Review
We’ve been going through these graded stages of the path. Perhaps I can summarize very quickly. We started with appreciating the precious human rebirth, then appreciating how it’s going to be lost at the time of death and how nothing is going to be of help at the time of death except the Dharma measures that we’ve taken. We looked at the rebirths that could follow if we haven’t taken these Dharma measures: as a so-called hell creature, as a wandering, hungry or clutching ghost (however we want to translate it), or as a creeping creature, an animal. How horrible that would be. Fearing that, not wanting that to happen, and seeing that there is a way to avoid that – so, we’re not just paralyzed with fear – we put the safe direction of Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha into our lives – what’s known as “refuge.” This we do by working to achieve a true stopping of all our suffering and its causes and to realize all the pathway minds, the understandings, that bring that true stopping about and that result from the attainment of that stopping in the way that the Buddhas have done in full and the Arya Sangha have done in part. Then we saw that the first step of going in that direction is to avoid destructive behavior. That led to the discussion of karma. We’ve been going through lots of different points about karma. No need to review all of them.
What we are up to is the discussion of how we cleanse our mental continuums of karmic aftermath. In this context of the initial scope motivation, that means that we’re dealing with the karmic aftermath of destructive actions – karmic aftermath in terms of karmic potentials and tendencies, not karmic habits. Karmic habits are asserted only in the Mahayana (Skt. Mahāyāna) system. What is taught on the initial scope has to be shared in common by Hinayana (Skt. Hīnayāna) and Mahayana.
We also spoke about how we can only get rid of the karmic aftermath completely when we have had non-conceptual cognition of voidness. That is what enables us to get rid of, or achieve a true stopping of, those factors that act as conditions for the ripening of the karmic aftermath.
Degenerating and Non-Degenerating Continuums and Their Supporting Conditions
An interesting point is that there are many different types of continuums. There are some continuums that degenerate. Such continuums are caused – namely, they have a beginning, like the body – and from moment to moment, they get closer and closer to their end. They degenerate. They fall apart. There are others that don’t degenerate. Some have no beginning but have an end, some have a beginning but no end, and others have no beginning and no end.
What causes a continuum to degenerate? It has to do with the conditions that support it. For example, the condition that supported the creation of this body was the joining of a mental continuum with a sperm and an egg. That initial condition is no longer present as the physical continuum continues. Because the continuum is not continually regenerated by its supporting condition, it degenerates. It gets weaker and weaker and falls apart. With a continuum that goes on without degenerating, the supporting condition is there from moment to moment to moment.
In the case of samsara (Skt. saṃsāra), we’re talking about the supporting conditions that activate a karmic potential for rebirth and thus perpetuate samsara, and this is in the context of the twelve links of dependent arising. The immediate conditions that activate karmic potential for rebirth are the links of clinging and an obtainer attitude. But underlying them is the unawareness of how we and others exists. Our continuum of unawareness has no beginning, but it can have an end. Since we’re going to have that unawareness in every moment until we gain a true stopping of it, that unawareness is going to perpetuate the continuum of samsaric rebirth and experiencing suffering.
The continuum of unawareness has been going on with no beginning and without degenerating. “Without degenerating” means that it does not gradually come to an end all by itself; it doesn’t gradually fall apart, as does the body, for example. And though the results that the continuum gives rise to go up and down – sometimes better rebirths, sometimes worse – the continuum of unawareness neither degenerates nor goes up and down. .
An example of a continuum that has a beginning but no end is the death of a particular lifetime. The continuum of the end of that lifetime goes on forever; it never occurs again. The end of that lifetime remains the case without ever degenerating. This is because each moment of the no-longer-happening of that lifetime perpetuates the next moment of that no-longer-happening forever.
A mental continuum is an example of a continuum that has no beginning and no end. It goes on forever without degenerating because it’s continually sustained by its own conditions, which are the immediately preceding moments. That immediately preceding condition is what keeps on perpetuating it forever.
So, we have these types of possibilities. That’s the whole point of how we can get rid of the continuum of rebirth. The phenomenon of rebirth has no beginning, but it can have an end. Since beginningless time, we have built up the karmic potentials for rebirth and activated them with clinging and an obtainer attitude deriving from beginningless unawareness. If we attain a true stopping of all unawareness, all ignorance, then we no longer provide the cause for perpetuating the arising of karmic impulses and for perpetuating the clinging and obtainer attitudes that activate their karmic potentials. With the ending of the continuum of unawareness, the continuum of rebirth comes to an end.
Of course, from the seeing path of mind up to liberation and enlightenment, there is a build-up of deeper and deeper levels and strengths of unawareness. The true stopping of all of it does not occur all at once. But this gradual process is not a natural degeneration.
Please think about that. It’s something that I think we have to understand on a deeper level than what we explained last week.
Participant: What does “ripen” mean?
