I was born in Norway, so I'm Norwegian nationality, and these days I'm not sure if I'm Norwegian anymore
or whether I'm Australian, or whatever, after a while you loose your identity,
which is a kind of idea of the Buddhist path.
There are so many different identities that we have, but obviously national identity is one of them.
And you can see how bad it actually is.
You see it with a lot of the violence, you see now in places like Sri Lanka,
You see the problems in Burma, even for Buddhists there's a problem and it comes from idea of national identity.
It's a very I think important driver of that violence and the clash you have between different cultures:
the Islamic culture versus the Buddhist culture, so that is a big problem.
So if you lose a bit of identity, probably it's a good thing, that's what I reckon.
So that's my background, that's where I come from and I started out my monastic life in the UK,
in Amaravati monastery, Chithurst monastery, Ajahn Sumedho's monasteries in the UK.
And then I heard a talk by Ajahn Brahm and I said "This is my teacher!"
So I came to Australia straight away, and I've been ever since, I've been a monk here now, staying in this monastery over 23, years
close to 24 years and that was the best move of my life, I think, it was just the right thing.
Sometimes it's like you have, I think, it has to do with your...
It's not just about recognizing the right teaching,
sometimes we have a kind of chemistry with somebody else. It's like your outlook is somehow similar,
so it's easy to work with them and for me I felt a very good chemistry with someone like Ajahn Brahm.
I also find him very inspiring in terms of Dhamma qualities, I see Dhamma qualities in him,
that I think are quite rare actually in the world to find in almost anyone.
That's one of the reasons why I stay here.
So I started off in the U.K. but I actually began before that.
It's one of those interesting things in life, it is always the matter why do you end up as a Buddhist monk.
In one way it's really hard to explain.
You grow up in a country where there's hardly any Buddhism at all, I didn't know any Buddhist.
My parents certainly were not Buddhist but there was something inside me,
which kind of drew me in that direction.
And I remember when I was 12 years old I had this fantasy about living in a hut,
in the forest by myself - 12 years old and I think: what's going on there.
And it's very interesting! And I think in retrospect the only way I can
really explain the kind of natural inclination towards Asian religions,
towards meditation, all these things, that it really must come from a past life,
I can't really understand any other way where it comes from.
So that is the beginning and at that point people are kind of disappointed:
surely you saw the superiority of the Buddhist teaching and you became a Buddhist.
But it is not, it isn't like that, life doesn't work like that.
It doesn't matter, it's not about intelligence it's often the emotions that drive us,
and if you have a natural feeling for something you just go there.
We are emotional beings and the Buddha says so: vedana paccaya tanha.
Vedana is not exactly the same as emotion, but very closely related to that.
And that is what drives you through all your life,
drives you to do things, so that is, I think, one of the most essential things.
So that is what gets you started on the Buddhist path,
but then what actually keeps you there and what kind of keeps you going is often something very different.
And what keeps you there is that once you start reading the word of the Buddha,
you start to understand what it is all about.
One of the things that kind of became clear to me after a while was that this is the
answer to the meaning of life, that's what became clear to me.
Once that is your outlook, that you think this is the answer to the meaning of life,
what are you gonna do? Are you going to do something else?
You can't do anything else, if you found the meaning of life,
why are you gonna go and get married and get a job somewhere?
Why are you gonna do whatever else in life if you found the meaning?
There's only one conclusion from that and that is that you commit yourself to that.
Then there's no other possibility really.
This is the feeling I have had for the last 10 or 15 years:
this really is the answer to the meaning of life but now it's just a matter of applying myself.
I think it is a second thing that makes you remain as a monastic in a longterm.
You see that you think that you have found the meaning of life,
you apply yourself and you see that the path actually works. How do you know that the path works?
Well you know that the path works,
and this is actually what Buddha says in the suttas as well, how you actually know these things.
You look inside of yourself - are your good quality is improving?
If they are, it is working. Are your bad qualities declining? If they are, it is working.
More mindfulness, more kindness, more samadhi, bit more wisdom,
at least a little bit, it takes a while before wisdom really takes off.
Reduction in negative things, less anger more equanimity of mind,
more coolness and all these things.
This is what I have seen continuously pretty much since I became a monastic.
