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Common Ground - Islam and Buddhism

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c o m m o n g r o u n d between i s l a m a n d b u d d h i s m<br />

Mara, the principle of death for the outer world of things, is also<br />

the source of all temptation <strong>and</strong> sin for the inner world of the soul;<br />

the following sayings heighten our awareness of this inner nexus<br />

between ignorance, egotism <strong>and</strong> sin: that is, the mutually reinforcing<br />

relationships between deficiency on the plane of knowledge,<br />

susceptibility to delusion on the plane of psychology, <strong>and</strong> the propensity<br />

to evil on the plane of morality:<br />

Who shall conquer this world … <strong>and</strong> the world of Yama, 13<br />

of death <strong>and</strong> of pain? … He who knows that this body is<br />

the foam of a wave, the shadow of a mirage, he breaks the<br />

sharp arrows of Mara, concealed in the flowers of sensuous<br />

passions <strong>and</strong>, unseen by the King of Death, he goes on <strong>and</strong><br />

follows his path. 14<br />

When a man considers this world as a bubble of froth, <strong>and</strong><br />

as the illusion of an appearance, then the king of death has<br />

no power over him. 15<br />

Subtle Polytheism<br />

These subtle relationships <strong>and</strong> causal connections are the life-blood<br />

of the suffering which flows from the impermanence of all things;<br />

they point to the condition of ‘mutual arising’ or ‘interdependent<br />

causation’ (pratītyasamutpāda) which characterizes the outer world,<br />

<strong>and</strong> attachment to which generates suffering in the soul. This key<br />

psychological insight into the human condition is of immense practical<br />

value in terms of Buddhist-Muslim dialogue, if the aim of such<br />

dialogue is to go beyond merely establishing formal resemblances<br />

as regards ethical teachings on the plane of social relations <strong>and</strong><br />

give rise, instead, to a process of mutual illumination on the level<br />

of spiritual insight into the human condition. More specifically, the<br />

acute <strong>and</strong> penetrating insights fashioned by the Buddhist stress on<br />

anicca can help Muslims bring into sharper focus those teachings<br />

within the Qur’ān <strong>and</strong> the Sunna which pertain to the necessity of<br />

zuhd or detachment with regard to the world. These teachings can be<br />

divided into two categories, overt, relating to the evanescence of the<br />

‘life of this world’, <strong>and</strong> subtle, relating to a complex <strong>and</strong> calibrated<br />

apprehension of the meaning of idolatry <strong>and</strong> disbelief.<br />

13. Yama is the guardian of hell in Buddhist cosmology.<br />

14. Dhammapada, 44 <strong>and</strong> 46, p. 42.<br />

15. Dhammapada, 170, p. 60<br />

84

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