Cultivating Right View, Giving Up Wrong View | 12 Apr 2024

Ajahn Anan emphasizes the importance of cultivating the Right View as part of the Noble Eightfold Path, leading to liberation from suffering. He explains that giving, or Dāna, is more than a material act; it transforms our hearts, creating merit and spiritual joy. Through stories of the Buddha and Anathapindika, he illustrates the power of selfless giving and the resulting inner joy and spiritual growth.

Ajahn Anan highlights the belief in karma, rebirth, and the virtues of parents and teachers as essential to Right View. He encourages us to prepare for life's inevitable transitions by building a strong inner refuge through good karma, meditation, and reflecting on the Buddha's virtues. His message is one of hope, urging us to live with faith, generosity, and wisdom, ensuring a bright, joyful future and a path to liberation.

Transcript

Right view,

Within the Noble Eightfold Path,

Is a right view that one will attain to the highest Dhamma.

There is right view,

Right speech,

Mindfulness,

Samadhi,

Concentration,

Which is for the liberation from suffering.

This requires right view that is firmly established.

By coming today,

You may ask if you have samadhiti,

Right view.

You do have right view in regards to faith and views that are correct.

Like making offerings and giving alms,

We view that the dana,

The gift that we have given,

As having real results.

So then we come to make offerings and give dana.

How does it have real results?

The material things which we give and sacrifice,

We have given them away,

But it becomes a feeling,

A mental phenomena that is with the heart,

Which we call merit.

We change it from a coarse material to a refined mental phenomena that is with our heart.

It doesn't disappear anywhere.

It is with our heart.

We do it for the purpose of overcoming stinginess.

Maybe we do hope for merit to arise with us,

But if it's a deeper dana,

It is sacrificing and sharing for others to have happiness,

In a way that we aren't troubled by it.

And there are those with a lot of inner strength and barami,

Spiritual perfections,

Who are bodhisattvas,

Paramabodhisattvas,

Buddhas-to-be.

They have a lot of barami,

So when we say to not be troubled by the giving of dana,

They are not troubled by it,

By way of the heart.

In the Buddha's past life as Vesantara,

He gave away all his wealth,

But he was not troubled in the heart,

And his heart was joyous.

His inner strength was the strength of barami and jhana,

Mental absorptions of a high level,

That of a bodhisattva with full barami.

So he could do dana like that.

And in regards to a layman or a laywoman,

Then it was the wealthy merchant,

Manatha Pindika,

Who could give dana like that.

He made offerings until his money was all gone.

How could he do that?

It was because he had joy and an uplifted heart.

He gave alms until he had only rice left that was of bad quality,

Broken rice and sour gruel.

But he still made offerings.

He wasn't afraid to do it.

He wasn't worried that it would be wasted or that he would run out.

Why?

Because of his heart.

He did it and was joyous.

It was his barami that he had accumulated over a long time.

Still the Deva,

A divine being,

Was troubled that he was doing it too much.

So he sent that Deva away to go elsewhere,

As it was obstructing his doing of goodness.

The Deva was troubled and had nowhere to stay.

It asked for the Sama Sambuddha,

The perfectly self-awakened Buddha's metta,

His kindness.

The Buddha said,

You must make Manatha Pindika to be as rich as before.

And with its divine abilities,

The Deva could make it so that Manatha Pindika's field turned to gold.

He came back to be as rich as before.

So doing dana,

We have samaditi,

Because we believe it has real results.

And there are many who do not believe it,

That making offerings will come to nothing.

To pray to the gods is better.

Then at least they will have some left over for themselves.

But if we really understand it,

We know that having made offerings,

It doesn't go anywhere.

Because the result of dana is with our hearts.

So this is someone with samaditi.

And we have a belief in the law of karma,

The results of karma.

And to give puja,

Homage,

And respect to those whom one should give homage to.

To those with sila-dhamma,

Virtue,

There is the Buddha,

Dhamma,

Sangha,

Mother and father,

And to those who have done us goodness.

