The Buddhist Hour Radio Broadcast Archives
Buddhist
Hour
Radio Broadcast on Hillside 88.0 FM
Broadcast 317 for
Sunday 22 February 2004
This script is
entitled:
Generosity - the first base of meritorious actions
Edmund Burke (1729-1797) said in the Speech on the
Middlesex Election: "It is... our business carefully to
cultivate in our minds, to rear the most perfect vigour and maturity,
every sort of generous and honest feeling that belongs to our
nature."
Buddha Dhamma is practised with body, speech and
mind. Generosity as part of Buddha Dhamma practice is performed with
body, speech and mind.
Generosity or dana in the Pali language
can be practised in many ways.
Recently our members welcomed
two groups of Buddha Dhamma practitioners to our Temple around the
time of the Chinese New Year celebrations. The two groups, of around
ninety persons, traveled in buses visiting many Buddhist Temples as
part of their annual one-day pilgrimage.
It had been some
years since they had visited our Upwey Centre, creating the
opportunity for our members to practise generosity in many ways,
offering Buddha Dhamma materials, brochures, food and refreshments,
and incense as dana to our many visitors.
Our Members
welcomed our guests, giving their time freely for the benefit of the
many visitors, and thanking each person for coming and inviting them
to visit again and again.
On 1 February 2004 on the
Buddhist Hour we outlined The Code of Conduct for Members and
Students of the Chan Academy Australia, Buddhist Discussion Centre
(Upwey) Ltd. as recommended by our Founder, Master John D.
Hughes.
The first of these recommendations was:
"Practice
and develop morality."
In last week's program we talked
about morality as the foundation stone of Buddha Dhamma practice.
Knowing that you are blameless generates peaceful mind states.
This
week we will talk about the second of these recommendations:
"Practice and develop generosity"
Generosity in the
Pali language is dana.
The meaning given in the Pali Text
Society Pali-English Dictionary for dana is:
Giving, dealing
out, gift; alms-giving, liberality, munificence; especially a
charitable gift to a bhikkhu or to the community of bhikkhus, the
Sangha. As such it constitutes a meritorious act (punnan) and heads
the list of these, as enumerated in order, danamaya punnan, silamaya
punnan, bhavanamaya punnan, that is acts of merit consisting of
munificence, good character and meditation.
Special merit and
importance is attached to the mahadana the great gift, that is the
great offering (of gifts to the Sangha).
The constituents,
qualities and characteristics of a dana are:
8 objects suitable
for gifts form a standard set (also enumerable as 10), that is anna
pana vattha yana mala gandha-vilepana seyyavasatha padipeyya (bread,
water, clothes, vehicle, garlands, scented ointment, convenience for
lying down and dwelling, lighting.
The Anguttara-Nikaya iv.239
reads:
The worthy man... gives clean (things), what is choice,
proper, at fitting time, and with care; he gives repeatedly; and
giving calms his mind; after giving he is glad...these are the eight
gifts of a good man.
Clean, choice and timely, proper drink
and food
He gives in charity repeatedly
To them that live the
life - fair field of merit-
Nor feels remorse at lavishing his
gifts
Of things material. Gifts given thus
The seers extol. And
sacrificing thus-
Wise man, believer, with his heart set
free-
I'the calm and happy world that sage is born.'
Danavatthu
is that which constitutes a meritorious gift; almsgiving,
beneficence, offering, and donation.
Dana (or generosity) is
the first of the ten perfections to be practiced. It is also the
first bases of meritorious actions.
Give whatever you can -
even if it is one stick on incense.
Give to others regularly.
Take flowers or gifts whenever you visit any person or
organisation, even to your doctor or dentist.
Offer food
regularly to Sangha members, other persons, birds and animals - do
whatever you can.
The practice of generosity counters
meanness and selfishness around possessions. Practicing giving things
away, especially the things we like, eases our grasping nature.
Great play write Shakespeare wrote in King Lear, "My
mind as generous, and my shape as true".
The
Buddha taught ten meritorious deeds for us to perform in order to
gain a happy and peaceful life as well as to develop knowledge and
understanding.
If one likes to accumulate good kamma in this
life, there are ten bases of meritorious actions which produce good
effect and which should be done by all means. (Dr. Mehm Tin Mon:
1995, p. 209).
Dana, giving charity or generosity, is the
first of the ten bases of meritorious actions.
The other bases
are:
Sila: morality; observing five precepts, eight precepts,
ten precepts, etc.
Bhavana: meditation - both tranquillity and
insight
Pacayana: reverence to elders and holy
persons
Veyavacca: service in wholesome deeds
Pattidana:
transference of merit
Pattanumodana: rejoicing in others'
merit
Dhamma-savana: listening to the doctrine
Dhamma-desana:
expounding the doctrine
Ditthijjukamma: straightening one's
right view
The ten meritorious actions can be classified into
three groups; namely dana group, sila group and bhavana group.
