Mindset Determines How We Age

by Thrangu Rinpoche

Keep a cheerful, calm state of mind. Try not to overthink  

when we are unhappy. This is beneficial to both our body and mind, 

and helps to slow down the ageing process.

Elderly Tibetans often circle stupas and make prostrations. This is a kind of dharma practice, and also a type of physical exercise. Due to cultural differences, elderly populations elsewhere have different habits and customs. However, I think the main difference lies in whether or not they have encountered the dharma.

WAVE GOODBYE TO NEGATIVE THINKING

Generally, in their spare time, Buddhists listen to the teachings or stay at home to practice or recite prayers, so they don’t easily become upset. Elderly non-Buddhists mostly reside in places without the dharma or do not have the chance to learn about the dharma. Even though they might lead comfortable lives, they tend to have more negative thinking. Once they retire and have nothing to do,  they tend to feel more bored and lonely.

The most important thing for older people is to not be pessimistic. We should not constantly think, “Oh, I am too old. I am really struggling a lot” and focus solely on negative things.

We should often be cautious not to give rise to thoughts of jealousy, pride, and anger. When they do arise, we have to realise that these negative thoughts are of no use to us.

Older people in different situations experience distinct afflictions and suffering. For example, some have more anger and are short-tempered, others suffer more from physical pain. Fortunately, there are ways to face all these afflictions and suffering.

AFFLICTIONS ALSO DEPEND ON CONDITIONS

According to the Treasury of Abhidharma, there are three causes for the afflictions to arise: not abandoning the kernels of the afflictions, the object being present, and inappropriate attention. An older person with more anger in them, for example, has not abandoned the kernel of anger. When they see an object that angers them, they develop inappropriate attention. This means that they persistently think about the person who angered them and the terrible things that person has done. They feel this way even if the person never directly harmed them, due to the influence of inappropriate attention.

Afflictions arise when the causes and conditions, namely the kernels, object, and inappropriate attention are present. We can handle the situation by thinking logically, and approaching it from an objective and positive perspective. The person who angered us might have had no alternative, which is something with which we can empathise. We ourselves probably also behaved wrongly at that time. Using a logical approach, based on reasoning, helps to diminish our anger, and makes it easier for us to cultivate loving-kindness and compassion. This practice is suitable for older people with more anger in them.

CULTIVATE DEVOTION TOWARDS THE DHARMA

Some of us experience mental suffering, but constantly feeling sorry for ourselves is not constructive. We should consider the fact that there are many people in this world suffering just like we are. We are not the only ones experiencing pain.

We should try to think about what we can do to alleviate the pain of others. We can recite prayers and make dedications for them.

Thinking and practising like this also reduces our own worries and suffering.

In general, we should try to cultivate devotion towards the dhar­ma. We can do things like reciting prayers, circling stupas, and meditating to help us develop devotion.

In a way, we can say that people living in Asia are very fortunate. Although it is rare to find stupas in most places, they can visit monasteries, meditate there, and make offerings and aspirations,  which are all excellent practices.

In addition, some older people may suffer from serious illnesses and experience various physical discomforts. They should make use of the opportunity to pray to the Medicine Buddha, practice his sadhana, and recite his mantra.

FEELING JOY TOWARDS AGEING

As an older person, I make a habit of reminding myself that being able to age like this is such a wonderful and fortunate thing. It is proof of my longevity. We should make use of our precious time to practice the dharma.

We need to be optimistic and joyful and remind ourselves that not everyone is able to live as long as we have. This is not easy to achieve, so we must treasure our ageing process and give rise to inner joy.

Keep a cheerful, calm state of mind. Try not to overthink when we are unhappy. This is beneficial to both our body and mind and helps to slow down the ageing process. A body and mind that is calm and cheerful is extremely beneficial to us.

The more you are preoccupied with your own physical ageing, the more anxious you will become. Do not worry so much about your physical appearance. Concentrate, rather, on not wasting your life. Practise the Dharma. The more you engage in it, the more your satisfaction will grow. 

-- Dilgo Khyentse Rinpoche

涅槃是什么？

斌宗法师

前言

修学佛法最后的归趣在求证涅槃，那么学佛修行的人，当要彻底明白它，不可轻易忽略它。然而它到底是个什么东西？让我来略说一下：

一、涅槃的意义

涅槃是梵语，正音为波利匿缚男，旧云涅槃，今顺古亦云涅槃。又名泥洹，或云涅槃那，皆音之讹略，或楚夏不同。旧译为灭度，或云寂灭、无为、解脱、安乐、不生不灭等，名虽异其义则同。今单举灭度和寂灭二义释之：灭度，即‘灭’除烦恼，‘度’脱生死的意思。寂灭，寂谓理性‘寂’静，灭谓烦恼‘灭’除。亦可说，证得‘寂’静之体性，自然烦恼‘灭’除；烦恼灭除，自然证得寂静体性。“智论”云：涅名为出，槃名为趣，谓永出诸趣生死，则亦可译为出趣也。

若据新译——玄奘法师则译为‘圆寂’，此义比较来得完善，因为寂灭、灭度、解脱等译，不过仅约断德方面，言断灭生死烦恼。圆寂则统明智断二德。今略释之：

具足一切福德智慧叫做‘圆’；永离一切烦恼生死叫做‘寂’。简单的说：即德无不‘圆’，患无不‘寂’。详细的说：即福慧二严做到圆满无缺(圆)，三惑烦恼彻底清除，二种生死完全度脱(寂)，永远不再被烦恼生死所困扰，回复‘圆’明‘寂’照的本有心体，而获到一种纯善纯美的庄严解脱。这就是涅槃的境界——圆寂。圆约进善方面言(成就一切福德)；寂约灭恶方面言(断惑灭苦)。据此研究起来，圆寂似乎大乘无为的涅槃，寂静、灭度等为小乘涅槃。

要之，圆寂也就是指得‘圆明寂照之真心’。因为它——真心——本具一切功德(圆)，永离一切烦恼(寂)故。成佛即证此真心，故涅槃并非诸佛的专有品，不过凡夫一向为梦想所蒙昧，因此不能证得。所谓迷则颠倒梦想，悟则究竟涅槃。

当知梦想，根本是由本觉真心而起的，我人如能灭一分梦想，即证一分真觉(如镜子去一分尘埃，即现一分光明)，乃至全灭全证。至此则一切功德无不复归‘圆’满，一切烦恼生死无不毕竟空‘寂’，是证到大乘究竟涅槃的境界。

二、涅槃的种类

现在再来把它的种类介绍一下：涅槃有二种，一、有余，二、无余，要详细明白它当分三段来讲：

(一)就小乘方面：证得阿罗汉果，对于招感生死业因的见思惑，虽已断尽而更不生起，但尚有前业所招的生死果报身未灭(生命体犹存)，叫做有余涅槃(尚有余此有漏依身的生死苦果可灭故)。若连以前烦恼业所受之身亦灭，更不随业受生死，叫做无余涅槃(无余外生死苦果可灭故)。换言之：不但招感生死之本的心理上之烦恼业惑已经解脱，即众苦所聚的生理上之现实生命体亦同称解脱，此为无余涅槃。以上为小乘的有余、无余涅槃(此有余、无余同为一体，因同断见思，同证真理。其不同处，唯在有漏依身上灭，未灭上分)。

(二)就大乘方面：若变易生死因尽为有余涅槃，变易的果尽为无余涅槃。此为大乘的有余、无余涅槃。

(三)就大小相对言；小乘所证涅槃为‘有余’，因为它仅断见思烦恼，灭分段生死而已，尚‘有’其‘余’的尘沙、无明烦恼未断，变易生死未了，故曰有余。至于大乘所证的涅槃，则为‘无余’，因为它是三惑全断，二种生死永灭，再‘无’其‘余’的烦恼可断，生死可了，故曰无余。此为大小相对的有余、无余涅槃。

又近代的学者说：果报身未灭为有余(虽惑断而身尚在)待果报身灭时，始称为无余的涅槃。

更对于小乘和大乘涅槃的分解，详细可再分为三点说明：

1、小乘灭生死而涅槃，大乘达生死即涅槃，这叫做本性寂灭非寂灭异，此其一也。

2、小乘唯断界内见思，大乘并断界外(三界外)尘沙、无明，这叫做界内界外断惑异，此其二也。

3、小乘无身无智，未彻证法身般若之德；大乘则身知具足，众德圆备，这叫做众德具不具异，此其三也。我来引一段经文补释这众德具不具的道理，使读者易懂。

“法华玄赞”二云：‘一、真如之体灵明妙觉，名为般若’；彼为觉性故也。小乘之涅槃体非觉性，故不名般若。二、真如之体出所知障，名为‘法身’；彼为一切功德法所依故。小乘之涅槃非为功德法所依，故不名法身。三、真如之体众苦都尽，名为‘解脱’；彼离分段变易故。小乘之涅槃唯离分段，未脱变易，故非圆满解脱。

据上所说，小乘涅槃所断的是见思烦恼，所灭的是分段生死，所证的是偏空真理，所以它的生死因便是见思烦恼，它的生死果即指有漏依身(为有漏烦恼感受生死所依之身)。大乘涅槃，所断的是尘沙、无明烦恼，所灭的是变易生死，所证的是中道实相理。此则以尘沙、无明为变易生死因，空及二边之法相为变易生死果。

二乘人灭分段生死，不受后有而入涅槃。大乘菩萨及佛虽变易生死，息妄归真，而证无余涅槃。或云：‘佛息应身之化，归于真身之本’谓之无余涅槃。

总之，二乘所证涅槃，它的本体是见思烦恼永寂，偏空真谛理显现。菩萨所证涅槃，它的本体是尘沙烦恼永寂，但中俗谛理显现。佛所证的涅槃，它的本体是无明烦恼永寂，实相中谛理显现。

小乘虽然不算圆满解脱，可是它已能了脱分段生死，因此，亦得称为涅槃——小涅槃；三德中仅具解脱一分。至于大乘所证的涅槃，可就不同了，它是圆断烦恼、圆满解脱、圆证三身、圆获三智；那法身、般若、解脱三德具备，常乐我净的四德不缺。

此外还有性净涅槃、无住涅槃，合前有余、无余为四种涅槃。有余、无余是三乘共证，凡夫无分；性净涅槃是凡圣同具；无住涅槃是佛果独证。今略说明之：‘性净涅槃’谓诸法自体，性本空寂，不假他修，法法平等，圣凡不二的理性。‘无住涅槃’是说不住生死，不住涅槃，因为它是福慧圆满，更无所求。体虽如如而能不变随缘；用虽生灭而能随缘不变。又以大悲故不住涅槃(不忍坐视沉溺生死的众生而不救)；以大智故不住生死(不被无明所迷，业力所转)，故云无住。

结语

如上所明，涅槃是学佛修行最后的归趣，不消说它当然是个无法估价的圣果。嗟嗟！世有一班不懂教义的人，竟以涅槃认为是死的别名，这是根本错误的！要知道，它——涅槃，乃诸佛圣者所同证的圣果，是由历劫辛苦，积行一切功德所换来的代价。就以小乘涅槃来说：并不是个个死了就能即证涅槃。请大家认识清楚为幸！

Even if you can recite the whole Tripitaka by heart, even if you know the entire Dharma, if you don’t have the guru’s advice, there will be a gap between you and the Dharma when you practice. 

