Trusting One’s Path - A Story about Ajahn Jungien, a
Thai Monk. (Taken from a talk by Eugene Cash.)
"When we become the path, it is inseparable from our life." - Eugene Cash
There is this story about the Theravadan bhikkhu, Ajahn Jungien. At one point in
Thailand there was a war going on between rebel forces and the Thai army, and he put his
retreat centre in the middle between the two battling forces. The Government didn’t
like him, the rebels didn’t like him, but he said, "I’ll teach the Dharma
to both sides." And he did that. Now, so many of the rebels had come to like him that
the rebel commander saw him as a threat, and so they decided to go and kill him. Word came
to Ajahn that they were coming, the rebel commander was leading a group to come and kill
him personally, so he thought about what to do, because if he stayed and got killed, that
would be bad karma for his killers. He wasn’t afraid to die, but he would be putting
them in a situation that was bad for them.
So, he thought, where will I go? And he thought a good place to go would be to go to
the rebel commander’s house. So, that’s what he did. It was late at night and he
woke up the rebel commander’s wife, and she let him in, and then woke up the kids,
and he started teaching the Dharma to them. And the neighbours came over to see what was
going on, and there’s Ajahn teaching the Buddha-Dharma, and they all got involved.
Meanwhile the rebel commander and his men had arrived and searched everywhere, all over
his retreat. They decided to wait for him.
Then Ajahn decided to go back. But the family of the rebel commander and the
neighbours, and some of the rebels who had received teachings from him, said, "But
you’ll have to be careful, or you’ll be killed! You can’t go back
there." But he was going, so they suggested that he get dressed up in rebel fatigues,
and they dressed him up to travel back to his retreat centre, and they took him back. The
rebel commander was waiting there for him.
"Where have you been? I’ve been looking for you everywhere," he said.
"I was at your place, teaching the Dharma to your family," said Ajahn.
The commander looked at him incredulously. He couldn’t believe this guy. And Ajahn
said, "You know, now that I’ve taught your children, they are the children of
the Buddha. Your children are now my children, so we share that. We share a wish for their
welfare."
"But," he added, "your wife is still your wife." The rebel
commander laughed at that, and at that point Ajahn Jungien knew that they would be
friends. And they were.
