The Power of the Precepts

A talk given at the Men’s National Order Weekend, Padmaloka, November 1997

I was asked to give a practical talk on our practice of the Precepts in the Triratna Order and how we might improve it. The first question that occurred to me was: am I in any position to assess our practice of the Precepts in the Order? And if I am to give practical suggestions on how to improve it, what is practical? What might be practical for one person might be impractical for another. We do recognise the principle of spiritual hierarchy so what might be practical for one Order member might not be practical for another, who has perhaps just been ordained. So there are some problems with this brief to give a practical talk on our practice of the Precepts in the Order and how we might improve it.

The theme of this weekend arose out of the talk that Bhante Sangharakshita gave on the Order Convention. In the course of that talk he said: “I sometimes get the impression that not all Order members are as scrupulous, shall we say, about the observance of the ten Precepts as they might be.” Rather than trying to assess for myself what the state of our practice of the Precepts is I am just going to accept Bhante’s comment as an accurate assessment of where the Order is at in terms of the observance of the Precepts, i.e. not sufficiently scrupulous.

To give a practical talk on how we could improve our practice of the Precepts means to give a practical talk on how we could be more scrupulous in our practice of the Precepts. So what does it mean to be scrupulous? According to a dictionary I consulted scrupulous means the same as punctilious, which means of course giving attention to detail. So this is the meaning I am going to concentrate on in the talk. I am going to attempt to make a few practical suggestions about how we could give more attention to detail in our ethical lives. How we could be more punctilious in our observance of the ten Precepts.

I am going to do this first of all by looking at some things which I think hinder us, which are obstacles to our ethical practice. And then I am going to make some suggestions about the individual Precepts. Whether my suggestions are practical or not I will leave up to you to decide.

What prevents us from being scrupulous in our observance of the Precepts? I would like to suggest there are three things in particular that hold us back from giving more attention to detail in our ethical lives: firstly, God, secondly, the comfort culture, and thirdly, psychological problems. Obviously these three are intimately connected with each other, but I am going to consider them separately just to see if we can learn anything from a closer look.

God

Now Order members don’t believe in God as far as I am aware. However, the concept of an all-powerful omniscient deity who has to be obeyed under threat of terrible punishment is a concept that has gripped and shaped our collective psyche for many generations. And it is a concept that still carries enormous power in the world around us and has affected many if not all of us, and affected us deeply. As Buddhists we have to free ourselves from the powerful grip of this God concept. What this often means is blasphemy and rebellion against authority. To be free to live a truly spiritual life we have to stop being the obedient children of this tyrannical father God. So we learn disobedience. Just, as in the same way adolescents rebel against their parents in their bid for the freedom of adulthood, so, disobedience to God and to the decrees of God is the adolescent stage of the spiritual life. And as such it is an important and essential stage of the spiritual life.

Now it is easy to fool ourselves that we are free from the fear of God and free from the grip of this God concept when in fact we may still be simply in the stage of adolescent rebellion against it. And when we are in this stage of rebellion we may see the power of the tyrant, as it were, all about us. We have antennae that read everything in terms of authority or freedom. And anything that smacks of authority is to be rejected. We may be like the adolescent who rejects everything that is to do with the past, maybe rejects all art and music or literature of past generations, because it is associated with the past, and in that way throwing out the baby of excellence, as it were, with the bathwater of restrictions.

When it comes to this area of ethics we definitely have no time for commandments. That is hardly surprising. And we are definitely in favour of ethical principles. But there is a huge ground between commandments on the one hand, and ethical principles on the other. And this ground is filled with things like vows, resolutions, rules, personal precepts and confession. And in this middle ground between commandments and principles we can sometimes make the mistake of associating these rules or personal precepts or resolutions or confessions with authority. And in our eagerness to reject authority we depotentiate our practice of the Precepts.

To be scrupulous, to be punctilious, in our practice of the Precepts might mean placing restrictions on ourselves. It might mean a certain amount of condemnation even, or at least passing an unfavourable judgement on our actions. But restriction, judgement, are authoritarian and we can’t have that! Sometimes we will shy away from a scrupulous detailed observance of the Precepts and stay in the safer ground of broad principles. And that safer ground of broad principles can allow us a huge freedom to rationalise and even be complacent. I think many of us may have difficulties with authority or anything that smacks of authority, difficulties which come out of our struggle to free ourselves of the tyranny of a cranky deity. But these difficulties can also hinder us in our punctilious, and scrupulous, practice of the Precepts.

