Sin and Guilt (1987)

0:00 Welcome you all to Amaravati and this important talk I'm giving this afternoon on sin and guilt. Report an error in the passage at 0:00

0:11 Prepare yourselves for my American evangelical background might arise if I start Report an error in the passage at 0:11

0:28 shouting about the Lord or something. Please forgive me, it's just going back to a previous life maybe. But this subject is, I think, quite significant in our cultural terms because sin is very much a word that is fraught with meaning and significance and all kinds of views and opinions arise just by mentioning that word. Report an error in the passage at 0:28

1:09 And so it's so connected to... To the Christian Jewish background, Report an error in the passage at 1:09

1:23 now sin in its real meaning probably implies very much the sense of separation. Report an error in the passage at 1:23

1:37 So that even though sin now in modern parlance oftentimes can mean anything. When you say a sinner, that implies oftentimes that... They're sexually promiscuous, or they gamble, or they do something wicked. If you use the word, it's connected oftentimes just to sexual immorality. A sinful woman. You wanted to have a kind of popular film made called Woman of Sin. Report an error in the passage at 1:37

2:21 And that would imply that she may have rather loose sexual life rather than she tells lies. Report an error in the passage at 2:21

2:39 I'm just giving just from, say, a common interpretation of how that, say, is how it might affect our mind just by the common usage of that word. Report an error in the passage at 2:39

2:54 But if you actually use the word sin For the Buddhist word dukkha, you can find an interesting similarity. Because, say, if we're born in sin, say in the Christian way of talking, we're born in sin, that oftentimes is interpreted, isn't it, that somehow sexuality is a sin or that the sexual act is sinful and we're born in sin. Report an error in the passage at 2:54

3:31 And the whole thing's connected in that rather emotional way. But if one should say we're born into the realm of suffering, that isn't quite so... I don't think people would find that so objectionable, because being born into the human realm, into this sensual form, is being born into the realm of suffering, meaning we... Report an error in the passage at 3:31

4:03 We are going to feel the sense of impingement for a lifetime. This is what birth implies, isn't it? If we were not born in a separate form, we would not be conscious in this way that we are conscious. So we wouldn't be, say, suffering from the cold or from old age or from separation from the loved or all the possibilities. Report an error in the passage at 4:03

4:34 and complications of a human life, which we would say, which we would describe as human suffering. Now, the Buddha did teach the noble truths about suffering and the end of suffering. And many people interpret Buddhist teachings as the Buddha taught everything is suffering. In fact, that was recently stated in the Middle Way, the recent edition of the Middle Way. Report an error in the passage at 4:34

5:07 The Buddha taught everything is suffering. But I would disagree with this statement, because the Buddha didn't teach everything was suffering. That sounds too absolute, doesn't it? The Buddha stated very clearly, there is suffering. And that's a different, very different thing than everything is suffering. Report an error in the passage at 5:07

5:32 There is suffering is only pointing to suffering. It's not saying anything about it other than there is this experience of suffering that we all have in this human form. And this suffering is the illusion of separation, isn't it? The illusion we have of being contained as a separate entity, a separate being, alienated, isolated. Report an error in the passage at 5:32

6:06 The more you're attached to The conditions of separation, the more you suffer. There's more and more suffering involved. The more selfish you are, the more you suffer. The less selfish you are, the less you suffer. Because selfishness in this sense is the illusion of being a separate being, a separate soul, a separate entity on a kind of permanent basis, in a kind of absolute way. Report an error in the passage at 6:06

6:39 And this separation Always creates conflict. When I am identified with the separateness of my body and the separateness that arises through consciousness, when I'm identified and attached to that, that sense of separateness, then I suffer. There's suffering involved in that attachment. Because I'm vulnerable, I'm going to feel life, I can be hurt, I can be attacked, I can be mutilated, tortured, insulted. These are all possibilities for any of us at any time, isn't it? Report an error in the passage at 6:39

7:24 Being born in a form like this onto this planet, we are now, say, very vulnerable creatures. And whether we fully recognize this or we just kind of Half recognize it. The fact is that we do have a lot of fear and anxiety about our lives because there's a lot to be frightened of on the sensory plane. Report an error in the passage at 7:24

7:58 Because pain is something that we dread, isn't it? Having pain and diseases. Just the problems that come from getting old. We dread that. We can dread that. Just the problems of a family, of growing up. And of being liked or despised or being mistreated or misunderstood or being scandalized or humiliated, this is all possible for any of us during this lifetime within this human form from birth to death. Report an error in the passage at 7:58

8:40 So sin, to me, rather than looking at it from just a kind of narrow view, I've seen it as just some kind of absolute condition that we are kind of victims of. I would regard even the Christian use of sin more in the terms of the Buddhist suffering, or dukkha, because dukkha is the separation, isn't it? Report an error in the passage at 8:40

9:18 It's the, we create dukkha, we make dukkha. Out of ignorance, not understanding things as they are, not knowing the dharma and practicing the dharma and living by the dharma, or if you don't know the word dharma is, it's the truth. Report an error in the passage at 9:18

9:41 When we contemplate, when we study, when we practice dharma, we're opening our minds to this awakened state of being able to see things clearly as they really are. We call this dharma. Well, when we're not in tune with that, when we're blinded by ignorance, then we continuously create the illusion of separation. Report an error in the passage at 9:41

10:11 And so there's always me against you, me and mine, my thing, my life, my ways, my views, my opinion, my family, my country, my religion, my monastery, my roads. Report an error in the passage at 10:11

10:30 My ways. And this will inevitably, as long as this is an attachment and a delusion of the mind, will create conflict, both Report an error in the passage at 10:30

10:41 within my mind and create conflict externally, because all you can do, if I'm insistent on this illusion of me being absolutely separate, of me being this being here, in a kind of fixed way, permanent way, then... All you can do is react to it, unless you're wise, and then you can just understand the illusions as illusions. Report an error in the passage at 10:41

11:17 Now, the sensual world is a world of change, isn't it? It's all about the arising and ceasing. It's a conditioned world. It's a sensitive world. Sensuality. Sensitivity, all this implies that we have sense organs that contact sense objects, and that consciousness arises, sensual consciousness arises from that contact. Report an error in the passage at 11:17

