TRUE BUDDHIST LAY PRACTICE – THE MODERN BODHISATTVA SAMURAI

TRUE BUDDHIST LAY PRACTICE – THE MODERN BODHISATTVA SAMURAI

The full title should be – Instructions to the Lay Mahayana Buddhists on how to manage and defeat suffering, pain, anguish, worry and anxiety and stay calm, serene and reposed like the Buddha; to achieve Bodhi [Enlightenment].

I dedicate this article especially to (1) Ms Julie Boon, for her dedication to Bodhisattva practice and devotion to Guanyin and her metta and friendship and understanding, and (2) my twin brother Albert and my sister Molly, for always being there, when I fail or fall in life.

Metta means – ‘loving-kindness’ – and Buddha illustrated ‘metta’ as being the universal quality or type of love that a mother has for her children.

First, a preamble. How should one practise Buddhism? This takes me back to my childhood days when I attended kung-fu classes at Chin Woo Stadium in Kuala Lumpur, just to accompany my father who was doing swordfighting kung-fu, except in training they use a wooden Chinese sword. I was grouped with other children doing kung-fu exercises rather than the real kung-fu that our parents were doing. The kung-fu master or Sifu was instructing us to stand with our feet apart, and then bending our knees as if we were astride a bicycle, and with our fists thrust like doing a double punch simultaneously. We were to keep a straight back, and maintain that high squat position, not quite sitting and not quite standing, until we could do so for half hour. Until we succeed we could not proceed to Lesson 2. That was my 1st lesson that Chinese kung-fu was not about pumping up the muscles like Muhammad Ali, but about inner strength, the way a tree pliable stem becomes a solid trunk over time. My 2nd lesson came years later when I did tai-chi. I was told that learning tai-chi was not like learning dancing or calisthenics, all exhibition and show, and that it was more about the within, i.e. the mind and the breathing and the chi within the movement, Without the essence of the chi-kung, the function in the movement would not be real and fluid and in harmony with the chi. I never progressed beyond the basis level in both kung-fu and tai-chi by the way. At least I got taught that both are about what is within and nothing to do with the without i.e. the ‘person’ doing it.

So, practise Buddhism like a gardener looks after his garden, except here the garden is in your mind. Buddhism is about what you allow to plant in the garden of your mind, how you fertilise, aerate and maintain it, and what weeds or pests or poisons or scrap or rubbish you get rid of. Do not practise Buddhism idolising Buddha. He is only the teacher in the School of Truth. He may not be the right teacher for you. There are other teachers in the School of Truth or there might be other Schools of Truth. Even if you were in the same School you might be more suited for the science stream than the humanities or vocational stream. Remember that the Bodhi is the Truth and not Buddha. Buddha merely teaches the Truth or is like a doctor dispensing the truth. If Buddha, instead of Bodhi-awareness should occupy and obsess your mind, kill the ‘Buddha’ idol in your mind! Do not practise Buddhism as an ‘ism’ as in Buddhism. It is just a name and a label; just the name of the school. In Buddha’s time there was no such word called ‘Buddhism’. But regardless of whether you are being taught Mathematics, Law or Philosophy, the subject content itself is quite irrelevant. Subject content is just worldly knowledge. In Bodhi, what is important is that you are being taught the equivalent of logic and reasoning, but in the

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spiritual sense. The subject content of Mathematics, Law or Philosophy is just expedient means to that end. Education is still education, whether you are in the Science, Arts or Vocational streams. But do not practise Buddhism as if ‘you’ are being educated. This would be a fatal spiritual mistake! In Bodhi, it is not ‘you’ that is being educated, but your ‘mind’ that is being educated. Bodhi is all about the mind. Bodhi is about the ‘within’ and not the ‘without’. Bodhi is about going inside your ‘mind’! Get rid of the ‘I’ and the ‘Ego’ outside the mind. The pure mind has no ego. The deluded mind has an ego because it has taken the external form of the body as its surrogate ‘I’ and ‘Ego’. But that ‘body’ is a different body from second to second! All the cells all over your body are dying and birthing every micro-second! There is no ‘I’ in the ever changing body! Above all, practise Buddhism with metta; with a loving, caring, giving, compassionate heart. Remember a ‘mind’ without a ‘heart’ has no life-giving spirit of Bodhi. The secret key to Bodhi is through a selfless mind and a selfless heart of metta. This is what the formless eternal life-giving spirit of Bodhi is.

Given that we are in what Buddha described as the Dharma-Ending Age, where and when the ability and capacity of sentient beings for spiritual discernment would be very low, this aging Upasaka humbly submits a sharing of his thoughts and his long Buddhist journey so as to help turn the Bodhi Wheel. My Buddhist journey began at birth when I was born with a ‘hole in the heart’ and my mother was told that I had only a few weeks to live. My mother prayed to Guanyin to keep me alive and in return dedicated my life to Guanyin.

This discourse or exposition or explanation is for the benefit of lay Mahayana Chinese Buddhist practitioners i.e. ordinary single or married lay Buddhists out there in the world, whether poor working class people barely making ends meet, struggling to put food on the table, struggling to pay the rent or mortgage and bills and struggling to keep the creditors from the door or otherwise rich people enjoying worldly life in luxury and yet somehow missing something spiritually that they cannot quite explain in their life; or otherwise you might be neither rich nor poor but nevertheless skilled and talented or professionally qualified, and therefore have adequate financial means. Who and whatever you are, in your different busy-ness or breeziness or business, the common denominator is that you profess to be a Buddhist. Since you are not a Buddhist monk or nun cloistered up and in reclused solitude in a Buddhist monastery or nunnery, how do you go about practising Morality [Sila], Meditation [Samadhi] and Wisdom [Prajna], the three pathway practices to Bodhi [Enlightenment]?

You will note that I have used the adjective – ‘Mahayana Chinese’. This can be translated into ‘Chan’ [Chinese] or Son [Korean] or Zen [Japanese]. For the benefit of Western readers I shall use the adjective ‘Zen’. In Chinese Zen Buddhist writings, Buddhist scripture is illustrated or explained using the Three Pillars of Chinese Society, i.e. Taoism, Confucianism and Buddhism. Zen Mahayana Buddhism is a somewhat eclectic or syncretic spiritual fusion of Taoism, Confucianism with Buddhism. This marriage of sorts goes to the heart of Chinese culture and philosophy. It is a very wide and diverse subject. If you are interested, surf on the internet using the tags – ultimate reality, mind, Buddhism, Taoism, and Confucianism. The mystic, enigma and mystery that are the esoteric Tao make it an ideal prelude or background curtain-drop or foundation to the study of Buddhist Sutras. For, Buddhism has nothing to do with worldly knowledge or with the acquisition of intellectual knowledge as we know it. For, inherent in knowledge is ‘Ego’; but Bodhi [Enlightenment or Nirvana] has no time or place for ‘Ego’ or anything


conventional and worldly. The Tao is helpful in that it instils in you the sense that what is the Tao cannot be grasped by worldly knowledge and wisdom, and what it is has to be gleaned inferentially or spiritually. In that sense spiritual Buddha-fields are synonymous with the Tao. Similarly, the tenets of filial piety, discipline, virtue, benevolence, loyalty and morality contained in the Analects and the Doctrine of the Mean lend themselves to Buddhist moral ethics and values. It is one of those strange inexplicable affinities, but for some reason or paradox, with a Taoist or Confucian background, you are more perceptive to Buddhism. And more strangely again, when you in turn have acquired a good knowledge of Buddhist theology or philosophy, when you revisit the Tao Te Ching and the Analects, you will find that Buddhism, like a spiritual key, opens up and reveals the inner arcane secrets of the One Reality of the Tao and the Doctrine of the Mean [i.e. between Ultimate Reality and Non-Ultimate Reality] in Confucianism.

Lu Tung Pin alias Lu Shun Yang was one of the Eight Immortals in Taoism. He was the 5th Taoist Patriarch of the North. He was enlightened through Zen and became a Protector of the Dharma. Lu Tung Pin is famous as the author of the 100 Character Inscription – 20 lines and 5 Chinese characters per line – a poem epitomising the Three Pillars of Chinese Society, a fusion of a Taoism, Confucianism and Buddhism. Tzu Yang, another eminent Taoist, and the 5th Taoist Patriarch of the South, also practised Zen. The famous Sung Dynasty Confucian scholars like Chou Lien Chi, Cheng Tzu, Chang Tzu and Chu Tzu, all practised Zen. This was not surprising for in those days education meant studying Confucian classics, as the Imperial Exam, and indeed the entire system of government, was based on these classical studies and Confucian tenets. All ancient Chinese scholars therefore started off life initially as Confucian scholars. Whatever the reason for the fusion, the net result is that Zen is synonymous with the Three Pillars of Chinese Society. Read the works of Chih-Su, a prolific writer on the syncretism of the Three Pillars of Chinese Society. Note that Chih-Su started out as an ardent Confucianist with a singular mission to get rid of Buddhism as a foreign disease in China. It would be the equivalent of an American Mid-West pastor vowing to get rid of Islam from the United States.

In his book Ou-i Ssu-Shu Chieh, Chih-Su wrote – “I then knew that Confucianism, Taoism, Buddhism, Chan, Vinaya Buddhist doctrines were all yellow leaves and empty fists [meaning skilful devices or expedient means (words in brackets mine for elucidation)]”. Buddhism is therefore ‘yellow leaves and empty fists’ or in the words of a Zen Master – ‘fetching water and chopping firewood’. It is about being mundane and expedient. It is like keeping out of the radar of worldly existence. Note that Buddhism is not a faith or religion; it is taken to be so only as a matter of expediency. Note that Buddhism is not a spiritual or philosophical practice; it is only taken to be so as a matter of expediency. If Buddha is the teacher pointing his finger towards the Bodhi of ‘enlightenment’, then teacher worship or idolising the teacher or being the teacher’s pet or manually aping Buddha, like you would with the tai-chi master at a tai-chi class, will not, all other things being equal, make us enlightened! Even ‘enlightenment’ as a word or label has no relevance. We only say there is enlightenment as matter of expediency. There is in fact no enlightenment. It is all a manner of appearance or impression. It is like saying we are alive when in fact we are all dying! It is like saying the glass is half-full when it is half-empty. In Buddhist terms the glass is half-full or half-empty and also neither half-full nor half-empty, depending on what perspective


is expedient to the actual situation at hand. Therefore the important essential skill to have in Buddhist cultivation [no, It is not the ability to meditate] is the Power of Expediency.

