Guru's Talk

 The Man Who Longs For His Homeland

Translated and Edited by True Buddha Foundation Translation Team

I confess that I am someone who longs for his homeland. Do you still remember the poignant poem that we learned when we were little?

Before my bed the moonbeams brightly shine

Gleaming like frost upon the ground

I lift my head to see the moon so bright

Then lower my head with heavy heart and thoughts of home

While living in Seattle, USA, for twenty years, I would think back to the scenery of my homeland, this kind of yearning making me feel like a fool. I would often drive to Seattle’s west coast and gaze at the vast ocean, knowing that across the ocean was another coast that was my homeland. I would feel confused and lost.

When I was in Seattle, I told Mrs. Lu, Master Lian Xiang, "It looks like we're going to grow old and die here in Seattle, doesn’t it?"

I remember what someone once said long, long ago:

"Never be a wandering, lonely spirit. If you are going to die, better that you die in your homeland."

But is this possible? I think that most of the time it is not possible.

The world is more wide-open to modern man. People emigrate to different parts of the world, settle down and plant their roots there. Some of them don’t even remember their original roots, so what is there to talk about returning to one's home country, like a falling leaf returning to its roots?

About being a foreigner—who is not a foreigner? Everyone is. When you ask around, everyone is a foreigner. When you return to your hometown, there are no old friends; everyone is now playing the role of a foreigner, traveling away from their homeland to make a living, generation after generation, wanderers in foreign lands, no way to return. And even if they do return, everything is foreign.

As to my homeland, what I feel is unfamiliarity and a fear of not finding a familiar face. It is really true that as one approaches one’s homeland, one feels apprehensive. It is indeed a sad and disheartening feeling!

Today I finally understand:

The human life is one of drifting in a suffering ocean of birth and death

One’s homeland is no more the place where you were born.

And neither is it the place where you will die.

Even though Leaf Lake is the place of my retreat, I feel it is so familiar and yet so foreign. Will I grow old and die at Leaf Lake?

I understand that within our inner heart is really where our true homeland is, that deep within our heart is where our homeland has always been, within our original nature, within the realm of the True Buddha, within the Maha Twin Lotus Ponds, within the pure land of Buddha’s country.

That is our eternal homeland!

(the end)


《本文譯自真佛報第438期頭版師尊「真佛論劍」文章「尋找故鄉的人」》

--->回目錄