Buddhism for Vampires

Dharmakirti is considered the definitive Buddhist epistemologist and logician. He was eaten by the cannibal hero of The Vetali’s Gift in “Eating an entire epistemologist.”

Almost nothing is known for certain about his life (or death). According to tradition, he was Chancellor of Nalanda University, and died around 700. The novel is set around 700, and Nalanda plays a major role—although as of the cannibalism incident, it has been mentioned only in passing.

The views I attributed to Dharmakirti in that episode are oversimplified. What the ogress says roughly reflects mainstream Buddhist philosophy, but does not reflect his distinctive ideas, which are complex and subtle. Interestingly, he was heavily influenced by Cārvāka. That is an Indian philosophy that was materialist, atheist, skeptical, and anti-ascetic. Fascinating—if it had not been suppressed by Church and State, perhaps the Enlightenment and Scientific Revolution would have occurred in India, rather than Europe, and a thousand years earlier.

The poems I quoted in “Eating an entire epistemologist” were, in fact, supposed to have been written by Dharmakirti. Whether that is true is anyone’s guess. In Buddhist history, questions of who wrote what are highly political, and often deliberately obfuscated. I would like to think he was the poet, because it makes him seem like a flesh-and-blood person, rather than a logical abstraction, as he is treated by Buddhist scholars.

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Dharmakirti

“You should be grateful,” she said. “Hardly anyone gets to eat an entire epistemologist.”

“An epis-what?” I asked. Then I realized, too late, that she was side-tracking me.

“An epistemologist. He wanted to know how you can know things.”

“Like what?”

“Like anything.”

“Like what?”

“Well… How do you know that the Buddha was enlightened?”

“Everyone knows that!”

“How?”

“Are you saying the Buddha wasn’t enlightened? Because everyone knows that—even Brahmins say so.”

“Maybe I chose a bad example… Although he spent years working on that one… Do you know whether you are in a dream now?”

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The “Four Thoughts That Turn the Mind to the Dharma” is one of the most tedious of Buddhist teachings.

Let’s see if we can kick it up a notch…

“Impermanence”—your own approaching death—is the second of the four.

Sooner or later, everybody is just someone else’s meat.
—Anita Blake

If you unexpectedly discover that you are minor character in an Anita Blake novel, you know that you are likely to be eaten alive by a zombie on page 237.

In our world, the likelihood of being eaten alive by a zombie is quite slim. However, the likelihood of your being eaten alive by a cancer is large—about one in four.

A cancer is essentially a zombie—a mass of human tissue that should be dead and isn't.

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“Come along,” the ogress said, and started up the path. I followed, trying to keep up while she climbed the steep bank.

I was tired and hungry. It was dark. My knee hurt. She was going too fast.

I slipped and fell, landing with my foot twisted round.

There was a snap and horrendous pain.

I yelled.

The ogress reappeared immediately. I was sitting on my butt and holding my leg, howling.

“Does this hurt?” she said, poking my ankle.

“Yes!” I screamed. What did she expect?

“How about this?”

That hurt even worse. I tried to kick her away with the other leg; she batted it aside without looking.

“Broken,” she said. “It’ll be as big as your head tomorrow. And it’ll be a month before you can walk properly. You’ll have to stay with me.”

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Image courtesy juana manuel

She was some sort of ghoul or ogress. Sleeping in her cave was an obviously bad idea…

I woke the next morning with daylight streaming in through the cave mouth. Pulling aside the skin that hid the cave’s back room, I saw that the ogress had returned while I slept, and now lay on her bed of bones.

She knew the way to the vetali’s palace, and I needed to argue her into cooperation.

I coughed loudly to wake her, with no result. I clapped my hands and called out “Hello!”, but she seemed to be dead to the world. Evidently she had been out the whole night on some loathsome errand.

I was still quite sure that the palace must be somewhere nearby. I spent the day exploring the area, up and down the valley and hillsides.

Nothing.

My knee hurt. I limped back to the cave at dusk. Getting the ogress to tell me where to find the palace seemed the only way forward.

I had not eaten since the morning before, so I was now quite hungry, and not in a mood for nonsense. If I could not find the palace the next day, I would have to go back to the village at the foot of the mountains to get food.

She was waiting for me on the cliff-ledge at the cave mouth. “Come down to the river with me,” she said.

“What? Why?” I asked.

“Because I said so,” she said.

“Why should—” I began, but she was already heading down, faster than I could go. I followed her reluctantly.

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Ted Meissner and I discussed Buddhism for Vampires a few days ago by Skype. He has posted a podcast recording on his site The Secular Buddhist.

Our conversation was a lot of fun and I think you’ll enjoy it. He’s a skilled interviewer, and probably more knowledgeable about the subject than I am! The audio format is completely new to me, so I might sound clueless, but he can make up for that.

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On the throne there was a girl, about my age. As I approached, she stepped down and came to greet me. “This is the vetali,” I thought.

My eyes opened. It was day. I was lying in the charnel ground, with a ferocious headache.

There was a ribcage an arm’s length from my nose.

The bonds that tied my limbs were gone. I sat up.

The clearing was less frightening in daylight, but more alien. The scattered body parts seemed incomprehensible, meaningless. It was quiet apart from the buzzing of flies.

My mother’s kartika-charm was gone. The dakinis must have taken it.

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“It shows things that were, and things that are, things that yet may be,” the dakini said.

I fell into the sky.

I hurtled, ever-faster, toward the stars. Screaming, tumbling, twisting, kicking: desperate to find something to hold onto.

Cold night air howled past, tearing at my face.

Then my wings caught the wind.

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