Hello and welcome back to our study of the Dhammapada.
Today we continue with verses 85 and 86, which read as follows.
apakate manusesu ye jana paragamino atayang itarapajati ramevanudhavati
These verses are a common chant in Thailand.
So quite familiar.
These and the next ones in the chapter.
So these two mean
Apakate manusesu, few are they among humans.
Ye janaparagamino, who go to the farther shore.
Atayangitarapaja, hear these other humans, other people.
Tiramevanudhavati, simply run up and down the shore.
But those who in regards to the well-taught Dhamma, are those who go according to the Dhamma.
These people go to the farther shore.
These cross to the other side.
Of the kingdom of death, which is hard to cross.
Which is very hard to cross.
So we have some imagery here.
The imagery of crossing an ocean.
And now most people just run up and down the shore.
Dhiram is this shore.
Anudhavati is running up and down.
So this was given in regards to another very short story.
It's rather more of a remark that the Buddha gave in regards to
the habits of those who would come and listen to the Dhamma.
It seems that there was a specific group of people who came to listen to the Buddha's teaching.
They had done good deeds or they had supported the monastery and so they came and gave alms to the monks and then stuck around intending to listen to the Dhamma all night.
There would be teachings of the Dhamma where the monks would take turns giving talks all night, or maybe even one monk would talk all night, probably the former.
Probably it would be several monks taking turns.
We once did this in Thailand, something like this.
There were some ancient Buddha statues that were stolen.
They were actually kept behind bars.
They were quite valuable.
They were kept behind bars, and someone actually cut through the bars or bent the bars or something to steal these Buddha images.
Cut through the bars, I think.
to steal the Buddha images.
And somewhat miraculously, one of them was found at the bottom of one of the rivers, I guess, like a small river, when it dried up or something in the dry season.
It was found.
And so they pulled it up and brought it back and had an all-night ceremony.
It was something like this.
The details are imprecise.
I maybe never even paid too much attention to the details, but it was something like that.
And so we had an all-night ceremony to...
honor the Buddha, or maybe to re-establish its sanctity or something, its holiness.
I mean, it was a very cultural sort of thing that I didn't pay too much attention to.
It may have been broken or something, and there was a fixing that had to go on, and at the end of fixing it, you have to re-bless it or something.
But it was kind of considered a miracle that they got it back.
So it was a big deal.
And all of the monks, I was a part of it.
We would take turns chanting or giving talks or that kind of thing all night until the sun rose.
So the spirit of this still goes on, even today.
this idea of an all-night Dhamma thing.
But it was sort of, I think it was Ajahn Tong that put it together.
I don't know how often it happens.
I know in Burma they do all-night chantings and all-night teachings, from what I hear.
Anyway, the situation here was all of them were trying to listen to the Dhamma, but none of them lasted.
Or maybe not none of them, but many of them were unable to last.
None of them.
They were unable to listen to the Dhamma all night.
Some of them were overcome by lust, sexual passion, and went home.
Some of them were overcome by anger, boredom maybe.
Anger is of many different kinds.
It can be boredom.
It can be dislike of the Dhamma teachings.
be self-hatred at the idea that every time you hear something that hits too close to home, maybe they're talking about things that are unwholesome and you realize that you engage in some of those and so you get angry at yourself and feel guilty and all these things.
So being overcome with that, they were unable to stay and they went home.
And some of them
Some of them are overcome by mana, conceit.
So that would be feeling self-righteous and displeased by the Dhamma, but not an angry thing, just sort of feeling like they knew better than the monks, or these monks don't know what they're talking about, being attached to views and that kind of thing.
Some of them got caught up with dinamida, so they got tired.
That's a common one.
And were nodding off and said, I realized that they had to go home.
It's better.
And so they went home in the middle of the teaching.
And so they went off.
The next day the monks gathered and commented on this and just were sort of remarking on how difficult it is for people to listen to the Dhamma and how people aren't all that keen to take the opportunity to listen to the Dhamma.
And the Buddha said, monks for the most, the Buddha came in and asked them what they were talking about.
And when they told him, he remarked that this is common for people.
He said, for the most part, for the most part, they are dependent upon or they are attached to existence, bhava, becoming.
They dwell stuck, stuck in bhava, stuck in becoming.
The meaning here, Baba is a sort of a neutral term, that sort of blanket statement for anything that leads to further becoming.
So when you want something, on a very basic level, it leads to becoming here.
And now you give rise to something new, which is the plan to get what you want.
and you want to eat and so suddenly the plan to make food arises maybe you want to watch a movie so you plan to go out and to the i guess people don't go to the video store anymore you whatever you want you want to go to thailand and so you give rise to something this
But you give rise to further becoming something that's not just functional, but it's actually a desire-based, a whole new set of variables.
Or if you're angry, you give rise to something new as well, at the very least a headache, but you can also out of anger give rise to argument, friction, conflict, war even.
Of course war can be caused by greed and often it's caused simply by greed.
