| The recent upsurge of interest in Buddhism, both East and West, has
been marked by a vigorous practical orientation and a drive to discover the peace and
freedom to which the practice of Dhamma leads. This zeal for practice, however, has often
been accompanied by another trait which may not be so fruitful, namely, a tendency to
neglect or even belittle the methodical study of the Buddha's teachings. The arguments
offered in defense of this attitude have already become familiar currency among us. It is
said, for example, that study is concerned with words and concepts, not with realities;
that it leads only to learning, not to wisdom; that it can change only our ideas but fails
to touch us at the deeper levels of our lives. To clinch the case the testimony of the
Buddha himself is enlisted, with his famous remarks that to learn much without practicing
is like counting the cows of others or like carrying a raft on one's head instead of using
it to cross the stream. This contention, to be sure, has its aspect of truth, but also
suffers from a one-sided emphasis which may actually thwart rather than aid our progress
on the Buddhist path. It is certainly true that learning without practice is fruitless,
but the other side of the issue also should be considered. Should a person gather cows if
he knows nothing about how to take care of them? Should he try to cross a rough and
dangerous river without knowing how to operate a raft? The Buddha himself insisted that
his followers learn and transmit the Dhamma both in the letter and the spirit, but rather
than appealing to traditional formulations, let us inquire ourselves into the value and
function of Dhamma study.
The point at issue, it must be stressed, is not study as
an academic discipline or the accumulation of a wealth of learning, but the acquisition of
a sound and solid working knowledge of the basic Buddhist doctrines. Now to see why this
is so essential, we must recall that the entire practice of the proper Buddhist path
develops out of the act through which we enter the path -- the going for refuge to the
Triple Gem. If we have taken this step honestly, with correct motivation, it implies that
we have acknowledged our need for spiritual guidance and have entrusted ourselves to the
Buddha as our guide and to his teaching as our vehicle of guidance. By taking refuge in
the Dhamma we accept not merely a technique of meditation that we can use at liberty for
our own self-appointed purposes, but a profound and comprehensive teaching on the true
nature of the human condition, a teaching designed to awaken in us a perception of this
truth as the means for reaching the full and final end of suffering. The liberation
offered by the Dhamma comes, not from simply practicing meditation in the context of our
own preconceptions and desires, but from practicing upon the groundwork of the right
understanding and right intentions communicated to us by the Buddha.
This cognitive character of the Buddhist path elevates
doctrinal study and intellectual inquiry to a position of great importance. Though the
knowledge that frees the mind from bondage emerges only from intuitive insight and not
from a mass of doctrinal facts, genuine insight always develops on the basis of a
preliminary conceptual grasp of the basic principles essential to right understanding, in
the absence of which its growth will inevitably be obstructed. The study and systematic
reflection through which we arrive at this preparatory right view necessarily involve
concepts and ideas. But before we hasten to dismiss Dhamma study as being therefore only a
worthless tangle of verbiage, let us consider that concepts and ideas are our
indispensable tools of understanding and communication. Concepts, however, can be valid
and invalid tools of understanding; ideas can be fruitful or useless, capable of bringing
immense benefit or of entailing enormous harm. The object of studying the Dhamma as part
of our spiritual quest is to learn to comprehend our experience correctly: to be able to
distinguish the valid from the invalid, the true from the false, the wholesome from the
unwholesome.
It is only by making a thorough and careful investigation
that we will be in a position to reject what is detrimental to our growth and to apply
ourselves with confidence to cultivating what is truly beneficial. Without having reached
this preliminary conceptual clarification, without having succeeded in "straightening
out our views," there can indeed be the earnest practice of Buddhist meditation
techniques, but there will not be the practice of the meditation pertaining to the
integral Noble Eightfold Path. And while such free-based meditation may bring its
practitioners the mundane benefits of greater calm, awareness and equanimity, lacking the
guidance of right view and the driving power of right motivation, it is questionable
whether it can lead to the penetrative realization of the Dhamma, or to its final goal,
the complete cessation of suffering.
It is almost impossible to give a single word of counsel
on the subject of study applicable to all followers of the Dhamma. Needs and interests
vary so greatly from one person to another that each will have to strike the balance
between study and practice that suits his or her own disposition. But without hesitation
it can be said that all who earnestly endeavor to live by the Buddha's teaching will find
their practice strengthened by the methodical study of his Dhamma. Such an undertaking, of
course, will not be easy, but it is just through facing and surmounting the challenges we
meet that our understanding will ripen and mature in the higher wisdom.
-ooOoo- |