Buddha: A Story of Enlightenment

13

The moment Gautama stepped into the small clearing, he knew that he’d found what he was looking for. A crude thatched lean-to faced him from under the shade of an old tree. The shadows were deep, but he could see a hermit sitting in lotus position. There was no trail of footprints or telltale smoke in the air to lead Gautama to this place. He had been away from home for three months now, and he was an adept forest dweller himself. No longer did he wake up with a start in the middle of the night fearing danger from the snap of a twig. He could let his footsteps wander where they wanted to, and now here he was.

He crossed the small clearing and stood over the hermit, who could have been Asita-slender, wiry build, nut brown skin, thinning hair with a long beard. Gautama moved as silently as he could, and he didn’t speak in greeting to the old ascetic, who made no motion, not even the flutter of an eyelid, to acknowledge his visitor. Finding the shade of a nearby tree, Gautama sat under it and folded his legs. For ten years now he had been meditating, and just as Asita promised, it had become his refuge from the outside world.

At first he had found it hard to settle down completely. As the scriptures say, the mind is like a runaway coach, and the driver never stops whipping the horses. But from inside the coach a voice whispers, “Please stop.” At first the team and driver ignore the voice. It is very soft; it never insists. Over time, however, the voice wins obedience, and the driver and horses stop wildly galloping. Bit by bit they slow down until the mind is at rest. Thus Siddhartha learned a basic lesson: whatever can run can also stand still.

Gradually the tree shade moved away, and he began to sweat. He could see an orange glow in his eyelids and knew, if it was this near sunset, that hours must have passed. Gautama took a peek, but the hermit was still motionless under his lean-to. There was no guarantee that he possessed any wisdom or could be a useful teacher. But Gautama had promised himself that he would seek out someone like Asita. How can freedom be taught except by someone who is free?

Darkness descended, and still there was no sign of activity. Gautama got to his feet and headed toward a stream he’d crossed near the clearing. Stooping to drink, he realized that waiting could take longer than he’d thought. He collected some fruit from the trees and headed back to the clearing. He fashioned a bed of boughs and went to sleep. The hermit became a black outline against the nearly black night sky.

In this way three days passed. The hermit’s ability to remain as still as one of the Shiva statues outside Canki’s temple impressed Gautama deeply. His own body ached from the hours he had put in sitting and waiting for something to happen. He fidgeted, obeyed the call of nature, ate and drank when he had to. Like a force of nature, the wiry old man remained immobile. Once or twice Gautama gave a soft cough to make his presence known. On the second day he ventured to say “Namaste” in a quiet voice. On the evening of the third day, he walked over to the ascetic, squatted on his heels beside him, and said, “Sir?”

The hermit opened his eyes. “You talk too much,” he said. His voice was clear and alert; the trance he was waking up from was no ordinary kind.

“Can you teach me?” Gautama asked, wanting to seize the moment before the hermit retreated back into his deep samadhi once more. But he was too late. The hermit closed his eyes, and soon the sun set. Gautama stretched out on the ground for the night, having no idea if he’d made any progress. Apparently he had. When he woke up the next morning the hermit was standing over him.

“Maybe,” the hermit said.

Gautama sprang to his feet. “What shall I do first?”

“Be quiet.”

The hermit went back to his place under the lean-to and resumed his meditation. Gautama suspected that he wouldn’t open his eyes for another three days. It took four. In the meantime, however, the new disciple wasn’t bored. Gradually he began to be filled with his teacher’s presence. It happened invisibly. Gautama was obliged to meditate along with his master. Imitating the guru was the main path for a disciple: you ate when the guru ate, slept when the guru slept, listened when the guru spoke. Yet the greatest teachers, so Siddhartha had been told when he interrogated visitors to court, taught in complete silence.

Apparently Gautama had run into one of those, for whenever he closed his eyes, something new would happen. He found stillness, as before, but now it was vibrant and alive, as if a shower of sparkling white light were falling inside him. Its effervescence caused his body to tingle gently, a delicious sensation that made it effortless to sit in meditation for hours at a time. In between, when Gautama found that his limbs were too stiff and his body too restless to sit any longer, he puttered around the clearing, sweeping away debris, placing a gourd of water beside his master, gathering fruit and firewood for the night. He was eager to ask the hermit how he managed to enter a disciple and fill him with his presence. Then he remembered his master’s rebuke about talking too much. On the evening of the fourth day the hermit surfaced from his samadhi.

His first word was, “Well?”

Gautama prostrated himself at the hermit’s feet. He could have said, “I am satisfied,” but his gesture of obeisance was enough. His teacher had given him a taste of all that was to come, and when he said, “Well?” he meant, “Do you accept me?” The bond between a guru and a chela, or disciple, exists deep in the heart. Gautama had become so sensitized that this one word, “Well?” said everything. It said, This is how things will be. If you want praise and smiles, go to someone else. I’m not here to flatter you.