The
dana group represents alobha (generosity) and opposes issa (jealousy)
and macchariya (stinginess). It is compared to the legs.
The
sila group represents adosa (goodwill) and opposes lobha (attachment)
and dosa (anger). It is compared to the body.
The bhavana
group represents amoha (wisdom) and opposes moha (ignorance). It is
compared to the head.
To have a complete set of legs, body and
head, one must perform all the three groups of punna-kiriya-vatthu
(bases of meritorious actions).
A stingy mind could be
likened to rotten prune whereas the generous mind is fresh like the
ripened fruit.
Teaching and listening to the Buddha Dhamma
are important factors for happiness for both the teacher and student,
while encouraging both to live in line with the Dhamma.
But
to do this, we set up a library of worthy references.
Straightening
one's views enables a person to show to others the beauty of the
Dhamma.
In the Dhammapada, the Buddha taught:
'Should a
person perform good,
He should do it again and again;
He should
find pleasure therein;
For blissful is the accumulation of good.'
'Think not lightly of good, saying,
'It will not come near
to me' -
Even by the falling of drops a water-jar is
filled.
Likewise the wise man, gathering little by little,
Fills
himself with good.'
The merits from giving Buddha Dhamma
texts to our library are great as we intend our library to last at
least 500 hundred years.
A person who is enjoying receiving
paper handouts of Dhamma without paying any attention to kamma has
somanassa - sahagatam ditthigata - sampayuttam asankharikam - ekam:
meaning, one consciousness, unprompted, accompanied by joy, and
connected with wrong view. This is a citta (consciousness) state
rooted in lobha (greed).
When we make an offering and have
non-attachment to the offering and goodwill for the welfare of the
being who receives the offering, and if we also have knowledge of
kamma and kamma-result at the time of giving, we have all three
wholesome roots to accompany our consciousness, that is adosa
(goodwill), alobha (generosity) and amoha (wisdom).
If we make
an offering without being prompted by anyone and if we also feel glad
at the time of offering, the kusala citta will be "somanassa -
sahagatam nana - sampayuttam asankharika maha - kusala citta",
meaning: one consciousness, unprompted, accompanied by joy, and
associated with knowledge.
We practise Dhamma dana in
many ways.
Our strength is that we offer Dhamma at no charge
from our five websites. Collectively the five sites recorded over
24,000 visits since we first began site visitor statistics.
We
want to deliver a mass education system about the best insights that
Buddha Dhamma can deliver. Our sixth website www.edharma.org will be
developed as a part of working toward this goal.
We are
currently programming an online database for our hundreds of
photographs that we have uploaded onto our websites. We will be able
to present our photographs in a photo album style with distinct
categories that will make it easy for visitors to find the photos. We
have photographed many Buddhist events at our Temple and other
locations, and we wish to make these images available for all beings.
This is Dhamma dana.
Our conceptual solution for Information
Technology is robust enough to meet our mission to reach a target of
1 million readers of our Buddha Dhyana Dana Review (BDDR) Online at
www.bddronline.net.au by 2020 AD.
If we were to be asked for
an analysis model for explaining this figure, we would take a bold
view of the year 2020, and having the assumption that there will be 1
billion persons interested in the Buddha way, we want to reach 1 in
1000 persons. At the lower end, if the world figure is 500 million in
2020, we want to reach 1 in 500 persons.
More and more, we
plan that Internet delivers more of our ranges of teaching.
Our
flagship journal the Buddha Dhyana Dana Review can be found online at
two websites at www.bddronline.net.au and the mirror copy is at
website www. bdcu.org.au.
We have an IT plan that is scalable
so we can deliver full issues of the Buddha Dhyana Dana Review from
our computer database to our Internet sites with little fuss.
Our
Longhair Australia News online publication, which we plan to publish
four times each year, is dedicated to persons who will come and help
us in the future with information technology.
The John D.
Hughes Heritage Collection is the oldest Buddha Dhamma reference
library in Victoria at the same site. Preservation of the collection
is our No.1 priority. Our library catalogue is also accessible via
the Australian Library Gateway at www. nla.gov.au/libraries. The John
D. Hughes Collection includes:
Rare and valuable texts
including the complete Buddhist Cannon;
A catalogue that
contains over 4000 entries on texts in our Library;
Commentaries
by renowned Teachers;
"Books of Guidance" in English
on various foreign languages;
Journals and newsletters;
Audio
and video tape recordings of Teachings;
Buddhist artifacts,
ritual objects from all traditions and original works of
Calligraphy;
Video recordings of Buddhist Monks and
Nuns;
Buddha Dhamma data warehouse including electronically
formatted texts and material;
Audio and digital versions of
over 317 of our Buddhist Hour radio broadcasts;
Chan Academy
multimedia learning CD-Roms;
Photographs taken locally and
internationally, including over 3000 digital photos online.
