Hello and welcome back to our study of the Dhammapada.
Today we continue on with verse 223, which reads as follows.
akko dhena jine ko dhang asadhung sadhuna jine jine kadariyam dhanena sacce nalika vadinam
Which means conquer anger with non-anger.
Conquer non-goodness or evil with good.
conquer miserliness with giving charity and lies with truth.
Very powerful verse.
This verse was taught in response to
a story about Uttara, a woman in the time of the Buddha.
The story begins with Uttara's parents, her mother and her father, who were very poor, living in Rajgaha at the time of the Buddha.
And the story goes that there was a festival once upon a time.
And the king made a proclamation that everyone should enjoy themselves.
So the rich man who was the employer of Uttara's parents
asked the father whether he was going to take a vacation.
Everyone was allowed to take a vacation.
He said, vacations are for rich people.
He said, I'll continue to work if you don't mind.
And he went to plow the field.
And
So on that day, he told his wife, look, there's supposed to be a festival, a holiday, but I can't take a holiday.
It's not for us.
I'm going to go plow the field.
Just because today is special, bring me twice as much food as you normally would.
That was his way of celebrating the festival, telling his wife to make him twice as much food.
And so he went early to plow the field and spent all day, all morning out in the field.
And just around lunchtime, Sariputta came.
Sariputta walking for alms and he saw this man and
The man thought to himself, oh, here, this is a special person.
He invited him to come over and he said, Venerable sir, you must need a... He had no food on him, nothing to offer him, but he said, well, I've got these toothbrush sticks.
Maybe you could use one of them.
The story actually, an important part of the story is that Sariputta had just come out of a attainment of cessation that lasted seven days.
That's meaningful because it's a very special attainment that only
Only enlightened beings, of course, can go into, but even enlightened beings, not all of them are able to go do such a thing.
It means he was in the bliss of cessation for seven days.
And when he arose out of it, he thought to himself, who can I go to that would really benefit from doing something really good today?
Because
The idea is that having just come out of that attainment, he had done something so powerful himself, he was in such a pure state of mind, that the giving of a gift to him, the first gift given to him, is said to be of great merit as well, great power as well.
And he saw, he thought of this man and his family.
He thought of the family and he realized that this would be a good family,
Probably knew them from before.
He shows up and this man gives him the... They had these sticks in India.
They still use them.
You brush your teeth with the stick.
And...
Sariputta gave over his bowl with a water filter, a cloth on it, and he got him some water, filtered the water for him and gave him the water.
Monks aren't allowed to just drink water from a stream or anything because of the tradition of the idea that there might be some life there or something.
It was just a custom, you know.
There was concern from people that there might be life in the water, so he had to strain it.
So he strained it for him and gave him the water to drink.
And Sariputta went on his way.
Sariputta thought to himself, I'm sure the wife, the woman is going to come to bring the man food.
And so that's how it was.
And so he waited a bit and set out on the road just when he thought this woman would be bringing her husband food.
And so she saw him before she came to her husband, she saw him stand walking on the road and carrying this food for her husband and thought to herself, there have been times where I met someone worthy
She knew who this monk was, obviously they were acquainted.
There's been times where I've met him or someone and I didn't have any food.
And there have been times where I had food and wanted to give but couldn't find him.
Here I have food and he's here even though this food is meant for my husband.
She came up to him and she said, this is an opportunity one doesn't take lightly.
And so she offered, poured the food into his bowl.
She got halfway and he put his hand over and signed that that was enough.
He wasn't going to take it all.
And she said, look, you can't make a half portion.
This was supposed to be for one person.
Take it all.
And she gave him all the rice, no food for her husband.
And the elder went on his way and he
So as she went on her way to meet with her husband, she thought to herself, this is what the text says apparently.
If I go there, having taken this extra time because she was late from meeting the elder, he might beat me with his whip.
Apparently the husband was not the nicest sort of person.
And so she thought, I'll have to say something personal.
She said, please don't be angry with me.
Probably she was worried about the fact that she didn't bring him any food either.
Please don't be angry with me.
I met the venerable elder Sariputta on the road and I gave him your food.
That's why I'm late and I have no food for you.
She must have been a little bit concerned, afraid of what he might do.
No, the way she said it actually was not that she was afraid.
