The Buddha in Metta Tantra is the historical Buddha. The person whose
earthly remains are in the National Museum of India in New Delhi. The same
person credited with founding Buddhism and teaching the Pali Canon. In this
respect Metta Tantra is in complete accord with traditional Theravada. The Buddha is respected as the source of this Tantra. The Buddha images that adorn
our altars are the physical reminders of his limitless Metta.
Bhikkhu Ňanamoli
wrote easily the best biography of the Buddha I have ever read. Ňanamoli’s “The
Life of the Buddha” first published in 1972 is an eminently readable mix of
biography and scripture. The
best dating for the historical Buddha is between the Sixth and Third Centuries
before Christ. Naturally there is a fair bit of ongoing academic debate
concerning exactly when he lived. Which seems at times rather like position
justification to me. It matters not when the Buddha lived, what is beyond all
dispute is that he did live. Unlike the founder of Christianity in whose name
so much horror has been committed, we, as I’ve already said, have the actual
physical remains of someone who lived in the right place and has scientifically
been proven lived at the right time. Certainly the people who interred the
remains inside urns, which themselves where interred inside stupa and had
writing clearly identifying whose remains were inside had no doubt as to whose
bones they were in possession of.
What is a cause for
concern is that in modern Theravada, as is the case with almost every other
“religion”, is the moment you begin discussing the founder of it, people begin turning their brains off. The
result is that legends, myths and outright nonsense is treated like they are
rock solid, undisputable facts. As I wrote in the Introduction, Theravada
glosses over the fact that the Buddha certainly spent a fair bit of his
pubescent years fucking his brains out with the servant girls....and possibly
boys that were given the job of distracting him from ever entertaining the idea
of fulfilling the part of his natal chart that mentioned the word “Buddha”.
Sadly this
suspension of intelligence extends to the Buddha’s entire biography. A baby literally minutes
old walking, talking and announcing that he is the Buddha. To accept this as
being entirely factual you have to be dumber than I’ve been known to look on
occasion. For a start it kills the entire idea of the Buddha needing to have to
engage in a lot of hard work in order to achieve Enlightenment and the whole
Suddhodana needing to keep the boy in seclusion in order to prevent him asking
The Big Questions. There are questions as to whether the accepted biography of
the Buddha is even his biography, with at least one modern commentator in the
blogosphere being of the opinion that it has been lifted almost intact from the
biography of the Buddha’s contemporary Jaina Mahavira.
A biography of the
Buddha:
When did he
live?
The best available evidence has the Buddha living and teaching in
the fifth century before the Common Era. The evidence for this is perhaps
remarkable in its completeness, I’m aware of only one other ancient religious figure having such a
reliable fix in time and that is the Buddha’s contemporary the founder of
Jainism, Jaina Mahavira and this is because he is so frequently mentioned in
Buddhist texts. And to this we curiously enough owe the English and the Age of
Enlightenment in Europe. Because at this time there was an outbreak of
curiosity in Europe. This was due in part to the English, the French and the
Dutch acquiring empires in Asia (the English hit the jackpot and got India, Sri
Lanka, Burma and Malaysia, the French picked up Indo-China, the Dutch
Indonesia). The Spanish had the Philippines which they had turned 90% Catholic,
also by the time that serious questions were being asked, Spain was essentially
not in the empire building business. So there was this outbreak of curiosity,
that resulted in things being dug up and translations of indigenous religious
texts being made. Including significantly the travel journals of some Chinese
monks who had made pilgrimages to India.
The English, we may
remember, were the colonial masters of the Indian sub-continent for a century. They were also
the rulers of Sri Lanka, Burma, and Hong Kong. They were also travellers and
traders and travelled to China and Japan. The English and other Europeans kept
seeing amazing similarities in the local religion. The Japanese had similar
statues to the Sinhalese, which bore more than a passing resemblance to the
statues in Tibetan monasteries, the Vietnamese had statues that looked like the
Japanese. Not surprisingly a penny dropped and the question was asked “Are all
these “idols” from the same religion?”
Now parallel to this
dropped penny, the English were engaged in surveying and mapping their newly
acquired Empire in India. Sooner or
later the two worlds were going to meet. They met in the form of Alexander
Cunningham. The English by this time had
established that there was a Pan Asian religion that they called “Buddhism”.
