Self-Realization via Self-Transcendence:

A Spiritual Interpretation of KUNG FU PANDA

DreamWorks 2008 animated film Kung Fu Panda, which received positive reviews from most (87% out of
174) of the film critics was yet given two and a half-stars by Peter Howell of The Toronto Star for lack a
story. The present endeavour begs to differ with this criticism and presents a spiritual interpretation of the
film. We attempt to show that the story of this film, although set against traditional Chinese background,
does represent in a marvellous manner the essence of all spirituality: self-realization through selftranscendence. It looks at certain themes from this film in the light of some spiritual teachings derived
from a variety of sources, from tradition Chinese thought (Tao Te Ching and Chuang Tzu) and Classical
Arabic and Persian Sufis (Ibn Arabi; Ibn Ataullah; Attar) ( to some modern spiritual, intellectual and
literary authorities (e.g. Ashraf Ali Thanawi, Frithjof Schuon). The spiritual themes include significance of
spiritual symbolism, living in the present moment, self-transcendence (turn me into not-me), spiritual
humility, loving God without thinking of the reward, realized self and humility. The over-arching purpose
of presenting this interpretation is not to contribute to film-criticism but to recall important tran-cultural
spiritual and religious teaching we need so badly at the present moment, both individually and on a societal
level.

I am neither a film critic nor a film critic's son! Hence this so called "spiritual commentary"
has nothing to do with the movie in question from the point of view of film-making. It also
does not make any claims regarding the complete accuracy of depiction of traditional Chinese
culture in this film. What this commentary does is simply to look at certain themes from this
film in the light of some spiritual teachings derived from a variety of sources. It is understood
that the spiritual teachings highlighted here are capable of many other readings.

The story of the cartoon movie Kung Fu Panda is pretty simple. Po, a flabby panda, loves
Kung Fu more than anything else. However, Po is stuck in the noodle bar run by his father

who is waiting for day he would pass on to his son the secret ingredient of his "secret
ingredient soup."

Up on the mountain top, in the Jade Palace, Master Shifu has trained five famous Kung Fu
masters (Tigress, Monkey, Viper, Crane and Mentis, most probably symbolizing five
techniques of Martial Arts). The ultimate ambition of these Masters is to win the Dragon
Scroll which is believed to contain the recipe for limitless power and no one has yet proved
oneself worthy of reaching for it. Legend has it that only the Dragon Warrior will get to read
the Scroll. One day Master Shifu is summoned by the Grand Master Hu Gueh who tells him
that according to his vision, Tai Lung, the diabolical villain, who is imprisoned for life for his
destructive arrogance, will break the prison, attack the Jade Palace and the Villagers.
Naturally Shifu becomes greatly agitated and starts running here and there thinking of
measures he can take. The Grand Master takes him to a Pool in the Palace and says "Your
mind is like this water, my friend, when it is agitated it is difficult to see, but if you allow it
settle, the answer becomes clear." He gently touches the surface of agitated water and the
moment it settles a reflection of the Dragon Scroll on the ceiling appears in it. So it is time to
choose the Dragon warrior. This water pool episode affords us our first opportunity to make a
spiritual comment. The heart/Intellect, symbolized here by the pool, must reflect The One.
However, it is not disembodied but is attached to a body that lives within a world and this
world disperses it in all directions. This dispersion makes the reflection of the One in the
heart impossible. Hence the central problem of spiritual life is "making one's heart settle."
This is nothing other than making room in one's soul for the divine presence.i Many different
techniques are taught by various spiritual systems to attain this goal. One has to put one's
whole being, intelligence, will and emotions into effort to achieve this settling of the Pool
that is one's heart. It is in view of the significance of this that the soul in Saint John of the

Crosss spiritual poetry repeatedly speaks of its house being at rest as a necessary prerequisite for the journey to Unio mystica.ii

Coming back to the story, a tournament is announced in which the Grand Master is to choose
the Dragon Warrior. Naturally Po, our hero, wants to go to the Jade Palace to watch and quite
as naturally, his father, asks him to sell noodles there. When he finds it impossible to ascend
the mountain with the heavy noodle cart, Po leaves the cart behind and climbs up the
mountain to reach the Palace. When he reaches the top, however, the gates are closed and he
cannot enter the Palace. After trying many things in vain he finally constructs a fire-works
chair which pushes him skywards. As the Grand Master is about to point at one of the fiver
masters as the Dragon Warrior, Po falls from the sky right in front of Hu Gueh. To the
astonishment of all, even of Po's, the Grand Master declares the panda to be the Dragon
warrior!

