|
Main Index
|
| |
| | | Book Name: The Dhammapada - The Way of the Buddha, Vol 9 | Previous Next | |
|
|
|
| |
the futility of your desire -- that it cannot be fulfilled, that it is unfulfillable, that you are in a vicious circle. Seeing it -- that you are moving in circles -- you jump out. This is also renunciation, but you don't jump out of desire for another desire: to get into heaven, to avoid hell. You are not jumping out of desire; you are only changing one desire for another. You are exchanging worldly desires with unworldly desires, but desire is desire. You can change the object, but the nature of desire remains the same.
This is a great contribution of Buddha to religious consciousness. He says: Don't renounce, let renunciation happen. If it happens on its own accord it has a beauty of its own, it has grace, and you never repent, you never look back. If you renounce, if you make effort, your renunciation will bring sadness to you. And many times you will start thinking whether you have done right or wrong. Many times your mind will waver, many times desire for the renounced will again surround you like a cloud. Many times you will be full of lust and greed and fear. Many times the world will attract you again. That is natural.
Hence Buddha says: FOR IF IN YOUR RENUNCIATION YOU ARE RECKLESS AND BREAK YOUR WORD, IF YOUR PURPOSE WAVERS, YOU WILL NOT FIND THE LIGHT.
It can happen only in a wrong kind of renunciation that your purpose wavers, because when you renounce with effort it is always a halfhearted affair. A part of your mind says, "Renounce, because if you don't renounce you will suffer." A part of your mind says, "Don't renounce. Who knows whether there is any life after death or not? And who knows whether renunciation is rewarded or not? Nobody comes back from the other shore to tell the truth. It may be all imagination, it may be all a strategy of the priests. Who knows?"
Doubt is bound to persist, and when doubt is there there is wavering, and when doubt is there you are split. When doubt is there you can never be wholeheartedly into anything; you remain divided. You can never be an individual, indivisible. And the person who renounces for some motive is renouncing through the mind -- and that is impossible. You cannot renounce
|
|
|
|
| |