Or . . .

Or, what does it all have to do with the price of golf balls, Hugh might have said, something with which I'm sure he is well acquainted, having no doubt lost a few.

The Buddha's famous first statement to humankind was, "Life is suffering." Much as I might not like to, I see some kind of mystical correspondence between that and Calvin's "total depravity," which is a concession worthy of Lee at Appomattox. We shall see what General Grant (Mr. Drennan) makes of that.

But "life is suffering" has also been translated variously as "disappointing, or unsatisfactory." That life is disappointing could hardly be disputed by the vast majority of individuals—disappointing politically, economically, socially, religiously, and in every other way, and then it ends in death. This brooks no argument.

So Buddha's purpose, as I understand it, was not somehow to transform all of that into happiness, either in this life or in whatever follows, but through understanding and subsequent right action to break free from what he saw as an ongoing, incessant, habitual round of the same old foolishness that causes this misery in the first place. I do not see this as conflicting with the essential teachings of Jesus, whichever of those have reached us in authentic form uncontaminated by their various interpreters.

~TK