I don’t have any quick answer to this. If someone has difficulty with authority, is frequently upset about what some authority is telling them to do, even some authority perhaps in the Order, then I would say they need to begin by acknowledging to themselves that they are probably still in this phase of rebellion and consider, with the help of their friends, how they are going to move on to the stage of a more genuine freedom and individuality. To be in a sort of unthinking rebellion against authority is to be in the grip of authority as much as being in unthinking conformity.

The Comfort Culture

In many ways the comfort culture may be the mundane world’s rebellion against the restrictive God concept. The comfort culture is the culture of consumerism, of shop 'til you drop, the culture of image, designer happiness, accumulation, hype and excitement. And the comfort culture is what we are surrounded by–it is the strongest, most prevalent idea in the word around us. It is so pervasive that it is hardly noticeable; it is hardly noticeable as a phenomenon, it is just the way things are. The comfort culture sells images of satisfaction. And the more we expose ourselves to it the more affected we become by these images of satisfaction. And the more we are affected by the images of satisfaction that are purveyed by the comfort culture the more our behaviour becomes determined by them. We pursue the images of satisfaction and we pursue those images by consuming the objects associated with those images: the objects are cars, computers, hifi, mobile phones, the latest, the best, the biggest, the fastest, the most horsepower, the most RAM, all that. And in this way we get into the excitement of the comfort culture which can, it seems, satisfy every desire and create a hundred more. So excitement is satisfaction in that world. To be alive is to be excited by something. To want something and to buy and consume is satisfaction. And this is the world we live in, this is the world that tries to embrace us in its seductive arms all the time. And we fall for it, we love it.

Our love for these images of satisfaction can become a real obstacle to a scrupulous observance of the Precepts because our greed can so quickly and so easily be rationalised into a need. We don’t just want the latest or the biggest or the best computer or smartphone, for instance, we need it. It is faster and of course it will save time for more Dharmic things, won’t it? Kulananda talks about that particular example in his book Western Buddhism, he calls it techno-lust. I am sure you can think of your own examples. There is a need for particular kinds of clothing, there is a need for special haircuts, or whatever.

In the face of the comfort culture, it might be a good idea for us to value boredom more. Because the comfort culture is all to do with excitement, to be alive is to be excited as it were, it might do for us to value boredom and in that way wean ourselves off this sort of excitement that is valued around us.

Psychological Problems

In my time involved in the Triratna Community I would say there is one main psychological difficulty which I have observed as affecting most strongly people’s ability to practise anything–to practise ethics, meditation or friendship–and that difficulty is simply self-hatred, self-hatred in all its forms and manifestations. I am constantly in contact with newcomers, regulars, Mitras, Mitras who have asked for ordination, and Order members, and I have observed that this self-hatred in one form or another is what hinders most people on the spiritual path. And I have seen this among Order members, even quite senior Order members.

In terms of ethical practice, self-hatred seems to badly affect anyone’s ability to give, to communicate, and makes it difficult to practice any of the Precepts. It seems to me that self-metta is absolutely fundamental to the practice of the Precepts, especially at the level of effective Going for Refuge. Because I think to Go for Refuge effectively requires that the Precepts are more than just a discipline. We need to practise the Precepts from the heart. And that means having a heart that is warmed by metta. I think we need to take very seriously the development of metta. Do we experience self-metta? If not, what are we doing about it? What is self-metta anyway? Sometimes I have noticed that people can have a an unrealistic notion about metta as if it were some sort of powerful peak experience that could only be sustained for a short time. Or alternatively, some people have a sort of overly sentimental idea of metta as some sort of all-embracing mother love that doesn’t discriminate, isn’t critical. I would say that self-metta is a realistic self-appraisal in a spirit of good will and in a context of development. With an experience of self-metta we can be critical of ourselves without undermining ourselves, we can be proud of our achievements without being big headed. All that is required is a realistic self-appraisal in a spirit of good will. And I think without that we can remain for a long time on a sort of roller-coaster of feelings of inferiority, superiority, equality, ill will, intoxication, passivity, and so on. A lack of self-metta is definitely an obstacle to practising the Precepts and so we should give serious attention to the development of metta if we want to be more scrupulous in our observance of the ten Precepts.

