A man who understands everything should not be touched by any material thing
Password of happiness – Ashu Patel
A long time ago I read a Zen story in an English book. After the Zen master Mu-Nan had grown old, it occurred to him one day that before departing from earth I should give my most important possession to my dearest disciple Shoju.
He called Shoju to his room and said, Shoju, now I am old and approaching the end of life. You are my only disciple who can carry forward the things I have taught. I give you a scripture. I am giving you this precious scripture to symbolically show that you are my successor. The knowledge written by seven generations of Zengurus is in this book and I have also written my comments and what I have understood about life in this book. Keep this book like life.
Shoju said, Guruji, if this book is so important, keep it with you. I have learned the principles of Zen from you without any book and that is enough for me that I have no need for this book.
However, Mu-Nan insisted to him that he must keep this book. And he handed over that book to Shoju.
At that time there was a fire burning next to it. Shoju threw the book into the burning heat without a moment’s thought! That book started burning.
Mu-Nan had never been angry in his life, but when Shoju threw the precious book into the fire and it caught fire, he was enraged and shouted: What are you doing, fool?
Shoju snapped: What are you talking about!
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Zen stories are apparently quite simple, but they have tremendous depth.
This zen story came to mind after knowing the case of a five star bawa some time ago who suffered financial loss due to her special man and then the five star bawa got very angry with her special man and humiliated him.
If a man understands life, he should not be affected by any material loss or loss of anything. Leaving aside the common man, there are cases where many five star bavas who have millions or crores of followers bully, insult, threaten, harm or sometimes even kill a person for material things. But it keeps happening. Only some of these cases come out.
In contrast, in one case, a wealthy acquaintance of mine graciously forgave an old employee of his.
A wealthy acquaintance of mine suffered a huge financial loss due to the negligence of one of his employees. At that time his employee was scared. He apologized and said to deduct this amount from my salary. The rich acquaintance said to him: Good man, this loss is so great that it cannot be repaid even if you work all your life and I keep cutting your salary, but you do not worry. The damage I was meant to do has already been done. This mistake could have been done by me or my family members. You didn’t mean to hurt me. You are my faithful man. You have proved your loyalty. You are connected with me for so many decades, so forget this. Instead of reprimanding him, he consoled him saying that what is done is done. Now you don’t keep this thing in mind. Be careful in the future.
The employee cried and said you are like God.
Rich acquaintance said: I am not God I am trying to be a good man. I was also shocked for a moment when this damage happened. And to tell you the truth, I was a little angry, but then I mentally counted from one to ten and thought that no matter how much I hurt you, the damage that has already been done to me – to our company – will not be compensated. So now it is done, instead of crying, let’s move forward.
Friends, when a rich man who is fully immersed in the world forgives a person who has done him a great harm and a five-star bawo scolds and humiliates those who have harmed him, the character of both is proven. A man who is angry with someone close to him for any harm cannot be wise.
No Guru or any book can help a man to understand life more than a certain extent. A man who has understood life does not need any book or any guru.
The art of understanding life should be learned.