11:52 So in being born in a form like this, from the birth to the death of this body, means that we are in this very sensitive state for a lifetime. Report an error in the passage at 11:52

12:08 This is what being born really means. We're conscious. We have consciousness and we feel. Our sense organ, our ability to be sensitive, feels everything. It's not going to just, even though we'd like to maybe only feel the pleasant and the good things, we also have to feel the unpleasant, the painful. Report an error in the passage at 12:08

12:35 We have eyes. As much as we would prefer to look at only the beautiful, we also have to bear with the ugly, don't we? With the ear, as much as we would like to only hear the most beautiful sounds, we have to put up with very unpleasant ones, and so forth. So sensitivity, as it is, is this way. It means that we are going to be impinged on, we're going to be in contact with. Report an error in the passage at 12:35

13:07 Whatever, whatever is around, whether it's pleasant to us or unpleasant to us. Now when we interpret this sensitivity from a personality position, then we become frightened, we're threatened by it. Because this is what we tend to do, isn't it? We tend to create a person who makes choices about all this. Report an error in the passage at 13:07

13:41 I would like only the beautiful and the pleasant, the good. I don't want any pain, and I don't want any diseases or sicknesses or weaknesses. I don't want to get old, and I don't want to die, and I don't want to lose my loved ones, and I want to feel safe. I don't want to feel insecure. I want life to be a very pleasant, blissful experience. Report an error in the passage at 13:41

14:13 I don't want it to be a painful, miserable one. Notice this, what I want, what I would like, this wanting, desiring, the good, the beautiful, the true. Report an error in the passage at 14:13

14:30 But then that very desire has its other side, doesn't it? Because when we desire, when we're only coming from desire, which is out of ignorance, then we also have to Deal with fear. Fear that we're going to, we're not going to, we're going to have all the opposite. We're going to be miserable and in pain and have to live with the horrible and the unpleasant, the untrue. Report an error in the passage at 14:30

15:04 So ignorance is the real problem. Getting back to the source of suffering is, it's not birth, it's not the sensual world, it's ignorance. Report an error in the passage at 15:04

15:24 This the Buddha made very clear in his teaching of the Paticca Samuppada, where ignorance is the origin, conditions all the rest, all the rest of the illusions and delusions of self and desire, becoming. Report an error in the passage at 15:24

15:52 Now guilt, how I use guilt, because there are different ways of defining it. Words meant in the Western world we're often obsessed with this guilt. Report an error in the passage at 15:52

16:12 Now much of the guilt is based on just the people who haven't really done anything that bad still feel guilty. Sometimes we feel guilty just because we're hungry for food, aren't we? I'm greedy because I'm hungry for food. We feel guilty because... We have sexual desires. We can feel guilty about making mistakes. And so this guilt is the kind of proliferation of our mind coming from a personality view. Report an error in the passage at 16:12

16:53 In Report an error in the passage at 16:53

16:59 Western civilization, we tend to say we can imagine how we should be from the ideal position of if I were If I were a really good person, if I were perfect, if I were normal, if I were healthy, if everything was all right, if I didn't have any emotional problems, if I were perfectly balanced, then I wouldn't be like this. Report an error in the passage at 16:59

17:28 I wouldn't be frightened of the dark. I wouldn't be greedy for food. I wouldn't have sexual desires. I wouldn't make mistakes. Report an error in the passage at 17:28

17:40 I wouldn't do things wrong. Report an error in the passage at 17:40

17:49 Now contrast guilt with the word shame. Now we all, unless you're unfortunate enough to be a psychopath, most human beings have a sense of shame. Report an error in the passage at 17:49

18:02 And this I use for that feeling of knowing when we've done something wrong. And we need this. This is what we call hiri otappa in Pāli, a conscience. When I, if I should say something that's not true, There arises in my mind the knowledge that I've said something not true. I wouldn't call this guilt, Report an error in the passage at 18:02

18:27 because if I don't make anything out of it, if I don't go on and on about what a terrible thing I've done, if I recognize that I've said something wrong, then that helps me to set it right. We needn't make a problem about it. It just means that... maybe I have to learn how to be more careful speech. Report an error in the passage at 18:27

18:54 I have to put forth more effort in my life to do good things and to be more mindful so that I learn from mistakes. I should say something wrong. Report an error in the passage at 18:54

19:08 there's the conscience that knows. always knows, if you don't want it to know. When I was younger, I really... Resented having a conscience. It stopped me from doing a lot of things I thought would be a lot of fun to do. Report an error in the passage at 19:08

19:30 But a conscience is a very wonderful thing to have. I'm very grateful for it now. I have a conscience. Or this sense of shame. Our sense Report an error in the passage at 19:30

19:50 of shame allows us to learn from life. Psychopaths say, I assume, not being one myself, I don't know, but I assume that they don't have this mechanism, this conscience, so that they can just go and do things without feeling any sense of shame about it. Report an error in the passage at 19:50

20:08 But most people that I know, anyway, do have a sense of shame. And this is a very important function of our mind because it really keeps us from doing and saying things that will cause all kinds of misunderstandings. ...problems and confusions, both to ourselves and to others. Now when shame turns to guilt, that's coming from ignorance, and how I'm using the word guilt now, is the self-view attached. Report an error in the passage at 20:08

20:46 For example, if I'm guilty about saying something wrong, then I go on with, oh, I shouldn't have said that, I'm a terrible person, I'm hopeless, I should kind of... Go away and hide away from things. It turns inward into self-hatred, self-condemnation. And that can be an obsession of the mind. Many people have that self-disparaging tendency. We can become so guilt-ridden over just making normal mistakes as a human being, can't we? Report an error in the passage at 20:46

21:29 We can ruin our day because we We say something wrong and somebody misunderstands and we can spend the whole day feeling guilty and upset about it, obsessed with a mistake. Report an error in the passage at 21:29

