You dress so gay

Parents in Malaysia! Beware! If your son likes to wear V-neck shirts, it's because he's gay and wants to show off his body to other boys!

And your daughters, if they prefer the company of only some girls, but not all girls, look out - they're lesbian!

Seriously? o_O

Yes, the Malaysian government is at it again. It's all over the news in Asia, but also getting attention with some Western press and bloggers.

I wrote about efforts in Malaysia to revive reparative therapy techniques to turn ladyboys into real men, so I won't recover all of that. But it seems the Malaysian government is really paranoid about having gays within the populace and is soliciting the help of parents and teachers in spotting this scourge so something can be done about it.

As I've said before, it would all be laughable if it weren't so freaking real. The seminars being hosted in Penang, which has been known to have a lively gay scene, are the fourth conducted in the country. Despite that lively scene in Penang, a friend of mine who lives there is absolutely scared to death to have anyone find out he is gay.

Buddhism is about refuge and I have found the Buddha's teachings to be excellent support for gay practitioners. Yes, there are Buddhist commentators and teachers who adopt homophobia as part of their doctrine, but that's their doctrine, not the Buddha's. When I launched this blog a little more than three years ago, I wrote about how our coming out process was a liberating experience very much like the liberating feeling we experience when we encounter the Dhamma.

I hope our family in Malaysia remains strong throughout this, regardless of their religious point of view. Some meditative sessions on loving kindness are  probably in order. And the more musclely straight men who wear colorful V-necks and carry big satchels, the better.

Debating a monk is dukkha

Have you ever tried to point out to a monk that he just might be full of shit? It’s not an easy thing to do, because let me tell you, some monks are very adept at turning the tables and making you out to be the problem, that it’s your delusion operating here, not theirs.

I stumbled into such a debate after seeing a post on the Heartland Singapore Facebook page. It was referring to a post at buddhavacana.net, which appears to be a message board. There are other, blog-like pages on this site, but it doesn’t appear to be very active. Anyway, you can read my heresy by following the link I provided.

The gist of this began with a question emailed to the monk administering the page: “Can a gay person be ordained as a monk/nun?”

Bhante Shi Chuanguan replied with this: “Heterosexual men and women have to transcend their heterosexual desires if they are going to be ordained. Similarly, gay person can be ordained as a monk/nun, as long as this person can transcend this inclination.”

Me thinks I detect a double standard here.

As an aside, the Venerable Ashin Sopaka had a very pithy comment on the Heartland Facebook page, to which I will return later. But my response on the forum was to say I thought the answer provided, as well as an answer provided by another presumed monastic, was drawing a distinction between straight people seeking ordination and gays seeking ordination, that each was to be treated differently.

The Bhante said that straights had to “transcend their heterosexual desires,” while a gay person had to “transcend this inclination.”

This inclination? So the straight person need only renounce his or her sexual desires, while the gay has to renounce being gay? In other words, renounce his or her sexuality. What’s up with that?

You can read my entire reply on the message board, as I waxed very eloquent and pontificated like a true queen in heat. Perhaps that was a bit rash, because Bhante replied and suggested that, “Your inference that there is such a prejudicial idea is what is prejudicial.”

Moi? OK, OK, you can read my reply to that bit of obfuscation, because clearly this Bhante wanted to paint me the ignorant dualistic thinking bitter fag and a poor victim of all that nasty hate in the world, which, I would point out, often begins with narrow-minded and atavistic interpretations of religious doctrine by Paleolithic thinkers such as him. But I digress.

What I want to do is now return to Ashin Sopaka’s comment on the Heartland Facebook page. Ashin Sopaka succinctly points out that apparently the requirement to enter the monastery and seek ordination is to already be an enlightened being. Doesn’t the requirement that a gay first “transcend this inclination” mean that one must have renounced all notion of self, which can only be achieved upon enlightenment?

Seems to me that all the monastic code requires is that the monk or nun abstains from any form of sexual activity. That living in a monastery is the venue through which a monk or nun practices the doctrine to eventually transcend all fabricated notions of identity, whether they are sexual or otherwise. What “inclinations” remain in the unenlightened mind is irrelevant to anyone else in the monastery, as it is the duty of the monk or nun to peel back the layers of delusion and clinging within his or her own mind to ultimately attain freedom.

