(Half bell)
(Bell)
Dear Thay, dear Sangha...
my question deals with the first mindfulness practice.
In the face of extreme violence such as genocide
is it ever acceptable to respond to violence with action...
including even violent action?
I practice national security
And I think of Churchill or Chamberlain
with Hitler for instance.
Or more modern examples of Rwanda...
or Sudan,
where maybe compassionate listening with Hitler
as was done by Chamberlain
may not have been enough.
And I struggle with this.
Dear Thay, our friend is asking about situations of extreme violence
And she's giving an example in the middle of the 20th century
when Hitler was causing a great deal of suffering.
And there was one official in England
who tried to practice compassionate listening with Hitler
and it was seen as not successful.
And actually allowed Hitler to continue to hurt more people.
And she's asking whether in certain situations
is it appropriate to use violence to stop violence?
Non-violent action is not a technique.
It is a way, not a technique.
And the foundation of non-violent action is understanding and compassion.
When you have understanding and compassion in your heart
everything you do will be non-violent.
Suppose someone is killing, someone is breaking the law
and you arrest him and put him in jail.
Arresting him and putting him in jail...
is that violent or non-violent?
It depends...
on the situation.
If you arrest that person, if you lock him up
and yet you do it because of understanding and compassion,
then that is non-violent action.
And even if you don't do anything,
but you allow...
you allow the people to kill and to destroy,
Although you don't do anything, that is also violence.
Violence can be action or non-action.
So the outer appearance might be violent,
but if you do it with a mind of understanding and compassion
it is not truly violence.
Suppose a horse suffers very much and is about to die, but cannot die.
And you give her a death blow so that she can die,
it looks like violence, but it comes from your compassion.
You don't want the horse to continue to suffer for too long.
So that image tells you
that whether the action is violent or non-violent,
it depends on your heart.
If you have the willingness to reduce suffering,
if you understand why a person has done such a thing violently,
so then even if you lock him up and deprive him of a few days' food
that is still non-violent.
Because depriving someone for a few days of food
in order to help him to know
that having something to eat is something very great,
to give him that kind of insight.
That does not come from your willingness to punish,
but to help him to learn and appreciate.
That is non-violence.
So we should not wait until the situation presents itself
to decide whether we should react with violence or non-violence.
We have to begin right now.
And when the situation presents itself,
we will be able to act with compassion...
that means with non-violence.
And non-violent action should...
it should be...
conceived as a long-term action.
When you teach your child,
when you tell your child how to act,
you are engaging in non-violent action.
You don't wait until the child becomes cruel
and begins to destroy or to kill before you teach them.
You have to use preventative measures.
So in the realm of education,
in the realm of agriculture,
in the realm of art,
you can introduce...
non-violent thinking and non-violent action
and teach people to remove discrimination.
That is the basic action of non-violence,
because violence comes from discrimination, from separation,
from hate, from fear, from anger.
So helping people to transform these things
before they are translated into action.
That is true non-violent action.
It should begin right now
and we should not wait for something to happen
in order to think whether we should act violently or non-violently.
And I think non-violence can never be...
completely absolute.
We can say that we should be as non-violent as we can.
When we think of the military,
we think that the things that the military do are only violent.
But to conduct an army,
to protect a town,
to stop an invasion by a foreign army,
there are many ways to do it.
And there are more violent ways,
and there are less violent ways.
You can always choose.
Maybe it is not possible to do it 100% non-violent,
but 80% non-violent is better than 10% non-violent!
See? So don't ask for an absolute.
That is the way we practice the Five Mindfulness Trainings.
You cannot be perfect in the practice.
Do not worry that you will not be perfect.
In observing the Fourteen or the Five precepts,
what is important is that you are determined to go that way.
You do your best, that is what we need.
It's like in the forest - you get lost in the forest at night,
and you don't know how to get out.
And you have to look at the Northern Star in order to find your way.
And if you go north,
that does not mean you want to arrive at the Northern Star.
You don't need to arrive, you only need to go north.
(Laughter)
So the Five Trainings are like that.
You should go in the direction of understanding and compassion.
You don't have to be perfect.
If you know that you are doing your best, that is good enough for the Sangha,
good enough for the Buddha.
So non-violence is the same.
We have to do our best.
Thank you.
(Half bell)
(Bell)