We
preserve data to propagate Buddha Dhamma by use of different
media.
317 Buddhist Hour radio programs have been produced
over our six years of broadcasting.
The texts of the programs
are preserved in multiple paper copies in our library, recorded on
audio tapes, digital tapes, backed up on our bdcublessings website,
and from time to time we burn our radio script archive onto CDs.
We
preserve Dhamma texts by publishing globally with input from papers
from many great Masters.
Some sites contain audio chanting as
well as video instruction.
We intend to develop more and more
Internet sites so we must operate under many different regulations in
different countries.
New translations of Suttas from Pali to
English by Sister M. Uppalawanna have been added to our Internet
sites. The Suttas Majjhima Nikaaja 1 - 101, Majjhima III, Anguttara
Nikaaya I - Ruupaadii Ekaka Vagga I are on our
websites:
www.bddronline.net.au, Buddha Dhyana Dana Review
Online Volume 12 No. 3, and mirrored at URL www.bdcu.org.au.
We
have loaded an English Translation of a French publication about the
History of Pureland Buddha Dhamma to our Buddha Dhyana Dana Review
Online website.
We are learning to systematise the handling
and preservation of captured data in digital form. We have hundreds
of colour photographs from three digital cameras that we have backed
up to CDs for storage and use by our webmasters.
In the case
of the Brooking Street Bugle, our internal publication, we have found
how to increase the very human approach online of our publication.
Now we understand we can illustrate an article with 200
colour photographs or more on our web site, whereas if we were to
print it we would have to limit the range of illustrations because of
physical space and economic considerations.
We have around in
excess of 1000 documents.
We want to distribute and preserve
more Chan Academy Australia branded information in various modern
media.
We aim to be the fifth most popular Buddha Dhamma
e-resource in the world by 2008. By that year, a new fast Internet
service ought to be operating.
At our Centre, our library
contains most of our sources of research information. During the last
three decades our Teacher assembled the library collection. This is
called the John D. Hughes Collection at 33 Brooking Street, Upwey
3158 Victoria Australia.
Internally, we use search engines to
find good information for researching our position papers, reports,
documents for the Buddha Dhyana Dana Review, the weekly Buddhist Hour
broadcast scripts as well as, for example, searching for web site
addresses and matters of administration and corporate governance.
We are in our second year of a nine-year program of
Abhidhamma classes at our Centre. Students use their own merit and
energy to learn.
If students do not replace the consumption
of merit brought about by their physical consumption of paper
handouts of Buddha Dhamma, they will be unable to receive an
education based on printed material based learning (books, journals,
web site, CD-Roms) in future times.
We are literate.
Students
are expected to read our Buddha Dhamma texts and handouts given on a
weekly basis. They must continue to increase the amount of data they
handle with higher order analysis.
Also, they ought to read
our Buddhist Hour weekly radio broadcast, our Buddha Dhyana Dana
Review, our Brooking Street Bugle, our Longhair Australia News, our
photographs, reports, papers and any other written materials
published on our web sites and elsewhere.
Much of our material
is available online on our web sites, so that participants can
research off-site. In the future, we will also prepare CD-Roms for
offline reading at our Centre.
One day when our Teacher
the late John D. Hughes was in hospital he indicated to his wife
Anita from his hospital bed that she should read the Metta Sutta, or
Sutra on Loving-kindness, to two patients nearby in the hospital ward
where he was being cared for.
Anita initially declined, saying
that she would stay by his side in order to devote all of her energy
to his recovery, but she was persuaded by some words he wrote
down:
"The gift of one piece of Dhamma is more wealth
than all the jewels in all the worlds."
Anita then
informed the nearby patients that her husband would like her to read
a Buddhist prayer for them. They were delighted, and so she read to
them the Metta Sutta.
Rare is a chance to meet great Teachers
of Buddha Dhamma in Victoria. When a window of opportunity opens, we
ought to plan to be there.
When Buddha Dhamma statements are
studied, they are found to be a practical guide of how to live in the
world if a person chooses to stay within the becoming of birth and
death processes.
The John D. Hughes Collection requires
monetary donations to fund these worthwhile causes. We invite the
donations of Buddhist texts, commentaries and Dhamma material to
assist with the growth of the Collection now and throughout the 21st
century.
This will help us to create a more complete reference
resource, and allow greater use by Buddha Dhamma Scholars and
Practitioners.
Your donation to the Collection will not only
increase our library's holdings, but also will also contribute to
lifetimes of learning and preserve Buddha Dhamma material for future
practitioners.
Previously, we broadcasted the
recommendations to "Practice and develop morality." Today
week we have talked about the second of the recommendations, to
"Practice and develop generosity".