They were also furiously digging up every ruin they came across and translating
the inscriptions they found on coins, on rocks, on pillars. Sooner or later
someone was going to “test drive” what
the translations of Buddhist texts were telling them….that when the Buddha had
died that his ashes were distributed to eight different places. They had the translations of Venerable Fa
Hien who very considerately included accurate descriptions and distances in his
journal. Once the English had converted Venerable Fa Hiens ancient Chinese
measures to English miles, yards and feet, the rest, so to speak was easy.
Within 20 years the English had located the birth, enlightenment
and death places of the Buddha. They had also excavated the stupa they found
there and translated the inscriptions that they found. Significantly in 1851 at
Sanchi the reliquaries of the Buddha’s disciples Maha Sariputta and Maha
Moggallana. In 1897 at Piprahwa the relics of the Buddha himself were found
exactly where both Fa Hien and the suttas had said they would be.
Evidence, including I believe, carbon dating has placed the
objects found at Piprahwa and Sanchi to the 5th Century BCE + or –
200 years.
Where did he
live?
The evidence from the suttas suggests that the Buddha never left
what are now the Indian provinces of Bihar, Jharkhand, Uttar Pradesh and the
Nepalese province of Lumbini. There are legends of him making it as far a field
as modern Sri Lanka, Burma and Thailand, but there is nothing in the suttas to
remotely suggest this. The place names mentioned in connection to the Buddha all
fall within the boundaries of these modern jurisdictions. We must remember that the Buddha walked everywhere.
So given that it is a walk of 2000+ kilometres to Sri Lanka, which at 30 km a
day would take about 70 days each way, and there are no gaps in the chronology
to allow for a walk of 140 days (5 months) and that is assuming that he walked
there, took a look and then immediately returned, it is easy to see that these
visits never happened. Also logic tells you that there was no visits by the
Buddha to these places:
1.
He most
likely had never heard of them.
2.
What reason
did he have to visit them when he was fully occupied teaching in the places we
know him to have been?
It is perhaps worth noting that whilst we can place the Buddha in
a limited geographical area, that this area is still significantly larger than
that which either Jesus or Confucius ever travelled.
The world at
the time of the Buddha.
The world in the Fifth Century BCE was a very, very different
place, as you can see by the map that accompanies this chapter. Although the
map only covers the Eastern Hemisphere, there is much that it will inform you
concerning the world at that time. Try to find the Roman Empire on the map, you
won’t, for in the Fifth Century BCE Rome whilst busy, hadn’t moved much beyond
being a city state whose own independence was in doubt. The Romans in fact had
trouble asserting their authority in the Tiber Valley. They were at war with
the Etruscans and the Sabine’s. It was in the Fifth Century that the Roman
Republic was born after the Romans had deposed their last king, who
incidentally was an Etruscan. Rome was almost unknown outside the Italian
Peninsula. The possibility of an empire that would govern Western Europe for
the best part of a thousand years and influence it for two thousand years after
its fall, was nowhere evident.
The Greeks had their hands full experimenting with the idea of
democracy and repelling the expanding Persian Empire.
The Persians were building an empire that was geographically
centred on modern Iran, but extended eastwards to the edge of India and west to
the Mediterranean. If you were to place bets on who would ultimately rule
Europe and determine the nature of European civilisation, all the safe money
would have been with the Persians. The Persians were Zoroastrians, more
commonly known today as the Parsi. Zoroastrianism was the dominant monotheistic
religion of its day.
Any suggestion that the Jews whilst monotheistic would in any way,
shape or form produce something that would alter the world would have earned
you a trip to either a doctor to figure out which malevolency was inhabiting
you or utter derision. The Jews were an argumentative people who lived roughly
where Israel is today. They had never been able to get it together long enough
to build an empire nor was there any prospect of them actually doing so. Yet
the Jews through Christianity did fundamentally alter the world. Jesus, we
remember was born Jewish.
The Carthaginians were building the empire in the Western
Mediterranean/North African region that Rome would destroy in the Punic Wars,
some four centuries in the future. Egypt had her pharaohs.
The Chinese were engaged in a period of internal war with the
various principalities trying to conquer their neighbours and eventually form
the next empire. Confucius lived during this century.
India had her city states, kingdoms in the Dravidian south (as
distinct from the Aryan dominated north) and experiments with republicanism,
and of course the Buddha.
