Zen Garden Koan # 22

A Koan for an Angry Friend

And so it came that a monk, often angry, stood before a statue of Buddha and beseeched it: "Oh Buddha! Why is my life in such a present state? I dream of the past, even though I knew it for what it was. The future is so far away, its path has dimmed in my eyes. All that exists is in the now, and what is there now?"
The statue did not answer.
Later, as the monks gathered for dinner, Mummu spoke. "I was walking at night and saw a single star. Was it beautiful? Its light took ten thousand lifetimes for it to reach my eye. Was it still beautiful? Yes, it was, for though its beauty started in a past long forgotten, it waited for longer than mankind to bring that beauty into bloom. I ask you", said Mummu, as he pointed to the angry monk, "Is is beautiful now?"

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