歌曲
The Blind Men and the Elephant
Author: John Godfry Saxe(1816 – 1887)
Artist: Natalie Merchant
Album: Leave Your Sleep
Six men of Hindustan
To learning much inclined
went to see the Elephant
Though all of them were blind
That each by observation
Might satisfy his mind
Satisfy his mind, satisfy his mind
Six men of Hindustan
To learning much inclined
Well the First approached the Elephant
And happening to fall
Against his broad and sturdy side
At once began to bawl
"God bless me!
But this Elephant is very like a wall!"
And the Second, feeling of the tusk
Cried, "Ho! what have we here
So very round and smooth and sharp
To me 'tis mighty clear
This wonder of an Elephant is very like a spear!"
All of them were blind
All of them were blind
Six men of Hindustan
To learning much inclined
The Third approached the animal
And happening to take
The squirming trunk within his hands
Thus boldly up his spake
"I see," quoth he
"The Elephant is very like a snake!"
Then the Fourth reached out an eager hand
and felt about the knee
"What most this wondrous beast is like
Is mighty plain," quoth he
"'Tis clear enough the Elephant is very like a tree!"
And the Fifth who chanced to touch the ear
Said: "Even the blindest man
Can tell what this resembles most
Deny the fact who can
This marvel of an Elephant is very like a fan!"
And the Sixth no sooner had begun
about the beast to grope
Seizing on the swinging tail
that fell within his scope
"I see," quoth he, "the Elephant is very like a rope!"
All of them were blind
All of them were blind
Six men of Hindustan
To learning much inclined
To learning much inclined
And so these men of Hindustan
Disputed loud and long
Each in his opinion
Exceeding stiff and strong
Each was partly in the right
but all were in the wrong
So often theologic wars,
The disputants, I ween
Rail on in utter ignorance
Of what each other mean
And prate about an Elephant
Not one of them has seen!
课文
The Blind Men and the Elephant
八六版高中英语课文 第一册 LESSON 3 THE BLIND MEN AND THE ELEPHANT 盲人和象
Once upon a time there were six blind men who lived in a village in India. Every day they went to the road nearby and stood there begging. They had often heard of elephants, but they had never seen one, for, being blind, how could they?
One morning an elephant was led down the road where they stood. When they heard that an elephant was passing by, they asked the driver to stop the beast so that they could have a "look".
Of course they could not look at him with their eyes, but they thought they might learn what kind of animal he was by touching and feeling him. For, you see, they trusted their own sense of touch very much.
The first blind man happened to place his hand on the elephant's side. "Well, well," he said. "This beast is exactly like a wall."
The second grasped one of the elephant's tusks and felt it. "You're quite mistaken," he said. "He's round and smooth and sharp. He's more like a spear than anything else."
The third happened to take hold of the elephant's trunk. "You're both completely wrong," he said. "This elephant is like a snake, as anybody can see."
The fourth opened both his arms and closed them round one of the elephant's legs. "Oh, how blind you are!" he cried. "It's very clear that he's round and tall like a tree."
The fifth was a very tall man, and he caught hold of one of the elephant's ears. "Even the blindest person must see that this elephant isn't like any of the things you name," he said. "He's exactly like a huge fan."
The sixth man went forward to feel the elephant. He was old and slow and it took him quite some time to find the elephant at all. At last he got hold of the beast's tail. "Oh, how silly you all are!" cried he. " The elephant isn't like a wall, or a spear, or a snake, or a tree; neither is he like a fan. Any man with eyes in his head can see that he's exactly like a rope."
Then the driver and the elephant moved on, and the six men sat by the roadside all day, quarrelling about the elephant. They could not agree with one another, because each believed that he knew just what the beast looked like.
It is not only blind men who make such stupid mistakes. People who can see sometimes act just as foolishly.
觉悟
The Whole Elephant 大象的全貌
Thanissaro Bhikkhu, Feb 16, 2016
audio flie & transcript from: dhammatalks.org
Bodhiwood 字幕组译制
You probably know the story of the blind men and the elephant.
