… This is also an issue in a famous story from the Vinaya. The different
cousins of the Buddha were planning to ordain, and there was one who
wasn’t quite sure whether he wanted to ordain or not. So one of the
other cousins said, “Well, what do you think you’re going to have to
do if you stay as a lay person …
… It’s related to Vinaya, the discipline.
Discipline is a word we don’t like. We tend to think of it as having to do with punishment and harsh regulations. But it’s simply a choice that you’re making. You’re learning from your past experience that some of your desires are in your best interest, and some of your desires are not …
… But he took the Vinaya and combined it with the forest practice and so rediscovered the way to Awakening.
At that time the Thai Buddhist hierarchy had decided that the way to nibbana was closed. Nobody seemed to be going that way — that was the official line. They even had made a survey of meditation temples to prove it. And Ajaan Mun had to …
… The second group contains those who study on their own – listening to sermons, reading textbooks, studying the Vinaya, Suttas, and Abhidhamma; discussing questions with one another (dhamma-sākacchā), which can lead to understanding on a higher level, so that one may apply one’s knowledge to training oneself.
Both groups are classed as being on the elementary level of education in the study of …
… So keep that in mind as you’re practicing, when you find yourself running up against something you’ve got to give up, either because of the Vinaya or because of the way we live here. Remember that it’s a trade, not a deprivation. If everything were really easy here, you’d start getting lazy, and your work on your inner resources would …
… As he said, the Dhamma
and the Vinaya are timeless, and we have to have pride in our timeless
tradition in order to maintain it.
Now, you do have to be careful about that pride. You notice in the
sutta on the customs of the noble ones, the Buddha said that you’re
careful to be frugal and content with little, but at the …
… sā vo bhavissati aññamaññānulomatā āpattivuṭṭhānatā vinayapurekkhāratā.
“That will be for your mutual conformity, for your arising out of offenses, for your esteem for the Vinaya.
(Mv.IV.1.14) evañca pana bhikkhave pavāretabbaṁ.
“And, monks, you should invite like this:
byattena bhikkhunā paṭibalena saṅgho ñāpetabbo
“An experienced and competent monk should inform the Saṅgha:
suṇātu me bhante saṅgho ajja pavāraṇā.
“‘Venerable sirs, may the …
… In some cases, it was in the form of the
rules, like the rules in the Vinaya. In other cases, there were more
general principles about how certain actions lead to happiness, and
other actions lead to long-term suffering. Based on that, you can
decide; he gives you principles for deciding. And he attacked any
teaching that would not provide you with those …
… To see intention
explained, you have to look into the Vinaya, the monk’s rules. There
you see intention defined basically as meaning to do something.
An unintentional act is when you didn’t mean to do it, or you meant to
do it but you didn’t mean to have certain results come about. For
instance, if somebody is choking on some food …
… The fence is the Vinaya, which prescribes penalties for our errors—major, intermediate, and minor. This is the fence that blocks the wrong paths so that we won’t stray down them, and that opens the right path—the Dhamma—so that we can follow it to the goal to which we aspire. The Vinaya is a fence on both sides of the path …
… The full set of disciplinary rules is called the Vinaya. Central to the Vinaya for each of the orders is a code of important rules, called the Pāṭimokkha, which the members of each Saṅgha should listen to every two weeks.
The Buddha established the Vinaya rules to serve three purposes:
• to maintain the good faith of the laity,
• to promote harmony within the Saṅghas …
… This is why we have the Vinaya for the monks—all the
rules that, at first glance, seem really obsessive. But they point to
an important issue: that if the mind is really well trained, if the
mind really is in a solid state of well-being, that fact should be
reflected in all of its activities. And one way of catching it is …
… When the Dhamma & Vinaya
proclaimed by the Tathagata is being taught, he heeds it, gives
it attention, engages it with all his mind, hears the Dhamma with
eager ears.
“He discerns that, ‘I am endowed with the strength of a person
consummate in view.’ This is the sixth knowledge attained by him
that is noble, transcendent, not held in common with
run-of-the …
… You read the story of his life, even just the section in the Vinaya,
and you see all the problems that the monks and nuns created for
him—and those were the people who were supposedly his disciples. On
top of that, he had to deal with sectarians of other kinds. Here he
was, offering them a path to the end of suffering, and …
… From the cessation of delight, I tell you, comes the cessation of suffering & stress. {By this means, Puṇṇa, you are not far from this Dhamma & Vinaya.”
When this was said, a certain monk said to the Blessed One, “Here is where I am ill at ease, lord, for I don’t discern, as they have come to be, the origination, the passing away, the …
… You look at the remainder of his life and you can see that it was full
of difficulties in trying to get the Dhamma and Vinaya established.
Here he had been working so hard to find something of real value, and
he was offering it for free, but there were a lot of people who
wouldn’t take it. Not only that, they would …
… The Khuddakasikkhā—a Vinaya manual written by Ven. Dhammasiri, a Sinhalese monk, in the 11th or 12th century—states that the sky lightens in four stages before sunrise (measuring in Sinhalese hours, of which there are 60 in one period of day and night): a slight reddening 4 Sinhalese hours (= 1 hour and 36 minutes) before sunrise; a slight whitening 3 Sinhalese hours (= 1 …
… People saying, “Well, why
don’t we change the Vinaya here, why don’t we change the Dhamma there,
make it nicer?” That’s what’s going to kill the Dhamma.
So while the true Dhamma is still alive, take advantage of it. It’s
still available. It’s simply up to you to decide whether it’s
important enough to focus all your …
… When he goes to visit the lay followers, though, instead of asking their forgiveness he quotes passages from the suttas and Vinaya showing that the Buddha did not allow bhikkhus to accept money. This time the lay followers are convinced by his arguments and announce that of all the bhikkhus in Vesālī, he is the only true son of the Sakyan. The Vajjiputta bhikkhus …
… I needed only to arouse mindfulness in them.
“So, monks, you, too, should abandon unskillful qualities and commit yourselves to skillful qualities, and in that way you, too, will come to growth, increase, & abundance in this Dhamma-Vinaya. Suppose, monks, that—not far from a village or town—there were a large sal-forest choked with castor-oil weeds. And suppose that some man …
II. The Department of Education | Basic Themes
… The second group contains those who study on their own – listening to sermons, reading textbooks, studying the Vinaya, Suttas, and Abhidhamma; discussing questions with one another (dhamma-sākacchā), which can lead to understanding on a higher level, so that one may apply one’s knowledge to training oneself. Both groups are classed as being on the elementary level of education in the study of …
MvIV: pavāraṇākkhandhako
… sā vo bhavissati aññamaññānulomatā āpattivuṭṭhānatā vinayapurekkhāratā. “That will be for your mutual conformity, for your arising out of offenses, for your esteem for the Vinaya. (Mv.IV.1.14) evañca pana bhikkhave pavāretabbaṁ. “And, monks, you should invite like this: byattena bhikkhunā paṭibalena saṅgho ñāpetabbo “An experienced and competent monk should inform the Saṅgha: suṇātu me bhante saṅgho ajja pavāraṇā. “‘Venerable sirs, may the …
SN 35:88 Puṇṇa Sutta | To Puṇṇa
… From the cessation of delight, I tell you, comes the cessation of suffering & stress. {By this means, Puṇṇa, you are not far from this Dhamma & Vinaya.” When this was said, a certain monk said to the Blessed One, “Here is where I am ill at ease, lord, for I don’t discern, as they have come to be, the origination, the passing away, the …
