The Rareness of Being Human

When the Buddha taught the Dharma, he was always skillful in using parables to help people understand the profound doctrine. One day, in order to help his disciples understand the rareness of being born as a human, he related the following parable: "In the ocean there is a blind sea turtle that comes up to the surface once every hundred years. If there is a wooden plank with a small hole floating in the ocean, the chance of the blind turtle's head passing through the small hole is extremely small. The chance of being born as a human is the same as that of the blind turtle poking its head through the hole of the floating plank." This is the famous Parable of the Blind Turtle.