THE TAO THAT CAN BE TOLD OF
 IS NOT THE ABSOLUTE TAO
 ON THE RISE OF RELATIVE OPPOSITES

 

 WHEN THE PEOPLE OF THE EARTH ALL KNOW BEAUTY AS BEAUTY,
 THERE ARISES (THE RECOGNITION OF) UGLINESS.
 WHEN THE PEOPLE OF THE EARTH ALL KNOW GOOD AS GOOD,
 THERE ARISES (THE RECOGNITION OF) EVIL.


 THEREFORE:
 BEING AND NON-BEING INTERDEPEND IN GROWTH;
 DIFFICULT AND EASY INTERDEPEND IN COMPLETION;
 LONG AND SHORT INTERDEPEND IN CONTRAST;
 HIGH AND LOW INTERDEPEND IN POSITION;
 TONES AND VOICE INTERDEPEND IN HARMONY;
 FRONT AND BEHIND INTERDEPEND IN COMPANY.
 THEREFORE THE SAGE:
 MANAGES AFFAIRS WITHOUT ACTION;

 PREACHES THE DOCTRINE WITHOUT WORDS;
 ALL THINGS TAKE THEIR RISE,
 BUT HE DOES NOT TURN AWAY FROM THEM;
 HE GIVES THEM LIFE, BUT DOES NOT TAKE POSSESSION OF THEM;
 HE ACTS, BUT DOES NOT APPROPRIATE;
 ACCOMPLISHES, BUT CLAIMS NO CREDIT.
 IT IS BECAUSE HE LAYS CLAIM TO NO CREDIT
 THAT THE CREDIT CANNOT BE TAKEN AWAY FROM HIM.
 ON THE ABSOLUTE TAO

 

 I SPEAK ON MAHAVIR as a part of my duty -- my heart is never with him. He is too mathematical. He is not a mystic, he has no poetry of being. He is great, enlightened, but like a vast desert; you cannot come across a single oasis in him. But because I was born a Jaina I have to pay some debts. I speak on him as my duty but my heart is not there; I speak only from the mind. When I speak on Mahavir I speak as an outsider. He is not inside me and I am not inside him.

 The same is true about Moses and Mohammed. I don't feel like speaking on them; I have not spoken on them. If I had not been born a Jaina I would never have spoken on Mahavir either. Many times my Mohammedan disciples or my Jewish disciples come to me and say, "Why don't you speak on Mohammed or Moses?" It is difficult to explain to them. Many times, just looking at their faces, I decide that I will speak; many times I look again and again into the words of Moses and Mohammed, then I again postpone it. No bell rings in my heart. It would not be alive -- if I spoke it would be a dead thing. I don't even feel a duty towards them as I feel towards Mahavir.

 They all belong to the same category: they are too calculative, extremist; they miss the opposite extreme. They are single notes, not harmonies, not symphonies. A single note has its beauty -- an austere beauty -- but it is monotonous. Once in a while it is okay, but if it continues you feel bored; you would like to stop it. The personalities of Mahavir, Moses and Mohammed are like single notes -- simple, austere, beautiful even, once in a while. But if I meet Mahavir, Moses or Mohammed on the road I will pay my respects and escape.

 I speak on Krishna. He is multi-dimensional, superhuman, miraculous, but seems to be more like a myth than a real man. He is so extraordinary that he cannot be. On this earth such extraordinary persons cannot exist -- they exist only as dreams. And myths are nothing but collective dreams. The whole of humanity has been dreaming them... beautiful, but unbelievable. I talk about Krishna and I enjoy it, but I enjoy it as one enjoys a beautiful story and the telling of a beautiful story. But it is not very meaningful, a cosmic gossip.

 I speak on Jesus Christ. I feel deep sympathy for him. I would like to suffer with him and I would like to carry his cross a little while by his side. But we remain parallel, we never meet. He is so sad, so burdened -- burdened with the miseries of the whole of humanity. He cannot laugh. If you move with him too long you will become sad, you will lose laughter. A gloominess surrounds him. I feel for him but I would not like to be like him. I can walk with him a little while and share his burden -- but then we part. Our ways are different ways. He is good, but too good, almost inhumanly good.

 I speak on Zarathustra -- very rarely, but I love the man as a friend loves another friend. You can laugh with him. He is not a moralist, not a puritan; he can enjoy life and everything that life gives. A good friend -- you could be with him forever -- but he is just a friend. Friendship is good, but not enough.

 I speak on Buddha -- I love him. Down through the centuries, through many lives, I have loved him. He is tremendously beautiful, extraordinarily beautiful, superb. But he is not on the earth, he does not walk on the earth. He flies in the sky and leaves no footprints. You cannot follow him, you never know his whereabouts. He is like a cloud. Sometimes you meet him but that is accidental. And he is so refined that he cannot take roots on this earth. He is meant for some higher heaven. In that way he is one-sided. Earth and heaven don't meet in him; he is heavenly but the earthly part is missing; he is like a flame, beautiful, but there is no oil, no container -- you can see the flame but it is going higher and higher, nothing holds it on the earth. I love him, I speak on him from my heart, but still, a distance remains. It always remains in the phenomenon of love -- you come closer and closer and closer, but even in closeness there is a distance. That is the misery of all lovers.

 
 Historians are doubtful about his existence. I cannot doubt his existence because how can I doubt my own existence? The moment I became possible, he became true to me. Even if history proves that he never existed it makes no difference to me; he must have existed because I exist -- I am the proof. During the following days, when I speak on Lao Tzu, it is not that I speak on somebody else. I speak on myself -- as if Lao Tzu is speaking through a different name, a different NAMA-RUPA, a different incarnation.

