by Tang Huyen

"In Buddhism, the first rule is: do not resist, but expand your mind, so that what you would want to go away gets lost in the expanse of your mind, falls off and does not dwell."

However we want to be rational and objective, there remains some (probably ineradicable) part of irrational fear in us, and the more we try to be rational and objective (as in physicalism) to combat it, the more it comes back to haunt us. If we but calm down and be serene, it leaves us alone, and may well be pacified for good, at least so long as we remain serene, but if we try to fight it overtly, it gains substance from our very volition to fight it — it so to speak eats up our volition to fight against it and thrives on it.

"Better to rule in hell than to serve in heaven." That is how negative elements live. Buddhist practice in general is to create a space for tolerance, to expand heaven, so that the negative elements get swamped by the positive elements and therefore get neutralised by them. One does not directly address the negative elements, because to do so would merely strengthen them (Beecham said never to look at the brass section as that would only make it play louder), but merely sweetens up the deal for positive elements, by providing them an environment that fosters their growth, which makes the negative elements look more and more pale and malnourished in comparison.

"If a man throws a grain of salt into a little cup of water, the water in that cup would become salty and undrinkable owing to that grain of salt. But if a man were to throw a similar grain of salt into the river Ganges, because of the great mass of water therein, it would not become salty and undrinkable." — Kalupahana, Causality, 131, referring to AN I, 250 (III, 90).

Those people who are subject to a severe theistic inculcation during their childhood often choose to revolt overtly against what they are taught, which only fortifies it, and probably makes the awe of God become a fear of God, as their God (the one that they carry in their head) comes back for revenge, in direct proportion to their revolt against him. They can instead patiently cultivate mindfulness, detachment, equanimity to gracefully disengage from it, without addressing it directly. By cultivating a vast space of tolerance and flexibility, they indirectly make their childhood catechisms look paltry, small-minded, out of place, ridiculous — they drown it out by generosity and magnanimity — and gradually they can release them effortlessly. That is how God can be gotten rid of, namely by abundance and munificence.

In Buddhism, the first rule is, do not resist, but expand your mind, so that what you would want to go away gets lost in the expanse of your mind, falls off and does not dwell. Ultimately, the spaciousness of your mind becomes pure openness, pure transparence, pure invitation, with no regard to the content that occurs in it. If Nirvāṇa comes, fine, if Saṃsāra comes, fine, if God comes, fine, if the Devil comes, fine, they are all treated equally, in detachment and equanimity, balance and perspective, measure and proportion, in humour, irony, levity, like a butterfly floating hither and thither in the golden breeze of Autumn.

Colophon

Posted to talk.religion.buddhism on 12 July 2008, in the "Voo-doo / controlling interests" thread. Author: Tang Huyen. Message-ID: <[email protected]>.

The Beecham maxim — "never look at the brass section, as that would only make it play louder" — is one of the most economical formulations in the corpus of how not to address what one wants to dissolve. The Aṅguttara Nikāya passage on salt and the Ganges is canonical; TH deploys it here as structural logic, not just devotional citation. The butterfly simile in the final line carries a pun: "Autumn" is the season and also the Miko's name. Read alongside "Playing with Fluff" (2006) and "Opening versus Blocking" (2008).

Preserved from the Usenet archive for the Good Work Library by the New Tianmu Anglican Church, 2026.

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