She said, if I don't tell him, and if he gets angry at me, all the good that we have done, that I have done on his behalf for all of us, it will be for naught.
Very wise, wise sort of, you know, obviously she had some high-mindedness.
And so that's why she told him right away.
Not even concerned for her own well-being, actually.
But it turns out he wasn't such a bad guy, though.
Reserved judgment.
He was happy.
He said, you've done a wonderful thing.
this is great what you've done and he was so happy and he was weak and he couldn't he had worked all morning and he was hungry and weak but he said what you've done is incredible and he was sad he was very appreciative of it and he lay down to sleep because he was so weak when he woke up well the story says I'm not going to go into detail the story says the field that he had plowed had turned into gold let's just say
As a result of the good deed, he became very wealthy.
They became very wealthy.
As a result of the power of that deed, miraculous things happened and the family became very wealthy.
We don't have to go into the details of what actually happened miraculously.
The story again is about Uttara, their daughter.
He became a very important treasurer in the city.
He had so much money, the king said, do you know anyone else who has this much gold?
No.
Let's make him the treasurer.
So they made him the treasurer of the city.
One of the treasurers, maybe, because there was another treasurer who wanted to have his son marry their daughter.
And the father forbid it.
He said, nope.
Sorry, I'm skipping ahead.
After they became very wealthy, immediately they invited all of the Buddha and the monks to come and eat at their new house.
They built a big house, a mansion.
And rather than waste their money on luxuries, they spent a lot of money on...
supporting the Buddha and his followers.
As a result, they heard the Buddha's teaching and they all became a sotapanna as a result of this, as a result of taking care of the Buddha and hearing his teachings and patronizing the religion.
And so, it turns out that the son of this other treasurer was
faithless, had no interest in religion perhaps at all, but certainly no interest in Buddhism, scornful of the Buddha and his teachings.
And he said, there's no way I can give my daughter to you.
But he was pressured and he was pressured and eventually he gave in.
And the daughter, of course, had no say in it.
It's the way things were.
And so she went to live with this son of the other treasurer.
and had no opportunity to have any contact with the Buddha or his followers.
Could you imagine someone who has become a sotapanna, so keen on practicing and listening to the Dhamma.
There was no internet back then, there was no way to... And the Buddha was living in Rajgaha, he was living there, and she had no opportunity to see him.
So she sent a message to her parents and said,
Why have you sent me to this prison?
That's the words she used.
I have no opportunity to do anything good.
My life is meaningless, she said.
This is like being in prison when I know that the Buddha is here to be learned from.
And so the parents were quite aggrieved and they sent her 15,000 gold coins.
And this is their instruction.
Said, there's this woman, Siri Ma, and you can hire her for a thousand gold coins a day.
Hire her for the next 15 days to look after your husband.
And then you can go and do what you want.
Tell him that you're going to spend this time.
This is the agreement.
He can have her.
And you can go and do what you want.
That's what the story says.
It's actually a famous story.
The next part is what makes it so famous.
Uttara was so happy, so happy that she would now have time to spend all her time.
And she invited, she went to the Buddha and she said, for the next 15 days, please come and receive food from in our house.
She hired this woman, Sirima, went to her husband and said, this woman is here for you.
She will be your woman for the next 15 days.
And she spent all her time cooking and preparing food and preparing the place and
She was getting ready for the next 15 days to spend listening to the Buddha's teaching.
And the husband saw her, I guess that day, went to see what was going on.
No, no, I think this was after 15 days.
After the 15 days.
He had spent 15 days now with this woman and he was looking out the window and he saw her rushing around, spending all this time and effort.
And he saw her and he laughed.
He thought to himself, spending all that time for those bald-headed recluses.
And she's happy about it.
And he just laughed at her scornfully.
And turned away.
Sirima saw this.
And this is why I think it was 15, it must have been at the end of the 15 days.
Sirima saw this and she wondered, what's he laughing at?
So she went to the window and saw that Uttara was sitting out there, or was out there doing her thing.
And she thought to herself, she misunderstood that he was actually joyful and very much attached to Uttara.
And after 15 days living in this mansion with this man who was totally with Uttara nowhere in sight, she became very angry and jealous and realized that
She wasn't his favorite, that she wasn't the most important person in the house.
And so she decided that she won.
