For 'Politics and Human Nature', I had been prepared to read Hobbes, Nietzsche, Freud, and Darwin, but Walpola Sri Rahula's "What the Buddha Taught" was something of a surprise on the reading list. And as much as the atheist in me tries to deny this, I enjoyed this book immensely. There's no greater joy than finishing a book with a sense of revelation, as if the workings of the world had become clearer. I found that feeling in reading my beloved political philosophers and literary icons, but also in Dr. Rahula's work. It dawned on me that Buddhism isn't so much a religion, but a philosophy, a way of life. It does not require rites, rituals, and conversion, advocates the tolerance of other beliefs, acknowledges the absence of supernatural power (the Buddha is a leader, not a deity) and of the afterlife (contrary to popular belief, Nirvana isn't "heaven"). Rather, as I read the Buddha's teachings, there is a growing familiarity. The similarities between this and the works of Confucius and Mencius are uncanny. Perhaps, there is a reason my ancestors voraciously embraced this import from the Indian subcontinent.
One passage in the book was particularly enlightening.
"You cannot escape life however you may try. As long as you live, whether in a town or in a cave, you have to face it and live it. Real life is the present moment - not the memories of the past which is dead and gone, nor the dreams of the future which is not yet born. One who lives in the present moment lives the real life, and he is the happiest.
When asked why his disciples, who lived a simple and quiet life with only one meal a day, were so radiant, the Buddha replied: " They do not repent the past, nor do they brood over the future. They live in the present. Therefore they are radiant. By brooding over the future and repenting the past, fools dry up like green reeds cut down in the sun." "
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