Thursday evening, 2/7/08

My friend, Paul Dietrich, sent me a book, Desert Wisdom, Sayings from the Desert Fathers, by Yushi Nomura, about the hermits of the 2nd, 3rd and 4th centuries AD in Egypt.  They sound so much like the hermits of China, some of whom I met on my trip through China with Bill Porter. What interesting folk hermits are.  

To purposely withdraw from society for a year, ten years or a lifetime, in order to think, to delve more deeply into one's self so as to be a better follower of an idea, faith or god is truly extraordinary.  The hermit finds his or her own place, high in the mountains, deep in the country, away from society, yet not so far as to be gone.  They need seed for gardens, acolytes to teach, other hermits to commune with.  Yet they need hours and hours of solitude in which to meditate on their breath, their bodies and their center.   Bill said that Buddhist monks become hermits as a sort of graduate program.  They need that couple of years or more in order to find their center, their "present", the emptiness they seek.  

In the book Paul sent I found some sayings by various monks that could just as well have come from China.  Here are a few:

"It was said about Abba (father) Agathon that for three years he carried a pebble around in his mouth until he learned to be silent."

"Abba Silvanus said: Woe to the person whose reputation is greater than his work."

"An old man said: If you have words, but no work, you are like a tree with leaves but no fruit.  But just as a tree bearing fruit is also leafy, a person who has good work comes up with good words."

And finally, in this time of the Bear Market are these words:

"An old man said: If you have lost gold or silver, you can find something in place of what you lost.  However, if you lose time you cannot replace what you lost."

Ciao