| Join Forces to Benefit the World | ||||||||
| By Dharma Master Cheng Yen Translated by Teresa Chang | ||||||||
April 30 of this year (March 24 on the lunar calendar) was the 50th anniversary of Tzu Chi. In honor of this occasion, group after group of volunteers from Taiwan and abroad returned to the Jing Si Abode [the Tzu Chi headquarters in Hualien, eastern Taiwan] to participate in bowing pilgrimages. Chanting the Buddha’s name, the volunteers proceeded in dignified, orderly lines with their steps in sync, prostrating themselves on the ground after every three steps. They remained unperturbed even when it rained. They took one step after another, piously praying for world peace. Their actions demonstrated their piety and purity of heart. It is with this same spirit that our volunteers have given of themselves over the past half century to benefit the world. No matter what difficulties or challenges they encounter, they stay the course with the love of the bodhisattvas in their hearts so that they can help envelop the world with love. Take a look around the world today and you will see an abundance of natural and man-made disasters. It proves what the Buddha said: “The world is impermanent and the land is fragile.” To help ward off disasters, we must be all the more determined to speak kind words, do good deeds, and think good thoughts. Doing so will perpetuate a cycle of goodness in the world. The state of people’s minds has a direct impact on the state of the world. When people’s minds are balanced, harmony will prevail. When everyone loves, trusts, and gets along with one another, when everyone abides by ethics and morals, and when everyone supports and inspires each other, society will be peaceful and disasters will decrease. Avoid a deluded life There is a chapter in the Lotus Sutra called “Prophecy of Enlightenment for Five Hundred Disciples.” It records that after 500 of the Buddha’s disciples received a prophecy from the Enlightened One that they would all attain supreme perfect enlightenment, they openly repented that they had used to fail to fully comprehend the Buddha’s intentions—they sought only to end their own cycles of birth and death instead of helping deliver other people from suffering as well, and they were content with lesser knowledge instead of pursuing comprehensive wisdom. The disciples used a story to illustrate their ignorance. A man visited a friend at his home. After becoming drunk on wine, he lay down to sleep. While the man was sleeping, his friend had to go away on official business. Before he left, he took a priceless jewel and sewed it into the lining of his visitor’s clothes as a gift. The man, being in a drunken stupor, had no idea what his friend had done. When he finally came to, he set out to visit other countries. He expended great effort and endured much hardship during his travels just to keep himself clothed and fed; he just had to make do with the little he received. The 500 disciples were comparing themselves to the impoverished man who had a precious stone on him and didn’t know it. The gem could have provided the man with a very good life, but being oblivious to its existence, he continued to live in destitution. There is no difference among the mind, the Buddha, and living beings. Every one of us has a precious gem on us, which is our innate true nature, which is the same as the Buddha’s. Yet we are unaware of this and allow our innate natures to be buried under layer upon layer of affliction and ignorance. It’s like we are drunk or sleep-walking, and we squander away our lives in delusion. In our deluded states of mind, we mistake liquor, sexual desire, wealth, power, and status to be the most important things in life. We indulge in the pursuit of these things and continuously create bad karma with our actions, words and thoughts. For example, people have been digging up mountains since ancient times in search of valuable minerals to be polished into precious gems, so that they may get rich and show off their wealth and status. They exploit natural resources to satisfy their vanity. When our minds are held captive like this by greed, we get pulled to do things that beget negative karma. When we focus only on ourselves, we’ll always crave more things to satisfy ourselves. No matter how much we have, we are not content. Our lives are hard as we engage in an endless pursuit for more. Life is short. We must become aware of its transience and do our best to make good use of it before it slips away. If we can expand our love for ourselves to include other people and make great aspirations to work for the good of humanity, we will gain immeasurable Dharma-joy. Our hearts will be rich and never lack for anything. In addition to giving of ourselves, we should also help others to do the same. The Buddha said in the Sutra of Forty-Two Chapters, “When you see people giving to others and you joyfully aid in their efforts, you acquire great blessings.” A disciple wanted to know whether, if we encourage and help others to do good, they would then take away the blessings and decrease our own chances of accumulating blessings for ourselves. The Buddha answered by way of this metaphor: “When thousands of people light their torches from the flame of a single torch to cook or dispel darkness, the original flame is undiminished. The same is true of blessings.” Indeed, a candle can light thousands of additional candles without losing its own brightness. Everyone is capable of giving. Don’t ever be held back by thinking, “I don’t have enough strength. How can I help others?” We should all try our best to give and the strength will come. We must also go one step further and inspire others to give. When we can pull together everyone’s kindness and strength, we will be able to pave a path of Great Love in the world and reduce suffering. If we can do that, we’ll reap boundless merits.
