Chapter Six: Protecting the Body
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In order for bodhisattvas to give of their body, possessions, and virtues for the sake of all sentient beings, they must learn to guard and protect them. Chapter 2–7 discusses the various practices bodhisattvas can engage in to accomplish this. Such practices include finding and following a suitable teacher, studying the sūtras and following the precepts and ethical discipline taught therein, protecting the body from harm, upholding one's virtue by avoiding transgressions, etc.
Concise Summary of Essential Points
As to how one can avoid meaningless and fruitless actions, Śāntideva lists twelve types of mindfulness.[1]
- Being mindful to respect the Buddha's words and regard the karmic consequences.
- Being mindful of the still body and its nature.
- Being mindful to maintain steadfast activity to benefit others and the parts of the body which are required.
- Being mindful to move the body during fear or festivals.
- Being mindful during the four behaviors.
- Being mindful to adopt righteous conduct to stop unruly behaviors.
- Being mindful of unattractive gestures when speaking.
- Being mindful to speak moderately.
- Being mindful to speak clearly when speaking to uneducated people.
- Being mindful of calm abiding and insight.
- Being mindful to frequently investigate the mind.
- Being mindful of the instructions even in large crowds.
Mindfulness comes from respect, and respect is characteristic of being calm and peaceful. Calm and peace in turn come from being in solitude and from being quiet, disciplined, restrained, alone, without distraction, content, moderate, etc. Through calm and peace, one will be able to see the truth, and seeing the truth will generate compassion, which will then lead to the development of discipline, meditative stabilization, and wisdom. Calm and peace will also help one to aspire to transcend the misery of samsara and seek both worldly and transcendental joy and happiness, like someone in a house on fire wishing for cool water. One will respect the precepts and be mindful in eschewing fruitless actions, which is true avoidance of harm. Thus, one must maintain mindfulness in order to protect the body. In this context, Śāntideva cites The Questions of Ugraḥ Sūtra (Skt. Ugraparipṛcchāsūtra) to restrict the consumption of alcohol and other intoxicating drinks, even by lay bodhisattvas.
Further, he quotes The Jewel Crest Sūtra (Skt. Ratnacūḍasūtra) to explain right mindfulness, which is the mindfulness that stops all afflictive emotions, does not give any opportunity to the works of evil, does not allow bodhisattvas to fall into wrong and evil paths, and does not give any chance for nonvirtuous actions to arise. Alongside mindfulness, which is rendered by the Sanskrit term smṛti and the Tibetan term dran pa, Śāntideva presents the meaning of awareness, mental alertness, or introspection, saṃprajanya in Sanskrit and shes bzhin in Tibetan. Awareness, he points out, is being conscious of one's physical, verbal, and mental actions and those of other people and other things around oneself. The dyad of mindfulness and awareness feature prominently in Śāntideva's formulation of discipline and art of mind training, which lies at the heart of his Mahāyāna path. "Bodhisattva training," he claims, "is the training of the mind, as the mind is the foundation of all dharma."[2] He cites several sūtras to underscore the central role mind plays in the process of enlightenment and the importance of guarding, purifying, ornamenting, pacifying, improving, enlightening, developing, pleasing, and opening what The Stem Array Sūtra calls "the city of mind."
With constant observance of mindfulness and awareness, Śāntideva goes on to discuss how a bodhisattva must conduct himself or herself by eschewing all crude and unwholesome behaviors which can annoy the world or provoke criticism. He lists the many unbecoming physical and verbal manners which a bodhisattva must avoid in order to protect other beings from annoyance and displeasure, for protecting other beings from displeasure is indirectly protecting oneself and one's body from harm. All the elaborate discussions in the scriptures about behaviors and precepts, Śāntideva argues, can be condensed in the need for the bodhisattvas to guard the mind. To this effect, he quotes three stanzas from his Way of the Bodhisattva.
Responding to a rhetorical question in which he asks whether guarding the mind is all that is required to protect oneself from harm, Śāntideva goes on to discuss the ethics on food and clothes. Food, which is referred to here as medicine in the same way as it is done in the Vinaya corpus of monastic discipline, consists of regular food for sustenance and medicine for illness. A monk bodhisattva survives on alms, and Śāntideva presents different sūtras on the attitude and comportment a bodhisattva should have while begging for alms. A bodhisattva should receive alms without attachment to good ones or aversion toward poor ones, without thinking of the quality, quantity, and purity of the alms, without despair for not getting alms easily or on time, and with a most grateful and humble gesture. When invited or waiting for alms, one must only speak of Dharma until the meal is received and then promptly leave the place without commenting on the quality, quantity, or value of the food. If one obtains generous alms, one should divide the alms, according to The Jewel Cloud Sūtra, into four portions: one part for monastic friends, another part for people in misery, another for beings in the lower realms, and another part for one's own consumption.