Dr. Berzin: “To ripen” literally means something “gives its fruit.” The fruit has been there on the tree, and now it falls off. So, now, you actually get the fruit – the result.
Actually, the word “ripen” (smin-pa), in the Buddhist context, has two different meanings, and there are two different usages of it. One meaning is that something grows full, becomes mature, like an unripe fruit becoming ripe. The other meaning is that something exhausts and finishes as it produces its fruit – the fruit falls off the tree. The ripening we’re talking about here is the fruit falling off the tree.
[meditation]
There are temporary ways, though, to cleanse our mental continuums of these karmic potentials and tendencies. They don’t accomplish a full cleansing, just a partial one. But it helps. This is what we are able to do initially. And this is what we were speaking about last time – how the four opponent forces weaken the negative potentials very much but don’t get rid of them completely.
Openly Admitting Our Mistakes
Before we apply the four opponent forces, we have to admit our mistaken actions, our negative actions. I think it’s important to understand that we identify them as mistakes. We committed them because we were confused; we didn’t commit them because we were bad. We didn’t commit them because of original sin or something like that: we were confused. We were mistaken. We thought that stealing something, hurting somebody, or yelling at somebody would be of benefit to us. In fact, it wasn’t. So, we were confused. We were mistaken. We then admit that. The word that is sometimes translated as “confession,” I translate as “openly admitting.” We admit that we made a mistake – that what we did was negative, destructive.
What we discussed last time was whether we needed to actually admit this to somebody. At first, I was a little bit confused about this, but it is true that most often we do invoke the Buddhas and bodhisattvas and admit our mistakes in front of them. We’re not asking them for forgiveness, however. Forgiveness implies that we are bad and that they, simply through their own power, can absolve us from our so-called sins. That comes from a different type of religion, different philosophical background. Here, we’re simply calling upon them to witness us openly confessing.
The Role of a Witness
Then we started to explore the importance of having a witness, which I’d like to explore a little bit more before we go on. There are two ways of looking at this, and both are quite similar.
One is that verbalizing our mistakes, admitting them in front of someone, makes our admissions more honest, more truthful. It doesn’t have to be another person, though. Usually, it’s not because it’s very hard for another person to be completely neutral. But the Buddhas and bodhisattvas have complete equanimity and so on, and we can ask them to be patient with us. Asking them to be patient doesn’t mean that we think that they might be angry with us – given that the opposite of patience is anger. The Buddhas wouldn’t get angry with us. They’re not capable of anger. However, there are many different kinds of patience. One kind of patience is to endure the difficulties of helping somebody else – which is actually quite a challenge. For example, when we try to help others and give them good advice – like the Buddhas give us good advice – they don’t follow it! Anyway, we ask the Buddhas and bodhisattvas for their patience, but we don’t ask for their forgiveness. So, opening up in front of them can, if we take it seriously, helps us to be more honest. We wouldn’t want to deceive the Buddhas and bodhisattvas! If we’re just by ourselves, though, we can sort of kid ourselves. So, this is quite helpful.
The other, which is an extreme view that we need to try to avoid, is that verbalizing our mistakes makes our admission of them more real, gives them true existence – as with the example we used that unless we actually verbalize, “I love you,” we think that our love is not real. Obviously, that doesn’t work because we would then only have to say it once. And once is never enough. Sometimes we feel compelled to express our love to somebody by always saying, “I love you,” or by always touching them or something like that in order to somehow prove the true existence of our love. That doesn’t work either; it never satisfies. There’s no true existence to be established. So, by trying to establish it, we’re just banging our heads against the wall, in a sense.
These two, though, are rather similar to each other, aren’t they? Either the verbalizing makes it more honest, or it makes it more real. Is there a difference?
Participant: For me it’s more than just being more honest. When I verbalize my mistake, I have to be more conscious of it.
Dr. Berzin: That’s very true. That’s a basic principle in psychology – that verbalizing makes us more conscious of what we’re feeling. So why would we have to verbalize our mistakes in front of a witness?
Participant: It helps me to clarify.
Dr. Berzin: It helps one to clarify even if the witness says nothing. I’m thinking here of the type of psychotherapy where the therapist says hardly anything.
It’s not only the act of verbalizing that is significant, though. I think it is also the milieu in which we do it. Going to a therapist office, sitting there, paying money and so on creates an environment in which we would be more conscious. Now, in the Buddhist context, we certainly aren’t paying money to make an open admission, but we do give the admission a formal structure. So, perhaps that helps. However, making the act a more conscious one doesn’t necessarily make it more real. One could see, though, how it would be easy to confuse the two. And also, as I said, one wouldn’t be able to deceive the Buddhas and bodhisattvas, whereas one could conceivably deceive a friend.
