Chapter 1
(Tape 1 /
Ps: 1-22)
The name of the original book is Visuddhi Magga
which means the path to purification or the way to purification or purity. ‘Magga’ means the path. ‘Visuddhi’
means purification or purity.
This book was written in PÈÄi language.
Actually PÈÄi was not the name of the language. It
was the name of a category of PÈÄi literature which
are called ‘Texts’. The word ‘PÈÄi’ is used in
contradistinction from the AÔÔhakathÈs (Commentaries)
and TikÈs (Sub-Commentaries). The language came to be
known as PÈÄi at a later date. The word ‘PÈÄi’ can mean the Texts and also the language in which the
texts are recorded. The Texts are comprised of Vinaya,
Sutta and Abhidhamma. They
are called ‘PÈÄi’. The Commentaries are called ‘AÔÔhakathÈs’ and the Sub-Commentaries are called ‘TikÈs’.
This book belongs to the category of Commentaries, one of the categories
in PÈÄi literature. First there were Texts. Then
there were Commentaries. Later there were commentaries on the commentaries
which are called ‘Sub-Commentaries’.
The author of this book was the Venerable Buddhaghosa.
The name given is BhadantÈcariya Buddhaghosa.
Actually his personal name was Buddhaghosa. The word
in front is BhadantÈcariya. ‘BhadantÈ’
means venerable and ‘Œcariya’ means teacher. So the meaning of the
name is the venerable teacher Buddhaghosa. Buddhaghosa was his personal name. ‘Buddha’ means the
Buddha and ‘Ghosa’ means voice. So ‘Buddhaghosa’ means the voice of the Buddha.
He wrote or edited many Commentaries. The Visuddhi
Magga is not the only Commentary he wrote. It seems
that this book was written first and then the other Commentaries followed
later. We do not know if they were published one after the other or more or
less at the same time. The other Commentaries always refer to the Visuddhi Magga when they have
something to say in detail. So we can assume that this book was written first
and then the other Commentaries came later.
Although this book is called a ‘Commentary’, it is not a Commentary on a
particular Sutta, or a particular collection of Suttas, or a particular PiÔaka.
It is called a ‘common Commentary of the Texts’. That means it quotes copiously
from the Texts and then it explains these Texts in great detail. So it is not a
Commentary of any particular Sutta, or collection of Suttas, or PiÔaka. It is a common
Commentary to all Texts.
The author of this book was Venerable Buddhaghosa.
He lived in the fifth century AD. He was about 900 years removed from the
Buddha.
The Commentaries he wrote were not his own creation. They were not
originally his work because the Commentaries existed during the time of the
Buddha. These Commentaries were carried down from generation to generation by
word of mouth. Later they were written down and taken to
He got permission to write these Commentaries
and so he wrote them for the Sa~gha
there. All were accepted as authentic exigical
literature of the Texts or PÈÄi.
There is a Commentary to this Commentary. We call it a ‘Sub-Commentary’.
Its name is ParamatthamaÒj|sÈ. It is mentioned in the
introduction of this book. That Sub-Commentary was written by a teacher or a
monk called Venerable DhammapÈla. I am not sure to
what age he belonged, maybe the seventh century.
The purpose in writing this book, as the name implies, was to show
people the way to purity, the way to purification. ‘The way to purification’
means purification of mind from mental impurities or defilements. So in fact it
is a book on meditation. It is a handbook of meditation written by a monk for
monks.
When he wrote this book, he assumed that the readers had a knowledge of Abhidhamma. So it
is not so easy in some places to understand this book without a knowledge of Abhidhamma.
The purpose in writing this book was just to help those who wanted to
practice meditation. The different types of meditation are explained in this
book. In some cases they are given in meticulous detail.
When he wrote this book, he followed the structure hinted at by the
Buddha in one of the Suttas. The author picked one
stanza from the Sutta PiÔaka
in the SaÑyutta NikÈya.
That stanza is given at the beginning of the book. Following that stanza and
following let us say the Buddha’s blueprint for spiritual development, he
structured this book.
There are three stages in Buddha’s plan for spiritual development. The
first is sÊla. The second is samÈdhi.
The third is paÒÒÈ. The first is called ‘virtue’,
following this translation. The second is concentration. The third is understanding. SÊla or virtue
is the foundation on which samÈdhi (concentration)
and paÒÒÈ (wisdom) are built. Without sÊla there can be no concentration. And without
concentration there can be no paÒÒÈ or penetration
into the nature of things. These three stages of development are to be practiced
one after the other. The author, the Venerable Buddhaghosa,
followed this structure.
SÊla or virtue is described in the first two chapters. The
first chapter deals with sÊla. The second chapter
deals with what we call ‘ascetic practices’. Ascetic practices are for the
further purification of sÊla or virtue.
From chapter three through chapter thirteen samÈdhi
or concentration is explained. In these chapters the forty subjects of tranquillity meditation are explained in detail. The last
two chapters in this part give the benefits of tranquillity
or serenity meditation.
From chapter fourteen through chapter 23 paÒÒÈ
or wisdom is described. There are 23 chapters in the book. In chapters 14-17 a
theoretical knowledge of the aggregates, bases, faculties, roots
and so on is explained. The description of vipassanÈ
meditation begins with chapter 18 going through chapter 22. The last chapter 23
explains the benefits of mental culture or vipassanÈ.
There are two editions of this book in PÈÄi
written in Roman script. One was published by the PÈÄi
Text Society of London. The other was published by
There are two English translations. The first was done by a Burmese
layman named Pe Maung Tin
who was also the editor of the first Commentary of the Abhidhamma,
the AÔÔhasÈlinÊ. In English it is called ‘The
Expositor’. Pe Maung Tin’s
translation came first. It was published in 1923. The second translation called
‘The Path of Purification’ was done by Venerable NÈÓamoli.
He was an English man who became a monk after the war. He lived all his years
as a monk in
We are going to cover only three chapters in eight weeks. Maybe we will
take up the other chapters next year. In this part there are altogether only
120 pages. So we will have to read about 15 pages each week. That means you
will have to read three pages a day. I want you to really read the book before
you come to the class because I cannot go into detail reading from the
beginning to the end. We will not be able to finish 15 pages in an hour because
I will have to explain some of the difficult points in this book. So we will do
three chapters in eight weeks.
The first chapter deals with virtue or sÊla.
Unfortunately it deals only with the sÊla of monks.
This book was written for monks. So the first chapter deals exclusively with
the sÊla for monks. The purification of sÊla is very much emphasized in this chapter.
There is a saying in
Student: Or study it?
Teacher: Yes. Actually all monks study
because if you are interested in meditation you have to study it. The
instructions for meditation are given in detail in this book. Everybody or
every monk who wants to practice meditation has to have at least some
acquaintance with this book, even though they may not have read through the
entire book. Relying on their teachers and reading some portions of the book,
they practice meditation. This is the handbook of meditation teachers as well
as the students of meditation.
The first chapter deals with the virtue of monks. At first the author
gives us a stanza from the SaÑyutta NikÈya. Based on this stanza he planned this book. He wrote
on the basis of this stanza which describes sÊla, samÈdhi and paÒÒÈ. “When a wise
man, established well in virtue, develops consciousness and understanding, then
as a bhikkhu ardent and sagacious, he succeeds in
disentangling this tangle.” This is the stanza put at the beginning of this
book.
This stanza was in response to a question asked by a deity. The deity
asked the Buddha: “The inner tangle and the outer tangle, this generation is
entangled in a tangle. So I ask of Gotama this
question, who succeeds in disentangling this tangle?”
The explanation of this stanza was given below. When you read this book,
you will at least have a glimpse of how the PÈÄi
Commentaries are written. There are word explanations and then some comments on
them. When you see words in italics, these are the words that appear in the
original PÈÄi Text.
“Tangle is a term for the network of craving.” Actually craving is
compared to a tangle here. When we have craving, we are entangled in different
things.
The deity asked how this tangle could be disentangled. The Buddha’s
answer was that first you were to be well established in virtue, in moral
conduct, in sila. Then you develop consciousness.
Here ‘consciousness’ really means samÈdhi. SamÈdhi is described as consciousness here. Then you
develop understanding or paÒÒÈ.
“Then as a bhikkhu ardent and sagacious, he
succeeds in disentangling this tangle.” That means you develop samÈdhi. You practice samatha
meditation. Then you develop understanding. That is you practice vipassanÈ meditation. If you practice vipassanÈ
meditation, you will succeed in disentangling this tangle. You will succeed in
destroying this craving. When craving is destroyed, when craving is eradicated,
there will be no tangle of craving. So Buddha taught this deity to first be
well established in virtue. Then he was told to practice meditation or samÈdhi and then he was told to develop paÒÒÈ
or wisdom.
VipassanÈ and paÒÒÈ are
synonymous. SamÈdhi and here citta
(consciousness) are synonymous. SamÈdhi and samatha are synonymous. Then the author describes how he is
going to write this book.
“Herein, purification should be understood as NibbÈna.’
‘Purification’ really means NibbÈna. “Herein,
purification should be understood as NibbÈna, which
being devoid of all stains is utterly pure. The Path of Purification is the
path to that purification; it is the means of approach that is called the
‘path’.”
There may be some places where I would like to make corrections or
suggest a better translation. In paragraph 5 - “The Path of Purification is the
path to that purification; it is the means of approach.” I think we should say
‘the means of attainment that is called the path’. The PÈÄi
word ‘adhigama’ is used in the sense of attainment,
reaching. It is better to say ‘the means of attainment that is called the
path’.
“The meaning is , I shall expound the path of
purification. That path of purification is taught sometimes by insight alone
(that is by vipassanÈ alone) according as it is
said.” Always the ancient authors are very conscious that whatever they said
must have proof of authenticity. So Venerable Buddhaghosa
always refers to statements in the Texts or the PÈÄi
books. Here the author takes a statement from the Suttas
as a proof of authenticity.
“Formations are all impermanent; when one sees this with understanding
and turns away from what is ill, that is the path to
purity.” VipassanÈ is meant. Sometimes the path of
purification is taught by insight or vipassanÈ only.
“And in some instances by jhÈna and
understanding according as it is said:” - here jhana
means tranquillity meditation. ‘Understanding’ means vipassanÈ meditation. Sometimes the path is taught by samatha and vipassanÈ meditation.
“He is near unto NibbÈna in whom
are jhÈna and understanding”. This is a quote from
the Dhammapada. Once again here ‘jhÈna’
means samatha meditation. This will be described in
great detail in the coming chapters.
“And in some instances by deeds (kamma) etc.
according as it is said: ‘by deeds, vision and righteousness, by virtue the
most sublime life by these are mortals purified, and not by lineage and
wealth’.” In this stanza kamma, vision,
righteousness, virtue and life sublime are described as a way to purification.
When the Buddha taught, he taught in various ways depending upon the
capabilities of his listeners.
“And in some instances by virtue etc., according as it is said: ‘he who
is possessed of constant virtue, who has understanding, and is concentrated,
who is strenuous (he who is energetic or he who puts forth effort) and diligent
as well will cross the flood so difficult to cross’.”
“And in some instances by the foundations of mindfulness (sometimes the
path is described by the foundations of mindfulness) etc., according as it is
said: ‘Bhikkhus, this path is the only way for the
purification of beings’.”
“Similarly in the case of right effort and so on” - sometimes by way of
right effort and sometimes by way of faculties and others this path is
described.
“But in the answer to this question it is taught by virtue and the other
two.” Here in this stanza, the stanza mentioned at the beginning of the book,
the path is described or taught by virtue, concentration and wisdom.
Then the detailed explanation of the stanza is given in paragraph 7 -
“established well in virtue, a man, wise, develops consciousness and
understanding” and so on. Now let us see the explanation of the word ‘wise’.
“Wise: possessing the kind of understanding that is born of kamma
by means of a rebirth-linking with triple root-cause.” You are familiar with
the roots, lobha, dosa, moha and their opposites alobha, adosa, and amoha. A relinking consciousness
may be accompanied by two roots (alobha and adosa) or by three roots (alobha,
adosa and amoha). When it
is accompanied by three roots, a person is called a ‘three root person’. Only
these three root persons can become enlightened in that particular life. If our
relinking consciousness is only accompanied by two
roots, non-attachment and non-hatred, we cannot hope to get enlightenment in
this life. A ‘wise man’ means a person that is born with three roots. The relinking consciousness has all three roots. Understanding
or wisdom (amoha) is included in his relinking consciousness.
Student: Lobha
is hatred?
Teacher: Lobha
is attachment. Dosa is hatred. Moha
is delusion or ignorance. The opposites of these three are alobha,
adosa and amoha. Only two
or three of these last three roots accompany the relinking
consciousness.
If you remember the diagram of death and relinking
thought process, you will remember the relinking
consciousness, PaÔisandhi. That consciousness is
accompanied by some mental factors. Among these mental factors there may be all
three good roots or there may be two roots. If a person is reborn with the relinking consciousness accompanied by three roots, he is
said to be ‘wise’ here.
“Develops consciousness and understanding: develops both
concentration and insight.” That means one practices both samatha and vipassanÈ meditation.
“Sagacious: it is understanding that is called ‘sagacity’; possessing
that is the meaning. This word shows protective understanding.” Actually here
‘understanding’ means some kind of clear comprehension. Clear comprehension of
what is beneficial and clear comprehension of what is suitable is called
‘understanding’ here. Rather than saying ‘protective understanding’ we should
say ‘understanding engaged in keeping meditation’. That means when you practice
meditation, you have to know what is beneficial and what is not and what is
suitable and what is not. You have to keep this wisdom or understanding with
you always when you practice meditation. That is what is meant here.
“He sees fear (bhayaÑ ikkhati)
in the round of rebirths, thus he is a bhikkhu.” The
word ‘bhikkhu’ is translated as monk. Most of the
Buddha’s suttas are taught to monks. So you find the
Buddha addressing monks very often. In one of the Suttas,
the Sutta on the foundations of mindfulness, the
Commentary explained that anybody who practices meditation and who sees danger
in existence can be called a ‘bhikkhu’, a ‘monk’. Bhikkhu is derived from ‘bhi’ and
‘ikkhu’. ‘Bhi’ here means
fear or danger. ‘Ikkhu’ means to see. So the meaning
is one who sees danger in existence can be called a ‘bhikkhu’.
In this case not only ordained monks is meant, but anyone who sees danger in
existence or in becoming can be called a ‘bhikkhu’.
Such a person will be able to cut this tangle and become an Arahant.
By this stanza the Buddha shows many things - the three trainings,
dispensation that is good in three ways and so on. They are all explained
later.
The dispensation of the Buddha is said to be good in the beginning, good
in the middle and good in the end. Why is it good in the beginning? “Because of
the passage which says what is the beginning of profitable things?” ‘Profitable
things’ here means wholesome (kusala). Different
authors have different translations for the PÈÄi word
‘kusala’. I prefer the word ‘wholesome’. The author
here preferred profitable. ‘Profitable things’ means wholesome things.
