“The Mother of Love, Amida”
Lafcadio Hearn uses the phrase “the Woman-never-to-be-known.”* To me, She is the Mother of Love, Amida, within each of us that can be Known, but usually – tragically – is not.
He speaks of “the ideals unattainable, – the haunting of troubled souls” by her. He uses the word “soul” in the sense of person, hence here, “troubled person.” Whereas I use the word capitalized – Soul – to refer to our Buddha-Nature, our Mother of Love.
I would therefore amend him thus: the haunting of us in anguish yet to Know our Souls. That can be Known. And this ideal attainable is at the very basis of our existence. It is our task in life.
* Kokoro (Rutland, VT: Tuttle, 1972), p. 159.