Dealing with Feelings of Shame, Embarrassment and Guilt
That brought up the other topic, which is feeling ashamed or embarrassed. Where does that come in? “I’m too ashamed, too embarrassed to tell anybody” about some awful thing that we did when we were young. I’m sure many of us have done some pretty awful, stupid things when we were teenagers. What is this factor of being ashamed or embarrassed about telling somebody about it now?
Participant: It’s about feeling regret and guilt.
Dr. Berzin: Those are two different things: regret and guilt.
Participant: It’s about feeling guilty.
Dr. Berzin: Right. So, when we feel embarrassed or ashamed, we feel guilty. Let’s analyze this a little bit further. What does feeling guilty imply? Feeling guilty implies a strong identification with an image of the “me” as a “bad” person and with the “bad” thing that we did. We hold onto that identity and don’t let go. That identity, “I’m so terrible, and what I did was so terrible,” is guilt, isn’t it?
Participant: I also had the thought that in order not to feel guilty, it’s important to separate the deed from the doer.
Dr. Berzin: Right. That’s often used in the case of somebody like Hitler, to use an extreme example.
Participant: That’s a very extreme example.
Dr. Berzin: It is. But if it’s valid, it should work for the extreme as well. We can’t say that, inherently, somebody is a bad person. It’s what they did that was terrible.
Participant: I’d rather have a lighter example. For instance, if I say something stupid, that doesn’t make me a stupid person. But quite often we forget that.
Dr. Berzin: That’s because we identify with what we did. We identify the “me” as a bad person, or a stupid person, or an idiot, or whatever. Usually, we have stronger words for ourselves.
But is that the same as feeling ashamed or embarrassed about telling somebody else? Can one feel ashamed or embarrassed just on one’s own? Or does feeling ashamed or embarrassed have to do with being in front of somebody else?
Participant: You’re concerned about how the other person might consider you at the time. It’s a judgment you make about yourself.
Dr. Berzin: It’s a feeling based on a judgment: “I feel ashamed. I’m embarrassed at what I did.”
Participant: But shame and embarrassment are not the same in German: peinlich sein oder sich zu schämen.
Participant: Schämen, in German, could be directed at either myself or others.
Dr. Berzin: Right. We can be ashamed of ourselves or of others, as in “I’m ashamed of what my children did.” We could also say, “I’m embarrassed by what my children did.” That could also be a use. And also, “I’m ashamed in front of somebody else.” “Embarrassed,” I think, is used more in relation to other people. We would say, “I’m ashamed of what I did, but I’m embarrassed to tell anybody.” I think that’s the distinction in English.
But, in any case, let’s not quibble about the words. Let’s deal with the concept. First of all, what would prevent us from admitting our mistakes and stupid actions to somebody else? If we were too embarrassed or too ashamed, we wouldn’t tell anybody, would we? So, we would have to overcome our embarrassment and our sense of shame in order to tell somebody, wouldn’t we? Do you agree?
Participant: In order to do that, I would have to give up the image of myself that I want others to have of me.
Dr. Berzin: Right – the image that “I’m such a good person.” Of course, it could also be that we want to be accepted by a gang of ruffians, so we brag about all the terrible things we did. But let’s leave that example aside.
Participant: Then we’re not ashamed.
Dr. Berzin: Right. Instead, we’re proud.
So, overcoming feeling ashamed and embarrassed requires quite a lot. We have to overcome a self-image – a false self-image. Actually, to go more deeply, we have to separate the doer from the deed, as you said, and not project any image. For instance, we also don’t want to project the image of “I am the repentant, good person,” the “good Buddhist,” or good whatever. That also could be a self-image: “I’m so wonderful and so honest for having actually admitted this to you” – in other words, feeling proud about that.
Now, is there a difference between feeling proud and feeling relieved because of having done that? What’s the difference? In both cases we feel happy. “Oh, I got that off my chest,” is the expression that we use in English. I think the psychology behind or the emotion involved with actually opening up and admitting our mistakes is very important to investigate.
Participant: I think that the point is not to take the association of the person and the deed to an extreme.
Dr. Berzin: Right. Ah! That’s an excellent point. The person and the deed are not identical, nor are they totally different, totally separate. If we go to the extreme of making them totally separate, we give up all responsibility. So, there’s obviously a middle path. That’s very much like Madhyamaka (Skt. Mādhyamaka): they’re neither one nor totally different and separate. So, we have to refute both extremes.
Participant: So, it would be OK for me to say, “What I did was not OK, but I’m not fundamentally a bad person.”
Dr. Berzin: Right. “What I did was mistaken. I was confused.” Thinking like that allows one to have compassion for oneself – that one wants to be free of this confusion.
Participant: I agree with the philosophical implications, but in daily practice, I would really keep the person and the deed separate.
Dr. Berzin: So, we shouldn’t dissociate from the deed too much, because then we give up responsibility. But in daily practice, especially if we are deeply embedded in guilt, I would add, it’s better to make this differentiation between the person and the deed.
