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and all opposites disappear into each other, supporting, dancing with each other. It becomes an orchestra.
Christmas Humphreys says, "Shall I tell it you? Consider...."
Now, look how just small changes make great differences: "Shall I tell it you? Consider...." This is the way philosophy moves, not Zen: "Consider...." It is not a question of consideration; either you know or you don't know.
The Master Nansen did not say, "Consider, now I will give a great clap. Consider, now I will shout, 'Riko!' and you have to say, 'Yes, Master!' Then I will say, 'See, the goose is out!"' Then the whole point would have been lost.
Just a few days ago in a darshan meeting in the evening I called Nirupa. She had broken one of her hands. She is one of my mediums, but now she cannot participate in the dancing. She was just sitting in the front line and I called her. For a moment she hesitated and everybody laughed, because what was she going to do with one hand? But Zen is done with one hand -- the sound of one hand clapping! -- and she did well. Of course, only I could hear the sound, but the sound of one hand clapping.... Even when you are making a sound with two hands clapping the energy is one. Your left hand and your right hand are not two, they are joined in you. They are not opposites, they are complementary, they belong to one being.
All opposites belong to one being, and it is not a question of consideration. If you consider, you take all the juice out of the beautiful koan.
"Consider,' he says, "a live goose in a bottle. How to get it out without hurting the goose or breaking the bottle?"
He cannot even say "without killing the goose." A proper Englishman! "Without hurting the goose or breaking the bottle." In fact, even to say "breaking the bottle" his heart must be breaking! "The answer is simple...."
It is not simple. In the first place it is not an answer either. "There, it is out!" He has destroyed the whole beauty of the koan. But habits die very hard. It is just the way of thinking, the way of the mind.
The Pope was given a pair of red silk slippers with the initials T.I.F inscribed on them. When His Holiness
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