-- Atiśha

Three in One: A Buddhist Trinity

by Reginald A. Ray

It is said that the Buddha is defined by three bodies of enlightenment, the so-called trikaya of classical Mahayana theory. These include the dharmakaya, the body of ultimate reality; the sambhogakaya, the body of joy; and the nirmanakaya, the Buddha’s conditioned, human body of flesh and blood. The trikaya theory often seems rather abstract and remote, far removed from our ordinary lives and daily meditation practice. In this column, I want to suggest, however, that the trikaya actually forms part of our most intimate experience and is the very basis of our present human existence.

According to the Abhidharma, there are three major kinds of ground that all humans experience in the course of their lives. The first, the ground of “existence,” is the experience of ourselves as having a relatively solid and continuous identity, grounded in the practical, conventional world. This ground is affirmed through all the activities of the body, speech and mind by which we seek to define, maintain and enhance our familiar sense of “self.” This ground corresponds to the conventional idea of human life and is what most people view as the essence of their identity.

The second kind of ground is “death/birth.” There are times when we find ourselves unable to maintain the identity we have thought of as “me.” We feel weak and shaky, our very bodies and mind seem to be dissolving, and we feel like we are falling apart. In the midst of this fear, we may feel as if we are dying. We can call this ground “death/birth,” because whatever dissolution and death we may experience — whether psychological, social or even physical — is at the very same time a birth into another identity or mode of being.

The third kind of ground is emptiness or the “groundless ground.” Here, sometimes abruptly, we come face to face with our own nonexistence. We look to the solid and desirable ground of our familiar “existence,” and even to the typically undesirable ground of “death/birth,” and can find neither. We are able to discover nothing but space that is open, clear and empty. People report discovering this third kind of ground in the midst of a serious automobile accident, or when they have suddenly been humiliated, or while making love. It can also occur when we are stunned by traumatic news, overwhelmed by sadness or surprised by something extraordinarily beautiful.

These three grounds are nothing other than the three bodies of enlightenment manifesting in our experience. The apparent solidity and continuity of “existence” is the practical, helpful nirmanakaya; the perpetual change and transformation of “death/birth” is the unceasing sambhogakaya, and the unbounded openness of “emptiness” is nothing other than the immutable dharmakaya.

But, we may ask, how can these three bodies possibly manifest in the experience of confused, unenlightened people such as ourselves? Buddhism teaches that within each of us is buddhanature — the immaculate, peerless state of enlightenment embodied in a perfected way by the Buddha. What is this buddhanature? It is nothing other than the three bodies of a fully awakened one. Buddhism affirms, in other words, that the three kayas, in their integral, pure and mature form, are within us at this very moment.

Yet obviously we do not experience the three kayas in their full and perfected form. Rather, when they arise as the background of every moment of our lives, we instantly overlay and obscure them with the habitual, distorting tendencies of our ego.

Each of us, based on our particular karmic proclivities, tends to focus on one or another of the three kayas. We try to create from it a solid, secure ground for our samsaric “self.” For most of us, the nirmanakaya, in its solidified form as “existence,” is the ground we most prefer, with “death/birth” and “emptiness” being undesirable or even deeply feared grounds. Others, however, seek their primary security in the constant turmoil of “death/birth,” and find the continuity and stability of “existence” or the ground of emptiness extremely threatening. Such individuals feel compelled to create constant chaos in their own lives and in the lives of others. For still other people — and these are usually spiritual practitioners — the desired ground of ego is emptiness: they find themselves most comfortable with empty space and quite reluctant to credit either “existence” or “death/birth” as legitimate modes of being.

We can see from our own experience that the attempt to create an ego identity out of any of the three grounds is fraught with difficulties and contradictions. The fallacy of the conventional attempt to build an identity out of the nirmanakaya is perhaps the easiest to understand. By seeking permanence and security in “existence,” one is refusing to acknowledge the impermanence that marks all phenomena and the emptiness that underlies it all. In so doing, the conventionally grounded person is locking him- or herself into an identity that — while perhaps fresh and creative in its formation — quickly becomes outworn, restrictive and even deadly when the causes and conditions that produced that identity have changed, making it no longer applicable. From this arises the demonic quality of the conventional, modern world, where impermanence, change and death are marginalised and denied.

The attempt to make the continuing impermanence of “death/birth” a reference point is equally problematic. In this case, fearing the suffocating potential of “existence” we become perpetual rebels, deeply mistrustful of any appearance of continuity, stability or peace. The irony and self-contradiction here are that, in our perpetual opposition to any fixed identity, we have created the most fixed identity of all, one of invariable opposition to anything that has been built and created, by ourselves or anyone else.

The attempt to use the “groundless ground” of emptiness as our primary identity is also flawed. When we try to dwell in emptiness and refuse to give the more conditioned aspects of our lives their proper due, we avoid taking seriously the legitimate requirements of our own karmic situation. Yet just because we are trying to avoid the relative world, it does not go away. Instead, our avoidance of karma that is calling to be dealt with creates its own difficulties in negative circumstances that will eventually surface and disrupt our lives and our spiritual paths.

We are unable to succeed in making the three kayas into secure, solid ego grounds because of their very nature — which is our very nature. The dharmakaya is the space of awareness, limitless and all-pervading, in which there is never any place for a concept of ego identity to take root — even an identity conceived as “emptiness.” The sambhogakaya manifests in the unceasing display of ever-moving and changing energy, and this continually dissolves any sense of “I,” even one that seeks identity in the process of change itself. And the practicality of the nirmanakaya is defined by the needs of others. Since these are always new and unanticipated — external to our agenda, and beyond our control — there is no ground for ego here either.

Even more, the three kayas are said to be ultimately indivisible. When we rest in our own inherent nature, in its purity (our buddhanature), we discover that our experience embodies the emptiness of the dharmakaya, the impermanence of the sambhogakaya and the practicality of the nirmanakaya, all at once. This indivisibility goes to the very heart of why we can never succeed in making an ego out of the three kayas. The dharmakaya — the “formless kaya” — is said to be “for oneself,” because it is the very essence of our own liberation. By contrast, the two other kayas — the “form kayas” — are said to be “for others,” because they embody compassion and practical assistance to others. Different as they may seem at first, each kaya implies and is inseparable from the others. The dharmakaya contains the seeds of the other two and, when it meets with the suffering of beings, naturally gives birth to them. For example, when we rest our mind fully in the emptiness of the dharmakaya, and encounter others in pain, we find that the inspiration to help others (the sambhogakaya) and the practical applications of this compassion (the nirmanakaya) arise in a natural and compelling way. In a sense, the more we rest in the dharmakaya, the more we are called to compassionate engagement with those in distress.

By the same token, the two form kayas imply the dharmakaya, and, in fact, can only function properly when they are transparent to its emptiness. This is so because only when the energy of the sambhogakaya and the practicality of the nirmanakaya are seen as without essence is their helpfulness to others able to be open, flexible and completely appropriate to what sentient beings need.

The classical iconographic representation of the Buddha’s realisation shows him touching the earth with his right hand, and calling the earth to witness his attainment. And what is this attainment? It is realising that our ultimate nature is nothing other than the three kayas of the Buddha. This is a realisation in which we see that there is not, nor ever was, any ground for ego at all.

Whether friend or enemy, there should be no attachment or aversion.

-- Chokyi Nyima Rinpoche

修學聖道的次第

玅境老和尚

一、引經立題

《楞伽阿跋多羅寶經》卷三：

採集業為識不採集名智

觀察一切法通達無所有

逮得自在力是則名為慧

此頌共六句；第一句「採集業為識」說凡夫流轉生死的緣起。第二句「不採集名智」以後五句，明佛教徒修學聖道的次第。今天我要講的題目，在此已經表示出來──修學聖道的次第。

二、道前基礎

（一）、願力為先趣聖道

不修學聖道的人，在世間上做種種事業，心裡也是有願。什麼願呢？希望得到榮華富貴。先有此願，再做此事，後來可能成功、可能不成功，也可能成功與失敗兼而有之。這便是「願、行、果」，由願導行，由行而得果。社會上的人與事均不出此範疇。

我們漢文佛教中流行最廣的淨土法門，也是以「信、願、行」的願為前導。不只是淨土，佛教徒相信了佛法之後，無論學習何種法門，皆是以願、行、果為軌律。無論在家居士或出家法師，若無虔誠有力之願為先導，可能不學習佛法，即使學習佛法也可能不修行，因為無聖道願何須修行？何能策勵修行？

但此願不是輕易能建立的！當然，你也可能一時聽某位善知識的一段法語，心中歡喜就有了願。但是一時高興而發的願不堅固；應該作深入細微的抉擇觀察，經過內心長時的醞釀，最後決定：「我想成為聖人！」這樣的願才有前進之力量，不容易退轉！

（二）、恆學佛法無厭足

學習佛法的目的乃為掌握聖道次第，然後用功修行，而修行的同時還要不斷的學習。譬如《金剛般若波羅蜜經》，前面說無我觀，最後也是說無我觀；前有「云何降伏其心？」中間也有「云何降伏其心？」二文似無差別。但是若讀無著菩薩、天親菩薩的《金剛般若經論》，即知文雖相似，其義不同。經過長時期的學習貫通，才能知道如何依之修習止觀；修行之中亦有可能產生疑惑，時時研讀經論，則能從佛菩薩的法語中得到印證而釋疑。

從《阿含經》中看出，佛在世時，即使是大阿羅漢也還常在佛邊聽法心無厭足。大阿羅漢已是所作已辦的無學位，何以仍須聽佛說法？因為仍有所不知、所不能故。 在大乘佛法如《大智度論》中，龍樹菩薩提及彌勒菩薩到了等覺菩薩之高位，也還要聽佛說法；因為等覺菩薩距佛尚遠，仍有諸多不足之處，所以須繼續向佛學習。 何況吾輩凡夫更應恆學佛法、無有厭足。

（三）、聖道依法不依人

有一件事我們應該知道！佛在世時，佛教徒善根深厚，具足福智聖道資糧，思想統一，大家都信佛所說而無疑問，依佛所示的法門用功修行而得聖道。現時代唯有佛法留存於世，佛教徒雖信仰三寶而多諸苦惱。有何苦惱？今日佛法思想混亂！你說一套、我說一套，誰說得對呢？末法時代的佛教徒肉眼如盲，學習佛法真是難！

初學的佛教徒沒有擇法眼，如何能知所學習的法門是聖道，可以解脫生死呢？如果你的師父是阿羅漢或得無生法忍的菩薩，你不需要多學。因為他是過來人，用三十分鐘、最多一個鐘頭，告訴你一個修學聖道的法門，你依之修行，有問題隨時可以請問他，他也可以隨時教導你。但是現在你知道誰是聖人﹖非得自己深入學習佛法不可！

《瑜伽師地論》上說：「依法不依人！」不依就是不相信。譬如某個人有大威德境界，很多人都恭敬尊重他，讚歎他是大善知識，但他說的一定是正法嗎？不一定！有些人是存心欺詐，有些不是，但是說的法門不正確，他自己也不知道，就這樣為人講說。即使有神通，也是靠不住！

從經論上看，凡夫也可以有神通！印度外道中一位大老師有神通，在禪定中見牛雞狗死後升天，故勸徒弟跟牛學、跟雞學、跟狗學，徒弟因為師父有禪定神通，他說的話決定是對，可以相信，所以依教奉行。由此可知，不學習佛法只是有神通，因果道理還未能懂，真是所謂「一盲引眾盲」了。我們漢文佛教裡也有同樣的情形， 以為這個人有威德、有神通，他說的就可信。其實不然！佛法是「依法不依人」，這也包括真實有神通的人在內。所以我們想要修學聖道，一定要注意這件事！《瑜伽師地論》說補特伽羅有欺詐性，故不可信；唯有法是可信的。