I’m sure Bhante Shi Chuanguan is a very wise man and knows his Dhamma pretty well. But his understanding of gay people, in my opinion, is no better than your average homophobe.

Update: I am pleased to say that Shi Chuanguan replied to my comments in a manner suggesting that we are coming together to a closer understanding.

Silence = Death

Martin Niemöller was a German protestant pastor with balls. Niemöller is probably best remembered for the following quotation:

“First they came for the Socialists, and I did not speak out – because I was not a Socialist. Then they came for the Trade Unionists, and I did not speak out – because I was not a Trade Unionist. Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out – Because I was not a Jew. Then they came for me – and there was no one left to speak for me.”

Over time, the quote was embellished to include Jehovah’s Witness, Catholics, Communists, and homosexuals. Niemöller was late finding his balls, because during the rise of Nazism in Germany, he remained silent and eventually spent 7 years in a concentration camp. But his quote is instructive nonetheless to show how ignorance and persecution gains strength and influence when good people remain silent.

Eighteenth century Irish writer and historian Edmund Burke famously made two very prescient observations: First, “All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing.” And second, “Among a people generally corrupt, liberty cannot long exist.”

Both Nathan at Dangerous Harvests and Kyle at The Reformed Buddhist have brought to light a bill under development in Arizona that seeks to ban the use of “foreign law” within the state under the penalty of impeachment. Among the usual suspects in the litany of “foreign law” is Sharia law. As if that wasn’t stupid enough, the bill also seeks to ban “karma.”

That’s right – they want to ban “karma” and anyone citing “karma” or allowing it to be introduced as a legal strategy could be impeached.

Who are these people? Do they really think that karma is a statute written on paper somewhere and that it has legal precedence in certain “foreign” courts? Karma is no more a statute than the “law” of gravity. The sheer ignorance of it all would be laughable if it wasn’t so fucking scary!

Then Arun at Angry Asian Buddhist, as well as John Pappas with an article at Elephant Journal, reveal how residents in Johnson County Kansas are seeking to block a Buddhist group from moving its temple because they fear animal sacrifices will go on there. I’m not kidding – animal sacrifices!

Again, the sheer ignorance of these people would be hilarious if it weren’t for the fact that they scare the shit out of me. That they believe or even think they can get away with lying that Buddhism includes animal sacrifices among its rituals is so astounding that I wonder if the end of the world really is coming soon. Because the tide is evident when you consider that the governor of Wisconsin is trying his damndest to gut the unions in that state and set back more than 100 years of labor law and advances that began in Wisconsin to the benefit of workers everywhere in the country.

I’m all ears. Someone guide me on what to do. Who do I need to send a letter to? Who do I email?

Silence = Death.

Land of institutionalized denial

I am beginning to think that American culture deliberately fosters ignorance and delusion. Far too many people willfully deny how something is, based upon feeble evidence when if they just did a tiny bit of research, they would see how things really are.

America’s debate on health care reform is a relevant and timely example. People willingly let themselves be manipulated into thinking that health care reform represents socialized medicine, that government has no role in running health insurance plans. And yet, these folks will at the same time utter, “but don’t you dare change my Medicare!”

Someone I know living in Asia recently took his mother to a hospital emergency room because she was having chest pains. Two diagnostic heart tests were conducted, the results of which were each reviewed by two physicians. She was given immediate pain relief and two prescriptions for follow-up care. Turned out it was severe indigestion. The entire charge for treatment came out to $35 U.S. The bill for the same care in an American hospital would probably be closer to $8,000. Even with health insurance, the American patient would face an out-of-pocket expense of between $1,500 to close to $3,000.

But I digress.

Like the Borg of the Star Trek series, this American machine of institutionalized denial has many methods to absorb normally clear-thinking and intelligent individuals into the collective of delusive ignorance. One of its more effective tools is Fox News, which was recently caught in another lie. Seems that this “news” organization can’t even keep track of what it has reported in the past, because it willfully blundered its way into portraying President Barack Obama a liar, questioning the president’s comment about a 2006 earthquake in Hawaii. Turns out there was a significant earthquake in Hawaii in 2006, and Fox News reported on it at the time!