The routine at camp was soon established. The disciple performed the small duties that kept the necessities of life going. Most of the time the two of them simply sat, facing each other across the clearing like two life-size icons abandoned by a sculptor in the forest. Then the face of Yashodhara began to appear in Gautama’s mind. She was smiling, and he couldn’t help looking at her smile. The scriptures give permission to meditate upon various divine images, so why not his wife? If love is divine, can’t a woman also be? Yet the moment Gautama fixed his mind’s eye on Yashodhara’s face, her body appeared, and it was not clothed. The young monk squirmed, praying that his master didn’t see the physical reaction this caused, which wasn’t his fault.

He fought his reaction. Meditating on arousal wasn’t in the scriptures. Yashodhara’s face changed; it began to mock him. Her hands moved down her body. He fought harder. Perhaps if he focused on the purity of his love for her. Gautama thought about the day he chose her to be his wife. She was sixteen, he was nineteen. He had given up on finding Sujata but was far from losing her memory. When it was announced that he was to be betrothed, eager fathers drove a long distance to present their daughters in faraway Kapilavastu. Nobles, princes, and kings of neighboring domains crossed the border with elaborate entourages of slaves and horses. Siddhartha sat on the ramparts looking down at the scene with Channa.

“If the interviews are too much for you, I can always take a few off your hands,” Channa said. Some of the younger girls were barely twelve; it wasn’t expected that he would live with them immediately-arrangements would be made. But delay was only temporary. Suddhodana couldn’t be put off.

“Choose a girl who plays with dolls, choose an old maid of nineteen,” the king said. “But you can’t walk away without choosing someone.” They both knew that the future of the dynasty was at stake.

On the ceremonial day when all the hopeful brides were assembled at court, Siddhartha entered the hall in the same elaborate coat and plumed red turban he had worn when he turned eighteen. Each girl was prostrate on the floor, and as the prince walked down the line, he would catch a fetching or shy glance, a glint in one eye that promised sensual delight, in another a darting shyness that spoke of innocence and even bewilderment. Only one girl didn’t look up at him, keeping her veiled face to the floor. She made Siddhartha curious.

“A great day!” declared Suddhodana in a loud, jovial voice. But when his son walked into his embrace, he whispered in his ear, “None of your tricks. They’re not here so you can pray with them.”

Siddhartha knelt. “I know my duty, father.” As he turned around, a chamberlain ran up and handed him a garland of gold necklaces. Siddhartha pulled out a strand and approached the first girl.

“You are very beautiful. Why do you wish to marry me?” he asked, lifting her from the floor. Her direct gaze told him she wasn’t shy.

“Because you are kind and good. And handsome.” She gave him a seductive look, one that was well practiced. Siddhartha knew it was called “the assassin’s knife” in the manuals of love that noble girls were given to read. He bowed and handed her the gold necklace. He returned a smile that was gracious, but Siddhartha wasn’t practiced at hiding his feelings, and the girl knew she had no chance. Her father would be furious.

To the second girl he said, “If anyone could be even more beautiful, it’s you. Why do you want to marry me?”

The second girl had kept close watch on what happened to the first. She said, “To give you sons as magnificent as yourself.” Her voice had the ring of sincerity, but Siddhartha suspected that she was simply better trained. The love manuals taught that a man must always feel that he is making his own decisions while at the same time being carefully manipulated. If a woman was skillful, and applied eros when it was useful, he wouldn’t even know what was happening. Siddhartha bowed and handed the second girl a necklace. She put it on with a haughty toss of the head as he moved on.

The king felt anxious. “He doesn’t like any of them,” he whispered to Canki.

The high Brahmin was unruffled. He knew that discrimination can hold out against desire only so long. “Patience, sire. He’s a young man. When peaches are ripe, no one leaves the market without buying one.” But nothing about Siddhartha’s manner looked promising by the time he had reached the last girl. She looked up at him but didn’t remove her veil.

From behind the girl, her father nudged her with a fierce whisper. “Go ahead. Get up and look at him!” She took a moment before rising. Now Siddhartha remembered who she was. The one girl who had made him curious.

“I cannot tell if you are beautiful,” he said. “What’s your name?”

“Yashodhara.”

“May I see you?”

She kept her veil on. “Is my appearance the only thing that would make me worthy? If so, don’t look at me. My face might conceal a false heart.”

Siddhartha smiled. “A good answer. Then tell me: Why do you wish to marry me?”

“I’m not sure yet. I don’t know you, and you haven’t made any pretty speeches, the way you did to the others.”

Siddhartha was intrigued by these words, but he also had to see her. He lifted Yashodhara’s veil. She wasn’t beautiful in the way the first girls had been, modeled from the pages of the love manuals. But instantly he knew how he felt.

“You’re wonderful, because you were made to be loved.”

Up to this moment she had had the advantage, but now Yashodhara blushed. “That was a pretty speech, but too short for me to make up my mind. My father will be so disappointed if I come away empty-handed. Can I have a necklace?”

She held out her hand and Siddhartha frowned. “Was that a good enough reason for you to come here?”

She replied, “Sire, I live in the deep woods, four long days’ journey from here. My father is very anxious that I marry you. But a gold necklace can feed a hundred of my starving people, those I left behind.”

“Girl!” her father rebuked.