（四）、抉擇所修是聖道

如何抉擇所修的法門是聖道？辨別方法有二：第一、此法門是佛說的，那就是聖道。現實上有一種情形，有人自己公開寫了一部經：「如是我聞，一時佛在......。」這和佛經相同也是「如是我聞」，那是佛說的嗎？他說他就是佛，你怎麼辨別真偽？就我們漢文佛教來說，印度翻譯過來的佛法經論，古德編有眾經目錄，說明這部經是什麼時代、是誰翻譯的，我們由此能有一個判斷準則。譬如說：《華嚴經》、《法華經》、《維摩詰所說經》、《金剛經》不是偽造的，沒有人懷疑。但有些經在佛教史上存有種種疑點，這就是有問題。若這些經在佛教史上沒有人說閒話，也就可信。

第二、要知道染污的生死流轉，和涅槃寂靜的清淨緣起是相反的。其中般若的智慧非常重要！它能背離生死、除斷煩惱，向於涅槃。如果修行的法門不能與生死緣起相反，不能隨順趣向涅槃，則這個法門是有問題的。所以，我們學習佛法想要修行，對於為何有生死要注意，而修道如何能斷生死也要明白。所學的法門究竟是不是聖道，要確認無疑才能不徒勞，不然的話你可能白辛苦了。

三、正行次第

（一）、正見生死緣起

【頌】：採集業為識

１、約人說

（１）、生死流轉的動力因──採集業

所引《楞伽經》六句偈，第一是「採集業為識」：「採」就是拿過來；不是動手，而是用心。「集」是聚集；不只是一次，而是多次的、不斷的這樣做，叫做「集」。「業」，微細的說，心一動就是「業」；而發動語言、付諸行動，由內心的思惟而來，故皆為「業」。

我們從無始劫來直到現在，無論遇見何事，起心動念就是「採集」，「採集」的同時還有執著。執著是通於一切惑業苦的；作善也執著、作惡也執著。就算是佛教徒，得無生法忍之前，拜佛也執著，讀經也執著。但是拜佛、讀經的執著中，有清淨而微弱的反動力，能違反生死趨向涅槃！雖然有此「逆流」之力，仍有執著。 「採集業」者，採集即是業，或者業由採集而有，專指世間流轉生死的動力而言。

（２）、流轉三界的果報主──識

「採集業」者為誰﹖即是「識」；或者業為因，識是果報主。欲界人、天的分別心叫識，色無色界天人內心的分別也叫做識。這些識沒有智慧，都是普遍執著的，一切眾生皆同；以上約人說。

２、約法說

（１）、無明相應觸處著

現在約法說，「採集業為識」亦即是執著，實在就是心與無明相應之義。有無明而無智慧，這個識處處執著，表現出來的行動就有力量令於生死中流轉、難以解脫。 在《攝大乘論》中曾提及一事：譬如江河泉流，人見是水，餓鬼見是猛火，故恆受饑虛之苦。為何人見是水，而餓鬼見是猛火？此中有二義。一、行緣識：此人前世有良心廣作利益安樂眾生之善事，今世業熟得果，故隨福業識見是清水。而彼餓鬼前世造作眾多罪業，故隨罪業識見水非水而是猛火。二、無明緣識：人見的水、鬼見的火，皆非真實，如夢中境。然因無明之故，執為真實是水、真實是火，受其苦樂之報。若能學習佛法成就真慧則能無著於水火，衝破無明的蒙蔽與業果的束縛， 見第一義得大解脫。

（２）、隨惑造業感苦果

眾生為業所繫，不能解脫，應明解其義為是。茲略言之：業是自心所造，業報現前還自受之，即是心受。福業得樂果，罪業受苦果。其身口意造業之時，應是隨心所欲而為之。至得果時，則非全是心之所欲。惡業感苦果，非是心之所欲，然不能拒而不受。眾生多不信解此義，哀哉！苦果亦是無常，經過若干時節，苦果即滅。隨其餘業，還流轉於六道之中，無有已時。要而言之，心作心受，不作不受；無有我作他受，他作我受。若能遇見三寶，栽培善根，庶幾乎有光明之日也。

我們現在修學聖道，假設得了色界四禪並修得神通，就可以發動神通到欲界天和帝釋天王見面、到色界天與大梵天王見面，亦可至兜率內院拜見彌勒菩薩。雖有禪定神通，短期內可以到他方世界一行，但不能久住；因為我們的身體卑劣，受不了那樣的大福德境界。卑劣的果報繫縛你，你不可以轉變！

除非修學聖道到了菩薩第八地，棄捨肉身得法性身，能遍入一切世界無有障礙，於一切境界中自在無礙，成就如是大自在力才叫解脫。凡夫就不行﹗不要說其他的果報世界我們不相應，即使在人的世界裡，若到別的國家，他給你三個月的簽證，到期你就得離開。這個身體實在有諸多問題，應生厭離心；對佛菩薩的大自在境界， 應生希求心、勤修聖道。

（二）、正修聖道觀行

【頌】：不採集名智，觀察一切法， 通達無所有，

１、法執未除不究竟

上面已說「採集業為識」的生死流轉，今說「不採集名智」的聖道緣起。如何才能不採集呢？一定要「觀察一切法，通達無所有」。

《維摩詰所說經‧觀眾生品》中，文殊師利菩薩和維摩詰居士說法時，天女心生歡喜散花供養。法會大眾有大菩薩，也有阿羅漢。花落至大菩薩身上，就慢慢落到地面；至阿羅漢，則著其身而不落。受八關齋戒的在家居士都是不著香花鬘的，何況阿羅漢是大比丘﹖現在花著身是不如法的，所以急於將之撥除，但用盡神通力亦不能去！天女即問：「何以去花？」舍利弗尊者答：「此花不如法，是以去之。」天女又說：「是花無所分別，仁者自生分別想耳。」這是天女呵斥舍利弗尊者也有分別心。

我們沒有學習般若法門、未證聖道的人，其心常是虛妄分別、處處執著。但是愛見煩惱已斷的大阿羅漢還有分別心嗎？唯識的經論說小乘佛教學者只能斷人我執，不能斷法我執；如果進一步學習《般若經》、《解深密經》等大乘經典，通達諸法實相，才能悟入「一切法本性無分別」的勝義。由於舍利弗尊者是學習《阿含經》而得聖道，未能了知一切法畢竟空之深義，所以天花落至其身，他就有點相似的厭惡心，認為花之著身不合戒法，故欲去之。此時其心有法和非法、持戒和破戒的對立分別；內心如是思惟分別時就感覺不如法，所以要去掉它。

「花著身」，在大乘佛法來說，心於天花有所著，花即著身而不落。如果像大菩薩那樣心無所著，花就從身掉落於地了。「去花」，不是去掉眼見的花，而是要去掉內心的執著。但是這些阿羅漢只欲以神通去花，未能反省因為內心分別故，花才著身而不落；若能除掉內心的分別，花自然就掉落了。所以天女說：「是花無所分別，仁者自生分別想耳！」此正是聲聞學者的法執。

２、因緣生法本性空

如何才能真正通達一切法無所有呢？《攝大乘論本‧增上慧學》偈云：

應知一切法本性無分別

所分別無故無分別智無

「應知一切法，本性無分別」可以作二義解釋。

第一義：「一切法」即因緣生法。因緣和合，此法現前，即是現在；因緣未和合、未現前，名為「本」。「應知一切法」是現在的因緣生法；而「本性無分別」即指諸法未生之時，是無分別的。舉例言之，因緣所生法發生以後，或是一朵花，或是一棵樹，我們可以分別是蓮花、是菊花，是松樹、是柏樹，是青黃赤白種種顏色， 是大小枯榮各種形貌；若是一個人，則此人是男、是女，是胖、是瘦，是讀書人、不是讀書人，作各式各樣的分別。而這些分別在本性的時候是無所有的，故云「無分別」。如此言之，因緣生法本性無分別，則現前之時應有分別？若能尋思因緣生法現前雖有，而屬諸因緣，自性是空，則現在有分別時，即無分別。若復觀察因緣生法終歸無常敗壞之時，既不可得，還有所分別乎？

禪宗有慧可禪師斷臂供養達摩禪師的公案；可禪師斷臂之後其心不安，請問達摩祖師安心之道。師曰：「將心來與汝安。」可曰：「覓心了不可得！」師曰：「我與汝安心竟！」《景德傳燈錄》先於禪宗之記錄，見之於唐道宣律師的《續高僧傳》：「遭賊斫臂，以法御心，不覺痛苦。」讀此傳文，斫臂之事發生於「達摩滅化洛濱」以後，不與達摩同時。又「以法御心，不覺痛苦」，應知可禪師定慧境界甚高，應無請問安心之道之事。何謂「以法御心」？可禪師是學習《楞伽經》（四卷）的，此經云：「前聖所知，轉相傳授，妄想無性。」（T39，384c）應是此法也。於所緣境取相分別，名為妄想；妄想所緣，自相空寂；所緣空寂，能緣亦無。觀達所取、能取自性寂滅，心無所住，故云：「妄想無性。」「獨一靜處，自覺觀察，不由於他，離見妄想，上上升進。」是名以法御心；此與「覓心了不可得」義亦無異。由此可見漢傳禪法中，古代是如是如是的學習的，與後代的看話頭有差別乎？

我們凡夫的習慣，總是在虛妄的形象上執著分別，不能觀察一切法的本性空寂。若是我們能通達「本性無分別」，修習止觀破除執著，就沒有分別了。《金剛經》說：「一切賢聖，皆以無為法而有差別。」則是要吾人學習無為法，才能破除內心的分別。若不學習無為法，老是在世俗諦上執著分別──這是好的、這是壞的，這是可愛的、這是可憎的......，作各式各樣的分別，則遠離無為法不得解脫。

「不採集名智」：《金剛經》特別注重智慧：「是故須菩提！諸菩薩摩訶薩應如是生清淨心。不應住色生心，不應住聲、香、味、觸、法生心，應無所住而生其心。」這正是現證無為的真智，無所住、無所著，現證解脫。禪定中的「般若」，是通達無為法的勝慧，有勝堪能斷除一切煩惱，既破我執，亦破法執，超越二乘，故名「金剛般若」。

３、假名無實無分別

（１）、言說安立唯識現

現在說第二義。《解深密經》說一切法可分二類：一是「自相安立」，一是「言說安立」。「自相安立」者，此事本身有體性，是自相有。「言說安立」者，此事自相空，唯假名言詮示才能顯現。

「言說」，即是我們的說話，是以一切文字、名句組成的；所以善於說話的人是讀書人。譬如小孩子初開始牙牙學語，母親告訴他「1、2、3、4、 5......」「媽媽、爸爸......」各式各樣的名句，他學多了，連接起來就會說話。所以名句和言說有緊密關係，沒有名句就不會說話；內心的思惟分別也要有名句為緣才能現起。

《瑜伽師地論》云：「名為先故想，想為先故說。」要先有各式各樣的名句，內心才能思想；要先有內心的思想，我們才能說話。可知「名、想、說」互相有連帶關係；離開了思想不會說話，而沒有名句內心也不能思想。故「言說安立」即是「名句安立」；「名句安立」也就是內心的「思想安立」。唯識的經論說「一切法唯心所現」，也就是「一切法名言安立」，兩者意義相同。

