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The early Buddhist tradition is sometimes characterized in the popular imagination of Westerners as somber, serious, austere, and pessimistic. Because of its emphasis on suffering and rejection of the world for a more solitary life of contemplation and meditation, it is understandable how people could arrive at such a characterization. But such a caricature would be incorrect and misleading. Within the hardships of ordinary life, Buddhists have been able to find humor. In a commentary to the text of the Dhammapada, a story is told about some old monks who became friends with an old woman, the wife of a former member of their group. When the old woman died, the monks were inconsolable. In order to help them understand, the Buddha told them a story from the Kaka (Crow) Jataka (stories of former lives) about their former existence as crows. One day, it seems, the mate of one of the crows got very drunk, was swept out to sea, and drowned. The crows attempted to save her by baling out the sea with their beaks, until they finally just gave up their fruitless effort.1 We can commiserate with the sorrow of the monks, but we can also laugh at the absurdity of the desperate actions of the crows. If the sea in this narrative is a metaphor for the suffering associated with life, and if the crows are metaphorical figures for human beings, the impossible task of the crows is analogous to the struggle of humans against the suffering of the world. Like the sea-baling crows, humans need a life raft to help them navigate the sea of suffering that is symbolic of human existence. During the fifth century B.C.E. in India, a man named Siddhartha became the Buddha (Awakened One), and he functioned as a life raft for all those suffering in the sea of pain. With his concern for the absurdities and suffering associated with human life, the historical Buddha functioned as a human savior figure, even though he was not considered divine during his life. During the formative period of Buddhism, the Buddha was considered an ordinary man of flesh and blood and a gifted charismatic teacher. He was not an incarnation of a deity. He was simply a man who discovered the truth by means of his own efforts and shared it with others. 1 1 Crows and Monks: Introduction The Buddha also did not function as a mediator, reformer, prophet, priest, or theologian, because there was nothing to mediate, no organization to reform, no divinely inspired message to share with others, no organized ritual to perform or duties of office, and no deity upon which to reflect. The Buddha is best understood as a teacher, philosopher, and founder of a major world religion. His teaching was rational in the sense of analyzing the basic problems of life and devising a solution. By systematic reasoning about human existence, he came to the conclusion that it was painful, and he prescribed a remedy for the pain by means of his self-discovered path. Moreover, he discovered an end to pain that formed his goal of nibbana (Sanskrit: nirvana). We will discuss his analysis of life, pragmatic solution, and goal in chapter 3. Briefly, the Buddha’s teaching emphasized gaining direct access to a greater reality by means of determined efforts. The Buddha stressed an immediate rather than a cumulative religious experience, although it could take many years of arduous practice to reach one’s goal. Like major religious figures such as Jesus and Muhammad, the Buddha gathered a small group of followers who were attracted to his charisma and teaching. But unlike figures such as Jesus and Muhammad, the Buddha insisted upon the creation of a monastic community. The monastic community shaped those who joined it, and it influenced Indian culture and the laity who were necessary for its support. The tale of the crows is a good example of the use of narrative by Buddhists to make a point about some aspect of religion or philosophy. Early Buddhism developed from within the context of an oral culture in which verbal communication and narrative were important for spreading one’s message to a mostly illiterate populace. Buddhist teachers told stories repeatedly, long before these tales were preserved in texts. This study of Buddhism proposes to follow the lead of Buddhist teachers over the centuries by taking a narrative approach to the subject as much as possible, in order...

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