Explanations by Master Cheng-Yan
Subject: Donning the Armor of Diligence With Firm Resolve (被精進鎧 發堅固意)
Date: November.21.2018
“When Bodhisattvas engage in spiritual practice in front of the Buddha, the Dharma, the Sangha, their parents, teachers and elders, they always give rise to humility to respectfully serve, be filial and provide for them. With this as their cause, it gives rise to different effects in their cyclic existence. Bodhisattvas will help all beings be transformed. This is known as cultivating the cause and receiving the effects.”
We must be mindful! We need to listen and understand. Indeed, “Bodhisattvas engage in spiritual practice.” Bodhisattvas must engage in spiritual practice over the course of many lifetimes. Over the course of these countless lifetimes, they always have parents, teachers and elders. This is a definite principle in life. When Bodhisattvas are reborn in the world, their lives are exactly like ours, except that when they come to live in the world, they attain realizations from the lives of ordinary people, understand various kinds of suffering in the world and also realize that in life as a human, there is only birth, living, aging, sickness and finally death. “What is the value of a life like this?” They then aspire to investigate the principles of life, to comprehend where the true principles of life really lie. Why is there suffering of birth, aging, illness and death in this world? Why is there the suffering of parting with loved ones? Why is there the suffering of meeting those we hate?
Why is there the suffering of disparities in wealth and status? Oh, why is there so much suffering? The more they investigate, the more they come to realize [the truth]. This is how they begin forming aspirations to pursue [the answers]. In the course of their pursuit, they make vows to keep moving forward along the path in the right direction. The world is full of so many suffering sentient beings; they must make everyone aware of this principle. So, on one hand they mindfully pursue the Buddha-Dharma; this is called “seeking the path to Buddhahood.” On the other hand they also seize the moment to find ways to spread the wonderful principles by sharing them among people, so that everyone can realize and understand them. In this way, they spread the Buddha-Dharma widely throughout the world. These people are Bodhisattvas.
In this manner, they pursue the true principles to realize the Buddha-Dharma, while simultaneously putting the principles into practice in their daily living by willingly helping others through good and virtuous deeds. When people’s minds are afflicted, entangled and unable to analyze things clearly, Bodhisattvas come to teach them with the Dharma. This is called “seeking the path to Buddhahood while transforming sentient beings.” So, they are those who listen to the Dharma, practice the Dharma, teach the Dharma and spread the Dharma. Bodhisattvas cultivate the Buddha-Dharma by putting it into practice and also spreading the Dharma.
So, the Dharma comes from the Buddha. The source of the teaching is the Great Enlightened One, who is the Buddha. Thus, we should revere and respect the source of the Dharma, the direction that the Buddha gave us. We must also be very grateful for the Dharma circulating in the world. We must practice according to the teachings. So, we should form aspirations to concentrate on our spiritual practice. With so much suffering in the world, if we do not first let go of our own suffering, let go of the source and cause of suffering, then how can we engage in spiritual practice? So, we set [everything] aside to focus on entering the monastic community and serving the Buddha and the Sangha. Having entered here, we begin to follow the Buddha’s teaching and guidance by upholding the practice with body and mind, since we live in such an environment. So, we should have respect for the Buddha, the Dharma and the Sangha. When it comes to our body, where do our bodies come from? They come from our parents. So, we should respect and honor our parents. To practice filial piety, we use the life our parents have given us and repay them through our wisdom-lives. Life is inherently impermanent. Birth, aging, illness and death are all in the law of nature. We have a pair of parents in each lifetime and we have passed through many lifetimes, being reborn over the course of many kalpas. Many kalpas is a very long time and over the course of that very long period of time, we do not know how many lifetimes we experienced. Fortunately, we are now in the human realm where the principle of impermanence serves to constantly heighten our vigilance.
Life is very short! We must remind ourselves to be vigilant. Since life is so short and especially since the world is impermanent, [we know] this principle is surely true, so we should be even more vigilant.
