Suffering and Buddhism
Paul Ingram

While Howell touches on possible integrations of genetic science, suffering, and aspects of Christian Womanist, process, and liberationist theologies, Dr. Paul O. Ingram of Pacific Lutheran University presents the Buddhist tradition's treatment of the problem of suffering. "Reflection about how Buddhist tradition has conceived the 'problem of evil'" as it relates to science, suffering, and genetics is problematic, Ingram says. "Buddhists have been exploring the relationship between the Buddhist doctrines of interdependence and impermanence with contemporary physics and biological evolutionary paradigms for at least fifty years. Yet Buddhists have not, to my knowledge, explicitly connected analysis of the experience of suffering with the science of genetics." And, secondly, Ingram says, "the 'problem of evil' is not a Buddhist problem." Rather, Ingram says, the question of "how one can account for the existence of evil and suffering" rises from Jewish, Christian, and Islamic characterization of God as good, just, loving, and all-powerful.
"Buddhism indeed focuses on the suffering undergone by all sentient beings - not just human beings," Ingram says, but "evil in a world created by a just, good and loving, all-powerful deity, as well as the problem of undeserved suffering of the righteous and the 'undeserved prosperity' of the unrighteous have never been structural elements in Buddhist explanations for the nature and cause of universal suffering."
To understand Buddhist treatment of suffering, one must be acquainted with four "interdependent aspects of the Buddhist world view - apart from which there is no Buddhism" - the doctrines of impermanence, non-self, and interdependent co-origination, and the Law of Karma. "The first three doctrines characterize the structural character of all things and events at every moment of space time," Ingram notes, "while the Law of Karma points to how human beings cause suffering both to themselves and other sentient beings. These elements of the Buddhist world view are so interdependent that each involves the other - like spokes of a wheel - so that each one needs to be understood in light of the other three."
The doctrine of impermanence and the Law of Karma.
"[T]he Buddha taught that all existence is duhkah, usually translated as 'suffering' in Western languages," Ingram says. "But more than simple suffering is involved in this teaching . . . all existence involves suffering, or better, 'unsatisfactoriness,' because all existence is characterized by change and impermanence. Literally, everything and event at every moment of space-time - past, present, and future - has existed, now exists, or will exist as processes of change and becoming, because all things and events are processes of change and becoming. Consequently, life as such is duhkha, 'unsatisfactory' 'suffering,' physically, mentally, morally." When "we become aware that our own lives mirror the universality of impermanence, that change and becoming are ingredient in all things, that there is no permanence anywhere; when we experience our own mortality and feel the resulting anxiety about our lack of permanence, we have an understanding of what the Buddha was driving at in the first noble truth."
"Seeing permanence of any kind forces us to live out of accord with reality, 'the way things really are,'" Ingram says. And as "Buddhists understand the Law of Karma, living out of accord with reality causes suffering in the numerous forms suffering can take individually and collectively."
The doctrines of non-self and interdependent co-origination.
"If there exist only process and becoming, but no permanent 'things' that process and 'become,' who or what experiences 'suffering?'" Ingram asks. "Or put another way, if there is no 'soul,' who suffers?"
"Hinduism, some forms of classical Greek philosophy, and traditional Christian teaching," Ingram says, suggest "the existence of a permanent soul-entity remaining self-identical through time to explain continuity, "the paradoxical experience that we are the same person through the changing moments of our lives even as we experience that we are not the same person through the moments of our lives." Buddhism, however, "rejects any and all notions of permanence, including the notion of unchanging self or soul entities," Ingram says. "We are not permanent souls or selves; we are impermanent non-selves."
"Non-self," however, does not mean "non-existence." Rather, Ingram says, "we either exist or non-exist as a continuing series of interdependently causal relationships." According to the doctrine of interdependent co-origination, "things, events, and us become in interdependent relation with everything in this universe at every moment of space time . . . we are as impermanent as the systems of relationships that constitute us." Stated differently, Ingram says, "we are not permanent soul entities that have interdependent relationships and experiences. We are those relationships and experiences as we undergo them. We are not soul-entities that suffer, we are our suffering" as we experience suffering.
Nirvana, enlightenment, and awakened compassion.
Through meditation the Buddhist experiences "nirvana," "awakening," "enlightenment," or "wisdom" - an "apprehension of the universal interdependence and interrelatedness of all sentient beings as these processes coalesce in our own lives. This wisdom "Generates 'compassion' or karuna - experiencing the suffering of all sentient beings - not just human beings - as our own suffering, which is exactly what it is in an interdependent universe." For the Buddhist, Ingram says, "no one is free from suffering unless all sentient beings are free from suffering." Thus, "energized by awakened compassion, the awakened ones . . . are moved to work in the world to relieve all beings from suffering."
The Buddhist way of addressing suffering - "social engagement," or "social activism," as it is more familiarly called by American Christians - is grounded in the practice of non-violence and the practice of meditation. Because "individual greed, hatred, and delusion are central problems from which all need deliverance," Ingram says, quoting Thich Nhat Hahn, "'social work entails inner work.'" And it is meditation, that practice in which Buddhist social engagement is grounded, that opens us "to the experience of interdependence [of] all things and events" and "engenders compassionate action."
"However," Ingram writes, "while Buddhist have always been socially engaged with the forces that engender suffering, focus on 'systemic' suffering has not generally been a central point of Buddhist thought and practice until its contemporary dialogue" with Christian liberation theology's emphasis on "issues of structural suffering" - institutionalized causes of economic, gender, social, political, and environmental oppressions, as well as racism and war. Systemic suffering, Ingram says, the "suffering all persons experience but which bears little, if any, relation to personal choice or an individual's clinging to permanence in an impermanent universe," is "the primary form 'the problem of suffering' seems to be assuming in contemporary Buddhist theory and practice."
Two particular issues - and "problems" for the Buddhist treatment of suffering - are human rights and violent social activism. "[T]hrough Buddhist eyes, the Western struggle for human rights seems to be a disguised form of clinging to permanent existence as in an impermanent universe," Ingram says. "From this perspective the struggle for human rights can only engender more suffering for all sentient beings. "Nevertheless, according to Ingram, "Buddhists realize the importance of human rights issues as issues of suffering," and thus "Buddhist debate on the nature of human rights still continues."
"Related to the issues of human rights is non-violent resistance against economic and political oppression," Ingram adds. "Since the heart of Buddhist social engagement is the practice of non-violence that grows out of the sense that all things and events are interdependent, Buddhists are in principle opposed to any form of violent social activism in the struggle for justice and release from communal suffering. The general Buddhist principle at work here," Ingram says, "is that violence only creates more violence in an interdependent universe. For this reason, until recent times, Buddhists have not been led to be socially active in struggle against unjust political systems, institutionalized forms of economic exploitation, and other forms of international violence. That is, classical Buddhist teaching and practice has tended to focus on individual suffering, but has not focused attention on how suffering becomes institutionalized in social systems."
However, in "confronting systemic suffering," Ingram says, "Buddhists are now facing this question: in a universe in which life must eat life to survive, is non-violence always the most ethical response to systemic suffering?" Or are there times in which the practice of non-violence "might itself engender more systemic suffering?"
Monotheistic theology faces "the problem of evil" and the related "problem of suffering" - the task of defending the Christian, Judaic, or Islamic good, just, all-powerful and loving god against accusations of unjust suffering and evil in the world. Buddhist teaching, however, grounded in the classical Buddhist doctrines of impermanence, non-self, interdependent co-origination and the Law of Karma, faces a different challenge. Buddhist teaching explains the presence of suffering as a result of individuals attempting to cling to permanence in a fleeting universe. The difficulty for Buddhism, however, lies in how to address, from a worldview grounded in non-violence, the suffering that results from oppression institutionalized in social systems.
According to Ingram, "the issue of suffering is not approached anywhere in Buddhist thought as a 'problem of evil,' since, given the non-theistic character [of] the Buddhist world view, the problem of theodicy cannot even occur. Furthermore, Buddhist reflection on unmerited systemic suffering has occurred only within the last thirty years, mostly inspired by Buddhist dialogue with Christianity." Ingram concludes, "All that can be said for certain in this regard is that Buddhist thought and practice on this issue [are] still in process."

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Interreligious Understanding and Cooperation
By Ven.Dr. Sheng Yen, D.Litt.
Dharma Drum Mountain International of Taiwan

