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Resource question Moderators: Moderators Jump to page : 1 Now viewing page 1 [25 messages per page] | View previous thread :: View next thread |
Everything Else -> Generally OT | Message format |
tweeva |
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Veteran Posts: 101 | LS, I recently found the story below (sorry for the long post). However, I can't find the original source of it. Does anyone here know more about it? It seems to be titled "The Process", and could be written by Rumi. A wise king was riding along, at the moment when a snake was going into the mouth of a man asleep, The rider saw and was hurrying to scare away the snake, but he arrived too late. The snake had been swallowed. Since the king had an abundant supply of intelligence, he struck the sleeper several powerful blows with a mace. The strokes of the hard mace drove the sleeper, in flight from the rider, to beneath a tree. There many rotten apples had dropped and the King said : "Eat of these, oh you in the grip of pain!" He gave the man so many apples to eat that they were falling out of his mouth. The man was crying : "Oh King, pray, why have you set on me? What have I done to you? If you had from the beginning a quarrel with my soul, stike me with your sword and shed my blood at once. Ill-omened was the hour I came into your sight. Happiness to him who never saw your face! Without guilt, without sin, without having done anything great or small, heretics would not allow such oppression! Blood gushes from my mouth together with my words. Oh God, I beseech thee, give him retribution!" Every instant he was uttering a new curse, while the king kept beating him and saying ; "Run in this plain." Blows of the mace fell on the man, and the King followed as swiftly as the wind. He went on running, again and again falling on his face. He was full-fed, sleepy and fatigued; his feet and face became covered with a hundred thousand wounds. Till nightfall the rider drove him to and fro, until vomiting overtook him. All the things he had eaten, bad or good, came up from him; the snake shot forth from him along with what he had eaten. When he saw the snake outside of him, he fell on his knees before that benificent king. As soon as he saw the horror of that black, ugly, big snake, grief departed from him. "Truly," said he, "you are the Gabriel of mercy, or you are God. Oh blest the hour you saw me. I was dead. You have given me new life. Oh you, whom the pure spirit would have praised, how many foolish and idle words have I spoken to you! If I had known a little of this matter, how could I have spoken foolish words? I should have spoken praise, if you had given me a single hint as to the case, but you, keeping silent, showed persistence and continued to beat me on the head. My head became dizzy, the wits flew out of my head, especially as this head has little brains." The king answered : "If I had uttered a hint of it, your gall would have instantly turned to water. Had I told you the qualities of the snake, terror would have fetched up the breath from your soul. You would have become good for nothing, as a mouse before a cat, you would have been as distraught as a lamb before a wolf. No power to plan or move would have remained in you. Therefore I tended to you without speaking. I was mute, I handled the iron. If I had told you about the snake you would not have been able to eat, nor would you have been capable of vomiting or cared to do so. I heard your abuse and went on with my work. I kept repeating under my breath : 'Lord, make it easy.' I had not permission to speak of the cause and I had not the power to abandon you." "If I should tell aright the description of the enemy which is in your souls, the gall-bladders even of courageous men would burst, such a one would neither go his way, nor care for any work. Neither would there remain to his heart endurance in meditation, nor to his body strength for fasting and prayer. So that by my hand, the seemingly impossible is actualised, and wings are restored to the bird whose plumes were torn away." Anyone? Tw | ||
GreenJello |
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Reminds me of a comment my teacher once made about most teachers in the various traditions deliberately lying to their students..... | |||
tweeva |
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Veteran Posts: 101 | GreenJello - 2007-10-15 2:17 PM Reminds me of a comment my teacher once made about most teachers in the various traditions deliberately lying to their students..... What was the comment? | ||
GreenJello |
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tweeva - 2007-10-17 9:22 AM GreenJello - 2007-10-15 2:17 PM Reminds me of a comment my teacher once made about most teachers in the various traditions deliberately lying to their students..... What was the comment? It's hard to explain, but the story explains it well. Essentially that beginning students are often deliberately misled by their teachers for their own good. To quote Jack Nickolson "You want the truth! You can't handle the truth." Another example would be the compassionate lie that Obe Wan Kenobi tells Luke in the first Star Wars. Instead of forcing him to face something he's not prepared for, he tells him that his father is dead. This all leads to some very interesting questions of morality, and truth telling, since this whole thing is very open to abuse by less than scrupulous people. | |||
tweeva |
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Veteran Posts: 101 | Interesting that you mention the quotation by Col. Nathan R. Jessep. The very same one came to my mind. Note that in the story, the king does not actually lie. He just does not explain the motives of his actions until the time is right. He simply does wat needs to be done. I like the story, but am still mystified as to its origins. Tw | ||
tourist |
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Expert Yogi Posts: 8442 | It made me think a bit more broadly - about how we cannot know why certain things happen in our lives. We've had some awful news lately about a young man we knew very well as a child who has committed suicide. It just makes you ask why, why, why? And I think we just can't know. Knowing would be worse. Like Arjuna seeing Krishna - we just are not capable of knowing at this point in our development. | ||
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