Before I continue let me provide a personal anecdote or example about how I was taught the Power of Expediency. My late foster father Long Yoke Phin was a self-educated man. He came from a poor family and only had two years of primary education. But he was a home-grown philosopher. His only son Long Shin, my twin Say Chuan and I [Hong Chuan] were inseparable as we were all of the same age. When we were 14 or 15, and just starting to have a serious interest about girls, he advised as follows – “Before you decide to get married to a particular girl, open both your eyes, check everything, check her background, her family, particularly her mother; but once you are married, ‘close one eye’!” Later in life when I was absorbed in studying the Tao and the concept of yin-yang, I came across the saying – “Everything in life is like the moon, it has a bright side and a dark side.” For some reason this expression about the moon brought back memories about my foster father’s advice on marriage. I then realised that he was not saying - do not watch your wife like a hawk; but rather that in life it was better not to try to know everything, best to leave certain things unsaid and unseen. Heaven’s message is that there is always a side of the moon that is beyond human sight. In life therefore it is always best to leave something not to be known. Expediency requires that in life we follow our intuition and instinct, not tick off every box or expect everything or outcome to be perfect or exactly how you want it. There can be no perfection in an imperfect world. Expediency enables us to get on with life whatever the vagaries or difficulties or misfortunes. The tapestry of life is like a magic carpet with its myriad patterns and shapes and different shades of colours and complexions. The beauty is in the eye of the beholder. That is expediency. If we all see things the same way, that is not expediency. Expediency allows us to give and take.

Unlike other spiritual practices or religions, Buddhism requires you not to take yourself [i.e. your worldly being and worldly self-ego] too seriously or the world too seriously or anything in this world too seriously. You have to allow a certain space of detachment, to remind yourself and others that we each have our own ‘solo’ journey in life. Having the power of expediency enables us to adopt this ‘physician’s bedside manner’; of a certain detachment from what we worldly do, what we worldly feel and what we worldly have and what we worldly are, to be full of worldly empathy and worldly concerned, but yet not directly spiritually emotionally attached and drawn in so as not to see ‘the forest from the trees’. Now you know why doctors are not allowed to treat immediate family, except in an emergency. In Buddhist spiritual terms you have to show loving-kindness (metta) without emotionally ‘falling in love’. It is a bit like the ‘Whirlwind Rambler’ [Hak Soon Foong] character in the cult movie series of the same name, played by Akira Kobayashi, the good gangster, moving on with unrequited love, from one episode to the next, all those saved maidens [one of whom was played by Sayuri Yoshinaga] unable to thank him, in kind or love. To the ‘Whirlwind Rambler’, with an entire humanity to save, falling in love might turn out to be a distraction. But expediency is more than that obviously. Expediency predicates a spiritual understanding that we are all awash and adrift in the turbulent fast flowing worldly stream of life towards an ocean quagmire of worldly mortality. As much as we want to help those around us, the indomitable current catches and pulls us downstream in different ways. We cannot in that sense, doctors, priests or shamans or ‘saviours’ or ‘Whirlwind Ramblers’, hope to change the course of our or anyone’s individual destiny, to any influential extent. Buddhists call it Karma. Some are bound for


greatness and some are bound for misery and despair. With karma, we are all on course with or to reaping what we sow or suffering the karmic effects of our causes and conditions. Searching for Bodhi has nothing to do with overriding the Immutable Law of Karma, of Cause and Effect. By analogy, in Christianity, The Journey Home of the Prodigal (spirit ) Son of God has nothing to do with the travails of the worldly son of man, son of Adam. Jesus said that you will reap what you sow! Be warned! God will make the spiritually blind spiritually see; and the spiritually poor, spiritually rich; and even forgive the original sin of Adam being separated from God. But He will not reap what you worldly sow. All Jesus commanded of His disciples was - “As the Father loved Me, I also have loved you; abide in My love. .... This is My commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you.” [John 15: 9 & 12]. This is just another way of saying that Christian salvation, briefly put, is through [1] Love God with all your mind, body and soul [2] Love your neighbours as you love yourself.

Let me linger further on this matter of expediency for, in my opinion, this is a major obstacle for Westerners prone to taking words literally. I reiterate - Bodhi is beyond worldly comprehension. In true Zen or Chinese Mahayana Buddhism there are and must be no names or labels or words or any other worldly or conventional concepts or notions, when you are on the quest for Bodhi. Therefore worldly words, labels, knowledge, concepts and notions have no place or purpose. Why? It is because you cannot worldly describe the indescribable! You cannot worldly grasp the ungraspable! You cannot worldly comprehend the incomprehensible! It is beyond human language or communication. But nevertheless as humans, we need to communicate with each other in or through a human language. That communication, as in what we are doing right now, is only expediency. It is all just ‘finger pointing’ or sign posts or road signs. It is like ‘pointing to the reflection of the moon on the surface of the pond’ to infer what the moon looks like, in Zen teaching terms. So bear in mind that because of expediency, when we discuss things we discuss them on a provisional basis, because of the limitations of the human language and the specific or worldly context. It is like, sometimes, it is more appropriate to say ‘ice’, and sometimes it is better to say ‘water’, or at other times to say ‘rain’ or ‘waves’. At another level, because of or dependent on the ability or capacity of the audience, we say ‘orders’ or ‘commands’ instead of ‘rules’, ‘regulations’ or ‘legislation’. For example, in Buddhist scriptures, depending on the audience therein, words like ‘No Mind’ or ‘Mind Only’ or ‘One Mind’ are used; but they all mean or refer to the same thing. I have used the word ‘Bodhi’ to mean Enlightenment; but the following words, depending on the context, all have the same meaning – Mind-Ground, Dharmadhatu, Tathagata, Nirvana, Suchness, Thusness, Dharani-Body, True Suchness, Buddha Nature, Dharani, Thathagatagarbha and Complete Enlightenment.

Accordingly, always take all words or any type of worldly communication or knowledge with an expedient broad brush. After all, it is the substance and not the form that counts. It is the spirit and not the form that counts. Focus on the flow and direction of the thought rather than the very specifics of the thought itself. Focus on the context rather than the word itself. In Buddhist practice or cultivation, we are ‘contemplating’ and ‘reflecting’ rather than ‘analysing’ or ‘hypothesizing’. In Buddhist practice or cultivation, focus on the background sublimal subconscious acute mental awareness; rather than the worldly analytical mathematical logical mind. Do not seek to know or understand the rhyme or reason. The latter will drive you mad, just like when you are tested with Zen koans, particularly when you lack


spiritual practice or ability or capacity or discernment. It is more about mentally relaxing and letting go of the world, and to gradually get to a stage where you mentally face a ‘blank wall’, the point where all worldly conventional wisdom and logic have been exhausted and failed. That is ideally the starting or threshold point in Buddhism. It is only when and if you have mentally reached a ‘blank wall’, that you are at the limit where worldly wisdom and logic (and indeed your worldly senses and intuition and your ‘self’ or ‘ego’) no longer have relevance. It is like you have been asported to a totally dark underground chamber; where when you open your eyes, you cannot see anything, where you can actually hear ‘silence’, but you are as good as dead to the world. Isolated and lost in the desolate darkness, all you have left is some sort of ‘primordial awareness’. When you read and study the Buddhist scriptures, do it with this ‘primordial awareness’. You know you are cultivating correctly and on the Path of the Middle Way when you are conscious of this or your ‘primordial awareness’, which is quite separate and discrete from your worldly self-consciousness, that other part of your mind. Your ‘primordial awareness’ is keeping track or scrutinising your worldly self-consciousness, as the latter falls prey to the six senses. What are the various perceptions or formations of the six senses that are also known as derivative senses? The expression ‘to come to your senses’ in terms of probity, civility, decorum, sensibility, modesty and virtue, takes on a newfound meaning, when you have discovered your ‘primordial awareness’. The derivative senses are all delusions or afflictions or defilements of the ‘primordial awareness’, and they are – the 7 emotions – pleasure, anger, sorrow, joy, love, hate and desire; and the six sexual attractions – colour, form, movement, voice or speech, softness or smoothness and features.

Why am I telling you this? Because this was how I had my sudden awakening to what Bodhi-awareness might be like. I suffered a heart attack and I went backwards mentally in time till I was back as a toddler in my mother’s arms. Imagine your realisation of the intensity of a mother’s metta when you revisit your deceased mother back in time? Your consciousness still travelling backwards, you continue to reel back through that dark time tunnel, until it is all ends in a totally blank black screen. But something unmoving was still there. In the sublimal subconsciousness, my ‘primordial awareness’ was there! And then came, that sudden flash of bright light! Later I came out of coma [I was operated on while I was unconscious], and I was back to what I am, but nothing had changed in the worldly sense. But something had changed in a spiritual sense! I do not want you readers to have to suffer a near-death experience to be awakened to the illusoriness of the worldly self and indeed of the worldly sensual reality. Allow me in this discourse to point you to the Ultimate Reality of the Bodhi in you; the Bodhi that is beyond the birth and death of the World of Samsara.

Another thing about expediency is that even expediency or the expedient word or words might get lost in the translation, for example, from Chinese to English. Let me explain in advance in anticipation of possible word confusion, of their meaning being inevitably lost in the translation. ‘No Mind’ does not mean not having a mind but rather nothing in the mind or to be exact no defilements in the mind. Defilements, afflictions and delusions of self-ego are anything that feeds Karma, which keeps you stranded in the World of Samsara. So, in the same sense, ‘Thoughtlessness’ or ‘No-Thought’ means absence of defilements, afflictions and delusions of self-ego during conscious activity of the mind. ‘Nobody’ means an egoless person or someone no longer a sentient being; i.e. someone still existent and subservient to his worldly senses in the World of Samsara. ‘Nowhere’ means unmoving, not abiding


anywhere, not existing or not-not existing, not here and not there, not lost and not found; or simply not anywhere in the World of Samsara. ‘Still’ as in keeping the mind ‘still’, does not mean stone-like comatose or nescience but means being patient, calm, not irritable or fretting, not impulsive, not itching or restless. ‘Virtue’ in Buddhist terms has nothing to do with how sensible you might be about sex or other elements of immorality; as these matters fall exclusively within the province of the Immutable Law of Karma. There is no sex or immorality or any dharma or duality like good or bad in Bodhi or in Christian heaven. To put it politely, there is no marriage in heaven. ‘Virtue’ has to do with not being disparaging or belittling or condescending of others but universally treating them honourably, respectfully as equals. ‘Virtue’ simply means humility and reverence for the welfare and wellbeing of humanity. If you understand this explanation as to why words are not what they appear to be, you will understand the Doctrine of Appearances. The English metaphor is – ‘Do not judge a book by its cover’. Taking this further, do not or never judge the world from what it appears to be, do not judge worldly ‘reality’ for what it seems. Understanding this is vital in Buddhist practice. Otherwise you will not get anywhere, when you get to the end of the Diamond Sutra when the Buddha says – “All conditioned dharmas are like dreams, like illusions, like bubbles, like shadows, like dew, like lightning and all of them should be contemplated in this way.” When you understand the Power of Expediency and the Doctrine of Appearances, you will then appreciate the Zen Buddhist saying that – ‘Zen is everywhere and Dharma is all around us’. Your mind sees things and seems to experience things but you must not let your mind abide in anything that is in the World of Samsara. Which might seem obvious, when you are trying to extricate yourself from it, but is it? For all are just expediency and appearances; and this is how you must take them.

