Do Not Believe What I Believe

A man who would be great went wandering in the spiritual wilderness.

Each day, he spent many hours pondering the meaning of it all.  As he went about his daily business of gathering sustenance, he reflected on the principles that enriched his life.  For many years, he was content to dwell in this question, to profit from what he learned, and to refine it through his experience.

One day, this was no longer enough.

The great man resolved share what he had learned.  His knowledge had come at a great cost.  Progress had been tortuous.  When sometimes the work of others inspired him or saved him years of struggle, he was overcome with appreciation and gratitude.  His heart ached with a need to ease the way of those who would come after him.

So he traveled about the land, talking about his quest – about the questions he had pondered, about the answers he had found and the beliefs he had formed and rejected or adopted.  Because he was wise, and had spent his life in pursuit of practical knowledge, he soon attracted others who came to hear what he had learned.  They came to study his methods, and called themselves his students.

The great man cautioned his students not to become disciples.

“Do not believe what I believe,” he said.  “The flower that I have carefully nurtured in the garden of my soul cannot be transplanted.  It has evolved to thrive in my soul, and in the keeping of my hands.  If you plant that flower in your own garden, it will become a noxious weed.

“Instead, if you wish, plant the seeds that you harvest from my garden, water and tend them carefully, and see which ones grow, and which thrive, and which bear fruit.”

So the students did as the wise man had said.

They harvested the seeds of wisdom from the great man’s garden, and planted them in their own.  And because they were good seeds, a great many of them grew and bore fruit.  And these new gardeners too became wise.

Before long the students of the great man had attracted followers of their own.

They too cautioned their students not to become disciples.

“Do not believe what the wise man believes,” they said.  “Instead, take the seeds which we have grown from his garden, and raise and nurture them yourselves.  Treasure those that bear fragrant flowers, and uproot those that do not thrive.”

So the students of the students did as they were asked.  For this they became wise, and gathered their own students around themselves.

The students of the students of the students were in awe of the many wise followers of the great man.  They asked their teachers, “Give us some of the master’s magic seeds, so we too may become wise today.”

Their teachers cautioned them, “The seeds are not magic.  The magic is in your own hearts and in your hands and in your own soul.  When you tend the seeds carefully, and root out the plants which do not suit your garden, you will harvest your own great truths.”

Soon a great crowd gathered around them clamouring for wisdom.  In their impatience, they dug up the flowers and transplanted them into their own gardens.  But the transplants became deformed and brittle.  The students cast about themselves, looking for the cause of their failure.  “Perhaps we are not tending them the right way,” they said to one another.  “See how the master rakes the soil just this way and not that.  See how he waters them on these days but not those.  We must do as he does.”

So they learned to rake and water and weed in the prescribed manner.

But in their midst, there was one who did not follow the precepts of the master.  Instead, he wandered from garden to garden, harvesting a seed here and there, sometimes passing without stopping, at others pausing to collect a handful.  These all he planted in his own garden, which he tended carefully.  Here he spent countless hours toiling.

He often spent hours just watching the plants that grew in his garden.  He would nurture some, while others he would remove from his garden after consideration.   In time, his garden became thick and verdant, but the plants in it appeared strange and alien to the students of the master.  Their colours were unusual, their scents exotic and foreign.

The students looked again at their own gardens where the plants of the master struggled.  They noticed that their neighbour often rooted out and discarded plants that looked better than those they left haggard in their own gardens.  “Surely this is not right,” they murmured amongst themselves.  “How can we allow one among us to root out the master’s plants?  See how his own grow tall and shade out our own?  Who will stand up for the master?  Are we not his disciples?”  So they drove the heretic from their midst and burned his garden.

Hence, the heretic went wandering in the spiritual wilderness.

After many years, he returned, and his life was full and his face serene.  And so he traveled about the land, talking about his quest – about the questions he had pondered, and the beliefs he had formed and rejected or adopted.  Because he was wise, and had spent his life in pursuit of practical knowledge, he soon attracted others who came to hear what he had discovered.  They came to study his methods, and hailed him as great, and called themselves his students.

The great man cautioned his students not to become disciples.  “You must each grow the garden that thrives in your soil and under your care.  You may take the seeds from my garden, but you cannot grow what I have grown.  Most importantly, you cannot transplant my flowers into your own soil.”

And the students looked around and saw that it was true.  They saw the stunted sticks that clutched at sunlight in the gardens around them, while their owners carefully followed the prescribed weeding and watering rituals, their faces empty.  So the students resolved never to become disciples.  And their students also promised this.

But the master knew, like his predecessor, that one day, he too would have disciples.  They would drive his successor from their midst and burn his garden

For a moment, the great man stood lost in thought and sadness.

Then he shrugged, bent down, and gently weeded out a plant, careful not to disturb the one that poked through the soil beside it.