The Buddhist STUPAS of Victor’s Way

The stone mounds which you see around you are called stupas. They represent Buddhist burial mounds in which the relics of Buddhist saints were enclosed. Stupas (like the Bodhi tree) served as means of remembrance rather than of worship, the earliest Buddhists not believing in gods, the soul, an after-life and so on. In India, Afghanistan, Kashmir and China stupas ranged in size from a few inches to several hundred feet.

Buddhist ‘saints’ (i.e. ‘perfect beings’) came in 2 versions. The popular, later version of the saint (as role model) was the ‘ceased’ guy or gal who had perfected impeccable moral (hence political) behaviour. The earlier, unpopular version of the saint was the ‘ceased’ amoral (free of any role) social dropout who had actually experienced the Buddha’s universal solutions of the cause and ending of existence and of suffering.

Here, along Victor’s Way, the relics of a long since ‘ceased’ being are carved onto the outsides of the stupas. They transmit coded information about the means of attainment of the deathless state of non-relativity.

If you lie on a bench or simply hold very still and absorb into the stupas or be absorbed by them, you can perhaps experience the quasi deathless state of non-being (meaning: going on ‘standby), that is to say, of absolute release from the stress (meaning unpleasant turbulence) of responding, called Nirvana.