“The not doing of any evil, virtue is the beginning of the
dispensation.” So sÊla is the beginning of Buddha’s
dispensation or Buddha’s religion.
“And that is good because it brings about special qualities of
non-remorse and so on.” SÊla is conducive to feelings
of non-remorse because when one’s moral conduct is pure, one does not suffer
from guilt feelings or remorse. The benefit of pure sÊla,
pure virtue is non-remorse.
What is meant by ‘and so on’? One leads to another. In paragraph 32 we
read about this. “Discipline is for the purpose of restraint, restraint is for
the purpose of non-remorse.” When we have restraint, we do not have regrets; we
are free from regrets.
“Non-remorse is for the purpose of gladdening.” When there is
non-remorse, we are glad. “Gladdening is for the purpose of happiness.” Gladdening is a weaker form of happiness and
happiness is a greater form of happiness.
This happiness leads to tranquillity. Only
when there is happiness, both happiness of the mind (‘Happiness’ also means
comfort.) and comfort of the body, does tranquillity
arise.
“Tranquillity is for the purpose of bliss (sukha).” ‘Sukha’ is translated as
bliss here. Tranquillity is passadhi.
You will come across these words in the 52 cetasikas
- tranquillity of mental body and tranquillity
of citta.
“Tranquillity is for the purpose of bliss and bliss is for
the purpose of concentration; concentration is for the purpose of correct
knowledge and vision.” For the purpose of concentration we need bliss. ‘Bliss’
here means comfort or peacefulness. When there is no peacefulness, we cannot get
concentration. So it leads ultimately, step by step, to liberation from all
suffering, to the extinction of all suffering and to the extinction of all
mental defilements.
Concentration is the middle of Buddha’s dispensation. “Because of the
passage beginning ‘Entering upon the profitable’ - here also the usual
translation is cultivating what is wholesome, what is good. Do you remember a
stanza that I talked about in the first or second Abhidhamma
lecture? There is a stanza or verse in the Dhammapada
which describes in a very brief way the teachings of the Buddhas.
It says: “Not to do evil, to cultivate good and to purify one’s mind - this is
the teachings of the Buddhas.” The author is
referring to that stanza.
“Entering upon the profitable” means cultivating what is wholesome. It
is the middle of the dispensation because it means concentration.
“That is good because it brings about special qualities of supernormal
powers and so on.” When you have concentration, you can get jhÈnas
and also supernormal powers.
“Its goodness is the end is shown by understanding.” Understanding,
knowledge or wisdom is the highest stage. “Because of the passage ‘The purifying of one’s own mind - this is the buddha’s dispensation’ and because understanding is its culmination,
understanding is the end of the dispensation.” ‘Understanding’ here means
penetration of the Four Noble Truths.
Now paragraph 11 - “Likewise the necessary conditions
for the triple clear-vision is shown by virtue.” Do you know the triple
clear-vision? SÊla is the necessary condition for the
triple clear-vision. The triple clear-vision is the recollection of past lives,
the knowledge of the passing away and reappearance of beings and the
destruction of mental defilements. These three are called the ‘triple
clear-vision’.
Actually they are supernormal knowledge.
They belong to supernormal knowledge.
“The necessary condition for the six kinds of direct-knowledge is shown
by concentration.” The six kinds of direct-knowledge are shown in the footnote.
Three of them are the triple clear-vision. They are knowledge of supernormal
power (that means one knows how to perform some miracles), the divine ear,
penetration of mind (that means reading the minds of others), recollection of
past lives, the knowledge of passing away and reappearance of beings, and the
knowledge of the destruction of cankers.
“The necessary condition for the categories of discrimination is shown
by understanding.” It is very difficult to understand this phrase, “the
categories of discrimination”. What do you understand by that? Actually it is a
kind of understanding. Let us look at the footnote. It is the understanding of
meaning, understanding of law (‘Law’ means Dhamma.),
understanding of language and understanding of wisdom or intelligence. These four are
called ‘discriminative knowledge in the PaÔisambhidÈ.
That means the penetrative knowledge of these four.
The first one is meaning. Only meaning is given in the footnotes. In
fact it is the knowledge that something arises out of something. Something
arises depending upon some other thing. It is a result or an effect. Instead of
law we can interpret it to mean cause and also the words of his teaching.
Language is just language. Here with TheravÈda
interpretation it means PÈÄi language.
You know everybody wants their language to be the original language of
humanity. Therefore those who are brought up in pali tradition like to think that pali
is the original language. They like to think that PÈÄi
was the language used by the people who appeared in the world in the beginning.
People brought up in the Sanskrit tradition say that Sanskrit was the original
language of human beings. So here ‘language’ means PÈÄi
language. ‘Intelligence’ just means understanding or wisdom.
So many things are shown by just this one verse. We are not sure that
Buddha meant all of this. The commentators are very fond of explaining in many
ways a single teaching or single verse of the Buddha.
In paragraph 12 “Likewise the means for surmounting the states of loss
is shown by virtue.” ‘The states of loss’ means the four states of misery or
woe, the four apÈyas (the animal kingdom, hell, angry
ghosts and another kind of ghost).
“The means for surmounting the element of sense desires by
concentration...” - do you know the element of sense desire? What do you
understand by that? ‘Element of sense desires’ here means the world of sense
desires, kamavacara loka.
The Pali word used is ‘dhatu’.
Dhatu is normally translated as element. Therefore
the author translated it as element of sense desires, but that doesn’t convey
the intended meaning. In Pali we have kamadhatu, rupadhatu, and arupadhatu. ‘Kamadhatu’ means the
realms of sense desires. That is the human world, the six lower celestial
worlds and the four states of woe. So here I think we should say the world of
sense desire. That makes more sense.
Student: Venerable U SÊlÈnanda
for some of the people who do not have books I would like to read the question
and the answer again. The question that the Commentary is answering is: “The
inner tangle and the outer tangle, this generation is entangled in a tangle.
And so I ask of Gotama this question: who succeeds in
disentangling this tangle?” The answer was: “When a wise man, established well
in virtue, develops consciousness and understanding, then as a bhikkhu ardent and sagacious, he succeeds in disentangling
this tangle.”
Teacher: Next time I think it will be
better when you have read the passages. Today it is something that you are not
familiar with. You may be lost in some places.
This is just the introductory talk before the author really explains
what virtue is, what the meaning of sÊla is and so
on. He proceeds in this manner. First he puts questions. Then he gives answers
to these questions one by one.
The first question that he asks is what is virtue,
what is sÊla? The answer is: “It is a stage beginning
with volition present in one who abstains from killing living beings etc.” When
we abstain from killing living beings, abstain from stealing and so on,
consciousness arises in our minds. What kind of consciousness arises? Wholesome or unwholesome? Wholesome.
Together with that wholesome consciousness mental states or mental factors
arise. Among these mental factors there is one that is called ‘volition’, ‘cetanÈ’. So the question is: what is virtue? The answer is:
cetanÈ is virtue. When we say ‘virtue’, we mean cetanÈ, cetanÈ which accompanies
the type of consciousness which arises in our minds when we abstain from
killing, stealing and so on.
“For it is said in the PaÔisambhidÈ” - that is
the name of a book. In our countries it is included in the Texts. Actually they
are something like an appendix to the TipiÔika. The PaÔisambhidÈ was not taught by the Buddha. It was taught by
the Venerable SÈriputta. The commentator, the
Venerable Buddhaghosa, had much respect for this
book, the PaÔisambhidÈ. He quotes from this book very
often throughout the Visuddhi Magga.
“For this is said in the PaÔisambhidÈ: ‘What
is virtue? There is virtue as volition, virtue as consciousness-concomitant,
virtue as restraint, virtue as non-transgression.” So in that book it is said
that volition is virtue, mental factors are virtue, restraint is virtue, and
non-transgression is virtue. Virtue can mean any of these things.
‘Consciousness-concomitant’ means what according to our understanding? Cetasikas.
Sometimes cetasikas are called ‘virtue’. We have
abstinences among the 52 cetasikas. Do you remember
that? They are right speech, right action and right livelihood. They are called
‘restraint’ here. There may be others too. Non-transgression is also called
‘virtue’. You know volition. Volition arises with consciousness when we abstain
from something.
“Virtue as consciousness-concomitant is the abstinence in one who
abstains from killing living beings and so on.” Here
‘consciousness-concomitant’ means the three abstinences. The three abstinences
are called ‘virtue’. Sometimes cetanÈ is called
‘virtue’ and sometimes the three abstinences are called ‘virtue’.
“Furthermore, virtue as volition is the seven volitions (that accompany
the first seven) of the (ten) courses of action (kamma)
in one who abandons the killing of living beings and so on.” There are what we call ‘ten courses of action’. That means
abstaining from killing, abstaining from stealing, abstaining from sexual
misconduct, abstaining from lying, from backbiting, from harsh speech and from
talking nonsense. There are these seven and we will come to the other three
later. When the author said ‘seven’, he meant these. There are three kinds of
misconduct by body and four kinds of misconduct by speech. So they are seven.
“Virtue as consciousness-concomitant is the three remaining states
consisting of non-covetousness, non-ill-will and right view.” These three plus
the seven mentioned above are called the ‘ten courses
of wholesome action (kusala).
“Virtue as restraint should be understood here as restraint in five
ways.” There are five kinds of restraint mentioned in the Suttas.
The first is restraint by rules of the community. ‘Rules of the community’
really means the rules for monks. There are 227 rules for monks. When a monk
keeps these rules, then he has restraint in his bodily actions and in his verbal
actions or speech.
There is restraint by mindfulness. Mindfulness is sometimes called
‘restraint’. There is restraint by knowledge, restraint by patience and
restraint by energy.
“Herein restraint by PÈÔimokkha is this: ‘He
is furnished, fully furnished, with this PÈÔimokkha
restraint’. Restraint by mindfulness is this: ‘’He guards the eye faculty,
enters upon restraint of the eye faculty’.” That is when you see something, you
try to just see it and not go to liking it or disliking it. If you can just see
it and avoid the arising of the unwholesome mental states, you are said to be
restraining the eye faculty. In fact restraining the eye faculty does not mean
closing your eyes or not looking at things. You look at things that you see,
but you do not get akusala from seeing them. This is
restraint in the eye. In order not to be attached to things that you see or not
to be upset by things that you see, you have to keep mindfulness. That is why
mindfulness is called 'restraint' ’ here.
“Restraint by knowledge is this: ‘The currents in the world that flow Ajita,’ said the Blessed One, ‘are stemmed by means of
mindfulness’.” The ‘currents’ here means akusala. The
currents of akusala are stemmed by mindfulness. When
there is mindfulness, they cannot arise. They are stopped.
“Restraint of currents I proclaim, by understanding they are dammed.” By
understanding they are totally subdued or suppressed. So here understanding is
called ‘restraint’.
“And
use of requisites is here combined with this.” That means the use of requisites
is also called ‘restraint’ here. ‘Use of requisites’ refers to monks. Monks
have to use requisites with reflection and understanding. That means for
example whenever I put on this robe I have to say to myself or I have to
reflect: “I use this robe just to ward off cold, just to ward off heat, to ward
off insect bites’ and so on. When we eat something also, we say: “I eat not to
take pride in my strength, not to make myself beautiful, but I eat this just to
be able to practice buddha’s
teachings.” When we use the VihÈra (the dwelling
place), we have to reflect that it is used for protection from heat, cold and
so on. And when we take medicine, we reflect that we take medicine just to get
rid of disease and so on. Monks have to do this whenever they make use of these
four requisites. If there is no understanding or no knowledge, we cannot do it.
Therefore the use of requisites is called ‘restraint by knowledge’.
“What is called restraint by patience? He is
one who bears cold and heat.” We bear cold. We are patient with cold. We are
patient with heat. We are patient with thirst. We are patient with hunger. That
is called ‘restraint by patience’. Actually patience itself is restraint here.
“What is called restraint by energy? He does
not endure a thought of sense desires when it arises.” That means you have to
make effort or you have to have energy not to endure such thoughts. As soon as
such thoughts arise in your mind, you just stop them. That is called here
‘restraint by energy’ because if you don’t have energy, you cannot do that. You
have to make effort to stop as soon as these thoughts arise in your mind.
“Purification of livelihood is here combined
with this.” Purification of livelihood is also meant for monks. Monks must have
a very pure livelihood. Monks must not work to earn money. Monks must not tell
fortunes or read palms in order to get something from people. If we do that,
then our livelihood is said to be impure. In order to have pure livelihood what
must we do? We must go out for alms. We must make effort. We must have energy.
That is the only purity of livelihood for monks. Monks must not work for money.
Monks must not ask people to bring food to them. They must go out for alms.
I am in a very different country. We monks
cannot go out for alms. So now we have to ask people to bring food to the
monastery. ‘Purification of livelihood’ means you must depend upon yourself. In
the books it says that you must rely on your foot muscles. You walk and collect
food from house to house and return to the monastery.
“So this fivefold restraint, and the
abstinence, in clansmen who dread evil, from any chance of transgression met
with, should all be understood to be ‘virtue as restraint’.”
“Virtue as non-transgression (that is not
breaking the rules) is the non-transgression by body or speech, of precepts of
virtue that have been undertaken.” When you take the precepts, you keep them.
You do not break them. The precepts here are of body and of speech. We must
understand that sila has to do with bodily actions
and with verbal actions, not thoughts. You may think of killing a living being, but
as long as you do not kill it, you are not breaking that rule. You may think of
telling a lie to another person, but if you do not tell a lie, you are not
breaking that rule. Therefore sÊla is to control the
bodily and verbal actions of a person.
Student: We have a
precept which is not to harbor ill-will. How does that work?
Teacher: It is
included in samÈdhi in TheravÈda
Buddhism. SamÈdhi is for control of mind, for control
of thought. Just thinking something bad does not constitute breaking of rules.
These rules control the actions of the body and the actions of speech. Although
it is not good to have unwholesome thoughts, still if you do not do with your
body or by your speech, you are still keeping these rules. In TheravÈda Buddhism sÊla is for
bodily and verbal actions. SamÈdhi is for control of
mind. PaÒÒÈ is for eradication of mental defilements.
Although it is not a precept in TheravÈda Buddhism, non-ill-will is the same as “do not
harbor thoughts of hatred or ill-will’. That is included in the three courses
of action of mind - non-covetousness, non-ill-will and right view. They are
included in kamma of mind. We have three kinds of kamma - bodily kamma, verbal kamma and mental kamma.
What is the meaning of the word ‘sÊla’? It may not be interesting to those who are not
interested in PÈÄi. The word ‘sÊla’
is explained here as meaning composing or upholding. What is this ‘composing’?
