GƯƠM BÁU TRAO TAY _ Handing Down the Precious Sword (Song ngữ)

[trantu]

3. It looks like that but is not the way it is

Subhuti respectfully asked two questions to the Buddha: “How can we rest our mind, how can we subdue our mind?” and the Buddha said: “There is nothing difficult there, the Great Bodhisattvas should subdue their mind this way, this way… Listen carefully. I shall tell you how”. Subhuti happily answered: “Pray, do, World-honored One. With joyful anticipation we long to hear.”

More than 2,500 years later, more so now we very much long to hear and prick our ears to listen, because man has never lived so much in fear, anxiety and stress as we do now within the scope of global conflicts, epidemics, natural disasters and the like! Man is infected with various diseases which modern medicine cannot heal just yet! So many different kinds of diseases manifests around us, one induces another because their roots are not to be found in our body! We go to see every kind of doctors eventually ending up resorting quack specialists. An abundance of drugs are available like anti-depressants, sleeping sedatives, anxiolytics, even very potent drugs to help people disengage themselves from their thoughts and induce a temporary sensationless state just to provide momentary rest, peace and isolation from the taxing emotions and distress of anguish or fear.

[trantu]

The Buddha taught: How to control your mind? Where must your mind dwell? You only need to bring all living creatures of whatever class to the final extinction, to the unbounded liberation, Nirvana! But actually none of them was brought to the final extinction!

Oh my goodness! What a whirlwind! The Buddha continued on before one recovered from the first train of thought:

“Why so? Because no Bodhisattva who is a real Bodhisattva cherishes the conception of an ego, a personality, a being or a life span”.

Upon hearing this many listeners felt the contradiction to commit themselves further and they started to reconsider their idea of becoming Bodhisattva.

Even Subhuti cried out:

“I might easily understand the Buddha’s teaching, but in 500 years, what about the people of that time, will they be able to understand?”

The Buddha admonished him: “Subhuti, do not utter such words.”

This is because the Buddha has great faith in the future, as people are more likely to easier understand his teaching thanks to modern technology, mode of media communication, and so forth… though material improvements and life conveniences will be abundant… people will be more prone to suffer and their destructive emotions will also soar up! The Buddha added: “In the future, if someone hears this Sutra and is not frightened, or alarmed, or terrified, you should know that person is most rare”.

Half a century ago, Edward Conze (Ph.D. in Psychology and well-known Buddhist scholar who translated the Diamond Sutra into English) said that an intellectual theologian friend of his, upon reading the translation bewilderedly exclaimed: “It’s crazy! Utterly crazy!” But Edward Conze didn’t think this was crazy at all, on the contrary he affirmed that the results will be acknowledged through daily application of its principles!

[trantu]

Nguyen Du read the Diamond Sutra over and over, thousands of times, until he had the opportunity as Ambassador to make a trip to China. As he looked at Prince Luong’s stone terrace and its fading carved words, he lamented:

“Finally I understand that only wordless sutras are genuine teachings!”

(Chung tri vô tự thị chân kinh)

The ancients similarly attested: “We vow to understand the true meaning of the Tathagata’s teachings” (Nguyện giải Như Lai chân thật nghĩa).

Perhaps there is something … some secret here.

The Buddha said hat to discipline one’s mind, one must bring together countless types of beings – beings born from womb, from egg, from moisture or from transformation, beings with form or without forms, with perception of without perception, with neither perception nor non-perception… to the final extinction (of rebirth), to the Nirvana without exception. Then, although these countless, incalculable beings have been brought to extinction, in reality… no one been extinguished!

Up to now, we think that beings are animated things, inclusive of human beings, so if we bring every ‘being’ to extinction then whom are we left to live with? Some texts say that we must bring the totality of beings to extinction without pride on oneself, in so doing to achieve the magnanimous deed that is the way of a Bodhisattva.

Other texts have alluded to beings not as human beings or animated things but as thoughts, ideas, concepts!

To ordinary people as ourselves, the sentence “bring to extinction”, then moving toward Nirvana is somewhat terrifying! In fact, to bring people to extinction does not mean to kill them, but to bring them across the way to the other shores, i.e. to liberate them!

