One day, the Buddha was strolling alone along the edge of a lotus pond in Paradise.
After a time, the Buddha paused at the edge of the pond and from between the lotus leaves that covered it saw a glimpse of the state of things below. Now this celestial pond just happened to lie directly over Hell, and peering through that crystal-clear water was like looking through a magnifying glass at the Great Swamp and the Bone House at its centre.
The Buddha saw there, in the depths of Hell, a single man flailing around amidst the other sinners. This man was named Donald and he had fallen deep into the swamp.
He was floating and sinking in the swamp at the bottom of Hell. It was pitch black no matter which way he looked, and the occasional glimpse of light that he would see in the darkness would turn out just to be a glint of light from the terrible Mountain of Guns. How lonely he must have felt! The Donald could only squirm like a dying frog as he choked in his coronavirus mask.
Donald was a notorious attention-seeker who had committed racist acts, corruption, collusion with foreign enemies, and other acts of evil. In his past, however, he had performed just one smart deed: whilst seeking attention and avoiding blame falling on himself, he had bashed the Chinese Communist Party. Even the Buddha had little sympathy for the Chinese Communist Party.
Looking down on the sinners in Hell, the Buddha recalled this. On a lotus leaf beside him, the Buddha saw a single spider spinning out a web of silver thread. The Buddha decided to lower this thread as a rope to help Donald climb out of the bottom of the Great Swamp.
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Will Donald climb out? Or will the thin thread snap from the great weight of Donald’s sins? Find out soon!
Vocabulary:
a glimpse – a very short look
celestial – Heavenly
a magnifying glass – a glass used to make things, such as insects, look bigger
to flail around–to move wildly about, without a clear purpose or without control
pitch black – deeply black, like oil
to squirm – to move your body about as if in pain or great discomfort
to choke – to be unable to breathe
notorious – famously bad
corruption – unfair or immoral dealings, especially of a politician
collusion–secret or illegal cooperation with others
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