Then why is that if you keep the precepts, then you can be more established, more stationary in your enlightenment, in your enlightened state of being? Why is that? Anybody know? (Because it all takes your energy away, it all distracts you, it leaks out when you break the precepts or when you involve yourself in it. It just pours out and you can’t… it’s like a balloon with holes in it.) Yeah. Good. Very good! Thank you. It’s very good like that. It’s like a leaking tank of water. It’s like a hole, holey balloon. Holey balloon, has a hole in it. Slowly the air comes out. Because you are not protected.
The precepts are for your protection. The precept is the thing you should not do. It actually should not be a precept, because it should be the nature of your being, of a noble being. So, of course, if you’re a noble being, then you respect everyone as yourself. So how are you going to harm somebody else? Because that’s like harming yourself. We are all one. Or, if you love someone so much, if you love other people, if you have compassion, then you could not harm other people. If you do, that means you have no compassion or very little, or less. Then of course, you cannot enter samadhi. That’s one.
And if you steal from somebody else, then of course, then you also don’t treat others as the way you would like to be treated. Or, if you tell lies, something like that, that means you’re lying to yourself. You don’t respect the person, that he has intelligence at all, that’s why you lie. Then you’re also no good. Actually, the Buddha will talk more about these kinds of precepts afterwards. So, I don’t want to go ahead to spoil the fun. So, after you keep the precepts well, then you are more established in your enlightened status. Then after you have samadhi, meaning you are stationary in your enlightenment, then you have wisdom. That’s what the Buddha says here.
And wisdom is revealed out of samadhi. So, after you keep the precepts, you will have samadhi. After you have samadhi, you will have wisdom. Therefore, the precepts are number one. These are called the “Three Non-Outflow Studies.” It’s just like, outflow means leaking. You see, non-leaking studies. Meaning if you keep the precepts then you have samadhi. When you have samadhi, you will have wisdom. Not the normal knowledge, but it’s the wisdom of the enlightenment, of Buddha, of sainthood. The wisdom of the higher dimension, of the elevated Heaven wisdom. So, it’s very good to keep the precepts.
So, collecting thoughts are like precepts, because if you always concentrate on your cultivation, whether sitting, laying… Because if you always have one-pointedness in your mind, you will not feel distracted by any of these temptations around you. Or anything that is not pleasant to your liking or to your mind and your eyes and your ears, you will not think about it. You concentrate always on the Holy Names, concentration on goodness, virtues. Just remember all that, and you’re just forgetful of every other thing. That’s why the Buddha said collecting thoughts, meaning collecting all of this concentration, one-pointedness is as good as precepts. Yes, it’s like that. But of course, concentrating on Nirvana, on wisdom, on Buddha’s teachings. Not concentration on other things. You know. That I don’t have to tell you. That you know very well; that worldly stuff.
So, “Ananda, why do I call collecting one’s thoughts the precepts? Because if living beings in the six paths of any mundane world had no thoughts of lust, they would not have to follow a continual succession of birth and death.” You see? Now the Buddha’s beginning to expound on one of the precepts. The one that He refers to here first of all is lust. Lust is physical. Lust also for sensation. Lust is not only that, it’s maybe lust for power, lust for richness, and just trying so hard, or going too much in that direction that you forget Heaven, you forget to cultivate, you forget to concentrate on some virtues and some morals, to help others, nothing. You just want that, richness or the bodily satisfaction. That’s also lustful.
Now, so the Buddha thinks if you collect your thoughts away from lust, then you’ll never have to be reincarnated again and again into the suffering world as ours, or others. The next one, now Buddha continued, “Your basic purpose in cultivating is to transcend the wearisome defilements. But if you don’t renounce your lustful thoughts, you will not be able to get out of the dust.” Meaning you will not be able to be free, liberated from the circle of life and death; always rolling in the dust of this world or the next. So here He emphasized that we should always concentrate in the opposite way of lustful intentions.
