The first precept: not killing
from Hoko
This seems like a straightforward instruction: don’t kill things. However, there’s actually some interesting and complicated teaching to chew on. This precept came about not because of murder, but because of suicide. There are a lot of teachings in Buddhism about suffering and dissatisfaction, and it can seem like a pessimistic faith tradition. Life is characterized by suffering, our possessions and loved ones can’t make us permanently happy because everything is changing, and this thing we call "self" isn’t even something we can grasp.
Buddha didn’t teach these things in order to make us feel hopeless. He had to point out how we create suffering so he could show us how to stop. He asked his monks to spend two weeks contemplating the impurity and impermanence of the body, but this exercise took an unfortunate turn. About 60 of them became disgusted with their lives and depressed about the human condition, and a wandering person who posed as a monk convinced them to kill themselves.
Imagine how the Buddha felt when he learned about this! This was never the point of his teaching. He was never about negating the value of life, ours or others. This wasn’t the outcome he expected or wanted at all. He wanted the monks to stop clinging to the body, but not to give up their lives.
Thus there is this first precept about not killing, and in our tradition, that means any living being, not just people. However, if we keep this precept completely, we ourselves can’t live. We need to eat, and we need to cut trees to make shelter, and we kill microbes just by breathing and insects just by walking. What do we do? Now this isn’t just a simple rule we have to follow, it’s a real problem for us. We need to keep living our lives and help others to live also.
Dogen reminds us that no one can live outside of the network of interdependent origination. That means that everything exists because of the causes and conditions that lead to its arising. Nothing comes into being without a cause and without the conditions that are necessary for that to happen. Cause is like a seed, and conditions are like the soil. Put a seed on a rock, and it won’t grow. Plow a field but don’t plant anything, and again nothing will grow. Everything depends on something else.
We can’t live independent of our surroundings. We need parents to give birth to us, a certain amount of oxygen in the air, food and water, a livable temperature, other people to teach us, cure our diseases, and manufacture stuff we need. This is emptiness: nothing has an independent self nature because it can’t really be separated from causes and conditions and other beings.
If nothing has an independent self nature, then how can beings be born and die? How can any being be killed? There isn’t something we can call a subject which is killing something called an object. It’s not possible for me to kill something outside of or separate from me. Bodhidharma says not arousing the view of extinction is the same as keeping the precept of not killing. In order to keep this precept, we don’t just refrain from committing murder; we have to deeply understand interdependent origination.
The absolute teaching is that there is no killing, and yet we know that people, animals and plants die every day. Both of these points of view are reality and we have to hold both somehow. This is why we need to deeply investigate the network of interdependent origination and keep it healthy.
For this and all other precepts, there’s no easy answer to how we keep it. Right off the bat, with very first precept, it’s impossible to keep it! Why do we vow to do something we can’t do? Because we still have to make effort. We still have to avoid killing as much as possible and avoid encouraging it by others. This is why practice is always incomplete and why we have vow and repantance. We have an aspiration and make effort, but know that we will fall short and take responsibility when we do.
The clear mind version of this precept is Protecting, cultivating and encouraging life. The Bonmokyo says we should rescue and protect life. We and all beings are liberated from the unwholesomeness of killing when we support others to live full, healthy lives. When others are healthy, we are healthy too because of the network of interdependence. As soon as we take compassionate action that supports life, we’re observing the precept of not killing.
It’s not enough for us just to try not to kill beings. As bodhisattvas, we vow to liberate all beings from suffering. The clear mind version is the action we actually take. Uchiyama Roshi says that this is why Dogen says that practice and enlightenment are one: engaging in the actual practice of protecting and encouraging life is a complete manifestation of awakening. Remember, the precepts are descriptions of reality.
Protecting life is a manifestation of nurturing mind. Uchiyama Roshi wrote" Shakyamuni Buddha said it this way: All worlds are my world and all sentient beings -- people, thiings and situations -- are my children. Dogen Zenji’s expression roushin, nurturing mind or attitude, came out of this. My way of expressing this is everything I encounter is my life."
How would it be if we took care of everything we encountered as our children? That means we take the most skillful action we can so that that child has a healthy and wholesome life. Sometimes that action is difficult or seems to break a precept. There’s no handy reference for what action to take; that’s why we have to keep sitting and keep getting clearer about how the universe works. That’s the wisdom we need to balance our compassion.
