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A great Zen master said as his death poem just before he died,
"From the bathtub, to the bathtub,
I have uttered stuff and nonsense."
The bathtub in which the baby is washed at birth,
the bathtub in which the corpse is washed before burial,
all this time I have said many nonsenses.
Like the birds in the trees go twee, twee, twee.
What is it all about?
Everybody tries to say, "Ah, yes, it is a mating call—and quite purposeful.
They are trying to get their mates by attracting them with a song."
that's why they have colors,butterflies have eyes on them
for self-protection.
Engineering view of the universe,
why do that.
They say, Well, it is because they need to survive. But why survive?
What is that for?
Well, to survive.
See, human beings really are a lot of tubes,
and uh...
all living creatures are just tubes.
These tubes have to put things in
one end
and let it out with the other.
Then they get clever about it and may develop nerve ganglia on one end of the tube
the eating-end called a head.
and that's in it's got eyes in it, and it's got ears in it, and it's got little organs and antennae
and things like these and it helps you define things to put in one end
so that you can let them out the other.
Well, while you are doing this the stuff going through wears the tube out
and so, that the show can go on, the tubes have complicated ways of
making other tubes
which will go on doing the same thing again, in at one end, out the other.
And they say well that's terribly serious.
That is awfully important.We have got to keep on doing this.
When the Chinese
say nature is purposeless
this is a compliment. It's like the idea of
the japanese have a word
uh...yugen
And they describe yugen
as watching wild geese fly and being hidden in the clouds;
as watching a ship
vanish behind the distant island;
as wandering on and on in a great forest
with no thought of return.
Haven't you done this? Haven`t you gone on a walk
with no particular purpose in mind?
You carry a stick with you and you occasionally hit at old stumps,
and wander along and sometimes twiddle your thumbs.
It is at that moment that you are a perfectly rational human being;
you have learned purposelessness
All music is purposeless.
Is music getting somwhere
If it were i mean if the aim of music were
of the symphony
were to get to the final bar
the best conductor would be the one who got there fastest.
See, dancing, when you dance,do you aim to arrive at a particular place on the
floor Is that the idea of dancing?
The aim of dancing is to dance!
Is the presence. Well it's exactly the same with our life!
We think life has a purpose. I remember the preachers used to say
When i was a small boy I would always hear it:
"We must follow God's purpose.
His purpose for you and His purpose for me."
When asked these Caths what the purpose was they never knew!
They didn't know what it was!
God is working his purpose out as year succeeds to year,
God is working his purpose out and the time is drawing near."
The time when the earth should be full of the glory of God as the waters cover the sea.
What's the glory of God Well they weren't quite sure.
I tell you what it is
In heaven all those angels are gathered around the glory of god
That is to say The "which than which there is no whicher"
Catholics call it the "Beatific Vision"
The Jews call it the "Shekinah"
There all are angels
They are standing around it and saying hallelujah hallelujah hallelujah hallelujah
It means nothing
They just having a ball
You see that's what happened at the beginning
When god created the universe It was created like all-stars all planets all galaxies
He created this and said have a ball
but before
before he said that he said you must draw the lines somewhere
that was the real thing you said first
before let there be light that came later
first thing was that you must draw the line somewhere
otherwise nothing will happen
you gonna have the good guys the bad guys you gonna have this you gonna have that
the black-and-white, light and darkness
must draw the lines somwhere
Now here is the choice.
Are you going to trust it or not?
If you do trust it you may get let down,
and this it is your self—your own nature and all nature around you.
There are going to be mistakes,
but if you don't trust it at all
you are going to strangle yourself.
You are going to fence yourself round with rules and regulations and
laws and prescriptions
and policemen
and guards and who's gonna to guard the guards?
And who's gonna look after Big Brother to be sure that he doesn't do something
stupid? No go.
Supposing i get annoyed with somebody in the audience
And I'm gping to throw this ashtray at them. And I don't want to hit my friend sitting next to
that person.
I wanna be absolutely sure that this ashtray hits that individual!
And so, I don't trust myself to throw it.
I have to carry it along and
be sure I hit that person on the head.
You see, I don't throw it, because I can't let go of it. To throw it I must let go of it.
To live I must have faith. I must trust myself to the totally unknown.
I must trust myself
to my nature,
which doesn't have a boss.
Because a boss is a system of mistrust.
and so that is why Lao-tzu's Tao
loves and nourishes all things,
but does not lord it over them.