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LET DHAMMA GLOW IN ITS PURITY

Dhamma to Spread

My dear Dhamma children:

You are all eager to see the pure teaching of the Enlightened One revived here, and I too am eager for this to happen. However, if you arrange ten-day courses but do not emphasize the importance of applying Dhamma in life, the courses will become just another type of rite, ritual or ceremony, and they will not have the effect they should.

With Vipassana one learns how to apply sīla in life, and sīla starts with sammā-vācā, right speech. Right speech means abstaining from false statements, chatter and backbiting. So wherever Vipassana is taught we advise that if anyone finds fault with a Dhamma brother or a Dhamma sister, they should not say a word about it to others, but meet the brother or sister privately and politely explain, "I do not think your action is according to Dhamma."

You can explain your view politely once or twice, and if the person still has not understood you can say, "I am going to inform a senior or the Teacher that we have a different understanding of this situation." This is the proper way of dealing with people with whom you have a difference of opinion. The moment you start talking ill of another in his or her absence you are breaking sīla, the first important sīla of sammā-vācā.

You should examine yourself. If you have said something bad about a Dhamma brother or sister, correct it as quickly as possible. Go and ask pardon, saying, "I made this mistake, I said bad things about you when I should have come and talked with you."

This is a sangha, a family of Vipassana meditators. Speaking ill of others will create friction and divisions. Some may accept the information they hear and others may not, and gradually conflict will start, which is totally against Dhamma. The Buddha stated clearly that some actions are extremely unwholesome and give very harmful results; creating a division in the sangha is one of these few very harmful actions. There are bound to be differences of opinion when family members live together or meditators serve together; there is nothing wrong in that. You should not blindly follow one student, however senior this person may be. But this difference of opinion should not lead to a split in the Vipassana sangha.

I keep teaching that all the members of the Dhamma family, the Vipassana family, must have nothing but love in their eyes towards each other, with never a trace of anger or hatred.

There are political and social organizations where people who crave power and status try to create a group of their own followers and to denounce others, but such behaviour is not appropriate for the field of Dhamma. The moment you realize that there is a group which follows you and another group which does not, you should immediately realize, "There is something wrong with me, that is why I want everyone to fulfil my wishes. Oh, my ego is so strong! I am not fit to serve Dhamma, let alone to lead in Dhamma. I’d better retreat and practise Dhamma at this time." Unless one starts accepting the fact that one’s ego is strong, and one’s attachment to the ego is strong, one can never come out of this bad habit of finding fault with others. The moment one realizes, "Look, I have said these words and taken this action because of my ego," then the ego automatically starts dissolving, dissolving. But if you keep justifying your actions, either vocal or physical, then the ego becomes stronger and stronger.

This morning I heard that at a recent event one or two of my Dhamma daughters became upset because their seating plan was not followed. This is such a sorry situation. Where is Dhamma in this attitude? The ego is so important to these people. I have so much compassion for them. They must grow in Dhamma so that they have love and compassion for others, instead of finding fault.

This is a minor incident but it is how impurity starts and develops. If we don’t say a word against this kind of impurity, you will make your ego stronger and generate aversion for others.

Something else damaging has come to my attention: The traditional teaching of Vipassana is the same everywhere in the world; you are not permitted to make any change in it. I have the history of Vipassana before my eyes. Vipassana was totally lost within 500 years in India because people from different sects started to add something from their own tradition to it. Gradually whatever was added became predominant and Vipassana faded out. The purity has been maintained for 2,300 years in the land of my birth, Burma; handed down from teacher to pupil. If they had added anything to it, the addition would have become predominant and Vipassana would have been lost; but they kept it pure and this is why we have received it today. We must not start spoiling it in the name of improvement. Everybody who spoils it says, "I am improving it!"—as if he or she is much wiser than the Buddha or the tradition. This is a dangerous tendency; one has to be very careful.

Therefore, those who wish the pure Dhamma that is arising now to be maintained for centuries must understand we have a great responsibility. We have no authority to change the discipline, the teaching or the instructions. If you really want to change something, send the main Teacher your suggestion, and only if the Teacher agrees can the change be made. If you feel you are wiser than the Teacher and you can alter the teaching according to your own wisdom, you will harm the tradition, you will harm the spread of Dhamma.

