Stories for superstition
5 Buddhist wisdom stories for superstition from Buddhist teachers, each linked to the original talk.
- Ajahn Chah reads a palmStory · Ajahn Brahm
In brief: A lay supporter asks Ajahn Chah to read his palm. Ajahn Chah says Buddhist monks don't do that. The man argues cleverly: you just taught gratitude, I've fed you and driven you…
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so this was happened to know my master ENT CH so my came up to him once and said can you please read the lines on my hand tell me my fortune I just said no Buddhist monks we don't do that we don't believe in fate and destiny he said I know you're saying that but it's not true read the lines on my palm he said no we can't and then he'd had this lay person was very very smart he thought he could outwit a monk don't ever try that he said you just gave a talk last week on gratitude on how important that is know someone helps you you have to have gratitude towards them and this I've been feeding you for years I've been going to your temple giving donations driving you around this the first time I ask for anything and you say no where's the Gratitude in that it's a really good argument so Rajan says okay I will read the lines on your hand and this is the one and only time this great master in Thailand ever read somebody's fortune and he was so excited because this was a great Master my teachers got many disciples all over the world great wise person and so aanch got his hand and with his finger started drawing the lines and every now and again he would stop and go H that's interesting and some going and this guy was was getting more and more excited it was really being wound up and aunch took forever to finish and when he finally did finish this guy was so excited he was going to get his fortune predicted by a monk he knew had powers and who could not lie would not lie whatever that monk said would have to be true and so aent when he finished he looked the guy in the eye and said sir yes yes yes yes your fortune yeah get on with it your future sir and I won't lie to you whatever I say will work yeah I know that come on your future sir is uncertain and it wasn't wrong
- Five Angels in the fifth raceJoke · Ajahn Brahm
In brief: A Perth man dreams that five angels each give him five pots of gold. At breakfast his wife has made five pieces of toast and five boiled eggs; it's the 5th of May; Ascot has five…
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the fifth of May reminded me of one of those amazing stories about this gentleman here in Perth quite many years ago now. And this is the last question here. So I don't mind just going off with a Oh no, there's another one afterwards. Anyway, I've already started the story. that he had a dream in the middle of the night. Actually, not the middle of the night, it was early in the morning here in Perth. And his dream is he dreamt of these five angels, these five like davas angels. And they each had five big pots of gold. And they queued up and they gave him 25 pots of gold. That was his dream. And then as soon as he received his last pot of gold, he woke up. He looked around the bedroom. It was morning time. He couldn't see any angels in his bedroom. But worse, he didn't mind not seeing angels, but he really missed the pots of gold. And so, just a dream. When he went down to breakfast, he found that morning his wife had made him five pieces of toast and five boiled eggs, which was weird. What's with the number five? He looked at the newspaper. 5th of May and just you know wondering what was going on he decided to look at the horse racing pages here in Perth there is a horse racing course it's named after a big one in in England called Ascot A S C O T five letters. So he looked at the fifth race that afternoon and he looked down the fifth horse in the fifth race. He just couldn't believe his his eyes. The horse was called Five Angels. The horse five angels was running on the 5th of May in Ascot and he just dreamt of five angels giving him this huge fortune in gold. If you do have these experiences, you only have them once in your life. So he decided to to take the afternoon off work. He went to the bank to keep the lucky number five. $5,000 out of the bank. A lot of money. $5,000. He went to the racetrack. He chose the fifth book maker in line. He said $5,000 to win horse number five. Race number five, five angels. He knew the lucky number five couldn't go wrong. And the lucky number five didn't go wrong. His horse came in fifth.