21:46 Well, this is suffering, isn't it? Then guilt is because we are creating a problem about it. Oftentimes it doesn't solve the problem just to feel guilty. I mean, feeling guilty tends to increase the problem because it increases the sense of me as a separate being who does things wrong. Who isn't any good. Who is worthless. Who is a disgrace. Who is too greedy or too full of hatred or too selfish or this or too much of that. Report an error in the passage at 21:46

22:20 And that is what we create. That is not from wisdom. That is from ignorance. Because with wisdom we still make mistakes but we learn from them. Report an error in the passage at 22:20

22:38 We can reflect. On the results of what we do, what we say, and we learn from that. It doesn't mean that we're always going to do everything just right and perfectly. It means that the way things move and change, we can learn from that. So like being a monk, learning from monastic life, is that when you're first ordained, you're doing everything wrong. Report an error in the passage at 22:38

23:15 Usually, at least I did. Report an error in the passage at 23:15

23:20 Old ways are very old habits. Layman's ways, very strong still. So you tend to, your intention to do good, but the old ways can still overwhelm your mind. So you find yourself thinking, saying the wrong things, doing things you shouldn't. But then the sense of shame arises because in monastic life, It's a matter of honor. It's not imposed on you. None of us were forced into the monastic life. Report an error in the passage at 23:20

23:57 It's a deliberate, free choice. So it is appealing to our sense of honor and personal integrity. Rather than trying to be good out of fear and we're being good just because we're afraid to be bad, it means that we're actually trying to be good Trying to do good as our practice, as our way of relating to life and being within this realm of sensual forms and birth and death and the pain and the pleasure and the good and the bad that we all experience. Report an error in the passage at 23:57

24:45 Buddha, I think, has the clearest statement about morality. Because in the Western view of morality, It can be rather too much, a heavy kind of morality, so that even a bad thought, an impure thought, is considered immoral. Report an error in the passage at 24:45

25:13 At least this was the impression I had from my Christian background, and even on the Sermon on the Mount, the statement that even if a man looked with lust at another woman, he is committed Adultery in his heart, President Carter said one time. And Report an error in the passage at 25:13

25:36 he admitted to having lustful thought for another woman. Self-confession. Report an error in the passage at 25:36

25:44 But to a Buddhist, this would not be a moral sin. The immorality of would only come through action and speech. Now this is very important because the stila of Buddhism or the The moral precepts are guides for action in speech. Report an error in the passage at 25:44

26:13 If we have bad thoughts, as long as we don't act on them or speak on them, then we have not broken our moral commitment. Report an error in the passage at 26:13

26:26 So that in this practice of meditation as a Buddhist, you have a freedom of mind to look at things. And see them as dhammas so that even a bad thought is seen as dhamma. It arises and ceases. You're looking at it as it really is rather than taking it personally. And this gives you a perspective on our ability to think and feel. Report an error in the passage at 26:26

26:58 We're not thrown into making a judgment, a personal judgment about how bad I am because I have bad thoughts. Report an error in the passage at 26:58

27:07 Then we get caught up in guilt again, don't we? If I have bad thoughts, then I must be a bad person and so forth. We get carried away with this sense of being bad and then we become obsessed. We can be overwhelmed with this fear and guilt, self-disparagement, which make us even more heedless where we tend to do the very things that we think, the bad things that we think. Report an error in the passage at 27:07

27:37 Because when we're heedless and guilt-ridden and frightened, then that's the ground for committing actions and speech, which can cause harm, confusion, disruption, pain, misery, and the whole lot to ourselves and others. Report an error in the passage at 27:37

28:00 I found this very helpful to me because when I was a boy, I used to worry a lot about this. Because I wanted to be good, but yet there were so many bad thoughts going through my mind. And so that, like I was never, as a child, never allowed to show anger. Report an error in the passage at 28:00

28:27 We always thought that was bad. So that one repressed anger, was very frightened of it, and then it would come out in really awful ways sometimes. Anger would come out in rages. And be really nasty. And then you'd start hating yourself, feeling guilt-ridden about this. And you had no way of looking at it in any other... Nobody offered a perspective except that it was bad, it was terrible, and therefore you must be that way too. Report an error in the passage at 28:27

29:03 I must be a bad person, otherwise I wouldn't be thinking like this. I mean, good people don't get angry, do they? The illusion of a good person. It doesn't get angry. They're always kind, always compassionate, always patient and forgiving and so forth. Report an error in the passage at 29:03

29:29 So one becomes very frightened and threatened and you think, well, it's unfair, isn't it? Being born like this and then you're supposed to be good, you want to be good, and then you have all these bad thoughts going through your mind. Report an error in the passage at 29:29

29:45 And then when you go through puberty, you start having sexual thoughts. That can be rather frightening. You've been told that those are dirty thoughts. And then you think, oh, increasing. Now, not only is there anger, this is a hopeless situation. Report an error in the passage at 29:45

30:15 And the thoughts are bad. The thoughts are immoral. That's how I interpret it, anyway, in my youth. Report an error in the passage at 30:15

30:27 Becoming a Buddhist, this allowed me a kind of freedom to look at what I was frightened of. Now, living as a Buddhist monk, you do have tremendous protection because you're committed to a moral way of living, so in action and speech, so that you give yourself to that particular discipline to conform your actions and your speech to the precepts of that discipline. Report an error in the passage at 30:27

30:59 You submit yourself to that, but you're encouraged to look. Report an error in the passage at 30:59

31:35 And problems that one is repressed out of guilt. In the Buddhist meditation, one suddenly has the ability or spills the confidence to let these things arise in consciousness rather than just resist and suppress them again. One is willing to look at hatred in consciousness, not to judge it as a personal failing, but to see it See, that it is a dharma. It arises and it ceases. It is not self. It is just what it is. Report an error in the passage at 31:35

32:14 So you're seeing, you're looking at it and it's teaching you dharma rather than as something that is a personal failing, a permanent blot, a stain, something that is an obstacle that's preventing you from enlightenment. So even the freedom of the mind to allow what has been suppressed into consciousness again, to allow it into full consciousness, means that we can reflect on it and see it as impermanent. Report an error in the passage at 32:14

