American Buddhism | 'Ask Us Anything' With Denny K Miu (10/27/2020)
For this month’s open-audience, open-discussion “Ask Us Anything” — continuing discussions about meditation and related topics — Denny and I expand from last month’s chat on “Hīnayāna” as a superlative and more on Theravada and Mahayana in general.
Transcript
Good morning,
Good afternoon,
Good evening everyone.
Welcome to the Josh and Danny show,
The what we call the dumb and dumber of Buddha Dharma.
Anyway,
Just a joke.
So every month we get together and we seem to get better and better at it,
Huh Josh?
Well that's the plan right?
Yes.
So anyway,
We have a division of labor here in the sense that Josh writes down questions,
Viewpoints that are controversial and then we try to discuss them.
So this show anyway,
Or this one anyway,
Right?
Yes,
Yes,
Yes,
Yes,
Yes,
That's true.
So what is that one thing that you think,
Out of all the things that you showed me that you thought would be a possibility for discussion,
What is that one thing that you think would be kind of most controversial?
Well,
I probably don't want to start with that one,
Don't want to set fire immediately.
But the stuff that we kind of,
Some of the stuff we talked about,
Well we can also continue from the last time about Hinayana and for me,
Being a westerner,
We can do a quick recap of what we said last time and then go further into that if you'd like.
For me,
It just didn't,
Well a small vehicle didn't necessarily mean that was a derogatory term.
But then when you say it's like a lesser or inferior and maybe then,
But if we're going to be inclusive and diversify,
Even that is okay too because you know,
I don't need,
Yeah it's weird because it's like I know Denny wants defend and stuff,
It's just,
I don't know what to say,
But I'm gonna let Denny take the reins here because he's more well-spoken and knowledgeable about this than I.
Yeah,
Yeah,
Well let me,
You know,
This is like a plate of spaghetti,
You got to get that,
Get to the,
You know,
At the one end of the spaghetti and you just pull it and then the rest will just like become one strand.
So I think,
First of all,
I think there are a lot that we can talk about,
Some of which we kind of continue from last time,
But as we talk about,
I think that one strand of spaghetti is what I would call localization.
That is,
Why are there so many different strands of Buddhism and why is there so much discussions,
Some of them constructive and some of them not so constructive among them and then ultimately,
You know,
What is the future of Buddhism in the Western world,
In particular in America and so I think that one thing that kind of connects everything is localization and always there's Buddhism and then there's sort of localized Buddhism and always,
You know,
Buddha,
We all know who Buddha is and we hope that when we say Buddhism is the teaching of Buddha,
But then when that teaching goes to a particular,
You know,
Get immersed into a particular culture,
It becomes something else and then the people who are of that community,
When they look out,
They think that that is Buddhism and then when they see some other strands and,
You know,
It causes discomfort and so ultimately,
Probably not in this show because we just don't have enough time,
But ultimately we're going to talk about the future of Buddhism in America.
In other words,
What should it be?
How would it become?
And so the question is that,
Well,
It would only be something that is,
It has to have its own life.
It has to be something that belongs to our culture as opposed to something that belongs to someone else's culture and then we sort of inherent their sort of historical development,
Right?
And so ultimately we're going to be talking about the future of Buddhism in America and talk about why is it that it's important for Buddhism to localize because once we kind of get hold of that,
Then the whole discussions about Theravada versus Mahayana,
The Tibetan versus the Chinese,
The Japanese versus the Thai,
These are all localized issue.
Good point.
Yeah.
And that's one benefit of America for sure is like the melting pot.
There's not a lot of ancient entrenched culture here that has to defend itself so much.
So it's a really interesting,
I guess,
Like laboratory almost,
You know?
Absolutely.
For me,
I have,
The challenging part is bringing it to these teachings to kind of like social settings and groups and culture and stuff where,
You know,
Being more of an individual,
Which that kind of thing fits into the West too for good and bad.
That,
You know,
Just focusing on the,
I guess that's why I was drawn originally to the original Buddhist teachings because just the exemplify the behavior and conduct and just profound truth and wisdom and just,
I mean,
Every,
You know,
The perfectly developed human being in all the teachings.
But then again,
That's just the,
And then exactly he wasn't even,
Was beyond human or something other than human as well.
But,
You know,
And then all the stuff he went through just individually.
So it's kind of like rectifying that kind of individual or maybe personal path within how bringing that to a larger scale of people who aren't that dedicated in the practice,
But still see value and want to be involved.
So that's definitely something to explore and that's a great topic for the future.
Yeah,
Yeah.
I think kind of putting the punchline,
You know,
First,
Which is that one of the most profound aspect of Buddhist teaching and one of the most disturbing is that there is no one path.
There's only one goal,
But there is no one path.
So everybody's entitled to the own path.
And so what's central to Buddhist teaching,
I believe that it's something like this.
I forgot what is this or this,
Where it stands for a word,
Apale or a Sanskrit word called,
I believe it's called epicycle.
Ehipassiko.
Ehipassiko.
Yeah,
That's how I heard it pronounced.
Ehipassiko.
And growing up in Asia,
Growing up in small town of Macau and later on in Hong Kong,
We have a lot of street vendors.
So,
You know,
Back then we don't really have like big supermarket,
You know,
You go to the market and then you have all these what we call hawkers and they just like selling fruits and underwears and whatnot.
And one of the things that they would say is they yell at the top of the throat and basically it's like,
Come look,
Come choose and,
You know,
Come pick what you like.
And that's ehipassiko.
That's what,
You know,
One time I believe there was a sutra and I think you mentioned it where people were asking Buddha,
The historical Buddha,
These really deep questions about his teaching versus other people's teaching and all that.
And he just kind of put up his hand and he says,
You know,
Ehipassiko,
Which means,
You know,
Come and see,
Come and see.
And the other,
Go ahead.
The other qualities of the Dharma that just reminds me is,
I don't think I'm getting all of them,
But the one is it's immediate here and now,
Right?
It doesn't have to wait.
You don't have to wait to get the benefits from an afterlife from it.
And it's verifiable here and it's verifiable by the wise.
You know,
The wise can back it up.
There's a few other things that I'm blanking on now,
But there's a list of,
You know,
What makes his teaching.
Yeah.
So,
In that sense,
I think that ehipassiko is really in a different way is that it really reflects the discipline of modern science in that when you study science,
Whether you study biology or chemistry or even engineering,
You have to start with some assumption.
You have to,
There are some things you have to accept.
And so you can't just like start from a clean sheet of paper and hoping that you get somewhere.
So as a Buddhist student,
Buddhism student,
You have to have some assumption and you have to accept that there's certain truth to the assumption,
But at the same time,
You have to accept that it's not the whole truth.
Right?
Well,
And there's no belief required either.
You're not asked to believe something.
You have to check it out.
Well,
You have to believe,
You don't have to believe their entirety,
But you have to start somewhere.
You cannot just come in and say,
I don't believe in nothing and then hoping that you get somewhere,
Right?
Now see,
This is a really good point to bring up because when I heard about this one teaching that instead of getting enmeshed in belief or disbelief,
Because a lot of times that will turn people off because it takes so much energy to hold onto a belief or defend a belief in the same way with a disbelief.
So the alternative to this that I find is wiser is treating everything as just information.
Okay.
