Tag Archives: eat

Buddha on a plate.

There is a Buddhist saying that if you are a Buddhist and you are you meet Buddha on the road, kill him. This is an old koan (Buddhist parable) is attributed to Zen Master Linji, (the founder of the Rinzai sect).

It is not to be taken literally. The three elements: road, killing, and Buddha are symbolic. The road is the road the Buddhist is traveling toward enlightenment. The Buddha is whatever concept of Buddha he or she might be carrying. That concept is wrong, a false idol, if you will, and to kill it is to ditch (by the symbolic roadside) that false concept as part of the road to enlightenment.

But it does bring up an interesting corollary. To wit: if you find Buddha sitting on your plate, are you supposed to (symbolically) eat him?