The Patriarch Bodhidharma once outlined four practices which Buddhist disciples should take to heart. They are summarized below.
1. The Practice of Compensating for Previous Wrongs
From time immemorial we have been lost along the six Evil Paths. In each lifetime we have incurred karmic debts, large and small, in connection with either love-attachment or hatred. These are truly countless. Although our efforts in cultivation dissolve part of this karma, it is not entirely eliminated, and must be gradually repaid. Thus, someone who is always ill, or is disabled, has created heavy karma of killing in past lives. Those who are the targets of a great deal of slander and calumny were, in earlier times, intelligent and influential people who, proud of their good fortune, despised others. Or else, they created the karma of vilifying the Dharma or the Order. Those who are always lacking in means lacked compassion and failed to practice charity in past lives. Those who must endure banishment, imprisonment, bondage and torture, were, in past lives, in the habit of chaining, beating or imprisoning sentient beings. Those who are lonely and isolated, lacking supportive friends, did not have bonds of affinity with other sentient beings in the past.
These karmas are countless. If today we encounter animosity and opposition to our cultivation, we should remain calm and forbearing, accepting that we must repay our karmic debts without chagrin or complaint. In the wasteland of Birth and Death, all sentient beings have been related at one time or another, sharing the same table, living in the same house -- as family members or as friends. Therefore, of all karmic obstructions, those of killing sentient beings and of love-attachment are the deepest.[1] The ancients have lamented:
In the vast ocean of karma, love-attachment is the most difficult thing to sever. In the great wide world, killing sentient beings [for food] is the most common transgression!
In East Asian folklore, there is the tale of a famous poet who journeyed to the mountains during the Mid-Autumn Festival in search of inspiration. In the moonlit night, he witnessed the Immortals "mount the wind and ride the fog," as they gathered around a huge marble table laden with succulent fruits and rare wines, playing musical instruments and reciting poetry ... Among the fairies was a maiden by the name of "Mountain Moon," with lovely, ethereal features and a gracious, enchanting voice. The poet, eavesdropping, was moved to the point of confusion. Suddenly, an elderly Immortal, having savored his cup of wine, began to recite verses:
Those of common destiny, Meet at the Assembly of Immortals; I consent to the poet Wedding Mountain Moon!
Hearing this stanza, the poet reluctantly emerged from hiding and joined the assembly. The elderly Immortal decreed that the young maiden had a karmic affinity with the earthly poet, and that they should live together for thirteen years. He thereupon ordered that the register of Immortals be brought over, and crossed her name out. After thirteen years of life together, her earthly life having come to an end, Mountain Moon rendered herself invisible and flew back to the mountains to pursue her cultivation. Thus, even Immortals are within the cycle of Birth and Death, causes and conditions.
Regarding the karma of killing, both Elder Master Arya Simha (the Twenty-fourth Indian Patriarch of Zen) and Elder Master Hui K'o (the Second Chinese Patriarch), despite having achieved Enlightenment, still had to repay their debts by calmly submitting to violent death.[2] Take also the case of Maudgalyayana, a well-known disciple of Sakyamuni Buddha, with the highest spiritual power among Arhats. Because he wished to repay his previous karmic debts, he let a group of bandits kill him with sticks and stones and bury his body in an excrement pit. The Buddha, moved by this scene, ordered his disciples to unearth the body, cleanse and bathe it with perfume, then cremate it and retrieve the relics.[3]
On the path of cultivation, no one knows who is really perfect. Thus, we should neither be complacent nor look down on others. Because the karmic debts of sentient beings are countless, sometimes they must repay one layer after another. Some cultivators seem to be free of karmic debts, but this may not be the case. It may just be that the time and conditions for repayment have not yet arrived. To eliminate evil karma, we should be patient, practice repentance, and strive to cultivate. Nguyen-Du, a famous Vietnamese poet of recent times, had perhaps deeply assimilated the Buddhas' teaching on karma and the possible transmutation of cause and effect when he wrote:
Having committed evil karma, Let us not blame Heaven for being near or far, While Providence plays a part, So do we ...
These words are generally recognized as a reflection of the truth.
2. The Practice of Adapting to Conditions
This means that the practitioner should adapt flexibly to his situation and conditions. For example, living in conditions of wealth or poverty, he lives in accordance with conditions of wealth or poverty. The same applies to conditions of underdevelopment or prosperity, adversity or good fortune, loss or gain, right or wrong ...
Contentment with conditions means being wealthy without being arrogant, being destitute and beset by misfortune without being sad and depressed or altering one's determination. Why is this so? It is because instances of prosperity, decline, misfortune, and/or blessings are all illusory.[4] They appear for a while according to our karma and then disappear. It is really not worthwhile to become attached, discouraged or sad.
Confucius and his disciples were once surrounded by rebel soldiers. They had been short of food for seven days, yet Confucius was happily playing the lute. His leading disciple inquired, "How is it, Master, that in the face of death you can still smile happily?" Confucius replied, "Whatever misfortunes befall a man after he has done his best to prevent them, can only be the will of Heaven. Why, then, bemoan them and weep?" Confucius may be considered a sage conversant with the will of heaven and earth -- always calm and clear sighted, never bewildered or wavering, regardless of the circumstances. The practitioner should be likewise, realizing that wealth and property, family and friends, are all the result of illusory, temporary conditions. He should not be unduly attached to or preoccupied with them, if he is to progress along the path to liberation.