It's like light as a feather.
So if some other information comes along to discredit that,
Then you can let go of the information we already have.
And then if something comes along to add to that,
We can just take another feather and add that on there.
Yes,
Yes,
Yes,
Yes,
Yes.
No,
No,
I think that's an excellent point.
And this comes back to the distinction between data versus fact.
They're a little bit different.
Everyone might think that they're the same,
But before we get there,
And so the idea of a Buddhist teaching is that you have to start somewhere and you have to accept some data,
Some historical data,
Right?
You have to accept that.
And then,
Because it's just like science,
Science has to accept you.
If you want to,
You know,
Einstein has to accept Newton first before he disappears.
That's a starting point.
Yeah.
That's a reference point.
If I don't accept,
You know,
Basic particle dynamics,
I'm never going to go to the next step of studying something else.
You have to accept that.
Even if you're trying to disprove it too,
You have to have a reference point.
Yeah,
Yeah,
Absolutely.
So you have to have an anchor.
And so that's in Buddhist teaching,
Just saying,
But then you don't stop there.
You know,
This organized religion to me has the problem that you believe and then you stop.
That's it.
Right.
And so if we accept that kind of practice,
We wouldn't be having this conversation.
Well,
Because we don't accept that.
We accept the idea that you got to start somewhere.
That's what we call assumption.
Then the question is that,
Okay,
Now I got to explore.
Okay.
Now give me a chance to explore.
And then now give me a chance.
Once I explore and understand,
Then I have to come up with my own enhancement,
Right?
I got to say,
You know,
This is the work.
It works at 90% of the time,
But there's some inconsistency in there.
And rather than arguing about it,
Let me explore.
Right.
And Buddhism has this great capacity to allow you to explore.
And then ultimately you have to verify.
You have to come back and say,
Hey,
I got there.
This is what I got.
It's not to say that what I start with was wrong.
It's just that it was incomplete.
Right.
Yes.
So yeah.
Yeah.
And that's about emitting our faults too.
Most people don't want to do that.
And most people don't like questions either.
If you start questioning different religions.
Well,
The problem is,
Is it actually invites them.
Yes.
Absolutely.
Absolutely.
You cannot equate questions with questioning.
Yes.
That's very good distinction.
Thank you.
Yes.
Right.
And so anyway,
So we want to talk about Buddhism in America.
We want to talk about what we believe would be happening would be that Buddhism has had over half a century of history in America.
But for the most part,
What we have seen even today,
Most of what we see is what I would call immigrant Buddhism.
They were brought here by the immigrants.
Just like any other religion,
Where there's Christianity of Islam is that they were brought here by immigrant.
This is their belief system.
Before they came to the country,
They brought it here.
Right.
And it has,
You know,
In the initial part,
It has tremendous vitality because it's serving a well-defined population of consumers.
But the question is that we still have to go beyond that.
It's like hamburger coming from Germany,
I think,
I don't know.
You know,
Then it became something else.
You know,
Fish and chip came from another country and it became something else.
Right.
Well,
There's the pizza effect,
The interjection real quick,
A pizza effect where it supposedly came from Italy,
It got modified here,
And then it goes back to Italy with the American changes.
So it even changes the origination point of it.
French cuisine.
Yeah.
Well,
Yoga too.
French cuisine is completely what we would call California cuisine,
You know,
Has completely changed the French.
Yeah,
You can go on and on.
So I want to make the distinction.
I want to understand.
What I want to do is all discussion has to be based on data.
Right.
We have to be able to say,
Hey,
You know,
This historical data.
Okay.
And if you don't accept it.
Well,
It's actually more challenging than it seems because a lot of times they say history was written by the victors.
So a lot of times we don't get to hear the historical viewpoint,
Especially in such a warring world.
You know,
We don't really get to hear the viewpoint so much of the people who were defeated in war,
In battles and whatnot.
So you know,
Their version of history wasn't really allowed.
I mean,
It was destroyed a lot of times.
So you don't have to look that far.
You really don't have to look that far.
You know,
There's so much to be learned about the culture and the history of the Native Americans and so much to be learned from the slaves.
You don't have to look that far.
Right.
So I think hopefully we can agree on some set of historical data and then understanding that we accept each other's fact.
Well,
Even if we don't accept it,
We have to reference it to be able to study it and to,
You know,
Analyze it,
Dissect it,
Add to it,
Draw wisdom from it.
That's a big thing because if we don't learn from the past and we don't incorporate the knowledge into living,
Breathing actionable wisdom,
Then it's just book knowledge for not much reason.
So if you were someone like Josh and I,
You know,
Who lives in America and we're interested in Buddhist teaching and we see this,
I mean,
As a consumer,
We're completely sensory overload.
Right.
And what it is,
Is because we have different traits of Buddhism coming in this country because we have so many different immigrants.
So the most obvious one,
The most popular one perhaps right now from my perspective would be something like Vipassana,
Which comes from countries like Sri Lanka and Myanmar and Thailand.
Right.
And so we understood that Vipassana is probably the most common practice in,
Especially in the coast,
You know,
The two coasts.
And so we understand the Tarabata.
So we call that the Tarabata Buddhism.
And of course,
I would think in terms of visibility,
The second most popular would be the Zen Buddhism.
Yes.
But beyond that real quick,
I'm going to pause here,
Is mindfulness.
It's become like a phenomenon.
It's not really associated with the thing that's in popular culture that's called mindfulness really isn't as much association with Buddhism.
Some of it does.
But you know,
You've got this stereotypical,
Very attractive blonde woman in the lotus posture,
You know,
With mudras on her hands and looking just serene and peaceful and blissed out.
And you know,
That can definitely be the case,
But that's not the entire picture.
And then some people even call it Nick mindfulness,
You know,
Like McDonald's and it's become a million dollar,
Billion dollar industry.
Oh yeah.
Yeah.
You have all these apps that are really,
Yeah.
So let's save that.
Let's save that for another day,
Which is,
You know,
Can you really study Buddhism by focusing mainly what I would call materialistic perspective,
You know,
What,
You know,
We'll save it for another day.
We save another day,
Which is the difficulty.
I remember writing an article when I talk about Master Ziru,
You know,
As like the membrane,
You know,
Osmosis system,
You know,
And he's right in the middle,
You have the kind of Western approach of studying Buddhism and you have the Eastern approach of studying Buddhism.
Neither one of them is ideal.
And he's like sitting in the middle and he's trying to bring them together.
We save that for another day.
So let's continue and say,
The reason why it's important to talk about history is because when you think about all these different ways that people have been studying Buddhism in the United States,
Starting with Vipassana and then mindfulness,
Which in some way they're closer to each other,
Both of which more or less come from the Southeast Asia,
Right?
Because Vipassana,
The mindfulness is really what we call Satipatthana,
Which is the mindfulness of the four foundations of mindfulness.
We'll come back and talk about that.
So at least we kind of put a hand around something that we call Tarawata practice,
Which are mainly,
And you can tell from the uniform that,
You know,
It's easy to tell that they have a particular kinds of uniform,
Which are the people who,
Which are the monastics who practice in Sri Lanka and Myanmar and Thailand and all that.
Interestingly,
They don't in Vietnam.
Vietnam is that one country that doesn't actually practice the Tarawata.
However,
So that's one.
