THE LAUGHING BUDDHA

THE

big mistake

within the illusion

is to take it

seriously

and forget to laugh

With GOD being associated with so much suffering and sacrifice across the religious landscape, one figure stands apart as a spiritual iconoclast--the laughing Buddha.  What the hell did he know, and what was so funny?  He obviously got the joke the rest of us didn’t.

To be fair, there are both laughing Buddhas, and ones lost in states of nirvana (or resting from all the laughter--we will never know).  One wonders which came first--your standard chicken-or-the-egg dilemma.  They obviously decided to cast him in both phases.

It is believed he was onto something--to laugh in the face of (fill in the blank).  That guy had style and gravitas, and he was obviously one-up on most everyone else.

Figureheads of influential religious movements are generally expected to be serious-sorts. For instance, would anyone take the Pope seriously if he were seen laughing his head off continually.  Or, would one be inclined to follow Muhammad if he was always found to be riding around with a big grin.  Not likely.  The religious landscape tends to breed party-poopers.  

But not the laughing Buddha.  That guy was probably the life of the party.  He was more like GOD than he knew, and he never really addressed the issue.

We should all have a good laugh on him.