Continuously Committing Acts of Theft in Your Heart Leads to the Complete Loss of All Your Merit

Teachings of All Buddhas

You Must Teach Sentient Beings to Cultivate Samadhi, Then Cease Stealing: This Is the Third Irrevocable, Pure, and Wise Teaching of the Tathagata, All Past Buddhas, and World-Honored Ones

This is the Buddha’s formal teaching. The “you” addressed here is the Venerable Ananda. You should pass this teaching on to sentient beings of the Dharma-ending age: those who cultivate either buddha-recitation samadhi or the Shurangama King Samadhi must first sever the mind of lust, then the mind of killing, and finally the mind of stealing. This is the third irrevocable, pure, and wise teaching shared by the present Tathagata and all past Buddhas: the Buddhas of the past taught this when they appeared in the world, I teach it now, and the Buddhas of the future will continue to teach this. This principle can never be altered.

The Foundation of Samadhi

Therefore, Ananda! If One Who Has Not Ceased Stealing Cultivates Meditative Absorption, It Is Like Pouring Water into a Leaking Zhi (zhī, a Water Vessel) Hoping to Fill It; Even After a Dust-Hair Eon, It Will Never Be Full

Here the Buddha offers an analogy: suppose a person who constantly harbors the mind of stealing in their heart yet practices meditative concentration. You may devote great effort to sitting meditation, buddha-recitation, and mantra recitation, but if you teach occult, superstitious claims to others, swindle property, and engage in frequent theft, this is just like a person pouring water into a leaking zhi every day. Even though you perform many auxiliary practices each day hoping to fill the vessel, because it has a leak, even after a dust-hair eon, you will still be unable to fill it with water.

This water represents the merit and wisdom of our meditative absorption. You may practice very diligently, but if you constantly commit acts of stealing in your mind, all your accumulated merit will leak away. It will be extremely difficult for you to attain samadhi, as these actions destroy your merit. This is why you must have a solid foundational basis when cultivating samadhi.

The Methods of Renunciation and Giving

So what is the antidote to this? This section presents four methods. Let us first look at the first: renouncing greed through bodily conduct:

If Bhikshus Keep No Surplus of Robes or Alms Bowls, Not Even a Tiny Amount, and Give Any Leftover Alms Food to Hungry Sentient Beings

This is the renunciation of greed. If you wish to cultivate samadhi, you should only keep as much worldly clothing and as many alms bowls as you need for daily life, and avoid accumulating any surplus. If you have leftover food from your alms rounds, give it to hungry sentient beings; do not store excessive wealth or provisions, as these are obstacles to the path. This is the first point. Next is renouncing the mind of pride and anger.

In Large Assemblies, Press Palms Together in Respect to All; If Struck or Insulted, Receive It as Equal to Praise

In large gatherings, you should press your palms together in respect to all members of the assembly with a humble mind. If someone who disagrees with you or holds a misunderstanding of you strikes or insults you, you should accept it with joy and conviction, as if they were praising you. This is the renunciation of pride and anger. The natural antidote to stealing is renunciation: letting go of attachment to external material possessions, and letting go of the anger and pride in your mind.

You Must Renounce Both Body and Mind Entirely, Sharing Your Flesh, Bones, and Blood with All Sentient Beings

This third method is the complete renunciation of both body and mind. You can offer your physical body to the Buddha, and in your mind, let go of all forms of anger and arrogance. You can even share your own flesh, bones, and blood with all sentient beings for their enjoyment, embodying the great compassion of a shared essence with all beings. Next is the final section: not clinging to provisional teachings.

Do Not Misuse the Buddha's Provisional (Non-Ultimate) Teachings to Justify Yourself and Mislead Beginners; the Buddha Certifies That Such a Person Attains True Samadhi

The previous sections addressed stealing of body and mind; this final section addresses stealing of the Dharma. “Do not take the Tathagata's non-ultimate teachings and twist them to justify your own actions.” Some of the Buddha's teachings are eternal, universal principles: as we see in the scriptures, these teachings hold true across all times and places, true in the past, present, and future. But the Buddha also gave many teachings that were temporary expedients, tailored to the specific circumstances of his audience at the time; these are called non-ultimate teachings, shaped by the context of their original setting.

To twist non-ultimate teachings to “justify your own actions” has two layers of interpretation. First, according to common commentaries, this means using the Buddha's non-ultimate teachings to defend your own misconduct. For instance, if you have a strong attachment to eating meat, you might claim that the Buddha's precepts permit disciples to eat the five kinds of pure meat, citing Theravada bhikshus who eat meat when they visit Taiwan. Your argument is that the precepts explicitly allow eating meat, so long as it is one of the five pure meats! This shows that you fail to recognize that this is a non-ultimate teaching of the Buddha. This is the first case: using non-ultimate teachings to defend your own misconduct.

The second interpretation comes from Master Ouyi: “twisting them to justify your own actions” means treating non-ultimate teachings as your own narrow, biased perspective, and clinging to it as absolute truth. This stems from failing to distinguish between provisional and ultimate teachings, and from being arrogant about your limited understanding. This, of course, also misleads sentient beings.

“The Buddha certifies that such a person attains true samadhi.” Only when we can fully penetrate the distinction between provisional and ultimate teachings do we establish the causes and conditions for attaining true samadhi.