However, the dominant American politic is much cleverer than that, subtly supporting a hegemony guided and continued by a white-male subscript that has lost the ability to self-evaluate and self-correct.

I need another brief digression here, as I know some of my white male friends and readers will look upon that paragraph and think, “Oh fer chrissakes, here comes the white male bashing stuff again.” All I can say is get over it. This isn’t about you personally. Your knee-jerk response to take umbrage with such comments only reveals how this remains a major hindrance in your practice. To quote an Aerosmith song, “Talk with yourself and you’ll hear what you wanna know.”

Popular culture, while it has been an excellent vehicle of change, has continued to unwittingly play a huge role in the preservation of ignorance. The upcoming film “The Last Airbender” is a good example. I became aware, from one of Arun’s posts at Angry Asian Buddhist, of how the feature film of this very popular cartoon series was being “whitewashed”. It was bad enough for producers to cast non-Asians to portray Asian characters, but when I read kudos’ post at Dharma Folk, I was flabbergasted. And yet, my response quickly changed to, “Why am I not surprised?”

The film industry has a long history – despite the diversity of those who work within that industry – of deliberately pandering to the prejudices and bigotry of its audiences. How “The Last Airbender” is coming along only reveals that Hollywood still doesn’t believe that mainstream America is sophisticated enough to grasp Buddhist concepts or principles without thinking it is an attack on the predominant Christian faith. And it also reveals that there remain too many in Hollywood who believe that Asian actors ought not portray Asian parts.

In my previous post, I offered a clip from the 2007 film “Windowbreaker” as an opportunity to examine racism in the context of Asian Americans. But let’s take a step away from the fantasy world of film and take a look at real life.

The Philadelphia Enquirer has been following the story of a school district’s response to Asian students there being targeted with violent assaults. The issue now, apparently, is over the investigation conducted by authorities, which was led by a retired judge. The investigation focused on a few, very specific incidents. The Asian students, however, are saying their attempts to provide context to these events – that they are the culmination of years of racial animus that went on without consequence – were ignored. They also allege that the investigation report does not accurately reflect the events on which it did focus.

I do not know the race of the judge who led the investigation, nor do I know whether that may be a factor in his resistance to listen to critics of how the investigation he led was conducted. But it was interesting to note that the Asian students say that race is not the issue with the attackers – but it is an issue with the victims as these incidents have all been directed at Asian students; there was no systemic assault being made against other ethnic or race groups.

What has this got to do with Buddhism?

The beauty of Buddhism, for me, is its simplicity. While the Tipitika can go into agonizing detail about how the mind works, all of the Buddha’s teachings can be summed up quite nicely into short expressions. One of the simplest – and one of my favorites – is the Buddha’s succinct expression of how dependent origination operates:

“When this is, that is…When this isn’t, that isn’t.” (AN 10.92)

Julie Andrews beautifully sung this powerful nugget as well in “The Sound of Music,” when she sings, “Nothing comes from nothing, nothing ever could.” (Bet you didn’t think that a Rodgers & Hammerstein musical could be connected to Buddhist teachings. Well, after all, my Buddha is pink.)

Things are as they are because of the conditions that created them. Remove the conditions and you change how things are. But the very essence of delusion often leads us to misdiagnose the true conditions that led to a situation. And one of the most effective tools of delusion is denial – we tend to deny any responsibility for contributing to the conditions that have created a present situation. It’s always somebody or something else. We don’t like to think that anything we do or say, or the way we think, has anything to do with something as repugnant as racism.

In terms of racial issues, this is not a one-way street. I have personally struggled with identifying meaningful ways I can be involved to help solve the violence that has been going on with Chicago youth. But I am white and live on the north side, and the fact is much of this violence is among the black and Hispanic communities of the south and west sides. Despite my desire to help find a solution, I know I will face the perception from the other side of, “Oh, here’s another guilty-feeling liberal white dude trying to help out blacks and Hispanics because he thinks we can’t do it ourselves.” I understand the perception, because there have been and continue to be plenty of white people who respond with condescension toward other ethnic and racial groups, as well as plenty of white people who respond to issues like this who are motivated purely by self-interest.