At this juncture, one can understand that what apparently is a hurdle (closed door of the
Palace) was in fact an opening towards a great achievement. I am always reminded here of an
Urdu short story Samay ka Bandhan (the Bondage of Time) by Mumtaz Mufti (d. 1995). This
is a story of a young girl in a brothel who is fond of peeping out of the window and observing
the world outside. The senior prostitute sees this and explains that she must understand the
requirement of time. This is not the time or age for her to see, it is time to be seen. "Be the
spectacle, not the spectator!" she tells her. Po was burning with the desire to see the show and
this desire was not fulfilled. He did not know that the time has come for him to become the
show.

In spite of an outraged Master Shifu and the astonished five genuine candidates, the newly
selected Dragon Warrior is led in style into the Jade Palaces Hall of Great Warriors. His
training starts. Its hardest part is being absolutely hated by everybody and made to realize at
every moment that he does not belong at the Jade Palace. Everyone, including Master Shifu,
hopes that he will not take all the humiliations and hardships of training and will quit.

At the end of the first day, Po is standing dejected under the Peach Tree of Heavenly
Wisdom, stuffing himself with the peaches when he is visited by the Grand Master Hu Gueh.
When the Master learns that Po is thinking of quitting and going back, he asks him not to be
concerned too much about what was and what will be. He leaves him saying, "Yesterday is
history, tomorrow is mystery but today is a gift. That is why it is called present."

Now the message contained in these lines, comes for Alice Morse Earleiii, is a familiar theme
in Muslim spirituality. It is so integral to it that it has been epitomized in the form of the
dictum: The Sufi is son of the (present) moment.iv The wisdom behind this saying is easy to
discern but hard to put in practice. We possess neither Past nor Future but only the present
moment. Our life is woven of individual moments and each of these moments comes with a
demand or requirement. Day-dreaming about the moment that we have lost or the one that we
might or might not earn is fatal: It makes us lose our sole real possessionv: the present
moment. Consequently, we are unable to fulfil its requirement. The Sufi is someone who,
instead of day-dreaming, fulfils the demand of the present moment.

One day when Master Shifu is meditating the news is brought that Tai Lung, the diabolic
Tiger, has escaped the prison and is on his way to the claim the Dragon Scroll, once denied
him, and destroy the village. Shifu runs to tell the Grand Master, who is as calm and serene as
ever. He tells Shifu that the only hope is to believe in Po to be the real dragon warrior. Shifu
resists and a brief argument takes place between the two masters. The gist of this argument is
that although there are things we can control, (like deciding where to plant a seed) there is
time and place for everything (like when the tree will bear fruit and the fruit will be according
to the nature of seed). Although this is an important point which shows that the solution to
age-old problem between free-will and determinism lies somewhere between two extremes,
we do not wish to dwell further on it. After advising Shifu to believe, Grand master passes
away and Shifu is left alone. This incident, however transforms Shifu and he comes back to
the Palace kitchen where Po is dining in a light mood, with the five masters, with whom he
has after all developed a sort of working relationship. When Shifu announces that Tai Lung is
coming and suddenly points at Po as the one who, being a Dragon warrior is going to stop
him, the shock is simply too much for poor panda. He, therefore, runs out of the Jade Palace.
Shifu follows him and tries to stop him. When Po persists in his attempt, the master asks, why
did he not quit in the first place, if he always knew that he was unwanted. Po's answer is
simply amazing: "Every time you threw a brick at my head or said that I smelled, it hurt, but
it could never hurt more than it did every day of my life justbeing me. I stayed because I
thought that if anyone could change me, could make me not-me,it was you, the greatest Kung
Fu teacher in all of China!" This turning of "me into not-me," called transcending
oneself by Frithjof Schuon, is the alpha and omega of spiritual life.vi It is the only legitimate
intention for choosing a spiritual path and a spiritual master. One does not do this in order to
work miracles or arrive at some specific state or station. In real spirituality there is no concept
of "arriving at" (wusool in Arabic and Punhunchnaa in Urdu). There is nowhere one has to

arrive at by following a spiritual path. It was said in the presence of a great Sufi Master that
"so and so has arrived," to which he quickly responded by saying "at hell (he has arrived)!"vii
The foremost pre-requisite of self-transformation is the dissatisfaction with self. The
importance of this condition has been made clear by Ibn 'Ata Allah, "The source of every
disobedience (i.e. sin), indifference and passion is self satisfaction. The source of every
obedience, vigilance and virtue is dissatisfaction with oneself.... What knowledge is there in a
self-satisfied scholar and what ignorance is there in an unlearned man dissatisfied with
himself."viii So by confessing his self-dissatisfaction and expressing the wish of self
transformation, the panda reveals his greatest spiritual asset. Now, as we said, a spiritual
master helps one transform oneself into not-self. We encounter a paradox when we try to
understand the true nature of this self-transcendence. The paradox is that going beyond the
self is at the same time realizing the self. As Schuon has explained, man is totally himself
only by transcending himself. Quite paradoxically,
it is only in transcending himself that man reaches his proper level; and no less
paradoxically, by refusing to transcend himself he sinks below the animals which by
their form and mode of passive contemplativity participate adequately and innocently in
a celestial archetype; in a certain respect, a noble animal is superior to a vile man.ix So one is
not becoming anything one was not already. In terms of this story, it is not the case that Po,
an ordinary being, wanted to become the Dragon Warrior, but that he was a Dragon Warrior
all along, what he needed Master Shi Fu for was to bring that Warrior Self out of his non-real
self, which existed a noodle vendor.