New Zealand was empty of people and would remain so for another
thousand years.
Australia had her diverse Aboriginal cultures.
In the Western Hemisphere, the Mayans in modern Mexico, the
Chavins in Peru and the Muisica in Colombia were the dominant cultures. Maize,
potatoes, chillies, beans and Sweet Potato, Alpaca and Llama were all
domesticated and had been for about 5000 years.
South-East Asia had its rice farmers and proto-empires. The Mon
were the power to be reckoned with.
This, then, was the world a the time of the Buddha. How much of it
was known to him is hard to say. He would have known of the Persian Empire. He
most likely did not know of the Greeks or any other peoples to the west of the
Persians. It is a much smaller world than the one we inhabit, but still
fascinating.
The culture
he was born into.
In a lot of ways the Buddha was born into a remarkably tolerant
culture. I remember having read the Pali Canon, and remarking to a monastic
friend that I couldn’t remember the Buddha really prohibiting all that much in
the areas of sexual expression. His reply was “No. The Buddha stayed out of
peoples bedrooms.” Which is remarkably at odds with the Abrahamic religions
where masturbation, homosexuality, contraception, divorce, inter-racial,
inter-religious and even inter-denominational marriages are prohibited. So
there seems to have been relatively free reign in sexual matters. Polygamy and
polyandry seem to be a matter for the people concerned to sort out for
themselves. The operative words are “free consent”. There are serious
prohibitions against sexual relations with people in the care of their parents,
which makes an allowance for minors and the mentally disabled. Also marriages
are viewed as sacrosanct. But within marriage, it is up to the couple to reach
decisions on sexual matters. Sexuality itself is not discussed in the suttas.
We do not know if any of the disciples of the Buddha were Gay, because once you
become a celibate monastic it is irrelevant. And in the non-monastic life the
same rules apply as to heterosexuals. The Buddha taught one Dispensation, he
didn’t teach a different one for each sexual orientation.
Slavery was present in the culture. How onerous the slavery is
hard to determine from a simple reading of the suttas. It seems to be more
burdensome than bonded labour, but significantly less burdensome than in Rome
where the slave was literally the possession of their owner and the owner could
do pretty well what they liked without fear of legal sanction.
Women had more legal rights than they were to enjoy in later
centuries. Perhaps the single piece of evidence that illustrates this is the
existence of a Nuns Community in Buddhism and the absence of a Nuns Order in
Hinduism. Although in allowing the creation of an order of female ascetics, the
Buddha was pushing the social envelope until it squeaked, it does show that
women weren’t bound to domestic duties with the cultural chains that they were
to be under Hinduism and Islam. It was possible for women to pursue an
alternative to marriage and the kitchen. There was a right of divorce.
Hinduism, as such, wasn’t
in existence. All the gods, well the major ones are present. We remember it is
the Hindu god Brahma who asks the Buddha to teach. But perhaps because Buddhism
concerns itself with other matters, gods such as Ganesh & Kali aren’t mentioned. Even if we assume
quite reasonably that the whole pantheon of modern Hindu deities are being
worshipped at the time of the Buddha, the caste system isn’t concreted into
place with the Brahmins at the top of the social pyramid. But there are hints
in the suttas that this was beginning to happen, because the Buddha teaches
that it is not birth that makes a man a Brahmin, but rather his own effort.
Even given this, the great spiritual endeavour is happening in
India at the time of the Buddha. Before his enlightenment, the Buddha was a
part of it. Today some 26 centuries after the Buddha modern Indians are still
engaging in the same ascetic practices that he engaged in. The Indians had a
spiritual thirst before the Buddha and it is still unquenched. It makes the
spiritual endeavours of the West look quite lame in comparison. This then, is a
brief examination of the culture into which the Buddha was born.
Who was he
before the Enlightenment?
The person we know as The Buddha came into the world on the full
moon in what is now our month of May somewhere around the year 560 BCE . His
mother Maha Maya was following the custom of her time and returning to the
village of her birth to give birth to her child. There are legends of her
dreaming that a white elephant had entered her womb and of the newly born child
taking seven steps and declaring that this was his last lifetime and that he
was a Buddha…..which notably conflicts with another essential (and to my mind
seriously inspirational) part of the Buddhas biography. His father Suddhodana
was a governor of the expanding Koliyan kingdom. He was also eventually the
father of at least one son, the Arahant Rahula, and an unknown number of
daughters…..daughters not being important in the succession of power, are
therefore unlikely to be mentioned by ancient chroniclers, but nevertheless,
there is no mention of a daughter of the Buddha.
