"If you talk about Christ it is because of the churches, the theology, the Bible, the words. People carry the net for many lives without realizing that it is just a net, a trap, as if one goes on carrying a ladder.

"Buddha used to say:

"A few men were crossing a river. The river was dangerous, it was in flood – it must have been the rainy season – and the boat saved their lives. Then they thought – they must have been very, very intelligent – they thought, 'This boat saved us, how can we leave it now? This is our savior and it will be ungrateful to leave it!' So they carried the boat on their heads into the town.

"Somebody asked them, 'What are you doing? We have never seen anybody carrying a boat.'

"They said, 'Now we will have to carry this boat for our whole lives, because this boat saved us, and we cannot be ungrateful.'

"Those intelligent-looking people must have been stupid. Thank the boat but leave it there. Don't carry it. You have been carrying many types of boats in your head – maybe not on your head, but in your head. Look within. Ladders, boats, paths, words – this is the content of your head, of your mind.

"The container becomes much too important, the vehicle becomes much too important, the body becomes much too important – and then you are blind. The vehicle was just to give you the message – receive the message and forget the vehicle. The messenger was just to give you the message – receive the message and forget the messenger. Thank him, but don't carry him in your head.

"Mohammed insisted again and again, almost every day of his life, 'I am just a messenger, a paigamber. Don't worship me, I have just carried a message from the divine. Don't look at me, look at the divine who has sent the message to you.' But Mohammedans have forgotten the source. Mohammed has become important, the vehicle.

"Says Chuang Tzu:

Where can I find a man
who has forgotten words?
He is the one
I would like to talk to.

"A man who has forgotten words, he is worth talking to, because he has the innermost reality, the center of being within him."