32:56 Because it is impermanent, isn't it? We're not just trying to get out of anything. We're looking at it in what it actually is as an experience. Any thought is impermanent. Good thoughts, bad thoughts, they're all impermanent. When you're looking at it as impermanent, when you're seeing it for what it is, then the tendency to judge it as a personal problem, as something personal, falls away. Report an error in the passage at 32:56

33:28 You're no longer saying, oh, this is mine, this terrible thought is mine, I shouldn't think like this, and on into the obsessions with guilt. You're seeing it... It's not a person at all. It's a condition. It might have a personal kind of quality to it, but it's not a person. It's an anger and greed and all these things. We can think of them from the self-view as personal traits. Report an error in the passage at 33:28

33:58 But when seen as they are, as dhammas, then they are seen clearly as not, they're not a person, they're not mine. They're just what they are. An angry thought is just that. It's impermanent. It has that quality of anger. Report an error in the passage at 33:58

34:20 And it's just what it is. It's nothing other than that. And so it ceases. It ends. And when we allow it to cease and end, then its karmic force ends. Report an error in the passage at 34:20

34:37 That's the cessation of that condition because what arises ceases. So we've allowed that which has arisen to cease. And in that cessation of that condition is the relief and peace of the mind that isn't caught up with guilt, remorse, fear, desire, and all the complicated additions and proliferations we can add to the moment as it is. Report an error in the passage at 34:37

35:12 When the Buddha taught the end of suffering, There's suffering, and there is the end of suffering. If everything is suffering, then it does seem really hopeless, doesn't it? Report an error in the passage at 35:12

35:39 Now, I like to use the word suffering, or dukkha, the Pāli word dukkha, as what we create onto life, out of ignorance. So this is, we're not saying that even, say, the body, we could say, is suffering. But it's not, really. It's just if we... It's just what it is. It's sensitive, yes. It feels. It's vulnerable. Report an error in the passage at 35:39

36:19 It is what it is. But since it's not self anymore, one can't label it in any kind of absolute way as being unsatisfactory or suffering. It is a condition. It is a dharma. It is born and it dies. It follows the natural law. Report an error in the passage at 36:19

36:40 The dhamma chat. So that the body itself, I don't see it as dukkha or suffering. It is what it is. It's when, out of ignorance, there's attachment to the body as me and mine, that there's suffering. And that suffering I create onto the body. I don't like it. I don't want it to be the way it is. It's not good enough. I don't want it to get old. I don't want it to be sick. I don't want the pain in it. I don't want the hunger in it. I don't like the way it looks. Report an error in the passage at 36:40

37:22 And that's suffering, isn't it? That's creating that onto the body. When the body is seen for what it is, no matter how it is, whether it's beautiful or ugly, male or female, old or young, healthy or sickly or whatever. When there's no additions from the mind, when there's no ignorance and nothing added to it, then it's bearable, even in its pain and illnesses. Report an error in the passage at 37:22

37:56 It is what it is. It follows the natural law. It's dharma. It's not self. So then we see that's the end of suffering. There's no suffering in that. There's only suffering when we want it to be otherwise, when we... Attaching to it as a personal possession. Now this is most important to free the human individual from this illusion of oneself being a human body. Report an error in the passage at 37:56

38:32 Because these human bodies are, as refuges, they're very unsatisfactory. If this is what one really is, is this form here, this is all there is, then it's... It is suffering, and everything is suffering. Because this is not a refuge, the human form, the human birth. It is a transition only. It's not to be attached to, identified with. I advise you not to seek refuge in the human form. Report an error in the passage at 38:32

39:16 It does have nice qualities, yes. If it's healthy and so forth, it can be very pleasant. We can get a lot of pleasure from our bodies. We certainly have many nice qualities and pleasant experiences with them. But there can also be very unpleasant, very miserable. Report an error in the passage at 39:16

39:41 But this is what we can meditate on now while we are alive within these forms is the fact that this is the way it is. This feeling is like this. Being conscious and feeling life. We open ourselves to life as we're experiencing it. No longer taking it as a personal quality, but merely for what it is. Feeling pain, feeling pleasure, beauty and ugliness. The whole sensual impingement. All that can impinge and we can experience through this form. Report an error in the passage at 39:41

40:28 We can see as a way of learning and understanding, of learning dharma, of realizing truth, rather than taking it personally, where we tend to just feel increasingly more threatened, frightened, guilt-ridden, especially if life changes in a way that we can't control. Report an error in the passage at 40:28

40:55 Just think, in modern life now, on this planet, things change so quickly. It can be very frightening to us. What before seemed like something kind of lasting to us, some governments and countries and parties and families and nations and so forth that had a sense of being long-lasting now change very quickly. Report an error in the passage at 40:55

41:28 Everything can move very fast. Report an error in the passage at 41:28

41:35 Just think of... Just in the past 80, 90 years, my mother, 86, she can still remember the horse and buggy. She can remember the crystal set before they had radios. She can remember the first telephones. Report an error in the passage at 41:35

42:03 She's still alive. She can remember. Then she has television. They have a... My mother and father are both living. They have... Report an error in the passage at 42:03

42:17 people in California have chairs that you can just press a button and it everything you want. My father has an electric bed. Report an error in the passage at 42:17

42:31 they have American gadgetry. They have possible gadget in the kitchen and television and remote control. So my father... Arthritic father can sit there and press a button and go to 60-odd television channels. Report an error in the passage at 42:31

42:54 And all that from the days of the horse and buggy and the crystal set. So that is, you know, when we think how fast things change. It's the society now, say, 90 years ago to the present time. A very rapid transition. Report an error in the passage at 42:54

43:24 The sensory world is like this. It has its cycles, it moves, it changes. And if we seek refuge in sensory consciousness and sensory experience, all we can do is feel very threatened, frightened by life. Report an error in the passage at 43:24

43:44 That's what fear comes from, isn't it? When you see dharma, when you know the truth, Then there's nothing to fear because you're not, you're seeing the sensory world no longer as a personal problem but as it really is. It's dharma, it's teaching, it's learning, it's strengthening, it's always teaching us in whatever way it moves and changes. Report an error in the passage at 43:44

