For those of you who don't know, this is a very famous Theravadin Buddhist story, and it's possible that this is a story about our Buddha in a previous life.
There was an ascetic, a monk, living in the woods who was practicing very hard on patience. He was in the woods spending almost all of his time on practicing patience. Whenever the villagers would come to visit him, he would always and only teach about patience. He was called the Keeper of Patience.
One day the king came to the lake close to where the ascetic was meditating. He was on one side of the lake practicing, and the king went to the other side of the lake to have having a picnic with twenty or so of his women, many of his servants and guards. He was enjoying himself with the pleasures of being King.
After much activity, the King falls asleep.
The women all think to themselves, "Oh great, we're out of the castle, let's go around the lake and just see what's around here."
So they wander around the lake and come across the Keeper of Patience meditating. "Oh great, this is one of those monks, we don't get to see them, let's ask him to teach us." They sat down in front of him and he starts teaching them about patience.
The King wakes up and sees his women gone. he is immediately upset and shouts to his guards, "Where are my women, where are my women?" His guards say, "Well, it's ok, sir. They are around the other side of the lake with the Keeper of Patience." The King immediately gets angry, "He took my women, he took my women."
And he was totally jealous and angry, thinking the Keeper of Patience took his women. So, he goes with his guards and as he gets closer to where the Keeper of Patience is teaching his women, he hears the teacher talking about patience.
When he gets up to the Keeper of Patience, he says, "Patience, patience! We will see about your patience. Cut off his legs!" Blood spurts out.
The Keeper of Patience says to the King, "King, do you think my patience is in my legs?" The King goes further mad, "Cut off his arms!" They cut off his arms.
The Keeper of Patience says, "King, do you think my patience is in my arms?" The King goes, "Cut off his nose and ears!" (That was traditional torture in those days)
The Keeper of Patience says, "King do you think my patience is in my nose and ears?" The story states that the Earth was so horrified it opened up and swallowed the king. The guards got down on their knees and begged the wise Keeper of Patience, "Please don't cast a spell over us, we were only doing our duty."
The Keeper of Patience says, "May you and the king be happy and peaceful forever." And then he dies.
This story is reveals a very high level of practice. A very high level of maintaining our inner strengths in the face of tremendous physical pain.
Now regarding the talk last night on Unpleasant Physical Sensations, I don't know how many of you are working on that level. Even with mosquitoes or a little pain in the knee, whatever.
This is an image, a story to keep in mind, as to where you are going if you want to keep working on that.
To be able to let go of the attachment to this body, knowing we are just going to die. We are not going to take this body with us to another life. Can we develop more non-attachment?
Can we develop the ability to stick to our inner direction, wise principles, in the face of physical pain?
Now, when you think of this story and you think of your direction, how committed are you to your direction?
A question you can ask yourself to test your commitment is this: imagine I come up to you and say, "I am going to cut off your legs, but I won't cut off your legs if you throw away your Dhamma. Renounce it, let go of it, don't do it any more, drop it." Which are you going to do? You ask yourself that question maybe later. Will you allow your legs to be cut off so you can keep your Dhamma, or do you want to keep your legs and throw away your Dhamma?