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The Healing Power of the Precepts
Thanissaro Bhikkhu
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Copyright © 1997 Thanissaro Bhikkhu
The Buddha was like a doctor, treating the spiritual ills
of the human race. The path of practice he taught was like a course of
therapy for suffering hearts and minds. This way of understanding the
Buddha and his teachings dates back to the earliest texts, and yet is
also very current. Buddhist meditation practice is often advertised as
a form of healing, and quite a few psychotherapists now recommend that
their patients try meditation as part of their treatment.
After several years of teaching and practicing meditation
as therapy, however, many of us have found that meditation on its own
is not enough. In my own experience, I have found that Western
meditators tend to be afflicted more with a certain grimness and lack
of self-esteem than any Asians I have ever taught. Their psyches are
so wounded by modern civilization that they lack the resilience and
persistence needed before concentration and insight practices can be
genuinely therapeutic. Other teachers have noted this problem as well
and, as a result, many of them have decided that the Buddhist path is
insufficient for our particular needs. To make up for this
insufficiency they have experimented with ways of supplementing
meditation practice, combining it with such things as myth, poetry,
psychotherapy, social activism, sweat lodges, mourning rituals, and
even drumming. The problem, though, may not be that there is anything
lacking in the Buddhist path, but that we simply haven't been
following the Buddha's full course of therapy.
The Buddha's path consisted not only of mindfulness,
concentration, and insight practices, but also of virtue, beginning
with the five precepts. In fact, the precepts constitute the first
step in the path. There is a tendency in the West to dismiss the five
precepts as Sunday-school rules bound to old cultural norms that no
longer apply to our modern society, but this misses the role that the
Buddha intended for them: They are part of a course of therapy for
wounded minds. In particular, they are aimed at curing two ailments
that underlie low self-esteem: regret and denial.
When our actions don't measure up to certain standards of
behavior, we either:
1- regret the actions or
2- engage in one of two kinds of denial, either
a) denying that our actions did in fact happen
or
b) denying that the standards of measurement
are really valid.
These reactions are like wounds in the mind. Regret is an
open wound, tender to the touch, while denial is like hardened,
twisted scar tissue around a tender spot. When the mind is wounded in
these ways, it can't settle down comfortably in the present, for it
finds itself resting on raw, exposed flesh or calcified knots. Even
when it's forced to stay in the present, it's there only in a tensed,
contorted and partial way, and so the insights it gains tend to be
contorted and partial as well. Only if the mind is free of wounds and
scars can it be expected to settle down comfortably and freely in the
present, and to give rise to undistorted discernment.
This is where the five precepts come in: They are designed
to heal these wounds and scars. Healthy self-esteem comes from living
up to a set of standards that are practical, clear-cut, humane, and
worthy of respect; the five precepts are formulated in such a way that
they provide just such a set of standards.
Practical: The standards set by the precepts are simple --
no intentional killing, stealing, having illicit sex, lying, or taking
intoxicants. It's entirely possible to live in line with these
standards. Not always easy or convenient, but always possible. I have
seen efforts to translate the precepts into standards that sound more
lofty or noble -- taking the second precept, for example, to mean no
abuse of the planet's resources -- but even the people who reformulate
the precepts in this way admit that it is impossible to live up to
them. Anyone who has dealt with psychologically damaged people knows
that very often the damage comes from having been presented with
impossible standards to live by. If you can give people standards that
take a little effort and mindfulness, but are possible to meet, their
self-esteem soars dramatically as they discover that they are actually
capable of meeting those standards. They can then face more demanding
tasks with confidence.
Clear-cut: The precepts are formulated with no ifs, ands,
or buts. This means that they give very clear guidance, with no room
for waffling or less-than-honest rationalizations. An action either
fits in with the precepts or it doesn't. Again, standards of this sort
are very healthy to live by. Anyone who has raised children has found
that, although they may complain about hard and fast rules, they
actually feel more secure with them than with rules that are vague and
always open to negotiation. Clear-cut rules don't allow for unspoken
agendas to come sneaking in the back door of the mind. If, for
example, the precept against killing allowed you to kill living beings
when their presence is inconvenient, that would place your convenience
on a higher level than your compassion for life. Convenience would
become your unspoken standard -- and as we all know, unspoken
standards provide huge tracts of fertile ground for hypocrisy and
denial to grow. If, however, you stick by the standards of the
precepts, then as the Buddha says, you are providing unlimited safety
for the lives of all. There are no conditions under which you would
take the lives of any living beings, no matter how inconvenient they
might be. In terms of the other precepts, you are providing unlimited
safety for their possessions and sexuality, and unlimited truthfulness
and mindfulness in your communication with them. When you find that
you can trust yourself in matters like these, you gain an undeniably
healthy sense of self-respect.
Humane: The precepts are humane both to the person who
observes them and to the people affected by his or her actions. If you
observe them, you are aligning yourself with the doctrine of karma,
which teaches that the most important powers shaping your experience
of the world are the intentional thoughts, words, and deeds you chose
in the present moment. This means that you are not insignificant.
Every time you take a choice -- at home, at work, at play -- you are
exercising your power in the on-going fashioning of the world. At the
same time, this principle allows you to measure yourself in terms that
are entirely under your control: your intentional actions in the
present moment. In other words, they don't force you to measure
yourself in terms of your looks, strength, brains, financial prowess,
or any other criteria that depend less on your present karma than they
do on karma from the past. Also, they don't play on feelings of guilt
or force you to bemoan your past lapses. Instead, they focus your
attention on the ever-present possibility of living up to your
standards in the here and now. If you are living with people who
observe the precepts, you find that your dealings with them are not a
cause for mistrust or fear. They regard your desire for happiness as
akin to theirs. Their worth as individuals does not depend on
situations in which there have to be winners and losers. When they
talk about developing lovingkindness and mindfulness in their
meditation, you see it reflected in their actions. In this way the
precepts foster not only healthy individuals, but also a healthy
society -- a society in which the self-respect and mutual respect are
not at odds.
Worthy of respect: When you adopt a set of standards, it
is important to know whose standards they are and to see where those
standards come from, for in effect you are joining their group,
looking for their approval, and accepting their criteria for right and
wrong. In this case, you couldn't ask for a better group to join: the
Buddha and his noble disciples. The five precepts are called
"standards appealing to the noble ones." From what the texts tell us
of the noble ones, they are not people who accept standards simply on
the basis of popularity. They have put their lives on the line to see
what leads to true happiness, and have seen for themselves, for
example, that all lying is pathological, and that any sex outside of a
stable, committed relationship is unsafe at any speed. Other people
may not respect you for living by the five precepts, but noble ones
do, and their respect is worth more than that of anyone else in the
world.
Now, many people find it cold comfort to join such an
abstract group, especially when they have not yet met any noble ones
in person. It's hard to be good-hearted and generous when the society
immediately around you openly laughs at those qualities and values
such things as sexual prowess or predatory business skills instead.
This is where Buddhist communities can come in. It would be very
useful if Buddhist groups would openly part ways with the prevailing
amoral tenor of our culture and let it be known in a kindly way that
they value goodheartedness and restraint among their members. In doing
so, they would provide a healthy environment for the full-scale
adoption of the Buddha's course of therapy: the practice of
concentration and discernment in a life of virtuous action. Where we
have such environments, we find that meditation needs no myth or
make-believe to support it, because it is based on the reality of a
well-lived life. You can look at the standards by which you live, and
then breathe in and out comfortably -- not as a flower or a mountain,
but as a full-fledged, responsible human being. For that's what you
are.
Source : www.buddhismtoday.com
Update : 01-12-2001
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