A Fistful of Sand

  Ah The Four Bodhisattva Vows are among the most well-known and profound commitments in Mahāyāna Buddhism. At first glance, they appear paradoxical, even impossible to fulfill: Sentient beings are numberless; I vow to save them all. Delusions are inexhaustible; I vow to end them. Dharma gates are boundless; I vow to master them. The Buddha way is unsurpassable; I vow to attain it. Taken literally, these vows seem unattainable. How can one possibly save an infinite number of beings? How can one end delusions that continuously arise? How can one master all Dharma teachings or attain an unsurpassable path? However, these vows are not meant to be fulfilled in a linear or conventional sense. Instead, they serve as a profound  upāya  (skillful means) to dissolve self-centered limitations and awaken one to the nature of reality. Saving All Beings: The Non-Dual View The first vow, "Sentient beings are numberless, I vow to save them all," seems impossible if we think of it in ter...

The Buddha on Herding Oxen From the Dhammapada Stories Commentary This instruction was given by the Teacher while he was in residence at Alavi with reference to a certain lay disciple. For one day, as the Teacher seated in the Perfumed Chamber at Jetavana surveyed the world at dawn, he beheld a certain poor man at Alavi. Perceiving that he possessed the faculties requisite for attaining the fruit of stream-entry, he surrounded himself with a company of five hundred monks and went to Alavi. The inhabitants of Alavi straightaway invited the Teacher to be their guest. That poor man also heard that the Teacher had arrived and made up his mind to go and hear the Teacher teach the Dhamma. But that very day an ox of his strayed off. So he considered within himself, "Shall I seek that ox, or shall I go and hear the Dhamma?" And he came to the following conclusion, "I will first seek that ox and then go and hear the Dhamma." Accordingly, early i...

In the West there is a tendency to focus on the “do-it-yourself” self-help character both of Shakyamuni Buddha's enlightenment. After all, did he not teach us to work towards liberation though our own effort? We take this mean that we are all alone and on our own. Once again we fail to recognize the fact of dependent origination. No one ever has actually “done-it-himself”. Buddhists in the West (code for white folk who have an interest in or even adopted Buddhism) often avoid or reject the role of faith and devotion. Even though these components of have been a part of Buddhism from the beginning – as we can see in the practices of bowing to Buddha, bodhisattvas, monks and teachers, lighting incense, reciting copying sutras, and decorating monasteries and temples with sculpture and paintings – many “Western Buddhist centers have abandoned these practices without ever exploring why they were developed in the first place. From the earliest days of Buddhism importance placed   on d...