Kuan Yin – Goddess of Mercy
Princess Miao Shan was the third daughter of King Miao Chung towards the end of the Chou dynasty in the Kingdom of Hsing Lin. King Miao Chung had three daughters and they were Miao Ching, Miao Yin and Miao Shan. The Queen, Po Ta, had a strange dream before the birth of Miao Shan. She saw a heavenly pearl transform into a fiery sun which then collapsed and settled at her feet. The King in his wisdom regarded the sight of such a heavenly sign as a great omen and hoped to have a son on his throne. When she was born a girl, she was very disappointed and this was the 19th day of the second moon and she was named Miao Shan.
Miao Shan grew up to be an extremely beautiful, highly religious and virtuous girl who is unaffected by the attractions of worldly affairs. She only longed for a quiet retreat in the mountains where she could practice the perfections of her virtues. She longed to bring relief to all the miserable beings on earth.
The King began to find suitable husbands for his daughters when they were of marriageable age. His two sisters accepted their marriages, but Miao Shan flatly refused to marry and this angered her father. She later left the palace to retire to a convent called The White Sparrow. There he continued to practice his cultivation of the Tao to achieve Consummation.
Her father purposely made life difficult and unbearable for his frail daughter to persuade her to return to his palace. However, all her attempts failed and in her deep anger she ordered the convent to be burned down because such an unfilial daughter deserved to be executed. Miraculously, the fire was instantly put out by torrential rain, saving the lives of Miao Shan and a few hundred nuns. The enraged king then decreed that Miao Shan be executed, but the executioner’s sword touched his neck and shattered into pieces. This made the king even more angry and he then ordered Miao Shan to be strangled to death with a silk cord. As she was being strangled, the guardian god appeared in the form of a great tiger, dispersed the crowd, and carried her body into the forest.
Miao Shan’s spirit descended into hell, but her great compassion and the purity of her prayers soon transported her soul back to her body, which lay under a pine tree. Upon returning to life, Amitabha Buddha appeared and instructed the princess to continue her practice of the perfections in a cave called Hsuan Ai on Po-to Island.
After nine years of devotion performing acts of merit and meditation, he attained Buddhahood. Meanwhile, King Miao Chung, for his heinous crimes of burning down a nunnery that nearly caused the loss of so many lives and the murder of a virtuous maiden like Miao Shan, was punished with an incurable disease. The only cure is an ointment made with both hands and the eyes of “someone who never gets angry.” Aware of her father’s plight due to his spiritual powers acquired from him and out of compassion, Miao Shan sacrificed both of her eyes by gouging them out with his fingers and cutting off both hands for her father. She had them shipped to her and made the recovery right away. In gratitude, the King sent a delegation with his ministers to thank the kind donor and only to discover, to his great surprise, that these precious gifts came from none other than the daughter he had killed. He was so overwhelmed with remorse that he renounced his throne and accepted the Taoist faith.
Miao Shan acquired Tao on the 19th day of the 6th Moon and returned to Heaven on the 19th day of the 9th Moon. She was conferred the heavenly title of Goddess of Mercy or “Kuan Shih Yin Pusa” (Kuan Yin) in Chinese. The last heavenly title conferred on her by God is “Nan Hai Ku Fo”, and “Fo” means Buddha. She will very often come down from Heaven to teach devotees the Tao of Heaven and she said that the Tao that she acquired thousands of years ago is the same Tao that we receive today in the temple of the Tao of Heaven.
The Goddess of Mercy asked us why she was always depicted in the portrait holding a vase and willow leaves and this is what she said: “The willow leaves represented our eyebrows and the vase our nose. To insert the willow leaves in the vase, the lid of the vase had to be opened. It was to indicate to the human that the spot or point of our divine nature is in that position. When you are initiated with Tao, the third divine eye will open and this is indirectly indicated by a red dot on his forehead.
Author: T. A. Chew