Please don't read this if you are a Buddhist or easily offended . If you do read it, don't write to me to tell me how annoyed you are - I did warn you!

It is satirical and based on a live show we saw called Sidhartta.

This story starts as all dogmatic myths do with a whole lot of loose ends. A king living in wealth and splendor while his loyal subjects flail in poverty and sickness. They were so kak bang of the Brahman and their threats of eternal damnation that they give their last rupee for a favorable prayer and a possible reservation as an ant in their next life.

The 'Great' king was firing blanks, so he and queen Maya had no heir. The queen suggested the king tries a concubine, as she couldn't cope with his premature ejaculation and dogged determination to impregnate her. As a last resort she sought out a well-hung court hand and got herself in a 'family way'. She explained the experience as a supernatural occurrence. According to her an elephant visited her in the night and planted the seed of the sweet child-to-be within her womb - at least it wasn't all a lie, the court hand did indeed have something in common with an elephant.

Nine months later the baby emerged not only speaking but poeping lotus petals. Poor queen Maya having just given birth to a three year old died immediately - and who can blame her?

The little prince grew up in the lap of luxury. Everyone he knew was beautiful and happy and healthy. What a kak life he thought, this is too good to be true. So one day on a parade through the streets of India (which was very much like the India of today - beggar ridden and poverty stricken) he not only encountered illness, poverty, suffering and death, but also an overwhelming desire to devote his life to end all suffering (at least he had ambition on his side). Much like all healthy, wealthy noble people are inclined to do.

So he pissed his father off and left the royal palace in pursuit of the big cure. He tried all kinds of ways to harm himself so that by suffering he could not only understand it but fix it - for everyone. He went on a diet, he stopped having sex, he walked till he had blisters, and yet, and yet he remained healthy and unenlightened. He was so disappointed he went into a deep depression - later on he would call it meditation.

He decide to plant himself under a tree and to stay there until the elusive enlightenment stopped eluding him. While sitting there his depression was made worse by some evil dude. We know he was evil because of his cackling laughter, his bushy pointy eyebrows and of course the tail and horns - now where did I see that before…? Of course the prince was too depressed to notice and when the evil dude sent his daughters to seduce the prince couldn't manage to get it up and had to let them go feeling even more depressed.

Days later 'it' dawned on him, it must have been after much hair and ear pulling as he now had lobes as long as forefingers. Apparently you can't be enlightened without them. He also appeared completely serene and suddenly was full of numerical guidelines to end suffering, four noble truths, the eightfold path and if you mess up, life upon life of pond creature karma. Karma is very much like hell only worse because you get born in India, time and again. Your only hope is being born as a cow, since cows are treated really great and fed really well. Most people commit one of the five unforgivable sins though and have about a zero% chance of being born as a cow.



The very second the prince became enlightened he also changed his name, he became the Buddha and apparently this gave him the right to tell people what to do. He instantly had a gazillion followers and everyone wanted to be just like him, especially the other princes, and so… there were monks. Being the Buddha is like being a pop star, only you are the only one allowed to be good looking While he kept his abundant hair the monks had to shave their hair off. Monks in general had to sit around a lot and had to look adoringly at the Buddha when he spoke. Everyone knew this was their chance to be reborn as a cow.





One of the princes was evil and wanted to kill the Buddha, this became a trend and people (with bushy eyebrows) write books about it now. We knew right of he was evil because he had scary bushy pointy eyebrows and a cackling laugh. The Buddha scared him off with incessant chanting and he was instantly struck by lightning and reborn as a leper in India.

The cool thing about Buddhism is that you can be a Buddhist and practice whatever other religion it is that fires up your guilt engine. There is no way you are going to get enlightened especially when you have short ears and bushy eyebrows. Looking at the suffering in India, I can only say bravo for becoming Enlightened and giving an already downtrodden world more guilt and rules and scary stories of hell. It really has made suffering so much more bearable now that we know it is only an attachment that we can shake off. All we need to do is diet (got that taped the entire fashion magazine industry must be Buddhist), be celibate, become morosely depressed and to sit under trees fighting off attacks by people with busy eyebrows, although in South Africa you'll probably have to fight off quit a bit more than that.

I have always thought of Buddhism as a gentle way of life, but it is as much a religion as any other. It is has the same rules, threats, hero's, bad guys and a questionable storyline. It disempowers people and it doesn't end suffering. Like all myths one can learn from it and try not to make the same mistakes. Like most myths the effort is noble but the predictable outcome is an unrealistic failed ideal.

Animations from: