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In an eye catching magazine article headline - “Where Do Buddhas Go After they Die? A Lesson on How to Waste One’s Time” - Vanessa Sasson, a professor of religious studies explains that question is often asked by students who take her course on Buddhism is this one: “What happens when a buddha achieves Awakening? Where does he go?” The question refers to a time when the samsara cycle of birth, death and rebirth end freeing a fully awakened individual merges into ‘nirvana’. To answer that question, Sasson relates a time decades ago when she was a youth visiting India and a spiritual seeker. She was sitting in on a class taught by an elderly Tibetan monk whose lecture was being simultaneously translated into English by a female teaching assistant.
Sasson raised her hand and asked the monk: “If we are all moving forward through samsara, does this mean that we will all eventually achieve Awakening? And if so, what happens then? Does the world explode if there is no one left in it? Where do we all go?” Here’s how Sasson described the monk’s response: “The teacher eyed me carefully, then stood up and did the strangest thing. He barked at me in Tibetan for what seemed to be an eternity, and then stormed out of the room.” The entire class was stunned into a silent embarrassment and then Sasson asked the interpreter: “What did he just say?”
She paused, took a deep breath and replied: “He said, ‘What is wrong with all you Westerners? Why do you always want to know the end of the story?! Are you awakened yet? I don’t think so. So instead of worrying about the end of the story, just work on getting awakened now. You will find out how it works when you get there!’” Then the elderly monk stormed out of the lecture to reinforce how important it was to understand that not every question can be answered; that sometimes we have to focus on the task before us and not what is in the distant future.
Here’s how Vanessa Ssson interprets her experience with that elderly monk: “At the time, I didn’t know what to do with the experience. I mulled it over, thought about it repeatedly, felt bad about it often, but most of the time I just wondered. But years later, I have come to love his reply. I now realize that this monk, whose name I do not remember, whose story I know nothing about, smashed a vajra sword over my head with that reply. He told me to abandon my quest for a logical explanation where mythical narratives are concerned; to stop worrying about how it all works and instead focus on the important stuff. The point is to attain Awakening, not to figure out the system. Because cosmic mechanics are not the point.”
(source: www.buddhistdoor.net)
Sasson raised her hand and asked the monk: “If we are all moving forward through samsara, does this mean that we will all eventually achieve Awakening? And if so, what happens then? Does the world explode if there is no one left in it? Where do we all go?” Here’s how Sasson described the monk’s response: “The teacher eyed me carefully, then stood up and did the strangest thing. He barked at me in Tibetan for what seemed to be an eternity, and then stormed out of the room.” The entire class was stunned into a silent embarrassment and then Sasson asked the interpreter: “What did he just say?”
She paused, took a deep breath and replied: “He said, ‘What is wrong with all you Westerners? Why do you always want to know the end of the story?! Are you awakened yet? I don’t think so. So instead of worrying about the end of the story, just work on getting awakened now. You will find out how it works when you get there!’” Then the elderly monk stormed out of the lecture to reinforce how important it was to understand that not every question can be answered; that sometimes we have to focus on the task before us and not what is in the distant future.
Here’s how Vanessa Ssson interprets her experience with that elderly monk: “At the time, I didn’t know what to do with the experience. I mulled it over, thought about it repeatedly, felt bad about it often, but most of the time I just wondered. But years later, I have come to love his reply. I now realize that this monk, whose name I do not remember, whose story I know nothing about, smashed a vajra sword over my head with that reply. He told me to abandon my quest for a logical explanation where mythical narratives are concerned; to stop worrying about how it all works and instead focus on the important stuff. The point is to attain Awakening, not to figure out the system. Because cosmic mechanics are not the point.”
(source: www.buddhistdoor.net)
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