One day a Zen Master and his novice decided to travel from the mountain where they lived to a city down below. Along the way they had to cross a river, and there they found a beautiful young girl wandering around. The Master was afraid that this girl was upset, and perhaps even ready to drown herself, so he approached her and said:

"Buddha with you! Is there anything that I can do to help you?"

"Oh Master, I want to go to the other shore, however the river is high and I cannot find the stepping stones. I do not know when the water will subside?" When she had finished speaking she lowered her head without hope.

"Let me carry you across," the Master said to the girl, and he then proceeded to do just that. As soon as they reached the other bank he set the girl down, said goodbye, and they parted.

The Master and the novice continued towards the city, but sometimes the novice would give his Master a troubled quizzical look as if to rebuke him. In his mind he thought:

"How can you be a monk and yet carry a girl?"

All the time he wanted to say this, however he did not speak out. Even when they returned to the temple he did not say anything, though he still had the question in mind.

Three months passed, and it happened that the Master and novice came to travel the same route, once more approaching the river. Finally the novice could no longer endure this doubt and he asked:

"Master! didn't you always teach us to strictly observe the precepts? For a monk there should be no physical contact with a woman, so why on that day did you carry a girl across the river?"

Initially the Master could not understand what the novice was referring to.

After a while however he remembered the incident and could answer :

"Oh! you mean that situation, as soon as I carried the girl across the river I put it down. How can you carry this for three months?"