Keeping the Five Precepts Is Learning to Be Human

In fact, the five precepts only involve body and speech, not mind. No matter what the mind is like, as long as body and speech do not transgress, it does not count as breaking the precepts. Therefore, the five precepts do not speak of guarding the mind, only of guarding body and speech; they belong to the Small Vehicle precepts. By watching over the body and guarding the mouth, if one keeps them well, one's cultivation as a person will be good, and in the next life one can continue being a human, and can also eliminate self-view and realize the fruits. But if one wishes to cultivate the Mahāyāna dharma and attain enlightenment, one must receive the bodhisattva precepts and uphold the bodhisattva precepts. Keeping the five precepts well gives one virtue and moral character; if one cannot uphold the five precepts, one's character is incomplete, one's cultivation is not good enough, and one's human virtue is not fulfilled. If even an ordinary being's moral character is not fulfilled, then it is impossible to transcend being human, impossible to eliminate self-view and become a sage.

If one dares not receive even the five precepts, and after receiving them cannot keep them well, then how could one keep the several hundred precepts of a monastic? So many lay Buddhists always slander monastics, saying how bad they are, but what about themselves? How great is the gap between them and the monastics' mental conduct of renouncing and turning away from worldly life, and their capacity to accept the restraint of several hundred precepts? The gap is too great to describe in detail. The five precepts are only five; they seem simple and easy, but in fact they are neither simple nor easy. Those who can fully keep the five precepts are exceedingly few. The precept against stealing and the precept against false speech are hard to keep; the vast majority of people do not clearly understand their meaning and scope, and those who violate them are not few.

Keeping the five precepts is simply being a good human being. If one cannot even be a good human being, what is there to say about realizing fruits or not? In the next life, one falls into the three evil destinies. Many people, without even receiving the five precepts, subtly imply that they have realized the fruits and attained enlightenment. If one cannot even keep the body and speech precepts of the Small Vehicle's five precepts, how can one keep the mind precepts of the Mahāyāna bodhisattva precepts? Guarding the mind is the most difficult of all; it is very hard to avoid creating unwholesome karma in every arising thought. Then the bodhisattva precepts in the Yogācārabhūmi-śāstra are even harder to keep. If one has not eliminated the fundamental afflictions, one should not even think about keeping these yogic bodhisattva precepts; they can be received and upheld only by bodhisattvas on the bhūmis who have eliminated afflictions. Bodhisattvas care only whether their arising thoughts are wholesome, compassionate, and wise, not the surface behavior of body and speech. As long as it can benefit sentient beings, what should be done must be done; otherwise, one violates the bodhisattva precepts.

As for whether sentient beings can understand this—of course sentient beings, with their low level of wisdom, cannot understand it, so one should try not to let them know, because the bodhisattva has already grown into an adult, while sentient beings are still children with shallow wisdom and little insight; therefore, sometimes the affairs of adults cannot be made known to children. Even pre-bhūmi bodhisattvas (pūrvabhūmika bodhisattva) cannot achieve such precepts, let alone ordinary sentient beings. Yet quite a few people are studying and receiving these precepts—where such a bodhisattva precept substance could be obtained is unknown. Ignorant people just carry on in a reckless muddle in whatever they do.

Body and speech are the actions of the six consciousnesses, while mind is the mental conduct of the manas. If one can control the manas, body and speech will inevitably not transgress. Conversely, even if the manas's thoughts are not upright, if the mind consciousness forcibly suppresses them and feigns purity, body and speech can still refrain from transgressing; if body and speech do not transgress, the five precepts are not violated. Controlling and subduing the manas is extremely difficult; successfully cultivating and conditioning the manas, eliminating afflictions so that it is automatically and spontaneously pure without needing restraint—that is even harder.

If afflictions are not eliminated, mental karma will inevitably be violated. Therefore, eliminating afflictions necessarily means eliminating the afflictions of the manas, so that one becomes automatically and spontaneously pure without the mind consciousness forcibly suppressing them. If only the afflictions of the mind consciousness are eliminated, it can only count as suppressing afflictions, not eliminating them; when the mind consciousness is careless and negligent, the manas will suddenly manifest afflictions, and the river will burst its banks and flood.