As per my experience and knowledge gained, I interpret it as below:
An enlightened person is like a solenoid in which current is flowing. So it creates a magnetic field around it. If another solenoid (without current in it) is brought near it then current starts flowing in it too. A normal person ( like that thief ) which is having some inclination (even unknown to him, due to deeds in past lives) towards spirituality and within 8 miles radius (Mahavira discovered it from honey bees) then he will start moving towards the enlightened person. If he is a thrift then definitely he will move towards his hut to steal only.
The Zen master knows this very well. So he looks at his past lives deeds and responded with blessings to get more time passed with him for his benefit, because at least he followed his heart. Mind will deny even entering the hut for stealing.
Monk has seen the unseen in that thief, may be it was a no moon day, so he is saying that if he could have stayed overnight he may have become his disciple and his spiritual journey may have found his ultimate destiny (seeing the unseen ‘The common spirit’ or ‘the Truth that liberates’) in this life or in those moments itself but the thief could not understood his gesture. His solenoid was not having enough number of turns to be able to get induced recognisable current in it to be able to feel true worth of the Monk.
A person with good enough number of turns starts moving towards such very high energy Monks from far away places 1000–5000 miles. Osho had 10,000 deciples in 75 countries, lived together preparing and eating vegetarian food!
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