And the other one,
Of course,
And then we talk about the Japanese Zen Buddhism and then,
You know,
How did that get involved?
How did that get developed?
Yeah,
That would be very interesting.
There's something in Laos and Cambodia too,
Right?
Yes.
There's a Tarawata in Laos and Cambodia.
Oh,
Absolutely.
Yeah.
Laos and Cambodia.
Okay.
So the countries.
.
.
I don't hear much about them though.
That's,
I don't hear much about Laos and Cambodia.
They also,
They're less developed.
They're not as tourist friendly.
So,
You know,
Less people go there and they are a much smaller country.
Actually in terms of percentage,
That the highest percentage of Buddhists,
You know,
Per capita is actually Laos.
It's almost 90%.
Whereas in Thai,
It's not as high as you think.
Yeah.
Even Bhutan?
Bhutan?
Bhutan might be quite high.
But that's not Tarawata though.
Yeah.
Yeah,
Right.
Bhutan is not Tarawata.
Yeah.
So then we talk about the Zen Buddhism in Japan.
Now then we have kind of a very close cousin to that,
Which is the Sun meditation in Korea.
Okay.
Okay.
So we got that.
And then,
And then probably be in terms of visibility to a typical American Buddhist student would be the Tibetan Buddhism.
Yes.
And then finally,
Just our,
You know,
Population wise,
Then the most common one would be,
Which would be called the Mahayana Buddhism.
Okay.
The problem is that they're not,
They're not,
They're not polar opposite to each other.
The name is confusing because they're not polar opposite to each other.
So for example,
Mahayana,
Maha means the great or the large,
The big.
Yana means the vehicle.
And so,
So people say,
Oh,
Mahayana,
That's a big vehicle.
But when we say Mahayana,
What we really meant is Chinese.
That's what we meant is the Chinese Buddhism.
Right.
Whereas we say the Tibetan Buddhism is very obvious that we're,
We're focusing on a,
A,
A geo,
Geography.
But in reality,
The Tibetan Buddhism is,
Is part of Mahayana.
Okay.
The problem is that when we then go to the,
The south and we say,
That's Taravada,
That's not the opposite of Mahayana.
Taravada just means elders.
Those who are,
Who are,
Who are very well developed in,
In the,
In the,
In the learning.
Then when we talk about Vipassana,
Which is different translations and the one I like is just contemplation.
It's just look inward to,
To get insightful into,
Into your mind.
Right.
And so then people get confused with the name Vipassana as it represents a way of learning versus Vipassana as a concept.
So then the question is that,
Oh,
Vipassana,
That's only even Vipassana meditation because outside of that,
You can't talk about Vipassana.
Right.
Which is wrong because everything is Vipassana.
In fact,
One would argue that the only unique contribution from the historical Buddha was Vipassana.
So all the other sects,
All the other approach is just another way of achieving Vipassana,
Which is,
Which is the other side of the coin of Samadha.
Now we're getting,
You know,
Okay.
That's okay.
Yeah.
We can get that.
Yeah.
Okay.
So then,
So I'm just saying,
I'm just pleading with our audience,
You know,
The complexity,
What we're talking about.
So,
So that's why,
Yeah.
That's a great point.
So then,
Then when you get to mindfulness,
You say,
Oh,
Okay.
We,
We study mindfulness.
So,
So that's after then you do Zen Buddhism.
No,
No,
No,
No.
Mindfulness is,
Is,
Is as basic to Buddhism as anything else.
Okay.
So,
So,
So further muddy the waters with consciousness,
The word consciousness and awareness,
You know,
Consciousness awareness,
You know,
People relation to mind.
Yeah.
Now then again,
You know,
When you go to Zen Buddhism,
You know,
Where does the word Zen,
Zen is,
Comes from the word Chan in Chinese,
Which comes,
Which actually was abbreviation of Chan.
Now back in the old days,
It's called China.
And then that comes from the Sanskrit word called Jana.
And,
And the,
The,
The meaning of Jana just means sentimentation.
Now,
Yeah,
That's,
Well,
That's the thing because I've heard definitions of like Samatha.
Well,
Samatha,
You know,
Is,
Is,
Is,
Leads to cultivation of Samadhi,
Which is another thing that,
Cause it's,
It's really hard to talk about Samadhi,
But then you talk,
You have the settling.
I've also heard it like,
Well,
For Samatha practice,
Like a one pointedness,
A unification of mind,
A gathering of mind,
You know,
A coming together.
Yeah.
So the Jana's,
Like eight Jana's are absorption states,
According to some.
So that means there's no meditator,
No meditative object.
It's just total absorption into the object and they'll lead to these different absorption states.
Right.
But anyway,
There's so much here.
So I want to,
Yeah,
But the point I'm trying to make is that,
The point I'm trying to make is that,
Is that these,
None of them are unique to the practice.
None of them are unique to the practice,
You know,
So,
So,
So,
You know,
You,
You,
You can't just take a Madonna hamburger and says,
You know,
Double Patty as if they own that concept.
Other people could have double Patty.
Okay.
You know,
So you have to brand it differently.
The unfortunate thing is that we,
We most,
The way that Buddhism are brand now is that they're brand according to a concept that is actually uniform and universal.
And so then typically we,
We,
We think that,
Oh,
Vipassana,
That has to do with Vipassana.
That's that the way is you practice Vipassana is the only way that you practice Vipassana.
The way that you practice mindfulness.
Well,
If you go somewhere else,
Then,
You know,
Anyway,
So there's a problem with that.
There's another problem is that then we go to the level when we start to talk about Taravada,
Mahayana,
Tibetan,
And Japanese and Buddhism,
We have to understand that what makes them unique,
What makes each and one of them unique and distinct has to do with the culture.
Yes.
Right.
And has nothing to do with the superiority of the technique.
It's just a cultural thing.
So,
So I want to,
I want to,
So,
So what we do within that little circle,
What we call the,
The,
What do you say that the storm in the teapot?
Or the eye of the hurricane.
The storm,
No,
No,
I'm talking about the storm with the teapot,
You know,
The little teapot where you people,
It is the argument is between Taravada and Mahayana.
And,
And this is sort of a one way argument because those people who practice Taravada,
They don't understand what the argument is all about because that's,
You know,
They just practice.
Okay.
This is what they do.
And it's,
It's the people who,
Who,
Who practice Mahayana,
When they look at Taravada,
They actually give it a different name.
Historically,
They give a different name called Hana Yana.
Hana Yana,
Right?
Again,
You know,
Going back to the hamburger,
It's like,
You know,
You and I eat meat if we do,
And all of a sudden these people are trying to make vegetarian burger and they're having all these discussions.
And then we say,
What?
Just leave me alone.
Okay.
I don't need to know all this.
But the problem is that those guys who want to push vegetarian burgers,
They start to make all these distinctions.
And in the same way,
The people who practice the quote unquote Taravada Buddhism,
They're in the,
You know,
They,
They're completely happy with what they're doing.
They don't name,
They don't name names.
They don't,
They don't use,
You know,
For them is not necessary.
Whereas the problem we see now is that a lot of people who practice a Mahayana,
Actually what I would call the Chinese Buddhism,
They look at everybody else and they say,
Oh,
That's,
We call those Hana Yana,
Small vehicle.
Right?