Ultimately, as the son of a
governor, Gotama would have entered the administration of the Koliyan kingdom,
led a normal life of marriage, work and a death in his late 60’s.
Fortunately for us, this was not to be so. At the time of his
birth, the infant Gotama’s horoscope was drawn up (proof that not a lot has
changed in India in 2600 years), the hermit Asita predicted/saw in the
horoscope that the boy currently only interested in his next feed, was someone
very special indeed….a Wheel Turning Monarch. You get the impression that Dad
wasn’t wildly happy about the news….not what the Old Man had in mind for
junior.
You can almost imagine the scene:
Asita: Ah, sir, I’ve ah done young Gotama’s horoscope
Suddhodana: Yes! My son will conquer the world, have 50 wives and
leave 300 children!
Asita: Ooh, ah!
Suddhodana: Well? Out with it man!
Asita: I’ve done the horoscope,
it does say that there is a very good chance that he will conquer India
and have 50 wives and 300 children, but there’s something else in his chart.
Suddhodana: Something else? What something else? I didn’t pay you
for “something else”.
Asita: Sir, ah, would it upset you all that much if he was to
become one of those forest ascetics and become a Buddha?
Suddhodana: WHAT?!!!
You can imagine crockery being thrown at this point and Asita
looking very carefully at where the guards hands were in relation to their
swords. Clearly the second aspect of the horoscope wasn’t the desired outcome,
because the decision was made that absolutely everything possible to prevent
its occurring must be done. Young Gotama was to have a good education, he was
to live a life of total pleasure, he was never to be exposed to anything that
might remotely trigger a spiritual question in his young mind, including seeing
old people….which means that after a while he stopped seeing Dad and they
became pen-pals. This was the Grand Plan, and like all Grand Plans it had a
serious flaw.
You can imagine the life that the young Gotama was living….endless
sex, great food, and enough alcohol to drown in. But sooner or later the boy
needed to have some time on his own. He asks to be taken for a drive. Along the
way he sees something that he has never seen before: a sick man. He asks
“What’s wrong with that person, they look pale, they’re unsteady on their feet,
hell they look awful?” Now the
bodyguard/chaperone/charioteer has been ordered to say nothing, but he responds
“That person, sir, is sick, he is unwell”.
“What’s “sick”?”
You can imagine that there followed a pretty long question and
answer session between Gotama and the other person. At the end of it, the boy
isn’t happy. He gets taken home, he thinks it over, he most likely corners a
couple of people and asks them about this thing called “being sick”.
Some months later he gets taken for another drive. This time he
sees an elderly person. Again the same Q & A session results. He gets taken
back home. It’s a repeat of before. The Grand Plan is getting shaky.
Gotama gets taken out for a third drive….you can imagine by now
that no one is volunteering for the job. They see a corpse. This time a serious
Q & A breaks loose because in the space of about a year the young Gotama
has seen three things that he never even guessed existed and he has some
serious questions that need to be answered.
The fourth and final trip is the decider. A wandering ascetic is
seen. Now this is just the sort of person that the Old Man didn’t want junior
to become. To make it worse the ascetic is happy. There is a chance that the
young Gotama saw this ascetic on his alms round.
“So who’s that guy with the shaved head, brown robes and bowl, the
happy one?”
“That would be a wandering ascetic sir. Someone who seeks the
ending of birth and death.”
So by now Gotama is a seriously troubled young man. The Grand Plan
has come apart at the seems and Gotama has seen exactly the things that Dad
didn’t want him to. He goes home.
The questioning continues. In fact Gotama has so many questions
and so very few answers and is so troubled that he eventually decides that he
has to leave his very comfortable life in order to find someone who has the
answers to his questions. There is a catch, he can’t just pack up and leave,
there is the royal succession to consider, he is the heir and he must provide
“the spare”. So he does and eventually Rahula is born. So Suddhodana has an
“heir and a spare”. I, personally, don’t accept that Gotama left when Rahula
was a new born, too many children died young in this age for the Buddha to be
to feel secure about the chances of a new born actually living. We, in the
first world live in a time where infant mortality is low, but in the Third
World today, and certainly in historical times, you were as likely to have both
mother and child die as live. Childbirth was a risky business. So he was in the
palace for at least the first six to twelve months of Rahula’s life, which
actually illustrates just how deep the questioning had become. The Bodhisatta
was so troubled by his questions that he actually left his infant son in order
to have them answered.
