When we begin to practice a spiritual life, specifically as Buddhists, the precepts are the things we agree to do. It makes sense to trust the wisdom of elders and enlightenment as an ultimate teacher. For that reason, in Zen practice we do not treat our teachers like gurus to be worshipped but tend to treat them like wise aunts and uncles who’ve been scouting the trail ahead of us, perhaps made similar mistakes, and are offering us their condensed wisdom as guidance.
Teachers are not irrefutable sources. When we bow to a teacher or when we bow to a statue of the Buddha, it’s sometimes misperceived by others as subordinating ourselves to someone of higher status with more sacred juju than ourselves. In fact, we are bowing to wisdom. When we bow, we are honoring our own inner wisdom, and the Buddha’s, and the continuity of clarity, awareness, and wisdom on Earth. We don’t have to change our previous religion to practice in this way. Non-Buddhists may think of precepts as externally imposed laws, commands, and judgments like the Ten Commandments, but they are not the utterances of a god.
We keep our intentions on the back burner of the mind. We refer to them to judge our own conduct. I’m responsible for what I do. It’s pretty simple. It means I have freedom to choose. I don’t have to choose to follow them, but the precepts are there to guide me if I want my life to approximate the Buddha’s. If I remember that they are the products of an enlightened mind, why wouldn’t I choose them?
When I make some decision, I will live out the consequences (and so, too, many others). So the precepts resemble safety rails on the highway, or a mountain climber’s rope and carabiners, which, if used correctly, can save the climber from a fatal fall.
Having spent nearly the previous half of my life ignoring most directives and instead following my own whims and impulses and having suffered the consequences, and caused others to suffer the consequences of my poor choices, I find a deep utility and purpose in these precepts.
The First Clear Mind Precept
Another way to express the First Clear Mind Precept—“I vow to not kill”—is “A disciple of the Buddha does not kill.” The syntax of this is not a command, more like a reminder that if you want to be a Buddhist, this is how we behave.
This is the first precept in Buddhism while it’s the sixth commandment in Judeo-Christian tradition, following not coveting your neighbor’s wife and holding no god before Yahweh or Jehovah. So we can understand by its placement that this is of the highest concern to Buddhists.
First, Do No Harm
Harmlessness is the very first edict of Buddhism, and not killing or taking life is the surface meaning. It’s impossible to get through life without killing something, but still, that’s our intention, and Buddhist vows always aim at the impossible for fear of falling short of the possible. Saving all beings, for instance, is the work of eons, but by actualizing that intention, others will see and model what we do, and pass it on through time.
You will have to negotiate for yourself whether you are going to have someone else kill the animals you eat. If you eat meat, it will be up to you and your diligence to determine whether the meat you eat has been humanely raised and slaughtered. You may decide to limit your protein to grains, legumes, and vegetables and not eat sentient beings. I try to avoid eating mammals, but occasionally the desire disguised as bacon will foil my best intentions.
Cutting broccoli is taking a life, but because there is no option but to eat, we say grace and eat with gratitude and the full knowledge of the double-bind in which we exist—to sustain our own lives we must use others. A popular Buddhist grace states:
We venerate the Three Treasures.*
We’re thankful for this food
The work of many people
and the suffering of other forms of life.
*The Three Treasures are Buddha, dharma, and sangha.
Following this train of thought will eventually lead you to consider how much of the planet you feel you have a right to exploit for your own existence and indulgences. Each precept will have to be moderated by your understanding and conditions. The precepts are not one-size-fits-all rules to be followed in lock step but instead require meditation, nuance, and adjustment to be responsive to the particularities of your life.
Recently the Dalai Lama, a life-long vegetarian, was ordered by his doctors to eat some meat for his health. Life is fluid, and we must be, too. Conditions change, and we need to follow those changes, not the thoughts we may have about them.
In our practice we often say, “Put no head above your own.” That means when your head is clear and when it is calm, your feelings and intuitions will tell you everything you need to know. Be skeptical of everything, even your own teachers. All the questions and answers you need reside in Buddha-nature, into which your spinal telephone is plugged. Zazen is where we take the time to answer our calls.
Not Giving Rise to The Idea of Killing
In the realm of dharma, the deeper implication of this precept is that we don’t give rise to the idea of killing. We cut off thoughts of anger and vengefulness, thoughts of envy. We cut them off by recognizing them, feeling them, and letting them go, by changing our mind, by pouring a cup of tea.
When we meditate, we recognize what comes up, but we just observe what arises with it, and if we don’t seize it, it will depart. Suzuki-roshi once said, “It’s okay to let your thoughts in. You don’t have to invite them to tea.”
The idea of not killing is a seed that sprouts below thoughts. Physical violence and abusive behavior like threats and displays of anger are also a kind of killing. They kill peace. They murder the clarity and calm of others. They kill silence. They kill friendship. So, once again, we must decide for ourselves: How do I, as a Buddhist, negotiate disputes and differences?
The Second Clear Mind Precept
The Second Clear Mind Precept states, “A disciple of the Buddha does not steal,” and its corollary is to practice the perfection of giving. The deeper, more internal aspect arises from thoughts of gaining and loss.
