The Noble 8-Fold Path: Reason and Emotion in the Spiritual Life: Right Resolve

Recap: Perfect Vision

• studying the noble 8-fold path or way - leading from ignorance to enlightenment, form darkness to light, is central to Buddhist philosophy, and one of the most important formulations of this
• last week: 1st aspect - right understanding / perfect vision. Not just intellectual or theoretical but the initial spiritual insight or experience that sends us off and impels us to tread the path. Object is the true nature of existence - which can be expressed in terms of images or concepts.
• Other 7 stages represent the vision permeating through all aspects of our life. They are the path of transformation.

Reason versus Emotion

• Right resolve / right resolution - brings us to one of the most important problems in the whole of the spiritual life - reason & emotion. It is comparatively easy to understand a religious or philosophical teaching - but putting it into practice is a whole other story! Much harder.
• Story about a Chinese emperor who was very keen on discussion with visiting Indian teachers. Asked: what is the fundamental principle of Buddhism. Answer: ceasing to do all evil, learning to do good, purifying the heart. Even a child of 3 can understand it, but even an old man of 80 can't put it into practice.
• St Paul: "that which I would, that I do not, that which I would not, that I do."
• Why this gap between our theory and practice? Answer is in the very depths of human nature. We know with the conscious mind / the rational part of ourselves, the other part probably much larger made up of instinct, emotion, volition, more unconscious than conscious. This part of us is not touched at all by rational intellectual knowledge. It goes its own way, dragging the rational part along. The emotions are stronger than reason. So we have to enlist in one way or another the deeper forces of the emotions. 
• This is the central problem of the spiritual life: to find emotional equivalents of our intellectual understanding. Without this no further progress is possible. 

Perfect emotion and the path of transformation

• Right resolve is not the best translation: thought / intention/ purpose / plan / aspiration. Samyak samkalpa. Samkalpa = will. Represents the whole emotional / volitional side of our being. Brings the whole emotional and volitional side of our being into harmony with the true nature of existence, with our perfect vision.
• First stage of the path of transformation. Mediates between the first step of the 8-fold path and the last 6 stages - essential - need to transform our whole emotional nature to drive energy to the other stages.
• No spiritual life until the heart is involved!

What perfect emotion is not

• Not the involvement of crude, untransformed emotions e.g. someone hears that church halls are being used on Sunday evenings for dances, and writes a letter to the Times about it! His emotions are involved but no perfect vision, just a bundle of prejudices and rationalisations 
• Not to be transformed through intellectual understanding only by perfect vision 

What perfect emotion is: 3 -ve parts and several +ve parts

Renunciation - nekkhama

• Result of the insight of conditioned existence - a reduction of craving. The grip of craving, usually so tight, starts loosening.
• Ask oneself: since becoming a Buddhist, what have I given up? There should be something... But no uniform pattern of renunciation. Result: life simpler and less cluttered up... Less giving up than growing up, should not feel like a sacrifice. Our hold on things should relax. 

Non-hate - avyapada

• Antagonism is often frustrated craving - see kids tantrums. E.g. lack of success etc - bitterness, fault-finding, nagging... but with the decrease of craving, hatred also decreases as the possibility of frustration becomes less. So ask oneself: since becoming a Buddhist, have I become better tempered? 

Non-violence - avihimsa

• or non-cruelty = in the mahayana, deliberate cruelty is one of the worst things. Need to teach our children that animals are sensitive to suffering. 'If you are struck, you feel hurt. If you strike a crow it will also feel hurt' said the Buddha at some point. Hogarth paintings on the 4 stages of cruelty. 1st: boys tormenting a dog - 4tth: one of them killing someone.  
• Ask ourselves: did we become less cruel since becoming Buddhist? Incl cutting or sarcastic speech, enjoying blood sports...
• Vegetarianism - not a hard and fast rule, but a sincere Buddhist will make some move in this direction - heart will become sensitive and this will drop off of its own accord.

Generosity - Dana

• Giving / generosity. +ve counterpart of renunciation
• Basic Buddhist virtue. Less the quantity given, than the will to give or to share. Often one of the first signs of perfect emotion
• Different types: giving material things e.g. food / clothes. Giving time, energy, thought. Giving knowledge / culture / education. Share one's intellectual gifts - in contrast to the Brahmin cast that tried to keep a monopoly on knowledge. Giving fearlessness - sharing ones own confidence / giving security though this. Should be able to reassure people through one's presence. Life and limb. 
• Highest gift: gift of the Dharma, of the way to nirvana.
• In the east, one should be giving in some way or other all the time... bring something when seeing a friend, when visiting a temple. Does influence the mind - gets one thinking a bit about other people... 

Love - maitri

• Word used for a very dear very intimate friend - an overwhelming desire for the happiness and wellbeing of the other person, on temporal and spiritual levels. 
• May all beings be happy - develop this feeling towards all beings. And it is possible to develop it using exercises - not easy!