Now,
What do you mean by names?
All these names?
Can you give an example,
Some examples?
Now,
In Chinese,
If you,
If you meet,
Actually master doesn't do that.
I noticed that he does it a little bit,
But just,
Just because that's what people understand.
So when he,
When he talks about,
Because he himself practiced both.
Yes.
He himself practiced both.
He practiced the Taravada technique,
Which in the evening and night,
Right?
He practiced the technique because,
Because that's,
You can associate that with Arahant,
Which is,
Which is really,
The idea is that you're,
You're seeking liberation or emancipation of your own.
You're trying to relieve yourself of your own suffering,
Relieve yourself of the hindrances.
Okay.
So that's what Taravada teaching is all about.
Okay.
So we call that the Arahant path.
Where's the Mahayana,
The Chinese Buddhism,
They focus on what we call the,
The Bodhisattva approach.
And where you're supposed to focus on helping others,
Helping others to,
To be liberated and be emancipated.
Right?
And I love Shifu's approach because,
You know,
The,
The importance of that is how can we best help other people if we're not have the highest degree of liberation possible that we can have,
You know what I mean?
Well,
Exactly.
Exactly.
We're trying to help people from a lower standpoint,
Which can still be effective,
But not as effective as if we're,
You know,
Completely as liberated as we can be.
And that explains,
That explains why the argument is a one way argument because those who practice the Taravada Buddhism,
They understand what they're doing.
They understand that,
That they see themselves as the lifeguard in a big swimming pool.
And it's very important for them to perfect their own,
You know,
Skills.
You know,
If they don't know how to swim,
Chances are,
They're not going to be a good lifesaver.
And so they're very much focused on that,
But in their scripture,
They talk about,
You know,
Going from an Arahant to a Bodhisattva.
So the,
So the teaching of the quote unquote Mahayana is actually embedded in the Taravada teaching,
But they see that as a logical and beneficial progression.
Let's take,
Let's learn how to swim.
Then we go and teach someone else.
Whereas a lot of people have this misconceptions over the Mahayana side that says that,
Well,
No,
Actually what you want to do is to be a Bodhisattva.
And they ignore the part that,
You know,
Actually if you don't know how to swim,
You're not going to be a good lifesaver.
They ignore that part,
Which is very sad,
Which is very sad.
And that's a,
That's,
That's a big part of what Master is trying to do is trying to break down this wall and say,
You know,
Like anything else you got,
You got to,
You got to,
You got to,
You got to,
You got to start here.
And then in fact,
One of the,
One of the discussions,
One of the discussion I have when the last time I was with the,
The prison Dharma group was that they were talking about the,
The full vow,
One of which was,
You know,
Save all being.
Remember that the translation,
Save all being.
And,
And I,
I said,
You know,
Actually,
Most of the Japanese teaching are translations of Chinese.
Okay.
So they take the Chinese word and they translate in Japanese.
And then when it comes to America,
It's translated from Japanese,
But half,
More than half of which are Chinese anyway.
So in fact,
We are translating it from directly from Chinese.
Okay.
And so the Chinese language is a very difficult language to translate,
Especially if you're trying to translate word by word,
Because the Chinese single characters have no unique meaning.
It's how you conjugate it in relation and context,
Right?
Yeah.
It's how you conjugate it with another word that you give it a little bit more precision.
And so I said,
You know,
The word save doesn't mean say it means to guy.
I love that so much better than save.
I mean,
We don't have to be a Messiah figure,
You know?
Yeah.
We're,
We're here to guy others.
In fact,
We can't guy unless we ask.
And how can we,
You know,
How can we even save anybody that would just step on their journey and not,
You know,
And not give them the chance to learn what they need to learn from their,
Whatever's happening in their experience.
Correct.
So that's a very,
So coming back,
So,
So,
You know,
If you,
If again,
You know,
We're,
We're,
We're getting away from,
From the details of discussions.
Yeah,
I don't think literally,
Yes.
Yeah.
But I think,
I think the reason,
So,
So,
So coming back to your question is that how,
How,
How,
How,
How is that argument?
Well,
It is not,
It's to me,
It's not so much an argument as it is an ignorance.
Okay.
As in ignorance.
So,
So I've been called Orientals.
You know,
I don't reject that.
Some people,
You know,
A long time ago when I first came to United States,
They said,
Oh,
You know,
You're oriental.
And I have to say,
Well,
What does that mean?
Cause I don't understand that word.
And so in order to really understand the word oriental,
I have to kind of put it in context of Occidental.
Yes.
I was just getting ready to say that.
Yep.
And I don't call you Occidental.
Why should you call me oriental?
Because by calling me an oriental,
You're being ignorant.
You're ignorant of my culture.
But see,
That's the thing,
You know,
It's,
It's weird how that stuff gets going.
That's why I always don't,
I don't really,
I mean,
People could call me honky or cracker or whatever they want.
I really don't care what they call me.
I just,
I just like the respect,
Just have to know what people would like to be referred to as called so I can do that.
Yes,
Because it opens up doors.
People will say something and they don't mean it derogatorily.
It's just,
It's somehow it's just got it installed in the culture and they don't really believe it.
It's their way of shutting,
It's just like for them to shut off,
You know,
Like just shut down their mind.
They're just like,
So,
So what I'm saying is that the people who,
The Chinese Buddhists who practice what they call Mahayana practice,
Who then call everybody else,
Especially those in Southeast China who practice what we now call the Tala Vada,
They're no different than a white person calling me oriental in that is really their choice of shutting themselves off of really understanding what other people do.
So what they do is that this is it.
Mahayana is the great vehicle.
How great is that?
You know,
So it's,
It's,
It's complete and this is all we need to know.
And everybody else is we call them Hanayana,
Hanayana,
Small vehicle.
Now,
Now before I explain,
Now by the way we don't use that anymore because in 1950 there was actually a world Congress of all the other Buddhists.
Now remember 1950 the Chinese were,
Well,
They are still today,
But they were,
They were under the control of the communists.
And so there were,
There were basically no participation from the Chinese Buddhist.
In fact,
Chinese Buddha didn't even exist anymore.
They were completely destroyed for a long time.
Real quick comment,
That's,
It's fear of the unknown.
It's a fear of the unknown.
So it protects them from fear of the unknown.
It's identity.
It's,
It's,
It's,
You know,
We call this identity politics.
Yes.
You know,
It's identity.
It's,
It's really not about you,
It's about them.
You know,
It's really,
They,
For them to point a finger at you,
Four of them are pointing,
You know,
Three of them are pointing to themselves.
That's what it is.
They're afraid of what they don't know.
So in 1950 there was a world Congress where all the Buddhists from all the sects got together and they said,
No,
From today on,
We're not going to use the word Hanayana because it's,
It's an insult.
It's an insult.
And from now on,
We're going to say Thalabharata because that's the word,
That's a,
That's a,
That's a Pali word that means elders.
Okay.
And there's a reason for that.
So this is great context because just the word in itself,
A definition to a Westerner doesn't really mean much,
But when it's embedded into a culture and the intent of how they say it and view it,
Then it makes sense that it would be kind of derogatory.
So I see.
Yeah.
So,
So again,
You know,
So,
So for me,
Even when I see a,
A,
A Chinese Buddhist monk or nun that referred to the Thalavala teaching as,
As Hanayana,
The small vehicle that says something about that person.
