18 Guanyin and Laozi

  1. Thousands upon thousands of years ago, there was one day—either yesterday, today, or tomorrow—when two auspicious entities met in the sky and became entangled with one another.

  2. Were these auspicious entities the spiritual essence of Laozi and Guanyin? Yes, and no. However, it isn’t important whether they were or not. What is important is that Laozi ultimately became Laozi, and Guanyin ultimately became Guanyin.

  3. Their souls are interlinked, though one soul cannot become interlinked with another. Only souls that cannot become interlinked are true souls. Only souls that can become interlinked are true souls.

  4. They meet and have an argument. Guanyin asks Laozi: Li Ran, what is it that has permitted us to meet again?

  5. Laozi replies with a smile: The person I see today is not the you from before, and the person you see today is not the me from before.

  6. Laozi: Why didn’t you go to Jerusalem to wait for me that day?

  7. Guanyin: If I had been there on time, you wouldn’t have realized that the world is not round, but rather an oval.

  8. Laozi: Do you know how far I walked to reach Jerusalem?

  9. Guanyin: Because it is so distant, you must have observed vast stretches of heaven and earth, and discovered countless patterns and secrets!

10. At this point, Laozi smiles: Fortunately, by the time you reached Jerusalem, I had already left. If you hadn’t used your own body to rescue the tigress, and if you hadn’t entered the brothel twenty-seven times in one day, rescuing twenty-seven children, mothers, and young girls who were themselves about to enter the brothel, and if you had in fact arrived at Jerusalem on time to see me, then you wouldn’t have encountered the ten Eastern nations on the road back from Jerusalem.

11. Guanyin smiles: Yes, that is true. Go on.

12. Laozi: If you hadn’t encountered the ten nations and rescued tens of thousands of people, then you wouldn’t have become a Buddha and acquired this world of believers.

13. Guanyin: You should thank me for not arriving there on schedule, because if I had, you would not have achieved an enlightened understanding of heaven and earth.

14. Laozi: I want to thank heaven and earth, not you. It was heaven and earth that were responsible for your failure to arrive, which in turn enabled me to learn the rules and mysteries of heaven and earth.

15. Guanyin replies angrily: It had nothing to do with heaven and earth! It was humans who prevented me from arriving there!

Laozi replies with equal anger: It was heaven and earth that prevented you from arriving, and it had nothing to do with humans!

16. Guanyin and Laozi begin to argue—arguing like the wind, water, and primal chaos.

17. They argue like light in darkness, and like darkness in light.

18. After they have argued for a long time, Laozi finally begins to calm down: On the surface it appeared as though the masses of people prevented you from arriving on time, but the people’s disaster was a result of their not having abided by the rules of heaven and earth. Therefore, it was indeed heaven and earth that prevented you from arriving on time.

19. Guanyin: Heaven heaven heaven, earth earth earth. Then you tell me, how high is heaven? How broad is the earth?

20. Laozi: Heaven does not have a fixed height, and the earth does not have a fixed size. However, if you want to know how high heaven is or how large the earth is, don’t start measuring from just any territory or edge of a territory. Instead, to measure the height of heaven, you must start from the surface of the ocean, and to measure the size of the earth you must start from the ocean’s edge. This is because the ocean under heaven is all the same height, and it is the ocean that abuts onto the land.

21. Guanyin: Although it is true that the earth does not have a fixed size, if someone stands on the earth, there will be level ground beneath her feet, and there will be the heavens above his head. The size of the earth can be measured from the edge of the ocean, but it can also be measured from a person’s heart. This is because all measurements must begin from a person’s heart.

22. Guanyin believes: Between humanity and heaven and earth, humanity is superior. Laozi believes: Between heaven and earth and humanity, heaven and earth determine humanity.

23. In the end, Guanyin and Laozi both agree that the world is constituted by heaven and earth and humanity, but as for whether it is humanity that determines heaven and earth, or heaven and earth that determine humanity—this question must be temporarily set aside.

24. In this way, they decide that from now on Laozi will focus on understanding the harmonious integration of heaven, earth, and humanity.

25. Meanwhile, with respect to the relationship between heaven, earth, and humanity, Guanyin will take life as the center and will focus on rescuing human life from suffering between heaven and earth.