| |
BUDDHISM
> Teachings: The joy of pure morality by YANGSI RINPOCHE
Edited
from a teaching given by Yangsi Rinpoche at the Lam Rim Chen Mo retreat
at Tushita Meditation Centre, Dharamsala, March, 2000.
When we talk about ethics, what is ethics? Ethics is the quality of our
mind wishing to abstain from non-virtue and negativity, wishing to
protect our thoughts and actions from non-virtue and negativity. That
quality of our mind is ethics. When we engage in a non-virtuous
action, there are various parts to it. The first preliminary part is
the motivation. Then you have the actual course of the action. And then
you have the completion of the action. When you have that quality of
ethics wishing to protect your thoughts and actions from non-virtue,
that quality of the mind is in itself an antidote to the motivation. Of
course it is also an antidote to the actual action–engaging
physi-cally and verbally in the course of the action. That quality
within our mind, the wish to abstain from non-virtue, the wish to
protect our thoughts and actions from non-virtue, in itself acts as an
antidote to both the preliminary motivation and the actual action of
our body and speech.
Ethics is that quality of the mind, which wishes to protect the mind.
What it is protecting against is non-virtue. Of the various
non-virtues, it is primarily protecting against the non-virtuous
motivation. And of the types of non-virtuous motivation, it is
primarily concerned with the three poisonous states of mind. So
how to generate and strengthen the quality that wants to abstain from
non-virtue and to protect the mind? There are two ways. The first is
through the taking of vows or precepts from an abbot or a preceptor.
The second way is through understanding the shortcomings and failures
of ignorance, attachment, anger and so forth, knowing the disadvantages
of these negative states of mind. Knowing the antidotes to all of these
is what enables us to have that quality of the mind wanting to abstain,
wanting to protect. As we talked about last time, for some,
ethics is happiness, for others, it is suffering. For example, if one
thinks, “I took these vows and precepts and if I break them or
incur transgressions, it will cause me to take rebirth in the lower
realms,” this is a narrow way of thinking, and if one practices
ethics only in this way it will not become ethics that causes
happiness. It is not living in ethics that brings joy. What is
important is that one takes on the practice of living in ethics by
understanding that it is the antidote to one’s negative states of
mind, targeting attachment, anger, and igno-rance. One needs to
understand the dependent arising of actions and their results, and it
is this wisdom that transforms living in ethics into happiness. By
thinking in this way, our practice of ethics becomes one that is able
to bring forth happiness, as opposed to thinking, “Oh, I have
taken these commitments and if I don’t keep them I’m going
to be reborn in the lower realms.” If this way of thinking is the
only reason why one is living in ethics, then living in ethics cannot
be joy, cannot be happiness. Concerning the manifestation of our
three poisonous states of mind, the base of the manifestation is the
intention. For that matter, the base of the manifestation of any of the
ten non-virtuous actions is the intention. This base of intention is a
mental karmic action, and its very root is ignorance. In order to
counteract it, one needs the understanding of both emptiness and
dependent arising.
And in order to enhance the mind of ethics that wishes to abstain and
protect, one has to have good reasons, pure reasons that give us the
incentive to abstain and protect the mind. Also, one has to know what
it is that one is protecting the mind from. Besides the three poisonous
minds, there is also the mistaken view that (fails to understand that)
the way things appear is not reality–things are not true the way
they appear. These mistaken modes of apprehen-sion can be faulted by
the logic of ultimate truth and by the logic of conventional truth. In
this way, when we think about develop-ing the mind which wishes to
protect and abstain, we should even think in terms of that level of
view: wanting to protect the mind and to abstain from this grasping at
true existence, which is mistaken because it is completely faulted by
the reasonings of both ultimate and conventional truths. In short, what
has been said here is that to really enhance the mind which wishes to
protect and abstain, and in order to gain the perfection of ethics or
morality, one must have wisdom. For example, in order the enhance the
mind’s capacity or strength in wishing to give, one needs the
support of wisdom, and to enhance the mind wishing to protect and
abstain, one also needs the support of wisdom. But of the two, it is
even more important in the case of enhancing the mind, which wishes to
abstain and protect–the mind of ethics. With regard to the
enhancing or cultivation of this mind of ethics, one needs a much
stronger support of wisdom.
