Bhikkhu Cintita

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  • From Thought to Destiny: To Do Good

    Uposatha Teaching: First Quarter Moon, September 2, 2010.

    Index to Current Series
    “    Thought – Act – Habit – Character – Destiny”

    Bad deeds, and deeds hurtful to ourselves, are easy to do; what is beneficial and good, that is very difficult to do. Dhammapada 163

    We are considering the three systems of Buddhist ethics as advice for what actions we choose to perform. In last week’s episode we considered To Avoid Evil, which is To Follow Ethical Precepts. Next week we will consider To Purify the Mind, which is the most uniquely Buddhist approach to developing Virtue. This week we look at the most natural form of ethics, which arises naturally in humans as a result of our innate capacity for kindness, and that is, to seek the benefit of all and avoid harm to all.

    What is involved in Doing Good is not only to have a reserve of kindness and a willingness to sacrifice some personal benefit for others, but also to track as best as possible the consequences of one’s actions, whether completed, in progresses or under consideration. This entails the capacity to Do Good will vary considerably from person to person, particularly with regard to the last point. We live in a very complex world in which tracing consequences of action runs very deep, and ultimately, like the chess player who can only see a certain number of moves ahead, to Do Good we must all in the end follow our best hunch.

    Performing actions in the world is a huge responsibility. The depth of the consequences of our actions is captured in the Buddha’s exposition of causality, “because this arises that arises, because this ceases that ceases” as the pervasive operating principle in the world, but is most thoroughly expounded in the Mahayana philosophical tradition with the view that just as we depend on everything in the world (Joanna Macy writes, “The Amazon Rain Forest is a part of our lungs”), and everything in the world depends on us (we move our arm and the world moves). To see that this is true, consider the following:

    The actions you perform today will determine whether others live or die! This sounds implausible because we tend to think of the effects of our actions as extending only as far as we can track them, while they in fact extend forever. Suppose, for instance, you drive to the mall to buy a spiffy t-shirt, and as you enter the freeway a friendly car, cruising down the slow lane, slows down further to let you merge. However a less patient car behind that car decides it really wants to drive a bit faster and pulls into the middle lane, which then induces some further realignment for other cars further back. It is easy to see that the process of realignment will propagate, but even as the adjustments settle is likely eventually to influence the timing of entries onto and exits from the freeway further down the highway, entailing further realignments. In fact the realignments will propagate down the highway you are on, then onto roads and highways that intersect with this highway, then back onto the highway but in the opposite direction, and eventually deep into Canada, and deep into Mexico. Traffic flow will differ slightly over the map in the hours and days to come for your having made this trip to the mall. Now every day accidents happen on our highways and roads, many of them fatal. An accident generally arises due to faulty split-second decisions in the context of the particular immediate alignment of vehicles. Since your actions have propagated realignments throughout the road map, it follows that accidents, some fatal, will now happen that would not have happened if you had not driven to the mall, but also that accidents will not happen that would have happened.

    In meteorology they similarly talk about the Butterfly Effect, the influence the flight of a single butterfly will have on the occurrence or non-occurrence of storms and hurricanes in the decades and centuries to come. Similarly your actions will result in wars happening or not happening, corporations rising and falling, and so on. You are not a sole cause of any of it, but an enabler for virtually all, past a certain time horizon. Being in the world is a huge responsibility, whether you are a human or a butterfly. Not that we can actually track much of this.

    One way we extend our limited ability to track consequences is to deal in probabilities. This is called Being Careful. So, leaving a tool box just inside the door of a poorly lit room is probably not Doing Good because of the likelihood, not certainty, of an unfelicitous consequence for someone’s bodily well-being. Another way to extend our ability to track consequences is research or investigation. This is called Being In The Know. For instance, I might learn the many ways my purchasing and consumption choices harm the environment; cause pollution of air, rivers, ground and oceans; cause global warming; sustain harmful social and economic conditions, and I might adjust my choices accordingly so that the consequences of my actions move away from harm and toward benefit. In the modern globalized world both the need to understand consequences is enhanced since they propagate so rapidly, and our ability to track consequences is extended since scholars and journalists explain many causal relations for us. Being Careful and Being In The Know are huge obligations for humans (butterflies, I suppose, are off the hook).

    The most ancient discussions in Buddhism in this area of Doing Good is the ethics of eating meat, an issue which is debated to this day. A number of precepts from early Buddhism touch on this issue. One is the precept not to kill living (breathing) things. Another is the broad rule of Right Livelihood, one of the eight folds of the Noble Eightfold Path, which lists among wrong livelihoods that of slaughtering animals. And a third is the monastic guideline laid down by the Buddha concerning eating meat (Jivaka Sutta, MN 55). This permits monks and nuns to eat meat, but with a caveat:

    “Jivaka, I say that there are three instances in which meat should not be eaten: when it is seen, heard, or suspected [that the living being has been slaughtered for the bhikkhu]. I say that meat should not be eaten in these three instances”

    In the later East Asian Mahayana tradition one of the Bodhisattva Precepts, common to all monastics and many laypeople, simply prohibits adherents from eating meat altogether.

    Now, killing an animal is in itself considered harmful. However, at the Buddha’s time many lay people would kill animals to feed themselves and also offer to any recluses who came by in search of alms, Buddhist or otherwise. Doing Good entails that one’s own choices should not have killing an animal as a consequence. But notice how the Buddha’s caveat works to ensure exactly this. If the lay donors have already killed an animal for family conception and general recluse consumption, acceptance of meat by the bhikkhu seems not to have killing as a consequence. The bhikkhu has a clean bill of mental purity. Accepting the carnivorous meal furthermore also avoids offending, confusing or disappointing the donors. If, however, a family offers to provide a meal to some Buddhist nuns, say, and to kill a pig, say, to to do so, according to the Buddha they would have to refuse.