And you know that if this continues, there is only one goal,
This goal has only one direction, that is ultimately towards Nibbana.
What really matters in Buddhism is the Dhamma. The Dhamma is primary, Vinaya arises from the Dhamma.
And you see that in the beginning of the Vinaya Pitaka
In the Suttavibhanga the Buddha talks about how the Vinaya arises,
and Venerable Sariputta goes to him and sais: lay down the Vinaya rules so that Sasana can last a long time!
You know that story, yeah? And the Buddha says: I only lay down the rules
one certain defilements, certain asavas arise in the community, then I lay down the rules.
And the whole Vinaya is based on this idea that there is a problem that needs to be solved.
Only then he would lay down the rule to counter that, but the Dhamma was already in place. place
Lay people can also, at the right time and place, they can say something.
They can say: oh Bhante why are you eating afternoon, isn't there a rule about this?
You know "hint, hint" not kind of push too hard because it can backfire,
but maybe kind of give a hint: you know we saw these other monks, they didn't eat afternoon, how come there is a difference?
"khkm, hint, hint"
Something very gentle, because I think one of the most important things is to realize that.
The reason why monks often break the rules are because they are used to that from the environment,
they are used to that from their own teachers. It's not because they choose to be bad,
it's that they have been conditioned into bad ways of doing things.
Once you realize that, you can have a bit of compassion for them, you know they're not really evil or bad or anything like that.
It's just that this is how they've been conditioned.
So recognizing that, then you tend to be also more gentle with them if you want to try to change their ways.
So this is the the first thing, to try to see if they change.
The second thing is to, I think, it's always the right thing if you want to support the monastic order,
give the most support to where you have the most faith.
Where you feel the practice is kind of taken to the highest level, that is where it's best to give the most support.
Why? Well, because that is where the results are gonna come.
If you're gonna be able to sustain the Buddhism for the future what we need is Arias,
we need Noble Ones, who actually understand this teachings.
Where is that going to happen? It's going to happen where the Vinaya is taken seriously,
where meditation is happening, where the path is practiced fully, that's where it's going to happen.
So if you want to preserve Buddhism for the future,
you should also ensure that you support those monastics who are taking this to the highest potential.
And remember it doesn't have to be just monks, it can also be nuns.
Nuns have the same potential as monks to get enlightenment if they practice well.
So better to support a good nun than to support a dogdy monk, yeah? People often forget that.
That actually is an important point. One of the things that I always remember,
I love in many ways the Mahaparinibbana Sutta,
there are so many beautiful teachings in there and also some of the teachings that attempt to...
the Buddha attempts to summarize what Dhamma is all about.
And he tends to give advice about the future, how the monastic order should practice,
to enable the Dhamma to live for a long time into the future,
all this kind of things, so many interesting teachings in there.
One of the teachings are seven factors that lead to non-decline,
and one of those seven factors is that the Dhamma will grow and not decline
as long as the monastics delight in forest lodgings - it's one of seven factors, for goodnes sake
for why the Dhamma lasts into the future so it's actually not just a small issue,
it's actually very very big issue and you have people who take
the Dhamma seriously, practice according to the rules live in the forest.
There is actually another of the seven factors. It is that as monastics you don't
abolish any of the existing rules you don't make new ones,
and you practice according to the existing rules.
Theravada world is very large, we are just little monastery.
Okay, Ajahn Brahm is very famous, that's true, but very often what happens is that
while he is famous, then everything is kind of going really well here,
but one day he is gonna die, what then?
Of course if we have some other monks who can live up to his standards and can carry that on onwards
into the future, then maybe it can become a force that kind of
becomes more widespread in the Theravada world.
But Theravada world is conservative, and it is not gonna change easily, and the arguments that people use,
the Vinaya arguments that people use are very settled.
I've seen some of those arguments, they are very settled arguments, I don't think that they need to look at things that way.
The problem is that with the Vinaya, you can take many different angles or view points
how you look at the Vinaya. You can take a conservative angle, you can take a more liberal angle to these things.
What decides the angle you take is often your values that come before hand.
Is ordination of bhikkhunis, is that acceptable according to the Vinaya?