Therefore, we should seize the moment. We know that worldly pleasures are fleeting. Not only is [life] short, it is also constantly changing and impermanent. We should seize this moment in this lifetime. In the present moment of this lifetime, our minds should never deviate from the Dharma. Moreover, we should quickly apply the Dharma in our daily living. Our lives are inseparable from other people so we must constantly learn by being among people. When practicing according to the teachings, some people listen to one teaching and they can understand 10, 100, or even 10 million things while others cannot understand a word or a verse, even after hearing it 10 times. This is how our capabilities differ in sharpness or dullness. Why do some people have such sharp capabilities? It is because they never lose their morals and virtues, and they know the principles. The source of learning the Dharma is the Buddha, the Dharma, the Sangha and our parents’ grace, which are all very clear. When people pass on the Dharma to us or teach us,we must be very grateful. This is all very clear. We have engraved in our minds these very clear principles of life, and we will always remember them. Because of this, we always treat others with reverence. We know to revere the Buddha, revere the Dharma, revere the Sangha and respect our parents. We hope that we can repay the grace of the Three Treasures, and repay the grace of our parents, teachers and elders. How do we repay them? By being diligent with our reward-body. We must clearly understand the principles; in terms of how we act, we must always [advance] in the right direction so that we do not become confused. How do we cultivate our mind in very single moment so that we are constantly moving in the direction of awakening? We become “awakened sentient beings,” people who awaken in the world and have love for others. This is how we must repay our parents’ grace for giving us our bodies, which has given us the chance to learn the Dharma and live among the Three Treasures, the Buddha, the Dharma and the Sangha.
If we are reverent and grateful, then naturally within our minds, we will “always give rise to humility”. Since the source of our body, the source of our thinking and psychology, lies in the teachings of the Buddha-Dharma, we should take our bodies as vessels for spiritual practice. We should use them well and never be conceited or arrogant. Thus, we must humble ourselves and [cultivate] humility in our attitude toward the Buddha, the Dharma, the Sangha, our parents and all people. This is reverence and gratitude.
This is “humility”. It does not mean being aloof, thinking, “I am so smart; I know so much”. When we increase our self-importance, we forget, the concept of where our body and mind comes from. We should remind ourselves to be vigilant of this. So, we must earnestly cultivate reverence and gratitude. With this body, naturally we will ”respectfully serve, be filial and provide for [our elders]. We should set aside all matters and, with reverent heart, be filial and provide for our teachers, elders, the Buddha, the Dharma and the Sangha. When we do this in our daily living, everything we say and do, our attitude and expression will all be seeds.
If we are humble and reverent in our hearts, then this mindset will be expressed in our attitude. When we express this attitude, the people receiving feel differently; they will feel joyful in their hearts. In our minds, when this becomes part of our consciousness, we will have engraved the Dharma into our hearts. If we always treat the Buddha-Dharma, our teachers, and our elders with such humility, we will naturally be like this with everyone else. This will have already becomes part of our [karmic] consciousness, a seed in our memory. This is what people ordinary call a “[good] habit”. When we treat others and handle matters in the same way as we treat our elders, we are treating everyone with humility. By the time we have cultivated this [good] habit the seed has ripened.
“With this as the cause,” we will no longer need to strive to practice it, for it is habitual; we just do it that way, as it should be according to the principles. This is how we practice etiquette. This is how etiquette is developed. So, etiquette is based upon principles. It is what it should be according to principles. These become a habitual part of everyone’s consciousness. This is our “cause,” our seed. We do not need to put effort into it, because this is just how we do things! This is just the way we treat people, as it should be; this is just how we conduct ourselves. In facing the Buddha, Dharma, Sangha, our teachers, parents and elders and all the way to other people, this mindset will become very natural [for us]. It is a natural principle.
This etiquette, this propriety, is a natural principle. This is our cause, our causal seed. So, for all of us, “the only thing we take with us when we die is karma”. For us ordinary beings, “the gives rise to different effects in [our] cyclic existence”.
