The man without desires

Once a king wanted to know who was the happiest person on earth. Although everybody always flattered him, he knew how unhappy he was. When his subjects didn’t listen to him, he felt miserable. So the king asked one of his ministers, “Who is the happiest person on earth?”

The minister answered, “He who can drink nectar. He who can bring down Heaven to earth.”

The king said, “I am disgusted with you! What kind of answer is this?”

The minister said, “He who can see God is the happiest person.”

“Yes,” said the king. “But who can see God? Give me a better answer.”

This time the minister said, “He who has conquered desire.”

The king said, “This is all philosophy.”

“Then,” said the minister, “he who has fulfilled his desires.”

“Yes,” said the king. “When our desires are fulfilled, we are very, very happy.”

“But he is really the happiest,” said the minister, “who has conquered his desires. You may say this is all philosophy, but perhaps there are some sages who have actually conquered their desires. There are people on earth who are praying and meditating. Perhaps for them this is not philosophy at all; it is reality.”

“Go and bring them!” said the king.

So the minister left the palace in search of some holy men. He saw some persons very sincerely praying and meditating. He went over to one man and begged him to come to see the king. He said, “The king wants to see a man who has conquered his desires. Please come to show the king that you don’t care for earthly pleasures.”

The sage said, “All right, if he wants me to come, I have to go.”

The man came with the minister and the king was very pleased with him. The sage was very simple, very innocent and very pure.

Another minister, who was very shrewd, became jealous of the first minister. He did not want the first minister to be admired by the king. So he said to the king, “I am so happy that my friend has brought you someone who has conquered his desires. But I forgot to tell you that just now the Queen has sent a message that she needs you desperately for something. She wants to know if it would be possible for you to come and see her privately. Since you have to go and see her, perhaps this man can come back tomorrow.”

The king said, “Yes, the best thing is for me to see him tomorrow.”

The minister who had brought the sage asked the man if he could come back the next day and the sage agreed.

The following day, when the sage again came before the king, the rogue minister greeted him before the other minister arrived. He said, “So you have come!”

“Why not?” asked the sage.

“We are glad to see that you have conquered your desires,” said the minister. “But why have you come here? What for?” In this way the rogue minister challenged the sage.

The sage finally got annoyed and said, “Yesterday the king invited me and I promised that I would come here to prove that I am a desireless man. I am a desireless man and I want to prove it.”

The minister said to the king, “That means that he still has an eagerness to prove that he is desireless. He has this desire. Otherwise, why would he care about what you think? His desire is to prove that he is without desire. So he is not a desireless person.”

The king said, “It is true. He has not conquered his desires.”

The sage could have said that the king had invited him to come, so he was listening to the king’s request, or he could have said that it was the king’s desire that he was fulfilling. But instead the man got annoyed with the minister and didn’t think about what he was saying. Then he was caught.