If we think it through, maybe the premise here is the word “being”. If we manage to decode it, we might perhaps open even the “Lost secrets of Martial Arts” (Càn khôn đại nã di tâm pháp) as Vô Kỵ (the knight errant of Kim Dung’s martial novels) did while he stayed in a deep crypt.

[trantu]

Once I talked to a monk regarding my question about “beings”, he answered briefly “those who depend on causes and conditions to come into being” and that was all he said. But to me that was enough, that was very clear; after long periods of searching and pondering, my concerns finally resolved. Now I understand why Zen masters used to demand that their disciples pound rice, fetch water and cut wood for many years without any semblance of teachings, until the disciple internalized a sense of maturity. Like in the old days when an apprentice wanted to learn from a master alchemist, the master would examine the disciple from every angle before proceeding to teach him skills on how to cut herbs, shed, pound and cook them… only after five to seven years would the disciple be allowed to check pulses and prescribe remedies because a minor mistake can be fatal! And when he succeeds, the master might even give him his daughter’s hand in marriage! So we can say that the context of “beings” here is not what we typically understand but refer to the causes and conditions linking up with one another and coming together, or coming into ‘being’, that is why we call them “beings”. As the chanced meeting ends, so does the act of ‘being’. In Buddhist studies we cannot rely on words alone, nor can we depart from them…

In the latter parts of the Diamond Sutra, it is said clearly that “the beings are not beings”. We are acquainted now with the “it is no…, therefore it is called…” phrasing in this sutra. This kind of saying, this unconventional, beyond-the-thinking language helps us to refute false tenets and to destroy concepts which have long been frozen in our cortex. To be liberated, a man must first free himself from his extremely solid concepts and perceptions into which, as in a spider’s web, he is entangled, caught up, hampered and unable to move.

[trantu]

Every branch has its own terminology that those within the same specialization can understand completely, unlike non-specialists who may not comprehend fully. For example, a large number of medical terms cannot be translated, and must be pronounced phonetically in their original forms in order to completely express their meaning (subtlety and all). That is why doctors used to add Latin terms when talking to each other, to the great confusion of their patients who don’t have the slightest idea of their meaning and subsequently get them all wrong and entangled in more confusion.

“Arisen from causes and conditions”, sentient beings differ greatly from one another. That is why they are innumerable. We ourselves also are a sentient being, a being constituted by the five aggregates (skandhas) combined together: Aggregate of Matter (or of Form), Aggregate of Feeling or Sensation, Aggregate of Perception, Aggregate of Mental Formations and Aggregate of Consciousness … In other words, our parents were “fated” [i.e when the causes and conditions were complete and linked together] to meet in order to… have us. In the case they were not “fated” to meet, “even face to face they could not see each other” (vô duyên đối diện bất tương phùng), we by no means can be here! And what about our grand-parents? If they did not happen to wonder once “Why did I meet this person? Are we fated to live a lifelong together?” (người đâu gặp gỡ làm chi, trăm năm biết có duyên gì hay không?), our presence here would also be highly improbable! Therefore we have the opportunity to inherit the genes of the entire clan, even those of our character, or those of asthma, of diabetes. The two H and O atoms are “bound to meet” so that different matters come into being, and if we add the C atom, sometime the combination of them would give rise to vinegar, some to alcohol. And if we are “bound to meet” with alcohol, not a few new beings will be “fated” to come to life! Let’s take anger, for example. Because of an offensive comment, we can react in explosive anger! A few harsh words are exchanged and soon a few problems spring into “being”! From words, these “beings” can easily come to blows. The anger, greed, sadness, fear and anxiety or stress are also “beings” which can wreak havoc in our mind and lead to endless flusters, afflictions, sufferings! Even those around us might be very sweet like angels in the morning, but easily turn to demons in the afternoon. And so can we, as the others see us!

