Anthology of Japanese Literature (24 page)

The Three Worlds are joined by one mind.
¹⁹
If the mind is not at peace, neither beasts of burden nor possessions are of service, neither palaces nor pavilions bring any cheer. This lonely house is but a tiny hut, but I somehow love it. I naturally feel ashamed when I go to the capital and must beg, but when I return and sit here I feel pity for those still attached to the world of dust. Should anyone doubt the truth of my words, let him look to the fishes and the birds. Fish do not weary of the water, but unless one is a fish one does not know why. Birds long for the woods, but unless one is a bird one does not know why. The joys of solitude are similar. Who could understand them without having lived here?

Now the moon of my Ufe sinks in the sky and is close to the edge of the mountain. Soon I must head into the darkness of the Three Ways:
²⁰
why should I thus drone on about myself? The essence of the Buddha's teaching to man is that we must not have attachment for any object. It is a sin for me now to love my little hut, and my attachment to its solitude may also be a hindrance to salvation. Why should I waste more precious time in relating such trifling pleasures?

One calm dawning, as I thought over the reasons for this weakness of mine, I told myself that I had fled the world to live in a mountain forest in order to discipline my mind and practice the Way. "And yet, in spite of your monk's appearance, your heart is stained with impurity. Your hut may take after Jomy
ō
's,
²¹
but you preserve the Law even worse than Handoku. If your low estate is a retribution for the sins of a previous existence, is it right that you afflict yourself over it? Or should you permit delusion to come and disturb you?" To these questions my mind could offer no reply. All I could do was to use my tongue to recite two or three times the
nembutsu,
however inacceptable from a defiled heart.

It is now the end of the third moon of 1212, and I am writing this at the hut on Toyama.

TRANSLATED BY DONALD KEENE

1
The capital was actually established at Kyoto by Saga's father, the Emperor Kammu, in 794.

2
Oxcarts were the traditional vehicles of the court nobility, who now were changing to military ways. Estates near the new capital of Fukuhara (by the Inland Sea) were desirable, but those near the center of Minamoto power in the east and north were dangerous.

3
According to the
yin-yang
system of Chinese divination, a capital should have nine streets running east-west and eight streets running north-south, as was observed in the building of Kyoto.

4
A description combining the virtues of the legendary Chinese Emperor Yao with the Japanese Emperor Nintoku.

5
Ordinary beggars would have been bareheaded and barelegged.

6
In Shingon Buddhism, of which the Ninnaji was a center, great significance is given to
A,
the first letter of the Sanskrit alphabet, the beginning of things, and it is believed that all afflictions can be ended by contemplating this letter.

7
Kamo no Chomei's family enjoyed a hereditary position as Shinto priests at the Kama Shrine, but in his generation this privilege was rescinded.

8
Chomei felt that even the simplicity of his cottage was still not a suitable life; he had to become a true hermit.

9
Normally the site of a house was selected after consulting
yin-yang
diviners, but for a Buddhist priest one place was as good as another.

10
The Buddha was said to have emitted light between his eyebrows.

11
Fugen (Sanskrit, Samantabhadra) is the highest of the bodhisattvas. Fud
ō
My
ō
ō
(Sanskrit, Acalan
ā
tha) is the chief of the Guardian Kings.

12
The west is the direction of Paradise and it was thus auspicious that it should have been clear in that direction. The purple cloud is the one on which Amida Buddha descends to guide the believer to the Western Paradise.

13
The invocation to Amida Buddha practiced particularly by believers in J
ō
do Buddhism.

14
From a poem by the Priest Mansei. See page 93.

15
Reference to the famous "Lute Song" (
P'i-p'a Chi
) by Po Chü-i. Minamoto no Tsunenobu (1016-1097) was a famous musician and poet.

16
Semimaru was a poet of the Heian Period who lived in a hut near the Barrier of Ausakayama. See page 92. Sarumaru-dayu was an early Heian poet, but nothing it known about him. For a later description of roughly the same area, see Bash
ō
's "Unreal Dwelling," page 374.