Motivation

So far I have just mentioned a few things which I think are hindrances to ethical practice. So what can we do? I think, as with so many things, if we are to really change anything we need to be motivated. If our heart is not in it there will be little change. As Bhante Sangharakshita puts it: “the central problem of the spiritual life is finding emotional equivalents for our intellectual understanding”. Assuming that we have an intellectual understanding that we need to be more scrupulous in our observance of the Precepts, what then is the emotional equivalent of that understanding? I would say that we need to be able to relate the detailed practice of the Precepts to our own happiness firstly, and secondly to the compassionate work of the Order.

If we can see how we personally benefit from a scrupulous practice of the Precepts, how we attain happiness through ethical thoroughness, then we will be motivated, our heart will be in it and we may even take action to change something. If we cannot see how we can benefit from a more scrupulous observance of the Precepts then we will have little motivation to extend ourselves in that area. And we probably won’t change anything. We need to have a clear heartfelt sense of where our own benefit lies if we are to make the changes that a more scrupulous observance of the Precepts would demand.

And we also need to be able to make a definite, direct connection between the compassionate work of the Order and a more scrupulous ethical practice. The compassionate work of the Order involves making the Dharma available to all who wish to respond to it. And to this end we establish Centres, communities, businesses and we teach meditation and Buddhism.

Sometimes we see the work of the Order as teaching the Dharma, spreading the Dharma. I would like to make a distinction between teaching the Dharma and teaching about Buddhism. I think there is a definite place for teaching about Buddhism, but essentially the compassionate work of the Order is to teach the Dharma. And the difference between the two is that you can teach about Buddhism without the need to exemplify it, but you have to exemplify it in order to teach the Dharma. The best way to teach the Dharma is to exemplify it. Sometimes we may have to talk about Enlightenment or shunyata or whatever and we can only repeat what Buddhist tradition or Bhante have to say, but our most effective Dharma teaching I think is not what we say but what we do, how we live our lives. I think Dharma teaching without exemplification can have a very hollow sound.

It is in the small things of our lives, the details of how we live our lives–what we read, how we conduct our relationships, what our attitude is to the washing-up, or whatever–that others can see the Dharma manifesting. And that is why a scrupulous observance of the Precepts is essential to the compassionate work of the Order. If we are not scrupulous in this area then our ability to spread the Dharma is compromised and by association the ability of the Order to spread the Dharma is weakened. Our love of the Dharma and our desire to introduce others to it can be a strong motivation to a more detailed, a more punctilious, practice of the Precepts. To be strongly motivated, to find this emotional equivalent to our intellectual understanding, we need to be able to relate the observance of the Precepts to our personal Myth, as it were, and to the Myth of the Order.

The First Precept

I spoke about metta earlier, specifically self-metta. And I think the most practical thing that any of us can do in relation to the first Precept is to ensure that our predominant attitude towards ourselves is one of metta. And to do this we need to take practical steps, apart from the obvious one of doing the metta bhavana practice. For instance, we need to be willing to take responsibility for our own mental states. Perhaps I shouldn’t be saying this to a gathering of Order members, however I have frequently encountered Order members who blame their negative mental states on other people or on the world about them. For instance, sometimes Order members experience loneliness and isolation–and they don’t seem to accept that it is their own responsibility to do something about that. To continue to inhabit that sort of mental state I think is a fairly gross form of selfishness, and to continue for years I think is quite irresponsible. Similarly I think with fear and anger and so on. We need to be responsible and to act responsibly with regard to our own mental states. And of course we need to take responsibility for ensuring our own relative happiness and positivity.

I think another area to look at in relation to the first Precept is the area of disputes, especially disputes or falling out between Order members. I think we can expect Order members to disagree, we can expect Order members even to strongly disagree, we can expect Order members to upset each other, we can expect Order members to take offence and to fall out. We can expect all of that because most Order members are still imprisoned, as it were, by egotism to a fairly strong degree. However, even though we can expect Order members to have arguments and rows and to fall out I think we can also expect, and indeed I think we must expect, Order members to quite quickly come to the point of forgiveness and apology. Because forgiveness is essential to the health and long life of the Order. And forgiveness also should definitely not be dependant on apology. If we are in a state of mind where we feel unforgiving towards another Order member, or indeed towards anyone, we need to do all we can to get to the point of being able to forgive. We must forgive, we should forgive, we have to forgive. The Order is more important than our pride or our feelings of hurt. And the unity of the Order is more important than our rows or our arguments or even our opinions.

