Teaching of ThaBarWa
Sayadaw U Ottamasara
Guided Vipassana Insight
Meditation Sermon
Delivered at ThaBarWa
Centre (Thanlyin)
31st July 2012
Part One
Kamma
causes (actions or intention of an act) are
for doing only and using only. Kaya-kamma
(physical action) means all movements of the body or parts of the body, Vaci-kamma (oral
or verbal action) means all verbal expressions and Mano-kamma (mental action) is the functioning of the mind.
As
long as one is using one's mind, it is called mental action. As long as one is using one's body, it is
called physical action.
-
Using visual objects, voice and language
are kamma cause.
-
Using taste, feeling and thinking
are kamma cause.
-
Using eyes, ears, nose, tongue,
body, mind, visual objects, sound, smell, taste and feeling are also kamma cause.
- Technology
is kamma result (effect).
- Using
technology can be called kamma cause.
- Using
time, place and life are also kamma cause.
Staying
idle or not doing anything physically, mentally or verbally does not
necessarily means eradicating the root-cause of those kamma actions. It is not
the correct way. It is not sufficient.
Eradicating
the root cause does not necessarily imply merely abandoning of one's kamma cause
such as doing or not doing anything.
Though one needs to abandon physical action, verbal action and mental
action, it is insufficient to just abandoning them in that way.
One
needs to center their utmost abilities to carry out :
- Dana, which is the
ability that can use all living and nonliving things as abandoning purpose,
- Sila,
abandoning power to all physical and oral actions,
- Bhavana, abandoning power
to all mental actions.
It
does not necessarily matter whether :
- the mind
is carrying out the tasks of the mind or
- the eyes
are doing the jobs of the eyes or
- the ears
are doing the jobs of the ears or
- the body
is carrying out the tasks of the body.
Doing
the job or carrying out the tasks is not really important.
It
is more important to have ability to abandon placing central emphasis on those
tasks.
It
is more important to place central emphasis on real dana, real sila and
real bhavana.
Placing
central emphasis on mindfulness is also mental action .... be it on purpose or
automatic, all are called kamma causes.
Eradicating
the root cause means striving to abandon mind from putting mindfulness on
endeavours, on purpose or automatically.
Effort
always come together with mindfulness.
Concentration
is attained through effort and mindfulness.
If
one places effort and mindfulness over issues, such as health, rules and
regulations, one will eventually attained concentration on these issues.
Likewise,
if one places effort and mindfulness over Buddha, dhamma and sangha, one will
have interests in religion, dhamma and thus one will eventually attain concentration
on these subjects.
If
one sets eyes on technologies or medicine and place mindfulness and effort over
these subjects, one will attain concentration and eventually becomes specialist
in these field.
Be
it doing something or idling or doing nothing but eating and sleeping ....
these actions still amount to committing kamma cause. Whatever the conduct is, be it big or small,
there is always an involvement of mindfulness, effort and concentration in it.
One
needs to have knowledge, skill and expertise to carry out tasks, think and plan
for his job, business and endeavours.
Likewise,
all the yogis (meditators) have faith and understanding in the method and
technique of meditation that he or she is practicing; he or she will also be
able to think and understand other's methods, techniques and teachings and he
or she will, more or less, have mindfulness, effort and concentration on his or
her method of meditation.....these are just kamma causes.
Those
kamma causes such as mindfulness, effort, concentration, thinking, analyzing,
understanding, all are related to mental action, superficial and created
truth.
To be continued ...