By Adam Grant
Spiritual life developed naturally for Thich. He joined the Tu Hieu Temple in Hue City as a bhikshu (monk) at the young age of sixteen. It was an easy decision for him. As a youth he had some experiences which drew his mind upwards and blessed him with pure aspirations. Under French colonial rule there was a pinching uneasiness in the people’s hearts, but Thich came across an illustration of the Buddha, and as a reaction, his mind left behind all the world’s uneasiness to have a short stay in the realm of peace. This experience, which contrasted the suffering around him, left a deep, lasting imprint on the young boy of nine years. A couple of years later, Thich had what he described as his first really spiritual experience. He was on a school trip and slipped away from his class in search of a hermit who was rumored to live nearby. Traversing the forest, he was unable to find the hermit. What he found instead was a natural well, with the most delicious water. He was very thirsty and drank his fill, then fell fast asleep. When he woke up, he felt that he had met the hermit in the form of the well, profoundly quenching his thirst for water and for the experience of peace. Satisfaction of desire usually fades quickly, and the desire returns reinvigorated. Thankfully, the desire strengthened was the one pulling the young boy away from his classmates to drink from the hermit’s well.
During the initial years of Thich’s entry into monastic life, in the early 40s, there were some very major tensions in Vietnam. First, the Japanese occupation of Vietnam lasted from 1940 to 1945, and then the 1945 famine left 400,000 people dead by starvation. Walking out of the temple, Thich saw the deceased lying in the streets and being taken away in trucks. Yet, Thich did not allow the rough times to pull him down, and he was diligent in his training and practices. Looking back, he recalled his novice-hood as a happy time. His training began at Tu Hieu Temple, under Zen Master Thich Chan That (1884-1968), in the lineage of Master Linji and Master Lieu Quan. Tu Hieu Temple was an idyllic, simple temple, lacking electricity, running water, or toilets. So, there was no shortage of chores to be done. Chopping wood and tending the cows were a couple of the jobs assigned to Thich, and while doing them he was constantly reciting in his mind forty-five short verses from the booklet “Essential Vinaya for Daily Use.” Full presence and concentration in every work was an essential principle passed down in the lineage of Zen Master Linji.
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