Ecclesiastes (2)–
Manuscripts of the Gods: The Bible and Ancient Cultural Thresholds
by James Whitlark, Ph.D.
Ecclesiastes and Buddhist Texts
[Taxila]
Because of Taxila’s fame as a university town, numerous Jataka accounts
of Gautama Buddha’s former incarnations have him (then a Bodhisattva) educated in,
teaching in, or even king of that city (Dar 12).. As Heliodorus’s aforementioned
pillar testifies to the Hinduism of a Taxilan Greek, George Woodcock has looked at
the lineages of Buddhists in the general area and found that even the famous Buddhist
pundit Nagasena was probably a Greek convert to that faith (Woodcock 95). In Greek
and Aramaic, a stone pillar erected at the command of the Buddhist emperor Ashoka
evidences his desire to convert the Westernized Indians of the north. Indeed, archaeology
shows Taxila to have often been more Buddhist than Hindu. It is thus an appropriate
place to imagine reading Ecclesiastes—a book whose analogies with Buddhism have long
been remarked. In 1894, for instance, the Christian theologian E. J. Dillon was so
convinced of Buddhist influence on it that he wanted to remove it from the Bible
(Dillon 153-76). How do Buddhists respond to parallels between the two faiths?
Buddhism tends to be relatively tolerant. It arose in an India dominated by the Vedas, which the Buddha politely criticized, but with no implication that they were completely devoid of merit. Typically, the J–atakas show him learning Hindu scriptures, often at Taxila (Jones 1979, 3). Unlike nineteenth–century Christian evangelism, which generally rejected other creeds as totally pagan and demonic, Buddhism argues more specifically against particular doctrines (e.g., the Matakabhatta-Jataka, which condemns the Vedic sacrifice of a goat, because it involves taking life). J–ataka 487 teaches the utility of the Vedas (though, only for “this–worldly goals” (Jones 156)).
The question of how deep ties may be between Buddhism and the Bible is controversial. Certainly, parallels exist, e.g., the miraculous begetting of Buddha and Jesus, a heavenly annunciation, Asita’s and Simeon’s proclaiming the babies to be saviors, their walking on water, healing the sick, fasting, being tempted by Mara or Satan, the earthquakes at their deaths, the Trikaya and Trinity, Buddhist and Christian monasticism, et cetera (Sedlar 281). In“Intertextuality, Buddhism, and the Infancy Gospels,” Zacharias P. Thundy argues that such parallels arose because “the Indian traditions were part of the literary–cultural context of the text of the Christian gospels” (Thundy 18). At that time, there were Buddhists in Alexandria and Origen alleged that Buddhists had reached England (Origen, “Commentary on the Book of Ezekiel,” cited in Ikeda 74). Professor Hajime Nakanura claims to have found remains of Buddhist monasteries in Northern Europe. (Ikeda 74). Whatever the actual connection of the two ancient religions, the Buddhist attitude toward possible interrelationship is well represented by Daisaku Ikeda’s very popular Buddhism, the First Millennium, which includes a section welcoming similarities of the faiths as a ground for “world unity and onenes” (Ikeda 72-76.
The long tradition of tolerance makes likely that second–century
Taxilan Buddhists would have approved what Dillon abhors: both Ecclesiastes and the
Buddhist scriptures (Pali suttas and Sanskrit suttras) recognize the vanity and frustration
inherent in life. A more interesting point, however, is that the common theme of
that Biblical book and Buddhism facilitates applying to Ecclesiastes developments
in Buddhist hermeneutics. These are useful both because of their own merit as theories
of reading and because they are reflections on the international tradition of wisdom
that produced Ecclesiastes.