The five masters leave the Palace to try to stop Tai Lung on his way and Po is left alone with
Master Shifu. The Master finds Po eating stolen food stuff from the kitchen shelves. He is
surprised to see that to reach for a cookie-jar on a high shelf the fat panda could jump 10 feet
off the ground and ask him how Po had done that. Po wonders and is confused how to explain
but the moment he looks at himself what he has achieved, he falls down! Such is the Way!
The moment you realize and consider that you have accomplished something, your
achievement vanishes! "The Sage accomplishes without taking credit," as we are taught by
the Tao Te Ching.x This acting without sense of accomplishment also finds its beautiful
expression in the Martial Arts. Anyhow this episode gives the Master the clue for the
transformation of the Panda and he takes him for training to the Pool of Sacred Tears. He
forbids the Panda from having anything until the training is finished. Once this is done Shi Fu
invites Panda to join him in the bowl of dumplings. The Panda has however to fight Master
over the dumplings and the latter eats up all except one. A serious fight commences between
the two and finally Po succeeds in snatching the dumpling from the Master who is glad the
training was successful. But Lo! The Panda throws the dumpling back into the Master's hand
saying, "I am not hungry." Let us consider what has happened here. At the training what the
Panda realized was that what he was fighting for (i.e. the dumpling) was not the ultimate end
but the mean, training itself was the ultimate end. By pondering on this part of the story, we
can realize a completely new solution to an old controversy between the mystics and the
legalists. This controversy concerns the Paradisal pleasure promised by the Scriptures. The
mystics think that worshipping God to get to Paradise is like doing business with him and not
real worship. God should be loved and worshipped for being loveable. The legalists think that
since God has promised Paradise and has asked us to do everything for the sake of Paradise,
doing so is simply obeying his command. We can arrive here at a middle position between
these two in the following manner. When Po was fighting with his Master he was doing so

for the sake of a dumpling. But when he finally got it, he saw that there is something which is
much more important than the dumpling for which he was struggling so hard. So as far as
obeying God here-and-now is concerned, the jurists are right. We cannot simply discard the
part of scripture that deals with Paradise. But, the mystic is teaching that the one who attains
to Paradise will not attach any value to it in comparison with the One. To borrow an
expression from Mawlana Ashraf Ali Thanavi, these will value The Bestower (Lateef) more
than the Bestowals (Lutf).xi Before him, the great mystic-theologian of medieval Islam, Imam
Muhammad al-Ghazali had denounced those who serve God in order to gain His favours as
having taken God as a means for their own end, while the ultimate end should be God.

Now that Po has been trained and the Furious Five have returned after trying in vain to stop
Tai Lung , it is time for the Master to give the Dragon Scroll to the Dragon Warrior. So the
scroll, which is believed to contain the secret to limitless power, after reading which Po will
fulfil his destiny, is taken down from the dragon-mouth. Po opens it while everybody around
him stands anxious to see what secret will be revealed. The Dragon Scroll happens to be just
a blank piece of silk! Everyone is dumbfounded. Po exclaims that perhaps the whole Dragon
Warrior business was nothing more than a hoax and Grand Master was nothing but a crazy
old turtle after all. With the blank scroll in his hands, the panda returns to the village to help
the villagers evacuate the valley before Tai Lung arrives. Naturally he is very depressed
though his father is very happy to see him. In order to lighten his son up, the father tells him
what the secret recipe of his famous secret ingredient soup was. He says that the secret recipe
is nothing and says that to make something special you only need to believe it to be special.
These words came as a bolt of lightning to Po who opens up the Dragon Scroll and this time
it is not blank! Nothing, to be sure, is written on it, but Po can see his own reflection in the
shiny silk. So the secret to limitless power is the one who has attained the Dragon Scroll

oneself and not something written on the Scroll. So he runs back to the Palace where Master
Shi Fu is trying to hold Tai Lung enough for the villagers to escape.