As a practical suggestion I would suggest that we should not be out of harmony with another Order member for more than three months. I think three months is too long but making allowances for weakness of character let’s say three months. After three months you should be ready to forgive. If you are not then you need to enlist the help of your Chapter and your spiritual friends just to get you to the point of forgiveness. Perhaps also reading or studying the Bodhicaryavatara, which has a lot to say about forgiveness and is quite uncompromising about it.

In Sukhavati community where I live we do a ritual of a forgiveness ceremony whenever someone leaves the community. And I suggest that every Chapter could do a ritual forgiveness ceremony, maybe annually, or even every six months. In our ceremony, in the context of a metta bhavana, or after a metta bhavana, one person stands up and goes to each other person in turn and says, ‘I forgive you for any harm you may have caused me and I ask you to forgive me for any harm I may have caused you’. And the other person says, ‘I forgive you’. So it is quite simple. But it is also quite a strong ritual; it does have an effect. In a Chapter each person could take a turn to stand up and go around the circle asking and offering forgiveness. This can, as I said, be a strong ritual and I think has a very beneficial effect.

One final suggestion with regard to the first Precept. We see vegetarianism as an extension of the principle of the first Precept, non-harmimg. The reason we don’t eat sausages and so on is because we would consider that as giving support to an industry that harms living beings. And vegans apply that to dairy products also. Now I think the same principle applies to the consumption of alcohol. If we drink alcohol we are giving support to an industry that causes a lot of harm, a lot of pain, a lot of suffering, to living beings. I think alcohol tends to cause most harm to human beings, who are higher up on the hierarchy of consciousness. It could therefore be argued that alcohol, and the alcohol industry, cause greater harm than the meat industry, and that drinking alcohol is therefore a greater contradiction to the principle of the first Precept, the principle of loving kindness, even than the consumption of meat. So I would say that if we seriously want to be more scrupulous in our observance of the Precepts we should not drink alcohol at all. (I think there are other arguments against alcohol as well, to do with land usage and so on, which I won’t go into now.)

The Second Precept

The second Precept is about our relationship to possessions and the whole notion of ownership. Bhante has made it quite clear that the ideal for the Order is common ownership. He has also said that a step on the way to common ownership and to loosening our attachment to possessions is to share the use of what we own. I think some people do try to move towards this ideal of common ownership, although by its nature it is not realisable unless more and more of us take it seriously.

However, I don’t want to talk about how we own things but rather about what we own. I think that a simple lifestyle in terms of fewness of possessions is an implication of the second Precept. I said earlier that we are constantly being seduced and tempted by the comfort culture around us. We are being encouraged and induced into accumulating things, our greed is encouraged, we are told over and over again that we need more, we need more of everything, we need bigger, better, faster things. Without them our lives can only be dull, boring, unsatisfying. Whereas with more things, more possessions, more devices, more toys, we will have an exciting, vibrant, fulfilling life. Now the message of the Dharma, as I understand it, is the opposite of this: it leads to frugality.

I think we need to be more scrupulous about what we do with our money if we wish to be more scrupulous in our observance of the second Precept. The accumulation of possessions is ungenerous. We need to identify what our needs are and try to give up our greeds as it were, our greedy addictions. All Order members could take the very practical step of giving up cigarettes, alcohol and leisure drugs. I think the consumption of these things just sullies the purity of your own mind and body and it also besmirches the purity of the Order.

We need to be careful not to succumb to the advertised reality around us, which in many ways is anathema to the Dharma. We need to question ourselves whenever we spend money. I think even when we contemplate spending, say, more than £10 or £20 we should question ourselves. We need to gradually adopt the more revolutionary lifestyle of few possessions, of non-accumulation and of sharing. And our surplus should be spent in such a way as to promote the message of the Dharma and specifically the message of Bhante Sangharakshita.

These are all very practical suggestions which would involve us in a more scrupulous, a more detailed, attention to large areas of our lives. And just to add to this, I would expect that those who take the Anagarika vow would lead the way in this and exemplify the simple life quite fully.

