Lecturer: Master Cheng-Yan
Subject: (戒慎心淨 虔誠念純)
With Discipline, Our Hearts Are Pure（With Reverence，Our Thoughts Are Pure）
Whether we talk about the physical or mental aspects of practice, we need to be careful.
With vigilance and purity of heart, we naturally have no defilements. With reverence and purity of thought, we can self-reflect. With remorse and self-respect, we avoid mistakes. With repentance and meditation, we will not be tainted.
This means that we always need to be vigilant. We cannot violate rules and precepts. If we are disciplined, our minds are always clean. If our minds are clean there is no filth. Our minds will not be polluted by dirt and will not attract ignorance. It is also important to be reverent. With reverent hearts come pure thoughts; our thoughts will always be simple. With simple and pure thoughts we can self-reflect. When dealing with people or matters, we need to be reverent. Then we can maintain pure thoughts and always know to self-reflect. Next, we need to have a sense of remorse. Only those with remorse can have self-respect and not make mistakes. If we have no conscience, then we have no remorse, and not only will we make mistakes, we will lead others to do the same. So, our conscience is directed inwards while remorse is directed toward others. We need to take care of ourselves and not lead others to make mistakes. We need to repent. A repentant mind is always pure, so we constantly repent. A pure mind is meditative. If our minds remain calm, we are careful about everything. If we made mistakes in the past, we need to sweep them away at once. So in the Water Repentance, we often read about repentance ad remorse. To repent means to remain undefiled and free of mistakes. If we are defiled or make a mistake, we need to sweep it away at once. The Zen School has a saying, “Beat the thought until it dies, then our Wisdom-life will arise.” What are those thoughts? Afflictions and ignorance. Do not let them come back to life. If we made mistakes, we must eliminate them so they do not come back. If our minds are free of discursive thoughts, afflictions and ignorance, then we are meditative and always maintain stillness and clarity. The mind will not attract defilements. Filth will not pollute our minds. So the text states, “As mentioned above, we have already repented all the mind and severe transgressions committed against the Three Treasures.” What is mentioned above is that in the past we made many mistakes. In a monastic community, we must practice the Six Points of Unity.
If we lack these six points, we do not respect each other.
If we make a mistake, we commit a mild or severe transgression.
This is what is “mentioned above”.
We commit mild and severe transgressions.
“We have already repented all the mild and sever transgressions committed against the Three Treasures.”
We have repented them all.
If we have not repented, perhaps we will easily make those mistakes again, whether slighting the Buddha’s image in the Buddha hall, or spoiling the holy grounds of Sangharama.
Lay practitioners, especially, and those without enough faith or reverence can easily commit these transgressions.
So we need to always heighten our vigilance.
All transgressions, serious or light, committed against the Three Treasures, must be repented one by one so we do not repeat them.
Besides those committed against the 3 Treasures, there are other transgressions.
“Are for the remaining evils, today we repent again in sequence.”
Besides the Transgressions we commit against the Buddha, Dharma and Sangha, or in the Sangharama, aren’t there even more disputes in our daily living?
So these are the “remaining evils”.
There are many other evil deeds, so “today we repent again in sequence.”
We have gone over a long list of ways to make mistakes, violate rules, and break precepts in our daily living and our interactions with people and matters.
We have talked about this for a long time.
Now the repentance text restates, “Today we repent again in sequence.”
We still need to repent them again, one by one.
We are ordinary beings.
Even after we know something, we easily forget and easily become lost.
After we hear something, we may have a moment of realization, but we are easily seduced by external conditions.
We become deluded and make mistakes again.
So, Imperial Preceptor Wu-da was very mindful.
He reminded us over and over again.
Next it says, “Are the Sutras state, there are two types of healthy practices.”
“The first is to not commit transgressions, the other is to repent after committing them.”
These two healthy practices mentioned in the text can protect our Wisdom-life and help maintain its health.
They always remind us to be vigilant and reverent, and to have a remorseful and repentant heart.
These are two methods.
One is repentance, the other is regret.
We still need to talk about repentance so we do not commit transgressions.
If we feel repentant, we will not do it again.
If we have regrets after we do it, we will repent at once.
So, we must always be very vigilant.
This is repentance and regret.
If we are repentant, we commit no wrongs or we repent at once after we commit them.
This maintains our Wisdom-life so it always continues to grow.
If we are unrepentant after we commit a wrong, we will continue to do it.
If we continue doing it without repenting, we will harm our Wisdom-life.
If we harm our Wisdom-life, we will not have the opportunity to achieve liberation or enlightenment, or to develop our wisdom.
The repentance text also states, “There are two kinds of White Dharma” White Dharma is a beneficial practice“ They remove all of sentient beings’ hindrances.” Those who have a conscience do no evil .Those who feel remorse do not lead others to evil.