In this lifetime, as we engage in spiritual practice as monastic, we most lively will not lose our human form, unless of course we aspire to be reborn in the heaven realm. Usually, when we refrain from breaking precepts, refrain from committing the Ten Evils and do good deeds, as long as our hearts still seek to escape suffering, we will be reborn in heaven. [This will happen] unless, with firm aspirations, [we say,] “I will not go to heaven!” I will do the Buddha’s work as a Bodhisattva. [That is], unless we have this aspiration to become Bodhisattvas and attain Buddhahood and do not crave pleasures or fear transmigration throughout the Six Realms. This is because at the ultimate level of wisdom, we do not crave Nirvana. This is wisdom. We learn the Buddha-Dharma to truly attain Buddhahood, which means to completely attain Buddhahood. The Buddha repeatedly comes to the world lifetime after lifetime. The Buddha not only comes to the human realm, He comes and goes throughout the Six Realms, following sentient beings to relieve sentient beings [from suffering]. So, He is the “guiding teacher of the Three Realms” and “kind father of the Four Kinds of Beings”. Those in the Three Realms can all receive the Buddha-Dharma’s teaching and transformation. The Buddha always follows sentient beings; He accords with their conditions. He forms aspirations and makes vows to relieve sentient beings from suffering in the Four Evil Realms, so He must go to those realms as well. Thus, although we may not break the precepts while in this world, although we may not lose our human form, there is still the chance that we have remaining karma from a past lifetime.
Everyone is responsible for their own karma. If we create evil karma, we must accept its negative retributions. If we create good karma, then we will receive positive retributions. Yet, when we were still ordinary people, before we began engaging in spiritual practice and before we heard the Buddha-Dharma, we might not have practiced the Ten Good Deeds, and we might have even committed the Ten Evils. If we committed the Ten Evils, then who is responsible for the effects? It is always we ourselves. Yet, through our blessed [affinities], we have encountered the Dharma. Through our causes and conditions, our very powerful causes and conditions, we have come to enter the Buddha-Dharma. We changed our past [behavior]. We have transformed our past evil deeds, the Ten Evils we committed in the past, and now we practice the Ten Good Deeds. These Ten Good Deeds accumulate, so we have eliminated our past habitual tendencies. Now we are fully headed toward virtuous causes and good fruits as we accumulate this goodness. When we accumulate a lot of good deeds, do those bad deeds we did in the past all disappear? They do not disappear. It all depends on whether we have done good deeds in our past lifetimes, whether we have accumulated good karma over many lifetimes and walked the path of goodness. However, when it comes to our evil karma, if the negative conditions we created in the past are very strong and our positive [conditions] are weaker, then this evil cause will manifest itself in ways that we cannot escape from.
This is like how, for ten lifetimes, Master Wu Da had been an eminent monk. Throughout lifetime after lifetime, he was very careful in his spiritual practice, to the point that he gained the respect of the Tang emperor Yizong, who rewarded him with a sandalwood chair. Just as he was about to sit in it, Master Wu Da became smug and self-satisfied. With this, his karmic door was slightly ajar, and an unwholesome thought entered his mind. In his arrogance, he forgot himself; he was not paying attention and hit his leg. All he did was bump it against something, but it then became bruised. The bruise began to fester and took on a strange shape; tis growth could not be controlled. The boil took on the shape of a human face. It tormented him unbearably. Thinks to his karmic affinity with Venerable Kanaka from when he had come to Venerable Kanaka’s aid, this blessed cause came together with these conditions, and Venerable Kanaka came to save him in time. He instructed him to wash away his karmic obstacles. This is why we now have the Waster Repentance Sutra to recite. An eminent monk in this lifetime, He had engaged in spiritual practice for 10 lifetimes, culminating in his eminence in this lifetime. But in the past he had plotted to murder someone, and that evil karma still remained. So, if karma is not exhausted, it is like a ball of iron that never disappears. It is just like a burning ball of iron that continues to burn red hot. So, we need to be very mindful.