 Lao Tzu is not like Mahavir, not mathematical at all, yet he is very, very logical in his madness. He has a mad logic! When we penetrate into his sayings you will come to feel it; it is not so obvious and apparent. He has a logic of his own: the logic of absurdity, the logic of paradox, the logic of a madman. He hits hard.

 Mahavir's logic can be understood even by blind men. To understand Lao Tzu's logic you will have to create eyes. It is very subtle, it is not the ordinary logic of the logicians -- it is the logic of a hidden life, a very subtle life. Whatsoever he says is on the surface absurd; deep down there lives a very great consistency. One has to penetrate it; one has to change his own mind to understand Lao Tzu. Mahavir you can understand without changing your mind at all; as you are, you can understand Mahavir. He is on the same line. Howsoever much ahead of you he may have reached the goal, he is on the same line, the same track.

 When you try to understand Lao Tzu he zigzags. Sometimes you see him going towards the east and sometimes towards the west, because he says east is west and west is east, they are together, they are one. He believes in the unity of the opposites. And that is how life is.

 So Lao Tzu is just a spokesman of life. If life is absurd, Lao Tzu is absurd; if life has an absurd logic to it, Lao Tzu has the same logic to it. Lao Tzu simply reflects life. He doesn't add anything to it, he doesn't choose out of it; he simply accepts whatsoever it is.

 It is simple to see the spirituality of a Buddha, very simple; it is impossible to miss it, he is so extraordinary. But it is difficult to see the spirituality of Lao Tzu. He is so ordinary, just like you. You will have to grow in understanding. A Buddha passes by you -- you will immediately recognize that a superior human being has passed you. He carries the glamor of a superior human being around him. It is difficult to miss him, almost impossible to miss him. But Lao Tzu... he may be your neighbor. You may have been missing him because he is so ordinary, he is so extraordinarily ordinary. And that is the beauty of it.

 To become extraordinary is simple: only effort is needed, refinement is needed, cultivation is needed. It is a deep inner discipline. You can become very very refined, something absolutely unearthly, but to be ordinary is really the most extraordinary thing. No effort will help -- effortlessness is needed. No practice will help, no methods, no means will be of any help only understanding. Even meditation will not be of any help. To become a Buddha, meditation will be of help. To become a Lao Tzu, even meditation won't help -- just understanding. Just understanding life as it is, and living it with courage; not escaping from it, not hiding from it, facing it with courage, whatsoever it is, good or bad, divine or evil, heaven or hell.

 It is very difficult to be a Lao Tzu or to recognize a Lao Tzu. In fact, if you can recognize a Lao Tzu, you are already a Lao Tzu. To recognize a Buddha you need not be a Buddha, but to recognize Lao Tzu you need to be a Lao Tzu -- otherwise it is impossible.

 

 It is said that Confucius went to see Lao Tzu. Lao Tzu was an old man, Confucius was younger. Lao Tzu was almost unknown, Confucius was almost universally known. Kings and emperors used to call him to their courts; wise men used to come for his advice. He was the wisest man in China in those days. But by and by he must have felt that his wisdom might be of use to others, but he was not blissful, he had not attained to anything. He had become an expert, maybe helpful to others, but not helpful to himself.

 So he started a secret search to find someone who could help him. Ordinary wise men wouldn't do, because they used to come for his own advice. Great scholars wouldn't do; they used to come to ask him about their problems. But there must be someone somewhere -- life is vast. He tried a secret search.

 He sent his disciples to find someone who could be of help to him, and they came with the information that there lived a man -- nobody knew his name -- he was known as the old guy. Lao Tzu means "the old guy." The word is not his name, nobody knows his name. He was such an unknown man that nobody knows when he was born, nobody knows to whom -- who his father was or who his mother was. He had lived for ninety years but only very rare human beings had come across him, very rare, who had different eyes and perspectives with which to understand him. He was only for the rarest -- so ordinary a man, but only for the rarest of human minds.

 Hearing the news that a man known as The Old Guy existed, Confucius went to see him. When he met Lao Tzu he could feel that here was a man of great understanding, great intellectual integrity, great logical acumen, a genius. He could feel that something was there, but he couldn't catch hold of it. Vaguely, mysteriously, there was something; this man was no ordinary man although he looked absolutely ordinary. Something was hidden; he was carrying a treasure.

 Confucius asked, "What do you say about morality? What do you say about how to cultivate good character?" -- because he was a moralist and he thought that if you cultivate a good character that is the highest attainment.

 Lao Tzu laughed loudly, and said, "If you are immoral, only then the question of morality arises. And if you don't have any character, only then you think about character. A man of character is absolutely oblivious of the fact that anything like character exists. A man of morality does not know what the word `moral' means. So don't be foolish! And don't try to cultivate. Just be natural."

 And the man had such tremendous energy that Confucius started trembling. He couldn't stand him. He escaped. He became afraid -- as one becomes afraid near an abyss. When he came back to his disciples, who were waiting outside under a tree, the disciples could not believe it. This man had been going to emperors, the greatest emperors, and they had never seen any nervousness in him. And he was trembling, and cold perspiration was coming, pouring out from all over his body. They couldn't believe it -- what had happened? What had this man Lao Tzu done to their teacher? They asked him and he said, "Wait a little. Let me collect myself. This man is dangerous."

