19. Rules & Determinations

Training in the Vinaya fosters all four forms of determination. We’ve already discussed one way in which it fosters discernment: You learn how to talk yourself into abstaining from actions that you like doing but will lead to long-term harm, and to talk yourself into doing actions that you don’t like doing but will lead to long-term well-being.

But the Vinaya also fosters discernment in another way. It contains discussions of many cases where a monk misbehaves in a way that doesn’t quite come under a rule that has been formulated, and the question arises: How to determine what penalty, if any, his misbehavior might deserve?

In adjudicating cases like this, the Vinaya employs a framework for analyzing actions that’s useful not only for grading levels of offenses, but also for understanding the nature of action itself. The framework looks at an action in terms of five aspects: the intention, the perception, the object, the effort, and the result. For instance, to break the rule against killing a human being, five conditions have to be met:

If a monk acts in a way that meets all of these conditions, he’s permanently expelled from the Community. If some of these conditions are met but others are not, the penalty is less severe. Examples would include: dropping a large rock on a human being in the dark and so killing him, but perceiving him to be another large rock; trying to kill a human being but only injuring him/her; hitting someone on the back to dislodge something caught in his throat, not intending to kill him, but he dies as a result. The first two examples would entail the lesser penalty of confession; the last example, no penalty at all.

What’s important about this framework is that it emphasizes two factors that, in dependent co-arising, occur prior to sensory contact: intention and perception. Knowing that you’ll have to analyze your actions in this way if your behavior is ever called into question, you learn to apply this framework to all your actions. As a result, you become more sensitive to events in your own mind and their role in inspiring you to act. That helps to develop your discernment.

As for the other determinations:

The fact that the rules are clear-cut, with clearly delineated exceptions, forces you to be precise in judging your own actions. The clear boundaries provided by the rules make it hard to fudge the question of whether your actions are harmful or not. In this way, the rules foster the quality of truth.

The need to abandon any behavior that goes against the rules—including the mental tendency to make excuses for yourself for not abiding by them—fosters the quality of relinquishment.

The reward of following the rules is that you have no reason for remorse over your behavior. This freedom from remorse is a source of joy, and as we pointed out in the discussion of the Buddha’s instructions to Rāhula, that joy helps to foster a radiant sense of inner calm.