by Vilas Sarang
Suppose now that I was to eat food little by little, drop by drop, such as bean soup or chickpea soup? So I took food little by little, drop by drop. When I took food little by little, drop by drop, my body became exceedingly emaciated. Because I ate so little, all my limbs became like withered creepers; because I ate so little, my buttocks became like a bullock’s hoof; because I ate so little, my protruding backbone became like a string of balls; because I ate so little, my gaunt ribs became like the crazy rafters of a tumble-down shed; because I ate so little, the pupils of my eyes shrank low and deep; because I ate so little, my arse became as shrivelled and shrunk as a bitter gourd cut before it is ripe becomes shrivelled and shrank by a hot wind. If I touched the skin of my belly, it was the backbone that I took hold of. If I thought I will touch my backbone, it was the skin of my belly that I took hold of. If I wished to obey the call of nature I fell down on my face then and there. If I stroked my limbs with my hand, the hairs, rotted at the roots, fell away from my body.
Siddharth went through all that debasement and degradation. We know that he did not find the insight he was searching for. Who knows if the debasement was indirectly the base for that illumination? One must go through the pain of inferno to reach the heights of paradiso.
Kondanna, the seniormost of them all, used to keep a watch on Siddharth’s progress and report it to the other four. The tales he told them of him living in the crematorium, and eating filth, left them dumbfounded. More and more, they were convinced that Siddharth would, any day, emerge from the place a mere skeleton, but shining with glory. Breathlessly, they waited for that day.
One day, Walya arrived, as he used to do, to check if his master was alive. Siddharth was stretched out in his filth, supine. But Walya saw his master make a sign—he wanted to tell Walya something. Walya had to bend down to hear what his master wanted.
‘What? You want me to bring you a whole bowl of rice?’
The master nodded.
Hurriedly, Walya went and picked up the master’s alms bowl; he ran to the village and got a whole bowlful of rice. Siddharth needed Walya’s help to stand up. Holding Walya’s hand, Siddharth made it to his habitual place. A whole bowl of rice! Would he be able to eat it all?
Slowly, Siddharth began to eat, a grain of rice at a time.
‘Eat, master, eat!’ Walya encouraged Siddharth. His joy knew no bounds. It was as if his master had come back from the dead.
In no time, Kondanna got wind of the news. He alerted the rest of the group and they came running. Siddharth had not yet finished his bowl of rice. The five men stood around him, watching in disbelief. Their disbelief quickly turned into contempt. The youngest of them was the first to open his mouth.
‘What, Siddharth, eating a whole bowlful of rice?’
‘He must really be hungry,’ another said.
‘Siddharth has chickened out. What a shame,’ a third man said.
‘After all, he has been a raja’s son. He will go back to his royal ways.’
‘We thought he was our leader. But it turns out, he is a lost leader.’
‘Come, friends, we must find some other enlightened one who will show us the way.’
They all left in a huff. Only Kondanna reluctantly lingered. After all, he had seen Siddharth as an infant without a name.
That same evening, Kondanna found an excuse and returned to Siddharth’s place.
Kondanna sat next to Siddharth. He placed his hand upon Siddharth’s shoulder—like a younger brother.
‘Tell me, Siddharth, why did you take the decision to abandon your ascetic practices?’
‘Brother Kondanna, you know how much I tried, how far I had gone. In spite of all that I did, I did not get anywhere. I am convinced no man could have done more.’
‘Certainly, brother.’
‘Which is why I took a considered decision. It is not that I was not able to bear all that pain, all that agony. I have been through similar experiences before. I judge things as a matter of fact. Why pursue a method which, you are convinced, will not yield results?’
‘You mean to say, brother, that you have not lost hope?’
‘Of course not. It is only that I must take my bearings again.’
Kondanna patted Siddharth’s shoulder affectionately.
‘I knew you were a man of grit. Now I know the depth of your iron courage. Good luck, my brother, and farewell.’
Just as he had told Kondanna, Siddharth was thinking of the next step.
