If Jesus Meets the Buddha......

June 23, 2024

Today’s Gospel reading tells us about Jesus calming a storm.  Later in the same Gospel (Mark 6:46-56) we are told another story of Jesus coming walking on a stormy lake to meet the disciples who are struggling in the storm. And despite the first experience, the second story too speaks of a lack of faith on the part of Peter. Similarly, in the same Gospel, there are two stories of the multiplication of food that are found in Mark 6:35-44 (five loaves)  and later in Mark 8:1-9 (seven loaves). After the second instance, we have Jesus reminding them of the two instances of the multiplication, and ends by asking them: Do you not yet understand?”

In the aftermath of both the sets of stories (calming the storm, and the multiplication of food), Jesus seems deeply disappointed with and pained by his disciples - the same people that he helped so many times - not having any faith in him, even forsaking him when he was arrested.    

In our lives too, some of us must have experienced times when the people we seem to have cared for, turn their backs on us. A friend of mine, who was at the time suffering legal harassment by a family that she had helped on numerous occasions, was asked whether she would continue to help them if they asked for help, to which she answered, “Yes I want to do everything I can, without expecting anything in return, - but it is certainly very painful”. When I hear stories like this from my friend or others who have gone through similar experiences, I remember the story of the Buddha and his long quest to find out how to overcome sorrow. His central insight  after his illumination was that all sorrow is caused by desire.  We ‘want’ something, and we do not get it, and that is why we experience sorrow. Think about it - there is much truth in that. His conclusion was that therefore the way to overcome sorrow, was to overcome desire - including the desire for people’s gratitude or trust, or anything else we may want in our lives.

On the other hand, when I look at Jesus’ life, I can see that he certainly did ‘desire’ much.  He did desire  that his disciples trust in him,  and stand by him when he was down. And he was deeply hurt when they did not. I can clearly see various such ‘desires’ in Jesus right till his death on the cross - as a result of which he did experience the pain of rejection by the Jews, the deep sadness in the denial, abandonment and even betrayal by his closest disciples/friends.  He also desired not to go through the way of suffering that he believed was marked out for him, so much so that he sweated blood in the Garden and begged God to take away the chalice of pain from him.  Again his cry on the cross: My God, my God, why did you abandon me? clearly seemed to indicate that he certainly desired that God would not abandon him.    

On the other hand, while the Buddha, after achieving his state of desirelessness, was willing to help his disciples to attain this non-desiring and non-sorrowful state if they wanted it, he was seemingly quite indifferent to many issues that burdened the world around him. After all the essence of his teaching was that one had to overcome the desire for anything, including the desire to set things right.  Jesus, on the other hand, clearly did desire to  change the world around him in many ways, and strove hard to do that.  He saw  his mission as one “to set the oppressed free”.  (Luke 4:18). As a result he faced much opposition, got into vitriolic arguments with the religious establishment, chased the merchants out of the temple because he desired that they should not make his father’s house into a den of robbers etc. - all of which ended with him finally getting crucified.  Obviously quite a sorrow-full life - and yet such a wonderful, inspiring life!!!

In fact if we think of the most common images we have of these two religious geniuses, we will realise that the most common statue/image we have of the Buddha is always one of a person in serene contemplation, but the most common one we have of Jesus is that of a man wracked with pain and sorrow, and nailed to  a cross.

Two approaches to life, both of which obviously have much value for all of us!  But which is the one I would choose for myself ?  Or can I put the insights from  both these lives into practice in my own life, like perhaps Ignatius of Loyola (the founder of the Jesuits) tried to do (though how successfully, I am not sure) when he exhorted his companions to work as if everything depended on oneself, and to pray as if everything depended on God? In other words, work to your utmost to achieve what you desire, but do not get attached to the outcome because that depends on God. That approach seems similar to Krishna in the Bhagwad Gita, in which it is taught that one must do one’s duty with full intensity, but without being attached to the success or failure of what one does. The analogy used in the Gita is that of a stormy sea where on the surface the waves are madly dancing (where actions take place), as contrasted to the bottom of the same sea where the waters are tranquil (where one’s innermost self resides). But is it possible for us to be like the stormy sea, that is calm inside even as it rages on above, or do we have to choose between peace for myself and justice for all? I do not have the answers. And maybe we each need to find our own answers.

But when we start to listen attentively to the insights that other religious geniuses have offered us over the centuries, we start asking better questions and start growing spiritually, instead of remaining locked within the confines of our own religion. While each religious genius came from a particular cultural, religious, social, familial and individual history/environment, - and their teachings grew out of each one’s specific background, - they each tried to respond to the world around them in the light of each one's respective experience of the Ultimate Reality.

Today, we are lucky that our Church has begun to  open up to the insights of so many religious geniuses. As Vatican 2 says: “The Church, therefore, exhorts her children, that through dialogue and collaboration with the followers of other religions, carried out with prudence and love and in witness to the Christian faith and life, they recognize, preserve and promote the good things, spiritual and moral, as well as the socio-cultural values found among these others”.  (Nostra Aetate). So instead of limiting our religious world to the teachings of just one genius, let us open it up and grow in our understanding of, and our relationship with, this Ultimate Reality.  

First Reading: Job 38:1, 8-11
 
The Lord addressed Job out of the storm and said:
    Who shut the sea within doors,
        when it burst forth from the womb;
    when I made the clouds its garment
        and thick darkness its swaddling bands?
    When I set limits for it
        and fastened the bar of its door,
    and said: Thus far shall you come but no farther,
        and here shall your proud waves be stilled!
 
Second Reading: 2 Cor 5:14-17
 
Brothers and sisters: The love of Christ impels us, once we have come to the conviction that one died for all; therefore, all have died.  He indeed died for all,  so that those who live might no longer live for themselves but for him who for their sake died and was raised.  
 
Consequently, from now on we regard no one according to the flesh; even if we once knew Christ according to the flesh, yet now we know him so no longer. So whoever is in Christ is a new creation: the old things have passed away; behold, new things have come.
 
Gospel: Mark 4:35-41
 
On that day, as evening drew on, Jesus said to his disciples: “Let us cross to the other side.” Leaving the crowd, they took Jesus with them in the boat just as he was.  And other boats were with him. A violent squall came up and waves were breaking over the boat, so that it was already filling up. Jesus was in the stern, asleep on a cushion.  They woke him and said to him, “Teacher, do you not care that we are perishing?” He woke up,  rebuked the wind, and said to the sea, “Quiet!  Be still!” The wind ceased and there was great calm. Then he asked them, “Why are you terrified?  Do you not yet have faith?”  They were filled with great awe and said to one another, “Who then is this whom even wind and sea obey?”