1. Interreligious Respect
During the time of Shakyamuni Buddha, there was once a layman who, originally a devotee of another Indian religion, converted to Buddhism after meeting the Buddha. This layman was uncertain whether or not he could still make offerings to his original teacher. When he learned of the man's confusion, the Buddha told the man he could continue to make offerings to his original teacher just as before. In fact, in the Agama Sutras and Monastic Code preached by the Buddha, the Buddha frequently praises the merit of making offerings not only to the Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha, but also to other religious practitioners such as ascetics and Brahmins. So respecting other religions is a basic criterion for a Buddhist devotee. Therefore, Buddhists will not cause conflicts with followers of other religions, and will always get along with them peacefully, like good neighbors. This is especially true in the Chinese cultural sphere. Although at times in Chinese history arguments have erupted between Confucians, Buddhists, and Taoists, and there have even been large-scale persecutions of Buddhists, these incidents were all instigated by a small number of politically-connected Confucians and Taoists who used their influence at court to encourage misguided, anti-Buddhist policies.
However, relations between ordinary folks of different religions have actually been very cordial. For instance, up to the time when I escaped from mainland China in the1940s, itinerant Buddhist monks could seek lodging in Taoist temples, and itinerant Taoist clerics could pass the night in Buddhist monasteries -they respected one another's faith and method of spiritual practice. Chinese maintain that "all paths lead to the same destination." So any religious practitioner who does not go against the basic moral principles of love, peace, and the pursuit of true happiness is worthy of approval regardless of his method of practice. Hence the Chinese saying that "Buddhist monks and Taoist clerics all belong to the same family."
China has a plurality of ethnic groups and a great diversity of religions. At one time in history, the Confucians, due to their self-centeredness and superiority complex, viewed non-Han races as uncivilized barbarians. However, through mutual adaptation and interaction with one another over a long period of time, the Han eventually came to discover that other cultures were also very admirable: not only did these other cultures have much in common with Han culture, but they actually had merits which Han culture lacked. Therefore, in the areas inhabited by Chinese there have been neither religious wars nor implacable enmity between ethnic groups .
Chinese Mahayana Buddhists believe that the good teachings in all religions are the elementary prerequisites for attaining Buddhahood, and that the prophets of all religions are manifestations of Buddhas and Bodhisattvas. They have manifested themselves in these various personas only to adapt to different cultures and living environments, so that they may use the most appropriate means to deliver sentient beings. Hence in the 12th century, the Confucian scholar Lu Jiuyuan (1139-1193), influenced by Buddhism, said that "When a sage appears in the East, he has the same mind and realizes the same principle; when a sage appears in the West, he has the same mind and realizes the same principle." This means that all prophets, from whatever geographical area and of whatever religion, have more or less the same love and realize roughly the same truth.
If we use this principle to view all religions, we will respect all religions. While it is perfectly natural for devotees of any particular religion to claim that their own religion is the best, we must also acknowledge and respect the fact that our neighbors and relatives also have the same right to claim their religion is the best. Once on an airplane I was sitting right next to a Christian missionary, who was piously reading the Bible and praying. Seeing that I had nothing to do, he gave me a Bible and showed me how to read it. I praised his good intentions and enthusiasm, and agreed with his statement that Christianity is the only religion through which one can attain salvation. He immediately asked me, "If this is the case, why are you a Buddhist monk? Isn't that a pity?" I said, "I'm sorry, but for me, Buddhism is most suitable. So I would say that Buddhism is the best religion."
II. Interreligious Understanding
As shown in the incident I just mentioned, it is necessary to respect one another before we can understand one another. I accepted the missionary's Bible, and in return gave him a Buddhist book. From his expression I could see how much he hoped that I would diligently read the Bible, just as I hoped he would look through the book about Buddhism.
In Taiwan and various parts of the world, I frequently go to the educational institutions and churches of other religions, sometimes to lecture on Buddhist studies, sometimes to participate in symposiums, and sometimes to attend religious ceremonies. I have quite a few friends from other religions. Other religions invite me to discuss Buddhism, and we also invite missionaries and scholars of other religions to our Buddhist schools and institutes to introduce their religions. And representatives from the major religions are always happy to attend religious conferences sponsored by Buddhists.
From what I know, the first people to introduce Buddhism to the West were not for the most part Buddhists but rather Christian missionaries who had gone to the Orient to evangelize.
Buddhism has been in China now for 2,000 years. When it was first introduced to China, it tried to adapt to indigenous Chinese culture as much as possible, even using Taoist and Confucian terminology and concepts to explain parts of its doctrines. This then contributed to the arising of Buddhist schools with distinctly Chinese characteristics such as the Tiantai, Huayan, Pure Land, and Chan schools. In other words, Buddhism in China first learned and absorbed elements from traditional Chinese culture, then evolved into new schools distinct from Indian Buddhist schools. Even traditional Chinese Confucians learned and incorporated Buddhist thought, which resulted in the rise of Neo-Confucianism in the Song and Ming dynasties. Chinese Taoists, in a similar manner, transformed and incorporated many Buddhist scriptures into the Taoist Canon, thereby enriching Taoist culture. In China, Buddhist monks from the generation before mine were required to be well versed in not only the Buddhist Canon, but also Confucian and Taoist thought; otherwise, it would have been difficult for them to propagate Buddhist teachings. In our age, we should open our minds even more, and learn about the various world religions, so as not to find ourselves in self-imposed isolation with narrow horizons, like a frog gazing up at the sky from the bottom of a well.
If we turn back to discuss Indian religions, we can see that they, too, have contributed to one another's growth through mutual influence and stimulation. In fact, much of the content of Buddhism was incorporated from ancient Indian religions. In the Buddha's time, different religious sects and schools filled India, some ancient, and some newly-established. Siddhartha Gautama himself humbly learned from many teachers of various spiritual schools. After becoming a Buddha, though he developed distinctly Buddhist views, and discarded many religious views and beliefs not in conformity with Buddhism, Buddhism is still a product of Indian religious culture. Hence, in turn, in the 8th century the great Hindu philosopher Shankara (700-750) consulted Buddhist Madhyamika philosophy and thereby created Vedantic philosophy.
Buddhism stresses an ethic based on cause and effect-as you sow, so shall you reap-whereas Christianity seems to focus almost solely on the believer's salvation through faith, without relating it to his ethical behavior. Actually, according to the contemporary philosopher John Hick, if one looks at the parables of the worthy and unworthy servants and of the sheep and the goats in the Gospel of Mathew, chapter twenty-five, one can see that the teachings of Jesus Christ actually have a very strong ethical and practical character: that is, one day we will inevitably reap the consequences of what we do in our daily lives now. For this reason the Apostle Paul, in chapter six, verse seven of his letter to the Galatians "whatever a man sows, that he shall also reap." In addition, Hick said that "in our own time Catholic and Reformed ...... Christians have come, at least in a significant minority, to see an authentic response to God as requiring a dedication, individually, nationally and globally, to social justice and the preservation of endangered Mother Earth." Seen from this angle, the views of Christianity are not that far from those of Buddhism and other religions.
Let us now look at the God of Islam. In the Qur'an, Allah has ninety-nine different names, including the Protector, the Forgiver, the Bestower, the Forbearing One, the All-Forgiving, the Source of All Goodness, the Protecting Friend, the Loving One, the Lord, the Pardoner, the Compassionate, and the Guide to the Right Path. From this we can see that Allah is a God who loves all humanity, as stressed in the Qur'an, sura two, verse sixty-two, "whoever believes in God and the Last Day, and whoever does right, shall have his reward with his Lord." In his book The Fifth Dimension Hick said that, when the Muslims came to India, there were some who argued that Zoroastrians, Hindus, Jains, and Buddhists were also "People of the Book." "The Book" refers to the eternal word of God that is expressed to his people in different human situations through different prophets in different revealed scriptures. Even though many mainstream and fundamentalist Muslims believe that many nonMuslims are missing their opportunity to enter Paradise, the message spread by Islam is that the possibility of entering Paradise is good news for all, not just for Muslims. The Islamic mystics, the Sufis, are especially able to believe that followers of other faiths may also receive God's mercy.
Naturally, from a standpoint of mutual respect and appreciation, religions must seek greater understanding of one another, yet there is no need to distort each other's beliefs in our search for common ground. That would not only cause great pain and trouble, but also lead to three possible outcomes: 1. twisting other religions to make them like one's own; 2. denying the position of one's own religion to comply with other religions; or 3. blending different religions together to establish a new one. None of these scenarios are healthy. Thus someone once asked His Holiness the 14th Dalai Lama, "If you believe that all religions are good, should we establish a syncretic religion?" He replied, "No, there are already enough religions in the world." What he meant was that, since ancient times, humanity's religions have always been diverse. Each has its own beauty. Each has its own virtue. Each has its own truth. There is no need to blend them. It might be good to seek common ground while preserving differences. For instance: Buddhism advocates the theory of conditioned arising and is non-theistic. It can respect and understand theistic religions and does not need to deny its own position in order to be on friendly terms with other faiths.
III. Interreligious Cooperation
Cooperation among religions does not mean leaders of various religions coming together to discuss doctrine to find out who is superior or inferior, higher or lower, greater or lesser, better or worse. This will only lead to conflict, deepen disagreement, increase enmity, and create opposition. If we can follow the principle of mutual respect, then we can all interact peacefully. Especially in our religiously pluralistic modem age, one has only to leave one's country, one's ethnic group, or even one's home, to come into contact with followers of different religions. In an open society, one may find several different faiths even within a family. We must respect, even support, each other's choices with an attitude of appreciation, and should never criticize other faiths based on our own subjective standpoint. We should cooperate to create a harmonious, peaceful, happy and warm community in which to live.
Today, and especially in the world of the future, due to the ever-increasing quantity and accessibility of information, the convenience of transportation, the rapid progress of technology, and the ever-changing nature of contemporary society, people separated by thousands of miles can talk as though they sat face to face. For this reason, those who would like a single faith to take over the niches of all other faiths are faced with stronger and stronger opposing influences. Unless we would isolate ourselves from the reality of the greater world, we must help one another and cooperate in sharing the various resources needed for life.
We religious believers all share a common way of thinking. We all believe that the object of our belief, be it called Jehovah, Jesus Christ, the Messiah, God, the Lord, Allah, Shiva, Vishnu, the Bodhisattvas, or the Buddha, is possessed of love, compassion, awe-inspiring presence, and great divine power; thus we believers are able to gain peace, protection, and salvation. Moreover, we also believe we must follow and practice the teachings and admonishments of our sacred scriptures, holy injunctions and revelations to help all beings also gain peace, protection, and salvation. In this way, we share the great love and compassion of God, the Bodhisattvas, and the Buddha with all people. Yet this is not limited to spreading the faith; what is more important is maintaining the safety of humanity and the peace of people's minds and raising the quality of society and people's characters. A livable environment for all requires that all work collectively for its improvement.
All the living and non-living beings on this planet are integral parts of the community of all life, how much more so the believers of various religions who are human beings. Different interpretations of sacred texts, holy injunctions and revelations have led to the differences between religions, however, if one can experience the non-personal and indivisible Ultimate Reality, he would know that in this Reality, there is no distinction between self and other, inner and outer, superior and inferior, or high and low. Yet this reality is many-sided.
Looking at the life of Gandhi, we see that he was influenced by a Jain master named Raychandbhai to accept that many different views, including religious views, may all be reasonable and valid. Thus he agreed that "religions are different roads converging on the same point. What does it matter that we take different roads so long as we reach the same goal? I believe in the fundamental truth of all great religions of the world. I believe they are all God given and I believe they were necessary to the people to whom they were revealed."
This is to say that the various religions have only one goal, which is Ultimate Reality. This is the transcendence of human nature and divine nature, the movement from a personal, differentiated God to a non-personal, undifferentiated reality. In Buddhism this is called Reality; in other religions it is called Absolute Truth. Gandhi saw that Reality has many sides, so he accepted that the differences did not contradict Absolute Truth. What the various religions argue over is the different aspects of reality. If they realized that a single reality underlies those aspects, they would cease arguing. Naturally, we don't have to completely endorse Gandhi's view, but it is something we can raise for consideration.
I'd like to relate a true story: Thirty years ago, several friends and I made a vow to save Chinese Buddhism. Thereafter, some went to south to Thailand, some northeast to Japan, and some into the mountains to practice austerities. More than ten years later, we unexpectedly all met again in the US. Each had learned different things, but they were all facets of Buddhism. Thus once again we agreed to cooperate on practical matters. Actually, there should be a lot of room for cooperation between different sects of a single religion or between organizations or individuals of different religions. This cooperation doesn't have to entail joining a single organization. It could simply be acting in cooperation to abandon violence, cast aside long-standing grudges, and not settle old scores. It could mean joining forces to eliminate the causes of starvation, diseases, natural disasters, and ethnic conflicts, to protect the environment and resources of this planet for future generations, and to protect the human spirit from being polluted by enmity, greed, envy, anger, pride, irresolution, fear, worry, arrogance, feelings of inferiority and voidness. If each religion can start by influencing and encouraging its own believers in this way, then the major religions of each country in the world can also influence that country's citizens, as well as politicians and businessmen. If everyone can share this kind of understanding, it will be a giant first step toward religious cooperation.
This article by Venerable Dr. Shen Yen was his Closing Address at the International Conference on Religious Cooperation held in Taipei, Taiwan, ROC, on the 21st of September, 2001.

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Julia Cameron on the Path of Creativity
The author of The Artist's Way and The Vein of Gold in conversation with Samuel Bercholz, founder and president of Shambhala Publications.