44:12 Nothing is, we can't say that only the good things are dharma. Everything is. In this word dharma it includes everything because All the conditions from the best to the worst arise and cease. Report an error in the passage at 44:12

44:34 Our attachment to the conditioned world, the conditioned world is the changing sensual plane, the Report an error in the passage at 44:34

45:02 immortal. To realize, and in the Buddhist teachings it made this very clear, the relationship of the conditioned to the unconditioned, the mortal to the immortal. Report an error in the passage at 45:02

45:18 So that our freeing ourselves from illusion from delusions about the conditioned world frees us from that blindness of ignorance of just being bound by conditions and being caught in just reactions to sensory planes and this is within this human form here and now this possibility this ever present possibility of seeing and knowing clearly and realizing deathlessness now Report an error in the passage at 45:18

45:57 deathlessness Cannot be, it's not a condition, so there's no way you can describe it. And it's not personal, not a person. You can't go and find a deathless person. Report an error in the passage at 45:57

46:13 All people are death-bound conditions. So people, personality, these are what we create from the ignorance of not understanding dharma. Report an error in the passage at 46:13

46:32 And the Buddha talked about the personality view, sakaya-diti, as one of the gross obstacles to realizing the path, the Eightfold Path. Report an error in the passage at 46:32

46:56 And personality view, this can be, when we start looking, when we investigate personality view, Our own views about our personalities, we begin to see them as conditions that arise and cease. So the personality views, we can let go of that. We don't have to be a person or a personality as an attachment. Report an error in the passage at 46:56

47:30 There's still the appearances of personality. We all have our unique qualities and so forth that we would call personal traits. Report an error in the passage at 47:30

47:42 So it doesn't mean that one becomes a kind of blank zombie by letting go of personality. It means that one is no longer tortured by the attachment to ignorant views. Report an error in the passage at 47:42

47:56 So that the ability to respond to life, to this process we're all involved in from birth to death, living within a separate form as conscious beings, with this feeling, this sensitivity, then we... And in Buddhist values, being born as a human being is a great blessing. Report an error in the passage at 47:56

48:34 I used to think it was a curse. This is terrible, being born as a human being. Dirty thoughts and repressed anger. Report an error in the passage at 48:34

48:45 And the... And all the problems in a competitive society where you're always judging yourself about whether you're better or worse than somebody else. Report an error in the passage at 48:45

49:00 And you have competitions. Report an error in the passage at 49:00

49:09 There's always going to be someone who's going to be better than you. And so that this is being... Born as a person all the time, this identity with separation, with separateness, is suffering. And I would say that when we talk about sin. I like to use that word sometimes because it is a shocking word to people. Report an error in the passage at 49:09

49:44 In fact, the irony of it is that sin in Thai means morality. Like the French have done with Latin, the Thais have done it with Pāli. Report an error in the passage at 49:44

49:58 So you get kind of corruptions of Pāli. And the sīla, sīla is the Pāli, and in Thai it comes out sin. So sin is morality in Thai. Report an error in the passage at 49:58

50:15 And porn, porn, which is like in pornography in English, in Thai means blessings. Report an error in the passage at 50:15

50:30 And there was a Thai man who used to come to Chitras who was called Porn Sin. Report an error in the passage at 50:30

50:40 Blessings of morality. This shows how relative even language is. Report an error in the passage at 50:40

51:04 What I've Report an error in the passage at 51:04

51:10 said here is an offering to you to contemplate and reflect on. Report an error in the passage at 51:10

51:21 What I like to do is to share experiences and thoughts with you. And then the... What I appreciate is your contemplating, considering, thinking, reflecting on this. I have no intention to tell you anything or what you should do or believe in or anything like this. Merely the Buddha's way of teaching was to try to awaken in the individual being that reflective capacity. Report an error in the passage at 51:21

51:58 Feeling to contemplate one's own existence, to be able to investigate the dharma, rather than just be told what you should believe in. Report an error in the passage at 51:58

52:10 So when one teaches like this, then it is, it's an offering, a sharing, for reflection only. Report an error in the passage at 52:10

52:27 So now I will open the rest of the time up to any questions. Report an error in the passage at 52:27

· · · silence, 1 minute

53:10 Well, the tendency for... I think most of us is to analyze it a lot, and that tends to increase the personal quality of it. What I found very helpful was more going to the feeling of it, like the heat in your body, like when you're feeling anger, or just the feeling they hear in your heart. Just trying to investigate the feeling. Report an error in the passage at 53:10

53:43 When there's anger in your mind, so you're going to the vedanā, the feeling of the body, and staying with the feeling, because that will help you to not be caught up in thinking and in judging and going around and around with angry thoughts, Report an error in the passage at 53:43

54:03 but in going to the actual feeling, the physical feeling that you have from anger. Then staying with the feeling, concentrating on the feeling. Bearing with the feeling till it ceases. Then you have the sense of relief of cessation. Because you're not suppressing the anger. Like suppressing the anger would be, I shouldn't think like this and kind of just deliberately refuse to look at it or have anything to do with it. Report an error in the passage at 54:03

54:35 So it's like looking over here and pretending you don't see it anymore. But this is a direct acceptance of the condition itself. Report an error in the passage at 54:35

54:47 And being patient with it, because anger always implies a lack of patience with oneself and the world. You become very angry because people are so stupid, or I'm so stupid, or it shouldn't be like this, the world shouldn't be like this. Anger can be very stimulating too, like some people depend on being angry to feel alive. Report an error in the passage at 54:47

55:18 I need to read the newspapers. It's all about, I mean, things that one can feel indignant about, isn't it? He didn't. Isn't that terrible? And you feel this sense of being alive. Why do people buy these depressing newspapers? Report an error in the passage at 55:18

55:38 Because, you know, a scandal, something horrible happens, atrocity, rape, all this. They stimulate the mind. You get indignant, angry, upset. And that's sometimes what we depend on for having that sense of feeling alive. When we're not angry or greedy or anything, we can just feel depressed, uncertain, insecure, and drift into a kind of neurotic, kind of neutral state. Report an error in the passage at 55:38