「名言安立」和「自相安立」有關係，但不是同一回事。「自相安立一切法」即因緣生法，它是離言的；不須名言顯示，彼彼事自相有，此自相有絕諸思議對待。譬如說：我現在想念我的母親，母親影像隨即顯現，心不想時影像則無，可見所想的影像是無自性的，由心分別而有，此即「名言安立」。但是母親本身的體相，是他自己的業力所成，對名言安立而言，即名「自相安立」。《解深密經》說：「我說識所緣唯識所現！」彼彼體相因思惟而顯現，不能離於思惟而獨立，故名自性空或自相空；但有虛妄分別，無所分別的義（事），所謂「唯識無義」。

「名言安立的一切法」本身既無體性，何故感覺為有？因為如是如是想，如是如是現故！此是思想的特異功能。譬如有人來對你說：「某某人說你的壞話，造了很多的謠言破壞你的名譽！」你聽了以後勃然大怒。此恚怒由何處來？由第三者免費宣傳的那幾句話而來！沒聽到那些話之前，心裡會有這些感覺嗎？

《顯揚聖教論‧成空品》云：「由唯依名起義執故！」（T31，557c）名是能詮，義是所詮，名能詮義。吾人聞名之時，因名思義，於義執為實有，因之而有虛妄分別，愛憎繁興、多諸苦惱。不知觀察所詮之義，因名而有，無自體性。若名所詮之義有自體性，非依名而有，則未聞名時亦應覺知才對。云何無名之時未能覺悟耶？故《顯揚聖教論‧成空品》又云：「若義自體如名有者，未得名前，此覺於義應先已有。」（T31，557c）故知名所詮義，要依名言，義覺方轉，其義自性空寂；名言雖有，義實是無！無義故，名言亦不能自存；無名言故，心無分別。若能通達名義本空，無分別智現前，豈非聖人乎？於此可以作一結論：名言安立的一切法是自性空的，然有作用，令你心動。

佛陀為我們開示了種種法門經典──《華嚴經》、《法華經》、《般若經》，四念處、四正勤、五根、五力、七菩提分、八聖道支、六波羅蜜、十二因緣、苦集滅道，這是真如、這是涅槃......，如是皆為名言安立。何故安立自性空寂的名言，有何益乎？若不安立如是名言，眾生修學聖道何由發起？何由得解如是勝義？

《金剛經》云：「須菩提，汝勿謂如來作是念，我當有所說法，莫作是念。何以故﹖若人言，如來有所說法，即為謗佛，不能解我所說故。須菩提！說法者無法可說，是名說法。」如來證悟諸法實相，觀達諸法假名安立，畢竟空寂。吾人若認為如來真實有所說法，有名有義，則是謗佛同於凡夫有執著了。故《維摩詰所說經‧弟子品》云：「其說法者無說無示，其聽法者無聞無得。」

如此，「應知一切法，本性無分別」者，即是「名言安立的一切法」自性空寂，無有如名言所分別義；換言之，其心微動則有相現，豈知其相空無所有、無自體性？如能恆時如是觀察思惟，於一切法唯有識性，將能獲得決定勝解。

（２）、捨妄契真入三性

再引用《攝大乘論》二頌以釋此義：

名事互為客其性應尋思

於二亦當推唯量及唯假

實智觀無義唯有分別三

彼無故此無是即入三性

「名」是能詮顯的；「事」，也就是義，是名所詮顯的。「客」表示它不是真實的，來了還會走，也就是空的意思。「名事互為客」：因為有種種事才安立種種名， 名依事有，名則是自性空，非自性有；因為有名，才顯示有這件事，事依名顯，事亦是自性空。無名之時，名所示事不能自立，故云：「非離彼能詮，智於所詮轉。」名與事乃相依相待而有的。譬如說：某地發生一事，記者發表了一篇報導，名依事有；其它地區的人閱讀之後，才知某地發生什麼事，事依名有。記者若不寫這篇報導，其它地區的人則不知有此事，無名則無事；反之，若沒有那件事，也就沒有這篇報導了，無事則無名。又如說火、說飯，這只是火、飯的假名，並非口內真實有火、有飯。即所詮義，是自性空的；名亦是自性空的。

「其性應尋思」：名與事的體性，要在禪定中思惟推求，故云「尋思」。禪定中的思惟，有力量能令智慧深入觀察；散亂心的思惟，如風中之燭無照明之力。若有禪定而不思惟，難解其義；就算得到色界四禪或無色界四空定，缺少般若波羅蜜的智慧，依舊是個生死凡夫。吾人要尊重佛陀的智慧，依據佛陀的法語去思惟觀察，定中作觀才有力量見第一義諦。若是不依聖言量，自己坐在那裡冥想，是不行的！

「於二亦當推」：「二」，是一切法的自性和差別。如說「色」法，乃以變礙為性；心法的「識」，則以了別為性，是名「自性」，與《中論》的「自性」含義不同。而一法有一法的作用，與他法不同，即是「差別」。譬如同樣是房子，這個房子是這樣，那個房子又是另一個樣子。又雖然通名為人，但是人與人不一樣，有各式各樣的差別。不光是尋思名、義，「於」諸法自性與差別等「二」，「亦當」如上所述道理「推」求觀察。

「唯量及唯假」：「量」是分別；「假」是不真實。當知彼自性、差別二事都是自心的分別，沒有真實體性。譬如做夢時，或者有人請吃飯、或者被狗咬，夢裡一切都像真的，醒了以後才知道無如許事。我們現在也都在無明大夢裡，執著真實有種種境界；但是為什麼你做這個夢，而我卻做那個夢？因為夢是行緣識──也就是業力所成就的，故人人不同。有人跑到天上做夢， 有人在人間做夢，有的則墮入三惡道做夢。若能覺悟，則夢與醒都是虛妄的、畢竟空寂的，即不執為實有。

「實智觀無義」：通達「名言安立的一切法畢竟空寂」的智慧名「實智」；用如是慧「觀」察一切名所詮顯的「義」，皆是空「無」所有的。前文的「尋思」是推求義，這裡的「實智」是決定無疑之義。

「唯有分別三」：名言所詮顯的義無所有，「唯有三」種虛妄「分別」──名分別、自性分別、差別分別。

「彼無故此無」：彼所詮顯的義既無，此能詮顯之三種分別亦無。何以故？若有所分別義，則可有能緣分別，由「彼」義「無」所有故，當知「此」名、自性、差別的分別亦「無」從生起。

「是即入三性」：觀見名事互為客故，相依相待而有，無獨立的自體，即是悟入遍計所執性；觀見義無所有，唯有名、自性、差別之虛妄分別，即是悟入依他起性；由義無故，亦不觀見此分別，泯絕能取所取的戲論，即是悟入圓成實性；如是名為悟「入三性」。

四、解脫境界

【頌】：逮得自在力，是則名為慧。

（一）、證無分別智解脫

綜前所述，「應知一切法，本性無分別」以二義釋之：一、「緣起的一切法」本性空無分別。二、「言說安立的一切法」本性空無分別。本性為什麼無分別？「所分別無故！」我們所分別的境界，如是顯現、不如是有，皆是自性空的；本性空即是自性空。「所分別無故」：此事無論修學聖道與否，從本以來都是無自性的。不修行，所分別是無；修行，所分別也是無。這有一個問題：既然不修行所分別也是無，為什麼我不能得解脫呢？譬如說：我們感覺痛苦，痛苦是所分別；「所分別無故」，痛苦即無痛苦，我們應從痛苦中解脫出來，為什麼我們未能解脫呢？「無分別智無」：因為沒有無分別智，老是分別執著有，所以不能解脫。若於諸法無分別理，智證現前，現見諸法無分別性，即得解脫。

有一回我從美國到香港，在住處的後山上看見一個人，在那裡好像和人打架一樣，又叫又罵、拳打腳踢。明明只有自己一個人，他卻認為面前有人和他對打對罵。那不是神經病嗎？其實，正常人也是這麼回事！所有境界全是自己虛妄分別而已，我們卻執著真實有這些所分別的事。但這個道理一定要閱讀經論多聞熏習才能明白；再經過修習止觀，於禪定中專精思惟，而後方能大夢初醒。一旦醒來，再也不會執妄為真了。

然而還有一個問題，就是業力尚未結束，境界還是會現前。得阿羅漢者，身體一樣有老病死；但是這樣的人心裡有聖道，不為彼世俗諦的因緣生法所繫縛，而能入於第一義諦中。他能不為假名所惑，所以世俗諦的苦惱境界不能苦惱之。由上可知，得聖道的解脫其實不難﹗因為只要得到智慧，通達煩惱縛著、令我們苦惱之事，實在是自性空無所有的，一切的問題就解決了。

（二）、逮得自在名為慧

前云「採集業為識，不採集名智。」如何能不採集呢？「觀察一切法，通達無所有。」我們因為執著有，而生出種種煩惱；若能觀察無所有，成就無所得的智慧，一切動亂的境界只是分別、只是名言而已，都不是真實的。因此，一切的愛見煩惱皆滅，是名「不採集」。初開始沒有得定，亦應作如是觀、如是思惟；同時也要修奢摩他的止。只要前生有栽培，今生又肯努力，放下塵勞之事認真坐禪，逐漸能從欲界定進步到未到地定，乃至得色界初禪、二禪、三禪、四禪！觀諸法空之智慧有了禪定之攝持，力量強大，就真能「通達無所有」，也就是明了一切法「本性無分別」。

「逮得自在力」：若時時如是修習止觀，逐漸地止有進步、觀也有進步。如何知道自己進步了呢？「得自在力！」聞讚不以為喜、聞謗不以為憂；毀譽不動、得失無心，而生悲愍。這就表示止觀有力量，即名「逮得自在力」。

「是則名為慧」：自在力有兩種。第一種是接近聖道，還不是聖人；此時能夠調伏煩惱，也有自在力。另一種是證無生法忍後，得真實的自在力；此時不叫「智」，而名之為「慧」。心與無相般若相應，見道之時異於加行位也。

「採集」和「不採集」是相反的！「採集業為識」是凡夫流轉生死的相貌；「不採集為智」是賢聖境界。至於成就無分別智後，才能真正不取著、不採集，得解脫大自在的境界。

五、結勸勵行

上來所說大乘觀行，一定要深入學習佛法才能修。我們漢文佛教中，淨土法門普遍流傳，很多的大德都歡喜弘揚。當然，念阿彌陀佛是穩當的，能往生到阿彌陀佛國非常好﹗但若不學習經論，對於佛法認識不足，對世間法的認識也不夠，信心能堅固嗎？遇見異因緣能不退轉嗎？所以我們要學習佛法，掌握聖道次第！此即《摩訶般若波羅蜜經》所云：「新學菩薩摩訶薩，次第行、次第學、次第道！」

但是佛法亦非易學！前述「名事互為客，其性應尋思，於二亦當推，唯量及唯假。實智觀無義，唯有分別三，彼無故此無，是即入三性。」這樣的教義不學習能懂嗎？一定要學習若干時節以後才能通達。現在雖然不懂，仍須繼續學習，同時也修止觀幫助理解。理解力逐漸增長，終究有一天能夠明白。若初開始聽不懂就放棄了，那就永遠也不能懂了。聞思修三慧不具足，學佛也只是句空話而已。

以上只是引用《楞伽經》的六句頌略加解釋修學次第。如果你願意修學聖道，這六句頌是不夠的；還要廣讀經論，並努力修學止觀，才有希望成就聖道。如果不願意學習經論，只有念阿彌陀佛、求生淨土了，那也是殊勝法門！幸有此殊勝法門！

The essence of the Buddha’s teachings is that while formal practice can help us to develop direct experiences of emptiness, wisdom, and compassion, such experiences are meaningless unless we can bring them to bear on every aspect of our daily lives. It’s in facing the challenges of daily life that we can really measure our development of calmness, insight, and compassion. 