I’ve experienced this with Asians as well, such as when I visit a predominately Asian Buddhist organization. At the Thai temple I’ve been attending, a young Thai woman approached me and asked some questions. One comment she made was, “So you are Christian, right?’ She was quite surprised when I replied that I am Buddhist and have been practicing for about 10 years. I’m not saying this woman is racist, but her question did come from a culturally biased perspective, regardless of whether she is aware of it. It’s the same bias I show whenever I meet an Asian person and ask them, “Where are you from?” The presumption with this question is that even if the person asked was born in the U.S., he or she is “alien” based purely on his or her physical appearance.

Nothing is easy. But we Buddhists have some very powerful teachings that can help others who suffer if we find the means to present these teachings skillfully. No one likes proselytizing. People do appreciate help. When it comes to racism, sometimes the only thing, and yet the most important thing, we can do is closely examine our own actions and thinking, and do so without fear.

The Buddha: What do you think, Rahula: What is a mirror for?

Rahula: For reflection, sir.

The Buddha: In the same way, Rahula, bodily acts, verbal acts, and mental acts are to be done with repeated reflection.

Whenever you want to perform a bodily act, you should reflect on it: 'This bodily act I want to perform — would it lead to self-affliction, to the affliction of others, or to both? Is it an unskillful bodily act, with painful consequences, painful results?' If, on reflection, you know that it would lead to self-affliction, to the affliction of others, or to both; it would be an unskillful bodily act with painful consequences, painful results, then any bodily act of that sort is absolutely unfit for you to do. But if on reflection you know that it would not cause affliction... it would be a skillful bodily act with happy consequences, happy results, then any bodily act of that sort is fit for you to do.

(Similarly with verbal acts and mental acts.)

While you are performing a bodily act, you should reflect on it: 'This bodily act I am doing — is it leading to self-affliction, to the affliction of others, or to both? Is it an unskillful bodily act, with painful consequences, painful results?' If, on reflection, you know that it is leading to self-affliction, to affliction of others, or both... you should give it up. But if on reflection you know that it is not... you may continue with it.

(Similarly with verbal acts and mental acts.)

Having performed a bodily act, you should reflect on it... If, on reflection, you know that it led to self-affliction, to the affliction of others, or to both; it was an unskillful bodily act with painful consequences, painful results, then you should confess it, reveal it, lay it open to the Teacher or to a knowledgeable companion in the holy life. Having confessed it... you should exercise restraint in the future. But if on reflection you know that it did not lead to affliction... it was a skillful bodily act with happy consequences, happy results, then you should stay mentally refreshed and joyful, training day and night in skillful mental qualities.

(Similarly with verbal acts.)

Having performed a mental act, you should reflect on it... If, on reflection, you know that it led to self-affliction, to the affliction of others, or to both; it was an unskillful mental act with painful consequences, painful results, then you should feel horrified, humiliated, and disgusted with it. Feeling horrified... you should exercise restraint in the future. But if on reflection you know that it did not lead to affliction... it was a skillful mental act with happy consequences, happy results, then you should stay mentally refreshed and joyful, training day and night in skillful mental qualities.

Rahula, all the priests and contemplatives in the course of the past who purified their bodily acts, verbal acts, and mental acts, did it through repeated reflection on their bodily acts, verbal acts, and mental acts in just this way.

All the priests and contemplatives in the course of the future... All the priests and contemplatives at present who purify their bodily acts, verbal acts, and mental acts, do it through repeated reflection on their bodily acts, verbal acts, and mental acts in just this way.

Therefore, Rahula, you should train yourself: 'I will purify my bodily acts through repeated reflection. I will purify my verbal acts through repeated reflection. I will purify my mental acts through repeated reflection.' Thus you should train yourself.

From the Ambalatthika-rahulovada Sutta: Instructions to Rahula at Mango Stone (MN 61).

Forming a skillful response

We Buddhists have recently been faced with a challenge of faith, so to speak. Public figures from all across the globe have publicly commented on Buddhism in ways that many of us consider, to put it mildly, ignorant. There was the Rev. Rony Tan in Singapore of the Christian evangelical group Lighthouse, who used the dubious example of an allegedly former monk as an opportunity to denigrate Buddhism; there was Brit Hume of Fox News who inarticulately suggested that Tiger Woods ought to abandon his Buddhist practice and turn to Christianity where he would find the type of forgiveness that Hume suggested Buddhism did not have; and more recently we had Bill Maher who used Tiger Woods’ adulterous activities as an opportunity to bash Buddhism so clumsily that the normally erudite Maher sounded like a 12-year-old who asserts he’s an expert on sex after his first orgasm from masturbating.

