If You Meet the Buddha on the Road, Kill Him!

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Many Zen sayings cause a double take. At first, they seem pretty far out and ridiculous, but when their deeper meanings are explained, and better yet actually experienced, profound personal transformations can result.

It is natural for anyone practicing Buddhism to become deeply indebted to the Buddha because of the freedom one attains. It can get to the point of actually idolizing the Buddha and imagining him as a savior who watches over our actions and helps us with life, especially for those with Christian backgrounds. Unfortunately, this is all in the head.

Perhaps to cure young monks of this kind of transference of responsibility to an imaginary father figure, Zen masters mention such things as peeing on the Buddha statue, or dropping ashes on it; disrespectful ways to exhibit how silly it is to idolize. The statue is made of bronze or stone, but the ideas that accompany the statue are made of pure illusion, according to Zen masters.

Some religions outlaw any kind of statue or representation of their deity, simply because of this problem of idol worship. Some prohibit even mentioning God's name for fear of conceptualizing! The tendency is to become lazy and merely worship an idol, rather than progress with the hard work of transforming oneself into a more spiritual person.

Other religions encourage statues everywhere and of every kind, as a reminder to be religious. Unfortunately, the statues become alive in ways that are delusional, becoming the focus of the religion instead of what the religion truly stands for, which is becoming one with something greater than ourselves. Instead of looking inwardly to find where change is necessary, we gaze at statues, like deer starring into headlights!

In much of Buddhism, statues are plentiful and usually depict the Buddha sitting in meditation - just an innocent statue made of bronze formed from a mold. But for some, that statue can take on a life of its own. For example, people may notice that the statue never moves from its mediation position, while he or she moves like a maniac all over the place, usually accomplishing very little at the end of it all.

The statue may also depict a Mona Lisa smile, where one is never sure whether the Buddha is smiling or not. Some days, he seems to be smiling, and on others, not smiling. One can be carried away with this and check to see if the Buddha is smiling or not after they have done something good . . . or bad. The mind can actually cause the Buddha to smile; or not!

So the idea is not to kill the Buddha or his teachings, but to kill the tendency to worship him. The Buddha knew that worshipping him would never enlighten the practitioner because even if the practitioner completely gave up his or her self in worship, they wouldn't have cultivated the wisdom necessary for complete enlightenment. They wouldn't have developed the discernment required to see past these kinds of mental illusions.

It is much easier to fall in love with the messenger instead of the message, because the message is seldom good news. The message can indicate good news in the future, but to potentialize that good news requires making big changes in our lives, and big changes always involve moving out of our comfort zones.

We become quite satisfied with only worshiping. After all; it's easy and comfortable, and to go to the trouble of becoming more truthful or less greedy, or do less backbiting or gossiping less, or maybe watching less TV and praying more, or eating out less and giving the extra time to those less fortunate, or do any of the things that we have been slacking from . . . well; that takes effort. Much easier to pray for someone than actually help them.

How could we help the starving people in Africa, for example? We give to the church that transfers the money overseas to help. What else can we do? Why go to the trouble of changing ourselves when throwing money at something does the trick. Or does it? We hope that it does because making money has become our national idol.

Would looking at African children the same way that we look at own kids be more realistic. If our own kids were starving, would we give to the church and hope that it filters down to them? No, we would drop everything in order to get them food. We would become passionate about it. So what is the difference? Is it the distance, the cultural differences; what?

Maybe we can't be responsible for the world because the world is so big and we can only do so much. And so we pray for others, and we feel good about ourselves for praying, and we go to church and sing praises to make sure that we will go to heaven. And we create our little comfort zones.

We barricade ourselves in our cul-de-sacs, clutching the cross that hangs from our neck at night, praying for protection from an uncertain world and hiding under our covers and praying for the rest of the world to be protected as well. And peeing on the cross never crosses our minds, nor does killing Jesus, if we met him on the road. Because what would become of us?

What is becoming of us?

E. Raymond Rock of Fort Myers, Florida is cofounder and principal teacher at the Southwest Florida Insight Center, http://www.SouthwestFloridaInsightCenter.com His twenty-eight years of meditation experience has taken him across four continents, including two stopovers in Thailand where he practiced in the remote northeast forests as an ordained Theravada Buddhist monk. His book, A Year to Enlightenment (Career Press/New Page Books) is now available at major bookstores and online retailers. Visit [http://www.AYearToEnlightenment.com]