In todayand#8217;s FBA Dharmabyte and#8220;Buddhist Dragons,and#8221; Sangharakshita shares a few thoughts on the naga, or Buddhist Dragon. From the talk, and#8220;Protectors of the Dharmaand#8221; in the and#8220;Transformation of Self and Worldand#8221; series on The Sutra of Golden Light by Sangharashita, 1976. In this series Sangharakshita here shows how one of the most popular of Mahayana Sutras takes on the idea of transformation, and finds the beauty that awaits us in the dream that is also like Reality.
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Buddhist Dragons
[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. [music] I want to conclude tonight with a few remarks on something I touched upon earlier on. And that is the subject of dragons. That is to say, the nag as a seppence. Recently I was reading a book, a Buddhist book, written by a Chinese Buddhist monk who is still alive. And he made imparting the statement that dragons are not so common nowadays as they used to be. However, I must say, straight away, I don't agree with him. I think that they are, if anything, commoner than they used to be, at least in some parts of the world. So how is this? You may remember that the protector of the western quarter of the world is Virupaksha. You remember that Virupaksha is the protector of our quarter of the world. He's associated with the western direction, with the western region, like Amitabha, like other locatorsphara, in fact like the whole lotus family. And which class of non-human beings is Virupaksha, the leader and ruler of? He's the leader and ruler of the dragons and others. Now what exactly are the dragons? We mustn't confuse them with our own Welsh dragons, or British dragons. We mustn't confuse them with the dragons that were killed by King Arthur and his knights. The Buddhist dragon is quite a different kind of creature. According to Buddhist tradition, dragons are highly intelligent. You may not believe this, but they really are. They often have a very good understanding of the Dharma. A very good understanding indeed, but they don't practice the Dharma. In particular, they don't observe the precepts. And this is why perhaps in Indian Buddhism, in Indian Buddhist art, dragons are represented more often than not in serpent form. They are to say with big heads and long thin bodies. And of course, no arms and no legs. So why is this? No arms and no legs. What does that mean? Well, no arms and no legs because dragons, serpents, don't do anything. They can only think. They can only understand. They never practice. So they don't need arms and legs, you may say. So we can perhaps now see why I don't agree that dragons are not so common as they used to be. In the West, dragons are very common indeed. In the West, we have lots of people who understand the Dharma very well. Who know all about Shrinya Tha, all about Zen, all about the One Mind, all about the Abhi Dharma, all about the esoteric tantric teachings, especially the esoteric tantric teachings. But you never even think of practicing the Dharma. Such dragons are very common in some Buddhist circles. We may even have a few of them in the audience here tonight. They can take human thought. So what does this mean? What does this imply? What it means that we need to invoke the help of Virupaksha, the protector of the Western quarter. In other words, we have to bring our dragons under control. We have to bring our one-sided intellectual activity under control. We have to start practicing the Dharma. We have to start being receptive to the Dharma, being receptive to the golden light. If we do that then, we will be able to transform our own life, our own self, and also we will be able to co-operate in the transformation of the world. And if we can do that, then we too shall be in our own much smaller sphere, one of the protectors of the Dharma. We hope you enjoyed today's Dharma Bite. Please help us keep this free. Make a contribution at freebuddhistaudio.com/donate. And thank you. [BLANK_AUDIO]