When the Shoe Fits - Oshorajneesh.com

CHAPTER 8. THE TURTLE
Eternal does not mean permanent: eternal means non-temporal, eternal means there is no time.
Even if a single moment of love is there, it is eternal. In that moment is such depth that in that
moment time ceases, in that moment there is no future, no past, in that moment you are simply so
much that you spread all over existence – the whole existence belongs to you and the whole of you
belongs to the existence. That moment is eternity unto itself. Wherever love is, there is eternity, and
then there is the possibility of prayer. If your smile is false, your kiss will be false, your love cannot
be true; and all your prayers will be just words and nothing else.
How can you find a god, how can you become god like if you are not true? You seek truth but in
your life you are always untrue. How can an untrue person meet the truth? This seems an almost
impossible thing. The truth will knock at your door, you need not go anywhere; just be true. And
when I say just be true, I am saying just be natural.
Nature is truth, and there is no other truth than nature. This is the message of Chuang Tzu, one of
the greatest messages in the world.
Now we will try to enter this beautiful story.
CHUANG TXU WITH HIS BAMBOO POLE WAS FISHING IN THE PU RIVER.
Can you conceive of Buddha fishing in the Pu River? Can you conceive of Mahavir fishing?
Impossible. CHUANG TZU WITH HIS BAMBOO POLE WAS FISHING IN THE PU RIVER. What
does this mean? It means Chuang Tzu is an ordinary man, he does not claim anything whatsoever,
he just enjoys being ordinary. He does not live by principles, he lives by instinct. He does not
superimpose his ego on his nature, he simply flows with it – he is just an ordinary man.
This is the meaning of his fishing in the Pu River; only an ordinary man can do that. Extraordinary
people how can they do it? They have much ’ought’ in them: this should be done, that should not
be done. They live by morality, they live by principles. What are you doing? A man of knowledge,
fishing? Impossible to conceive you are killing fish!
Chuang Tzu believes in nature, he says whatsoever is natural is good. He is just an animal and he
will not create any morality just to feel superior. The story says just be ordinary and enjoy being
ordinary, only then can you fall by and by into the natural; otherwise you will become unnatural. This
fishing is just symbolic. Whether Chuang Tzu fished or not is not the point, but he is that sort of man
who can fish, who can sit with his bamboo pole.
That is why you cannot make a statue of Chuang Tzu, it is difficult. A Buddha is perfect, you can
make a statue of him; it is as if he were born just to have statues made of him; you cannot find
a better man, so statue-like. That is why, naturally, millions of statues exist of Buddha, more than
of anybody else. He looks perfect, the perfect model for a statue; sitting under the Bodhi tree with
closed eyes, not doing anything. He looks the perfect ideal, the perfect ’ought’, as man should be –
absolutely non-violent, absolutely truthful, absolutely meditative. He is just like marble, not a man at
all.
You cannot make a statue of Chuang Tzu, you will find him in such wrong places. He is just an
ordinary man and this is the beauty of it, this is the whole message of it. Just be ordinary, with a
bamboo pole, fishing, and Chuang Tzu says that this is enlightenment.
When the Shoe Fits 111 Osho