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Transcript
Sitting Under the Bodhi Tree The Story of Buddha’s Enlightenment (Version 2a) A Sunday service led by the Reverend Michael Walker, Interim Minister Presented on Bodhi Day – December 6, 2015, at the Unitarian Church of Harrisburg, Pennsylvania Sitting Under the Bodhi Tree v.2a Rev. Michael Walker INVOCATION (SLT # 419)1 Look to this day! May the kindling of this flame be like For it is life, the very life of life. the rising of the sun in your heart. In its brief course lie all the verities May it ever be so and blessed be you all! And realities of your existence: The bliss of growth, The glory of action, The splendor of beauty; For yesterday is but a dream, And tomorrow is only a vision; But today, well lived, makes every yesterday A dream of happiness And every tomorrow a vision of hope. Look well, therefore, to this day. 1 By Kalidasa, 4th century Indian philosopher and contemporary of the Buddha. December 6, 2015 Page 2 Unitarian Church of Harrisburg Sitting Under the Bodhi Tree v.2a Rev. Michael Walker MEDITATION believers whether Buddhist, Christian, Jewish, Because we are talking about Buddhism today, for Muslim, and so on. Basically, from the viewpoint of real human value we are all the same.2 our meditation I would like to offer these words by the present-day Dalai Lama, a Buddhist leader of the Tibetan - His Holiness, The Dalai Lama people. You are invited to find a comfortable spot in your seat as we take time for meditation, followed by a What do you do to find happiness? moment of silence. What do you do to rid yourself of suffering? Human beings by nature want happiness May it ever be so and blessed be you all! and do not want suffering. With that feeling everyone tries to achieve happiness and tries to get rid of suffering, and everyone has the basic right to do this. In this way, all here are the same, whether rich or poor, educated or uneducated, Easterner 2 From H.H. The Dalai Lama, The Path to Tranquility: Daily Wisdom, Snow Lion Publications. or Westerner, believer or non-believer, and with December 6, 2015 Page 3 Unitarian Church of Harrisburg Sitting Under the Bodhi Tree v.2a OFFERING Rev. Michael Walker If you are writing a check, please specify on the This congregation offers a liberal spiritual home to Memo line whether this is for your Pledge, an offering to seekers from all walks of life. We are proud of the work UCH, or for the Share-the-Plate recipient. we do in the community, the classes we offer for children Thank you, all, for your generosity. This and adults, for the care and concern provided by this morning’s offering will now be received. community and it’s staff, and for these two beautiful campuses that have each become a spiritual home for so many. If you are here for the first time, we invite you to let the offering basket pass you by, because you are our honored guest. And if you have made this your spiritual home, we thank you for your continuing generosity. Every month, we also collect donations during the Offering to support a worthy cause. This month, our Share-the-Plate Recipient is ____________________. December 6, 2015 Page 4 Unitarian Church of Harrisburg Sitting Under the Bodhi Tree v.2a Rev. Michael Walker Around 2,500 years ago, in a part of the world that Sitting Under the Bodhi Tree The Story of Buddha’s Enlightenment we now know as northern India and Nepal, ruled the Reverend Michael Walker Shakya king, Sudhodana Gautama, and he had a son, Prince Siddhartha Gautama. Like any prince, he lived a This month, I’m going to give a series of sermons privileged life in the palace. His tutors came to him, he that are really stories, from various faith traditions. For did not go out to go to school. He had all that he needed today, I’m going to talk about the foundational myth of or wanted, within the palace walls. As a boy, he had the Buddhism, the story of the Buddha’s enlightenment. I children of aristocracy as his playmates, also from believe in the importance of stories, not as fiction but as a privileged families. His childhood was a life of leisure repository of cultural wisdom. I don’t believe that any of and pleasure. The point is he had no experience of the the stories I will share this month are 100% historically outside world. He had not experienced life outside of the accurate. But, I do believe that they contain a form of palace, so he had no idea that other people’s lives might Truth, in the sense that they teach us important lessons be different than his. about ourselves... about humanity. December 6, 2015 There are many versions of this story, but they Page 5 Unitarian Church of Harrisburg Sitting Under the Bodhi Tree v.2a Rev. Michael Walker generally