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This analogy comes from ''The Sūtra of Nanda's Going Forth'' (Skt. ''Nandapravrajyāsūtra''), where it states the following: | This analogy comes from ''The Sūtra of Nanda's Going Forth'' (Skt. ''Nandapravrajyāsūtra''), where it states the following: | ||
{{QuoteCite | {{QuoteCite | ||
|quote-text="Suppose, Nanda, that this whole wide world comprised the waters of one great ocean in which there dwelled a single, blind turtle, and that there was also a single yoke with a hole, tossing about. Considering this, that blind turtle entertains the thought that it must put its neck through the hole of this yoke, but the yoke with its hole is buffeted by the wind and tossed about in all directions. In that case, Nanda, what are the chances that the blind turtle’s neck would ever accidentally enter the hole of that yoke, even in a hundred years? In the same way, Nanda, this human birth may not be found, nor the excellence of a favorable circumstance. | |quote-text="Suppose, Nanda, that this whole wide world comprised the waters of one great ocean in which there dwelled a single, blind turtle, and that there was also a single yoke with a hole, tossing about. Considering this, that blind turtle entertains the thought that it must put its neck through the hole of this yoke, but the yoke with its hole is buffeted by the wind and tossed about in all directions. In that case, Nanda, what are the chances that the blind turtle’s neck would ever accidentally enter the hole of that yoke, even in a hundred years? In the same way, Nanda, this human birth may not be found, nor the excellence of a favorable circumstance. | ||
"Nanda, it is very difficult for you to find this human birth; and thus, if you have found perfect favorable conditions, | "Nanda, it is very difficult for you to find this human birth; and thus, if you have found perfect favorable conditions, | ||
"Nanda, you have found the very difficult to find | "Nanda, you have found the very difficult to find | ||
Favorable conditions for going forth. | Favorable conditions for going forth. | ||
Nanda, the teacher has appeared before you; | Nanda, the teacher has appeared before you; | ||
So, do not disappoint me!<ref>Alexander Csoma de Kőrös Translation Group, trans., | So, do not disappoint me!<ref>Alexander Csoma de Kőrös Translation Group, trans., ''The Sūtra of Nanda's Going Forth'', ''Nandapravrajyāsūtra'', Toh 328 (84000: Translating the Words of the Buddha, 2023), 1.14–16, https://read.84000.co/translation/toh328.html?#UT22084-072-028-56.</ref> | ||
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From the same sūtra, there is also another, similar analogy for how difficult this precious human rebirth is to obtain. | |||
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|quote-text="Suppose, Nanda, someone tosses some white mustard seeds at the eye of an upright-standing needle. In that case, Nanda, what are the chances that any single white mustard seed would pass through the eye, even in a hundred years? In the same way, Nanda, this human birth may not be found, nor the excellence of a favorable circumstance."<ref>Alexander Csoma de Kőrös Translation Group, ''Sūtra of Nanda’s Going Forth, 1.17, https://read.84000.co/translation/toh328.html. | |||
https://read.84000.co/translation/toh328.html?#UT22084-072-028-61</ref> | |||
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Khenpo Kunpal [LINK to text pdf. P. 191] explains the former example clearly. | |||
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|quote-text=For this reason, the Lord Buddha gave the hypothetical example, found in a sutra setting forth perfect instruction, in which the entire earth is imagined to be covered by an immense ocean on the surface of which there floats a yoke blown here and there by the wind. Coming to the surface once in a hundred years, a blind turtle living in the ocean's depth could in theory find its head inside the yoke, adrift as it is upon the shoreless sea. But since the ocean is vast, the yoke mindless, and the turtle blind, the odds against such a thing happening would be immense. And yet to find a human birth is far more difficult than this!<ref>Fletcher and Blankleder, ''Nectar of Manjushri's Speech'', 150–51.</ref> | |||
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<h4>Carefulness in Action Resulting from Reflecting on the Difficulty of Escaping from the Lower Realms</h4> | |||
Verses 21 and 22 provide the reasoning to support these above quotations from ''The Sūtra of Nanda's Going Forth''. | |||
{{PullBcaVerses|4.21}} | |||
Specifically, here, an "evil action of a single instant" refers to malevolence toward a bodhisattva or to the five negative actions with immediate effect [LINK to glossary]. These are exceptionally heavy karmic actions which can cause someone to die swiftly and to fall directly into a very bad birth without the usual intervening period in the bardo (Tib. ''bar do'').<ref>bardo (བར་དོ་ Wylie: bar do) is an intermediate, transitional, or liminal state between death and rebirth.</ref> This verse explains how, since we have been accumulating such extremely bad karmic actions since beginningless time, there must be so many nonvirtues imprinted on our mindstreams that have not yet ripened. And since we have not purified nearly all of them, how can we expect again to find a happy state of rebirth. The next verse explains that just by experiencing the negative karmic consequences of an action we will not be free from these unhappy states. | |||
{{PullBcaVerses|4.22}} | |||
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