Rude Awakenings - Forest Sangha Publications

^0 T H E D R U M 06had been a notice proclaiming “Photographs Are Forbidden” at theentrance. Still, I reckoned if I used my little camera no one would notice.So as we were taking one last look I slipped the camera up to my eye andadjusted the focus...“Excuse me sir, photographs are not allowed.” It was the museumcaretaker we had passed on the way in. He was now standing behind us.I gave him my most pleading look. “But this Buddha rupa is so beautiful,and I would so like to have a photograph of it to show people inEngland.”With a slight waggle of his head he replied, “How can I stop you?”And with that he walked back to his chair.A J A H N S U C I T T OThe day the drum stopped was a sad day. When I could actually thinkmore clearly, Vaishali struck me with a kind of pathos. The fact that ithad been a place where the Buddha gave some seminal teachings on thesurvival of his Way in the future meant that I kept relating the city’sdecline to the decline of the Triple Gem in its birthplace. This was theplace where the Buddha first summarized his teachings as sila (morality),samadhi (meditation), and pañña (wisdom), the definition that is thebedrock of Buddhism. And here, worn out, and encouraging his disciplesto take responsibility for themselves to practise the Dhamma fortheir own and others’ welfare, was where he left his alms bowl and beganthe journey north to his death place.Now the barest relics are left. The Buddha’s bowl had occupied a hallowedshrine until the Emperor Kanishka removed it in the second centuryC.E. According to the sutta, the Licchavis obtained an eighth portionof the Buddha’s remains and enshrined them in a stupa in Vaishali. Thesutta’s account was confirmed by the pilgrim Hsuan Tsiang, who visitedwhen Vaishali’s ruins were more extensive. He even added that theemperor Ashoka had opened the stupa, taken out nine-tenths of the1 6 5