More about noble friends and noble conversations...

I just had to return to this quote from a lovely book: One Breath at a time by Kevin Griffin:

"One night, my teacher was talking about a sutta (a record of the oral teachings of Buddha) where the Buddha's cousin and attendant, Ananda, comes to him and says: "Venerable sir, this is half the holy life, that is Noble Friends and Noble Conversations." When my teacher read this, I thought that the Buddha was going to correct, saying that these things weren't that important. Instead, the Buddha responds: "Not so, Ananda! Noble friends and noble conversation are the WHOLE of the holy life."

The reason is that someone posted how much they agreed with the quote from Mark Twain I posted on 4 July:

"The proper office of a friend is to side with you when you are wrong. Nearly anybody will side with you when you are right."

It comes back to the real business of life...seeing that my precious relationships are in tact, maintained with authenticity and honesty...which to be truthful, after an "extremely expensive" education which primed me with the perverted wisdom of never displaying my emotions, are not always my strong suit.

But I guess Buddha knew, having grown up in an extremely controlling family, that unless we have a really good level of human honesty about ourselves no amount of meditation will prepare us for the eightfold path of right living. To neglect our loved ones, our human relations, for a path of solitary path of meditation, can be a costly affair. I for one know what it is to put a spiritual bypass around my problems - I just seemed to rehatch them into bigger and bigger eggs....

Here's another take on the subject:

"A good spiritual friend who will help us to stay on the path, with whom we can discuss our difficulties frankly, sure of a compassionate response, provides an important support system which is often lacking. Although people live and practice together, one-upmanship often comes between them. A really good friend is like a mountain guide. The spiritual path is like climbing a mountain: we don't really know what we will find at the summit. We have only heard that it is beautiful, everybody is happy there, the view is magnificent and the air unpolluted. If we have a guide who has already climbed the mountain, he can help us avoid falling into a crevasse, or slipping on loose stones, or getting off the path. The one common antidote for all our hindrances is noble friends and noble conversations, which are health food for the mind."

-Ayya Khema, When the Iron Eagle Flies

I think Ayya, a German Jewish Buddhist nun who fled the Nazis, is referring to guru with a small g and not a capital g. And this makes a big difference in how you consider her quote...I believe that she is looking to a friend who is perhaps just one step ahead of you on the climb, and with whom the position is often reversed...so there is a wondefully, loving mutuality of respect. A loving, authentic and honest relationship...

Ayya died in November 1997.

Thanks to Geoff Allen for his excellent page of Buddhist quotes, where I sourced this quote.

And by the way, don't you love the picture of Buddha transmitting wisdom to Ananda...