Some months ago I was feeling the need for an extra
dose of divine guidance; I had been undergoing a period of inner disquiet and
lack of trust and direction. As I meditated, the bodhisattva AVALOKITESHVARA (“Sound that illumines the
World”) came to me – this Being is known as the Lotus Holder, because of
the Blue Lotus held between the bodhisattva’s hands. Avalokiteshvara is
titled Mahakaruna, which can be translated The Great Compassion.
I don’t know what I had expected to hear, but I was told a
story, which I’d like to share.
“There was once a
man who had a goat that he kept tied up in a field. The goat was given
provisions and a shelter and everything it needed to survive, but it was a
tied-up goat, and a tied-up goat never knows freedom.
One day, there was
a sage who passed the field where the goat lay tethered. Avoiding the man who
owned the goat, the sage went straight to the animal who thought “Now I’m going
to be untied and set free!” But the guru sage just sat down beside the goat and
began to hum, softly.
The goat was very
confused. It was angry because the guru hadn’t seen fit to untie its chains,
and it couldn’t understand why the guru was just sitting, chanting.
After many days, the
goat got tired of trying to make the guru untie the chains, and instead started
to make sort-of goat noises as near to the guru’s noises as it could.
As it did this more
and more, a strange thing happened. The chains of the goat’s tether began to
vibrate. They also vibrated more and more, until, miraculously, they just
slipped off the goat’s legs where they had been affixed. At which point the
guru sage simply got up, stopped chanting, bowed and smiled at the goat and
went quickly on his way.
The goat tried to
follow, but tripped up on the pile of chains and knocked itself out. When it
came to, the guru was nowhere to be seen.
But there was
something left. Where the sage had been sitting there was an impression of his
left heel that had imprinted itself in a dead leaf. The leaf seemed to shine in
the moonlight as though a gift of Love had been left behind, even though the
person who brought it was gone.
The goat ate the
leaf so as to have the gift of Love inside for ever.
It said goodbye to
the field and slipped away along the country lane into the world.
Whenever it sees a goat tethered in a field, it jumps over the
fence and sits down beside the other animal and starts to make strange,
seemingly un-goatlike noises.
There have been
many reports of free-ranging goats in that country, and now, even the donkeys
are joining in.
Who knows where it
will stop?”