    However, the modern food industry works differently than this pastoral scenario. First, the person who slaughters the animal is generally far removed from the situation in which the meat is consumed. The donor more likely simply buys the already slaughtered meat at a grocery store, but creates a market demand such that new meat is killed to replace what is purchased. Second, harm to animals is greatly magnified in corporate farms. The Buddha refers in the Jivaka Sutta to “the pain and grief on being led along with a neck-halter” and “the pain and grief on being slaughtered.” Now we have to consider that these are often done in a much less humane way as heretofore, by poorly trained and poorly paid employees, and add to that the pain and grief of being raised indoors in crowded, smelly, poorly lit conditions, and of chickens having their beaks clipped off to prevent them from pecking each other out of stress. Tracing further we have to consider the impact of producing feed for the animals, which we know to be environmentally enormous, contributing significantly, for instance, we now know, to Global Warming. (We also have to compare the alternative to meat, that is the consequences of vegetarian food production, including the modern use of pesticides, etc., which can also cost many animals their lives.) In sum, whereas the Buddha traced out the consequences of accepting meat for his time, modern conditions entail that in the hopes of Doing Good, we do this work ourselves.

    Modern Buddhist controversy around eating meat I think has two sources, one having to do with how much weight is given to Avoiding Evil relative to Doing Good, and the other having to do with how much weight is given to Doing Good relative to Purifying the Mind. These are not always in accord. In the first case, the Buddha provided us with a clear guideline for Avoiding Evil in meat eating, and for some that is enough. For instance, in Theravada countries it is normal for monks to accept meat knowing it has been specifically purchased to feed the monks, since it has not litereally been slaughtered to feed monks. In the second case, the actual consequences of the development of Virtue seem to actually diminish the further one is removed from the act of slaughter. The karmic consequences for the monk who accepts meat will be much less than for the monk who kills the animal himself, as we will see beginning next week.

    Doing Good tends to be emphasized, at least doctrinally, more in Mahayana than in Theravada. It is neglected, for instance, in the Theravada Abhidhamma, but is highlighted in the Mahayana as part of the Bodhisattva ideal. This might partially explain the difference in the respective attitudes toward meat eating (allowing however that in Tibet not eating meat is hardly an option in the harsh agricultural environment). However, in general practice Theravada monastics are well known for their good works, for Doing Good, and there are, in fact, many Theravada monastics and sometimes monasteries are strictly vegetarian, citing ethical reasons. I have, or instance, met some very senior Burmese monks who have encouraged me never to accept meat from donors.

    Although Precepts can point out consequences that might otherwise be missed, occasionally they may contradict our commitment to Doing Good, for instance, in the case where the Gestapo shows up at your front door and asks you, gleefully aware that a Buddhist will not lie, if you are hiding Jews in the attic, or where you just happen to be returning from a softball game with a baseball bat in your hand and walk in right behind a man who has “gone postal” and is about start shooting at fellow employees. The inclination is greater in the Theravada tradition to obey the letter of the Precept, and in Mahayana to abandon Precepts more readily where this seems the more compassionate thing to do. The early Suttas give little advice on handling these contradictions, but one exception is MN 58, where the Buddha draws an analogy to the necessity of painfully digging a swallowed stone out of a baby’s throat with one’s finger, thereby causing harm but preventing greater harm. However the Buddha is not known ever to have justified anything remotely like a Just War or for that matter any taking of human life.

    A final point concerning Doing Good concerns who is the beneficiary of our kindness. It is a commonsense idea that certain people do not merit Goodwill, for instance, that criminals, torturers, murderers and people whose opinions or certain other attributed differ from ours, do not deserve to benefit from our deeds, in fact deserve to suffer from any misdeeds we might cook up. This idea is anathema to Buddhism (although there is a common misunderstanding in Buddhism that all personal suffering is caused by individual kamma and that helping them to alleviate the suffering means they will just have to burn it off later, a wrong view that I will discuss in future weeks). In fact, just as we try to develop Metta (loving-kindness) for everyone without discrimination, even for our worst enemies, all beings properly fall withing the scope of Doing Good. The thoughts of retribution that tell us differently are simply unskillful, and rooted in hatred. Thought they may be pervasive it is our aspiration to let them go and to Do Good without discrimination.

    Not the perversities of others, not their sins of commission or omission, but his own misdeeds and negligences should a sage take notice of. Dhammapada 50

    Here are questions to consider on this Uposatha Day: When is punishment Doing Good? You can consider punishment of children or punishment of criminals. What consequences of punishment can you trace that are harmful for others in addition to the person being punished?

  • From Thought to Destiny: To Avoid Evil

    Uposatha Teaching: Full Moon, August 25, 2010.

    Index to Current Series
    “    Thought – Act – Habit – Character – Destiny”

    This mind of mine went formerly wandering about as it liked, as it listed, as it pleased; but I shall now hold it in thoroughly, as the rider who holds the hook holds in the furious elephant. Dhammapada, 326.

    Last week I introduced the three ethical systems that inform our actions in Buddhism, Avoiding Evil, Doing Good and Purifying the Mind. This week I discuss the first of these in detail, which is in fact a variety of systems of vows or precepts.

    Precepts take the form of rules or regulations. Examples are “Do not kill living things,”Do not tell a falsehood. There are systems of five, eight, nine and ten precepts. The full set of monastics vows runs into the hundreds of precepts. Almost always stated as abstentions, precepts are valuable for their clarity in stating minimal standards of physical conduct. In Buddhism they are almost always a matter of vow rather than imposed by an outside authority such as the Commandments that Moses brought down from the mountain as a gift from God, or traffic laws imposed under threat of fine. Exceptions might be temple rules like, “Take your shoes off before entering.”

    Precepts can inform important karmic decisions, like whether or not to murder your annoying neighbor, or simply provide standards to ensure harmonious relations, much like many traffic laws, or simply to express some point of etiquette, like always bowing to the Buddha when entering a temple. One can, and will, create personal precepts, like feed the dog at 6:00 pm. And in fact personal vows are how we best live deliberately, how we take a stand and boycott banks or insurance companies, or food from factory farms, and stick with them.