“It is either a coordinating, meaning non-inconsistency of bodily actions etc.
due to virtuousness.” ‘Non-inconsistency’ really means non-scattering of one’s
actions. That means if we do bad actions, then our actions are said to be
scattered, non-coordinated. I think ‘scattered’ is better than ‘inconsistency’.
‘Consistence’ means that it must not be different from others or something like
that. If you are consistent, it means that you do this thing always. It can be
a bad habit. Here it means that your actions are not scattered when you have sila.
“SÊla is an
upholding, meaning a state of bliss owing to its serving as a foundation for
profitable states.” Only when you have sÊla, can you
have wholesome mental states. Therefore sÊla is
something like upholding. These are the two meanings of sÊla.
“For those who understand etymology (that
means grammarians) admit only these two meanings. Others however, comment on
the meaning here in the way beginning ‘ The meaning of
virtue (sÊla) is the meaning of head (siras), the meaning of virtue is the meaning of cool (sÊtala).” That is playing upon the word. The PÈÄi word ‘sÊla’ is close to the
word ‘siras’ and is also close to the word ‘sÊtala’. So they may explain in this way, but it is not
accepted by the commentator here.
“What are the characteristic, function,
manifestation and proximate cause of sila?” I think
you are familiar with these. Whenever we have to understand something, we have
to understand by way of characteristic, function, manifestation and proximate
cause. Only then do we understand thoroughly.
Especially when you practice meditation, you
come to understand things sometimes by way of characteristic. That means you
see things by means of characteristic. Sometimes you see the function.
Sometimes you see the manifestation and sometimes you see the proximate cause.
So with reference to these four we have to understand things.
Therefore we must understand sÊla with reference to these four aspects. What is its
characteristic? That means what is its individual essence or its nature. The
characteristic of sÊla is just composing, the same as
that mentioned earlier. “Just as visibleness is the characteristic of the visible-data base
even when analyzed into the various categories of blue, yellow etc., because
even when analyzed into these categories, it does not exceed visibleness, so also this composing, described above as the
coordinating of bodily action, etc., and as the foundation of profitable
states, is the characteristic of virtue even when analyzed into the various
categories of volition etc., because even when analyzed into these categories,
it does not exceed the state of coordination and foundation.” ‘Visible-data
base’ just means the visible object. Among the 28 material properties there is
one thing which can be seen. That is the only thing that can be seen by our
eyes. It is translated as form or visible object. The
characteristic of that visible object just visibleness.
That it can be seen is its characteristic. Although we may say that visible
objects are red, yellow, blue, white and so on, but according to characteristic
they are only one, visible data which has the characteristic of visibleness.
In the same way we may describe cetanÈ as sÊla. Cetasikas are sÊla. Restraint is sÊla. Non-transgression is sÊla.
However many varieties of sÊla there may be, the
characteristic, the common nature of all kinds of different sÊla
is just composing. So it has the characteristic of composing.
What is its function? The PÈÄi word for function is rasa.
Rasa has two meanings. One meaning is action or function and the other meaning
is achievement. Sometimes function as action is used. Sometimes function as
achievement is used. Here both are mentioned. The function of sila is the stopping of misconduct. When you have sila, you do not break precepts. You do not have
misconduct. Stopping misconduct is its function or is its nature. Blamelessness
is its function as achievement. That means when you achieve purity of sila, then you are blameless. Blamelessness is actually the
outcome of the purity of sÊla. Blamelessness is also
said to be the function of sÊla. The PÈÄi word ‘rasa’ has two meanings
- action or achievement.
What is the manifestation of sÊla? “Now virtue, so say those who know, itself as purity
will show; and for its proximate cause they tell the pair, conscience and shame
as well.” Manifestation of sÊla is just purity. When
we concentrate on sila, it appears to us as purity. SÊla is real purity. So purity is the manifestation of sÊla or virtue.
The proximate causes of sÊla
are conscience and shame. Actually the proximate causes are shame and fear.
‘Shame’ is the shame to do unwholesome things. ‘Fear’ is the fear to do
unwholesome things. If we do unwholesome things, if our moral conduct is not
pure, we will get bad results. So this shame and fear are called ‘the proximate
causes of sÊla.’ So long as people have this shame
and fear, they will keep precepts. The moment these two leave people, then they
will do anything they like.
Student: Could you
define what proximate cause is?
Teacher: There are
two kinds of causes - near cause and far cause. It is near cause.
Please read about 20 or 20 pages for next
week. After you have read, then you can come to the class and we can discuss.
Student: I have
heard that if you want to really study TheravÈda
Buddhism you need a cave and you need this book.
Teacher: That’s
right. It is held in very high esteem in TheravÈda
countries. It is next to the Buddha actually. This is the Burmese edition of
the book in PÈÄi, the first volume.
Student: This book
is meant for monks. Does it have any place for ordinary folks like us?
Teacher: You have
to be patient with the first two chapters because the rules and practices are
for monks. But you can adapt some of the statements in this chapter and the
next chapter to sÊla for lay people. Monks are
exhorted to be very strict with regard to their rules. They are exhorted not to
break even a small rule. It is said that one should see danger even in the
smallest transgression. In the same way if you are going to practice
meditation, then you have to clear the bases. You have to establish a firm
foundation of moral purity first. As a lay person you take precepts, at least
five precepts and you keep them. You are not to break any one of these rules.
You are to keep them intact. You may be exhorted not to break any of these
rules even though your life is in danger. We can adapt the admonition or the advice
given in this chapter to the practice of lay people too. This chapter deals
with monks’ behavior, monks’ sÊla.
I am afraid you will find many improper
conduct and resorts mentioned here. You will know how monks are clever in
acquiring things for themselves and clever in not telling direct lies, but in
saying white lies or something like that.
One thing that is good about the
Commentaries is that they give many stories. We can learn from these stories.
From the third chapter onward it is for those who practice meditation whether a
lay person or a monk. Still the emphasis is on monks because monks were those
who practiced meditation more than lay people. However that is no longer true.
Lay people are also very interested in meditation now.
In
Student: What was
his name?
Teacher: His
personal name was Venerable U NÈrada, but he was
known as the Mungun SayÈdaw.
His name was mentioned in Venerable Nyanaponika’s
book, The Heart of Buddhist Meditation. So now many lay people practice vipassanÈ meditation. Also in this country many people are
interested in meditation. I think this is a good trend that Buddhism is going
towards. After all practice is what counts. Just understanding or just knowing
theoretically will not help us much. We must put this theoretical knowledge
into practice.
The study and practice I think should go
together. Just study will not help us much. Something that you see through the
practice helps you to have deeper understanding of what you know from the
books. These two should go together - practice and meditation.
Thank you very much.
SÈdhu! SÈdhu! SÈdhu!
(Tape 2 / Ps: 23-52)
Let us go back to the structure of the first
chapter. I am referring to the detailed table of contents. This chapter deals
with what is translated as virtue. In PÈÄi it is sÊla. A stanza from the SaÑyutta NikÈya is used as an introduction. Then the author explains
what the path of purification is along with a commentary on the stanza at the
beginning of the book. Then the author goes on to explain sÊla
or virtue - what is sÊla, what is
virtue. He explained that volition is virtue, mental factors are virtue,
restraint is virtue, and non-transgression is virtue. This he explained
according to a Text called ‘PaÔisambhidÈ’. In
connection with restraint the author explained five kinds of restraint
-restraint by PÈÔimokkha, restraint by mindfulness,
restraint by knowledge, restraint by patience, and restraint by energy. (paragraph 18)
After explaining what virtue is or what is
taken to be virtue according to the teachings of TheravÈda
Buddhism, the author goes on to explain the meaning of the PÈÄi
word ‘sÊla’ or why virtue is called ‘sÊla’ in PÈÄi. The explanation
given is that it is called ‘sÊla’ because it
coordinates the bodily and verbal actions. Also it serves as a foundation for
the formation of wholesome states. So the two basic meanings of the word are
given there. One is coordinating and the other is the basis for holding up.
Next the author gives the characteristic,
function, manifestation and proximate cause of virtue. It is customary with TheravÈda authors that whenever there is something to be
studied or to be understood that they explain that thing according to its
characteristic, its function, its manifestation and its proximate cause. In Abhidhamma also citta, the 52 cetasikas and so on are explained with reference to their
characteristics, functions, manifestations and proximate causes. The
characteristic, function, manifestation and proximate cause of virtue are given
in paragraphs 20-22.
Then the author gives the benefits of
virtue, the benefits of having pure virtue or pure sÊla.
Then he describes the different kinds of virtue which takes up the rest of the
first chapter.
This week we will begin with the benefits of
virtue. In paragraph 23 the author first begins with a quote from the AÓguttara NikÈya. Do you see
A.v.1? ‘A’ means AÓguttara NikÈya. It is the name of one of the five
collections. The translation of AÓguttara NikÈya is Gradual Sayings. There are five volumes.
Further down in paragraph 23 you see
D.ii.86. ‘D’ means DÊgha NikÈya.
It is another collection. The translation of this collection is called
Dialogues of the Buddha. There are three volumes.
A little further down you will see M.i.33.
‘M’ means Majjhima NikÈya.
It is another division of suttas. The translation of
this collection is Middle Length Sayings. I hope you have read all these. These
are the benefits of virtue.
On the next page in paragraph 24 the author
gives the benefits of virtue in verse form. About six lines from the bottom it says,
“Virtue does away with self-blame and the like.” ‘Self-blame and the like’ -
what are the others? The benefits of being virtuous or of having pure or good sÊla are four. The dangers of not being virtuous of having
bad sÊla are also four.
The first of these four is self-blame or
self-reproach. When our moral conduct is impure, the first blame comes from us
because we are the first to know what we did. So self-blame or self-reproach
comes first.
Then there is the blame of others or the
reproach of others. If we do not keep our rules properly or if we break our
precepts, other people will also blame us. There is the blame of others or the
reproach of others.
The third disadvantage of bad sÊla is punishment. If we do not keep precepts, then we may
commit crimes. We may kill beings or we may kill human beings. We may steal and
so on. As a result of this, we will get punishment in this life. That is
another danger of having impure moral conduct.
The fourth one is having an unhappy destiny.
That means rebirth in the four woeful states or the four states of loss -
rebirth in hell, rebirth in the animal kingdom, rebirth as a hungry ghost and
rebirth as another kind of ghost. These are the four disadvantages of being
impure in moral conduct. The opposite of these are the four benefits.
“Virtue entirely does away with dread of
self-blame and the like.” Virtue entirely does away with the danger of these
four namely self-reproach, reproach of others, punishment and unhappy destiny.”
Then the author gives the kinds of virtue.
Western people often say that Eastern people are fond of numbers. Here virtue
is explained as of one kind, two kinds, three kinds, five kinds. First the
author just gives a list of them. Then they are explained in detail.
There is only one sÊla
or one kind of virtue according to the characteristic. When we take into
account the characteristic, there is only one virtue which has the
characteristic of coordinating bodily and verbal actions and upholding people.
Then there are two kinds, three kinds and
five kinds of virtue. You may read the list.
I want to make some changes in paragraph 41,
section 16. The author is explaining four kinds of virtue. He mentions natural
virtue, customary virtue, necessary virtue and virtue due to previous causes. I
think we should say ‘ingrained virtue’ instead of ‘necessary virtue’. The PÈÄi word here is DhammatÈ. That
means the way it is. That means ingrained virtue. The last one is virtue due to
previous causes. Here ‘previous causes’ means causes in previous lives. People
are virtuous because they were virtuous in their past lives too. This being
virtuous is carried over from past lives.
In the detailed explanation in paragraph 26
- “Herein, keeping is accomplished by faith and energy; avoiding, by faith and
mindfulness.” In this paragraph there are two kinds of virtue. One is keeping
and one is avoiding. ‘Keeping’ means following the advice
that this should not be done. Most precepts are about what should not be
done. One must not kill, one must not steal and so on.
Sometimes we should do this and sometimes we should not do that. If we do not
do these things, we come to some state that lacks virtue or is impure.
The ‘keeping’ is accomplished by faith and
energy. There are rules which say that the monks must do certain things at the
monastery for example. This kind of sÊla or virtue is
accomplished by faith. If you have faith or confidence in the Buddha, if you
have energy or effort, then you can keep that sÊla.
In this translation it says that ‘avoiding’
is accomplished by faith and mindfulness. In the Burmese-PÈÄi
edition and also in the PÈÄi Text Society edition
there is no word for mindfulness. We should strike out the two words ‘and mindfulness’
here. We should just say, “Avoiding is accomplished by faith.” Only when you
have faith and when you have confidence in the Buddha and in the rules, can you
keep yourself from breaking the rules. This is accomplished through faith and
not by mindfulness. “Mindfulness” is not supported by the Commentary on this
book. We call it a Sub-Commentary. In the Sub-Commentary also only the word
‘faith’ or in PÈÄi the word ‘saddha’
is explained and not mindfulness or sati. We should
say here, “Avoiding is accomplished by faith.” If you have faith or confidence
in the Buddha and his teachings, then you can follow the rules that prohibit
you from doing certain things.
Student: What does ‘keeping
by energy’ mean?
Teacher: You have to do
something when you follow rules that say something must be done. For example
there are duties to be done for our teachers. We must get up early in the
morning before the teacher gets up. We must offer him water for washing his
face. If there is something to eat, we must offer it to him. We must do some
chores for him and so on. This is the first kind of ‘keeping’. If we do not
have faith and if we do not make effort, we will not accomplish that kind of sÊla. So there both sila and
energy are required. Refraining from something needs only faith, not
necessarily mindfulness.
In the next paragraph “that of good behaviour” and “that of the beginning of the life of
purity” - they are terms that are directly translated from PÈÄi.
About four lines down it says: “This is a
term for the virtue that has livelihood as eighth.” A couple of lines before it
says: “this is a term for virtue other than that which
has livelihood as eighth.” The eight are given in the footnote. They are
refraining from three wrong bodily actions, refraining from four wrong verbal
actions and refraining from wrong livelihood. These constitute eight precepts.
These eight precepts are different from the eight precepts to be mentioned a
little later. These precepts are called those that have livelihood as eighth.
The others are different.
“This is a term for the virtue that has
livelihood as eighth. It is the initial stage of the path because it has to be
purified in the prior stage too.” I think there is no word for ‘too’ in the
original PÈÄi. We should leave out ‘too’.
This sila has to
be accomplished before we take up the beginning of the life of purity. That
means before we practice meditation, we have to purify our moral conduct. So it
has to be accomplished or purified in the prior stage of the path. ‘The path’
here means the practice of meditation leading to enlightenment.
In paragraph 29 four kinds of sÊla are mentioned. “There are two kinds of dependence -
dependence through craving and dependence through false view.” Craving itself
is dependence here. False view itself is dependence here. Sometimes we have
attachment. We have lobha. We want to be reborn in a
better world. We want to be reborn as a deva or a
celestial being. Or we may want to be reborn as a human being of good family.
