Hello and welcome back to our study of the Dhammapada.
Today we continue on with verse number 93, which reads as follows.
Yasasava parikhinah
ahare ca anisito sunyato animito ca vimokoyasa gojaro akase wa sakuntanang padang tasa duranayang which means
Yasasava parikhina means one whose asavas, asava is the taints, it's one way of talking about defilements.
So one whose mental defilements are completely cut off.
who isn't dependent on food, who is independent in regards to food.
Again, this is a verse about food.
Same as yesterday.
For such a person, or for who,
It actually isn't saying what I, it isn't exactly what I said.
It's yasa gocharo, so who's, so apart from being unattached to food, they also dwell in emptiness, the liberation through emptiness and the liberation through signlessness.
Such a person, just like a bird in the sky, it's hard to know their path.
So yesterday it was hard to know their gati, which means their destination.
But here it's padang, which means their path.
So a bird in the sky, you can't see where it's going.
There's no sign that it's going here or going there, or where it's gone, right?
You can't follow it.
You can't track a bird in the sky in the same way you can't track a person who is free, who has attained to freedom from suffering, attained liberation.
So that's the story.
Again, it's a very short story.
The story here is about Anuruddha.
It's an interesting story, one that I often think of.
The ideal for a Buddhist monk is to search for robes in the garbage.
Now you don't find too much cotton cloth in the garbage anymore.
It's probably actually pretty difficult in most places, even in Asia, to find cotton cloth.
or any kind of cloth that could be useful to make a robe that anyone's thrown out.
I mean, stained isn't a problem.
It's just to find a piece of cloth or enough pieces of cloth, because unless you're going to make a robe out of plastic bags, our garbage has changed to the point where it's hard.
But this was the thing.
So Anuruddha, his robes got worn out, and he was wandering around looking for cloth to make new robes.
And so he was going from one rubbish heap to another, wandering through the city of Veluvana, the city of Rajgaha.
And it turns out that there was an ex-wife of his.
His ex-wife decided that, or found out about this and made the determination in her mind to get him some robes.
Now you might ask, how did Anuruddha have an ex-wife?
If you don't know much about Anuruddha, you might not ask, but if you know anything about Anuruddha, you'll know he ordained when he was quite young.
All the other Sakyan, he's a relative of the Buddha, a cousin, I think, and all the other Sakyan princes were becoming monks, except for Anuruddha and his older brother, Mahanama.
And so Mahanama came to Anuruddha and said, look, everybody else is ordaining.
Every other family in our clan is sending somebody out to ordain.
So our family should have someone as a monk as well, just so we don't, you know, just to, for the glory or, you know, just for the goodness of our family.
Mahanama thought this was important.
And so he said, so either you or I should become a monk, and the other one will stay and become a rich householder and a businessman.
And he said, wow, you know, I mean, becoming a monk looks really difficult.
I think I'd prefer to stay, Anuruddha said, I think I'd prefer to stay as a lay person.
But Mahanama said, okay, well then, in that case, I'm going to have to teach you.
Because Anuruddha was really, if you remember the story about the nutty cakes,
which is a story for another time, I've already told that story.
But Anuruddha was incredibly naive.
He wasn't stupid, but he was totally naive in the purest sense, and he just had no experience, he'd never been
had any contact with hardship or difficulty.
And so when his mother said, there are no cakes, he was confused.
And he thought she was saying, all I've got is these nutty cakes.
Nutty meaning there aren't.
And so he said, well, bring me some nutty cakes.
And so now he thought, well, looking at how difficult it is to be a monk, it doesn't really look like something I'd be interested in.
And so Mahana sat him down and started explaining to him what he would have to do.
Well, you know, first you have to gather the farmers together and you have to plant the rice and then you have to grow the rice and take care of it and guard off pests and so on.
And water, make sure the irrigation is proper and then you have to mill the grain and then you have to...
store it and then you have to bring it to the market and sell it and he went on.
And Anuradha just said, stop, stop.
There's no way I'm doing it.
He was just horrified.
He said, there's no way I'm going to do that.
Absolutely, becoming a monk is far, far preferable.
He couldn't believe the sort of thing.
And so it's sort of a refreshing look, because most people are kind of resigned to the fact, well, of course you have to work a nine-to-five job, but it's nice to have sort of an outside opinion of someone who hasn't done it, and thinking, geez, why wouldn't I just become a monk?
Kind of refreshing, because people think, oh, how difficult it would be to be a monk.
And you don't have to work nine to five, that's for sure.