    Westerners often have some resistance to precepts because they regard rules and regulations as infringing on personal freedom, or would like to keep their options open rather than to commit themselves to anything. Doing Good or Purifying the Mind seems to afford more opportunity for personal creativity, they reason. However, the notion of personal freedom referred to is almost always at odds with the Buddhist concept of liberation; the latter is not the freedom to do what you want but rather the freedom from having to want anything, that is, it is freedom from the tyranny of the self with its endless desires and needs, dislikes and fears.

    Precepts put these requirements of the self into a box that if useful will create an initial level of discomfort, but give an opportunity to understand that self’s needs and to develop humility and contentment. It will also expose consequences that might have happened along with intentions that might have been enacted; these will be left dangling where they can be clearly observed as harmful and ill-conceived. For instance, many Buddhist codes include a precept to abstain from gossip, which gives one pause as certain situations open up this enjoyable option. Without that precept that behavior is likely to go unnoticed as something that causes problems, in its consequences for the mind and for others, we will tend to be careless in that behavior.

    In following precepts we learn better to care for consequences and to cultivate skillful karma. There is a Zen saying that if you put a snake in a bamboo tube it will discover its own shape. In fact one of the common expressions for precepts is sekiya, rules of training; one might think of them as training wheels for the bicycle of practicing Doing Good and Purifying the Mind. Precepts will also in the end create a sense of ease as a break from the burden of the self.

    Taking this one step further, all of ritual falls withing the range of precepts. In ritual there is no direct moral component, yet there is what is considered proper behavior. But like moral precepts they afford the opportunity to engage in activities independently of the tyranny of the self and thereby to develop wholesome qualities of mind, and to experience a joyful sense of liberation. Ritualizing everyday activities has similar advantages in eliminating opportunities for personal choice.

    Last week I described precepts as naturally porous and rigid. The rigidity often shows up when two precepts contradict. For instance Just War might involve killing for some greater good. With the Gestapo at the door and Jews in the attic, a little lie might be justified. In Zen circles there is generally an assumption that precepts almost always contradict one another and that through wisdom one arrives at the appropriate call. It is interesting that the Buddha rarely sanctioned violating precepts. The one example I am aware of is in MN 38 where the Buddha was challenged for using disagreeable speech against Devadatta, his cousin who tried to create a schism in the Sangha, tried to kill the Buddha and other disagreeable things. The Buddha said that sometimes it is necessary to dig a pebble out of a child’s mouth even though it causes great discomfort.

    Next week we consider how to Do Good, that is to plan actions that are of benefit, even where the bottom line of the precepts does not require it.

  • Was Jesus a Buddhist Monk?

    The neat separation many of us make in our minds between Eastern and Western religion and culture belies many common historical origins and interconnections. We forget the common origin of most of the languages of Europe and India, along with Persian, Armenian and Hittite. We forget how Alexander, a Greek/Macedonian extended an empire all the way to India, stranding many outposts of Greek culture in palaces like Ghandara, in present day Afghanistan and Pakastan, later to become a major center of Buddhism. We forget that King Ashoka of 3rd Century B.C. India dispatched missionaries to spread Buddhism far and wide, including to Greece, Egypt, Syria and Italy, and how the Silk Road, the trade route through which Buddhism extended itself historically extended not only to China in the east, but to the Mediterranean and Rome in the West. Centuries later the extensive Arab empire would serve as a conduit between East and West.

    So it should not be surprising that parallels between Christianity and Buddhism have been recognized for some time. Some of these are physical artifacts, such as the similarity of the Christian gesture of prayer, which apparently has no Jewish counterpart, and the Indian anjali, carried wherever Buddhism has spread, or the Catholic rosary and the Indian mala. Scholars have pointed out similarities between many biblical and Buddhist texts. Most striking for me has always been the Buddhist flavor of the words of Jesus, particularly evident in the non-canonical Gospel of Thomas. And then there is the existence of similar monastic traditions in Buddhism and Christianity.

    I will let Ajahn Brahm fill in the next couple of paragraphs about recent discoveries of Buddhist communities around Alexandria Egypt dating since before the time of Christ, including the possible Buddhist identity of a monastic community called the Therapeutae and the possible affiliation of Jesus with that community or with some offshoot or sister community.

    [youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WpBKG2Lz8lQ]

    [youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kv27hu-Sxu8]
    Is Christianity with its Jewish influences—much as Zen with its Taoist influences—in the end a branch of Buddhism? Was Jesus the original Jew-Bu, a precursor to the many modern Jewish practitioners of Buddhism?

    When I was at St. Joseph Abbey last month, visiting with Father William and Brother Aaron, I was glad to see that they were not only aware of the evidence for the Buddhist origins of their own monastic lives but found it to be quite compelling. A further common development in the monastic tradition both East and West concerns higher education and research. Universities developed in India from Buddhist monasteries in the First Millennium A.D.— Nalanda is the best know example—, and in Europe from Christian monasteries several hundred years later. In my recent essay “Science and Vinaya” I point to parallels between the traditional Buddhist monastic community and the modern scientific community. Although I attribute the commonalities there to similarity in function, it may be that the roots of modern scientific discipline trace all the way back to the Buddhist Vinaya historically.

    This is all cool stuff, but still speculative

  • From Thought to Destiny: Introduction

    Quarter Moon Teaching

    “Sow a thought,
    and you reap an act;
    Sow an act,
    and you reap a habit;
    Sow a habit,
    and you reap a character;
    Sow a character,     and you reap a destiny.”
    – anonymous

    This quote may have a Buddhist origin. No one seems to know where it came from, but various Nineteenth Century Western writers referred to it without attribution and it seems now to be variously attributed to each of them, but some think it may be a translation from Chinese, so its resemblance to Buddhist thought might not be a coincidence.

