Anzenkai

The Human Being Comes First

There is an old story about a travelling monk who was looking for a place to sleep and do zazen. Perhaps this is not exactly the original story, but this is how I remember it and how I relate it to what I would like to say in this post. The travelling monk wanted to have a retreat, or sesshin, in solitude. One day, he met an old woman on the way, and she offered him to stay in an empty hut that she owned. The monk stayed in the hut for some time, and he put a lot of effort into his zazen practice. Then, one day, the old woman sent a young and beautiful woman to visit the monk. The young woman visited the monk in the hut, and she talked kindly to him. The young woman tried several times to have a nice conversation with the monk, but the monk thought to himself that this was the old woman testing him. The monk continued his zazen practice, he ignored the young, beautiful woman, and he never replied to her kind speech. After a while, the young woman left the hut, and the monk thought that he had successfully passed the old woman’s test. The next day, the old woman came to the hut and asked the monk to leave immediately.

- Photo of me at a place with a loving message in Tokyo.

In my church context, there is a common expression that "the human being comes first". The monk failed, and the old lady asked him to leave immediately, because he lacked this understanding. Compassion, cooperation, generosity and helpful conduct toward our fellow human beings are more important than our religious ideals and forms of practice. The monk in the story had a fixed idea that he would be a good and successful monk if he simply resisted all temptations and ignored the kind and beautiful young woman. In doing so, his focus was only himself, forgetting about his fellow human being.

My teacher in pastoral counselling here in Uppsala says that in every person that we meet, we also meet God. Therefore, we should revere every meeting with a fellow human being as a meeting with God. This does not necessarily mean that we should literally worship or obey every human being that we meet, but it means that we should have a fundamental reverence for everyone as a part and expression of God. As I have explained in earlier posts, I see God as the whole reality, and not as some kind of separate being. We are in God, and God is in us. When the young woman visited the monk, it was an opportunity for a conversation that could bring more happiness and peace to both of them. It was also an opportunity for both of them to grasp and nourish their awareness of God. Because of the monk’s too fixed, too strict and too selfish ideas, they missed this opportunity.

The Church of Sweden is called a Lutheran church. This name indicates a traditional connection with Luther’s ideas. Luther was criticizing the church at his time for demanding many kinds of actions from people, in order to enjoy God’s love. The church even claimed that one could buy the forgiveness of sins, and thereby God’s love, by giving money to the church. Luther protested against these ideas. We cannot be separated from God’s love, whatever any politically powerful church organization says, and this is not because of our personal actions. It is only by the grace of God. It is the nature of reality.
- Photo of the cross at Tao Fong Shan, Hong Kong.

One of Luther’s ideas was that it is more important what we believe, than what we do. My understanding of his idea is that, because we are human beings, we make mistakes, but our actions are based on our state of mind. Therefore, our state of mind is most important. (At the same time, it also works the other way around. Our actions have great effect on our state of mind. Therefore, for example, I enjoy doing zazen.) Because our actions grow from our state of mind, the old woman asked the monk to leave her hut. She had offered the monk a place to practice zazen, but when she saw the actions that grew from his state of mind, she stopped supporting his practice. Hopefully, the monk understood why he was kicked out from the hut. Hopefully, the old lady’s reaction was a wake up call for him. Hopefully, when necessary, we can remember this story and wake up too. I know I need it sometimes.

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