The Matrix and Buddhism

Being a computer programmer might be the best job ever. especially if you are a hacker at night and goes by the name of Neo. Thomas Anderson is always the person you need for the job. then one day, he gets a wake up call from Morpheus, the greatest computer hacker in the world.That starts off the movie of the famous title of "The Matrix" "To do no evil; To cultivate good; To purify one's mind; This is the teaching of the Buddhas" The word Buddhism translated means "awakening" Siddhartha Gautama was always searching for nirvana. comparing Neo's life and the Buddha's life, we can sense a connection between the two

Neo's life would probably never be the same ever again. In the Movie, he is given a choice by Morpheus to take the blue pill or the red pill. In fact, he always has a choice to do something. Buddhism is applied into the making of the movie this way. Buddhism in short, can be described as leading a moral life filled with awareness and thoughts development and understanding. One quote in the movie that seems to sum up all of Neil's actions is "Can I go back?" "No, but would you really want to?" Neil's decision to take the red pill is always questioned and he is always questioning himself. The reason behind this is probably the reason is that he would have taken the blue pill instead. The symbolic reason that there is a red pill and the blue pill can be related to Buddhism.

 Buddhists ultimate goal in life is to reach Nirvana and Neil is always making the choices to try and get there. he chooses the red pill and that can be taken as suffering and hardships and reincarnation and the blue pill is the path to nirvana. That is why Neil questions himself a lot. He wants to reach nirvana. "There's a difference between knowing the path and walking it."He knows that nirvana is the road less taken and he wants to go back

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/c/c1/The_Matrix_Poster.jpg