Samuel Bercholz: Your work is nominally about creativity, but it seems to be as much about tools for spiritual growth. What is the connection?
Julia Cameron: People often say to me, "Your book is a Buddhist book," or "This is a book about mysticism, really, or this is a Sufi book." That is probably because creativity is a spiritual path, and at the core of the various spiritual paths are the same lessons. For instance, I recently read Thich Nhat Hanh for the first time, and I found myself thinking that he sees the world with an artist's eye. I think that's because he is very heart-centered. Even though we think of creativity as an intellectual pursuit, in my experience creativity is a heart-centered pursuit. We actually create from the heart. I think it's interesting that the word "heart" has the word "art" embedded in it. It also has the word "ear" embedded in it.
So both Buddhism and creativity involve the art of listening to the heart. That's where the creative impulse arises from. That's why I cannot distinguish between creativity and spirituality. When you're practicing creativity you become a grounded individual, and that communicates the universal.
I've been a writer for more than thirty years, and the issues that arise in the creative practice are the same kinds of issues that arise in a spiritual practice. You get to look at your insecurity. You get to look at your inquisitiveness. You get to look at your fantasy that a satisfied desire will lead to satisfaction. As near as I can tell, this is what happens with a grounded meditation technique: you go through all of the shenanigans of the restless nature of the mind and what you are left with is, just be. Out of being, things are made. So creativity is the act of being.
Samuel Bercholz: Your creativity exercises could also be viewed as a form of therapy.
Julia Cameron: Again, I don't make those definitions. My books are taught by myriad therapists. What they have found is that if they can heal their clients' creativity, neurosis disappears. This is why they all love this approach, and why therapists facilitate artists' circles all the time.
My feeling is that an enormous amount of what we think of as neurosis is actually blocked creativity. When people begin living in their creativity, the "neurosis" disappears. I am not certain that we are a neurotic culture; I think we are more a stifled culture, needing to express the self, and you can spell that either small "s" or large "S."
My feeling is that we are exhausted with talk therapy. Because The Artist's Way is experiential, it brings people back into their bodies and their hearts. Therapists are using it to bring people into an embodied practice, and that's why everyone's calming down.
It's one of the world's best kept secrets that art makes people sane and happy. If you think creativity makes you crazy and broke, let's not do it. On the other hand, if it makes you expanded and connected and joyous and vibrant and beautiful, it may make us a little nervous, but maybe we should try it.
The only time I get in trouble is if I'm not making something myself. If I'm too busy teaching to do my own art I get very sad. It's a matter of balance for me. I must keep my artist first and my teacher second. I must be making things and then sharing out of that process. If I am only teaching what I have already learned without doing my practice in order to be learning more, I'm very desperately unhappy. It's dangerous for me.
When we are creative we become happier, more stable, more user-friendly. We have this image of writers as grumpy curmudgeons. Well, when they're blocked they are, but a writer who's writing is usually a very festive, even if it's secretly festive, person. A lot of what I teach is playing. I think that as we become more light, we take our ideas more seriously.
Samuel Bercholz: Do you mean "light" like "more brilliant" or like "light-hearted?"
Julia Cameron: Light-hearted. As we become more light-hearted, we paradoxically take our ideas more seriously. If we're trying to take our ideas seriously without a light heart we do not have the passion to execute them. This is why I say creativity is a matter of the heart: it takes heart to execute. If you can get people back in their heart, you get them into executing their creativity. If you keep them in their head, the heart becomes hobbled and the capacity to make things that connect becomes hobbled.
Samuel Bercholz: A big part of The Artist's Way and Vein of Gold is how passion and creativity relate.
Julia Cameron: I think passion is a marvelous thing. I was recently bawled out by a shaman because he took my use of the word passion to mean emotion and turbulence. I use passion to mean an act of will and commitment. I believe that we are intended to be utterly present, present with a passionate commitment. Then when we are, we create. Conversely, when we create, we become present with passionate commitment.
One of the aspects of certain forms of Buddhism that I have difficulty with is that occasionally I get the feeling that people are using their meditation to avoid experiencing the incarnation we all share. They become detached, they hold the larger view, and it becomes: leaf falls from tree, child dies, same value. I think we can hold that view some of the time, but we are intended as humans to resonate far more deeply than that. I believe that creativity as a spiritual path is very much a felt path.
Samuel Bercholz: "Felt" in the sense of passion, or heartfelt?
Julia Cameron: I don't see those as two different things. Do you?
Samuel Bercholz: No, but...sometimes feeling is just a swirl. Is there a difference between the swirl of emotion and heartfelt feeling?
Julia Cameron: When we're in a swirl of emotion, in a funny way it's intellectual. Confusing and conflicting ideas are wrapped up with the emotions, much the way smoke has particles in it. When we are in our heart, there is a clarity to the feeling, a purity to the feeling. It's less like smoke and more like water. Creativity allows you to purify swirling emotions.
Samuel Bercholz: By grounding them? By liberating them? What happens?
Julia Cameron: You see, for me it's difficult to talk so theoretically. For instance, this morning I was very frustrated. I sat down and wrote four short poems, and then I was fine. The poems both grounded and liberated what I was feeling.
Then I think we should talk just about the practice, because the intellectual part of this doesn't make any sense. You can read everything about creativity, everything about meditation, everything about spirituality, and what difference does it make?
Okay, let's look at the nuts and bolts of The Artist's Way. Get up in the morning and write three pages of long hand writing about anything.
Samuel Bercholz: What inspired you to do that? This is something you created, and people are doing it all over the world.
Julia Cameron: It didn't begin with an idea. One day I got up and started doing it, and I found that it worked.
Samuel Bercholz: What do you mean by "worked"?
Julia Cameron: It made me prioritized for my day; it rendered me present to my life; it gave me a seed bed of ideas that later became creative work; it rendered me profoundly present. So I did it more. (laughs)
Samuel Bercholz: Then you wrote the prescription for everybody else. How did you know that this wasn't just for you?
Julia Cameron: People would call me up who were confused, and I'd say, "Try this," and it would work for them. That's how it became larger: I simply shared the tool. It's a tool that arose out of the fact that I am a writer with a habit of writing; therefore, it was the most natural thing in the world for me to get up one morning and start writing, and then to notice what it did for me.
I also do believe in reincarnation. I think that I'm a teacher, and I suspect I've been a teacher for a very long time. A lot of what I know comes from my thirty years of work as a writer, but I suspect that a lot of what I know is remembered. I think this is true for all of us, that we are often doing in this life a work that we began a long time ago. That's what I think The Artist's Way is; it's a work that I probably began a long time ago. Or that artists began a long time ago.
Samuel Bercholz: So do you think there's an ancestry of artists as well as a family ancestry?
Julia Cameron: Absolutely. When people talk about a spiritual practice, they talk about the lineage of the practice. I think I'm squarely within the lineage of creativity, from the caves forward.
Samuel Bercholz: Is this a natural gift, or something you had to develop?
Julia Cameron: I think we have natural gifts and then we develop them. I think my work is helping people to wake up to their gifts and develop them.
Samuel Bercholz: Do you think everybody has natural gifts?
Julia Cameron: Absolutely!
Samuel Bercholz: So what's with all these frustrated people?
Julia Cameron: I think we've forgotten who we are. I think we've forgotten we're gifted. We've been made to feel we aren't gifted: we have an enormous mythology that creativity belongs to an elite few. They've known it since birth, they suffer no fear, they always wear black...
So what The Artist's Way tools do is reconnect people to their own creative impulses, at which point people become far stronger and begin to move in the direction of those impulses. It's essentially a spiritual process, a listening process: with morning pages you are listening to what's going on within you. You're putting it on the page and communicating it to yourself and, in a sense, to the world.
The second basic tool is something called an "artist's date," which is a once-a-week festive period of solitude. This is like turning on the radio to receive. So with morning pages you're listening to yourself and communicating out, and then you go into solitude, a festive engaged form of solitude - you are out in the world, you are interacting, you begin to feel and hear other impulses. You begin to receive.
Samuel Bercholz: In The Vein of Gold you talk about walking as more than just a physical thing. It's about visual images that come by and all kinds of things.
Julia Cameron: We are ecosystems. Creativity is an ecosystem. If we want to be creative, we fish from the well of the ecosystem. It's as though you have an inner trout run and when you strive for creativity you're fishing out of it. Then you need to replenish it, restock it.
When you walk, a couple of things happen. One is that you have an image-flow moving at you. You see and notice things. You see a tiny little bird skittering under a pine branch. You see a homeless person if you're in the city. You note the image, and the image goes into the well. The well is part of the heart, and that's where your art comes from.
Walking also moves you across the bridge into a larger realm of ideas. It allows you to listen to a different frequency. I experience it as a sort of click in the back of my head. I begin to have insights and inspirations which seem to be of a simpler and higher order. There is something enormously powerful about visualizing and moving at the same time. It may just be because we have more energy to deal with, but it really helps things to clarify, and once something clarifies it begins to be able to manifest.
I call it crossing into the imagination. When we make things they begin as thought forms, as spiritual blueprints, and when we are walking and we visualize something, we're actually drawing it into form. As a writer, if I have a tangled plot line, I go for a walk. I'm not thinking particularly about my plot; I'm thinking about the little wren that I saw, I'm thinking about the mallards, if I'm in New York maybe I'm thinking about the antique velvet rope that I saw in the shop window. And as I'm thinking about these things, "Oh! That's what I can do with my plot" emerges. Creativity is sort of Zen: as you focus north, solutions emerge south. It's not linear.
Samuel Bercholz: Well, that's magic. That's the way spiritual practice is: it works because it works. I mean, you could do whole scientific studies and they don't help anything. You can make up excuses why it works, but they're just excuses.
Julia Cameron: You know, if smart were the solution, very few of us would be screwed up. Smart isn't the solution. The heart is the solution. That's why I don't like the term "mindfulness." I like the term "heartfulness." I think it's more accurate.
Samuel Bercholz: Actually, the term is translated from the Sanskrit, and whoever translated it chose the word "mind" rather than "heart." But mindfulness refers to the Sanskrit citta, which is in fact "heart." So "heartfulness" is more accurate; it's not about our head at all.
Julia Cameron: Well, this is good. I always thought, what a dreadful word, they can't mean it.
So we're really talking about what arises from the heart.
Samuel Bercholz: You don't mean the little flesh thing, right? What do you mean by "heart?
Julia Cameron: The essence. The center. The place that is simultaneously individual and universal that each of us carries. That point of truth. I think heart is a pretty good word for that.
Samuel Bercholz: What's the relationship between time and creativity? You're struggling with a deadline now, working on a book, and all of us who are involved with the world of creativity know there are always deadlines and the panic that comes with them. Do you think it's positive that there are time restrictions or would it be better if things were eased up?
Julia Cameron: It's a central question. We yearn for more time with the illusion that if we had open time we would be creating all the time. The trick is to actually learn to use the time which we have.
What I try to teach is how to be creative within the life you've got. We are a workaholic society. We are addicted to work and often to work for work's sake. But when you are happy, rested and in touch with yourself, you can often work very quickly. That's because when you have some clarity it's easy to do something quickly. The trick is really clarity. People say, I don't have time to do the morning pages, but if they do the morning pages it gives them clarity, and that makes them do all the rest of their life more quickly and more easily.
Now, the whole issue of how to be creative within a business environment is an issue of people being connected and clear, which is contagious. I use the term "creative contagion." Very often if one person in a workplace starts working with creative emergence tools somebody else will say, "What are you doing? You seem really different." Then they'll start doing them and you have this sort of grassroots beneath the hierarchy; out of sight of the superiors you have these people who are becoming more and more grounded while also becoming more visionary, innovative and individual.
These tools render us able to see our choices in any given situation. In the middle of a demanding business day you can close the office door for ten minutes and listen to a piece of music. You can go off and write a half a page just to clear your thinking. The tools are very portable. These little tiny timeouts during a day keep you connected, and just an instant of connection creates space for what I call grace, or what other people might call inspiration or intuition. If we make the smallest opening, there is the possibility of creativity. This is why it is so much like a spiritual practice.
Samuel Bercholz: Do you want to say something about the various kinds of addictions and their relationship to creativity?
Julia Cameron: Our mythology tells us that artists are addicted people - that they are promiscuous, drug addicted, alcoholic. We've come to think that somehow those addictions are part of the creative process.
My experience is exactly the opposite. My experience is that creativity is freedom from addiction. We are frightened when we feel the force of our own creative energy, because we don't know how to ground it. This is why my tools tend to be grounding tools, and when creativity is safely grounded and used, addictions fall to one side. Conversely, if you see someone addicted, what you're seeing is a profoundly creative soul reaching for a substitute to self-expression.
When people get sober they can be profoundly creative. When people get emotionally sober off of a process addiction like workaholism or sex addiction or relationship addiction, they have freed for their use a beautiful amount of new usable energy with which they can make wonderful things. That doesn't just mean writing a poem or making a ceramic vase. It can be a new system for the office. It can be revamping the way they do parent/teacher meetings.
But often what happens is that when we experience our creative energy we don't recognize it as creative energy; we just think it's anxiety. So rather than saying, "How can I direct this energy and what should I make?" we try to block it. We block it by thinking of some titillating sexual adventure. We block it by picking up a drink. We block it with a pint of Hagen Daas. We block it by picking up workaholic work. But it doesn't go away; it's still there. Creativity is always there, because it is as innate to humanity as blood and bone. It is the animating force.
Samuel Bercholz: Although a lot of people talk about creativity and sexuality as not different energies. Do you see them as different?
Julia Cameron: No. I would tend to say that energy itself is pure, and that we can abuse it. You can feel the difference between an
addictive, deadening sexual encounter and a sexual encounter where you stay present and the other person stays present.
Samuel Bercholz: Being in the present is the issue?
Julia Cameron: I think so.
Samuel Bercholz: Is it the same with creativity?
Julia Cameron: Creativity is living in the connected moment.
Samuel Bercholz: What do you mean by connected?
Julia Cameron: Heartful, present, alert, attentive, engaged.
Samuel Bercholz: Thank you.