Not about that.
That says that person that is really,
He doesn't have the worldview.
He probably doesn't have the not the modern understanding of Buddhism chances are,
You know,
That he's,
He's not,
He's not a good teacher for me.
That's,
That's my point.
Okay.
So,
So before I get into Thalavada and how,
How is that distinct from the,
You know,
Now,
Now let me just use the two words,
Which is Chinese Buddhism and sort of the South East Asia Buddhism,
The Thalavada versus the Mahayana.
So when I use those words,
Just say those are the two distinctions,
But you know,
The,
The jhana.
And then we got to throw in,
Or we don't have to,
But there's Vajrayana,
Which is you know,
It's not quite as a popular and that's what,
Now is there a distinction between them?
For them,
They consider themselves.
And there's also tantric Buddhism too.
Yeah,
Yeah,
Yeah.
But that's another,
No,
No,
But they,
They don't have any problems.
The Tibetans don't have any problem with you calling them Mahayana.
They,
They,
They believe in that.
Yeah.
In fact,
In fact,
They,
In,
You know,
Yeah,
That's not a problem.
It's just that within that,
They want to distinguish themselves from the Chinese Buddhism.
Then,
You know,
They,
They go,
They go into detail.
So the reason for the word jhana actually came from the Lotus Sutra,
Lotus Sutra.
And so there was a,
There was a section in there that talks about an old,
It's a story.
It's a,
Just a analogy.
And the story is that there's this old man who's the head of the clan and he has these huge complex and in there,
You know,
Lives his,
His descendants.
Okay.
And they're having so much fun inside and,
But the house is on fire.
So he's like jumping up and down,
Jumping up and down,
Trying to get them to come out.
He says,
Look,
The house is on fire.
Let's get out.
Let's get out.
And,
And,
You know,
All his,
His clan,
Clan people,
I say,
No,
We're full.
We're having fun here.
This is great.
We don't want to get out.
And so the story was that he then brought three vehicles.
He brought three vehicles.
There's a small vehicle pulled by deer.
There is a middle vehicle pulled by horse.
And then there's a large vehicle pulled by oxen.
And then he put in there,
You know,
All kinds of treasures.
And then he tried to entice them to come out and eventually,
You know,
They come out and then they,
Then,
You know,
You ship them off out of danger.
And the reason for that analogy is,
Is that in the,
In the Lotus Sutra,
The burning house is a universe and,
And,
And we're suffering in the universe and it's time to get out.
And so you have to have different vehicle and what we call the small vehicle is the,
Is the,
In some ways,
The Taravada teaching where you're focusing on your own salvation,
Your own liberation,
Your own emancipation.
Then you get to another vehicle,
Another vehicle with the Bodhisattva and so forth and so on.
And so that's where it came from.
That's where it came from.
The problem again is that the,
What we call the small vehicle,
Which should really be called Taravada,
They encompasses all three vehicles,
But they do it in a more logical,
You know,
Progressive way.
It's like going to college.
It's like,
You know,
Starting from the elementary school graduate,
Then go somewhere,
You know,
It's like that.
Whereas the,
The,
The other teaching says that,
No,
We can pick and choose.
And then,
You know,
From now on,
We're going to call ourselves the large vehicle,
The great vehicle.
Now there is a historical context to all that.
There's actually a historical context to all that.
So what we,
What we call Taravada Buddhism is,
Is,
Is,
Is almost unchanged.
The teaching is almost unchanged from the day of the Buddha.
And so everybody knows that the Buddha was born about 2,
500,
2,
600 years ago,
And he had many,
Many,
Many,
Many,
Many disciples and the sutra will tell you that out of that,
He has like 2,
500 disciples that he consider,
You know,
He's,
He's,
He's,
He's,
He's,
He's,
He's,
He's elite.
Okay.
It's actually 2,
505.
Because 2,
500 years ago too,
Or,
You know,
Right.
Yeah.
Anyway,
The five is because after he got enlightened under the buddhi tree,
He went and looked for his five bodyguards.
And so there was five,
Then,
Then he eventually met someone.
So also actually what's interesting is all of his students came from somewhere else.
So he,
You know,
He would be like this wanderer,
You know,
With the,
With the answer.
And then he meets someone,
He convinced someone else that,
That,
That,
You know,
His path is the right path.
And then that person that he convinced turned out to be a guru.
And so he is so convinced of his teaching,
That Buddha's teaching that not only did he came over,
He brought all of his students to come over.
And so you can actually dissect that.
And so,
So like after the five,
He get another,
You know,
Another,
Another 100,
Then he got another,
He met three brothers and together,
You know,
It was like 2000,
You know,
Like there was a history of how that worked.
And so finally he got like,
And so we just shortened the 2,
500 students.
These are their,
Their,
Their unique,
You know,
Elites.
Okay.
It's interesting you called them bodyguards.
I've always heard them as the people he practiced asceticism with.
Well,
Both are true.
Both are true.
So what happened is that he,
He,
One night he decided that after,
After his son was born,
Actually,
His son Laylan became his disciple.
Yes.
Yeah.
So after,
After his son was born,
He decided it was time for him to,
To renunciate.
Okay.
Wait,
Rahula,
The name itself is interesting,
The meaning,
But we don't have,
We won't go into that.
Yeah.
That's okay.
Write that down.
Okay.
So he decided that he would,
He would renunciate.
So he left his,
His,
His household.
And when he left his household,
His king was trying to find him.
And,
You know,
Finally he convinced his father that he's not coming back.
And so his father sent five bodyguards.
Huh.
To follow him,
To protect him.
And so those five,
Then he eventually practiced asceticism with him.
Huh.
I didn't,
I don't know how I missed that before.
And then,
And then Laylan,
He decided to know that he needs,
And ultimately he needs to the middle path,
You know,
That the,
The living the,
The life of the prince is one side and then living the life of aesthetic is another.
And then he decided,
You know,
That has to happen.
But don't forget the,
He trained under two teachers that taught him the kind of the Jannic states too.
Yeah.
He wanted to teach them first,
But they were already dead after his enlightenment,
Right?
Yeah.
Correct.
There's that one person on the road that he kind of met and freaked out after his enlightenment too.
So,
Yeah,
Yeah,
Yeah.
So there's a whole history.
So,
So the five students,
I call them bodyguards,
You know,
Because that's,
That's,
That's,
That's the story.
But anyway,
He,
He had all these students and they ultimately are the elders.
Okay.
They're,
They're the elders.
And so when he passed away,
He,
He,
He,
When he,
When he achieved Navana,
So then all the students throw up their hands and say,
Oh,
You know,
Para Navana.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
And so,
So then,
Then he's,
He's,
He's older student decided that,
Yeah,
His older student says,
No,
Wait a minute,
You know,
This is not right.
We got to,
We got to sit down and,
And,
You know,
Have a pow wow.
And so this is,
This is the word is,
Is the word is the gathering.
Okay.
And so we call that the council.
And so to understand the history,
To understand the history of Buddhism,
You,
You have to start with quote council.
So the first council was held either 30 or 90 days after the death of Buddha,
Because they have to,
For two reasons.
One is that it's still a rainy season and they have to call everybody back because what happened is that those,
Once they,
Once they,
Once the student become learned,
Then Buddha would send them away.