Participant: I would just say, “I did something negative, but that doesn’t make me a negative person.”
Dr. Berzin: So, what’s important is not to deny that I did it.
Participant: “I have negative habits.”
Dr. Berzin: “I need to work on it and not just accept that that’s the way I am.” A lot of people say, “Well, that’s the way that I am. I have these negative habits, so learn to live with it. I am a person with a bad temper. Live with it.” We tell everybody else to deal with it.
Participant: “That’s my character.”
Dr. Berzin: Right. That is definitely not something that we would agree to from a Buddhist point of view. A character or personality can be changed regardless of how strong it might be. Changing it all depends on motivation and inspiration, of course, and having good methods, persevering with them, being patient and so on. And it’s not easy.
So, from a Western point of view, in order to open up to somebody – to the Buddhas and bodhisattvas, in this case – we would have to overcome feeling ashamed and feeling embarrassed, which, again, from our Western point of view, has to do, I think, with a strong identification with a certain image of ourselves. “I’m ashamed of what I did, and I’m too embarrassed to tell anybody. What will they think of me?” It’s very me-oriented.
Not Valuing What is Positive and Not Exercising Self-Control
Now, to look from the Buddhist point of view, Vasubandhu says there are two factors that are necessarily involved with all destructive behavior. One is not respecting or valuing qualities that are positive or people who possess those qualities. The other is not having any self-control, not having any sense of needing to restrain oneself from acting negatively. So, these are things that we would want to overcome, to get rid of. “I no longer want to be like that. I do respect and value what’s positive and people who are positive, and I will exercise some self-restraint and not just do whatever negative thing comes into my head.” So, now we’re not really dealing with the variables of being ashamed or being embarrassed.
Think about that. “I acted negatively because I didn’t value being positive. I didn’t see the value of that. I didn’t have any respect for that, and I exercised no self-control.” Probably, we didn’t even recognize what was positive and what was negative.
[meditation]
Do you remember the line from the Seven-Limb Prayer, “Overwhelmed by the deception of ignorance, I’ve committed many negative deeds”? I was overwhelmed by my unawareness. I didn’t know what was positive and what was negative, what was helpful and what was harmful. That underlines the fact that I was confused, that I was mistaken. I was deceived. It’s not that somebody else deceived me: I deceived myself. Because of that, I couldn’t recognize positive things, let alone value positive things. Also, because of that, I didn’t exercise any self-restraint. I didn’t know what to restrain from.
Do you remember a discussion we had some weeks ago about why we are honest, why we don’t cheat? This is assuming that we don’t cheat. In some societies it’s endemic. But I’m talking about people here who are trying to follow a spiritual life. I asked whether it was because we fear the suffering of worse realms. For most of us, that’s not the case. Then, I opened up and said that why I don’t cheat or deceive others is because it just doesn’t seem right. Now, if we analyze, we can see that when it doesn’t feel right to cheat or to lie to others, to be dishonest, it’s because we have some sense of what’s positive and what’s negative. And because we value what’s positive, we restrain ourselves from doing what’s negative. Also, when we lie or cheat, we can – if we’re sensitive to our bodily energies – feel a disturbance of our energies. We feel a little bit nervous. That’s an indication of a disturbing emotion, of confusion. Do you notice that? There could be a fear of being caught, of being found out, or whatever.
These are the two mental factors that Vasubandhu says accompany all destructive actions: having no sense of values (ngo-tsha med-pa, Skt. ahrikya), which means not respecting positive qualities or persons possessing them, and having no scruples (khrel med-pa, Skt. anapatrapya), which means lacking any restraint when it comes to acting negatively.
No Ethical Self-Dignity and Not Caring about the Effects of Our Actions on Others
What about Asanga (Skt. Asaṅga)? Asanga defines these two terms differently, and he doesn’t say that they are necessarily present in every destructive action. Nonetheless, it’s interesting to look at what he says about these two terms. He defines the first as no ethical self-dignity – not caring about how our destructive actions reflect on ourselves. So, because we don’t have ethical self-dignity, we act destructively. In a sense, that’s not having any shame, isn’t it? The second one is not caring about how our actions reflect on others, such as our family, our religion or some other group we might belong to.
There’s never any mention of not caring about how we might hurt others. That’s because we don’t know how our actions will affect others, what the consequences will be. Obviously, if we kill someone, that’s one thing. The example that you used today at lunch, which is a classic example, is a very good one: A farmer bought a horse for his son. Everybody said, “How wonderful,” and he said, “Well, it could be good or bad.” Then the boy fell off the horse and broke his leg. Everybody said, “Oh, that’s terrible,” and the farmer said, “Well, it could be good or bad.” Then a war broke out, and all the young men had to go to war, but his son was excused because he had broken his leg and he couldn’t walk properly – again, that could be good or bad. So, we don’t know what the consequences will be on somebody else. It’s a good example, although what we’re talking about is, in a sense, not having a sense of family honor – if we want to put it in different terms.