What has happened here illuminates another central dimension of Spirituality: the key to
success on the spiritual path is possessed by no one but the spiritual seeker himself. At the
end of the journey, if there is such a thing, the traveller will acquire nothing but his real true
Self. This dimension was elaborated in a marvellous way by the Persian Sufi poet Fariduddin
Attar in his work Conference of Birds. The story goes something like this: The birds are
worried because they have no King and they fear that without a ruler they will perish. So they
go to seek the advice of the Hoopoe who tells them of a legendary Bird Simurgh, living far
away. They come to think that Simurgh can be there ruler so the hoopoe leads them in the
quest for that bird. They have to traverse a number of valleys representing different spiritual
stations. The whole flock is not able to continue the journey as many of them either die on the
way, become sick or simply revert. Only thirty birds are able to make it to the dwelling
place of Simurgh. But when the final curtain is raised they are astonished to find that there is
nobody behind it. Eventually they understand that Simurgh is not some specific bird but it
simply means Si (thirty) and Murgh (birds), those thirty birds themselves that could pass
through all the stages of journey. So what you get at the end of your spiritual journey is only
a new you!

When Po reaches back at the Jade Palace Tai Lung is about to kill Master Shifu. However, he
follows Po when he sees him holding the Dragon Scroll. After a brilliant fight Po kills Tai
Lung and thus proves his being Dragon Warrior. He then comes to the villages and the
Furious Five, who have always been humiliating him and asking him to go back, bow before

him in reverence, calling him "Master." How does Po respond to this treatment? Does he say,
"Now you see who I am, you blind Idiots!"? No. Nothing of the sort happens. A gentle,
natural and completely spontaneous smile appears on the lips of the dragon warrior for less
than a moment and he says, as if talking to himself, "Master? Oh! Master Shi fu!!!!" So when
finally he is titled "Master" by his rivals, instead of becoming proud and haughty he is simply
reminded of his own Master who was left almost dead by Tai Lung at the Jade Palace. But
the final and a great spiritual lesson is yet to be learnt from Po's attitude at his success. At this
final juncture our guide is none other than Ibn 'Arabi, the Great Master (al-Shaykh al-Akbar).
He speaks of the haughtiness and pride shown by his contemporary spiritual masters towards
their disciples. The real master, according to him, is someone, who, when looks at his
disciples' dependence upon him, is reminded of his own dependence upon God. He realizes
that everything which enables him to become a master has been given by God. Since a master
is made to realize this by the disciple, the disciple as a matter of fact is the Master's Master!xii

Finally when Panda brings the news of his victory to Master Shifu, the latter receives it with
perfect calmness and serenity as if nothing has happened.
Conclusion:
We have attempted in the aforementioned lines to bring out perennial spiritual teachings that
are echoed in all mystical traditions of the world, taking out lead from various events and
sayings found in the film Kung Fu Panda. In addition to shedding light on the hidden
structure of the Story we hope to have shown how the unifying force of world spirituality can
be highlighted through the medium of film making.

Frithjof Schuon, Les Stations de la Sagesse (Paris: LHarmattan, 2011), 149.

See Saint John of the Cross, Ascent of Mount Carmel, Bk. I chapter 1 and Bk. II chapter 1. The Complete
Works of Saint John of the Cross, translated and edited by E. Allison Peers (Hertfordshire, Anthony Clarke,
1974).
iii
Alice Morse Earle, Sundials and Roses of Yesterday
iv
Ibn Arabi, Al-Futuhat al-Makkiyyah, (Beirut: Dar Sadir, n.d.) I: 647.
v
Fritjhof Schuon writes: We would also say, in order to provide one more key, that serenity consists in
resigning oneself to that destiny, at once unique and permanent, which is the present moment: to this itinerant
now that no one can avoid and that in its substance pertains to the Eternal. The man who is conscious of the
nature of pure Being willingly remains in the moment that Heaven has assigned him; he is not feverishly
straining towards the future nor lovingly or sadly bent over the past. The pure present is the moment of the
Absolute: it is now neither yesterday nor tomorrow that we stand before God. Roots of Human Condition
(Bloomington: World Wisdom Press, 1991), 111.
vi
The Holy man is the one who Transcends himself Schuon Echoes of Perennial Wisdom.
vii
The saying is attributed to Abu Ali al-Rozbari by Abdul Karim al-Qushayri in his treatise, Al-Risalah alQushayriyyah, (Beirut: Dar al-Kutub al-Ilmiyyah,1998 ), 72.
viii
Ibn Ataullah, Sufi Aphorisms: Kitab al-Hikam, trans. Victor Danner, (Lahore: Suhail Academy, 1973), 2930.
ix
Frithjof Schuon, To Have a Centre
x
Tao Te Ching, chapter 30.
xi
Ghazali, Imam Muhammad, Al-Maqsad al Asna (Karachi: Noor Muhammad, n.d) , 83-84. Ashraf Ali Thanavi,
Malfuzat Hakeem al-Ummat (Idarae Talifate E Ashrafiyyah);
xii
Ibn Arabi, Al-Futuhat al-Makkiyyah III. 17.
i

ii