We already have everything we need to live. We have sunlight, oxygen, water, flowering plants, the entire panoply of life revealed by sunrise every day. What are our actual thoughts about gain? What do we need to gain badly enough to take what is not given?
I can think of circumstances where desperate people steal to feed their children or because they’re starving, or need medicines they can’t afford. I would prefer to indict the culture and laws that deny people these basic human needs, because in such instances I’m not going to judge such thievery. Yes, they’ve broken a Buddhist precept; so would I if my children were hungry.
Once again, you have to decide on your own authority and ethics how strictly you will observe Buddha’s way. I once crossed the country without money, cleaning the bathrooms in gas stations for my gasoline; making and selling earrings I crafted from the pelt of a road-killed pheasant.
My friend Pete Knell, president of the San Francisco Hell’s Angels, crossed the country, earning what he needed by painting farmers’ mailboxes and stenciling their names on the fresh paint, just to demonstrate that he was not a thief.
The Third Clear Mind Precept
The Third Clear Mind Precept, “A disciple of the Buddha does not misuse sexuality,” is a statement concerning ethical relationships. It doesn’t declare that sex is immoral (a tough case to make since the species’ survival and much of its pleasure depends on it).
It does declare that relationships can be abused. Sexual attraction can prompt dishonest statements of affection, break wedding vows, and engender jealousy and violence. It is not a trivial force to contend with.
The precept’s corollary is to honor the body—one’s own body and the body of your lover, wife, or husband—and also to manifest good faith in relationships. No veneers of feigning more affection for someone than you actually possess. No false promises. We have to decide what our own limits will be.
Continued expression of sexual interest after someone has expressed that they’re not interested is a misuse of sex. Trying to overcome someone’s resistance is not compassionate treatment. Extend such behavior far enough and it becomes rape. The male strategy of thinking, “If I keep trying, maybe they’ll say yes,” is not respectful. It’s a misuse of someone else’s space and privacy or may take advantage of their attraction to you, even though you have never touched them.
Using sexual relations to gain power or status or to manipulate one’s partner is both a misuse of sexuality and a kind of theft of that person’s sovereignty. To avoid unintentional harm, it’s also necessary to consider: What is the effect of my sexuality on another person? If one is serious about modeling harmlessness and responsibility, the question is not simply getting what you want but checking in with yourself (the precepts) to determine if you are using your sexuality as a lever to pry open that person’s will.
It’s no easy feat to stay on top of hormones. In my 20s, in the thrall of the counterculture and drugs, I was careless with a number of young women. That callowness returned to haunt me later in life and required painful amends to be made. As the man said, “There’s no such thing as a free lunch.”
A bodhisattva makes a commitment to live from a generous heart. We already possess the entire Universe and more than we can use, so it should also be clear by now how misusing status and authority, when we have power over someone, is a form of stealing.
The Footprint of Your Life
The footprint of a single life is small on the sands of time, but if I consider myself a Buddhist, and act as consistently as the Buddha would, I am moving his great dream of universal enlightenment forward through time. Some Native American tribes make it a practice to consider the consequences of their actions on seven generations. We can imagine how different our world would be today had our forefathers practiced the same discipline with the environment.
We consult the precepts because we have confidence that they create a dignified, liberated, and helpful life. They minimize harm. They maximize kindness and compassion. They create a world that is deeper and more profound than only intelligence can offer to restrain our innate greed, anger, and delusion.
You don’t have to declare yourself a Buddhist to do these practices. His Holiness the Dalai Lama has said publicly that there’s no necessity to change your religion. We are modeling behavior, not proselytizing.
You can judge for yourself whether the practice serves you. Trust that the answer to every question resides in your Buddha-nature. It contains every possibility, so it’s a more reliable place to search than the world of dialectics and contradictions.
Copyright 2024. All Rights Reserved.
Adapted with permission of the publisher,
Inner Traditions International.
Article Source:
BOOK: Zen in the Vernacular
Zen in the Vernacular: Things As It Is
by Peter Coyote.
In this engaging guide to Zen Buddhism, award-winning actor, narrator, and Zen Buddhist priest Peter Coyote helps us peer beneath the Japanese gift-wrapping of Zen teachings to reveal the fundamental teachings of the Buddha and show how they can be applied to contemporary daily life.
Revealing the practical usefulness of Buddhist philosophy and practice, Zen in the Vernacular shows how Zen offers a creative problem-solving mechanism and moral guide ideal for the stresses and problems of everyday life.
For more info and/or to order this book, click hereclick here. Also available as an Audiobook and as a Kindle edition.
About the Author
Peter Coyote is an award-winning actor, author, director, screenwriter, and narrator who has worked with some of the world’s most distinguished filmmakers. Recognized for his narration work, he narrated the PBS series The Pacific Century, for which he won an Emmy award, as well as eight Ken Burns documentaries, including The Roosevelts, for which he won a second Emmy. In 2011 he was ordained as a Zen Buddhist priest and in 2015 received “transmission” from his teacher, making him an independent Zen teacher. He is the author of several books.