Participant: That’s very Asian.
Dr. Berzin: It’s very Asian – having a sense of honor. Is that the same as being embarrassed?
Participant: I don’t know. In what way do we not have a sense of honor?
Dr. Berzin: We don’t have a sense of honor, don’t honor our family, when we don’t care how our actions reflect on our family. We don’t care that, if we cheat or commit a crime, this will reflect badly on our parents and how they raised us or that this will reflect badly on our religion. If I’m a Buddhist and I go out and commit a crime, you’re going to think all Buddhists are criminals – this type of thing. So, certainly, that is a value that is important, even if we don’t come from a traditional Asian society. Our actions do reflect on others. We’re not just by ourselves. We don’t live in a vacuum.
But embarrassment doesn’t come up there, does it? So, it’s interesting.
Participant: Well, isn’t embarrassment losing face, public face?
Dr. Berzin: That’s a Chinese term, “to lose face.” Is that equivalent to these Sanskrit terms? Losing face in front of others has to do with what others think of us. Here, we’re not talking about what others think of us but about what others think of our family.
Participant: But the person who brings shame to the family is a member of the family.
Dr. Berzin: So, in other words, the whole includes all the parts. That’s true.
Participant: I guess in these Asian cultures, your actions reflect even worse on your family.
Dr. Berzin: Right. In some Imperial Chinese dynasties, when somebody committed a serious crime, it was customary to kill seven generations of that person’s family. The whole family would be punished.
In any case, I think that when it comes to opening up to others, openly admitting that we’ve done something wrong, it’s important to understand what we need to overcome. We talked about feeling too ashamed and embarrassed to tell somebody else, which we analyzed as having to do with thinking strongly of the “me,” of our self-image. And certainly, that’s valid. We would have to overcome that.
In addition, we would have to overcome being overwhelmed by the “deception of ignorance,” of unawareness. We would have to admit that we were mistaken. “I was mistaken in not valuing things that are positive and those who are positive. I was mistaken in not exercising any self-control. I really didn’t have any self-dignity, any sense of self-worth” – which in Western terms has to do with thinking, “I’m bad. I’m no good.” After all, what does it mean to have ethical self-dignity? It means, “I think enough of myself,” which can be based on Buddha-nature, etc., “that I’m not going to act like a complete idiot.”
This is the wonderful thing about the relation with the spiritual teacher and why one is supposed to always imagine one’s teacher as a witness sitting on one’s head or on one’s shoulder or in one’s heart all day long. “I have so much respect for my teacher – how could I act like an idiot in front of him?” So, again, this is this value of respecting positive qualities and those who possess them.
Therefore, because we have so much respect for the Buddhas and bodhisattvas, we care. We do value what’s positive and will exercise restraint. And we have some sense of self-worth. We acknowledge our Buddha-natures. You see, this is the problem: If we say, “I am originally or inherently bad” – original sin and all of that – then it’s hard to have a sense of self-worth. So, this is something that we have to be careful about.
We also have to realize that we don’t exist in a vacuum. There is a larger context. There are others who are affected by our behavior or by what others think about our behavior. So, the emphasis isn’t on me, me, me – just what they think of me. That would be a very selfish orientation. “I don’t want people to think badly of me. I want people to think well of me, so I’m going to admit that I did wrong.” That’s quite different from being concerned about our family, thinking, “I don’t care that it affects me so badly, but I do care that it affects my children, my family. And how it reflects on me reflects also on my family.”
Look at the Tibetan refugees who come to India. Well, many of them will go back because they don’t want their families to suffer retribution. In many of these societies, especially in the former Communist countries, when somebody did something wrong, everybody else in the family would be affected. They could lose their jobs and so on, couldn’t they? So, this acts as a strong motivation – having this sense of responsibility, in a sense, to the family.
Participant: It’s also possible to make the border around your “I” bigger.
Dr. Berzin: That’s true. We could just have a bigger “me.” We have to avoid as well identifying with just one group. However, it’s a little less selfish than thinking just of ourselves, because we could think, “I don’t care what happens to me, but I don’t want my children to be killed or to be disadvantaged.” This starts to become much more Mahayana in flavor.
Participant: I imagine that to reduce this solid feeling of being ashamed, you can look at the suffering you inflict on others and to feel compassion for them. It takes some attention away from this feeling of “I’m so bad. I’m so ashamed.” You still have this feeling, but you see more the consequences of your actions on others. “It was my fault that this other person suffers.”
Dr. Berzin: So, if we put the emphasis more on the other person by thinking, “I’m really sorry that you suffered as a consequence” – this is now talking about the victim rather than family, although the family of the victim could be included as well – we then take the emphasis off of the “me” that feels so ashamed. It could, however, make one feel even more ashamed.