Those who have a conscience and a sense of remorse are called humans. Those who do not are no different from animals. These two good methods help us and other sentient beings eliminate obstructions. Speaking of white, the character for taking refuge is made up of the characters for “white” and “turn from”.
It means to turn away from darkness towards light .That is the meaning of taking refuge. Turning form darkness is avoiding doing any evil. Moving towards light means doing all good deeds. Since we are Buddhists, we take refuge with the Three Treasures of Buddha, Dharma and Sangha .The Buddha is the Great Enlightened One, the one who realized the Truth and wondrous Dharma of the universe.
Our bodies and minds are already directed toward this Great Enlightened One. This means He is our role model and we want to learn from Him. So, when we direct body and mind to the Buddha, we want to learn the enlightening Dharma
We have to always self-reflect on our past mistakes and ignorance. We need to brush aside ignorance and sweep away mistakes. Thus, we open a door in the darkness of our minds .Once we open this door of our minds, the Wisdom-sun, the light of enlightened wisdom, will shine into our minds.
When the sun is out, the dark night has passed .This has the same meaning. When we are enlightened, beneficial methods appear. Beneficial methods are called white. With them we sweep away dark and evil things.
So, these two kinds of White Dharma can help us eliminate obstructions. Sentient beings have many obstructions because we continue making mistakes, planting bad seeds, creating bad affinities, and so on. These all create difficulties for us life after life. Whatever we do, we face many obstacles. So, we need to learn these two kinds of White Dharma. The Buddha taught us in this way; He opened many Dharma-doors to help us understand.
So, these two methods are called White Dharma. Thus, we also direct our minds toward Dharma, we need to reverently uphold His teachings. The first one states, “Those who have a conscience do no evil.” We will not do evil ourselves.
If we have a conscience, we will do no evil As we have already taken refuge with the Buddha, and are already people who promote Dharma, we must abide by rules, precepts, and propriety
and are already people who promote Dharma
we must abide rules , precepts ,and propriety
We must always have this attitude in our minds
So we often talk about conscience
If we have a conscience,
We will always be vigilant and
constantly reflect on ourselves ,
on whether something is right or wrong
if it is right ,we will do it ,
if it is wrong ,we will never do it ,
This is called our conscience.
In our minds , we are always vigilant.
“Is this correct?”
If not , we close the door to our minds.
We do not let our minds run rampant .
We need a conscience , so we will not do evil.
This means we follow the rules.
Having a conscience means we follow the rules.
“Those who feel remorse “
“do not lead others to evil “
We know we need to obey the urles.
When we look at others ,
we need to recognize when they are making mistakes.
We do not want to be led astray by someone.
More importantly ,we need to become his good teacher or benevolent friend ,
If he made a mistake, we bring him back.
The text calls these the two kinds of White Dharma.
These are all very beneficial.
Having a conscience and a sense of remorse is a beneficial method.
With that we protect ourselves and safeguard others.
This is “having a conscience”
Preventing ourselves from doing bad deeds and protecting others from making mistakes is
also called “having a conscience”.
“Those who have no conscience or”
“know no remorse are no different from animals “
So ,everyone need to hava a sense of remorse..
If we have no conscience no remorse,
we lack restraint in our minds and actions.
We may expose pur bodies or have a messy appearance in the Sangharama.
This kind of behavior shows a lack of remorse
it is as if they have no conscience or shame.
We see this often nowadays.
People need to have self –respect.
Right now people follow no reles when they dress.
In the past ,we wore certain colors and styles of clothing based on our age.
We were very particular.
In the past ,when people were young they wore adorable outfits.
When they got older they need to look a ladies and gentlemen.
At school they wore uniforms.
They did so in elementary school ,secondary school and college.
After graduation ,
people with refinement dressed properly
For older people , such as
grandmothers, they wore grandmothers-like clothing.
People now are different those in the past.
When I look at them I feel that they have abandoned the rules for appearance
in what they wear.
They are “no different from animals “in
having no sense of propriety.
So ,if we make this type of mistake
we need to be very sincere and
“today ,with utmost sincerity”
“we take refuge with the Buddha and “
“repent in accordance with the Dharma
We need to earnestly repent.
We feel remorseful and repentant.
With remorse , we will heighten our vigilance,
be very ,self –aware and protect ourselves.
We must overcome the desires in our minds.
We must overcome our erroneous behavior.
This is a sense of remorse.
If we carelessly made a mistake ,we need to repent.
So with remorse, we will repent.
In our daily living, we must always be careful.
That is why I say ,
with vigilance and purity of heart ,
you are not defiled
With reverence and purity of thought ,
you can self-reflect.
With remorse and self-reflect , you avoid mistakes.
With reverence and meditation,
you can be free of any taint.
I share this reminderwith you all.
Apply these simply words to your daily living
Then your minds will always be clean and
the Dharma will always be in your actions.
So , please always be mindful.
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