And you don't have to do all the things that... I don't have to put up with so many of the things that lay people put up with.
Of course, there are many other challenges, obviously.
But Anuruddha... Ah, yes, so the point being that he had no wife.
He was too young when he ordained.
He wasn't, I guess, too young, but he had not a wife, as far as I know.
But this was an ex-wife from three lives ago.
And I'm not sure how they know that, but it's been handed down as how it was.
So three lifetimes ago, he had a wife.
And she was reborn as a goddess, an angel, Jalini.
That's what it says.
And she wanted to offer him a robe because he needed the robe.
And she thought, well, if I give it to him, he's not going to take it because he's intent upon getting a discarded robe.
So she made this wonderful angelic robe.
and placed it underneath a refuse pile with just the corner sticking out.
And Anuruddha was coming along and he came up to this pile and he saw the corner and he pulled it out.
And he thought, wow, what a, what a, he said, this is indeed a most remarkable refuse heap.
And so he took the
I guess there were more than one.
He took the robes out, or the cloths out.
It was just cloth, actually.
They would start with cloth, and they would sew the robes themselves.
And so that's what he did.
He brought it back to the monastery, and all the other monks helped.
So they got together in a circle.
It says that everybody got involved with making him a robe.
Anuruddha was just so well-loved.
that they all got together and 500 monks with the Buddha as the head at the head and the 80 chief disciples came as well all for the purpose of
No, not all.
They didn't all get together, but they were all there.
And the Mahakasabha was at the foot of the robe, Sariputta was in the middle, and Ananda was at the head.
So these three powerhouse monks were
involved.
And yes, 500 monks along with the 80 great disciples got involved spinning out thread to sew with.
They actually had to take old robes, I guess, or take some kind of cotton resources to make thread out of.
And the Buddha threaded the needle.
Mahamoggalana went and got supplies for them because he had magical powers.
Anyway, this is the story.
It was a big to-do.
Everyone got involved with making this set of robes up for Anuruddha, which is an incredible image of this harmony and cooperation with all these enlightened beings.
And the ex-wife angel went off into the city and got everyone to bring food.
I was thinking, oh, there's all these monks, and they have to stay together, and they have to be busy making the robes.
So it would be good if everyone were to come.
So she went in disguised as a human being and got everyone to bring alms to the monastery.
But the point of this story and how it relates to our verse is that a problem arose in that there was too much food, which is often what happens with these big celebrations, even in modern times.
People get so excited that they bring lots and lots of food and they really want to do good deeds.
And so it's a great thing.
But then what inevitably happens is someone complains.
And that's what happened here.
turns out there was a great heap of food remaining over after everybody had eaten.
There was just, even with 500 monks and 580 monks, just too much food, because everyone was so keen to help, hearing that this, what a great opportunity to help this auspicious occasion.
I mean, maybe it doesn't sound that auspicious, but it's a big deal when a monk gets a new robe and really your clothing and enlightened being and so on, you know.
Not just any monk.
It's Anuruddha.
He was one of the 80 great disciples of the Buddha.
And so there was all this food that was just rotten.
It just went bad.
And some monks got offended.
And they...
looked at it and they thought, you know, this must be Anuruddha's doing.
And they say he must have gone to his kinsmen and told them, hey, bring some food, bring so much food for everyone.
And they said, you know, clearly he didn't think beforehand and he wasted all this food and kind of took advantage of people's goodwill.
It's amazing how people, it's the same as yesterday, they get so involved with other people's affairs and want to criticize and attack them.
And then, so the teacher found out about it and he called them over and asked them, what are you guys talking about?
And they told him and he said, look, do you have any evidence that Anuruddha did it?
And they said, yes.
They actually said, yes, we do.
He said, do you not think that it was brought?
He said, do you really think that Anuruddha ordered this?
And they said, yes, of course we think that.
And the Buddha scolded them and said, there's no way Anuruddha could do that.
There's no way Anuruddha would be so attached.
And I guess the implication is that he has some attachment to food.
So he was greedy.
He wanted special food for all the monks or he wanted special food for himself.
And he didn't understand what was enough.
He didn't know what was enough food.
And his greed overtook him, obviously, because there's no way he could have miscalculated.
He must have just gotten so greedy that he wanted extra food.
But the truth is he had nothing to do with it.
It was the lay people who were just overzealous, and this angel who went out of her way.
He didn't even ask, of course, this angel to go and tell people to bring alms.
Probably would have had everyone go out and get alms themselves.
But when the food came, so they ate what they could, and the rest, well, you can't blame them.
They didn't ask for it.
