Stories about judgment
4 Buddhist wisdom stories about judgment from Buddhist teachers, each linked to the original talk.
- Good, bad — who knows? The king's fingerStory · Ajahn Brahm
In brief: A king scratches his finger hunting; the court doctor only says 'good, bad, who knows?' When the finger worsens and must be amputated, the king jails the doctor. Later, captured…
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it was a story of the king you went hunting you know this is a good dad who knows story a golden oldie but is so powerful King when hunting and when he was hunting he scratched his finger and when he scratched his finger there was a doctor in his entourage and so he called a doctor over doctor my fingers been scratched can you please have a look at it and the doctor looked at it and just put a bandaid on it and the King said is it gonna be okay it's my finger and she would ask her doctor is it gonna be okay and the doctor said good bad who knows that's pretty wise isn't it you know it didn't impress the King that much so when he got back to the palace after enjoying himself on the hunt by that time the finger was red it was infected so the king called the doctor over again and said doctor look at my finger it's got worse and so the doctor took the band-aid off put some ointment on I put a proper bandage and I cleaned it out put a bandage on and of course the the King asked again is it gonna be okay is it okay and the doctor you said good bad who knows so the key was a bit perturbed but he's very busy so he just let the stupid doctor go away but a couple of days later I mean his finger was so bad you know that the doctor had to amputate it that's how infected it was and of course you know if that happened to you you'd sue the doctor you know you get a lawyer and take them to court or whatever and get some compensation in those days it wasn't suing you just put that doctor in prison in the bottom of the palace and he put the doctor in prison himself say you stupid doctor law what's happened to my finger all this good bad who knows business and so what do you think about that there may be in jail I know where the doctor who applied to their King being in jail good bad who knows that crazy doctor you can run there so that they've left the doctor in jail and of course in a couple of weeks later when his finger was healed he went back to his favorite pastime hunting in the forest and this time he was a bit heedless he was following some sort of animal and got separated from the rest of his entourage and got lost in the forest lost in the forest wandering around he actually got captured by this forest people these indigenous people and they were so totally startled beyond his control they didn't know he was a king they just captured him they happened to be one of their holy days so they took him to the priests to be sacrificed so their God a human sacrifice so they tied him up and the priest was doing all the mumbo-jumbo and the dancing up and down and stuff and then he got out the sacrificial knife it was about to snow slit the Kings well there's only the last moment the very last moment that the priests realized the king was missing a finger and he said stop everybody if we make a sacrifice to our God we have to sacrifice somebody perfect he's not perfect enough he's missing one finger set him free so because he lost one finger and he wasn't perfect enough to be sacrificed to a god they set him free and he realized that doctor what a wise man he was I lost a finger I thought it was bad but as he was good because if I had all my ten fingers I'd be dead by now so soon as he as soon as he found his way back to the prison he went in the bathroom as he went straight to the prison straight to the doctor's cell and opened the lock himself and said you're free I'm so sorry what I did know you were right and he told him the story and I said it was good I lost my finger otherwise I wouldn't be here today I'd be dead sacrificed but the doctor was remorseful he felt so guilty about what he did
- He judged the violin — then heard the old womanStory · Ajahn Brahm
In brief: A poor mountain father sacrifices for his children's education; they prosper in the city, send him a fine violin he cannot play — it sounds awful. Years later in town he hears…
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an old man who lived up in the mountains. And he worked very hard in a very poor village so that his children could have a really great education. And the children they did work hard at school then at university and then they went to town then to the city where they established themselves in good careers. And after they had established themselves, they decided together to invite their father into the city for the first time. And this father had worked hard all his life. He never seen a major city before. And so when he went into that city, he saw things he never ever seen before. And one of the things he didn't actually see, he heard it. It's really terrible, terrible, terrible sound. But even though the sound was very hard to listen to, he couldn't resist finding out what was causing what he decided was the worst sound in the whole world. And he followed it to a house. In the back room of a house, he saw a little child trying to play the violin. He never seen a violin before in his life. And he saw this little child. It was a terrible noise. And so he thought, "Violins are bad." He never wanted to hear a violin again. Same day in the afternoon, passed another house. This time he heard a beautiful sound, one of the most beautiful sounds he'd ever heard. followed that to the front room of a house. There he saw an old woman playing the violin. The same instrument. There was an old woman. She had learned how to play that violin. And she was a maestro of that instrument. And he thought straight away that he'd made a mistake judging the instrument rather than judging the person
- Suicide is stuffing up one exam questionStory · Ajahn Brahm
In brief: Parents who used to come to Friday talks lost a child to suicide just before the TEE exams. Ajahn Brahm frames a life like an exam of many papers and questions: stuffing up one…
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there was one I don't know if the parents are here this evening. They used to come most evenings. Uh they uh their kid uh committed suicide just before the TEE exams. Uh he's doing very well. There was no reason why he We don't still don't know why people commit suicide, but there it was. Committed suicide. And of course, they were very distraught. And I said, "Look, in the "How many papers in each subject? Two." I didn't really know where I was going with this. But so, that's 10 papers. Maybe say five questions in each paper. So, that's 50 questions decide whether you're going to get to university or not. So, you've got 50 questions. If you stuff up one question, does that mean you're not going to go to university? Of course not. So, committing suicide is stuffing up one question. But keep that in perspective of everything else you've done in your life. So, you can't measure a person's life just by the ending. Yeah, they committed suicide. It's a stupid thing to do. But what about all the other things they did in their life? Does that count for nothing? Of course it doesn't. So, when you look at their whole life, not just the ending, their whole life, they're probably really good person. They did a lot of kindness, a lot of love, a lot of a nice person to be around. But you know, they the last question in the exam, they they messed up that answer. But the rest of the questions were perfect. So, such a person would get a good rebirth. But if they've lived a terrible life and been selfish and hurtful and cheated on everybody and everything else, then it doesn't matter how they end their life, they're still going to have a bad rebirth. So, don't just judge a life by the way it ended. The life is bigger than the end. Much bigger. And anyway, sometimes you don't know why a person did these things. So, I It's very hard to judge. What I really don't like is people who say, "Suicide, therefore you're going to go to hell. It's the worst thing to do. It's a bad thing. I don't know where people get those ideas from. It's already bad enough if a loved one has committed suicide and you hear those other stupid people go along and say, "Oh, they're going to go to hell, it's a bad thing to do." That makes it so much worse and it's untrue. So, look at the whole life, not just the ending. And trust a good person will get a good rebirth.
- The ugly dead trees were condominiumsStory · Ajahn Brahm
In brief: New to Serpentine forest he wants to chainsaw 'ugly' dead trees; learns they house possums, birds, lizards — a condominium, not a cemetery.
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dead trees. Now I came from Europe, you know, where the trees were mostly alive. So when I saw the dead trees, I wanted to get the chainsaw out and cut down those dead trees. They were ugly. You know, who wants to live like in a cemetery forest? And so if you could take down the dead trees and all these live trees would grow up and you have this beautiful like green forest with leaves everywhere and these dead trees were just a blight on the landscape. So I thought the dead trees were terrible until somebody told me and it was true that in those dead trees that was the habitat for many psums