Light of Asia - Chapter 2, cont'd

Leaving home, Siddhartha became an ascetic, fasting and generally torturing his body. Six years of that did not yield the results that he wanted - the book says that his goal was to be released from the cycle of rebirth. At that point, he decided that he had not taken the correct path. Why go for six years and then stop? Why not stop sooner, or later? Sounds like grad school.

He began eating and drinking normally again. He sat under a tree, and recalled an incident from his youth in which he "fell into a trance" under a tree. He decided that extreme concentration (under a tree?) may be the way, and began to meditate ("to practice concentration"). What exactly he did is not described, but it worked (maybe the six years of preparation helped). The Pali documents say he first recalled his previous lives, then saw the rebirths of many other beings and how their karma affected their being reborn, and then achieved "the knowledge of the four noble truths" and of the four causes that keep one from achieving release from samsara: sensual desires, desire for existence, ignorance, and false views. He then became enlightened.

On the four latter causes I do not see the distinction between "ignorance" and "false views". Maybe "ignorance" is just having no clue, whereas with "false views" you actively take a position that is wrong? Anyway, these things don't seem to parallel Christian beliefs at all, except for the first one, sensual desires.

The later Sanskrit documents report the enlightenment story with more flowery events: miracles occur, and the tempter Mara enters the scene. Again, some colorful pictures of these events can be found at the Rubin Museum of Art.

In any case, apparently the Buddha could have taken off for nirvana at this point, but decided to stay and teach. He took on many followers, but Ch'en doesn't mention women at this point.

In fact, we have a story at Buddha's death that puts women in a negative light. It is not said whether this comes from the earlier documents or the later. The story goes that Ananda, the Buddha's "personal attendant," asked for instructions regarding women. Ch'en gives the exchange as follows:

Ananda: "How are we to conduct ourselves with regard to womankind?"
Buddha: "As not seeing them."
Ananda: "But if we should see them, what are we to do?"
Buddha: "Keep wide awake."

I don't understand this exchange, but there's more than a hint of sexism there.

Prior to this discussion he had been ill, and that had been aggravated by a bad case of food poisoning from a serving of "pig's soft food" (Ch'en says it is not known whether this was food for pigs, or possibly mushrooms.) He had already told Ananda that he did not want to announce a "successor" to his position (which would have been quite odd, indeed), asserting that the answer lies within the individual, not in a hierarchical system (the book says "Be ye lamps unto yourselves"). Soon thereafter, the Buddha died. His final words were "Subject to decay are all compound things. Strive with diligence."

That last sentence, "Strive with diligence", sounds very un-Zen-Buddhist. It would be interesting to see what the Zen Buddhists make of it.