Lukas Panicali
Dhammapada Notes
- Poetic rather than storytelling like the Ramayama
- “The Dhammapada’s elegant verses, many spoken by the Buddha over the long years of
his teaching, were assembled by his senior monks and nuns to express his essential
wisdom.”
- “One page, one verse alone, has the power to change your life.” ( Power of Buddha )
- Ultimate Buddhist goal described by the Dhammapada is liberation: a form of spiritual
freedom through purification
- Nirvana - an extinguishing or a release
Dichotomies
- “Hatred never ends through hatred.”
- The human mind is essential, everything deals with the mind.
- Recites the results and consequences of living opposing lives.
- “Those who know the essential to be essential and the inessential as inessential reach the
essential, living in the field of right intention.”
Vigilance
- “Vigilance is the path to the deathless; Negligence the path to death”
- To be self-aware and cautious, to not fall into negligence
- “The monastic who delights in vigilance and fear negligence is incapable of backsliding
and is quite close to Nirvana.”
The Mind
- The watched and disciplined mind brings happiness
- The mind is hidden
- “For one who is awake, whose mind isn’t overflowing, whose heart isn’t afflicted, and
who has abandoned both merit and demerit, fear does not exist.”
Flowers
- “The person obsessed with gathering flowers, insatiable for sense pleasures, is under the
sway of Death.”
The Fool
- “A fool conscious of her foolishness is to that extent wise. But a fool who considers
himself wise is the one to be called a fool.”
- A person with a lack of acceptance of their foolishness is their own worst enemy
- Evil deeds follow the fool
- “The way to material gain is one thing, the path to Nirvana another. Knowing this, a
monk who is the Buddha’s disciple should not delight in being venerated, but cultivate
solitude instead.”
The Sage
- “Let one such as this advise you, instruct you, and restrain you from rude behavior. Such
a person is pleasing to good people, but displeasing to the bad.”
- Only associate with the best of people, do not associate with the lowest
The Arahant
- One who has reached Nirvana
- Description of the qualities an Arahant has
- “For someone at the journey’s end, freed of sorrow, liberated in all ways, released from
all bonds, no fever exists.”
Thousands
- Quality over quantity
- One meaningful word, day, action, etc. is more spiritually empowering than a thousand
empty ones.
- “Greater in combat than a person who conquers a thousand times a thousand people is the
person who conquers herself.”
Evil
- “Having done something evil, don’t repeat it, don’t wish for it: evil piled up brings
suffering.”
Violence
- Do not harm living beings
- “If, desiring happiness, you do not use violence to harm living beings who desire
happiness, you will find happiness after death.”
Old Age
- Aging and death are inevitable
- Our physical selves do not stay the same
- “This body is worn out – so fragile, a nesting ground for disease. When life ends in death,
this putrid body dissolves.”
Oneself
- “Oneself, indeed, is one’s own protector. What other protector could there be? With
self-control one gains a protector hard to obtain.”
- “Don’t give up your own welfare for the sake of others’ welfare, however great. Clearly
know your own welfare and be intent on the highest good.”
- You are your own master
The World
- “Come, look on this world as a beautiful royal chariot. Fools flounder in it, but the
discerning do not cling.”
- Do not cling and instead allow yourself to detach from this temporary world
The Buddha
- “The merit of worshipping those worthy of worship, be they buddhas or disciples who
have transcended their obsessive thinking, passed beyond sorrow and grief, gone to
peace, and who have nothing to fear, can never be calculated by any estimation.”
- “Doing no evil, engaging in what’s skillful, and purifying one’s mind: this is the teaching
of the buddhas.”
Happiness
- “Health is the foremost possession, contentment, the foremost wealth, trust, the foremost
kinship, and nirvana, the foremost happiness.”
The Dear
- “Practicing what one shouldn’t, not practicing what one should, having abandoned the
goal, clinging to what is dear, one comes to envy those who practice.”
- Clinging to things that are dear and being obsessive can cause grief and sorrow
Anger
- “Conquer anger with non-anger”