The monk continued asking, “Since you could not see anything, why are you still holding a lantern?” The blind man said, “It is dark night now, isn’t it? I heard that if there is not light on the dark night, all others in the world are also blind just like me. So I lit up a lantern.” The monk got the point all of a sudden and said, “So you lit up the lantern to illuminate others?” But the blind man replied, “No, I do it for myself.” “For yourself?” the monk sank into bewilderment again. The blind man, with great calmness, asked the monk, “Have you ever been run into by others on a dark night?” The monk said, “Yes. I was run into by two people just now.” The blind man said with a sense of pride, “But I have not all the time. Even though I am blind and cannot see everything, I am holding a lantern in the dark so that I can illuminate others and meantime let others see me. Then they will not run into me due to the dark night.”
僧人問：“既然你什么也看不見，那你為何挑一盞燈籠呢？”盲者說：“現(xiàn)在是黑夜吧？我聽說在黑夜里沒有燈光的映照，那么滿世界的人都和我一樣是盲人，所以我就點(diǎn)燃了一盞燈籠。”僧人若有所悟：“原來您是為別人照明？”但那盲人卻說：“不，我是為自己！” “為你自己？僧人又愣了。盲者緩緩地問僧人說：“你是否因?yàn)橐股岷诙黄渌伺鲎策^？”僧人說：“是的，就在剛才，還被兩個人不留心碰撞過。”盲人聽了，就得意地說：“但我就沒有。雖說我是盲人，我什么也看不見，但我挑了這盞燈籠，既為別人照亮兒，也更讓別人看到了我自己，這樣，他們就不會因?yàn)榭床灰姸参伊恕！?

Hearing the blind man’ words, the monk felt tremendously enlightened. He could not help looking up to the sky and sighed, “I had been travelling to a lot of places to seek the Buddha and never had I imagined that he is just around me. Our perception of Buddhism is just like a lamp. As long as we light it up, even though we cannot see the Buddha, he can still see us.” To light up the lamp of our lives can not only brighten others lives, but also brighten ours. Only by brightening up others lives can we truly brighten our own. So please let others light up the lamps of our lives! Only then will we truly seek out the safety and glory we are longing for in the darkness of our lives.
苦行僧聽了，頓有所悟。他仰天長嘆說：“我天涯海角奔波著找佛，沒有想到佛就在我的身邊，人的佛性就像一盞燈，只要我點(diǎn)亮了，即使我看不見佛，但佛卻會看到我自己的。”是的，點(diǎn)亮屬于自己的那一盞生命之燈，既照亮了別人，更照亮了你自己；只有先照亮別人，才能夠照亮我們自己。為別人點(diǎn)燃我們自己生命的燈吧，這樣在生命的夜色上，我們才能尋找到自己的平安和燦爛！

Always remember: only by lighting up a light for others can we illuminate ourselves.
只有為別人點(diǎn)燃一盞燈，才能照亮我們自己。

（中文故事: 選自<<小故事網(wǎng)>> 英文翻譯: 愛爾蘭都柏林大學(xué) 賴小琪）