and#8220;And there he saw a man beating that drum. Then from the sound of the drum he heard these confessional verses.and#8221;
Todayand#8217;s FBA Dharmabyte, and#8220;Shifting the Centre of Gravity: Confession,and#8221; is an excerpt from the talk, and#8220;The Spiritual Significance of Confession,and#8221; by Sangharakshita, 1976.
[music] Dharma Bites is brought to you by Free Buddhist Audio, the Dharma for your life. Our work is funded entirely by donations from our generous listeners. If you would like to help us keep this free, make a contribution at freebuddhistaudio.com/donate. Thank you, and happy listening. So perhaps we now have a clearer idea of what is meant by the spiritual significance of confession. It means the confession has significance for the individual's attainment of higher levels of consciousness, whether those be the Dejanis or even the state of enlightenment itself. It means that confession plays an important part, an important role in the transformation of the individual, in what we may describe as the shift of the center of gravity of the individual's being, from the psychological to the spiritual, and from the spiritual to the transcendental. So it's confession in this sense that is illustrated in the sutra of golden light. Illustrated especially, as we saw last week in chapter 3 of the sutra of golden light, in which occur the celebrated verses of confession. Those who were present last week may remember that at the beginning of this chapter, chapter 3, the Bodhisattva, Ujuraketu, falls asleep. And later, when he relates the dream that he had while asleep to the Buddha, he says that he fell asleep one night when he was not tired. So this should give us a hint, this should give us a clue that the dream is no ordinary dream. In the dream, he says a golden drum, a drum that radiates golden light throughout the whole of space. And he says innumerable Buddhas sitting on thrones of barrier, a green precious stone, at the foot of wonderful jewel trees, at the head of assemblies of many hundreds of thousands. And these Buddhas also, so he says in his dream, fill the whole of space. And he further sees a man in the form of a Brahmin beating the drum. And while the drum is being beaten, a series of verses come forth. Well, last week we dealt with what Ujuraketu saw in his dream, and tried to give some hint, some pointer to its significance. But tonight we're concerned with the confessional verses which he heard. Verses which were which are not only sound but light, which are the golden light, the light that transforms the individual life, transforms the self, and transforms the world. Now last week we saw that these verses could be divided into ten sections. Three out of these ten sections are confessions of faults, or confessions of evil. And confession in this sense is the principal subject of the verses. So we'll be dealing with it at some length. But before that I want to say something about the prayer for the progress of all sentient beings and the bodhisattva vow. These make up the first and second sections of the verses. And afterwards that it is a after dealing with the confession of faults or confession of evil, I want to say just a little about rejoicing in medics and praises of the Buddha, which constitute the sixth and eighth and part of night sections of these confessional verses. Now I've described the first section of the verses as a prayer, but this is a very provisional description indeed. What I've called the prayer is in fact just the sound of the drum, is in fact the golden light of the drum. And more than that it's the effect of the sound, the effect of the light. In other words the effect which they have, which the sound and the light have on all sentient beings, and effect which is of course beneficent. In other words, who's your cater in his dream? Not only here's a prayer that by virtue of the drum of golden light all beings may progress, he sees in his dream he actually sees the golden light helping them to progress. So here we may say that the medium is in truth, the message. The prayer of the drum, the prayer of the golden light is as it were self-fulfilling. We mustn't forget that as we saw last week, the golden drum is the absolute. The golden drum is the Buddha as well as being Rutra Kato himself, that would say the new Rutra Kato. And the golden drum is also the sutra. So what Rutra Kato hears in this opening section of the confession is not just a pious wish, that all sentient beings may progress. What he hears and sees is a sort of cosmic drama. It's the drama of the effect of the golden light of the transcendental on the darkness of the mundane. He has, as it were in his dream, a sort of spiritual vision. On the one hand there is the golden light, the great golden light, which is the light of truth, the light of reality, the light of the Buddha. And on the other hand there is the darkness. The darkness of ignorance, the darkness of confusion and bewilderment, the darkness of defilement and passion. And he sees, Rutra Kato sees that the darkness is struggling. The darkness is struggling to overcome the light. And the light is struggling, as it were, to overcome the darkness. And he sees in his dream that the light is winning. He not only hears the prayer, that in the words of the verses themselves, the woes of the triple thousand world may be suppressed. He sees that, in the case of certain individuals at least, woes actually are being suppressed. He not only hears the prayer, that beings may be without fear, he sees some of them becoming free from fear. And in the same way, he sees beings gaining enlightenment. He sees them teaching the Dharma. He sees them destroying greed, hate and delusion. Moreover, he sees beings paying homage to the Buddha, worshipping the Buddha, sees them recollecting the Buddha, remembering the Buddha, meeting the Buddha, sees them performing skillful action, sees the fires of hell, being quenched, sees all woes being quenched, all woes being suppressed. In other words, Rudra Kato has a vision of the whole world being transformed. He sees darkness being overcome. He sees the golden light triumphant. So what is his response to this? He too feels the effect of the golden light. He too wants to be transformed. And not only that, he wants to cooperate with the golden light in its work of transforming the work. He wants to cooperate in the work of helping sentient beings to progress. But what does he do? What does he say? He says, "And may I be for those who are without deliverance, without rescue, without refuge, the deliverer, the refuge, the excellent protection." In other words, the bodhicitta, or will to enlightenment arises, and he takes, or he makes, the bodhisattva vah. He says, "The vah to attain supreme enlightenment for the benefit of all sentient beings." We hope you enjoyed today's Dharma Bite. Please help us keep this screen. Make a contribution at freebuddhistaudio.com/donny. And thank you. [music fades out] [music fades out] [music fades out] [BLANK_AUDIO]