-- Yongey Mingyur Rinpoche

Conventional Body View

by Prof. David Dale Holmes

People believe that everything they see and conceive of, including their so-called bodily selves, is fixed and permanently there to be used for fulfilment and enjoyment, yet this is not true and is based on delusional wrong view.

Identifying body awareness and arising consciousness with any sense of a permanent self is actually based on ignorance (Pali: avijja) — delusion about the self in the world and the way things really are, or ignorance of non-self.

Such wrong view is dependent on a delusive compulsion to nourish an egocentric need for a substantial sense of self-assurance; for an undeniable and absolute guarantee that we will always be able to nourish and feed our personal desires for continuing self-satisfaction and existence, which we wish to imagine can never be taken away.

This wrong view arises out of the dangerous and harmful part of the mind that greedily reaches after the things that it hopes and thinks will guarantee its lasting happiness, but which, in the long run, because of the impermanent nature of all things (Pali: anicca), in fact, leads to a continuing and disturbing sense of uncertainty; to insecurity and instability; to unhappiness and unsatisfactoriness, because things do not inevitably turn out to be the way we want them to be.

So how are we to understand the body?

The accomplished teacher Luang Phor Viriyang has said: “The first medium is the body. It refers to our physical body, which is capable of obtaining all of the feelings and emotions and communicating through its five senses. The body can co-function with the mind and it is also under its control.” (Viriyang 1)

And further: “One usually thinks of the body as his whole self.”

“Since the lifespan of our body is 50–100 years, human beings usually compete with their lifespan and try their best to use their bodies to the fullest potential.” (Viriyang 22)

In other words, for good or for worse, in the conventional sense, we try to get the most out of our lives and our bodies for as long as we can, for as long as they last, especially in terms of physical pleasure, because in our heads we mistakenly consider the body to be a source of satisfying sense experience, as being pleasurable and satisfying, despite the obvious fact that we eventually grow older and become weaker — inherently knowing we are slowly dying.

The so-called beauty of the body is a deeply embedded socio-cultural myth that the mind does not want to let go of. We must, however, learn to accept that the body (our own or another’s) is not a beautiful object in the way we would desire it to be. The body is not there in the world for the purpose of bringing us the fulfilment of our dreams.

Despite the truth that the body is not, in reality, at all what we imagine it to be within the distortions of our own mind’s eye, we foolishly continue believing in the reverse of the truth — ironically, often ignoring the undeniable physical indications of decay, deterioration, and dissolution, maintaining an attitude contrary to obvious visual and physical discrepancies that anyone else can see. Once we’ve understood this, then we must examine the nature of the body to see it not for what we might like it to be, but for what it actually is — which the Buddha describes in a well-known discourse as follows:

“In this body, there are head hairs, body hairs, nails, teeth, skin, flesh, tendons, bones, bone-marrow, kidneys, heart, liver, pleura membranes, spleen, lungs, large intestines, small intestines, gorge, faeces, bile, phlegm, pus, blood, sweat, fat, tears, skin-oil, saliva, mucus, fluid in the joints, urine, and so on.” (Nyanatiloka 119)

In the same dialogue, the Buddha uses an analogy to compare the body to a “fathom-length sack,” the kind that normally contains grain, open at two ends. But instead of containing grain, imagine it is stuffed full of the above-mentioned body parts and ask ourselves how we would feel if our own body sack were being shaken, so that we might see each body part as it was slowly slipping and sliding, slithering and falling, and that we could observe these individual body parts as they were slowly running down into a heap, piling up upon the ground. We would have ample time to examine and contemplate each of these body parts individually — accumulating there in a heap. (See Nyanatiloka 58–63)

Would we be enamoured with the physical body if we examined it in this way — as just an aggregate of components — being aware of its nature made up of compounded individual parts?

One who meditates on the body contemplates himself as just such a body, as just made up of individual parts. And that’s a good place to begin to see the body as it really is, and not as one might want it to be — as an independent entity, or as if one were somehow intellectually separated from the physical “bag of bones” itself.

No matter how well the body parts may function together to sustain life and even to provide momentary pleasures, they are still just body parts that have, through a natural process, merely come together to continue sustaining life.

Using a simile again, the Buddha goes on to say that it is as if “a skilled butcher or his apprentice, having killed a cow, would sit at a crossroad cutting it up into pieces . . .”

Elsewhere, the Buddha observes that even the king’s chariot is not a unity but merely made up of its individual parts. And thus the monk or mediator learns to contemplate the body as though it were just made up of component parts.

The Buddha states that this body is composed not only of component parts, but that the parts are made up of combinations of “matter, liquid, heat, and gas,” and this being so, we should know that this sack full of elements, in accordance with biochemical laws, contains an ever-changing process of arising and ceasing solidity, liquidity, burning energy, and gaseous aridity, which certainly has no fixed, permanent reality.

Imagine solidity turning, through heat, into liquidity, and burning as energy, then turning into invisible gaseous-aridity within your body. Imagine your body continually consuming itself. Can you imagine that?

The body is just a sack or sheath full of elements that are ever-changing, ever being burned up internally as sources of nourishment, and ever being replenished by new sources of energy.

So, what do you think? Do you assume that you are a fixed unity to be nourished? A so-called “self” to be satisfied, rather than a simple aggregation of component parts, made up of elements that in turn nourish the body parts with requisite energy in order to keep them moving and functioning?

How do you see your own body?

If you have not thought this process through before, perhaps it is time to start.

To know the four foundations intellectually is not enough. We have to contemplate and meditate on them until we personally experience them from the depth of our hearts the preciousness of this human life; and that our life’s end can come at any time. This is how you practise the four foundations. Although we have this precious human body with its 18 qualities, if we do not develop bodhicitta, love and compassion in our hearts, this human life is of no use. There are many material things in this world but none of them can accompany us at the moment of death. The only thing we can take with us from life to life until enlightenment is our development of love, compassion and bodhicitta.

-- Garchen Rinpoche

痛苦是暂时的，希望永远存在

达照法师

很多人都知道，世间是无常的，一切相皆会变化，我们真正需要的是对此产生自己的看法，而不是说听来的一句话就觉得是自己的。因为听来的只是闻的智慧，还不是思的智慧。你需要通过自己的思考，确认这个世界就是无常的，在心中给予肯定。

就像我们操作完了电脑程序，要点“确认”一样，在佛里叫做“定解”，就是说你对无常的理解一旦确定成为你的人生观，你就确实看到了这个世界的一切相都是无常变化的。只有看到了这一点，我们才了解佛教对世界第一步的看法是什么样的了。

我们常常一想到人生无常，就会伤心落泪。人生几十年，无论你年轻时多么漂亮，都会变老，变丑；无论你有多少财富，有一天都会离开你；无论多么恩爱的亲人，也会和你分离。“夫妻本是同林鸟，大限来时各自飞”，没有一个人能陪你生，也没有一个人能陪你死；即使是一起死，由于业报不同，也会去向不同的地方。

“人生天地间，忽如远行客。”在这个世间，每个人都是独来独往，独生独死，苦乐自受，无能代者。没有人能代替你感受这个世界的快乐和痛苦，所以你很孤独。

因为孤独，所以总想向外去求，想求一个人理解你，求一个人成为自己的知音。其实求到死，也没有人能理解你死亡之前的那种孤独，没有人理解你。

有些人在死亡前被自己的情绪所控制，本身就已经很痛苦了，活着的子女们因为舍不得亲人离开，也被情绪控制着而痛哭流涕，他们如果哭得很伤心，要离开的人因此也就更难过。所以佛法告诉大家，如果家里有人要往生了，我们一定要创造一个好的气氛，不能哭，不能破坏。

我们每个人都是孤独的，周围的人最多只能帮助你一下。在这样的一个变化无常、孤独的世界上生活，想起无常，就会让人很难过、伤心落泪。

但是反过来说，无常是不是真的那么糟糕呢？其实对我们来说，无常也是一件好事，比如说别人欺负你，你心中充满了仇恨，如果你把仇恨早早地忘记掉，那就解脱了。

正是因为无常的缘故，我们所有的缺点还有机会弥补。因为无常，才会有变化。如果没有无常，我们是凡夫就永远只是凡夫，就没有希望改变了。如果是穷人，因为无常，可以通过努力发财成为富人；如果你没有知识、没有智慧，因为无常，你可以变为有知识、有智慧的人。

因为无常的缘故，我们的情绪会开阔很多，我们会对人生以及这个世界充满了希望。痛苦是暂时的，希望永远存在，这是我们对无常的世界最正确的一种认识。

总之，我们首先要看到我们拥有的时间和空间，它本身是一个错觉。在无尽的时间和空间当中，我们的心一旦被时间或者空间束缚住了，就会对这个世界产生错误的看法，就会为外在的物质或内在的精神而奔忙一辈子，无法获得真正的自在。

Like this cup, you are full of your own opinions and speculations. How can I show you wisdom unless you first empty your cup?

-- Shunryu Suzuki

Two Roads to an Awakened Heart

by Sangeeta Bansal

“People take different roads seeking fulfilment and happiness. Just because they’re not on your road does not mean they are lost.” — Dalai Lama 

In my personal spiritual journey, I’ve come to understand that the goal of meditative practice is to arrive at a place in daily life where one is unperturbed by the vicissitudes of exhilarating or devastating events, where one is engaged in fulfilling work, and where one can exist in harmonious relationship with others. Accompanying this is a fundamental shift in self-identity and a broadening of perspective, where one no longer sees the self as the centre of the universe and places far less importance on personal thoughts and feelings. Two of my favourite practices along this journey, reviewed here, are mindfulness meditation and kundalini yoga.

WHY PRACTICE EITHER?

Mindfulness meditation, taken directly from the Buddha’s teachings, and kundalini yoga, with its roots in ancient Indian tantric practices, can both be regarded as mental training to raise one’s level of awareness. Notwithstanding considerable differences in methodology, are these practices fundamentally distinct?

In the Buddha’s teachings, it is stated that the essence of being human lies in our incessant craving. This craving is manifested in holding on to things (including ideas and belief systems), grasping and clinging, and not letting go — all of which prevent the aspirant from progressing along the spiritual path. “In common sense, duhkha is a kind of thirsty desire: a sensation of dissatisfaction that always drives you to approach or avoid something based on greed or hatred. In a deep sense, duhkha is emptiness: there is nothing to satisfy you” (Katagiri 2007, 38).

The mindfulness path, then, teaches us how to tap into our minds and bodies in order to identify this thirsty desire — as well as the obstructive and debilitating thoughts that accompany it — and then let it go.

On closer inspection, these destructive emotions that make us grasp and cling are the same hurdles that kundalini yoga refers to as “energy blockages” along the pathways that constitute our subtle body. Our energy matrix comprises conduits that transfer life force (qi or prana) throughout the body. “Holding fears and misconceptions in your consciousness impedes, and even reverses, the flow of energy” (Swami Saradananda 2011, 14).

GROUNDED IN ACTION

A spiritual warrior is a person of action! Both practices are practical instructions, grounded in the principle of doing rather than believing — the idea is to actively participate in the removal of suffering. Both require dedicated efforts based on a solid foundation of sustained attention training.

The quiescence of the meditative mind is accomplished through many hours of sitting and focusing on a chosen object of attention. After a foundation of shamatha or concentration meditation, mindfulness practitioners will go on to vipashyana meditation, which bestows upon them certain “insights” related to the nature of their own minds and also the realities of the universe.

