Troubles In The Temples: Chapter 4 - Tragedy Strikes the Head Temple at Taiseki-ji +%

[Disbasing Zen Stories]

Troubles In The Temples: Chapter 4 - Tragedy Strikes the Head Temple at Taiseki-ji +

All of Taiseki-ji is cast in a funereal hue for the present and near future, at the very least.

A great tragedy has befallen the High Priest Nichinyo and the Hayase clan.

His wife tries to comfort Nichinyo, but he cannot be consoled. He weeps openly, tearing at his garments. "私たちは非常に慎重でした、なぜこれが起こっているのですか" (We were very cautious, why is this happening?)

He flings himself onto the kōkana nagaisu, sobbing. There is simply no hope, and no future. It's dead! Our life blood, the cash flow from the stupid dantos is dead.

Tozan pilgrimage is cancelled for the Head Temple.

No special access fees. No offerings for personal services, tours, entry fees to all those favorite spots on the temple grounds, and personal guidance sessions. No kickbacks from the airlines, hotels, travel agencies, rental car services, and preferred local businesses.

All gone, with no end in sight.

And all because that stinking little priest living right there at Taisekiji could not cover up that he had contacted Covid-19, and the authorities got wind of it and shut the head temple down and demanded to cancel all Tozan visits, especially from the heavily infected United States. That imbecile better hope that he dies and that Nichinyo doesn't get his hands on him!

Those damned doctors and health authorities and their damned testing! Why can't they be like Trump in the United States, forcing everything to be opened up! So what if a few people with pre-existing conditions don't make it, they are going to die anyway! HERD IMMUNITY!

After the super-spreader events at the temple in Korea with the infected Nichiren Shoshu priests, the bright white spot light is firmly locked onto Nichiren Shoshu around the world. All twelve of those idiots got themselves infected, probably from the red light district! They better hope they die, too, before they are deported back. When the survivors exit quarantine, they'll be back in the hospital with some serious concussions!

Nichinyo starts to think... However ... fortunately ... there is some expensive real estate from closed local temples to put on the market. Yes, the real estate market is way off the highs and even the lows, but so is his bank balance! Some temples have to be sacrificed! The local priests will be submitting to his authority, no question! Maybe he can offer them in secret to cut them in on the cash, and then cut them out at the end, heh. They'll be too embarrassed at their stupidity and complicity to say anything later!

He has to make a secret plan, he thinks, telling no one about it. He has to see what the immediate needs are to tide the bottom line over for the short term, and what short selling needs to be done to salve the gaping wounds in his bank account.

And he needs to cut back, and stop buying the most expensive liquor and dispense with the services of one of the three geishas he currently carries, the older one who does whatever he wants her to. She will be upset, but she'll find someone! And after she is gone, the other two will be more compliant to his demands, anyway, no loss! Tough times are only tough if you have no money, they are golden if you have the cash.

And if this continues, and it gets sticky difficult to pry away local temples from the priests and their buddies in the local authorities, there is always the Head Temple itself, and the quick exit to be made by selling that to the fools in the Gakkai who still care about the Fuji School and Nikko Shonin. They have a pile of cash!

Maybe things are gonna be alright for the Hayase clan after all! Or at least for Nichinyo.

He sits back and sips the single malt his wife served him, feeling rather pleased with his turn of thinking.

-Chas.
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LS Chap. 16 .....

At that time the World-Honored One, wishing to state his meaning once more, spoke in verse form, saying:

Since I attained Buddhahood
the number of kalpas that have passed
is an immeasurable hundreds, thousands, ten thousands,
millions, trillions, asamkhyas.
Constantly I have preached the Law, teaching, converting
countless millions of living beings,
causing them to enter the Buddha way,
all this for immeasurable kalpas.
In order to save living beings,
as an expedient means I appear to enter nirvana
but in truth I do not pass into extinction.
I am always here preaching the Law.
I am always here,
but through my transcendental powers
I make it so that living beings in their befuddlement
do not see me even when close by.
When the multitude see that I have passed into extinction,
far and wide they offer alms to my relics.