It is hard to accurately portray just how deep the questioning had
become, but take a minute and consider a couple of things: Gotama at this point
in his life had only known comfort. He had never been hungry nor exposed to
anything like physical discomfort. He has both a son and a wife he loves
dearly. His life, as it is, has a guarantee of physical pleasure. He is also so
deeply troubled by what he has seen that the only way forward for him was to
leave all this and to quite literally step into the unknown.
This is exactly what he does. One night he and his servant Channa
leave the palace. Gotama dons the robes of a wandering ascetic and tells Channa
to take his clothes back to the palace and to tell them what he has done. Now
Channa isn’t a fool, he realises that if he shows up with Gotama’s clothes with
no Gotama filling them, that he’ll most likely be executed out of hand. So he
decides to accompany his master on his quest and the clothes are left in the
branches of a tree not far from the chariot and horses.
The Bodhisatta has set out on his quest. The first days and weeks
can’t have been easy for him….he has no experience of life outside the palace.
We don’t know what, if any use Channa was to him. It is a safe bet that the Bodhisatta didn’t
immediately tap into the local ascetic network, the first days would have been
tough. Even if the Bodhisatta did tap into the ascetic support system on day
one, he still faced sleeping out in the open, having to go on alms round where
you can guarantee that the food wasn’t of either the quality or quantity that
he was used to and dealing with insects, people who neither knew nor cared who
he was and as a result were rude, indifferent or even hostile, there were no
body guards to keep him safe and we can bet that Dad had people out looking for
him. Not only did Gotama have to tap into a world he had until relatively
recently barely known existed, he had to disappear as well. In a very short
space of time Gotama left his wife, child, life as he had known it and the
province his father administered. This must have been deeply frightening for
him. One day a pampered princeling, the next a nobody on the run. This, to me,
shows that the boy was deeply serious about his questioning. He faced these hurdles and then overcame
them.
He found a teacher, a guru. His first guru was Alara Kalama.
Kalama ordained him and then taught him all that he knew. Gotama masters all
that Alara Kalama has to teach him and is offered the position of Guru….Alara
Kalama offers him equal status so long as Gotama stays. Even at this point
Gotama still hasn’t had his questions answered. He goes in search of another
guru. He finds Uddaka Ramaputta and ordains into his tradition. The pattern is
repeated. At the end of two guru, the now ascetic Gotama still has his
questions unanswered.
He decides to go it alone. Because no guru has been able to give
him a teaching that results in Enlightenment, he decides to have no guru. He
actually has his own group of disciples who by the time he sets out on the
course of action that leads to Enlightenment live apart from him. The
austerities that the ascetic Gotama undertakes are almost beyond comprehension,
he eats the dung of cattle, he fasts almost to the point of death, he holds his
breath for long periods of time. He tries everything he can think of in order
to achieve his goal, which is Nibbana. The body is nearly destroyed as a
result, and Gotama still hasn’t reached the end of his quest. But let us not
take my words for the austerities that the Bodhisatta undertook, let us hear
him talking about them to his disciple Ven Sariputta
“Sariputta, I recall having
lived a holy life possessing four factors. I have practised asceticism-the
extreme of asceticism; I have practised coarseness-the extreme of coarseness; I
have practised scrupulousness-the extreme of scrupulousness; I have practised
seclusion-the extreme of seclusion.
