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Book: An Overview
of The Buddhadharma
- Book: An Overview of The Buddhadharma
- Title: Integration of Practice with daily activities
- Written by: Living Buddha Lian-sheng, Sheng-yen Lu
- Translated by: Janny Chow
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Integration of Practice with daily activities
Many students have been coming here for several years to learn
to do the practice. There was one time when several were asked by
someone outside the school what they had learned from me. One student
replied, "Master Lu did not teach me anything." Did this
hurt my feelings? Let me use this story as an illustration. One
of the students of the Zen Master Bird Nest had been following him
for many years. One day this student packed up his belongings and
bade farewell to the Zen Master. The master asked, "Where
are you going?" "I am going to look for
another teacher." The master asked again, "Why
are you going to find another teacher? Aren't you doing
very well here?" The student replied, "You
have not taught me any Buddhadharma in all the years I have been
here." Zen Master Bird Nest then extended his leg
and plucked out a hair. (Too bad, I don't have hairy
legs!) [audience laughter] The Zen Master pointed to the hair. "This
is Buddhadharma," The hair from the leg was the Buddhadharma.
Do you comprehend? At that moment, the student suddenly had a breakthrough
and understood what Buddhadharma was. If that student I mentioned
earlier had packed up and come to say good-bye to me, I also would
have plucked out a whisker [audience laughter] and told him, "This
whisker is the Buddhadharma. Do you understand?" Buddhadharma
is interwoven with everything in one's daily life and
it has to be experienced! Everything is a manifestation of the Truth!
After listening to the teachings, instead of going home and forgetting
about them, one has to apply the teachings to one's
normal life and daily activities-this is Buddhadharma.
Therefore every gesture of the teacher is a Dharma teaching. [audience
applause] Every word uttered and every action performed by Buddha
Shakyamuni was the Buddhadharma. Described in the sutras were the
daily rituals of the Buddha, which indicated that walking, living,
sitting, and lying down could also be intimate experiences of the
Buddhadharma. Many people are not aware that to practice Buddhism
is to have a sacred orientation to everything in one's
ordinary life. Buddhadharma is not some special technique that is
only taught to one special person. Its transmission is not based
on any special "price." There are other
teachers who would confer upon you special methods or exclusive
empowerments if you made a huge offering. We have a Taiwanese folk
saying to describe such practice, "One has a grand opening
every three years and money made at each opening lasts three years."
Sometimes some of these special methods are not authentic. There
are people who use this form of practice solely to make money. At
the time of Buddha Shakyamuni, such practices were forbidden by
him.
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