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TEACHINGS | EASTERN HORIZON 7

a mother hen, with eight or ten or In Jesus’s story you have him dying The path of insight, the path of
twelve eggs, and whether she wishes on the cross and being reborn, investigation, helps us to examine
it or not, the chicks will develop in emerging from death to eternal life. the nature of experience. What
the natural way. Eventually, when But in the Buddhist symbolism it seems to be ‘me being born, moving
they are ready, they peck their way is a different picture. When there’s around in that world out there,
out of the shells; they break free heedlessness, it is as if we are dead. and who will die one day,’ when it
from the boundary of the shell to It appears as if there is birth and is examined closely it’s recognized
come into a waking, living, active life. death because the mind attaches to that the world is happening here,
The mother doesn’t have to wish it. the born and dying. We don’t create in our field of experience. As the
If the conditions are there then the the deathless. It is not something Buddha said: ‘That whereby one
chick will break through. These are that can be lost or gained, it is a perceiver of the world, and
all symbols, stories that point to that is awakened to, it is realized. a conceiver of the world, that is
experience of being encased, enclosed And through its realization it is called “the world” in this Dhamma
in a state of death or darkness, and recognized that birth and death are and discipline. And what is that
then emerging into freedom, into just appearances, just a seeming. whereby one is a perceiver of
light, into the living world. It is like the sun appearing to rise the world, and a conceiver of the
and appearing to set. It only does world? The eye, the ear, the nose,
In Buddhist symbolism, the shell so because the earth is spinning. If the tongue, the body, the mind
represents ignorance, avijjā, not the earth didn’t spin, the sun would …’[SN 35.116] The world is the
seeing clearly. And when wholesome, appear to sit in the same place all world of our experience. It’s our
skilful qualities have accumulated, the time. Birth and death appear mind’s construction of the world.
then the mind breaks through to be happening, because of the That is what is experienced. And
ignorance, breaks through self- mind’s attachment to sight, sound, that is born, takes shape and
conceit: ‘I’m so special; I’ve got so taste, smell, touch. Being a good dissolves, moment by moment. The
many problems; I’m so good; I’m so person, a bad person, success and sounds of these words, the feelings
bad …’. It breaks through the shell failure, healthy and sick, gaining of the body, moods of irritation,
of all the ‘I am’s.’ And, according to and losing; because of the mind’s enthusiasm, alertness, sleepiness,
these images, having broken through attachment to all these births and comfort, discomfort, these are
the shell there is the experience of deaths, it seems like we are being patterns of consciousness, organic
freedom, independence. born and we’re dying. patterns of change, arising, taking
shape, dissolving. That is the world.
One of the most significant teachings As Luang Por Sumedho said over There is no other world we can
the Buddha gave in this area is and over again: ‘There is nobody meaningfully speak about. We can
what you might call the motto of being born, nobody dying. It’s just only talk about the world of our
Amaravati. When the monastery conditions of mind that are changing. own experience. Even if we use
first opened, this theme was used by There is no person truly being born, machines and devices to measure
Luang Por Sumedho over and over no person who really dies.’ And this them, those patterns will still all
again: ‘Mindfulness is the path to the doesn’t just apply to a unique being appear only within the sphere of
deathless. Heedlessness is the path like Jesus; none of us are really born, our perceptions.
to death. The mindful never die. The no person really dies. Because of the
heedless are as if dead already.’[Dhp mind’s attachment to the world of When we take a statement like:
21] Over and over again, Luang Por perception, thought, feeling, memory, ‘There is nobody born, there is
Sumedho would use this as a topic. attachment to the four elements of nobody who dies, only conditions
It’s one of the reasons why this the material world, it seems that way. of mind that change,’ it is not to
monastery is called Amaravati, the It is very convincing. be believed or rejected, but to be
Deathless Realm. picked up and explored. There