Precisely as Siddharth sat down with a whole bowl of rice, Sullenpride, Maar’s eldest son, cried out: ‘Father, father, come, have a look!’
Maar answered, ‘What is it, Sullenpride? Is my enemy dead?’
‘No such luck, come and see for yourself.’
Maar got up and went to see for himself.
‘See, see, a whole bowl of rice! And he’s eating it!’
‘Oh,’ Maar said, with a huge sense of disappointment. ‘I thought he would starve himself to death.’
‘Obviously, he has given that up.’
‘Yes, with a whole bowl of rice, it’s clear.’
‘I wonder what he is going to try next.’
‘Let’s see, son. This man is stubborn.’
9
Sullenpride, Maar’s eldest son, said: ‘Father, where are you going?’
Maar grunted. Obviously, he was in a foul mood.
‘Father—’
‘I’m going to the enemy. To would-be.’
‘But, father, he is quiet now. He isn’t up to his tricks. He’s only doing meditation, or something.’
‘Son, when the enemy is quiet, when he is meditating, then I most fear him.’
‘I don’t understand.’
‘Would-be is quiet. It is a sign that things are happening.’
‘Things?’
‘Yes. In his mind. Things are happening in his mind. That is a thing to fear.’
‘Do something to his mind,’ Sullenpride suggested.
‘Like what?’ Flurry, the youngest son, enquired.
‘I’ve got an idea!’ Delight, one of the daughters, said.
‘Like what?’ Sullenpride asked.
‘He’s meditating, right?’ Delight spoke with enthusiasm. ‘Let me go to earth. I will go and dance before him. That’ll distract him.’ As an afterthought she added: ‘If necessary, I shall dance naked in front of him. Yeah, stark naked.’
‘Ah, that’s an old idea. In heaven, they used that trick with rishis who set out on hot tapasya,’ Maar said.
‘Anyway, why not try it?’ Sullenpride asked his father.
‘Children, enough of your prattle. This super-enemy isn’t going to fall for these things.’
‘But, father, you yourself told me that libido is one of the strongest weapons in our armoury,’ Sullenpride said. He used the word ‘libido’ to show off his professional expertise. Maar treated his children, particularly the eldest son, as budding disciples of Maardom.
‘Libido?’ Maar said. ‘Libido is peanuts for him. See you, children.’
Siddharth had shifted his base much farther into the forest where tall and wide-boled trees, with thick foliage, grew aplenty. Perhaps by instinct, the quester had chosen a setting that took him back to primaeval memories where evolution had, over countless ages, taken slow steps and where this particular quester was hoping to take one small step further. He used to go out with his begging bowl late in the morning. He ate a bowlful of rice, his only meal of the day. The village where he begged for alms was quite far from the jungle. This was convenient, for going into the village and walking back, Siddharth got plenty of exercise. He was like a grandmaster training for a match, keeping himself fit physically and mentally. Gone were the days of debilitating starvation. And after his physical ordeal, Siddharth had lost all fear of the jungle. He knew that no animal would harm him. One had only to take care that one did not step on a snake.
Deep in the heart of the jungle, Siddharth selected a place where a small, clear stre
am flowed. Near the stream was a huge pipal tree which seemed to invite him. Perhaps the subconscious memory of his own birth, with his mother clutching at a tree, drew him to this one. The abundant foliage of the pipal made a soft musical sound, conducive to meditation and trance. If no breeze blew and the tree was quiet, the stream flowed with a soothing sound, a continuous flow of time, so relaxing that one might feel that time stood still.
Sometimes, Siddharth continued his meditation long into the night, especially when the moon had waxed full.
It was the month of Vaisakh, and in the pale moonlight, Siddharth was surprised to see dark clouds in the sky. Rapidly, thunder and lightning followed but there was no rain. It was only Maar, who was preparing for his advent. Maar thought thunder and lightning were just right, but he did not like rain. Besides, rain would have interfered with the serious conversation he planned.
‘Hail, would-be!’ Maar thundered. ‘So you have given up asceticism, have you?’