If we are not careful, as our transmigration in the Six Realms depends on the causes we created, then we will attain the results accordingly. If our retribution is to go to hell, then that is the realm we will go to. If our retribution is to become an animal, then we will go to the animal realm. If our retribution is to become a hungry ghost, then we will go to the realm of hungry ghosts. These are all different realms. [Causes] “give rise to different effects”. Because of what we have done in our past lives, these causes bring about different retributions. This is how, as sentient beings, we end up on different paths in different places. [These causes] “give rise to different effects in cyclic existence. Bodhisattvas will help all beings be transformed”. This is what Bodhisattvas hope for. Whatever realm they go to, they go there willingly just like the Buddha did. Wherever there is suffering, they willingly go to relieve them. However, the human realm is most important, for it is in the human realm that we guard the door to the hell realm and shut the door to the animal realm. If we can teach people to do good deeds and refrain from breaking the precepts, then naturally they will not create those causes so as to suffer those kinds of results. So, as we repeatedly come and go in life, we practice the Bodhisattva-path. This is what Bodhisattvas practice. Thus, we must be a role model for others. With cultivation, we gain virtues and form good affinities with others. Only then can others accept what we t ell them. Thus, we need to put [the Dharma] into practice. So, “Bodhisattvas will help all beings be transformed”. Only when we have affinities with people will they accept what we say and let us transform them. Because of this, “This is known as cultivating the cause and receiving the effects”. If we wish to transform others, we must engage in spiritual practice ourselves and cultivate our causes. The purpose of all this is to guide us to earnestly form aspirations and make vows. Good and evil are clearly different. If our goodness is stronger, then we can follow these good karmic conditions and quickly accumulate them so that we have benefactors in our lives. We see how Master Wu Da practiced goodness. Before he was accomplished, he did good by saving someone He saved Venerable Kanaka. Venerable Kanaka then became Master Wu Da’s benefactor, who gave him the chance to eliminate the suffering in his life. Thus, people of future generations have the chance to read the Water Repentance Sutra.
This is all a matter of causes and conditions. So, we must earnestly seize karmic conditions as we go about our daily living. So, “[Causes] give rise to different effects”. In different realms. It is best for us to stay in the human realm. In the human realm, we see all the Six Realms, so we can earnestly engage in spiritual practice.
[Causes] give rise to different effects. Unenlightened beings transmigrating through the Six Realms are reborn according to the retributions from all the different kinds of karma they create. Unenlightened beings create all kinds of karma, so they receive all kinds of effects and are reborn in 10,000 different physical forms. Thus, it says, “[Causes] give rise to different effects”.
“Unenlightened beings transmigrating through the Six Realms are reborn according to the retributions from all the different kinds of karma they create”. The karma we create determines the realm we will be born in. This is how it “gives rise to different effects”. Unenlightened beings create all kinds of karma, so they receive all kinds of effects and are reborn in 10,000 different physical forms”. Every kind of sentient being born in every realm has different appearance. In the animal realm alone, who knows how many millions of species there are! “Unenlightened beings crate all kinds of karma, so they receive all kinds of effects”. Will we ultimately be reborn as an elephant, as a chicken or a duck? These are all animal realm retributions. There are many different forms, Even a chicken or a duck can save someone. There are many such stories. So, they are reborn in 10,000 different physical forms. These are all sentient beings. Every kind of animal is included when we talk about sentient beings. When we speak of saving beings, these animals are all included. Animals do not exist for us to eat. They are born in the animal realm due to their karmic retribution. This is why we should heighten our vigilance and mindfully seek to comprehend this.
“Thus, it says, [Causes] give rise to different effects.” Different ways of life exist due to different karmic retributions. This is what we need to clearly understand. We have yet to get into the sutra itself, but [the previous passages] help teach us how to be diligent, and as we go about our daily living, how we should care for our minds. So, we must mindfully listen to the Dharma.
The previous sutra passage states, “At that time, Sakyamuni Buddha said to Maitreya Bodhisattva, ‘Excellent! Excellent! Ajita, you are able to ask the Buddha about such great matters’”.
We talked about this before. It is simple, so we understand it upon hearing it. The next sutra passage goes on to state, “All of you together should be of one mind, don the armor of diligence and form firm resolve. The Tathagata now wishes to reveal and proclaim the wisdom of all Buddhas.”
We must all listen mindfully and wholeheartedly. We must be diligent in our mind and truly be resolved in our aspirations. The Buddha carefully admonished us to never let our thoughts become scattered, so this is why He said, “All of you together should be of one mind, don the armor of diligence…”. It is as if we are going into battle, so we must don our armor.