It is something like that. We practice sÊla in order
that we may be reborn in a better existence. That sÊla
is dependent upon craving or attachment. Because we have attachment to these
lives we do something so that we may be reborn there. So craving itself is
dependence. It is not dependence through craving, but dependence as craving we
may say.
Sometimes we have the false view that
purification is through virtuous conduct. That means we believe that we can
become purified through virtue only. That is a false view because we have to
practice virtue first, then concentration and then wisdom. Virtue alone, by
itself, will not help us to become enlightened, to become purified.
‘Purification’ here means purification of mind in the form of enlightenment.
Enlightenment can be gained only through vipassanÈ
meditation, only through practice of wisdom. That practice of wisdom is
possible only when there is concentration. And concentration can be built only
on the purification of moral conduct. Purification of moral conduct alone, by
itself, cannot lead us to emancipation or enlightenment. That is a false view.
Through this false view we practice sÊla. Here false
view is a dependence for the practice of sÊla. So there are two kinds.
Let us go back a little. Do you understand the
‘Double Code’ in about the middle of paragraph 27 - “ what
is included in the Double Code (the bhikkhus’ and bhikkhunis’ Patimokkha)…”? Bhikkhus are monks and bhikkhunis
are nuns. Rules for monks and nuns are technically called ‘PÈÔimokkha’.
The word ‘PÈÔimokkha’ is given in the translation. Since there are
two, it is called ‘Double Code’. There are 227 rules for monks and 311 rules
for nuns or bhikkhunis. Women have more rules than
monks have. Both belong to the beginning of the life of purity.
“And that included in the duties set out in
the Khandhakas (of Vinaya)”
- you know there are three PiÔakas. The first is Vinaya PiÔaka. That PiÔaka consists of rules for monks and nuns and so on. Vinaya PiÔaka is composed of the
227 rules for monks, the 311 rules for nuns, the stories leading to the laying
down of these rules and some explanations of the words in the rules. They are
called ‘Sutta Vibha~ga’.
Then there are some other books which are
called ‘Khandhakas’. ‘Khandhaka’
just means section. In the Khandhakas mostly rules
pertaining to ‘keeping’ are given. There are Khandhakas
telling how to perform the ordination ceremony, what qualifications one must
have to be ordained and so on. In another section the duties which are to be
performed for our teachers or for our pupils, or for guest monks are mentioned.
These are called ‘Khandhakas’. Included in the duties
set out in the Khandhakas is that of good behaviour. There are two books containing these Khandhakas. One is called ‘Great Khandhaka’
and the other is called ‘Small or Lesser Khandhaka’ .
Those are very interesting books if you are
interested in social conditions during the time of the Buddha. What utensils
they used, how they made houses, all these things are mentioned in these books.
As the number of monks grew, there were more and more problems. Sometimes those
monks were like children. They would go to the Buddha and ask him what to do.
For example monks have to prepare dye for themselves. They have to boil bark of
a tree or wood from which they would get color. Sometimes the pots would
overflow or boil over. Then they would go to the Buddha and report it to him.
They would ask him what to do and then he would say to use a filter or
something. These books are interesting. The duties and other things contained
in these books are called ‘the virtue that is of good behaviour.
They are set out in the Khandhakas.
In paragraph 32 - “In the seventh dyad all
virtue subject to cankers is mundane.” I hope you understand what ‘subject to
cankers’ is. What is ‘subject to cankers’? ‘Cankers’ means mental defilements.
‘Subject to mental defilements’ really means the object of mental defilements.
The virtue which is the object of mental defilements is called ‘mundane’ and
virtue which is not the object of mental defilements is called ‘supramundane’.
In the next paragraph - “In the first of the
triads the inferior is produced by inferior zeal, (purity of) consciousness,
energy, or inquiry.” You have to understand these four. The PÈÄi
word for zeal is chanda. You have met chanda among the 52 mental factors. It is translated there
as conation. ‘Chanda’
means the will-to-do. The mere will-to-do is called ‘chanda’.
It is not desire. It is not attachment. It is just the will to do something.
Let us say you want to pick up a book. That will to pick up the book is called
‘chanda’. In the first instance that will, zeal or chanda is inferior.
There are four kinds of what are called ‘adhipati’ (dominating factors). Please read The Manual of Abhidhamma, chapter 7. In that chapter you will find these
four adhipati. These four are called ‘dominating
factors’. They arise with other mental factors and one of them predominates.
Sometimes chanda predominates. Sometimes citta predominates and so on. They are called ‘dominating
factors’.
The next factor is (purity of)
consciousness. Here it is not necessarily ‘purity of consciousness’, but just ‘consciousness’. Then there is energy. After that we have
inquiry. ‘Inquiry’ means knowledge or understanding. It is not really inquiry
into something. The PÈÄi word for inquiry is vÊmaÑsÈ. VÊmaÑsÈ is translated as
inquiry. The basic meaning of vÊmaÑsÈ is inquiry.
That is correct. It is a synonym for the PÈÄi word ‘paÒÒÈ’ (understanding). So here sometimes
understanding, or knowledge, or wisdom predominates.
If one of these four is inferior, then the sÊla is called ‘inferior sÊla’.
When they are medium, then the sÊla is medium. When
they are superior, the sÊla is superior. Please read The manual of Abhidhamma, chapter
7, to learn more about these dominating factors.
“That motivated by craving, the purpose of
which is to enjoy continued existence is inferior.” Actually what it means here
is to enjoy better existence and to enjoy wealth or something in that
existence, not continued existence. It is to enjoy better existence and
to enjoy some things there.
In paragraph 35,the
third line - “that practiced by the magnanimous ordinary man...” - what is
‘magnanimous ordinary man’? The PÈÄi word is puthujjana. Puthujjana is a
person who has not reached any of the stages of enlightenment. We may call him
an ordinary person. The usual translation of that word is worldling,
so ordinary worldling.
Student: What does
‘magnanimous’ mean?
Teacher: ‘Magnanimous’ here
actually means he has good moral habits and that he is well-read. To translate
directly it is he has heard well. During the time of the Buddha and some time
thereafter there were no books. Whatever you learned, you learned from someone.
I hope you have read these pages. I will be
picking places where I want to give you some more information. Please go to
paragraph 40. “In the second tetrad there are training precepts announced for bhikkhus to keep irrespective of what is announced for bhikkhunis.” ‘Irrespective of what is announced for bhikkhunis’ - what do you understand by that? There are 227
rules for monks and 311 rules for nuns. There are rules which are common to
both monks and nuns and there are others which are not common. The monks must
keep the 227 rules and also some of the rules laid down for nuns. That is what
is meant here. So there are not just 227 rules for monks, but also some other
rules which were originally meant for nuns. Monks must also keep these rules.
For example there is no rule among the 227
rules that monks must not sing, or dance, or go to shows and so on. However
there is that rule for the bhikkhunis. Monks must
also keep that rule even though it is not included in the 227 rules. When we say ‘monks’ rules’, we mean these 227 rules plus some other
rules. Monks must keep these rules also, even though they are not in the
rules for monks. There are rules which are common to both monks and nuns. And
there are other rules. Monks must keep those rules too.
Student: It is translated
poorly.
Teacher: The translation is
not so good here. The meaning is that. ‘Irrespective’ is not correct.
“The ten precepts of virtue for male and
female novices are the virtue of the not fully admitted. The five training
precepts - ten when possible - as a permanent undertaking...” - here also the
translation is a little incorrect. The five training precepts are permanent
training. They are called in PÈÄi ‘niccasÊla’. You know that the word ‘anicca’
is impermanent. So nicca is permanent. These precepts
are called ‘permanent sÊla’. That means if you claim
to be a follower of the Buddha, you must keep these five precepts. They must be
with you always. So they are a permanent undertaking. Ten are to be undertaken
when you can. The five are to be taken as training precepts as a permanent
undertaking, ten when possible.
“The five training precepts - ten when
possible - as a permanent undertaking, and eight as
the factors of Uposatha Day, for male and female lay
followers are the virtue of the laity.” It should say ‘eight as the factors of Uposatha’, not day, just Uposatha.
The PÈÄi word ‘Uposatha’
can mean two things - the observance and the day of observance. Here the day is
not meant. ‘The eight as factors of Uposatha’ means
the eight precepts - the five permanent precepts plus not eating after mid-day,
not using flowers, perfumes and so on and also not singing and dancing, and not
using luxurious beds and seats. These precepts are called ‘Uposatha
precepts’. The most
important is not eating after mid-day. These eight precepts are
called ‘Uposatha. If it is Uposatha
for lay people, we mean these eight precepts. Uposatha
for monks is different. Uposatha for monks is just
the recitation of the 227 rules in an assembly.
So lay people should take and always keep
five precepts. If they can, they should take eight precepts on certain days of
the month. The usual days these precepts are taken are the full moon day, the
new moon day, and the eighth day of each half month.
We go by the lunar months. The month is
divided into two halves - the bright half and the dark half. The middle of the
bright half is the eighth day. The middle of the dark half is also the eighth
day. For at least four days in the month people in Buddhist countries like
You know there were no books in the olden
days. In order that they would not forget the rules or in order that the monks
would remember the rules, the monks had to recite the rules in this way. They
learn the rules by heart. At the Uposatha one monk
recites the rules and the other monks pay attention to the recitation. This is
called ‘Uposatha for monks’.
In paragraph 42 the author explains the four
kinds of sÊla or the four kinds of virtue often
mentioned in the Suttas. For monks these are the important
kinds of virtue. These will be explained in more detail than the others. The
author gives the texts from the Suttas.
“The virtue described by the blessed One
thus: ‘Here a Bhikkhu dwells restrained with the PÈÔimokkha restraint possessed of the (proper) conduct and
resort, and seeing fear in the slightest fault, he trains himself by
undertaking the precepts of training’ is virtue of PÈÔimokkha
restraint.” This is one kind of sÊla. ‘Virtue of PÈÔimokkha restraint’ means simply keeping the PÈÔimokkha rules, keeping the 227 rules or the 311 rules,
keeping them unbroken.
Section b of paragraph 42 shows the
restraint of the sense faculties. That means restraint of eyes, ears and so on.
Strictly speaking it is not sÊla because it is not
keeping any rules. When you have restraint of sense faculties, your sÊla is practically pure. So it is included as sila.
“On seeing a visible object with the eye, he
apprehends neither the signs nor the particulars through which, if he left the
eye faculty unguarded, evil and unprofitable states of covetousness and grief
might invade him; he enters upon the way of restraint, he guards the eye
faculty, undertakes the restraint of the eye faculty.” What it means is that
when you see something, you try not to get akusala
from it. That is what is meant by restraint of the senses.
For example you may see a beautiful thing. If
you have no wise attention, then you will get attached to the thing and there
will be akusala. To keep yourself from getting akusala, from getting unwholesome thoughts, you practice
mindfulness actually. The practice of mindfulness is to prevent attachment to
these objects. It does not mean that we are to close our eyes or our ears and
not look or listen to things. It does not mean that. We will be seeing things
and we will be hearing sounds. What the restraint here means is not to have akusala when we come across these objects.
The third in section c is the virtue of
livelihood purification. For monks ‘pure livelihood’ means getting requisites by
proper means. That means by going on alms round monks get food. By picking up
pieces of cloth they can make it into a robe and wear it and so on. This is
good livelihood for monks. If monks do not follow these rules, then there is no
virtue of livelihood purification. It will also be explained in detail later.
“Abstinence from such wrong livelihood as
entails transgression of the six training precepts announced with respect to
livelihood and entails the evil states beginning with ‘scheming, talking, hinting,
belittling, pursuing gain’ is the virtue of livelihood purification.” If you
have read through this chapter, you will know what these are. I am afraid that
you know more about the bad tricks monks use to obtain what they want.
The six training precepts we will find in
paragraph 60. In paragraph 60 these are given one by one. “With livelihood as
cause, with livelihood as reason, one of evil wishes, a prey to wishes, lays
claim to a higher than human state that is non-existent, not a fact, the contravention
of which is defeat.”
Let us suppose that I want to be rich. I
want to possess many requisites. I want to possess many things. Even though I
have not obtained any of the stages of enlightenment, I will say that I am
enlightened or something similar. This is so that you will think much of me and
offer me many things. It is something like that. Such a breech of rules is
caused by livelihood.
Or perhaps I don’t want to go out for alms.
I want to be at the monastery and just let people bring rich food to me and so
on. This also is impure livelihood for monks. These six rules are proclaimed or
laid down with regard to monks’ livelihood.
You see the word ‘defeat’ there. These are
technical words. ‘Defeat’ means if a monk breaks this rule, he is finished as a
monk. He is defeated as a monk. He is no longer a monk, even though he may
still go on wearing the robes, even though he may still go on admitting himself
as a monk. In fact, in reality he is not a monk the moment that he says this
and the other person understands it. There are these six rules. We will come to
these six rules later.
Student: What happens if
the person does not understand?
Teacher: If the person
spoken to does not understand at that moment, he is not defeated. But if the
person to whom he is speaking knows at that moment that the man is saying that
he is enlightened and the monk is not really enlightened, then there is defeat.
I think you have read what are resorts and
others for monks and what are not resorts for monks.
‘Resorts’ are things which monks must engage in and things which monks must not
engage in. In paragraph 44, in about the middle of the paragraph, you will
find: “Here someone makes a livelihood by gifts of bamboo, or by gifts of
leaves, or by gifts of flowers, fruits, bathing powder, and tooth sticks, or by
flattery, or by bean-soupery (do you know that?), or
by fondling” - I will come to ‘bean-soupery’ later.
‘By fondling’ really means baby-sitting, picking up a baby and taking care of
it, not just by fondling. It is taking care of a baby. Someone leaves a baby
with a monk, and if he takes care of the baby in order to please that person,
then it is called ‘fondling’.
Now ‘bean-soupery’
means having a livelihood that resembles bean-soupery.
You still don’t understand, right? Please turn to paragraph 75. “Bean-soupery is resemblance to bean soup; for just as when beans
are being cooked only a few do not get cooked, the rest get cooked, so too the
person in whose speech only a little is true, the rest being false, is called a
‘bean soup’; his state is bean-soupery.” Most of what
such a person says is just lies.
There is an expression in English that is
somewhat similar - ‘half-baked’, but it does not mean the same thing. It does
not mean this. If most of what I say is not true and only a little of what I
say is true, then I am guilty of this ‘bean-soupery’.
In paragraph 45 we have ‘resort’. We have to
understand this properly. There is proper resort and improper resort. “Herein,
what is improper resort? Here someone has ‘prostitutes as resort, or he has
widows, old maids, eunuchs, bhikkhunis, or taverns as
resort’.” ‘Having them as resort’ means being friends with them, being intimate
with them, frequenting their houses. That is what is meant by ‘having them as
resort’. So there are some places which monks must always avoid,
the places of these people.
