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Great Vows for All (second of four Teishos, August 2005)

Delusions are inexhaustible; I vow to put an end to them.

In my talk last week, we looked at the first line of the Great Vows, which we chant together after meditation. We determined that the first line is about our intention, to free all creations and thus to free ourselves. The next three lines as I see them are about how we fulfill that intention.

The second line, "Delusions are inexhaustible, I vow to put an end to them", deals with duality. Our ego views the world as two, which makes the world seem as if we are separate pods of experience with no relationship within the world. It says I'm here and you're there and we have no real connection to each other. We identify ourselves by our stories and beliefs. We impart solidness to these stories and beliefs, as if they had substance and define who we are. This is a delusion. It is as if we saw a rainbow as solid. Our mind tends to freeze our awareness into some solid concept. We see the rainbow, it exists but it is made of sunlight, raindrops and heat. It comes and goes. And like a rainbow our awareness is not tangible, it comes and goes. If we try to hold on to a rainbow we are in big trouble. Our true nature is empty and shows up as things, phenomenon, in this world. When we actually see this, we put an end to that delusion.

There are different translations of the Great Vows. Desires or obsessions might substitute for delusions. Since desires or obsessions arise continually, the line "I vow to put an end to them" does not mean we actually won't have them anymore or that they will cease, it means through our practice of zazen we will look through them and transcend them when they present themselves. You might think of this line as "I vow to not reduce who I am to my storyline." Through practice we see, that like a rainbow, everything is real and empty, and our storyline, which seems so solid and defining, is not all of who we are. It too is real and empty. Through the practice of zazen, we watch our storyline, our desires and, as Thich Nhat Hahn says, "smile at them and release them rather than being endlessly pulled around by them". When we practice in this way we are working with the second line of the chant.

© 2006. Ray Cicetti.