Siddharth replied, ‘Yes, it wasn’t taking me anywhere.’
Maar: But where do you want to be? Up there, with the gods?
Siddharth: No. I have no such ambition.
Maar: Then what do you want? You could have been a world-conquering monarch. But you let that pass.
S: My ideas are quite different.
M: And may I ask what those ideas are?
S: I want to free mankind from all evil.
M: All desires? Even harmless ones?
S: Yes. That’s right.
M: But, would-be, don’t you see that what I specialize in are man’s innate desires?
S: That is not all there’s to man. Look, Maar, some days ago, I saw a lioness being friends with a calf. Friend, rather than prey. That is what I want.
M: I know. But that was only an isolated incident. But otherwise, what do you see in the animal world?
S: You have to tell me.
M: Lions devour their prey, hyenas devour the leftovers. As a matter of fact, do you know what happened to the calf on whom the lioness showered such affection?
S: You have to tell me.
M: A couple of days after you saw the spectacle, the calf strayed away from the lioness. Taking the opportunity, another lion killed it.
S: That was unfortunate. But human beings are much more malleable.
M: But human beings, too, were born with the same instincts. How can you fight with desires, god-given desires?
S: Desires work both ways. And man is intelligent enough to find that out. An excess of desires works havoc. Desire, when tempered, may be good. But desire, let loose, is like a hungry dog. Then it turns into pure greed. Greed devours everything.
M: I tell you, would-be, desires will work in the human mind even after you are gone.
S: Look, Maar, I have no illusions that I will change human nature for good. All I want is that those humans who see my point of view, will follow it. That is all.
M: You are sensible, I must admit.
Maar vanished, as always, like a phantom. Before Siddharth, the jungle lay silent. The clouds were gone. It was still a few days for the full moon. Willy-nilly, Maar’s words may have contributed to the seeker’s quest.
10
A full-moon night in the month of Vaisakh: the forest spread out before Siddharth was absolutely quiet. In the distance, a herd of deer grazed. Their dainty movements looked ethereal in the moonlight. The old pipal tree was still. The stream made a soft constant sound. The still, silent seeker was ready—his mind was completely and utterly lucid.
The bodhi on that celebrated night began when the moon had fully risen, three hours before she was to reach her zenith. Soon, Siddharth had a tremendous vision of his past lives:
I recalled many a former existence I had passed: one birth, two births … a hundred, a thousand, a hundred thousand births, in various world-periods … I was there, such was my name, such my family, such was my way of life … such was my end. Having died, I came to life again there, such was my name … and such was my end.
Clearly, in these early hours, Siddharth had a dream experience. Only in dreams is time unhinged and one may ‘see’ long stretches of temporal experience. In real time, the dream may not last more than a few seconds.
Siddharth’s dream was the key, it was the Kierkegaardian leap he took. He had these visionary flashes, intermittently, well beyond midnight. As he tells us: ‘With the heavenly eye, purified and beyond the range of human vision, I saw how beings vanish and come to be again.’ The cosmic, Dantesque vision was no doubt luminously transcendental, but the dreamer was always lucidly aware. What makes sense of human actions? There was only one logical answer, sanctioned by Hindu philosophical tradition: karma. ‘Those beings who make evil use of the body, speech and thought will obtain after the breaking-up of the body at death a painful rebirth, they will sink down, perish and be processed in hell.’
This long night was a deep sleep, a timeless dream, but it was also supremely logical and tightly controlled by the seeker: ‘I directed my mind to the knowledge of the destruction of influences and knew as it really is: this suffering, dukkha …’
The last watch of the night: the moon is down and dawn breaking. Siddharth’s tremendously creative ‘sleep’ is over and his rational mind is active. The leap has been completed, the seeker has found his breakthrough: an unwavering focus on dukkha. And Siddharth works out this insight to its conclusion: ‘Cessation, and the path that leads to its cessation.’
The night of the bodhi draws to its end with this creative fusion. Dawn breaks, as it always has. In the forest of Uruwela, soon to be known as Bodh Gaya, Siddharth has achieved what he wanted; the exultation is clear in his words.