This seems like a straightforward instruction: don’t kill things. However, there’s actually some interesting and complicated teaching to chew on. This precept came about not because of murder, but because of suicide. There are a lot of teachings in Buddhism about suffering and dissatisfaction, and it can seem like a pessimistic faith tradition. Life is characterized by suffering, our possessions and loved ones can’t make us permanently happy because everything is changing, and this thing we call "self" isn’t even something we can grasp.
Buddha didn’t teach these things in order to make us feel hopeless. He had to point out how we create suffering so he could show us how to stop. He asked his monks to spend two weeks contemplating the impurity and impermanence of the body, but this exercise took an unfortunate turn. About 60 of them became disgusted with their lives and depressed about the human condition, and a wandering person who posed as a monk convinced them to kill themselves.
Imagine how the Buddha felt when he learned about this! This was never the point of his teaching. He was never about negating the value of life, ours or others. This wasn’t the outcome he expected or wanted at all. He wanted the monks to stop clinging to the body, but not to give up their lives.
Thus there is this first precept about not killing, and in our tradition, that means any living being, not just people. However, if we keep this precept completely, we ourselves can’t live. We need to eat, and we need to cut trees to make shelter, and we kill microbes just by breathing and insects just by walking. What do we do? Now this isn’t just a simple rule we have to follow, it’s a real problem for us. We need to keep living our lives and help others to live also.
Dogen reminds us that no one can live outside of the network of interdependent origination. That means that everything exists because of the causes and conditions that lead to its arising. Nothing comes into being without a cause and without the conditions that are necessary for that to happen. Cause is like a seed, and conditions are like the soil. Put a seed on a rock, and it won’t grow. Plow a field but don’t plant anything, and again nothing will grow. Everything depends on something else.
We can’t live independent of our surroundings. We need parents to give birth to us, a certain amount of oxygen in the air, food and water, a livable temperature, other people to teach us, cure our diseases, and manufacture stuff we need. This is emptiness: nothing has an independent self nature because it can’t really be separated from causes and conditions and other beings.
If nothing has an independent self nature, then how can beings be born and die? How can any being be killed? There isn’t something we can call a subject which is killing something called an object. It’s not possible for me to kill something outside of or separate from me. Bodhidharma says not arousing the view of extinction is the same as keeping the precept of not killing. In order to keep this precept, we don’t just refrain from committing murder; we have to deeply understand interdependent origination.
The absolute teaching is that there is no killing, and yet we know that people, animals and plants die every day. Both of these points of view are reality and we have to hold both somehow. This is why we need to deeply investigate the network of interdependent origination and keep it healthy.
For this and all other precepts, there’s no easy answer to how we keep it. Right off the bat, with very first precept, it’s impossible to keep it! Why do we vow to do something we can’t do? Because we still have to make effort. We still have to avoid killing as much as possible and avoid encouraging it by others. This is why practice is always incomplete and why we have vow and repantance. We have an aspiration and make effort, but know that we will fall short and take responsibility when we do.
The clear mind version of this precept is Protecting, cultivating and encouraging life. The Bonmokyo says we should rescue and protect life. We and all beings are liberated from the unwholesomeness of killing when we support others to live full, healthy lives. When others are healthy, we are healthy too because of the network of interdependence. As soon as we take compassionate action that supports life, we’re observing the precept of not killing.
It’s not enough for us just to try not to kill beings. As bodhisattvas, we vow to liberate all beings from suffering. The clear mind version is the action we actually take. Uchiyama Roshi says that this is why Dogen says that practice and enlightenment are one: engaging in the actual practice of protecting and encouraging life is a complete manifestation of awakening. Remember, the precepts are descriptions of reality.
Protecting life is a manifestation of nurturing mind. Uchiyama Roshi wrote" Shakyamuni Buddha said it this way: All worlds are my world and all sentient beings -- people, thiings and situations -- are my children. Dogen Zenji’s expression roushin, nurturing mind or attitude, came out of this. My way of expressing this is everything I encounter is my life."
How would it be if we took care of everything we encountered as our children? That means we take the most skillful action we can so that that child has a healthy and wholesome life. Sometimes that action is difficult or seems to break a precept. There’s no handy reference for what action to take; that’s why we have to keep sitting and keep getting clearer about how the universe works. That’s the wisdom we need to balance our compassion.