So then the Buddha taught this verse.
He said it couldn't have been.
Anuruddha would never have thought such a thing.
He had no such greed, no such attachment.
And the implication is that he has rid himself of the asavas.
He is independent in regards to food.
He dwells in selflessness and signlessness.
And as a result, and this is an interesting, it's interesting how it relates here because it says which means his track.
And here it's interesting because this could refer to his state of mind.
So these people are trying to think, you know, Anuruddha was like this, Anuruddha is thinking this.
This is what Anuruddha is like.
And he said, you guys have no clue.
We are not able to tell Anuruddha's train of thought.
This is the padang.
Padang means his track.
Just as you couldn't, if you looked at a bird, if you looked at the sky where a bird had traveled, you wouldn't see which way the bird went.
In the same way, you don't know which way Anuruddha is going in his mind.
You can't know Anuruddha's mind.
It's very difficult.
And you people who are set upon criticism, how could you know?
He doesn't say that because he's not being critical of them.
He's just chastising them and saying, how could you say that about my son?
The Buddha would use the word my son for monks who were enlightened monks because it wasn't dependent on how long they'd been a monk or so on.
He considered that anyone who became enlightened was his son through his teaching.
If they became enlightened, he would call them his son.
So we call that Mamaputta.
Mamaputta, my son.
So the verse is quite similar to yesterday.
There's not that much more to talk about.
We've talked about food, not being dependent on food, which is in the sense of being able to even go without it.
If no food comes, you sometimes won't eat, and that happens.
It may have been they would just decide, well, we're too busy, we won't even go and get food.
So today we'll just all go without food.
They might even do that.
They might not.
But as it often happens, there's no need because lay people are in touch with the monks and when they find out and everybody wants to get involved, they think, oh, well, we'll bring food to the monastery.
We've got, we can do that.
We can support in that way.
And they would do that.
But we have the first part that's a little bit different, right?
I guess it's not that much different.
What was the first one?
It was... who has no hoarding.
So yeah, it's quite different.
This one is talking about one who has rid oneself of the
Asawa is an interesting word.
It has to do with the sawana stream.
So asawa is like the outpourings.
Our mind is contained, but it leaks.
So asawa could be translated as the leaks.
How our mind leaks out.
It leaks out because it's not contained.
Our mind is not stable.
calm so it's like there's an overflowing there's a rippling of waves and and as there's a outpouring this is it's kind of a symbolic way or a metaphoric way of talking about the defilements
or it's an idiomatic usage of the word.
Asava, used by the Buddha, refers to, you know, the meaning is that, as I said, that defilements are an outflowing.
And when you cut those off, your mind is contained.
That's the implication.
So it means defilements.
And by defilements, of course, we mean anything based on greed, based on anger, or based on delusions.
So again, it's similar to last week.
I'm not sure too much to say.
This is obviously the sort of thing that, except that I've realized that the grammar wasn't exact what I was saying yesterday, how I thought that one who doesn't rely upon food is as a result
set in the two kinds of liberation.
It's more like not only do you have to be free from, or in addition to being free from reliance or dependence on food, such a person who on top of that is also, or maybe you could say in line with that, is also dedicated to the two kinds of liberation.
Liberation through
emptiness and liberation through signlessness, which means they see non-self.
When they see non-self, that adds to the likelihood that they're not going to cling to food, the idea that I want to feed my body or worry about or concern about the body.
When they see impermanence, they will not be worried about or concerned about change.
Not getting food won't bother them.
The pain or the hunger of going without food isn't a deal because they're comfortable with experience as it is.
Change doesn't bother them.
They're not dependent on one condition.
So in our meditation we're going for a lot of these things.
Someone asked me today about how you give up your dependence on food and really it's like all other questions, the answer is still meditation.
When you understand, rather than trying to control, rather than trying to force yourself or feel guilty about or get angry at yourself when you want to eat junk food or when you want to eat too much or that kind of thing,
you have to change to study it if it's wrong well then i should know it's wrong if i really knew that it was wrong then i wouldn't for any reason indulge in it so we have to study it means that we don't know enough yet we're not clear in our minds enough so we still like and want when you study then you see sunyata and you see animita sunyata means it's not it's void of any substance it's not really
a substantial happiness.
Animitta means it's not a stable happiness.
It can change without sign, without signal or warning.
When you see these things, then you give up your attachment.
You'll see, well, really it is bad, useless, harmful.
And then you stop, just naturally.
So that's the Dhammapada for today.
I think we'll stop there.
Thank you for tuning in.
Keep practicing and be well.