17
This paragraph is full of allusions to old poems which it would be tedious to explain.

18
From a poem by Saigy
ō
: "The mountain is remote; I do not hear the voices of the birds I love, but only the eerie cries of the owl."

19
From the Avatamska Sutra. The Three Worlds may be interpreted as the past, the present, and the future.

20
The three paths in the afterworld leading to different types of hells.

21
J
ō
my
ō
(Vimalakirti) was a priest of Sakyamuni's time who built himself a stone hut much like Ch
ō
mei's. Handoku (Panthaka) was the most foolish of Sakyamuni's disciples.

TALES FROM THE UJI COLLECTION

[
Uji Sh
Å«
i Monogatari
]

This is a collection of 194 tales divided into fifteen books and including examples of every type of theme, ranging from the Buddhist moral tale to humorous anecdotes and traditional fairy stories. The date of the collection is unknown, but it is now generally accepted as probably early thirteenth century. See also the Introduction, page 22.

THE GRATEFUL SPARROW

In times now long ago, one bright sunny day in early spring an old woman of about sixty was sitting outside her house picking lice. In the courtyard a sparrow hopped about. Some children who were playing nearby started to throw stones at the bird, and one of them struck it, breaking its back. While it struggled about, helplessly flapping its wings, a crow came swooping down upon it. "Oh, what a pity! The crow will get it!" cried the old woman. She rushed over to the sparrow and picked it up. Then she blew on it with her warm breath and fed it. She put the bird into a little pail which she took indoors for the night. The next morning she fed it some rice and made it some medicine of copper dust. Her children and grandchildren said sneeringly, "What a dear old lady she is, to take care of a sparrow in her old age!"

Nevertheless, she tenderly looked after the bird for several months until at last it was hopping about again. Though a mere sparrow, it felt very happy and grateful that she had restored it to health. Whenever the old woman left the house, even on the briefest of errands, she would give instructions to her family. "Look after the sparrow and see that it gets something to eat." And her children and grandchildren laughed at her and teased her. "How touching! Why do you worry so much about a sparrow?" "Say what you please, it's a poor helpless creature," she would reply.

As a result of the good care she took of it, the bird finally was able to fly once more. "Now no crow will get it," said the old woman, and took it outdoors to see how well it could fly. When she placed it on the palm of her hand and held it out at arm's length, away the sparrow flew with a flutter of its wings. After that the old woman, in the loneliness and tedium of her life, longed for the bird. She would say, "How sad that it has flown away after so many months and days of taking it in for the night and feeding it in the morning!" As usual, everyone laughed at her.

Some twenty days later the woman heard the loud chirping of a sparrow outside her house. "Why, that's a sparrow! Perhaps the same one has come back," she thought, going out to look. Indeed, it was the very same sparrow. "Oh, how touching! How touching that it has not forgotten me and has come back," she said. The sparrow, peering at the old woman's face, dropped something very small that it held in its beak, apparently intending to leave whatever it was for her, and then flew away. "What can the sparrow have dropped?" wondered the woman. She went over and discovered that it had let fall a single gourd seed. "It must have had some reason for bringing this," she said, picking it up. Her children mocked her, "How wonderful! She gets a present from a sparrow and acts as if it were some great treasure!" "Say what you will, I'll plant it and see what happens," she replied, and this she did.

When autumn came the plant bore a great many gourds. They were not of the usual kind, but much larger and more numerous. The old woman was exceedingly pleased. No matter how many she picked or gave away to the neighbors, more still remained than she could possibly use. Her children and grandchildren who had laughed at her ate the gourds every day.

At last, when she had distributed the gourds to everyone in the village, she decided that she would cure seven or eight of the largest and finest to use as containers. These she hung indoors and left to dry. When several months had elapsed, she inspected them, thinking that by this time they would be about ready. The gourds had indeed turned out very well, but when she took one of them down, she was surprised to find how heavy it was. She cut open the gourd all the same, only to discover that it was stuffed with something. She poured it out to see what it might be—the gourd was full of white rice! Amazed at this prodigy, she emptied the gourd into a big container, but when she had finished it was full again, just as when she began. Astonished and overjoyed, she said, "This is most unusual. The sparrow must be back of this." She put the rice into containers and stored it away. When she examined the other gourds, she found that they were full of rice too. No matter how much she poured out or used, there was still more left than she knew what to do with, and she thus became a very wealthy person indeed. The other villagers were amazed and envious at her good fortune.