 And about Lao Tzu he said to his disciples: "I have heard about great animals like elephants, and I know how they walk. And I have heard about hidden animals in the sea, and I know how they swim. And I have heard about great birds who fly thousands of miles away from the earth, and I know how they fly. But this man is a dragon. Nobody knows how he walks. Nobody knows how he lives. Nobody knows how he flies. Never go near him -- he is like an abyss. He is like a death."

 

 And that is the definition of a Master: a Master is like death. If you come near him, too close, you will feel afraid, a trembling will take over. You will be possessed by an unknown fear, as if you are going to die. It is said that Confucius never came again to see this old man.

 Lao Tzu was ordinary in a way. And in another way he was the most extraordinary man. He was not extraordinary like Buddha; he was extraordinary in a totally different way. His extraordinariness was not so obvious -- it was a hidden treasure. He was not miraculous like Krishna, he did not do any miracles, but his whole being was a miracle -- the way he walked, the way he looked, the way he was. His whole being was a miracle.

 He was not sad like Jesus; he could laugh, he could laugh a belly laugh. It is said that he was born laughing. Children are born crying, weeping. It is said about him that he was born laughing. I also feel it must be true; a man like Lao Tzu must be born laughing. He is not sad like Jesus. He can laugh, and laugh tremendously, but deep down in his laughter there is a sadness, a compassion -- a sadness about you, about the whole existence. His laughter is not superficial.

 Zarathustra laughs but his laughter is different, there is no sadness in it. Lao Tzu is sad like Jesus and not sad like Jesus; Lao Tzu laughs like Zarathustra and doesn't laugh like Zarathustra. His sadness has a laughter to it and his laughter has a sadness to it. He is a meeting of the opposites. He is a harmony, a symphony.

 Remember this... I am not commenting on him. There exists no distance between me and him. He is talking to you through me -- a different body, a different name, a different incarnation, but the same spirit.

 Now we will take the sutra:

 

 THE TAO THAT CAN BE TOLD OF

 IS NOT THE ABSOLUTE TAO.

 

 LET ME FIRST tell you the story of how these sutras came to be written, because that will help you to understand them. For ninety years Lao Tzu lived -- in fact he did nothing except live. He lived totally. Many times his disciples asked him to write, but he would always say: The Tao that can be told is not the real Tao, the truth that can be told becomes untrue immediately. So he would not say anything; he would not write anything. Then what were the disciples doing with him? They were only being with him. That's what satsang is -- being with him. They lived with him, they moved with him, they simply imbibed his being. Being near him they tried to be open to him; being near him they tried not to think about anything; being near him they became more and more silent. In that silence he would reach them, he would come to them and he would knock at their doors.

 For ninety years he refused to write anything or to say anything. This was his basic attitude: that truth cannot be taught. The moment you say something about truth, it is no more true: the very saying falsifies it. You cannot teach it. At the most you can indicate it, and that indication should be your very being, your whole life; it cannot be indicated by words. He was against words; he was against language.

 It is said that he used to go for a morning walk every day, and a neighbor used to follow him. Knowing well that he didn't want to talk, that he was a man of absolute silence, the neighbor always kept silent. Even a "hello" was not allowed, even to talk about the weather was not allowed. To say "How beautiful a morning!" would be too much chattering. Lao Tzu would go for a long walk, for miles, and the neighbor would follow him.

 For years it went on, but once it happened that a guest was staying with the neighbor and he also wanted to come, so the neighbor brought him. He did not know Lao Tzu or his ways. He started feeling suffocated because his host was not talking, and he couldn't understand why they were so silent -- and the silence became heavy on him.

 

 If you don't know how to be silent, it becomes heavy. It is not that by saying things you communicate -- no. It is by saying things that you unburden yourself. In fact, through words communication is not possible; just the opposite is possible -- you can avoid communication. You can talk, and you can create a screen of words around you so that your real situation cannot be known by others. You clothe yourself through words.

 That man started feeling naked and suffocated and awkward; it was embarrassing. So he simply said, when the sun was rising: "What a beautiful sun. Look...! What a beautiful sun is born, is rising! What a beautiful morning!"

 That's all he said. But nobody responded because the neighbor, the host, knew that Lao Tzu wouldn't like it. And of course Lao Tzu wouldn't say anything, wouldn't respond.

 When they came back, Lao Tzu told the neighbor, "From tomorrow, don't bring this man. He is a chatterbox." And he had only said this much: "What a beautiful sun," or "What a beautiful morning." That much in a two-or three-hour-long walk. But Lao Tzu said "Don't bring this chatterbox again with you. He talks too much, and talks uselessly -- because I also have eyes, I can see that the sun is being born and it is beautiful. What is the need to say it?"

 

 Lao Tzu lived in silence. He always avoided talking about the truth that he had attained and he always rejected the idea that he should write it down for the generations to come.

 

 At the age of ninety he took leave of his disciples. He said goodbye to them, and he said, "Now I am moving towards the hills, towards the Himalayas. I am going there to get ready to die. It is good to live with people, it is good to be in the world while you are living, but when one is getting nearer to death it is good to move into total aloneness, so that you move towards the original source in your absolute purity and loneliness, uncontaminated by the world."

 The disciples felt very, very sad, but what could they do? They followed him for a few hundred miles, but by and by Lao Tzu persuaded them to go back. Then alone he was crossing the border, and the guard on the border imprisoned him. The guard was also a disciple. And the guard said: "Unless you write a book, I am not going to allow you to move beyond the border. This much you must do for humanity. Write a book. That is the debt you have to pay, otherwise I won't allow you to cross." So for three days Lao Tzu was imprisoned by his own disciple.