[trantu]

“Tea, alcohol and females,

these few trifles are keeping me distracted…”

Một trà một rượu một đàn bà,

ba cái lăng nhăng nó quấy ta (Tú Xương)

Is it true that these “trifles” distract us? Not really! “The wind does not move, the flag does not move. Only the mind does” [said the 6th Zen Patriarch]. When our mind is peaceful, what can “distract” us? Should anger or sadness (or anything else) come into being, we only need to “extinguish” them all, to let go of them entirely and that’s it! The surface of a lake must be motionless for the moon’s reflection to hold. But that takes time. We have to train painfully for a long time, it will not do to rush progress. The word “extinguish” here does not mean to destroy but to put aside, or “not to let it come into being again”, or let it be in an “unborn state”. If we train skillfully, we can “extinguish all the sentient beings”, why not? To “extinguish all the sentient beings” also means that no sentient being has been extinguished, because if they no longer come into being, what is left to be extinguished?

But it seems that even this [explanation] doesn’t entirely make sense!

[trantu]

4. That is the way it is but it does not appear so.

Once we understand “beings are not beings, therefore they are called beings,” we thought we held the password to enter the Diamond Sutra vaults, but that in fact is not the case, because that it the way it is but it doesn’t appear so.

Let’s revisit the previous episode during which the “precious sword” was being handed down. Seeing scores of people in amazement by his beyond-the-thinking language, the Buddha asked “Why is that?” Then he affirmed: “Because if a Bodhisattva still holds on to the arbitrary illusions of form or phenomena such as an ego, a personality, a being, or a life , then that person is not a Bodhisattva”.

Once again I was dumfounded! I expected an explanation from the Buddha, but what he said seemed to be of no relevance to what was said previously. May be there is something mysterious here.


Initially, I thought about the first, second and third person in singular and plural in the past, present and future as in the grammatical verbs conjugation in order to mark the relativeness between the self with the others, with time and space, but it seemed that was not the way it is! Then I thought that it might be a 3-dimensional chart and a curved line representing the time on which each individual affirms his present status in society, his connection with other “beings” at a certain point, but that still was not right either! What was it then? It took me a long time to realize it: That is the no-self state of a practitioner on his way toward liberation! The practitioner must “meditate on the emptiness of the five aggregates” (skandas) – the true no-self – in order to “overcome all ills and sufferings” [The Heart Sutra].
But he must first overcome all ills and sufferings for himself, then be able to help others to be a worthy Bodhisattva. So this is a compulsory, necessary condition in order to…

This “no-self” doctrine is rather elusive! Even if it is possible to use logic, philosophy of interdependency, of emptiness to understand the meaning of “no-self”, but it is only the result of a theoretic, conceptual body of knowledge. Here, the no-self is a state, a realm that the practitioner can perceive through a long and consistent practice, the meditation!

[trantu]

Meditation exists from time immemorial. When prince Siddharta was still very young, he would sit shaded under a tree to observe the laborers in the distant paddy fields, and unknowingly attained the first dhyana state.

Later, on the path of enlightenment, he studied under two of the foremost meditation masters of his time, and in a short time mastered the 8 dhyana absorptions up to the “neither perception-nor-non-perception” stage, but still did not find peace and yearned to search for a path to call his own, so he left them! It was only when he attained the ninth dhyana realm “the absorption of complete extinction of sensation and perception” that lead to the stage of “all-knowing”, to the “Buddha-hood” in which every delusion vanished. In other words, the dhyana “extinction of sensation and perception” is the only remedy to heal all inflictions and sufferings at their roots, while the previous process only treated the symptoms superficially as and where it was needed and cannot prevent the recurrence of diseases. To treat a disease at its root is to heal it thoroughly, without any risk of recurrence or post-treatment sequela.

The term “extinction” in “dhyana of extinction of sensations and perceptions” does not mean “extinguish (annihilate)” them but prevent them from development further. Destroying a tumor is not as good as preventing it from developing in the first place. Prevention is better than cure. In short, to be worthy of being a Bodhisattva, one must successfully endure this path. In other word, a Bodhisattva must thoroughly “deeply practice meditation” to attain the no-self state. He must relinquish all attachment to the illusions of form or phenomena such as an ego, a personality, a being or a life-span. He must also relinquish all discrimination, all seizing – then he can serenely stroll into the bustle of the market place of the world, immune to any affliction, without fear of being contaminated.

[trantu]

Fortunately, if we listen carefully, we will hear that the Buddha instructed Subhuti very precisely “The Great Bodhisattva should subdue their mind in this way”. All the Great Bodhisattvas have practiced in “that way” to control their minds. As for…“rookie” or lesser Bodhisattvas… please do not be in a hurry. We still must take steps, have patience, strive diligently and persevere … the enduring paths ahead!