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Let peace prevail on Earth
By Ven. Dr. K. Sri Dhammananda

The belief that the only way to fight aggression is by applying more aggressive methods has led to the arms race between the great powers. And this competition to increase the weapons of war has only brought mankind to the very brink of total self-destruction. If we do nothing about it, the next war will be the end of the world where there will be neither victors nor victim... only dead bodies.
Hatred does not cease by hatred; By love alone does it cease.
Such is the Buddha's advice to those who preach the doctrine of antagonism and ill-will, and who set men to war and rebellion against one another. Many people say that the Buddha's advice to return good for evil is impracticable. Actually, it is the only correct method to solve any problem. This method was introduced by the great Teacher from His own experience. Because we are proud and egoistic, we are reluctant to return good for evil, thinking that the public may treat us as being cowardly people. Some people even think that expressions of kindness, honesty, patience and gentleness are signs of weakness. But what harm is there if we could settle our problems and bring peace and happiness by adopting this cultured method and by sacrificing our dangerous egoism?
TOLERANCE
Tolerance must be practised if peace is to come to this earth. Force and compulsion will only create intolerance. To establish peace and harmony among mankind, each and everyone of us must first learn to practise the ways leading to the extinction of hatred, greed and delusion, the roots of all evil forces. If mankind can eradicate these evil forces, tolerance and peace will come to this restless world.
Today the followers of the most compassionate Buddha have a special duty to work for the establishment of peace in the world and to show an example to others by following their Master's advice:
All tremble at punishment, All fear death; Comparing others with oneself, One should neither kill nor cause to kill. DHAMMAPADA
Peace is always obtainable. The way to peace is not only through prayers and rituals. Peace is the result of man's mental development, harmony with his fellow beings and with his environment. The peace that we try to introduce by force is not a lasting peace. It could be likened to a truce between the conflict of selfish desire and fleeting worldly conditions.
Peace cannot exist on this earth without the practice of kindness and tolerance. To be tolerant, we must have proper understanding, with unbiased mind. The Buddha says,
No enemy can harm one so much as one's own thoughts of craving, hate and jealousy. DHAMMAPADA
Buddhism is a religion of perfect understanding because it preaches a life of self-restraint and self-reliance. Buddhism teaches a life based not on rules but on principles. Buddhism has never persecuted or maltreated those whose beliefs are different. The Teaching of the Buddha is such that anyone can practise the Noble religious Principles even without any religious labels.
The world is like a mirror; if you look at it with a smiling face, you can see your own, beautiful smiling face. On the other hand, if you look at it with a grim face, you will invariably see ugliness. Similarly, if you treat the world kindly the world will also certainly treat you in like manner. Learn to be peaceful with yourself and the world in return will also be peaceful with you.
Man's mind is given to so much self-deceit or egoistic ideas that he does not want to admit his own weaknesses. He will try to find some lame excuses to justify his wrong action so as to create an illusion that he is blameless. If a man really wants to be free from problems, he must have the courage to admit such weakness. The Buddha says:
Easily seen are other's faults; Hard indeed it is to see one's own faults.
The history of mankind is a continuous manifestation of man's greed, hatred, pride, jealousy, selfishness and delusion. It is mentioned that during the last 3,000 years, men have fought 15,000 major wars. Is this the characteristic feature of man? What is his destiny? If they are really human how can they bring destruction to their fellow beings?
Although men, have discovered and invented many important things which people have not known before, they have also made great advances leading towards the destruction of their own kind by misusing this new discoveries. Many human dignity and civilisations have been completely erased from this earth. Modern man has become so sophisticated in his art and techniques of warfare that it is now possible for him to turn the whole of mankind into ashes within a few seconds. The world has become a storehouse of military hardware as a result of a little game called 'Military Superiority.'
We are told that the prototype of a nuclear weapon is more powerful than the atomic bomb which was dropped at Hiroshima, Japan in August, 1945. Scientists believe that a few hundred thermonuclear weapons will chart the course towards, universal destruction. just see what human beings are doing to their own human race! Think what sort of a scientific development it is! See how cruel and selfish man has become!
Man should not pander to his aggressive, intrinsic attitude. He should instead uphold the noble teachings of the religious teachers and display justice with morality to enable peace to prevail.
Treaties, pacts and peace formulae have been adopted and millions of words have been spoken by countless world leaders throughout the world who pro. claim that they have finally found the way to maintain and promote peace on earth. But for all their efforts, they have not even succeeded in removing the threat to mankind. The reasons for this is that we have all failed to educate our young to truly understand and respect the need for selfless service and instill in them the danger of selfishness. To guarantee true peace, we must use every method available to us to educate our young to practise love, goodwill and understanding.
THE BUDDHIST ATTITUDE
Buddhists should not be the aggressors even in protecting their religion. They must try their best to avoid any kind of violent act. Sometimes they may be forced to go to war by others who do not respect the concept of the brotherhood of man as taught by the Buddha. They may be called upon to defend their fellow men from aggression, and as long as they have not renounced the worldly life, they are duty-bound to join in the struggle for peace and freedom. Under these circumstances, they cannot be blamed for their actions in becoming a soldier or being involved in defence. However, if everyone were to follow the advice of the Buddha, there would be no reason for war to take place in this world. It is the duty of every cultured man to find all possible ways and means to settle disputes in a peaceful manner, without declaring war to kill his fellow men. The Buddha did not teach His followers to surrender to any form of evil powers.
Indeed, with reason and science, man could conquer nature, and yet man has not yet even secured his own life. Why is it that life is in danger? While devoted to reason and being ruled by science, man has forgotten that he has a heart which has long been neglected and been left to wither away and be polluted by selfish desire.
If we cannot secure our own lives, then how can world peace be possible? TO obtain peace, we must train our minds to face facts. We must be objective and humble. We must realise that no one person, nor one nation is always wrong. To obtain peace, we must also share the richness of the earth. We should not deprive the living right of others.
It is simply inconceivable that five percent of the world's population should enjoy fifty percent of its wealth, or that twenty-five percent of the world should be fairly well-fed and some over-fed, while seventy-five percent of the world is always hungry. Peace will only come when nations are willing to share, the rich to help the poor and the strong to help the weak, thus creating international good will. Only if and when these conditions are met, can we envision a world with no excuse for wars.
The madness of the armaments race must stop! The amount of money and human lives that various governments waste in the battlefield should be diverted to build up the economies to elevate the standard of living of the people.
The world cannot have peace until men and nations renounce selfish desires, give up racial arrogance, and eradicate crazy attitude for possession and power. Wealth cannot secure happiness. Religion alone can affect the necessary change of heart and bring about the only real disarmament... that of the mind.
All religions teach people not to kill; but unfortunately this important religious principle is conveniently ignored. Today, with modern armaments, man can kill millions within one second. Very unfortunately some people bring religious labels, slogan and banners even into their battlefields. They do not know that by so doing they are only disgracing the good name of religion.
Verily, 0 Monk,' said the Buddha, 'due to sensuous craving, kings fight with kings, princes with princes, priests with priests, citizens with citizens, the mother quarrels with the son, the son quarrels with the father, brother with brother, brother with sister, sister with brother, friend with friend. MAJJIHIMA NIKAYA
We can happily say that for nearly 3000 years there has never been any serious discord or conflict created by Buddhists that led to war in the name of this religion. This is the result of the dynamic character of the concept of tolerance contained in the Buddha's teaching.
People today are restless, weary filled with jealousy. They are intoxicated with the selfish desire to gain more fame, wealth and power. They crave for gratification of the senses. People are passing their days in fear, suspicion and insecurity. In this time of turmoil and crisis, it becomes difficult for people to coexist peacefully with their fellowmen. There is therefore, a great need for tolerance in the world today so that peaceful coexistence among the people of the world can be possible.
The world has bled and suffered from the disease of dogmatism and of intolerance. The land of many countries today are soaked with the blood needlessly spilled on the earth. Whether in religion or politics people have been conscious of a mission to bring humanity only to their own way of life and have been aggressive towards the ways of life of others.
Let us look back on this present century of highly publicized 'Progress'... a century of gadgets and inventions. The array of new scientific and technical devices is dazzling... the hand phone, facsimile, telephone, electric motors, aeroplanes, radio, television, computers, internet, space ship, satellites and electronic devices...
Yet in this same century the children of the earth who have developed all these inventions as the ultimate in progress, are the same people who I-lave butchered millions of others by bayonets or bullets, gas or bomb. Amidst all the great 'Progress', where does the spirit of tolerance stand?
Today man is interested in exploring outer space when he is totally unable to live even as man-to-man in peace and harmony on the earth. Man will eventually desecrate the other planets.
For the sake of material gain, modern man violates nature. His mental activities are so preoccupied with his pleasure that he is unable to discover the meaning of life. This unnatural behaviour of present day mankind is the result of his wrong conception of human life and its ultimate aim. It is the cause of the frustration, fear, insecurity and intolerance of our present time.
In fact, today intolerance is still being practiced in the name of religion. People merely talk of religion and pro. mise to provide short cuts to paradise. If Muslims really follow the concept of Brotherhood, if Christians live by the Sermon on the Mount, if the Hindus shape their life in oneness and if Buddhists follow the Noble Eightfold Path, definitely there will be peace and harmony in this world of ours. In spite of the invaluable Teachings of the great religious teachers, people have still not realised the value of harmony and understanding. The intolerance that is practised in the name of religion is most disgraceful and deplorable.
The Buddha's advice is
Let us live happily, not hating those who hate us. Among those who hate us, let us live free from hatred. Let us live happily and free from ailment. Let us live happily and be free from greed; among those who are greedy.
OUR DUTY
Today, more than at any other time in history, peace seems remote and has become the most unattainable commodity in the world. There have been wars and conflicts before, there have also been terrible tyrants and oppressive governments, but never have there been these forces which seem bent on wrecking human lives been so effective on a global scale. As Buddhists, we too have a great responsibility to support all right thinking men who endeavour to join hands to stop this madness which is threatening to destroy our planet.
Is there a phase in human history when people are contented after getting what they desire? Is it possible to satisfy the insatiable thirst of man's craving and anxiety? Is it not so that the more we feed our senses, the more the craving grows? How good will it be if men can develop contentment that the Buddha had appreciated.
Millions of innocent human beings now have to flee from their homelands as refugees. There are no words in the human vocabulary that can fully describe the sorrow and agony inflicted by war on the people. 'War', according to Albert Einstein, 'Is a savage and inhuman relic of an age of barbarism.' And he is right.
It seems to me today that man is a creature that finds greater pleasure in destruction than creation. Is it in man's intrinsic nature to fight? No, it looks more like men finding peace so boring and war is exciting.
The Buddha has clearly stated in the Dhammapada.
Though one should conquer a million men in the battlefield, Yet he, indeed is the noblest victor who has conquered himself.
It is easy to kill, rob and threaten, but it takes greater strength to control the mind when it is influenced by anger and jealousy. Love and compassion are not symptoms of weakness but of strength. It takes a truly strong man to refrain from taking revenge.
The Buddha says in Dhammapada
Self-conquest is, indeed far greater than the conquest of all other folk, no other supernatural being can win back the victory of such a person who is self-subdued and ever lives in restraint.
Such sentiments have been echoed in the teachings of other religious leaders who came before and after the Buddha, but the Buddha alone has stated in no uncertain terms that there can be no excuse whatsoever for attack or even retaliation. There is no excuse for aggression of any kind for the Buddhists. He says: We should not be the aggressors but the defenders.
Racial arrogance, religious discrimination, traditional and customary practices, language and cultural differences, political conflicts, superiority and inferiority complexes, capitalism and poverty are some of the main causes which arouse man's prejudice capable of persuading him to inflict violence and bloodshed on others. Selfishness or egoistic ideas will only further aggravate the situation.
So as human beings, our task is to convince the world that peace is something which can be achieved not by conquering others but by conquering our own selfishness.
The Buddhist way is not to increase the numbers of those who label them. selves 'Buddhists' but to increase the number of noble human beings who do not fear to speak out against war and reject hatred. By realizing the dangerous situation of the world today, we hope that Buddhists all over the world, irrespective of their religious denominations or sects, will contribute something within their capacity to maintain peace and harmony for human beings to live without fear and worry.

