Self-nature Has Its Own Wisdom

Self-nature Has Its Own Wisdom
May /27/ 2023—May / 28/ 2023

Hello everyone, welcome to our Dharma talk at Dharma Rain Meditation Center.

Wisdom (Sanskrit: Prajñā), also known as Bore, Boruo, etc., in Chinese, which means wisdom or insight, is one of the precepts, samadhi and wisdom three studies. Mahayana Buddhism listed it as one of the Six Perfections). Hence it also named “Prajnāpāramitā”.

The “prajna” here is a Sanskrit Prajna transliteration, the original meaning is “wisdom.” The meaning of Prajñā’s word root is perception, knowledge, or understanding. The prefix Pra is a comparative degree, which means higher, bigger, more than or beyond. Therefore, literally, Prajñā is a kind of advanced perceptive ability; it is an ability to distinguish right from wrong and to make a simple choice by obeying the rule, all sentient beings have this ability. Those who have wisdom can use their own observation power to choose the right way. Lack of wisdom was called ignorance. However, the wisdom here means the “wonderful wisdom of Buddha”. It is everything that could see things in colour or colourlessness, and it can hear in sound and in silence, it gives birth to all good Dharma. As for the “wisdom” of ordinary people, it is created by foreign objects. It can only hear or see that there is a coloured and sounded subject. If it is colourless or silence, it cannot be seen or hear. It cannot develop a good Dharma directly. Therefore, ordinary people’s wisdom becomes an ignorance and delusional while prajna is like a lamp that light up everything, achieve everything and tame certain beings.

We have discussed before that three studies could cope with three poison, respectively. The knowledge of righteousness is wisdom, which can see the three-phase nature of the characters of “uncertain, painful, and non-self” and Tao will present naturally. This is the way how wisdom deal with ignorance.

There is an interesting story from the Sutra of One Hundred Parables. A couple got a piece of cake, a big and delicious one. This cake is just enough for dinner for one person. Both of them were lazy and neither wanted to cook, so the couple had a bet: put the piece of cake on the table, the one who talks first cannot eat, the another wins the cake, no share.

After their bet, they placed the cake on the table and sitting there. There was a thief happened to come over, he opened and heard no sounds. He saw the couple sitting there soon; he was scared; however, he found that the couple did not yell; they did not move. After observations, the thief moved all the furniture to his truck; the couple felt so bad; however, they can not yell because they want the cake both. The thief had not let it go; he came back to molest the wife. At that time, the wife couldn’t help herself anymore.

she yelled:”You stupid idiot, you don’t say anything even he molests your wife.” Her husband was so happy and said: “Hhhha, the cake is mine”.
We would say: “Gosh, such a stupid guy” isn’t it?

However, suppose we do not understand the Dharma, if we do not deeply enter the Sutra treasury and have wisdom like the sea, we probably similar to this gentleman. In that case, we cannot distinguish which one is important, which is not.

The Buddha’s Last Bequest said: “The robbers of the three afflictions forever lie in wait to kill men, so that (your danger) is even greater than in a household rent by hatred. So, fearful, how can you sleep and not arouse yourselves? The thief of our afflictions stole our merits every day. When afflictions rise up, our merit is destroyed by it; you are not in the mode of cultivation and mindfulness. Your chances of free from the samsara will be missed. So, what did we pay for such tiny little fame and fortune? Lost valuable solutions to the escape from samsara, lost precious opportunity to attain wisdom and enlightenment. This annoying thief stole all of our valuable treasures to emptied. What did we get? A cake named fame and fortune? And countless hindrance of karma.

How should we defend this hateful thief? Every day we must give more time to the cultivation, deeply enter the Sutra treasury, you will have wisdom like the sea. Deeply entering the Sutra treasury does not mean that you can become wisdom immediately, but you will definitely and improve your common sense in cultivation, wisdom will present naturally when you are pure enough. In other words, why we have to deeply enter the Sutra treasury? It is to construct our “faith” and “understanding”. As long as one has confidence in himself and understands the various Dharma’s reality, he or she will practice it properly; they can solve their problem. It is not easy to persuade people to do something, right? As long as he does not understand the real Dharma, how can you persuade him to do or not to do it? Because he does not understand, he does not believe, and there is no trust. How can we persuade people to do something in this situation? The Buddhas and Bodhisattvas have never been instructed on what each individual what exactly they should do. They only teach beings to understand to approach enlightenment. If you understand, you will practice it without any flaw, because you have a complete understanding. After all, the heart is full of omnipotence and self-nature. Therefore, the “faith” and “understanding” are the first two steps. After these we will go to “action” and “realization,” and they will not need to talk about the evidence. When people have “faith” and “understanding”, they will “action” and “realization naturally. When they attained the enlightenment, persuading is not necessary.

The Sixth Patriarch Huineng said: “that the Essence of Mind is intrinsically pure! Who would have thought that the Essence of Mind is intrinsically free from becoming or annihilation! Who would have thought that the Essence of Mind is intrinsically self-sufficient! Who would have thought that the Essence of Mind is intrinsically free from change! Who would have thought that all things are the manifestation of the Essence of Mind!” Our theme today is self-nature has its wisdom, which is, the self-sufficiency wisdom has been stored in our self-nature. How can we believe that? I got to say “faith” is not an easy thing. Take an example, and we play video games on-line. I know that I have three lives. After three lives, I can start over again. I can have countless lives, assuming my life is infinitely long. We can easily accept this because it is virtual. When someone tells us that our world which we exist is also virtual, it is also a “reversing dream”, the only thing that constant is our self-nature, and it is originally pure and wisdom enough. We are not going to believe that, because it is too real and we didn’t get an opportunity to jump out and look at it. Of course, we will not see the five skandhas are empty and attain the wisdom from self-nature. To rejuvenate and become aware of our self-nature, we need to cultivate spirituality. We must follow a real master, especially reminding those famous masters, and start with a proper Dharma gate. Deeply enter the Sutra treasury, and have wisdom like the sea. How can I have the wisdom or when can I see my self-nature wisdom, I want to explain like this: if we hang a few mirrors in the meditation room from today, before we walk in, will they discuss, who I want to see today? When we walked in, the mirrors saw it. Two ants fought the mirrors also saw it. They didn’t rise any mind or ideal. The same theory for our cultivation means we will have different ideas when encountering different issues, fearlessly and skillfully acquiring progress. Eventually, we can return to our bodhi-natural which have all the wisdom and purity. Therefore, cultivate by following the Dharma, purifying yourself, do not need any other preparations, you will encounter your self-nature wisdom in the right timing.

Thank you for the listening!