Yellowbrow Yaoguai Kings
Description
In the West, on the peak of Mount Lingshan.
Two men sat facing each other. Clouds billowed and the air crackled with tension.
The young monk looked up at the sky, then pressed his palms together and bowed to another monk with brows yellow. “Our masters are all here, brother. Are you ready?”
The yellow-brow monk smiled and returned the bow. “I have been ready for some time.”
The Ullambana Assembly, held once every five hundred years, had come to the stage of debate for graduating disciples.
The young monk raised a hand, signaling his brother to ask the first question.
“Tell me, brother,” said the yellow-brow monk, “what is the meaning of life?”
“To seek truth,” replied the young monk.
“And what is truth?”
“The way all things move, the primary law of the universe.”
The yellow-brow monk said nothing but brought out a flower. Its petals, first drooping, gradually unfurled in glorious bloom.
Gazing at the flower, he said, “Observe it. By following its nature, it undergoes such wonderous changes.”
He then gently sniffed the flower and said, “Every flower that blooms releases a unique fragrance. This is the essence of its life, bursting forth for its own propagation.”
He let go, and the flower drifted away. “To feel such a moment to the fullest, that is bilss.”
The young monk shook his head. “A moment’s pleasure leads to an eternity of pain. One will be trapped in the cycle, never at peace.”
The yellow-brow monk said, “On my recent journey down the mountain, I saw parents who, driven by hunger, exchanged their children for food. I saw dissolute sons of wealthy families who, consumed by lust, brought ruin to the moral order.”
The young monk frowned, looking at his senior brother.
The yellow-brow monk continued. “I saw learned scholars who, craving glory, supressed the dissents. I saw great generals who, thirsting for gain, massacred entire clans.”
The young monk remained unshaken. He said evenly, “Brother, do you not see? Those parents who traded their child for a meal will regret it all their lives. Those dissolute sons, living without restraint, died in an instant with their joy. The scholars who suppressed dissent, once they fell from power, were reviled by all. The generals who loved slaughter, they could never rest easy, undone by their own sins.”
The yellow-brow monk retorted, “Nonsense!”
The young monk was slightly taken aback. “Nonsense?”
“Their struggle, their joy, their determination, and their pleasure. Their endless cycle of sorrow and ecstasy never ceased, and never sated!” said the yellow-brow monk, “And this is the very source of the boundless vitality across the Three Realms. How then should it not be the true meaning of all life?”
“And those who set themselves up as false idols. Given time, their pretensions are always unmasked. They become a joke in nursery rhymes and a laughingstock in the pages of history.”
“Brother? Why do you praise the suffering of karmic cycles, as you spurn the truth of liberation and enlightenment?”
The yellow-brow monk said, “Brother, without joy and sorrow, what is there to enlighten?”
The young monk said, “Where lies enlightenment? It is but suffering, plain and clear.”
The yellow-brow monk bellowed, “In pain, one finds revel, and in revel, pain! Without both, there is no redemption!”
Poetry
Indulging in desires, I am carefree,
No fears, no sorrows, just pure glee.
In land of bliss, at the Eight Precepts, I laugh with delight,
Inherent nature blooms, a tower of light.
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