Okay.
So they,
During the news of Buddha's death,
Got to their ears,
You know,
They all come back.
So they have to wait for everyone to come back.
Okay.
And then they also have to wait for the end of the rain season.
Okay.
And so anyway,
So this first council was essentially 30 or 90 days after Buddha's death and 500 of the elders got together and there was actually,
You know,
They got together and they,
They,
They,
They,
And they decided that they,
What they do is very simple.
They said,
And they only do two,
Three things,
Two things.
One is what was Buddha's teaching?
Okay.
And then the other one is that what are the rules?
Vadaya,
Yes.
Yeah.
What are the rules?
And so they actually,
The primary purpose was for the rules.
The primary purpose wasn't even for the teaching.
That's right.
There's a,
Lots of controversy of what the rules should be then,
Right?
Yeah.
So they,
They formulate the rules.
And so there's like 200 precepts for a,
A,
A male monastics and there's,
You know,
Whatever number for the female monastics.
And so,
So they actually spent the most time to say,
You know,
These are the rules.
These are the,
These are the,
The,
The,
The precepts that we have to follow.
Yeah.
The original,
Official rules.
Then they,
Then they got around to say,
Okay,
Now,
Now we're going to have to focus on,
On master's teaching.
And so now keep in mind that everything was oral.
This is 2,
600 years old.
There were no written language.
The first written sutta wasn't until,
Until like 800 years after,
Maybe 600 years after,
After Buddha's death.
Okay.
So this is all oral.
Now,
Someone would say,
Well,
If it's oral,
How could it be accurate?
And actually some,
Some historians,
Some,
Some people who actually believe that oral is more accurate than written.
Yes.
And the whole teachings were designed lyrically and with repetitions,
Just for that very purpose of memorizing.
And then you've got,
You know,
This famous story of Ananda,
The Buddha who just got in,
Had to be enlightened before he joined the first council.
Correct.
Correct.
And he was the one,
He was,
He was the,
He was the attendant.
So,
So he was,
And he,
And he was interestingly,
You know,
He was born on the day that Buddha achieved enlightenment.
Wow.
And he was,
He was Buddha's,
He was Buddha's cousin.
And attendant.
Yep.
Yeah.
And,
And,
And then he became his attendant because he's,
He,
He has this photographic memory.
Yes.
And he,
And he actually,
The story was that he made a pact with,
With Buddha and says,
You know,
I have to be present in every lecture you give.
And if I'm not,
Then you have to come back and tell me that again so I can record it.
Okay.
So that's why our YouTube channel,
That's why I record.
Okay.
That's why I record.
Except that.
Yeah.
The thing that struck me with the story with Ananda though,
That's so meaningful and this type of material is something like he,
You know,
He once said to the Buddha,
You know,
I bet,
You know,
Friendship,
Spiritual friendship is,
You know,
Maybe half of the path.
And the Buddha said something,
Well don't say that Ananda,
Spiritual friendship is the entirety of the path.
It's a little paraphrase there.
Yeah,
Yeah,
Yeah.
There's a lot of really great stories.
And that really,
That really struck me how important that,
That he,
The importance they put on,
You know,
Spiritual friendship,
You know.
Yeah.
It's just as important as having a good teacher.
So.
Yeah.
So this is called the first council and we're probably can we get to the second council before time runs out on us today.
But it's important to understand that the purpose of the council was number one to formulate and institutionalize the rules,
The conduct.
Okay.
Now this is,
This can tie,
These early councils can tie into the early schools of Buddhism too.
Yes.
Most of them aren't around anymore,
But I mean that could be.
Yes,
Absolutely,
Absolutely.
So,
So,
So this is the first,
This is the first council.
And so let me continue with the first council.
So,
So it was about the rules.
It was about the precepts.
And then secondary to that is that it was about Buddha's teaching and,
And,
And,
And,
And,
And,
And the way it was done was that Ananda would recite Buddha's teaching.
The sutta part.
Yeah.
The sutta part.
Yeah.
He would recite sutta's teaching and,
And that's the difference,
By the way,
That's the difference between Dharma and sutta.
So Dharma has different meanings.
And one of that is what Buddha says is Dharma and what's written down and agreed on is the sutta.
Okay.
So you can argue that one is the other,
But the other doesn't have to be that.
Yeah.
So,
So it's very important.
So sutta is what,
Not only what Ananda recite,
But what everybody agree on.
So,
So the rules are very specific is that,
You know,
Ananda would recite and then other people would say,
I didn't hear that.
And then they would say,
Oh,
Then that doesn't belong there.
Okay.
It will have,
It had to be enamelous.
It cannot be it's like 99,
No 499 of them says they they heard it,
But then one guy said,
No,
I didn't hear it.
Very strange.
And there's a lot of credibility because they are all fully enlightened beings.
They're not fully enlightened,
But they're all.
.
.
They're all Ahad,
See.
Ahad,
That's it,
Present.
And then also,
But who is the,
Ahnana didn't do the Vinaya,
Who,
I forget the guy that.
.
.
Yeah,
We can look that up.
There's a name,
There's a name,
Yeah.
Another very important,
You know,
Yeah,
Yeah.
The Vinaya.
So,
Out of the 500,
There's,
You know,
You can list the names of the 10 most important disciples,
And it's actually one of them.
Yeah.
He's actually very,
Very.
.
.
He's the one.
So,
Then that's how it's written down.
I mean,
Not written down,
That's how it's agreed on.
And then it just became a oral tradition,
You know.
It became an oral tradition,
Right?
Well,
I mean,
It continued.
It solidified and continued the oral tradition.
And for the most part,
One would argue that.
.
.
Because they were reciting some of his teachings before this,
You know,
In the oral tradition.
Yeah,
So one would argue that the practice,
The taravada practice of today is not that different from what was agreed on 2,
600 years ago.
Yes,
There's an unbroken line.
Yeah,
There's an unbroken line.
There's an unbroken line.
And that,
In fact.
.
.
As far as we can determine,
Yes.
Yeah,
In fact,
In fact,
There's an interesting side note.
You know,
In Thai,
They don't have female monastics.
Okay,
Now in Mahayana,
In Japan,
Of course we have female monastics,
But in Thailand,
They don't.
And the argument that they make is that the male monastics has an unbroken chain all the way back to Buddha.
Whereas the female one was broken.
Because out of the 500 elders,
There were no female.
That's right,
Yes.
And so they make the argument that it was broken.
So therefore we cannot have female monastics in Thailand.
Speaking of controversial stuff,
This is another one.
I think Biku and Nalio,
You know,
There's monastics on both sides of this issue,
I guess you could call it.
Yeah,
But you do see female monastics in Thailand and they're called the white cloth.
They actually renounce it in Myanmar or Sri Lanka.
So in Myanmar,
They actually relax.
And so,
But once they get back into,
In fact,
There was a controversy when the last king of Thai passed away,
They refused attendance from the quote female monastics because they said that they're not real.
That was a huge controversy.
The white gown thing,
At least in Thai forest tradition that I've heard out of a Bayagiri podcast is,
I think they have like an anagarika,
Which I'm not exactly sure.
I think that means that's the first step before you become a novice.
I'm not sure exactly,
I have to look that up.
