Few would dispute that the extra-ordinary awakening of the Buddha is a seminal moment in the history of humanity. He realized human beings must face suffering, the causes and conditions for its arising, the total and unshakeable resolution of suffering and the Way.Immediately after his awakening two curious events took place.
The Buddha had spent seven weeks meditating in all four postures, sitting, walking, standing and reclining, until he had fathomed out a comprehensive path to dissolve all difficult issues of daily life without exception, but (as he reported to his friends years later) he experienced a real hesitation to establish himself as a teacher.
The thought arose in his mind that it would be difficult for others to realise the truth of what he was pointing towards. He said to himself:
“Those wrapped in darkness will never discern this abstruse Dharma.
“If I were to teach the Dharma,
others would not understand me,
and that would be wearying and troublesome for me.”
For final measure, he then admitted that his “mind inclined towards inaction.”
No sign there of any confidence in humanity.
It was an incredible statement to make. These thoughrts followed on from the full flush of his awakening and after several weeks of reflection and meditation on the path for people to experience and know liberation. He had realised the importance of the limitless heart through love, compassion, appreciative joy and equanimity.
It was an admission that after six years of dedicated practice, of engaging in numerous satsangs with respected spiritual teachers, of frequent contact with great yogis, he still doubted their capacities for the same awakening and liberation as himself. He obviously felt that what he realised would be incomprehensible to the vast army of dedicated seekers, yogis, meditators, sadhus, mystics and gurus living in northern India at that time.
The thought arose in my mind: “Be grateful, Gautama that you were not born 2600 years later in the West. If you believe people in India in your era were “wrapped in darkness,” then you should see the depth of darkness of contemporary Western life – obsessed with materialism, competition, pleasure, sex, money, Wall Street gambling, compulsive thinking and unconsciously plundering of the environment.
On top of this, there is an archaic belief for millions in the incomprehensible all-loving, omniscient, omnipresent, all powerful God the Creator of Judaeo-Christianity. The followers believe in a pathological God who sends disbelievers the plague, kills all the Egyptians’ first born and despatches prophets to be murdered. Christians believe their God also allowed the Romans to crucify His only Son who died to save all our souls before he physically resurrected into heaven.
Dear Gautama, Try teaching the same Dharma in the West. You had it easy in India sharing the Dharma with a rich spectrum of spiritual pracittioners and traditions deeply receptive to your teachings of the emptiness of I and my and the discovery of liberation.
Today, we have to work often in the dark underworld of the West. Teaching the Dharma in the West truly has the potential to be wearying and troublesome.
Yet, there are beings here, too, in the West today with little dust in their eyes.