A Couple Prays for a Child and the Orange Orchard of Trần Hưng Đạo

In a small wooden house in the north, the winter wind howled through the cracks in the door, carrying the scent of agarwood rising from the altar of Đức Trần Hưng Đạo. The wife sat hunched before the altar, her beads moving through her fingers, tears falling silently onto her skirt. Her husband stood by the window, gazing at the orange and apple orchards heavy with fruit, his heart weighed down. So many years had passed, and still there was no sound of children's laughter in their home.

"O Lord, I ask you for a child. Just one, so this house will no longer feel so empty."

They had come from the north to build a life in the south, and later took refuge at a temple. The wife often told everyone that Đức Trần Hưng Đạo was very responsive, that whenever she prayed, she received many blessings. But having a child remained a burning longing unfulfilled. Once, during a spirit-channeling ceremony, the deity descended through the body of a medium. The couple came before him, bowing again and again as they pleaded.

"O Lord, we have no children. Please grant us one."

"Go home. In six months, I will grant it."

Joy flashed in their eyes. Six months passed, and the wife counted each day, yet her belly remained flat. They returned to the temple, anxiety stirring in their hearts, her hand clutching the hem of her husband's shirt.

"O Lord, half a year has passed and we have received nothing."

"You asked for a child, so I tested your heart. You keep an orchard of oranges and apples. When the neighbor children came to play and take fruit, you took up a whip and a stick and drove them away with blows. So where was your love for children? You do not deserve to have a child. Go home. You will never have children."

At those words, the wife went numb, her knees buckling onto the stone floor. The husband stood frozen, his heart tightening as if in a knot. They remembered those afternoons when a few neighbor children slipped through the fence to pick fruit, and the two of them had chased them off with sticks, cursing harshly. Back then, they only thought of protecting their orchard, never knowing it was the deity's test. Torn apart inside, the wife blamed herself, but it was too late.

"We were wrong… why did we drive those children away?"

"Now it is too late for regret. If you did not cherish children, how could you be given one?"

The turning point of the story is the deity's verdict — the truth about their attitude toward children. They came to see the seed they had sown: those who do not cherish children reap the fruit of childlessness. After that day, the couple returned home and changed completely. Whenever they saw children passing by, the wife would lay out fruit to offer them, and the husband lowered the fence so the children could come and play more easily. But what the deity had decreed stood firm — they still had no child.

Life went on, and though they had enough wealth and comfort, the house remained without the sound of children. In return, however, they became people who helped the children of the neighborhood, opening a free evening class. The lesson sank deep: whatever you cherish, you will have in abundance; those who do not love children will live this life in loneliness.

The Meaning of the Story

According to the karmic law of cause and effect (karmic law), whatever we cherish, we will receive in abundance. This couple did not cherish children, so they did not deserve to have them. Loving and cherishing all sentient beings is the way to sow wholesome seeds, transforming unwholesome karma into wholesome karma.

Compiled from a dharma talk by TT. Thích Chân Quang