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is totally different. Tao has a different quality, and to me Tao is the deepest religion that has existed on this earth. There is no comparison to it. There have been glimpses, there are glimpses in the sayings of Jesus, in Buddha, in Krishna -- but only glimpses.
Lao Tzu or Chuang Tzu's message is the purest -- it is absolutely pure, nothing has contaminated it. And this is the message: it is all because there is somebody in the boat. This whole hell is all because there is somebody in the boat.
YET IF THE BOAT WERE EMPTY,
HE WOULD NOT BE SHOUTING, AND HE WOULD NOT BE ANGRY.
IF YOU CAN EMPTY YOUR OWN BOAT
CROSSING THE RIVER OF THE WORLD,
NO ONE WILL OPPOSE YOU,
NO ONE WILL SEEK TO HARM YOU.
THE STRAIGHT TREE IS THE FIRST TO BE CUT DOWN,
THE SPRING OF CLEAR WATER IS THE FIRST TO BE DRAINED DRY.
IF YOU WISH TO IMPROVE YOUR WISDOM
AND SHAME THE IGNORANT,
TO CULTIVATE YOUR CHARACTER AND OUTSHINE OTHERS,
A LIGHT WILL SHINE AROUND YOU
AS IF YOU HAD SWALLOWED THE SUN AND THE MOON --
AND YOU WILL NOT AVOID CALAMITY.
This is unique. Chuang Tzu is saying that the halo of saintliness around you shows that you are still there. The halo that you are good is sure to create calamity for you, and calamity for others also. Lao Tzu and Chuang Tzu -- master and disciple -- have never been painted in pictures with halos, auras, around them. Unlike Jesus, Zarathustra, Krishna, Buddha, Mahavira, they have never been painted with an aura around their head, "because," they say, "if you are really good no aura appears around your head; rather on the contrary, the head disappears." Where to draw the aura? The head disappears.
All auras are somehow related to the ego. It is not Krishna who has made a self-portrait, it is the disciples. They cannot think of him without drawing an aura around his head -- then he looks extraordinary. And Chuang Tzu says: To be ordinary is to be the sage. Nobody recognizes you, nobody feels that you are somebody extraordinary. Chuang Tzu says: You go in the crowd and you mix, but no one knows that a buddha has entered the crowd. No one comes
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