    This poem concisely and precisely as pie captures the foundational set of Buddhist teachings on Karma. The word “karma” in Sanskrit, or “kamma” in Pali (which is roughly Sanskrit without r’s), means action, action of all kinds. For instance, you can recognize this root in the Noble Eightfold Path in which Pali “Samma Kammanta” is English “Right Action.”

    Traditionally the central concern of karma in India, before and after the Buddha, has been the relationship between our present actions and our future welfare or destiny. The Sanskrit word for action is Karma. For the brahmins since before the Buddha the ritual aspects of action were the determinants of destiny, and knowledge of the rituals gave brahmins their authority. The Buddha rejected this and stressed the volitional or intentional aspects of karma as the determinants of future welfare, character or destiny.

    So the Buddha often used “karma” in a technical sense as for something having two components: Intention and Action, that is, why you do something, and what it is you actually do. For the Buddha intention is critical: If no intention is present, for instance in the case of killing a bug accidentally, there is no karma at all:. It matters to the world, but not generally to the character, welfare or destiny of the actor. But if intention is present, then the nature of the intention will help shape character and destiny.

    There is a great assortment of intentions, but the Buddha recommended avoidance of those rooted in Greed, Hatred or Delusion, because actions that have these as intentional components (1) are likely to hurt others, (2) tend to make us greedy, hateful and deluded people and (3) bring us personal suffering, if not now then in the future. Through karma we not only make the world, we also make ourselves. The more you steal the more you become a thief, the more you kill the more you become a killer, the more you gossip the more you become a gossip. Actions become habits. These habit patterns form who we are, and even manifest themselves in characteristic physical attributes such as beauty or ulcers. In fact the Buddha often referred to a Law of Karmic Payback whereby we reap what we sow in some rather specific ways. Our character propels us forward into life circumstances, into new rebirths, into states of woe or bliss and eventually into nirvana, that is, the ending of Karma.

    So, the focus of Buddhist practice, that is, of the Noble Eightfold Path, is the choice of that first thought from which, as the poem tells us, everything else follows. Understanding what else follows is important in understanding the choice we make in the first thought. I herewith begin a possibly lengthy series of Uposatha Day teachings on the topic of this little poem. It will take us from Karma past Rebirth and on to Nirvana.

    This is a challenging topic that is often poorly understood. Aspects of this topic are also quite controversial in the West. Western minds, particularly the Law of Karmic Payback and Rebirth. This will require some careful consideration of a range of viewpoints.

    … to be continued

  • Beyond the Noble Eightfold Path

    Quarter Moon Teaching

    The Suttas recount the following conversation:

    As he was sitting there, Ven. Ananda said to the Blessed One, “This is half of the holy life, lord: admirable friendship, admirable companionship, admirable camaraderie.”

    “Don’t say that, Ananda. Don’t say that. Admirable friendship, admirable companionship, admirable camaraderie is actually the whole of the holy life.

    The question I want to raise is, What happened to the Noble Eightfold Path in this dialog? Isn’t it the whole of the holy life? The Buddha goes on to answer this, but let’s enjoy the suspense for a while.

    The Noble Eightfold path is pragmatic, rational, integrated and rather self-contained. As you continue your studies you will find that most of the Buddhist teachings relate to one or more of the eight steps of the path: as you learn about Emptiness, about meditation techniques, about Karma and Rebirth, about the many mental factors, about the various systems of Precepts, and so on, things I have only begun to touch on in my brief overview. However, like everything, a path is embedded in a larger context: A physical path winds its way through a forest to the top of a hill, down the other side, over a bridge spanning a creek, past a hornet’s nest across a meadow and home. What keeps the traveler on the path when he or she might just as well go off swimming or rock climbing, or prospecting. And it is also so with the Noble Eightfold Path. It has to begin somewhere, what are the conditions for entering the path in the first place? What keeps one on the path? How does one find out that there is a path and where it leads?

    We have seen that our friend the potter also follows a path, one that leads to the perfection of the skills of a master potter. Is there also some part of being a potter that lies outside the potter’s studio? Yes, the potter is embedded in a context that has material, social and motivational aspects:

    The Potter’s Material context. The potter had to rent or purchase his studio and all of the equipment needed, and probably has required a source of income, possibly from selling the fruits of the potter’s skills. The potter had to make a commitment of money and time to the practice of the potter’s craft, to rearrange his or her life simply to make room for practicing his or her craft.

    The Potter’s Social context. The potter has placed him- or herself into a tradition that has been transmitted through history to the present moment. The potter has probably spend innumerable hours studying the work of others, at craft shows, in craft shops and finally in museums. The potter found some source of training, perhaps as an apprentice to a master potter, or through college courses. The potter probably spends a lot of time talking with, and being encouraged and inspired by, other similar-minded craftspeople, and may belong to a guild or professional society. And the potter may also have become a resource for others who aspire to learn the potter’s craft perhaps.

    The Potter’s Motivational context. Probably the potter has learned a lot about art, and has been inspired by certain artists and certain trends. The potter has, if he or she is not too poor, purchased a lot of ceramics, other crafts and general art to bring home and live with as a constant source of inspiration. Almost certainly the potter subscribes to some potterly publications and reads potterly books. And the potter’s stained clothes and fingers are a constant reminder to him- or herself and to others that, “Here Stands a Potter.” All of these help keep pottering at the center of the potter’s life, ensures the unquestioned devotion of the potter to his or her craft, even when there are so many other interesting this to do in life.

    Buddhism is not much different:

    The Buddhist Material Context. The practitioner may share a practice space with a community, or may have invested some time and effort in fixing one up at home. The practitioner probably helps sustain a temple. The dedicated practitioner will have made a deep commitment to making room in his or her life, often with a complete reorientation of priorities, abandonment of livelihood and so on.

    The Buddhist Social Context.The practitioner has begun training, through reading, through lectures, through individual instruction from an admirable teacher, maybe joined a Buddhist center or a monastery. In fact, the practioner has placed him- or herself into a tradition that has been preserved and transmitted from ancient times through the centuries to the present moment. He or she probably belongs to a Buddhist community and has frequent contact with like-minded people, and it is here he or she discovers admirable people, those who have most benefited from and best embody Buddhist practice. The practitioner with time will become a resource for others drawn to practice perhaps even a deep inspiration for those taking their first steps on the path.