But I remember the name anagarika,
I have to look that up.
But anyway,
Yeah,
That's another,
There's so much to what you just brought up about the female monastic thing.
Yeah,
So I will quickly,
So that's the first council,
That's the beginning of the Theravada teaching,
When we'll argue that it's more or less unchanged,
And it was unbroken,
Okay.
And then,
So you mentioned a little bit about all the council is subsequent to that,
Which is then the start of the breaking off of the different sects.
So today,
We're just gonna talk about this,
The second one.
The second one actually was only about 300 years,
Something like that,
After the death of Buddha.
So this is still 300 years before Christ,
Okay.
So this is called the second council.
So imagine 300 years,
How much,
You know,
Like this country is a little bit over 300 years,
And how much has been different,
Right,
From the day that it was found.
So you can imagine,
You know,
What 300 years mean,
And what Buddhism,
How Buddhism has changed.
And so history,
The history was that there was a huge argument,
There was a huge argument between two separate sects,
Two separate sects,
So which is the beginning now of the Mahayana versus the large vehicle versus the small vehicle,
Okay.
And was there a core to that argument?
Yes.
A core point,
Okay.
Yeah,
Yeah,
So there was a huge argument,
And the argument was that there was a group of practitioners from one part of the country,
And there was another group of practitioners from another part of the country.
And then finally,
They had a disagreement,
And you can look this up,
But it's called the 10 points of dissension.
Okay,
Yeah.
Okay,
10 points is that,
Things like,
You're not supposed to have meal after noon.
That's right,
And one was on salt,
And I remember some of these now.
I'm impressed that you know that.
I am so impressed that you know that.
The gold and silver thing too,
Wasn't it?
Yeah.
So I'll talk about the one that is more obvious,
But actually less important at the moment,
Because things like,
You know,
When is,
How does it work,
And what does noon mean,
You know.
Or can you have,
You know like,
If I come to,
If I come to St.
Louis and I have a meal before noon,
And then I hop on to a flight,
And then you know,
Somewhere else,
Can I have it again,
Right?
Things like that.
And so they come up with like,
Either the two or the three finger rule,
Okay?
Which is that you gotta stick,
If the sun is on top,
It casts a shadow,
And it cannot be longer than two fingers.
Huh.
Okay,
So there's another rule.
They use that to determine ease too,
The shadow with sticks and stuff.
Yeah,
So there's another rule,
Which is,
Which is,
You know,
When you sit someplace,
You know,
How big is that space that you're supposed to sit?
So that comes with that,
Now the tradition of,
Whenever a monastic sits down,
He has to have a piece of cloth,
And he sits on that.
So they have to have a certain amount of space,
Or not?
Yeah,
They have to have a certain amount of space.
And that's for what,
Their like energy field?
I have no idea.
I have no idea.
I'm just telling you the data,
Okay?
I have no idea.
Things like,
Now actually the most important one,
That prompted everything was about money.
Yep.
And so,
In the traditional teaching of Buddha is that they have to renunciate,
Which means that there's a very,
Very,
You know,
Like,
Rule that says that you cannot touch money.
In fact,
Before you become a monk,
You know,
You have to be like that novice monk.
And the novice monk has 10 precepts.
I actually took that precept,
Because there's a way that you could do that for a week.
And so I actually was a monk,
A novice monk for a week.
And out of that,
The very last one is that you can't touch money.
Well that,
And then you can't also be in debt either,
Right?
Some of the- Nothing,
Nothing.
You're supposed to be- No,
No,
No,
I mean before you even joined,
You can't,
Because some people were doing that to get out of debt,
You know what I mean?
Yeah,
But the reason for,
There's a reason for that.
The reason for that is that,
Is that all,
Back in those days,
All the people who have the resources to pursue to a spiritual path are very rich people.
And so 99.
9% of Buddhist students come from very rich family.
Remember the story about how someone wanted to borrow or buy a piece of land,
And he went to the prince,
And then,
You know,
Actually the prince says,
Well I don't need money,
You know?
And then he says,
But,
You know,
If you can cover it with gold,
You can,
As much as you can,
That's yours,
Right?
I mean,
Look at how much money these guys have.
But it's the opposite,
Kind of,
In more modern times,
Where people would get so much in debt,
And people would be coming after them for that debt,
And then they would escape under the protection of a monastery,
But they're not allowed to leave.
Correct,
Yeah,
But that come later,
That come later.
Yeah,
They're a lot later.
Yeah,
That come later.
So the initial idea of renunciation is that,
You know,
They're dealing,
Buddha is dealing with students who are of huge,
You know,
Amazing wealth.
And so he has to kind of say,
Well you have to give up your wealth.
And so they actually get,
So the word bhikkhu,
Bhikkhu.
Bhikkhu,
Yeah.
Bhikkhu means beggar.
Yeah,
A mendicant,
Yes,
Yes.
Yeah,
It means beggar.
Now,
What's interesting is that if you were a beggar,
If you were a beggar,
And you go to Buddha,
And you wanna be his disciple,
He will not accept you.
Interesting dichotomy.
Because,
You know,
If you're a beggar,
And you just say,
I wanna study Buddhism,
I wanna be a householder,
And Buddha would say,
No,
You can't be a householder without taking responsibility for yourself.
You can't be,
You know,
No,
Sorry.
Whereas if you are a rich person,
He turned you into a beggar.
Wow,
It's equal to playing field there.
That's crazy.
Over my radar,
Yep.
Yeah,
So the point is,
That rule was put in,
So all his students have to renounce,
Okay.
Now what happened is that,
Now,
Because there's a way to get around that,
Because they have attendance.
And so,
The attendance would be the one to actually collect money.
So,
For example,
When I travel with Master,
One time we were put in this place,
Really beautiful,
Essentially a villa.
You know,
We live in this place,
And where one part is the living quarter,
And the other part is the Dharma Hall.
And so,
After we finished the practice,
It was like seven days,
Something like that,
The students live in someplace else.
And so,
We went back,
And Master,
You know,
They put him in this suite,
You know,
There's this hallway.
And I made a mistake of standing by the hallway,
Just having a conversation.
And all of a sudden I see in front of me all the students who were lining up.
And I said,
What's going on?
And so,
What they think,
They thought that I was their attendant,
And my job was to accept the money.
Wow.
And I said,
No,
No,
No,
No,
No,
That's not Master's style.
You wanna give him money,
Give him money.
So,
Anyway,
Back to the second council.
The whole point of the second council was that there was a disagreement,
Because one group were very,
Very true to the ritual of teaching,
Which is that they don't touch money.
The second group says,
No,
No,
No,
That's not right.
Money is money.
Money has no,
You know,
It's not even.
So what they do is that they set up this bowl,
This pot,
This pan with water and some turtle or something for people to throw money in there.
And then they said,
You know,
We didn't accept money.
The turtles,
Yeah.
The turtles did,
Right?
And then they took the money at the end.
So this was a huge,
Huge problem.
So they had this second council just to kinda having this powwow.
But out of that,
They come up with a 10 point,
The rule for the 10 point.
And essentially it says that,
Look,
The Tarabata would agree to this 10 point.
You don't agree,
You're not one of us,
Okay?
Okay.
But top of the list had to do with salt.
Yeah,
Isn't that wild?
Yeah,
It's how much times have changed and stuff.