Another point should be clear: The evening discourses, the daily instructions and the teaching of Anapana, Vipassana and Metta have been translated into more than thirty languages and we have to ensure these translations are made correctly. An incorrect translation will give wrong instructions for years to come to those who speak that language.

Understand the process: Once a translation has been completed, one or more students who are well versed in both the relevant languages must verify it. Then I am sent samples of the voices of several students from that country, and from these I select the voice that has the proper vibration. Finally, that person has to come all the way to Igatpuri to record the tapes. People have come from far-off places like Mongolia, Indonesia and Russia. The recordings must be done only at Igatpuri or at a centre that is nearly as developed as Igatpuri because the vibration of the atmosphere is very important. Your input on the tape carries the vibration of the atmosphere around you. If this vibration is not healthy, whatever you say, even if you are giving a hundred-percent correct translation, will not have the effect it should have. We have seen the difference in recordings, and that is why these rules have been made.

Regarding the courses, we want people to get established in the technique by sitting several ten-day courses before they take a Satipatthāna course. The Satipatthāna course provides an intellectual understanding of the practice and confirms that what we are practising does indeed accord with the words of the Buddha.

Generally people are more interested in understanding Dhamma at the intellectual level than practising it, but in Dhamma the practice is much more important than anything else. We can’t make any kind of concession here. If the Satipatthāna course becomes a student’s first course what will this person actually practise? He or she will only play intellectual games.

If we keep giving Satipatthāna courses to students who are only interested in playing intellectual games, we are harming these people, creating a barrier to their progress. They will never practise seriously because they are happy playing intellectual games. Dhamma is not for intellectual games. Be careful.

The other day I came to know of another small incident: Students were asked to sit, meditate and chant just before the press arrived for an interview. It is shocking to make an exhibition of our meditation; this is against Dhamma.

On the last day of the ten-day course discourses I say, "Meditate at your home for an hour in the morning and evening, and when you are travelling in a bus or a train observe the truth within with open eyes." The moment you close your eyes in public you are making a show for others, "Look, I am a great meditator, even while travelling I meditate!" Making an exhibition of Dhamma means you have not understood Dhamma.

Whenever I see somebody making a show that he is a religious person with a mark on the forehead or an ornament or a certain kind of cloth, I understand this person has no trace of Dhamma. If Dhamma is present, what need is there to make an exhibition of it? Your behaviour will say that you are a good Dhamma person. Whenever I give a public talk anywhere in the world, students arrive about an hour earlier and meditate in the hall. About fifteen minutes after the meditation is over the public arrives and the discourse begins. While the students are meditating, no non-meditators are allowed in; otherwise their meditation would become a show.

These are small details but they are important because one always starts to slip because of a small inattentiveness, and then one keeps slipping further and further down. In the past this is how Dhamma deteriorated, not only in India but also in other countries.

You are all leaders of Vipassana here. It is good that particular incident happened during the press conference; it convinced me that now is the time to explain to my sons and daughters that this is not a Dhammic way to work. If I were to refrain from explaining, in case somebody becomes unhappy, I would not be a good teacher. It is my duty to explain these things. Wherever I have found such mistakes, I point out the errors with love and compassion; the mistakes are rectified and then the Dhamma starts glowing in its own purity.

I see great potential for the pure Dhamma to arise here. My dream is that one day the great nations of China and India will take up Dhamma in its purity, and the entire world will accept it, and there will be great benefit to miserable people. So not only in your interest but also in the interest of all humanity, see that you maintain the purity of the technique, the purity of the discipline, the purity of the rules and regulations. They are all framed to keep the technique pure, to keep the Dhamma pure.

This is the path of pure Dhamma. We are not here to please people, we are here to serve them, to help them come out of their misery. Whether there are fewer or more students doesn’t matter. Pure Dhamma should be given so that they can develop and come out of misery. That is more important for us than counting heads.

In the fourteen years I was with my teacher, I saw how he taught Dhamma with strong discipline. In the twenty-nine years I have been teaching Dhamma, success has come only because of the strong discipline. People feel a Goenka course is hard, but good results come from it and they attend.

I am sure all of you will maintain the purity of Dhamma and spread Dhamma in its purity—for your good and for the good of many, not only of this generation, but of the coming generations.

May Dhamma grow in its purity. May more and more people benefit by Dhamma.

Bhavatu sabba mangalam

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