The other
guidelines of conduct for members and Friends are:
Practice
kindness, in the Pali language metta.
Practice and develop refuge
in the Triple Gem.
Practice and develop Buddhist
meditation
Practice and develop merit making.
Develop your
scholarship.
Whenever you take food or liquid, do "Five
Reflections on Food".
Support Buddhist Organisations
locally, nationally and internationally.
Practice and develop our
five styles of friendliness, cultural adaptability, professionalism,
scholarship, and practicality.
Plan to become debtless.
Write
a life plan.
Incorporate all the above and review regularly.
Be careful what you wish for, it will come true.
These
guidelines were recommended as Code of Conduct for Members and
Students at our Temple, the Chan Academy Australia, Buddhist
Discussion Centre (Upwey) Ltd., by our Founder, the late Master John
David Hughes.
Our Members and students successfully live their
lives according to Buddha Dhamma by following the above
recommendations. Their lives improve and they become happier.
Next
week, we will explore and explain the third of these recommendations,
how to practice metta (loving kindness).
May persons
develop generosity with written texts to benefit both self and
others.
May all beings know the truth of the written
Dhamma.
May all beings know the peace that comes from hearing
Buddha Dhamma.
May persons be well and happy in gathering
Buddha Dhamma texts to benefit all present and future Buddha Dhamma
students.
May you develop the perfection of dana
(generosity).
May all beings, in the ten directions, seen and
unseen, receive blessings from this script.
May all beings in
the ten directions, seen and unseen, know, realise and follow the
path out of suffering.
We thank the Devas and Devatas of
Learning for their help in and guidance with the writing of this
script.
May you be well and happy.
May all beings be
well and happy.
This script was written and edited by the
Buddhist Hour Radio team: Julian Bamford, Evelin Halls, Anita Hughes,
and Pennie White.
References
Chan Academy Australia
(2004) How to apply Buddha Dhamma to your Life, Buddhist Hour
Broadcast Script 315, 8 February 2004 available at
www.bdcublessings.net.au accessed on 7 February 2004, Buddhist
Discussion Centre (Upwey) Ltd., Melbourne.
Burke, p 108, 24,
Wordsworth p 577, 3 and Shakespeare p 453, 9 cited in The Oxford
Dictionary of Quotations, Third Edition, Oxford University Press,
Oxford.
Mon, Dr. Mehm Tin, The Essence of Buddha Abhidhamma,
pp. 38, 39, 209, 210
Chan Academy Australia, Operating Written
Dana: In how many ways?, Buddhist Hour, Broadcast 283, For Sunday 29
June 2003 written and edited by John D. Hughes, Anita Hughes, Julian
Bamford, Evelin Halls, Buddhist Discussion Centre (Upwey)
Ltd.
Words: 2902
Characters: 15078
Paragraphs:
155
Sentences: 147
Averages
Sentences per paragraph:
1.3
Words per Sentence: 17.4
Characters per word:
4.9
Readability Statistics
Passive Sentences: 14 %
Flesch
Reading Ease score: 47.7
Flesch-Kincaid Grade Level score:
10.7
Readability Statistics
When Word finishes
checking spelling and grammar, it can display information about the
reading level of the document, including the following readability
scores. Each readability score bases its rating on the average number
of syllables per word and words per sentence.
Flesch Reading
Ease score
Rates text on a 100-point scale; the higher the
score, the easier it is to understand the document. For most standard
documents, aim for a score of approximately 60 to 70.
Flesch-Kincaid
Grade Level score
Rates text on a U.S. grade-school level. For
example, a score of 8.0 means that an eighth grader can understand
the document. For most standard documents, aim for a score of
approximately 7.0 to 8.0.
Disclaimer
As we, the
Chan Academy Australia, Chan Academy being a registered business name
of the Buddhist Discussion Centre (Upwey) Ltd., do not control the
actions of our service providers from time to time, make no warranty
as to the continuous operation of our website(s). Also, we make no
assertion as to the veracity of any of the information included in
any of the links with our websites, or another source accessed
through our website(s).
Accordingly, we accept no liability
to any user or subsequent third party, either expressed or implied,
whether or not caused by error or omission on either our part, or a
member, employee or other person associated with the Chan Academy
Australia (Buddhist Discussion Centre (Upwey) Ltd.)
This Radio
Script is for Free Distribution. It contains Buddha Dhamma material
and is provided for the purpose of research and study.
Permission
is given to make printouts of this publication for FREE DISTRIBUTION
ONLY. Please keep it in a clean place.
"The gift of
Dhamma excels all other gifts".
For more information,
contact the Centre or better still, come
and visit us.
© 2002. Copyright. The Buddhist Discussion Centre
(Upwey) Ltd.