But do you know why?
No,
Tell me yes,
Please.
So the point is that monastics are not supposed to carry salt.
Because,
Well,
You're not supposed to store food overnight too.
Ah,
See,
See,
It wasn't because salt was precious.
It was because what happened is that the rule,
Because they're beggars,
Okay?
So they essentially eat two meals a day,
Breakfast,
Which is,
You know,
Whatever,
Fruits and whatever.
And then the main meal is at nancho.
So they would actually go out and they do the Om Ra,
Right?
They would get the offering.
And the rule was that,
First of all,
They have to pick a random direction.
They can't go back to the same place every time.
Ah,
Yeah,
Yes.
Has to be random.
Get dependent on that,
Yeah.
Second rule is that they can only knock on five houses.
Huh.
And they knock,
But they cannot go in.
And then it's up to the inhabitants to give them food or not.
Well,
Sometimes they're on the line of the road though,
Right?
Well,
Nowadays,
Yeah.
Nowadays,
Okay.
But this is also,
Real quick points,
This overall though,
This is between like the spirit of Buddha's teaching and then the letter of it,
Right?
Because there's stories in the suttas where,
You know,
Such and such did this,
So then a new rule was established because of what happened,
Right?
Yeah.
So,
You know,
It's all about,
Do we wanna stick,
I mean,
How do we stick to the letter?
I mean,
What are the advantages of doing that?
And when is,
What is really in the true spirit,
You know?
Correct,
Correct,
Correct.
And then also one of the,
Yeah.
But having that conversation means that you're not a talavada.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
That's right,
Yeah,
Because they're strict.
Then,
You know,
There's the thing about preserving lineages,
Pure lineages.
Well,
Again,
Yes,
Go back to,
Yeah,
Yeah.
And also picking and choosing,
Which works quite a bit in the sense of both.
No,
But that's a difference between data and fact.
Yeah.
Because just compare side by side,
The talavada,
The way it was practiced in Southeast Asia,
They're very strict on money.
But they're not strict on vegetarian.
Yeah,
Yeah,
It's very fascinating.
They think that Buddha never taught us to be vegetarian,
Because how can you be vegetarian when you rely on someone else's for food?
Well,
You would insult somebody,
Right?
Yeah.
If you didn't accept their,
Unless there is one exception though,
If you knew that the animal was slaughtered just for you,
Killed just for you.
Right,
So they come up with five rules that they can't slaughter just for you.
That's why the random direction becomes important.
They cannot be waiting for you.
Oh,
I see,
That's a good point,
Yeah.
All right.
And then over with the eight- They cannot slaughter for you,
You cannot be present when the meat was slaughtered,
Even if they don't do it for you.
You cannot be within earshot,
Okay?
And then there's two more,
Which is that if they're roadkill,
You can eat it.
Okay.
Or if two,
The animals were fighting- And would die.
And they're done,
You can go get the scrap,
That's okay.
Well,
That's nature,
Right?
Yeah.
That's nature,
It's basically like that.
Yeah,
Exactly.
But my point is that,
I mean,
This is different from data and fact,
Because one side holds it as fact,
It says,
No,
We can't touch money.
But we're quite flexible when it comes to eating meat.
The other side,
The Chinese Buddhism,
No,
No,
No,
You cannot eat meat.
There's no way to get around that,
Okay?
But we can touch money.
That's the- I mean,
Well,
With the money,
What about crypto coming up,
You know?
Are you gonna touch a computer that's been involved in a crypto transaction or is holding crypto on a hard drive,
You know?
Yeah,
But like you were saying,
None of that lends itself to anything.
Exactly,
So.
Yeah,
So the salt has to do with this.
The salt has to do with this.
So five houses,
And it doesn't matter if you get offering or not.
It's only five houses.
So worst case scenario,
If you went to five houses,
You had nothing to eat,
Well,
Too bad.
Yeah.
Okay,
You can't go to another five.
And if you,
Then the opposite is,
What if you go to one house and you get all the food that you need?
No,
You still have to visit for more.
So they want to interact with the community,
So they completely separate.
It's a two-way street.
It's a two-way street.
It's for your own,
Because it's actually the two,
A paramy,
Actually,
If you think about it.
One was the renunciation paramy,
And the other one was generosity paramy.
Yes.
Right,
It's the two.
Now,
Then the problem comes,
Well,
You know,
I got lucky today,
Got lots of food.
I didn't violate the rule.
I stayed within five houses,
But I do have a lot of food.
I can't eat it all.
And you know,
Tomorrow I might not get any.
In fact,
Yesterday I didn't get any.
Couldn't I just preserve it?
And the rule says no.
And to make sure that you cannot preserve,
You cannot carry salt.
Yeah.
Crazy,
Crazy,
Crazy.
Well,
Yeah,
I mean,
What are you gonna do?
You gonna eat five bowls of food?
Um.
Oh,
Man.
My refrigerator is broken,
So why I'm gonna have to eat five bowls of food?
I need some time for that.
Good thing you have some salt,
I guess.
Yeah,
Okay,
Why don't we call it,
We can continue then.
Yeah,
It was great,
It was great.
All right,
Denny.
Yeah,
Thank you for the questions.
Thank you.
Well,
Yeah,
It was a pleasure,
And I don't think we got to do everything.
So next time,
End of November,
We'll pick a time.
We'll continue with the historical development of the different sects,
Starting again with Theravada.
We finish that,
Then we come back to the Chinese Buddhism,
The Mahayana,
Then maybe that we branch off into the Japanese Zen Buddhism.
How that cut branch off from that?
And we didn't even touch the Tibetan stuff,
Really.
And then we gotta come back to the Tibetan.
Yeah,
Yep.
We gotta come back to the Tibetan,
And then finally,
When we're done,
We'll go on to the next thing.
Plus all the other potential topics we raised today.
Yeah,
Yeah,
There's lots more,
There's a lot more.
Okay,
One public announcement.
If everything goes well,
Our English Saturday class,
Which is eight o'clock on Saturday morning.
I know in the past Josh has talked about that.
I hesitate to give you more information because I knew we were in transition.
But in any case,
We are using Zoom.
Everybody knows Zoom by now.
Zoom just started with a platform called OnZoom,
Which allows us to really open up our Saturday morning class to public,
And ultimately allowing us to receive donations for Mappa and Master Jiru,
For whatever other purpose that we wanna do.
So it's a great way of really reaching out.
So I'm hoping to get it all done so we can launch this Saturday.
If not,
It will be launched the week after.
And the URL for that is dennykmiu,
D-E-N-N-Y-K-M-I-U,
.
Com,
Backslash fellowship.
That is not active today.
That only points to our YouTube playlist.
But hopefully once you get going,
It will point to the OnZoom page where you can buy tickets.
It's free,
And it will give you all the information to log in and all the good stuff.
So Denny,
You're gonna transition the current URL you're using now to that one then?
No,
The current URL would work the rest of the time.
It won't work on Saturday.
The one that we call dennykmiu.
Com backslash zoom,
That won't work.
Because they will send you a unique URL.
Okay.
Okay.
So use the slash fellowship on Saturday.
Yeah,
Backslash fellowship.
That would be the Saturday,
Okay?
Okay.
All right.
Okay,
Thank you,
Josh.
Thank you.