Let us refer back to what were described at the beginning of this discourse about practising Morality [Sila], Meditation [Samadhi] and Wisdom [Prajna], the three pathway practices to Bodhi [Enlightenment]? Now, as indicated above, words are just words; and like the situation found in ‘Alice in Wonderland’, a word can mean whatever you want it to mean. Remember however that conversely, a rose is still a rose even though you give it another name, a la Shakespeare.

‘Morality’ in a Buddhist sense has nothing to do with conventional or worldly morality or sins or crimes or judging between good or bad. It is already apparent that every action, thought or deed has a resultant karmic effect. If the Immutable Law of Karma already has total exclusive control over the World of Samsara, Buddhism is only concerned about ‘Morality’ that would make you transcend the World of Samsara. ‘Morality’ in Buddhism is about giving and sharing, about being family, brotherly, neighbourly and civil, courteous and humane. It is about not being greedy, selfish, envious, jealous, possessive or egocentric or power hungry. Whenever we worldly give, whether it is money, knowledge, advice or service, it is all Bodhi practice of morality. But true ‘giving’ and almsgiving in a Buddhist sense is when there is no giver, no recipient and no gift, since there are no dharmas, no form, no sentient beings [refer to the Heart Sutra]. This expression must be taken in the sense like the Bible story of the poor widow who gave two mites [a couple of pennies]. She and what she gave and what the temple got were almost insignificant as to be invisible. But Jesus said – “this poor widow has put in more than all; for all these out of their abundance ..... but she out of her poverty has put in all her livelihood that she had.” [Luke 21:3-4]. Also – “But when you do a charitable deed, do not let your left hand know what your


right hand is doing.” [Matthew 6:2]. When there is an ‘I’ that gave ‘this’ to ‘you’, it is worldly giving and may be worth lots of merit under the Immutable Law of Karma, and you may indeed come back in your next life as a very rich man or a king. But it is not ‘giving and caring’ selflessly in a Bodhi sense. With Bodhi you do not want to ever return to the World of Samsara. You want to put an end to karmic suffering. You want to expiate all karmic residues.

Bodhi ‘giving and caring’ is a giving away of your ego and self to others. It is more about being a ‘white knight’ to the damsel in distress or fighting for justice for the poor and needy and sick, like a modern Jesuit. It is about being charitable and caring for others, about being a ‘saviour’. It is like as if there is no worldly ‘you’. It is like as if the selfless ‘real’ you is up there in heaven looking down at the ‘Avatar’ of the worldly ‘you’, and using the ‘Avatar’ of the worldly ‘you’, as an instrument, as a Bodhisattva samurai for ‘caring and giving’. This ‘Avatar’ of the worldly ‘you’, has no real sense of self or being, other than to discharge its Bodhisattva samurai ‘spiritual’ mission on Earth. That is why we Chinese are fascinated, infatuated and inspired by our kung-fu samurai-like heroes; whether they be the Generals in The Romance of the Three Kingdoms or the rebels in the Outlaws of the Marsh (or Water Margin) or Tripitaka, Monkey, Pigsy and Sandfish in The Journey to the West. The Red General [Kwan Kung] in The Romance of the Three Kingdoms is now a Door God in every Buddhist temple. The Journey to the West is all about a Buddhist journey to seek Bodhi. Tripitaka represents the part of our mind that is our pure numinous ‘primordial awareness’. Monkey represents the monkey in our mind, the egoistic proud self-consciousness. Pigsy represents our sensual mind and being, in his love for entertainment, drinking, food and sex. Sandfish represents our basic ignorant animal instinctive mind, our marine evolutionary past and existence in the ocean of humanity, how we keep coming back, as fish in the ocean of mortal life. Water as an imagery, has a special predominant significance for Buddhists as the source of life. Direct and indirect images of water are pervasive and ubiquitous everywhere in Buddhist literature e.g. reflection of the moon in the water, lotus growing out of muddy waters, waves on the water and ice, water and steam, and so forth. Water is indeed the source of worldly life. You might metaphorically say that the World of Samsara started off as a wet dream!

‘Meditation’ in a Buddhist sense is not about the quiet sitting, for meditation has nothing to do with the body at all. If you have the skill to meditate in the Buddhist sense, you can do it sitting, standing, walking, running or lying down or even in your sleep, if you are an Arhat or Bodhisattva. Nor does it have to be a quiet place or under a coconut tree; for if you are adept, you can do it amidst the chaos and noise and hustle bustle of human activity or the ‘battle field’ of any environment. It is all in the mind and about the mind. Meditation is about being mentally calm, cool and collected under fire, when all is chaos and the world is falling down or apart around you; when we are incessantly besieged by a barrage of sensual onslaught, on and from our six senses and all around us, from our friends and foes, animated and unanimated things alike. Meditation is therefore about not being angry, hateful, spiteful, vengeful, punitive, irritable, fretful, fearful, intimidated, frightened, scared and otherwise ‘worked up’ or stressed. Meditation is about equanimity. Meditation in Western terms is about anger and stress and frustration management. If you can control your anger and stress and frustration, you are already a meditation master. You do not need a Zen Master for accreditation.


To be a Buddhist meditator, or indeed to practise Buddhism, you do not have to start looking like an Indian monk or change your name or start learning Sanskrit or Pali. There is no such thing as a Buddhist look or language or practice. The language that Buddha spoke, and indeed the language that Jesus spoke, are extinct. Nothing is permanent in the World of Samsara! All worldly dharmas or forms or characteristics are empty! Zen is in the mind and the mind is Zen. If you communicate with other humans in a language based on judgment, subjectivity and relativity or a computer in binary language, for this is a world of duality; to meditate with the Bodhi-mind you would have to do the converse, to use a non-duality, non-binary language. In the vacuity of acute numinous ‘primordial awareness’, of voidness or emptiness [of no impermanence, no subjectivity, no relativity, no change] or ‘sunyata’ as the Buddhists call it, there is non-duality.

When translated into actual practice, this ‘essence’ of ‘primordial awareness’ takes on the ‘function’ of ‘mindfulness’, and, please note, only as a matter of expediency. For in a strict sense in Bodhi, you are neither mindful nor not mindful. Thus to be Bodhi-aware, you have to be worldly ‘mindful’. We will come back to this practical expedient practice of ‘mindfulness’ later. So the aim is that you have to empty your worldly mind; and to do that you have to let go of your ‘ego’ and your ‘self’ and your worldly self-consciousness of these. Just like in Morality you let go of your ego and yourself so as to share and be one with humanity; it is the same with Meditation. So, Meditation is not about ‘you’ meditating when ‘you’ are meditating, for that is not Buddhist meditation at all; for that is your worldly ‘you’ thinking or assuming or pretending that ‘you’ are meditating. I reiterate Buddhist meditation is about emptying the mind of ego and self. In ‘Egolessness’ there is in fact ‘Nobody’ that is meditating at all! As expediency, we just say that there is somebody meditating. The inscrutability of the Chinese, Koreans and Japanese is just a false facade of having achieved samadhi of meditation, of being cool, calm and collected and in total equanimity with all manner of things and events around them. Most who appear inscrutable [remember all the childhood Kung-fu and Samurai movies and Bushido?] are probably a long way off from mastering Zen meditation; but nonetheless it paid for them to pretend that they were highly ‘cultivated’, and that they were a ‘superior being’ in Confucian terms [read The Ethics of Confucius, by Miles Menander Dawson, [1915]], and thus beyond the world.

‘Wisdom’ in a Buddhist sense is not about actual worldly wisdom or knowledge. It has to do with ‘spiritual insight’; ‘spiritual’ in the sense that it has nothing to with this world or its ‘sentient beings’; and ‘insight’ in the sense that it has nothing to do with externalities, i.e. of this world, of form, of phenomena, of dharmas, but with something within your concept of self, i.e. your ‘mind’. It is about understanding your ‘mind’. In particular it is about discovering or awakening to your Bodhi-mind or your mind-essence. As Zen master Ho-Tse said – “Since the Mind-Essence is that which is capable of awareness, awareness is precisely the mind.” Please refer back to my narration about ‘primordial awareness’ and the Bodhi-mind. So, wisdom is about awakening to the awareness of the Bodhi-mind. That said I must emphasise that the wisdom of ‘awakening’ cannot be acquired through worldly knowledge or wisdom. ‘Awakening’ cannot be studied nor schooled in you. It depends on karmic destiny. Awakening is therefore ‘sudden’; when you suddenly experience an ‘opening’ through your karmic delusions. Once suddenly awakened to Bodhi-awareness, it is just like you can see the light in the dark tunnel; you can then through gradual practice work your way towards the freedom of Nirvana that


is Bodhi. Awakening itself is not Bodhi but the awareness of what Bodhi is. Until you know what Bodhi is, how can you work towards Bodhi? Otherwise you have the impossible odds of success found in the Zen saying of – ‘a blind tortoise surfacing through a hole in driftwood out in the ocean’. It is like Bruce Lee suddenly realising that Wing-Chun was the Kung-fu; and then took years and years of dedicated gradual practice to achieve Wing-Chun. In case you might miss this important point, the Bruce Lee example or illustration has nothing to do with Bruce Lee, or else you are still clinging or utilising your worldly mind, for still thinking with an ‘I’ or ‘Me’ or ‘Mine’. You should have drawn the lesson that it is all about the mind and that the source of the ‘Mind’ is one. There is but ‘One Mind’; but although it is one and the same, the delusion of the worldly self and the wisdom awakening are drastically different. Although the power of prajna [wisdom awakening] is great, the power or draw or pull of the power of karmic delusion, of the Immutable Law of Karma is even greater. When you attain ‘Wisdom’ in the Buddhist sense it means you are able to see things, that is the worldly reality, for what they are, that they are merely perceptions of the mind, merely appearances, merely expediency to feed the false and illusory ‘self’ or ego; and that in the Ultimate Reality that is Bodhi, there is no ‘self’ or ego, just selfless ‘primordial awareness’. In other words the Mind when undeluded by the appearances and not afflicted by karmic consequences is the selfless Bodhi-mind, which is pure numinous ‘primordial awareness’. The deluded and defiled mind is the self-ego mind subject to the Immutable Law of Karma and caught up in the World of Samsara.