Kundalini practitioners will visualise their chakras and the mandalas associated with each while chanting mantras, working with the body’s subtle energy in order to purify it. They will also gain insights into their own mental blockages by observing “where in the spine do they spend their time” (Selby 1992). Thus, they too will gain precious insights into the workings of their minds.

OVERCOMING SUFFERING 

As mentioned, one of the key teachings of mindfulness meditation practice is the understanding and management of desire and craving, since these ultimately lead to addiction and suffering. When craving arises — be it for alcohol, drugs, power, or sexual union — one neither judges it nor indulges in or denies it; one simply observes the raw quality of the emotion that is arising. This form of observation, accompanied by labelling the emotion, has the surprising effect of moderating the impulse to act on the craving.

The aim of kundalini yoga is also to enable the practitioner to let go of cravings. The Sanskrit word for letting go is anahata, which is also the name of the heart chakra in the kundalini yoga teachings. Anahata is to become unstuck, using the practice to balance out obsessive compulsions. Do you find yourself worrying about survival, food, and safety, or do you crave sexual intimacy, intellectual fulfilment, or spiritual enlightenment? Are you besieged by a fear of public speaking? Do you fear relationships? Are you hungry for power and control over your fellow humans? Do you have resentments that stem from early childhood, when your needs were not met by your caregivers? These issues begin to surface as the kundalini yoga practice deepens, just as they might surface at a vipashyana retreat. All these thoughts, stored in the seven chakras or energy vortexes that exist in our body, are painstakingly examined and released.

THOUGHTS VERSUS ENERGY 

We may think of the human body as an onion with five layers that go from dense to subtle energy forms. The physical body is the outermost layer, powered by the second layer, the breath. The breath is then powered by the third layer, i.e. the qi or prana — the life force or “inner winds” — while the inner winds are in turn powered by the fourth layer; that of thoughts. The thoughts originate in what Geshe Michael Roach calls “world seeds,” or “vasanas” according to Vedic texts (Roach 2004, 21). Vasanas (the innermost layer) originate from our own deeds and experiences and are recorded in the unconscious mind. To awaken this subconscious, hidden mind and bring it to the front stage is the primary objective of our practice.

Negative vasanas result in negative thoughts, which work their way down to poor physical health. The practices of yoga and meditation both work on all five levels, either from inside out or outside in. We can start with physical hatha yoga and work our way inwards, or start with the purest thoughts of compassion (tonglen meditation) and work our way outwards. It is interesting to note that mindfulness meditation uses the crucible of thoughts to release negative tendencies, whereas kundalini yoga works on the energy system of the body. Both are part of the subtle body, i.e. not seen by the naked eye, but are different planes on which the practitioner is focusing, with the ultimate goal of releasing the hidden tendencies.

LIVING FROM AN AWAKENED HEART 

The key to mindfulness meditation is the awakening of compassion in the heart, which then begins to work at all five levels of the body. The practice is also intended to help end a dualistic view of the world, in which “the mind thinks of itself as separate; [whereas] the heart knows better . . . When we touch beneath all the busyness of thought, we discover a sweet, healing silence, an inherent peacefulness in each of us, a goodness of heart, strength, and wholeness that is our birthright. This basic goodness is sometimes called our original nature, or Buddha nature” (Kornfield 1998, 99).

Kundalini practitioners also aim to live from the heart. They seek to activate the heart chakra and, from there, to regulate the flow of energy to the lower chakras (which are rooted in the world of matter, survival, and procreation), as well as to the upper chakras, wherein lies the world of thought, communication, intuition, and enlightenment. “With its unique place in the centre, equidistant from the first and seventh chakra, [the heart chakra] marries the world of matter and spirit, of concrete and abstract, of knowledge and wisdom, of earth and heaven” (Selby 1992, 147).

In conclusion, both practices use different methods but arrive at the same place, namely an awakened heart.

It is hard to believe that despite all the dangers that we face every day, we tend to take our lives for granted and go on with our daily routines. Therefore, we cannot afford to lose mindfulness and awareness for even a moment.

-- Zurmang Gharwang Rinpoche

佛法义理虽深妙，却又在我们日用寻常之中

太虚大师

佛法的精义甚深难知，不是言语可以说出来的。但他的义理虽然深妙，却又在吾人日用寻常之中，并非离掉吾人日用寻常另外有所谓佛理佛法。只因吾人迷逐幻影不自觉知，将自己本来现成的佛理抛在九霄云外，好像佛是佛人是人，斩然截成两橛，似乎佛法与吾人没甚关涉，一讲到学佛便好像是一件希奇古怪不合人情的事，这就错了！现在分四层来讲：

一　何谓佛教

佛者、梵语佛陀，汉译为觉者。故佛之一字，即指一对于宇宙及人生之迷梦，乃至一切世出世间万法之迷梦，能够澈底打破而得大觉大悟之人。由此大觉悟人说明宇宙万法之真理，并说明此真理人人皆可悟到，又为之创设种种能够悟证真理之方法；由此种种方法是佛所施设之教法，故合称为佛教。吾人若能确信其教法，依教奉行，必有解悟真理实证真理之一日也。

二　佛教之内容

佛是觉悟者之义，其所觉是宇宙万法之真理，而此真理及万法乃人人心中所同具；祗以一向迷却本来，不能调和聚集令其显现了达，故流转生死系于业苦莫能自拔！佛教、即为此一大事而立教者也。其内容，以佛、法、僧三项为主。法者、轨持之义，谓能轨范任持一切事物故。僧者、清净和合众之义，一心照了一切法，一切法集显于一心，相融摄无碍故。又佛者说法化导于僧者也，法者由佛施设于僧者也，僧者依法修行于佛者也。非佛无以有佛教，非法无以成佛教，非僧无以持佛教，故佛教之内容必具佛、法、僧三者。

三　佛教与吾人有何关系

吾人心之自性是灵觉的，若非究竟正觉之佛，无以悟吾人心觉之自性，未免恒为迷失本性之人。又吾人觉性是遍照法界万法的，若非佛法遍明法界一切法，则无以显吾人性觉之相。又觉含法界，万法唯心故。吾人的体用性相，是法界万有调和一如的，若非佛法之僧统理大众一切无碍，则无以全吾人性觉之用。故若非佛教，则吾人便失其为人之真价值，而吾人之体相用一切皆失。以此、可知佛教与吾人关系之深切矣。

四　吾人因何要研究及修持佛教

吾人向来因迷亡其真价值，致体相用一切隐没，不能现前施行自在，而从此迷惑造妄动之业，感牵缚之苦！故吾人欲脱苦须净业，欲净业须破惑，欲破惑须悟得其真价值；明体达相以全其用，此则除佛法莫能为功也。故吾人当研究佛所说之教法而了解其理，由了解其理更进之以修习行持，乃能实现吾人之真价值也。

依此四端，可知学佛为吾人极平常极必要之事。而决非不近人情者也。

Faring far, wandering alone, bodiless, lying in a cave, is the mind.

Those who subdue it are freed from the bond of Mara.

-- The Buddha

Meeting Reality in Hard Times

by Asa Hershoff

We live in a step-down world. We live on a canvas, a projector screen. Our only spiritual problem and spiritual journey are to experience and identify with the paint that creates the pictures on that canvas, whether it is horrific or a thing of beauty. We need to recognise the lights that are projecting this wonderful movie onto the screen of experience, be they terrifying or joyous. We need only recognise the source of this matrix of phenomena — the basis of the personal self, the world around us, other people, atoms, lampshades, cups of coffee, and sunbeams. The more we re-identify with that reality, the more our mundane experience becomes suffused with clarity, vibrancy, and awe. And compassion for the blabs of awareness trapped in a misperception of objects, activities, and identities.

To help us access that non-local non-place, a bridge is a tremendously helpful tool. A portal, some kind of touchstone, that is a pure reflection of original awakeness — bodhi — will do. In Himalayan Buddhism and Hindu tantra, we use a deity as that doorway. Constant repetition of one’s connection to that pure representation, that deity form, sound and mind, habituates our body, speech, and thought to the experience of the manifest world as a playful hologram, emanating from primary purity.

Life takes on a special vibrancy, where every molecule is alive and speaking its unique voice. All are self-liberated, knowing their own origin. The world itself awakens. And at death, the habit of jumping into that portal bears its final reward, and even the bridge can be abandoned as we step into What Is. There is no “dissolution of ego” or any other funny ideas, as there is nothing to dissolve, nor anything that has ever been solid or separate. Then, whether we live in times of pandemic, war or peace, heavens or hells, gods or demons, neither hope nor fear can obstruct the blissful awareness-ground of all.

Based on the observation of mere cognisance, the non-observation of [outer] referents arises. Based on the non-observation of referents, also the non-observation of mere cognisance arises. Thus, one engages in the characteristic of the nonexistence of both apprehender and apprehended. Therefore, observation is established as the nature of non-observation, because if there is no referent to be observed, an observation [of it] is not suitable. Thus, one should understand observation and non-observation as being equal. 

-- Vasubandhu

平常心要如何修

明海大和尚

“春有百花秋有月，夏有凉风冬有雪，若无闲事挂心头，便是人间好时节。”这首大家熟知的偈子出自宋代无门慧开禅师的《无门关》，颂的是“平常心是道”。

什么样的心态是与道相应的心态，是真正吉祥幸福的心态呢？就是平常心的心态。

“平常心”这个话，原本是赵州禅师的师公马祖道一禅师提出来的，后来赵州禅师在南泉普愿禅师那里请教“如何是道”，南泉普愿禅师也讲“平常心是”。什么是平常心呢？赵州禅师跟着就问：“还可趣向也无？”意思就是说，我们还能够想一个办法到达它吗？南泉禅师说：“拟向即乖。”如果想用你的心去攀缘，去找，或者说去分别这个平常心，那你就已经不是平常心了。

南泉禅师接着说：“道不属知，不属不知。”它是在知和不知之外。“知是妄觉，不知是无记。”我们平时用的知是分别妄想。但是，如果像木头和石头一样，浑然不知，又是无记。道不落在这两边，所以与道相应的平常心，也不落在知和不知这两边。

慧开禅师这四句话，就相当于他用自己的语言去诠释平常心。怎么样来修行我们这个心，这是禅的一个永恒的题目，也是我们所有修行人，所有学佛的诸位，或者说是所有众生生命的核心命题。

要修行平常心，有三种境界是我们必须要经历的：第一种境界就是在平淡处，或者叫枯淡处，来炼这个心；第二种境界，就是要在喧闹处来炼这个心；第三种境界，就是要在困厄处来炼这个心。如果我们能够历经枯淡、喧闹、困厄这三种境界，而内心却是如如不动的，大概这个心就算平常心了。所以，平常心不是我们通常理解的那样简单，在禅的修行层面，平常心有很精准的定向。

第一个枯淡处。这是现代修行人很难通过的一个考验。处在信息化的时代，每天我们的眼耳鼻舌身意都要面对太多的信息，根尘相接，令我们在六根门头，产生很炽盛的分别，白天黑夜念念不间断在进行。

如果在以前，我们的眼根也许只是看到山河大地和身边的景象，但现在我们的眼睛有了很大的延伸， 可以通过摄像、照片、望远镜、网络，看到时间空间跨度更广阔的景象。

我们的六根有一个习性，就是它好像总是在饥饿状态，总想看点什么，听点什么，吃点什么，摸点什么，想点什么。六根的这种状态，就像饥饿时见到食物一样。我们的六根需要接触外面的信息来让它得到满足，我们的分别心也需要法尘的信息，这些信息就像食物一样让它满足。

