“Dump more flowers on him!” I heard a god yell, which was followed by another god yelling, “No, don’t dump more flowers on him—there’s no reason for it!” I thought this second remark was rude, because there definitely was reason for dumping flowers on me, I had just attained Absolute Knowledge, after all! On the other hand, I was glad not to have more flowers dumped on me; I was getting pretty sick of it by that point.
Suddenly I was lifted a hundred feet in the air. Glancing down, I noticed that I was sitting on a throne. I yelled up at the gods, wanting to get their attention. “Ho!” I cried up to them. “I have attained perfect knowledge, I am pure-hearted and wise, the destroyer of all pain, HO, I AM THE BUDDHA!” The gods dumped a bunch of flowers on me and my throne was lowered back to the ground. “What exactly was the point of that?” I remember wondering to myself. (ASV 14:70–76)
“He is like a cloud,” I heard one god say about me. “No, he is like a thunderbolt with a hundred edges,” another god offered. “I think he is like a gem,” a third god insisted, followed by: “a tree,” “a jar” and “a cow.” “They should have stopped with saying I was like a thunderbolt with a hundred edges,” I remember thinking. “Because I’m not like a jar and I am nothing like a cow.” (ASV 14:80–84)
At that point, the giant snake Makahala showed up and wrapped me in his coils, apparently believing he was protecting me from gnats. (MV 1:3) I tried to tell him to let me go, that I had been enlightened and needed to save the world, but he was squeezing me so tightly that I couldn’t even make a sound. He held me like that for a week, until the gods then started pouring jugs of water over us and he slithered away.
After that, who should come shambling up to me but Mara, once again accompanied by his three daughters. “You’ve accomplished your goals, sage, why don’t you go straight to nirvana?” Mara asked me, apparently thinking he was being clever. “First I must save the world,” I replied and Mara shrieked and ran away. (SY 4:1) (My god, he was feeble.) His daughters, however, remained behind and started trying to seduce me. Appetite, with her long, bony face, whispered, “I am Appetite, sage, worship me or I will hug the life out of you.” She tried to hug me but I side-stepped her a few times until she eventually gave up and trudged away. Then Delight, who had a shrill, nasal voice, droned, “I am Delight and I offer you delight, sage, bringing within your reach … delight.” Did she feel embarrassed to have used her own name three times in one sentence? I don’t know, but she definitely should have. When I didn’t respond to Delight, she started cursing at me and stormed away. (ASV 15:13–22)
Off a look from Lust, Mara’s three daughters stepped a few feet away from me and conferred in low voices. A moment later they returned, having given themselves “make-overs,” looking slightly better than they had previously. (“I’m not sure why they didn’t start off looking that way,” I remember thinking to myself.) “Dear Tathagata,” they said to me in unison (“Tathagata” was my new moniker, by the way, it meant “Perfect One,” because that’s what I now was), “please allow us to be your devoted followers.” When I ignored them, they transformed themselves yet again, this time into three old crones. “We are old, sir, pitiful and terrified of death, please help us,” they croaked. This request I agreed to and before long Mara’s daughters were worshipping me. (ASV 15:30–36)
Mara himself, shameless creature that he was, took one last shot at me. “I knew you would become a Buddha!” he yelled down from heaven. “By my actions today, I have helped you!”
“You have lost, Mara” I responded. “Now go away.”
“I am defeated,” Mara muttered in a maudlin tone of voice and in a flash he was gone, as were his daughters.
Alone under the Bodhi tree, a question popped into my mind: Did I actually want to share these profound insights with the world? Given how irrationally attached to life most humans were, given how many of them actually enjoyed life, even took pleasure in it (or thought they did anyway), what would be the point of speaking to them? How could such limited creatures ever grasp my stupendous insights? “Perhaps I will just stay here under the Bodhi tree and wait for my blissful extinction,” I remember thinking. (SY 6:1)
At that moment Brahma appeared before me, a vision of white and gold, his splendid, silky robe hanging elegantly off one shoulder, his white parasol propped casually on the other shoulder. “Brahma?” I whispered. “What are you doing here?”
“Perfect One,” Brahma replied. “You must teach the world of your magnificent insights, for if you do not the world itself will die.”
When I remained silent, Brahma continued. “You are correct that there are many who will not understand your words, Sublime One.”
“Yes.”
“But there are some, a few, who will understand you, Stainless One.” (I wasn’t sure I liked that nickname very much, by the way; “Who ever said I was ‘stained’?” crossed my mind.) “Only you can help mankind, Perfect One,” Brahma implored me. “Arise, victorious hero! Arise and SAVE THE WORLD!”
When I finally rose to my feet, Brahma yelled, “The Blessed One has agreed!” and instantly
