by Sun Shuyun
Coming to Bodh Gaya is the crowning moment of the pilgrims’ life. The first feeling must be one of intimacy: this is the place they have long read about – how the Buddha sat down at the foot of this tree to meditate, how he was attacked by Mara, the lord of evil, with arrows, pieces of rock and darts of burning flame, how in vain Mara sent his three daughters to seduce the Buddha. All his tricks failed. After seven days, the Buddha finally achieved enlightenment. When he wondered whether what he had realized was too difficult for people to comprehend, the gods Brahma and Indra begged him to go out and preach it to the world. This is the message the pilgrims have learned and pondered and practised. Now they are actually here, sitting under the world’s most revered tree, the primal source of everything they have followed. The teaching was hard to understand at times; the precepts difficult to observe when faced with the problems life threw at them; meditation was too demanding; sometimes they felt what the Buddha realized was not for them, mere mortals. But here, once again, it is all real. The Buddha found his way here, on his own. The Burmese ordinands wanted to start their new life as he had done. But all pilgrims try to communicate with the great teacher in their own way, to intuit for themselves the lesson he taught.
For what the Buddha has given them, the pilgrims feel immensely grateful. The flowers, the banners, the music, the lamps, the ceremonies, the prostrations, all express their gratitude. The Buddha pointed out a different way of life for them, purer, simpler and happier. Now they have found comfort and hope where there was none; they can overcome the craving at the very centre of existence in a materialistic world, the fear of losing everything they hold dear; they can cope with the pain of life and transcend it. They pray that they will persevere just as he did, and hope that they too will reach final awakening.
Although I was still struggling with many tenets of Buddhism, and even more with its practice, I too found it moving to think that everything began here, under this tree – the grand monasteries from India to China along the Silk Road, the little village temple where my grandmother prayed daily, the sublime beauty of Buddhist art and the changes in the lives of so many people, in so many countries, for the past 2,500 years. Looking at the pilgrims performing their devotions, I could begin to appreciate Xuanzang’s reaction 1,300 years ago. I even had the sense he was among them, feeling the same excitement, gratitude and reverence, ‘scattering flowers, burning incense, playing music as they go from one sacred site to another, paying their homage and making their offerings’.
But when he came to worship at the Bodhi Tree, he broke down. Hui Li tells us that Xuanzang ‘cast himself down with his face to the ground in worship and with grief. With tears in his eyes, he said, “I do not know where I was at the time when the Buddha attained enlightenment. I can only have reached this sacred place now. How bad must my karma have been not to have been born in his time?” ’
This is the only occasion in his entire eighteen-year journey that he showed his emotions. The fatal avalanche that almost killed his entire company, the vicious bandits who held knives to his head, the beautiful princess whose hand was offered to him, the highest honour given to a Buddhist monk – all were recorded by him in a simple, matter-of-fact manner, with no note of triumph for the things accomplished, obstacles removed and praises showered on him. But in front of the Bodhi Tree, this calm, fearless and indomitable man surrendered to his feelings. Like a wandering child, he felt he had finally come home, he could let go.
How Xuanzang wished he could have heard the Buddha’s very words before later generations produced their conflicting commentaries! Although he had cleared many of the doubts in his mind and achieved much of the purpose of his trip, he must have felt he still had a long way to go for the final liberation. The physical exhaustion accumulated during all those years of travel, the decline of Buddhism in India that he had seen exemplified in ruined stupas and monasteries, the anxiety of whether the Dharma would suffer the same fate elsewhere – they could not shake his determination, but they made his quest more difficult.
I stood there in the courtyard. The chanting had stopped; the only sounds were the wind threading itself through the leaves of the Bodhi Tree and the respectful murmur of pilgrims’ voices. I had the sudden sensation that I could share a moment of recognition, across time, with this man I would never meet, but whom I had been searching for. In following his footsteps, I had made a point of trying to identify with his feelings, thoughts and reactions, to understand him and his world. Occasionally, he or Hui Li tells me what went on in his mind, as when he was on the altar, ready to be sacrificed to the river goddess by the pirates; I was always grateful for such insights. Sometimes, I had vague ideas of what he would have thought of a particular situation, such as the avalanche in the Heavenly Mountains, but it was perhaps as good as ‘scratching an itch through a boot’; I needed a lifetime to grasp fully the serenity and total detachment he embodied. At other times I failed miserably; the pages of miracles in the Record, for example, were simply beyond my comprehension, as was Yogacara: we were worlds apart. But here under the Bodhi Tree, halfway through my journey, surrounded by pilgrims and almost overwhelmed by their devotion, reflecting on Xuanzang’s outpouring of emotion, I felt I could enter his world – he was human too. His presence, as if in another dimension, inaccessible but none the less real, was chaperoning me, silently.
