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00124 True Teaching and False Teaching
00124 True Teaching and False Teaching
No. 00124
Category / Lecture Tours-Asia
Event date / 1986.10.20
Place / (Formosa/Taiwan) Taipei
Language / Chinese
Translation / Taiwanese
Time (mins) / 1h29m08s
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  • Summary

What is Dharma? It is something intangible and hard to explain, at most we could talk only a little bit about it. Actually true teachings are not to be talked with mouth, and cannot be expressed with words. Therefore, it's not easy to teach the Dharma with this body or to spread it through physical means, because all physical things are already too coarse and do not belong to the level of wisdom. If we want to explain something that belongs to great wisdom with this non-wisdom vehicle, it is almost impossible.

Since ancient times, it has not been easy for any great Zen Master to come out and teach people or deliver sentient beings. They should fight with our habits and argue and battle with the conceptions that we are attached to. Not all people would come and listen every time when a great master comes out; even if some hear it, they won't believe it and even slander it after they go back. The slanderers, or those who won't listen, they only believe in their own conceptions. As in the ancient time, they didn't believe in the true teachings of great masters, but worship god of fire, god of sun, god of wind, etc. instead.

After an enlightened master passes away, he often becomes more famous than when he was living; because the King of Maya will use his name to carry out a plan of destruction, by turning it into a religion in which false teachings are mixed in so that people would think such is Buddhism and end up still a citizen of Maya, transmigrating still in the circle of life and death. He likes it very much; he will let us have a religion of comfort to "flatter" our longing for the true teachings, since many people want to search for the truth but don't know how and where to find it.


Highlights
  1. If we want to know the true teaching, what should we use to understand and experience it?
  2. Can the truth be passed on through language such as by singing, Buddha worshiping, reciting Buddha's names or lectures?
  3. What is Dharma transmission and heart-to-heart transmission (initiation)? What does "heart" mean?
  4. You may ask yourself, after the initiation, all people are enlightened, but why some people are more enlightened than others?
  5. Why, in the ancient times, did people worship the god of fire, god of sun and god of wind, or why were there superstition of ghosts or gods-worshiping?
  6. We often say that sentient beings are difficult to deliver. Are sentient beings really difficult to deliver?
  7. The past Zen masters or famous masters would give their disciples a lot of tests. What are these tests for?
  8. Why must we still keep on practicing spiritually after the initiation?
  9. Why are ancient Masters more famous than the Masters today?
  10. As the scriptures say that meditation is very good, some people also learn to meditate themselves. When they go to temple and see monks meditate like that, they do the same after returning home. Can this be called meditation?
  11. What will happen if we recite the secret mantras to deliver sentient beings?
  12. Merits can be given away just like money. Therefore, when we practice spiritually, we should rely on the boundless merits. How could we find the boundless merits?
  13. If someone does morning ceremony and evening ceremony every day, likes to go and worship the Buddha very much, and thinks himself as a man with sincerity and faith to seek for the Tao. Can that person be liberated in this way?
  14. Some mantras are powerful. All his gestures are powerful, so we followed him to do some hand gestures and foot gestures. Why do they turn out to be useless?
  15. Why should we become Buddha first if we want to deliver sentient beings and ghosts?
  16. What does it mean by "heavenly and human teacher and compassionate father for four life times"?
  17. According to the Universal Gate Sutra, if one recites the name of the Quan Yin Bodhisattva, he "will not be burnt if he falls into fire" and "will float up if he falls into water". What proof should there be so that we can have faith to keep on with the spiritual practice?
  18. How to find a true Master and to get to know and learn the true reaching?