All of you together should be of one mind, don the armor of diligence: Before the Buddha would reply, He first admonished them to focus their minds. In practicing the path to destroy the maras, diligence is most valuable. It is like donning an armor before entering a battle.
This was the Buddha responding to Maitreya Bodhisattva’s question. The Buddha was about to answer him. Before He answered, the Buddha admonished us to be single-minded in our diligence and not be scatter-minded when listening to the Dharma. We must focus on listening to the Dharma. Before the Buddha responded, He first warned us, “Do not get distracted. You must really focus”. So, “He first admonished them to focus their minds”. He first admonished us, telling us that we should focus our minds. “In practicing the path to destroy the maras, diligence is most valuable”. In spiritual practice, we must focus our minds like this, so the maras cannot come and disturb us. The maras are the maras of our mind. The discursive thoughts in our minds are all called maras.
When the mind becomes distracted, the maras of afflictions arise in our minds. This is because the mind becomes distracted and branches toward external objects. We must always collect our thoughts to be of one mind. Before the Buddha began to speak, He told everyone to focus their minds and be of one mind, so we must earnestly be mindful and diligent. Being of one mind is to focus the mind and truly be diligent. “Being diligent is most valuable.” It is like donning an armor before entering a battle. It means we must don our battle armor. It is “Forming firm resolve”. If our resolve is not firm, we cannot do anything.
If we want to accomplish something, this depends on whether we have a firm resolve, whether we have string willpower and it depends upon ourselves; are we focused? Do we have firm resolve? As we seek to accomplish this thing, do we willingly give of ourselves? This all requires great mindfulness. So, if we are not resolved and single-minded, we will not be able to accomplish anything.
Form firm resolve: Without firm resolve, one cannot accomplish things. Thus, He first exhorted them to be diligent and firm. This was to admonish those in the assembly and help them give rise to deep faith.
“Thus, He first exhorted them to be diligent and to establish firm resolve.” This was how He admonished them. He admonished the assembly, “If you want to listen to the Dharma, you need to be like this. You need to be single-minded and diligent. Be firm in your resolve”. Being single-mindedly diligent and firm in resolve is very important! When the Buddha taught the Dharma, He did this as well. This helped them give rise to faith so they had deep resolve and faith.
If people’s minds are not diligent and their resolve is not firm, they will easily give rise to delusion and disturbance. They will be unable to have right faith in the path Buddhahood. He admonished them to be of one mind, so as not to be distracted and disturbed. He admonished them to don the armor, so as not to become lax. He admonished them to be diligent, so as not to retreat out of fear. He admonished them to be firm, so as not to become doubtful.
So, if “we are not diligent” and our “resolve is not firm, we will easily give rise to delusion and disturbance”. If our minds are not diligent and our resolve is not firm, then our minds can quickly become distracted and easily give rise to delusion and disturbance. Our minds then become deluded. These delusions can be very subtle. They can lead to improper thoughts, even illusory understanding, illusory views and fantasies. As we have all these thoughts, we can easily be distracted. So, “They will be unable to have right faith in the path to Buddhahood”. If we do not focus our minds and refuse to be diligent and have firm resolve, then, while we are on the path to Buddhahood, it will be impossible to enter the path to Buddhahood with right faith. So, “He admonished them to be of one mind so as not to be distracted and disturbed”. This warns and admonishes us to advance diligently and single-mindedly. When it comes to the Buddha-Dharma, we must be single-minded in our firm resolve. We can see that many different religions also [require the same resolve]. So, we must do the same.
We must have right faith, right views, right understanding and right conduct. The principles must be practiced. Our thinking must come together with matters in order to be principles. We must be mindful in choosing our direction and make an effort to clear the way. So, to diligently clear the way, we must earnestly prepare ourselves by donning our armor and never growing lax.
It is as if we were going into battle. When going into battle, how could we be lax? We must be sharp, for the enemy is before us. These maras are all forms of discursive thinking that influence us to deviate in our faith. Just like donning armor for battle, we must advance forward and not be lax. “He admonished them to be diligent, so as not to retreat out of fear”. We must be diligent to prevent our minds from retreating. So, we must “be firm, so as not to become doubtful”. We must not have doubts in the Buddha-Dharma.