Participant: It’s just that, often, when you do something out of anger, you get so angry that you don’t even think about the consequences. So, here, you would be looking at the consequences.
Dr. Berzin: So, thinking about the effect of our actions on others brings us closer to thinking in terms of the consequences of our deeds, rather than thinking just in terms of the “me,” the cause, and “how terrible I was.”
Participant: So, then you have the insight.
Dr. Berzin: So, it helps us to have insight into cause and effect and, also, to develop compassion for others. Definitely. That’s true.
It’s an interesting point because, here, we’re on the initial level of the lam-rim, and on the initial level, we’re not yet at the point of refuting the solid “me.” But if we go through the whole lam-rim sequence and then go back over the earlier stages, such as this initial scope, from the point of view of Mahayana – which is the way that it’s intended: first, we go through the stages step-by-step, and then we go back and reinforce each stage over and over again from a more holistic point of view – we would view this in a much larger context than that of me, me me.
In any case, it’s important to distinguish here between openly admitting our mistaken deeds to the Buddhas and bodhisattvas and confessing them to somebody in a church and asking to be forgiven for our sins.
Questions
To What Extent Should We Care about What Society Thinks?
Participant: One of Asanga’s points is that we should be concerned about how our actions reflect on our family and the group that we belong to. But what about being a homosexual? Many societies think homosexuality is wrong or sick and even blame the family? Should we be concerned about what society thinks?
Dr. Berzin: Ah! That’s a very good point. When a society considers homosexuality as wrong and blames the family for not correcting their child’s sexual orientation, should we, as that child, be concerned about what society thinks? Should we take that judgment as correct and, so, view homosexuality as something to avoid? Well, that’s the question. What do you think?
Now, let’s take this example of homosexuality even further, because this is an issue in many societies, in many, many societies – marriage. Say you you’re homosexual, so you don’t get married. That reflects badly on the family, and the friends of your mother and father are going to constantly bother them with questions: “When is your son going to get married? When is he going to produce grandchildren?” So, now it’s a real issue. It’s not something that you’re thinking about in the abstract. Now people are really giving your parents a hard time. What do you do?
Participant: You try to minimize the impact on family and society by not bringing your homosexuality to everybody’s attention and to the point of confrontation.
Dr. Berzin: Right. But still you’re not married.
Participant: Also, I think that when you confess in front of Buddha the mistaken things that you did that might reflect badly on your society or whatever, it’s also important to confess about what is mistaken according to your own values.
Dr. Berzin: That is very important. What do we openly admit to? Within Buddhist sexual ethics, there certainly are precepts concerning homosexuality, masturbation, and these sorts of things. They are to be avoided because they are contrary to the wish to attain liberation: they’re based on desire. It’s in that sense that they bring about suffering. Are they inherently bad? No. But they are undoubtedly based on some disturbing emotion, so they’re not going to bring you closer to liberation. That’s the point.
Participant: Yeah, but all types of sexuality are like that.
Dr. Berzin: That’s right, except for procreating. Therefore, sexual ethics for laypersons are about setting limits. We need to have certain limits and to realize that sexuality has its limitations. It’s not a path to liberation, by any means. And although one could be very, very strict, when we look at the history of sexual ethics for laypersons, we see that different things were added by certain authors at different times and that different things were left out. So, certain things seem to be culturally determined. For instance, prostitution for a married person is perfectly OK as long as one pays for the prostitute. This is quite strange from a Western point of view. So, I think the point is to set limits, because any sexual behavior is usually going to be based on desire.
Participant: In other words, is it how something reflects on others?
Dr. Berzin: Right. This is my point – that we would certainly want to openly admit having committed rape or something like that. That’s a serious thing. Adultery, as well, is pretty serious. It usually breaks up marriages. But masturbation? Homosexuality? I don’t really know. It’s interesting why gay people come out: “I want people to accept me for who I am.” That sounds very non-Buddhist, doesn’t it – thinking in terms of a solid “me” and a solid identity. Nevertheless, if you’re not going to get married, are you then going to lie and say, “Well, I haven’t found the right partner” – in which case, your parents are always trying to fix you up with somebody? Or do you just be honest and say, “That’s not for me”? These are difficult questions. But you’re right, we have to take into consideration not only whether the values of the society are correct and proper but also whether what you’re dealing with is that serious and how your family is going to be treated by society.
I bring in another example – the monastic rules of discipline that Buddha made. A great deal of them were made out of consideration for what society would think of the monastic community. For instance, people could lose respect for the monastic community if a monk and a nun were together in a room and sat on the same bed or if a nun walked around in the city without another nun as a companion. People could get the wrong ideas. Now, for a monk and a nun to be in the same room together isn’t necessarily a problem, but out of consideration for society, Buddha said to refrain from doing that. It might sound stupid. It might sound unnecessary. Particularly in our modern age, that might sound unnecessary. But that was how Buddha made a lot of the monastic rules of discipline.
