Stories about prediction
2 Buddhist wisdom stories about prediction from Buddhist teachers, each linked to the original talk.
- The abbot who forecast the winterJoke · Ajahn Brahm
In brief: In a mountain monastery in Ladakh, a newly elected abbot, a poor meditator, is asked whether the winter will be cold, as the psychic old abbot used to be asked. He says he'll…
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monastery in Northern India about this time of the year actually probably around the November time and the old abbot... you know had passed away and they had a new abbot. The old abbot... was working too hard and got worn out and faded away. So they had to elect this new abbot. And anyway... if you are like a head monk you are supposed to be wise and good meditator and a good leader, but you are also supposed to have a few powers... in the back pocket, just in case and one of these powers which this abbot had in this monastery in the North of India... he would always be able to... sort of you know predict you know sort of catastrophes or whatever is happening... in particular at that time of the year the other monks depended on him and they did this... this year as well... they asked the abbot... is it going to be a cold winter? up in the foothills of the Himalayas... or is it going to be a mild winter? what's going to happen? the old abbot would always be very accurate he would be able to meditate and say very cold winter, mild winter, or in-between so they asked the new abbot and the abbot said "leave it with me tonight and I'll meditate on it" the new abbot wasn't as experienced as the old one so instead of meditating on it... he got out his cell phone and rang the Meteorological office ... asked to get through to the head-guy this was actually a professor. Abbot didn't tell he was a abbot of a monastery a famous monastery all he did is say, "ah... if you don't mind me asking what's the long term weather forecast in this area of North India?" and the professor said... "well... you know it would probably be... average cold" "thank you!" and so the following morning the abbot after the chanting told all the monks... "I perceive... I predict... it's going to be just an average cold winter up here so you better collect some wood to heat the monastery so all the monks... every other duty was stopped and they went to collect some wood and after one week of hard work collecting wood they (monks) asked, "is this enough?" and the abbot said, "leave it with me" "I'll meditate tonight", he wasn't lying, he did meditate, but also rang up afterwards he rang up the meteorological office and asked, "How's it looking?" and the professor said, "actually it's got worse" "I think it's going to be quite a cold winter", Abbot, "Thank you!" So the following morning, he told all the monks, get back to work, go collect some more wood, it's going to be a cold winter up here. so they worked very hard getting some wood and then... after another week, same thing (monks) "Is this enough"... (abbot ) "leave it with me" in the night when monks were asleep he got the mobile phone out and rang the professor anonymously (abbot) "how's it looking?" (professor) "oh, it's got much worse!" "it's going to be a really cold winter" (abbot) "thank you!" ... so... next morning told monks ... "It's going to be really cold" said the head monk (abbot) "collect more wood" so they really worked hard collected wood all over the place stacking it here, stacking it there and they were really exhausted and at the end of three weeks "is this enough?" (abbot) "leave it with me" and that night he called the professor again (abbot) "how's it going?" and the professor said... "phew... I've never seen anything like this" "the signs are it's going to be one of the coldest, bitterest winters ever seen in this part of North India" and the abbot... anonymous... the professor didn't know who he was abbot, "are you sure?", professor, "yes" (abbot) "how do you know?" "well" said the professor of meteorology "All those monks in the holy monastery are collecting wood like nobody's business
- 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