And I recognized that my mind was free from the influences of sense-desire, of becoming and of ignorance. And the knowledge arose in me: ‘Rebirth for me is destroyed, the religious life has been led, done is what was to be done, there is no more being and becoming for me.
The orange-yellow light of sunrise, increasing every second, seems to underline his sense of relief, of exhilarating peace. It is as if the four corners of the earth echo his cry: ‘Done is what was to be done.’ That cry has echoed down the centuries.
When the full moon night in the month of Vaisakh of the year 528 BC began, he was a mere seeker, at most a Bodhisattva; at the end of the luminous night, he was Buddha.
Have you seen the leaf of the pipal tree? It has a large, expansive body; then, imperceptibly, it tapers down to nothing, to the Upanishadic no-point. Siddharth’s mind, on the bodhi night, worked like that. He had wide knowledge of many things, the thoughts of sages like Alara Kalama and Uddak. But Siddharth knew that that was not enough. At the end of the line of five hundred ox-carts, was there going to be merely dust? What was the use of walking on water if one did not know where to go? The yogic no-point was a great achievement, but the real search should begin there. Does transcendental meditation teach you to think of the suffering of mankind? Siddharth’s mind began where the pipal leaf tapered off and went the furthest.
Buddha’s words are magnetic, resonant. Religion generally emphasizes morals; Buddha begins, astoundingly, with an analysis of the human condition. And his analysis floors you: ‘Birth is ill, decay is ill, death is ill.’ His focus is on human psychology, at a time when psychology was the last thing religion was concerned with. ‘Not to get what one wants … means suffering.’ You’ve got to get up and take note; because who is there who does not want something, and doesn’t get it? Quickly the discourse changes to ‘all-grasping’. It is getting serious. And the next word he utters is the weak point for everyone: ‘craving’.
You’ve got to give in. You may ignore rebirth, right conduct etcetera. But Buddha has got you hooked. And as you continue along this path, you just have to sit up and take note of the eightfold path and the rest. Is it any wonder, then, that Buddha’s teaching spread in the far corners of Asia, and even beyond?
‘Depression’, in modern times, is a curious, two-faced word. In ps
ychology, is means one thing, something that is spreading fast; and Buddha’s teaching will be greatly helpful there. In economics, it means another thing; periodically, we hear of economic depressions, and you think of Buddha’s warnings about craving, about greed. Buddha’s relevance will only grow in the twenty-first century.
The present book has a perspective of centuries; contemporary concerns do not come within its scope. But religions, or rather, religious authorities, are eager to suggest solutions to solve contemporary problems from their own, exclusive doctrines. The problems of the world—economic crises, pollution—are going to last as long as the world will, so we may take note of them.
The head of the Catholic church, in one of the most recent encyclicals, advises people that they must allow themselves to fulfil themselves as individuals or as a society, but ‘only when god is involved’. To a Buddhist, this may sound like a strange condition, for a Buddhist does not think in those terms at all. Again, the eminent authority finds ‘the roots of the economic crisis in wickedness’. The Abrahamic religions typically think in terms ‘wickedness’, or ‘sin’. This kind of abstraction is quite alien to Buddha’s thinking. Out of curiosity, I looked up the index to three or four books on Buddhism: the word ‘sin’ did not figure at all! It is not that Buddhism does not care for individual or social morality; but it thinks of such problems concretely without involving god.
Conservation of all resources is a concept much in vogue now. Buddha had practised water conservation 2500 years ago. A disciple named Manavaka carefully observed Buddha’s daily routine and this is what he tells us: ‘To wash his bhiksha patra after his daily meal, Buddha takes only as much water as is necessary. He washes the vessel without the water making noise, never does he turn the vessel upside down; he doesn’t put the vessel down on the ground to wash his own hands, while washing the vessel his hands are cleaned, he doesn’t need additional water for that purpose. He does not throw the vessel-water carelessly away, nor does he throw it too near his own body. All his movements are peaceful, easeful and disciplined.’