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Nirvana

Nirvana is the goal of Buddhism, and yet it is not a heavenly paradise or any kind of eternal life or union with a divine being. It literally means "to extinguish" and refers to extinguishing the fires of greed, anger, and ignorance. Nirvana is usually spoken of in terms of what it removes or destroys, namely the three poisons of greed, anger, and ignorance and the suffering they engender. In the following passage, the Buddha clearly states what nirvana refers to, and also shows that an equally valid term would be "the deathless" because in extinguishing the fires of greed, anger, and ignorance one is released from the cycle of birth and death and awakens to the unconditioned.
"Venerable sir, it is said, 'the removal of lust, the removal of hatred, the removal of delusion.' Of what now, venerable sir, is this the designation?"
"This, monk, is a designation for the element of Nirvana: the removal of lust, the removal of hatred, the removal of delusion. The destruction of the taints is spoken of in this way."
When this was said, the monk said to the Blessed One: "Venerable sir, it is said, 'the Deathless, the Deathless.' What now, venerable sir, is the Deathless? What is the path leading to the Deathless?"
"The destruction of lust, the destruction of hatred, the destruction of delusion: this is called the deathless. This Noble Eightfold Path is the path leading to the Deathless: that right view... right concentration." (Connected Discourses of the Buddha, p. 1528)
The third noble truth as expressed in the Buddha's first discourse at the Deer Park actually does not use the term nirvana. Rather, the third noble truth is the truth of the cessation of suffering. Nirvana is simply another name for the cessation of suffering and it's causes, but many others are used as well.
"Monks, I will teach you the taintless and the path leading to the taintless. Listen to that...
"Monks, I will teach you the truth and the path leading to the truth... I will teach you the far shore... the subtle... the very difficult to see... the unaging... the stable... the undisintegrating... the unmanifest... the unproliferated... the peaceful... the deathless ... the sublime... the auspicious... the secure... the destruction of craving... the wonderful... the amazing... the unailing... the unailing state... Nirvana... the unafflicted... dispassion... purity... freedom... the unadhesive... the island... the shelter... the asylum... the refuge..." (Ibid, pp. 1378-1379)
So nirvana is one among several possible terms used to indicate the goal of Buddhist practice. It is certainly the most well known. However, the other terms should be kept in mind because they give further clues as to the nature of this goal. Many of the terms are negative: the taintless, the unaging, the undisintegrating, the unmanifest, the unproliferated, the deathless, the destruction of craving, the unailing, the unailing state, the unafflicted, dispassion, and the unadhesive are all terms which show what this goal is not and what it is freedom from. Other terms emphasize the elusive nature of the goal: it is subtle and very difficult to see. Others convey a sense of safety and the transcendence of suffering: the far shore, the stable, the peaceful, the secure, the island, the shelter, the asylum, and the refuge. There are terms which bring out the positive nature of the goal: the truth, the sublime, the auspicious, the wonderful, the amazing, purity, and freedom. Judging from these descriptive terms, it would seem that nirvana is much more than simply the absence of the three poisons and the suffering they create. However, because it is something so unlike anything we can experience with our deluded consciousness, it is safer to say what it is not rather than to risk giving a distorted view of it by trying to say what it is.
What Nirvana Is Not
The following statement by Shakyamuni Buddha gives a good illustration of the way in which the goal of Buddhist practice is set apart from all conditioned phenomena:
"There is, monks, that state where there is no earth, no water, no fire, no air; no base consisting of the infinity of space, no base consisting of the infinity of consciousness, no base consisting of the infinity of nothingness, no base consisting of the infinity of neither perception nor non-perception; neither this world nor another world nor both; neither sun nor moon. Here, monks, I say there is no coming, no going, no staying, no deceasing, no uprising. Not fixed, not movable, it has no support. Just this is the end of suffering." (Udana, p. 108)
What is interesting about this list is that it not only negates worldly phenomena but also other-worldly phenomena which meditators might get fixated on. Earth, air, fire, and water are the four primary elements which the ancient world believed composed all material things. So in negating those elements as well as the sun and moon it is made clear that nirvana is unlike any worldly phenomena. But the passage goes on to say it is "neither this world nor another world nor both" which cuts off identification of nirvana with any other world including the heavens of the realms of form and formlessness.
Buddhist cosmology views the world as divided into three realms: the realm of desire, the realm of form, and the realm of formlessness. These three realms consist of all the many regions wherein one undergoes samsara, the cycle of birth and death. The realm of desire encompasses the many hells, the hungry ghosts, animals, humans, fighting demons (the asuras), and the first six of the many heavens. It is called the realm of desire because all the beings within them are primarily motivated by their desire for sensual pleasures and it is within the realm of desire that they reap the rewards of their good and bad actions. The realm of form consists of the eighteen heavens which correspond to the four states of "dhyana," or meditative concentration. Those who attain those states of concentration in this life or who are reborn in those heavens have all reached a state of mind which temporarily transcends the sensual desires in favor of the contemplation of some more abstract form or concept. The realm of formlessness consists of four heavens which correspond to four increasingly subtle subjects of meditation which are all listed in the passage above: the base consisting of the infinity of space, the base consisting of the infinity of consciousness, the base consisting of the infinity of nothingness, the base consisting of the infinity of neither perception nor non-perception. Each of these heavens or states of concentration are said to transcend form itself due to their immaterial and boundless nature. However, even the refined heavens of the realms of form and formlessness are held to be only temporary states, and after millions or billions of years the heavenly beings in those realms must "come back to earth" and undergo rebirth in one of the other realms. Likewise, even the most advanced meditator must come out of their meditative absorption at some point and if they have not uprooted clinging and delusion within their minds they will undergo just as much frustration, anxiety, and suffering in regard to life and its problems as before.
In the Brahmajala Sutta of the Digha Nikaya, 95 types of wrong views held by the Buddha's contemporaries are listed. Five are specifically concerned with mistakenly claiming that nirvana can be identified with sensual pleasures or any of the four dhyanas. These are all considered views which wrongly identify nirvana "here and now" with the conditioned experiences of the three realms. (Long Discourses of the Buddha, pp. 85-86) The Brahmajala Sutta together with the passage from the Udana make it clear that nirvana is not any kind of material pleasure, altered state of consciousness, or heavenly realm. It should also be remembered that before attaining buddhahood, Siddhartha systematically rejected each of these possibilities after personally experiencing them for himself. He left the pleasures of the palace precisely because he recognized that sensual pleasures could not hold off the suffering of old age, sickness, and death. During his years of searching for the Truth he attained the meditative state of nothingness and later the state of neither perception nor non-perception but discovered that as soon as one came out of those states, one was still confronted by old age, sickness, death, and many other forms of suffering. Siddhartha's ability to see the shortcomings of both sensual pleasures and highly refined states of mental concentration and his determination to go beyond them was quite remarkable. Most people mistakenly believe that these lesser experiences are in fact the goal, when in fact nirvana is of a whole different order. This is why the Buddha impressed upon his disciples the distinction between nirvana and all the states of mind and being in the three realms.
There are other more subtle errors than simply misidentifying nirvana with the pleasures of this world or those of sublime meditative achievements. As taught in the Fire Sermon, there is nothing that should be identified or clung to as the self among the five aggregates. Nor is there anything apart from the five aggregates which can be the basis of a permanent, unchanging, independent self. This includes nirvana. So if one believes that nirvana is something that can be identified with the self, or as the abiding place of a self, owned by a self or even as something that can be contrasted with a self, then one has not really understood nirvana let alone come to know it as it really is. The experience of nirvana is simultaneously the experience of selflessness. The Buddha taught that one could analyze all the different elements of material existence such as earth, air, fire, and water, and see that none of them provide the basis for a self. In fact, in coming to know things as they really are one will also appreciate selflessness and the freedom that comes from abandoning the delusion of self. If this is true of the material elements, how much more true is it of nirvana which is the unconditioned.
"He perceives Nirvana as Nirvana. Having perceived Nirvana as Nirvana, he conceives [himself as] Nirvana, he conceives [himself] in Nirvana, he conceives [himself apart] from Nirvana, he conceives Nirvana to be 'mine,' he delights in Nirvana. Why is that? Because he has not fully understood it, I say.
"Monks, a monk who is higher in training, whose mind has not yet reached the goal, and who is still aspiring to the supreme security from bondage, directly knows earth as earth. Having directly known earth as earth, he should not conceive [himself as] earth, he should not conceive [himself] in earth, he should not conceive [himself apart] from earth, he should not conceive earth to be 'mine,' he should not delight in earth. Why is that? So that he may fully understand it, I say.
"He directly knows water as water ... He directly knows all as all...
"He directly knows Nirvana as Nirvana. Having directly known Nirvana as Nirvana, he should not conceive [himself as] Nirvana, he should not conceive [himself] in Nirvana, he should not conceive [himself apart] from Nirvana, he should not conceive Nirvana to be 'mine,' he should not delight in Nirvana. Why is that? So that he may fully understand it, I say." (Middle Length Discourses, p. 87)
Even recognizing that the spiritual goal is not sensual pleasure, or exalted states of consciousness, or the basis of a self is not enough however. The most insidious obstacle to liberation is clinging itself. If one tries to pridefully lay claim to the experience of nirvana, the unconditioned, then that very attitude of egotistic clinging gives the lie to that claim. Only when every cloud of pride and clinging have been cleared away can the genuine illumination of nirvana shine through into our lives.
"Here, monks, some recluse or brahmin, with the relinquishing of views about the past and the future, through complete lack of resolve upon the fetters of sensual pleasure, and with the surmounting of the rapture of seclusion, unworldly pleasure, and neither-painful-nor-pleasant feeling, regarding himself thus: 'I am at peace, I have attained Nirvana, I am without clinging.'
"The Tathagata, monks, understands this thus: 'This good recluse or brahmin, with the relinquishing of views about the past and the future...regards himself thus: "I am at peace, I have attained Nirvana, I am without clinging." Certainly this venerable one asserts the way directed to Nirvana. Yet this good recluse or brahmin still clings, clinging either to a view about the past or to a view about the future or to a fetter of sensual pleasure or to the rapture of seclusion or to unworldly pleasure or to the neither-painful-nor-pleasant feeling. And when this venerable one regards himself thus: "I am at peace, I have attained Nirvana, I am without clinging," that too is declared to be clinging on the part of this good recluse or brahmin. That too is conditioned and gross, but there is cessation of formations.' Having understood 'There is this,' seeing the escape from that, the Tathagata has gone beyond that.
"Monks, this supreme state of sublime peace has been discovered by the Tathagata, that is, liberation through not clinging, by understanding as they actually are the origination, the disappearance, the gratification, the danger, and the escape in the case of the six bases of contact. Monks, that is the supreme state of sublime peace discovered by the Tathagata, that is, liberation through not clinging, by understanding as they actually are the origination, the disappearance, the gratification, the danger, and the escape in the case of the six bases of contact." (Ibid, p. 846)
For many, all these negations gave the impression that the Buddha was teaching a form of nihilism in which one ceased to do anything except contemplate the annihilation of the "self." The Buddha clearly stated that this was not the case. In one instance, a Jain adherent named General Siha came to the Buddha to see if the Buddha really taught a form of quietism and annihilationism. The Buddha responded:
"There is indeed a way, Siha, in which one can rightly say of me that I am a teacher of inaction; and there is also a way in which one can say that I am a teacher of action.
"I do teach people to be inactive in regard to evil conduct in deeds, words and thoughts; I teach inaction in regard to the multitude of evil, unwholesome qualities. But I also teach people to be active by way of good conduct in deeds, words and thoughts; I teach action in regard to the multitude of wholesome qualities.
"There is also a way in which one can rightly say that I am an annihilationist. For I teach the annihilation of greed, hatred and delusion; I teach the annihilation of the multitude of evil, unwholesome qualities." (The Numerical Discourses, p. 201)
Nirvana is not just passivity nor is it the annihilation of the self. The Buddha taught that the "self" is a concept with no substantial or singular referent in the first place. So there is no "self" to get rid of, and nirvana is not the extinction or annihilation of a self. But it is the extinction of greed, anger, and ignorance. It is, therefore, the extinction of the delusion of self and all the selfishness and suffering which the delusion of self engenders.
Nirvana is most often spoken of in negative terms, in terms of what it is not. But this does not mean that nirvana itself is a negative experience. Rather, it is something which is very positive because it eradicates the very things in our lives which keep us chained to the cycle of birth and death, and all the suffering which comes with it.
What Nirvana Is
The Buddha did teach that nirvana is more than a mere absence. While it is unlike any conditioned phenomena which ordinary people experience, the Buddha does describe it as something which we can awaken to as the source of freedom and bliss. It is an unconditioned reality which can be seen or experienced by those who remove delusion and clinging in regard to conditioned phenomena.
"There is, monks, a not-born, a not-brought-to-being, a not-made, a not-formed. If, monks, there were no not-born, not-brought-to-being, not-made, not-formed, no escape would be discerned from what is born, brought-to-being, made, formed. But since there is a not-born, a not-brought-to-being, a not-made, a not-formed, therefore an escape is discerned from what is born, brought-to-being, made, formed. (Udana, p. 109)
In the Itivuttaka, this same passage is accompanied by the following verses which explicitly describe this sublime state as one of bliss:
The born, come-to-be, produced,
The made, the formed, the unlasting,
Conjoined with decay and death,
A nest of disease, perishable,
Sprung from nutriment and craving's cord -
That is not fit to take delight in.
The escape from that, the peaceful,
Beyond reasoning, everlasting,
The not-born, the unproduced,
The sorrowless state that is void of stain,
The cessation of states linked to suffering,
The stilling of the conditioned - bliss.
(Itivuttaka, p. 31)
Nirvana is often referred to as blissful in several discourses. In the following verses, nirvana is called the "greatest bliss." It is then referred to as the deathless, which is the goal of the eightfold path.
"The greatest of all gains is health,
Nirvana is the greatest bliss,
The eightfold path is the best of paths
For it leads safely to the Deathless."
(Middle Length Discourses, p. 613)
Another passage from the Udana, said in reference to the enlightenment and passing away of Bahiya whom we shall hear more of later, includes many of the negations found in the other passages, but this time the negations are used to characterize nirvana as an otherworldly illumination which transcends the light of the sun, moon, and stars.
Where neither water nor yet earth
Nor fire nor air gain a foothold
There gleam no stars, no sun sheds light.
There shines no moon, yet there no darkness reigns.
When a sage, a brahmin, has come to know this
For himself through his own experience
Then he is freed from form and formlessness
Freed from pleasure and from pain.
(Udana, p. 21)
Despite the fact that nirvana is the unconditioned, the Buddha did distinguish between two different "types" or "elements." The first is the nirvana-element with residue left and the second is nirvana with no residue left. Actually, these are not two different kinds of nirvana, as though the unconditioned could be divided into categories, so much as they are descriptions of the impact that nirvana has at the point of realization and later on upon the death of one who has realized it. These are described in the Itivuttaka as follows:
"Monks, there are these two Nirvana-elements. What are the two? The Nirvana-element with residue left and the Nirvana-element with no residue left.
"What, monks, is the Nirvana-element with residue left? Here a monk is an arhat, one whose taints are destroyed, the holy life fulfilled, who has done what had to be done, laid down the burden, attained the goal, destroyed the fetters of being and is completely released through final knowledge. However, his five sense faculties remain unimpaired, by which he still experiences what is agreeable and disagreeable and feels pleasure and pain. It is the extinction of attachment, hate and delusion in him that is called the Nirvana-element with residue left.
"Now what, monks, is the Nirvana-element with no residue left? Here a monk is an arhat... completely released through final knowledge. For him, here in this very life, all that is experienced, not being delighted in, will be extinguished. That, monks, is called the Nirvana-element with no residue left.
"These, monks, are the two Nirvana elements.
These two Nirvana elements were made known
By the Seeing One, serene and unattached:
One is the element seen here and now
With residue, but with the cord of being destroyed;
The other, having no residue for the future,
Is that wherein all modes of being utterly cease.
Having understood the unconditioned state,
Released in mind with the cord of being destroyed,
They have attained to the Dharma-essence.
Delighting in the destruction (of craving).
Those serene ones have abandoned all being.
(Itivuttaka, pp. 31-32)
Nirvana with residue left is what the Buddha attained beneath the Bodhi Tree. This type of nirvana is the extinction of the defilements during one's lifetime. One is still vulnerable to physical pain and discomfort, as well as the need for food and sleep and other natural functions, but one no longer suffers any emotional distress because all greed, anger, and ignorance have been rooted out. In addition, one who attains nirvana with residue left no longer produces any karma. In other words, their actions are no longer tainted by craving or egocentricity or the desire to possess or acquire anything further from or in life. Because their actions are accompanied only by pure intentions with no trace of craving or aversion there are no longer any karmic repercussions. However, while they no longer create any further karma, karma from their past (including past lives) may still come to fruition for good or ill until the time of their passing. Fortunately, those who attain nirvana with remainder are able to deal with all the vicissitudes of life with calm and equanimity from that point on.
Nirvana with no remainder describes the total extinction of all pain and suffering with no chance of it arising anymore. This is attained upon the death of the physical body and the dissipation of the five aggregates (form, sensation, perception, volition, and consciousness). Nirvana with no remainder is also called "parinirvana," which means "complete nirvana." Parinirvana thus refers to the death of a buddha or arhat whereupon they transcend the cycle of birth and death and are forever beyond the reach of all forms of pain and suffering.
Unfortunately, some sutras occasionally use the term "nirvana" to refer to the parinirvana of a buddha or arhat, and so people mistakenly got the impression that nirvana was a state which could only be achieved at death and some even came to the conclusion that it was a kind of heavenly reward. In actuality, nirvana is something which is realizable in this very lifetime; though it is true that the second type, parinirvana, is only attained at death. Even then, parinirvana depends upon the attainment of nirvana during one's lifetime as it is the culmination of the cessation of suffering which is begun at the point when one extinguishes the defilements and directly encounters the unconditioned which transcends all conditioned objects of clinging.
Perhaps the most positive characterization of nirvana is that it is liberation from suffering. It is this taste of liberation which pervades the entirety of the Buddha Dharma. All of the teachings and practices have liberation as their aim. As the Buddha put it:
"Just as the great ocean has but one taste, the taste of salt; even so this Dharma and Discipline has but one taste, the taste of liberation." (Numerical Discourses, p. 204)
Nirvana Directly Visible
Nirvana might seem to be a remote goal, something that lies forever beyond our horizon. However, the Buddha assured people that it was indeed possible to come to know it within one's lifetime. The way to do it is to abandon greed, anger, and ignorance.
Once the brahmin Janussoni approached the Blessed One ... and spoke to him thus:
"It is said, Master Gotama, 'Nirvana is directly visible.' In what way, Master Gotama, is Nirvana directly visible, immediate, inviting one to come and see, worthy of application, to be personally experienced by the wise?"
"When, brahmin, a person is impassioned with lust ... depraved through hatred ... bewildered through delusion, overwhelmed and infatuated by delusion, then he plans for his own harm, for the harm of others, for the harm of both; and he experiences in his mind suffering and grief. But when lust, hatred, and delusion have been abandoned, he neither plans for his own harm, nor for the harm of others, nor for the harm of both; and he does not experience in his mind suffering and grief. In this way, brahmin, Nirvana is directly visible, immediate, inviting one to come and see, worthy of application, to be personally experienced by the wise.
"Since he experiences the complete destruction of lust, hatred and delusion, in this way, brahmin, Nirvana is directly visible, immediate, inviting one to come and see, worthy of application, to be personally experienced by the wise." (Ibid, p. 57)
Simply abandoning greed, anger, and ignorance is easier said than done. It involves more than just a determination to be a better person. One must actually walk the eightfold path and attain a more accurate and direct perception of the way things actually are. In other words, one must develop a new perspective which recognizes that due to the impermanent and thoroughly contingent nature of all things there are no fixed or permanent signs of individual existence to grasp, that all things are empty of a self or what will establish a self, and therefore there is nothing to be wished for or desired. The Abhidharma calls this perspective the triple gateway to liberation: the signless, the empty, and the wishless. The triple gateway actually cuts both ways, because not only the conditioned but the unconditioned, nirvana, is characterized as signless, empty, and wishless. Nirvana is without any kind of sign by which it could be compared to anything else, it is empty of any kind of self or substance, and it is freedom from all wishes and desire. One can not help but wonder if this implies that the true nature of conditioned phenomena and the unconditioned are really the same since they are both said to have these three qualities. Furthermore as one sees through conditioned things and stops reacting to them on the basis of greed, anger, or ignorance one is able to see and enjoy the unconditioned.
Nirvana as the unconditioned can not be created or brought about or possessed or identified with as we have seen. Following the eightfold path and the other teachings of the Buddha do not create nirvana but enable us to make the causes whereby we can see and know it for ourselves. In some cases this can take a lifetime or even lifetimes, but it is also possible to come to know it directly and immediately by dropping all our projections and ceasing to depend upon the things around us for our happiness and identity. In learning to let go completely and allow all things to be themselves, without the distortions of the three poisons, we encounter nirvana. This is the gist of the instruction which Shakyamuni Buddha gave to the wanderer Bahiya, who instantly attained nirvana because he put the Buddha's teaching into practice without any hesitation.
"Herein, Bahiya, you should train yourself thus: 'In the seen will be merely what is seen; in the heard will be merely what is heard; in the sensed will be merely what is sensed; in the cognised will be merely what is cognised.' In this way you should train yourself, Bahiya.
"When, Bahiya, in the seen is merely what is seen... in the cognised is merely what is cognised, then, Bahiya, you will not be 'with that' ; when, Bahiya, you are not 'with that,' then, Bahiya, you will not be 'in that'; when, Bahiya, you are not 'in that,' then, Bahiya, you will be neither here nor beyond nor in between the two. Just this is the end of suffering."
Now through this brief Dharma teaching of the Lord, the mind of Bahiya of the Bark-cloth was immediately freed from the taints without grasping. (Udana, p. 20)
The sudden liberation of Bahiya, who passed into parinirvana shortly thereafter, shows that nirvana is not so remote. It is called the unconditioned, the unborn, the deathless, the supreme joy, transcendent illumination, and the extinguishing of the fires of greed, anger, and ignorance, among many other names which put it beyond what we normally experience. However, the lesson to Bahiya and his subsequent awakening make it apparent that ultimately nirvana is not just another thing to experience in terms of our desires and delusions, but rather a profound shift in the way we experience everything. It is all about seeing reality not as we want it to be, but as it is.

