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THE TWO PATHS OF SPIRITUAL DEVELOPMENT: the Paths leading to the Pratyeka Buddha and the Buddha of Compassion  by Stefan Carey 

At work there is a desk calendar with a profound quote from the Indian spiritual classic, The Bhagavad Gita: “Perfection is not attained by inaction”. For a lazy bones like me, what was required was a day of complete rest and dare I say inaction. So, I swung into action and took the day off – to think about this awful challenge. “Perfection is not attained by inaction”.  Perfection. Buddhahood, Nirvana. To achieve these good bottom-line results of spiritual development it looked like I had my work cut out for me! I sweated over the prospect of no more sloppy thinking and behaving. No more drifting. Perfection, Buddhahood and Nirvana are important goals, I’d always seen that, but never paid much attention or made much of an effort. Why not want to be there when the gold medals are being handed out? Let’s get serious I thought, after all, the pressure is on for impressive achievements material and otherwise.             But how to reach there? And then an important, uncomfortable question arose in my otherwise sloppy thinking. “Who is spiritual development for?” If Buddhahood and Nirvana means losing the grip of self i.e. all the things in me that say this is “Stefan” or “Henrietta” in the next lifetime, when I have reached a relative perfection and lost the “self”, who or for what part of “Stefan” or “Henrietta” will I have got there for? Who is this for if there is no self left? Questions, questions, questions!             This paper is about deciding for ourselves which of the two main pathways of spiritual development we want to tread: Buddhahood and Nirvana. In simple terms, the point at which we do not need to learn any more on earth in a physical body. And the question I want you to consider is will you develop spiritually for yourself only, or for the rest of humanity? That is assuming the rest of humanity has nothing to teach you first! Of course there is no pressure from anyone to do either.             In technical terms the two paths of spiritual development are about your choice about being either a Pratyeka or a Bodhisattva Buddha. At the end of the day, you will choose one or the other. It will be fairly obvious by the end that I recommend one pathway. But don’t take my word for any of this or anyone else’s – for a start I have only read about these things, and these are just my opinions, my interpretations.              The journey of spiritual development and who you are making it for is a decision only you will make. The Theosophical Society attempts to put the right knowledge about this in our hands as best as it can. The Theosophical Society has no authority. None. The real authority and responsibility rests with you.             I wonder perhaps you are thinking now as I would “How can I ever reach Nirvana, some sort of “perfection”?”, a wobbly term at the best of times, but let’s take it to mean the point at which the human part of you does not need to learn any more. “How can we be thinking and talking about these abstractions if we are so bogged down in the day-to-day to develop spiritually?”              We feel – at least I do – too busy and too imperfect to even start any serious sort of spiritual development. One day you have more time, more time to concentrate with fewer distractions. My sincere apologies, it won’t happen like this.             Spiritual development happens when you are not looking. Development is the slow unfolding of the limited consciousness to unlimited consciousness, it is limited consciousness to unlimited consciousness, it is a natural process. Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary gives us at least two definitions of development: “1. to expand by a process of growth, to cause to grow and differentiate along lines natural to its kind, e.g. rain and sun developed the grain, or: 2. to become gradually manifest.”             Picture this: our spiritual growth, is like a tree growing and reaching out into the fabric of humanity, the earth around us, the oceans, the mountains, the night skies, the planets, the atoms – tiny movement by tiny movement, nourished and prompted by the divinity within. The paradox is the connections were always there.             Slowly, as pure consciousness or intelligence, we will become self-consciously infinite. And sometimes you will go backwards, but mostly forwards.             So, I expect there are no excuses for putting this off for too long. No excuse for inaction for what is in fact a very natural process that can be accelerated by the application of the will in the right direction, a will hopefully directed to the purpose of building Universal Brotherhood, now the main purpose of the Theosophical Society.             Let’s go back again to the two main spiritual paths of spiritual development, the two main choices. The first is the Pratyeka Buddha or the path of the one who decided it is “everyone for himself” – the spiritual economic rationalists if you like. The term Pratyeka is not important, but is a Sanskrit term.             

