The funeral arrangements were just too much for Ananda. His plight during these last days reminds us of the immense gulf that separates the unenlightened from the Arahant. Ananda knew all about Buddhism intellectually, but this knowledge was no substitute for the “direct knowledge” of the yogin. It could be of no help to him when he started to experience the pain of the loss of his master. This was infinitely worse than the death of Sariputta. He understood the Noble Truth of Suffering with his mundane, rational mind, but he had not absorbed it so that it fused with his whole being. He still could not accept the fact that everything was transient and would pass away. Because he was not a proficient yogin, he could not “penetrate” these doctrines and make them a living reality. Instead of feeling a yogic certainty, he felt only raw pain. After he had listened to the Buddha’s uninipassioned directions about his ashes, Ananda left his master’s bedside and fled to one of the other huts in the grove. For a long time, he stood weeping, resting his head against the lintel. He felt a complete failure: “I am still only a beginner,” wept the elderly bhikkhu. “I have not reached the goal of the holy life; my quest is unfulfilled.” He lived in a community of spiritual giants who had reached Nibbana. Who would help him now? Who would even bother with him? “My Teacher is about to attain his parinibbana-my compassionate Teacher who was always kind to me.”
When the Buddha heard about Ananda’s tears, he sent for him. “That is enough, Ananda,” he said. “Don’t be sorrowful; don’t grieve.” Had he not explained, over and over again, that nothing was permanent but that separation was the law of life? “And Ananda,” the Buddha concluded, “for years you have waited on me with constant love and kindness. You have taken care of my physical needs, and have supported me in all your words and thoughts. You have done all this to help me, joyfully and with your whole heart. You have earned merit, Ananda. Keep trying, and you will soon be enlightened too.”
But Ananda was still struggling. “Lord,” he cried, “do not go to your Final Rest in this dreary little town, with mud walls; this heathen, jungle outpost, this backwater.” The Buddha had spent the greater part of his working life in such great cities as Rajagaha, Kosambi, Savatti, and Varanasl. Why could he not return to one of these cities, and finish his quest surrounded by all his noble disciples, instead of dying here alone, among these ignorant unbelievers? The texts show that the early Sangha was embarrassed by the obscurity of Kusinara and the fact that their Teacher died far away in the jungle. The Buddha tried to cheer Ananda, pointing out that Kusinara had once been a thriving city and the great capital of a cakkavatti. But the Buddha’s choice of Kusinara almost certainly had a deeper reason. No Buddhist could ever rest on past achievements; the Sangha must always press forward to bring help to the wider world. And a Buddha would not see a dismal little town like Kusinara in the same way as would an unenlightened man. For years he had trained his conscious and his unconscious mind to see reality from an entirely different perspective, free from the distorting aura of egotism that clouds the judgment of most human beings. He did not need the external prestige upon which many of us rely in order to prop up our sense of self. As a Tathagata, his egotism had “gone.” A Buddha had no time to think of himself, even on his deathbed. Right up to the last, he continued to live for others, inviting the Mallians of Kusinara to come to the grove in order to share his triumph. He also took the time to instruct a passing mendicant, who belonged to another sect but was drawn to the Buddha’s teaching, even though Ananda protested that the Buddha was ill and exhausted.
Finally, he turned back to Ananda, able with his usual sympathy to enter into his thoughts. “You may be thinking, Ananda: ‘The word of the Teacher is now a thing of the past; now we have no more Teacher.’ But that is not how you should see it. Let the Dhamma and the Discipline that I have taught you be your Teacher when I am gone.” He had always told his followers to look not at him but at the Dhamma; he himself had never been important. Then he turned to the crowd of bhikkhus who had accompanied him on this last journey, and reminded them yet again that ‘All individual things pass away. Seek your liberation with diligence.”
Having given his last advice to his followers, the Buddha fell into a coma. Some of the monks felt able to trace his journey through the higher states of consciousness that he had explored so often in meditation. But he had gone beyond any state known to human beings whose minds are still dominated by sense experience. While the gods rejoiced, the earth shook and those bhikkhus who had not yet achieved enlightenment wept, the Buddha experienced an extinction that was, paradoxically, the supreme state of being and the final goal of humanity:
GLOSSARY
Ahimsa: “Harmlessness”; the ethic adopted by many of the ascetics of North India to counter the aggression of the new states.
Akusala: “Unskillful” or “unhelpful” states, which will impede the quest for Enlightenment.
Anatta: “No-Soul”; the doctrine that denies the existence of a constant, stable and discrete personality.
Arahant: An ‘Accomplished One,’ who has attained Nibbana.
Arama: Pleasure-park donated to the Buddhist Order for a settlement.
Asana: The correct position for yogic meditation, with straight back and crossed legs.
Avasa: Rural settlements, often built from scratch each year by the Buddhist monks, for the monsoon retreats.
Atman: The eternal, unchangeable Self sought by the yogins, ascetics and followers of the Samkhya philosophy. It was believed in the Upanisads to be identical with brahman.
Ayatana: Meditative planes achieved by a very advanced yogin.
Bhikkhu: An “almsman,” a mendicant monk who begs for his daily food; the feminine form is bhikkhuni: nun.
Bodhisatta: A man or woman who is destined to achieve enlightenment. Sanskrit: boddhisatva.
Brahman: The fundamental, supreme and absolute principle of the cosmos in Vedic and Upanisadic religion.
Brahmin: A member of the priestly caste in Aryan society, responsible for sacrifice and the transmission of the Vedas.
Brahmacariya: The holy life of chastity, the quest for enlightenment and liberation from pain.
Buddha: An Enlightened or Awakened person.
Cakkavatti: The World Ruler or Universal King of Indian folklore, who would govern the whole world and impose justice and righteousness by force.