    The Buddhist Motivational Context. Similarly, the Buddhist practitioner has had the opportunity of contact with admirable Buddhist practitioners, which has often been the point at which entering the path is first considered, has read the Life of the Buddha and gained a deeply respectful attitude toward the Buddha, the Dharma and the Sangha, the admirable teacher, his admirable teachings and those admirable ones who transmit his teachings to new generations, thereby opening one’s mind to the three sources of influence. The practitioner has viewed Buddhist art, depictions of the Buddha and other aspects of what is admirable Buddhism. He or she will be inclined to undertake ritual symbolic activities such as chanting, bowing and offering incense, around an altar or a pagoda to reinforce a sense of devotion and respect for that which is admirable. All of these help keep Buddhist practice at the center of the practitioner’s life, even while there are so many other interesting things to do in life, to keep the practitioner on the path.

    The surprising thing about the material, social and motivational context in which one practices the Noble Eightfold Path is that it gives Buddhism its religiosity. It is organized, communal and devotional, very much like other religions. Many Westerners who are giving Buddhism the eye like to think that Buddhism is not a religion, but a philosophy or a way of life, but in any case something entirely rational. What gives?

    First of all, these elements are not uniquely religious, as we have seen in the case of the potter. Similarly a marriage has a material, social and motivational context, as does a hobby, probably anything one wants to be doing as a profession, scholarship, sports, both spectator and participatory. The relevant aspects of the respective contexts differ in form, the elements of the context manifest according to subject domain. For instance motivational aspects of marriage include a solemn ceremony, the wearing of rings as a constant reminder of one’s vows, a lot of daily ritual expressions of affection; motivational aspects of sports includes cheer leaders, pep talks, wearing certain symbols of the home team as well as attire of the appropriate color, ritual chanting, worship of prominent athletes, often even displaying their pictures, and so on. Naturally the broad domain of religion has certain characteristics that carry over to Buddhism as well.

    Second, the context of the Noble Eightfold Path not only provides conditions for embarking and remaining on the path, but the context by itself seems to support many of the aims of the Noble Eightfold Path by itself, albeit in a very unsophisticated way. In particular devotional practices, bodily expressions of respect, involvement in a mutually supporting community tend to give rise to skillful states of mind. They dethrone the ego and encourage humility, gratitude, compassion and generosity. I think developing these qualities is the common project of most religions, which might explain why they seem to have a common “religiosity.” The Buddhist project takes this to another level by adding the Noble Eightfold Path, a technology that capable of bringing these admirable human characteristics progressively toward perfection. Buddhism at the same time makes living breathing people, not gods, as objects of devotion and respect, those admirable people that best embody the Noble Eightfold Path in their lives. The Buddha finishes the quote above as follows:

    Admirable friendship, admirable companionship, admirable camaraderie is actually the whole of the holy life. When a monk [read practitioner] has admirable people as friends, companions, & comrades, he can be expected to develop & pursue the noble eightfold path.

    On this Uposatha Day of the first quarter moon, take some time and reflect, what are the factors that inspire me to take the Buddhist Path or that sustain me on the Path.  Of course many of the people involved will have reached you through books, on-line lectures, etc. Then consider, how do I show my appreciation for this, and how do I open my heart and mind to better accept this influence.


  • Some Temporary ordinations.

    In Burma and in Thailand it is very common for a man, especially a young man, to ordain as a monk temporarily, often for just a few days. This constitutes a completely valid ordination, going through all the steps, including shaving the head and beginning to wear the robes. But in this case the intention is not to remain a monk for long. Almost all Burmese men are ordained temporarily at some point, and of course many permanently. I don’t think there is temporary ordination for women, since ordination for nuns is a different kind of thing (that is quickly changing in the West, and in Sri Lanka).

    Last weekend I participated in a temporary ordination, and next weekend I will participate in another. Next weekend will involve three novices (under 20 years old) and five full monks (bhikkhus), and apparently they will live here at the Vihara for about a week. Interestingly I will be the senior monk from July 26 on, and so I will be responsible for offering them some training, scheduling meditation, etc.  An ordination is an Sangha Action, that is it is actually offered by a group of ordained monks, a sangha, who thereby accept new members.  So when I say I participated, it was as an existing member of a sangha.

    I learned a couple of interesting new customs at last week’s ordination ceremony, which I would like to describe here. One is boat ordination, and the other is maidens offering the use of their hair.

    A complicated aspect of ordination is that it, as an Act of a Sangha, has to take place within a clearly marked territory, called a sima. This is necessary because all monks within the sima are asked to participate, and monks outside of the sima are presumed to belong to other sanghas. It is all very legalistic. A sima can be a given monastery, it can also be something like the City of Maplewood, with its established boundaries. An ordination requires at least five fully ordained monks, so we generally need to assemble the sangha from more than one monastery, at least in the USA. One way to easily define a sima is simply to have the ordination on a boat, and declare the boat the sima. The acting sangha then consists of any monks who are on the boat. That is what we did last weekend for the temporary ordination ceremony.

    We filled a power boat on one of Minnesota’s 10,000 lakes with monks, pushed away from shore and conducted the ordination in the boat. There is actually a part of an ordination ceremony  in which the ordainees and their teacher need to separate themselves from the existing sangha. This was accomplished by using a second boat, which is technically outside the sima of the first boat, but can be steered close enough for monks to hop from one boat to the other and back. Of course the whole scene was quite a curiosity for the other totally uninvolved people who had brought their boats to the lake to fish: a boat crowded with bald, burgundy-robed, chanting monks was more than they expected.

    The second custom was enacted after the ordination, on shore. A lot of Burmese came to make offerings to the old and new monks. This takes the form of an alms round, with a long line of people offering various things like toothpaste, snacks, soap, flowers, finally culminating in a lunch lunch offered at a picnic table. The custom I had never seen before was enacted at the beginning of the alms round.

