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| All composite things decay, says Lord Buddha | | | R.L.Kaith
One night Mahamaya, chief queen of Suddodhana, king of the Sakyas, dreamt that she was carried away to the divine lake Anavataps in the Himalayas, where she bathed the heavenly guardians of the four quarters of the universe. A great white elephant with a lotus flower in its trunk approached her and entered her side, Next day the dream was interpreted for her by wise men-she had conceived a wonderful son, who would be either a Universal Emperor or a Universal Teacher. The child was born in a grove of Sal tress called Lumbini, near the capital of the Sakyas, Kalilavastu, while his mother was on the way to her parents'home for her confinement. At birth he stood uprighttook seven strides and spoke "This is my last birth-henceorth there is no more birth for me."
The boy was named Siddhartha at a great ceremony to the fifth day from his birth. His gotra name was Gautama. The sooth sayer prophasied that he would become a Universal Teacher. To prevent this prophecy coming true, King Suddodhana resolved that he should never know the sorrows of the world. He was reared in delighful palaces from whose garks every sign of death, discase and misery was removed.He learned all all the arts that a prince should learn and excelled as a student. He married his cousin Yasodhara whom he won at a great contest at which performed feats of strength and skill which put to shame at other contestants including his envious cousin Devadatta.
But for all his prosperity and success he was not inwardly happy and for all the effortof his father he did see the four signs foretold which were to decide his career, for the gods knew his destiny and it was this who placed the signs before him. One day as he was driving round the royal park with his faithful charioteer channa, he saw an aged man in the last stages of infermity and decrepitude-actually a god who had taken this disguise in order that Siddhartha Gautama might become a Buddha. Siddhartha asked channa who this repulsive being was, and when learned that all men must grow old he felt troubled. This was the first sign. The second came a little later, in the same way, in the form of a very sick man, covered with boils and shivering with fever. The third was even more even more terrible a corpse being carried to the cremation gound, followed by weeping mourners. But the fourth sign brought hope and consolation a wandering religious beggar, clad in a simple yellow robe, peaceful and and calm with a mien of inward joy. On feeling him Siddhartha realized where his destiny lay and set his learnt to become a wanderer.
Hearing of this king Siddhodhana doubled his pretution. Siddhartha was made a virtual prisoner though still surrounded with pleasures and luxuries of all kinds, his heart knew no peace and he could never forget the four signs. One morning news was brought to him that Yasodhara had given birth to a son but it gave him no pleasure. That night there were great festivities but when all were sleeping he roused Channa who saddled his favourite his horse Kanthaks and he rode off into the night surrounded by rejoicing demigods who cautioned the fall of his horse's hoofs, so that one should hear his departure. When far from the city he stripped off his jewellery and fine garments and put on a hermit 's robe provided by an attendant demigod. With his sword, he cut off his flowing hair and sent it back to his father with his garments by the hand of Channa. The horse Kanthaka dropped dead from grief when he found he was to be parted from his masteer, to be reborn in one of his heavens. Thus Siddhartha performed his "Great Going Forth", and became a wandering ascetic owning nothing but thr robe he wore.
At first he beggad food as a wanderer but he soon gave up this life for that of a forest hermit. From sage named Alara Kalama he learned the technique of meditation and the lore of Brahman as taught in the Upnishads, but he not convinced that man could obtain liberation from sorrow by self-discipline and knowledge, so he joined forces with ascetics who practising the most rigorous self-mortification in the hope of wearing away their karma and obtaining final bliss.
His penances became so severe that five quickly recognised him as their leader. For six years he torched himself until he was nothing but a walking skelton. One day , worn out by penances and hunger, he fainted and his followers believed that he was dead. But after a while he recovered consciousness and realized that his fasts and penances has been useless.He again began to beg foodand his body regained its strength. The five disciples left in disgust at his backsliding.
One day Siddhartha Gautama, now thirty five years old, was seated beneath a large pipal tree on the outskirts of the town of Gaya, in the realm of Bimbisara, king of Magadha. Sujata, daughter of a nearby farmer, brought him a large bowl of rice boiled in milk. After eating some of this he bathed, and that evening, again sitting beneath the pipal tree, he made a solemn vow that, though his bones wasted away and his blood dried up, he would not leave his seat until the riddle of suffering was solved.
