THE DHAMMAPADA: THE WAY OF THE BUDDHA, VOL. 9-12 The ...

THE DHAMMAPADA: THE WAY OF THE BUDDHA, VOL. 9-12 75
late. When the religion had disappeared from India, then they thought over it, and why it had happened. And
this was the cause: Buddha was talking about peace, about nirvana. Nirvana means cessation, that you will cease
totally. Who wants to cease totally? Deep down you want to remain, abide. Yes, you can accept that the body
will not be there, the body will fall into dust dust unto dust. But your spirit, your soul will be there.
And Buddha says you don’t have any soul, because your soul is nothing but a holy name for your old ego. And
what is your spirit? nothing but another facade for the ego to survive. He is very compassionately cruel. He says
you will not be there at all.
People used to ask him, ”Then why should we meditate? It seems like committing absolute suicide!”
And Buddha said, ”Yes, exactly it is that. But peace will be there.”
Now the problem becomes even more complicated. You can even become interested in peace; tired of your joys,
happiness, unhappiness, sadness, misery, suffering, you can even reluctantly, in a resigned way, agree to attain to
peace but you will not be there. Then another problem arises which is far more significant to you in your sleep:
”If I am not there, who is going to experience peace? And what is the point of attaining something if you can’t
experience it, if you are not there at all?”
And Buddha is absolutely right. He says: If you are there, peace cannot be. When you are not there, peace is.
Shakespeare says: To be or not to be is the question. Buddha says: Choose not to be. To be is the problem;
not to be means all problems have been transcended, all worries have been transcended.
Buddhists learned that there is something dangerous in Buddha’s message; it has to be changed. They changed
it. In Tibet, in China, in Japan, they dropped Buddha’s words or they gave new meanings to those words. While
they were translating Buddhist scriptures into Tibetan, into Chinese, into Japanese, Korean, they made it a point
that all negatives should be dropped from Buddha and they should be replaced by positives. ”You will be there
in all your glory, in all your grandeur, in all your beauty. You will be there in your purity. Your soul will be there,
utterly purified, pure gold. And you will attain to bliss: mahasukh great bliss.”
And then, like fire, the religion of Buddha spread all over Asia. It disappeared from the country of its origin
for the simple reason that Buddha would not compromise with your sleep; it succeeded all over Asia because the
followers compromised. They destroyed the purity of Buddhism; they brought it down to your level. Buddha’s
effort was to raise you to his level, and his followers brought him to your level.
That’s what happens always with the followers, because they are also asleep; they are people like you. They
are also dreaming like you, they are also desiring like you. There is a certain understanding between you and
them. They can understand your dreams because they are their dreams too. Buddha is as far away from them as
he is from you. It is a strange phenomenon, but it has always been so. Christians succeeded when they betrayed
Christ and Buddhists succeeded when they betrayed Buddha. You have to betray the master, then you can be
a success. When the master starts speaking like sleepy people, then sleepy people become interested; then he is
speaking in your language.
The other night, Veet Marco had a dream:
While Jesus Christ was on the cross, three soldiers were playing cards beneath him. At a certain point one of
the soldiers got up and pierced Jesus’ rib with his spear. Jesus moaned, and the soldier laughingly returned to
his seat and continued playing cards.
Soon after a second soldier got up and held a sponge soaked in vinegar up to Jesus’ face.
Jesus screamed, ”Father, Father, why have you forsaken me?”
The soldier started laughing, then went back to his seat and resumed playing cards.
Suddenly the sky became dark, the earth started to tremble, lights beamed from the north and from the south
and a mysterious silence filled the air.
The nails on Jesus’ hands and feet started disappearing. The third soldier, seeing this, ran to Jesus’ feet and
began praying and worshipping God. A terrible wind started blowing and Jesus began to ascend. The soldier
hung on to his legs, screaming and crying, ”Jesus, Jesus, yours is the power and the glory!”
Jesus’ face was filled with light, his hair blowing in the wind, his body donning a white silken robe, ascending
up and up into the sky, with the third soldier clinging to his legs, ascending along with him.
The soldier, suddenly realizing what was happening, became frightened and cried up to Jesus, ”Jesus, Jesus,
where are you going?”
Jesus smilingly replied, ”I am going to my father up in the Kingdom of God.”
”And how about me?” quizzed the frightened soldier. ”Where am I going?”
Jesus, kicking him off, screamed down to the falling figure, ”You sonofabitch, you go back to your fucking
mother!”