I had a sudden urge to share my moment of understanding of Xuanzang’s experience with some of the pilgrims. After their service was over, I asked a young woman from the Singapore group how she felt about being here. ‘If you don’t know, I cannot tell you. It’s inexpressible,’ she said piously. A small group of Indians whom I mistook for Sri Lankans were more forthcoming: ‘He is the incarnation of Lord Vishnu. He is kind, loving and very generous. And this place is lovely, very good for a day’s outing.’ Not what I was expecting. I went back to where I had been standing. I was wondering if the young man in meditation would talk to me when he finished. I had no idea how long it would be but it did not seem to matter. I could be here and watch the world go by. Another hour passed and he stood up. He was more than happy to talk to me. He said his name was Andrew and asked me what the time was. I looked at my watch: it was one thirty in the afternoon. He had been up since five o’clock so he would not mind some food first. ‘After all, the Buddha only gained enlightenment after taking a bowl of porridge from a village woman,’ he said with good humour. He would come back in twenty minutes.
Back under the Bodhi Tree, Andrew sat down in his meditation position and told me he was on a retreat, his eighth. He was a systems engineer from Wisconsin. He spent ten months every year working and two months in Bodh Gaya. He was searching for the transcendental happiness in Buddhism. ‘After all, the pursuit of happiness is written in our constitution, it’s our right,’ he said seriously, the gentle smile disappearing. ‘But are we happy? I would say no. I’m a good example. I know what makes me happy – racing cars, designer clothes, exotic holidays and so on. But the pleasure never lasts and you know, I’m kind of tired of chasing them. When do we have enough and where do we stop? That’s what I wonder. What’s really happiness? The Buddha was a prince and his father surrounded him with beauty and luxury. But he gave it all up to search for lasting happiness. And he found it here, under this tree.’
‘What do you think the Buddha realized here?’ I wanted to hear it from someone who was obviously searching diligently.
‘I could talk about it till the cows come home,’ he said, a slow smile spreading across his face. ‘I’m sure you’ve read a lot about the Dharma. But for me, the key is the “right understanding” of the human condition. The first thing we do when we are born into this world is cry. Even if we are lucky enough to avoid illness, life doesn’t always live up to our expectations. We become frustrated, disappointed, feel despair, not to mention anger, greed, jealousy. Sex in my dreams. Life can be pleasant: the Buddha knew that from his years in the palace, but it doesn’t last. I don’t know, it seems to me
that what’s behind all suffering, really, is wanting things. The Buddha said our mind was like a monkey in the forest: it grabs one branch, lets it go, seizes another. We’ll never be satisfied.’
He paused to gauge how much I was taking in, or as the Chinese say, to see if he was playing violin to a cow. When he was reassured I was following him he went on. ‘Once we have let go of our attachments to ourselves, we can learn kindness and compassion, as the Buddha taught, and not to harm others. If you keep making the effort and stay aware of what you do and how it affects other people, if you keep practising meditation, you can change your life. But even that doesn’t mean the end of pain. The Buddha fell sick, grew old and died just like everybody else. By enlightenment, the Buddha showed us how to find inside yourself the strength to live with pain, to transcend it. Suffering is all around you, but you can still find peace of mind.’
This Buddhism based on self-exertion was not the one I learned about in school; nor did it resemble what my grandmother practised. If anything, Chinese Buddhism seemed the exact opposite: it had little to do with individual effort and everything to do with gods and goddesses. The most telling evidence is our written character for the Buddha. I demonstrated it for Andrew on my notebook. It is pronounced Fo, and its left half is the character ren, human or a man, its right half means no, or not. Combined, , the Buddha, means ‘not-a-man’. If a man is not a mortal man, he must be a god. That is what the Buddha is for the Chinese, an almighty, omnipresent and omniscient god who can answer all your prayers, realize all your dreams, and of course, deliver you to the Western Paradise or any other paradise you want, and grant you the final awakening. The past Buddhas and the countless Buddhas-to-be, the Bodhisattvas, all have the same magical powers, as numerous sutras tell the followers.
In her daily prayers, my grandmother vowed to take refuge in the Buddha, the Dharma and the Sangha. I think she took it very literally, or she simply did what the sutras told her to do: to pray sincerely and make offerings to the best of her capacity, and leave the rest to the Buddhas and the Bodhisattvas. Grandmother’s wishes were simple and few, although they changed from time to time. After my brother was born, she stopped praying for a grandson; instead, she asked for the Bodhisattvas to help my sisters and me find good husbands when the time came. But ultimately, she wanted us all to reunite in our next life in the Western Paradise and live happily afterwards. She was sure that her favourite Bodhisattva Guanyin would grant all her wishes. I remembered joking with her: if I had robbed a bank and offered half the money to Guanyin, would I get her protection? Grandmother looked horrified by my question, and then said after a momentary hesitation, ‘Yes, of course. The Bodhisattva is for everyone.’ That was my impression of Buddhism until a few years ago.
Andrew listened to me carefully, nodding his head now and then. ‘That is one interpretation of the Buddha’s teaching,’ he said when I finished. ‘I guess it tries to draw as many people as possible to Buddhism in the first place. Once they learn more about it, they would realize it is good for them and they would not need the extra incentives. That was exactly how the Buddha persuaded Ananda to become his disciple, by promising him five hundred incomparably beautiful wives. But after a while, Ananda discerned the monastic life was his calling and enlightenment his goal. He did not want even one wife, let alone five hundred.’