agree that in his youth, Siddhartha wanted to asked, "You are powerful, father; can you make that old see what was outside the palace. His father, the king, man young again?" "No, my son, that is not in my was opposed to this, but he finally relented, on the power." condition that the prince take guards with him, as he On another day, they again went for a walk around walked around the city. As they wandered around, the city, and Siddhartha saw a woman, sitting on the side seeing what there was to see, Siddhartha saw an elderly of the road, with an empty wooden bowl in front of her. man, stooped over and having difficulty walking. He He had never seen an empty bowl, let alone one made out asked his guards: “What is wrong with that man?” of wood instead of gold or silver. He asked his guards, “Nothing is wrong with him, he is just old. This happens “Why is that woman sitting on the ground, with an empty to all of us,” said a guard, realizing that young Siddhartha bowl?” “She is poor and begging for alms so that she had never seen old age. When the prince returned to the may buy some food,” a guard said, realizing that the palace, he sat and thought about this for a while, trying to prince had never before seen poverty. understand what happens to people after many long years When he again returned to the palace, he sat for a of life. The prince told his father what he had seen, and December 6, 2015 long time, contemplating privilege and poverty. He Page 6 Unitarian Church of Harrisburg Sitting Under the Bodhi Tree v.2a finally went to his father, the king, and asked him how Rev. Michael Walker know all he could learn about his people. they might be able to help poor people. “We have so In a poor quarter of the city, he again saw elderly, poor and hungry people. And, he also saw a boy, whose much, father, and they have so little!” “Yes, son. But, if eyes were clouded and white. The boy was held by his we were to give all that was needed to every poor person, mother, and he was listless, weak and sickly. “This boy is they would be happy and we would now be poor. not old, but he looks as if he cannot go and play with Poverty is too big of a problem for us to solve.” other children. What is wrong with him?” asked Siddhartha went off to think about what his father had said, but was still very disturbed that he was unable to do Siddhartha. One of his guards said, “This boy is very something to change the situation. sick. Sometimes, children from families who are poor and hungry become ill.” Siddhartha’s family had all the Some days later, he again went for a walk with his guards. They went all over the city, because Siddhartha doctors they needed, all the food they needed, all they had come to realize that that there was much about the ever needed – and he had never before seen sickness. He world he did not know, and he wanted to learn. If he was was greatly disturbed by what he had seen, and he to rule his father’s kingdom someday, he felt he should December 6, 2015 decided to go home. Page 7 Unitarian Church of Harrisburg Sitting Under the Bodhi Tree v.2a On the way home, lost in thought, Siddhartha Rev. Michael Walker better that you know that life can be difficult, or painful, contemplated how life was for himself, and how it was or tragic. That life for the people is not like life as it is for others. He was coming to understand poverty, known by the rich and powerful.” sickness and old age. Just as he was thinking this very thing, he saw a sight that brought him to a halt. The The years go by and Siddhartha, now a young elderly man he had seen on a previous walk was lying man, has married and had a young son of his own. But before him, face down on the side of the road. “What has he was forever affected by the things he had learned happened to this man!” Siddhartha exclaimed. “Guards, about life, and knew that life outside his father’s palace help him!” With looks of sorrow, they said, “I’m sorry, was so very different than his own. As a youth, he had my prince. We cannot help this man. He is dead.” The been disabused of the notion that his father, the king, had within his power to change all the vagaries of life for his guards knew that the prince had never before seen death. people. Earthly power is limited. And, year after year, The leader of the guards said, “I am sorry you have seen watching his people struggle to deal with old age, these things. These are the reason the King wished that sickness, poverty and death, Prince Siddhartha decided you would not walk around the city. But, perhaps, it is December 6, 2015 Page 8 Unitarian Church of Harrisburg Sitting Under the Bodhi Tree v.2a Rev. Michael Walker he must leave his father’s palace. He could not live in a among people