Now the children of the old woman who lived next door said to their mother, "Other people, though they're no different from you, manage to become rich, but you can't even do the simplest thing." As the result of such complaints, the old woman from next door went to visit the first old woman. "Now then, what's all this about? I've heard some rumors about a sparrow, but I really know nothing about it. Please tell me the whole story from the beginning, just as it happened."

"It all came about from planting a gourd seed that a sparrow dropped," replied the first old woman, and would not give any further details. But the second old woman kept pressing her. "I insist! Do tell me all about it!" And so, thinking that it would be wrong to be petty and keep the matter a secret, she said, "I took care of a sparrow that had a broken back, and nursed it back to health. It must have felt so grateful that it brought me a gourd seed which I planted, and this is what happened."

"Please give me just one of the seeds," said the second old woman, but she refused. "I will give you some of the rice that was inside the gourds, but I can't give you any seeds. Those I most certainly cannot give away."

Having been thus unsuccessful in getting a seed, the second old woman began to keep a sharp lookout in the hope that she too might find a sparrow with a broken back to take care of, but not a single sparrow of that description was to be seen. Every morning when she looked out of her house, there would be some sparrows hopping about outside the back door eating any grains of rice that had happened to fall. The old woman would pick up stones and throw them at the birds on the chance of hitting one. Since she threw a great many stones at a great many sparrows, she naturally succeeded at last in hitting one and wounding it so that it could not fly. Very pleased with herself, the old woman went over to the bird and, after making sure that its back was thoroughly broken, she picked it up, fed it, and gave it medicine with great solicitousness. Then she thought, "If the old lady next door gets so much in return for taking care of a single sparrow, how much richer I could be if there were several! I would be superior to her, and my children would praise me."

She spread some rice in a winnowing tray and kept watch. When some sparrows gathered to eat the rice, she threw stone after stone at them, and at last succeeded in striking down three. Deciding that would do for the time being, she put the three injured sparrows in a pail, powdered some copper and fed it to them. After several months of treatment they all recovered. She joyfully took them outdoors, and they flew away with fluttering wings. "How clever I am!" she thought. But the sparrows felt only the bitterest hatred toward her, even though she had nursed them, for she was the one who had broken their backs.

About ten days later the sparrows returned. The happy old woman looked first to see whether they had anything in their beaks, whereupon they each let fall a single gourd seed and flew away. "I thought so!" she said and, gleefully picking up the seeds, planted them in three places. The seedlings grew unusually fast and soon became very large. But they did not produce so many gourds—not more than seven or eight on a plant. Nevertheless, the old woman watched them with a broad grin on her face. She told her children, "You said that I was never good for anything, but I'll show you that I am better than the old lady next door." They were quite convinced now that things would indeed turn out as she said.

Since the gourds were few in number, the old woman, wishing to get the largest possible amount of rice out of them, neither gave any away to other people nor ate any herself. But her children said, "The old lady next door gave some gourds to her neighbors and ate some herself. All the more should you do so, since you had three seeds to start with. You ought to give some away, and we should eat some ourselves." Accordingly, she picked quite a number of gourds, both for the neighbors and her own family, but the gourds proved to be horribly bitter, and made everyone feel nauseous and giddy. Everyone who ate any fell violently ill, and the old woman's outraged neighbors went in a body to her house intending to scold her. "What on earth has she given us?" they asked one another. "How dreadful of her! Even those of us who no more than smelled one vomited, and we were so sick that we nearly died." When they arrived at her house, however, the old woman and her children were prostrate and vomiting all over the room. There was evidendy no use in complaining, and the neighbors went home.

It was two or three days before they had all recovered. The old woman thought to herself, "I wanted to keep the gourds so that they would all produce rice, but we were in too much of a hurry to cat them. That is no doubt why this accident happened." She picked all the remaining gourds and put them away.

