|
Main Index
|
| |
| |
|
| |
feel guilty -- stealing from a poor monk, a poor beggar, who had not much in the first place stealing from a man who was so readily ready to give, I who accepted you so totally -- this man will feel guilty, this man will start repenting. He will not be able to sleep back home. He may have to come back in the morning to be forgiven.
No, that will not be good. Zen does not want to create guilt in any way. That's what Zen is all about, a religion without creating any guilt. A religion can be very easily created with guilt, that's what other religions have done. But when you create guilt you have created something far worse than you were going to cure. Zen does not create any guilt, takes every care not to create any guilt in anybody.
Now he says, 'THANK A PERSON WHEN YOU.RECEIVE A GIFT. This is a gift! Don't you know even this much? I am GIVING it to you -- you are not stealing it from me.' What a difference! It is the same thing.
This is what Zen says: Give -- rather than it being snatched away. And this is the total vision about life. Before death comes give everything so death need not feel guilty. Give your life to death as a gift. This is the Zen renunciation. It is altogether different from Hindu or Catholic renunciation -- they give in order to get. Zen gives in order so that no guilt is created anywhere in the world; no guilt is left behind.
SHICHIRI ADDED, 'THANK A PERSON WHEN YOU RECEIVE A GIFT.' THE MAN THANKED HIM AND MADE OFF.
A FEW DAYS AFTERWARDS THE FELLOW WAS CAUGHT AND CONFESSED, AMONG OTHERS, THE OFFENCE AGAINST SHICHIRI. WHEN SHICHIRI WAS CALLED AS A WITNESS HE SAID: 'THIS MAN IS NO THIEF, AT LEAST AS FAR AS I AM CONCERNED. I GAVE HIM THE MONEY AND HE THANKED ME FOR IT. '
You see the point? How respectful! What immense respect! What unconditional respect towards a man -- towards a thief!
If this Shichiri was a Christian saint, he would have threatened him to be ready to suffer hell -- and hell for eternity. If he was a Hindu saint, he would have preached him a long sermon on no-theft, and he would have made him very frightened that he will be thrown into hellfire. And he would have painted a very
|
|
|
|
| |