During the beginning of the Christian period and slightly before, Buddhism was redefining
itself through a split into Theravada (“wisdom of the elders”) and Mahayana (“the
great vehicle”). The former is the more conservative hermeneutics, accepting only
what are probably the oldest Buddhist scriptures (though, possibly with non–Theravadist
doctrines edited away). Itself shaped in opposition to the rise of Mahayana, Theravada
is reminiscent of modern Christian fundamentalism: each sees itself as continuing
the unsullied beginnings of its faith, yet was formed through battle against “revisionism.”
The Theravadist attitude is that Gautama Buddha’s teachings (e.g., the unsatisfactoriness
of life) are timeless and literal truths. Like Jewish and Christian fundamentalisms,
this way of reading presumes that the text makes Truth present paranormally, but
unlike those fundamentalisms there is no immortal God preserving the scriptures.
These for Buddhism are material, consequently doomed to dissolution.
In at least one respect, Ecclesiastes has more in common with these
hermeneutics of Theravada than with those of Jewish and Christian fundamentalisms.
Although Ecclesiastes acknowledges the existence of an eternal Deity, it imagines
books constantly being made because Truth is repeatedly forgotten (e.g., 1.11 and
12.12). It does not prophesy its own immortality. Yet it draws on the legend of Solomon’s
supernaturally endowed Wisdom to guarantee authority as a typically Theravadist reading
of the suttas (e.g., The Questions of King Milinda) vests the authority of
the text in the paranormal Wisdom of the Buddha. Indeed, those Questions serve
as a good starting point for a comparison of Ecclesiastes with Theravada.
A Theravadist Perspective
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For if grounded in virtue, and careful in attention—whether in the land of the Scythians or the Greeks, whether in China or Tartary, whether in Alexandria or in Nikumba, whether in Benares or in Kosala, whether in Kashmire or in Gandhara, whether on a mountain top or in the highest heavens—wheresoever he may be, the man who orders his life aright will realise Nirvana. —The Questions of King Milinda. (Rhys Davids 1890, 203-04. |
Already in the fourth century, the philosopher Pyrrhon accompanied Alexander the Great to India and, on returning to Greece founded the Cynic school. Edward Conze argues that it seems a radical break from previous Greek thought but resembles various Indian doctrines, particularly those of Jainism and Buddhism (even of Mahayana, which was presumably in no more than a nascent form at the time (Conze 141-42)). Thus, the spread of Cynicism throughout the Hellenistic world provides one more possibility for Buddhist influence on Ecclesiastes.
For our purposes, however, the essential point is simply that Ecclesiastes and that authoritative guide to the suttas The Questions of King Milinda have some similiarities and come from approximately the same period in the development of literacy. In each case, the work paradoxically buttresses its attack on the power and pomp of the world by having the argument accepted by a mighty emperor. Paradoxically, the readers’ natural tendency to model themselves on a rich king serves to win them away from material success and raise them to a higher Wisdom advocated by that ruler.
Also a characteristic of literate wisdom literature, Ecclesiastes and this work meditate on the nature of writing itself. In The Questions of King Milinda, when asked how the Buddha can be known centuries after his death, Nagasena replies that just as “Tissa … a teacher of writing” continues to exert influence through his texts, so the Buddha is encountered only through the suttas (Horner 1969, 96-97). Even the technicalities of writing such as the alphabet may appear as similitudes of the Buddhist path as where Nagasena exemplifies “mindfulness” (a form of disciplined attention) with the mental processes required to memorize the alphabet (Horner 1969, 110). Thus, although the Buddha’s words may at first have belonged entirely to an oral milieu, by the time of The Questions of King Milinda, Buddhism is being rethought in terms of writing.
Writing occupies an even–more conspicuous part in Ecclesiastes. That work culminates with the endlessness of book making (12.12). Its basic sentiments are related to the rise of literacy. It wishes to find something new. As a major cultural imperative, this desire arises with the innovation of writing, eventually leading toward the modern academic quest for constant discovery and publication. Orality was presumably quite comfortable with a world of what is usually translated “vanity” but is actually the Hebrew word hebel, mere breath, subject to disappearance and formulaic renewal.
