Once, an elderly Buddhist monk was travelling, accompanied by a young disciple. As they crossed many villages and towns, they came upon a river that was swollen with the torrential rain that had been falling in those parts. They saw a young, beautiful woman standing on the shore looking worried. When she saw the monks, she hurried to them and said, 'Sirs, can you please help me cross the river to the other shore? I need to go back to my village and it is getting dark".
The elderly monk immediately took her hand, swung her on his shoulders, crossed the raging river and let her down on the other shore. She thanked him profusely and went on her way. The young disciple couldn't come to grips with the fact that his revered master who had undertaken the vow of celibacy had not only touched a woman, a beautiful one at that, but had carried her on his shoulders for over half an hour. After a few days, not being able contain his disappointment any longer, he said to the elderly monk, "You shouldn't have done that" The monk asked, surprised, "What shouldn't I have done?" "You shouldn't have touched that beautiful girl, or carried her. It wasn't right". The elderly monk smiled and said, "Look, I was helping someone in need, I wasn't looking at how young or beautiful she was. Besides, I left her on that shore, why are you still carrying her?" We do this all the time, don't we? We carry the monkey of guilt, anger, disappointment, resentment and injustice on our backs, long after the incident. Let's drop it on the other shore and lighten our load. As Ramana Maharishi said once about surrender, 'Do you still carry your baggage even after boarding the train on your journey?"
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Once there was a king who was arrogant. He thought too highly of himself. One day he heard that a venerable sage had come to his kingdom and was giving blessings to everyone, so he decided to go.
When he went to the edge of the forest where the guru was staying with a few of his students, he was told by one of the students that the sage was inside finishing his meditation. When the student, who was new to the place, asked him who should he say was calling on the sage, the king said, 'Tell your guru that I have come'. The student went in and came out after a few minutes. The king enquired impatiently,'Well, what did he say?' The student said, 'Sir, I conveyed your message to my master and these are his words, he said to tell you: " Come after I have died"' This is a translated story from Tamil, so the rough meaning is, the master says to come after the death of me (Naan setha pinbu vaa). Which means he wants the king to come after he has annihilated his ego, the 'I'. Story One.
The Buddha was walking across a village one morning as usual on his daily journey when the people of the village came out and started abusing him and hurling insults. The Buddha stood silently waiting for the tirade to end, and when it did, he asked quietly, ' Are you all done, because I have to go to the next village'. Story Two The Buddha went on his morning routine of asking for biksha, (it's a practice monks follow to get food, they go door to door and take whatever the owners hand out). For some reason the owner of the house seemed to be in a nasty mood. He came out with some rice, abused the Buddha, and proceeded to put the rice into the Buddha's begging bowl. The Buddha said: 'If I don't accept this rice you've given me, who does it belong to?' The man said, 'why it belongs to me.' The Buddha continued, 'Now if I don't accept the abuse you've been directing, who does it belong to?' So saying, he returned the rice and went on his way, leaving the foul mouthed man with a valuable lesson. These two lessons from an interesting contrast with the snake story where he advised the snake to hiss not bite.
Most shops in South India, at least in Tamil Nadu, will have a small poster on their walls with a picture of Lord Krishna speaking to Arjuna from his chariot. Called 'Geetacharam' or the essence of Gita (Bhagvad Gita), this summarises the teachings of the Lord.. I always found it useful as it puts things in perspective.. It's in Tamil, I've given my translation here based on my limited knowledge of both the languages.
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AuthorWorking with the available light as Ramana Maharishi said. Archives
November 2020
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