    Three young women with long hair knelt, and leaning forward, their foreheads touching the grass, and their hair spread forward across the path the monks were about to walk on. The monks then began the alms round by walking on their hair!  I had to ask what this was about after the event.

    Buddhist practice often involves many forms of ritual symbolic offerings. This is as true from my experience in Japanese Zen as in Burmese Theravada. A prime example is a food offering made to a Buddha statue. Such enactments in Buddhism, though symbolic, have a quite practical purpose: they bring forth positive states of mind which are reinforced through the mindfulness of ritual. So, for instance, although there is no Buddha actually there as a recipient to receive a food offering, the enactment of the donation creates merit for the donor. This means it actually helps the donors character develop karmically in a positive direction. This is the logic of symbolic offerings.

    The maidens offering their hair in this way is apparently a reenactment of a Sir Walter Raleigh-like story of someone who did this with hair rather than with cloak, presumably for the Buddha so that he wouldn’t soil or dampen his feet. For the maidens it produces merit, as in a food offering. However in this case the offering is symbolic not because there are no recipients for the donation (we monks were the recipients), but rather because nothing was actually offered (our feet were in no real danger of becoming soiled for want of hair). Mostly the whole thing was fun.

  • Noble Eightfold Path: the Big Picture

    Uposatha Day Teaching

    During each of the last eight Uposatha Days we have taken up a successive step on the Noble Eightfold Path, the Buddha’s checklist for Buddhist practice, the path to the Perfection of the Human Character. Each step has been described concisely, in fact too briefly to do full justice. But I hope I have managed to convey three things: First is the reason behind each fold in the path. I’ve tried to make a clever concrete analogy with the training of a master craftsperson, a potter, wherever possible. Second is a handle on practice. The Noble Eightfold Path is very practical, and is almost entirely about action, action of body, speech and mind, which you can practice with and observe throughout the day, not just on the cushion. And third is an appreciation of the way all of the steps form an integrated whole, none working independently of the others. This appreciation should be an inducement to treat all of the steps as roughly equivalent in worth, not to neglect one in favor of another. This is the value of the checklist format of the Noble Eightfold Path; it is helpful to review the eight steps periodically and consider what you are doing to uphold each step. And continue to receive instruction and to practice diligently each of the steps.

    How the trainings in the path work together.

    The Perfection of the Human Character happens at three levels. Our actions form habit patterns, our habit patterns solidify into our character. Through Ethical Conduct we transform our actions directly, and through Cultivation of Mind we transform our habit patterns. However this will go only so far, because we generally continue to have very recalcitrant ways of cognizing and perceiving the world and our situation that will inhibit liberation at a very fundamental level. Through Wisdom we transform the most recalcitrant delusive views. For instance, and this is the most important instance, most of us have this very pronounced view that we are a separate self, and that is always an impediment to perfecting virtue. Most fundamentally this entails that we misperceive the world because of a consant bias in favor of this self. Nevertheless, through the practice of Ethical Conduct we can behave toward others as if that self were not there, by not stealing, by not harming, and so on. Through the practice of Cultivation of mind we can mitigate the affective mental factors that manifest that self and try to take control of our actions, that is, we can learn to put aside greed, anger and so on, that arise in the self’s quest for personal advantage. Now, all of this will tend to loosen the iron grip of the self, but not eliminate it. Through the practice of Wisdom we get at the most recalcitrant views, especially this view of the self.

    How the path deepens Right View.

    It is at this point we should reveal that the Eightfold path is not linear, and in fact among its many loops, Right Concentration brings us right back to Right View, from whence the path began. On the basis of a steady, pure and aware mind we gain Insight, a kind of Right View that is much more profound that the teachings we began with. To understand Insight, consider what the potter knows. The potter goes beyond mere conceptualizations of his domain and learns the materials and tools by feel or intuition, in ways that cannot readily be put into words. In fact, much of what the potter knows from experience is known not by the brain but by the fingers. By the same token, the greater part of Right View is a direct experience of the way things are, unmediated by conceptual thought. When we got into the path we found ourselves actually working with the material of life, just as the potter works with his or her materials and tools. Very prominent in the Buddhist path is the mind itself, which is the primary material we work with. This is made possible through the cumulative contributions of all of the folds of the Noble Eightfold Path that together support a mind that is utterly steady, pure, beyond manipulation and the filter of self-concern, beyond excuses , preconceptions or even opinions, simply open and aware.

    What is it that the Buddhist practitioner becomes aware of? In short, the three marks of existence: impermanence, suffering and selflessness. We become aware of a world in constant flux, where changes propagate continuously through an ever evolving network of contingencies, in which we seek in vain for any semblance of solid ground, any constant we can grab onto. But as soon as we grasp something we think we can rely on it begins to melt away in the constant flux of existence. It is painful when our hopes and plans cannot keep pace with reality. What we seek more than anything in this flowing network of contingencies is a self, a constant reference point, a lasting identity, and trying to hold on to this becomes the most painful thing of all. No wonder we had always felt so insecure and anxious. The only way out is for our minds to become as open and as fluid as the world.

    Where the Path Leads.

    I’ve described the path as leading (in spite of its loops) to the perfection of human character. It has been described in alternative ways, but these are equivalent. It has been described as the path that leads to the end of karma (and thereby of the cycle of rebirths), to the realization of emptiness and to the end of suffering. These descriptions are respectively from the behavioral, cognitive and emotive perspectives associated with the trainings in Ethical Conduct, Wisdom and Cultivation of Mind. The difference between these perspectives sometimes raises the question of whether we practice for ourselves or for others. The answer is that we always practice in spite of ourselves, the practice always mitigates the influence of the delusion of a separate self. This has consequences at the same time for the harm one does to oneself and the harm one does to others. If I advise you to drive carefully, to make sure your windshield is not frosty, to make sure your breaks are in order, to avoid cell-phone or intoxicant use while driving, and so on, I can justify this in either of two ways, by adding either, “… or else you might injure yourself,” or, “… or else you might injure someone.” The fact is, a car not in control is a dangerous thing, and a mind not in control is a dangerous thing (in road rage we find both). This is why we follow the Noble Eightfold Path.