Remember when Sariputra “requested three times”. The Buddha had already told him several times, “Stop! Stop!” This was because the Dharma is so profound that those who cannot understand or accept it will give rise to deviant thoughts, deviant actions and so on. Now, at this point, He had given us the “teaching of the manifest”. Now, at this point, He was entering the “teaching of the intrinsic”. The Buddha had to again remind us. In the past, it was Sariputra who did the asking. Now it was Maitreya who did the asking.
So, when the Buddha began to teach, although He would promptly answer them, as part of His process of teaching, as a matter of course, He still wished to remind them again. He wished to instruct them to have firm aspirations and profound faith. This matter relates to the true principles of the world. Our wisdom-life depends upon it. As we come and go in life, in this world, among the Six Realms, which realm will we go to? It is very important, our great cause, so how can we not be mindful? So, we must be very single-minded, determined and have deep faith.
Next [He said], “All of you”. At the beginning, He said, “All of you. You must all start by together having one mind”. He began by teaching and admonishing them. “You all must be earnest and single-minded”. This is the Buddha’s compassion. He “warned and admonished them” to heighten their vigilance. The admonishment the Buddha conveyed toward us was true and not false, so we must earnestly be diligent to accept and uphold it.
All of you: The Buddha, out of loving-kindness, warned and admonished them. He first admonished them before He was about to teach to help them be courageous and listen carefully. After listening, they had to have faith in and practice it. They could not give rise to doubt and resignation just because its meaning and purpose were obscure and profound.
“He first admonished them before He was about to teach”. Before teaching, He wanted to first remind them, “to help them be courageous and listen carefully”. He wanted to help elevate their diligence and lift their spirits so they would listen carefully. This is because He was to “reveal the intrinsic,” so everyone needed to listen very carefully. So, “After listening, they had to have faith in and practice it”. After listening to it, we must have faith in it and put it into practice, though “its meaning and purpose were obscure and profound”. We cannot say, “This is so obscure and profound. How can have so many meanings? How can it be so profound?” Such thinking gives rise to laziness, doubt and fear. How deep can it possibly go? When we become lax, we begin to have doubts and it will be impossible to advance forward. We must always remain vigilant of this. “The Tathagata now wishes to reveal and proclaim the wisdom of all Buddhas”. Starting from that point, He was not only speaking to those Bodhisattvas, but also to all the Buddhas, the Buddha’s manifestations from other lands, past Buddhas, Buddhas to come and the many great beings who had gathered there. He would begin to clearly explain to all of them how the wisdom of every Buddha was accumulated.
The Tathagata now wishes to reveal and proclaim the wisdom of all Buddhas: He wished to explain this great matter, so He admonished and exhorted them. With the supreme wisdom realized by all Buddhas, the Tathagata would explain the wisdom of cause and effect. The wisdom of all Buddhas is profound and infinite and not something people can understand. Now by using the group emerging from the ground, He taught about His lifespan to reveal the Tathagata’s extremely profound wisdom. Thus, He said to “form firm resolve”. This was to reveal the cause of forming aspirations and beginning to practice.
So, “He wished to explain this great matter” This was a great matter. What is the process of spiritual practice that every Buddha must go through? How do they “actualize the Six Paramitas in all actions”? How do they attain the karmic conditions for this one great cause in the world? How do they attain Buddhahood in the lands that they are in? So, “He admonished and exhorted them”. He wanted to teach them all. In order to listen to a teaching like this, we must have reverence in our hearts.
As we said at the beginning, we need reverence toward the Three Treasures, the Buddha, the Dharma and the Sangha. We should also respect our parents for giving us our bodies; we should be grateful to them. If we want to repay their grace, then we need to become accomplished ourselves by having the proper attitude toward our spiritual practice, by being responsible in conducting ourselves. This means fulfilling our responsibilities and doing the things we should do. This means we should practice earnestly in accordance with the teachings. So, the Buddha still wanted to teach us, admonish us and guide us. He started with teachings more easily understood, with “the door of the manifest,” which we have all gone through. At this time, He was about to enter “the door of the intrinsic.” To begin teaching these fundamental principles, He had to be even more cautious. What should we do? How did all past Buddhas and the present Buddha finish their journey?
