Taoism/The Second Parable: Build the Heavenly Palace in Your Spiritual Heart!
The Second Parable:
Build the Heavenly Palace
in Your Spiritual Heart!
Lao Tse was walking down the path unhurriedly.
Invisible for strangers, his Teacher Huang Di was near him all the time.
None of the casual passers-by could hear their conversation.
No one who observed them could note anything unusual.
Lao Tse was recovering gradually his ability to see and hear his Master.
“How do You come here from the Abode of Tao?” — asked Lao Tse.
“This is easy!” — Huang Di laughed in response. — “This is much easier than to come in the Abode of Tao!”
Huang Di continued with a smile:
“Love unites so firmly that even the death of a body cannot break this union! All that we love sincerely is securely stored in the memory of the soul!
“I remember you! Now you should try to remember your life with Me in your past incarnation. Try to remember the Universal Home where All Those Who have cognized Tao obtain the Unity!
“Anyone who at least once has entered into this Mergence in the Abode of All the Perfect Ones retains this skill forever. One day this memory will awaken the soul and call it again to stand on the Path leading to the Mergence with Tao and to the consolidation of this Mergence! Just as a river rushes to the sea, so such a soul, after being born again in the material world and matured there, rushes to the Boundlessness of Tao! Such souls look for the Unity, in which they find their Ultimate Happiness! If we take all the pleasures of the material world and put them on a scale, they will not be able to match with this Greatest Happiness!
“The wise chooses the Jewel of the Mergence with Tao! The wise prefers this Happiness to all the pleasures of the material world!”
“Can You recreate Your body so that I can embrace You?” — asked Lao Tse.
“I can do everything, but it will be better if you embrace Me without our bodies! Do this with the arms of the consciousness, of the soul! I’m not going to indulge you with the ‘miracles for the babies’! Soon you will recall everything, and the events that you now perceive as miracles will be your usual knowledge and style of life.
“Meanwhile embrace Me tightly, My beloved!”
… Great Huang Di, in His Transparent Appearance, stretched out His Arms Himself to embrace Lao Tse.
… Keenness of this contact of the souls was much stronger than similar embraces with embodied people…
Now the Teacher and His disciple merged as souls.
Anyone who has experienced this understands the importance of such an event.
And to the one who has not experienced it yet, it can happen some day…
… Huang Di continued His lesson:
“Now recall what you should do to stay firmly in the Heavenly Palace, which you should create from your middle dantyan. There you will be able to see Me and feel Me any time!
“Always remember that the innumerable multitude of the material objects and the sequences of the events are just the outward manifestations of life. A human mind wanders from one external object or event to another. It looks at the past or dreams about the future… Still it’s possible to subdue the mind and to teach it to be in calm! For this, one needs to switch one’s attention from the external to the internal…
“This is possible when the mind is immersed in the middle dantyan or, what is the same thing, in the chakra anahata.
“Then one can clear the space and create the Heavenly Palace of the soul in that chakra. Only after this, the Infinite Divine Consciousness called Tao can live there by the Part of Itself.
“In other words, the Heavenly Palace for Tao should be built in the vast depths of the human developed spiritual heart!
“Then one also can live in the inner chambers of this Palace without grieving over misfortunes and without rejoicing over successes but knowing the Base of everything — Tao!
“If you invite Me to this home, then I will come there from My Home — the Abode of Tao. I’ll come to you again and again until you yourself can come to My Home and settle in it forever! This is the Infinite Divine Home of all Te! There They all are One, and this Unity is called Tao!
“Thus your spiritual heart can become a home for Te, Tao, and you yourself!”
… Now Lao Tse began to submerge himself in his spiritual heart consciously, and not spontaneously, as it had happened before during his contacts with Huang Di when the emotions overfilled him and the entire soul turned into love.
Yet at that moment, this area in his chest was not large and transparent enough…
Huang Di continued:
“Feel the arms of the soul, i.e., the arms of the spiritual heart that are consubstantial with it. You can use these arms to clean this space so that you can invite Me there!
“You haven’t cleaned there for a long time. That is why the inner chambers of the soul became like a house in which no one has lived for many years…”
… Huang Di left His disciple for a while and Lao Tse began cleaning his inner chambers.
Soon they became like a crystal glass room shining like a diamond in the light!
“You have worked well to be able to invite Me!” — Huang Di said manifesting Himself once again.
Then He continued:
“At the beginning, the spiritual heart may occupy little space, but the one who strives to merge with Tao should deepen it and then expand it again and again, trying to make it as infinite as Tao!
“Expand your Heavenly Palace with the arms of the consciousness so that it can be decent to invite Me in it and so that you can contain as much of Me as possible!”
… Lao Tse pushed the transparent wall of his Heavenly Palace with his arms of the consciousness, and — oh wonder! — it yielded and moved easily towards the infinity… He did the same with all other walls, then with the floor, and then with the ceiling… He repeated this many times and soon the Freedom, the Expanse, the Light, and the Bliss were all around!
“Now this is truly the Heavenly Palace! — Huang Di said with approval. — “You’ve done it in a very short time, but you should not forget that it will be much more difficult to do the same for your disciples. Some of them will need months for this work, if not years. Now I just have helped you to recall what you already knew in your former life on the Earth. That is why it was possible to do all this so quickly and easily.”
“What should I do next? How should I live?”
“You should live with Me, recalling and studying further the Great Path!”
“Where should I go right now?”
“Now turn to the left. There you will buy for yourself a white donkey. Then you should gather writing instruments and set out on a journey. We have a lot of work to do!”
In fact, having turned to the left, Lao Tse found a road leading to a market. He reached it and found himself in the midst of bustle and hubbub of that place. Yet, surprisingly, all this did not disturb the calm that reigned now in the Heavenly Palace of Lao Tse.
Feeling the presence of Huang Di, he was walking among buyers and sellers.
Soon he saw a man selling a donkey, but Huang Di said:
“Not this one! Keep going!”
… Lao Tse wondered at his new feelings: he spoke with the Immortal so easily as with an incarnate person! He perceived the presence and the words of Huang Di even more clearly than the noise of the market!…
Finally, they found a cute white donkey.
Lao Tse began bargaining with a seller… and lost the sensation of the presence of Huang Di…
At last, the donkey was bought.
“You overpaid! The former owner was cruel to this kind animal and didn’t deserve such a payment!” — Lao Tse heard suddenly. — “Well, for the first one of our concerted actions, it is not bad…”
… Being guided by Huang Di, Lao Tse quickly finished all his affairs and disposed of his property. Then he gathered writing instruments and some food for the road.
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