On a recent trip to a Tibetan documentary festival, I happened to stop by a thrift shop set up at the venue… (that’s when an idea struck me why keep on writing about the usual and why not take a deviation from the beaten track and look at the Tibetan problems from a different perspective. I would rather say the teachings and culture are often quite explicitly explained in the varied documentaries, often portraying, the land, the religion and the people. But rarely do you get to hear any folklore associated to the region).
Well like all thrift shops they had several things that are usually associated with Thrift shops… Well of the whole lot, one thing caught my attention in particular. It was a sticker and not like any of the other stickers available at the shop. While the other sticker were screaming out in bold “save Tibet”, or “students for a Liberated Tibet”, this one only had a picture on it. No words blaring out any message just one picture.
To describe the picture, let’s see; it was a round sticker, predominantly green, with a landscape in the back ground and in the fore ground it had a tree and below the tree stood an elephant, atop with sat a monkey hold aloft a rabbit and finally a bird completing this strange pyramid.
Now looking at this strange sticker I ask the guy behind the counter the story behind the sticker and get the following explanation:
Once upon a time an elephant came upon a giant tree in the forest by the river bank. He rested under its shade for a rest. Soon a monkey came to rest there also. The elephant said, "This is my tree. I found it first." The monkey replied, "Do you see any fruit on this tree?" "No" said the elephant. The monkey said triumphantly, "Ah! I was here before you and I ate up the fruits on this tree before you got here." The elephant then bowed to the monkey, "OK, you're my big brother, since you came here first." "Wait a minute" said the rabbit that hopped by, "When I saw this tree, it was just a sapling with only a few branches and certainly not any fruit. So I was here before both of you." Then the elephant and monkey bowed to the rabbit: "OK, you're our big brother, since you were here first." Just then, they heard "Ha! Ha! Ha!" from a partridge on the treetop: "This tree wouldn't have sprouted if I didn't spit out the seed from a fruit I had eaten. So I was here before all of you." Then the elephant, monkey, and rabbit, all bowed to the partridge, "OK, you're truly our big brother, since you planted this very tree." Then they decided to share the tree together in peaceful harmony— enjoying the beauty of the tree's fragrance, the nourishment of the tree's fruits, and the bounty of the tree's shade. Other animals in the forest often see them together with the partridge on top of the rabbit that is held up by the monkey who rides on top of the elephant. Henceforth, they were called "the four harmonious brothers", and by their example, peace reigned throughout the jungle.
Well that was the folklore associated with the sticker, well I began to wonder what is it that this sticker so blatantly trying to convey. Well upon further investigation I am told it is the That is, when our body (the elephant), mind (the restless monkey), and emotion (the hare in the moon) are balanced, our soul (the bird) is open to the spirit (the tree of life). A sticker on the folklore of the harmonious four to explain Buddhism, it sure is an interesting…
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