The Discipline of Transcendence, Vol 4

The Discipline of Transcendence, Vol 4

Discourses on the 42 Sutras of Buddha

Talks given from 31/10/76 am to 10/11/76 am

English Discourse series

11 Chapters

Year published: 1976

Originally published in two volumes, later released as four volumes.

The Discipline of Transcendence, Vol 4

Chapter #1

Chapter title: The Eightfold Way

31 October 1976 am in Buddha Hall

Archive code: 7610310

ShortTitle: TRANS401

Audio: Yes

Video: No

Length: 96 mins

THE BUDDHA SAID:

THOSE WHO FOLLOW THE WAY ARE LIKE UNTO WARRIORS WHO FIGHT SINGLE-HANDED WITH A MULTITUDE OF FOES.

THEY MAY ALL GO OUT OF THE FORT IN FULL ARMOR; BUT AMONG THEM ARE SOME WHO ARE FAINT-HEARTED, AND SOME WHO GO HALFWAY AND BEAT A RETREAT, AND SOME WHO ARE KILLED IN THE AFFRAY, AND SOME WHO COME HOME VICTORIOUS.

O MONKS, IF YOU DESIRE TO ATTAIN ENLIGHTENMENT, YOU SHOULD STEADILY WALK IN YOUR WAY, WITH A RESOLUTE HEART, WITH COURAGE, AND SHOULD BE FEARLESS IN WHATEVER ENVIRONMENT YOU MAY HAPPEN TO BE, AND DESTROY EVERY EVIL INFLUENCE THAT YOU MAY COME ACROSS; FOR THUS YOU SHALL REACH THE GOAL.

GAUTAMA THE BUDDHA has no leaning towards abstraction, philosophy or metaphysics. He's very practical, down-to-earth practical. He's very scientific. His approach is not that of a thinker; the approach is existential. When he attained and became a Buddha, it is said that the God of the Gods, Brahma, came to him and asked him, "Who is your witness? You declare that you have become a Buddha, but who is your witness?" Buddha laughed, touched the earth with his hand, and said, "This earth, this solid earth is my witness."

He is very earthy; he made the earth his witness. He could have said so about the sky, but no; he could have said so about the sun or the moon or the stars, but no. He touched the earth and said, "This solid earth is my witness." His whole approach is like that.

Before we enter into these sutras. his basic steps have to be understood.

Buddha's Way is called 'the eightfold Way'. He has divided it into eight parts. Those divisions are arbitrary, just utilitarian; the Way is one. It is not really divided, it is divided so that you can understand it easily. And this is very fundamental: if you can understand these eight steps or eight divisions of the Way, the Way will open just in front of you. You are already standing on it, but not aware; your mind is wandering somewhere. The Way is in front of you. So try to understand these eight steps as deeply as possible.

The first is: right view.

And all these eight steps are concerned with rightness -- right view, right intention, right speech, right morality, right livelihood, right effort, right mindfulness, and the eighth, the ultimate, right SAMADHI. The word 'right' has to be understood first because the Sanskrit word SAMYAK IS SO meaningful, is so pregnant with meaning that it cannot be translated. 'Right' is a very poor translation for it for many reasons.

First, the word 'right' immediately gives the idea as if it is against the wrong. SAMYAK never gives that idea; SAMYAK IS not against the wrong. Buddha's right is not against the wrong, because Buddha says, 'Wrongs are many, right is one -- so how can the right be against the wrong?" Health is one, diseases are many. There are not as many healths as there are diseases, so health cannot be against the diseases -- otherwise there would be sc many healths. Somebody is suffering from TB and then he becomes healthy, somebody is suffering from cancer and he becomes healthy, and somebody is suffering from flu and he becomes healthy. These three healths are not three healths. The diseases were different, but health is one, and one cannot be against the many.

Exactly the same is true about right and wrong. Right is one. Wrongs are millions; you can go on inventing wrongs. Right cannot be invented; it does not depend on you. Right is a state of affairs where you are in tune with the whole. That is the meaning of health too: when you are in tune with the whole you are healthy. The music flows between you and the whole, there is no obstruction. You feel a well-being. There is no noise, everything is in harmony. When the individual is in tune with the universal, right exists, health exists. When you fall out of tune then so many wrongs arise -- there is no limit to them, they are endless. And you can invent new wrongs.

Humanity has invented many new diseases which were not prevalent before. In the old scriptures, ayurvedic scriptures, many diseases are not mentioned. People think they are not mentioned because ayurveda was not yet enough of a science, so they could not diagnose those diseases. That is not true; ayurveda became a perfect science. But those diseases were not in existence, so how can you diagnose a disease which doesn't exist? They were non -existential. There were a few diseases which existed only for rich people, very rich people. They were called royal diseases. Tuberculosis was called 'royal'. It was not an ordinary disease. Now the whole world has become royal; now the whole world suffers from richness, affluence. Leisure has made many things available, many new diseases available.