 

 It is beautiful. It is very loving. He was forced -- and that's how this small book, the book of Lao Tzu, TAO TE CHING, was born. He had to write it, because the disciple wouldn't allow him to cross. And he was the guard and he had the authority, he could create trouble, so Lao Tzu had to write the book. In three days he finished it.

 This is the first sentence of the book:

 THE TAO THAT CAN BE TOLD OF

 IS NOT THE ABSOLUTE TAO.

 

 THIS IS THE FIRST THING he has to say: that whatsoever can be said cannot be true. This is the introduction for the book. It simply makes you alert: now words will be following, don't become a victim of the words. Remember the wordless. Remember that which cannot be communicated through language, through words. The Tao can be communicated, but it can only be communicated from being to being. It can be communicated when you are with the Master, just with the Master, doing nothing, not even practicing anything. Just being with the Master it can be communicated.

 Why can't the truth be said? What is the difficulty? The truth cannot be said for many reasons. The first and the most basic reason is: truth is always realized in silence. When your inner talk has stopped, then it is realized. And that which is realized in silence, how can you say it through sound? It is an experience. It is not a thought. If it was a thought it could be expressed, there would be no trouble in it. Howsoever complicated or complex a thought may be, a way can be found to express it. The most complex theory of Albert Einstein, the theory of relativity, can also be expressed in a symbol. There is no problem about it. The listener may not be able to understand it; that is not the point. It can be expressed.

 It was said when Einstein was alive that only twelve persons, a dozen, in the whole world understood him and what he was saying. But even that is enough. If even a single person can understand, it has been expressed. And even if a single person cannot understand right now, maybe after many centuries there will come a person who can understand it. Then too it has been expressed. The very probability that somebody can understand it, and it has been expressed.

 But truth cannot be expressed because the very reaching to it is through silence, soundlessness, thoughtlessness. You reach to it through no-mind, the mind drops. And how can you use something which as a necessary condition has to drop before truth can be reached? Mind cannot understand, mind cannot realize, how can mind express? Remember it as a rule: if mind can attain, mind can express; if mind cannot attain to it, mind cannot express it. All language is futile. Truth cannot be expressed

 Then what have all the scriptures been doing? Then what is Lao Tzu doing? Then what are the Upanishads doing? They all try to say something which cannot be said in the hope that a desire may arise in you to know about it. Truth cannot be said but in the very effort of saying it a desire can arise in the hearer to know that which cannot be expressed. A thirst can be provoked. The thirst is there, it needs a little provocation. You are already thirsty -- how can it be otherwise? You are not blissful, you are not ecstatic -- you are thirsty. Your heart is a burning fire. You are seeking something which can quench the thirst, but, not finding the water, not finding the source, by and by you have tried to suppress your thirst itself. That is the only way, otherwise it is too much, it will not allow you to live at all. So you suppress the thirst.

 A Master like Lao Tzu knows well that truth cannot be said, but the very effort to say it will provoke something, will bring the suppressed thirst in you to the surface. And once the thirst surfaces, a search, an inquiry starts. And he has moved you.

 

 THE TAO THAT CAN BE TOLD OF

 IS NOT THE ABSOLUTE TAO.

 

 At the most it can be relative.

 For example, we can say something about light to a blind man knowing well that it is impossible to communicate anything about light because he has no experience of it. But something can be said about light -- theories about light can be created. Even a blind man can become an expert about the theories of light; about the whole science of light he can become an expert -- there is no problem in it -- but he will not understand what light is. He will understand what light consists of. He will understand the physics of light, the chemistry of light, he will understand the poetry of light, but he will not understand the facticity of light, what light is. The experience of light he will not understand. So all that is said to a blind man about light is only relative: it is something about light, not light itself. Light cannot be communicated.

 Something can be said about God, but God cannot be said; something can be said about love, but love cannot be said; that "something" remains relative. It remains relative to the listener, his understanding, his intellectual grip, his training, his desire to understand. It depends on, it is relative to, the Master: his way of expressing, his devices to communicate. It remains relative -- relative to many things -- but it can never become the absolute experience. This is the first reason that truth cannot be expressed.

 The second reason that truth cannot be expressed is because it is an experience. No experience can be communicated... leave truth aside. If you have never known love, when somebody says something about love, you will hear the word but you will miss the meaning. The word is in the dictionary. Even if you don't understand you can look in the dictionary and you will know what it means. But the meaning is in you. Meaning comes through experience. If you have loved someone then you know the meaning of the word "love." The literal meaning is in the dictionary, in the language, in the grammar. But the experiential meaning, the existential meaning is in you. If you have known the experience, immediately the word "love" is no more empty; it contains something. If I say something, it is empty unless you bring your experience to it. When your experience comes to it, it becomes significant; otherwise it remains empty -- words and words and words.

 How can truth be expressed when you have not experienced it? Even in ordinary life an unexperienced thing cannot be told. Only words will be conveyed. The container will reach you but the content will be lost. An empty word will travel towards you; you will hear it and you will think you understand it because you know the literal meaning of it, but you will miss. The real, authentic meaning comes through existential experience. You have to know it, there is no other way. There is no shortcut. Truth cannot be transferred. You cannot steal it, you cannot borrow it, you cannot purchase it, you cannot rob it, you cannot beg it -- there is no way. Unless you have it, you cannot have it. So what can be done?

 The only way -- and I emphasize it -- the only way is to live with someone who has attained to the experience. Just being in the presence of someone who has attained to the experience, something mysterious will be transferred to you... not by words -- it is a jump of energy. Just as a flame can jump from a lit lamp to an unlit lamp -- you bring the unlit lamp closer to the lit lamp, and the flame can jump -- the same thing happens between a Master and a disciple: a transmission beyond scriptures -- a transmission of energy not of message, a transmission of life not of words.

