As the evening settled, the crowd filled almost all the available ground beside busy Kalutara Road. The great old Bo Tree,with its cargo of sacred leaves, etched its branches against the cooling sky. This was the people's Buddhism. Only a year ago, the neighbours around the holy tree had pooled small pieces of their land to create a tiny people's park, and generous donations from families who could ill afford it, set up the great white Buddha image and a circular battlement of twenty-eight small orange clad buddhas to protect the tree and remind the faithful of the arduous previous lives of the man who finally sign-posted the path and gracefully stepped away into the void.
A respected local lay person took the microphone and led the prayers. This was no temple. No place for monks. One nervous young novice flickered deep orange for a few minutes on the edge of the crowd and then thought better of it and headed for the evening refuge of his temple.
Night came. The oil lamps burst into flame and the community purred in prayer like three hundred contented kittens.
No comments:
Post a Comment