“The Buddha told Subhuti”, as a reminder to all who wish to join the Bodhisattva’s path that they cannot allow themselves to skip meditation. Without meditation (or concentration) it is difficult to have wisdom. The ethical disciplines lead to concentration, concentration to wisdom, and vice versa. It is an equilateral triangle with two directions: onward and backward. In my opinion, ethical disciplines, concentration and wisdom are specific antidotes for greed, aversion and delusion; the ethical disciplines to counter greed, concentration to counter aversion and wisdom to counter delusion. If we only treat the symptoms… the disease will not be eradicated, it will recur with sequelae risks. So, in order to eradicate it and cure it thoroughly, one must combine the three remedies to foray the disease on 3 planes. If one focuses too much on concentration, one tends to be out of touch with the real world; on ethical disciplines, one tends to be too intransigent, too rigid; and with an imbalance of wisdom, one tends to brag…

In spite of this, these three healing drugs must be dosed according to the patient’s need. The “aversion type” tends to be over sentimental, easy to love, easy to suffer…
[In the case of]:
When injured, one keeps the arms
Refusing to be healed, to be cures of the poisonous inclination…
Rồi bị thương, người ta giữ gươm đao
Không muốn chữa, không chịu lành thú độc.
(Xuân Diệu)
We parted even before our meeting
My soul follows your shadow…
Chưa gặp nhau mà đã biệt ly
Hồn anh theo dõi bóng em đi…
(Hàn Mặc Tử)
then these situations are best treated by meditative concentration.

[trantu]

Intellectuals who always tend to accumulate and squirrel away information, proud of their “book knowledge”, are best treated firstly by wisdom in order to counter their symptom of delusion. When enlightened by wisdom, one naturally knows that one needs ethical disciplines and meditative concentration as well. Among the three remedies, meditative concentration is the most fundamental. Only by meditation can one attain the “no-self” state and the dhyana of “extinction of sensations and perceptions”, to stop discriminating and be attached to things. Lao Tzu said that enlightened persons always seem somewhat guileless, and that is because they are now different, free from all passions and have attained the perfectly content seclusion or no-rebirth state.

If in his first lesson the Buddha taught that we should eat when hungry and drink when thirsty, in order to emphasize the “ethical discipline”, then this second lesson emphasizes the “meditative concentration”. From the passage: “Then the Buddha addressed the Venerable Subhuti” … to “is not a Bodhisattva” there is a consistency in the meditative process from the sphere of desire, sphere of form and then non-form. Then one must overcome all these too, to eventually attain the dhyana of “Extinction of sensations and perceptions” which is also called the ninth dhyana absorption.

It is like a perfect exchange of martial arts sword play, movements intertwined with harmonious and unbroken transitions from visible to invisible, like trancelike flowing water or chasing clouds, until all but the essence of the art of sword remained; the performers and their moves also disappeared… and that is the ultimate move. At that moment there is no more object nor subject, when the herd as well as the herdsman cease to exist. One must experience this! Not just talk about it. That is what the Buddha taught.
Of course there are many other layers of meanings to experience before one can discover oneself. This is what is called the “infinite meanings” in Buddhist scriptures. The handing of the Precious sword symbolizes the capacity of going beyond convention and constraining. If we are still clinging, or still hold on to any fix meaning tight, then we still are dependent, stuck… how can we attain the mental state of that mind without dwelling anywhere?
Lệnh Hồ Xung’s “sword destroying tactics” in the “Độc cô cửu kiếm” (Technique of combatting alone using 9 swords) defeated 15 trained swordsmen who besieged and outnumbered him. If he used the “No More” technique (vô chiêu thắng hữu chiêu), imagine how more awesome it would be! The way towards destroying the move is only a simple step toward the technique “going beyond convention and constraint”. One day we shall be able to perceive, to discover and to be “aware” to much more layers of meanings. The important thing is to practice, to discover through experience. Only then, will we be able to understand what means “unutterable” (impossible to explain) and “unfathomable” (impossible to comprehend), where even language is not of use!.