As to the second requirement, the strict observance of the
rules of discipline, I will tell you sincerely that there can be no spiritual progress without morality and the fulfillment of religious duty.
Discipline is the foundation upon which enlightenment
rests. Discipline regulates our behavior and makes it unchanging.
Steadiness becomes steadfastness and it is this which produces wisdom.
The Surangama Sutra clearly teaches us that mere accomplishment in meditation will not erase our impurities. Even if we
were able to demonstrate great proficiency in meditation, still, without adherence to discipline, we would easily fall into Mara's evil
realm of demons and heretics.
A man or woman who is diligent in observing moral discipline and religious duty is protected and encouraged by sky dragons
and angels, just as he is avoided and feared by demons from the
underworld and heretics from everywhere.
It once happened that in the state of Kashmir, a poisonous
earth dragon lived in a cave near a monastery of five hundred Theravadin arhats. This dragon terrorized the region and made people's
lives miserable. Everyday the arhats would assemble, and together
they would try to use the power of their collective meditation to
drive away the dragon. But always they failed. The dragon simply
would not leave.
Then one day a Mahayana Chan monk happened to stop at
the monastery. The arhats complained about this terrible dragon and
asked the monk to join them in meditation, to add the power of his
meditation to theirs. "We must force this beast to leave!" they
wailed. The Chan monk merely smiled at them and went directly to
the poisonous dragon's cave.
Standing in the cave's entrance, the monk called to the
dragon, "Wise and virtuous Sir, would you be kind enough to depart
from your lair and find refuge in a more distant place?"
"Well," said the dragon, "since you have so politely asked,
I will accede to your request and depart forthwith." The dragon, you
see, had a fine sense of etiquette. So, away he went!
From their monastery, the arhats watched all this in absolute astonishment. Surely this monk possessed miraculous samadhi
powers!
As soon as the monk returned, the arhats gathered around
him and begged him to tell them about these wonderful powers.
"I did not use any special meditation or samadhi," said the
monk. "I simply kept the rules of discipline and these rules stipulate
that I must observe the minor requirements of courtesy as carefully
as I observe the major requirements of morality."
So we can see that the collective power of five-hundred
arhats' meditation-samadhi are sometimes not the equal of one
monk's simple adherence to the rules of discipline.
And if you ask, "Why should strict attention to discipline
be necessary if the mind has attained a non-judgmental state? Why
should an honest and straightforward man even need to continue to
practice Chan?"
I would ask such a man, "Is your mind so secure that if the lovely
Goddess of the Moon were to come down to you and embrace you
with her naked body, would your heart remain undisturbed?"
And you... If someone without having cause were to insult or to
strike you, would you feel no anger and resentment? Can you be
certain that you would always resist comparing yourself to others,
or that you would always refrain from being judgmental? Can you
be sure that you would always know right from wrong?
Now, if you are absolutely certain that you would never yield to
temptation, that you would never err at all, then, open your mouth
and speak loud and clear! Otherwise, do not even whisper a lie.
As regards the third requirement of having a firm belief in
one's Buddha Self, please know that faith is the mother, the nourishing source of our determination to submit to training and to perform our religious duties.
If we seek liberation from the travails of this world, we
must have a firm faith in the Buddha's assurance that each living
being on earth possesses Tathagata wisdom and, therefore, has the
potential of attaining Buddhahood. What prevents us from realizing
this wisdom and attaining this Buddhahood? The answer is that we
simply do not have faith in his assurances. We prefer to remain in
ignorance of this truth, to accept the false as genuine, and to dedicate our lives to satisfying all our foolish cravings.
Ignorance of the truth is a disease. Now, as the Buddha
taught, the Dharma is like a hospital that has many doors. We can
open any one of them and enter into a place of cure. But we must
have faith in our physicians and in the efficacy of the treatment.
Whenever he wanted to illustrate the problems which
doubt and lack of faith cause, the Buddha would relate the parable
of the physician. He would ask, "Suppose you were wounded by a
poisoned arrow and a friend brought a physician to help you. Would
you say to your friend, `No! No! No! I'm not going to let this fellow
touch me until I find out who shot me! I want to know the culprit's
name, address, and so forth. That's important, isn't it? And I want
to know more about this arrow. Is the tip stone or iron, bone or
horn? And what about the wooden shaft? Is it oak or elm or pine?
What kind of sinew has been used to secure the tip to the shaft? Is it
the sinew of an ox, a monkey, or a ruru deer? And what kind of
feathers are in the shaft? Are they from a heron or a hawk? And
what about the poison that's been used? I want to know what kind it
is. And who is this fellow, anyway? Are you sure he's a qualified
doctor? After all, I don't want a quack to treat me. I think I have a
right to know these things, don't you? So, please answer my questions or I'll not let the man touch me.' Well," said the Buddha,
"before you could get your questions answered to your satisfaction,
you would be dead."
So, dear friends, when you find yourself suffering from
the ills of the world, trust in The Great Physician. He has cured millions of others. Which believer has ever perished in his care? Which
believer has failed to be restored to eternal life and happiness by
following his regimen? None. All have benefited. And so will you
if you have faith in his methods.
Faith is a kind of skill that you can develop. If, for example, you wish to make bean curd, you begin by boiling and grinding
the soybeans and then you add a solution of gypsum powder or
lemon juice to the boiled beans. You know that you can stand there,
if you wish, and watch the curds form. You have faith in your
method because it always works. Thus you gain the feeling of certainty. Of course, the first time that you made bean curd, assuming
that you were completely unfamiliar with its production, you may
have lacked faith in the method. You might have been filled with
doubt that gypsum or lemon water would cause the boiled beans to
form curds. But once you succeeded and saw with your own eyes
that the recipe was correct and that the procedure worked, you
accepted without reservation the prescribed method. Your faith in
the method was established.
Therefore, we must all have faith that we each have a Buddha Nature and that we can encounter this Buddha Nature if we diligently follow a proper Dharma path.
If we are afraid, we should also remember Master Yong
Jia's words recorded in his Song of Enlightenment;
"In the Tathagata's Real World neither egos, rules, nor
hells exist. No samsaric evils may be found there. If I'm lying, you
can pull my tongue out and stuff my mouth with sand, and leave it
that way throughout eternity."
No one ever pulled Master Yong Jia's tongue out.
