Gentleness

The Buddha always gave blessing, “Happiness and prosperity are for the gentle men”. So Buddhist people followed the Buddha’s blessing and teachings, they try to practise loving-kindness, generosity, responsibility, truthfulness, mindfulness and awareness, gentleness, homage, respectfulness, gratefulness etc. These virtues are not only for Buddhist people to practise, but for all. And those, who practise them, will get blessed with happiness and prosperity; there is no exception. There is the Chinese story which illustrates this well. The story goes like this;

There was a young official, named Jangliang, who helped establish Hun dynasty. The first king, Laopang honoured him, but Jangliang was very gentle and humble. Apart from gentleness and homage, Jangliang liked study. One day he traveled to another town and on the way he met an old man sitting on the bridge. He felt that this old man was not normal. He must have been intelligent or a sage. Jangliang thought, “I must learn something from him” and approached to ask him, “Sir, can you teach me something?” The old man looked at Jangliang and said, “Well! My shoes fell into the river. Can you get me my shoes, first?” Jangliang said, “Yes sir, I will get you your shoes”. And then he immersed himself into the river to find the shoes for the old man. Soon after that, he found the shoes and handed them to him. The old man said, “The shoes are wet. Can you make fire and dry them for me?” Jangliang did so. The old man asked him again, “I am too old; it is difficult to wear the shoes. Can you wear me the shoes?” Jangliang was very gentle and humble; he did all the old man ask him to do.

Then the old man said to Jangliang, “You are good man, I will teach you something. Tomorrow you come to meet me here in the evening”. Jangliang said thank you to the old man and went to stay over night in the inn. In the afternoon, Jangliang went to the bridge and there he saw the old man sitting and waiting for him. The old man said, “You are late, you don’t really want to study”. Jangliang said to the old man, “I am punctual; this is not evening yet, sir”. Then he said, “All right, I will give a second chance. Tomorrow you meet me here at noon”. The second appointment, Jangliang thought, “I will go early and will not miss it”. And again, when he arrived at the bridge, he saw the old man sitting and waiting for him. He said exactly the same, “You are late. You don’t really want to study”. Jangliang explained to him, “I do want sir, this is not at noon yet”. Then he said again, “OK, I will give you last chance. Tomorrow you meet me here in the morning”. Jangliang thought, “This is the third time; I won’t miss it”, and prepared himself to go early morning. When he got there early, he didn’t see the old man. He waited and waited; the morning passed, the noon passed and the evening drew near. Then the old man appeared in front of Jangliang. He did not show any aggressiveness; he was still gentle and humble.

This time the old man said, “Well! I see your intention, gentleness and homage, you are good man. I give you the book of war strategy. You learn it and you will be a great warrior and be able to serve the country”. Jangliang said big thanks to the old man and received the book humbly. He studies it hard and soon he became a great warrior. So his story was told from generation to generation.

The story shows that those, who are gentle and humble, are always blessed with happiness, success and prosperity.

This is very good example for the young generation nowadays. When they are gentle and humble, their life can be blessed with happiness, success and prosperity. It is not only for themselves, but also for society where they live in. Therefore, they can live together in peace and harmony. That is real blessing.