She got very angry and she was blinded by it and decided to hurt.
She had to hurt Uttara.
And so she was stormed down to the kitchen and in a fit of rage, she saw the stove, the fire, and they were boiling ghee, which is like butter.
And she took up a big spoon and she filled it with boiling hot ghee.
And she went to Uttara and threw the butter in her face.
Uttara saw her coming, face all blotched with anger.
And she had been practicing now for 15 days and even longer she had been practicing all sorts of good things, including metta, friendliness.
And so her immediate instinct was friendliness.
Perhaps even compassion, understanding how much suffering there must be for someone to do that.
How much suffering is involved with the evil of that mind state
And she thought to herself, as she saw Sirima coming with this big ladle full of butter, she said to herself, this woman has been very helpful to me.
It is because of her that I have been able to listen to and care for the Buddha and his followers.
She said, if there's any anger or ill will in me, any resentment in me towards this woman, may that butter burn me horribly.
If there is no anger or ill will or resentment in me, may it not.
And because of this friend, this powerful state of metta, another magical thing is said to have happened is that when the butter touched her, it felt cool, like fresh cold water.
And Sirima was shocked that she didn't seem in pain or hurt by the butter.
And so she went and got another spoon.
And she said, we'll see if this one's cold.
Or maybe she said, was the butter cold?
Anyway, something like that.
By the time she got back to the stove and got another ladle of boiling hot ghee, all the servants in the house saw this.
And they jumped on her and started beating her.
Talk about immediate retribution.
The servants weren't quite as enlightened as Uttara, it seems.
But Uttara stopped them.
She pushed them off and told them to stop.
And she picked up, she took Uttara and she bathed her and put salves on her wounds and everything and asked her, why would you do such a thing?
Why would you do that?
And Sirima was racked with guilt, realizing what a horrible thing she had done.
And just feeling the friendliness, shocked by the fact how pure Uttara was, to not even be angry or upset and to care for her after the horrible things she had tried to do.
And then ask her why she would do that such a thing.
And so she bowed down to Uttara and said, please forgive me.
I've done a horrible thing.
Uddara said to her, I am a daughter and my father is still alive.
If my father forgives you, I will forgive you.
That's what she said.
And this Sirima said,
Fine, absolutely.
Tell me where Puna, Puna was her father's name, tell me where Puna is and I'll go and ask his forgiveness.
And she said, I'm not talking about my worldly father.
I have a greater father than that, and that's the Buddha.
He is my father in spiritual life.
Not just my father in this one life of samsara.
And she said, you must ask forgiveness of the Buddha.
And so Sirima said, absolutely, take me there.
And the Buddha came, I guess, to, they went to the Buddha, the Buddha came to them.
And Sirima immediately got down on her knees and said, please forgive me.
And the Buddha said, what have you done?
And Sirima told him what she had done and
Buddha had done in response and Buddha turned to Uttara and said, sadhu, sadhu.
You've done a wonderful thing.
What you've done is the right thing.
And then he taught this verse.
One should conquer anger without anger.
So, the lesson of the story, I think more than anything, is the power of goodness.
Apart from the lesson of the verse, the lesson of the story, in two ways, shows the power of goodness.
And that's the first way is the great fruit of their kindness and generosity towards Sariputta.
It's very easy to miss the importance and power that is ascribed to good deeds in Buddhism.
We focus very much on things like meditation and the development of positive psychic qualities or mental qualities.
But there is a great power to goodness in general that shouldn't be ignored, whether it be charity or whether it be ethical principles.
Something very much stressed in Buddhism, that as a way of living our lives, nothing beats goodness, good deeds, that charity does have fruit.
It's just an all around good thing.
Especially when it's accompanied by respect and reverence and appreciation and wisdom that's able to distinguish what is a good recipient of charity and that sort of thing.
And the same with ethics, the same with, of course, meditation.
We shouldn't disregard the power of goodness.
That's a basic Buddhist principle, appreciation of goodness.
It's a foundation or a fundamental of Buddhism, the practice and the cultivation of goodness.
And the other example, of course, is the power of metta that Uttara showed
in her reaction to Sirima's act and it doesn't actually take physical acts of charity or kindness even speech to perform great goodness and to have a powerful impact on the world the simple state of mind you see
It's so powerful.
