Being Mindful Stories

Story · Ajahn Brahm

The monkey who knocked on the monk's door

As told by Ajahn Brahm in How to Deal with Difficulties | Ajahn Brahm | 29 April 2022

1 min read

Content note: death of a baby (animal); second-hand, unverified

The story — as told by Ajahn Brahm (verbatim captions)

And there was a story this old monk told me. This old monk was he told some wonderful stories. He was living by himself in a bamboo and thatch hut in the middle of the jungle many years ago. He said even one evening late at night there was a knock on his door and he who's knocking on the door. No one comes here at nighttime. And he said that when he opened the door there was a a monkey who was holding a little dead baby. a dead baby monkey in her arms. And he realized this was one of the the monkeys in the forest around him who had lost her kid. And what does the monkey know what to do? He gave it to the monk or she gave it to the monk almost asking the monk, "Can you do something to bring my baby back to life?" And the monk just, you know, looked at the the baby monk. It was dead. no possibility of reviving it. But at least did some chanting and after doing the little chanting for the baby monkey gave the little baby back to its mom and the m monkey just obviously had very wet eyes just went away. which is like how sort of people live in the forest a long time. Actually, you actually the animals get to know you and somehow other this griefstricken mother monkey thought that maybe the monk could do something but it couldn't.

▶ Watch Ajahn Brahm tell it from 37:46 (to 39:30)

A reflection (in the spirit of Ajahn Brahm's talk)

A forest monk opened his door at night to a mother monkey holding her dead baby, as if he could help. He couldn't; he chanted a little, and she left with wet eyes. After a storm he saw fresh green leaves among the old ones on the ground. Death comes to the young too. Hold your loved ones gently, and grieve kindly.

In brief (our summary)

An old monk living alone in a bamboo-and-thatch hut deep in the jungle hears a knock one night. At the door is a monkey from the forest holding her dead baby, as if asking him to bring it back to life. He sees it cannot be revived, does a little chanting for it, and gives the baby back; the mother, wet-eyed, goes away.

Teaching point

Death comes to the young too; even the monk could not undo it — this is what our world is like.

When this story may help

Themes

Source & credit

Told by Ajahn Brahm in How to Deal with Difficulties | Ajahn Brahm | 29 April 2022 · 2022-04-29 · ▶ watch from 37:46 to 39:30 · Buddhist Society of Western Australia

3 other tellings of this story

Caption notes: YouTube auto-captions with machine-added punctuation; words left exactly as captioned. 'baby monk' = baby monkey.

The narrative is Ajahn Brahm's own telling, quoted from the talk captions. The summary and reflection are Being Mindful Stories's editorial notes. Please credit the teacher and link the original talk. Markdown version

  • The storm and the green leaves

    In brief: A forest monk in northern Thailand survives a night of falling trees in his flimsy hut; next morning he sees that the storm tore down…

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    The answer which, I got for that, I got from a monk, an old monk who's living in the jungle, who was one of these people who was still enough to listen to the teachings from the nature, from around us Brilliant teachings. And I tell this every time I have to do a funeral service for someone who is young. I tell this, and many people get it, they understand "Ahh, I understand now". And it was, this monk was in a very simple hut, in the north of Thailand, and when I talk about simple, I really mean simple, just made out of bamboo and thatch for the roof, and thatch for the walls as well: really simple to put up, very natural, very easy. And you know, he'd go on alms round every morning to the local village, live a very very frugal, peaceful life, but very very happy. But living in the jungle, there are such things as storms, and if a storm comes when you're in the middle of the forest, and you haven't got much protection, it is very dangerous. Trees come down, or even big branches! And imagine, just visualize a bamboo and thatch hut, if a decent size branch hits that roof, it just goes straight through. Not like metal roofs, or these, uhh, roofs which are engineered so that almost like an Elephant could fall on this roof and it wouldn't go through. Otherwise we wouldn’t get planing permission and building permission, not that an elephant would actually fall on this roof, but you never know (Laughs) So, so over engineered, for safety. But anyway, so, it was such a flimsy dwelling, that one branch could go through and it would... if you didn't actually get crushed you'd get injured, break a leg, break an arm, and remember this is simple living, you don't have mobile phones, you don't... you know even if you did have one, there would be no telecommunications tower there, there's no one you can call, no one can help you if you break a leg, that's probably worse than dying instantly you just die slowly. So it was very dangerous! So he was up all night, hearing the... THUUUDD! BANG! (Hits Table) WHA... oops, WHACK actually that hurt (Laughs) That didn't work as I expected it to. I always say that when you give a public talk, do some special effects (Laughs) Cause you know what happens when people talk, talk, talk, you know, they fall asleep they get bored. It is something like, special like raise your voice, or go BANG! or WOFF! then actually, you know, people actually enjoy it in weird ways. Anyway, so BANG!, WHACK! All these trees where THUDDING next to him. And so, you know, it was very difficult to meditate And he was up all night, but, you know, he survived If he didn't survive he wouldn’t be able to tell me the tale. He survived the night. And in the morning He walked outside, to see the damage; And yeah, several big trees Just missed his hut, he was lucky to be alive! But it wasn't the trees which grabbed his attention, what he saw was the leaves on the forest floor. Most of the leaves which had been torn off the trees and laid dead on the forest floor, where the old, brown leaves. But amongst those old brown leaves there where several yellow leaves, even a few green leaves. And some of those green leaves where so freshly green, they could have only been alive for a few hours, and now they laid dead on the forest floor. Before he completed his insight, his understanding, he checked to see what leaves remained alive on the twigs and branches of those trees; And of course! Most of the leaves remaining alive on the forest trees, where the green leaves! But, even though a few green leaves had been torn off and laid dead on the ground, there where still a few curly old brown leaves, still clinging on, Even though the young green leaves where torn off and laid dead. You understand what we mean, even though young children die, there are still some of these old people who keep coming to our center every Friday for years and years and years still clinging on (Laughs). You know the old Grandma and Grandpa, why aren't they dead yet? (Laughs) They're all still clinging on when these young people die. And he realised that there was nothing wrong. That's what they where saying there: "there's something wrong, It can't be right, why are old people still alive and young people die? It can't be right". Then he saw it was right: It was the nature of life and death it's the nature of a storm which goes through a forest, to mostly take the old leaves, but it always leaves a few old leaves. And it always takes a few young green leaves as well. Nothing is wrong, welcome to life.

