STUDY GUIDE FOR

study guide for
The Noblest Life

How to Use This Course

This video is part of an ongoing monthly series in the teachings of Eknath Easwaran. The talks on this tape, like all of Easwaran’s talks, are rich and deep in content. They shed light on many aspects of life, but their true value emerges as we try to apply their teachings in our daily lives. The Guide is meant to be used in conjunction with a daily practice of Sri Easwaran’s Eight Point Program, based on passage meditation. We do not recommend following the Practical Exercises if you are not practicing this program according to the instructions given in Easwaran’s book Meditation, which can be found on our Web site, www.nilgiri.org. A brief list of those points can be found at the back of this Guide.

The Practical Exercises are suggestions for you to explore as they seem appropriate in your life. If you are already familiar with Easwaran’s books, you will have seen some of these exercises before. But we suggest that you take this opportunity to really put them into practice, and discover their great power to deepen your spiritual life. Try them in moderation, exercising your common sense and not taking them to extreme lengths. Easwaran always emphasized the importance of the middle path.

Before or after watching each talk, we suggest that you read through the notes and the Practical Exercise. Then, after watching the talk, try to put the exercise into action in your life. A week or so later, you may find it interesting to watch the talk again, with the experience of the exercise fresh in your mind. You may want to note the results in a journal.

A week-by-week curriculum for studying this tape, in coordination with readings from Easwaran’s books, is available for use by Blue Mountain Center Satsangs, and other interested individuals. Please see the Videos section of our Web site, under Video of the Month. A full listing of our Satsang groups is also available on our Web site. For more information about this series, other publications of Easwaran and Nilgiri Press, and a schedule of retreats based on the Eight Point Program, please contact

The Blue Mountain Center of Meditation
Post Office Box 256
Tomales, CA 94971
800 475 2369
www.nilgiri.org

The Life of the Buddha
Part One

Introduction

This videotape contains one long talk by Eknath Easwaran, divided into two parts. In it, he narrates the story of the Compassionate Buddha with a wealth of detail, great warmth, and even, it seems, a kind of personal familiarity. It is clear that he identifies deeply with the Buddha and sees in his life a pattern for his own spiritual development. Similarly, this talk can help us find a pattern for our own striving on the path toward spiritual fulfillment.

The practical exercises in this Study Guide focus on the climactic moment in Prince Siddhartha’s life when he committed himself completely to meditation. In the events described in Part One of this tape, Easwaran touches on three qualities we can cultivate to establish this kind of unshakable commitment: first, a deep compassion, which drives us to seek resources within ourselves to help others; second, a passionate determination to reach the goal; and third, a sense of moderation that helps us preserve and use all our vitality for spiritual growth.

^{Outline of the Talk}

Easwaran begins by presenting the Indian concept of divine incarnation, as given in the Bhagavad Gita, where the Lord says, “Whenever dharma declines and the purpose of life is forgotten, I manifest myself on earth.” (4:7) Against this background, Easwaran sees the Buddha’s life as a manifestation of divine compassion, in response to the world’s spiritual need.

At other points in history, that divine response has come in the form of “very ordinary” people who transform themselves through spiritual disciplines. Mahatma Gandhi is a supreme example, but Easwaran also sees his own life and the history of the Blue Mountain Center as proof that ordinary people can become “humble instruments in the hands of the Lord.”

So Easwaran narrates the story of the Buddha not as an ancient tale, “but as a truth that can be verified by anybody in any country, in any religion, who has the determination, the daring, the sustained enthusiasm,” to follow spiritual disciplines and become a selfless instrument of peace.

The story begins on the full-moon night in the month of May, with the birth of the Buddha, whose given name was Siddhartha. A great sage named Asita, with his spiritual insight, recognizes on the baby’s body thirty-two physical characteristics indicating future greatness. Asita tells the king that if the boy stays in the palace he will grow up to be a great emperor. But if he renounces his kingdom he will become a great spiritual teacher.

(Eventually, the Buddha did renounce his kingdom, but he always retained his regal bearing. Once a high-caste Brahmin remarked that he seemed more fitted to a crown than a begging bowl. In reply, the Buddha said, “A king am I indeed . . . king of the Dharma.” Easwaran adds that we can all aspire to “this imperial throne of love in action.”)

Siddhartha’s father did everything he could to prevent the boy from becoming dissatisfied with the palace. He provided every possible avenue for pleasure and prestige, for accumulating marvelous possessions, and achieving worldly goals. Siddhartha became an excellent student and a great archer. He won the hand of the beautiful princess Yashodhara in an archery contest. When they had a son, named Rahula, their personal happiness seemed complete.

Yet even as a boy he was noted for profound compassion. We see it when Siddhartha saves a swan that his cousin had shot with an arrow.

We also see it in his response to what are known as the Four Noble Sights: sickness, old age, death, and meditation. One day Siddhartha asks his charioteer, Channa, to show him the poorer parts of the city. On seeing the reality of sickness, old age, and death for the first time, Siddhartha is deeply troubled and asks to go home. (In other tellings of the story, Easwaran describes the fourth sight, which Siddhartha sees on the way home: a man sitting still and silent, deep in meditation.)

An immense inner crisis, kindled by these Four Noble Sights, impels Siddhartha to leave his kingdom in quest of the peace he saw in the face of the meditator. He departs on the full-moon night in the month of May.

Prince Siddhartha begins his quest by undertaking the severest disciplines. After years of effort he realizes that success in spiritual effort requires a sense of moderation to keep the body and mind fit for long, deep meditation.