One with samaditi will have confidence that to give homage to their virtues has real results,

And that good karma and bad karma have real results.

Everyone in this world needs to have wisdom.

Having the belief that after dying there is rebirth.

Belief in the ongoing cycle of birth and death.

And some have a problem with this.

Does the next life exist?

If it does,

Then can you show me?

Venerable Ajahn Chah asked,

Does tomorrow exist?

His disciple answered,

Yes,

It exists.

Then if it exists,

Can you bring it to me to see?

We can't,

But it does exist.

The next life is like that.

The past life is like that.

We have been born already,

And as for the next life,

Tomorrow can be the next life.

So samaditi is believing in dying and then being reborn.

Believing in the law of karma.

Believing that this life exists,

Next life exists,

And the virtues of parents are real.

And that this citta,

Heart,

Has cycling through death and rebirth.

And if we practice well,

This heart is able to be purified and liberated.

That nibbana is real.

But those who do not believe this are miccha diti.

Miccha diti.

Miccha means incorrect,

Incorrect views,

And they can do anything because they don't believe in the law of karma,

Or of results of karma.

Of this world and of the next world.

But the Buddhists which have mindfulness and wisdom,

They will believe and have respect for the Buddha,

Dhamma,

And Sangha.

Like we see that there are the relics of the Sama Sambuddha,

Along with the relics of the chief disciples of Venerable Mahamoggalana and Venerable Sariputta coming from India to Thailand.

And there are people who come to give homage and puja these relics.

And their minds are uplifted from having given homage.

Their minds are bright and radiant,

And are meritorious,

Which is goodness.

They have the belief that arahants are real.

That the Buddha is real.

They recollect and bring it within their hearts.

Someone with this level of faith means they have built a lot of merit and barami correctly,

And so they have a determination to build goodness,

And have the strength of mind to give alms,

To listen to Dhamma,

And to progress the mind to be better and higher.

These days,

Society has changed.

There are younger generations,

And even small children,

Who come to the monastery.

Sometimes there are children who are seven or eight years old who want to ordain as novices and monks.

They want to be free from suffering.

They have the inclination and causes that they have built from the past.

When we have faith as our original assets,

We have our merit and goodness that we have built.

Then we have the chance to come to seclusion,

To practice Dhamma,

To sit meditation,

And to train our minds.

We give dana,

Which are like supplies on a long journey.

When we are travelling far,

We rely on supplies.

After being born in the cycle of saṃsāra,

We need to be supported with dana,

Which will then give us abundance and completeness.

Because if we are lacking and in difficulties,

Then to come to train and sit in meditation would require us to stop working for many days,

And then we wouldn't have enough income to get by.

We have to struggle to earn a living,

For our livelihood and to support our family.

If we have the results of merit that support us,

We are able to get by.

We can take some time off work,

Or won't have to work too much.

We have sufficient time to train in mindfulness and samādhi,

And to do good karma.

And there were people in the time of the Buddha who did bad karma by killing living beings.

There was a man who butchered pigs for 55 years.

And before his death,

He was wriggling around,

Which showed that he would be reborn in a destination of suffering.

So this is coming from darkness and going to darkness.

But there are some people who come from darkness,

Have done bad things before as normal.

But then at 50 years old,

They change their minds and come to the monastery and listen to Dhamma.

And ultimately,

They can have inner happiness,

Bliss and joy.

There was one layman,

Named Nhu,

Who was an old village head in the Rayong district.

He came to the monastery and had a lot of happiness and joy.

He would chant Mayang Bhante and ask for precepts.

He would chant some correctly and some wrongly,

And would laugh out loud.

He would be in a good mood.

And when he was not yet 70 years old,

As is normal for the conditional nature of the body,

It declined.

He had cancer,

Which was the result coming from smoking and drinking alcohol.

And his body declined.

He had lung cancer.

It was torturous,

And he did not want to live in the world anymore.

He wanted to commit suicide to end his suffering.

