透過教育弘揚佛法

　　PROPAGATION OF BUDDHISM THROUGH EDUCATION

　　法界佛教大學校長阿比納博士講于九月八日萬佛城大殿

　　A talk by Dr. Snejzana Akpinar, President of Dharma Realm Buddhist University on September 8, 1998, in the Buddha Hall at the City of Ten Thousand Buddhas

　　戴嶽子 中譯 Chinese translation by Dai Yue Zi

　　晚安，希望大家能細心聽我講，因爲我要講的是我們該如何教人，和我們該如何弘揚佛法。

　　Good evening. I hope you will listen to my lecture carefully, because I will talk about how we should teach and how we should propagate the Dharma.

　　法即教育，或者說佛法的一面是教育；反之，教育也是法。所以，通過教育去弘揚佛法就幾乎等于通過教育去推廣教育。兩者差不多是一個詞。

　　Dharma is education, or one aspect of Dharma is education, and conversely, education is Dharma. So, to propagate the Dharma by education would almost mean to propagate education through education. They are almost the same word.

　　法的意思很多，但它主要的意思，從其梵文出處，以及在印度來說，是指「方法」和「系統」而言。我們可以問自己，什麼是教育？思考這個問題的本身，也就是一個方法——一個將我們混亂的思想理出一個頭緒來的方法。其目標總是一致的：即是幫助衆生明白他們的真實自性，使他們向善向上。所以，佛法即是釋迦牟尼佛及佛教化導衆生的方法。

　　Dharma means a lot of things, but its primary meaning in Sanskrit, where the word comes from, and in India in general, is a "method" or "system." We can ask ourselves: What is education

　　 That, too, is a method: a method for sorting things out in our confused minds. The goal is always the same: It is to help living beings become better by attaining some understanding of their true nature. So, the Buddhadharma is the method of education which Shakyamuni Buddha and Buddhism uses.

　　在梵文裏還有一個詞——「叁那塔納法」，意即恒常不變之教。此詞並不包涵佛教、印度教或其他宗教的涵意在裏面。它是一種永恒的東西。這也是釋迦牟尼佛，及此世界許許多多的賢聖者所教的東西；不只是教，更在爲這世界重興這種修習之法。此教總是在那兒的，只是需要一再地取來用之，來適應某個時代的情況。

　　There is also something that is called the sanatana-dharma in Sanskrit, which means the perennial or eternal teaching, the teaching that is always constant and that never changes. And that teaching has no connotation of Buddhism or Hinduism or any other religion. It is that which is always there. And that is also what Shakyamuni Buddha, along with many sages of this world, was teaching—not only teaching, but reviving—as a practice for the world. It is a teaching that is always there, but it needs to be brought forth again and again in order to suit the conditions of a certain age.

　　在我們這個「現代世界」——現在應稱「超現代世界」了——從本質上說，人們還是在一樣的；像往常一樣，我們還是非常地迷糊，我們也在尋求一種秩序，以我們能力內的最好方法，去將事情理出一個頭緒。這需要艱苦的付出，嚴格的紀律，還有失望、不快樂，也就是在梵文或巴利文中所稱的「不滿」(dukkha 都卡)；即佛教徒稱之爲「苦」的。這是一種苦，但也有樂的一面。總而言之，教育或弘法的宗旨在于使人類找到一條離苦得樂的途徑，在這個基礎上再去幫助別人得到同樣的安樂和遠離執著。

　　In our modern—and what is now called postmodern—world, people are still attempting to do that same thing, in essence. As usual, we are still very confused, and are trying to help ourselves to find some kind of order, to sort things out the best way we can. That requires very hard work. It requires discipline, and of course it requires disappointment, unhappiness, or what in Sanskrit or in Pali is called dukkha—unsatisfactoriness, which we Buddhists like to call "suffering". It is a form of suffering, but it also involves some happiness. Above all, the whole point of education or Dharma, is to enable us human beings to find a way out of it all, to reach a point of equanimity, from where we can compassionately help others reach that same point—that point of equanimity or detachedness.

　　在這一整個過程，作爲老師、教育工作者、母親、父親、作爲工程師、醫生或律師，我們應時時不忘慈悲或者說觀音菩薩是我們的主要伴侶。那就是我們的救生索，能令我們于迷糊之海中得以生存，能令我們具足能力去幫助別人，使他們也具足能力再去幫助其他的人。否則，在這不完美的社會，我們會別的不成，而盡是滿腔的沮喪，憤懑和怨恨。

　　Throughout this process, as teachers and educators, as mothers, as fathers, as engineers or doctors or lawyers, we should never forget that” our major companion has to be compassion or Guanyin. That will help us survive above the confusion and enable us to help others to do the same. Otherwise, we will very easily get frustrated in this imperfect world, and we will simply be angry and resentful, nothing else.

　　爲何教育是不可少的呢？一個人如何去從事教育呢？教育人有許多方法，教育的種類也有許多，沒有一個簡單單一的答案。其中一個重要的因素是要了解學生的的需求、程度…

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