你们应该听过盲人摸象的故事。
A king gets one of his ministers to gather up the blind people in the city and then says, “Okay, show them an elephant.”
国王让他的一个大臣召集一群盲人， 下令：“好，去牵一头象过来。”
So some of the blind people touch the elephant's legs. Some touch his trunk. Some touch his tusks. Some touch his body. Some touch his tail.
盲人来摸象，分别摸到腿、鼻、牙、身、尾。
And depending on what they touched, they have their ideas about what an elephant is like.
他们根据自己所摸到的，来描述大象是什么样子。
Some say the elephant's like a post. Or the elephant's like a granary, like the pole of a plow.
分别说大象像柱子、粮仓、曲轅。
My favorite comparison comes from the ones who touched the tail and said, “The elephant is like a broom.”
我最喜欢的比喻就是那个摸到尾巴的，说“大象像扫帚。”
And then the blind people start fighting each other over what interpret of the elephant is right, saying, “It's like this. It's not like that.”
这群盲人于是为此争论不休，觉得自己对，别人错。
The creepy part of the story, of course, is that the king did this for his entertainment and he's gratified by the sight of the blind people fighting.
这个故事诡异的地方是，国王召集这群盲人，
目的是为了给自己逗乐，看到盲人争吵不休，他很开心。
What's even creepier, though, is that there's another version of the story in the Chinese Canon,
更诡异的是，这个故事的另外一个版本，来自中文典籍，
the same story, but interpreted differently.
相同的故事，不同的诠释。
In the Pali Canon, the blind people are non-Buddhist sectarians.
在巴利典籍里，盲人不属于任何佛教派别。
They don't know the Dhamma and so they fight over the Dhamma because they don't really know it.
他们未闻法，因此他们争论不休。
In the Chinese version, though, the blind people stand for all people, Buddhist or not,
中文版本里，盲人代表所有人，包括佛教徒、非佛教徒。
basically saying that even Buddhists are blind.
总的说来，即使是佛教徒，也可能是盲人。
There's nobody who can really know the Dhamma.
没有人能真正了解法。
All we know is winnowing baskets, brooms, granaries, and posts. We don't really know the elephant.
我们只能知道簸箕、扫帚、粮仓、柱子，不是真正了解大象。
it's impossible for us to know the elephant.
我们也没办法了解大象。
So we shouldn't fight over our interpretations. Just content ourselves, some people say that the ear is the elephant, so they think that it's a winnowing basket,
所以没有必要彼此争吵。满足于自身即可。
有人说耳朵是大象，所以他们认为大象是簸箕，
while you have to content yourself with winnowing basket,
这样簸箕就可以让你满足自身，
and you have to content yourself with your broom or your granary or whatever.
你也可以用扫帚、粮仓之类的来让自己满足。
And the story is not just in the Chinese Canon. It's still told to this day.
这个故事不仅在中文典籍里。直到今天，大家还讲这个故事，
in all kinds of Buddhist centers.
各个佛教团体都会讲这个故事。
It's a really destructive version of the story because the implication is that nobody can ever know the Dhamma. It's too big.
这样诠释这个故事真是具有毁灭性，
它表示没人能真正了解佛法。这太夸张了。
And the other implication, of course, is that you might as well stop trying to figure out what way of knowing the Dhamma is right or not.
另外它还意味着，你应该停止对佛法的探求，不必要追求对错。
It is true that there's an awfullot in the Buddha's awakening.
佛陀的证量高深莫测，这没错。
As he said, it's like a forest full of leaves, whereas what he taught was just a handful of leaves. But it is a handful.
佛陀也说过，他的证量如同森林之叶，而他说宣说的如同掌中之叶。
And the handful is what's important to know. That's what we all have to know.
他所宣讲的掌中之叶是我们了解的关键，我们所有人都该去了解。
And it's something we can get our heads around: the four noble truths.
