Todayand#8217;s FBA Dharmabyte, and#8220;The Four Sanghrahavastusand#8221; takes us into the heart of the Mahayana tradition and#8211; the Four Means of Unification and#8211; generosity, kindly speech, beneficial activity, and exemplifying. The Sutraand#8217;s hero, Vimalakirti, was a master of the Bodhisattvaand#8217;s and#8216;Skilful Means.and#8217;
From the talk and#8220;On Being All Things to All Menand#8221; by Sangharakshita, given in the series: and#8220;The Inconceivable Emancipation and#8211; Themes from the Vimalakirti Nirdesha.and#8221;
[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] So, we've seen why it is that the Mahayana attaches great importance to skillful means. We must now turn to skillful means, itself, that it is a skillful means considered as the seventh parameter, the seventh perfection. It's time I've fulfilled my promise to say something about each of the three things in the practice or employment of which Upaya or skillful means consists. So, first of all, I hope you're not going to be too put off by the technical terms, the Sanskrit and all that. We'll just take it in our strike. First of all, the four sangra havastus or elements of conversion. Elements of conversion is the usual translation here. It's the one that I've used in the survey of Buddhism. But Thurman, the American translator of the text, Thurman has suggested a much better alternative translation. One that in fact brings out the real meaning of the term, the real meaning of sangra havastu. He suggests it should be translated means of unification, that it would say means of unification of the spiritual community. Or as he explains it, the four ways in which a bodhisattva forms a group of people united by their common aim of practicing the dharma. After all, the bodhisattvas aim in making use of skillful means in being himself the skillful means is not simply to lead people to enlightenment individually. His aim is to enlist their cooperation in building the Buddha land for the benefit of all. So what are these four means of unification? First of all, there's dana or giving, a very old friend indeed, we may say. In fact, such an old friend that you might be surprised to find dana being mentioned here as part of the seventh partamita. After all, dana has a whole partamita to itself, so to speak, because dana or giving or generosity is the first partamita. But here, dana has a special function to perform. The function of establishing positive contact with people. The function of creating spiritual friendship. The function of helping to form a spiritual community. Now, we don't usually think of dana in this way. We usually think of dana in a more utilitarian way, so to speak. We give people something because they need it, but here it's not quite like that, at least not in the narrow sense. You give people things because you like them. You give people things because you want to be spiritual friends with them, because he wants to form a spiritual community with them. Not, of course, that you give in a calculating sort of way, just in order to bring about those particular results. The whole process, the whole process of giving in this way is completely natural, completely spontaneous. By giving someone a present, you give expression to your special awareness of them. You give expression to your positive feeling towards them. You give expression to your genuine concern for them. Giving, in fact, is a form of communication. We could even formulate a general principle here, even formulate a sort of aphorism. We could say a spiritual community is characterized by the constant exchange of presence amongst its members. Exchange of presence strengthens the spiritual community. It's a natural expression of the life of the spiritual community. Not that you give to him because he gives to you. You all just naturally feel like giving to one another, so you express that feeling by the actual giving of gifts. We hope you enjoyed today's Dharma Bite. Please help us keep this free. Make a contribution at freebuddhistaudio.com/donate. And thank you. [music] [music] [music] [BLANK_AUDIO]