This insight makes possible the climax of his spiritual quest. On the full-moon night in the month of May, sitting under the Bodhi tree, he resolves: “Come what may – let my body rot, let my bones melt away, let my blood dry up – I will not get up from here until I have entered nirvana.”

Practical Exercise

Sitting under the Bodhi tree, the Buddha says, “Come what may – let my body rot, let my bones melt away, let my blood dry up – I will not get up from here until I have entered nirvana.” For Easwaran this critical moment in the Buddha’s spiritual striving is a model for the determination we too can summon in our more mundane, seemingly endless efforts on the path – to sit down daily for meditation, to bring the mind back to the words of the inspirational passage, to follow the Eight Point Program during the day.

For the next week or two, try to apply the determination of this episode to your own practice of meditation. Below is a list of suggestions. Choose one or more which seem appropriate to you, and try with all your might to make progress. If you prefer, you may choose other improvements which you have found in Easwaran’s teachings. (Don’t meditate for longer than thirty minutes unless you have already received approval from the bmcm to extend your period of meditation.)

Suggestions: Move as little as possible during meditation. Choose the passage(s) you will use before sitting down to meditate. Sit up straight without slackening your posture. Memorize a new passage. Prepare for meditation by getting up earlier and keep repeating your mantram continuously until you start meditating. Make an extra effort to stay on the passage, repeating it more slowly and returning quickly when distracted. Reread the instructions for meditation in any of Easwaran’s books.

Recommended Reading

Eknath Easwaran, Introduction to The Dhammapada, pages 7–46.

Suggested Passage for Meditation

The Dhammapada, “Twin Verses” in God Makes the Rivers to Flow.

The Life of the Buddha
Part Two

Introduction

In Part Two Easwaran pays homage to the tremendous force of love released by the Buddha’s life, a force which continues to be active even today “when little people like you and me practice meditation, act on his teachings, and aspire to leave the world a little better than we found it.”

One by one, he narrates the simple stories that have been handed down for over two and a half millennia – profound personal transformations that took place in the hearts of kings and thieves, merchants and paupers, even in elephants and snakes. For Easwaran, these stories “Are all marvelous symbolizations of what infinite love a human being is capable of. This is what nirvana means. This is what realizing God means. After that, there is nothing you want from the world, nothing the world can give you. All that you want is to give and give, and the more you give, the longer you live.”

^{Outline of the Talk}

Part Two begins with a brief reprise of the introduction to Part One, then Easwaran resumes the story by recounting the many temptations that came to Siddhartha on the night of his illumination.

The final temptation makes Siddhartha pause: “Blessed One, you have attained nirvana, you have attained self-realization – but who will ever believe you? Why don’t you just stay here, glorying in your own illumination?” Siddhartha’s compassionate reply, says Easwaran, implies that his teachings were given for people like us: “Yes, the vast majority may not believe, but there will be a few who have little dust in their eyes. They will see clearly, and they will follow my Noble Eightfold Path.”

Prince Siddhartha, who has now become the Buddha, begins his teaching career. In Benares, he meets five disciples who had abandoned him. Drawn by the radiance of his spirit, they ask him to accept them again.

The Buddha delivers his first sermon, known as setting the wheel of dharma in motion. In his second sermon he introduces his Eightfold Path, a systematic method for discovering the vast world within.

He is joined by many disciples: King Bimbisara with his physician Jivaka and his courtiers; a wealthy merchant named Anathapindika, who bought a park for the Buddha; the guild master’s wife, Vishaka, who gave him a priceless tiara. The Buddha returns to his home in Kapilavastu, where his father, his wife, and his son all become his disciples.

Easwaran recounts the story of a disciple who came two centuries after the Buddha’s death, the emperor Ashoka, who made the Buddha’s teachings the basis for his rule, extending compassionate protection to animals.

The Buddha’s compassion for animals is highlighted in the jataka tale (a story describing a previous lifetime of the Buddha) in which the Buddha gave up his life to save the life of a tigress and her cubs. As a result of such self-forgetting kindness, extending over many lifetimes, the Buddha’s love became powerful enough to tame a mad elephant, and to inspire the protective love of a cobra.

In the final section of this talk, Easwaran narrates the last days of the Buddha. It is an occasion for him to reflect on the conquest of death – a theme at the heart of all mystical teachings. He quotes a verse from the Bhagavad Gita: “As a man abandons worn-out clothes and acquires new ones, so when the body is worn out a new one is acquired by the Self, who lives within.” In recounting the Buddha’s reassurance to Ananda, his closest disciple, Easwaran voices the promise made by many great spiritual teachers to their students: “I am always going to be with all of you, because the Self that lives in my heart is the same Self who lives in the hearts of all.”

Practical Exercise

This talk is an ideal example of the power contained in the life stories of great spiritual figures. In this exercise we will explore that power further by using Reading the Mystics to charge our practice of meditation with new determination.

During the coming week or two, find a way to give more concentration and depth to your spiritual reading. You might try one or more of the following suggestions.

Read more slowly, pausing after significant paragraphs to reflect on how the reading applies to you. When you find an especially meaningful passage, read it over again the next day, or even a few days in a row. Keep a journal to copy the phrases or sentences which strike you deeply. If you have a copy of Easwaran’s translation of the Dhammapada, read from the Introduction, especially pages 46–58 on the “Stages of Enlightenment.”

During the course of this exercise, pay attention to its effect on your meditation, especially on the aspects which you chose to work on in the first exercise. Do you see a benefit?