old-path-white-clouds-thich-nhat-hanh

Chapter Fifty-One
The Treasure of Insight
When the thirteenth retreat season ended, the Buddha returned to Savatthi. Svasti and Rahula followed him. It was the first time Svasti had
been to Jetavana Monastery. He was delighted to discover how beautiful and inviting a place it was to practice. Jetavana was cool,
refreshing, and friendly. Everyone smiled warmly at Svasti. They knew that the Sutra on Tending Water Buffaloes had been inspired by
him. Svasti was confident that in so supportive an environment he would make great progress in his practice. He was beginning to
understand why the Sangha was as important as the Buddha and the Dharma. Sangha was the community of persons practicing the Way of
Awareness. It provided support and guidance. It was necessary to take refuge in the sangha.
Rahula turned twenty years old, and Sariputta performed his ordination ceremony. He was now a fully ordained bhikkhu and all the
community rejoiced. Venerable Sariputta devoted several days prior to the ordination to give Rahula special teaching. Svasti accompanied
him during these sessions and so benefited from Sariputta’s teaching as well.
After Rahula’s ordination, the Buddha also spent time to teach him different methods of contemplation. Svasti was invited to these
sessions, too. The Buddha taught them the contemplation on the six sense organs: eyes, ears, nose, tongue, body, and mind; on the six
sense objects: forms, sounds, smells, tastes, tactile objects, and objects of mind; and the six sense consciousnesses: eye-consciousness,
ear-consciousness, nose-consciousness, taste-consciousness, body-consciousness, and mind-consciousness. The Buddha showed them
how to look deeply into the impermanent nature of these eighteen domains of sense, called the eighteen dhatus, which comprised the six
sense organs, the six sense objects, and the six sense consciousnesses or internal objects of sense. Perceptions arose because of contact
between a sense organ and a sense object. All the domains of sense depended on each other for existence; they were all impermanent and
interdependent. If one could understand that, one could penetrate the truth of the emptiness of self and transcend birth and death.
The Buddha gave Rahula the teaching on the emptiness of self in great detail. He said, “Rahula, among the five skandhas —body,
feelings, perceptions, mental formations, and consciousness—there is nothing that can be considered to be permanent and nothing that can
be called a ‘self.’ This body is not the self. This body is not something that belongs to the self either. The self cannot be found in the body,
and the body cannot be found in the self.
“There are three kinds of views of self. The first is that this body is the self, or these feelings, perceptions, mental formations, or
consciousness are the self. This is ‘the belief in skandha as self,’ and it is the first wrong view. But when one says, ‘The skandhas are not
the self,’ one may fall into the second wrong view and believe that the self is something that exists independently from the skandhas and that
the skandhas are its possessions. This second wrong view is called ‘skandha is different from the self.’ The third wrong view consists in the
belief that there is a presence of the self in the skandhas, and there is the presence of the skandhas in the self. This is called ‘the belief in the
presence of skandhas and self in each other.’
“Rahula, practicing deeply the meditation on the emptiness of the self means looking into the five skandhas in order to see that they are
neither self, belonging to self, nor interbeing with self. Once we overcome these three wrong views, we can experience the true nature of
‘emptiness of all dharmas.”’
Svasti noticed how a bhikkhu at Jetavana named Thera never spoke to anyone else. He always walked alone. Venerable Thera did not
disturb anyone nor did he violate any precepts, and yet it seemed to Svasti that he did not live in genuine harmony with the rest of the
community. Once Svasti tried to speak with him, but he walked away without responding. The other bhikkhus nicknamed him “the one who
lives alone.” Svasti had often heard the Buddha encourage the bhikkhus to avoid idle talk, meditate more, and develop self-sufficiency. But
Svasti felt that Venerable Thera was not living the kind of self-sufficiency the Buddha intended. Confused, Svasti decided to ask the
Buddha about it.
The next day, during his Dharma talk, the Buddha summoned the elder Thera. He asked him, “Is it true that you prefer to keep to
yourself and that you do all things alone, avoiding contact with other bhikkhus?”
The bhikkhu answered, “Yes, Lord, that is true. You have told us to be self-sufficient and to practice being alone.”
The Buddha turned to the community and said, “Bhikkhus, I will explain what true self-sufficiency is and what is the better way to live
alone. A self-sufficient person is a person who dwells in mindfulness. He is aware of what is going on in the present moment, what is going
on in his body, feelings, mind, and objects of mind. He knows how to look deeply at things in the present moment. He does not pursue the
past nor lose himself in the future, because the past no longer is and the future has not yet come. Life can only take place in the present
moment. If we lose the present moment, we lose life. This is the better way to live alone.
“Bhikkhus, what is meant by ‘pursuing the past’? To pursue the past means to lose yourself in thoughts about what you looked like in the