Why do samurai instilled with the Code of Bushido have no fear of death? Why were there kamikaze pilots? Why were there kung-fu warriors, like the Rebels of the Water Margin, the procreators of the '18 Brotherhood Triad' or the '306 Brotherhood Triad'? When you are awakened to the Bodhi you will realise that birth and death are just an illusion. There is nobody having born or anybody dying. It is all a phantasmagoria of a dream. We are all like ‘Avatars’! In egolessness of Bodhi, why fear death? Birth and Death, as we know it are just karmic consequences and destiny. Therefore samurai or kamikaze pilots or kung-fu warriors do not fear death because they are Buddhist adepts. However for these samurai or kamikaze pilots or kung-fu warriors or whoever, this was a mistaken and false Buddhist practice on their part. It is demented wisdom. It shows lack of Buddhist spiritual insight, about equanimity and about awakening to Bodhi. Not having a fear of death does not mean you have to be reckless about life. If you have to make a decision to take life, your own life or someone else’s, remember that every action has a karmic effect. Do not assume that you taking a life, because you have no fear for death necessarily, have the consequence of expiating all your residual karmic consequences. For this would be extremely unlikely. Killing yourself [as a suicide bomber] to kill others like the kamikaze pilots did, because you have run out of bombs; might not be the same as sacrificing yourself to save others in immediate or impending danger. Similarly committing suicide because you are unhappy with your life or the world per se or being an accomplice to euthanasia, may not expiate all your residual karmic consequences. Spiritual wisdom sees things differently from worldly wisdom. The only way to expiate karma is let it run its natural course or change its course by quid pro quo redemption or remission, doing good and building up merits to countervail the demerits in your karmic store.

Let us move along, now that we have a better understanding of what the major Zen Buddhist terms actually mean. Taoism and Confucianism, as I have explained, are an integral part of our Chinese cultural


and spiritual experience, just as Buddhism is. Similarly, Bushido – the Way of the Samurai – is attributed to or associated with Zen Buddhism, Confucianism and Shinto [which is like Japanese Tao]. Personally, I take the view that if it were not for Buddhism’s inherent affinity with the existing Taoist/Confucian culture or philosophy in China; Buddhism would not have been so fully received and assimilated. If Buddha taught by employing expedient means to ‘turn the Bodhi Wheel’ of this spiritual or philosophical investigation as to how to end human ‘suffering’, then it is and will also be in full accord with the Buddhist practice of using expediency to suit ones’ own personal life experience, for the Chinese to travel the Buddhist journey through or by utilising the Way of the Tao and the Doctrine of the Mean, the way Chinese Mahayana Buddhism have done or are doing. For the Chinese living their life through Chinese beliefs and customs and traditions, this is their life and cultural and philosophical landscape that comprise their living experience. The Truth is the truth no matter how you get to the Truth. Indian Buddhist temples are different from Thai, Burmese, Borobudur, Vietnamese, Chinese, Korean or Japanese Buddhist temples. Similarly, it would be just as appropriate and correct and advisable and equally justifiable for Western Buddhists to travel this journey of philosophical or spiritual investigation, as to why this is a world of suffering and injustice, through Christian theology or Greco-Roman or other European philosophy and whatever Western ‘isms’ that would form their living experience. Westerners have to paint their own Western Buddhist landscape. You cannot make ‘Indian curry’ or ‘Chinese stir-fry’ the national cuisine of France! Perhaps educated Westerners could take as their starting point what Descartes said – “I think therefore I am.” You can only, like the Kalamas, investigate within yourself and your native or national cultural heritage and philosophy, to the best of your spiritual ability and capacity and discernment. Just like Buddha can only guide you according to your spiritual ability and capacity and discernment. If you ‘hear’ Buddha through reading his sermons in the ‘Sutras’, the Buddhist scriptures, he speaks with one voice, but each of us can only hear and understand him according to our spiritual ability and capacity and discernment.

In Buddhist practice, please get away from the fanatic overzealous obsessive fixation with the literal fidelity or integrity of a written word or words that many Christians and Moslems have, as if God spoke in a human language, if at all! Buddhism is not concerned with words or this world. As mentioned earlier, in Buddhism we are not really interested [beyond the relative or provisional context] in words, names or labels. Words like labels and names are just words, and any meanings attributed to them are just worldly or human meanings. When you venture into the vacuity of the unknown, keep your mind like an empty glass. Do not be tied down by existing worldly concepts and values. Come with an acute open mind. The Zen technique of koan testing, e.g. asking the disciple a question like – ‘Do Dogs have a Buddha-nature?’ - has the sole purpose of instilling and generating doubt. Do not be fooled! These koan questions have no logical answers whatsoever. It is like asking someone whether there is God. If he says ‘yes’ then you reply that there is no God. If he says ‘no’ then you say that there is God. Another example is saying to the Buddhist disciple that ‘Mind is Buddha and Buddha is Mind’; but when the Buddhist disciple have this thought, you then turn around to tell him that he is mistaken, and that in fact ‘There is no Mind, and there is no Buddha’. ‘Doubt’ is being used as a Zen spiritual meditative tool to test your ingrained and incessant clinging to conventional worldly wisdom and knowledge to the hilt; until your mind gives up the ‘ghost’ or the ‘illusion’ that is ‘you’, or you otherwise go insane, whichever comes


first. The Buddhist disciple must release himself from this world! Bodhi is beyond the world, so to get there you have to get beyond the world.

So ‘Doubt’ is another Zen expedient means, in this case to drum into the Zen disciple the Doctrine of Non-Duality. If not through such expedient means, i.e. through provisional means, how else is the Zen Master going to explain or express Non-Duality? In the relative world of duality, of good and bad, big and small, far and near, fear and submission, subject and object, birth and death, male and female, how do you teach the absoluteness of Bodhi, of the One Dharma, of the pervasiveness of Emptiness of Sunyata, of the non-duality of Eternity. How do you get to the world where metaphorically or esoterically two is joined to make one [in Christianity]? How do you get to the world where the binary system is replaced by an absolute ‘one’? How do you get to the world where there is only one God and you shall have no idols before him [in Christianity]? How do you get to the world where there is only ‘eternity’ and therefore no concept of time, as there is no past present or future to be found? What is past, present or future as we know them, since they are relative to each other, and cannot be found on its own? Each cannot exist without reference to another! Without an object reference there is no subject and vice-versa. Even worldly time is artificially set, since we do not know the beginning of time. In eternity there is no beginning or ending! Time as we know it, whether we set it by the moon and the sun or not, is elastic. If you are in love and waiting for your girlfriend at the bus stop, 5 minutes is like 5 hours!

So, Bodhi or Enlightenment can never be attained from the mere reading of Buddhist Sutras or the mere profession that you are a Buddhist! If there is an ego or an ‘I’ trying to achieve something, how can there be any achievement of Enlightenment because Bodhi is only enlightenment when it is not worldly and not achieved by anything worldly! Bodhi has nothing to do with the world or any worldly achievement. Nevertheless it is called Bodhi, but from a worldly expedient point of view. Christians will say that a good man will go to heaven; but that is also an expedient expression, for only spirits or angels go to heaven. Buddha did not claim that he had a monopoly to ‘spiritual insight’ or that his path was a worldly path or programme; or otherwise he would not have asked the ‘good pious man’ who was practising Jainism not change his religion. If anything, Buddha instructed those who enquired of him [refer to the Sermon to the Kalamas in the Kesaputtiya Sutta] to investigate for themselves how to end ‘suffering’, which is so called as a matter of expediency, for it really means ‘unsatisfactory’ or ‘uncertainty’ or ‘unpredictability’ and similar shades of experiences, rather than just simply ‘suffering’]; and that they must discover this truth for themselves from their own personal experience. So, I reiterate, Bodhi can never be acquired or studied or bought. Bodhi has to come as a life experience, like falling in love. You do not know when it will befall you. It is as if it were one’s destiny. One’s own personal experience can only be from one’s living of one’s life or lives. So in this Bodhi quest you have to learn from your own life and from your own living. For dead men tell no tales! But how many lives must you live before you actually learn and realise from your own personal experience? We shall discuss this point later when we discuss karma.

We are only Buddhists or Christians or black or white or however differentiated, rich or poor, male or female, clever or stupid, because we are humans and thinking in worldly terms. When we go beyond suffering, beyond death, beyond consciousness; into the unknown void and emptiness of sunyata, we are none of these things. This is a fact, because when we leave the world we leave our worldly body and


possessions and the human world behind us. ‘Dust to dust’ as the Christians would put it. So when you or I say that we are Buddhist or Christian or whatever creed or inclination, we are only doing so in a provisional worldly sense, when we are embedded in our worldly human persona, our worldly false ego or self-consciousness of an identity, of an ‘I’ or a ‘Me’ as a worldly being, as a human being, while we are alive. Buddhism teaches us to travel beyond worldly death. Bodhi is beyond worldly death. When we are selfless and egoless and have totally no selfish notion of a self, without self-consciousness, and definitely when we are no longer in human form, we are really none of this. There are no labels or names or worldly attributes when you have divested yourself of a worldly self or ego or human body. Being alive as a Buddhist means you learn how to be alive in this world but yet be dead to this world because you want to ensure that you take advantage of your time in the World of Samsara [of Suffering] to learn why you do not want to ever return to the World of Samsara or indeed any other world that is not truly eternal; and how to escape it. In eternity you are a ‘nobody’ going ‘nowhere’. But first you have to awaken to the awareness that you have an eternal selfless Bodhi-nature?

As a matter of faith or spiritual practice, it seems rather silly for Buddhists to say that they are Buddhist unless it is just a token expression on their part, to answer the population census. For to be a Buddhist you strive to be a ‘Nobody going Nowhere’ All Buddhists when they have reached a certain level of understanding and practice will know what this Zen expression ‘Nobody going Nowhere’ means. A ‘Nobody’ must mean you are a ‘Nobody’! A Buddhist is still somebody! But the human ‘you’ is not you! You are something that is not of this world. In that sense you are on Earth a ‘Nobody’ from elsewhere! Your human body is like a vehicle but ‘you’ are not driving it; in fact ‘Nobody’ is driving it. As Chinese ‘Buddhists’ we start out as devotees lighting joss-sticks seeking blessings from Buddha or, as is the case with most Southern Chinese, from Bodhisattva Avalokiteshvara [Guanyin, the Goddess of Mercy], and going through all the various religious rituals by rote at the various regular Buddhist festivals. Most of us still practise at this level, praying, making offerings, making oblations, chanting incantations etc. Later in Buddhist life, for the learned few or more religiously inclined, we start learning through the Buddhist scriptures about the Four Noble Truths, the Twelve Linked Chain of Causation of Interdependent Origination, the Eight-fold Noble Path and the Six Paramitas. By the time we get to study the Heart Sutra, on top of all the other Sutras, we then learn that all these are just ‘expedient means’.