 

 THE TAO THAT CAN BE TOLD OF

 IS NOT THE ABSOLUTE TAO.

 

 Remember this condition.

 Now enter the sutras:

  

 WHEN THE PEOPLE OF THE EARTH ALL KNOW BEAUTY AS BEAUTY,

 THERE ARISES UGLINESS.

 WHEN THE PEOPLE OF THE EARTH ALL KNOW THE GOOD AS GOOD,

 THERE ARISES EVIL.

 

 LAO TZU is the absolute anarchist. He says: The moment you start thinking of order, disorder arises. The moment you think of God, the devil is already present there -- because thinking can only be of the opposites; thinking can be only of the duality. Thinking has a deep dichotomy in it, thinking is schizophrenic, it is a split phenomenon. That's why there is so much insistence on attaining to a non-thinking state -- because only then will you be one. Otherwise you will remain two, divided, split, schizophrenic.

 In the West schizophrenia has become by and by more and more common, because all the Western religions are deep down schizophrenic; they divide. They say God is good. Then where to put all the evil? God is simply good and he cannot be bad, and there is much that is bad in life -- where to put that badness? So a devil is created. The moment you create a god, immediately you create a devil. I must tell you -- Lao Tzu never talks about God, never. Not even a single time does he use the word "god," because once you use the word "god" the devil immediately enters through the same door. Open the door -- they both come in together. Thinking is always in opposites.

 

 WHEN THE PEOPLE OF THE EARTH ALL KNOW BEAUTY AS BEAUTY,

 THERE ARISES (THE RECOGNITION OF) UGLINESS.

 

 The world will be beautiful when people have forgotten about beauty, because then there will be no ugliness. The world will be moral when people have completely forgotten the word "moral," because then there will be no immorality. The world will be in order when there is nobody to enforce it, nobody who is trying to create order. All those who try to create order are the mischief-makers -- they create disorder. But it is difficult to understand. It is difficult because our whole mind has been trained, trained by these schizophrenic thinkers. They say: Choose God and reject the devil; be good, don't be bad. And the more you try to be good the more you feel your badness inside.

 Have you ever observed that saints who are trying to be absolutely virtuous are too conscious of their sins? Then read Augustine's CONFESSIONS. A whole life trying to be a saint, then there arises the recognition of sin. The more you try to be a saint the more you will feel you are encircled by sins. Try to be good and you will feel how bad you are. Try to be loving and you will come across hatred, anger, jealousy, possessiveness. Try to be beautiful and you will become more and more aware of how ugly you are.

 Drop the dichotomy. Drop the schizophrenic attitude. Be simple. And when you are simple you don't know who you are -- beautiful or ugly.

 There is a Sufi story:

 

 A Master was traveling, and he came to an inn for an overnight stay with his disciples. The innkeeper told him that he had two wives, one beautiful, another ugly.

 "But the problem is," said the innkeeper, "that I love the ugly one and I hate the beautiful one."

 The Master asked, "What is the matter? What is the reason for it?"

 The man said, "The beautiful one is too conscious of her beauty; that makes her ugly..." when you are too conscious of beauty certainly you will become ugly "... and the other is too conscious of her ugliness. That makes her beautiful."

 The one who was beautiful thought continuously that she was beautiful -- she had become arrogant, very proud. How can you be beautiful with arrogance? Arrogance is ugliness. She had become very egoistic. And have you ever come across any ego which is beautiful? How can the ego be beautiful? The other, who was ugly and was conscious of her ugliness, had become humble, and humility has a beauty of its own. Humbleness, without any pride, without any ego, creates beauty.

 So the man said, "I am puzzled. I love the ugly one and I hate the beautiful one. And I am asking you to solve the puzzle. What is the matter? Why is it happening?"

 The Master called all his disciples and said, "You also come, because this is really something to be understood."

 And he said exactly what Lao Tzu is saying. To his disciples he also said, "Don't be proud that you know. If you know that you know, you are ignorant. If you know that you don't know, you are wise. An absolutely simple man does not know either way, whether he knows or doesn't know. He lives completely unself-consciously."

 

 Now, I would like to prolong the story a little longer. It stops there. As Sufis have told it, it stops there, but I would like to give it a deeper turn. I would like to tell you that after this Master's visit, I also visited the inn, after many years, of course. And the man, the innkeeper, came to me and said, "There is a puzzle. Once a Sufi Master visited me and I put this problem before him and he solved it. But since then everything has turned. The ugly woman has become proud about her humbleness, and now I don't love her. Not only is her body ugly, now her being, her whole being, has become ugly. And the beautiful woman, knowing that the consciousness that she is beautiful was destroying her beauty, has dropped that consciousness. Now I love her. Not only is her body beautiful, her being has become beautiful as well." So he said to me, "Now you tell me what the matter is. "

 But I told him, "You please keep quiet. If I say something, then again, the story will take a turn. Keep quiet!"

 

 Self-consciousness is the disease; in fact, to be unself-conscious is to become realized. That's what enlightenment is all about: to be unself-conscious. But between the dichotomy, between the two, between the dilemma, how can you be unself-conscious?

 You always choose: you choose to be beautiful and ugliness becomes your shadow; you choose to be religious and irreligiousness becomes your shadow; you choose to be a saint and sin becomes your shadow. Choose -- and you will be in difficulty, because the very choice has divided life. Don't choose, be choiceless, let life flow. Sometimes it looks like God, sometimes it looks like the devil -- both are beautiful. You don't choose. Don't try to be a saint; otherwise your saintliness will not be real saintliness -- a pride in it will make everything ugly. So I say that many times sinners have reached the divine and saints have missed. Because sinners are always humble; thinking themselves sinners, they cannot claim.