Sources
Bodhi, Bhikkhu, trans. The Connected Discourses of the Buddha: A New Translation of the Samyutta Nikaya. Boston: Wisdom Publications, 2000.
___________, ed. A Comprehensive Manual of Abhidamma: The Abhidammattha Sangaha of Acariya Anuruddha. Sri Lanka: Buddhist Publication Society, 1993.
Buddhaghosa, Bhadantacariya. The Path of Purification (Visuddhimagga). Sri Lanka: Buddhist Publication Society, 1991.
Ireland, John D., The Itivuttaka. Sri Lanka: Buddhist Publication Society, 1991.
____________, The Udana. Sri Lanka: Buddhist Publication Society, 1990.
Nanamoli, Bhikkhu and Bodhi, Bhikkhu, trans. The Middle Length Discourses of the Buddha: A New Translation of the Majjhima Nikaya. Boston: Wisdom Publications, 1995.
Nyanaponika, Thera and Bodhi, Bhikkhu trans. & ed., Numerical Discourses of the Buddha: An Anthology of Suttas from the Anguttara Nikaya. Walnut Creek: AltaMira Press, 1999.
Walshe, Maurice, trans. The Long Discourses of the Buddha: A Translation of the Digha Nikaya. Boston: Wisdom Publications, 1995.
Copyright by Ryuei Michael McCormick. 2003.