When several months had passed, and she thought that the gourds had reached the proper stage, she went into the storeroom with some tubs in which to hold the rice after she had poured it out. She was immensely pleased, and her toothless old mouth was grinning from ear to ear as she carried over one of the tubs and poured the contents of a gourd into it. But what came out was not rice, but hornets, bees, centipedes, scorpions, snakes, and other such creatures, and they fastened upon her and stung her eyes and nose and her whole body. Yet for the moment the old woman felt no pain at all. She thought that they were just grains of rice bouncing up out of the container and hitting her. She said, "Just wait a while, you sparrows! I'll see that you each get a little bit."

The many poisonous insects that emerged from the seven or eight gourds stung and bit her children too, and the old woman herself was stung to death. It seems that the sparrows, hating her for breaking their backs, had persuaded all the insects to hide inside the gourds and help them with their revenge. The sparrow next door had been grateful to the old woman who had cared for it and restored it to health when its back was already broken and it was in mortal danger of being seized by a crow. We must not be envious of others.

(
III
, 16)

THE HOLY MAN OF SHINANO PROVINCE

In times now long ago there lived in Shinano Province a priest who, having entered the priesthood in a remote country district, had never been properly ordained. He determined that he would somehow go up to the capital and receive ordination at the Todaiji.
¹
At last he succeeded in making the journey and the ceremony was duly performed. He had intended to return to his native province afterward, but it really seemed a mistake to go back to so heathenish a place where no one even knew about the Buddha, and he therefore decided to remain in the neighborhood of the capital. He sat down in front of the Buddha of the Todaiji and looked all about him at the surrounding countryside to see whether he could detect any suitable place where he might live peacefully and perform his devotions. At last his eye hit upon a certain mountain which could be dimly seen off to the southwest. "That is where I will live and pray," he thought, and went there.

As a result of the many rigorous austerities which the priest performed, he was at length able, thanks to the magical powers he gained, to produce out of thin air a small image of Bishamon, of about the size that would fit into a miniature shrine. He built a small chapel in the mountains where he enshrined the image, and spent the years and months in practicing devotions of an unparalleled fervor.

Now at the foot of this mountain there lived a certain man who, though of humble birth, was exceedingly rich. It became a habit with the holy man to have his begging bowl fly down to this man's house, where it would be filled with food and then return. One day the rich man had opened up his stoutly built log storehouse, and was engaged in removing some wares when the bowl came flying down to beg for its usual portion of food. "What a very greedy bowl you are!" he said, and picking it up tossed it into a corner of the storehouse instead of filling it immediately.

The bowl waited there patiently, but when the rich man had finished putting his possessions in order he forgot all about the bowl, which he neither filled nor removed from the storehouse. Locking the door behind him, the rich man went home. After a short while, the storehouse began to shake and tremble in a strange and unaccountable fashion. Everyone looked on in great excitement, wondering what could be the matter, and as they watched, it swayed and moved all the more violently, until it had risen about a foot off the ground. The onlookers were astounded, and excitedly asked one another what could be the meaning of this prodigy. "That's right!" cried someone, "the master forgot the holy man's begging bowl and left it inside the storehouse. That must be what has caused it." Meanwhile the bowl could be seen protruding from under the storehouse; and the building itself, riding on the bowl, sailed up into the air until it had reached a height of ten or twenty feet and then flew off, while the people gazed on in astonishment, shouting and jabbering at one another.

The owner of the storehouse, powerless to stop its flight, could only follow along to see where it would go. All the people of the neighborhood went running after it too. The storehouse flew at a leisurely pace until it arrived at the mountain where the holy man had his retreat, and dropped down with a thud beside his hut. At this everyone marveled more than ever. The owner could scarcely permit such a situation to continue, however, and approached the holy man, saying, "What an astonishing thing to have happened! Whenever your bowl has come to my house I have always filled it with food, but today I was so busy that I forgot all about the bowl and locked my storehouse without removing it. Then the storehouse began to shake and sway, and now it has flown all the way here. Please return it to me."