但是它好像永远不能满足，你要不断地给它喂，给它提供新的信息来刺激它。这就是我们在念念之间，根尘交接的时候，向外去驰求六尘信息，在上面起各种分别。

我们观察这个社会有一种现象，好像很少有一首歌曲一直流行，我们唱一段时间就觉得没味了，要换；好像也很少有明星一直都红，他红过了，会有后面的人把他取代。总是不断地在换，人们视觉疲劳、审美疲劳的频率越来越快。这就是我们现在的众生在根尘交接这一点上的饥饿感。

现在，如果我们把手机丢了，就好像丢掉了身体的一个器官一样，坐卧不宁，因为手机是我们跟外部世界进行根尘连接的一个中转。

枯淡是什么，枯淡是让向外追求根尘信息的习性歇下来。每天你到大殿里面念一样的经，但是你并不乏味，不觉得枯燥，还能够津津有味、法喜充满，这就是一个很大的挑战。就信息本身来说，虽然经文的内涵很深邃，但是从文字、声音上讲，那个经其实是比较单一的，但你能适应，每天坚持念，同时津津有味、法喜充满，这就是枯淡处炼心。

在枯淡处，你的心能够自己相对地独立，能够与经文的内涵相应，并从自己的信仰中生发出一种喜悦，那你就不会说今天念一种，明天换一种。可能有很多道友，都有这种经验，在某个时间段，下决心每天要念《地藏经》，过了一段时间又想再换一下，念《金刚经》，再过一段时间再换一下……

其实也是你的心，好像有一种疲劳了。在一个同样的重复的经文上，你的内心能够深入，能有法喜，这就是在枯淡处我们的心经受了考验。这是以念经来做个例子。

在丛林生活方面，我们每天吃的其实也很枯淡，菜根嘛。但是心定菜根香，如果心有定力，我们的注意力是收摄的，菜根也咬得有滋有味。如果你在吃的时候有心事，想别的事，即使山珍海味，也味同嚼蜡，所以心是如此地重要。

因此我们出家师父要耐得住这个枯淡，耐得住这个寂寞。在这个枯淡、寂寞， 在这个信息很简单的环境里面，我们的心能安定，其实就是信仰的力量。这个力量不是来自于名利的悬赏，不是来自于舆论的赞誉，而是来自于信仰，这是第一个。

第二个，要在喧闹处炼心。现在过年就是个喧闹处，人多、事多，你怎么能够有定力？有时候事情一多，人一多，我们就会不耐烦，脾气就会出来，甚至在佛殿里面对居士着急发火、骂人，这些现象经常有啊。有时候人忙了以后，你的定力就不行了，容易烦。

所以，恰恰要在喧闹中去锻炼怎么保持内心的从容。有的修行人在没有事情的环境里面心态还蛮好，刚有一点点事，心马上就乱了。这就是温室里的花朵，没有经过风雨的历练，不管用。日常生活里的这点喧闹，我们都不能够挺过去， 如果生死大限来临，我们就会方寸大乱，根本就没希望。

在东晋时，曾经有一场战争叫淝水之战，前秦的苻坚带着八十余万大军在淝水北岸，与南岸谢安统领的八万东晋军队对阵。这是中国历史上著名的以少胜多的战役。很多成语与这场战役有关，比如风声鹤唳，就是人听到风声、鹤叫，就以为敌人来了，描述苻坚军队败退时内心的恐惧。

但是在决出胜负以前， 谢安在屋里跟人下围棋，等到有人跑到军帐跟他报告说：我方大胜。他仍然不紧不慢地在那里下棋，说等我把棋下完。这就叫大将风度啊，在胜负未决之际，还能保持那种从容。

相比之下，春节期间，我们很多人很多事就没法比啊。当然过春节我们压力也很大，因为不卖门票，从昨天晚上到今天，估计有几万人次，消防的问题，防盗的问题，各种意想不到的情况。由于人太多，拥挤踩踏的危险都存在。寺院的执事提前开会安排工作，然后还有大量的义工参与服务。在这里要感谢义工们的奉献，他们有的维持秩序，有的看管香火，很辛苦。

在这种喧闹和纷杂中，保持内心的淡定，这也是一个修行人应该经历的。你多经历一点这个场面，你的心量会更大，定力会更足，这样你才有力量去担当佛教更大的责任。

每一代人都有一代人的责任，佛教的担子不会永远在一代人身上。你的力量从哪里来，像温室里的花朵，像脆弱的小草？其实小草倒不脆弱，把它压弯了，它还能直起来。有人就像温室的花朵，经历一点点复杂的事情，心就乱了，没头绪了。这就是一个问题。需要在混乱中修行。如果你在禅堂里有定力，你不妨到大街上去走走，看看定力还在不在。这是第二种炼心的境界。

第三种境界，就是要在困厄中炼心。什么是困厄啊，就是我们人生中遇到的特殊的困难和考验，比如严重的疾病、突然的灾难，或者人事的变动，比如被人冤枉了，或者有牢狱之灾了。当然，人生有个最大的困厄，每个人都不能免，虽然今天是初一，我们学佛的人倒是不怕，不妨谈论一下，这个困厄就是所谓死亡。

面对这种重大的困厄，我们的心怎么样？这个淡定的力量来自于平时的积累，取决于平淡处有没有把法喜修出来，喧闹处有没有把定力修出来。所以，在面对困厄的时候，最容易看出你是不是真正的有道力了。如果没有充沛的道力，困厄来临， 你就会手忙脚乱。

我想在这三个环节，能够让此心如如不动，这大概可以说是平常心的一种体现了。当然，我讲的三个环节，也是有深有浅的。如果要再讲深一点，平常心就是要求你不起分别。要不起分别，那必须要真正认识我们这个心，把我们内心分别的种子，那个根，给它斩断。这就是禅门修行用功最终的宗旨。斩断这个分别心，就像一根木材点着烧火，最后烧尽了变成冷灰，没有力量了；就像一头用石头做的狮子，它会叫吗？它不会哮吼。

在浅处，可以以这三个环节来检验我们。现在八零后、九零后发心出家修行的法师们，非常有必要在这三个地方炼心。

首先是枯淡处。因为八零后、九零后从小成长和教育的环境就有大量的信息刺激，大概都没有体验过什么叫枯淡，没有体验过没有手机、不上网的生活。你不要以为现在信息很多就是一种富有，其实这是一种贫乏。

也要经历喧闹的历练。喧闹的历练，你必须要去发心，要在丛林、在常住里面为大众服务。你要经历一点事，到客堂去待一待，每到过年或者有法会，在客堂的窗口去体验一下，看看待人接物中你的心态有没有起伏。

当然我们也会经历困厄。这个困厄可遇不可求，我们不会去求困厄，但是大概都会遇到。在困厄处逼自己，最后你的心就有力量出现。

最后，借此机会，我衷心地祝愿大家在新的一年，在“修平常心”这个题目上能够有大的收获，真正地做到无门慧开禅师偈子里所讲的“春有百花秋有月，夏有凉风冬有雪，若无闲事挂心头，便是人间好时节”。这是我们禅修的根本目的。

Kindness is a wonderful two-way street: like so many good things, the more we give it away, the more it will grow in us, nourishing our happiness like water that we use to feed the flowers.

-- His Holiness Gyalwang Drukpa, Jigme Pema Wangchen

 

The Heart Sutra: the Fullness of Emptiness

by Thich Nhat Hanh

If you are a poet, you will see clearly that there is a cloud floating in this sheet of paper. Without a cloud, there will be no rain; without rain, the trees cannot grow; and without trees, we cannot make paper. The cloud is essential for the paper to exist. If the cloud is not here, the sheet of paper cannot be here either. We can say that the cloud and the paper inter-are. “Inter being” is a word that is not in the dictionary yet, but if we combine the prefix “inter-” with the verb “to be,” we have a new verb, “inter-be.”

If we look into this sheet of paper even more deeply, we can see the sunshine in it. If the sunshine is not there, the forest cannot grow. In fact, nothing can grow. Even we cannot grow without sunshine. So we know that the sunshine is also in this sheet of paper. The paper and the sunshine inter-are. And if we continue to look, we can see the logger who cut the tree and brought it to the mill to be transformed into paper. And we see the wheat. We know that the logger cannot exist without his daily bread, and therefore the wheat that became his bread is also in this sheet of paper. And the logger’s father and mother are in it too. When we look in this way, we see that without all of these things, this sheet of paper cannot exist.

Looking even more deeply, we can see we are in it too. This is not difficult to see, because when we look at a sheet of paper, the sheet of paper is part of our perception. Your mind is in here and mine is also, so we can say that everything is in here in this sheet of paper. You cannot point out one thing that is not here — time, space, the earth, the rain, the minerals in the soil, the sunshine, the cloud, the river, the heat. Everything coexists with this sheet of paper. That is why I think the word inter-be should be in the dictionary. To be is to inter-be. You cannot just be by yourself alone. You have to inter-be with every other thing. This sheet of paper is, because everything else is. Suppose we try to return one of the elements to its source.

Suppose we return the sunshine to the sun. Do you think that this sheet of paper would be possible? No, without sunshine nothing can be. And if we return the logger to his mother, then we have no sheet of paper either. The fact is that this sheet of paper is made up only of “non-paper elements.” And if we return these non-paper elements to their sources, then there can be no paper at all. Without non-paper elements, like mind, logger, sunshine, and so on, there will be no paper. As thin as this sheet of paper is, it contains everything in the universe in it.

But the Heart Sutra seems to say the opposite. Avalokiteshvara tells us that things are empty. Let us look more closely.

Empty of What?

The Bodhisattva Avalokita,

while moving in the deep course

of Perfect Understanding,

shed light on the five skandhas and

found them equally empty.

Bodhi means being awake, and sattva means a living being, so bodhisattva means an awakened being. All of us are sometimes bodhisattvas, and sometimes not. Avalokita is the shorter name of the Bodhisattva Avalokiteshvara. Avalokita is neither male nor female and sometimes appears as a man and sometimes as a woman. In Chinese, Vietnamese, Korean, and Japanese, this bodhisattva’s name is sometimes translated as Guanyin, Quan Am, Gwaneum, and Kannon, which means “the one who listens and hears the cries of the world in order to come and help.” Avalokiteshvara also embodies the spirit of non-fear, as he himself has transcended fear. The Prajnaparamita Heart Sutra is his wonderful gift to us.

According to Avalokiteshvara, this sheet of paper is empty; but according to our analysis, it is full of everything. There seems to be a contradiction between our observation and his. Avalokita found the five skandhas empty. But empty of what? The keyword is empty. To be empty is to be empty of something.

If I am holding a cup of water and I ask you, “Is this cup empty?” you will say, “No, it is full of water.” But if I pour out the water and ask you again, you may say, “Yes, it is empty.” But empty of what? Empty means empty of something. The cup cannot be empty of nothing. “Empty” doesn’t mean anything unless you know “empty of what?” My cup is empty of water, but it is not empty of air. To be empty is to be empty of something. This is quite a discovery. When Avalokita says that the five skandhas are equally empty, to help him be precise we must ask, “Mr. Avalokita, empty of what?”

The five skandhas, which may be translated into English as five heaps, or five aggregates, are the five elements that comprise a human being. These five elements flow like a river in every one of us. In fact, these are really five rivers flowing together in us: the river of form, which means our bodies; the river of feelings; the river of perceptions; the river of mental formations; and the river of consciousness. They are always flowing in us. So according to Avalokita, when he looked deeply into the nature of these five rivers, he suddenly saw that all five are empty.

