Learning to knock on the Right Skull
– By Ven. Acariya Maha Boowa –
Part 1/2
NOTE: The following features talks by Ven. Acariya Maha Bowa, from the book “Straight from the Heart,” (Thailand, 1987), reprinted with permissions outlined in the book. In these talks, as in Thai usage in general, the words ‘heart’ and ‘mind’ are used interchangeably.
THE VENERABLE ACARIYA MUN taught that all hearts have the same language. No matter what one’s language or nationality, the heart has nothing but simple awareness, which is why he said that all hearts have the same language. When a thought arises, we understand it, but when we put it into words, it has to become this or that language, so that we don’t really understand one another. The feelings within the heart, though, are the same for everyone. This is why the Dhamma fits the heart perfectly, because the Dhamma isn’t any particular language. The Dhamma is the language of the heart. The Dhamma resides with the heart.
Pleasure and pain reside with the heart. The acts which create pleasure and pain are thought up by the heart. The heart is what knows the results which appear as pleasure and pain; and the heart is burdened with the outcome of its own thoughts. This is why the heart and the Dhamma fit perfectly. No matter what our language or nationality, we can all understand the Dhamma because the heart and the Dhamma are a natural pair.
The heart forms the core within the body. It’s the core, the substance, the primary essence within the body. It’s the basic foundation. The conditions which arise from the mind, such as thought-formations, appear and vanish, again and again. Here I’m referring to the rippling of the mind. When the mind ripples, that’s the formation of a thought. Labels, which deal with conjecturing, memorizing and recognizing, are termed sanna; short thoughts are sankhara. In other words, when a thought forms–‘blip’–that’s a sankhara. Sanna refers to labeling and recognizing. Vinnana refers to the act of taking note when anything external comes and makes contact with the senses, as when visible forms make contact with the eye and cognition results.
All of these things are constantly arising and vanishing of their own accord, and so the Buddha called them khandas. Each ‘heap’ or ‘group’ is called a khanda. These five heaps of khandas are constantly arising and vanishing all the time.
Even arahants have these same conditions–just like ordinary people everywhere–the only difference being that the arahants’ khandas are khandas pure and simple, without any defilements giving them orders, making them do this or think that. Instead, their khandas think out of their own free nature, with nothing forcing them to think this or that, unlike the minds of ordinary people in general.
TO MAKE A COMPARISON, the khandas of ordinary people are like prisoners, constantly being ordered about. Their various thoughts, labels, assumptions and interpretations have something which orders and forces them to appear, making them think, assume, and interpret in this way or that. In other words, they have defilements as their boss, their leader, ordering them to appear.
Arahants, however, don’t. When a thought forms, it simply forms. Once it forms, it simply disappears. There is no need to continue it, no seed to weigh down the mind, because there is nothing to force it, unlike the khandas governed by defilements under the leadership of defilements. This is where the difference lies. But their basic nature is the same: All the khandas we have mentioned are inconstant (aniccam). In other words, instability and changeability are a regular part of their nature, beginning with the rupa khanda, our body, and the vedana khanda, feelings of pleasure, pain and indifference. These things appear and vanish, again and again. Sanna, sankhara and vinnana are also always in a state of appearing and vanishing as a regular part of their nature.
But as for actual awareness–which forms the basis of our knowledge of the various things which arise and vanish–that doesn’t vanish. We can say that the mind can’t vanish. We can say that the mind can’t arise. A mind which has been purified therefore has no more problems concerning the birth and death of the body and the khandas; and there is thus no more birth here and there, appearing in crude forms such as individuals or as living beings, for those whose minds have been purified.
But for those whose minds are not purified: They are the ones who take birth and die, setting their sights on cemeteries without end, all because of this undying mind.
THIS IS WHY THE LORD BUDDHA taught the world, and in particular the world of human beings, who know right and wrong, good and evil; who know how to foster the one and remedy the other; who understand the language of the Dhamma he taught. This is why he taught the human world above and beyond the other worlds: so that we could try to remedy the things which are harmful and detrimental, removing them from our thoughts, words and deeds; try to nourish and foster whatever goodness we might already have, and give rise to whatever goodness we don’t yet have.
He taught us to foster and develop the goodness we already have so as to nourish the heart, giving it refreshment and well-being, giving it a standard of quality, or goodness, so that when it leaves its present body to head for whatever place or level of being, this mind which has been constantly nourished with goodness will be a good mind. Wherever it fares, it will fare well. Wherever it takes birth, it will be born well. Wherever it lives, it will live well. It will keep on experiencing well-being and happiness until it gains the capacity, the potential, the accumulation of merit it has developed progressively from the past into the present–in other words, yesterday is today’s past, today is tomorrow’s past, all of which are days in which we have fostered and developed goodness step by step–to the point where the mind has the firm strength and ability, from the supporting power of this goodness, that enables it to pass over and gain release.
Such a mind has no more birth, not even in the most quiet or refined levels of being which contain any latent traces of conventional reality (sammati)–namely, birth and death as we currently experience it. Such a mind goes completely beyond all such things. Here I’m referring to the minds of Buddhas and of the arahants.
THERE’S A STORY ABOUT Ven. Vangisa which has a bearing on this. Ven. Vangisa, when he was a layman, was very talented in divining the level of being in which the mind f the dead person was reborn–no matter who the person was. You couldn’t quite say he was a fortune-teller. Actually he was more a master of psychic skills. When anyone died, he would take the person’s skull and knock on it–knock! knock! knock!–focus his mind and then know that this person was reborn there, that person was reborn here. If the person was reborn in hell or in heaven, as a common animal or a hungry ghost, he could tell in every case, without any hesitation. All he needed to do was knock on the skull.
When he heard his friends say that the Buddha was many more times talented than this, he wanted to expand on his knowledge. So he went to the Buddha’s presence to ask for further training in this science. When he reached the Buddha, the Buddha gave him the skull of an arahant to knock on.
- “All right, see if you can tell where he was reborn.”
- Ven. Vangisa knocked on the skull and listened.
Silence.
He knocked again and listened.
Silence.
He thought for a moment.
Silence.
He focused his mind.
Silence.
He couldn’t see where the owner of the skull was reborn. At his wit’s end, he confessed frankly that he didn’t know where the arahant was reborn.
At first, Ven., Vangisa had thought himself talented and smart, and had planned to challenge the Buddha before asking for further training. But when he reached the Buddha, the Buddha gave him the skull of an arahant to knock on–and right there he was stymied. So now he genuinely wanted further training. Once he had further training, he’d really be something special.
This being the way things stood, he asked to study with the Buddha. So the Buddha taught him the science, taught him the method–in other words, the science of the Dhamma. Ven. Vangisa practiced and practiced until finally he attained arahantship. From then on he was no longer interested in knocking on anyone’s skull except for his own. Once he had known clearly, that was the end of the matter. This is called ‘knocking on the right skull.’
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