I say it is and I have been working with Venerable Analayo a lot on this issue
I've seen all the arguments and I still think it is,
but you can also, if you look at it from a different angle, you can also argue that it isn't.
So which do you choose? And the one you choose is going to be the one of your pre-existing values.
Is it important to have bhikkhunis in the modern world? I think it's incredibly important.
It's absolutely essential I think as Buddhists if you're going to be taken seriously in the modern world,
we have to have that sense of equality between men and women,
otherwise people are going to wipe us off like some kind of throwback to the Neanderthal past or something like that.
When you look at the number of good monastics in the world,
a number of good monks in the world is quite small.
If we can fortify that with some good nuns who can also take part in teaching
and inspiring people, etcetera, it's a wonderful thing.
So I hope maybe some of the things that we do here will rub off and carry on,
and become mainstream in Theravada Buddhism.
We will always be doing our very best to persuade the others that this is the right thing to do,
with bhikkhunis in particular, and we are not going to give up until we breathe our last breath.
I would tell lay people: support where your heart is, according to your heart.
Don't be afraid and don't be too afraid of having to be conservative always.
If you feel that something is right, especially when your mind is clear,
when you have no defilements in your heart and you feel something is right,
then very often that will be the right thing to do.
So Bhante, how are the local bhikkhunis behaving, are they behaving well?
Yes, the local bhikkhunis, that is the Dhammasara monastery that we have here,
I think there are about ten bhikkhunis there, a few samaneris
and they're expanding very fast. There's a lot of interest in ordaining as a bhikkhuni here.
Very high-quality bhikkhunis, they're all very highly educated,
They all have kind of a PhD's and all kind of stuff you know.
Some of them are very good meditators as well, they have very good results in meditation practice.
They're still young community so they are still learning a lot.
Because the bhikkhuni Vinaya is almost like a carte blanche nobody knows much about the bhikkhuni Vinaya,
because nobody practiced it for over a thousand years, so they have to start pretty much from scratch.
And I have tried to help them a little bit because I obviously I had a little bit of basic understanding of Vinaya in general,
so you can apply that to the bhikkhuni Vinaya as well.
But generally speaking their attitude is very good, they have very good candidates, intelligent,
very committed to the Dhamma, getting good results in their practice...
I must admit, I'm very impressed and if this continues and we continue to get candidates like that coming through,
the bhikkhuni Sangha, certainly here, is going to become very powerful and very strong.
And I think it won't be long before our Bodhinyana monastery is overshadowed.
You know these things develop, I think, they change over time, so it is not at all impossible,
that who knows, twenty, thirty years down the track,
that we may get a completely different situation here.
The Vinaya is a large number of rules in terms of etiquette and all kind of things it's certainly part of that.
But there is actually something else which is even much more important than that
and that is, how the community functions together, it's even more important.
This is what we call Sangha kamma in in the Pali.
It literally means like "action of the Sangha" of the order, of the monastic order.
This is how we come together, how we decide who is going to ordain,
how we do the Uposatha ceremony together, the observation ceremony togehter,
if we appoint someone as an officer of a Sangha to be in charge of the stores for example.
You do that through a Sangha-kamma,
an official act of the Sangha and this is to me, in some way, it's even more
interesting than the other part of the Vinaya. Because the other part of the Vinaya, okay,
after a while it becomes almost second nature, you know what you have to do.
You know that basically if you have a good heart, if you're kind,
you can't really go that far too far off the Vinaya.
It really in the end is about kindness and good heartdness, that's what really is about.
But this other thing, it ensures that the Sangha makes decisions that have integrity to them,
that everybody agrees to them.
The two basic principles of Sangha-kamma, of the actions done by the Sangha is:
on one hand that it's pure democratic decision, it's absolute democracy,
everybody has to agree, if you have one monk which says "nay" then it can't go through.
It's just an absolute democracy in some way there's much more democratic than modern modern democratic institutions around the world,
cause everybody has to agree in it. Something very beautiful about that,
because when everybody has to agree it means nobody is left out.
In a traditional democracy you can have the tyranny of the majority.
The majority opresses the minority, which sometimes can happen.
And if you look at history I think something like that is exactly what has happened.
You install some kind of despot through Democratic means,
and then we get the tyranny of the majority so to speak.