who preferred simplicity and quiet, and place of privilege, anymore. At the age 29, Siddhartha lived their lives with a sense of grace. When one among renounced his title and inheritance, left his family, the them became sick, the others cared for him. When he palace and his privileged life, and he began walking... died, they prayed for him, prepared his body, and sent This time, alone. Just, walking... Walking, far into the him off, reverently. Siddhartha remembered the man wilderness, where he found a group of ascetic monks lying on the side of the road, and began to think that he who had given up on earthly pleasures. He found himself needed to teach his people how to accept their lives as among them, and he stopped walking. And so now, he they were, and to live with a sense of awareness, but also sat. And he sat. And he sat. a sense of serenity. It seemed strange to him, to think of people going on with life, without paying attention to the For six years, he lived a simple, quiet life as he then traveled to learn from various teachers, monks, hardships experienced by others around them. It seemed priests and philosophers. He sat meditating, studied wrong to continue along on one’s business, ignoring a philosophy and ascetic techniques, gathered food in the dead body or a sick child or a hungry person, sitting... forest, and begged for alms along the road. He lived To learn about their lives, Siddhartha continued to sit. December 6, 2015 Page 9 Unitarian Church of Harrisburg Sitting Under the Bodhi Tree v.2a Rev. Michael Walker After these many years learning from many enlightenment, and Buddha means the Enlightened One, teachers, one day Siddhartha came upon a Pipal, or ficus much in the same way that Christos (Christ) means the tree, in a place now called Bodh Gaya. He decided to sit, Anointed One. In both cases, these are not names; they to meditate, to contemplate all he had learned of life and are titles bestowed upon them by their students and suffering. By some accounts, he sat there for forty days followers. But understand, Siddhartha, who had given up and forty nights (have you heard that time frame his royal title, had acquired this new title because he had somewhere, before?), deeply absorbed in a mental state become a wise teacher. But he was the first to say, he that brought clarity of thought and vision to him. So needed no title, and wanted no title. But, 2,500 years there he was, sitting under the tree, now known as the later, you can see how that turned out. Bodhi tree (because bodhi means enlightenment.) People came to see this man who had sat for so long under this At that time, sitting under the bodhi tree, the tree, and they listened to him explain four truths, Four essence of Gautama Buddha’s teachings, and such Noble Truths, about the nature of life. They began to call teachings are called dharma, was distilled into what is him the Gautama Buddha, or the enlightened one from now known as the Four Noble Truths. the Gautama family. We understand that bodhi means December 6, 2015 Page 10 Unitarian Church of Harrisburg Sitting Under the Bodhi Tree v.2a The first truth is dukkha, life is suffering. This is Rev. Michael Walker The second truth in the Buddha’s dharma was what the Buddha had learned, as a boy, walking outside tanha, the origin of suffering, which is that we have of his father’s palace. Though he did not want for craving or desire, coming from a place of ignorance, anything in his own life, he saw all around him suffering. attachment or aversion, within each of us. We desire Because any state or stage in life is not permanent, life is happiness and pleasure, a comfortable home, power in always changing, it is inevitable that one would the world or in our work, good health, eternal youth, food experience suffering sooner or later. We realize that life on the table, and many more things. We crave... Oh, we does not always live up to our own personal expectations, crave so many things. And in their absence, in times and this causes us heartache, if not worse. Buddha taught when our cravings are unmet, we feel a sense of his students that we may experience happiness in life, but suffering. Sometimes, we even crave to have none of that is a fleeting experience. This instability that is the those pleasures, knowing that they cause suffering in inherent nature of life creates within each of us, at some their absence. Sometimes, we mentally and emotionally, point in our lives, a sense of suffering. He also taught live in a place of ignorance, attachment or aversion. By that this is not a negative thing, it just is. This is life. ignorance, the Buddha meant that we simply do not December 6, 2015 Page 11 Unitarian Church of Harrisburg Sitting Under the