So this was the bad karma coming to give results.

But his mindfulness came up so that he could think that suicide would be no good and be a wrongdoing.

So he didn't do it.

He thought of the goodness that he had done by helping to build the monastery,

That he had sat meditation and had come to the monastery and chanted,

On every one pra,

Taking up the five precepts,

The eight precepts.

He was joyous.

His mind was calmed through his meditation of buttho,

Dhammo,

Sankho for a whole six months.

And as was natural,

He had to die.

And every night for his funeral,

The monks chanted the Abhidhamma chanting.

And there was someone who could see the village head,

Ngo,

With a crystal body,

Listening to the chanting as well.

And on the day of the cremation of his body,

I gave a dhamma talk,

And he sat and listened in front of the dhamma seat.

There was someone who saw this as well.

And after the cremation was completed,

He entered the dream of his wife and daughter,

That he had gone well.

There was no need to worry.

And they both had the same dream.

So this was about merit.

This was his mind being a deva already.

Being a deva before dying.

His mind was calmed.

From meditating on buttho,

Dhammo,

Sankho,

His mind was at ease.

It had no worries or anxiety.

The mind was a deva.

So this was the result of having given alms,

Having listened to dhamma,

And practiced meditation.

Then when it comes to our times of difficulties,

This merit will come to assist us.

It can be our refuge,

And it can lead us to gain wisdom.

When we have a father or mother pass away from us,

We grieve.

If we pass away from our mother and father,

Then our parents grieve.

If we pass away from our parents and they grieve,

And we can be aware of this,

Then we won't want our parents to suffer.

We have gone well already.

We have gone well.

We had a good rebirth in a good realm,

Being a deva,

Having more happiness than we did before.

Not being troubled like when we were a human.

Or if our parents pass away from us,

They don't want their children to suffer.

Because the parents are at ease already.

And being in this human realm,

They follow their merit and karma,

And they need to follow the time they have.

One day they need to pass away.

If they don't pass away today,

They must pass away one day.

But the important thing is passing well,

And going to a good place,

With happiness,

With merit and goodness.

This is important.

So we need to prepare for this first.

Prepare the heart,

Build a refuge in our hearts,

Build a home in our heart.

Because one day we need to pass away from this body,

And then we need a good resting place,

A good support.

Why?

Because we have death and then rebirth.

Dying from being a human,

We want to be reborn as a deva.

Then dying as a deva,

Being born as a human.

So we need to aspire that we will be born as a deva.

And this aspiration is not easy to attain.

But if we have merit,

Then we will gain it.

If we think like this,

Then we won't be sad,

Mourn and grieve.

There are some people who die young at sixteen years old,

And go on to being a deva,

And have a beautiful heavenly mansion.

So dying and where we go is important,

Because death must happen.

So we need to prepare first.

Build good karma.

Build a lot of merit and barami.

And especially our minds.

We train our minds.

Whenever we are free,

We think,

Buttho,

Dhammo,

Sankho.

We practice all day.

We recite the Ittipiso chant.

From reciting it one time,

To ten times,

A hundred times,

One thousand times,

Ten thousand times,

Forty thousand,

Fifty thousand times,

To eighty-four thousand times.

So we recollect the virtues of the Buddha a lot.

Whenever we recollect it,

We are happy that we can do it.

We chant Ittipiso eighty-four thousand times,

And we are able to do it.

We are joyous and blissful.

It is the merit arising from giving dharma,

From keeping the precepts,

And from our meditation.

If we wait to meditate at a set time,

Then it's too little.

Whenever we are free,

We should meditate then.

This is building good karma.

And this good karma will give us happiness in the present life,

And in the future.

So may you be firmly established in samma-ditti,

Right view that is correct,

Believing in the law of karma,

Believing in merit and varami,

Believing in dying and being reborn.

This then is like we have built a lot already.

And we give our dhamma practice as an offering to the Buddha.

May you all grow in the dhamma.

May you grow in blessings.

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