Miscellaneous Learning Is Not Right Effort

Our study of Buddhism and practice is meant to solve the actual, fundamental problem of birth and death, not to learn theory. As for theoretical knowledge, mastering enough to serve actual practice is sufficient—do not keep digging deeper into it. Apply your mind to what is crucial: once the wisdom of the manas is developed, all the dharmas you previously did not understand will become clear, and all the knowledge you previously did not know will become evident. Then, when you summarize it with your own wisdom and pass it on, it becomes the theoretical knowledge that others need—bringing immeasurable benefit both to others and to yourself.

After Cūḍāpanthaka attained the fruit of the fourth-stage arhat, he still could not teach the Dharma; he was clumsy with words, but he had accomplished everything that needed to be done. He had the wisdom of liberation but not the wisdom of arising-and-ceasing—he simply could not express it, and his store of knowledge was also insufficient. Even so, this did not prevent him from being a sage, one who possessed the wisdom to liberate himself from birth and death within the three realms. The apple had been eaten and was in his belly—this was real and tangible. How many times stronger is he than those glib talkers who can write a hundred books yet are ordinary beings replete with the afflictions of greed, hatred, and delusion?

Many people do not understand how to study and practice Buddhism. Day after day they delight in collecting knowledge everywhere, diligently gathering whatever they come across, useful or not, picking up nothing but sesame seeds, and then forgetting some of it after collecting it. They never develop the inexhaustible treasure trove, never take the golden key into their hands. They appear to be working hard, but in fact it is wrong effort (mithyā-vyāyāma)—the more diligent they are, the farther they stray from the Path.

Some people just love studying the patterns inside a kaleidoscope. Before they have figured out the first pattern, it changes into a second one; through ten thousand pattern changes, chasing after each design, their eyes end up dazzled, and they still have not figured anything out. Those without wisdom simply do not know to study how to make the kaleidoscope itself. Once you have the kaleidoscope, how delightful it is to master all patterns and figures at will! Knowledge in this world is boundless and developing explosively—what can you gain by chasing after it day after day? Give rise to the great bodhicitta and strive to become a knowledge repository yourself, with all knowledge flowing forth from your own mind in an unending stream, so that all sentient beings can draw nourishment of knowledge from this repository of yours—how beautiful a thing that would be?

Why is it that some people, after practicing for only a short time, attain deep meditative concentration (samādhi), with excellent contemplative practice (vipaśyanā-caryā) wisdom and never losing meditative absorption (samādhi), while others practice for decades without meditative concentration ever appearing and with weak power of wisdom? It is like a foolish dog chasing clods of earth: they pay attention to and take interest in everything outside, spinning through the various platforms every day, learning every kind of knowledge, and to this day have accomplished nothing. Often, the more accomplished a person is not, the more confident they are—on what basis is that confidence?

If you opened up the back of some people's heads, you would find it full of a tangled mess of loose threads, disordered and chaotic. Their thinking has no logic; one sentence does not match up with the next. Yet they go out and indiscriminately study things that lack logic, and the more they study, the more tangled threads fill their brains. A person's lines and modes of thinking are subject to perfuming (vāsanā): whoever you learn from, you will acquire that person's thinking characteristics. When you lack discernment and study things indiscriminately, your wisdom being weak to begin with, and then you are further perfumed with chaotic modes of thought, your own thinking becomes even less able to run in a straight line; your speech winds around and around, never reaching the root or the point. If your line of thinking is wrong, can you realize the fruits or see the mind?

As for those who practice well, their strengths lie in meditative concentration and contemplative practice. Not to mention that they do not study or look at the chaotic things outside—even my words as their teacher they have no mind to listen to. While I speak on this side, their minds are engaged in contemplative practice. After all, doing the work is what matters most; the great matter of birth and death is what matters most. But those who practice for decades without achieving anything busily absorb all sorts of chaotic knowledge in a disorganized way every day, enjoying themselves immensely—what exactly is there for you to be joyful about? Your brain is hopelessly clogged, without a single clear thread.