Playing the Lute to a Cow

Although the melody of the qin is melodious, elegant, and pleasing to the ear, the ox is very dull and at first will not understand it, let alone appreciate it. Because the manas, this ox, is heavily laden with ignorance, for beginningless kalpas it has spent the vast majority of time in the cycle of birth and death undergoing retributive suffering, without the opportunity to be nurtured by the true truths of the mundane and supramundane worlds; therefore it has never understood the principle of liberation. Even though the Buddha's Dharma is so wondrous, the manas remains unaware of it and does not comprehend its meaning; it does not even seek the method of liberation. The mind consciousness's effort to nurture the manas is just like playing the qin to an ox.

At this time, the mind consciousness must train its own playing technique and patiently continue playing over the long term; eventually one day the ox of the manas will come to understand the charm within the melody. The training that the mind consciousness must strengthen is to reach the point where, no matter what tune is played, the ox of the manas is guaranteed to understand it. This is extremely difficult and requires painstaking effort. Once the ox understands the tune, things will become easy, and cultivation will proceed smoothly and favorably.