Page 26 - Martial Science Magazine Feb/2015 #7

Teachings of the Budha

Hell

(Told by Master Thich Nhat Hanh)
Illustrations by: Henry Binerfa

The Buddha, in one of his former lives, was in
Hell. Before he became a Buddha he had suffered
a lot in many lives. He made a lot of mistakes,
like all of us. He made himself suffer, and he
made people around him suffer. Sometimes
he made very big mistakes, and that is why in
one of his previous lives he was in Hell. There
is a collection of stories about the lives of the
Buddha, and there are many hundreds of stories
like that. These stories are collected under the
title Jataka Tales. Among these hundreds of
stories, I remember one very vividly. I was seven
years old, very young, and I read that story
about the Buddha, and I was very shocked. But I
did not fully understand that story.

The Buddha was in Hell because he had done
something wrong, extremely wrong, that caused
a lot of suffering to himself and to others. That
is why he found himself in Hell. In that life of
his, he hit the bottom of suffering, because that
Hell was the worst of all Hells. With him there
was another man, and together they had to work
very hard, under the direction of a soldier who
was in charge of Hell. It was dark, it was cold,
and at the same time it was very hot. The guard
did not seem to have a heart. It did not seem
that he knew anything about suffering. He did
not know anything about the feelings of other
people, so he just beat up the two men in Hell.
He was in charge of the two men, and his task
was to make them suffer as much as possible.

I think that guard also suffered a lot. It looked
like he didn’t have any compassion within him. It
looked like he didn’t have any love in his heart.