“Such was my asceticism, Sariputta, that I went naked, rejecting
conventions, licking my hands, not coming when asked, not stopping when asked;
I did not accept food brought or food specially made or an invitation to a
meal; I received nothing from a pot, from a bowl, across a threshold, across a
stick, across a pestle, from two eating together, from a pregnant woman, from a
woman giving suck, from a woman lying with a man, from where food was
advertised to be distributed, from where a dog was waiting, from where flies
were buzzing; I accepted no fish or meat, I drank no liquor, wine or fermented
brew. I kept to one house, to one morsel; I kept to two houses, to two
morsels;…I kept to seven houses, to seven morsels. I lived on one saucerful a
day, on two saucerfuls a day…on seven saucerfuls a day; I took food once a day,
once every two days…once every seven days, and so on up to once every fortnight;
I dwelt pursuing the practice of taking food at stated intervals. I was an
eater of greens or millet or wild rice or hide-parings or moss or rice bran or
rice-scum or sesamum flour or grass or cow dung. I lived on forest fruits and
roots; I fed on fallen fruits. I clothed myself in hemp, in hemp mixed cloth,
in shrouds, in refuse rags, in tree bark, in antelope hide, in strips of
antelope hide, in kusa grass fabric, in bark fabric, in wood shavings fabric,
in head hair wool, in animal wool, in owls wings. I was one who pulled out hair
and beard, pursuing the practice of pulling out hair and beard. I was one who
stood continuously, rejecting seats. I was one who squatted continuously,
devoted to maintaining the squatting position. I was one who used a mattress of
spikes; I made a mattress of spikes my bed. I dwelt pursuing the practice of
bathing in water three times daily including the evening. Thus in such a
variety of ways I dwelt pursuing the practice of tormenting and mortifying the
body. Such was my asceticism.
“Such was my coarseness, Sariputta, that just as the bole of the
tinduka tree (Diospyros embryopteris “Indian Persimmon), accumulating
over the years, cakes and flakes off, so too, dust and dirt, accumulating over
the years, caked off my body and flaked off. It never occurred to me: ‘Oh, let
me rub this dust and dirt off with my hand, or let another rub this dust and
dirt off with his hand’-it never occurred to me thus. Such was my coarseness.
“Such was my
scrupulousness, Sariputta, that I was always mindful in stepping forwards and
stepping backwards. I was full of pity even for the beings in a drop of water
thus: `Let me not hurt the tiny creatures in the crevices of the ground.’ Such
was my scrupulousness.
“Such was my seclusion, Sariputta, that I would plunge into some
forest and dwell there. And when I saw a cowherd or a shepherd or someone
gathering grass or sticks, or a woodsman, I would flee from grove to grove,
from thicket to thicket, from hollow to hollow, from hillock to hillock. Why
was that? So that they should not see me or I see them. Just as a forest bred
deer on seeing human beings, flees from grove to grove, from thicket to
thicket, from hollow to hollow, from hillock to hillock, so too when I saw a
cowherd or a shepherd…Such was my seclusion.
“I would go on all fours to
the cow pens when the cattle had gone out and the cowherd had left them, and I
would feed on the dung of the young suckling calves. As long as my own
excrement and urine lasted, I fed on my own excrement and urine. Such was my
distortion in feeding.
“I would plunge into some awe inspiring grove and dwell there-a
grove so awe inspiring that normally it would make a mans hair stand up if he
were not free from lust. When those cold wintry nights came during the `eight
days interval of frost,’ I would dwell by night in the open and by day in the
grove. In the last month of the hot season I would dwell by day in the open and
by night in the grove. And there came to me spontaneously this stanza never
heard before:
‘Chilled by night and scorched by day,
Alone in awe inspiring groves,
Naked, no fire to sit beside,
The sage
yet pursues his quest.’
“I would make my bed in a charnel ground with the bones of the
dead for a pillow. And cowherd boys came up and spat on me, urinated on me,
threw dirt at me, and poked sticks into my ears. Yet I do not recall that I
ever aroused an evil mind of hate against them. such was my abiding in
equanimity.
“Sariputta, there are certain recluses and brahmins whose doctrine
and view is this: `Purification comes about through food.’ They say: `Let us
live on kola fruits,’ and they eat kola fruits, they eat kola fruit powder,
they drink kola fruit water, and they make many kinds of kola fruit
concoctions. Now I recall having eaten a single kola fruit a day. Sariputta,
you may think that the kola fruit was bigger at that time, yet you should not
regard it so: the kola fruit then was at most the same size as now. Through feeding on a single kola fruit a day,
my body reached a state of extreme emaciation (It should be noted that the kola
seed that the Blessed One is talking of here is actually a form of jujube, and
not the kola of West Africa which is the source of the caffeine in soft drinks.
