道德與法輪

सिद्धार्थ गौतम, Siddhartha Gautama, never defined his teachings as a self-referential -ism, rather he spoke of धर्म "Dharma", 法 『法輪  ―  fǎlún  ―  dharmachakra』 that is "natural law" or the principles underpinning the natural world.

In this way, बौद्ध धर्म Buddhism (धर्म, Dharma), is not so much a religion contained to the insights of a singular salvific figure, rather, the धर्म, Dharma, is about aligning oneself with reality by means of paying profound attention to it (mindfulness), and through a cultivated, concentrated, and holistic awareness transcending, as much as is possible, the limitations of our individuality while embracing it in its proper place, and with the proper perspective.

The धार्मिक Dharmic way of life is one that finds affinity easily with people across time and space, not with a rigid set of supposedly uniquely true suppositions that demand adherence, but rather through a sense of gravity pertaining to the very act of surrendering our attention to this very moment, and an ensuing and implicit acceptance of what we come to find there.

Indeed, there are numerous ways in which such surrendered attention can be rendered. It can take place in formal योग yogic methods such as sitting meditation, ध्यान dhyāna 禪, and through various liturgical forms (both those developed as uniquely बुद्ध धर्म का Buddhistic in nature and otherwise), alongside myriad other modes of condensing attention and combining it with the intention to yield awareness derived wisdom of the nature of being.

In my own practice, I find that I'm not a बौद्ध Buddhist in any sense implying devotion to a singular set of practices or even devotional reverence to any particular historical figure or archetype. Rather I consider myself a Buddhist only in so much as the term is historically related to the practice of धर्म Dharma, which is a concept not limited to the इंडिक Indic culture that gave rise to it, nor to the Sino influences that refined it, and which, by means of western inheritance and adoption through various traditions, has become as much a part of an emerging global lexicon as it is of its tongue and culture of genesis.

The 13th-century Japanese bastion of 達だる磨ま • (daruma) Dharma, 道元英平 Eihei Dogen once wrote: “To study the Buddha Way is to study the self. To study the self is to forget the self. To forget the self is to be actualized by myriad things. When actualized by myriad things, your body and mind as well as the bodies and minds of others drop away. No trace of enlightenment remains, and this no-trace continues endlessly.”

Becoming enlightened by the myriad things, to be taught by reality itself, until the teaching and the teacher are realized as inseparable, simultaneously then progressing and abiding together until no concern for, or even awareness of this-or-that persists. This is the धर्म • dhárma as I know it, and I believe, as it has been known to countless others throughout history (whatever that is) and certainly not just to Buddhists, or even humans. 

~ सुनयानंद धर्म Sunyananda Dharma, Dr. J. Richard Paszkiewicz 德心 禪師