Passage 4

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In plain words

Every task must be done to the full

In Italy there lived a man who did a craftsman's work, one called Andhoni. He was famous for making violins. He would labour a whole year over a single violin. A friend of this Andhoni came: ‘Hey, Andhoni, if you take one whole year to make a single violin, how are your wife and children to live?’ O friend! God is the embodiment of the full. Whatever work at all we do, it must always be full. For some selfish purpose of mine, to feed my wife and children, not even the slightest flaw must come into that fullness. So, since God is full, we must work for Him in fullness. Only then can God grant full Ānanda: so he taught that friend. That is, whatever small task we do, we must do it so that even that small task reaches a state of complete fullness. The reason: God is the embodiment of the full. All our tasks too must always be full, and nothing less. Since we are a part of God, the one who is a part must also attain the principle of complete fullness: so. That is just why those violins became so famous; even today Andhoni violins are renowned. In this way, to show forth God's fullness, we must practise fullness in our work too. Fullness is only one, not many. We divide the one into the many, but we must turn the many back again into the one.

The many must be turned back into the one

Now, a tailor has two things with him: one is the scissors. The other is the needle. What happens through these two? We took two metres of cloth and gave it to him, asking him to stitch a shirt. It is a single piece of cloth, two metres long. The tailor took his measurements.