Then in paragraph 49 there is another kind
of resort. “Proper resort is of three kinds: proper resort as support, proper
resort as guarding, and proper resort as anchoring.”
“Herein, what is proper resort as support? A
good friend who exhibits ten instances of talk (those are given in the
footnote), in whose presence one hears what has not been heard…” and so on. ‘In
whose presence’ really means depending on whom, not just in his presence. That means from him. You hear something from him.
That is what is meant here.
“...Corrects what has been heard, gets rid of
doubt, rectifies one’s view and gains confidence...” - these are the benefits
of hearing Dhamma talk. The Buddha said in one Sutta that there are five benefits to be gained from
listening to a Dhamma talk. The first one is that you
hear what you have not heard before. There is new information. Then you correct
what has been heard. That means you can clarify what you have heard before.
When you hear it again, then you get rid of doubt. That is the third benefit.
One may rectify one’s view. If you have a wrong view, you can set it right when
you listen to the Dhamma talk. You gain confidence.
That means your mind becomes full of confidence. These are the five benefits to
be gained from listening to a Dhamma talk.
“...Or by training under
whom...” - actually ‘not by training under whom’, but by following his example.
So it should be “or by whose example one grows in faith, virtue, learning,
generosity - this is called (proper) resort as support.”
In the next paragraph it says, “What is
(proper) resort as guarding? Here ‘a bhikkhu, having
entered inside a house, having gone into a street’,...”.
The translator always makes this mistake. The PÈÄi
word is antaraghara. ‘Ghara’
means house. ‘Antara’ means in, between, or within.
He translated antaraghara as inside a house because ‘antara’ can mean inside and ‘ghara’
means house. But the real meaning is a place which has houses in it. So it
means a village. So “A bhikkhu having entered a
village, having gone into a street, goes with downcast eyes, seeing the length
of a plow yoke.” So it is not ‘inside a house’. Monks must keep their eyes down
when they go out into the village or into the town, not just inside a house.
This is a wrong rendering of the PÈÄi word.
“Seeing the length of a plow yoke...” - in
fact it is not a plow yoke. It is a carriage yoke. A yoke is said to be about
four cubits long. That is about six feet. So a monk should look ahead about six
feet on the ground. He should not look up or sideways.
It may be possible where it is not so
crowded. In modern cities it is impossible. You have to look. If you just look
down and walk, you will be knocked down by a car or something. But monks are
trained to keep their eyes down - “not looking at an elephant, at a horse, a
carriage, a pedestrian, a woman, a man...”and so on.
“Seeing fear in the
slightest fault” means seeing danger in the slightest fault. Even a very
slight fault or transgression can bring harm to you. Especially when you
practice meditation, this can be a great obstacle to your progress or to your
concentration. A monk is instructed to keep the rules intact. Even if he has
broken a minor rule and he has broken it intentionally, then the feeling of
guilt is always with him. This feeling of guilt will torment him when he
practices meditation. There is danger in even the slightest transgression.
Seeing danger in the slightest transgression, he keeps his sÊla
(his virtue) really pure.
So we come to the end of PÈÔimokkha
restraint today. How many pages do we have to go through until the end of the
first chapter? 58 pages. So maybe we will finish the
first chapter in four weeks. Please read as much as you can.
SÈdhu! SÈdhu! SÈdhu!
(Tape 3 / Ps: 5-99)
This week we begin with paragraph 53.
Beginning with this paragraph, there is a detailed explanation dealing with the
passage given in paragraph 42b. There are four kinds of virtue - virtue
pertaining to PÈÔimokkha restraint, virtue of the
restraint of the sense faculties, virtue of livelihood purification and virtue
concerning requisites. We have finished the first one and now we are going to
the second.
In this paragraph the author speaks of the
usage seeing with the eye, seeing the visible object with the eye. ‘Seeing with
the eye’ really means seeing with eye consciousness or seeing consciousness.
The teachers of old explained that the eye cannot see because it has no mind
and the mind cannot see because it has no sensitivity or eye; but when the
object strikes against the sensitivity of the eye, there arises the eye
consciousness or seeing consciousness. When we see something, we see with eye consciousness
or seeing consciousness.
The usage of ‘seeing with the eye’ is
described as ‘accessory locution’. I don’t know what that means. In PÈÄi it is called ‘sasambhÈrakathÈ’.
The example given here is: “He shot himself with his bow”. What is the meaning
of ‘to shoot’? The meaning of the Pali word is ‘to
hit’ or ‘to pierce’. He hit him with his bow. Actually he hit him with the
arrow and not with the bow, but without the bow you cannot shoot the arrow. The
usage is that he hits him with his bow.
You
say shoot with a gun? So perhaps shooting is not correct.
Student: You can shoot
arrows with a bow and you can shoot bullets with a gun. ‘To shoot with a bow’
is correct. Perhaps it is more correct to say you shot him with a bow and
arrow.
Teacher: That’s right. When
a monk sees a visible object, then he apprehends neither the signs nor the
particulars. ‘The sign’ here means the sign of a man or a woman. That means
when a monk sees a person, he is not to see that person as a man or as a woman
- “or any sign that is a basis for defilement such as the sign of beauty etc.,
or as it is beautiful, or it is attractive and so on.” He stops at what is
merely seen. He must train himself in just seeing and not going into
evaluations. He must not evaluate the thing which is observed.
This kind of advice is given in many Suttas especially to MÈlunkyÈputta
and BÈhiya. Buddha said just to stop at seeing and
not to take the object as a man or as a woman, or as attractive or beautiful
and so on.
He does not take particulars. Here
‘particulars’ means the aspects or shape or whatever of hand, foot, laughter,
talk, looking ahead, looking aside and so on. These are called ‘particulars’.
In PÈÄi that is anubyaÒjana.
These things make known or particularize the defilements. When we take the
particulars of what we see, the defilements grow in our minds. So we are not to
take the signs or the particulars.
“He only apprehends what is really there.”
That means he only apprehends the visible datum there, just seeing only a
visible object, and not seeing a man or a woman. That is very difficult to
achieve. That would be possible only when we practice mindfulness meditation.
Without mindfulness meditation it is very difficult to stop at just seeing, and
not seeing a man or a woman, or to stop seeing the particulars.
For example you hear a sound from outside.
In a fraction of a second you have gathered in the particulars of the sound -
whose sound it is, where it comes from, whether it is loud or soft and so on.
It is very difficult to stop at just hearing when we hear something and at just
seeing when we see something. Long practice of vipassanÈ
meditation can help us to achieve this.
In this story the monk was not practicing vipassanÈ meditation actually. He was practicing the
contemplation on the foulness of the body or the 32 parts of the body. Among
the 40 subjects of calm meditation there is one called ‘contemplation of the body’. It consists in contemplating on the different parts
of the body and viewing them as foul, repulsive and so on.
This monk was practicing this kind of
meditation, especially contemplating on the bones. He met a woman who laughed
and showed her teeth. He got the sign of bones and not the particulars of that
woman. That is why later he said: “I did not know whether a man or a woman went
this way; what I noticed was just a skeleton (a group of bones).” After that
the sign of bones came to his mind. He contemplated on the bones with vipassanÈ as impermanent, as suffering, as without ego or
insubstantial. In this way he was able to reach Arahantship
while standing there. He had been practicing calm meditation for a long time.
At that moment he practiced vipassanÈ meditation
depending upon his subject of calm (samatha)
meditation. So he reached Arahantship through the
practice of vipassanÈ meditation actually.
In paragraph 57 and so on the author
describes when restraint and non-restraint actually arise. I hope that you
understand the passage. If you have gone through Abhidhamma,
you will easily understand. “Restraint or non-restraint is not actually in the
eye faculty or the eye, since neither mindfulness nor
forgetfulness arise in dependence on eye sensitivity. On the contrary
when a visible datum as object comes into the eye’s focus, then, after the
life-continuum has arisen twice and ceased, the functional mind-element
accomplishing the function of adverting arises and ceases.” If you are familiar
with Abhidhamma, you can understanding
it easily. ‘Life-continuum’ is bhavaÓga. ‘Functional
mind-element accomplishing the function of adverting’ is just the
five-sense-door-adverting (paÒcadvÈrÈvajjana).
Do you have the diagram of the thought
process in mind? You have to understand this with reference to the thought
process. Actually moments of restraint or non-restraint only come at the
moments of javana or impulsion. Restraint is kusala and non-restraint is akusala.
Therefore there can be restraint or non-restraint only during the moments of javana. That is what the Commentary is telling us in these
paragraphs. In five-sense-door-adverting there is neither restraint nor
non-restraint. The same is true for seeing consciousness, receiving
consciousness and so on. Only when we reach the javana
stage or impulsion stage, will there be restraint or non-restraint.
In footnote 16 I would like to make some
corrections or additions. In the second paragraph of the footnote “There is no unvirtuousness ,
in other words, bodily or verbal misconduct in the five doors; consequently
non-restraint (please put non-restraint) of unvirtuousness
happens through the mind-door, and the remaining non-restraint (we should say
‘non-restraint) happens through the six doors.”
“For the arising of forgetfulness and the
other three could be (‘could be’ is better than ‘would be’) in the five doors
because (They can arise in five doors as well as the mind-door.) since they are
unprofitable states (‘unprofitable states’ means ‘unwholesome states’) opposed
to mindfulness etc.; but (‘but not ‘and’) there is no arising of unvirtuousness consisting in bodily and verbal
transgression there because five-door impulsions do not give rise to intimation.”
Do you remember bodily intimation and verbal
intimation among the 28 material properties? Among the 28 material properties
there are two which are called ‘bodily intimation’ and ‘verbal intimation’.
‘Bodily intimation’ means something like gesture and ‘verbal intimation’ means
not really speech but that which causes speech. They are called ‘bodily
intimation’ and ‘verbal intimation’.
The Sub-Commentaries and all the teachers of
old explain that the verbal intimation or bodily intimation can be caused only
by the javanas of the mind-door thought process, not
the five-door thought process. It is explained here as “because five-door
impulsions do not give rise to intimation.”
“And the five kinds of non-restraint
beginning with unvirtuousness are stated here as the
opposite of the five kinds of restraint beginning with ‘restraint as virtue’.”
These are given in paragraph 18. You may go back and read. So restraint or
non-restraint only arise at the impulsion or javana stage.
Next let us go to paragraph 60, the ‘virtue
of livelihood purification’. Are you familiar with the rules for monks? These are called the PÈÔimokkha
rules’. There are 227 rules for monks or bhikkhus and
311 rules for nuns or bhikkhunis. When a monk or nun
transgresses these rules, they come to some kind of offense. There are seven
kinds of offenses. Six are mentioned in this passage.
“With livelihood as cause, with livelihood
as reason, one of evil wishes, a prey to wishes, lays claim to a higher than
human state that is non-existent, not a fact, the contravention of which is
Defeat.” If a monk breaks this rule, he is defeated. He is no longer a monk
although he may still be wearing robes and claiming that he is a monk. In
reality he is not a monk.
The next one is an offense entailing a
meeting of the Order. That is the second gravest offense. When a monk comes to
this offense, then he has to approach the Sa~gha
or at least four monks in the initial stages. Finally there needs to be twenty
monks to perform an act of Sa~gha.
In order to get rid of that offense a meeting of the Order is required. That is
the second gravest offense.
The third one is a serious offense. This one
can be gotten rid of just by making a confession. If a monk
says, not referring to himself directly, “The monk who lives in your monastery
that you have donated is an Arahant.” Actually
he wants to say, “I am an Arahant.” He comes to this
offense. He is not really an Arahant and he does not
directly say that he is an Arahant. But he says that
the monk who lives in your monastery is an Arahant.
If the person to whom he is speaking understands what he is saying, then he
comes to this offense. It says in this translation :
“The contravention of which is a serious offense in one who is aware of it.”
‘Who is aware of it’ does not give the meaning of the PÈÄi.
Actually it means if the other person understands at that very moment.
The Vinaya or
Disciplinary Rules for monks is very much like law, the secular law. The monk
only comes to this offense when the person understands at that very moment. If
he does not understand immediately and perhaps he thinks about it later and
understands, then the monk does not come to that offense.
Student: You mean the
person he is talking to?
Teacher: That’s right. Yes.
Student: If the person he
is talking to thinks he is an Arahant, then it’s OK?
Teacher: That’s OK if the
person doesn’t believe him. If the person knows that he is referring to
himself, then there is this offense.
Now let us go to the next one. “With
livelihood as cause, with livelihood as reason, a bhikkhu
who is not sick eats superior food (I would say ‘rich food’) that he has
ordered for his own use.” ‘Order’ here means to ask for. A monk must not ask
people to give to him. His asking or begging is by standing silently. We pick
up our bowls and stand in front of a house silently. That is our begging. It is
called ‘Ariyan begging’ or
‘Noble begging’. We don’t say anything. We don’t say, “Please give food to us”
or whatever. With our bowls we stand at the entrance of a house. Then lay
people come out and give us what they have. So ‘order’ here means just asking.
A monk must not ask.
“The contravention of which is an offense
requiring expiation” - what is expiation?
Student: Forgiveness.
Teacher: Actually it is
forgiveness by confession. Monks make confessions to each other. It is not a
confession like in Catholicism. We confess to each other.
“With livelihood as cause, with livelihood
as reason, a bhikkhu who is not sick eats rich food
that she has asked for her own use, the contravention of which is an offense
requiring confession.” Here it should be ‘special confession’, not just confession.
There are two kinds of confession that we make according to which rules we have
broken. The contravention of this rule requires a special confession to get rid
of it.
Student: So for a bhikkhuni to do the same act is more of an offense?
Teacher: Not necessarily.
There are some rules for monks also for which they must make special
confession. Sometimes breaking the rule incurs different offenses for monks
than for nuns.
These are rules laid down with regard to
livelihood for monks. Actually to purify his livelihood a monk must go out for
alms. He must not do any other thing like fortune telling or reading palms and
all these things. These are the six rules laid down especially with reference
to the livelihood of a monk.
Then there are other things given in the Visuddhi Magga. The author took
them from another book called ‘MahÈ Niddesa’. It tells about ‘scheming’ and other things. If
you have read all these pages, you know how crafty monks were in those days.
They are not difficult to understand.
Let us
go to paragraph 74. “Suggesting is insinuating by specifying thus, ‘That family
alone understands me’.” That is not correct. The correct meaning here is: “That
family knows me only and not others.” The monk wants to impress others. So ‘I
am the only one that the family knows’. It should be ‘that family knows me
only’ and not ‘that family alone understands me’. If that family alone
understands me, then I am not impressive.