  • New Essays

    I just posted a new essay, or actually a collection of essays at this site. Please see:

    Up to the Land of the Chopstick and Over to the Land of the Fork

    Also, you might want to check out my last essay:

    Science and Vinaya

  • Noble Eightfold Path: Right Mindfulness

    Uposatha Day Teaching for the Full Moon

    Right Mindfulness is perhaps the best known of the Eight Folds of the Noble Path. But few understand exactly what mindfulness is.

    Let’s look in on our master potter once again. There he is spinning a pot on the potters wheel, with his eyes fixed on his fingers, and his fingers carefully and slowly shaping the clay. We notice that he is not listening to music in his studio. His cell phone rings and he ignores it, in his mind just notes that it rang and lets it go. Suddenly there is a loud pop, the door of his kiln flies open and flames shoot out. He carefully removes his fingers from the clay without disturbing what he has acheived so far, carefully detaches the fire extinguisher from the wall and advances to the site of the new mishap.

    Mindfulness is simply to remember what it is you are doing, it is staying on task or taking up a new task at the proper time. It is an extremely important skill , in fact it underlies almost any other skill. In Buddhist training we cultivate mindfulness as the basis of all of the other factors of the path. The opposite of mindfulness is distraction, so we can think of mindfulness as a kind of guard for the senses and for what arises in the mind. It is the nose in the little slot on the door of a speakeasy that demands a password. Many people think of mindfulness as awareness, but actually it is more a matter of choosing what to be aware of.

    How do we train ourselves to be mindful? Seated meditation is the simplest way. In meditation you are given a task, most generally to focus the attention on some object. For instance, your task might be to focus on the breath. We quickly discover that this is difficult, because the mind wants to wander off to more interesting or pressing things. We forget, sometimes for minutes at a time, but when we remember we bring the mind back to the breath. We are practicing mindfulness, or failing to practice it as the case may be. The breath is the only thing that should know the password, but we get distracted. With practice we actually get very good at it; we still get distracted but only for seconds rather than minutes at a time, and less and less frequently.

    The beginning meditator is surprised and delighted to discover that the ability to stay mindful carries over to other tasks off of the cushion, generally to simple clearly defined physical tasks which do not require much thought. In fact, a lot of the things a potter does. For instance, if you are cutting potatoes that can be a mindfulness opportunity. Keep you mind on the cutting and nothing else for the few minutes you are engaged in this task. In fact, make the task a little more challenging: try to cut the potatoes into pieces of equal size; if you drop your mindfulness the sizes will drop their uniformity.

    Mindfulness becomes difficult when there is too much going on at once: when the kids are barking at you, the dog needs a ride to his piano lesson, the TV is trying to sell you something that is whiter than white, your cell phone is ringing and you don’t know how you are going to pay the mortgage. So, we cultivate simplicity wherever we can. This tends to reduce potential distractions. One way we can do this is by actually simplifying our lives: don’t make too many commitments, don’t live beyond our means (don’t have debt), don’t own a lot of things that just clutter up our living spaces, and require cleaning and maintenance. Another way is to make a habit of doing one thing at a time; yes you can give up your addiction to multitasking. If you are working in the kitchen, DON’T listen to the radio. DON’T leave the TV on all the time. DON’T talk on the phone while driving. The basis of Soto Zen meditation is shikan, “just.” Shikantaza, for instance is meditation, just sitting, and in fact in this technique we simply let go of everything that arises that is not sitting, even the breath. For many a daily task X we can practice shikan-X: just walking, just chopping potatoes, just brushing teeth, even just driving when you get good at mindfulness. This is great mindfulness practice.

    Another way to create opportunities for mindfulness is to have something to be mindful of. Mindfulness is remembering what we are doing, so it is important to be able to define exactly what it is we are doing. We actually spend a lot of time not knowing what we are doing and hoping something important will come to snatch us away from it. Instead, ritualize your activities. Religious rituals are very good for mindfulness practice, that is probably their main function: in a religious ritual there is no doubt about what you should be doing when (unless you have not learned the ritual functions, in which case you are on the spot because you know others have no doubt about what you should be doing when). However everyday activities can be ritualized: Get up at the same time, do the morning things in exactly the same order every morning, etc. A blanket rule is often taught in Japanese Zen: Leave No Trace. This means, if you cook, then you have to clean up. If you sit down to write letters then you have to put your things away before you move on to the next things. This creates automatic clarity about what your task is, and how thoroughly you should perform that task: NO trace. Cleanliness is Next to Godliness, as many Christians are aware. Why? Because it gives a great opportunity to cultivate mindfulness. If you finish sleeping, it is time to make the bed. At the completion of every task, check to make sure it is really complete. This means that if you open a door, walk through it and close the door, you should make sure the door is really securely closed. You can use your own imagination to find ways to ritualize your day.

    We live in a culture that actually discourages mindfulness. We love to multitask and think that life is boring if a lot of things are not going on at once. We get addicted to the dispersed mind. This is not a Buddhist way of being, which is to relish simplicity. We love to drink alcohol, which disperses the mind so much we forget our cares, often while fostering new ones. Most of what we call modern conveniences are actually just ways to avoid being mindful. For instance, we have different buzzers that go off to remind us of something we would otherwise have had to be mindful about, such as fastening a seat belt. We think ritual is boring in our culture. When we walk through a door our minds are already on the other side before we even touch the door. Where did our task go?

    One of the most important of the Buddha’s teachings is the Foundations of Mindfulness Sutta, which is the basis of Insight Meditation or Vipassana. In this the Buddha recommends the cultivation of mindfulness in attending to specific objects of meditation that foster penetrating insight into the nature of reality, that is a direct experience of Right View. These include mindfulness of breath, mindfulness of elements, of skandhas, of states of consciousness, of phenomena and so on, particuarly with regard to arising and falling.