So, this question of whether or not to get married because of what society deems to be correct is a difficult one to answer, especially if it means getting married under false pretenses, which would be the case for somebody who is gay. I don’t know what a clear answer for that would be. Obviously, the “un-brave” way of answering it would be to say that it depends on each individual case. So, I don’t know. You could be honest with your parents and suggest that they say to their friends and relatives, “He hasn’t found the right partner yet,” if they need to explain to others why you’re not married.
Participant: But in the end, everybody has to deal with the problem one’s self. Then one has to say, “Okay, I will refrain from certain sexual activities, but I will not refrain from this or that activity.”
Dr. Berzin: Right. This is how one approaches inappropriate sexual behavior in general. One decides to set certain limits. But with homosexuality, for instance, one decides, “I will refrain from kissing another man – my boyfriend – in public because people might attack us.” So, you just don’t do that. You don’t hold hands. You don’t do these sorts of things in public. You do them in private. But there are people who will object to that, gay couples who will object to that, and say, “I don’t care what society thinks.” This, I think, is asking for trouble. It is also, I think, based on an over-identification with one’s sexual orientation – making one’s sexual identity into something solid.
Participant: But there’s also the other side, which was, I think, his original point – that just because some people don’t like something and are displeased by all sorts of stuff, doesn’t necessarily mean that you have anything to confess.
Participant: Yeah, that was the point.
Dr. Berzin: Right. Just because others don’t approve doesn’t mean that I have to regret this. Thank you for clarifying.
Participant: And I don’t mean that you say that in a spiteful way. But the fact is, no matter what you do, somebody might take offense.
Dr. Berzin: That’s true. How I dress might cause offense to some people – or how I wear my hair. There are people who wear dreadlocks or have lots of body piercings and so on, and many people give them dirty looks.
Participant: Do I have to confess that?
Dr. Berzin: Right. Is it a mistake that we have to admit, or is it just the intolerance of the others? But even if it is just intolerance, we want for everybody to be happy and not to be unhappy. Does that mean that we have to please everybody? Well, we can’t please everybody. Not even Buddha could please everybody. And now it becomes very difficult, doesn’t it? Very, very difficult. So, then people, particularly in the West, would say, quoting Shakespeare, “Above all things, to thyself be true.” Be true to yourself.
Participant: What does that come from?
Dr. Berzin: Hamlet, I think. But it doesn’t matter. The point of “I have to be true to myself” is that “this is the real me, so I have to act like this.” This is over-identification with a certain self-image. Sill, we need to be considerate and to think about not causing offense – at least, gross offense. There’s always going to be somebody who finds what we do to be offensive – so, middle path.
Participant: But we can see, especially with your example of gays holding hands in the street, that things can come to be accepted. Due to some of them holding hands in the past, that has become more and more accepted. I see them all the time, and I don’t even notice it any more. And in some societies, marriage between gays is becoming accepted, and the other person even becomes part of the family.
Dr. Berzin: Right. There are a few countries in the world where gay marriage is accepted – although that doesn’t necessarily mean that they are accepted into the family. But at least it is legal. Some families are still very conservative. Still, there are plenty of places where a person could be thrown in jail or even get the death sentence. What does one do in a country like that? To say, “Well, the whole world has to change,” is quite idealistic – though it would be nice.
Participant: How could things change if nobody starts to make a change?
Dr. Berzin: So, you’re going to be a martyr?
Participant: I think Mark’s point was that no confrontation is an option but that a little confrontation can make a difference.
Dr. Berzin: So, then, again – middle path. A lot of confrontation is not productive, but a little confrontation is not so bad. So, you hold hands rather than passionately kiss on the street or in a restaurant, for example.
Participant: It can even be a problem, actually, when a man and a woman kiss in public.
Dr. Berzin: Right. A man and woman passionately kissing in public embarrasses a lot of people. It makes them feel uncomfortable.
Participant: In India, everybody holds hands and nobody’s gay.
Dr. Berzin: I wouldn’t say that nobody is gay, but certainly the vast majority of the men holding hands with other men and the women holding hands with other women are not gay. A man and a woman holding hands is something that’s now becoming more acceptable in India – though certainly not in Muslim countries.
But you’re right to ask: What do we openly admit? Is it actions that we’ve done that society doesn’t like? Remember, according to Asanga, having no ethical self-dignity and not caring how our actions reflects on our family, etc. – which is how he defines these two mental factors – are not necessarily present in destructive behavior. I think that we have demonstrated that in our discussion. According to Vasubandhu, however, not having any respect for what’s positive or people who are positive and not exercising self-control, which are his definitions of these two mental factors, are pervasive in destructive behavior.
So, that’s quite good. We’ve understood something.