In paragraph 78 “And here there should be
told the story of the bhikkhu supported by a family.”
Here also it is not that the bhikkhu is supported by
a family, but it is a bhikkhu who frequents families,
who visits families quite often. This is so he may become acquainted with them
in order to get some things from them. The translation should be ‘the bhikkhu who frequents families’ not ‘supported by a
family’. Venerable NÈÓamoli always makes this
mistake. The PÈÄi word is Kulapaka.
‘Kula’ means family. ‘Upaka’ means approaching. So it
means approaching families. That means visiting the families to get acquainted
with them.
This is not a good quality for a monk. A
monk should not visit families very often. When a monk is referred to as ‘one
who frequents families’, it is a kind of censure. The monk in this story is
very cunning. In the end he gets what he wants. The woman became very
frustrated and said: “There is no hoodwinking the shaveling.”
She could not deceive the monk. So she had to give the monk what there was in
the house.
Let me read footnote 24. “You are a donkey,
you belong to the states of loss, you belong to hell, you are a beast, there is not even a happy or an unhappy destiny to be
expected for you.” That also is not correct. If someone were to say to me that
there is neither a happy nor an unhappy destiny for me, I would be very glad
because this is true only for an Arahant. These
however are words of abuse. What it really means is that there is not a happy
destiny for you. There is only an unhappy destiny for you. You are going to
hell. There is not a happy destiny for you. Only an unhappy destiny is to be
expected for you. It is taken from other books, not directly from the Visuddhi Magga. These are some
words of abuse contemporary with the Buddha such as “You are a thief, you are a
fool, you are an idiot” and so on.
In paragraph 85 towards the bottom of the
paragraph “Herein, reflecting wisely is reflecting as the means and as the way,
by knowing, by reviewing, is the meaning.” With regard to the four requisites
the monks have to make reflection whenever they get any one of the four
requisites and also when they make use of them. When we put on our robes, we
have to reflect on it like “I put on the robe to ward off cold, to ward off
heat, to avoid bites by insects.” When we eat also, we make reflection, “I eat
this not to beautify myself, not to take pride in my strength, just enough to
keep me going in order to practice what the Buddha taught.” and so on. So
reflection is meant here.
The PÈÄi word used
here is yoniso paÔisankhÈ.
It is the explanation of these words. So ‘reflecting as the means and as the
way’ really means reflecting by proper means or knowing by proper means,
knowing what is the way. The meaning is just reviewing or reflecting with
wisdom, with understanding. So reflecting wisely he uses the robe and so on.
In paragraph 86 “For protection: for the
purpose of warding off, for the purpose of eliminating so that it may not
arouse affliction in the body. For when the body is afflicted by cold, the
distracted mind cannot be wisely exerted. That is why the Blessed One permitted
the robe to be used for protection from cold. So in each
instance, except that from heat means from the heat of fire, the origin of
which should be understood as forest fires and so on.” Actually it is
not the ‘origin’ but the “occurrence of which should be understood as forest
fires and so on.” It is not origin. It should be occurrence or happening. The PÈÄi word is saÑbhava. ‘SaÑbhava’ can mean a cause or just happening. Here it means
happening. The example of fire can be seen in a forest fire or a house fire and
so on. ‘Fire’ means that kind of fire.
In paragraph 90 “And here the clause neither
for amusement is stated for the purpose of abandoning support for delusion.”
Instead of ‘support’ we may say ‘basis for delusion’. Then
farther down “Nor for smartening nor for embellishment is said for the
purpose of preventing the arising of fetters for another” - what does that
mean? We should reflect this way in order not to have defilements and also so
that other people will not have defilements for us. For example if w take food for smartening our self, for embellishing our
self, then we will become attractive. So this may arouse defilements in other
people as well. So instead of saying “the arising of fetters for another” we
should say “the arising of fetters for others.” That means for others as well
as ourselves.
At the end of paragraph 91 “...for the
endurance and continuance of this body can be understood to mean” we should put
‘also’ after ‘to mean’.
In paragraph 92 about the middle of the
paragraph “For while this bhikkhu is engaged in
crossing the desert of existence by means of devotion to the three trainings” -
that means the practice of the three trainings. You know the three trainings. SÊla, samÈdhi and paÒÒÈ are called ‘the three trainings’. ‘Devotion to’
really means ‘practice of’.
“For while this bhikkhu
is engaged in crossing the desert of existence by means of the practice of the
three trainings depending on bodily strength whose necessary condition is the
use of alms food, he makes use of it to assist the life of purity just as those
seeking to cross the desert used their child’s flesh.” It refers to a Sutta in the SaÑyutta NikÈya. You may read that story in the Book of Kindred
Sayings, the second volume page 68. The reference given here is for the
original PÈÄi text. In the English version it is in
volume two page 68. It is not a real story. Buddha
gave it just as an example. You should view food in this way.
Two people and a child were going through
the desert. There was insufficient food supplies, so
they could not make it to the end. The supplies dwindled so that they had
nothing to eat. They discussed among themselves. If we cross over to a safe
place, we can get a new baby. If we kill the baby and eat it, we can cross the
desert. It was not expressly said in the Sutta that
they killed the baby. The Commentary explained here that they did not kill the
baby as though it were a real story. The father sent the baby to the mother and
the mother sent the baby to the father. Going back and forth the child died. So
the idea is that if you eat the flesh of your own child, you eat it because you
have to, not because you want to. That is the point here. “Those seeking to
cross the desert used their child’s flesh, just as those seeking to cross a
river use a raft, and just as those seeking to cross the ocean use a ship.”
At the bottom of paragraph 94 there is a
verse. “With four or five lumps still to eat, let him then end by drinking
water; for energetic bhikkhus’ needs, this should
suffice to live in comfort.” This is a stanza much quoted by our teachers or by
monks who want to advise other monks not to be greedy in eating. “With four or
five lumps still to eat, let him then end by drinking water.” So one doesn’t eat until one is full. Leave about four or
five lumps. Drink water instead. This way you will be comfortable. This is
true. If you eat too much especially when you are on a retreat and have to
meditate, you will find it very difficult to meditate. It is better not to eat
until you are full, but to eat a little less and to drink water instead.
“For energetic bhikkhus’
needs this should suffice to live in comfort.” ‘Energetic bhikkhus’
really means a monk who has sent his mind to NibbÈna
or to the attainment of NibbÈna. The PÈÄi word is translated here differently by Western people
from the traditional teachers. According to the traditional teachers the word
means one who has directed his mind to the attainment of NibbÈna.
Western scholars translate it to mean as having made effort or energetic. The PÈÄi word is pahitata. It can
have both meanings - one who has sent or directed his mind to NibbÈna or one who has made effort. The second meaning is
preferred by Western scholars. So here it says “for energetic bhikkhus’ needs”. Here ‘energetic’ really means one who
practices meditation for the purpose of attaining NibbÈna.
“This should suffice to live in comfort.”
A meditating monk should not eat much.
Now let us look at resting place or dwelling
place. What is a ‘lean-to’?
Student: It is like a tent,
a very rickety tent.
Teacher: the PÈÄi word is aÉÉhayoga.
Traditionally it is a building that has a roof in only one part. It is
something like a lean-to. There are five kinds of dwellings for monks. One is a
monastery. It is called a ‘vihÈra’ in PÈÄi. Then there is a lean-to and there are three more. The
PÈÄi word for a dwelling place for monks is senÈsana. ‘Sena’ comes from the
root which means ‘to sleep’ or to ‘lie down’. Œsana
comes from the root which means ‘to sit’. A place where a monk lies down or
sleeps or a place where a monk sits is called his place, his dwelling place,
his senÈsana. When a monk makes use of the dwelling
place, that is when he enters the building or when he goes out of the building,
then he must make this reflection: “I use this dwelling place to ward of the
cold, to ward off heat, to ward off bites of insects” and so on.
The last one is the reflection on medicine.
These are called ‘the four requisites of monks’ - food, clothing, dwelling
place, and medicine. In paragraph 96 it says, “Any work of a medical man such
as oil, honey, ghee, etc., that is suitable for one who is sick, is what is
meant.” The word ‘ghee’ is not in the PÈÄi original.
In Vinaya butter,
oil, ghee, honey and molasses are called ‘medicine’. These five are termed
medicine in Vinaya. They can be taken as medicine.
Monks can take honey or ghee in the afternoon, but not as food, only as
medicine. “Any requisite for life consisting of oil, honey, molasses, ghee etc., that is allowed by a medical man as suitable for the sick,
is what is meant.”
In paragraph 97 in the second part there is
the explanation of the PÈÄi word ‘paccaya’.
“the word meaning here is this: because breathing
things go, move, proceed, using (what they use) in dependence on these robes
etc., these robes, etc., are therefore called requisites.” In fact instead of
‘move, proceed’ we should say ‘live’. ‘Breathing things’
means living beings. So living beings live in
dependence upon these robes and other things, using them. That is why
they are called ‘paccaya’ in PÈÄi.
It is not important that you understand the meaning of the word ‘paccaya’. If you know that it means requisites here, it is
enough.
In the next paragraph “So, in this fourfold
virtue, PÈÔimokkha restraint has to be undertaken by means
of faith. For that is accomplished by faith, since the
announcing of training precepts is outside the disciples’ province.” It
is very important. That is why we cannot change the rules. We cannot add
anything to the rules and we cannot take anything out of the rules because the
announcing or laying down of rules is not in the province of disciples. We
cannot do that. Only the Buddha can do that.
If a monk has no faith or devotion to the
Buddha’s teachings, he will not want to keep all these rules. That is why the PÈÔimokkha restraint or the first virtue is to be
undertaken by means of faith, by means of devotion to the Buddha.
“The evidence here is the refusal of the
request to (allow disciples to) announce training precepts.” Those in the
brackets are to be stricken out. This refers to Vinaya.
Venerable SÈriputta asked the Buddha how the
dispensation of different Buddhas fared. The
dispensation of some Buddhas lasted long and the
dispensation of other Buddhas did not last so long.
Buddha answered that there were precepts and so on when the dispensation lasted
long. So Venerable SÈriputta requested the Buddha to
lay down rules - “Please lay down rules so that the dispensation of the Buddha
may endure long.” The Buddha said, “No. It is not time.” What the Buddha meant
to say was that Venerable SÈriputta did not know when
to lay down rules and that he did. So the laying down of rules is not in the
province of disciples. The words in the brackets are not in the original. They
were put in by the translator wrongly. The evidence here is the refusal of the
request to announce precepts or to lay down rules.
“Having therefore undertaken through faith
the training precepts without exception as announced, one should completely
perfect them without regard (even) for life.” Let’s put in the word ‘even’, so
‘even for life’.
“For this is said: ‘As
a hen guards her eggs, or as a yak her tail, or like a darling child, or like
an only eye - so you who are engaged your virtue to protect, be prudent at all
times and ever scrupulous’.” ‘Be prudent’ really means be
fond of your virtue. ‘Scrupulous’ or the PÈÄi word
here means to have respect for the rules, the Buddha, the Dhamma,
the Sa~gha and so on. Then we
have the story. It is not difficult to understand.
In paragraph 99 it says, “He augmented his
insight.” I hope you understand that. What’s that?
Student: He saw into the
future?
Teacher: Actually he
practiced vipassanÈ meditation.
In the second story “Also they bound another
Elder in TambapaÓÓi Island (SrÏ
Lanka) with string creepers and made him lie down. When a forest fire came and
the creepers were not cut...” - no, this is not correct. Here it should be
“When the forest fire came, without cutting the creepers, he established
insight.” He was bound with creepers and when the forest fire came, he could
easily cut the creepers and escape, but to cut the creepers means to break the
rule of the Buddha. So he would sooner give up his life than break the rules of
the Buddha. So without cutting the creepers, he practiced meditation. He became
an Arahant.
“When a forest fire came, without cutting
the creepers, he established insight and attained NibbÈna
simultaneously with his death.” ‘Simultaneously’ means almost simultaneously,
not at the same moment. Mind works very fast. So the two came
almost simultaneously. He became an Arahant
and then he died.
The advice given with regard to this story
is: “Maintain the rules of conduct pure, renouncing life if there be need,
rather than break virtue’s restraint by the worlds’ saviour
decreed.” So you should give up your life rather than breaking the rules laid
down by the Buddha.
Do you have any questions?
Student: I am a little
curious about all this which is essentially asceticism. The Buddha renounced
asceticism. How are these two resolved?
Teacher: When it says the
Buddha renounced asceticism, it means that he renounced unnecessarily
inflicting pain on oneself or self-mortification. For example when he was in
the forest practicing to become the Buddha, he reduced his food little by
little. At first he went out for alms and ate that food. Then he took fruit
from trees and ate that. Later he took only the fruit that had fallen. Later on
he took only the fruit from the tree under which he was living. So little by
little he reduced eating so that his body became very thin, emaciated. It was
unnecessarily inflicting suffering upon himself. That
asceticism Buddha refused or denied.
Ascetic practices given here are not that
severe, not that rigorous. They are things such as eating in one bowl only or
when you go out for alms, you do not skip any house. These are called ‘ascetic
practices’, but they are not like those practiced by the other hermits or sages
during the Buddha’s time. We will come to the ascetic practices in the second
chapter.
One thing that I want to say is that when I
went to the Zen Center in Japan I saw that they rinsed the bowls and then drank
the water from the bowls. It reminded me of one of the ascetic practices that TheravÈda monks practice. That practice is to eat in one
bowl only. If you are to use one bowl only, then you eat in that bowl and you
drink in that bowl. So i think there are some
practices carried to countries far away from India. They have changed a little
and so they seem to become very different practices, but I think there is
something common in both practices.
Student: In the Zendo we eat that way and wash our bowls. You are always
served. It is like alms. The food just comes. It is served to you. We don’t do
begging, but in the way that we eat in the Zendo it
is very similar.
Teacher: Yes. That’s right.
When monks are invited to the houses of lay people during the time of the
Buddha and even in the present time in SrÏ Lanka, the
monks sit in a row on the floor. The lay people take food and put it in their
bowls like you eat in Zen Centers. That is the practice in SrÏ
Lanka and also in India. But in Myanmar it is different. We can see many
similarities or common practices that have become a little changed depending on
the country and on the people.
Student: The original
intention seems to be the same.
Teacher: These are all dhuta~ga. ‘Dhuta~ga’ means to
shake off. These practices are undertaken to shake off defilements. They
develop good qualities like fewness of wants, non-attachment to food and all
these things.
Student: By that particular
act you keep reminding yourself of why you are eating and so on.
Teacher: You always have to
be on your guard to avoid mental defilements from coming to your mind.
Student: Many people talk
about not liking their job or not feeling good about their livelihood. We can
see here how monks are warned to be careful. So that is a reflection in our
more complex society how we need to be careful in our behaviour,
perhaps not in the exact same way.
