"Had Jesus stopped there, this small saying – only three words, 'judge ye not' – would have transformed the whole character of Christianity. But he added something and destroyed it. He said, 'so that ye are not judged.' Now it becomes conditional. Now it is no more non-judgmental, it is a simple bargain – 'so that ye are not judged.' It is business-like.

"Out of the fear – so that ye are not judged – don't judge. But how can you drop judgment out of fear? or out of greed? So that ye are not judged, don't judge – but greed and fear cannot make you value-free. It is very self-centered – 'Judge ye not, so that you are not judged.' It is very egoistic.

"The whole beauty of the saying is destroyed. The Zen flavor disappears, it becomes ordinary. It becomes good advice. It has no more revolution in it; it is parental advice. Very good – but nothing radical. The second clause is a crucifixion of the radical statement.

"Zen stops there: Judge ye not. Because Zen says all is as it is – nothing is good, nothing is bad. Things are the way they are. Some tree is tall and some tree is small. And somebody is moral and somebody is immoral. And somebody is praying and some body has gone to steal. That's the way things are.

"Now, see the revolutionary flavor of it. It will make you afraid, it will frighten you. That's why Zen has no commandments. It does not say: Do this and don't do that – it has no shoulds and no should-nots. It has not created that prison of the 'ought.' It is not perfectionistic.

"And now psychoanalysis knows it well, perfectionism is a kind of neurosis. And Zen is the only religion which is not neurotic. It accepts. Its acceptance is so total, so utterly total, that it will not even call a thief a thief, that it will not even call a murderer a murderer. Try to see the purity of its spirit – try to see the utter transcendence. All is as it is.

"Zen is unconditionally value-free – if you make a condition, you miss the point."