If we ask, “Empty of what?” he has to answer. And this is what he said: “They are empty of a separate self.” That means none of these five rivers can exist by itself alone. Each of the five rivers has to be made by the other four. It has to coexist; it has to inter-be with all the others.

In our bodies, we have lungs, heart, kidneys, stomach, and blood. None of these can exist independently. They can only coexist with the others. Your lungs and your blood are two things, but neither can exist separately. The lungs take in air and enrich the blood, and, in turn, the blood nourishes the lungs. Without the blood, the lungs cannot be alive, and without the lungs, the blood cannot be cleansed. Lungs and blood inter-are. The same is true with kidneys and blood, kidneys and stomach, lungs and heart, blood and heart, and so on.

When Avalokita says that our sheet of paper is empty, he means it is empty of a separate, independent existence. It cannot just be by itself. It has to inter-be with the sunshine, the cloud, the forest, the logger, the mind, and everything else. It is empty of a separate self. But, empty of a separate self means full of everything. So it seems that our observation and that of Avalokita do not contradict each other after all. Avalokita looked deeply into the five skandhas of form, feelings, perceptions, mental formations, and consciousness, and he discovered that none of them can be by itself alone. Each can only inter-be with all the others. So he tells us that form is empty. Form is empty of a separate self, but it is full of everything in the cosmos. The same is true with feelings, perceptions, mental formations, and consciousness.

Long Live Emptiness

Listen, Shariputra,

form is emptiness, and emptiness is form.

Form is not other than emptiness, emptiness

is not other than form.

The same is true with feelings, perceptions,

mental formations, and consciousness.

Form is the wave and emptiness is the water. To understand this, we have to think differently than many of us who were raised in the West were trained to think. In the West, when we draw a circle, we consider it to be zero, nothingness. But in India and many other Asian countries, a circle means totality, wholeness. The meaning is the opposite. So “form is emptiness, and emptiness is form” is like wave is water, water is wave. “Form is not other than emptiness, emptiness is not other than form. The same is true with feelings, perceptions, mental formations, and consciousness,” because these contain each other. Because one exists, everything exists.

In the Vietnamese literary canon, there are two lines of poetry by a twelfth-century Zen master of the Ly dynasty that say:

If the cosmos exists, then the smallest speck

of dust exists.

If the smallest speck of dust doesn’t exist,

then the whole cosmos doesn’t exist.

The poet means that the notions of existence and nonexistence are just created by our minds. He also said that “the entire cosmos can be put on the tip of a hair,” and “the sun and the moon can be seen in a mustard seed.” These images show us that one contains everything, and everything is just one.

Because form is emptiness, form is possible. In form, we find everything else — feelings, perceptions, mental formations, and consciousness. “Emptiness” means empty of a separate self. It is full of everything, full of life. The word “emptiness” should not scare us. It is a wonderful word. To be empty does not mean to be nonexistent. If the sheet of paper is not empty, how could the sunshine, the logger, and the forest come into it? How could it be a sheet of paper? The cup, in order to be empty, has to be there. Form, feelings, perceptions, mental formations, and consciousness, in order to be empty of a separate self, have to be there.

Emptiness is the ground of everything. “Thanks to emptiness, everything is possible.” That is a declaration made by Nagarjuna, a Buddhist philosopher of the second century. Emptiness is quite an optimistic concept. If I am not empty, I cannot be here. And if you are not empty, you cannot be there. Because you are there, I can be here. This is the true meaning of emptiness. Form does not have a separate existence. Avalokita wants us to understand this point.

Happy Continuation

Listen, Shariputra, all dharmas are marked

with emptiness.

They are neither produced nor destroyed.

Dharmas in this line means “things.” A human being is a dharma. A tree is a dharma. A cloud is a dharma. The sunshine is a dharma. Everything that can be conceived of is a dharma. So when we say, “All dharmas are marked with emptiness,” we are saying, “Everything has emptiness as its own nature.” And that is why everything can be. There is a lot of joy in this statement. It means nothing can be born, nothing can die. Avalokita has said something extremely important.

Every day in our lives, we see birth and we see death. When a person is born, a birth certificate is printed for them. After they die, a death certificate is made. These certificates confirm the existence of birth and death. But Avalokita said, “No, there is no birth and death.” We have to look more deeply to see whether his statement is true. What is the date on which you were born, your birth date? Before that date, did you already exist? Were you already there before you were born? Let me help you. To be born means from nothing you become something. My question is, before you were born, were you already there?

Suppose a hen is about to lay an egg. Before she gives birth, do you think the egg is already there? Yes, of course. It is inside. You also were inside before you were outside. That means that before you were born, you already existed — inside your mother. The fact is that if something is already there, it does not need to be born. To be born means from nothing you become something. If you are already something, what is the use of being born?

So, your so-called birthday is really your continuation day. The next time you celebrate, you can say, “Happy Continuation Day.” I think that we may have a better concept of when we were born. If we go back nine months to the time of our conception, we have a better date to put on our birth certificates. In China, and also in Vietnam, when you are born, you are already considered one year old. So we say we begin to be at the time of our conception in our mother’s womb, and we write down that date on our birth certificate.

But the question remains: Even before that date, did you exist or not? If you say “yes,” I think you are correct. Before your conception, you were there already, maybe half in your father, half in your mother. Because from nothing, we can never become something. Can you name one thing that was once a nothing? A cloud? Do you think that a cloud can be born out of nothing? Before becoming a cloud, it was water, maybe flowing as a river. It was not nothing. Do you agree?

We cannot conceive of the birth of anything. There is only continuation. Please look back even further and you will see that you not only exist in your father and mother, but you also exist in your grandparents and your great-grandparents. As I look more deeply, I can see that in a former life I was a cloud. This is not poetry; it is science. Why do I say that in a former life I was a cloud? Because I am still a cloud. Without the cloud, I cannot be here. I am the cloud, the river, and the air at this very moment, so I know that in the past I have been a cloud, a river, and the air. And I was a rock. I was the minerals in the water. This is not a question of belief in reincarnation. This is the history of life on Earth. We have been gas, sunshine, water, fungi, and plants. We have been single-celled beings. The Buddha said that in one of his former lives, he was a tree. He was a fish; he was a deer. These are not superstitious things. Every one of us has been a cloud, a deer, a bird, a fish, and we continue to be these things, not just in our former lives.

This is not just the case with birth. Nothing can be born, and also nothing can die. That is what Avalokita said. Do you think that a cloud can die? To die means that from something you become nothing. Do you think that we can make something a nothing? Let us go back to our sheet of paper. We may have the illusion that to destroy it, all we have to do is light a match and burn it up. But if we burn a sheet of paper, some of it will become smoke, and the smoke will rise and continue to be. The heat that is caused by the burning paper will enter into the cosmos and penetrate other things. The heat is the next life of the paper. The ash that is formed will become part of the soil, and the sheet of paper, in his or her next life, might be a cloud and a rose at the same time. We have to be very careful and attentive in order to realise that this sheet of paper has never been born and it will never die. It can take on other forms of being, but we are not capable of transforming a sheet of paper into nothingness. Everything is like that, even you and I. We are not subject to birth and death.

One autumn day I was in a park, absorbed in the contemplation of a very small but beautiful leaf in the shape of a heart. Its colour was almost red, and it was barely hanging on the branch, nearly ready to fall down. I spent a long time with it, and I asked the leaf a lot of questions. I found out the leaf had been a mother to the tree. Usually, we think that the tree is the mother and the leaves are just children, but as I looked at the leaf I saw that the leaf is also a mother to the tree. The sap that the roots take up is only water and minerals, not good enough to nourish the tree, so the tree distributes that sap to the leaves. The leaves take the responsibility of transforming that rough sap into refined sap and, with the help of the sun and gas, send it back in order to nourish the tree. Therefore, the leaves are also the mother to the tree. And since the leaf is linked to the tree by a stem, the communication between them is easy to see.

We do not have a stem linking us to our mother anymore, but when we were in her womb we had a very long stem, an umbilical cord. The oxygen and the nourishment we needed came to us through that stem. Unfortunately, on the day we call our birthday, it was cut and we received the illusion that we are independent. That is a mistake. We continue to rely on our mother for a very long time, and we have several other mothers as well. The Earth is our mother. We have a great many stems linking us to mother Earth. There is a stem linking us with the cloud. If there is no cloud, there is no water for us to drink. We are made of at least seventy per cent water; the stem between the cloud and us is really there. This is also the case with the river, the forest, the logger, and the farmer. There are hundreds of thousands of stems linking us to everything in the cosmos, and therefore we can be. Do you see the link between you and me? If you are not there, I am not here; that is certain. If you do not see it yet, look more deeply and I am sure you will see. This is not philosophy. You really have to see.

I asked the leaf whether it was scared because it was autumn and the other leaves were falling. The leaf told me, “No. During the whole spring and summer, I was very alive. I worked hard and helped nourish the tree, and much of me is in the tree. Please do not say that I am just this form, because this leaf form is only a tiny part of me. I am the whole tree. I know that I am already inside the tree, and when I go back to the soil, I will continue to nourish the tree. That’s why I do not worry. As I leave this branch and float to the ground, I will wave to the tree and tell her, ‘I will see you again very soon.’”

Suddenly I saw a kind of wisdom very much like the wisdom contained in the Heart Sutra. You have to see life. You shouldn’t say, life of the leaf, but life in the leaf, and life in the tree. My life is just Life, and you can see it in me and in the tree. That day there was a wind blowing and, after a while, I saw the leaf leave the branch and float down to the soil, dancing joyfully, because as it floated it saw itself already there in the tree. It was so happy. I bowed my head, and I knew that we have a lot to learn from the leaf because it was not afraid — it knew that nothing can be born and nothing can die.

The cloud in the sky will also not be scary. When the time comes, the cloud will become rain. It is fun becoming rain, falling down, chanting, and becoming part of the Mississippi River, the Amazon River, or the Mekong River, or falling onto vegetables and later becoming part of a human being. It is a very exciting adventure. The cloud knows that if it falls to the earth it might become part of the ocean. So the cloud isn’t afraid. Only humans are afraid.

A wave on the ocean has a beginning and an end, a birth and a death. But Avalokiteshvara tells us that the wave is empty. The wave is full of water, but it is empty of a separate self. A wave is a form that has been made possible, thanks to the existence of wind and water. If a wave only sees its form, with its beginning and end, it will be afraid of birth and death. But if the wave sees that it is water and identifies itself with the water, then it will be emancipated from birth and death. Each wave is born and is going to die, but the water is free from birth and death.

So you see there are many lessons we can learn from the cloud, the water, the wave, the leaf — and from everything else in the cosmos, too. If you look at anything carefully and deeply enough, you discover the mystery of interbeing, and once you have seen it you will no longer be subject to fear — fear of birth, or fear of death. Birth and death are only ideas we have in our minds, and these ideas cannot be applied to reality. It is just like the idea of above and below. We are very sure that when we point up, it is above, and when we point in the opposite direction, it is below. Heaven is above, and hell is below. But the people who are sitting right now on the other side of the planet must disagree, because the idea of above and below does not apply to the cosmos, nor does the idea of birth and death.

So please continue to look back and you will see that you have always been here. Let us look together and penetrate into the life of a leaf, so we may be one with the leaf. Let us penetrate and be one with the cloud or with the wave, to realise our own nature as water and be free from our fear. If we look very deeply, we will transcend birth and death.

Tomorrow, I will continue to be. But you will have to be very attentive to see me. I will be a flower or a leaf. I will be in these forms and I will say hello to you. If you are attentive enough, you will recognise me, and you may greet me. I will be very happy.