The kola nit we use is a known euphoric, the kola the Buddha knew was simply a
fruit). Because of eating so little my limbs became like the jointed segments
of vine stems or bamboo stems. Because of eating so little my backside became
like a camels hoof. Because of eating so little the projections on my spine
stood forth like corded beads. Because of eating so little my ribs jutted out
as gaunt as the crazy rafters of an old roofless barn. Because of eating so
little the gleam of my eyes sank far down into their sockets, looking like a
gleam of water that has sunk far down in a deep well. Because of eating so little
my scalp shrivelled and withered as a green bitter gourd shrivels and withers
in the wind and sun. Because of eating so little my belly skin adhered to my
back bone; thus if I touched my belly skin I encountered my backbone, and if I
touched my backbone I encountered my belly skin. Because of eating so little,
if I tried to ease my body by rubbing my limbs with my hands, the hair rotted
at its roots, fell from my body as I rubbed.
“Sariputta, there are certain recluses and brahmins whose doctrine
and view is this: `Purification comes about through food.’ They say: `Let us
live on beans,’…`Let us live on sesamum,’…’Let us live on rice,’ and they eat
rice, they eat rice powder, they drink rice water, and they make many kinds of
rice concoctions. Now I recall having eaten a single rice grain a day.
Sariputta, you may think that the rice grain was bigger at that time, yet you
should not regard it so: the rice grain was then at most the same size as now.
Through feeding on a single rice grain a day, my body reached a state of
extreme emaciation. Because of eating so little…the hair, rotted at its roots,
fell from my body as I rubbed.
“Yet, Sariputta, by such conduct, by such practice, by such
performance of austerities, I did not attain any superhuman states, any
distinction in knowledge and vision worthy of the noble ones. Why was that?
Because I did not attain that noble wisdom which when attained is noble and
emancipating and leads the one who practices in accordance with it to the
complete destruction of suffering.”
The Greater Discourse on the Lions Roar
Majjhima Nikaya Sutta 12
Perhaps it was because he
was simply tired of the pain that his current line of asceticism was giving
him, perhaps he had simply “reached the end of his tether” and couldn’t think
of any way to reach his goal, but at some point the Bodhisatta remembered an
event from his childhood. He remembered meditating under a tree. He also
remembered that the meditation was intensely pleasant. He had in fact entered
into Access Concentration or First Jhana
by accident. Think of a bliss that reduces you to a giggling wreck for
days afterwards, this is what Gotama had as a kid. Understandably given the amount of physical
pain he had put himself through, pleasure appealed to him. He also may have
considered that he had nothing to lose and everything to gain from returning to
an exercise from his childhood.
It would seem that the
thinking current at this time was that the body was the problem. If the body
was somehow made different then Nibbana would be reached. This line of
reasoning is present in varying degrees in Yoga and Jainism….perfect the body
and the mind will follow. Indeed even in modern India there are still ascetics
practising almost identical austerities to what the Bodhisatta practised.
Although I can’t find an explicit mention of it, it is reasonable to assume
that Gotama used both cannabis and opium in his austerities. My line of
reasoning is this: Both were available at that time. Both cause mind altering
effects. Bhang (cannabis) is used by Sadhu as part of their religious practice.
The sheer determination exhibited by Gotama in his endeavours to achieve
Enlightenment suggest that he left no option unexplored. It also explains the
Fifth Precept of not taking intoxicants. The Bodhisatta knew first hand how a
night on the weed could wreck your meditation for days after. The Bodhisatta realised that it is the
reverse that is true. Perfect the mind and the body will follow.
So it was that he
re-examined the lessons that he had learnt long before he had even conceived of
a life as an ascetic. I will take the liberty of assuming that whilst jhana was
known at this time, that it was viewed as an end in and of itself….this
explains the concept of Union with Brahma. No body had thought that jhana could
be the key to Enlightenment. This was the avenue of endeavour that the
Bodhisatta now decided to explore.
Take a moment to consider that for the previous six years the
Bodhisatta had engaged in serious asceticism, he had gone hungry, thirsty, been
cold, had explored mind altering substances….he had learnt and mastered the
teachings of the most wise guru he could find, and whilst he had come a long
way, he still hadn’t gotten what he had given up so much for. He was still unenlightened,
still subject to greed, anger and delusion, he was still very much an ordinary
person, there was still a very real chance that he could give up the quest and
return to the life he had left. Subjecting the body to torment had quite
literally gotten him no where. Returning to the experience under the tree when
the body had been healthy was the only option other than giving up, that was
available to Gotama, and with his character, quitting wasn’t an option.