The Third Precept

I just want to make one practical suggestion in relation to the third Precept, and that is with regard to the beginning and ending of sexual relationships. I think there should be a sort of etiquette or protocol in the Order and in the movement with regard to starting and finishing sexual relationships. Firstly, I think any Order member whose sexual relationship finishes should leave a period of say six months or so before starting another one. Secondly, when you are about to start a new sexual relationship I think you should find out who the person was involved with before. If it was someone in the Triratna Community go and talk to them, let them know what is happening, just as a matter of courtesy even. Thirdly, allow a period of time to get to know somebody before getting involved in a sexual relationship.

I spoke to Bhante about this last year and he said that he thought people were too quick to start having sex rather than getting to know each other first. He was advocating that they get to know each other first, which I think is advocating a sort of period of courtship. And fourthly, before getting involved in a new relationship I think it is a good idea to consult with your friends and Chapter members as to whether they think this particular person is suitable for you and whether you should be getting involved in a relationship at this particular time.

The Speech Precepts

Moving on to the speech Precepts. The Buddha spoke of five kinds of Right Speech: seasonable speech, kindly speech, meaningful speech, harmonising speech and truthful speech.

First of all, I want to recommend seasonable speech. This could be seen as an aspect of kindly or harmonising speech. Seasonable speech means of course speaking in the right season or at the right time. So it is appropriate speech. And to speak in this way requires awareness of others. Often when we speak, what is happening is simply the sound of our own selfishness. It is difficult to pinpoint or give examples of seasonable speech because by definition it applies to particular persons, places, times and so on. But perhaps an example that most Order members are familiar with is that of critical feedback after a talk. If someone gives a talk and you feel they have made mistakes or they have done a really bad job or they could improve a bit here and there, it would of course be good to let them know in time. I think it is necessary though to be sensitive to people, especially if someone is perhaps inexperienced or a bit nervous about speaking. I think it would be unnecessary and insensitive to criticise someone’s talk immediately after they have finished speaking. You can always wait. I think it would show a lack of empathy or even an over-obsession with our own opinions. I have come across examples of fairly gross insensitivity in this area which is why I mention it.

But seasonable speech applies all the time. And as I said, it is a question of maintaining awareness of others so that we can be appropriate. Giving feedback to Mitras is another area where seasonable speech is extremely important. It is not necessary, it is not even helpful, to tell Mitras everything we think about them right now. And especially not if we don’t have a friendship with them.

With regard to truthful speech I just want to mention one area and that is money. I have noticed that some people, and this includes Order members, seem to exaggerate quite a lot with regard to money. For instance, I have heard people say, ‘I have no money’, when it was obviously not true. I have heard people say they couldn’t afford something such as going on an Order Weekend or a retreat when what they actually meant was that they want to spend their money on other things. I know money and our relationship to money is a very complex thing, but I think the least we could do is to be factually accurate when we communicate with each other about money. So let’s say, ‘I have £20, £50’, or whatever, rather than, ‘I have no money’, unless we actually mean that we have no money.

With regard to harsh speech I want to follow Bhante, I want to mention swearing. Bhante does this in the Ten Pillars of Buddhism. There are still Order members who swear. Why is this? One reason that sometimes is given is that it is part of someone’s conditioning, usually working-class conditioning, it is just a natural way to speak. Another reason given is that it is the way to express strong emotion, strong feeling.

As regards working-class conditioning I think it is pretty pathetic for any Order member to continue to identify themselves in those terms. I myself come from a background which could be described as working-class, or at least aspiring in that direction, where swearing was very common for me. Certainly as an adolescent I would have been swearing constantly and later in my twenties, I mixed with Irish building workers in the pubs of Camden Town and Cricklewood and it was unlikely for a sentence to pass without a swear word, or actually several swear words. I think adolescent swearing, like adolescent smoking or adolescent drinking, is an understandable sort of bravado or machismo by which young boys try to push themselves through to manhood. The swearing of building workers and others is often just an extension of adolescent bravado. Because often these men are people who haven’t quite grown up, whose confidence needs to be constantly bolstered up by swearing, by drinking, by smoking. I think I grew up a bit and grew out of the need for swearing (and, as it happens, cigarettes and alcohol). But do Order members still need to exhibit this sort of swaggering bravado of adolescence by swearing? Is it a rebellion against some sort of imagined authority? Or is it in the interests of cultural authenticity? I think there is not much that is authentic about swearing actually. In my opinion it is always a sort of facade for something else, for lack of confidence or even for verbal insufficiency let’s say.

