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| | | Book Name: The Dhammapada - The Way of the Buddha, Vol 4 | Previous Next | |
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in a garden with a small child. And as small children ask, the child asked, "Can you tell me one thing -- why the trees are green?"
Now such questions can be asked only either by children or by mystics, either by children or by buddhas. What kind of question is this? You will never ask it, because it will look so foolish to ask why trees are green. And in fact you already know why they are green; you know, because it is chlorophyll that makes them green.
D.H. Lawrence also knew about chlorophyll. He could have said it to the child, and children are very easily trusting.... If you say, "It is because of this," they will say, "Okay." And in fact, they don't much care about the answer; by the time you are answering them they have become interested in some other question. They are intrigued by something else -- a butterfly, a flower, a cloud floating in the sky. They have already bypassed the question.
When a child asks he does not ask to be answered, remember. When a child asks he is simply talking out loud to himself, he is thinking out loud, he is wondering out loud, that's all. When he says, "Why are the trees green?" he is not saying it inside, he is thinking aloud. It is not really a question. He is puzzled by the mystery, he is wondering WHY the trees are green, he is not waiting for any answer; it is pure wonder, he is intrigued.
D.H. Lawrence is a great poet, a great novelist -- almost on the verge of being a mystic. Had he been in India, had he been in the East, he would have become a buddha. About these two persons I feel very certain they would have become buddhas if they had been in the East: Friedrich Nietzsche and D.H. Lawrence. About these two persons I feel absolutely certain. They were so much on the verge, just one step more....
Lawrence looked at the trees, stood there in silence with closed eyes for a few seconds, then told the child, "The trees are green because they are green." And the child was satisfied. But Lawrence continued to think, "What kind of answer is this that I have given to the child? -- the trees are green because they are green. It is a tautology. It is illogical!" But it is tremendously significant.
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