Raising Ourselves Above the Waves Suppose that when I was a schoolboy,
Before I became a monk,
I was an unfair bully to a smaller boy.
I would tease and hit him,
Mock him and make him suffer.
And now,
Years later,
I've become a monk and I observe all the precepts of a monk.
The Buddha laid out 227 precepts that a monk must observe.
For laypeople involved with family,
Money and worldly affairs,
Five precepts is enough.
Suppose now that the smaller boy had grown much larger and he still carried a grudge.
Then,
In the present situation we meet,
He sees that I am no longer the bullying child but a practising monk.
I greet him and apologise for my past behaviour.
He will not pay me back with a punch in the mouth.
Striking a good monk for his behaviour as a child would be inappropriate.
I've risen above the level of my childish deeds.
I will never repeat them.
And the effect of those childish deeds is greatly reduced.
Now suppose the same schoolboy situation,
But I did not become a monk.
I went on bullying.
Then my former victim,
Who has grown larger and stronger and is still holding a grudge,
Comes across me as I am bullying some new victim.
I see him and disingenuously apologise for my past behaviour.
The former victim is much larger now.
It is very likely that I would receive my punch in the mouth.
Few would shed tears for me.
Striking an adult bully for his childhood bullying seems rather justified.
I've remained at the level of my childish deeds and they've come back to me with full force and most likely a bit of interest.
Let's go back to the mass murderer who became enlightened.
Angulimala.
Remember him?
He murdered over a thousand people on his teacher's instruction.
Suppose the king had found him before the Buddha did.
He would have been punished as the murderer that he was.
I'm sure they had many ways to punish people then and he would have received the worst.
Few would question him receiving the harshest of punishments.
But the Buddha found him first and Angulimala became one of the luckiest people in history.
But luck,
Of course,
Is a matter of our own past deeds returning.
Angulimala did his murderous deeds as a man without precepts.
A man of a value of one.
If he remained at that low level,
The action of his deeds would have returned to him from the same level like a tsunami.
Yet,
He did not.
Yet,
He didn't remain at that level.
With the help of the Buddha,
He broke through his delusional fog and saw a higher truth which he took to heart.
He went from a murderer to a truly moral man who wouldn't hurt a fly.
It reminds me of the story behind the song Amazing Grades,
A Slave Trader Sees the Light.
In Buddhist terms,
Though we would say that his own value increased,
Made him high and stable,
And the tsunami hit but didn't wash him away.
It just hit him in the head with sticks and stones.
He had a giant wave of karma coming for him,
But by the time it arrived,
He had become an even larger giant.
Mathematically,
It looks like this.
Karma divided by one,
Over time,
Instead,
Karma divided by one trillion.
So let's suppose that in the past,
We kept no precepts.
Nothing was beneath us.
Lying,
Stealing,
And even raping and killing.
Huge,
Violent,
Killer waves of our own making are bearing down on us,
Ready to smash us against the rocks.
Then somehow,
We see more clearly.
Then somehow,
We see more clearly.
We improve ourselves.
We reject our past behaviour,
And we embrace the five precepts.
Our value has increased 10,
000 times.
Or put another way,
The power of our bad deeds to affect us has been reduced 10,
000 times.
The waves will hit us.
We can't stop them.
But they only take a limb,
Or an eye,
Or some teeth.
We are left alive.
The five precepts will reduce the negative effects from our past.
Furthermore,
When we are living on the higher moral ground of the five precepts,
We are operating in a cleaner,
More moral,
More benevolent environment.
We are surrounded by more good,
Smooth,
Harmonious action is more the norm.
In addition,
People are attracted to others at the same moral level.
So as you improve yourself,
You will find yourself in the company of more moral people.
This new,
Higher network is a valuable asset.
You can find good friends,
Good customers,
And even a good partner for your life.
Thus,
In this higher moral environment,
It's easier to reach your goals and realise your dreams.
It's easier to receive good because you're in a good place.
And more help is available because you're surrounded by good people.
This is also the power of the precepts.
And it's not all or nothing.
Suppose you can only keep four precepts,
But can't break away from the alcohol or drugs.
You get some measure of protection for keeping the four.
A lot better than nothing.
So keep as many precepts as you can.
It will help you build power until you can keep all five steady as a rock.
But remember,
The precepts must be held with intention.
You must actively uphold them,
Reminding yourself throughout the day that you are a person who doesn't kill,
Who doesn't take what is not given,
Who doesn't engage in sexual misconduct,
Who doesn't lie,
And who doesn't take drugs or alcohol.
It's the conscious,
Active holding of these virtues that give them their power.
There's another story in Buddhism about an enlightened disciple of the Buddha,
Who was beset upon,
Again and again,
By a group of robbers who wanted to beat him to death.
With his Arahant mindfulness and power,
He was able to continually avoid their clutches.
He thus avoided his attackers,
Accruing the karma of having killed an Arahant.
However,
In the end,
He saw that it was time,
And he submitted himself to them,
Allowing them to smash his body to death,
Breaking every bone in his body.
So even as an Arahant,
It's possible to have old karma strong enough to have one's life violently taken.
For us,
For most of us,
Our past karma is not so strong.
Yet,
When we make Yet,
When we make merit to improve our world equilibrium and offset the effects of our past bad actions,
We should be mindful of the type of merit we make.
We can think of merit like medicine.
Each medicine is specific for a type of disease.
If I've stolen money,
Or have a problem with money,
My merit-making should involve money.
If I've been untruthful,
Or have a problem with truthfulness,
My merit-making should involve truthfulness.
To be most effective,
The medicine must match the disease.
Yet,
What if I've taken a person's life?
What can be done then?
Maybe it's best to leave that question as food for thought.