We Buddhists who also happen to be gay are quite familiar with this type of ignorance. We’ve heard it from the people who like to lump homosexuals with pedophiles, suggesting that the terms are interchangeable; who assert that allowing same-sex couples to marry will surely lead down a slippery slope to humans marrying animals, that the institution of marriage will be so irreparably harmed that no decent straight person would want it; who stridently fight to deny us equal protection under the law, wrongly asserting that our “condition” is voluntary and chosen, failing to recognize that their protected religious affiliation is also voluntary and chosen; and who, when these straw men are knocked down, finally resort to that last refuge for those who have no rational argument by saying that homosexuals are sinful deviants who are despised by their deity because the Bible tells them so.

How do we respond to such ignorance? Should we respond to such ignorance? What could happen if we fail to respond to such ignorance?

John over at Sweep the Dust, Push the Dirt, recently asked these questions, which provoked a lengthy discussion in the comments to his post. You should take the time to read the responses if you haven’t already. Very interesting.

There are several passages in the Buddhist canon – from both the Pali texts and Mahayana sutras – that provide us clear guidance in this matter so we don’t need to debate when or how to respond to these situations.

First, there is the Brahmajala Sutta, in which the Buddha guides monks how to respond when someone misrepresents or disparages the Buddha, the Dhamma, or the Sangha.

“Bhikkhus! If others should malign the Buddha, the Dhamma and the Samgha, you must not feel resentment, nor displeasure, nor anger on that account.

“Bhikkhus! If you feel angry or displeased when others malign the Buddha, the Dhamma and the Samgha, it will only be harmful to you (because then you will not be able to practice the dhamma).

“Bhikkhus! If you feel angry or displeased when others malign the Buddha, the Dhamma and the Samgha, will you be able to discriminate their good speech from bad?

“No, indeed, Venerable Sir!” said the bhikkhus.

“If others malign me or the Dhamma, or the Samgha, you should explain (to them) what is false as false, saying ‘It is not so. It is not true. It is, indeed, not thus with us. Such fault is not to be found among us.’”

In the chapter titled Fortitude within the Lotus Sutra, the Buddha’s followers acknowledge that there will be times when they shall encounter people who “shall have much overweening pride and shall covet offerings, though their unwholesome faculties shall increase and they shall be hard to teach and convert, yet we, rousing the strength of great forbearance, will read and recite this scripture, bear and preach it, write and copy it, and in a variety of ways make offerings to it, not begrudging even bodily life.”

The chapter on Fortitude goes on with the many bodhisattvas proclaiming their understanding that an “evil age” will come when “…ignorant men … that revile us with foul mouths, or attack us with knives and staves … Men of twisted wisdom, their hearts sycophantic and crooked, (who) say they already have attained what in fact they have not yet attained, their hearts being full of pride.”

Faced with such calumny, the bodhisattvas proclaim, “Out of veneration for the Buddha, we will endure all these evils. By them we shall be addressed with derision … Such words of derision as these we will all endure with patience… We, venerating and believing the Buddha, will don the armor of forbearance and, to preach this scripture, will endure these troubles.”

This forbearance is anchored in the Four Ways of the Bodhisattva, which Thich Nhat Hanh describes as first being able to “dwell in a place of action.”

This means, “practicing patience and seeking harmony with others in everything that you do. If you are patient and tolerant of others, then you can create peace and joy for yourself, and thanks to that, those around you will also feel peaceful and joyful. Patience is not a weakness, but a stance of moderation and restraint. You do not try to force people to adopt your views,” says Thich Nhat Hanh in his book, “Peaceful Action, Open Heart: Lessons from the Lotus Sutra.”

Thich Nhat Hanh goes on to say that we shouldn’t directly engage “those who have worldly power, who practice wrong livelihood, or who have wrong intentions. This does not mean that you reject such people, but you do not seek them out to try and convert them.”

