Cherry Blossom and the Misty Moon
It happened about a very
famous Zen woman, her name was Rengetsu…. Very few women have attained to the
Zen ultimate. This one is one of those rare women.
She was on a pilgrimage,
and she came to a village at sunset and begged for lodging for the night, but
the villagers slammed their doors. They were against Zen. Zen is so
revolutionary, so utterly rebellious, that it is very difficult to accept it.
By accepting it you are going to be transformed; by accepting it you will be
passing through a fire, you will never be the same again.
So traditional people
have always been against ALL that it true in religion. Tradition is all that is
untrue in religion. So those must have been traditional Buddhists in the town,
and they didn’t allow this woman to stay in the town; they threw her out. It
was a cold night, and the old woman with no lodging… and hungry. She had to
make a cherry tree in the fields her shelter. It was really cold, and she could
not sleep well. And it was dangerous too — wild animals and all.
At midnight she awoke —
because of too much cold — and saw, as it were, in the spring night sky, the
fully opened cherry blossoms laughing to the misty moon. Overcome with the
beauty, she got up and made a reverence in the direction of the village….
This is what TATHATA IS.
Overcome with the
beauty, she got up and made a reverence in the direction of the village:
Through their kindness in
refusing me lodging I found myself beneath the blossoms on the night of this
misty moon.
She feels grateful. With
great gratitude she thanks those people who refused her lodging, otherwise she
would be sleeping under an ordinary roof, and she would have missed this
blessing — these cherry blossoms, and this whispering with the misty moon, and
this silence of the night, this utter silence of the night. She is not angry,
she accepts it. Not only accepts it, welcomes it — she feels grateful.
A man becomes a Buddha
the moment he accepts all that life brings with gratitude. He is on the Way, he
is on Tao; and he IS becoming meditative.
Osho – “Zen the Path of Paradox”
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