Site of Buddha’s enlightenment

In the fifth century BCE, at the age of 29, Siddhartha, prince of the Gautama clan of north east India, left his political inheritance, his parents, his wife and his young son. He vowed he would not return until he understood a way to relieve the suffering in the world. For seven years he lived in the forest, with only a begging bowl and a one cloth, going from extreme ascetism to the middle way in search of understanding. When he realized that extreme ascetism would harm the body and not help his quest, and was about to go into the village to beg for food, he fell unconscious near the banks of the Neranjana River from lack of food. A fourteen year old girl Sujata found him and rescued him by slowly feeding him milk. For seven days, Siddhartha  stayed in this place, sitting under a pipal tree, nourished daily by Sujata bringing him milk and an untouchable water buffalo boy bringing him grass to sit upon. At dawn of the seventh day, he attained an enlightened state of awareness and understood that the source of suffering arises from clinging and lack of understanding of impermanence and non-self. Enlightenment in Sanskrit is Bodhi. The tree under which Buddha sat became known as the Bodhi tree. After Siddhartha’s enlightenment, he spoke to the village children of what he had understood and promised to return to visit them.

In the third century, Trixila, the jealous wife of King Ashoka ordered a servant to cut down the Bodhi tree. She feared that like Siddhartha, who left his wife Yasodhara for the spiritual path, the king would leave her. The king poured mllk and water on the roots of the tree and two saplings sprouted. Ashoka’s children’s took one of the saplings to Sri Lanka. Ashoka replanted the other sapling and walled it off to protect it from animals. The present bodhi tree, which is about forty feet high is from the Sri Lankan root. The original Bodhi tree from the third century still flourishes in Sri Lanka.

Sister Chang Khong sat under one of the Bodhi trees and led the sangha in a deep body relaxation and then in prayers to our blood, land, and spiritual ancestors. There are many temples and statues from different countries in Bodh Gaya. The most striking statue for me was the large 63 foot statue of the Buddha at one of the Japanese temples. I slowly walked around it three times. I didn’t want to leave. The grandeur of this statue matched the grandeur of the view at Vulture Peak. Both quiet the mind instantly. Both bring emptiness and unspeakable joy.  Ahhh one breathes in without expecting to.