Developing and sustaining such restraint so that our responses are skillful is no easy task. We can be easily duped by ego into believing our intentions are correct and, subsequently, our actions are skillful. Which is why it is helpful to consider the Buddha’s teaching to his son Rahula on the importance of clearly reflecting on our intentions and actions not just before we engage in them, but during and after, discerning if what we are doing is, in fact, skillful and beneficial.

So out of all this, we see that responding to these and other events can be done skillfully, that we needn’t be silent doormats. But our response needs to be tempered and evenhanded for it to be skillful, something I struggle with all the time. Because what is the Dhamma? It is merely a raft we use to carry us across the river of samsara to the side of freedom. Once we cross that river, we abandon the raft. So if we become passionate about the Dhamma, that results in us clinging uncomfortably to something that we must ultimately let go.

Knowing the right questions to ask

People love to talk. And people love to debate. Often the debate, however, really isn’t an effort to persuade the other to your side; rather, it’s really a mild argument, just a simple game of “I’m right and you’re wrong” done for an audience with the hopes of gaining acolytes.

Monks love to talk. And monks love to debate. There’s a grand tradition among many Sanghas, particularly in Asia, of monks debating Dhamma when they gather together for festivals and other events. And monks within an individual Sangha debate each other to test their knowledge of the Dhamma. It is often a method of teaching other monks who may be listening to the debate, because there are times when someone has an incorrect view, they will hear that view expressed by another during a debate and then witness that view fall apart against the superior understanding of someone with correct view.

Monks, however, are also people and as a result, are not immune from having a debate devolve into pettiness. The Tipitika has many examples of a monk who stubbornly clings to wrong view. It is through these examples that the Buddha exposes a wrong view, contrasts it with right view, and corrects the monk’s misunderstanding, or course to everyone’s delight. This pedagogical technique is simple and timeless, but perhaps more importantly it is also effective: it brings about the desired results.

To say that there has been recent discussion within the iSangha and Twangha about what is the proper way to practice Buddhism is a bit misleading. Granted, the debate has taken form around the point of whether one can really have an effective practice if his or her absorption of the Dhamma is primarily through “discussion” via the Internet, which ostensibly would make such a debate appear to be “new.” Maybe even “different.” But it’s not any different from any other debate that has occurred within the Buddhist community, because at the heart of all this is the assertion that “my practice is the correct practice, your practice is false.”

For newcomers to the Dhamma, for those who have come to Buddhism with the hope that it will offer them something they could not find in other practices and faiths – inner peace and guidance on how to live a happy life that in turn promotes equanimity in all – encountering such debates within the Buddhism community can be disheartening. Because what I fear newcomers perceive when seeing these debates, which often are nothing more than flame wars in the old style of USENET, is that Buddhism is ensnared within the same political sniping and posturing that seems to dominate the monotheistic religions, as well as the general political culture of the West. To be skillful doesn’t seem to mean exemplifying the Noble Eightfold Path; rather, it seems to be clever in how you use your ad hominem – use just enough sarcasm, make your criticism just biting enough so that it doesn’t cause complete offense, but so that it creates an emotional rather than rational response.

The irony in all this is that the Buddha completely understood this, because, as he taught, at the root of all our suffering is ignorance – failing to see things as they really are. And the reason we fail to see things as they really are, as I understand his teachings, is that we have deluded minds. And because of our deluded minds, we fail to ask the right questions. Yet, cultivating the skill to ask the right questions is so simple that the Buddha taught it to a child, to his son Rahula (MN 61).

What the Buddha taught Rahula also seamlessly fits with what he told the Kalamas as well (AN 3.65). At the heart of these suttas – one given to a child and the other to an elite group of intellectuals – is guidance on asking the right questions. And a skillful question, as I understand the Buddha’s teachings, is one that seeks to honestly reveal our intentions.

Thanissaro Bhikkhu explains this very well in the essay “The Road to Nirvana Is Paved with Skillful Intentions.”