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  • The man who cried for the moon

    In brief: A father weeps every evening at his son's cremation ground; his family hires an actor who weeps louder, 'for the moon'. When the father…

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    it's a man who cried for the moon. A man who lost his only son, and would go to the cremation ground every evening to cry and cry and cry, and his family let him cry for a while. But when he was crying overmuch they wanted to find some way of overcoming his grief which was going on far too long, ruining his health and his business as I've seen happen. They hired an actor and the actor went to the cremation ground also, and the actor was crying more than the father who'd lost his son. When they met together, these two men crying their eyes out, the actor crying more, the actor asked, "what are you crying for?" He said, "I've lost my son. He's dead..". "What are you crying for," said the father to the actor. "I'm crying for the moon". "What do you mean, crying for the moon?" "It's my birthday last week, and my father asked me - what do you want? And I said I want the moon please. And my father wouldn't get it for me, and I'm so upset.. I'm crying for the moon." And the father said, "You're stupid. You're crazy! Why are you crying for? No-one can give you the moon!" "You call me crazy," said the actor, "You're crying for your dead son. At least you can see the moon! Where is your dead son?" [laughter]. And at that, this is a story, an old story, in the Buddhist texts, at that, the man realised what he was doing, he was crying for something you can never get. Grieving for something which you can't change. And that was enough for him to stop his grief, go back to work, and move on with his life.

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  • The conservative parents who became friends

    In brief: One of Ajahn Brahm's first Perth funerals is for a young British Buddhist of 23 or 24 who dies of cancer at Bethesda hospice. His very…

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    there was this young guy he was from UK and he he's only about 23 24 he developed cancer his terminal and he was over in one of the first hospices which was I was at um over in Netherlands by the river the old hospital over there somewhere what was it called again Netherlands or Del Keith somewhere Betha okay that sounds right Betha anyway so I went to see him in there and you know there's nothing you could really do you know he was dying but he was a Buddhist so when he actually died and I would did the funeral service his parents came over from UK and his parents were just this quintessential like um country folk from from UK you know they lived in a village they were very very formal very um conservative very Christian and when they saw me come into the the room for the funeral of their only son just their drawers dropped oh God what's what's doing the funeral for our only son and that's actually what I started off with you could see just it was almost like disappointment very severe disappointment this was their only son who died tragically of cancer and this guy in a funny robe was doing the funeral service for them at the end of the funeral service about 25 years ago they were so impressed they gave a $500 donation you know just out of joy and they they um made a decision that when they die that I have to do their funeral service for them and also that their ashes would get spread at bodana Monastery they became really really good friends the mother died her ashes were spread over bodana Monastery uh he's getting a bit old now he'd always come every year to our bana Monastery became a really really dear friend

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  • The wild horse that kissed the coffin

    In brief: Gerald in Hong Kong sent a photo-story: a man tamed a wild horse with only kindness and patience — no hitting or starving — until the…

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    there was a horse which no one could actually tame a wild horse and he decided to give it a try but not training it by hitting it or starving it or punishing it in any which way but just being patient and being kind and of course it took him a long time but after a while this horse you know would allow him to ride on on the horse's back became like an ordinary horse people thought it could never be they used the word broken that's a terrible word to use to break a horse he just used kindness and patience and this horse you know would always you know be this guy's friend would would greet him you know when he would come home from some other business he would greet him by actually putting his mouth on the on the mouth of this owner was actually kissing him but then unfortunately after so many years the owner died and passed away and this guy in hong kong gerald sent this beautiful photograph with the story of when this guy was in the coffin dead the horse came up and kissed his friend kissed the coffin obviously even that horse recognized that this that was his friend i just gave it one last kiss and this is those sorts of stories

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