Words per se are nothing! Things per se are nothing! Phenomena per se are nothing! All dharmas per se are nothing! There is no object without a subject and vice-versa! Without a subject-ego all is nothing! “Vanity of vanities! Vanity of vanities! All is vanity”, as was said in the Ecclesiastes. Words and things and images, they are all like fingers pointing out the direction or the way to the Tao, so to speak, but not telling us what the mysterious destination is like or what our unknown mysterious Bodhi self-nature is. They are like a raft that takes you across to the other side of the river. When you get there you have to abandon the raft. What is on the other side of the river? All these doctrines, like expedient means, like Santa Claus, have to be abandoned because there is no enlightenment or Nirvana to be attained. Why? For, there is ‘Nobody’ that attains Bodhi. There is no ‘you’ or ‘I’ lighting joss-sticks, no ‘you’ or ‘I’ seeking blessings from Buddha or from Guanyin, the Goddess of Mercy. The ‘you’ and ‘I’ is just a mortal worldly phenomenon. For, according to the Heart Sutra, form is emptiness and emptiness is [what sustains] form or allows form to express its form, like the void does with the box or the window or the house. The


Ultimate Reality or the Truth is neither form nor emptiness nor is it existence or non-existence. As was earlier quoted from the Diamond Sutra – “All conditioned dharmas [phenomena] are like dreams, like illusions, like bubbles, like shadows, like dew, like lightning, and all of them should be contemplated in this way.” We as Buddhist practitioners are a phenomenon in the form of a human being, who is asked to investigate why it [all dharmas (phenomena)] is an illusion i.e. it is a ‘nobody’ going ‘nowhere’.

The question is how does the ‘illusory’ ‘you’ investigate by way of spiritual contemplation? Particularly, when worldly consciousness itself or of perceived worldly reality is just a wild figment of imagination! It seems that Buddha is said to have said a lot of things but when it is all summed up, he had in fact said nothing [that could be perceived by a worldly being]; for he gave no direct answer [since the answer is not of this world]; it was all a lot of, metaphorically speaking, finger-pointing to where the spiritual moon is. If we are spiritually blind how can we see the spiritual moon no matter how much finger pointing we see? It is all in the mind only! Think! Would the moon and stars be there if you were not around to see it? Even when you see the moon and stars, some that you see are no longer there. Whatever you see is in the past! So it seems that we all have to investigate and find the Truth for ourselves, to the best of our spiritual ability and capacity and discernment. As the Zen Master said to his disciple – I cannot tell how to pee and what it feels like to pee; you have pee yourself to find out how to do it and how it feels! It is like the sex therapist describing what an orgasm is but until you have experienced an orgasm, it is all a lot of finger pointing! It is all in the mind; and what is in your mind may not be what is in my mind even if we think we see or hear the same thing. Karma has the effect that we all march to a different drumbeat. Karma has the effect that we all have different spiritual ability and capacity and discernment. Karma has the effect that we all suddenly awaken to the Bodhi-awareness at different times.

Do not laugh! Most Christians are just as silly as, if not sillier, than most Buddhists. I speak as a Jesuit Catholic. Most Christians think they are searching for God when quite clearly it is God searching for us. The lost sheep can only recognise its Master’s voice when the Good Shepherd first finds the lost sheep. Most Christians think Christianity is about human salvation i.e. about their human identity or soul going to heaven when they die. No! Christianity is about a Father’s love for His sons; about God the Spirit and His spirit prodigal sons. It is about the spirit sons of God returning to the spirit world and not lingering on in the mortal world of man, as sons of man, going up and down Jacob’s Ladder, in endless existences. Eternal Spirit Heaven has nothing to do with the mortal world of the sons of man. God say that we have to render unto Caesar what is Caesar’s i.e. rendering unto the world what is the world’s. Caesar represents the world of man! When Jesus said that there is no marriage in heaven and that He came to set fathers against mothers and husbands against wives etc He is saying that in the spirit we have no names, labels or self-consciousness and no self-ego! We are all one in the ‘Spirit’! In that sense only a ‘nobody’ can go to heaven; i.e. someone who has surrendered his individual identity and being and all; such that he or she loves God the Spirit Father with all his or her mind, body and soul and he or she loves his neighbours as himself or herself. And, is not the Jacob’s Ladder in Jacob’s Dream; and therefore the worldly existence(s) of the sons of man, is or are just like a dream, like an illusion!

Moreover being a ‘Christian’ is just a label and a name after the death of Jesus. We should be called an ‘Abrahamite’ or equivalent for Jesus said He came to fulfil the ‘Law and the Prophets’ and not to remove


a single iota; or perhaps simply a ‘Jesuit’, for Jesus said – “Before Abraham, I AM”. Christians are also silly in thinking that there is a one and absolute point in time called Judgement Day, when there will be a roll call and day of reckoning and judgment as to whether you go to Heaven or Hell. This is silly when we know that Saints and Prophets are already in Heaven [refer to the Transfiguration of Jesus, where Moses and Elijah appeared [Luke 9:28-36]]. Eternal time and earth time cannot be put on the same scale even in terms of the Theory of Relativity. For all we know, a trillion years on Earth could just be a few seconds in Heaven. Worldly names and labels and words have no meaning or bearing in Spirit Heaven. What is there to judge when God as the Spirit Father takes us, His children, as we are? Our deeds and actions judge us, and not God. We shall reap what we sow and God warn us that He can do nothing about that. Which begs the question why we practise Christianity the way we do, seeking forgiveness from without when we should be seeking it within us, by repenting, by forsaking the world where we are prodigally lost to return home to God our Spirit Father; when God says that He is in us, in every single poor, sick, thirsty; and imprisoned, and that where every two or three gather in His name He is there; and that He knows of the things we need even before we ask Him. Why then the need for priests and the Church; as distinct from having monks and nuns, living in seclusion or active in missionary work?

In Buddhism there is no church or priesthood as such, although you have monks and nuns. Buddhist, and in fact any type of Chinese, temples are not ‘churches’ in the sacramental or catechistic or ecumenical sense. They are simply ‘Way’ places; ‘Way’ as in ‘contemplation’. It is simply a place the Chinese will say that you consider the Tao or the mystery of why things are the way they are or simply confront the spiritual mystery of life. You do your own thing. You do what you have to do, in the manner and form that suits your spiritual level, to interface with the mysterious Tao; even if you perceive the Tao as or in deities, spirits or demons of sorts. It does not matter since it is all in the mind; it is about what plagues your mind; it is about what brings comfort to your mind; it is about expedient means; it is about arriving at a practical solution or pragmatic relief based on your individual common sense, based on your limited spiritual ability and capacity. Tao is beyond definition, and that is why it is called the Tao. You come as you are before the Tao. You take Tao for what you are and to the extent of your spiritual perception. It really does not matter whether you perceive the world as flat or round. In varying degrees we are all lost in our perception and lost in our own world. Salvation for a Christian or Bodhi for a Buddhist requires that you realise you are ‘lost’. Unless you are ‘lost’ how can you be ‘found’? You come as you are and destined for in this life and existence [and others], whether you are the good, the bad, the beautiful, the ugly, the rich, the poor, the strong or the weak or sick. True Christianity is like that as well in that God loves His spirit sons as they are, whether good or bad, beautiful or ugly; for a Father’s love bears no judgement; it is unconditional. It is truly sad when you see Christians being self-righteous, condescending and judgemental and associating Christianity with the fair and beautiful and the blessed and the superior and the chosen. True Christianity of Christ requires that you give up your life for others. The Journey of the Cross is one of self-sacrifice not self-salvation. The sacrificial lamb is the false self-ego of Adam, of the sons of Adam; and salvation is found when the self-ego is lost in sacrifice.

If the spiritual journey was subject to a tote or gambling odds, then being a Buddhist or Christian monk or nun would get you closer to enlightenment or Nirvana or heavenly salvation respectively. Cloistered away and segregated and reclused from the world, the monks and nuns can focus 100% 24/7 on


salvation, if they are Christians, or Nivarna [end of suffering] and Bodhi, if they are Buddhists. For Christian spiritual prayer contemplation practices please refer to St. Ignatius Loyola Rules of Discernment and Jesuit Spiritual Exercises. For Buddhist meditation practice, [and I highly recommend it, this book that was given to me by my good friend in metta, Tan Kah Tee], refer to “The Art of Disappearing” by Ajahn Brahm, published by Brahm Centre Ltd, Singapore. Ajahn Brahm is the Abbott of the Bodhinyana Monastery in Perth, Western Australia. But we are not all monks or nuns. That is what this discourse is all about. How do you succeed in your spiritual practice as a lay person, when you have to work to support a family and do all the things you have to do to survive, take the good with the bad, and hope to beat the odds i.e. get to the finishing line before the monks and nuns of this world, whether you are a Buddhist or a Christian?

The lay Catholics have an international lay organisation called Opus Dei founded in 1928 by St. Josemaria Escriva. Members vow to find and glorify God in work and in daily life and in particular not to put their hearts into personal material possessions [following the tenets of St Francis of Assisi]. They are committed to carry their Cross in the Image of Christ. The lay Mahayana Buddhists do not have an equivalent lay organisation. I hope this discourse will encourage some Buddhist person to set up a similar network of working lay Buddhist s, whether workers, professionals, businessman or bankers, judges and politicians as an international Buddhist brotherhood to seek the Bodhisattva Way to pursue the quest of Nirvana. As I said earlier, we are now in what the Buddha predicted to be the Dharma-Ending Age. In Christian terms this could be described as the Godlessness Age. We can see for ourselves how the world is almost completely to a man obsessed with materialism and mankind is faced with a barrage and continuous onslaught of brain-washing glossy predatory advertising, propaganda, and information or otherwise on the senses leading to hedonism, narcissism, egotism, sadism and elitism. We have to take the fight to regain our spirituality in the heartlands i.e. the ordinary man and woman, the laity out there.

Ajahn Brahm’s method of meditation, comprehensively detailed in his book that I have mentioned above, would ideally suit a monk or perhaps a lay person who has retired or is rich and has no need to work. Married men or women with families and working to make ends meet or to meet business or professional commitments, have hardly enough time to rest or sleep let alone meditate. Nevertheless, when you do get time to meditate as a lay person, when you can get the prerequisite moments of silence and solitude, once a week or whenever, follow Ajahn Brahm’s prescription for gradually ‘letting go’ or surrendering your self-consciousness. It is quite explicit and direct in its explanation and does so in the modern Western way of speaking, baring or stripping away all of the religious mystery and subterfuges that you find in most Buddhist books on meditation, and taking you to Buddhism in its very essence and mission – how to put an end to suffering, how to see Ultimate Reality beyond the beyond, beyond worldly comprehension.

