..續本文上一頁e problem arises from. One can say, ”Oh, the monks weren”t good enough”, but that is not fair, really.

　　[The next question was not recorded].

　　AS: I have had a very fortunate experience with a Buddhist monk, Ajahn Chah, and I see what a very happy, tolerant and harmonious being he is. Of course, many of his disciples do not understand what he is teaching, either. Yet he certainly makes it all very clear and offers them every occasion to practise and find out.

　　When one talks about dukkha [suffering], the first noble truth, one is not talking abstractly about dukkha out there, that exists as some sort of nameless thing. I am talking about that very feeling in one, in here [points to himself], that does not feel quite happy or feels a bit upset, worried, discontented, insecure, or ill-at-ease. One experiences the first noble truth within oneself.

　　One is not pointing to dukkha as some sort of vague thing that hovers over the world. If one really looks at one”s mind, one finds discontentment, restlessness, fear and worry. That is something one can see oneself. One does not have to believe. It would be idiocy to say ”I believe in the first noble truth”, or, ”I don”t believe in the first noble truth. I believe that everything is wonderful.” It is not a matter of believing or disbelieving, but rather one looks inside and asks oneself, ”Do I always feel wonderful and happy

　　 Is life just a constant source of joy and gaiety

　　 Or do I sometimes feel depression, doubt, fear, etc

　　”

　　Just speaking from my own experience, I could very much see the first noble truth. It was not that I wanted a more depressing ideology to accept. I recognised that there was fear, uncertainty and uneasiness in myself. Yet the first noble truth is not a doctrine. It is not saying ”life is suffering”, but rather it is just saying, ”there is this”. It comes and goes. It arises (the second noble truth), it ceases (the third noble truth), and from that understanding comes the eight-fold path (the fourth noble truth), which is the clear vision into the transcendence of it all -- through mindfulness. The eight-fold path is just being mindful in daily life.

　　RW: Yet mindfulness itself is not a wholesome factor.

　　AS: Neutral. It does not belong to anybody. It is not something one is lacking; it is not a personal possession.

　　RW: There are wholesome and unwholesome mental factors, and there are factors which are always present, like mindfulness. Mindfulness is not innately good.

　　AS: It is awareness of good and evil as change. By using the wisdom factor of discriminating alertness (satipanna), one sees the conditions of good and evil as impermanent and not-self. This mindfulness liberates one from the delusion that these conditions tend to give.

　　--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

　　 2.

　　 RW: I would like to return for a moment to the role of tradition. Do you feel that adherence to a particular tradition would naturally tend to separate one from another tradition that has a certain set of values

　　AS: Well, on the level of convention, everything is separate anyway. You are separate from me as a person, as a body. That can only be solved when we merge by developing wisdom. With conventional form there is only separation. There will always be men and women and innumerable religious conventions. These are all on the level of sense perception, which is always discriminative and separative. It cannot be otherwise. Yet if one is mindful, those very conventions take one to the deathless, where we merge. There is no ”you” or ”me” there.

　　RW: ”Deathless” -- how do you use that term

　　AS: It just means that which is never born and never dies. There is nothing more one can say, really, because words are birth and death.

　　RW: Could one say …

《Ajahn Sumedho Interviewed》全文未完，請進入下頁繼續閱讀…