In terms of the interdependence of what it takes to enhance the two
minds–the mind of generosity that wishes to give and the mind of
ethics that wishes to abstain and protect–of these two, the mind
that wishes to abstain and protect is far more dependent upon wisdom.
The antidote to the mind of ignorance is meditating on the twelve links
of interdependent origination–how cyclic existence is caused,
sustained, and perpetuated–as well as meditating on the twelve
links in reverse, in the order in which they can be ceased. In
this way, thinking about interdependent origination, the dependent
arising relationship, one considers that the very fact that (a
phenomenon) is dependent means that it is empty. And because it is
empty, it totally negates any type of inherent exist-ence. So in
this way, one applies the antidote to the mind of ignorance.
To overcome anger, we can consider, as it is said in The Guide to the
Bodhisattva’s Way of Life, that there is no evil, no negativity
like anger, in the sense that even merits that have been accumu-lated
for thousands of eons through generosity, through having made offerings
to the Buddha, all these merits are destroyed in one moment of anger.
In this way one gets a feel for how destructive anger is. On the other
hand, the antidote to anger, the mind of patience, has that much
benefit, for this is the mind creating the basis of happiness, not only
in this lifetime, but in future lifetimes as well.
With regard to attachment, we have many lifetimes of imprints of
attachment in our minds, and that attachment is what brings alive the
causes of one’s cyclic existence. Attachment is like the lasso
binding us to cyclic existence. By thinking about the shortcomings of
the mind of attachment, one should work towards cultivating the
antidote for the mind of attachment. As beginners on the path, thinking
over and over again about the shortcomings of attachment is the way to
start off.
Along with the antidotes to ignorance, anger and attachment, another
thing we need to work on is the antidote to the eight worldly dharmas.
The antidote to our mind’s interest in the eight worldly dharmas
is thinking about the general shortcomings of our cyclic existence, and
thinking about impermanence and death. The other delusions to
work on are pride and deluded doubt.
Pride is having an inflated sense of our own self-importance, the
thinking that in every respect oneself is superior to everybody
else. But in reality, one could not be like that–supreme in
every way in relation to others. So even if it’s not like that in
reality, the mind of pride tends to hold on to one particular attribute
that one might have, one particular good quality, and by the strength
of that, the mind thinks that one is best in every way. To counteract
the mind of pride, one should think about one particular weakness, an
area in which one is lacking in some way. The mind should focus more on
that.
Doubt here primarily refers to doubt with regard to cause and effect,
the four noble truths, and past and future lives. The antidote to such
doubt is understanding the four noble truths, at least having the
correct assumption of the four noble truths. Having the correct
understanding of this is the first step to counteracting the mind of
doubt.
There are root delusions and secondary delusions, but what one should
focus on eliminating are the root delusions. The more one can work on
the root delusions, the more one can eliminate the secondary delusions.
Therefore, as individuals seeking the path that leads us to
enlightenment, what we need to accomplish and to see as the result of
our life is the ability to free ourselves from the control of our
delusions. Becoming liberated from the control of the deluded states of
mind, developing faith in cause and effect, cultivating wisdom, and
having the basis of the minds of renunciation and ethics–if one
can practice the combination of all these features together, one can
obtain the objectives of the path. The Kadampa masters say that the
best attainment is developing faith in cause and effect, living in pure
ethics, and eliminating one’s delusions and negative states of
mind. By having faith in cause and effect, one is able to live in pure
ethics; by living in pure ethics, one is able to eliminate delusions.
This is the best attainment.
MAY ALL BEINGS BE HAPPY!
|
|