56:19 There's just anxiety. But if there's something really to feel indignant about, it kind of lifts you out of that. I've seen monks just, you know, really use anger in order to be able to not fall asleep. Report an error in the passage at 56:19

56:40 There was one monk, I remember, who used to, whenever he was sitting straight, you knew he was angry. Report an error in the passage at 56:40

56:49 Because when he wasn't angry, he was falling asleep. Report an error in the passage at 56:49

56:56 So that anger and lust also, it makes you, greed and lust, have a strong, make you feel alive. So that, like in, what are usually films about? Wars, violence, sex, things that arouse strong feelings. Report an error in the passage at 56:56

57:22 They don't make films about Buddhist monks letting go of anger. Report an error in the passage at 57:22

57:33 They might make a film about Buddhists not getting angry, but not about one letting go of it, at least not yet. Report an error in the passage at 57:33

· · · silence, 1 minute

58:10 Well, that is like with fear, because being vulnerable is taken very personally. The person is vulnerable, and the body is vulnerable. But as you begin to investigate more and more through insight, Then you realize there's nothing to fear. I mean, even the worst things that can happen to the body and to me as a person, I feel now I would have the strength to bear with that. Report an error in the passage at 58:10

58:50 I could endure even the worst. I'd be willing to even try. You know, whatever, no matter how horrible it might be, I could look at it now in a way that I could learn from it. So I'm not particularly concerned about what happens to me. But before I was very anxious and frightened by life because everything was taken personally. Report an error in the passage at 58:50

59:13 So if somebody insulted me, I was really hurt by the insult. Or if I had an illness, it was ruining my life and I wasn't any good anymore if I was sick or that. And everything was, and the possibilities of being I developed all kinds of defenses, you know, ways of walking and looking and acting and all that to kind of keep everything, you know, under control. Report an error in the passage at 59:13

59:55 And like with men, you don't... You don't want, at least my generation, you didn't want anyone to know you were vulnerable. You wanted people to think you were invulnerable, invincible. So you kind of tried to look and act in a way that was a bit frightening to people. Report an error in the passage at 59:55

1:00:18 The last thing you wanted to admit was that even to yourself that you were vulnerable, you could be hurt. Report an error in the passage at 1:00:18

1:00:40 Well, this is what I'm getting to, is that that, as you... ha, ha, ha. Report an error in the passage at 1:00:40

1:00:45 Like with fear and anxiety, the more you really look at it, not just suppress it, open to it, then you'll find that that falls away from you, the fear and anxiety. Report an error in the passage at 1:00:45

1:01:02 As long as you keep running away, like fear has power over you as long as it frightens you. Like fear will always have power in your life as long as you keep running from it. But then fear becomes powerless when you don't run from it, when you just look at it. And so it shrivels up like the dragon. It looks fierce and it breathes fire and you run in terror. But as soon as you turn and efface it, it shrinks. Report an error in the passage at 1:01:02

1:01:36 And fear is like that. Like I've found with just looking at what I'm frightened of in my mind. How does it feel? Not to analyze it. I'm frightened because of this or that. But just the actual experience when you're that way, when you're having that. And then you begin to, you can bear that. That's something you can bear and it ceases. It ends. But if you run from it, then you think you can't bear it. Report an error in the passage at 1:01:36

1:02:10 You've just got to keep running all the time and keep looking at other things to get away from it. And then we get caught up in just Suppressing and running in life. Because admittedly life has its dangers and we can when we become aware of the dangerousness of life rather it can be rather terrifying to us because it's taken from this personal position. Report an error in the passage at 1:02:10

1:02:38 When that position is let go of and seen and the actual fear is seen for what it is. You have a sense of fearlessness and trust, like faith. I find this very, very powerful in me now, tremendous faith in the dharma. When I started, when I became a Buddhist monk, I didn't have a lot of faith. I was a skeptical, negative type of person. Report an error in the passage at 1:02:38

1:03:13 I mean, I like Buddhism. Report an error in the passage at 1:03:13

1:03:36 out more and more through meditation, letting go of those tendencies, one feels this sense of abiding in faith and trust. Report an error in the passage at 1:03:36

1:03:45 In the form we are in as a human being, we can only know a little bit, being conscious within such a limited form on a planet. In one way, we're very insignificant in the totality of it all. It's just this little creature here in a vast universe which we can't understand it. You know, it boggles our mind, doesn't it, when you try to contemplate the universal system. It's so vast in the terms that we think and feel. Report an error in the passage at 1:03:45

1:04:28 But this is where in the human, the Buddha pointed not to the external universe, but to the mind of the individual, because this is where you can solve the problem, is in your mind. Report an error in the passage at 1:04:28

1:04:44 And that will allow you to feel this sense of trust in the universe, in the totality of it, a sense of trust rather than fear and anxiety. When you're just looking at it as a very vulnerable person, alienated and separate, it's rather frightening and terrifying because, you know, just nature itself, volcanoes and earthquakes and cyclones and tornadoes and fire and then nuclear. Report an error in the passage at 1:04:44

1:05:17 and nuclear reactors blowing up and pollution. There's a lot to be frightened of. I mean, it's not, you know, on that level of me being hurt and harmed by the environment I'm living in. Not to mention the possibility of being hurt by other people. And notice how sensitive my heart is. When I see something unpleasant, it hurts in my heart. I can feel something in here going on. Even if it's not happening to me, if it's happening to somebody else, you feel something here. Report an error in the passage at 1:05:17

1:06:02 And that's a sensitivity. When you see somebody doing something bad, you feel it. At least I can feel it. There's a definite... Feeling in my body from that. And so that we, you know, just the emotions and this whole feeling realm, you realize we are now swimming involved in this realm of sensation and feeling. Report an error in the passage at 1:06:02

1:06:41 And if we can accept the whole of it, I mean, as long as we're trying to just Pick and choose out of it what we like and then reject the rest. We're caught in fear because we're always running, we're trying to keep ourselves away from that which we don't like and trying to hold on to what we like. And the way out of that suffering is by accepting the totality of it. And then we feel a sense of trust and a refuge in dharma rather than this sense of alienation and fear. Report an error in the passage at 1:06:41

