Sensual Desire—One of the five hindrances: Five Hindrances (nivarana)
• Sensual desire (kamacchanda)
• Aversion / Ill-will (vyapada)
• Sloth and torpor (thina middha)
• Restlessness / Anxiety (uddhacca-kukkucca)
• Skeptical doubt (vicikiccha)
According to Professor of Buddhist Studies, Gil Fronsdal, there are many Buddhist text that say on the back of their cover jackets, that “Desire” is the root of suffering. This is a huge misinterpretation of what the Buddha was saying. It’s not ‘Desire” that is the root of suffering but being caught up in the grip of desire to the point where one is no longer in control, but the desire is in the driver’s seat. This could be from wanting a certain car, a certain object, or the desire for a relationship or to have a particular person to the point that one can no longer focus on the more important things of one’s life.
Mighty Kings have been brought down by being caught up in their desires to conquer in battles to being caught up in the lust or the obsession of a beautiful woman. Hence, life would be pretty boring if one never had any desires, but it’s when one’s desire is controlling one’s clear judgement or clear seeing, is when desire becomes one’s enemy—because desire clouds the mind from thinking rationally. It’s when desire for something or for someone becomes an addiction, this is when one needs enough insight and self-control to see that such desire is self-destructive.
Sensual desire can be a serpent that causes one to derail from clear seeing. Hence, something the Medusa was fully aware of. Medusa could have been a very prototypical goddess of a matriarchal society. Her hair of snakes and reptilian skin are symbolic of the natural cycle of birth, death and rebirth. Snakes are used due to their shedding of skin, their rebirth to a new skin: however, to those who were caught up in her beauty, would turn to stone. Medusa was beheaded by the hero Perseus, who thereafter used her head, which retained its ability to turn onlookers to stone, as a weapon until he gave it to the goddess Athena to place on her shield. In classical antiquity the image of the head of Medusa appeared in the evil-averting device known as the Gorgoneion.
0 Comments