India Journal #5: The Pilgrim’s Way
Chaos rages on in our public life. I bring you perhaps some reprieve by focusing on Buddhist history and pilgrimage and what it might mean to us in the moment.
According to the Buddha's cousin Ananda, there are four sites that devotee pilgrims are encouraged to visit. As it turns out, midway through this journey, we are hitting them all and a few more: where he was born (Lumbini), where he died (Kushinagara), where he became fully Awakened (Bodhgaya), and where he gave his first sermon (Sarnath). The Buddha has previously spent time in Varanasi and Sarnath, practicing with various teachers and ascetics. He returned after his enlightenment to give his first teachings, turning the first wheel of the Dharma, as it said. But it was not exactly his teaching that turned the wheel. Rather, it was the fact that another human being listening to him, Kadanya, “got it.” He was the Buddha’s first disciple to become fully awakened upon hearing the Buddha. It’s an interesting tension that the Dhamma is both taught with words, and yet cannot be understood merely in a cognitive way. Insight must be directly experienced. Why and how that happens is somewhat mysterious, but we can create conditions for one another to make it easier. This is why some say that “the Dharma is not taught; it is caught.”
Today, we can ask ourselves: are we creating good conditions and cultivating a steady mind so we can become “accident-prone” to deep insight into the nature of reality, of suffering, of liberation? Are we supporting others to create good conditions for themselves?
At present, we are on our way to Kushinagar, where the Buddha entered Paranibbana, and Lumbini, where he was born. Somewhat in reverse order! On our way back to Rajasthan, we will stop at Sankisa, an intriguing place where tradition tells us the Buddha returned following his Paranibbana to teach the Abidhamma. Although this is likely an ahistorical claim, these sites of mythic import are also part of Buddhist history.
A pilgrimage can be a profoundly moving spiritual experience for some. A friend wrote to me last week, asking if I felt "reverberations" while visiting the Bodhi Tree. I can't honestly say that I did. There were moments of feeling destabilized, even dizzy, by the sheer number of Buddhist practitioners present from all over the world, doing their many devotional practices and sometimes just resting or hanging out. The only other time I remember feeling this way was when I went to the "Western Wall " in the old city of Jerusalem. At places of such deep historical religious significance, it's impossible not to be moved in some way. The archeological sites in both Sarnath and Nalanda have also been fascinating. At the ruins of these ancient monasteries, I felt the presence of the thousands of monks and nuns who, over many generations, practiced here. It’s mesmerizing.
How people respond to religious places of historical import is different for everyone. I won't say it's been profound for me yet, but it has been very meaningful. It’s also been very humanizing. The Buddha was a human being, just like you and me. Important things happened, and other humans like you and me sought to mark that by building stupas and temples. At least one important Emperor, Ashoka, sought to rule according to Buddhist principles and erected pillars with Buddhist-inspired edits. Some of them are still standing. So far, we have seen one. All these people wanted us to remember the teachings, the Buddha, and transmit this tradition of liberation. Knowing that the significance of all these Buddhist sites has only really re-emerged in the last 150 years and has drawn Buddhist practitioners from all over the world is also very moving. It’s also such a message of tolerance and mutual respect to see so many different forms of Buddhism practicing side by side and in such a range of languages and styles. At these epicenters of the tradition, the Buddha’s message of compassion and wisdom can feel unstoppable, even if sometimes they are forgotten or covered over by the vagaries of history.