Silk Road
This is a collection of articles archived for the excellence of their content. Readers will be able to edit existing articles and post new articles directly |
Silk Road
December 09, 2007
REVIEWS: Down the Silk Road
Reviewed by Noor Jehan Mecklai
What a remarkable ‘his and hers’ account this is of the epic journeys of two people down the Silk Road, 1400 years apart, one a devoted Buddhist, the other an outsider looking in upon Buddhism. And what a service Mishi Saran has done to the whole idea of pilgrimage in bringing to life the story of Xuanzang, considered to be the greatest pilgrim of all time, while illustrating graphically the real problems and terrors faced by pilgrims of old, and showing how Xuanzang’s single-mindedness, fortitude, devotion and the special abilities born of years of well-directed religious practice at last found him entering the precincts of Nalanda University. There he wished principally to study aspects of the mind and consciousness as set out in the encyclopaedic Yogakarabhumi. In fact he wished to sit at the feet of various famous Indian Buddhist masters here and there, and to take back to China faithful translations of certain sutras, either because they were not available there or because the versions then extant in Chinese were imperfect.
This he did, covering in the process 10,000 miles on foot, horse, elephant and camel, tormented by the elements, plagued by deaths and desertions amongst his retinue, robbed by desert brigands. He returned to China after 18 years, with 657 sutras, a hero both in his homeland and to many whom he had met along the way. Indeed, we are told that the three deities Avalokiteshvara Buddha of Compassion, Manjushri guardian of wisdom and Maitreya ‘the once and future Buddha’, all appeared in a dream to Nalanda University’s ailing chancellor, Silabhadra, and exhorted him to stay alive in order to teach this great Chinese scholar.
Knowledge of his coming preceded him in several places, as his chronicle, penned by Hwui Li and translated into English in the late 1800s by Samuel Beale bears witness. And legends sprang up regarding the great pilgrim’s deeds; for example that when a boatman refused him passage over a river, he flew across it. We need not be surprised at this, since highly realised Buddhist and other mystics in ancient times could fly in a state of deep meditation. The famous Tibetologist Alexandra David-Neel mentions one or two instances of this even in the late 19th-early 20th centuries, while Glen Mullin’s The Flying Mystics of Tibetan Buddhism describes it at length.
Now Mishi Saran appears, writing of her own time on the trail of the redoubtable pilgrim, and using Beale as one of her main sources. What drove her to do so, and who drove and revealed what while she did so, presents a masterpiece including elements of adventure, history, archaeology, modern warfare, of the historical novel and of both biography and autobiography. Autobiography? Yes, you see, besides searching for the footsteps of Xuan Xuanzang she is in search of her own footprint — of what besides her passport makes her essentially Indian. Elements of the historical novel? Of course, for while including many, many quotes from the venerable one’s journal, she uses her sources creatively, reproducing scenes as if just taking place before his eyes, and infusing into them emotions which he does not mention. One may well ask how a modern woman, one confessing to a non-religious upbringing and apparently with no prior knowledge of Buddhism, could speak on behalf of a highly disciplined and spiritually realised seventh-century Buddhist monk. Well. Maybe that’s where the license of the historical novel enters. You may also argue that if he had conquered the fear of death as suggested by his experience with the murderous pirates, and if this fear is the basis of all others, as we read in Kamalashila’s Meditation: The Buddhist way of tranquillity and insight, then many of the reactions which Saran talks up on his behalf are way off the mark. Okay, okay. Take them with a pinch of salt, then. Take a kilo of the stuff if you wish. But at least give her credit for making the whole saga colourful, eminently readable, and for walking us steadfastly through Central Asia, China, India, Kashmir, Pakistan, Afghanistan while chasing the monk’s shadow.
Frequently the author shocks us into the ugly present. ‘The Fayaz Tepa was a kilometre from old Termez. There are more high watchtowers, armed guards... This was the southern tip of the Soviet Union’s might... This old Buddhist monastery was the launch pad of a ten year war in Afghanistan’. Else-where she pays tribute to sympathetic rulers like the great builder Ashoka, to Kanishka whose call for Buddhist unity brought forth a canon, to British surveyor Cunningham who did so much to uncover lost Buddhist sites and to prove to a cynical age that Buddha had really existed. Naturally he was guided both by Xuanzang and by Faxian, who had travelled the Silk Road in the fifth century while Buddhism was still flourishing. So accurate were Xuanzang’s descriptions and locations that archaeologists have thereby found many lost and buried cities, monasteries, including his beloved Nalanda University, the biggest ever excavated university in the world, sacked and its monks murdered by invaders from Central Asia, its great library burning for several months before all of its contents succumbed to the flames. Both Xuanzang and Saran describe the ruins of Kapilavastu — Buddha’s birthplace, of Lumbini where he grew up, of Sarnath where he first preached, of Kushinagar where he died — of accidental food poisoning — of Bodhgaya where he fasted and the Bodhi Tree beneath which he meditated unto enlightenment. And here at last, at the Bodhi Tree, we know that we are reading the actual thoughts and emotions of the great pilgrim. ‘At the time when the Buddha perfected himself in wisdom, I know not in what condition I was, in the troublous whirl of birth and death; but now, in this latter time... having come to this spot and reflecting on the depth and weight of the body of my evil deeds, I am grieved at heart, and my eyes filled with tears’.
So both of these pilgrims, with 1400 years between them, reached their inner destinations. For him it was this spiritual epiphany, plus the joy of knowing that he had achieved what he set out to do for China’s Buddhists; for her, thanks partly to his notes en route to and inside India, the pillars of her identity.
Chasing the Monk’s Shadow: A journey in the footsteps of Xuanzang
By Mishi Saran
Penguin Global
ISBN 0670058238
456pp. $26.95