1:07:20 Separation is me as a lost soul in a mysterious and universal system that I can't understand. Because with faith, it allows us to open to it, to the whole, the whole of it. We no longer feel we have to defend or pick and choose out of it anything. We trust it in the sense of An overwhelming benevolence, where when it's taken from a personal position, it seems cold and impersonal and unjust and threatening. Report an error in the passage at 1:07:20

1:08:05 When we look at it from the vulnerable personality view, we can look at life as a very frightening, threatening experience. Report an error in the passage at 1:08:05

1:08:18 And it seems like, you know, Survival of the fittest looks more like reality than anything else. You've got to look out for yourself. You've got to make sure you're all right. That's the kind of survival of the fittest. But when there's faith, then, that is when the mind is completely open, embracing, accepting. Report an error in the passage at 1:08:18

1:08:43 And then, rather than feeling threatened and terrified by all the possible... possibilities of pain and misery that we can imagine, we trust. And for the Buddhists, we say in Buddha Dhamma Saṅgha, the refuge in the triple gem. Report an error in the passage at 1:08:43

1:09:05 This is a Buddhist way of talking about the individual human's ability to abide in faith. And this faith isn't a belief. You're not believing in a kind of Benevolent being that's protecting you, it's much more a realization through wisdom. Faith and wisdom in Buddhism are inseparable from each other. They balance each other. Report an error in the passage at 1:09:05

1:09:42 Where sometimes in English the word faith can mean believing in something that may not even be true. But I would not use faith for that. I'd use more or less, you can believe in anything. Report an error in the passage at 1:09:42

1:09:56 You can believe that there are purple people on Jupiter. You can believe it if you want. But faith is a very wholesome thing. It's not coming from stupidity or ignorance in this sense of Buddhist faith or what they call saddha. Report an error in the passage at 1:09:56

1:10:31 We would say the Report an error in the passage at 1:10:31

1:10:37 Buddhist way of talking, we would say that By letting go of selfishness, then there is faith and trust. I mean, we're getting beyond... The Buddha avoided this sense of a self because it tends to... The concept itself, the concept of self, even a higher self or a lower self, whatever, can be quite... Blinding to it. Buddha, in his wisdom, avoided the term altogether, though he talked about no self, which isn't saying that there isn't any self in an absolute way, but a way of letting go of all views, all personality views, all attachments, even to the view of a higher self. Report an error in the passage at 1:10:37

1:11:47 Then there is the knowing and the wisdom, the knowing and wisdom, which is not, which one can't ever, if one makes it, says it as a personal attainment, then you're lost again in a self-view. Because when you let go of self-view, then what's left is mental clarity, intelligence, wisdom, which is not personal. Report an error in the passage at 1:11:47

1:12:16 It's not. Mind is not yours. It's not male or female. It's not Buddhist or Christian. It has no name. It's the way it is. It's truth. And when you have that realization, you abide in that more and more. You trust. You're willing to let go of the world because you're not looking. You don't expect the worldly conditions to be any refuge anymore. So you can let things go and change. Report an error in the passage at 1:12:16

1:12:45 change and and learn from life rather than trying to always protect defend yourself and hold on to bits and pieces of it Report an error in the passage at 1:12:45

1:13:13 realized if I like that, could Report an error in the passage at 1:13:13

1:13:38 Now, is it wrong to have shorthand? Report an error in the passage at 1:13:38

1:13:47 worry about the damper will take No, I agree with you completely. Report an error in the passage at 1:13:47

1:14:02 No, we need things like that. I mean, like, just to have the, or you could say the Buddha, or like in pure land Buddhism, there's a sense of Amitabha, or Avalokiteshvara. But these are symbols for loving, compassion, benevolence, which is true. And for a human, we often... Often times need to put them in human form. Love needs to be manifested in the human form. Or even symbolically. Report an error in the passage at 1:14:02

1:14:47 So that we have somebody like some bodhisattva like Avalokiteshvara because that's a manifestation of human form as compassion. Report an error in the passage at 1:14:47

1:14:58 I think it's perfectly valid. And for family life because this is And also with children, you can't talk about no self and all that. Children really need useful conventions that help them with their lives. And some of these, like the stories from the Jataka, Jataka stories, are beautiful ways of inspiring children to be kind and generous. Report an error in the passage at 1:14:58

1:15:40 And forgiving and so forth. And they are maybe myths and legends, but for children I think that's good enough. Your mind isn't asking for historical accuracy or psychological subtleties. It's a mind that's still exploring and needs confidence, needs to be encouraged. With beautiful conventions and gracious forms. But this, what I was talking about with you, is being able to investigate the mind itself, which, of course, when you really investigate fear and accept it, then, of course, it's gone. Report an error in the passage at 1:15:40

1:16:34 It's not there. But still, we need... Maybe affirmations that remind us of that. So that in, say, in monastic life, every morning, every evening, we chant to the Buddha Dhamma Saṅgha. We have all kind of the, some people are, European people are quite shocked to me that Buddhism has no rituals or rites and all that. Report an error in the passage at 1:16:34

1:17:03 The Buddha didn't teach rituals and rites. We had one Anagarika leave recently because he thought we were deluding the people with our rituals and rites because they have this kind of idea that it's superstition. Report an error in the passage at 1:17:03

1:17:20 But how I see the ritual and ceremonial side of Theravāda Buddhism is as graceful gestures and skillful means towards remembering, towards remembering. And recollecting the Buddhadharma Saṅgha. And the more we reflect and recollect and remember, this tends to take us out of that negative state where we're worried, upset, anxious about what might happen in the future. Report an error in the passage at 1:17:20

1:17:55 Like living here with, I find, living as a monk all these years, there's a real sense of devotion and relief. To be able to do a ceremony is like a beautiful gesture. And, you know, one has to do something in life. Report an error in the passage at 1:17:55

