What is the "Dharma"?

Ven. Nyanatiloka (A Buddhist Dictionary: Manual of Buddhist Terms and Doctrines), Dhr. Seven and Ashley Wells, (eds.), Wisdom Quarterly

Where does wisdom come from? It derives from studying Dharma (teachings, phenomena)

Yoga, meditation, relaxation, chanting banners draped on Sri Sri Ravi Shankar's beautiful Dharma center next to the Univ. of So. California (USC) the night of the "Yoga Rave" (WQ)

 

Buddhist Dictionary (palikanon)

[NOTE: The Sanskrit word dharma is multivalent with at least 12 distinct meanings, as is fairly common with many Indian terms. When capitalized it refers to the Buddha's Teachings, but all its meanings are related. This capitalization is only an English convention used to distinguish the Teachings from phenomena in general, other spiritual teachings, and one's duties and obligations, etc.]

 

The Dharma (Pali Dhamma) literally means the "bearer," (what upholds, supports), constitution (the nature of a thing), norm, law (jus), doctrine; justice, righteousness; quality; things, objects of mind (see spheres or bases, āyatana) "phenomena."

The word dhamma is met with in the texts in all of these meanings. The Commentary to the Long Discourses (Digha Nikaya) gives four applications of the term:

1. quality (guna),
2. instruction (desanā),
3. text (pariyatti),
4. selfless, void, empty (nijjīvatā), for example, "All dhammā, phenomena, are impersonal..."

Buddha, cat, books (Dee McIntosh/flickr)

The Commentary to the Dhammasangani has hetu (condition) instead of desanā (instruction).

Therefore, the "analytical knowledge" of the law or lawfulness of phenomena (see patisambhidā) is explained in the Path of Purification (Vis.M. XIV) and in the The Book of Analysis (Vibhanga) as hetumhi-ñāna) "knowledge of the conditions."

 

The Dharma, as the liberating truth discovered and proclaimed by the Buddha, is summed up in the Four Noble Truths (see sacca).

 

It forms one of the Three Gems (Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha, ti-ratana) and one of the Ten Recollections (anussati), which are subjects for frequent recollection or mindfulness as contemplation.

 

A dharma (dhamma) as object of mind (dhammāyatana, see āyatana) may be anything past, present or future, physical or mental, conditioned or unconditioned (cf. sankhāra, 4), real or imaginary. See wider Wiki discussion: Dharma.

KARMA: The 10 Courses of Action

Seth Auberon, Ashley Wells, CC Liu (eds.), Wisdom Quarterly; Nyanatiloka (Anton Gueth)

Mental-karma is important as are deeds.

Karma: "Courses of Action" (kamma-patha) is a name for a group of ten kinds of either unwholesome or wholesome actions the Buddha taught. 

He was known in ancient India not as a "Buddhist" or a Brahmin but as a Karma-vadin ("Teacher of Karma"), one who teaches the efficacy of personal deeds. There are three kinds of unskillful deeds -- of body, speech, and mind -- and three kinds of skillful ones:

 

I. Ten Unwholesome Courses of Action

• three bodily actions: killing, stealing, sexual misconduct;
  
• four verbal actions: perjury, slandering, harsh speech, babble;
  
• three mental actions: covetousness, ill-will, wrong views.
  

Unwholesome mental courses of action comprise only extreme forms of defiled thought: The greedy (rapacious) wish to appropriate others' property, the hateful (antagonistic) thought of harming others, and the holding or clinging to pernicious wrong-views.

While milder forms of mental defilement are also unwholesome, they do not constitute "courses of action."

 

Good Karma

Karma is following us everywhere we go.

Bhikkhu Bodhi (Tape 5: Rebirth and Kamma, "The Buddha's Teaching: As It Is") explains that these ten are called "courses" of action rather than ordinary karma because they have the power, in and of themselves, to lead to rebirth -- a course or corridor leading to a particularly unfortunate or fortunate state. 

For example, even a relatively minor good intentional-action can lead, IF it serves as the death-proximate karma (the thought passing through the mind right at the moment of passing away from one life to yet another) -- has the power to get one into a heaven. There are many heavens, and not a single one of them is eternal, so rebirth in heaven is not the goal of Buddhism. But it is a fortunate destination for rebirth in samsara, the ongoing Wheel of Rebirth and disappointment.

II. Ten Wholesome Courses of Action

• three bodily actions: avoiding killing, stealing, sexual misconduct (or preserving life, protecting what belongs to others, avoiding harm);
  
• four verbal actions: avoiding perjury, slandering, harsh speech, foolish chit chat (or honest, reconciling, gentle, and wise speech);
  
• three mental actions: unselfishness, goodwill, right views.
  

Both lists repeatedly occur in the texts (e.g., in AN X.28, 176; MN 9), and they are explained in detail in MN 114 and in Commentary to MN 9 (R. Und., p. 14), Atthasālini Tr. I, 126ff.

Sivali

Ven. Sivali: shining example of good karma

An enlightened monastic from the time of the Buddha, Venerable Sivali, is remembered and venerated as having unbelievably good karma -- a store of "merit" (punya) for everyone to emulate.

 

There is no reason to "envy" him his good fortune because we ourselves can also accrue a similar store of merit by good works (mental, verbal, and physical),  deeds that benefit ourselves and others that follow us through this life and from life to life until we find enlightenment.

