Inspirational indeed.
Sent from my Samsung galaxy note3
<div>-------- Original message --------</div><div>From: Edie Sidibeh <[log in to unmask]> </div><div>Date:09/26/2014 13:06 (GMT+01:00) </div><div>To: [log in to unmask] </div><div>Subject: WHAT AN INSPIRATION EVER </div><div>
</div>
A Zen master Hakuin
lived in a village in Japan. He was very famous, and had great reputation. The
whole village worshiped and respected him. Songs were sung all
over the village in his honor. But one day everything changed. A young girl in
the village became pregnant and gave birth to a child. When her family asked
her whose child it was she said it was the child of the young Hakuin.
How long does it take for admirers to become enemies? How long? It
does not take even a short while because inside the mind of an admirer
condemnation is always hidden. The mind just waits for a chance, and the day
admiration ends, condemnation begins. Those people who show respect can change
in one minute to being disrespectful. The people who are touching a person's
feet can within a moment start cutting the same person's head off. There is no
difference between respect and disrespect - they are two faces of the same
coin.
The people of the whole village attacked the Hakuin's hut. For a
long time they had been showing respect to the Hakuin but now all the anger
that they had suppressed came out. Now they had the chance to be disrespectful,
so they all ran to the Hakuin's hut and set it on fire and threw the tiny baby
at him.
The Hakuin asked, "What is the matter?"
The people shouted, "You are asking us what the matter is?
This child is yours! Do we have to tell you what the matter is? Look at your
burning house, look within your heart, look at this child and look at this
girl. There is no need for us to tell you that this child is yours."
The Hakuin said, "Is it so? Is this child mine?"
The child started crying so he started singing a song to make the
child silent, and the people left him sitting by his burnt-out hut. Then he
went to beg at his usual time, in the afternoon - but who would give him food
today? Today every door he stood in front of was slammed shut. Today a crowd of
children and people started walking behind him, teasing him, throwing stones.
He reached the house of the girl whose child it was. He said, "I may not
get food for myself, but at least give some milk for this child ! I may be at
fault, but what is the fault of this poor baby?"
The child was crying, the crowd was standing there - and it became
unbearable for the girl. She fell at the feet of her father and said,
"Forgive me, I lied when I gave the name of the Hakuin. I wanted to save
the real father of the child, so I thought of using the name of this Hakuin. I
don't even have any acquaintance with him."
The father became nervous. This was a great mistake. He ran out of
his house, fell at the feet of the Hakuin and tried to take the baby from him.
The Hakuin asked, "What is the matter?"
The girl's father
said," Forgive me, there has been a mistake. The child is not yours."
The Hakuin replied, "Is this so? Is the child really not
mine?"
Then the people of the village said to him, "You are mad! Why
didn't you deny it this morning?"
The Hakuin said, "What difference would it have made? The
child must belong to somebody. And you had already burnt one hut - you would
have just burnt one more. You had enjoyed defaming one person, you would have
enjoyed defaming one more. What difference would it make? The child must belong
to someone - it could also be mine. So what is the problem? What difference
does it make?"
The people said,
"Don't you understand that everybody condemned you, insulted you,
humiliated you very much?"
The Hakuin answered, "If I had been concerned with your
condemnation, I would have been concerned about your respect also. I do as I
feel right; you do whatever you feel to be right. Until yesterday you felt it
right to respect me so you did. Today you felt it right not to respect me so
you didn't. But I am not concerned with either your respect or your disrespect.
The people said to him, "Gentleman, you should have realized
that you would lose your good reputation."
He replied, "I am neither bad nor good. I am simply myself. I
have dropped this idea of good and bad. I have dropped all concern in becoming
good because the more I tried to become good, the more I found that I became
bad. The more I tried to escape from badness, the more I found that goodness
was disappearing. I dropped the very idea. I became absolutely indifferent. And
the day I became indifferent, I found that neither goodness nor badness
remained inside. Rather, something new was born which is better than goodness,
and which does not even have a shadow of badness about it."
DO ONTO OTHERS AS YOU WILL ACCEPT THEM IN RETURN. DO YOUR BEST AND LIVE THEREST TAKING CARE FOR ITSELF
¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤
To unsubscribe/subscribe or view archives of postings, go to the Gambia-L Web interface
at: http://listserv.icors.org/archives/gambia-l.html
To Search in the Gambia-L archives, go to: http://listserv.icors.org/SCRIPTS/WA-ICORS.EXE?S1=gambia-l
To contact the List Management, please send an e-mail to:
[log in to unmask]
¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤
¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤
To unsubscribe/subscribe or view archives of postings, go to the Gambia-L Web interface
at: http://listserv.icors.org/archives/gambia-l.html
To Search in the Gambia-L archives, go to: http://listserv.icors.org/SCRIPTS/WA-ICORS.EXE?S1=gambia-l
To contact the List Management, please send an e-mail to:
[log in to unmask]
¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤
|
