A paradox is a statement which contains some truth that contradicts itself.
Life itself is a paradox – no sooner than we are born we begin to die! In each moment we draw breath and inhale life sustaining oxygen and then in the next moment we exhale life reducing carbon dioxide.
Some examples of paradoxes:
- to truly live we must first die to ourselves
- boredom is the first step to living an exciting life
- happiness can only be found when you don’t look for it
- desire will only lead to dissatisfication
- when we attempt to rationalise our existence the less meaning we find
If we examine the teachings of Jesus and Buddha there is an apparent and interesting difference in how they communicated their teachings.
Jesus taught by using parables (simple staightforward stories containing lessons) whereas Buddha conveyed wisdom by using the power of the paradox.
Jesus would say: “ask and it shall be given” and ” knock and the door will open” whereas Buddha would say: “there is no need to ask as you already have all that you desire” and “there is no need to knock as the door is always open”.
It is these seemingly different fundamental approaches which have underpinned the Christian and Buddhist religions for centuries.
Why the apparent conflict between the world’s most influential teachers or is there really no conflict at all? The answer I believe can be found by considering both the cultural and societal contexts in which these masters lived.
In Jesus’ time most of the general population would have been illiterate with education and knowledge strictly controlled by the lawmakers and temple authorities. The use of the paradox would have not been understood by the very people Jesus was attempting to convey his teachings to. Hence he resorted instead to straight forward, easily understood language in story form. Much knowledge at the time was passed down through the oral tradition of story telling.
By contrast in Buddha’s time there had been a long tradition of Eastern mysticism which incorporated the use of the paradox. The people and society of the time well understood the paradoxical nature of life.
The two apparently different approaches however contained the seeds of the same messages. All that you desire is readily available to you from a bountiful universe if you choose to walk through the door of opportunity. Asking is setting your intention and knocking is taking action based on that intention. The intention and associated actions are present moment occurences rather than something that may arise in the future.
We pull out all stops when it comes to protecting our lives and ensuring that we are safe, secure and comfortable and live long lives. Yet by doing this we have closed the doors on life and have become less alive. So the paradox here is that in attempting to preserve and extend life we experience less life and become dead to real living anyway!
We set and pursue goals to achieve our desires in the hope that these will make us happy and fulfilled yet when we achieve these desires we quickly get bored and become disatisfied again and unhappy and so the cycle repeats itself.
Our desires are just distractions which keep our minds from becoming bored. Real satisfaction and happiness come when we can experience no mind (boredom). No place to go, nowhere to be, nothing to be and nothing to experience – just resting in silence of the present moment and observing.