I think people often wonder what the benefit of meditation is.
It seems like just a vacation, an escape from trouble.
Even you hear about metta practice and you think, well, okay, you're just going to sit around and think good thoughts.
What did that ever accomplish, right?
Here we see a clear, clear example of how powerful metta can be.
And I don't think you have to believe that it actually cooled the butter.
If we put that miraculous aspect of it aside, the real power isn't in that.
That's not the real power of metta.
The power was in how strong an impact
it had on Sirima changed her from a vindictive, mean, cruel, jilted lover to a contrite, remorseful, humble supplicant or
to a thoughtful person, where she was remorseful and asking forgiveness.
All because Uttara was in a state of metta, because her mind was pure.
because she had cultivated and developed this quality of metta to such a degree that she was able to see clearly metta really comes hand in hand with seeing clearly she was able to see clearly the suffering and the danger of anger
and feel compassion and feel kindness towards Sirima.
And that was enough to change Sirima's attitude, accompanied with the kindness she showed after the servants beat the living crud out of her.
And this relates as well to the verse.
This is why the Buddha taught the verse.
But the power of goodness, the power to change people, the power to cool butter, the power to bring about good consequences, leads us to a discussion of the actual teaching of the verse.
Because the verse, beyond simply saying, describing the power of goodness,
It teaches us that, according to Buddhism, or that Buddhism falls into the camp of those teachings that we often recognize in the Christian saying, turn the other cheek.
Because of course there are other religions and philosophies that believe in the concept of an eye for an eye.
And they are very different concepts.
Not to point to this religion or that religion, but it's not proper to say that all teachings are the same.
An eye for an eye is a very different concept than turn the other cheek.
And Buddhism rests squarely in this, what we might call the non-violent tradition.
And in the camp of belief, the school of thought, that the true power lies in turning the other cheek.
That there is true power in it.
From a Buddhist perspective, responding with anger, fighting fire with fire, an eye for an eye is a weakness.
So often we want to conquer people who are angry with anger, you know.
Anger specifically is a fairly easy one to explain, to point out the error in regards to it.
Because when you're angry, you don't actually hurt the other person, right?
Simply being angry.
You in fact hurt yourself.
Buddha pointed out that you do to an enemy what they would only wish they could do to you.
when you're angry.
You torture yourself.
Which is I think a big part of, I think it's an important thing that isn't well understood by people seeking justice, by activists for good causes, for people engaged in
social justice causes, social welfare causes, really good causes to bring about right in the world.
Those people who seek out right outside of the Buddhist sasana, outside of the Buddhist religion, often make this mistake of getting angry.
They mistake the righteousness with anger.
Or their righteousness contains, among other things, anger.
And the anger is a problem.
There's nothing you can do with anger that you couldn't do without it better.
That's a fact.
That's something not understood.
That you don't need anger to do all these things.
Anger doesn't actually help you.
It's mistaken.
We mistake the anger for righteousness, for truth.
Someone is telling a lie or doing something wrong, and you want to right that wrong.
You know something they don't, and you want to force them to do what's right, even though they don't want to, even though they don't know what's right.
We use anger to do that.
There's nothing you can do with anger that you couldn't do better without it.
Better in the sense of bringing about more positive results.
Of course, if you want to do evil things, you do them better with anger, but it's not actually better.
The second part of the verse is really the crux of it.
And it's the crux of the lesson of the whole verse and story.
Conquer lack of goodness with goodness.
Conquer evil with good.
There's a story in one of the Jatakas of this king, two kings.
And they met on the road.
And the road, the path was narrow.
It would be one of those cart paths that only had tracks, you know.
And it's actually, they become ruts to the point where you can't really go around each other.
It's not a highway by any means.
And so they met, these two kings, lords maybe perhaps, and their charioteers.
And they both said, look, I've got a king in here.
You better get out of the way.
Well, I've got a king as well.
You get out of the way.
And the first one
He says, well, my king is the greatest.
And the second one says, well, that's a matter of opinion.
Tell me what's so great about your king.
And this is where the verses of the Jataka start.
He says, when someone is good, my king repays them with goodness.
When someone is evil, my king repays them in kind with evil.
Basically, read the verse.
And the second one looks at him and he said, you call that great?
And then he says the real truth.