Cancer is a very new disease. It can exist only when the mind is very worried, when worry becomes like a wound. And around that subtle wound in the psyche arises a disease in the body corresponding to it. That's what cancer is: That's why cancer seems to be incurable. There is no way to cure it from the body side. It can be cured only from the mind side because basically it arises there.

Each age has its own diseases, each age has its own vices, and each age invents its own sins. But virtue is ageless, timeless. Sainthood has nothing to do with any age, time period. It is not historical, it is existential.

Buddha says: Right is that which is not your invention. It is already there. If you go away from it you are wrong, if you come close to it you are right. The more close you are, the more right you are. One day, when you are exactly home, you are perfectly right. SAMYAK and SAMADHI both come from the same root SAM. SAMYAK IS the step towards SAMADHI. If you don't understand SAMYAK, YOU will not be able to understand SAMADHI.

So seven steps ultimately lead to the final step. 'Samadhi' means: now everything has fallen in tune with existence. Not a flaw exists; the music is utterly perfect. But there is no better word in English than 'right', so you have to understand it. 'Right' in the Buddhist meaning of the term means: balanced, centered, grounded, harmonious, tranquil -- all of these things. But the basic thing can be understood even if there is no synonymous term in English to translate it.

But remember, it has nothing to do with wrong. Wrong is a human invention, right is divine. Right is not something that you have to do -- you were born right. Wrong is something that you have to do; you were not born wrong. Every child is born in harmony. That's why children are so beautiful. Have you ever seen a baby who is ugly? It doesn't happen. All babies are beautiful, but all grown-ups are not beautiful. So something somewhere must have gone wrong -- because all babies are beautiful. They have a grace, a tremendous elegance which has nothing to do with any practice, because they have no time to practice anything. They come into the world without any rehearsal. They are just there; so happy, so silent, so harmonious. Such grace surrounds them -- as if the whole existence is protective towards them. Then, by and by, they learn the ways of man and become wrong. Then ugliness appears. Then beautiful eyes can become horrible; then a beautiful face can become criminal; then a beautiful body can lose all grace. Then a beautiful intelligence.... Every child is born intelligent; that's how things are. An intelligent child can become stupid, mediocre. These are human achievements.

The wrong is a human achievement, the right is divine. You are not to do anything for it. You have only to stop all that you have been doing to create the wrong. And when there is right, you don't feel you are right. That's why, I repeat again: It is not against wrong. When you are in the right you are simply natural. You don't have any feeling of being righteous. You don't have any feeling that you are a great saint. If you have that feeling then you are still wrong somewhere -- because the no is a jarring note. It does not allow the music to flow.

'Right' means balanced, non-tense, centered; you are not a stranger in existence. That's what 'right' means: you are at home. This existence is your family. You are not an alien. In the west, and in the east too, the modern mind continuously talks and thinks about alienation, that man has become an outsider, that man has become a stranger, that we seem to be just like accidents on earth. Existentialists have the right word for it: they say we have been thrown here. Thrown? Dumped! Expelled! Punished! And this existence is against us. And you can prove it: so many diseases -- death is there; so many frustrations, failures. People go on saying man proposes and God disposes.

So of course man is doomed, doomed from the very beginning, is born with great desires and without any possibility of any fulfilment, ever. How can this existence be your home? It can't be your family.

The right is when you start feeling that you are at home. Nothing is alien, nothing is strange.

Buddha says: If you are, you are wrong -- because whenever you are, you are separate from existence. When you are not you are right. Listen to this paradox; it is one of the most beautiful paradoxes. Buddha says: When you are, you are wrong. Your being is to be wrong. The very separation, the 'I am', creates a barrier. Then you don't melt, then you become frozen, then you are like an ice-cube. Dead. Closed. Then you have a boundary.

When you start melting, and you start feeling, "The existence is, and I am just a part"... and you relax, and there is a let-go; you disappear. Then you are right. When you are not you are right.

These eight steps are just indicators, by and by, of how to come to that tremendous courage, that.ultimate courage where you take the quantum leap and you simply disappear. When the self disappears, the Universal Self arises.

The first is right view.

Buddha says: Look at things without any opinion, otherwise you never look at reality. Look at things without any philosophy, without any prejudice, without any dogma, creed, scripture. Just look. Look at things as they are. Be factual; don't create a fiction. If you are looking for something with a prejudice, you will find it -- that is the trouble. If you are already full of a belief you will find it because the mind is so creative, so imaginative, so capable of auto-hypnosis, that whatsoever it believes it can create. Buddha says: Go to reality without any belief. Belief is the barrier.

