Knowledge is ignorance. The knowledgeable person is covered with dark clouds of memory, information, scripture, philosophy.
Dipankara said to Gautama, “You need not think in terms of learning. Truth is already in you. Truth cannot be transferred.” Not only this, but when Gautama touched the feet of Dipankara, Dipankara bowed down and touched the feet of Gautama. Gautama was not enlightened in those days. He was very puzzled, embarrassed too.
There was a great assembly of monks; nobody could understand what was happening, what was going on. Dipankara had never done that to anybody else. And Gautama said, “What have you done? Why have you touched my feet? I am a sinner, an ignorant person. To touch your feet is right, but you touching my feet is absurd. Have you gone mad?”
And Dipankara laughed again and he said, “No, Gautama. You are puzzled because you don’t know your future. I am not mad. I can see it happening – you will be a buddha soon. Just to honor that fact I have touched your feet. And, moreover, for one who is enlightened all are enlightened. It is only a question of time. It doesn’t matter much. I have become enlightened today, you will become enlightened tomorrow, somebody else will become enlightened the day after tomorrow – it doesn’t matter. Enlightenment is going to happen to everybody, to every being. You can go on delaying it, that is up to you. The moment you stop delaying, the moment you stop postponing, it is there. It has always been waiting for you to recognize it.”
It is one of the most beautiful stories – that Dipankara touched the feet of Gautama. And Gautama was an unknown man. After centuries, nearabout three thousand years afterwards, Gautama became enlightened. The first thing he did was he bowed down to Dipankara. Now there was no Dipankara, but he bowed down and he laughed and he said, “Now I understand why you touched my feet. Now I can touch everybody’s feet. Now I know that the whole existence is going to be enlightened.”
Enlightenment is a natural happening. If we don’t hinder it, it is bound to happen. It is not that you have to achieve it, all that you have to do is not to hinder it. You hinder it in a thousand and one ways. You don’t allow it to happen. When it starts happening you become frightened. When it takes possession of you, you cannot give that much possession – you shrink back, you withdraw. You come back in your tiny cell of the ego. There you feel protected, defended, secure.
Enlightenment is the open sky of insecurity. It is vastness, it is uncharted ocean. The journey is from one unknown to another unknown. There is nothing that can be known. Knowledge, the very idea of knowledge, is part of human stupidity. Life is such a mystery it cannot be known. And if it cannot be known how can it be taught? And if it cannot be taught, what is the point of being a master and a disciple?