Siddhartha held up his hand. “It’s all right.” He bowed to Yashodhara. “With your first words I found that you are honest, and now I find that you are also kind. What more can I wish for?” He took her hand and led her to kneel before the king as the hall rang with cheers. There was no need for a long betrothal. Just as Siddhartha said, Yashodhara was a woman who existed to be loved, and their union was as real as Suddhodana’s with Maya. Yet it was known to both of them, if to no one else in the world, that Yashodhara had wept inconsolably on their honeymoon night.

Siddhartha turned red. “If I was clumsy or did something wrong-”

She put a finger to his lips. “No, don’t.”

“Then why are you so unhappy? An hour ago you seemed to be in love.”

“An hour ago I didn’t realize that you are going to leave me one day.”

He smothered her with kisses to reassure her and chided her gently about being a superstitious girl like the maids who ran to the temple for a good luck charm if they spilled the milk. Yashodhara’s words were never repeated between them. Ten years wasn’t enough to erase the memory, however, and when it came to pass that her husband did decide to leave her, Yashodhara was crushed by seeing her premonition come true.

All these memories danced before Gautama’s mind along with the image of his wife. The recollection of her sorrow was the only thing that enabled him to defeat his arousal. Gautama’s back slumped, and he wondered for the first time since finding his master if abandoning his family wasn’t an unforgivable sin.

Suddenly Gautama felt a stinging pain on one cheek. He opened his eyes to see his master standing over him, hand raised. Sharply the hand came down and slapped the other cheek.

“Why did you do that, sir? What did I do to offend you?”

The old hermit shrugged. “Nothing. You smelled like a man who sleeps with women. I knocked the stink off.”

This incident stuck in Gautama’s mind for two reasons-because it permanently banished any images of Yashodhara from his mind, and because it was the most words in a row that the hermit had spoken. But his master wasn’t setting a precedent for garrulousness. Weeks passed, the monsoons came, and he said not another word. This became a time of great peace for Gautama. One day he went for firewood but couldn’t find any that wasn’t soaked from the rains. He recalled a cavern formed by fallen boulders where perhaps some dry logs might have lodged.

Walking through the woods, he felt the rain coming down, but the monsoons were warm and he was toughened by months of exposure. His body didn’t shiver or his mind complain. Yet as he kept walking, Gautama noticed that he started feeling chilled, and a hundred yards farther on he was shaking badly. By the time he reached the cavern of boulders, he felt quite uncomfortable and his mind was attacking him mercilessly. Go home. This crazy master is going to turn you into his slave or a crazy recluse like himself. Run! It was as if he’d been taken back to his first day on the road.

He found an armful of dry kindling, and when the rain abated he headed back to camp. Now the process reversed itself. The closer he got to the small clearing, the better he felt. His mind calmed down, and the shivering in his limbs subsided. As he set foot in camp and saw his master again, perfect peace descended like a curtain over his whole being. Gautama stared at the old hermit in wonder.

“Mara.”

Gautama was startled. “What?”

“Mara is interested in you.” Gautama opened his mouth, but the hermit shook his head abruptly. “You know it’s true. You knew it before you came here.”

Gautama trembled, sensing that a gulf was opening up between himself and his master. He was surprised at how afraid this made him feel. “I haven’t thought of Mara in years,” he protested.

“And so you kept him away. For a time.”

The hermit breathed a deep sigh, as if he had to remind his body how to return to the physical world before he could say another word. A few agonizing moments passed. Siddhartha felt his heart sink. If he can smell that I have a wife, what must a demon smell like? he thought.

The hermit said, “Mara will keep away from me. He has no interest in feeding when the bowl is empty. You are different.”

“What interest could he have in me?” asked Gautama.

“You don’t know?” The old hermit saw the look of bafflement in his disciple’s eyes. “There’s something he can’t let you find out. You must go beyond anything I can teach. That’s the only way to rid yourself of the demon,” his master said.

Gautama felt panicky. He bowed to the ground and seized the hermit’s gnarled feet. “At least tell me what I’m looking for.”

When he got no reply, Gautama glanced up to see that the old hermit had closed his eyes again and was far away. The disciple could barely sleep that night. When he woke up before dawn he saw no dark outline against the night sky. His master had left. Grief overwhelmed Gautama, and yet deep down he wasn’t completely shocked-his master could only do the right thing. That was their bond, and he would never betray it. At that moment leaving had been the right thing.

Gautama could have hung around camp for a few hours or perhaps a day to see if his abandonment was only temporary. But the storm in his heart and the return of despairing thoughts told him something definitive. His master had withdrawn his protection; therefore, their relationship had come to an end. Carefully the young monk tidied up the camp. He swept the ground and put a fresh gourd of water beside the place under the lean-to where the hermit sat. Then he bowed to the grass mat that had been his master’s only throne and departed.

As it turned out, one shred of their relationship was left. As he trudged back to the main road several miles away, Gautama fell to musing. He saw the hermit’s face and its look of pity. He heard his own desperate plea, “At least tell me what I’m looking for.” The hermit turned implacable; he closed his eyes and refused to speak. Only this time the answer came silently in Gautama’s mind.

There is one thing Mara can never let you find out: the truth about who you really are.