You must have watched it.

If you are born a Hindu -- that means if you are being conditioned from your childhood by Hindus -- that means you are a victim of Hinduism. And the same applies to Mohammedans and Christians, Jews, Jains, communists: the whole humanity is a victim of this school or that, of this prejudice or that, of this belief or that. If you are born a Hindu, have been conditioned in certain dogmas, and you start meditating, you will start seeing visions of Krishna, Rama -- it depends on what you have been taught, who has been enforced and engraved in your mind -- but Christ will never come to you. Christ comes to a Christian, Buddha comes to a Buddhist, Mahavira comes to a Jaina. To a Jaina, Mohammed can never come; it is impossible. Even to conceive the idea is impossible. Even in a dream, Mohammed will not come to a Jaina. What is happening? Are these Buddhas, Mahaviras, Christs, really coming? or is your own belief creating them? Your own belief is creating them.

To a communist, nobody comes. His belief is that all religion is nonsense, an opium for the people, a dangerous poison to be got rid of as soon as possible -- then nobody comes. It depends on you. If you have a belief, that very belief becomes a dream; and if you are very, very sensitive, receptive, that dream can look more real than the reality. In fact, this happens every day, even in non-religious people. You dream in the night and when you dream the dream looks so real. You have dreamed your whole life and every morning you cancel it as unreal. But again, next night you dream, and in the dream again it seems real.

The dreaming faculty lives on belief. If you have a strong belief then the dreaming faculty joins with the belief, pours its energy into the belief, makes the belief a reality, and you start having visions. Buddha is not in favor of any visions -- because he says: "That which is, needs no visions. It needs simply clarity to see." Your mind need not have any dreams, great dreams of great saints, heaven and hell; these are all your creations.

Right view is: having no prejudice, having no belief, having no opinion whatsoever. Difficult... Buddha's path is arduous; he demands too much. It almost seems to be a superhuman feat. But it is possible -- and that is the only way towards truth.

If you have any opinion you will impose your opinion on the truth. You do it every day. If you come to me with the opinion that this man is good, you will go convinced that this man is good; if you come with the opinion that this man is bad. you will go convinced that this man is bad. Your belief will always find that which it wants to find. Belief is very selective. I have heard....

The boy had been brought into court again charged with stealing auto hubcaps. The magistrate determined to appeal to his father: "See here," said the judge."This boy of yours has been in this court many times charged with theft, and I am tired of seeing him here."

"I don't blame you, Judge," said the father. "And I am just as tired of seeing him here as you are."

"Then why don't you teach him how to act? Show him the right way and he will not be coming here."

"I have already shown him the right way," said the father, "but he just does not seem to have any talent for learning. He always gets caught!"

Now, the right way is different for the judge and for the father. The father himself is a thief. He also wants the boy to learn 'the right way' so that he is never caught again. But his right way is HIS right way.

For a holiday, Mullevy decided to go to Switzerland to fulfill a life-long dream and climb the Matterhorn. He hired a guide, and just as they neared the top the men were caught in a snowslide.

Three hours later a Saint Bernard ploughed through to them, a keg of brandy tied under his chin.

"Hooray!" shouted the guide. "Here comes man's best friend."

"Ah," said Mullevy. "And look at the size of the dog that is bringing it!"

Now, for one the dog is the greatest friend of humanity, for the other it is the bottle that he is bringing.

"Ah," said Mullevy. "And look at the size of the dog that is bringing it!"

It depends on how you look at things. You can look at the same thing, and you may not be seeing the same thing. If you are listening to me in trust, you listen differently. If you are listening to me with disbelief, you listen to me differently. If you are listening as a disciple, you listen differently. If you are listening just as an outsider, a visitor -- just by the way, you have come with a friend -- you listen differently. What I say is the same, but how you interpret it will depend on you. Right listening will be that you listen as nobody: neither for nor against, with no prejudice -- just listening. If you can see things without any idea in the mind, then Buddha says it is right view.

Right view needs no conceptualization. That's why Buddha says: Don't ask me any theoretical question. He does not say anything about God -- not that God is not. He does not say anything about it because it is pointless to create a theory. He tries to open your eyes to it. He says: To know the truth, you need eyes -- just as you cannot teach a blind man what light is like, howsoever you try. You cannot teach a blind man anything about the light. Of course, you can teach as much as you want and he may learn all the information that you deliver to him, but still, in reality, he will not be able to conceive what light is. He cannot conceive.