I have earlier indicated that in Christianity it is God who seeks you even though you might think you are seeking God. It is so to speak, dependent on whether you are near the top of Jacob’s Ladder. It is dependent on you reaping what you have sown. It is the same in Buddhism. You think you are seeking Buddha or Bodhi but in fact without a spiritual awakening, sudden awakening to Bodhi-awareness, if or when you were not ready in a karmic sense, you can hear or read Buddhist scriptures but they will all


just be meaningless mumbo jumbo to you. In Buddhist terms of delusion and defilements, you reap what you sow, in the World of Samsara. Every effect is due to relevant cause and condition. This is the Immutable Law of Karma or Cause and Effect. Unless you have sown the seeds towards Bodhi, you will never be a Bodhisattva, an Enlightened Being. Destiny is not a concept or conjecture. It is very real. True Buddhist practice can never occur until you have a sudden awakening to Bodhi-awareness and then follow through with gradual practice towards Bodhi.

Let me explain a bit more about the Immutable Law of Karma or Cause and Effect. But first, a personal anecdote, to lighten things up a bit. My parents being Chinese both naturally believed in karma, but in different ways. My twin brother and I were always in the top two positions academically every year in the local primary school. My father was very stoical about karma, and when asked why he showed no expression of pride over our achievements, he would say in Hokkien – “Sze dih eh, te sze dih eh; mm sze dih eh, te mm sze dih eh”; meaning, ‘if it were going to be yours, it will be yours; if it were not going to be yours, it will be yours’. Or, he would say - “Mia Lee pai, mia lee ho, kah liaw kong choo tia”; meaning, ‘Good destiny, bad destiny, it is all karma’. My mother in contrast was fearful of karma. When friends and relatives came to congratulate her on having smart twins, [we had a large extended family, as my maternal grandfather had four wives, but until the twins came along there was never any member of the clan winning any academic prizes], she would say – ‘No, they are not clever at all; no, do not say that, they were just lucky in the exams’. She was superstitious that if she showed pride or joy, this would result in bad karma for the twins! In her view, the Law of Karma expected people to be humble and undemonstrative.

I take it that most of would have read about Rip Van Winkle in fairy tales and fables, and read about Black Holes in quantum physics. Imagine Rip Van Winkle tied up in his dream when he was asleep for say a 1000 years. Imagine what an epic saga his dream would have been? The World of Samsara expressed as a dream or an illusion in Buddhist scriptures is like a kaleidoscopic hologram, like a ‘Princess Lea’ of Star Wars optic transportation, like an Avatar, exclusively self-contained or trapped in an infinite Rip Van Winkle type dream. Nothing gets out of that dream. A delusionary thought triggered the dream; and the energy of that thought is self-existent and persisting within that dream. When you come out of that dream, in fact ‘nothing’ comes out of that dream, i.e. nothing within the world of the dream comes out of that dream. What is outside the dream is outside the dream and what is within the dream is within the dream. In our perceived worldly reality of the universe as we understand it there are black holes. In fact black holes are not holes at all. They are more like concentrated energy absorption plugs. For, ‘nothing’ can get through a black hole. No energy can get through a black hole. The universe is air-tight energy wise otherwise all the laws of quantum physics and mathematical logic would not apply. The total amount of energy from the beginning till the end would be constant. In that sense there is no beginning and no end. What is therefore behind the ‘plasma’ veil or curtain ‘black hole’? Nothing! The Avatar like kaleidoscopic hologram is like the reflections on a mirror; and the energy absorption shield of the ‘black hole’ is like the reflectivity at the back of a mirror. The reflectivity of a mirror and the reflections in the mirror are unitary or synonymous, like the essence and its function, but one is a ‘delusion’ and the other is absolute unmoving unchanging pure acute ‘primordial awareness’.


Just like nothing [energy-wise] can get out of the black holes, similarly only ‘nothing’ can get out of the World of Samsara. The karmic illusions and the dream of the reflections of the mirror do not reside or go beyond the reflectivity wall or backing of the mirror. Karma and karmic cause and effect are like energy. A ‘thought’ is energy. Do not laugh at ‘will-power’ energy of a thought! Every action has a reaction. Every cause has an effect; and that is karma. To get out of the World of Samsara you have to be ‘nothing’ i.e. ‘nobody going nowhere’ as the Buddhist expression goes. In other words Bodhi or Enlightenment cannot be acquired by a worldly body or mind. You have to be a ‘no body’ and ‘no mind’. When you do things from the perspective of either the body or the mind, you still have an ego or a ‘self’ – the very basis for self-delusion of an ‘I’ of a worldly being.

Do not confuse karma with reincarnation. There is no ‘self’ or ‘soul’ being reincarnated; only karmic ‘energy’ [the karmic equivalent of protons, electrons, neutrons and all those strange particles that are inside them, and all those wriggly ‘strings’ inside them again] is being reincarnated. What is being reincarnated is the Avatar like kaleidoscopic hologram. It is all in the mind. But when there is no mind, as will be explained later, if there is no ‘ego’, no self, the Avatar like kaleidoscopic hologram gets out of scope and simply disappears; there is no longer any dream or any ‘reflection on the mirror’.

Every breath you take, every thought you have, every step you take, every word you say, every move you make, everything you do – all have a karmic effect. As is expressed in the Theory of Chaos – the flap of a butterfly’s wings may cause a thunderstorm on the other side of the globe. Therefore do not be amazed or surprised by the wonders and power and reach of the Immutable Law of Karma. We are not perfect. The fact that you and I are here today in the Dharma-Ending Age means that we are tainted by past karma. Therefore we have to take ourselves for what we are as to our karmic residue, in our journey or quest to expiate our karmic residue. Suffering is due to remaining karmic residue. To repent or to amend or to redeem ourselves of our karmic residue, to get parole, to get out of jail, we have to rehabilitate ourselves, to the best of our spiritual ability and capacity and discernment. We do not want to be repeat offenders and come back again and again to exist in the World of Samsara. As a lay person you do not have the benefit to be a monk or to spend 20 years in retreat in Wat Pah Pong in northeast Thailand in the Thai Forest Tradition to master meditation. So, definitely you have to proceed sowing the seeds towards Bodhi on the basis that you will not be a Zen meditation master. Secondly, you would not have the time to read the Sutras in depth, i.e. reading then over and over again, and contemplating them over and over again, in conjunction with training to be a Zen meditation master, so that you will acquire the requisite spiritual wisdom to understand the reality of life and suffering and the ultimate reality; that it is all a dream and an illusion. So, definitely you are not equipped to proceed to sowing the seeds towards Bodhi on the basis of wisdom. Consequently or as a result, the circumstances of a lay person dictate that his or her only, if not main, pathway out of the Three Practices or pathways of ‘Morality’, ‘Meditation’ and ‘Wisdom’ is simply Morality.

Using this pathway of ‘Morality’ to enlightenment requires short cuts and expedient means. But whatever the pathway to practice, there can never be practice if it was not done with total faith and with total fear. It is like Christians saying they love God but most will not be practising the Ten Commandments, unless they feared God and His wrath! Christians should definitely fear the Parable of the Sower and that they will definitely reap what they have worldly sown. What they worldly sow has


nothing to do with the spiritual Original Sin of being estranged or separated from the Spirit Father. In this same sense, it is essentially critical that lay Buddhists have an understanding and full faith and total fear in the Immutable Law of Karma or Cause and Effect or Reap What You Sow. Understanding Karma means that you are totally aware that every effect is due to some cause or effect. Karma impacts equally on everyone without fear or favour. There are no exceptions or exemptions. The natural law of relativity [Good Old Einstein – he would have made a good Buddhist!] means that effect is also relative to cause and effect. Therefore nothing is permanent. In fact nothing is permanent in the World of Samsara [Samara as in Suffering, not just in pain, toil and sorrow but mainly in terms of uncertainty of the future, the unpredictable ups and downs, and when death will befall us], of Karma, of Cause and Effect. If nothing is permanent, as in ashes to ashes, our worldly being and existence is also like a cloud in the sky or like a lightning flash. If we were ‘permanent’ i.e. eternal, what ever we are cannot be born only to surely die or can ever change in any manner or form. If we were eternal we would have been perfect in every way so there would be no need for duality or relativity or judgment. No one would be richer or poorer, better or worse, beautiful or ugly or other forms of differentiation. Accordingly, we should have no fear of what is impermanent, no fear of death; but rather have fear that we remain impermanent, remain stuck in the World of Samsara.

But paradoxically the fact that the World of Samsara is world of constant perpetual change means we can use this fact to change our Karma, to get us out of this place, to make this world a better place, to participate in the virtual reality of this World of Samsara, until we bring the curtain down on this theatre of false dreams and illusions, for ourselves and our fellow actors; so that we can all retire from the ‘stage’. To reiterate, it is because of karma and any karmic residual that we are destined to be who ever we are and what we are. The fact that nothing is permanent, and by implication every karmic cause and effect, gives us hope and removes our fear of mortal death, and provides us with the tool and mechanism to change our destiny; more specifically, to expiate our karmic residue, and get out of this karmic treadmill. We do not want to be in Hotel California [as the song by the Eagles goes] but rather we want to get out of this place [as the song by Eric Burdon of the Animals goes].

Assuming there is total fear of the Immutable Law of Karma commensurate with having no fear of death [of one’s worldly physical mortal being], and these are conditions precedent, we can now proceed as lay persons to sowing the seeds towards Bodhi. Since ‘Morality’ is our main practice pathway, the foundation of which are the Five Precepts prescribed by Buddha and therefore very much related and familiar to our daily lives; let me start first with explaining the expedient shortcuts we need to take for the other two practice pathways of ‘Meditation’ and ‘Wisdom.

As an expedient shortcut to ‘Meditation’ we will endeavour to focus on what we, as laity, are doing in our daily work or tasks; i.e. be totally focused on the physical task at hand. As you will be aware the most common method of Buddhist meditation is Vipassana Meditation [refer to the Anapanasati Sutra] which requires you to focus on your breathing, and sitting in silence in a quiet Way place. This method is obviously not helpful. Another method requires you to keep chanting ‘Amitabha Buddha’ throughout the day and night when awake. Again this is not helpful as it is difficult to multitask physically let alone mentally. Remember that the objective to meditation is to learn to control your errant mind and the call and pull of your five senses. We will practise ‘mindfulness’ or focusing on the task at hand. Mindfulness


in this practical expedient sense presumes certain prerequisites. Firstly, you must never be idle physically or mentally unless you are asleep. This means you are either doing a task that requires you to be physically active and that you have to keep alert to prevent accidents or stay mentally acutely active as to be totally absorbed in the problem solving or analysis. Secondly, and we will deal with this later in Morality, you must always have a gatekeeper or sentinel in your mind to filter out bad thoughts and to check that what you are doing is not immoral. We are ‘mindful’ in this mental sentinel sense, rather than optically mindful of the object or the task. It is a mental focus rather than the optic focus of looking through a microscope.