One must sit properly and consume the food one has received in the begging bowl with gratitude, modesty, mindfulness, loving-kindness, and the thoughts of sustaining the body, eliminating hunger, purifying the mind, contemplating on Dharma, teaching the noble path to others, and feeding the countless microorganisms in one's body. Any surplus food should be put on a rock or stone slab for other beings to feed on. If one has obtained scanty alms, a bodhisattva must have a positive attitude and think that this will help reduce drowsiness, lethargy, and sleep, make the body and mind feel light and agile, and reduce the impurities associated with alms. If, due to bad weather or other reasons, a bodhisattva cannot go on an alms round and will miss food for a few days, he should think of countless others being deprived of food and the opportunity to reflect on Dharma. In brief, a bodhisattva should not be attached to food and taste and should eat moderately to avoid heaviness and lethargy, on one hand, and debilitation and loss of strength, on the other.
Having discussed food ethics in general, Śāntideva then cites The Sūtra on the Descent into Laṅka (Skt. Laṅkāvatārasūtra) and a few other sūtras to argue against eating fish and meat. Eating meat can unnecessarily frighten the nonhuman spirits and lead to rebirth and suffering in the hell realm. Even the meat which is said to be threefold pure in common Buddhist ethics if the animal was not seen, heard, or suspected to have been slaughtered for one's consumption is not permissible, as the origin of such meat is not confirmed. It was provisionally permitted for those beginners who would not otherwise enter the path because they could not give up meat eating and as a method to counter the superciliousness of pure vegetarians. "Just as attachment is a hindrance to liberation, so are meat and alcohol hindrances," claims The Sūtra on the Descent into Laṅka.[3] Briefly touching on medicine for illness, Śāntideva remarks that even in the discipline of the hearers (Skt. śrāvakas), who seek individual liberation, the Buddha sanctioned the sale of even one's robes to protect the body from illness. What need is there to mention then about protecting the body of a bodhisattva who strives to protect countless beings? Thus, in order to protect this precious human body, highly nutritious food such as butter, vegetable oil, honey, sugar, syrups and extracts, which are normally not permitted to be consumed by a monk, are allowed to be consumed if viewed as medicine and a remedy when a bodhisattva is afflicted by life-threatening and agonizing diseases.
Moving on to discuss the ethics of clothes and dress, Śāntideva cites The Questions of Ugraḥ Sūtra to show that the purpose of monastic clothing is to protect the body from harm, to have decency, and to uphold the symbol of a renunciate and an object of veneration for the world. Thus, the robes should be kept clean and be worn without attachment to them. And they should be worn as a reminder to orient oneself toward nirvana and to stop sinful actions. To don monastic robes without such an attitude will lead to rebirth in the hell realm. Similarly, a bodhisattva monk must adopt dwellings, such as temples, without attachment, if one cannot live in open space due to weakness or illness. One must also sleep with mindfulness and awareness on one's right side with the left leg on the right one, thinking of light and of waking up soon and not with attachment to sleep.
In general, Śāntideva cautions that a bodhisattva must use resources without attachment and with a benevolent intention of serving sentient beings. Using resources offered by people out of devotion without adequate spiritual capacity or effort can result in serious consequences. Only two kinds of people, the Buddha declared, are permitted to enjoy the offerings made out of faith: those who possess the enlightenment qualities of seeing all conditioned things as impermanent and leading to suffering, all phenomena to be without self-existence, and nirvana to be peaceful and those who are fully liberated from afflictive emotions.
In addition to protecting the body through food and clothes, Śāntideva also presents a number of mantra spells which a bodhisattva can use to protect one's body from harm. He cites the mantras particularly from The King Array of Three Pledges (Skt. Trisamayarāja), a tantra which is quoted in this chapter and also in chapter 17. His citations include mantras to enter a maṇḍala of Buddhas in which one will be protected, mantras to avert malevolent spirits who cause harm, mantras to purify food and other utensils from poison, a mantra to avert harms by snakes, thieves, kings, elephants, lions, tigers, fire, etc., and a mantra to remember past lives. In his Way of the Bodhisattva, Śāntideva warns bodhisattvas not to misguide or deceive people with mantra spells. Yet, it is clear from this text that not only was the use of mantras and dhāraṇīs for different purposes common in Śāntideva's religious and cultural milieu but he also subscribed to the belief in the power of the mantra spells. Moreover, the use of terms such as maṇḍala or dkyil 'khor, samaya or dam tshig, jāpa or bzlas brjod, vidyāmantra or rig snags, mudrā or phyag rgya, and vajradhara or rdo rje 'dzin indicate that Śāntideva was familiar with the tantric systems and was perhaps a tantric practitioner, as many in Indo-Tibetan traditions would claim.
Unlike some of the tantric manuals for mantra recitation, Śāntideva states that it is not an offense or a flaw if the mantras are recited inaccurately or if procedures are followed incorrectly, as long as one has cultivated the power of faith, bodhicitta, and selflessness and recites the mantras with a sense of nonconceptuality. It is a downfall for a bodhisattva to enjoy resources such as food and clothing with craving or without being aware of the welfare of sentient beings. A bodhisattva, in essence, must engage like a servant to serve the world, and the protection of one's body, Śāntideva argues, is and should be for the benefit of the world.
Additional resources
Here we need to think about what would be particularly useful to the student/reader at this point. Link to key terms found in chapter one? Any thoughts?
The Way of the Bodhisattva
