SEXIS WRONG

on his father’s lap. How hard-hearted and cruel
he is—is there something wrong with my wish
to be with him always? 29
On and on she wept:
Two human beings cherished each other:
He was my joy, my sole delight.
His face was as radiant as the moon
And his form beyond compare.
Without him, all my possessions are nothing but rubble.
All alone on the bed we once shared,
He has abandoned me...
Henceforth I will not be able to take food and drink with
pleasure;
My hair will grow foul and matted;
How tragic the forcible parting of two lovers! 30
Chandaka consoled the queen by telling her of Gotama’s determination
to win enlightenment for the good of all, and of his
promise to return when he found the answers he was seeking.
The queen eventually recovered, at least in part, from her
grief, and life went on.
Gotama’s quest for enlightenment had begun.
His first stop was a grove where ascetics gathered to subjugate
the flesh in order to release the soul from the shackles of the
body. The ascetics were as dedicated to pain as the inhabitants
of Gotama’s former palace were devoted to pleasure. They survived,
barely, on roots, wild vegetables, seeds, tree bark, cow
dung, and the tiniest drops of water. If they dressed at all it was
in rough animal skins, rags, hair shirts, or robes
of weeds. They slept out in the open, in cemeteries,
in caves, or in trees. The grim ascetics
mortified them selves in a variety of ingenious
ways: never bathing, standing con tinually submerged
in water or mud, staring into the sun,
sitting in the center of a ring of bonfires, locking themselves
permanently into one posture or position, and tearing their
hair out by the roots or, on the other extreme, letting their hair
grow until it was filthy and matted and then weighting it with
chains.
Gotama was not convinced by the ascetics’ argument that
such severe penance would lead to inner peace: “If suffering is
all there is to salvation, most of brute creation would have attained
liberation eons ago.” When told by the ascetics that animal
(and human) sac rifice produced great merit, Gotama replied,
“Nonsense! Infliction of injury on other beings can never
bring good fortune; all sacrifice is a vain attempt to bribe the
gods.” Gotama also rejected the as cetics’ contention that the
aim of the religious life is to gain a better rebirth. “Enlightenment
in this very body is all that matters,” he insisted.
After leaving the ascetics, Gotama called on the philosophers.
He encountered amoral nihilists who maintained that all human
moral ity and goodness were futile; materialists who
claimed that exis tence was meaningless and ended totally at
death; and yogins who advocated quiescent states of mind
suspended between existence and non-existence, thought
and non-thought. Gotama was not satisfied with either the
materialists or the spiritualists; both, he sensed, offered distorted,
partial views. Confused yet determined,
Gotama traveled until he found an ideal spot for solitary
medita tion, a little hamlet near the lovely Nairañjanā River
and the village of Uruvelā. Gotama said to himself, “The river
here flows clear and clean, flowers, fruit, and green herbs are
abundant, and the birds never stop singing. This quiet, peaceful
place is perfect for my training.”
The ascetics were as dedicated
to pain as the inhabitants of
Gotama’s former palace were
devoted to pleasure.
There Gotama vowed to gain complete control of his body and
mind by ridding himself of all passions, physical and mental.
He sat in the meditation posture intently suppressing every
thought, his effort so great that sweat poured from his body
even in midwinter. To further calm his mind, Gotama stopped
breathing for longer and longer periods, until his head was
ready to explode. Further he went, attempting to starve his
body into submission while horse flies, mosquitoes, and other
insects feasted on his flesh. Near the end of his six-year fast,
Gotama was reduced to a skeleton, his limbs were blackened,
knotty stems, his ribs stuck out like the beams of an old shed,
and his spine could be grasped from the front. His head resembled
a withered gourd, his eyes were as glazed as the water
on the bottom of a nearly dry well, and his skin was the
color of cremation ashes. No longer human in form, Gotama
was taken for a dust demon by the village children, who cast
garbage on him. Finally he collapsed and was left for dead.
Gotama slowly regained consciousness, dragged himself to
the river, and washed away six years of grime and filth. A village
girl gave him a nourishing bowl of pāyāsa, which restored
and refreshed the exhausted seeker.
Pāyāsa, rice cooked with milk and mixed with crystal sugar
and fragrant spices, is a special, costly delicacy. Gotama’s acceptance
of that dish, from a woman, indicated that he had
come full circle. In the palace Gotama had partaken of the
choicest delicacies; as a men dicant he had to suppress his disgust
and eat whatever scraps were put into his bowl. He nearly
fasted to death, but then ate rich food to regain his physical
THE SEX LIFE OF THE BUDDHA 335