The story of Mahin

Legend says that the supreme being, after initiating the first ever Sangha in the city of Kasi flew to the austere mountains of Ratnadivam. It was a pleasant and auspicious morning for the entire world as the one with the thousand eyes was standing at the tallest peak of the mountain.

At that moment, the master was in pure joy which manifested as his love for the world. The entire universe felt in oneness with the him. The multitudes of beasts in land, small and large, the many creatures of the ocean, the trees and plants that are stillborn in the seeds, the old, the new, the sleeping and the awake, all the elements of this universe became a sacred benefactor of his infinite love. From where he stood, the love that was brimming from his inner self was softening the rock on which he was standing. The blessed rock became softer until it traced his divine and beautiful feet.

This is no ordinary rock. It is the master’s greatest teaching ever.

The footprints meant his presence at some point in time during his passage on this earthy realm. Only his footprints and not his entire self also meant his absence and marks his transcendence into divinity and the most vital lesson that the world is always changing and nothing is permanent.

The footprints remained untouched and pure in the heights of Ratnadivam for many thousands of years where it was worshipped only by the sun, the moon and the stars.

A monk by the name of Mahin, once had a vision of a pure white bird with a golden crown standing on the top of the mountain Ratnadivam. The vision led him to the very spot where the master had left his footprints.

The first soul to climb mountain Ratnadivam since the grand master himself was this Mahin, the pure at heart. It took many years for him to reach the tallest point on the peak and find the divine relic. The majestic Ratnadivam was no easy mountain to hike, she was the tallest mountain to ever exist and those who took her for granted are doomed to fail their quest. Mahin, was no stranger to this feeling and he had supreme faith in his ability to hike Ratnadivam. Little did Mahin know that his sheer will, amassed from many years of penance will be bent and crushed like a husk of rice under the feet of a mighty elephant.

Where every turn invites death, where water and food is alien, where the cold air cuts more painful than the sharpest knives on the land, where the mind of a man can be broken to thousand pieces, where the love for nature turns into hatred, where the mind gives up easily, there, on that place was Mahin suffering for years.

Beaten by the leviathan, Mahin hated the very thought of Ratnadivam. The divine bird never came in his dream again since he started his journey. No bird was to be seen around that area and he was starting to give up. His body had given up completely by now. He could no longer survive the quest and he completely hated that place. It was vile and not a friendly mountain.

With little of all that was left of his will power, he sat uncomfortably over a dark muddy rock and closed his eyes in deep meditation. He was seeking help and contemplated on the master. In his deep state he realised that the mountain was not his enemy, it could never be a bad place. Only his mind, his own arrogance and will power to conquer to reach the top was his greatest impediment. He smiled in meditation realising his own mistake. Mahin opened his teary eyes with a new found love for his existence. He realised that the quest did not matter, reaching the top of the mountain was no longer on his mind.

He stood up and decided to climb down the mountain when a sweet wind gently pushed him to turn around. There, on that very rock he sat, he saw traces of two divine footprints appear magically before his eyes. Mahin knelt before the footprints of the master.