Conceit, you give rise to this competition or this sense of
This conflict based on power struggle and desire for dominance, oppression, this kind of thing.
Oppressing others, belittling others, that kind of thing.
So you create something new.
Or you'd simply create a new plan for yourself.
I deserve to be king, so I'm going to fight my way to become king.
I deserve this or that, or I don't deserve this or that.
And so you strive accordingly.
Sometimes it's just out of laziness.
This gives rise to sleep, but it also gives rise to sickness.
It gives rise to conflict and problems when you don't act according to your duties, where you just consume but don't produce.
And as a result, people become upset because you're simply a consumer, a mooch, lazy, etc.,
And so on.
So this is the idea of becoming.
It's really anything that leads to... So there was a question recently about what's wrong with... There's always questions about what's wrong with seeking out pleasure, ordinary pleasure, because you do get some.
And it's really... These two verses point to the...
the mindset or the outlook of the Buddha and of Buddhists in general is that it's not enough and it's not sustainable because the more you want, as I said, the more you suffer, the less you get or the less satisfied you are.
And in fact it's the wrong way, it's unsustainable.
You find yourself bouncing back and forth or for a time
You're able to balance things before you fall one way or the other, and then it's back and forth again.
And it's building up disappointment, building up attachment and stress, or it's working for a time to
well, to either repress, often it's simply to repress our desires.
And we fluctuate back and forth and go through life, or we go through lives again and again and again, or born old, sick, die, born old, sick, die.
So this is sort of the outlook that the Buddha's basing this on.
These two verses are actually, one thing that stands out for me, besides the obvious symbolism or imagery which is quite powerful, is sort of congratulatory.
It seemed like a good opportunity to congratulate
All of the people involved with this community, all of the listeners, all of you who are listening to the Dhamma, right?
Taking the time, some of you every day too.
It's not something I never thought would happen.
I thought, okay, once a week maybe.
But some people actually come out every day to listen to the Dhamma.
You take the time to come online and sit still for an hour, half an hour, an hour, even to ask questions, so to get involved, to perform this act of good karma of asking questions.
Many of you are very respectful, and so I'm being respectful, and all sorts of good karma going on.
And that's something to be proud of, because even in the context of the story, many people... I mean, in the context of the story, these people are still to be congratulated, because they tried.
And it's not like they didn't hear some of the Dhamma, it's just they tried to do something beyond their capabilities.
All of the people here should be congratulated as well for having the good intentions.
Many people don't even think about crossing.
Or if they think about crossing, they never do anything to try to cross.
They would never come and meditate.
If you look at the list of meditators that we have, let's see how many we have tonight.
We've got actually a fairly small list today.
Uh-oh, and a bunch of orange people.
Maybe I spoke too soon.
What happened today?
But still, we have many, many people, and we have people meditating on this site around the clock.
People coming to listen to the Dhamma every day.
So this is a sign of at least wanting to cross.
Maybe some people just listen to the talks or watch my YouTube videos and maybe dip their foot in the water but don't ever cross.
But at the very least there's some thought and this is the first step.
The first step is thinking about it.
Having the giving rise to the intention or the desire to better oneself.
as opposed to just running up and down the shore.
Because that's what it's like.
That's what the Buddha likens most of our activity to, just running up and down the shore.
Sometimes running up and down out of desire.
Sometimes running up and down out of anger, fear, worry, conceit.
There are many ways of running around in circles.
running around in circles in the kingdom of death.
And this is where we find ourselves being born again and again, dying again and again, learning and forgetting.
not really learning from our mistakes.
Our intention here, our practice here, is to break that, to cross over, to go beyond, to go beyond death, to figure the system out, to come to understand the system, and to understand becoming.
and as a result not be dependent upon it.
One way of explaining why we're dependent upon it is because we don't understand it.
We're dependent upon it because it runs us.
We don't run it.
We don't lord over death.
Death lords over us, becoming as well.
We act in such a way usually that...
We don't fully understand the system.
We don't fully grasp what we're dealing with or what's in store for us when we
chase after things.
We're not clear in our minds as to the nature of our addictions and our aversions and our conceits and our views.
And so we hold on to them often without a clear understanding, or usually without a clear understanding.
Once we understand them clearly, this is the crossing over.
This is the rising above.
So it's rather a poetic verse, simple story, simple verse really, simple meaning.
It's kind of hard teaching.
It lays bare the fact that most of what we do is just running up and down the shore.
It doesn't really accomplish anything in the end.
But we should, on the other hand, it should be an encouraging teaching because whatever the good things that we do, this is our coming closer to be one of those few people who is actually able to cross over, who is actually able to rise above and free themselves from the wheel of suffering, from the kingdom of death.
So, good work everyone and thank you all for tuning in and for supporting these teachings with your practice, for practicing and continuing on this practice.
So, that's the Dhammapada teaching for tonight.
Thank you all for tuning in.
Keep practicing and