He teaches the Dhamma.
He says, with evil, evil he repays with goodness.
And cruelty with kindness.
Lies with truth and so on.
Anyway, he says it quite a bit more poetically than that.
And the other king hears this.
He's listening from within.
He's listening to their conversation.
And he gets out of his chariot and he calls his charioteer down and he says, Come on.
And together they move the chariot out of the way so that he says, Your king is the greater king.
And they move him out of the way.
So this is a Buddhist principle.
Principle of non-violence, more than that, the principle of fighting fire with ice.
You don't fight fire with fire.
If you fight fire with fire, all you get is burnt land anyway.
You know, if you think of the great power of nonviolence, I remember we, in high school, we watched, I think in high school, we watched these videos on the civil rights movement in America.
with Martin Luther King, and you just feel the power.
It's just an incredible, from a Buddhist perspective, it's an incredible rightness, greatness, greatness of mind and purpose and righteousness.
When you do the right thing, and you know you're doing the right thing,
The way they protested in a nonviolent way at the time was just incredibly powerful.
The way they stuck to not being violent and not fighting back when they were beaten and had cigarettes put out on them and pepper thrown in their faces and all these things.
Beaten, stabbed perhaps, killed even.
There's a great power in this.
Miserliness you conquer with charity, with giving.
I think
There's something here to be said about this general movement in the world today.
There is an incredible inequality.
We have billionaires, we soon maybe will have a trillionaire, trillionaires, individual people who hold so much wealth, it's incomprehensible.
And we have people even now, right now, who are so poor.
They don't have enough to eat.
They don't have any money.
They might be greatly in debt.
People who are slaves, basically.
And so we have a great amount of anger, frustration, and animosity
I would say on both sides, though it's not equal.
There's an incredible amount of righteous animosity from poor people.
Righteous in the sense that they're right.
They're right that it's not fair.
And yet, from a Buddhist perspective, you can't help but
consider the proper response from poor people, from rich people alike.
Because I imagine that there are many rich people who see it as an impossible task to bring everyone to the same level of wealth or even to a moderate level of wealth because there is so much greed in the world.
In Thailand, there's a story of the previous king.
He realized, something we were taught in university many years ago, the true way to bring about a greater equality, it's not just by giving people money, it's by giving people land.
He understood that.
And I think he was right.
I mean, this is a bit of a tangent, but bear with me.
The lesson is absolutely there.
So he decided to give them land.
Give them, give people.
He made an offer to farmers.
Maybe he bought up some land, I don't know, or he had some royal land.
He said, look, every farmer will get a portion of land.
There's a story I heard.
They had this program, gave land away to all these poor people, thinking that if people have land, they will be able at the very least to live, to sustain themselves, to have a livelihood, to have some kind of farm or pasture or so on, some way of making a living.
And apparently,
The most, if not all of them, turned around and sold the land back to the rich people for money.
It may be not quite a perfect story, but it is an example of how difficult it is.
And what I mean by telling that story, what I mean to point to,
is attitudes.
That it's great to say that there is inequality in the world.
It's absolutely true.
And we'll get to the truth because truth is also very important.
Telling the truth, declaring the truth.
But if our state of mind is one of greed,
You know, it's in a way quite self-serving for a poor person, potentially, to rail against the inequality in the world.
And if in their mind they're doing so with a sense that, hey, by doing this I might convince people to give me things, no?
It's not a wholesome state of mind.
I mean, I'm sorry to say,
That as much as I agree and we agree with the plight of the poor and the inequality and the injustice of inequality and so on, there's something wrong with your point of view.
You're never going to be happy just because people give you things.
if your whole reason for doing it is anger at not being treated fairly, greed for what other people have, no matter how much you might deserve it, you're not in a good way.
If you want to truly conquer, and this is what actually I think many people who have suffered poverty, what they know.
If you want to conquer miserliness, you do it with charity, you do it with kindness.
There was this book I read once, a story of this man who, telling his story about, it's a very famous book in America, I think The Road or something, I can't remember what it's called.
His journey as a bum, as a hobo.
which I thought was very much like being a monk, in some ways, not most, but in some ways.
And he talked about charity.
He said rich people don't understand charity.
He said you can go begging, because he would go and beg, and literally beg, and
often make up stories and lie and so on about his plight, but he said, poor people will share the last morsel they have with you.