 I will tell you another story.

 

 Once it happened: a saint knocked at the doors of Heaven, and at the same time, just by his side, a sinner knocked too. And the saint knew the sinner very well. He had lived in his neighborhood, in the same town, and they had died on the same day.

 The doors opened. The gatekeeper, St. Peter, didn't given even a look to the saint. He welcomed the sinner. The saint was offended. This was not expected, that a sinner should be welcomed.

 He asked St. Peter, "What is the matter? You offend me. You insult me. Why am I not received when the sinner has been received with such welcome?"

 Said St. Peter, "That's why. You expect. He does not expect. He simply feels grateful that he has come to Heaven. You feel that you have earned it. He feels the grace of God; you think it is because of your efforts that you have achieved it. It is an achievement to you, and all achievements are of the ego. He is humble. He cannot believe that he has come to heaven."

 

 It is possible that a sinner can reach and a saint can miss. If the saint is too filled with his saintliness, he will miss.

 Lao Tzu says:

 WHEN THE PEOPLE OF THE EARTH ALL KNOW BEAUTY AS BEAUTY,

 THERE ARISES UGLINESS.

 WHEN THE PEOPLE OF THE EARTH ALL KNOW THE GOOD AS GOOD,

 THERE ARISES EVIL...

 THEREFORE:

 BEING AND NON-BEING INTERDEPEND IN GROWTH...

 

 Use both -- don't choose. Life is an interdependence. Use sin also, it exists there for a purpose; otherwise it wouldn't exist. Use anger also, it exists there for a purpose; otherwise it wouldn't exist. Nothing exists without any purpose in life. How can it exist without any purpose? Life is not a chaos, it is a meaningful cosmos.

 

 BEING AND NON-BEING INTERDEPEND IN GROWTH;

 -- so be and not-be together-

 

 DIFFICULT AND EASY INTERDEPEND IN COMPLETION;

 LONG AND SHORT INTERDEPEND IN CONTRAST;

 HIGH AND LOW INTERDEPEND IN POSITION;

 TONES AND VOICE INTERDEPEND IN HARMONY;

 FRONT AND BEHIND INTERDEPEND IN COMPANY.

 

 Lao Tzu is saying that opposites are not really opposites but complementaries. Don't divide them, division is false; they are one, they interdepend. How can love exist without hate? How can compassion exist without anger? How can life exist without death? How can happiness exist without unhappiness? How is heaven possible without hell?

 Hell is not against heaven, they are complementary, they exist together; in fact, they are two aspects of the same coin. Don't choose. Enjoy both. Allow both to be there. Create a harmony between the two; don't choose. Then your life will become a symphony of the opposites, and that is the greatest life possible. It will be most ordinary in a way, and most extraordinary in another way.

 That's why I say Buddha moves in the sky, he has no earth part in him. Lao Tzu is both, earth and heaven together. Buddha, even in his perfection seems to be incomplete; Lao Tzu, even in his incompletion is complete, perfect.

 You understand me? Try to dig it!

 Buddha in his perfection is still incomplete, the earth part is missing. He is unearthly like a ghost, the body part is missing; he is unembodied, a tree without roots.

 You are roots, but only roots; it has not sprouted, the tree has not come to bloom. Buddha is only flowers, and you are only roots -- Lao Tzu is both. He may not look as perfect as Buddha, he cannot, because the other is always there -- how can he be perfect? But he is complete. He is total. He may not be perfect but he is total. And these two words have to be remembered always: don't try to be perfect, try to be total. If you try to be perfect you will follow Buddha, you will follow Mahavir, you will follow Jesus. If you try to be total only then can you have the feeling of what it means to be near Lao Tzu, what it means to follow Tao.

 Tao is totality. Totality is not perfect, it is always imperfect -- because it is always alive. Perfection is always dead -- anything that becomes perfect is dead. How can it live? How can it live when it has become perfect? -- it has no need to live. It has denied the other part.

 Life exists through the tension of the opposites, the meeting of the opposites. If you deny the opposite you can become perfect but you will not be total, you will miss something. Howsoever beautiful Buddha is, he misses something. Lao Tzu is not so beautiful, not so perfect.

 Buddha and Lao Tzu are both standing before you; Lao Tzu will look ordinary and Buddha extraordinary, superb. But I tell you: thousands of Buddhas exist in Lao Tzu. He is deeply rooted in the earth -- he is rooted in the earth, and he is standing high in the sky; he is both, heaven and earth, a meeting of the opposites.

 There are three words to be remembered: one is dependence, another is independence, the third is interdependence.

 Buddha is independent. You are dependent: a husband dependent on his wife, a father dependent on his son, an individual dependent on society -- thousands of dependencies. You are dependent. A Buddha stands like a peak -- independent. He has cut all the ties with the world: with the wife, with the child, with the father -- everything he has cut. He has renounced all -- a pillar of independence. You are part; Buddha is part, the other part. You may be ugly -- he is beautiful. But his beauty exists only because of your ugliness. If you disappear Buddha will disappear. He looks wise because of your stupidity; if you become wise he will no more be wise.

