Buddha
Flowers - Udumbara
26
July 2007
On a Saturday morning this
month (14 July to be precise), Monk Bright
Nothingness (明空师傅) at the Complete
Awareness Monastery (圆觉寺), situated in
Huaiyin Village of Dongzhi Town in Shanxi Province’s Wutai
County (山西省五台县东冶镇槐荫村),
got up
from deep meditation. He had been in a Closing Gate session for nearly
three months since 16 April, during which
time he had not received a single visitor,
and had not spoken to a single soul. Now
there were only two more days left for him to
conclude his annual retreat.
That morning, Bright
Nothingness of the Complete Awareness strode
leisurely into the courtyard, completely
unaware that he might be walking straight
into a historical event that allegedly occurs
only once in 3,000 years, which would later
on give him a lot of things to talk about to
a huge number of visitors flocked to his
temple.
But before that very moment,
at ten past seven, he was just standing there
appreciating the sight of an iron wire hung
across the field to dry his clothes.
He was never into fashion but
forever dons the boring robe of monk, so the
plain view of his clothes - even indeed there
were any hanging there at the time - did not
inspire him much. Yet the humble iron wire
somehow amazed him greatly: He detected some
alien presence. So he stepped forward for a
close inspection. There he saw a small bunch
of white bell-shaped flowers, each about 1 mm
in diameter, supported by floss-like tiny
stems growing on the bare iron wire.
Udumbara (优昙婆罗花) ?! The very reflection upon
this name shook his soul with awe.
What is udumbara then?
According to the Dirghagama
(Long Sayings) Sutra (《长阿含经》), before the World
Honoured One Shakyamuni, there were six
Earth-bound mortals who achieved their
complete realisation and attained their
perfect Buddhahood, and one of them
experienced that great leap beyond when he
sat right under a blossomed udumbara tree. It
is further said that the udumbara flowers
would not be seen again until 3,000 years
later when another great event on the similar
scale emerges, and that very event is
specified as the coming of the Dharma Wheel
King (转轮王).
The interesting thing is that
this year, 2007, as Monk Bright Nothingness
could remember nothing more clearly, is year
3032 in the Buddhist calendar.
In fact the white flowers in
the Chinese monastery were not the first
udumbara blossoms this round. More than two
years ago in the middle of February of 2005,
the white buds were allegedly detected on the
face of a giant Buddha statue in a South
Korean temple. But what makes the flowering
event in the Complete Awareness truly
extraordinary is, that two days after the
inital blossom, in the morning when Monk
Bright Nothingness was about to surface from
his season-long retreat, seven udumbara buds
surfaced on a red cloth. This time their
appearance was much more vibrant - all in a
bright golden colour. And the yellow flowers,
unlike their white counterparts that opened
at night only, were able to keep their
illustrious presence throughout the day, and
day after day.
When the udumbara tale in the
Complete Awareness became aware by the
general public through the media reports and
online posts, more similar stories emerged,
and all seem to happen during the month of
July.
Udumbara blossoms were found
on 6 July on a front windshield glass of a
light-duty vehicle belonging to Mr Jiang in
Jilin Province.
In Shengyang, 38 white flowers
were seen on a steel tube in a vegetable
garden.
And seven udumbara blossoms
reportedly grew on 13 July on a plastic box
at Ms Cao’s Hong Kong residence.
Of course, there is still much
debate over whether these strange buds are
indeed udumbara flowers that suppose to
inform the coming of the Dharma Wheel King to
our mortal world. But one thing most people
tend to agree with each other is that anyone
who claims himself to be the incarnation of
the Wheel King can be anything but the true
Wheel King.
That is because, 大音无声，大象希形, great sound can not
be heard and great shape can not be
discerned.
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