Andrew followed the Theravada tradition, which regards the Buddha as human; he was born a man and died as a man. ‘How can he,’ the Buddha once asked, ‘by whom we were created, be permanent, constant, eternal, unchanging, and remain so for ever and ever, while we who were created by Brahma are all impermanent, transient, unstable, short-lived, destined to pass away?’ Everything is impermanent. How can there be an everlasting god? ‘By oneself is one purified; by oneself is one defiled,’ the Buddha told his disciples. He had shown the path: he had demonstrated through his own example the latent power of the human mind. Now it was left to his followers to find their own way. Even his own teachings must be jettisoned once they had served their purpose. He compared them to a raft, telling the story of a traveller who had come to a great expanse of water and desperately needed to get across. There was no bridge, no ferry, so he built a raft and rowed himself across the river. But then, the Buddha asked his audience, what should the traveller do with the raft? Should he decide that because it had been so helpful to him, he should load it on to his back and carry it with him wherever he went? Or should he simply moor it and continue his journey? The answer was obvious. ‘In just the same way, my teachings are like a raft, to be used to cross the river and not to be held on to.’
I would have loved to talk to Andrew longer. He was so knowledgeable and the Buddhism he practised made a lot of sense to me. For a long time, I had been led to think that what Grandmother believed in was all there was to Buddhism. The gods and goddesses of Mahayana Buddhism were exactly the targets of our ferocious attack on Buddhism at school, and in Communist propaganda. We were never told there was another side to Buddhism, and I never knew the Buddha did not approve of gods at all. But Andrew had to leave. He was studying with a Sri Lankan monk in a nearby monastery, learning how to remove the five poisons of the mind – ego, pride, hatred, ignorance and attachment. ‘I still have plenty of them, I can assure you,’ he laughed. He meditated in the morning; he took lessons in the afternoon; in the evening, he meditated again and reflected on what he had learnt during the day. He said being in Bodh Gaya helped him a lot because there were many good teachers and seeing these devout pilgrims made him try even harder to reach his goal.
When he stood up, he said he must tell me one more thing. Once upon a time, a monk came to Bodh Gaya and started praying earnestly to the Buddhist statues. Then he thought he saw the Buddha praying to the images too. He was shocked. ‘You are the Buddha. Why are you praying to yourself?’ The Buddha replied: ‘That is my point. Pray to yourself, not to anyone else.’ ‘That’s what I think we should do,’ Andrew said. I wished him well and wondered if his homeland would ever be the next new world for Buddhism to flourish in.
Andrew told me to look out for Asoka, a Bodh Gaya guide and a Buddhist. He would be able to tell me a lot about the place and about Buddhism in India. I had turned down one guide at the ticket office when I came in – the ones I had used before simply recited what I already knew from the guidebooks, and their accents were so strong, I could understand only half of what they were saying. I prayed it was not Asoka I had refused. Of course, it was: a man in his late forties, of short build, with a childlike cheerful expression. ‘Wandering sheep do come back,’ he said with a smile. ‘Welcome to Bodh Gaya.’
Asoka proudly showed me, one by one, the shrines marking the spots where the Buddha spent the first seven weeks after his enlightenment, every one of which Xuanzang describes in detail in his Record: where he gazed at the Bodhi Tree from a distance, where he reflected on what he had achieved; where he meditated again; where he was shielded from a severe storm; where he tested his findings on a few people. Near the entrance was the spot where the Buddha had talked at length with a Brahmin. ‘You know what the Buddha told him?’ Asoka asked excitedly, and then quickly answered his own question: ‘ “I do not call a man a Brahmin because of his birth. He is indeed arrogant and wealthy. But the poor man, who is free from all attachment, him I call indeed a Brahmin.” That’s Buddha’s greatness: we are all equal. God cannot make one person superior, the other inferior.’ He was making his point with both his hands raised, his face agitated. ‘Upali, one of the Buddha’s chief disciples, was a barber; Sunita, honoured by kings and nobles as an enlightened man, was a scavenger; Amrapali donated a garden where the Buddha spent many rainy retreats in Vaisali, she was a courtesan.’
If he was so emotional about this aspect of Buddhism, I realized, Asoka was probably from a backward caste himself, or a ‘dalit’, the ‘oppressed people’ as they call themselves. I was sure an Indian would know at a glance. But to me he looked like everyone else. I had always been struck by how revoluti
onary the Buddha must have been to call for equality in such a stratified society as India. I asked Asoka to tell me more about it.
‘Buddhism was a rejection of Brahminism and caste,’ Asoka stated emphatically. ‘In the Sangha, everyone is treated as equal, whether you are a Brahmin or a sweeper. It is revolutionary, the first of its kind. It shows the world how a community based on equality can work. Like the Mahabodhi Temple, it opens its doors to everyone, even women – they were fourth-class citizens for a long time in India, and could not go near the temples.’ Asoka looked at me and a stream of pilgrims walking past us quietly, and went on. ‘The Sangha here does not mean the usual assembly of monks and nuns. It means anyone who embraces Buddhism. The Buddha believed that every one of us has the potential to become a Buddha, through our own efforts, not through our birth.’