But if everybody is onboard it means that you have to take into account everybody's feelings,
everybody's ideas, you have to listen to them, okay, how can we resolve this in a way where everybody is satisfied,
it's very good, it means that nobody really feels left out,
at the end of the day everybody feels that they have been heard.
Some people think that this is a recipe for gridlock, end of decisions taking at all.
Sometimes it is, but most of the time it works really well,
because people understand they have been mature to do that.
If you're not reasonable then nothing ever gets done, so it tends to work out.
So democracy is one aspect, but the other aspect which is so important for the Vinaya
is the idea of decentralization. Every monastery
is fully in charge of its own affairs and this was laid down by the Buddha.
The idea of the sima as a boundary and all decisions that are made are made according to these boundaries.
So whatever monks live within a certain kind of area they are fully independent in their decision making.
So this creates a very decentralized structure, it means that they are, in theory,
there are no hierarchies, only in theory, in practice there are hierarchies of course,
in theory no hierarchies and I think personally hierarchies are really bad.
The problem with hierarchies is they tend to lead to corruption.
If you have hierarchies everybody wants to climb the hierarchy,
because hierarchy gives you power, it gives you a status, it gives all this kind of thing.
When you have power than you can get things done in your way.
Everybody wants to climb hierarchy, it's inherently corruptive.
De-centralized structure, much less likely to be corrupted,
precisely because there is nowhere to go.
All you're doing is making decisions, then you are going back to your kuti,
and you are meditating or whatever, so it inherently has less ability to corrupt.
Yes, it means that there is no one on top to make sure everyone behaves properly,
but that's okay it means that some monasteries will be bad, some monasteries will be good,
and it's up to the lay people then to support those monasteries,
that are better and not so much those that are bad, yeah?
So that kind of tends to work it's way out anyway.
The idea of using a hierarchy to control the monastic order,
to kick out the bad ones and keep the good ones in there,
I think it defeats the purpose and makes the matter worse, it makes it more corrupt,
because that's the nature of hierarchies.
So it almost seems like Sangha is the Anarchist movement...
That's true, yeah, I must admit I do not really know exactly much about the
theory of Anarchy, I mean I know that there is the theory behind that as well,
I don't really know enough to be able to say whether how much it resembles that, but quite possibly yeah.
So Bhante, Ajahn Brahm is not a tyrant?
Because he used to say that there are two rules, first rule is you listen to what abbot says, thing
and the second rule, if something is wrong, go back to rule number one.
Exactly, yeah, I think that's a joke and how much... there is always some truth to every joke...
I shouldn't say that, that's terrible to say...
I remember there was one time when Ajahn Brahm,
you know he is the spiritual director of the Buddhist Society of Western Australia,
and every year there's election for the committee members of the BSWA,
Everybody has to sign the paper what they are and assign their positions,
and Ajahn Brahm signs: "Ajahn Brahm", and underneath he writes "spiritual dictator".
Somebody said: was it on purpose or it was a Freudian slip?
Generally speaking Ajahn Brahm, he works on Democratic ideals,
and in his monastery it's not as if Ajahn Brahm's ideas always win out,
sometime if people disagree then it's not gonna happen.
I think that is great there's a kind of a spiritual maturity to that,
in a sense of confidence in that.
I think the reason why you get a lot of control freaks in position as abbotts is because of insecurity basically.
They are afraid things are gonna collapse, they're gonna fall apart,
if we don't control things, but if you have a lot of personal security,
you don't have that fear anymore and you are able to let things go.
And this is what I see with Ajahn Brahm, that insecurity is not there.
The basic qualities in a monastic should always be things like gentleness
and kindness, that should always be there and if that is missing,
than straight away you should have some kind of we should have a little bit of...
we shouldn't reject them straight away but you should have a little bit of
skepticism perhaps that is the case. There should also be a sense that they are renunciants,
that they have given up pleasure of the world.
Personally I think the monastics should also live in simple monasteries.
A bit like here in Bodhinyana, if you look at the
buildings it's not very impressive, yeah? It looks like a kind of slightly rundown place, yeah?
It's good, actually, it is quite nice around here, isn't it?
But it's not... it's pretty average in many ways and I think that's great.
