Deepak on Buddha

The making of the Buddha
SHEILA KUMAR
775 words
2 December 2007
The Hindu
03
English
(c) 2007 Kasturi & Sons Ltd

Spirituality

A gentle reader on the life of the Enlightened One.

Buddha: A Story of Enlightenment, Deepak Chopra, HarperCollins; Rs 395.

Deepak Chopra, not in the least burdened by his New Age Guru label, has gone and written a book on the early life of Siddhartha who becomes Gautama, who, in turn, becomes the Buddha. No preaching, no lecturing, just an interesting story told in a measured manner and at a measured pace. However, for all that, eventually the book does become a primer for those wanting to know something about Buddhism. Chopra states clearly in the author’s note that he wanted to flesh out the character of this famous but very obscure (his words) person. So, that’s what he sets out to do, in a style reminiscent of T.H. White’s classic on King Arthur The Once and Future King. This here is the Buddha myth in deconstructed form, complete with a last chapter that tells neophytes how to attain some amount of Buddha-hood.

Make no mistake, though, the book is quite an interesting read. The story Chopra tells has always held universal appeal, that of the young, handsome prince who gives up a life of privilege and becomes a monk, practising severe austerities till he finally attains enlightenment … and this part is really well written. En route, though, the aspirant has small epiphanies that enlighten both him and us: that things which really mean so much are as thin and fragile as tissue; that if you think you are mighty, that’s all that counts, because no one is really mighty.

Siddhartha’s father, the warrior king Suddhodana, (fear is protection; use fear like medicine, he cautions, just enough to be a remedy but not so much that it becomes poison) is well fleshed out, though Queen Maya makes only a guest appearance. The demon Mara in his numerous face-offs with the Buddha before he becomes the Buddha, of course, is evocatively etched, a truly frightening look at pain, temptation and power. A demon’s work is to amplify the mind’s suffering, Chopra tells us, and goes on to give ample evidence of the same, whether Mara is testing Siddhartha or Devadatta, another interesting character as we encounter him in this book. At one point, in a flash of pure brilliance, Devadatta realises that “the gods don’t exist. But when the horror of life finally reveals itself, somebody has to invent gods”.

Path to enlightenment

And so, despite the king’s desperate efforts, Siddhartha gets to encounter sickness, ageing and death, which sets him on the path to renunciation. He goes into an abyss and returns, having left fear behind. His hunger for a guru is all too palpable; he meets and attempts to learn from several enigmatic savants before moving on. And the reader soon sees that in his enlightenment lay Gautama’s refuge. In fact, Gautama admits to wanting to be loved for the saint he knew himself to be, to inspire others to join him in his work. He is surprised that he will need words; he had hoped to heal the world with a touch or by simply existing in it.

This is the Buddha as the world knows him. The man who agonised over every aspect of hurt and pain. Whose compassion for everything and anything was all-encompassing, whose evolution was slow, very slow. His belief in the Buddha inside every person. His journey from zealot to the truly detached one. Even his take on the fight between good and evil is inspired, as is his first test after becoming the Buddha, the taming of Angulimala. The temptation of the Buddha here is none other than his wife Yashodara, a temptation he puts behind him with almost insulting ease.

This writer’s only beef is there isn’t much emotional resonance; we see Buddha as emotional, yes, endearing, well, no. Then again, you do take some stuff away from this book. Chopra talks of how people deal with fear by turning it into rage. How karma is just the memory of past pleasure we want to repeat and past pain we want to avoid. So okay, the book does need polishing and there is no real empathy built up between the Buddha and the reader, but no matter. As a primary Buddha reader, it serves its purpose very well. At one point Chopra calls his reader as one who might be coming to Buddha from the cold…if that is the case, this book is not the worst place to begin.