Apologizing
Participant: Say I lost my temper with a colleague. I might admit it to the Buddhas and bodhisattvas or to a spiritual friend who could understand or be a witness, but I wouldn’t confess it to the colleague. With my colleague, I would just apologize.
Dr. Berzin: But an apology isn’t, “I’m sorry. You deserved to be yelled at. You were stupid, but I am sorry that I yelled at you.” I don’t think it’s like that. I think that a sincere apology has to be, “I was mistaken in doing that. I’m sorry.” This is a very important point. And it is why openly admitting our mistakes is just the prelude to the four opponents. The last opponent is doing something to counterbalance the mistaken behavior. One thing we can definitely do to counterbalance it is to apologize. Also, one of the bodhisattva vows is to accept the apologies of others when they apologize. It’s very important not to hold a grudge when others have acted negatively to us. We always have to accept apologies.
Do we have to apologize to the Buddhas and bodhisattvas? “I let you down. I’m sorry. I promised to keep this vow, and I didn’t keep it.” Are we apologizing to them? Apologizing implies being forgiven. Or does it? Or does apology mean, “Don’t be angry with me. Be patient”? And doesn’t forgiveness imply that the forgiver is in some kind of superior position – that because they’re in a superior position, they can forgive the other person? Or does forgiving merely mean not holding a grudge?
Participant: I think I am able to apologize when I have the wish to be forgiven by the other person. But there are things that are not that easily forgiven. Even so, I can still apologize.
Dr. Berzin: Are you saying that there are certain things that could not be forgiven?
Participant: There are things that are not easily forgiven.
Dr. Berzin: Right. “I apologize that I hit your mother with my car and killed her.”
Participant: In which case, I can say, “I’m really sorry.”
Dr. Berzin: And the other person says, “That doesn’t help.”
Participant: But it might help her in the long term.
Dr. Berzin: It might help her in the long term, but still, it would be hard for her to forgive you.
Participant: She might never forgive me.
Dr. Berzin: Right, but it makes you feel better.
Participant: It makes me feel better, and it might help her. Apologizing is better than saying that I don’t care.
Dr. Berzin: Well, you wouldn’t tell her that you don’t care; you would just not say anything.
Participant: It’s quite a hard bodhisattva vow to have to say, “OK, I accept,” when somebody apologizes for having killed your loved one.
Participant: Especially when they kill them on purpose.
Dr. Berzin: Right. It sounds terribly Christian, doesn’t it, to forgive in this instance. But is it appropriate in a Buddhist sense? And what does it mean? It means to accept the apology and not to hold a grudge.
Not hold a grudge – that’s interesting. Would God hold a grudge against us? Is that why one confesses to God?
Participant: He can only give mercy.
Dr. Berzin: So, why would one have to confess? Why would one have to ask for forgiveness?
Participant: You do it to cleanse your sins.
Dr. Berzin: Anyway, these are very interesting points. What is involved with apologizing? What’s involved with saying, “I’m sorry”? That we can look at a little bit later when we get to applying an opponent force, a remedial measure.
Participant: There are some similarities between confessing to God and confessing to a priest in a Catholic church.
Dr. Berzin: Right. However, what we were pointing out is that we’re not asking to be forgiven. But when we apologize to someone, are we asking to be forgiven? And does forgiveness simply mean not holding a grudge and not being angry – so, the same as being patient? Or does forgiveness imply being cleansed of a sin – that we were bad?
Participant: I think that apologizing doesn’t necessarily imply that you are asking to be forgiven. I might see that the other person has a lot of difficulty forgiving what I did; nevertheless, I can say, “I am really sorry.”
Dr. Berzin: It’s like regret. Regret is the first opponent force.
Participant: You could apologize even when, from your point of view, you were not at fault.
Dr. Berzin: That is from the attitude training: give the victory to the others. Also, it ends the argument. If you say, “I was wrong. You were right,” that ends the argument.
Participant: And it may help the person who was hurt by whatever I did. Even though I don’t think it’s my fault, I say, “I am sorry that it hurt you. It was not my intention. I’m sorry about that.”
Dr. Berzin: Right. Let’s say you’ve said something totally innocent, but the other person takes offense – which is something that has surely happened to all of us. You could say, “Well, I’m sorry that you feel like that. That was not my intention. But whatever I did that offended you, I’m sorry.” However, that brings up an interesting point. The second opponent force – so, the one after regret, which has a lot to do with being sorry – is to promise not to repeat the action. Unless we know what it was that we did that was offensive, how can we say that we’re not going to repeat it?
But now we’re getting way over time. Next time, we’ll go into the actual four opponents. I hope it’s OK, though, that we’ve gone into this in this type of detail and analysis. I think that, from an emotional point of view, this is really quite important, particularly since we are so accustomed to guilt in our society. So, how we deal with this in Buddhism is, I think, an important point.