1:18:20 And with a ceremony, you bring people together. Like, people have babies, and maybe they don't want them to be baptized in a Christian church because they're Buddhists. What do they do? They don't want to just, you know, they have a baby, they'd like to... Do something good for the baby, to kind of bring it into the society and recognize it. And so they think, what can we do, Venerable Tomato? Report an error in the passage at 1:18:20

1:18:52 We have this baby now. Do Buddhists have any kind of ceremonies or that? So we have blessing ceremonies. So we encourage the couple to bring the baby and the relatives and friends and the monks and nuns come in and you surround the baby and you chant. And the ceremony, a kind of ceremony and ritual, which could be just a superstition if you thought that, you know, it's keeping away the demons from outer space. Report an error in the passage at 1:18:52

1:19:25 But when you're looking at it as during that time, the parents, the grandparents, the relatives, friends, monks, nuns, people just staying here, strangers, we're all doing this together. With our attention on the child, offering it blessings, giving it, sending forth good thoughts, wishing it well, paying attention, recognizing its existence. Report an error in the passage at 1:19:25

1:19:57 And all this is very wholesome and good, and everybody feels it, everybody enjoys it. If we didn't have those, I mean, we'd still get by, but those are still going to carry on. Report an error in the passage at 1:19:57

1:20:13 I say it is an absolute necessity, but it is a gracious gesture and a way that many people can do something gracious and beautiful and a blessing together as a corporate body. Report an error in the passage at 1:20:13

1:20:31 So I've gotten to appreciate ceremonies, which I didn't at first. I was one of those Americans that, a waste of time, went to Wat Ba Pong and all that Chinese, a waste of time. Report an error in the passage at 1:20:31

1:20:48 I came here to meditate. I didn't come here to... And Ajahn Chah used to just laugh at me and my strong opinions. And then eventually I began to recognize the value of many things that I didn't understand, didn't know anything about when I first began. Report an error in the passage at 1:20:48

1:21:24 I went to this Christian Buddhist conference in California. I found it very interesting. Report an error in the passage at 1:21:24

1:21:37 Because I came away as five days and it was one of these kind of international conferences with a lot of well-known theologians and philosophers and scholars, as well as practitioners of Christianity and Buddhism. And they're both different groups of Christians and Buddhists. But the openness and the good feeling. Report an error in the passage at 1:21:37

1:22:09 That existed there between the Christians and Buddhists was very impressive. And I had a real feeling that somehow Christianity was kind of developing again. It seemed to have been stuck for so many years in kind of just holding on to something very narrow. And some of the Christian theologians and Christian Report an error in the passage at 1:22:09

1:22:40 Monks were very impressive in much more kind of open and willing to look into the nature of things. They didn't have the feeling that they were trying to defend doctrines anymore. And more and more Buddhist-like, in fact. Report an error in the passage at 1:22:40

1:23:07 So Report an error in the passage at 1:23:07

1:23:12 this is... Many of these, most of the really open ones, were the Roman Catholics, which used to be the most kind of closed-door Christian religion. They wouldn't even have anything to do with the Protestants. When I was a child, the Roman Catholics, the idea of going into a Protestant church was like committing a mortal sin. Report an error in the passage at 1:23:12

· · · silence, 1 minute

1:24:18 conflict in the world it does become personal Report an error in the passage at 1:24:18

1:24:27 a point of and killing the Report an error in the passage at 1:24:27

1:24:37 Well, Report an error in the passage at 1:24:37

1:24:42 what I would, I'd differentiate, I'd say belief in a kind of blind belief in a religious convention creates the vision. It's like if I believe that That Theravāda Buddhism is right and everything else is wrong. I wouldn't call that faith. I'd call that belief coming out of ignorance. And of course that would make everything, by thinking to that belief, then of course I could only create conflict around me. Report an error in the passage at 1:24:42

1:25:19 If you didn't agree with me, if you didn't believe what I believed in, then we'd only conflict with each other. Either you're forced to believe me and Report an error in the passage at 1:25:19

1:25:31 ...support and affirm my belief, or you're a heretic, you're a sinner, you have to get out. So this sense of separation, this happens with religion a lot, because the sectarianism is one of the biggest problems with any religion, attachment to a particular... I found in Thailand, Christian missionaries are very disruptive in Thailand because Christian missionaries in Thailand tend to teach that they're right and everyone else is wrong. Report an error in the passage at 1:25:31

1:26:44 So wherever they go, they tend to disrupt the society. Even if they convert a village of Thai people who were formerly Buddhists, then that village feels that it can no longer associate with the other villages who are Buddhists. So then it's disrupted and caused conflict and separation. Report an error in the passage at 1:26:44

1:27:10 Faith, I use, not from, not as, there's no attachment in faith. It comes from seeing things, from knowing, from mental clarity, from right understanding rather than from blind belief. separation Report an error in the passage at 1:27:10

1:27:31 At first, maybe we have to believe in something, admittedly, like with many religious conventions, you're asked to believe and not doubt. That gets you maybe into, and sometimes they never get you out of that position. That's all they teach, and that's all they'll ever teach. But to me, religion, whole purpose, like I see with Christianity now, Its potential as a proper religion to be one of liberation from attachment, whether Christians see that or not themselves, something else, or whether they'll ever teach that way, something else, but I see that that is the possibility within Christianity without being a disruptive, divisive force anymore. Report an error in the passage at 1:27:31

1:28:26 With the Theravāda, you get... In Theravadan countries, you can really look down on Mahāyāna Buddhism. In Thailand, for example, if you just say, well, he's a Mahāyāna, it's like a dismissal. He's stupid, doesn't know anything. Not that they know anything about Mahāyāna, except that there's a prejudice. Report an error in the passage at 1:28:26

1:28:57 Then on my retreat now, there's a Korean bhikkhu. who has been ordained in Korea in the Mahāyāna form and was ordained in Thailand in Theravāda. There's two ordinations. He's better than I am. I don't even want. And I was asking him about in Korea, what did they teach about Theravāda? And he said that Theravadan countries are just The lesser vehicle, the Hinayana, and just selfish Arahants. Report an error in the passage at 1:28:57