2 disciples of gautama

2 Disciples of Gautama A Case-study for students of meditation

© Puneet Srivastava, April 2015

What may we learn from these 2 disciples of

Gautama for our meditation?


1 picked Gautama’s hand


1 was handpicked by Gautama

1 is known for his boundless joy


1 is known for his sorrow

1 mostly walked the road


1 lived long with Gautama

1 was feared all his life


1 was loved by all


Both are said to have attained Nirvana…

1 before him, so said Gautama


1 after Gautama

1 ferocious bandit, Angulimala


1 was ever polite, Ananda


What type are we?

Or somewhere in between the two?


Angulimala the ferocious wished to kill a 1000th time.

He saw a monk.

This shall be an easy kill. He thought.


He ran, yet he could not catch his hunt.

He tried again…

Yet his powerful hands fell short.


‘Stop monk stop!’ He finally cried.

‘It’s you who’s running,’ said the monk, ‘I stopped long ago.’


Those words and the bandit fell in Gautama’s feet.

In that moment the killer who wore his victim’s fingers around his neck died.


A new entity was born out of him.

Yet meditation didn’t come to him.


His past as a killer would haunt him every time he closed his eyes.

Master told him to not give up. And he did not.


Then one day someone said, ‘you look as divine as your teacher.’

That day Master asked him to be a wandering monk.


‘Go out and see the world anew,’ the Master said.

So now he walked the roads.


Many years passed. No one heard of his past.

But then one day, someone made out.


‘Hey that’s Angulimala, the bandit. He is back, disguised as a monk!’

‘Kill him before he kills us!’


The sound went like a roar.

In the rain of stones, the monk was beaten and bruised.


Somehow he crawled and reached his Master.

Covered in blood, yet locked in boundless joy.


Master asked, ‘are you angry with them?’

‘No,’ said the man, ‘like how I was once, even they didn’t know what they were doing.’


Saying this and smiling, he passed away as a free man in the lap of the Master.

Thereafter Gautama told all to be as free as Angulimala.


That day Ananda was in deep sorrow.

It was the day after Gautama left the world.


Folks thought Ananda was sad because the Master was gone.

‘Don’t mourn the departure of Gautama,’ they all said to him.


‘He left for where we all must go.’

Ananda heard them and replied, ‘I am not sad for Gautama.

Brothers my sorrow is for myself.’


‘Look at my fate.

‘I am the one who lived the most with Gautama.

‘I am the one who heard all his sermons.


‘I am the one who he talked to in private.

‘I am the one who kept it all in my memory.

‘I am the one who shall recite it now to everyone.


‘And look at my fate.

‘In this time Master became a Buddha and is now gone…

‘While I am still the same old Ananda.’


‘No change to me could come.’

Ananda thereafter locked himself in a room. For seven days he didn’t come out


On the eighth day when he emerged,People were left aghast.

It looked master had returned in form of Ananda.


But Ananda cleared all the air in a moment

‘I am your old Ananda,’ he said, ‘and now I tell you what Master left with me for all.’


These 2 disciples of Gautama…

One a bandit who killed indiscriminately…


Other a noble soul who spoke not a harsh word;

They represent two extremes of human nature.


We are perhaps somewhere in between.


The point is meditation can come to all.

However, not by itself!

We must put a conscious effort.

No matter who or what we be: Siddhartha, Ananda or Angulimala!


Further, for the one who has put in the effort,

Success is assured: Says the Master!


This much for the basics & if the interest is to know more… check this:

Little Soldier in the big war of life

Story of a Meditation Technology

PREVIEW & BUY(Click here)

http://www.desiretofly.in/littlesoldier/


Gratitude:

To my revered teacher Swami Amartyananda

and the message of SDM:

Satsang Disciplined Life

Meditation.

2 disciples of gautama

Spiritual