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Story · Ajahn Brahm

The Theravada–Mahayana boat race

As told by Ajahn Brahm in Dealing with Tiredness | Ajahn Brahm | 19 Feb 2016

1 min read

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

I went to a conference in Vietnam a couple of years ago, and if you go to conferences, big organised conferences, the organisers want you to see some of the sights. I don't like being a tourist but you had no choice. So I was in the middle of Vietnam somewhere, to these lakes and underground tunnels and stuff, where you go through in a barge, fascinating beautiful place but on the way back... Actually, weird, I was representing Singapore, not Australia, so I was in the Singapore boat and there was another Singapore boat, we had the Theravada monks in our boat, and the Mahayana monks in the other boat, so I looked at them and said "Right, a race, who's better, the Mahayana or the Theravada? [laughter]. Those are the two parts of Buddhist so we had a race between Mahayana and Theravada. I was in the Theravada boat paddling for all I could and the Mahayana monks were paddling really hard as well just to see who would win, and of course it's obvious, the Theravada would win, it's obvious, if you know anything about Buddhism, because the Mahayana, they are Boddhisatvas, they even let other people get to Enlightenment before they do, so they made us get to the finishing line before they did, that's their tradition [laughter].

▶ Watch Ajahn Brahm tell it from 19:33 (to 20:56)

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

Two boatloads of monks raced on a Vietnamese lake, and Ajahn Brahm has a cheeky explanation for why the Theravada boat won: the bodhisattvas were letting others finish first. Monks do daft things and have fun. Take your practice, your faith or your work seriously enough, and still leave room to paddle hard just for the laugh.

In brief (our summary)

On a sightseeing trip at a conference in Vietnam, rowing through lakes and tunnels, Ajahn Brahm (representing Singapore) is in a boat of Theravada monks alongside a boat of Mahayana monks. “Right, a race — who's better?” Both paddle hard; the Theravada boat wins — obviously, he says, because Mahayana monks are bodhisattvas who let others reach enlightenment first.

Teaching point

Monks have fun; religion can be far too serious.

When this story may help

  • taking life too seriously
  • rivalry
  • conferences and work trips

Themes

Source & credit

Told by Ajahn Brahm in Dealing with Tiredness | Ajahn Brahm | 19 Feb 2016 · 2016-02-20 · ▶ watch from 19:33 to 20:56 · Buddhist Society of Western Australia

2 other tellings of this story

Caption notes: Manual (volunteer) captions; occasional misspellings kept as is. '[laughter]' caption annotation inside the span.

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

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