The Pratyeka, after eons of self development and no more to learn on earth readily accepts a long rest, a blissful rest in Nirvana.             It is the thought behind the term Pratyeka Buddha that is important, because the thought behind it is like a compass of spiritual development, guiding the individual. This Pratyeka Buddha is on a, what we theosophists call the right-hand path, or a path of light. There is no darkness associated with the Pratyeka Buddha path.             As Dr. de Purucker says of the Pratyeka Buddha in Fountain Source of Occultism: “He raises himself to the spiritual realms of his own inner being where he enwraps himself, not heeding the call to return and help mankind. He is a very pure and holy individual otherwise he could not possibly reach Nirvana.” (Fountain Source of Occultism, p.517).             Pratyeka Buddha is still a great wondrous achievement. But it benefits no-one but the Pratyeka Buddhas themselves. My interpretation is that it is an intellectual self-interested form of spiritual attainment.             And I can understand why Pratyeka is an option. Can you picture yourself as having learnt all you can on earth, relatively perfect, ready to step over the threshold into one of the many kinds of Nirvana? It is only natural and fair I suppose, that you would like something like a Nirvana at the end of all this hard work.             However, I admit I feel this seems to be out of accord with nature, out of accord with the fundamental precepts of universal brotherhood, something we could use a lot of right now. To be honest, I am surprised you can get this far, walk into Nirvana, stop incarnating and ignore the rest of humanity. This is something for us all to ponder upon.             The other direction on your spiritual compass is the great path, a noble path, much, much harder path. I feel it is more in tune with nature - it is the path of the Bodhisattva Buddha In Sanskrit the ‘Amrita Yana’ or the Immortal Path]. This is the Buddha who on the verge of the end of incarnating on earth, looks back and says “No”. “He puts all that lives before him”. (Fountain Source of Occultism, -.518). Nirvana will have to wait. Cancel the ticket, forget the refund. (And the way Bodhisattva literally means “one whose essence has become intelligence”, imagine your essence becomes pure intelligence – what a concept!)             This Bodhisattva is the path of the one who entirely forgets the self, expects no reward at the end of a seemingly endless road of incarnations. The spiritual development is undertaken for the benefit of others. Again the term is unimportant. The thought behind the word is what counts – living for the benefit of others.              The Bodhisattva Buddha, after cancelling the ticket to Nirvana and dumbfounding the travel agent at Nirvana travel agency, then waits patiently for the rest of a confused unhappy and misguided humanity to catch up them, prompting, eventually invisibly helping, understanding, teaching and guiding. This is the key.              In the theosophical literature there is a fair bit of technical explanation about all the different kinds of buddhas, and what happens to the various aspects of the human constitution and above, if you happen to become a Bodhisattva Buddha in some future lifetime. To get yourself ready for this moment I suggest you read pages 517 – 528 of the Fountain Source of Occultism before then. This eleven pages is an inspirational and eye opening read about Bodhisattvas, and about Gautama the Buddha. We are very fortunate to have this information in such an easy to read form and a record of one who has done this. It helps us to understand and prepare.             And did you realise we are on the road to being Buddhas of one kind or another already? You may not think so. As Dr. de Purucker says in his book Fountain Source of Occultism: “Each one of us is an unexpressed Buddha”. (p.519) It is up to you – no one else in the universe – to decide what kind of Buddha you will express… Pratyeka or Bodhisattva.                                                            As we said earlier it does not seem we are anywhere near any kind of spiritual development. Yet, there are training grounds in daily life we overlook. As an example parents and spouse forego themselves daily, in the smallest trivial ways that you would expect lead to anything terrifically glorious like becoming a Bodhisattva. Having a family with children is like this. Daily sacrifice over many lifetimes, trains you, refines you, tests you. Every human being is tested in many ways in one day, in millions of moments each lifetime.             Another example of a training ground is that of someone in public office whose main interest is that of the public – a selfless teacher, a community lawyer, an inspirational politician or an environmental activist. All around us we see examples of self sacrifice, from the small to the great. All is preparation for the noble ideal of the Bodhisattva.             Spiritual development is the awakening gently of the higher nature and allowing its influence to get stronger in daily life. Small steps of self sacrifice – small steps slowly weaken and transform your passionate and lower self. Allowing the splendid self the compassionate Buddha nature to shine forth, the inner teacher made external to the world.  But remember compassion to be real, to be genuine is not an intellectual fantasy and something we do only when we are in public – it must be a personal and private too.             To end I would like to repeat small acts of kindness light our faltering steps on the path of spiritual development. Grandiose moments do not occur along the way. Enlightenment is a slow sunrise. Nirvana is not attained in a weekend. Buddhahood is not obtained over the Christmas holidays or even a few lifetimes.             In each human being there is a small point, a spark of light shining, burning, sitting with you and us today in your room as you read this, trying to raise the rest of your nature. Trying lifetime after lifetime to awaken and elevate a stubborn passionate human nature to the reality of the golden fire inside that it is infinite nature. In this process of raising ourselves to a higher level of consciousness, we may self consciously become at one with the universal self.             The world will see in due course what you will turn out as. Pratyeka Buddha or Bodhisattva Buddha. But today is as good a day as any to start thinking about who and what you will develop spiritually for. And remember, as the Bhagavad Gita reminds us: “perfection does not come from inaction” 

The text of the lecture above was delivered to the Theosophical Society Pasadena in Melbourne