“At first glance, we might think that continual self-reflection of this sort would add further complications to our lives when they already seem more than complicated enough, but in fact the Buddha’s instructions are an attempt to strip the questions in our minds down to the most useful essentials. He explicitly warns against taking on too many questions, particularly those that lead nowhere and tie us up in knots: ‘Who am I? Am I basically a good person? An unworthy person?’ Instead, he tells us to focus on our intentions so that we can see how they shape our life, and to master the processes of cause and effect so that they can shape our life in increasingly better ways. This is the way every great artist or craftsman develops mastery and skill.”

Grasping this, I come to understand that most of my embarrassing moments of misstatement, or incidents of provocation on my part, can be traced to either one of two things: I either deliberately deluded myself about my real intentions for an action and as a result ignored the outcomes they would create, or I was careless because I failed to fully evaluate my intentions and the likely outcomes they would produce.

I would suspect that one of these scenarios was in operation in the production and publication of a recent article in Tricycle Magazine, an item that has created some angst among Buddhist bloggers, to be putting it mildly. Granted, the article “Dharma Wars” does reveal something that is true: there are some Buddhist teachers who become bullies as they become ensnared with dialogue over whose methods produce results. Recently, I attended a Buddhist gathering where the question was asked how was what this group believed and practiced different than what was practiced in other schools of Buddhism. The answer dismayed me. The respondent said it had been her experience that other “vehicles” tended to denigrate other methods, that the monks or teachers within these schools would disparage other teachers or schools. This was a “turn-off” for the respondent. I was dismayed because the answer, I thought, was unskillful in that the respondent’s answer was motivated by the same intention she was criticizing. Rather than answering the question asked – how is your practice different from others – the respondent answered a question that was unasked: how is your practice superior to others. The respondent was doing exactly the same thing that she found to be a turn-off: she focused on what she believed to be the negatives of other practices to place her own practice in a more positive light.


Similarly, it seems to me the Tricycle article failed to deliver on its supposed premise because the author asked the wrong question. The article’s summary asks this question: “What is it about the Internet that turns Buddhist teachers into bullies?” This question presumes that Buddhist bullies are not responsible for their bullying behavior because the Internet made them be bullies. It’s the old, “the Devil made me do it,” argument, a premise that conveniently absolves one of any personal responsibility. The other flaw with this premise is that it’s based on the notion that there is something about the written word appearing on the Internet that provokes disharmony, that it is more likely to encourage unskillful discourse by virtue of the fact that it appears on the Internet, which seems rather odd to me because after all, a written word is nothing more than a written word, and whether it’s placed on parchment or a computer screen is moot. It all comes back to who wrote that word and what were his or her intentions in writing it and was his or her action skillful? If a Buddhist teacher behaves like a bully, it is because the seeds of a bully were already present; the Internet did not create that seed. So it would seem the more appropriate question to ask is, “Are Buddhist teachers who respond with anger and behave like bullies worthy of receiving attention?”

Interestingly, the Buddha had an answer for that question: No. In part of the Lohicca Sutta (DN 12), the Buddha describes three types of teachers that should be avoided and who, in fact, ought to be criticized. Lohicca then asks the next logical question:

“But which teacher, Master Gotama, is not worthy of criticism in the world?”

“There is the case, Lohicca, where a Tathagata appears in the world, worthy & rightly self-awakened. He teaches the Dhamma admirable in its beginning, admirable in its middle, admirable in its end. He proclaims the holy life both in its particulars & in its essence, entirely perfect, surpassingly pure.”

But criticism in the Buddha’s view does not mean malign those who proffer wrong view. Skillful criticism is outlined by the Buddha in the Brahmajala Sutta (DN 1):

“Bhikkhus! if others should malign the Buddha, the Dhamma and the Samgha, you must not feel resentment, nor displeasure, nor anger on that account. Bhikkhus! If you feel angry or displeased when others malign the Buddha, the Dhamma and the Samgha, it will only be harmful to you (because then you will not be able to practice the dhamma). Bhikkhus! If you feel angry or displeased when others malign the Buddha, the Dhamma and the Samgha, will you be able to discriminate their good speech from bad?

‘No, indeed, Venerable Sir!’ said the bhikkhus.