We are always generating karma and always being reborn, but a human birth is extraordinarily rare, a precious opportunity to make merit with redounding pleasing and welcome karmic-results and effects (vipaka and phala).

Ignorance, O ignorance! (cartoon)

Dhr. Seven and Amber Larson, CC Liu Wisdom Quarterly; Ven. Nyanatiloka, Buddhist Dictionary: Manual of Buddhist Terms and Doctrines; GoComics.com; Dilbert.com

IGNORANCE (avijjā, Sanskrit avidya) refers to lack of insight, lack of wisdom, nescience, unknowing. As a Buddhist term it is synonymous with "delusion" (moha, one of the three roots of all unwholesome action). In fact, it is the primary root of ALL bad karma and unhappiness in the various planes of existence generally referred to as "the world" or "universe."

It veils our mental eyes and prevents us from seeing the true nature of existence. It is the delusion or wrong view tricking beings by making life appear to them as (1) permanent, (2) happy, and/or (3) personal. Seeing its beauty without being mindful of inherent danger, living being cling to existence and experience even as it is passing away, disappointing, and impersonal.

What might we be were it not for ignorance? Enlightened here and now in this very life?

 

It prevents us from seeing that everything -- every compounded thing that comes into existence or originates dependent on supportive conditions -- is, ultimately speaking, radically impermanent, unsatisfactory, and void of "I," "me," or "mine": It is basically unattractive, foul, impure. (See The Four Perversions that make it appear otherwise).

 

Ignorance is defined as "not knowing [i.e., fully penetrating the truth of] the Four Noble Truths, namely, (1) unsatisfactoriness, (2) its origin, (3) its cessation, and (4) the way to its cessation" (S. XII, 4).

 

Kermit would have remained in the dark...

This root ignorance is the foundation of all karma that leads to becoming, all rebirth-producing actions, of all harm and suffering. Therefore, it stands first in the formula of Dependent Origination -- the 12-linked causal chain of the arising of present unhappiness.

But on account of it being first, explains the Path of Purification (Vis.M., XVII, 36f), ignorance should not be regarded as "the causeless root-cause of the world... It is not causeless. For a cause of it is stated: 

The Buddha glowing golden (Mesamong/flickr)

"'With the arising of defilements (taints, cankers, outflows, āsavas), there is the arising of ignorance' (MN 9). But there is a figurative way in which it can be treated as a root-cause. Namely, when it is made to serve as a starting point in an exposition of the Round of Existence... 

"As it is said: 'No first beginning of ignorance can be perceived, meditators, before which ignorance was not and after which it came to be. Yet, it can be perceived that ignorance has its specific [causal or supportive] condition'" (AN.X.61).

The same statement is made (AN.X.62) about the craving for [eternal] existence. The latter and ignorance are called "the outstanding causes of karma that lead to unhappy and happy destinies" (Vis.M. XVII, 38).

 

Ignorance as wrong or false view

As ignorance still exists -- albeit in a very refined way until the attainment of full enlightenment -- it is counted as the last of the Ten Fetters, which bind beings to samsara, the Cycle of Rebirths. As the first two unwholesome roots, greed and hate, are themselves rooted in ignorance, ALL unwholesome states of mind/heart are consequently and inseparably bound up with it.

 

Ignorance (delusion) is the most obstinate of the three roots of unhappiness. It is fully eliminated by the dawning of enlightenment, insight, final knowledge, liberating wisdom.

 

Ignorance is not only one of the taints or cankers, it is one of the proclivities. It is often called a mental hindrance (e.g., in S.XV.3; A.X.61) but does not appear together with the usual list of Five Hindrances [which it is at the root of].

The other definition of "ignorance" is anyone who disagrees with me (dilbert.com)

The Four Perversions

Amber Larson and Dhr. Seven, CC Liu, Wisdom Quarterly; BPS.lk; Ven. Nyanatiloka Mahathera, Buddhist Dictionary: Manual of Buddhist Terms and Doctrines (vipallāsa)

To see things as they are NOT is distorted delusion springing from ignorance. To see reality just AS IT IS is enlightenment springing from having rightly cultivated liberating-wisdom.

 

''There are four perversions or distortions (vipallāsa), which may be either of perception, consciousness, or of views. What are these four distortions? They are to regard:

1. what is actually impermanent as permanent,
   
2. what is actually unpleasant as pleasant (capable of yielding lasting happiness),
   
3. what is actually without a self as a self,
   
4. what is actually foul (ugly) as beautiful" (AN.IV.49).

• See Manual of Insight (Ledi Sayadaw, Wheel 31/32, p.5).

We don't have that in Iceland (Bjork)

According to the Path of Purification, the following perversions are eliminated by the first path-knowledge (stream entry, the first stage of enlightenment): the perversions of perception, consciousness, and views that the impermanent is permanent or that what is not a self is a self, and furthermore the perversion of views that the unpleasant is pleasant and that the foul is beautiful.

 

By the third path-knowledge (non-returning) are eliminated the perversions of perception and consciousness that the foul is beautiful.

 

By the fourth path-knowledge (full enlightenment) are eliminated the perversions of perception and consciousness that the unpleasant is pleasant (Vis.M. XXII, 68).