Taoism, Daoism, Tao, Dao, Lao Tzu's Tap Te Ching, Vol. 1 Tao: The three treasures, Chapter 2: Ordinariness, Question 2

The second question:

Question 2

YOU SAY THAT LAO TZU IS FOR THE RAREST OF SEEKERS. THEN HOW DO YOU CALL HIM TOTAL?

HE IS FOR THE RAREST of seekers because he is total. The mind is afraid of totality, the mind is always searching for perfection. The mind is a perfectionist.

Try to understand these two dimensions: the dimension of perfection and the dimension of totality. With perfection the ego can exist perfectly; in fact, it cannot exist without the dimension of perfection. The ego is always trying to be more and more perfect, and when you want to be perfect you have to choose -- you cannot be total. If you want to be wise you have to choose: you have to drop foolishness, you have to fight against ignorance. And if you want to be perfectly wise you have to cut out all the possibilities of ignorance, of foolishness, of madness.

But a total man is totally different. He is wise in his foolishness; he is foolish in his wisdom. He knows that he is ignorant -- that is his wisdom. In him opposites meet. Says Lao Tzu: Everybody seems to be wise except me. I appear to be a fool. Everybody is trying to be wise, trying to be knowledgeable, trying to be intelligent -- cutting out, hiding, suppressing foolishness. But foolishness has a beauty of its own -- if it can be joined together with wisdom. Then wisdom is total. And the greatest wise men in the dimension of totality are always fools also. They are so simple and so innocent that they look foolish. Lao Tzu must have looked foolish to many people. He was; he was both. And that is the difficulty: mind seeks perfection. Who will go to Lao Tzu? Nobody wants to be both foolish and wise. And you cannot even understand how one can be both. How can one be both?

It is reported that a Sufi mystic was traveling and came to a town. And his name had reached there before him, his fame was already known. So people gathered together and said, "Preach something to us."

The mystic said, "I am not a wise man, because I am a fool also. You will be confused by my teachings, so better let me keep quiet." But the more he tried to avoid it, the more they insisted, the more they became intrigued by his personality.

Finally he yielded and he said, "Okay. This coming Friday I will come to the mosque..." It was a Mohammedan village. "... and what do you want me to talk about?"

They said, "Of course, about God."

So he came -- the whole village gathered, he had created such a sensation. He stood at the pulpit and asked a question: "Do you know anything about what I am going to say about God?"

The villagers of course replied, "No, we don't know what you are going to say."

"Then," he said, "it is useless, because if you don't know at all, you will not be able to understand A little preparation is needed, and you are absolutely unprepared. It is going to be futile and I will not speak." He left the mosque.

The villagers were at a loss: what to do? They persuaded him again the next Friday. The next Friday he again came. He asked the same question; all the villagers were ready. He asked, "Do you know what I am going to talk to you about?"

They said, "Yes, of course."

So he said, "Then there is no need to talk. If you already know -- finished. Why unnecessarily bother me and waste your time?" He left the mosque

The villagers were completely puzzled: what to do with this man? But now their interest was going mad. He must be hiding something! So they again persuaded him somehow.

He came, and again he asked the same question: "Do you know what I am going to talk about?"

Now the villagers had become a little wiser. They said, "Half of us know, and half of us don't know."

The mystic said, "Then there is no need. Those who know can tell those who don't know."

This is a wise and foolish man -- he looks foolish but he is very wise in his foolishness; he looks very wise but he is behaving like a fool. If you understand life, the deeper you go the deeper you will understand that the whole is worth choosing. That means there is no need to choose. Choice will dissect the whole and whatsoever you get will be fragmentary and dead. Wisdom and foolishness are together in life; if you dissect them then wisdom will be separate and foolishness will be separate, but both will be dead. The greatest art of life is to let them grow together in such a balance that your wisdom carries a certain quality of foolishness, and your foolishness carries a certain quality of wisdom. Then you are total.

That's why: rarest are the seekers who will go to Lao Tzu. He will seem to be absurd because sometimes he will behave like a wise man and sometimes he will behave like a foolish man. And you cannot rely on him, and he is not predictable, and nobody knows what he is going to do the next moment -- he lives moment to moment. And you cannot make a doctrine out of him: he is not a wise man, he is foolish also. That foolishness will disturb you. And he is always inconsistent -- on the surface. Of course, deep down exists a consistency, absolute consistency: he is so consistent that his wisdom and foolishness are also consistent, but for that you will have to go deeper into this man. Just a surface acquaintance won't do, just familiarity won't do; you will need satsang. You will have to be in a deep participation with his being, only then will you be able to understand the totality.

Buddha is wise, Mahavir is wise. You cannot find a single bit of foolishness in them, they are perfection. Lao Tzu is not, Chuang Tzu is not, Lieh Tzu is not. They are contradictory, paradoxical, but that is where their beauty is. Buddha is monotonous. If you understand Buddha today you have understood his yesterday and you have understood his tomorrow also. He is a consistent thing -- clean, logical, moving in a line, linear.

But Lao Tzu is zigzag, he runs like a madman. You will understand, as we go into his sayings; you will understand that he runs like a madman. His assertions don't make sense on the surface. They are the most sensible utterings, but to know the sense you will have to change completely. Buddha is on the surface -- logical, rational; you can understand him without becoming a meditator; without flowing into his being you can understand him. He is understandable; not Lao Tzu. This totality.... Lao Tzu accepts this world and the other, and he accepts totally. He is not bothered about the other world; he knows that the other is going to grow out of this -- that is going to grow out of this, so why bother about it? Live this as beautifully as possible, as totally as possible, and the other will come out of it naturally. It is going to be a natural growth.

If you meet Lao Tzu he will be puzzling. Sometimes he will say something, another time he will say something else; he will assert a sentence and in the next sentence he will contradict it. That's why only very rare seekers reach to him; that's why there exists no organized religion for Lao Tzu. It cannot exist. Only individual seekers can reach him because organized religion has to be perfectionist, has to be according to the mind, has to be according to you; because organized religion means a religion more interested in the crowd, more interested in the mob. It has to exist with the mob and with the crowd.

Lao Tzu can remain uncontaminated, pure. He does not compromise. His totality becomes incomprehensible -- that's why rare seekers reach him, because he is total.

The more total a person is the more incomprehensible he becomes, because the more he becomes like God. He is not clear-cut. He is not like a garden made by man; he is a wilderness, a forest, with no rules, no plans, unplanned, a wild growth. That is the beauty. Howsoever beautiful a garden planted by man is, the man is too apparent there, the hand of man is too apparent there. Everything is planned, cut, planted by man -- the symmetry, and everything. But in a wild forest you don't have any symmetry, you don't see any logic. If God is the gardener, he must be mad. Why does he grow such a forest? Buddha is like a garden, a garden of a royal palace; Lao Tzu is like a wild forest: you can be lost in it. You will feel fear and danger will lurk at every step and every shadow will scare you to death. That's why Confucius said: Don't go near him. No one knows his ways. Either he is mad or he is the most wise man. But nobody knows who he is.

Taoism - Daoism - Tao - Dao

VOL. 1, TAO: THE THREE TREASURES

Chapter-2

Ordinariness