 Lao Tzu is the phenomenon of interdependence -- because life is interdependent. You cannot be dependent, you cannot be independent -- both are extremes. Just in the middle, where life is a balance, is interdependence. Everything exists with everything else, everything is interconnected. Hurt a flower and you hurt a star. Everything is interconnected, nothing exists like an island. If you try to exist like an island -- it is possible, but it will be an unearthly phenomenon, almost a myth, a dream. Lao Tzu believes in interdependence. He says: Take everything as it is, don't choose.

 It seems to be simple and yet the most difficult thing, because the mind always wants to choose. The mind lives through choice. If you don't choose the mind drops. This is the way of Lao Tzu. How to drop the mind? -- don't choose! That's why he never prescribes any meditation, because then there is no need for any meditation.

 Don't choose, live life as it comes -- float. Don't make any effort to reach anywhere. Don't move towards a goal; enjoy the moment in its totality and don't be bothered by the future or the past. Then a symphony arises within your soul, the lowest and the highest meet in you, and then -- then you have a richness.

 If you are only the highest you are poor, because you are like a hill which has no valleys: it is a poor hill. Valleys give depth and valleys give mystery; in valleys abides the very poetry. The peak is arithmetical; it is plain. In the valley move the shadows, the mysteries. Without a valley a peak is poor, and without a peak a valley is poor, because then there is only darkness. The sun never visits it; it is damp and gloomy and sad. The richest possibility is to be a peak and a valley together.

 Somewhere Nietzsche says.... Nietzsche had one of the most penetrating minds that has ever been possessed by any human being. Because of that penetration he became mad; it was too much, the mind was too much, he couldn't contain it. He says that a tree that wants to reach to the sky has to go to the deepest earth. The roots have to go to the very hell, deep down; only then can the branches, the peak, reach to the heaven. The tree will have to touch both: the hell and the heaven, the height and the depth both.

 And the same is true for the being of man: you have, somehow, to meet the devil and the divine both in your innermost core of being. Don't be afraid of the devil, otherwise your God will be a poorer God. A Christian or a Jewish God is very poor; the Christian or Jewish or Mohammedan God has no salt in it... tasteless, because the salt has been thrown away... the salt has become the devil. They have to become one. An organic unity exists in existence between the opposites: being and non-being, difficult and easy, long and short, high and low.

 

 TONES AND VOICE INTERDEPEND IN HARMONY;

 FRONT AND BEHIND INTERDEPEND IN COMPANY.

 

 THEREFORE THE SAGE:

 MANAGES AFFAIRS WITHOUT ACTION...

 

 This is what Lao Tzu calls Wu Wei: the sage manages affairs without action. Three are the possibilities -- one: be in action and forget inaction. You will be a wordly man. The second possibility: drop action, move to the Himalayas and remain inactive. You will be an otherworldly man. The third possibility: live in the market but don't allow the market to live in you. Act without being active, move but remain unmoving inside.

 I am talking to you and there is silence inside me -- I am talking and not-talking together. Move and don't move. Act and don't act. If inaction and action can meet, then the harmony arises. Then you become a beautiful phenomenon -- not beautiful against ugliness, but beautiful which comprehends ugliness also.

 Go to a rosebush. See the flower and the thorns. Those thorns are not against the flower, they protect it. They are guards around the flower: security, safety measures. In a really beautiful person, in a really harmonious person, nothing is rejected. Rejection is against existence. Everything should be absorbed. That's the art. If you reject, that shows you are no artist. Everything should be absorbed, used. If there is a rock in the way don't try to reject it, use it as a stepping-stone.

 

 THEREFORE THE SAGE:

 MANAGES AFFAIRS WITHOUT ACTION...

 

 He does not escape to the Himalayas. He remains in the world. He manages affairs but without any action. He is not active inside, the action remains on the outside. At the center he remains inactive. That is what Lao Tzu calls Wu Wei -- finding the center of the cyclone. The cyclone is on the outside but in the center nothing moves, nothing stirs.

 

 ... PREACHES THE DOCTRINE WITHOUT WORDS.

 Here I am preaching to you a doctrine without words. You will say I am using words. Yes, I am preaching... without words, because deep inside me no word arises. It is for you, not for me; the word is for you, it is not for me. I use it; I am not used by it, it does not fill me. The moment I am not talking to you I am not talking at all. I never talk to myself, there is no inner talk. When I am not talking I am silent, and when I am talking the silence is not disturbed, the silence remains untouched.

 

 ... PREACHES THE DOCTRINE WITHOUT WORDS.

 ALL THINGS TAKE THEIR RISE,

 BUT HE DOES NOT TURN AWAY FROM THEM...

 

 He never escapes. He never rejects. He never renounces. And that is the meaning of my sannyas. The word sannyas means renunciation, but I don't preach renunciation. Then why do I call you sannyasins? I call you sannyasins in the Lao Tzuan sense: renounce and yet don't renounce, remain in the world but yet out of it -- this is the meeting of the opposites. So I don't tell you to move, to drop, to leave your families. There is no need. You be there, you be totally there, but deep down something remains above, transcendental -- don't forget that. When you are with your wife, be with your wife, and also be with you. That's the point. If you forget yourself and you are just with your wife, you are a worldly man. Then sooner or later you will escape, because it will create so much misery in life that you will want to leave and renounce and go to the hills. Both are extremes. And the truth is never in the extreme, the truth comprehends the extremes. It is in both and in neither.

 

 ALL THINGS TAKE THEIR RISE,

 BUT HE DOES NOT TURN AWAY FROM THEM;

 HE GIVES THEM LIFE, BUT DOES NOT TAKE POSSESSION OF THEM.