Teacher: That’s right.
Student: In each act it is
so easy to be selfish.
Student: So try to put
Buddhism somewhere in everyday life. Be mindful.
Teacher: That’s right. In
one of the Suttas in A~guttara
NikÈya daily reflections are given there. A monk or a
lay person must make these reflections: I am old. I cannot avoid getting old. I
will get disease and I cannot avoid that. One day I will die and I cannot get
away from it. All that is mine will change and disappear. I am heir to kamma. Kamma is my only kinsman.
These reflections have to be made every day both by monks and nuns and lay
people. This is so they can get rid of pride in their youth, pride in their
belongings and so on. That is a very good Sutta both
for monks and for lay people. This is in the A~guttara
NikÈya, the Gradual Sayings.
Student: But don’t you
think that there might be some problem for some people who are depressed? If
you do that too much, you might jump off the Golden Gate Bridge.
Teacher: That’s right. You
have to follow the Middle Way. These reflections are to be made not to get
depressed. It is to get rid of pride in yourself, or in your appearance, or in
your body. It is for the purpose of getting rid of undesirable mental habits.
They are not to be carried too far.
You know once when the Buddha taught about
the foulness of the body, monks got so disgusted with their bodies that they
killed themselves and they asked other people to kill them. That really
happened during the time of the Buddha. Buddha knew it would happen, but he
could not avoid it. It is explained in the Commentaries that the kamma that these monks did together in the past got
opportunity to give result at that time. Buddha thought that if they had to die,
let them die with this kind of meditation. It would help them get a good
rebirth. So the Buddha taught the foulness of the body meditation to them. Then
he said: “I must not be approached by any monk for 15 days.” He said that he
wanted to be alone and would only see the monk who brought food to him. After
15 days he came out of seclusion. Then he asked Venerable Œnanda
why there were fewer monks. Venerable Œnanda answered
that there were fewer monks because he had taught that meditation. So Venerable Œnanda asked the Buddha to
teach some other kind of meditation. Then the Buddha taught breathing
meditation at that time.
Student: Is that a true
story?
Teacher: Yes. That story is
in the Book of Discipline if you want to read it. I don’t have the page number.
It is given in connection with the third of the four rules of defeat. The third
rule is not to kill human beings. Killing human beings is a grave offense for
monks. That story is given there.
OK. Thank you. Please read to the end of the
first chapter for next week.
SÈdhu! SÈdhu! SÈdhu!
(Tape 4 / Ps: 100-161)
We were in paragraph 100. There are four
kinds of virtue or sÊla. The first is called ‘PÈÔimokkha restraint’. These are the rules in the
disciplinary code for monks and nuns. That PÈÔimokkha
restraint is undertaken out of faith. Having faith in the Buddha and his
teaching, the monks and nuns keep these PÈÔimokkha
rules intact.
The next one is the restraint of the sense
faculties. It is to be undertaken with mindfulness. In fact the restraint of
the sense faculties is not strictly virtue or sÊla.
It is the control of one’s senses. The control of one’s senses can be done by
mindfulness or should be done by mindfulness. When one sees an object, one must
keep mindfulness with him or her, so that he or she will not get unwholesome
thoughts or unwholesome mental states with regard to that object. In order to
guard against unwholesome thoughts from entering our minds we need mindfulness.
So the second sÊla or the restraint of the sense
faculties is undertaken by mindfulness. By mindfulness one tries not to take
the signs, not to apprehend the signs, and not to apprehend the particulars.
One tries to just stop at seeing, hearing and so on.
In paragraph 101 “When not undertaken thus,
virtue of PÈÔimokkha restraint”, a word is missing
there, “restraint also is unenduring.” If we
do not undertake the restraint of sense faculties with mindfulness, then the
virtue of the first one, the PÈÔimokkha restraint,
cannot endure long, cannot last long.
“It does not last, like a crop not fenced in
with branches. And it is raided by the robber defilements as a village with
open gates is by thieves.” So the PÈÔimokkha
restraint becomes enduring when the restraint of sense faculties is undertaken
by mindfulness. When we apply mindfulness and try not to take the signs and
particulars of objects, then we will not come to transgression of the rules in
the PÈÔimokkha.
With regard to the restraint of the sense
faculties the story of the Elder VangÊsa was given.
He went out for alms and saw a woman. He had thoughts of lust arise in his
mind. He asked Venerable Œnanda what to do. The
Venerable Œnanda said that because you perceived
mistakenly, because you saw the person as a woman these kind
of thoughts arose. So try to concentrate on the formations as alien, as
suffering, as not self. If you have this attitude, this understanding, you can
extinguish this fire of lust in your mind. So the Elder expelled lust from his
mind and went on with his alms round.
Two more stories are given. These are
inspiring stories about how monks control their senses. One monk did not know
that there was a painting in the dwelling where he lived. The same monk did not
know who bowed down to him, the king or the queen. The monk always said, “May
the king be happy.” to whoever bowed down to him.
In paragraph 108 “Let him not be
hungry-eyed.” The PÈÄi word is lola. ‘Lola’ means unsteady or looking this way and
that way. That is called ‘lola’. Hungry should be
understood not in the sense of wanting to eat something, but hungry for the
visible object.
Student: Is it in the sense
of distraction?
Teacher: Yes. Monks are
taught to keep their eyes down especially when they go to the village. They are
allowed to see about six feet in front of them. They are to keep their eyes
down. They are not to look at this thing or that thing. When your eyes are
going from this thing to that thing, it is called ‘lola’.
Student: ‘Hungry-eyed’ is
not a common English word. It is one that is seldom used.
Teacher: Maybe the word ‘lola’ can be translated as hungry. Lola is something that
is not steady, not composed.
Then there is another story about the Elder MahÈ Mitta. These stories are not
difficult to understand.
The third virtue for monks is livelihood
purification. Livelihood purification is to be undertaken by means of energy,
by means of effort because if you are lazy and if you are a monk and do not go
out for alms, then your livelihood will not be pure. Livelihood purification is
to be undertaken by means of effort or energy. In order to keep livelihood pure
a monk has to avoid wrong search or unsuitable search. In order not to resort
to such things, a monk has to go out for alms every day.
In paragraph 112 it says, “And if he has got
putrid urine with mixed gall nuts...” Actually this is gall nuts soaked in
urine. It is not necessarily putrid urine, although the PÈÄi
word ‘p|ti’ is used here. It can just be urine,
especially cow urine. Do you know gall nut? I don’t know. The other name is myrobalam. It is a kind of fruit or nut. It has a bitter
taste. When it is soaked in cow urine, it is supposed to be medicinal.
If a person gets that kind of gall nut or myrobalam or the four sweets, they are supposed to be
medicine for monks. The one is not so good, but the four sweets are good
things. He who wants to keep his livelihood pure should keep what is not good
and give what is good to others.
The four sweets are medicinal sweets made of
four ingredients. What are the four? In our countries, in Buddhist countries
this is very common. Almost everybody knows at least what things monks can eat
in the afternoon. These four sweet things are ghee, honey, oil and molasses.
They are mixed. If you are strict, you are not to cook them. You may put them
in the sun and stir them. Some time later the mixture becomes a little thick.
That could be eaten in the afternoon if you are weak or if there is some
ailment to be gotten rid of. The four sweets are called ‘catumadhura’.
Student: This last part
means that if you are offered both of these medicines and you take the bad
tasting one and leave the good tasting medicine for others, that is a virtuous act.
Teacher: That’s right. Such
a monk is called ‘supreme in the Noble Ones’ heritage’.
Some kinds of hinting or indicating is allowed with regard to some requisites and is not allowed
with regard to other requisites. In paragraph 113 it talks about that. “As to
robe and the other requisites, no hint, indication, roundabout talk, or
intimation, about robes and alms food is allowable for a bhikkhu
who is purifying his livelihood.” A monk must not ask for requisites, not even
hint or indicate, or use roundabout talk to get a robe or to get food.
“But a hint, indication, or roundabout talk,
about a resting place ( a dwelling place) is allowable
for one who has not taken up ascetic practices.” This is allowable for monks
with regard to dwelling place.
“herein, a ‘hint’
is when one who is getting the preparing of the ground etc., done for the
purpose of (making) a resting place is asked: ‘What is being done, venerable
sir? Who is having it done? And he replies, ‘No one’.” That means there is no
one who is going to build this place. So if you can, please build. It is
something like that.
Student: If you can -
Teacher: If you can, please
build this place for me.
“ An ‘indication’
is saying ‘Lay follower where do you live?’ ‘In a mansion,
venerable sir’. ‘But, lay follower, is a mansion not allowed for
monks’?” A mansion is allowed for monks. Is it not allowed for monks? You live
in a mansion and I live in a hut. That is indication.
“ ‘Roundabout talk’
is saying ‘The resting place for the community of bhikkhus
is crowded’.” The monastery is too small. It is not enough for monks or lay
people to assemble. That is roundabout talk. That means the monk wants a new
monastery or an extension to the monastery.
These are allowed with regard to resting
place or dwelling place. With regard to robes and alms food they are not
allowed.
“All, however, is allowed in the case of
medicine.” Medicine is a necessity. If you have an ailment or a disease, you
really need medicine. So with regard to medicine hinting and all these others
are allowed.
“But when the disease is cured, is it or is it
not allowed to use the medicine obtained in this way?”
There is a difference of opinion with regard to this. Vinaya
specialists say that it is all right, but Suttanta
specialists say no. Vinaya specialists say that
Buddha has permitted and so it is all right to use medicine obtained by hinting
and others even after the disease is cured. The Suttanta
specialists say no, although there is no offense (That means there is no
breaking of a certain rule.) nevertheless the livelihood is sullied, therefore
it is not allowable. If you want to purify your livelihood to the utmost, do
not use them.
This has to be undertaken by means of
understanding. You have to reflect, ‘I use the robe just to ward off heat,
cold, bites of insects’ and so on. You have to use your understanding.
Therefore it is to be undertaken by means of understanding.
Now paragraph 124 “Herein, reviewing is of
two kinds: at the time of receiving requisites and at the time of using them.”
Sometimes you may receive a robe today, but perhaps you do not use it until a
month later. So there are two kinds of reviewing at receiving and at the time
of using.
“For use is blameless in one who at the time of receiving robes, etc., reviews them
either as (mere) elements or as repulsive.” Here also the translation is a
little inaccurate. Here what is meant is when the monk receives the robe and
others, he reflects or reviews them as mere elements or as repulsive.
Then he puts them aside and later makes use of them. He does not just put them
aside for later use, but he puts them aside and later makes use of them.
“And in one who reviews them thus at the
time of using them” - that means you have to review both at the time of
receiving and at the time of using. This passage may imply that if you review at
the time of receiving and if you do not review at the time when you are using,
it is alright. However the emphasis here must be on reviewing at both times -
both at the time of receiving and at the time when you make use of them.
“Here is an explanation to settle the
matter. There are four kinds of use: use as theft, use as debt, use as
inheritance, use as a master. Herein, use by one who
is unvirtuous and makes use (of requisites), even
sitting in the midst of the community, is called ‘use by theft’.” ‘Unvirtuous’ really means a monk who has broken one of the
four most important rules. If a monk breaks one of the four most important
rules, he is no longer a monk. He may be wearing robes. He may be claiming to
be a monk. His use of requisites is said to be by theft. He is not entitled to
receive the offerings given by lay people. So it is like stealing something. It
is called ‘use as theft’. ‘Unvirtuous’ here refers to
a person who is no longer a monk.
“Use without reviewing by one who is
virtuous is ‘use as a debt’.” Monks depend on lay people for these requisites.
Lay people offer these requisites to monks. Therefore monks have the
responsibility to reflect or to review on these four requisites. If a monk does
not review when accepting them or using them, then he is said to be ‘using them
as a debt’ or he is indebted.
He must review the four requisites. When?
The robe should be reviewed every time that you use it. Every time that you
pick up your robe, then you have to review the robe. “I use the robe just to
ward off heat, cold, bites of insects” and so on.
“The alms food (should be
reviewed) lump by lump.” What do you call this? A
morsel? So alms food should be reviewed at every
morsel, at every mouthful. That is why talking while eating is discouraged
for monks. A monk who talks while eating is supposed to be of bad behaviour because instead of reviewing, he is speaking.
When he is speaking, he is losing reviewing.
Student: During the
chanting before our meals we say the first portion is for precepts, the second
portion is for samÈdhi and the third is to save all
beings.
Teacher: Yes. Good. You
have to be doing something while eating. I mean thinking of something. When you
eat without reviewing, you are using the food as a debt. So
alms food should be reviewed lump by lump. “One who cannot do this,
should review it before the meal (That means in the morning.), after the meal,
in the first watch, in the middle watch, and in the last watch. If dawn breaks
on him without his having reviewed it, he finds himself in the position of one
who has used it as a debt.” Dawn is the beginning of one day. The new day does
not begin at midnight. The day is reckoned by dawn. When dawn breaks and a monk
does not review at all, then he is said to be using
the requisites as a debt.
“Also the resting place should be reviewed
each time it is used.” When you go into the monastery and when you go out of
the monastery, you must review.
“Recourse to mindfulness both in the
accepting and the use of medicine is proper.” So with regard to medicine you
have to review both accepting it and making use of it.
“But while this is so, though there is an
offense for one who uses it without mindfulness after mindful acceptance, there
is no offense for one who is mindful in using after accepting without
mindfulness.” You may accept it without reviewing, but when you are using, you
must really review it. That is what is meant here.
“Purification is of four kinds: purification
by Teaching, purification by restraint, purification by search, and
purification by reviewing.” This also has to do with the four virtues or four sÊlas. The first is purification by Teaching. The word
‘Teaching’ is not correct here.
There are two English translations of the Visuddhi Magga. One was made by a
Burmese gentleman and the other by Venerable NÈÓamoli.
Both of them did not get the right translation here.
The PÈÄi word here
is desanÈ. The word ‘desanÈ’
generally means a sermon, or a teaching, or a preaching. But here desanÈ is used in a technical sense in Vinaya.
‘DesanÈ’ in Vinaya means
revealing, or revealing one’s offenses, or confession. So it is purification by
confession. When a monk has broken a rule or rules, he confesses it to another
monk. When he confesses, he gets free from the offense of breaking that rule.
There is a kind of sÊla
which is called ‘purification by confession’. Just by confession you can get
rid of this offense. These are minor rules in the PÈÔimokkha.
For example cutting a tree - monks are not allowed to cut trees. If a monk cuts
a tree, or plucks a flower, or picks a fruit, he comes to a minor offense. In
order to get free from that minor offense he just has to confess it to another
monk.
There are some graver offenses which need
not only confession, but which require staying under probation for a period of
time. Also there are the gravest offenses which cause a person not to be a
monk. In that case ‘giving up robes’ is called a purification.