So far forty nine days he sat beneath the tree. At first he was surrounded by hosts of gods and spirits, awaiting the great moment of enlightenment but they soon fled, the Mara, the spirit of the world and sensual pleasure, the Buddhist devil, approached. For days Gautama withstood temptations of all kinds. Mara, disguished as a messenger, brought news that the wicked cousin Devadatta has revolted, thrown Suddhodhana into prison, and seized Yasodhara, but Gautama was not moved. Mara called his demon hosts, and attacked him with whirlwind, tempest, flood and earthquake, but he sat firm, crossed legged beneath the tree. Then the temper called on Gautama to produce evidence of his goodness and benevolence, he touched the ground with his hand, and the earth itself spoke with a voice of thunder: "I am his witness". Mara then tried gentler means of shaking Gautama's resolve. He called his three beautiful daughters . Desire, Pleasure and Passion, who danced and sang before him, and tried every means od seduction. Their wiles were quite inaffectual. They offered him Universal Empire but he was quite unmoved.
At last the demond hosts gave up the struggle and Gautama, left alone, sank deeper and deeper into meditation. At the dawning of the firty ninth day he knew thr truth. He had found the secret of sorrow, and understood at last why the world is full of suffering and unhapiness of all kinds, and what man must do to overcome them. He was fully enlightened a Buddha. For another seven weeks he remained under the Tree of Wisdom, meditating on the great truths he had found.
For a time he doubted whether he should proclaim his wisdom to the world, as it was so recondite and difficult to express that few would understand it but the God Brahma himself descended from heaven and persuaded him to teach the world. Learning the Tree of Wisdom, he journeyed to the Deer Park near Banaras where his five disciples has settled to continue their penances. To these five ascetics the Budha preached his first serogy, "Set in motion the wheel of the Law".The five were so impressed with his new doctrinethat they gave up their austerities and once more became his disciples. A few days later a band of sixty young ascetics became his followeres and he sent them out in all directions to preach the Buddhist Dharma. Soon his name was well known throughout the Ganges Plain; and the greatest king of of that time favoured him and his followers. He gathered together a disciplined body of monks, knit together by a common garb, the yellow robes of the order, and a common discipline, according to the tradition laid down in detail by the Buddha himself. Many stories are told of his long years of preaching. He returned to Kapilavastu and converted his father, wife and son Rahula as well as many other members of the court, including his cousin Devadatta whose heart remained full of jealousy. At the request of his foster mother and aunt Krsa Gautami, he allowed with much misgiving the formation of a community of nuns. Devadatta grew so jealous of him that once he even tried to kill Buddha by arranging a mad elephant to be let loose in his path bu the beast, impressed by Buddha's gentleness and fearlessness, calmly bowed at his feet. He averted a war between the Sakyas and the neighbouring tribe if the Koliyas by walking between the assembled arimes and convincing them of the uselessness and evil of bloodshed. He went alone to the camp of a notorious bandit, Angulimals, and converted him and his followers from their evil ways.
Though according to legend his life was attnded by many wonders, the earliest traditions record few miracles performed by Buddha himself. Once, indeed, he is said to have performed feats of levitation and other miracles at Sarasvati, as a result of a challenge from rival teachers, but he sternly forbade the monks to perform magical feats, and there is no record of his healing the sick by supernatural means. One touching story of Buddha is interesting in this regard. A women stricken with grief at the death of her only son and hearing that Buddha was in the vicinity, brought the child's corpse to him in he hope that he would restore it to life. He asked her first to go to nearby town and bring a handful of mustered seed from a family in which no one had died. She went from house to house but of course could find no such family, until at least she understood the inevitability of death and sorrow and became a nun.
For eight months of the year, Buddha and his followers would travel from place to place, preaching to all and sundry. For the four months of the rainy season, they would stop in one of the parks given to the Buddhist order by wealthy lay followers, living in huts of bamboo and reed the first form of the great Bushits monasteries of later times. Fir over forty years his reputation grew and the Sangha increased in numbers and infulence. With the exception of the conspiracy of Devadatta he suffered no persecution, though a few of his followers were maltreated by their religious opponents. His ministry was long, calm and peaceful one. The end came at the age of eighty. He spent the last rainy season of his life near the city of Vaisali, and after the rains he and his followers journeyed northwards to the hill country which had been the home of his youth. On the way he prepared his disciples for his death. He told them that his body was now like a worn-out cart, cracking at every joint. He declared that he had made no distinction between esoteric and exoteric teaching, but had preached the full doctrine to them. When he was gone away they were to look for no new leader-the Doctrine which he had preached would lead them. They must rely on themselves, be their own lamps and look for no refuge outside themselves. |
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