you will find knowledge. Mulla went. He arrived early in the morning. Investigation was necessary. To whom you surrender, examine him fully. He looked around the house, then went inside. It was a cold morning. The master was wrapped in a blanket, rubbing his hands. Mulla asked: what are you doing? He said: my hands are cold; I am warming them. He rubbed more and blew on them. Mulla asked: now what are you doing? He said: I am warming them by blowing. Mulla said: fine.
A little later the wife brought tea. The master began to drink — and to blow on it. Mulla asked: what are you doing now? He said: I am cooling the tea. Mulla said: salutation! I will not stay a moment with such an inconsistent man. A moment ago you said you warmed your hands by blowing. Now you say you cool tea by blowing! Even deception has limits! And even if a man changes, there should be some time gap. I am standing here — so quickly such inconsistency!
Lao Tzu says: by blowing things become hot, and by blowing they become cool. Therefore do not rush to conclusions about what is happening through blowing. Opposite events can arise from the same act.
‘Some are strong, some are weak; some can break, some can fall. Therefore the sage avoids excess, shuns waste, and keeps away from arrogance.’
Some are strong, some weak. But no one accepts his weakness. The weak wants to become strong. He will become weaker. The little strength he had, he wastes in becoming strong — and becomes weaker. And the strong — do not think he is at ease. There are stronger still, before whom he is weak. Today he is strong; tomorrow he may be weak. Old age will come. Strength today; tomorrow, not even in the hand. He too is anxious and afraid. The weak are afraid; the strong are afraid. The strong want to be stronger; the weak want to be strong. But no one accepts himself.
Lao Tzu says: if you are weak, recognize this truth — and remain weak. Remaining weak means only this: do not fight it. A great wonder.
Those who have studied animals deeply — Konrad Lorenz, for example — say: except man, whenever an animal accepts weakness, the other does not attack. Two dogs fight. As soon as one tucks his tail, the other stops fighting immediately. The matter is over. A fact is accepted. This does not mean the other dog stands and laughs, or goes around announcing: he is weak. No; the matter ends. The one who has tucked his tail is not dishonored. Nor is the one who has won honored. It is simply accepted: one is strong, one weak. The matter is finished. There is no virtue in being strong, no vice in being weak. Weak is weak; strong is strong.
A stone is small, another stone big. The big stone has no reason for honor. One bush is small, another big. The big bush has no reason for honor. The small has no reason for shame.
But with man it is difficult. The weak first does not want to accept he is weak. If he accepts, the strong begins to harass him, insult him, condemn him. Among animals, quarrels do not end in murder. Before murder the matter stops. Scientists say: only man and mice kill their own kind. No one else — only man and mice. Mice attack mice and kill them. And man. Apart from these two, on the whole earth, among endless creatures, no one murders his own kind. They fight up to the point where fact is accepted — who is strong, who weak. Once accepted, the matter ends.
Therefore there must be a deep kinship between man and mouse. Some link. Either mice have been spoiled by living with men, or men spoiled by living with mice. Another amusing thing: only man and mouse live in every climate in the world. There is no place where man is and the mouse is not. They are great companions. Perhaps one has transmitted a contagious disease to the other.
Animals do not kill their own kind. Because before murder, as soon as the weak knows, measurement happens — both growl, come near, show off, measure each other — the weak accepts: I am weak; the strong is accepted as strong. The matter ends. It is not dragged further.
Why? What virtue is there in being strong? What vice is there in being weak? What fault of his that he is weak? One man is frail and you have sturdy bones — what virtue and what vice? Granted you can throw him down and sit on his chest — what is there to boast of? Nothing. It is like placing a big stone and a small stone on a scale: the big goes down, the small hangs above. But where is the small insulted?
Lao Tzu says: because the weak wants to be strong, the frail wants to be powerful, the ugly wants to be beautiful — the upheaval. Lao Tzu says: be content with what you are. There is no going beyond fact. Fact is truth. There is no way to go against it.
What does this mean? It may seem shocking: does it mean man should make no progress? People come and say: what are you saying? Does it mean: do not progress? How will we be successful? If we accept such a thing we will become inert.
No. No one has ever become inert. The one who accepts does not waste his futile strength. It is that daily wasted strength which makes you weaker. The one who knows what he is — his limits, understanding, capability, strength — such a person does not waste his energy beyond his measure. Power is conserved. And that conserved power becomes movement in his life. But the movement arises from within, not from outer competition.
Just now we are all caught in outer competition. Someone is intelligent, you are trying to become intelligent. Someone is strong, you are doing push-ups. You are entangled in seeing others. You will fall in trouble. All around are a thousand kinds of people. Learn a little from each — someone’s intelligence, become an Einstein; someone’s strength, become a Gama. Now you are in trouble. You will split yourself into so many aspirations that you will break and become nothing.
You can be only one person in this world — and that person has not yet been born for you to imitate. That person is you. Each person is unique. He cannot be like another; he can only be himself. Therefore, being content with what you are, enter the suchness of becoming that.
‘Some can break, some can fall.’
Remember: the weak falls; the strong breaks. Great trees — the storm comes — they break. Little plants bend. The storm passes; they rise again. Ask the storm: he will say the little defeated me; the big lost. The strong breaks, the weak bends. But it depends on your seeing. This bending we can call strength — flexibility. This bending is also strength. It depends on our way of looking, our measure. If the world were wiser, where is the problem? Bending is also a power. He who cannot bend will break.
I have heard: Mulla Nasruddin was training his boy, making him do push-ups. A neighbor asked: what are you doing, Nasruddin — this is too much for a ten-year-old? He said: I am making him strong so no boy can bully him. I have taught him nine tricks so he can set anyone straight. The neighbor said: do you think there are not stronger boys? Nasruddin said: there are — and for them I have taught him the tenth trick. What is that? The tenth is: run away in time. Use the nine only as long as he sees the matter is in hand. When he sees it is beyond him, use the tenth.
There are two strategies in conflict: fight or flight. Man thinks running away is bad. Not in our land. We have given Krishna a name: Ranchhod Das — the one who left the battlefield. We even say ‘ji’ — honorific. Wise were those who gave this name. Otherwise, if you call someone Ranchhod Das, there will be a fight — you left the battlefield! But the intelligent person does not go to extremes; he does what is appropriate, balanced. Therefore Krishna could flee, and we did not insult him. It is astonishing. There is no reason to. Because sometimes fleeing is meaningful, sometimes fighting is.
‘Some break, some fall. The sage avoids excess.’
He does not live by rigid principles — ‘This is how I shall live’. He lets life flow and flows with it. Sometimes this shore, sometimes that. Sometimes in defeat, sometimes in victory. Sometimes he falls, sometimes he does not. Sometimes weak, sometimes strong. Before some he is wise; before some, simple. Before some beautiful; before some, ugly. But he does not choose a goal. He moves between the two.
‘The sage avoids excess, shuns waste.’
He avoids waste. We waste much. Imitation is waste — you can never be another. The energy you lose is lost in vain.
‘And avoids arrogance.’
Because it is by the demand of ego that we want to be like another. If we feel Krishna is honored, we want to be like Krishna. If we feel Einstein is honored, we want to be Einstein. If we feel an actor is honored, we want to be an actor. But why? The one who is honored — to be like him becomes the demand of our ego.
But the sage avoids ego, waste, and excess. Whoever avoids these three — in one sense, they are one — whoever avoids them attains supreme peace, nature, the Tao. He falls into his own swabhava.
Avoid interference — with others, and with yourself.
That is enough for today. Wait for five minutes, do kirtan.