这是我们可以弄明白的：四圣谛。
That's not all that much to comprehend.
我们需要了解的并不是很多。
To paraphrase Ajaan Lee, “There are people out there who can manage orchards of thousands of acres,
转述一下阿姜李的话：“能够管理万亩果园的大有人在，
and here we have just four noble truths, or four jhanas, and we can't get them straight. It's kind of embarrassing.”
我们只是面对四圣谛、四禅那，但是却整不明白。真丢脸。“
—the implication being, of course, that there's not all that much we have to master.
阿姜李的意思是，我们需要掌握的其实并不多。
And it is something we can master.
这些我们能够掌握。
And we're not going to spend our whole lives always being blind. After all, the Buddha was One with Eyes.
我们不要生生世世做个瞎眼汉。毕竟佛陀是具眼者。
and one of his images for the path is his act of teaching that he's a doctor who can cure people of their blindness.
在修行上，佛陀的一个形象就是医治瞎子的医生。
You probably know that story as well.
你可能也知道这个故事。
There's a blind man and someone gives him a cloth. It's a dirty old rag, but the person giving him the cloth says, “Here's a nice white piece of cloth. It looks really nice on you.”
有人给一个盲人一件很脏很破的衣服，告诉他：“送给你一件白色衣服，你穿着它很好看。”
So the blind man takes good care of the dirty old rag, thinking it's a nice white piece of cloth.
盲人小心翼翼地穿着那件又脏又破的衣服，觉得它是一件很好的白色衣服。
But then his friends and relatives take him to a doctor who can cure him of his blindness.
后来他的亲友带他去看医生，医好了他的眼病。
As he gets his sight back, he looks at the cloth.
恢复视力之后，他看到了那件衣服。
He sees that it's a dirty old rag. What he thought was valuable was not.
看到了那件衣服又脏又破，以前认为珍贵的，现在知道不是如此。
The gaining of sight, of course,is the gaining of the Dhamma eye.
恢复视力，当然就是获得了法眼。
When you see that there is really something deathless; and it can be obtained through the path.
当你发现真的有不死之道，可以通过修行获得。
So we're here to get over our blindness.
所以我们就要让瞎眼重见天日。
And we have to take it as our encouragement that it is possible to get over our blindness.
以此来鼓励自己，我们是可以重见天日的。
Don't listen to the people who say you can't.
有人说不能，你不要听他们的。
Just this evening, a magazine arrived in which someone was writing about how when he started on the Buddha's path, he was hoping for enlightenment,
就在今晚，有一个杂志社来这里，其中有人写了自己如何修习佛法，希望获得觉悟。
but what he got instead was awakening to the fact that there really is nothing to know. You should satisfy yourself with this state of not knowing, he said.
结果他悟到了：就是知无可知。他说：你应该满足于这种‘无知’。
That, again, is a destructive way of thinking.
这样想，也不好，对修行有破坏作用。
There is something to know.
其实啊，是有所知的，
And when you know it, it makes a huge difference.
若你认识到这一点，一切将大不相同。
it confirms the fact that your actions really do make a difference in your life.
它确证了你的行为真的会改变你的人生。
You know that if you hadn't acted on the path, you wouldn't have reached the deathless. You wouldn't have seen the deathless.
如果你没有走在法的道路上，就不会获得，不能亲证不死之道。
And you also see, in stepping out of space and time, just how long this process of suffering has been.
你同样看到，从时空的角度，你的苦难将是多么漫长。
That gives you all the more encouragement to do what you can to get past it, to complete the practice,
这样就能更好地鼓励你，努力超越它，圆满你的修行。
even though you realize that in gaining this vision you've cut off a lot of the suffering that you would have had to go through if you hadn't gained this vision, this eye, this sight.
即使你认识到通过获得这种知见，你已经减少了很多痛苦，如果你没有获得这个知见，你将受更多的苦。
But still, you see what it's like to be totally free of suffering.
