..續本文上一頁the same way. As long as we don”t know these things we think, "What can I do

　　 I have so much greed and aversion." This is not clear knowledge. It”s just the same as when we thought the madman was sane. When we finally see that he was mad all along we”re relieved of worry. No-one could show you this. Only when the mind sees for itself can it uproot and relinquish attachment.

　　It”s the same with this body which we call sankharas. Although the Buddha has already explained that it”s not substantial or a real being as such, we still don”t agree, we stubbornly cling to it. If the body could talk, it would be telling us all day long, "You”re not my owner, you know." Actually it”s telling us all the time, but it”s Dhamma language, so we”re unable to understand it. For instance, the sense organs of eye, ear, nose, tongue and body are continually changing, but I”ve never seen them ask permission from us even once! Like when we have a headache or a stomachache — the body never asks permission first, it just goes right ahead, following its natural course. This shows that the body doesn”t allow anyone to be its owner, it doesn”t have an owner. The Buddha described it as an empty thing.

　　We don”t understand the Dhamma and so we don”t understand these sankharas; we take them to be ourselves, as belonging to us or belonging to others. This gives rise to clinging. When clinging arises, "becoming" follows on. Once becoming arises, then there is birth. Once there is birth, then old age, sickness, death... the whole mass of suffering arises. This is the Paticcasamuppada. 9 We say ignorance gives rise to volitional activities, they give rise to consciousness and so on. All these things are simply events in mind. When we come into contact with something we don”t like, if we don”t have mindfulness, ignorance is there. Suffering arises straight away. But the mind passes through these changes so rapidly that we can”t keep up with them. It”s the same as when you fall from a tree. Before you know it — "Thud!" — you”ve hit the ground. Actually you”ve passed many branches and twigs on the way but you couldn”t count them, you couldn”t remember them as you passed them. You just fall, and then "Thud!"

　　The Paticcasamuppada is the same as this. If we pide it up as it is in the scriptures, we say ignorance gives rise to volitional activities, volitional activities give rise to consciousness, consciousness gives rise to mind and matter, mind and matter give rise to the six sense bases, the sense bases give rise to sense contact, contact gives rise to feeling, feeling gives rise to wanting, wanting gives rise to clinging, clinging gives rise to becoming, becoming gives rise to birth, birth gives rise to old age, sickness, death, and all forms of sorrow. But in truth, when you come into contact with something you don”t like, there”s immediate suffering! That feeling of suffering is actually the result of the whole chain of the Paticcasamuppada. This is why the Buddha exhorted his disciples to investigate and know fully their own minds.

　　When people are born into the world they are without names - once born, we name them. This is convention. We give people names for the sake of convenience, to call each other by. The scriptures are the same. We separate everything up with labels to make studying the reality convenient. In the same way, all things are simply sankharas. Their original nature is merely that of things born of conditions. The Buddha said that they are impermanent, unsatisfactory and not-self. They are unstable. We don”t understand this firmly, our understanding is not straight, and so we have wrong view. This wrong view is that the sankharas are ourselves, we are the sankharas, or that happiness and unhappiness are ourselves, we are happiness and unhappine…

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