I’ve always liked the Buddhist story of Indra’s net. Here’s a short version by Francis H. Cook from his book, Hua-Yen Buddhism: The Jewel Net of Indra.
Not long ago, I realized what a brilliant illustration of interconnectedness this is. I’d known about the metaphor for years and had some intellectual understanding of it. But thinking about it recently, I felt the reality of it like an electric shock that shook me from the top of my head right down to my toes. Every action, every thought we have changes the world; subtly no doubt, but certainly nonetheless. Changes not just our world, but the world. It can’t be other than that. Yikes!
Far away in the heavenly abode of the great god Indra, there is a wonderful net which has been hung by some cunning artificer in such a manner that it stretches out infinitely in all directions. In accordance with the extravagant tastes of deities, the artificer has hung a single glittering jewel in each "eye" of the net, and since the net itself is infinite in dimension, the jewels are infinite in number. There hang the jewels, glittering like stars in the first magnitude, a wonderful sight to behold. If we now arbitrarily select one of these jewels for inspection and look closely at it, we will discover that in its polished surface there are reflected all the other jewels in the net, infinite in number. Not only that, but each of the jewels reflected in this one jewel is also reflecting all the other jewels, so that there is an infinite reflecting process occurring.
Not long ago, I realized what a brilliant illustration of interconnectedness this is. I’d known about the metaphor for years and had some intellectual understanding of it. But thinking about it recently, I felt the reality of it like an electric shock that shook me from the top of my head right down to my toes. Every action, every thought we have changes the world; subtly no doubt, but certainly nonetheless. Changes not just our world, but the world. It can’t be other than that. Yikes!
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