 

 Love your children, but don't possess them. Love your wife and your husband, but don't possess them. The moment you possess... you don't know: deep down you have been possessed. The moment you possess you have been possessed. The possessor is the possessed. Don't possess -- because the possession tries to destroy the center of the other, and the other won't allow you to. And if you try to destroy the center of the other, in the very effort your own center will be destroyed. Then there will be only the cyclone and no center. Be in the world and yet not in it Something deep in you transcends, remains floating in the sky -- roots in the earth, branches in the sky.

 

 HE GIVES THEM LIFE, BUT DOES NOT TAKE POSSESSION OF THEM;

 HE ACTS, BUT DOES NOT APPROPRIATE;

 ACCOMPLISHES, BUT CLAIMS NO CREDIT.

 

 He simply lives, as part of the whole -- how can he claim any credit? He simply lives as a part of this organic unity, this existence, this thusness. He is part of it; how can he claim? How can a wave claim anything? The wave is just a part of the ocean.

 

 HE ACTS, BUT DOES NOT APPROPRIATE;

 ACCOMPLISHES, BUT CLAIMS NO CREDIT.

 

 IT IS BECAUSE HE LAYS CLAIM TO NO CREDIT

 THAT THE CREDIT CANNOT BE TAKEN AWAY FROM HIM.

 

 This is the absurd logic of Lao Tzu. He is absolutely logical, but he has a logic of his own. He says:

 

 IT IS BECAUSE HE LAYS CLAIM TO NO CREDIT

 THAT THE CREDIT CANNOT BE TAKEN AWAY FROM HIM.

 

 If you claim, the claim can be disproved; if you don't claim, how can the claim -- which has not been claimed at all -- be disproved? If you try to be somebody in the world, it may be proved that you are nobody. It will be proved, because everybody is trying to be somebody and everybody is a competitor in that claim. But if you don't claim, you remain a nobody -- how can this be disproved? In your nobodiness you become somebody, and nobody can disprove it and nobody can compete with it.

 If you try to be victorious you will be defeated. Ask the Alexanders and the Napoleons and the Hitlers: if you try to be victorious you will be defeated. Says Lao Tzu: Don't try to be victorious, then nobody can defeat you. A very subtle logic, the logic of life itself: don't claim, and your claim is absolutely fulfilled; don't try to be victorious, and your victory is absolute; don't try, just be, and all that you can try for will come to you by itself, on its own accord.

 A man who has not asked for anything, who has not been trying to be successful in any way, who has not been striving for any ambition to be fulfilled, suddenly finds that all is fulfilled -- life itself comes to him to share its secrets, to share its riches. Because a man who remains without claim becomes emptiness; into that emptiness life goes on pouring its secrets and riches.

 Life abhors a vacuum. If you become empty everything will come on its own accord. Trying, you will fail; non-trying, success is absolutely certain. I am not saying that if you want to be successful don't try -- no, I am not saying that. It is not a result, it is a consequence. And you have to understand the difference between a result and a consequence. When you listen to Lao Tzu or to me, of course you understand the logic that if you try to be victorious, you will be defeated because there are millions of competitors. How can you succeed in this competitive world? Nobody ever succeeds. Everybody fails. And everybody fails absolutely, there is no exception. And then Lao Tzu says that if you don't try to succeed you will succeed. Your mind becomes greedy, and your mind says: That's right! So this is the way to succeed! I will not claim, I will not be ambitious so that my ambition can be fulfilled. Now this is asking for a result. You remain the same -- you have missed Lao Tzu completely.

 Lao Tzu is saying that if you really remain without any claim, without asking for any credit, fame, name, success, ambition, then as a consequence success is there, victory is there. The whole existence pours down into your emptiness; you are fulfilled. This is a consequence, not a result. Result is when you desire it; consequence is when you were not even thinking about it, there was no desire, no thinking about it. It happens as part of the inner law of existence. That law is called Tao.

 

 IT IS BECAUSE HE LAYS CLAIM TO NO CREDIT

 THAT THE CREDIT CANNOT BE TAKEN AWAY FROM HIM.

 

 Understand Lao Tzu. And understand your inner greed. Because the greed can say.... It happens every day, almost every day -- people come to me and I tell them: Meditate, but don't ask for results. They say: If we don't ask for results, will they happen? I say: Yes, they will happen, but don't ask for them. So they say okay. Then after a few days they come and they say: We have been waiting and they have not happened up to now.

 You miss the point. You cannot wait. You can wait for a result; you cannot wait for a consequence. Consequence has nothing to do with you or your waiting. It is part of the innermost law. It happens on its own accord. You are not needed even to wait, because even in the waiting -- the desire. And if the desire is there, the consequence will never happen. Don't desire and it happens. Don't ask and it is given. Jesus says: Ask, and it shall be given. Knock and the door shall be opened. Lao Tzu says: Ask not, and it shall be given. Knock not, and the door has always remained open -- just look!

 And I say to you: Lao Tzu goes the deepest, nobody has ever gone deeper. Lao Tzu is the greatest key. if you understand him, he is the master key; you can open all the locks that exist in life and existence. Try to understand him. And it will be easy for you if you don't ask for any results out of the understanding. Just enjoy the understanding. Just enjoy the fact that you are on a journey with this old guy. This old guy is beautiful -- not against ugliness; this old guy is wise -- not against stupidity; this old guy is enlightened -- not against unenlightenment or unenlightened persons. This old guy is total. You exist in him, and Buddhas also. He is both. And if you can understand him, nothing is left to be understood. You can forget Mahavirs, Buddhas, Krishnas -- Lao Tzu alone is enough. He is the master key.
 

Osho Tao: The Three Treasures, Vol 1 Chapter 1

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