Buddha’s Sheltered Childhood and Plato’s Myth of the Cave 

As a philosophy student in university, I was immediately impressed by Plato’s Allegory of the Cave, after which I not only got my BA in philosophy, but I wrote a science fiction novel, both with that story as the prime inspiration. If you don’t know, it goes something like this: a group of people are born and live inside a cave, chained in place and with no knowledge of the outside. A single fire behind them illuminates a puppet-like show being played out in shadows in front of them, which becomes their reality… 

UNTIL one brave soul ventures out and discovers a bright beautiful world like he’d never imagined, after his eyes become adjusted to the light. Upon re-entry he would be temporarily blinded again, and no one would believe his hysterical claims of enlightenment, preferring the darkness, instead. Now compare this to the Buddha’s sheltered childhood, supposedly a true story, in which his early life had not the slightest discomfort and his every wish and slightest whim was fulfilled… 

UNTIL one day he ventures out and discovers the pain of old age, disease, and death. Apparently, he was so shocked that he felt compelled to start a new religion to describe and ameliorate a life so full of suffering. It became known as Buddhism. Similarly inspired, someone might also start a new religion based on Plato’s teachings and call it Christianity. In fact, Neo-Platonism did define much of early Christianity beyond the old and new testaments, until the medieval scholastic era inspired by Aristotle and defined by Saint Thomas Aquinas, and featuring angels dancing on the head of a pin, in addition to many other speculations, until Protestantism kicked in and launched a new era. 

Similarly, the Buddhist scholastic era was defined by the later Abhidharma Pitaka and featured dry dissertations and massive lists called matrices, until the Mahayanist sutras kicked in at the beginning of the Common Era extolling Emptiness, Bodhisattvas, and Buddha-mind. The parallels—and perpendiculars—are endless. For one thing, Plato’s adventurer left a shadow world to find enlightenment outside, while the Buddha left a perfect world to find a shadow world outside—of pure misery, so a different kind of enlightenment, or awakening. If you’re thinking that this looks like two sides of the same coin, then I tend to agree.  

The kicker comes with the generalization—or realization—that, in general, Buddhism tends to be pessimistic, while Christianity tends to be optimistic. And I can’t verify the veracity of that view, but, as generalizations and realizations go, it is probably valid, if not necessarily true. So, is that good or bad? Well, it may be a 51-49 decision, certainly not all or none, but I consider myself a Buddhist, after much deep contemplation, so I can live with that, if for no other reason than that we should all be humble. But that doesn’t mean that we should all be passive, no. So, there’s that, also.  

Then, there is also the fact that, disregarding the Semitic origins of Christianity and any Harappan mitochondrial and matrilineal contribution to what would later be considered Indian thought, the fact remains that northern Indian and Europe are intrinsically related genetically, even if more Eastern Europe than West. It’s all Greek to me. So, it’s not hard to imagine 4000 BCE steppes cowboys meeting for annual fairs and festivals and sitting around big campfires and talking Proto Indo-Euro pidgin until late in the night, the westerners soon to be Europeans and the Easterners later to be Iranians and Indians. This is the world that we inherited.