  • Noble Eightfold Path: Right Effort

    An Uposatha Day teaching for the First Quarter Moon.

    We don’t like to think Buddhist practice takes effort. Buddhism abounds with metaphors that might suggest it doesn’t, some traditional images and some new marketing slogans such as being already enlightened, realizing your own nature. It is true that our characters are bursting with possibilities many of which come forth when left alone. Our task is like that of a gardener, one pulls out the unskillful weeds and waters the skillful flowers, shrubs, vegetables and herbs and thereby give the desired shape to the garden. Right Resolve and Right Effort are the bookends to the Ethical Conduct Group. Right Resolve is the outline of how we conduct ourselves in the world, selflessly, with kindness and with compassion. Right Speech, Action and Livelihood are our proper verbal and physical activities. Right Effort drops down to the level of intention, the mental qualities we bring into our activities. These mental factors, like the actions they may give rise to, are sorted in terms of skillful and unskillful.

    We have seen that actions of body and Speech fall under the term Karma. We need to learn a bit more about karma, in particular that there are purely mental actions as well. Karma comes in three flavors, those of Body, Speech and Mind. Actions of mind do not directly work on the world, but always work on shaping character. For instance, you might be angry at someone, so you daydream of all the ways you can gain revenge, through malicious gossip, by stealing their cell phone, and so on. Even if you do not put these things into verbal or bodily action, these thoughts are Karma and have karmic consequences for the shaping of your character. You can turn yourself into a vengeful person simply by entertaining such thoughts if you do so habitually enough. Right Effort is itself manifested in Karma, in weeding and cultivating the mind, mental actions which have intentions behind them.

    What are the skillful and unskillful mental factors? How do we recognize the weeds? The answer is in the roots: The unskillful mental factors are those rooted in Greed, Hatred or Delusion, the infamous Three Poisons in Buddhist doctrine. However, you don’t need to take the Buddha’s word for this, in fact you shouldn’t. It is important to study the various mental factors that arise in the mind until you understand why the Buddha classified them in this way. The fact is, in many cases you will almost certainly disagree at first, and maybe never fully agree. For instance, Anger falls under the category of Hatred. Most people think of Anger as necessary as a motivator to fix what needs fixing (Where’s the Outrage? Alright, no more Mr. Nice Guy.). Consider this, because it is not the view of the Buddha or of untold generations of Buddhist practitioners throughout the centuries. Or lust, including for instance sexual or culinary delight, falls under Greed. Most people think of lust as the spice of life, as necessary to keep life from being dull. The Buddha himself reported that it was particularly difficult for him to see the downside of sensual pleasures, yet he finally came to regard these too as unskillful. Basically, when you look at these things, and this is a matter of developing Right View, consider two things. First, when the mental factor arises, is there suffering around it, that is, does stress or anxiety arise inseparably with the mental factor. You will be surprised how ubiquitous suffering is when you start looking, even when you think you are having fun. Second, when you allow that mental factor to give rise to an action of body or mind, are the consequences of that action desirable? How does the action play out in the world, is anyone hurt? How does it feel to yourself? Do you regret the action, does it feel right? Become an ardent student of these issues! Italian opera is a particularly useful resource in examining the unskillful qualities of lust. Unless you are a monk or nun you will probably set your own parameters around the range of Right Effort then focus on those unskillful mental factors that are particularly vexing in your life and on those skillful mental factors that you value when you see them in others.

    Right Effort provides the energy of practice. Every time there is resistance to Right Anything, then Right Effort is called for. If it is time to meditate and you are just to lazy, laziness is to be weeded out and ardency needs to be watered. If you really want to eat Ted’s cookie and are about to snatch it when he is not looking, greed is to be weeded, contentment watered. Often the effort required is enormous; you may be dealing with ingrained habits or natural instinctive behaviors. There are some standard mental techniques involved in Right Effort, but you will probably discover some of your own, from substituting another thought for the one you are entertaining, to deconstructing your present thought, from changing your perspective or conceptualization of the situation, to bringing the thought into the focus of attention until it dissipates of itself. By the way, Guilt is always considered unskillful in Buddhism; Shame is OK, but Guilt is a form of Hatred. Don’t be guilty about what arises in your mind, but do recognize if for what it is and try to move it in a more skillful direction.

    Right Effort is the first member of the Mental Cultivation Group of the Noble Eightfold Path. The other members of this group are Right Mindfulness and Right Concentration. Each of these folds is best practiced in seated meditation, walking meditation or one of the recognized postures of meditation. You can think of each of these postures as a laboratory for working with mental factors in a pure state, free from most worldly concerns and from the demands of verbal and bodily actions. In fact if you can embed this little laboratory in a remote and quite setting where you can dwell for days, weeks or months, perhaps with other meditators, that is ideal. However, Right Effort, Right Mindfulness and Right Concentration are also practices you can engage in throughout your day. This is particularly important for Right Effort, since the everyday activities and interactions present abundant situations in which factors such as anger, lust, deluded views, fear, stress, envy, jealousy, spite, restlessness, anxiety, arrogance, pride, and on and on, will arise. At the same time, Right Effort is the basis of the Mental Cultivation Group and of seated meditation. Meditation is often hindered by out thoughts of lust and anger, by sloth and torpor, by restlessness and be moments of doubt in the efficacy of practice. All of these are unskillful factors that call for some light weeding as one settles into meditation.

    On this First Quarter Moon day, take a few minutes, sit down in a quiet spot and close your eyes. What thoughts come up? Is there anger, anxiety, restlessness? Is there an unsatisfied longing? Is there joy, appreciation, kindness? See if you can catch one of these thoughts and hold it for a moment. Does it feel painful or unsatisfying? Is this thought asking anything of you? Then try to catch another and another, answer the same questions.