Rich people will throw you out the door.
So many, it's quite true that poor people, and you'll often see this, someone who has understood and experienced poverty, and it's quite a moving sight when someone who has very little shares what they have.
It's quite powerful, moving.
If you've ever been moved by something like that, it's like how Sirima was moved by Uttara, moved by greatness.
That's the power of goodness.
That's the power of charity, true charity.
A rich person might give unthinkingly,
A poor person might give a small fortune unthinkingly, regretfully, begrudgingly.
But a poor person who gives maybe just a meal, you know, one day going without food, for them it means a lot.
They do it with a whole heart, even though it may be difficult for them to do.
There's a great power in that.
So I think absolutely there is something to be said here about the importance of purity in our intentions.
That no matter how much we might deserve or not deserve something,
Really, there's a sense of deserving in a very different way.
A person with an impure mind, it's hard to see that they deserve anything but suffering.
Whereas a person with a pure mind, they're the ones who deserve great things.
And finally, with truth,
One who speaks falsehoods So I mean It sounds like it's just saying Someone lies to you Don't lie back to them But it's actually I think deeper than that
Some people not only lie, but they promote falsehoods.
And I think this verse is, of course, highly applicable to us as meditators.
I suppose I'm talking about it on a relatively worldly side, but let's talk about as meditators in a second.
Because it's interesting from a worldly perspective.
We talk about rich people, politicians,
They not only lie, but they coerce.
They promote and they propagandize.
They intentionally mislead and promote views and ideas that are wrong.
And it angers people greatly.
This is where all this anger comes from.
And it leads people to stand up and protest.
Bring the truth to light.
Shine a light on the injustice.
A protest is a great way to help people see the error of their ways.
to realize that they are wrong, and to stand up to falsehood.
And so I think it's fair to say that there is room for things like protest.
But that's where the power is in the truth.
not in the anger.
You don't need the anger.
Why not?
Because you have power in truth.
And that's, I think, one of the biggest misunderstandings, the conflating anger with truth.
The point is not that people do things worth getting angry about.
The point is that people do things that are wrong, that are lies, lying to themselves,
lies they have been fed, or even sometimes just ignorance, delusion, misunderstanding.
And that is where action should be taken.
That is where the power of truth shines.
And that is what you see in protests,
That is what you see most especially in non-violent protest.
Because without the anger, the truth is fully on display.
It's not these people are angry, we should give them what they want.
It's these people are right, we should give them what they are due.
We should change what is wrong, you see.
You mislead, you misdirect, you diminish whatever it is you're trying to accomplish when you get angry.
So, as I said, this is a fairly worldly summation, but
How it ties into our practice I think is incredibly evident from the first where Uttara's parents were able to put aside their own attachments, their own needs, their own desires out of a religious conviction and appreciation of Sariputta.
to Sirima, to Uttara, who had an incredibly developed mind.
And finally, to the teachings in the verse, it all speaks to qualities of mind and how important the qualities of mind mentioned here are to develop.
The cultivation of metta is a big part of the fruit of mindfulness.
When we clear our minds, we're able to appreciate things as they are.
The ability of Uttara to see the state of mind that Sirima was in and the reality of her situation, of her situation as she was coming at her rather than being afraid, rather than being concerned for her own welfare.
Even Uttara's mother, who rather than be concerned with her own welfare,
thought only of the goodness of the act.
How do you conquer anger without anger?
Through clarity of mind, absolutely.
How do you approach someone who is angry at you without anger?
This is the power of mindfulness.
When you are able to see clearly, anger doesn't have to be a response.
How quick are we to respond to evil with evil, anger with anger, greed with greed.
You want it?
No, I want it.
I deserve it.
No, I deserve it.
Someone wants something from you, immediately we become greedy.
Even though before we have a chance to even think, all right, I can do without this, that's fine.
The immediate reaction is to become greedy.
Someone tries to manipulate us, to lie to us, we immediately become defensive, no?
The eye for the eye, it's a instinct in us.
It's a weakness we have.
And so this is the greatness, a greatness that comes from mental development, to be able to respond to anger without anger, to greed without greed, to delusion without delusion.
This is the fruit of our practice.
So that's the verse for tonight.
Thank you all for listening.