“Bad Money Drives Out Good” in Religion

“Mahamudra: Essence and Practice” ( Book II)

“Bad Money Drives Out Good” in Religion.

◎Chen Yixin: How can one’s soul be liberated?

●Xue Mo: To liberate your soul, you have to find your true mind. When you find it, it is yours and will no longer be disturbed by the outside world. From then on, you don’t belong to any particular religious sect but are after something spiritual that is common to all human beings.

Whatever school or sect it is, the important thing is to pursue freedom and liberation. But more often than not, the pursuit of freedom is questioned and defamed. In this world, it is always bad money that drives out good.

This is a law in economics. When bad money drives out good, there will be only bad money left on the market. Why is that? Suppose good coins are, say, 90% gold while bad ones are only 10% gold, people will spend fake coins and keep genuine ones at home. As time passes, you can find only fake coins in circulation.

When genuine religious practitioners stay at home and don’t want to go out to spread the teachings, frauds will seize the chance to go around cheating people. This is why the market is filled with frauds. Nowadays, if you say you are a religious believer, people will look at you in a strange way, because the reputation of religion has been ruined by frauds. In the eyes of many people, religion is no longer a bearer of spiritual aspiration, but a profession verging on swindling.

Internal conflict and fights within a sect are also despised by non-believers, many of whom lost confidence exactly because they had seen the conflicts and fights.

In a sect, those who are repressed and excluded tend to be the elite.  When the elite are trying to do something for the group they are in, that group won’t be happy. For instance, Gendun Chophel, great Tibetan Buddhist scholar and historian, was tortured to death. It is also the main reason why some religious sects have declined. It happens in all ages. When the elite are doing their best, those with defiled minds in the group will think that you are trying to take over his territory and therefore they will push you aside or even make your name stink. So, a real practitioner must detach himself from name and form and stay away from disputes. The purpose of reciting the Diamond Sutra is to shatter all name and form. Don’t worry about being unable to achieve enlightenment. One can achieve it even by sweeping the floor. There was a Chan practitioner who practiced while working and in the end he realized the state of arhat.

The paths to enlightenment are many and various – the “eighty-four thousand permutations of the Buddhist teaching,” as they are called. They are meant to help concentrate one’s mind. Wisdom arises from meditative concentration. No concentration, no wisdom.

Mazu Daoyi came home after he was enlightened. Except his sister-in-law, nobody believed in him. His sister-in-law asked him for a method for achieving enlightenment. Mazu Daoyi asked her to hang an egg with a string and then listened to the egg attentively. Then he told his sister-in-law, “You will be enlightened when the egg makes a sound.” She listened to the egg every day and one day, the string was broken and the egg fell to the ground and cracked. On hearing the sound, she was enlightened. She hadn’t practiced any Yidam Dharma before. The most important thing is the mind.

If one who practices the Yidam Dharma is too obsessed with the Dharma and is without compassion or the wisdom of the nature of emptiness, he will end up an evil demon. It is terrible if such a person fails to meet a reliable teacher. Even when there is a reliable teacher nearby, if one doesn’t have enough accumulation of merit, one won’t believe what the teacher says. For example, there was a very poor man in Liangzhou who made a living by repairing bicycles on the street every day. One day, I said to him, “Now that you repair bicycles here every day, I have an idea which may help you earn more money.” I continued, “You can buy some second-hand books from the salvage station and sell them here when no one comes to your stand.” He said, “OK.” At that time, there was no second-hand book stand in Liangzhou. After some time, I went there again and I found that he hadn’t started selling books yet. I asked him why. He replied ferociously: “You haven’t been thinking about my money, have you?” He thought I was aiming at his money. We can see that the mind one has determines the action one takes. It is the same for religious practitioners. The state of your practice decides how you think.

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《光明大手印：实修心髓》下

宗教上的“劣币驱除良币”

◎陈亦新：如何才能使心灵得到解脱？

●雪漠：想要使心灵解脱，就必须找到自己的本元心。找到之后，你的心就是你自己的，不再受外界的干扰。这时，你已不属于任何宗派，你仅仅是对人类某种精神的向往。

无论是什么教派，追求一种自由的解脱就行了。不过，许多时候，这种自由的理念，反而会受到诋毁和非议。这个世界上，永远是劣币把良币驱出市场。

经济学上有这样一个规律：劣币驱除良币，最后市场上就会只流行劣币。为什么呢？假如真币含金量是百分之九十，而劣币只有百分之十。那么，人们就会把真币收藏到家里，把劣币花出去。久而久之，市场上流行的将全是劣币。

当真正的修行人都待在家里，不愿出去弘法时。那么，这个巨大的市场就空出来了。一些骗子趁机会招摇撞骗。这就是市场上为什么总流行骗子的原因。现在，你只要说自己是宗教徒，好多人就会怪怪地望你。为什么？因为那些骗子把宗教的名声搞坏了。宗教在一些世人眼中，已经不是一种精神的载体，而变成一种职业了，几乎带了骗子的味道。

教派里的内争和内斗同样为世人所鄙视。许多人正是看到教派的内争才丧失了信心的。

有时候，一个教派中受打击或是受排挤者，往往是一些精英。因为，当精英们局限于某个群体、想为它做事谋利时，那个群体是不买账的。像藏地伟大的佛教学者和历史学家更敦群佩甚至被迫害得丧失健康不治而死。这也是一些教派衰微的主要原因。任何时代都有这种情形。当那些精英全力做事时，群体中的不清净者会认为你是在跟他们抢地盘，进而就会全力地排挤你，甚至搞臭你。所以，真正的修行人一定要破除所有名相，远离纷争。诵《金刚经》的目的，就是要破除所有名相。不要怕无法觉悟，扫地都可以觉悟。有个具行禅人，边干活边修行，最后证得了阿罗汉果。

觉悟的路有很多，被称为八万四千法门。法门是定心的，心定就能生慧，如果不能定心，那么就无法生慧。

马祖道一成就后回到老家，别人都对他没有信心，只有他的嫂子相信他，向他求开悟之法。马祖让她在绳子上拴个鸡蛋，叫她静静地听鸡蛋，然后告诉她，什么时候鸡蛋发出声音，你就能开悟了。马祖的嫂子天天听，忽然有一天，绳子断了，鸡蛋掉在地上，“啪”的一声，打碎了，刹那间她就开悟了。她没有修什么本尊法。重要的是心，是精神的东西。

修本尊法的人，如果执著本尊法，没有慈悲心，没有空性智慧的话就会变成恶鬼。一个人没有慈悲心，没有空性智慧，不能破除执著，又没有善知识，是很可怕的。即使身边有善知识，但福德资粮又不够的时候，他是不会相信善知识的。比如，凉州城里有个非常贫穷的人，每天在街上修自行车。一天，我告诉他，既然你每天都修自行车，我就教你一个办法，让你多挣点钱。我说，你到废品收购站去收一些旧书，顺便摆在这儿卖。没有人修自行车的时候，你就卖书。他当时就说“好”。那时，凉州还没有摆旧书摊的。后来，我去的时候他还没有卖旧书，我就问他原因。他恶狠狠地说：你该不会是惦记我口袋里的那几个钱吧？他认为我给他出主意的目的是为了算计他的钱。可见，有什么样的心就有什么样的行为。修行的人也是这样的。你修行的境界怎样，你心里就会怎样想。

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