Janet and I were settling into a daily disposition of monastery life in 1981 Thailand. Although we were forbidden to have touch with each other (we would sneak notes sometimes), that didn't sway us; we felt privileged to be here at Wat Pah Nanachat with these developed monks and nuns, and practicing with them was a moving experience.
The whole community would occasionally get together to relate the Buddha's teachings in Pali, the valid spoken language of the Buddha. One of my favorite Buddhist stories was that of a king who was wounded with a poison arrow. Although the king was distinct to die unless treated immediately, he wouldn't allow the physicians to either take off the arrow or treat him until they could sass his questions: Who shot me? Where was the arrow made? What kind of a bow was used? What bird did the arrow's feathers come from, and so forth.
Kill Mosquitoes
The analogy is that we are all wounded mortally but refuse to cure ourselves until all is first explained to our satisfaction, which, of course, is impossible. "Where does the universe come from? What's behind it all? Do we have a permanent soul? Where are we going? Where did we come from? What are we?" If we stubbornly refuse to begin curing ourselves until after we have received satisfactory answers to these spiritual questions, we will be waiting for a long time! Answers merely reflect knowledge, which is dead information, because knowledge is conception and conception is always in the past. Since the truth is alive and permanently moving, the questions can never be answered to the satisfaction of mere mind.
Only when we can get beyond mind will these questions have validity, and if we could initially comprehend that, then our poison arrow could be removed, a poison that is no more or less than our idea of our "self."
The Buddha's teachings are unique, not exactly a religion, or philosophy, or psychology, and his customary spoken word remains unchanged to this day. The field of Buddhism of which these monks and nuns at Nanachat belonged was the original, conservative sect of Buddhism that has accurately preserved the Buddha's teachings for over 2500 years. This literal, preservation was fulfilled, by five hundred of his fully enlightened monks who met together to codify and memorize his whole teachings only three months after the Buddha died at the age of eighty. By chanting every word in unison, accurately and without alteration or interpretation insured that if one or two monks made a mistake and chanted the wrong words, the others would carry the day. As a result, it's a good bet that what the Buddha originally taught over twenty-five hundred years ago is being taught unchanged today.
Shaving heads was a twice a month ordeal, and with no mirror, and protection razors sans safeties, it was an moving experience. After the trauma of shaving my own head and mopping up the blood, I would meet in the sala at midnight with the rest of the community. One of the monks would volunteer to relate the two hundred and twenty seven rules, in Pali, (by memory), which would take about forty-five minutes, reciting as fast as he could. Then we would sit up all night meditating in the hall until daybreak when we would go on our alms rounds.
I was ordained as a novice to begin with, the step before full ordination, which means that I would technically only be responsible for retention 10 precepts rather than the 227 rules. In practice, however I wore the orange robes of a fully ordained monk and followed their 227 rules pretty much as they did.
The 227 rules were a study in themselves. During ordination, a monk would have to chant: "Head hair, body hair, nails, teeth, and skin," in Pali. He was to recognize these things throughout his life's touch as a monk. I had always related these five things to an animal, and often reflected on how, as human beings, we are in many ways animals, from our sex acts to our aggressive behavior. I saw the rules as a formalized progression from an animal to a human being, with meditation being a further refinement - from a human being to something more profound.
In addition to these five meditation objects, monks would meditate on the thirty-two body parts, each part capable of taking the practitioner into jhana states, or highly deep stages of concentration, just as the breath, or attention of breathing could do.
The rules dictated that we couldn't steal, kill humans, animals, or even swat nasty, disease-laden mosquitoes. We couldn't indulge in sexual activities (including masturbation), lie or use improper speech, or drink alcohol. We couldn't touch gold, silver, money, travelers checks (you get the idea) - or women! Or talk to women in private! We couldn't even hug a female relative! (But this rule was not kept religiously when a monk's mum or sister visited). And when monks were abroad visiting families, they could only be housed in places not under the same roof as a female, etc., etc.
One day in the sala after the meal, we were conferrence our bowls and heading face to wash and dry them in the sun, when a young, very cute, community girl, possibly twenty years old and speaking excellent English, asked me where I was from! I began chatting with her and before I knew it, two monks were hurrying over, frowning and shaking their fingers. Oops. I was violating a rule! The girl apologized, saying that she knew better, while I apologized to the monks as well, explaining that I was not accustomed to the rules yet. "Once planted, lust grows like Morning Glories in the springtime," they reminded me, and recommend that a few straightforward words could ruin my meditation for months - if I started mental about the young girl in my kuti!
I walked face and began cleaning my bowl in the stream alongside a Thai novice that had seen what happened. He looked at me with a mischievous smile, and said something that I will never forget...
Meditating in the Forest (Part 1 of 6)
