Todayand#8217;s Dharmabyte is a closer look into the chapter titled and#8220;Flowersand#8221; from the and#8220;Dhammapadaand#8220;, by Padmavajra. The ideal student masters the realm of death by entering the transcendental path while discerning the Verses of Truth.
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Flowers from the Dhammapada
[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, flowers. Who shall conquer the earth at the realm of death with its deities? Who shall make out the well-taught verses of truth as an expert picks flowers? The learner of the transcendental path shall conquer the realm of death with its deities. The learner shall make out the well-taught verses of truth as an expert picks flowers. So, first of all, who will conquer the earth and the realm of death with its deities? Conquer could also be translated as master. It can also be translated as comprehend. So, it's a matter of understanding, comprehending, mastering, life and death. The earth and the realm of death with its deities, life and death. And all the beings within it. So, who will master life? Who will master life? And who will make out the well-taught verses of truth? The verses of truth is dhammapada, actually. But probably it means here not so much the actual text of the dhammapada, but more the general meaning of making out understanding the Dharma, finding the way to the truth, finding the way of truth. So, who will understand the realm of life and death? And who will respond to that by finding the way of truth in relation to all that? And the answer to both is the learner of the transcendental path. The word 'for learner' is 'sake code'. It means literally one in training or disciple. And the one in training or the true disciple is the stream entrant, the one who is irreversible from enlightenment. That is the one who's entered the transcendental path. So, when you've entered the transcendental path, when you are irreversible from enlightenment, then you can really start to master the realm of death and its deities. You can really make out the way of truth, the verses of truth, the footsteps of truth. That's the sort of standard technical interpretation of this word 'sekka' for learner. But maybe we ought to kind of just bring it down to our own level just a little bit. And simply say, well, it's the one who is willing to learn, willing to discover who will master the realm of death. That is, who will make out the well-taught verses of truth. We need to become an ideal student. And we need to become a beginner all the time, actually. We need to be always in a state of beginnerhood if we're going to master the realm of death and its deities and make out the way to truth. We always have this sense of learning, really trying to learn and be open to the nature of things. And this ideal student makes out the verses of truth as an expert picks flowers. And I think what the text has in mind here is the expert garland maker, the expert garland maker. It's a real art, a real skill, selecting the best blossoms to thread, really looking for the best marigolds or the best roses or whatever it may be to thread pieces of string. And I really like the analogy of the person making out the truth as being like a garland maker, picking flowers and threading them on a garland. What I like about it, it's making it clear that discerning the truth isn't just an intellectual exercise. It's active, it's active, but it also involves aesthetic appreciation. You need a real feel for making out the truth. The truth isn't sort of abstract, it's not a set of ideas. You need to have a feel for its beauty and loveliness and distinctiveness. You get words for the spiritual life, even for reality itself, which involve the language of beauty, the word caliana, which is often used in the context of caliana mittreta, spiritual friendship, we usually translate that as. But caliana literally means the good, the ethically skillful, but it also means the lovely and the beautiful of the auspicious. And the word caliana is sometimes used to describe the whole range of the spiritual life. So you're trying to discern the caliana as much as you need to think as much in those terms as the truth. You also get a word like shumpa, which means pure, beautiful, lovely, which is often applied to reality itself. And it's why images of beauty throughout the Buddhist tradition are so important. Those, you know, the images of the Buddha, of Vajrasattva, and Padma Samava, are in the Shaiṇa. They're not illustrations, they're not illustrating an idea of the truth, those images. Those images are trying to communicate the truth. You know, if you look deeply into those images, you actually might start to discern the truth. And I think it's well worth reflecting on this, that actually, if we don't find beauty in discerning the Dharma in making sense of life and death, we're probably not going to make much progress. We'll probably just be running on ideas. There won't be that sort of powerful, driving, positive emotional response, which is really very, very important to the spiritual life. We hope you enjoyed today's Dharma Bite. Please help us keep this screen. Make a contribution at freebuddhistaudio.com/donnie. And thank you. www.donnie.com/donnie. [BLANK_AUDIO]