Let me quote the words of famous Layman Pang [one of Zen Master Matsu’s disciples]. He is the Chinese equivalent of Vimalakirti, the famous lay believer who was a rich man, married with wife (possibly many wives) and children, during Buddha’s time, and yet he is a paragon of Buddhist enlightenment and practice. We will come to Vimalakirti later. Anyway, Layman Pang said – “My day is filled with humble activities and I just keep my mind in harmony with my tasks. I accept what comes without desire or aversion. When encountering other people, I maintain an uncritical attitude, never admiring, never condemning. To me red is red and not crimson or scarlet. So, what marvellous method do I use? Well, when I chop wood, I chop wood, and when I carry water, I carry water.” [Quote is taken from ‘Empty Cloud: The Teachings of Zen Master Xu Yun’]. From this quote we have the oft-quoted plagiarism – ‘When you eat, you eat. When you shit, you shit!’ - used in Zen instruction on focusing on the present moment.

So, since we do not have the time or ability to keep our mind still, we improvise and come to a close approximation by controlling our ‘monkey’ of a mind and our thoughts by allowing or focusing on one thought [through one action] at a time. No multi-tasking! It sounds difficult at first. The monkey mind is just an illusion. We do not really think of a million things at one time. In actual fact, we can only think of one thought at a time; although the time for one thought is split second. By learning to be totally ‘mentally’ absorbed and focused on the task on hand, we are deliberately ‘mindful’ and attentive of a particular thought or a particular task to wipe out other thoughts or doing other tasks, and consequently disciplining or regimenting or automating ourselves. The training in ‘mindfulness’ is made simpler at the beginning if we live a simple life, and involve ourselves in routine and simple things. It is like putting the same favourite song or music on and on, like a broken record, or eating the same food or reading the same newspaper or going to the same coffee-shop or fraternising with the same friends or attend the same club. ‘Mindfulness’ begins with attentiveness; and that has its easier beginning in doing routine and familiar things. Since we cannot control our mind to the extent of making it stay calm or still at our very command or behest, we are arriving at a pragmatic compromise by allowing our mind to operate in a safe compound or within set parameters. We are or our mind is naturally fidgety or fearful of new or strange or unfamiliar things. Discipline is easier where there is routine and you are adept at what you do. In fact the same standard of discipline is required when we practise ‘Wisdom’ and ‘Morality’, the other two pathways. We seek or find discipline in tried and tested safe and good and mundane and simple things.

Let me illustrate ‘mindfulness’ through the example of the samurai and bushido. For the samurai, his occupation is as a warrior. When I think of samurai, I reflect back on the Samurai movie series starring


Koichi Ose, the Blind Swordsman movie series starring Takashi Kitano and the Lone Wolf and Cub movie series starring Tomoko Mayama. You can reflect back on any samurai sword duel you have seen in any Japanese movie. Mindfulness of the samurai at a duel is represented by the way he stands stoic, steadfast and with fortitude and disciplined concentration. He is totally focussed on the present. He is imbued with ‘Thoughtlessness’. There is nothing in his mind about winning or losing; there is no notion of ‘I’ in him, no duality of thought, no feeling of whether he is confident or not confident, no thought of death, no fear of death – nothing! His mind is just a live blank canvas, like an automatic home security camera. The moment there is any movement from his opponent, his mental camera clicks and triggers off his instantaneous response. It is what you call – a quick draw – the fastest gun in the West – in this case the fastest sword in the East – and that is bushido in action. That is how mindful you have to be in Bodhi practice.

Now, let us discuss an expedient shortcut to ‘Wisdom’. When you attain Wisdom in the Buddhist sense it means you are able to see things, that is the worldly reality, for what they are, that they are merely perceptions of the mind, and that in Ultimate Reality there is no ‘self’ or ego. Without self-consciousness you are not attached or clinging or subservient to your mind and the five senses, which are the so-called ‘Six Thieves’, that in Buddhist terms, are responsible for your remaining in the World of Samsara. Unless, you are reclused like a monk, it is very hard, almost close to impossible, to attain the requisite level of spiritual wisdom through reading and contemplating the Buddhist Scriptures, to weed out the ‘self’ or ego in you. As an expedient shortcut to spiritual Wisdom we will enforce or compel or ingrain in our psyche the Duty of Filial Piety. For those who are interested please read the Filial Piety Sutra. You will note that this is also the expedient short-cut standard to losing our self-ego in Christian practice. This is the Paramount Commandment in Christianity, for it is also ‘filial piety’ when you surrender to God the Spirit Father with all your mind, body and soul. Anyway, since this concept or tenet or doctrine of filial piety is the mainstay of Chinese tradition and culture, being the foundation of Confucian philosophy, we Chinese will have no difficulty in cultivating filial piety or ‘how soon’ in Chinese.

But first, a personal anecdote about filial piety. When I was young and asked my mother what ‘how soon’ meant, this was what she said to me – “Imagine you, your wife and me, just the three of us, are out on a boat in the middle of the lake. There is a sudden storm and the boat is capsized. You can only save one of us, either your wife or I, to drag to the shore. Who will you save?”. I replied – “I do not know [not wishing to offend, by giving the wrong answer].” My mother retorted – “You save me, your mother! You can always have another wife. But you can only have one mother!”.

Everything we do we put our parents first and ourselves a poor second. By showing humility to them, we are learning how to be humble. We do not eat unless they are fed. We put their health and safety before ours. When we do well at studies or work, we attribute it to our parents and glorify them in our success. That helps us avoid pride and arrogance in our success. When they are alive, we are just a shadow to them and are their servant. This should pose no difficulty in most cases. In some cases we might be dealing with bad or unworthy parents. Nevertheless, taking into account the Immutable Law of Karma and its effects, I suggest that as children we should still be pious and filial and devoted children to the good welfare of our parents, even if they might appear unworthy. If we cannot forgive our parents or vice-versa it is difficult for us to forgive others. Note that point here is about cultivating a practice that


makes you lose self-consciousness. Hate, aversion and dislike and despise are ‘poisons’ on the dark side of a self-ego. To hate is not doing good.

As we will see later in ‘Morality’, our main pathway, that it is about being good, about being selfless and not selfish, about being humble and not proud, as in ego. By practising filial piety we are putting a buffer between us and our natural inclination to inflate or suck up to our ego. If we do not shut our mind off to our self and ego and leaving it open instead to and only for the benefit of others, beginning with our parents out of filial piety, how can we truly clearly see and hear what is around us. For with self-ego, we are unconsciously or unwittingly engrossed with ourselves; we are only seeing or hearing ourselves! Filial piety makes us lose self-consciousness. Giving to others out of duty, care and responsibility and kindness and compassion, beginning with our parents out of filial piety, is the seed-ground for almsgiving and charity; which is the ‘giving and caring’ in ‘Morality’ [as discussed above earlier]. Continuing to care and remaining responsible for another’s welfare, beginning with our parents out of filial piety, even when we are angry with them or vice-versa or otherwise in conflict, teaches us patience and forbearance. When we become parents ourselves we then realise the meaning of gratitude and thankfulness. This is cultivated wisdom based on practice rather than theory. Starting from duty and responsibility based on piety and devotion, we acquire love and compassion and mindfulness and patience and tolerance. For we can see within one’s own family [parents and siblings and relatives] that there is good in the bad and bad in the good. Nothing is absolute and family things and matters are subject to the vagaries of life. We are then slowly imbued with humility and equanimity and to take problems in stride to be resolved through expedient means and practical common sense. We soon learn that spiritual wisdom has nothing to do with intellectual knowledge at all but to do with getting on with life through expedient means and practical common sense.

We can now concentrate on our main practice pathway of ‘Morality’. Morality is in Buddhist practice about being good and doing wholesome deeds, even though spiritually speaking Bodhi has nothing to do about being good or bad. Perhaps it is time that I introduce the Six Paramitas or 6 Perfections of - Almsgiving, Precepts, Forbearance or Patience, Discipline or Assiduousness, Meditation and Wisdom. I normally prefer to group them into 3 – Almsgiving & Precepts as one group coming under Morality; Patience & Discipline as part of Meditation and Wisdom. Thus, when we talk of being good and doing wholesome deeds, we are referring to - Almsgiving & Precepts. The basic Five Precepts are – Do not kill, do not lie, do not cheat, do not get drunk and do not indulge in sexual misconduct. Let me explain.

When you cultivate a gradual practice of being good and doing wholesome deeds you create good karma. Good karma is obviously better than bad karma. Karmic merits are definitely better than karmic demerits. Good karma is the source or genesis for a sudden awakening to Bodhi-awareness. It is only after the sudden awakening to Bodhi-awareness that you can meaningfully proceed with gradual practice to Bodhi, because the Bodhi-awareness gives you a definite sense of spiritual mission and direction. Gradual practice of being good and doing wholesome deeds, without a sudden awakening to Bodhi-awareness, is like a pious devout Christian not knowing the way to heaven. This is because practising the Ten Commandments gets you baptised by water, you are now a good son of man, but you are not yet reborn in the ‘spirit’, as the spirit son of God, for you are not yet baptised with the Spirit. Jesus said – “Verily, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom


of God. That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. Do not marvel that I said to you, ‘You must be born again’.” [John 3:5-7]. When you cultivate a gradual practice of being good and doing wholesome deeds you are eliminating defilements and afflictions and delusions from your karmic residue in the World of Samsara. Good and bad karma are matters pertaining to the Immutable Law of Karma and the World of Samsara. Metaphorically they relate to the ‘reflections on the mirror’. The Bodhi, represented by the ‘reflectivity of the mirror’ is immutable. The Bodhi-awareness in Bodhi remains pure and numinous and untainted by dualities of good or bad etc. It does not abide in anything, does not arise or cease and is neither born nor die; even when the mind is deluded, defiled or afflicted. In brief good begets good and bad begets bad. We do only good and wholesome things in the hope that we beget a sudden awakening to Bodhi-awareness. Unless you are awakened to the Bodhi, unless you are ‘reborn in the Spirit’, you will be a long way away from Bodhi.

In conclusion, let me summarise the key concepts raised in my discourse - Power of Expediency, Doctrine of Appearance, The Immutable Law of Karma, Filial Piety, Mindfulness, and finally Gradual Practice of Almsgiving and Precepts / Sudden Awakening to Bodhi-Awareness/ Gradual Practice towards Bodhi.

So that you might test the veracity of my discourse, I will now refer you directly to passages from the Sutras or writings by Zen Masters.