Mircea Eliade writes of preliterate cultures: “All that we have so far demonstrated confirms the existence of a similar conception in the man of archaic societies; for him things repeat themselves for ever and nothing new happens under the sun. But this repetition has a meaning, … it alone confers a reality upon events; events repeat themselves because they imitate an archetype—the exemplary event. Furthermore, through this repetition, time is suspended, or at least its virulence is diminished” (Eliade 1954, 90). With a modern (literate) impatience at the reoccurring, Ecclesiastes, however, deplores that repetition, deeming it monotonous and meaningless. Furthermore, it is in one important respect quite unlike Job, another literate book with which it is most often compared. There, the title character hopes an inscription will preserve his personal experiences (the novelties of his life). Ecclesiastes, however, has the more realistic view (shared by Buddhism) that books may disappear as part of the general forgetting of everything, preparatory to a new cycle of return. In Ecclesiastes, even writing in stone vanishes. And Ecclesiastes offers no promise that humanity will enter a celestial world:
All go to the same place; all came from the dust, and to the dust
all return. Who knows whether the spirit of a human being goes upward or whether
the spirit of a beast goes downward to the earth? (3.20–21 Revised English Bible)
Like the Theravadist world view, the most fundamental human desires are eventually
frustrated by the vanity of life. Yet Theravadist pessimism does not go as far as
Ecclesiastes, for the former retains a faith in language itself.
In its present form, The Questions of King Milinda even
assumes profound speech to be magical, as in the dialogue’s causing the earth to
shake six times:
When the King and the Elder had come to the end of their questions and answers, this
great earth … shook six times as far as its ocean–boundaries, lightnings flashed,
the devas poured down a rain of deva–like flowers, the Great [god] Brahm–a applauded,
and in the depths of the ocean there was a mighty roar like the roar of thunder from
a storm–cloud (Horner 1969, 305).
Due to his power with words, Nagasena is “hair-raising” (lomaham sana)—like the Krishna of the Bhagavadgita or the Yahweh of Job (Horner 1969, 1). N–agasena mentions that various suttas contained “safety–runes” (paritta ), protective charms (Horner 1969, 211). Likewise, he takes for granted that magicians can create storms (Horner 1969, 168).
His attitude resembles that of the Jatakas, the oldest extant collection of folktales (Horner 1957, viii). Although printed in whole among the Pali (Theravadist) scriptures, strictly speaking, only the work’s verse sections are canonical, but the totality forms one of the most popular and earliest narrative presentations of Buddhist doctrine. As such, it is a useful supplement to the scholarly Questions to show Theravadist belief in the magical power of the Buddha’s speech. In these J–atakas, among “all the arts” of Taxila the Bodhisattva (Buddha, in a former incarnation) acquired miraculous language skills (e.g., Thusa–Jataka, and Parantapa–Jataka). Typically, in the Sañji va–Jataka, an incantation taught by the Bodhisattva succeeds—though, a magician makes the fatal mistake of misusing it (Francis and Thomas 78).
Similarly, the Amba–Jataka has the Bodhisattva teach a charm that proves useful to a student yet only until the latter unwisely lies about where he learned it. If acquired from the Bodhisattva, even on the lips of a jackal, an incantation has great power, though, as one might expect, the animal’s folly eventually destroys him (Sabbada.t ha–Jataka). Only the Bodhisattva thoroughly controls the paranormal as by implication do his most holy words, those subsequent to Enlightenment, the scriptures. Other texts are termed less satisfactory (e.g., according to the Sattubhastu–Jataka, the Vedas with which a Brahmin will never be satisfied). When not an expression of Buddhist doctrine, words may disappoint their users—indeed, commonly do, illustrative of the Buddhist principle that life is eventually frustrating (dukkha ). Mahayana has a more complex attitude toward language that brings it into even greater accord with Ecclesiastes.
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