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the second enlightenment to occur under the Bodhi Tree in Bodh Gaya (India)
where his pictorial trajectory is said to lead. And there, beneath that tree, came the
acquisition of an indescribable, supernal foment in consciousness, the pillars of a
moral fortitude which, by definition, would extend the merits of his own enlightenment, or enlightenments, to the betterment of humanity and all other sentient beings.
This connection is the most seminal fact of the autobiography of Buddha, enlivened by way of such universal compassion. This is the dialectical cornerstone of the
Shussan Shaka tradition, making that moment on the mountain an existentially pivotal instant within the rushing stream of his, of all of our, existence: solitary enlightenment, universal connections; or not yet.
But in either case, what to do with one’s ineluctable feelings about others? An
endless embrace, or deferral. How to be of profound assistance? Does protection
manifest an ethological (interspecies) mandate? This is the most long-lasting and
relevant ethical question of all.
How to pivot effectively at that moment of great transformation which for
Buddha is said to have occurred on the traditionally eighth day of the twelfth month?
The crux of this dilemma—and it is a dilemma for a real human being (Buddha)—is
the motive for renouncing Nirvana—the end of all our travails—in the spirit of
assisting pain that has arisen ecologically throughout the world, in others. Can it be
fixed? The Hippocratic Oaths of every medicinal revelation—of kindness, comfort,
succor, amelioration—all combine to insist not on ourselves, but those same Others,
for whom Hippocrates (c. 460–c. 370) intoned a universality of first responders; for
it is only through that succession of apprehensions and kindness that we can truly
feel ourselves to be alive, part of life. Does said enlightenment call for the promulgation of a message of submission to the flux (samsara) that is inherently the biosphere and our place within it? If flux (all ecodynamics) is the norm, does it repair
of one wound; a repeal of a single sorrow; the staunching of blood that will flow, add
up to a meaningful confluence? Is a singularity equivalent to that confluence?
And what of the insuperable realization that helping one life, when tens of millions of others are crying out, is—at least, mathematically—not very impressive?
Or is it?
Such questions devolve to near mediocrity in as much as not one good question
can be answered fully. The very queries reveal a near naivety that is applauded at the
height of ethical concerns, but undermined by the masses of humanity which have
walked over it for thousands of years, unseeing, incapable of flexing a muscle over
the complicated delineations that would see the individual in the heart of the mob.
Triage scarcely intimates the degrees of nuance and emotional complexity embalming, offending, and/or liberating this inscrutably failed will-to-pantheism.
These conjectures whirl around the mind, and the paradox inherent to all of this
hinges, in turn, upon the notion that Buddha’s enlightenment has nonetheless led
him to despair, before the cause of all other sentient beings. And/or his despair and
frustration stems from his having the cause of others’ suffering all around him, in
him (the quintessence of Buddhism). As he stands above the steamy plains (Terai)
47 Sakya Coming Out of His Mountain Retreat
the second enlightenment to occur under the Bodhi Tree in Bodh Gaya (India)
where his pictorial trajectory is said to lead. And there, beneath that tree, came the
acquisition of an indescribable, supernal foment in consciousness, the pillars of a
moral fortitude which, by definition, would extend the merits of his own enlightenment, or enlightenments, to the betterment of humanity and all other sentient beings.
This connection is the most seminal fact of the autobiography of Buddha, enlivened by way of such universal compassion. This is the dialectical cornerstone of the
Shussan Shaka tradition, making that moment on the mountain an existentially pivotal instant within the rushing stream of his, of all of our, existence: solitary enlightenment, universal connections; or not yet.
But in either case, what to do with one’s ineluctable feelings about others? An
endless embrace, or deferral. How to be of profound assistance? Does protection
manifest an ethological (interspecies) mandate? This is the most long-lasting and
relevant ethical question of all.
How to pivot effectively at that moment of great transformation which for
Buddha is said to have occurred on the traditionally eighth day of the twelfth month?
The crux of this dilemma—and it is a dilemma for a real human being (Buddha)—is
the motive for renouncing Nirvana—the end of all our travails—in the spirit of
assisting pain that has arisen ecologically throughout the world, in others. Can it be
fixed? The Hippocratic Oaths of every medicinal revelation—of kindness, comfort,
succor, amelioration—all combine to insist not on ourselves, but those same Others,
for whom Hippocrates (c. 460–c. 370) intoned a universality of first responders; for
it is only through that succession of apprehensions and kindness that we can truly
feel ourselves to be alive, part of life. Does said enlightenment call for the promulgation of a message of submission to the flux (samsara) that is inherently the biosphere and our place within it? If flux (all ecodynamics) is the norm, does it repair
of one wound; a repeal of a single sorrow; the staunching of blood that will flow, add
up to a meaningful confluence? Is a singularity equivalent to that confluence?
And what of the insuperable realization that helping one life, when tens of millions of others are crying out, is—at least, mathematically—not very impressive?
Or is it?
Such questions devolve to near mediocrity in as much as not one good question
can be answered fully. The very queries reveal a near naivety that is applauded at the
height of ethical concerns, but undermined by the masses of humanity which have
walked over it for thousands of years, unseeing, incapable of flexing a muscle over
the complicated delineations that would see the individual in the heart of the mob.
Triage scarcely intimates the degrees of nuance and emotional complexity embalming, offending, and/or liberating this inscrutably failed will-to-pantheism.
These conjectures whirl around the mind, and the paradox inherent to all of this
hinges, in turn, upon the notion that Buddha’s enlightenment has nonetheless led
him to despair, before the cause of all other sentient beings. And/or his despair and
frustration stems from his having the cause of others’ suffering all around him, in
him (the quintessence of Buddhism). As he stands above the steamy plains (Terai)
47 Sakya Coming Out of His Mountain Retreat