Let me say that using our conditioned mind with its conventional worldly knowledge and wisdom and concepts to seek the unconditioned and the unconventional and the ungraspable and the incomprehensible is always going to be a hard ask. How do you utilise the deluded and defiled and afflicted worldly mind to discover the true absolute innately pure and numinous and acute ‘primordial awareness’ of the Bodhi-mind? How would proceed by way of metaphysical logic? As Chinul, the Korean Son Master, [he is absolutely brilliant!], explained in his article on Son practice, in about 1203-1205 [before the Mongol Invasion] in his - “Secrets on Cultivating the Mind” –

“This [the Bodhi-Mind or the Buddha-Nature or Self-Nature (words added by me for elucidation)] is the life force of all the Buddhas and the patriarchs [and sentient beings (words added by me for elucidation)] – have no further doubts about that. Since it has no former shape, how can it be large or small? Since, it cannot be large or small, how can it have limitations? Since it has no limitations, it cannot have inside or outside. Since there is no inside or outside, there is no far or near. As there is no far or near, there is no here or there. As there is no here or there, there is no coming or going. As there is no coming or going, there is no birth or death. As there is no birth or death, there is no past or present. As there is no past or present, there is no delusion or awakening. As there is no delusion or awakening, there is no ordinary man or saint [or Buddha (word added by me for elucidation)]. As there is no ordinary man or saint [or Buddha (word added by me for elucidation)], there is no purity or impurity. Since there is no purity or impurity, there is no right or wrong. Since there is no right or wrong, names and words do not apply to it. Since none of these concepts apply, all sense-bases and sense-objects [i.e. the six senses and their resultants (words added by me for elucidation)], all deluded thoughts,


even forms and shapes and names and words are all inapplicable. Hence how can it be anything but originally void and calm and originally no-thing? Nevertheless at that point where all dharmas are empty, the numinous awareness is not obscured. It is not the same as insentience, for its nature is spiritually deft. This is your pure mind-essence of void and calm, numinous awareness. This pure, void, and calm mind is that mind of outstanding purity and brilliance of all the Buddhas of the three time periods; it is that enlightened nature which is the original source of all sentient beings. One who awakens to it and safeguards that awakening will then abide in the unitary, ‘such’ and unmoving liberation. One who is deluded and turns his back on it passes between the six destinies, wandering in samsara for vast number of kalpas. As it is said, ‘One who is confused about the one mind and passes between the six destinies, goes and takes action. But when who awakes to the dharmadhatu [Buddha Nature (word added by me for elucidation)] and returns to the one mind, arrives and is still’.”

For the source that the Mind should not abide in anything [dharmas] or anywhere; and that Buddha did not say anything about anything other than expediency, I refer to what the Buddha said in the Diamond Sutra -

“They should give rise to a mind that is not based on form, and they should give rise to a mind that is not based on sound, smell, taste touch or thought. They should give rise to mind that is not based on anything.”

“Subhuti, never say that the Tathagata has this thought: ‘I have some dharma to speak about’. Do not have that thought. And why is this? If someone says that the Tathagata has a dharma to speak about, then that person is defaming the Buddha, and he does not understand what I have been saying. Subhuti, one who speaks the Dharma has no Dharma to speak about and that is what is called speaking the Dharma.”

For how the laity should practise by way of meditation or Bodhi cultivation practices, I refer to Vimalakirti Sutra – also called ‘The Doctrine of the Emancipation Beyond Comprehension’ -

This was what Vimalakirti said to Shariputra who was sitting in quiet meditation under a tree in the forest –

“Ah, Shariputra, you should not assume that this sort of sitting is true quiet sitting! Quiet sitting means that in this threefold [desire, form, formlessness (words added by me for elucidation)] world you manifest neither body nor will. This is quiet sitting. Not arising out of your samadhi [deep meditative state (words added by me for elucidation)] of complete cessation and yet showing yourself in the ceremonies of daily life – this is quiet sitting. Not abandoning the principles of the Way [the Buddhist Path to Enlightenment or in Chinese the Tao as in the mysterious Ultimate Reality (words added by me for elucidation)] and yet showing yourself in the activities of the common mortal – this is quiet sitting. You mind is not fixed on internal things and yet not engaged with externals either – this is quiet sitting. Unmoved by sundry theories, but practising the thirty-seven


elements [aids to enlightenment (words added by me for elucidation)] of the Way – this is quiet sitting. Entering nirvana without having put an end to earthly desires – this is quiet sitting. If you can do this kind of sitting, you will merit the Buddha’s seal of approval.”

This was what Vimalakirti said to Shining Adornment when the latter asked – ‘The place of practice – where is that?’ –

“Almsgiving is the place of practice, because it hopes for no reward. Observance of the precepts is a place for practice, because it brings fulfilment of vows. Forbearance is the place of practice, because it enables one to view all living beings with a mind free of obstruction. Assiduousness is the place of practice, because it forestalls laziness and regression. Meditation is the place of practice, because it makes the mind tame and gentle. Wisdom is the place of practice, because it sees all things as they are.”

............. (and continuing)

“Causes and conditions [i.e. The Immutable Law of Cause and Effect (words added by me for elucidation)] are the place of practice, for none of the links in the chain of causation, from ignorance to old age and death, ever come to an end. Earthly desires are the place of practice for through them we know the nature of Suchness [Ultimate Reality or Bodhi (words added by me for elucidation)]. Living beings are the place of practice, for through them we know that there is no ego. All phenomena are the place of practice, for through them we know the emptiness of all phenomena.”

............. (and continuing)

“My good fellow, if Bodhisattvas apply themselves to the [Six] Paramitas and teach and convert living beings, then you should understand that everything they do, every lifting of a foot, every placing of a foot will in effect be a ‘coming from the place of practice’ and abiding in the Buddha’s Law.”

Finally, a good summary of how to practise Bodhi-awareness. I refer to The Platform Sutra and The Formless Gatha of the 6th Patriarch –

With an even mind,

why bother upholding precepts?

With an upright practice,

why meditate?

To have gratitude, be filial to your parents.

To be just, have sympathy for others,


whether they are high or low.

To yield to others, whether you are honourable

or lowly, and live in harmony.

To be tolerant, do not speak of the wrongdoing

of others.

If fire can be produced by drilling wood,

certainly the red lotus will emerge from the mud.

What tastes bitter is an effective cure.

What is grating to the ear is honest advice.

Amend your errors and give rise to wisdom,

Defend your shortcomings and you will

lack a Sage’s mind

Daily, constantly practising to benefit others,

Attaining Buddhahood does not come

from giving money.

Bodhi is found within the mind

Why bother looking for the extraordinary outside?

Listen to what I have just said and apply it –

The West[ern Pureland] is before your eyes.

Finally, my personal attempt at poetry –

Nobody Going Nowhere

In this hard world trying to survive

All day working hard to stay alive

Our past karma we will never know

But definitely we reap what we sow

So when to you bad things happen


Bear with them, it is just retribution

If you have a near-death incident

Learn from it, raise your intuition

1st thing, death is not something to fear

The purpose to life will become clear

Once you discern your essential nature

In lives past, present and also in the future

You are nobody going nowhere in essence

All is false ego and illusion in the presence

For all our lives in this long journey are but a dream

Merely karmic consequences re-birthing in a stream

Secret to Nivarna is being good and to do good

That my very dear friend is the Ultimate Truth

I am confident that if the reader should awaken to Bodhi-awareness after reading my discourse here; with spiritual insight he or she will also find great pleasure and spirituality in reading -

Poetry of Rumi the Sufi Poet, Kahlil Gibran the Lebanese Philosopher and the evergreen ‘Desiderata’ and ‘Amazing Grace’; and the Parables in the Gospels, and indeed the entire New Testament [which I know of by heart as a Jesuit Catholic], the Taoist writings of Chuang Tzu and even the Bhagavad-Gita.

Beyond the Beyond we are all One!

As an afterthought allow me to give an illustration using 1 Corinthians 13 – The First Epistle of Paul the Apostle – St. Paul said -

“Though I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I have become as sounding brass or a clanging cymbal. And though I have the gift of prophesy, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and though I have faith, so that I could remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. And though I bestow all my goods to feed the poor, and though I give my body to be burned, but have not love, it profits me nothing. Love suffers long and is kind; love does not envy; love does not parade itself, is not puffed up; does not behave rudely, does not seek its own, is not provoked, thinks no evil; does not rejoice in inequity, but rejoices in the truth; bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never fails. But whether there are prophesies, they will fail; whether there are tongues, they will cease; whether there is knowledge, it will vanish away. For we know in part and we prophesy in part. But when


that which is perfect has come, then that which is a part will be done away. But when I was a child, I spoke as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child; but when I became a man, I put away childish things. For now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part, but then I shall know just as I am also known. And now abide faith, hope, love, these three; but the greatest of these is love.”

This is an example where one with spiritual insight sees the revelation of divinity rather than being caught up with being trying to be divine or being saved in heaven. Firstly, the language is misunderstood both in terms of meaning of words and also the language; being lost in the translation as well as the perception. The main error is in the word ‘love’, which has been taken out of context. It must be read in a spiritual context. In Greek, there are two types of love – ‘agape’ as in non-sexual or platonic or family love and also ‘eros’ as in sexual love. The ‘love’ here in 1 Corinthians 13 is definitely not ‘eros’, but it is not worldly either as in ‘agape’. The ‘love’ here is ‘love’ in the ‘spirit’; and more on point, it is the love of the Father, the Spirit for his lost prodigal spirit sons, as in the Parable of the Prodigal Son [Luke 15:11-32]. You will note that in Buddhist terms, the same ‘love’ is expressed as ‘metta’ and in feminine form, as the love of a mother for her children.

Read the passage again, and for ‘tongues’ read as ‘languages’, ‘prophesy’ read as ‘wisdom’ but ‘knowledge’ is worldly knowledge. Read again that part that says – ‘But whether there are prophesies, they will fail; whether there are tongues, they will cease; whether there is knowledge, it will vanish away. For we know in part and we prophesy in part. But when that which is perfect has come, then that which is a part will be done away.’ Refresh yourself as to why you have to go beyond worldly language, words and labels and wisdom and knowledge.

Test your spiritual insight as to the part that says – ‘But when I was a child, I spoke as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child; but when I became a man, I put away childish things.’ I will give you a hint. Refer to what Jesus said in Matthew 11:25 – “Father ... You have hidden these things from the wise and prudent and revealed them to babes.” And Matthew 18:3-4 – “Verily, I say to you, unless you are converted and become as like little children, you will by no means enter the kingdom of heaven. Therefore whoever humbles himself as this little child is greatest in the kingdom of heaven.” What is the main difference between a babe and an adult? Try innocent undefiled awareness as compared with attachments to the seven emotions and the six sexual attractions.

This next part is a bit more esoteric – ‘For now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part, but then I shall know just as I am also known.’ – What is that ‘child’ that is now dim in the mirror? What shall we know when we go beyond the ‘parts’ of language, wisdom and knowledge? Think of the ‘reflections’ of a mirror as contrast with the ‘reflectivity’ of a mirror.

‘Faith’ should be read as faith that the Father Spirit will not forget his lost son nor stop loving him.

‘Hope’ should be read as the hope that eventually the lost ‘sheep’ will be found and that the Prodigal Son will get to return home.

Enjoy! Metta!


Cheok Hong Chuan

18/3/13


TRUE BUDDHIST LAY PRACTICE – THE MODERN BODHISATTVA SAMURAI

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