The argument that swearing expresses strong feeling doesn’t really wash with me either. It is more likely to be the opposite I think, it can be used to give the impression that strong feeling is being expressed. It is like people using words like ‘fantastic’ or ‘brilliant’ or ‘magnificent’; if they use these words a lot after a while you realise that they are not expressing strong feeling, what they are doing is desperately trying to experience some feeling. The words are signalling what they would like to feel rather than what they actually do feel. I think, similarly, swearing indicates a desire to feel strongly but doesn’t necessarily indicate strong feeling. It is more like an actor’s technique. Anyway, my practical suggestion is that we just drop it. We don’t need to swear in the Order, it is unnecessary and it is uncouth.

I don’t have any specific suggestions to make about the Precept of meaningful speech. I just note in passing that our Order, our movement, is multicultural and it is becoming more and more so all the time. Just to mention one thing: humour is often very culture specific. So we need to be aware that what we find funny may not be funny to other people. And it is not due to some terrible deficiency on their part necessarily, it might be due to some deficiency on our part that we make such parochial jokes.

I think harmonising speech is probably the most effective use we can put our tongues to. The Sangha thrives on harmonising speech and we should practise it as often as we can, both in speech and in writing. Especially we should take every opportunity to pass on any compliments or any praise that we have heard about someone else.

I think we should not say anything about another Order member that we would not be willing to say to them, unless there is an extremely good reason. Backbiting, slander and rumour-mongering still sometimes occur in the Order. And this is very disruptive to the spirit of the Order. The spirit of the Order is a spirit of trust and generosity. If we have a criticism of a fellow Order member we should talk to them about it, not tell others about it, and certainly not publish it in Shabda. For one thing I think our perceptions may not always be entirely objective. If another Order member has been unskilful and has been unkind to us, what would be the reason for telling everybody, for publishing it widely? Is it to damage their reputation? Is it to get revenge? The principles of the Dharma demand that we forgive. The principles of the Dharma demand that we counter unkindness and unskilfulness with metta and skilfulness. There is no excuse for slander or backbiting. I think they are particularly damaging to the trust that the Order depends on.

What we say makes a difference, and we want it to make a positive difference rather than an undermining or a disruptive difference. We need to be quite punctilious about our speech. The timing, the tone, the appropriateness to our listeners, and our motivations, all need to come under scrutiny. We all have a way to go. Perhaps the first step is just taking seriously the fact that our words do have an effect.

The Mind Precepts

I don’t know if there is much of a practical nature that I can say about the mind Precepts. With the Precept on tranquillity I would simply like to suggest that we acknowledge our tendency to distraction and grasping and consider what ways we can refine our distractions, or focus our grasping on something more worthwhile. If we are distracted by computers or smartphones, to use that example again and we crave all the latest updates of software, hardware and so on, perhaps we could shift our interest slightly, shift our interest perhaps to more philosophical questions like the Dharmic implications of information technology for instance, or how the soul of humanity is coping with the impact of scientific progress. We could try to actually think creatively from a Dharmic perspective about what we are involved in rather than just being swine-like consumers of whatever is served up by international corporations to us. And we could refine our sexual cravings by pursuit of beauty–this is commonly spoken about in the Order–through the arts, especially through attempting creative activity ourselves, creative writing, painting, pottery, sculpture, or whatever. The basic point is to attempt to refine our distractions as a way to become less distracted and more creative.

The ninth Precept asks us to change hatred into compassion. I would just like to use it as an opportunity to reiterate the importance of forgiveness. In the Sangha we have to forgive each other, there is no alternative. If you are harbouring any grudges or nursing any feelings of resentment or feeling offended you are not contributing to the welfare of the Sangha. The unity of the Sangha is of supreme importance, it is through the Sangha that the Dharma can be effectively communicated, both verbally and by exemplification, and it is through the Sangha that we can gain insight into the reality of transcendent consciousness. Now forgiveness is not easy, we need to work at making it a habit. If we feel offended and find ourselves in mental states of ill will or resentment the creative way forward is to forgive. Until we forgive we can’t really engage in any constructive dialogue, even if the person who offended us was unskilful or even in the wrong. If we are someone who frequently finds ourselves annoyed, irritated, angry, we need to see that that is our problem. If we frequently get hot under the collar about something or other then we need to take a good look under our collar. Our anger and ill will is our problem, it is not some one else’s, and in the Sangha forgiveness is our only constructive creative course of action.