I love this place precisely because it is quite average, it's not really nice.
And if monks live in environments or nuns live in environments that are too beautiful,
too expensive, supported by too much money and all of these kind of things,
very often it is not good and if it hasn't been corrupted,
then it kind of is heading in that direction, towards corruption.
So there should be simplicity, kindness and renunciation.
These are the two of the main aspects of of monasticism.
For more infomation >> Ain't Nothing Like the Real Thing - The Jackson 5 - Subtitulado en Español - Duration: 2:47. 
For more infomation >> BÀI TẬP KHỞI ĐỘNG CƠ THỂ GIÚP DỄ DÀNG THỨC DẬY TỈNH TÁO SAU VÀI PHÚT - Duration: 3:44. 
For more infomation >> RENAULT EZ-GO CONCEPT - Duration: 3:40. 
For more infomation >> LIVE GENÈVE 2018 : KIA CEED & CEED SW - Duration: 4:00. 
For more infomation >> Cuatro años después, siguen los esfuerzos por dar con el avión MH370 desaparecido - Duration: 7:46. 
For more infomation >> Guía Saint Seiya Zodiac Brave ; Acuario Divino (トンファー) - Duration: 3:07. 
For more infomation >> Si les hommes appliquent ces règles, les femmes voudraient faire l'amour tout le temps - Duration: 7:31. 
For more infomation >> La Policía detiene al quinto sospechoso de la violación grupal en Jaén, un menor - Duration: 2:45. 
For more infomation >> Detenidos otros dos menores de edad como presuntos autores del intento de agresión sexual en Jaén - Duration: 2:28. 
For more infomation >> A Genève, Porsche décline sa Mission E en faux baroudeur - Duration: 4:14. 
For more infomation >> Worlds Biggest Candy
For more infomation >> Waldspirale, The U-shaped Green Roof Residential Building in Germany - Duration: 2:22. 
For more infomation >> What does tunesmith mean? - Duration: 0:33. 
For more infomation >> 운전에 도움을 주는 2017 '최고의 차량용 가젯' - Duration: 7:05. 
For more infomation >> 仮想通貨取引所Binanceハッキングでビットコイン大暴落 2018年最新ニュース！その真相と原因 暴落理由 今後の予想 - Duration: 3:36. 
For more infomation >> The Life Of The Party - The Jackson 5 - Subtitulado en Español - Duration: 3:09. 
For more infomation >> Phụ nữ đừng nên KỲ VỌNG và TIN TƯỞNG quá nhiều Sống Mạnh Mẽ và Độc Lập mới là phụ nữ Thông Minh - Duration: 11:47. 
For more infomation >> KPOP SONGS I DISLIKE - JANUARY & FEBRUARY 2018 - Duration: 6:58. 
For more infomation >> Hannity - March 8, 2018 - Duration: 42:58. 
For more infomation >> VA Legends DrumKit Review - MPC Live 2.1 Beat Making - Duration: 28:27. 
For more infomation >> Thursday Evening Weather: Another Warm Day Tomorrow - Duration: 3:28. 
For more infomation >> ✔ 又一位本土演員不幸逝世，演戲曾入圍金鐘獎，車內燒炭自殺，去世2天才被發現！ ✔ 宠物屋 - Duration: 8:57. 
For more infomation >> 허경영♥최사랑, 열애 인정 "한 집에서 같이 살았다" | NO.1 NEWS CHANNEL - Duration: 4:41. 
For more infomation >> 작년 말 연인 발전,박신혜,최태준 | 박신혜♥최태준, 양측 열애 인정… "작년 말 연인 발전" - Duration: 2:06. 
For more infomation >> 홍상수-김민희, 불륜 인정 1년 만에 '결별' | NO.1 NEWS CHANNEL - Duration: 2:17. 
For more infomation >> Kid Drives A Ferrari And Punches Cop!!! - Duration: 1:15. 
For more infomation >> "가해자 떠나라"..'대부' 이순재의 무게있는 일침 - Duration: 4:49. 
For more infomation >> O Plano Família - Duration: 3:01. 
For more infomation >> Cierran consulado de EEUU en Playa del Carmen - Duration: 2:14. 
No comments:
Post a Comment