你仍然可以看到彻底从痛苦中解脱是怎么回事。
Just the act of being in the six senses, being immersed in the world of the space and time in the six senses: There's a lot of suffering there.
通过六根所在的这个世界，在时间和空间之中，有许多的痛苦。
So take heart in the fact that, however blind you may feel you are in terms of the path, blindness can be cured.
要记住这个事实，无论你在求道途中是多么无知，你都能重见天日。
This is what the noble eightfold path is all about.
这就是八正道的要义所在。
If you develop right view all the way through right concentration, these qualities enable you to see more clearly.
通过正定发展正见，这些能让你看得更清楚。
And here, again, think about that interpretation of the story of the elephant.
再想想盲人摸象的故事。
If you say that everybody's blind and they have to content themselves with winnowing baskets and brooms and whatnot,
如果你说人人都是瞎子，必须满足于自身的局限，只知道类似簸箕、扫帚之类的东西。
there seems to be no right or wrong.
这样就没有对错了。
But right view is right because it works. It really does form a part of the path to the deathless that takes you out of your blindness.
正见之所以为“正”是因为它管用。它真的能够让你通向不死之道，带你脱离黑暗。
Right resolve is right because it works – and so on down all the factors of the path.
正思维之所以为“正”是因为它管用，如此所有其他几个也是这样。
The more mindful you are when you've learned a lesson that helps you to see more clearly, the more concentrated the mind, the more still you are,
当你学习的时候，越专心你就越能搞明白，你的心越专注，你就越平静，
then the more you can see what's going on inside.
这样你越能看清楚你的内心。
And even before you hit the deathless, you're able to see parts of your mind that were hidden in blind spots up to that point.
在抵达不死之道前，你就能看到心的部分，那部分曾经被掩藏于黑暗。
So we're here to see and to develop the qualities of mind that enable us to see:
所以我们在这里观察和开发心的品质，让我们看清：
the right view that has us look at the right spot;
正见让我们朝着正确的地方看；
the right effort that helps to clear away the things that get in the way of our seeing;
正精进为我们扫清其中的障碍；
and the right concentration that gives us an all-around vision.
正定给我们全方位的视觉。
We get the mind centered,
我们让心专一，
and once it's properly centered,it can look around itself—
当心正确地专注，就可以环视自身——
because you not only see the object that you're focused on when you concentrate, but you also begin to see the activities of the mind as they relate to the object.
因为你不仅看到你专注的所缘，你同时也开始看到与之相关的心的活动。
That's what you want to see. You want to see what you're doing.
这就是你想看到的。你想看自己在做什么。
This is the big blind spot in our lives and it's very ironic.
这是我们生活中的一个大盲点，很讽刺。
If it's right close to us—what we're doing, our intentions for why we're doing things—
如果它离我们很近—我们在做什么，我们做的动机——
We should know these clearly, but we have a tendency to hide them from ourselves,
我们应该很了解这些，但是我们倾向于掩藏它们，
or just to get interested in other things so much that we don't see what we're doing.
或者我们对其他事情太感兴趣了，所以看不见我们真正在干什么。
So we're turning the spotlight in the right spot: What are you doing right now?
所以我们将一束光投射到正确的地方：我们当下正在干什么？
How are you doing it? How skillfully are you doing it?
你是怎么做的？你用什么善巧方法来做？
To what extent are you giving rise to stress, pain, disease or disturbance by what you're doing?
通过你的所作所为，你给自己造成了什么程度的苦迫、痛苦、病痛和干扰。
And how can you get the mind more still to step back from those activities?
你怎样让你的心更平静，从这些活动中抽身而退？
See which actions are unskillful so that you can drop them. See which ones are skillful so you that can keep doing them
看清楚哪些行为是不善巧的，就放弃它们。哪些行为是善巧的，就继续，
until they've done the work.
直到完成任务。
As we keep following this path, as the Buddha said, eventually it will take us to a place that we haven't seen before—to see the as-yet-unseen.