The tenth Precept: transforming ignorance into wisdom, or refraining from wrong views. Now Bhante has actually given some quite practical and useful advice in relation to this precept in the Ten Pillars of Buddhism so I won’t repeat that. I just want to mention a few things about how we view ourselves. Sometimes I think people get caught in a particular view of themselves because of the language they use. The language they use and the mental models they have can be too static, not as dynamic as a Dharmic view needs to be. For instance, when we talk about our unconscious we can have a static view of an actually existing unconscious, a bit like a box with lots of things locked inside. Or we can have a static view of the past, seeing our memories in terms that are too concrete. Or we can have a static view of ‘my ego’, ‘my anger’, ‘my greed’. Through over familiarity with the language these things can take on the status of existing entities as it were. But memories are dynamic, the past didn’t just happen to us, we happened to the past as well. And we continue to affect the past, just as past events may continue to affect us. What we are unconscious of is always changing, we move in and out of consciousness. Similarly, our responses of anger or greed or generosity or whatever, are very fluid, very complex. I think we could even try to view ourselves in dynamic terms and to speak of ourselves as a process, as a continuum of responses, skilful, unskilful, creative, reactive. We are always changing, always in process, and we need to recognise this in the language we use to describe our experience and in the models we use to think about ourselves.

Language is metaphor, and metaphor has the power to shape the world. The word, as it were, is always made flesh and therefore we need to use the words appropriate to the ideas that we want to see taking flesh in the world. A practical way to work at changing wrong views is to work at changing the way we talk about our experience, so we use a dynamic language, a language of process. Let us speak in terms of how we are responding to events and people, and in terms of choosing our responses, rather than in terms of our unconscious or our ego or our unfortunate past, or whatever. We can use language and models of thinking that liberate us, liberate us to change, or we could use models and language that confine us. The Buddhist view of the universe is dynamic: conditioned co-production is a dynamic ever-changing model, unlike for instance the theistic model with its strangely fixed elements. Our world and its language and its metaphors has been heavily influenced by a theistic world view and we need to consciously work against that to change our view of ourselves and to change ourselves. My practical suggestion for the tenth Precept is that we look closely at the words we use to talk about our experience and the models we use to think about ourselves.

Conclusion

I said earlier on that we will only take action to become more scrupulous in our observance of the ten Precepts if we feel motivated, if we find emotional equivalents for our intellectual understanding. Now, as Order members, most of us are motivated by the aspiration to Go for Refuge, to deepen and strengthen the effect on us of our Going for Refuge to the Buddha, Dharma and Sangha. According to Bhante: “The relation between one’s Going for Refuge and one’s observance of the Precepts is an organic one, observance of the Precepts being as much an expression of Going for Refuge as the flower is an expression of the seed or his oeuvre an expression of the writer or artist. ... Going for Refuge, or commitment to the Three Jewels, is one’s life-blood as a Buddhist. Observance of the Precepts represents the circulation of that blood through every fibre of one’s being. By its very nature blood must circulate. If it does not circulate this means that the organism to which it belongs is dead, and that the blood itself, stagnating, will soon cease to be blood. Similarly, by its very nature the Going for Refuge must find expression in the observance of the Precepts. If it does not find such expression this means that as a Buddhist one is virtually dead and that the Going for Refuge itself, becoming more and more mechanical, will soon cease to be effectively such.” (The Ten Pillars of Buddhism, pages 20-21)

If we are motivated to Go for Refuge effectively that necessarily means that we need to be motivated to deepen and strengthen our observance of the Precepts. To deepen and strengthen our observance of the Precepts we need to pay attention to the details of how we practice the Precepts, we need to be ethically scrupulous. And according to Bhante Sangharakshita, or according to my précis of Bhante, we are not yet sufficiently scrupulous in our observance of the Precepts.