Ach wie nichtig

Lacking the determination to be free,
you remain stupefied by samsara's delights.
Since obsession ropes all beings to samsara,
First free yourself from it.
Wonderful is this life, short its nature.
Don't cheat yourself with fleeting pleasure....
The Three Principles of the Path

By regarding all phenomena as illusory,
I will keep these practices undefiled
By the stains of the eight worldly concerns....
-- Geshe Langri Tangpa, "Mind Training in Eight Verses"

Do not put your trust in princes,
in mortals, in whom there is no help.
When their breath departs, they return to the earth;
on that very day their plans perish.
Psalm 146:3-4

These verses remind us again not to let our spiritual development be distracted by obsession with the eight worldly concerns of gain and loss, praise and blame, success and failure, pleasure and pain; remember the metaphors of the dirty chalice and weedy ground. More to the point, they are giving us hints as to why to be indifferent to these concerns: They are "stupefying" (because they make us stupid!), and "illusory" because they are "fleeting", incapable of bestowing lasting happiness.

The old German chorale below may help to deepen your feeling for these root truths. It was written in 1652, just four years after the Thirty Years' War, a war of kings under the guise of religion in which the German states lost a third of their population to war, famine and plague. Just for a sense of proportion, that would be as if the US were to endure three 9/11's per day for thirty years.

The German word nichtig has a basic meaning of "insubstantial, perishable, futile" so the translator used "cheating" for rhyming purposes. You won't find this hymn in any modern hymnal, but it was the basis for a Bach cantata (BWV 26).

Ach wie nichtig, ach wie flüchtig
Michael Frank, 1609-1667
harmonized by J.S.Bach
Adapted from a translation in Hymns by Sir John Bowring

O how cheating, O how fleeting,
Is our earthly being!
'Tis a mist in wintry weather,
Gathered in an hour together,
And as soon dispers'd in ether.

O how cheating, O how fleeting,
Are our days departing!
Like a deep and headlong river,
Flowing onward, flowing ever,
Tarrying not and stopping never.

O how cheating, O how fleeting,
Are the world's enjoyments!
All the hues of change they borrow,
Bright today and dark tomorrow --
Mingled lot of joy and sorrow!

O how cheating, O how fleeting,
Is all earthly beauty!
Like a summer flow'ret flowing,
Scattered by the breezes blowing
O'er the bed on which 'twas growing.

O how cheating, O how fleeting,
All -- yes all -- that's earthly!
Everything is fading, flying;
Man is mortal, earth is dying;
Christian, live! -- on Heav'n relying.