A drop of dew, a flash of lightning There is a Buddhist story that goes like this: A king had a daughter whom he loved dearly. He built a beautiful garden for her. One day the princess looked down from a balcony into the garden, and she saw drops of water, sparkling in the sunlight, falling from a fountain. The princess was enchanted. She went to her father and asked him to collect those iridescent pearls for her. The king knew it was an impossible task, but he wanted to please his daughter, so he ordered his court to collect those water pearls for the princess within seven days. The ministers didn’t know what to do, but neither did they wish to die for defying the king’s order. They decided to put up a notice seeking people who knew how to collect those rainbow-colored water drops. At that time, a wise man happened to be passing through the kingdom. When he learned about what had happened, he told the local people that he could fulfill the princess’s request. He went to the palace, handed her a net, and asked her to gather the most beautiful water drops with it. The princess did as she had been instructed, but she found that every drop of water burst as she tried to collect them. She tried again and again to no avail. She finally realized that it was a lost cause. The wise man said to her, “Life is like these water drops: phantom-like, evanescent, and impermanent.” His words went right to her heart. Feeling enlightened, the princess asked the wise man to stay in their kingdom and be her teacher. She grew to be a sensible, perceptive person who governed her people wisely. Life is like a drop of dew or a flash of lightning. Don’t mistake an illusion for reality. Everything in this world is but passing smoke. We don’t own even our own body, just the right to use it. Pursuing material things will not bring us true contentment. The most important thing to do is to take good care of our minds and prevent our thoughts from going astray. When we nurture unwholesome thoughts, we are like a drunk who cannot think straight or act right. We lose the ability to tell right from wrong, and as a result we create bad karma and cause disturbance in the world. A bad thought can do the world harm, while a charitable thought can do the world good. Let us keep our minds open and learn the right thing to do. Once you know that something is right, just go ahead and do it mindfully. Loving the Earth Many places in the world were hit by earthquakes in April. In addition to Burma and Afghanistan, Japan, Ecuador, and Tonga also experienced major temblors. The shallow earthquakes that jolted Japan and Ecuador were especially devastating. That earthquakes seem to be occurring at a greater frequency and intensity is truly worrisome. But just worrying won’t help things. We human beings must repent and reflect on our behavior because our overexploitation of resources has badly damaged the Earth and caused its geological structure to be more vulnerable to damage caused by major earthquakes. We must take concrete action to protect the Earth. Tzu Chi has been engaged in environmental protection for over 20 years. Many of our recycling volunteers who joined the work when they were middle-aged have entered old age, but they continue to help safeguard the Earth with pious, selfless love. Even though they may have weakened with age and have difficulties walking or bending, that doesn’t slow them down. They keep on going because they know that by reclaiming reusable resources, they can help prevent more damage from being done to the Earth. They act willingly and voluntarily out of love and care for Mother Nature. Human beings keep damaging the Earth in pursuit of personal gain, yet their actions spell crisis for themselves. We should all learn to reduce our desires and foster love for the world. It’s only in this way that we will be able to help mitigate disasters. Extreme weather is also threatening humanity’s survival. Scientists have predicted that by 2025, just 9 years away, 1.8 billion people out of a global population of 8 billion will be facing water shortages. Droughts driven by El Niño this year have brought on food shortages in several countries, leading to a crisis of survival for many people. In Madagascar, 1.14 million people do not have enough to eat. When I saw some people there walking long distances to find cactus fruits to eat so that they could survive, I really felt for them. For those of us who are blessed to live in affluent countries, it’s important to cherish our blessings and conserve resources. We must learn to save for rainy days. Do not be picky about food or throw it away just because it doesn’t look appealing. Only by cherishing and conserving what we have will we improve our chances of staving off or reducing famine. Severe flooding hit Burma in July and August last year, devastating livelihoods dependent on agriculture. Many farmers were already poor and had had to borrow rice seeds to sow, but the disaster cost them their crops and rendered them unable to repay their debts. What’s worse, they couldn’t even afford to borrow more rice seeds again. To help poor farmers through this hard time, Tzu Chi volunteers in Burma mobilized to give them rice seeds. It is expected that by May of this year, over 10,000 farmers will have received our aid. When our volunteers gave out that aid, they also tried to sow seeds of kindness in the recipients’ hearts. U San Thein from the village of Shwe Na Gwin, in Taikkyi, was one of the recipients. When he received rice seeds from our volunteers last year, he learned how Tzu Chi had started with a small number of people saving small change in coin banks every day to help the needy. In the 50 years since that humble beginning, Tzu Chi has grown into an organization whose aid has reached over 90 countries. Inspired, U San Thein decided to follow suit. He and his family began putting a handful of rice into a container before cooking a meal to help those who were worse off than they were. U San Thein’s kindness did not stop there. He even went around his village and encouraged people to save up rice to help others too. There was a couple who lived in a simple, crude house which had no door or even furniture. The couple worked as hired hands on people’s farms. Though they weren’t well-off, the wife decided to follow U San Thein’s example and she began saving up rice every day. “Many grains of rice make a bushel; many drops of water make a river.” This village had only 104 households, yet when villagers gathered in late March to donate the rice they had saved, the amount came to 96 kilograms, enough to feed 256 people for one day. Such is the power of love! When the needy receive help, their hardship is eased. When people give help to others, their hearts become richer with love, and they gain an abundance of joy which can help reduce whatever mental afflictions they might have. Love can do a lot of good.
● There is a story in the Sutra of Illuminating Light: A group of hunters set up snares across a forest to capture animals. One day, a deer fell into one of the traps and cried out in pain. The hunters, hearing its cry, headed toward the sound. However, because so many snares had been set up by different hunters, many of the men themselves were caught in traps set by others. Some were badly injured, some even sustained fatal wounds. One hunter, having suffered excruciating pain from his injuries, realized how much pain they were causing animals by laying snares to catch them. Remorseful, he went to the Buddha and vowed that he would never hurt any living creatures again. The Buddha said, “It is like a man who is injured by an arrow he made himself. Inner arrows of desire are like this too: They hurt ourselves as well as others.” All suffering in life arises from the mental poisons in our minds such as greed or ignorance. Greed leads to desire. Desire is like an inner arrow or a trap. It can harm others as well as ourselves. If all people think of is their own benefit, they will inevitably fall into the traps that they themselves set. Therefore, if we want a stable and peaceful society, we must begin by purifying people’s minds. Purifying and transforming minds is not an easy task. But we must remember what the Buddha encouraged us to do in the Lotus Sutra: We must not just focus on improving ourselves; we must enter society and put our love into action. I expect everyone to make great aspirations and use Great Love to pave a smooth path in a world plagued by afflictions. Please be ever more mindful.
————— This article is excerpted from a series of speeches delivered by Master Cheng Yen from April 1 to 18, 2016. |
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