Compassion - karuna

• Love is transformed into compassion by the suffering of one who is loved - the most spiritual of all the emotions. Avalokiteshvara incarnates compassion. Eleven headed, thousand-armed form. Story of Avalokiteshvara contemplating the suffering of beings, death, hunger, etc - the contemplation broke his head into 11 pieces. Also Tara, the savioress or the star, born from the tears of Avalokiteshvara. Not just stories but of deep archetypal significance.
• In the Mahayana compassion is the highest. In some sutra the Buddha says the Bodhisattva doesn't need to be taught too many things - all he or she needs to know is compassion. In other texts: if one only has compassion for the suffering of other living beings, everything else will follow and enlightenment will be attained.
• Japanese wastrel who tried to become a monk & had to play a chess game: "you've learned two things today: concentration and compassion. Since you've learned compassion, you'll do!

Sympathetic joy - mudita

• happiness that we feel in other peoples' happiness - not so usual! Eliminate the opposite by awareness and positive effort. 
• In the East no association of religion with gloom - then some examples. Wesak in UK where people looked like they were at a funeral (3 years ago). 

Peace / tranquility - Upeksha

• Peace of mind - the peace that passeth understanding. Often think of it as -ve but it is +ve - even more than the other Brahma Viharas - not just an absence of something  but nearer to our conception of bliss 

Faith & Devotion - Sraddha

• Not belief. The emotional aspect of our total response to the truth - usually directed to the 3 jewels, symbolised by the Buddha image, the scriptures, the members of the monastic order - treated with great reverence due to what they symbolise.
• There are exercises for developing faith and devotion e.g. 7-fold puja. 
• 7 parts representing a sequence of devotional moods and attitudes accompanied in some cases by physical actions:
• Worship: offer candles, lamps, incense. Or 7 ordinary offerings: water for drinking, for washing, flowers, incense, light, perfume, food + sometimes music (Indian offerings to the honoured guest). These become the 7 or 8 religious offerings, offered to the Buddha, the honoured guest in this world. Often on the shrine as 7 bowls of water.
• Vandana: obeisance or salutation. putting hands together, to full length prostration - humble and receptive attitude
• Going for Refuge: commitment. Total orientation of our whole life. Talked of doing the first ordinations in the near future.
• Confession of faults. Practice of reciting sutras until the feeling of remorse or guilt ceases.
• Rejoicing in merits. Recollecting the virtues of others, of heroes and heroines, or ordinary people. Learn to appreciate and rejoice in the merits of all other human beings - makes one feel less alone, buoyed up. 
• Entreaty and Supplication. Based on Brahma Sahampati who entreated the Buddha to teach after his enlightenment. Makes the disciple ready to receive the teaching.
• Transference or dedication of merits and self-surrender. Shares the benefits of anything religious one does with all living beings - e.g. mahayana practice to feel whenever doing religious exercise that all other beings are doing it with one. Paves the way for the Bodhisattva vow - that one will not gain enlightenment for ones own sake only - but for all beings.

The importance of spiritual community

• Perfect emotion is the transformation of our whole emotional and volitional nature and attitude. Consists in 3 -ve (renunciation, non-hate, non-violence) and several +ve emotions (generosity, 4 immeasurables, sraddha). These are the fruits.
• Most of the +ve emotions are also social emotions - they arise in relationship with other people. Much more easily cultivated in the group. One reason for the spiritual community / sangha / order => makes this transformation easier, and without it there is no spiritual life. In the spiritual community people should be able to develop, and be developing, these emotions. 

1. Do you experience “this terrible chasm ... between our theory and our practice” in our Dharma lives? In what conditions do you feel it most strongly? In what conditions do you feel less of a gap between our theory and our practice? 

When I'm practicing more consistently, meditating every morning e.g., doing metta bhavana...

2. “For most of us the central problem of the spiritual life is to find emotional equivalents for our intellectual understandings.” Why might this be our “central problem”? What difficulties does it cause in your life? In the week ahead, what could you try to find these emotional equivalents in our Dharma lives? 

hmm

3. Why do you think renunciation is important in spiritual life? What have you given up since you started practising Buddhism? How might you practise renunciation more intensively in the week ahead? 

Don't buy into some things any more. E.g. try not to let anger linger, at least I don't feed it these days. Chocolate in smaller quantities! 

4. Since you started practising Buddhism, have you become ‘at least a little better tempered’? How might you deepen your practice of this in the week ahead? 

Yes - though still some way to go esp with my husband. Metta bhavana helps.

5. Since you started practising Buddhism, have you become a bit less cruel? In what ways might you still indulge yourself in acts of cruelty? How might you be more vegetarian and vegan as part of your practice of non-cruelty? 

Became veggie. Still thoughtless about e.g. using the car or seeing where what I buy came from and whether it was as ethical as possible.

6. Dāna is the “basic Buddhist virtue”. Do you consciously practise it each day? What might you do to help you remember and be motivated to do acts of dāna each day in the week ahead? What might you give? 

Time & attention, listening, appreciation, respect. If they count. + regular giving. Occasionally to a beggar on the street.

7. Which of the maitrī, karuṇā, muditā and upekṣā, known collectively as the Brahmavihāras or ‘sublime abodes’, do you find most inspiring? How might you develop each of them in your daily lives? 

All - upeksa perhaps most. Can do actual practices. Also helpful I think to get a good handle on exactly what the emotion is e.g. maitri has no attachment in it - quite different from the normal concept of love. 

8. Do you find puja helps to develop Perfect Emotion? What is your experience of practising it in relation to Perfect Emotion?

Yes - it makes me feel good, even if I don't like myself much at the time. Makes me inspired to practice more deeply.