Have you been enjoying the bright beautiful full moon? Western people see a man’s face in the moon, while Eastern people see a hare pounding rice cake. Why? In the East we learn the story of the hare in the moon as children, and we associate it, in the form of bright round rice cakes, with celebrations such as new year’s day. The presence of the hare comes from an ancient Buddhist story from India.
In an early incarnation, the future Buddha was born as a hare, and he freely gave his life out of compassion for a stranger in need. This story was beautifully told in a poem by the 19th-century Zen monk and poet Ryokan. I read his poem to the morning meditation group at our center recently, on the day of the full moon, and I’d like to share my translation of it with you now.
“The Hare in the Moon”
Long, long time ago
there lived in the world
Monkey, Hare and Fox
bound in friendship
playing in the morn
in field and on mount,
returning in the evening
into forest.
Thusly as years passed,
the Lord of Heaven,
hearing it, wanted
to know if it’s true.
Becoming an old man,
he tottered along
to where they lived,
and asked them,
“I have heard that
you are different
in species, but are
playing in the same
mind among yourselves.
If it is as I heard,
please help this old man
of his hunger.”
So saying he rested,
throwing his staff aside:
Having said, “It is easy,”
and after a while,
Monkey came collecting nuts,
from the woods behind.
Fox gave fish to him
brought from a stream in front.
Hare hopped and jumped,
but nothing to gain.
Being abused of the mind,
different, poor indeed,
the Hare plotted and said,
“Monkey, bring firewood.
Fox, please set fire!”
As they did as asked,
the Hare threw herself
into the smoke, and gave
herself to the old stranger.
The old man, upon seeing this,
cried bitterly looking up
the high heaven, and
fell down to the ground.
In a while, beating his bosom,
he said, “You three friends
are inferior to none of you,
but the Hare is specially
kind-hearted,” and
resuming the heavenly body,
picked up the dead body, and
sent it to the moon palace.
The “Hare in the moon”
is because of this –
thus up until the present time
it has been told, and
hearing this I also
drenched thoroughly
the sleeves of my robe.
This story captures the qualities of compassion, true friendship, and the interrelation of all that are central to the Awakened Way. In the literature and teachings of Zen Buddhism, the moon is a recurring symbol of the holy harmony of all. The mind moon is total truth and perfect peace, and any attempt to describe it using conventional language is at best the finger that points to it – a hint only, not the truth itself.
Here, the poet Ryokan is admiring the mind moon that is full and bright, like a mirror that reflects the universe just as it is. There is a story that he was so enamored of the moon that, catching a glimpse as he went to buy sake for a guest, he completely forgot the guest and sat looking at it for hours. Only the pure mind can see Pure Land.
Dogen, the 13th-century monk, teacher, and founder of the Soto school of Zen, also loved the moon, gazing at it even as he sensed his last moment. For Dogen too, the moon shone as the brilliant pure heart-mind. Amazed at the perfect round moon shining forth, he must have recollected his life, remembering this favorite Buddhist verse:
Doing all good,
Doing no evil,
Purifying mind
Is the teaching
Of all buddhas.
When we sit, we still and purify our minds, becoming like the bright beautiful full moon – holy truth itself. When we become holy truth itself, we are together with all throughout the universe, unified with all in space and time. We are supported by all and we are supporting all. If we don’t know this truth and act accordingly, we disintegrate and destroy this universal life system. Being truth is being a true friend; if one is not being a friend, one is not truth.
