Chapter 8


The Sermon at Benares


1. Who was Gautama Buddha before attaining enlightenment?

Answer: He was a prince named Siddhartha Gautama.


2. At what age did Siddhartha begin to see the sufferings of the world?

Answer: Around the age of twenty-five.


3. What four sights changed Siddhartha's life?

Answer: A sick man, an old man, a funeral procession, and a monk.


4. Where did Gautama Buddha attain enlightenment?

Answer: Under a peepal tree, later called the Bodhi Tree.


5. What does the word “Buddha” mean?

Answer: The Enlightened or The Awakened one.


6. Where did Buddha deliver his first sermon?

Answer: At Benares (now Varanasi), on the banks of the River Ganges.


7. Who was Kisa Gotami?

Answer: A woman who had lost her only son and was grief-stricken.


8. What did Kisa Gotami seek from her neighbors?

Answer: A medicine to bring her dead son back to life.


9. What did the people think about her request?

Answer: They thought she had lost her senses.


10. Who guided Kisa Gotami to the Buddha?

Answer: A man who could not help her but told her to go to Sakyamuni, the Buddha.


11. What did the Buddha ask Kisa Gotami to bring?

Answer: A handful of mustard seeds.


12. What condition did the Buddha attach to the mustard seeds?

Answer: They must come from a house where no one had died.


13. Did Kisa Gotami find any house that met the condition?

Answer: No, every house had experienced a death.


14. What realization did Kisa Gotami come to after her search?

Answer: That death is common to all and her grief was selfish.


15. What did she observe while sitting by the roadside?

Answer: The lights of the city flickering and going out, symbolizing life and death.


16. What metaphor does the Buddha use for the lives of mortals?

Answer: Like ripe fruits that fall and clay pots that eventually break.


17. What does the sermon say about grief and lamentation?

Answer: They only cause more pain and cannot bring back the dead.


18. According to the Buddha, what must one do to find peace?

Answer: One must draw out the arrow of grief, complaint, and lamentation.


19. What happens to a person who overcomes sorrow, according to Buddha?

Answer: They become free from sorrow and are blessed.

 

20. What is the core teaching of this sermon?

Answer: Death is inevitable, and wisdom lies in acceptance, not grief.


 Answer by Mrinmoee Doloi