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No Difference!
An interview with Swami Bharati Tirtha the Shankaracharya of Sringeri
by Chris Parish

Introduction
If India is the birthplace and heart of the world's most powerful and influential mystical traditions, there are those who would say that it is equally unparalleled in its conservatism regarding gender issues. Indeed, with distinct and clearly defined religious roles for women and men, a long and only recently outlawed legacy of ritual widow-burning, and a deep renunciate tradition all but forbidding the participation of women, Mother India has, in the final decades of the twentieth century, come under considerable fire for what many say amounts to an almost universal neglect of the spiritual welfare of her daughters.

Last winter, while still in the early phases of research for this issue, we began to wonder how representatives of Hindu orthodoxy might account for some of the apparently misogynist sentiments expressed in many of the most revered scriptures of their tradition-a tradition in which, perhaps ironically, goddess worship occupies a central role. It was with an aim to find answers that we sent reporter-at-large Chris Parish deep into the jungled hills of southern India to ask some probing questions of one of contemporary Hinduism's most respected authorities, Swami Bharati Tirtha, the Shankaracharya of Sringeri. Holding a position in Hindu religious society often compared to that of the pope in Catholicism, Tirtha is one of four current representatives of a long lineage of Shankaracharyas dating back to Adi Shankara, the eighth-century founder of Advaita Vedanta and India's most revered philosopher/sage. If anyone was qualified to defend the tradition's stance on gender, we thought, surely he would be the one.

In the course of the conversation, as we might have expected, the Shankaracharya did indeed stand firm in defense of the ideological bastions of his native soil. But as the following excerpt reveals, the direction he took to do so was one that none of us could have anticipated.

interview

WIE: In this issue, among other things, we're looking into the different advantages and disadvantages that men and women experience on the spiritual path and whether or not the spiritual path and goal are the same for men as for women.

Swami Bharati Tirtha: When one is doing practice on the spiritual path, the results of that practice will not differ based on sex, on whether one is a man or a woman. As long as the practice is done correctly, the result will be the same. From the point of view of the Lord, it is a human being that is practicing-not a person of a particular sex.

WIE: But we've noticed that the Hindu scriptures do tend to speak differently about the spiritual propensities of men and women. One of the things we were hoping to ask you, for example, is: Which qualities of men's and women's nature or conditioning are the most helpful to their spiritual development and which aspects might be hindrances to that development?

SBT: Here we will have to say the "individual human being," not "man" or "woman."

WIE: So there aren't any particular differences in your view? For example, it's been said that men can tend to be very fascinated by and attached to their intellect and that this can act as a hindrance to spiritual realization. Would you have any comment on that?

SBT: This attachment is a hindrance whether it is in man or in woman. There is no truth in saying that man alone has more attachment to knowledge. Because of the ego, whether we are speaking about man or woman, that attachment will be there. And attachment is a hindrance to the spiritual path. Ego is a big enemy-the biggest enemy.

WIE: Many scriptures in the Hindu tradition clearly state that men are inherently superior to women in their spiritual potential. We've seen numerous references to this and were wondering what the basis for this widely asserted view is.

SBT: In spiritual practice, there is definitely no greater advantage for men or women. What is said in the scriptures might be wrongly interpreted.

WIE: To be specific, in the course of our research we came across a number of strong statements in the Hindu texts criticizing women's basic character or nature. The Manu Samhita makes reference to the "natural heartlessness" of women and states that "women are as impure as falsehood itself." The Maitrayana Samhita asserts that "women are evil." And in the Mahabharata, we read that "women do not hesitate to transgress morals" and that "a man with a hundred tongues would die before finishing lecturing on the vices and defects of women, even if he were to do nothing else during a long life of a hundred years." If this were true, it would certainly seem to at least imply a difference in aptitude for spiritual pursuit.

SBT: Such things should not be taken as relevant points because intrinsically there is no difference.

WIE: How, then, do you account for the traditional notion that men and women tend to have different balances of the three gunas [essential qualities]? Well-respected scholars have asserted that men are generally considered to have a higher proportion of sattvas [lucidity], which is widely held to be the most beneficial disposition for spiritual development. Whereas, because of their biology, women tend to have a higher proportion of rajas [dynamism] and tamas [inertia]. Isn't it true that men are considered to be generally more sattvic [imbued with sattva], at least according to the tradition?

SBT: There is no difference. How can man be more sattvic than woman? All such ideas will come only when people think that man is more important than woman. This is only a man-made notion.

WIE: But from what we've seen and read it does seem that in India, it is considered better to be a man than a woman on the spiritual path. Not only are women referred to as being deceitful and untrustworthy, but they are often said to have minds that can't concentrate. There are numerous references to this in the scriptures.

SBT: Difficulty with concentration and a wandering mind occurs in both men and women. Whatever quality you find in women, or whatever quality is said to be stronger in women is there in men also. There is no difference.

WIE: What are all those references in the scriptures about? Why are they there?

SBT: What happens is that the main idea that was there in the original text gets confused in the course of interpretation. Usually, it is the interpretations that fail to acknowledge that these comments about women occurred in a particular context. In that particular context, one lady might have conducted herself in such a way that was not as good as the man. And in that particular reference, if the woman has exhibited such negative qualities, then an interpretation is given. But that does not mean it is an approved theory. So, bereft of the context, that interpretation will have no meaning. It cannot be taken as a general fact.

WIE: So are you saying that with all these references in the scriptures, there's no general point being made about women?

SBT: No general point. According to Vedanta philosophy, there is absolutely no difference between man and woman. And this is true not only with regard to sex. There is no difference in caste. There is no difference in religion. Every human being who practices his proper spiritual path is entitled to moksha [spiritual liberation]. That is the Vedanta stand about moksha.

WIE: Yet the Manu Samhita and other Hindu scriptures assert that whereas men have many religious duties to fulfill and many spiritual practices available to them, women have only a single religious duty and path-to worship their husband as a god. They're instructed to do this even if the husband doesn't have any good qualities at all, or if his command goes against the laws of scripture. A pious woman, it is said, should worship, obey and serve her husband faithfully if she is to advance spiritually. How are we to understand that?

SBT: What is wrong in that?

WIE: Well, the author seems to be suggesting that the spiritual path of women is solely to serve and honor their husband, whereas, from what I understand, men have an opportunity to take up many different forms of sadhana [spiritual practice].

SBT: Yes, that means to say that a woman's job is made easier, because the husband is doing all the sadhanas and the wife is helping him in all the sadhanas. That itself is a sadhana for her.

WIE: Does that path of serving her husband lead a woman to the goal of moksha?

SBT: Yes. If she takes it in the spirit that she will get moksha by just serving the husband, she gets it. There is a story wherein one rishi [sage] sat under a tree and there was a bird that dropped its filth on his head. The rishi was enraged and stared at the bird, and by the rishi's very sight the bird was burned to ashes. Then the rishi went to get food at a shop in town, and there he came upon one lady, a very pious lady, always serving her husband with all patience and faith. The husband had just come to the house, so in order to allow the husband to settle, she waited for a short period before cooking the food for this rishi. When she came out afterward, the rishi was angry because he was made to stand there and wait for a long period. He then began to stare at her just like he had stared at the bird. And she said, "I am not a bird to be burned by your staring." She was able to understand that this rishi had burned the bird dead, even though she had not seen it. And she was able to withstand his sight. How? She had acquired all the power only by serving her husband faithfully. So when a woman serves a husband faithfully, she will get all the spiritual powers that the husband is capable of getting. So that is why it is said that merely faithful service to the husband is itself sufficient sadhana. Separate sadhana need not be done.

WIE: How can such a seemingly simplistic sadhana as service to one's husband lead to the same goal as a practice such as jnana yoga [the path of knowledge], which is considered within Vedanta to be a much higher practice?

SBT: The most important thing is faith. They have faith that "just by serving I get everything."

WIE: So the entire path for women consists of simply serving their husband? They are not encouraged to engage in other forms of sadhana?

SBT: After serving the husband, if any time is left, she can attend to sadhana. If time is left. But her first priority is serving her husband.

WIE: Wouldn't it seem that men would therefore have an advantage on the spiritual path because they have all these different practices that they can do-practices that are not available to women? For example, the practice of renunciation, or the giving up of worldly and familial ties, is a cornerstone of Hindu religious life, but it is rarely taken up by women. The vast majority of renunciates are men.

SBT: According to Hindu faith, as long as the husband is living, the wife has no right to go away from him. If she did, she would be going away from her path of duty. But if the woman agrees, then the man can renounce and go. That is the only difference we find, that man can renounce with the consent of the wife. But the wife cannot renounce as long as the husband is living.

WIE: Earlier, you made the point that there is no fundamental difference between men and women on the spiritual path. I understand that in the view of Vedanta, ultimately there's no difference because there is only the Self, and the Self is one. But on a relative level, would you say that there are no differences even in the general characters of men and women that might make it easier or more difficult for them to practice?

SBT: The spiritual path and spiritual ideas cannot be mixed up with the day-to-day, worldly aspects of life. They are two distinct, separate things. What I have said about there being no difference is only in reference to spiritual life. In the world, however, there is a difference. Many differences are there.

WIE: And couldn't those differences affect the spiritual practice and the spiritual progress of the seeker?

SBT: One is completely different from the other. They are two different aspects of life. What we find here is purely worldly and has nothing to do with spiritual practice. The two cannot be mixed.

WIE: Could there ever be a female Shankaracharya?

SBT: That is a very hypothetical question.

WIE: Yes, I know that.

SBT: A very hypothetical question! Because the tradition is there and, as for the tradition . . . that is a highly hypothetical question. The question does not really arise.

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Pure Land in early Buddhism
By Graeme Lyall