The Bodhisatta practising austerities
(Gandhara 4th Century CE )
So Gotama quits the ascetic
practices. He takes nourishment from Sujata who offers him milk rice (kheer).
You can imagine that if ever kheer tasted good, it would have then. That first sip of milk, that first taste of the
rice and sugar would have simply been explosive. Gotama regains his health.
This must have taken weeks. Then he pursues jhana. He uses Mindfulness/Awareness
of the Breath (Anapanasati) as his meditation. This culminates in one explosive
night when he overcomes all the obstacles to Enlightenment and with the dawning
of the next day he is a Buddha, an Awakened One. Neither he nor the world will ever be the
same.
At this time an event occurs that is utterly electric in its
potency.
Mara shows up the morning after the Enlightenment and challenges
the Buddhas attainment.
“So you’re Enlightened are you?”
“Yes I am”
“Well who’s your witness?”
The Buddha simply touches the ground with his middle finger and says
“This is my witness”.
The Earth is His witness. There is no need for a divinity. The
Earth alone will suffice.
In the suttas the Buddha
talks about confronting demons, and the daughters of Mara, of raging elephants
and finally Mara himself. I would suggest that these are metaphors. For all of
us who seek to live a life of purity confront these things. Oh Mara the Tempter
exists, of that I have no doubt, but the Buddha uses metaphor to describe His
battle, and never for a moment do those of us who seek the ending of suffering
do anything other than agree totally with his description of the fight that he
had.
This brings to a close the first stage of the life of The Buddha.
Life
post Enlightenment
Immediately after the Enlightenment the Buddha did something
totally understandable….he took a break. He spent the first months enjoying the
bliss of Enlightenment. Teaching wasn’t his first inclination, in fact he had
to be asked to teach, and at first he refused. So you can picture him sitting
under the Bodhi Tree in what is now known as Bodh Gaya, blissed out with jhana.
He has absolutely no inclination to do anything other than this. He knows how
hard it is to achieve Enlightenment….he’s not long done it himself. Now
Enlightenment is such a rare thing, that the Buddhas Enlightenment attracted
attention, one of the beings inhabiting the race known as Brahmas (not
Brahmins), one of the beings called “gods” in the suttas, had noticed that
something very rare and important had happened. So this being known by the name
Sahampatti shows up to take a look at the new Buddha. He politely interrupts the blissing out. He
then asks that the Buddha consider helping others to Enlightenment. In fact he
asks three times and three times the Buddha says “No”.
Sahampatti asks “Why not?”
The Buddha: No! It’s too hard.
Sahampatti: Look some will listen to you
The Buddha: They’re all too stupid and self interested to even
want to try.
Sahampatti: I’ve had a look, and there are some who
will listen and do what you teach. If you don’t believe me, take a look for
yourself.
So the Buddha does take a look, and there are some “with just a
little dust in their eyes”, who are capable and willing to do what he asks of
them. So he relents. You can imagine the reluctance in which he approached the
task he had just accepted.
“They’ll bring all their worries, petty quarrels and disobedient children
to me. The questions will be endless!”
“True, but there will be those who will simply follow what you
teach and do it in silence”.
“Yeah! How many?”
“You might be surprised. And worse comes to worse you can always
go back to your meditation and solitude”.
At any rate, the Buddha sets out to find his former disciples and
does. It is curious that along the way that the Buddha meets another ascetic
and proclaims that he is a Fully Enlightened Buddha and basically gets the
brush off. To paraphrase”
“Friend, I am a fully enlightened Buddha, someone who has come to
the end of rebirth”.
“Yeah, whatever!”
The two go on their ways,
the Buddha to Sarnath, the other ascetic, who knows?
It should be noted that when the former disciples saw a well
nourished Gotama show up that they were a long way from being impressed and had
thought that he had given up the quest. Consequently they decided that they
weren’t going to pay respects to a quitter, no matter who he might be.
Eventually, despite themselves, they do. The Buddha asks them had they ever
seen him behaving and speaking in the way that he is now behaving and speaking?
The reply is that they haven’t. He tells them of his achievement and after a
time teaches the Dhammacakkapavattana Sutta (SN 56.11).
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