If others malign me or the Dhamma, or the Samgha, you should explain (to them what is false as false), saying ‘It is not so. It is not true. It is, indeed, not thus with us. Such fault is not to be found among us.’ Bhikkhus! If others should praise the Buddha, the Dhamma and the Samgha, you should not, feel pleased, or delighted, or elated on that account. Bhikkhus! If you feel pleased, or delighted, or elated, when others praise me, or the Dhamma, or the Samgha, it will only be harmful to you. Bhikkhus! If others praise me, or the Dhamma, or the Samgha, you should admit what is true as true, saying ‘It is so. It is true. It is, indeed, thus with us. In fact, it is to be found among us.”

Indeed, two bloggers I am aware of who responded to the Tricycle article with great skill were Nathan at Dangerous Harvests, and NellaLou at Enlightenment Ward. There have been skillful responses by others and my omitting them from mention is by no means a commentary on their value, but these two are certainly worth reading.

There’s a reason why Right Speech is part of the Noble Eightfold Path, and that is speech is one of the ways we make kamma. If our speech is unskillful, our results will be unpleasant. As Master Hsing Yun wrote in “Being Good: Buddhist Ethics for Everyday Life,” most of our bad kamma is created by the words we speak.

“Speech is the single most powerful means by which we interact with other people. Our choice of words, our tone of voice, even our selection of subject matter can have the profoundest influence on other people. Intemperate or ill-considered speech often leads to misunderstanding, suspicion and anger.”

Malavagga: Impurities

I’ve mentioned before that there is unresolved anger within me, which contributes to my quick flares of rage usually over the stupidest things. Driving really triggers most of these incidents. It comes down to my inability to be patient: someone cuts me off or is driving too slow. But there is also an arrogance within me that feeds this anger. I get in these moods when I delude myself with how superior I am to others: a better driver, or whatever. This anger, impatience and arrogance are all impurities, and impurity is what chapter 18 of the Dhammapada is all about.

What I like about the Malavagga is that you can take just about any set of the verses and contemplate them on their own. For example:

“Just as rust
— iron’s impurity —
eats the very iron
from which it is born,
so the deeds
of one who lives slovenly
lead him on
to a bad destination.”

That’s a powerful image, likening one’s careless and heedless deeds to rust on iron, slowly eating away at the core. It’s a slow process, but destructive nonetheless.

This set of verses is among my favorites:

“Life’s easy to live
for someone unscrupulous,
cunning as a crow,
corrupt, back-biting,
forward, & brash;
but for someone who’s constantly
scrupulous, cautious,
observant, sincere,
pure in his livelihood,
clean in his pursuits,
it’s hard.”

Being truly aware of my actions at all times is very difficult! Now consider being truly aware of all my thoughts! Wow, that seems impossible! Despite the suffering that it brings, being heedless of what I am thinking, saying or doing is really the easy way out. It can be a very easy existence until I wind up doing something really stupid that brings immediate and severe consequences.

“Whoever kills, lies, steals,
goes to someone else’s wife,
& is addicted to intoxicants,
digs himself up
by the root
right here in this world.

So know, my good man,
that bad deeds are reckless.
Don't let greed & unrighteousness
oppress you with long-term pain.”

The Five Precepts are clearly laid out here for us, as well as the consequences for not keeping them. The metaphor is that failing to keep the precepts leads to complete disruption in your life, so much so it is as if you had uprooted yourself, and an uprooted plant withers and dies.

This verse I really like as well:

There’s no fire like passion,
no seizure like anger,
no snare like delusion,
no river like craving.”

Passion is like a fire in many ways. Yes, passion burns hot like a fire, but just as fire does, passion consumes; it consumes you and it consumes the object of your passion.

Anger truly is like a seizure. When in the throes of a seizure, you have no ability to think, you are often unaware of what is going on, what you are doing, or even how it all started. Anger so easily turns into pure reckless action. It’s a complete loss of control. And like a seizure, it leaves you spent.

There is no snare like delusion, and there are many who know this all to well, as they prey upon the delusions of others.

Craving, like a river, creates its own inertia; once it begins, it just continues to roll on and on until like a large river it becomes an unstoppable torrent of desire. But also like a river, with water in constant flow, our craving never stops once it gets what it seeks. In fact, it hardly pays attention to the object of desire because as soon as it is grasped, craving’s attention is on a new target.

And so what is the impurity in all of these that brings such sorrow and woe, such dissatisfaction and uneasiness?

It’s ignorance.