Buddha: His Life, his Doctrine, his Order c8.s1.t5.33

c8.s1.t5.33

Here and there, as in our gospels, parables alternate with doctrine and admonition: “I shall show you a parable,” Buddha says, “by a parable many a wise man perceives the meaning of what is being said.” The operations of man as well as the life of nature are the fields of observation, with which these similes for spiritual life and effort, for deliverance, and the company of the delivered, deal. Buddha’s preaching of deliverance is compared to the work of the physician, who draws the poisoned arrow from a wound, and overcomes the power of the poison with remedial herbs. The company of disciples, the gathering of noble spirits, in whom all worldly differences of high and low cease, resembles the sea with its wonders, in the depths of which lie pearls and crystals, in which gigantic creatures have free play, into which the rivers flow, and lose their names, and make up the ocean, so many of them there are. As the lotus flower raises its head out of the water, unaffected by the water, so the Buddhas born in the world, rise above the world, unaffected by the impurity of the world. As the peasant ploughs his fields and sows the seed and irrigates, but has not the power to say: the grain shall swell to-day, to morrow it shall germinate, next day it shall ripen, but must wait till the proper time comes and brings growth and ripeness of his corn, so also it is with the disciple who seeks deliverance: he must regulate his course according to strict discipline, practise religious meditation, study diligently the doctrine of salvation, but he has not the power to say: to-day or to-morrow shall my spirit be delivered from every impure habit, but he must wait until his time comes for deliverance to be vouchsafed to him. For the tempter who tries to shut up against man the path of salvation and to lure him to false paths, and the deliverer, who leads him back to the right path, this simile is employed:* “As when, O disciples, in the forest, on a mountain slope, there lies a great tract of low land and water, where a great herd of deer lives, and there comes a man, who devises hurt, distress and danger for the deer; who covers over and shuts up the path which is safe, good, and pleasant to take, and opens up a false path, a swampy path, a marshy track. Thenceforward, O disciples, the great herd of deer incurs hurt and danger and diminishes. But now, O disciples, if a man comes, who devises prosperity, welfare, and safety for this great herd of deer : who clears and opens up the path which is safe, good and pleasant to take, and does away with the false path, and abolishes the swampy path, the marshy track. Thenceforth, O disciples, will the great herd of deer thrive, grow, and increase. I have spoken to you, O disciples, in a parable, to make known my meaning. But the meaning is this. The great lowland and the water, O disciples, are pleasures. The great herds of deer, O disciples, are living men. The man, O disciples, who devises hurt, distress, and ruin, is Mâra, the Evil One. The false path, O disciples, is the eight-fold false path, to wit : false faith, false resolve, false speech, false action, false living, false effort, false thought, false self-concentration. The swampy way, O disciples, is pleasure and desire. The swampy track is ignorance. The man, O disciples, who devises prosperity, welfare, salvation, is the Perfect One, the holy, supreme Buddha. The safe, good way, O disciples, in which it is well to walk, is the holy eight-fold path, to wit : right faith, right resolve, right speech, right action, right living, right effort, right thought, right self-concentration. Thus, O disciples, has the safe, good path, in which it is well to walk, been opened up by me; the false path has been done away, the swampy path, the swampy track has been abolished. Everything, O disciples, that a master, who seeks the salvation of his disciples, who pities them, must do out of pity for them, that have I done for you."