3. The Practice of Being in Accord with the Dharma
"Dharma" here means "True Thusness Dharma." For Pure Land practitioners, it represents the Buddha Recitation Samadhi. For Zen followers, whether they are walking, standing, reclining or sitting, the mind should always accord with True Thusness, just as water blends with water and empty space is one with the atmosphere. The Pure Land practitioner is the same: his mind is always focused on the words "Amitabha Buddha."
The ancients have said:
If a practitioner is not in samadhi for one instant, at that moment, he is no different from a corpse.
This is because if a cultivator's mind is scattered, he has been effectively "captured" by worldly Dusts. Once captured and dragged away, his "Dharma-Body Wisdom-Life" is lost and gone. On the other hand, if the practitioner is always focused on the Buddha's name, his mind will gradually become silent, still and illuminated, in unison with Buddha Amitabha. He is thus assured of rebirth in the Pure Land.
4. The Practice of Non-Seeking
This refers to the pure practice of not seeking after anything. All dharmas are illusory and dream-like, born and destroyed, destroyed and reborn. What is there which is true, everlasting and worth seeking? Furthermore, worldly phenomena are all relative; in calamities are found blessings, in blessings there is misfortune. Therefore, those who have wisdom are always calm and unruffled, their minds undisturbed in all situations.
For example, when a monk cultivates alone in a deserted hut, his living conditions are miserable and lonely and he has few visitors. Although his mundane conditions may be wanting, his cultivation is diligent. After a while, if virtuous people learn of his situation and come with offerings, his hut will gradually grow into a large temple, filled with monks and nuns. By then, while his blessings may be great, his cultivation has effectively declined, because his mind is now preoccupied with external events. The truth of misfortunes and blessings, mutually dependent, is similar. Therefore, ideally, the cultivator should seek neither untoward occurrences and rebirth as a sentient being nor auspicious occurrences and Buddhahood.
Some may ask, "If we recite the Buddhas's name seeking neither rebirth in the Pure Land nor the ultimate blessings and wisdom of Buddhahood, how can we progress in our cultivation?" Answer: It is because Buddhahood is True Emptiness. The more we seek it, the farther we are from it, and the more likely we are to lose it. Thus, the Lotus Sutra states:
Even if countless Arhats, Pratyeka Buddhas, and other sages, up to the level of Non-Regressing Bodhisattvas, were to ponder and seek it for innumerable kalpas, they still would not be able to see or understand the true wisdom of the Buddhas.
As far as rebirth in the Pure Land is concerned, the practitioner's method is to seek yet not seek, not to seek yet seek. This paradox resembles the case of a bright and clear mirror. When an image appears before the mirror, the mirror reflects it; when there is no image, the mirror remains empty and still. To cling to sight, knowledge and seeking is to "stray" into deluded thought. On the other hand, not to see, know or seek is to be no different from inanimate wood or stone! Speaking more broadly, the practice of non-seeking encompasses all "three doors of liberation": emptiness, signlessness and wishlessness.
If the cultivator can follow these four practices taught by the Patriarch Bodhidharma, he will be able to remain calm and unruffled in the face of all obstructing conditions.
(1) According to Buddhist teachings, if there were another obstruction or force as strong as love-attachment, no cultivator could ever hope to attain Enlightenment and Buddhahood.
(2) Master Arya Simha lived in Central Asia during the sixth century A.D. While he was preaching Buddhism in Kashmir, King Dammira, an enemy of Buddhism, razed temples and murdered a number of monks. When he finally beheaded Master Arya Simha, it was said that pure white milk gushed from Arya Simha's neck. The Patriarch Hui Ku (Hui K'o) was the Second Chinese Patriarch after Bodhidharma.
(3) Maudgalyayana was one of Sakyamuni Buddha's ten major disciples, known as the foremost in occult power. He died before Sakyamuni, killed by a hostile Brahmin while on his alms round. The Patriarchs Arya Simha and Hui K'o and the Elder Maudgalyayana are all revered figures in Mahayana Buddhism. Through their symbolic deaths, sentient beings are taught the crucial importance of adhering to the precept against killing -- a cornerstone of Buddhist ethics.
(4) See Glossary, "Illusion" :
Illusion (Maya). One of the key concepts in Buddhism.
Things in the phenomenal world are not real or substantial, as ordinary people regard them to be. They are transient, momentary, indefinite, insubstantial, and subject to constant alteration. In reality, they are like phantoms or hallucinations. (G.C.C. Chang). Phenomenal "existence," as commonly perceived by the senses, is illusory; it is not real inasmuch as, though it exists, its existence is not permanent or absolute. Nothing belonging to it has an enduring entity or "nature" of its own; everything is dependent upon a combination of fluctuating conditions and factors for its seeming "existence" at any given moment." (Fung Yu-Lan.) Thus, we have the expression, "illusory but not non-existent."
Dharma Master Thich Thien Tam
Translated and edited by the Van Hien Study Group
Sutra Translation Committee of the United States and Canada
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