Adapted from a lecture given to the University of New South Wales Buddhist Society (UNIBUDS) on Friday, 5th of May
My earliest experience with Buddhism was with the Theravada, which is the only survivor of the earliest schools of Buddhism. When Buddhism first became established in Australia in the early 1950's, this was the only form of Buddhism known to the pioneer Buddhists. It was not until twenty years later that people became aware of the Mahayana or Northern School, having previously harboured suspicions about the Mahayana's being a deviant form of Buddhism. The establishment of Mahayana Buddhism in Sydney was due, in no small part, to the efforts of Eric Liao who founded the first Chinese Buddhist temple in Sydney. I hope to show in this paper that there is no essential difference between the two schools, particularly as far as lay practitioners are concerned. Both schools are firmly based in the Buddha Dharma, the original teaching of the Buddha. Many of the perceived differences are based, largely, on semantics and the emphasis placed on particular aspects of the teaching and are not based on differences in the teaching itself. It is as if both of us are looking at this pen. I can see no pocket clip on this pen but, I'm sure that you can. Are we then looking at different pens? No. We are both looking at the same pen but we are looking at it from different angles. I feel that it is the same with Buddhism and its different schools or traditions. It is still the same Buddhism but it can be viewed from different angles. As Buddhism developed, following the passing away of the Buddha, these various approaches to the teaching arose but the differences were mainly concerned with the interpretation of the Vinaya or monastic rules rather than the Dharma itself. As many of you are aware, Buddhism teaches that everything is subject to change - nothing remains constant. There is one exception to this concept and that exception is the Dharma - the ultimate truth. By definition, it cannot change. Soon after the Buddha's passing, five hundred Arahants, or disciples who had attained enlightenment through hearing the teachings of the Buddha, gathered, in what is often called the First Council, to recall and organise the teachings of the Buddha also known as the Dharma. Ananda, who was with the Buddha constantly throughout his life, was asked to recall the sermons that the Buddha had preached. After some discussion, they agreed that what Ananda recalled was essentially what the Buddha had taught. This collection of sermons became known as the Sutta Pitaka or Sermon collection and constitutes the middle collection of the Buddhist canon. Upali, a monk of great learning, recalled the monastic rules and these, after discussion by the monks, were agreed upon. Ananda remembered having been told by the Buddha that some minor rules could, after his passing, be dispensed with, but the major rules must be preserved. During the discussion on this point, the monks could not agree on what constituted the minor rules, so they resolved that all of the rules should be retained. This, to me, seems rather surprising because an examination of the rules shows quite clearly that some rules are considered extremely important entailing expulsion from the order should they be broken. Four of these major rules are known as Parajika or rules of defeat. Should any of these Parajika rules be broken, the monk, at the instant that it is broken, ceases to be a monk and cannot re-ordain during their present life. These four important rules are sexual intercourse, killing a human being, stealing an object of value and claiming to have attained supernormal powers. The breaking of some other important rules entail disciplining by fellow members of the Sangha. Many of the rules, however, related to rules of etiquette which change over time and differ from one society to another. A breech of these, however, requires nothing more than a promise to try not to break them again - more or less a beating with a feather. These, I would suggest, are what the Buddha may have meant by the minor rules. This collection of the monastic rules is known as the Vinaya Pitaka or Discipline Collection and is the first section of the Buddhist canon. About 100 years after the passing away of the Buddha, the Second Buddhist Council was called to adjudicate on some monks who were not strictly observing the disciplinary rules of the Vinaya as agreed at the First Buddhist Council.. These monks were accused of breaking such rules as handling gold and silver, eating after noon, etc. which they considered to be minor rules and permitted by the Buddha. The Elder Monks, known as the Theras, disagreed and said that these offences should warrant the monks' expulsion from the monastic order. These dissident monks broke away from the orthodox or Theravada monks and formed a new group or schism known as the Mahasanghikas. The Mahasanghikas also disagreed with the Theravadins as to the goal of the Buddhist practice. The Theravadins held that the highest goal that one could attain was that of the Arahant and that the monastic life was the only way that one could attain it. The Mahasanghikas, however, regarded this as a rather elitist attitude. They argued that a Buddhist practitioner, monastic or lay, should strive to become a Bodhisattva, one who postpones their full enlightenment until they can become a Buddha and thus be instrumental in leading other beings to enlightenment. From the Mahasanghikas, the major tradition of the Mahayana was later to evolve. By the third century BCE, the Sasana, or Buddhist followers, had split into eighteen sects or schools. The Theravadins had broken into eleven sub-sects whilst the remaining seven were a part of the Mahasanghikas. The divisions into these sects were on minor points of doctrine or on interpretations of the monastic discipline. The essential teachings of the Buddha, the Four Noble Truths, the truth of unsatisfactoriness, its cause - greed anger and a deluded mind and its ceasing and the method for its ceasing, the Noble Eightfold Path of good conduct, one pointedness of mind and wisdom, and Dependent Origination, or interconnectedness of all phenomena, however, were preserved by all sects. Another important teaching to cultivate was known to the Theravadins as the Brahma Viharas or Four Heavenly abodes and to the Mahayanists as the Four Immeasurables. These four are the cultivation of loving kindness, known in Pali as Metta or in Sanskrit as Maitri, compassion or Karuna, sympathetic joy or rejoicing in the good fortune of others, known as Mudita and a balanced or non-discriminating mind, known as Upekha. These essential teachings of the Buddha are common to both the Theravada and Mahayana schools so, on these teachings at least, there is no differences between the traditions. Whilst the Theravadins held that the Buddha was man perfected, the Mahasanghikas were the first school to consider that the Buddha was transcendental and had three bodies (Trikaya) - an eternal essence - the essence or principle of enlightenment or Bodhi which is known as the Dharmakaya or truth body. Then there is the Sambhogakaya, the body which inhabits Buddhas and Bodhisattvas in the celestial realm. Finally there is the Rupakaya, or body of form which manifests in the human realm from time to time, the last instance being that of Siddhartha Gotama, also known as Sakyamuni Buddha. This teaching, to me, seems appealing and plausible. After all, Bodhi means awakening and one who is awakened to the true nature of life is a Buddha. We all have the potential to awaken to the true nature of life, otherwise Buddhist practise would be futile, so, essentially we all have within our nature to become awakened or enlightened. This is known as Bodhi Citta or enlightenment mind. We are all potential Buddhas. Sakyamuni Buddha was one who, born as a normal human being, attained this awakening and was able to show us the method for emulating his great attainment. The Mahasanghikas also held that there were heavenly Bodhisattvas, future Buddhas, who could be called upon for help in time of need. Many followers, understanding that everything is mind or a component of mind, understand these Bodhisattvas to be a part of our nature. They are not something external to ourselves but are manifestations of good qualities within our nature that can be cultivated. For instance, Avalokitesvara Bodhisattva, also known as Kuan Shih Yin Pu Sa, is the compassionate aspect of Bodhi or the Buddha. By emulating the boundless compassion of Kuan Shih Yin Pusa, we have cultivated Karuna - one of the Four Immeasurables. These doctrines, formulated by the Mahasanghikas, became an essential ingredient of the teachings of the group of schools, traditionally to become known as the Mahayana. The fathers of the Mahayana were considered to be Nagarjuna, who lived between the first and second centuries of our era, and founded what is known as the Madhyamika philosophy or philosophy of the Middle Way and Maitreyanatha who lived in the third century of our era. Nagarjuna taught that there is neither reality nor non-reality but only relativity. This Nagarjunian concept of relativity can be better understood by studying the Heart Sutra, one of the most important and most profound sutras in the Mahayana canon. The Heart Sutra clearly teaches that every phrenomenon is, in itself, void of substance or Sunnyata. Every phenomenon does not exist independently but is dependent on other phenomena for its arising. This, I have found, is the most profound and easily understandable explanation of Paticca Samupada or Dependent Arising. Maiteyanatha's philosophy, however, was developed in the fourth century by two brothers, Asangha and Vasubandhu and was known as Yogacara or Vijnavada. They taught that consciousness is the only reality. This Yogacara teaching became known as the 'mind only school' and was the precursor of Cha'an or Zen. The Mahayana, or reformed school, spread to China, Korea, Japan and Vietnam, during the early centuries of the current era. Although there is evidence that Buddhism was known in China during the Han Dynasty in the first century BCE, it was during the first centuries of the common era that there was much activity in translating the Buddhist scriptures into the Chinese language. As Buddhism developed in China, several schools or traditions arose, mainly based on the emphasis placed on a particular scripture. Some important schools which have influenced modern Chinese Buddhism are: T'ien-t'ai which evolved from the Madhyamika and based its study, mainly on the Lotus Sutra, which is considered one of the most important scriptures of the Mahayana tradition. Cha'an (Zen, Japanese), influenced by the Yogacara school which placed a great emphasis on meditation rather than scripture or Sutra study. Those scriptures that are considered important to the Cha'an school are "The Diamond Sutra" and the "Platform Sutra of Hui Neng". Hua-yen evolved from the Madhyamika school and emphasised the teachings of the Avatamsaka Sutra, one of the longest sutras in the Mahayana literature. Chen-yen is the Esoteric Buddhism, which grew out of the Yogacara school in India, and is closely related to the Vajrayana teachings common to Tibetan practitioners. Ching-t'u or Pure Land Buddhism is based on the Sukhvati-Vyuha, which describes the Pure Land and the Amitayur-Dhyana Sutra, a sermon that teaches the way to attain the Pure Land. The Pure Land School has sometimes referred to as 'messianic Buddhism', or Buddhism dependent on a saviour Buddha. This misunderstanding of the purpose of the Pure Land teaching is largely due to a lack of proper understanding of its teachings, particularly by Western scholars. The Pure Land School teaches that, by reciting the name of Amitabha Buddha, the Buddha of infinite light, that one can remanifest in the Pure Land or Sukhavati, described as the western Paradise, where Amitabha Buddha resides and, by hearing his teaching, can attain enlightenment more easily. These Chinese schools are not mutually exclusive. Chinese Buddhism today is a fusion of elements drawn from each of these schools but the main practice, especially by the laity, is Pure Land. Although, until a few years ago, I was aware of Pure Land practise, I didn't understand it and, like many Western Buddhists, regarded it as "not real Buddhism". After all, isn't one of the essential teachings of the Buddha to be self reliant. In the Dhammapada it says:
"By ourselves is evil done; by ourselves we pain endure.
By ourselves we cease from ill; by ourselves become we pure.
No one can save us but ourselves, no one can and no one may.
We ourselves must walk the Path, Buddhas only point the way."
It was not until I had the good fortune to meet a great Pure Land Master, Chin Kung Sifu, that I gained a better understanding of the Pure Land and came to realise how much the Pure Land teachings have been misrepresented in the West. Pure Land Buddhism has been misrepresented as being a form of Christianised Buddhism. Much literature represents it as "The Buddhism of Faith" - believe in Buddha Amitabha and you will go to the Pure Land. Master Chin Kung explained to me that the Pure Land is not a place but the state of having a Pure Mind - when the mind is pure, one is already in the Pure Land. A common definition of Buddhism is to cultivate good and avoid evil, that is by practicing good conduct or not doing anything which can harm ourselves or others, and cultivating a pure mind which is realised through meditation practice. So, with good conduct as a pre-requisite for successful meditation practice, one eventually purifies the mind and a mind purified is already in the Pure Land. There are many forms of meditation practice and it is up to the practitioner to find the one with which they are most comfortable. Reciting the Buddha's name, Amitabha in Sanskrit or Om Mi To Fo in Chinese, is similar to the Theravadin recitation of "Buddho" or similar Mantras during meditation. It is a means of fixing the attention to attain 'one pointedness of mind'. Seung Sahn Sunim, the famous Korean Zen Master, says that, in the U.S.A., he teaches students to recite "Coca Cola - Coca Cola" as a means of fixing the mind on one point to exclude extraneous thoughts. All mantras are equally effective in this respect. The important thing is to fix the mind on the object of concentration and to try to block out extraneous thoughts such as what will I do after I have finished my meditation or what am I going to eat for dinner tonight. The Buddha talks of a 'monkey mind' - one that perpetually jumps from one idea to another. Our minds, generally, are out of control. A mind out of control is in a state of chaos. It is our master rather than us being in control of it. The simplest way for us to gain control of our own minds is to practice concentration - to attain one pointedness of mind. The method employed by the Pure Land School is to totally absorb all of our senses in one thing - the Buddha's name - Amitabha. Master Chin Kung, realising that many people find making time for meditation difficult in their busy lives, suggests, what he calls, the Ten Recitation Method. He says that practising the Ten Recitation Method helps to gain mindfulness of Amitabha Buddha and to bring peace and clarity to the present moment. In this method, one should sit up straight and clearly recite Amitabha's name ten times whilst trying to maintain an undisturbed mind. This can be done out loud or silently. This should be practised nine times daily: upon awakening in the morning, at breakfast, before starting work, before eating lunch, during lunch, after lunch, when finishing work, at dinner time and before going to bed. The important thing about this method is regularity. If you are regular with this practice, you will soon notice your purity of mind increase and your wisdom will grow. If you visit the chanting hall of the Amitabha Buddhist Association at Berala, you will find that, no matter in which direction you are facing, you will see a picture of Amitabha Buddha. The chant of his name , Om Mi To Fo, can be heard at all times and the practitioners are perpetually chanting Amitabha's name during their walking meditation. If you would like to visit this Centre, I would like to invite you to come next Saturday, the 13th of May, at 9.30 a.m., when one of Master Chin Kung's disciple monks, Venerable Wu Hsin, will perform the official opening ceremony. The Centre is at 150 Woodburn Road, Berala, right opposite Berala railway station. It seems to my understanding, then, that walking medit