So, we should put effort into being mindful. “The wisdom of all Buddhas is profound and infinite.” How did they accumulate such wisdom? So, “The Tathagata would explain the wisdom of cause and effect. Explaining the wisdom of cause and effect” meant He would make it clear and help us understand that cause. What cause, what seed will we plant? We cannot mix different causes together. If we were to place in a bucket several different kinds of seeds and mixed them all together, then sowed them in the ground like that, several different plants would grow. By the same principle, if we plant evil seeds, in the future we will reap negative fruits.
However, if there are more good seeds, then the strength of those good seeds will be relatively stronger. If there are more evil seeds, then there will be more evil that manifests. Even if there is more good that manifests, does it mean that evil has disappeared? That evil is still there. This is what we should mindfully seek to comprehend. To understand this cause, we must observe it.
So, we need “all-encompassing wisdom” and then we need “profound discerning wisdom.” In this lifetime, we are now in the human realm. With everything we see in our surroundings and everything we come in contact with, we should carefully contemplate it, carefully observe it and earnestly and meticulously consider it. Moreover, we need to listen to the Dharma. We can thoroughly understand how all sentient beings are equal. This understanding of equality is “universal equality wisdom.”
Right now in this lifetime, we should try to attain this, to go from an understanding of this teaching to becoming like a great perfect mirror that can observe all things universally and understand all Dharma. This is why we need to be mindful. Without putting it into practice, we cannot do this. So, when it comes to the Buddha, the wisdom of all paths and all-encompassing wisdom. This is the Buddha’s wisdom.
This is what the Buddha attained. He was replete in the three kinds of wisdom, so this resulted in His enlightenment and in transforming others in the world with this wisdom. So, “The wisdom of all Buddhas is profound and infinite.” The Buddha’s wisdom is very profound. It is profound, profound, truly very profound! We humans do not know about this. It is very profound, but we still cannot afford not to know about it. So, He “now used the group” that was “emerging from the ground.”
“Now,” at that moment, He used the splitting open of the earth and the emergence of all those seeds as an analogy to open and reveal this to everyone. In fact, those seeds had originated from things that existed a long time ago, but were buried underground. This is like us humans; our good thoughts have always remained buried at the bottom of our hearts. The nature of True Suchness intrinsic to everyone has always remained buried. Now, it is revealed. So, now that it is revealed, our hearts have opened and we understand. At this point, the Buddha wanted to instruct us, to open and reveal for us, the origin of these causal seeds and how they came about. This is why He taught about His “lifespan.” So, He “revealed the Tathagata’s extremely profound wisdom.” He explained the source of these seeds, their great ages and their great profundity. He wanted to tell us about all of this. “Thus, He said to ‘form firm resolve.”’ Our aspiration must be very firm, and our intent must be firm if we are to “reveal our aspiration.” In revealing our cause for forming aspirations to begin our practice, we must start from that initial aspiration. All along the way, we have always strengthened that cause.
So, we must “actualize the Six Paramitas in all actions.” We often discuss “actualizing the Six Paramitas in all actions.” What does this mean? This is how we “form firm resolve” from the time we formed our initial aspiration, all the way as we actualize it in all actions. This is how the cause has ceaselessly continued on. This is “actualizing the Six Paramitas in all actions.” When causes and conditions are perfected, we can then attain Buddhahood. However, during this process, what is very important is the initial aspiration on our mind; have we lost touch with that initial aspiration? We must not lose contact with this, so that we can continuously walk this path and “actualize the Six Paramitas in all our actions.” This of course comes from always maintaining our very first aspiration. So, to practice the Bodhisattva-path, we must continue to practice our aspiration. Throughout this process, we must have this reverence, and we must humble ourselves. If we are respectful to those closest to us, we will naturally respect others in the same way that we respect our parents, teachers and friends. This is the starting point for our spiritual practice.
In summary, it is good to be human, for we can listen to the Dharma. All we need to do is to always be mindful!
(Source: Da Ai TV – Wisdom at Dawn program – Explanation by Master Chen-Yen)
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