- The monk in the front seat of the busStory · Ajahn Brahm
In brief: Thais believe a monk's good karma protects those behind him, so monks are seated at the front of buses. Travelling from Chonburi to Bangkok, the young Ajahn Brahm is waved on…
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this happened once accurate story I was traveling from chury to Bangkok not a long distance only 2 hours thank goodness cuz as soon as I got in this big bus the bus driver smiled he didn't want to take any money he just put me right in the front seat about that far from the wind screen because there was a movie on that bus which he really wanted to to watch but he was scared of crashes so he always had to pay attention to the road now I was there taking care of crashes he could watch the movie as much as he wanted and I was watching all these big trucks and cars just hurtling towards our buz as was going over the road to the other side fortunately we survived so it's obviously it was true but I tried that once when I was flying in tight Airways I was in economy class and I told the flight attendant you know sometimes uh aircraft crash into mountains so why don't you put me up front and then I can protect everyone behind because you know up front is first class on his business I thought it was a very strong argument but they wouldn't accept it so so I had to stay in economy
- The storm that waited for the ceremonyStory · Ajahn Brahm
In brief: For the Buddhist Society of Western Australia's 30th anniversary Vesak ceremony in Perth's Supreme Court Gardens, the biggest storm ever is forecast to hit at exactly ceremony…
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you know that story in one of the books about when we had our 30th anniversary of the Buddhist Society of Western Australia over Supreme Court Gardens and it was supposed to be a storm that night I mean really big storm like a major storm not one of these ordinary storms we have all the time here biggest storm ever to come to Perth right it's supposed to hit exactly the time we're going to have our ceremony and we had remember I'll go quickly this because many of you heard it before Premier Jeff Gallup he was a premier we invited him he was going to come three times his office called me aam there's a big storm coming you can't continue are you cancelling and three times I said no we are not cancelling one of our members he deceased now he said I was a sailor all my life in the merchant Sean I know these things the barometer is falling that parotic pressure is going down it's going to be a big storm I know these things you have to cancel no one of my M my own monks he took me aside and said a Bram look we really love you we respect you but you're making an idiot of yourself please cancel no and those you were there it was like Miracle just about half an hour before we started the ceremony the rain start stopped we did our ceremony full moon day way sack 19 I don't know when it was 2000 or whatever and it stopped it miracle and then after we finished rain came down Supreme Court Gardens flooded 2 Ines of water those of you are there hasn't done that for years Freeway flooded after the big storm but we stopped it and the following day there was a firm here uh I don't mind mentioning this ree hire they do a lot of party hire stuff and the CEO sent an email and said who is this a Bram we don't know who he is but can you please ask him who's going to win the horse racing today I still got that email somewhere
- Twelve blessed strings for Sri LankaStory · Ajahn Brahm
In brief: During a one-day match at the WACA, with Australia hammering Sri Lanka, young helpers come to Ajahn Brahm: the Sri Lankan captain wants holy string from a good monk. He blesses…
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This was the um the time I got into trouble. I had to I had hid this for many years. I should have just admitted it straight away. And that was with the with the um cricket. Many of the Sri Lankans know this story. I haven't told this to the the last uh uh there's a Sri Lankan New Year over in 70th anniversary was it Was it? Or independence or whatever. Anyway, in front of the the former um governor of Western Australia, Quentin Bryce. And she reminded me of this. But fortunately she's she's retired now, so I can't get into any more trouble about this because it was the um sometime people ask, "What are you doing going to the Sri Lankan Independence Day when you're a Brit? You know, that's like you know, that they kicked your ancestors out of the country. So what are you coming to celebrate?" I said, "Because I support Sri Lanka and their cricket team." Because what happened? There was a cricket match between Sri Lanka and Australia at the old West Australian cricket ground, the WACA. And only one day match. And at lunch interval the Australians, they were just hammering the Sri Lankans. They were winning by such a big amount. So some of the boys who actually come here, they were helping out at the stadium. They came here and said, "Ajahn Brahm, Ajahn Brahm, we've been asked by the captain of the Sri Lankan cricket team to get some holy string from a good monk and we think you're a good monk. Can you do this blessing string?" And so now I shouldn't have done this. I mean, it's a ridiculous thing to do, but I I blessed 12 pieces of string. Cuz you know, one for the 12th man in the cricket. I knew cricket. So 12 pieces of string I blessed and I sent them to the ground. You know what happened? Sri Lanka lost. But because they asked for it too late. [laughter] But that was not the really important match because that that was a warm-up game for the World Cup cricket. And as every Sri Lankan knows the Sri Lankans had never won much before. But this they had the final Sri Lanka this World Cup cricket final, Sri Lanka versus Australia. And you know how much Australians love their cricket. And Sri Lanka won. Against all predictions, Sri Lanka beat Australia and won the World Cup cricket. And that was Any Sri Lankan remembers that. Remember the occasion. It was uh the captain. I remember his name, Arjuna Ranatunga. Cuz I saw people show me in the the Western Australian newspaper, the big picture of the captain holding up the World Cup and the whole Sri Lanka, they just celebrated. I don't know for how long. And of course Australia was just so upset. They just missed out. But as he was holding up the cup, you know what I saw? On his hand my string. It was my string which was on all of the cricketers' hands there except the Australians. That was why they won the World Cup. Cuz an Australian monk and it took years before I admitted that. Otherwise I got kicked out of the country.