我们持续走在这条路上，如佛陀所言，最终它带我们至于从前未见之处。
It's unseen not because it's unseeable, but simply because we haven't looked in the right place. We haven't looked properly. We don't have the right vision yet, the right capacity to see it.
没见到不是因为不可见，仅仅是因为我们没有朝着正确的地方看。我们并没有正确的知见，也没有正确的能力去看它。
But that's something that can be developed,
但是我们可以开发出这些品质，
because someday we really will see the whole elephant, and we can throw away our concepts of winnowing baskets, brooms, and granaries.
因为总有一天我们会看见大象的全貌，这样我们就会抛弃以前的簸箕、扫帚、粮仓。
Of course, it's not just a matter of seeing. The Buddha also gives us ways of checking our seeing.
当然，并不只是去看。佛陀还给予我们方法，让我们检测我们的“见”
You know the story, too, of the elephant hunter looking for a elephant in the forest, he sees the tracks of an elephant,
想必你也知道这个故事，猎象者在森林里寻找大象，看到大象的脚印，
but he doesn't immediately jump to the conclusion that this has got to be a elephant. But still, the tracks look likely, so he follows them.
但是他并没有立刻得出结论，说这脚印必定是大象的。只是觉得像大象的脚印，于是他循迹而寻。
He sees scratch marks in the trees,
他看到树上的擦痕，
but again he doesn't jump to the conclusion that this has to be a bull elephant.
同样，他没有立刻做出判断说这是一头公象。
He's looking for a bull elephant because he needs one to do some heavy work.
他想逮住一头公象替他做重体力活。
When he saw the footprints, he knew that it might be dwarf females with big feet.
当他看到脚印的时候，他知道，也可能是一头大脚矮母象留下的。
He sees the scratch marks:These might be tall females with tusks.
当他看到树上的擦痕，也可能是高个子母象用鼻子造成的。
It's only when he actually sees the elephant that he knows he's got the bull elephant he wants.
只有当他看到了大象，才知道找到了他想要的公象。
The footprints and the scratch marks stand for the various stages on the path:
脚印和擦痕代表了修道路上的不同阶段：
the development of concentration, the development of some of the different powers that come from concentration.
禅定的开发，从禅定中开发出的不同能力。
But the vision of the deathless: That's the whole elephant.
对不死之道的知见，则是大象的全貌。
And it's something human beings can see.
这是人类可以见到的。
I was talking with a scholar one time who was saying that he didn't think that any conditioned human being——
我以前跟一个学者交谈，他说他觉得受到局限的人类——
he only saw human beings all were conditioned human beings,
他只是看到所有人都受到局限——
—could see anything unconditioned?
这样受到局限的人类，怎么能见到没有局限的无为法呢？
But with thinking backwards, the Buddha's approach wasn't to define what a human being is and then from that definition, decide what human beings can and can't know.
但是回溯过去，佛陀的方法并不是定义人类，从定义中探求人类能知什么，不能知什么？
Instead, he looked at what human beings can do and what they can know as the result of their actions.
相反，他是看人类能做什么，从行为到结果这个层面，能知道什么
And it took him to a place that really was unconditioned.
这样就将他带到不受限制的地方。
That's when he realized that defining yourself as being this, that, or the other thing is placing a limitation on yourself.
他认识到，这样那样地定义自己，就是给自身设限。
This ranges from everything just the idea that: “I am innately good,” or “I am innately bad,” up to whatever “I am” you might choose.
这包括任何事情，这样的想法：我本质是好的，或者我本质是坏的。或者其他方式给自己下定义。
If you're going to choose an “I am,” just choose an “I am” that says, “I am capable of finding awakening.”
如果非要这样给自己定义，那么就说：“我能够找到觉悟之道。”
That one will get you through.
这样你才能解决问题。
And you know that you have the capability to see the whole elephant when the whole elephant appears.
这样当大象的整个面貌显现出来的时候，你才有能力去见到它。
That's the proof that you don't always have to be blind.
这就是明证：你并不必总是个瞎子。