Posted by: Vila
« on: April 03, 2019, 07:18:53 AM »អរគុណ Master Moritz
Another day, another possibility. We don't know what tomorrow might be. _()_
Ein neuer Tag, wieder eine Möglichkeit. Wir wissen nicht was morgen sein wird. _()_
ថ្ងៃ ថ្មី មួូយ ជា ឳកាស ថ្មី មួយ ទៀត។ យើង មិន អាច ដឹង មុន នូវ អ្វី ដែល នឹង កើតឡើង ថ្ងៃ ស្អែក
"Dhammo have rakkhati dammacāriṁ"
"N'atthi santi param sukham"
Namo tassa bhagavato arahato sammā-sambuddhassa
In our world there are uncountable human beings who stand up for the poor and try with their energy to reduce the suffering here. The more one familiarizes oneself with the suffering and stays attentive, the more one recognizes the interrelations and notices that much of the aid, when seeing objectively, only leads to a worsening of the situation. A few weeks ago I had a great teacher. About this teacher I would like to tell you.
The monk's monkey
It was a sunny day in a Buddhist theme park south of Phnom Penh. Like so often, I went for a walk through the domain. The young monks were once again cutting back the ever-growing green plants. After a few days of intensive attempts to persuade them that plants are beautiful as they are, and to abstain from using petrol-driven trimmers, I had given up on actively influencing them.
I was on the way to the construction site for the temple of the "teachers of Buddha" where I liked to visit Borisot, the builder. On the way there was the monastery kitchen, and nearby it a young monkey was fettered to a tree with a three meter long chain. The monkey had been given as a present to the abbot, and since then languished away inside the confines of the round path which he had trampled around the tree. The novices often spent their time playing with him and teasing him. One can say that both did not let each other off much. Sometimes one of the little monks took away a bruise from a bite, another time the monkey had a cut wound on his hand, after they had teased him with a machete and he had tried to grab it.
I always spent a few minutes on the boundary of his area. Sitting on the ground, I watched the small monkey and tried to become friends with him. Contrary to his behaviour towards the monks, however, he shyed away from coming close to me. After a while I accepted it and used to just sit there to watch him. He spent most of his time, in sun and in rain, on the chain below the tree. When a monk noticed that I sat near him, he joined and brought something to eat for the monkey.
On this day they had taken the monkey with them and chained him nearby. He was allowed to swim in the water ditches of the mango plantation, and the young monks had fun watching him dive for food. I sat down with them and talked with one of the monks. He told me about the monkey, and that he felt sorry for him, and I asked him why they would not release him then. He told that he had already been away once, but people from a far-away village had brought him back. He also said that he is owned by the abbot and that they therefore had to take very good care of him. If he was free, he would not survive. I then went off on my way.
Every time I sat near the monkey, I wished that he would come to me, then I could release him. If I tried to catch him, he would be afraid and probably bite me as well. After two months waiting for the abbot's arrival, his appearance was sobering for us. We knew now that we were not welcome anymore. On the evening of his arrival I went to the monastery kitchen. At six o'clock the monks there drank tea with milk, the only nutrition in the evening after a work-filled day. I told a monk that we would depart and made him the offer that I would like to talk about the Dhamma with them if the abbot would allow it. His facial expression told me that they would not come, and so I turned around and went on my way back to our dwelling. After a few meters I came to the monkey's tree and took a look at him. Something was different. After one second, he stretched out his arm towards me, while glancing sideways to the ground. I approached him and he grabbed me by the hand, pressed it agains his body and gently bit into the curve between thumb and index finger while looking into my eyes. It was a touching moment. With my left hand I stroked him and opened his chain.
When he realized that he was not fettered anymore, he immediately made moves to run away. But he stopped between me and the monk and looked into the distance. The monk held out food for him, but the monkey gave him no more than a short glance. I was glad and turned around to walk on. After a few steps I noticed that the monkey had clung around my foot. I walked on as if there was nothing. The monk said out loud to the others: "See, he is showing gratitude." He gently bit into my calf and then let go of my foot. After two steps I turned around again for a short moment. The monkey sat on the foot path and looked into my eyes, and one moment later, he ran away. With a beam in my heart, I walked on into the dusk and further to our house.
The monk had reaffirmed two very important things to me: Helping is only possible when someone trusts one. Only if someone trustfully approaches you is it possible to reach him, only then is he open for a change.
The second lesson is connected with the (probable) fact that he will surely end on the chain again. Someone before has made it his task to help him and provide for him. Meanwhile he has overlooked that the monkey has become lazy and fearful thereby. Even if he hangs on the chain, he will prefer this life to the free life. He receives food from him and so his master and provider appears like a god for him. The help, or the nutrition which has been offered to him, has made him dependent. To reacquaint him with freedom would be a long and perhaps impossible task. Now one can only, with a lot of money and work, build a "golden" cage for him. His freedom was lost. For his masters he will now always stay a cause for pity and dejection.
Many kinds of aid, the so-called development aid, are nothing more than an entanglement into our prison. Out of a golden cage we call out to the free that they should do it as we do. We see how they have it difficult to get their food, and we entangle them into our system which is not real and does not escape suffering.
The monkey is a true teacher, as he reflects the source of our suffering. It is only based on our perpetual wanting, a wanting which has its origin in fear and lazyness. We fear starvation, fear having too little, fear becoming ill and fear to die. We are too lazy to be mindful, too lazy to go on our way, too lazy to keep a look around. If we live simply, live in the moment, there is no fear. In the present, fear does not exist. If we walk mindfully, it will never lack anything. The universe, nature, some want to call it God, has enough for our lives and to go beyond it. Let us not forget that, safe for one dependent exception, we will always lose everything. Everything is impermanent. The only thing that we consciously keep is our rebirth. How would it be if we lost that as well, and that completely consciously?
Not freed oneself from that which binds, one appears again and again, not overcome the four kinds of nutrition.