Bodhi Tree v.2a Rev. Michael Walker understand the nature of reality, the nature of life. And, is ignored or abandoned. This is the basis for the maybe, we don’t want to understand! By attachment, he spiritual practices that arose from Buddha’s dharma. meant that we hold onto those pleasures, when we have Working to end suffering is the ultimate goal. By them, trying so hard to never let go of that pleasure. becoming aware of our cravings, by addressing our own Never mind that life keeps changing, whether we want it ignorance, by accepting what is, we learn to end our own to or not. And by aversion, the Buddha meant that we suffering. After many long years of such spiritual fear we will have experiences in life that we don’t want, practice, or maybe after only minutes of intense practice, so we try to avoid them; or, that we fear that we will not perhaps we, too, can achieve nirvana, which is a state of attain our cravings, and so avoid living life, at all. These being in which we are in balance, living in the space cravings... these fears... this unwillingness to accept life between suffering and joy, liberated from the fears of life at face value, is what causes us suffering. In the and death, forevermore walking on the middle road of all existence. Buddha’s teaching, it is all within us. But there is hope... Still sitting under the bodhi tree, the Buddha taught The third truth the Buddha taught was, nirodha, his fourth Noble Truth, which is the Eightfold Path of the end of suffering that comes when craving or desire December 6, 2015 Page 12 Unitarian Church of Harrisburg Sitting Under the Bodhi Tree v.2a Buddhist life: the eight Rights, which are: Right Rev. Michael Walker tree for all those years. And he again began walking… Understanding, Right Thought, Right Speech, Right Walking… And this time, he was not alone. His Action, Right Livelihood, Right Effort, Right Mindfulness, followers, followed. Walking… and Right Concentration, which brings us back around to Right Understanding, again. This circular, Eightfold So for years, the Buddha and his followers walked, Path, is the Wheel of Dharma – the Buddha’s teachings in teaching their dharma as they went, founding an endless biofeedback loop! Our diligent efforts to live communities of practitioners, called sanghas, everywhere life by each one of those “rights” leads us next into our they went. It was to this end that the Buddha dedicated efforts to live life by each of the following “rights.” It is the remainder of his life. He never sat upon his father’s never ending… The Buddha taught that by living life by throne, because his work as a teacher had far more these precepts, one would not experience the cravings importance than ruling a kingdom ever would. And I and fears that cause suffering. think he was right, because these thousands of years later, Once he had taught these Four Noble Truths, the most people have heard of the Buddha and his teachings, Buddha could finally get up, from sitting under the bodhi December 6, 2015 while I think unlikely that most people have any idea Page 13 Unitarian Church of Harrisburg Sitting Under the Bodhi Tree v.2a Rev. Michael Walker see that tree along the path ahead of us, and find who King Sudhodana Gautama was… Nor do they care. ourselves there… sitting under the bodhi tree, with a new And so it came to be, some forty or so years later, that the Buddha was sitting on the side of the road, in the understanding of the nature of life. shade of a tree, with an empty bowl in front of him, May it ever be so and blessed be you all! grown old, yet wise... He had spent a lifetime responding to what he had seen as a boy: sickness, old age, poverty and death. Although there are many kinds of suffering, he would not have sought to learn about them, if he had not walked outside of the walls of his father’s palace and seen the things he saw. His realization of four simple truths and his desire to teach them to anyone who would listen has allowed half of the world, over many long centuries, to follow a middle path. Perhaps it is time for us to follow such a path? Walking… walking… until we December 6, 2015 Page 14 Unitarian Church of Harrisburg Sitting Under the Bodhi Tree v.2a Rev. Michael Walker BENEDICTION (SLT # 595) In benediction, let’s close with these words adapted from the Bodhisattva Vows: May [you and] all sentient beings be well and enjoy the root of happiness: Free from suffering and the root of suffering. May [you] not be separated from the joy beyond sorrow. May [you] dwell in spacious equanimity Free from craving, fear, and ignorance.3 May it ever be so and blessed be you all! 3 These words adapted from the Bodhisattva Vows. December 6, 2015 Page 15 Unitarian Church of Harrisburg