Giving up being a monk is what i mean. Becoming a sÈmaÓera (a novice) or becoming a lay person is called a ‘purification’ there. So offenses incurred with
regard to PÈÔimokkha rules can be purified by
confession.
‘Purification by restraint’ is restraint of
sense faculties. That is called ‘purification by restraint’.
The third one, ‘purification by livelihood’,
is called ‘purification by search’. That is because you have to search for
requisites, especially food. ‘Search for’ means to find by
suitable means, not by asking, or begging by word of mouth.
The last one is ‘purification by reviewing’.
In order to purify the last of the four sÊlas, you
review whenever you receive a requisite or when you make use of a requisite.
These are the four purifications corresponding to the four sÊlas.
“Use of the requisites by the seven kinds of
Trainers is called ‘use as inheritance’.” Do you know what are
Trainers? You know that there are eight Noble Persons or eight kinds of
Noble Persons. There are four stages of enlightenment and eight types of
consciousness that arise at the four stages of enlightenment. They are the Path
of Stream-Entrant, the Fruition of Stream-Entrant, the Path of Once-Returner, the Fruition of Once-Returner,
The Path of NoÓ-Returner, the Fruition of Non-Returner, the Path of Arahant, the Fruition of Arahant. These are
the eight types of consciousness. It is said that there are eight Enlightened
Persons or eight Noble Persons. In PÈÄi the word is Ariya. You may be familiar with the word ‘ariyan’. The person at the moment of Stream-Entrant Path
consciousness is called the ‘First Noble Person’. The person at the moment of
Stream-Entrant Fruition is called the ‘Second Noble Person’ and so on. There
are eight kinds of Noble Persons.
What are Trainers? ‘Trainers’ here means
those who have attained to the lower stages of enlightenment. Briefly Trainers
are those who are not ordinary persons (puthujjanas) nor Arahants. They are
Stream-Entrants, Once-Returners, Non-Returners, (and the Arahant at
the moment of path consciousness only). In PÈÄi they
are called ‘Sekhas’. They are not puthujjanas
or ordinary persons. And they are not Arahants. Their
use of the requisites is called ‘use as an inheritance’.
“But how then is the
Blessed One’s requisites or the laity’s requisites that are used?
Although given by the laity, they actually belong to the Blessed One, because
it is by the Blessed One that they are permitted.” Buddha permitted us to
accept things from lay people. It is virtually the requisites of the Buddha and
not of the lay people. When a son makes use of his father’s belongings, his
father’s requisites, he is said to be ‘using them as an inheritance’. “That is
why it should be understood that the Blessed One’s requisites are used. The
confirmation here is in the DhammadÈyÈda Sutta.” That Sutta is in the Majjhima NikÈya (The Middle
Length Sayings) in the third Sutta. Buddha said in
this Sutta, “Be the inheritors of Dhamma
and not of requisites.” Buddha urged his disciples in this way.
“Use by those whose cankers are destroyed
(That means those used by Arahants) is called ‘use as
a master’: for they make use of them as masters because they have escaped the
slavery of craving.”
From among these four try to make use as a
master. That is the best one. For those ordinary people who have not yet
attained any stage of enlightenment there can be no use as an inheritance and
also of course as a master. So there are only two - use as theft and use as
debt. But the Commentary said that the use by those who keep their precepts,
who keep their virtue pure could be included in the
use as inheritance because it is the opposite of the use as a debt.
“For one possessed of virtue is called a
‘trainer’ too because of possessing this training.” This is stretching the
meaning of the word. The word ‘Trainer’ or the PÈÄi
word ‘Sekha’ means persons that are neither puthujjanas nor Arahants, but
here with the stretching of the meaning, a person who has good sÊla ,
although he is a puthujjana, can be called a
‘trainer’ here. Use of requisites can be included as use as inheritance.
“As regards these three kinds of use, since
use as a master is best, when a bhikkhu undertakes
virtue dependent on requisites, he should aspire to that and use them after
reviewing them in the way described. There is one sentence missing here. I don’t
know why he left it out. “For he who so does is one who does what is to be
done.” That sentence is missing.
Student: That comes where?
Teacher: After ‘in the way
described’. “For who so acts (I think it is better to say ‘acts’.) is one who does what is to be done.”
In paragraph 130 “In connection with the
fulfilling of the virtue dependent on requisites there should be told the story
of the novice Sa~gharakkhita,
the Nephew.” He was eating and his Preceptor said, “Don’t let your tongue
burn.” Or “Don’t burn your tongue.” He was not eating hot food at that moment.
Still the Preceptor said, “Don’t burn your tongue.” That means don’t eat
without reviewing. He became an Arahant later.
In paragraph 131 about the middle of the
paragraph it says, “That of magnanimous ordinary men devoted to profitable
things.” ‘Magnanimous ordinary men’ means informed puthujjanas
or good puthujjanas. ‘Devoted to profitable things’
really means devoted to vipassanÈ meditation.
The number of precepts given by Venerable NÈÓamoli is different than that given in the traditional
interpretation. Traditionally the number of the rules for monks is - how do I
say? There are too many rules here. “Nine thousand millions and a hundred and
eighty millions, then as well, and fifty plus a hundred thousand and
thirty six again to swell. The total restraint disciplines: these rules the
Enlightened One explains told under heads for filling out, which the Discipline
restraint contains.” Traditionally the number is 91,805,036,000.
Student: That’s a lot.
Teacher: That is because
for one rule there are many minor offenses.
Student: It’s 91 billion.
Student: It’s 91 trillion.
Teacher: I don’t know.
Student: Million, billion,
trillion. That’s right. No, it’s only billion.
Teacher: So we take pride
in saying, “I am keeping 91 billion precepts.”
Now in paragraph 134 “The magnanimous
ordinary man’s virtue, which from the time of admission to the Order is devoid
even of the stain of a (wrong) thought because of its extreme purity, like a
gem of purest water.” ‘Gem of purest water’ - what does that mean? It doesn’t
make sense. It should be ‘like a gem well-polished’. That is the meaning. It
can be well-polished or well-washed.
Then there is a story. I will skip the
story. The stories are not difficult to understand.
Then there are more stories on page 48 in
paragraph 137. This is the story of a monk who broke his legs and asked the
robbers to let him practice meditation for the night. He practiced meditation
on pain caused by the broken bones. At dawn he became an Arahant.
He meditated on the pain. Pain became his object of meditation.
On page 49 the quotation from PaÔisambhidÈ is not so easy to understand. We can skip it.
“In the case of killing living beings, (a) abandoning is virtue, (b) abstention
is virtue, (c) volition is virtue, (d) restraint is virtue, (e)
non-transgression is virtue.” Then the others are given one by one - “ In the case of taking what is not given, in the case of
sexual misconduct, in the case of false speech”
and so on. Even in the case of first jhÈna the
abandoning of hindrances is virtue. In the case of second jhÈna
the abandoning of applied (vitakka) and sustained (vicÈra) thought is virtue and so on.
In paragraph 141 “And here there is no state
called ‘abandoning’ other than the mere non-arising of the killing of living
things, etc., as stated.” ‘Abandoning’
really means not letting them arise. If they have arisen, then they have
already arisen, and you cannot do anything about them.
We come to the end of the questions and
answers - “What is Virtue? In what sense is it virtue?” and so on.
“What is the defiling of it?” and “What is
the cleansing of it?” Monks are exhorted to keep rules very intact, to keep
their sÊla very pure. The ideal state is that the
precepts are not broken anywhere. That is explained here.
“When a man has broken the training course
at the beginning or at the end in any instance of the seven classes of
offenses, his virtue is called ‘torn’, like a cloth that is cut at the edge.” His
virtue should be untorn. If it is broken at the
beginning or at the end, it is called ‘torn sÊla’.
“But when he has broken it in the middle, it
is called ‘rent’, like a cloth that is rent in the middle. When he has broken
it twice or thrice in succession, it is called ‘blotched’, like a cow whose
body is some such color as black or red with a discrepant color appearing on
the back or the belly. When he has broken it (all over) at intervals, it is
called ‘mottled’, like a cow speckled (all over) with discrepant-colored spots
at intervals. This in the first place is how there comes to be tornness the breach that has gain, etc., as its cause.”
“And likewise with the seven bonds of
sexuality” - it means the seven kinds of engagements in sexuality. “here, brahman, some ascetic or brahman claims to lead the life of purity rightly.” It is a
little inaccurate. It should say ‘some ascetic or brahman
claiming to lead the life of purity rightly but does not.’ It should go like
that. “Some ascetic or brahman claiming to lead the
life of purity rightly but does not enter into actual sexual intercourse with
women. Yet he agrees to massage, manipulation, bathing and rubbing down by
women.’ In our country these are called ‘minor sexuality’. It is not sexual
intercourse, but they pertain to sexuality. So these seven things, massage etc.
are called ‘minor sexuality’. Although a person may not break the rule which
forbids sexual intercourse, if he is thinking of this, then his sÊla is said to be ‘impure’. It is not broken, but it
becomes impure because he is thinking of these things. He is taking delight in
massage etc. being done to him. This is a kind of sexuality. These things are
called ‘minor sexuality’ in our country. If we want to keep sÊla
pure, then we must avoid doing these things too.
In paragraph 154 about the middle “owing to
that unvirtuousness he is ugly as hemp cloth. Contact
with him is painful because those who fall in with his views” - ‘fall in with
his views’, what is that? What does that
mean?
Student: To agree with him.
Teacher: The PÈÄi word means to imitate him, to follow his conduct.
Sometimes the PÈÄi words can be misleading if you do
not know the exact formation of these words. The PÈÄi
word here is diÔÔhÈnugati. It could be diÔÔhiÈnugati or diÔÔhÈnugati. It
really is diÔÔhÈnugati and not diÔÔhiÈnugati.
Venerable NÈÓamoli took it to be diÔÔhiÈnugati.
That’s why you see the word ‘view’ here. ‘DiÔÔhi’
means wrong view. Actually the PÈÄi word is to be
separated as diÔÔhÈ Ènugati.
‘DiÔÔhÈ’ means what is seenand ‘Ènugati’ means
following. So following what is seen - that means following his conduct. Is
there a good word for that?
Student: Imitating.
Teacher: So “Those
imitating his conduct are brought to long-lasting suffering in the states of
loss.”
“He is like a log from a pyre.” The reference is not 99 but 90.
Paragraph 155, do you understand that
passage? “Now the Blessed One has shown
that when the unvirtuous have their minds captured by
pleasure and satisfaction in the indulgence of the five cords of sense-desires,
in (receiving) salutation, in being honored, etc., the result of that kamma, directly visible in all ways, is very violent pain,
with that (kamma) as its condition, capable of
producing a gush of hot blood by causing agony of the heart with the mere
recollection of it.”
I have a fresh translation of that. “Now the
Blessed One who has directly seen the result of kamma
in all ways (Buddha has seen kamma and its results in
all ways.) and wanting to show the very bitter pain to be experienced by unvirtuous persons whose minds are captured by pleasure and
satisfaction mentioned above has said: (Then what kind of pain?) pain which is
caused by pleasure and satisfaction in the indulgence of the five cords of
sensual desires (When a person indulges in these sensual desires, then there
will come pain.)caused by pleasure and satisfaction in
receiving salutation.” Suppose that I am
a monk and I have broken the most important rules. Actually I am not a monk at
all, but I claim myself to be a monk. Then I receive salutation and bowing down
from lay people. As a result of that, I may suffer in hell or in the woeful
states. “Caused by pleasure and satisfaction in receiving salutations or being
honored, etc., the result of that kamma directly
visible in all ways, is very violent pain, with that kamma
as condition, capable of producing a gush of hot blood by causing agony of
heart with the mere recollection of unvirtuousness.”
Suppose I am unvirtuous. When i
think of my unvirtuousness, I will have remorse and
depression. This can cause me to vomit blood. So it is capable of producing a
gush of hot blood by causing agony of the heart, just by mere recollection of unvirtuousness. This kind of pain, very bitter pain, is to
be experienced by those who are unvirtuous and whose
minds are captured by pleasure and satisfaction mentioned above. It is to be
translated that way although it is a little odd.
***Devoid of SayÈdaw’s explanations I believe the fresh translation is
the following: “Now the Blessed One who has directly seen the result of kamma in all ways and wanting to show the very bitter pain
to be experienced by unvirtuous persons whose minds
are captured by pleasure and satisfaction mentioned above has said: pain which
is caused by pleasure and satisfaction in the indulgence of the five cords of
sensual desires caused by pleasure and satisfaction in receiving salutation, or
being honored, etc., the result of that kamma,
directly visible in all ways, is very violent pain, with that kamma as condition, capable of producing a gush of hot
blood by causing agony of heart with the mere recollection of unvirtuousness."***
In paragraph 158 one word is missing. The
word ‘therefore’ should stand at the head of the paragraph. It should read
“Therefore, what pleasure has a man of broken virtue” and so on. The advantage
of being virtuous and the disadvantage of being unvirtuous,
these two are given here.
Towards the end of the verses “He is not
free from any sort of terror”. It could be translated as “any sort of
danger”. In the fourth line of this
paragraph it says, “He is well set upon the road to hell”. If all the woeful
states are meant by hell, it would be all right. Here what is meant is not hell
only, but the other woeful states also. There are four woeful states.
In paragraph 159 midway through the verses
“There are no cankers here and now”. It should say “There are no dangers here
and now” not ‘cankers’. “there are no dangers here and
now to plague the virtuous man at all.”
I think that is it for the first chapter.
You have seen that mostly virtue for monks or precepts for monks is what is treated mostly in this chapter. Some advice is applicable
to the virtue of lay people and also to nuns and so on. Much is only for monks.
For lay persons the keeping of five precepts is just enough. Buddha said that a
person who claims himself to be a disciple of the
Buddha should keep his moral conduct pure. That means he should keep five
precepts. If you take five precepts before going to practice meditation, that
is all right.
For lay people it is easier to have
purification of morals, purity of moral conduct, than monks. Monks have
disadvantage here. Monks have so many rules to keep. If they have broken some
rules and they do not get rid of these offenses, then that state can be a block
to their concentration and progress. They must do confession or if the offenses
are graver, they must do something like living under probation for some period
of time. It is not so easy for monks to have complete purity of morals as it is
for lay people. For lay people although they may have broken rules in the past,
before practice of meditation if they take precepts and mean seriously to keep
them, that is enough for them. Purity of morals for the practice of meditation
is easier for lay people than for monks.
OK. Any questions?
Student: So why does anyone
want to become a monk?
Teacher: A monk has fewer
things to worry about. Monks have more time to devote to the study and
practice. That is why I said in one of the talks that those monks who study the
Visuddhi Magga either give
up their robes or go into the forest and practice meditation.
Next week we go to ascetic practices.
SÈdhu! SÈdhu! SÈdhu!