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Buddhistdoor View: Dharma Lessons on What it Means to Be a Hero

By Buddhistdoor Global | | Buddhistdoor Global

The central theme of this commentary, and indeed many other editorials and news reports from the past week, is “heroes.” These heroes are the 12 boys who practiced meditation to stay calm while waiting for rescuers, their coach, who taught them these meditation techniques and divided his food among his team as they waited for help, the international team of divers and Thai Navy SEALs who carried out the rescue operation, the Australian doctor Richard Harris, who pressed on despite suffering a personal loss (he was notified of his father’s death during the final stage of the operation), and of course, Saman Gunan, the Navy SEAL who brought oxygen tanks to the trapped boys only to run out of air on the way out, making the ultimate sacrifice. The most obvious figure of heroism in Buddhist lore is, of course, the Buddha. The main hall of any Chinese temple is called the da xiong bao dian (大雄寶殿), which translates as “treasury hall of the great hero.” This epithet is reserved for Shakyamuni Buddha alone, the Buddha of this world-system (lokhadhatu). Doctrinally, the Buddhas of each cosmos and each eon are all great heroes, as they all follow the same heroic path predestined for enlightened beings, from seeing the Four Sights to attaining Nirvana and preaching the Dharma. Beyond doctrinal definitions, however, the Buddha is a great hero simply for being able to “suppress calamity and suppress evil.” (Howard et. al. 2006, 380) This is exactly what the international team of specialists and Thai Navy SEALs managed to do. Their heroism deserved all the media coverage that it received.