Yielding

1. DEFINITION

Unlike forbearance, which is keeping a calm heart when we meet what is unwelcome or goes against us, yielding means setting aside good benefits for others. Yielding is similar in meaning to giving, in that both hand what we have over to others. But looking closely, the two concepts still differ. Giving, in the general sense, is usually sharing what we have with others while some part still remains for ourselves. If we hold a million đồng in our hands, we can give a third or a half of it and still have some left. Yielding carries a different meaning. If we yield something to another person, we will no longer have it.

For example, so that the monks can keep track of their study timetable, a lay Buddhist resolves to offer the temple ten clocks. Meanwhile the temple has fifty people. So apart from those who already have a clock, the rest are shared out by the monks from the top down. We are among those who are given a clock but are ready to yield it to someone else. Although this yielding is not as clear-cut as giving (since the clock was not ours), it is very precious. For to yield to another means we accept no longer having that thing in our hands. So compared with giving, yielding is higher and harder to practise.

We know that deep in everyone's heart, a selfish mind holds sway. It is this selfish mind that leads to greed, hatred and rivalry between one person and another, because what we want, others want too. This is a general tendency, and no one in this whole world can escape it. Precisely because we want to grab good things for ourselves, we collide with other people's desires. Sometimes it is just a word of praise, or a title in the class, but because many people want it, there is competition, giving rise to resentment and division. That is how people are. And the whole world, the whole of humanity, is the same. For countless millions of years and generations, people have kept on seeking division in selfish resentment like this. For this reason, being ready to yield and set aside good benefits for others is something that is not at all simple for human beings.

Among the many things we can yield, four are called the advantages on which to build the practice of yielding: position, money, honour and affection.

In a person's life, the craving for position is considered the greatest and fiercest craving. To gain a position in society, people may commit many wrongdoings: seizing, plotting against one another, destroying one another. All of it comes from an overblown attachment to self. The attachment to self has the power to make people want to be exalted, want the authority to command many others, that is, to want position. Because it is people's great craving, position becomes one of the advantages on which the practice of yielding can be built. Some people hold the advantage in such a position but are ready to yield it to others because they feel they do not need it. Within the narrow scope of a classroom, yielding position can also be done. For example, among those put forward to be chosen as class monitor, we are the one with the advantage and the qualifications, but we decline because we want to yield to someone else. That is yielding position. Later in life, sometimes by chance we are assigned some post in the Sangha, but we do not accept it and yield it to others. That too is yielding position. In truth, yielding position is very difficult. It depends on each person's level of morality. Only with a certain degree of living for others can we yield to others those things that are considered hard to let go of in life.

While we are still in the community, where competition over benefits is not great (merely a few words of praise, a few belongings, some offerings of the four requisites…), we can yield to one another. But one day, when we are grown and the benefits are many times greater, yielding will become a great test of our heart and our morality. Then only a great heart can rise above the worldly material bonds to yield to others. After all, human morality is not unlimited; it has its "price", its "value". Only when we face a test do we know what our morality is worth. We can understand this roughly through a few simple examples from life:

One day, walking along the road, we happen to find a hundred thousand đồng that someone dropped. If we pick up the money and return it to the person who lost it, we can say our morality is worth more than a hundred thousand. It is because our morality exceeds that sum that we do not need the money.

Or while gardening with our fellow monks, we discover a package of gold containing three taels. At that moment we tell no one but suddenly develop a stomach ache and ask to go home. According to the lesson on moral psychology, what we find must be returned to the one who lost it. But in fact the gold we have found is no small amount. Those three taels, if kept, could buy a motorbike to travel for the Buddha's work. That would not be for a personal purpose. Moreover, if we returned it we would not know whom to return it to, while the motorbike is also something very much needed. We try every way to argue ourselves into keeping the gold and keep tormenting ourselves. So the value of our morality is measured only by three taels of gold, because we hesitate and waver before deciding. If our moral worth were greater than those three taels of gold, we would think of a way to return it without any agonising. Conversely, if our moral worth is smaller, we will quietly put the gold away and make various excuses to ask the teacher to go home and carry out our intention, without having to lie awake thinking.

That is why we say human morality is not unlimited. Some people can lose their integrity and morality for a few hundred thousand. Others have their morality broken only for two or three taels of gold, or sometimes even ten. But there are also those who, tested more severely, still keep the value of their morality. It all depends on their heart and wisdom.

We have many ways to assess a person's heart and wisdom. But the most accurate way is by the length of time they think about or aim toward. That is, by how long a span of time they look toward, we can know how great their wisdom and heart are.

For example, a person of ordinary heart and wisdom thinks only within a span of a day or two. They go round and round with thoughts about eating, sleeping, work… today, or at most tomorrow. A person who looks a little further may think of a week. What they will study and do in the coming week, they have already prepared from today. Another looks a few years ahead. In the first year of the Basic Buddhist Studies school, they are already thinking about the curriculum of the following years. Besides trying to do well in the subjects they are studying, they use their time to borrow materials and study in advance the subjects to come. Another looks further, five or seven years ahead. Now, studying at the basic level, they are already thinking about what they will do after finishing. Should they then continue at the advanced institute to earn a degree, or practise meditation and contemplation for a few years to strengthen their spiritual power before studying further?…

People of great heart and great wisdom can think through a programme for a whole lifetime. At present they are still in school, but they are already thinking about and setting a direction for the future. Seeing the problems that still exist in Buddhism, they think that later they will try to do the Buddha's work as well as possible. What is good, they will develop; what is not yet good in the Buddha's teaching, they will find ways to remedy so that the teaching may flourish. How can all the Buddha's disciples become holy and perfect; how can all the monastics in Buddhism be good people, free and liberated, all shade trees for everyone? They worry, think and chart a plan of work for their whole life, a life dedicated to the Buddha's teaching. That is a person of great wisdom, who can see across a whole lifetime.

People of superior heart and wisdom think not only within this one life but can think beyond later lives as well. That is the wisdom of a holy one. For holy ones never think only in circles within a human life, but always look out across many cycles of rebirth, able to take in everything from the near to the distant future. While in this life, they can see many later lives and know very clearly what they must do.

Once a child only eleven or twelve years old suddenly said to others something very strange: "How odd, people are born, grow up, work until they are old and die, going round and round like this forever." From this remark we see that the child had the makings of a holy one. Only a holy one worries about the human life, is troubled about rebirth, sees people passing from one life to another, sees the meaninglessness of a human life, being born, growing up and struggling hard only to return to dust in the end. Most of us are caught up in worries about food, clothing, rice and money, and in the joys and sorrows right before us. Our minds can hardly rise above those ordinary things. If someone praises us with one word, we are delighted and remember it for a long time; if someone criticises us with one word, we are miserable day after day. When we are rich and powerful we feel glorious; when poor we are always sad and bitter. That is, our hearts are always governed by the ups and downs of life. We do not have the eye of wisdom that can see beyond this human life to other human lives. If we saw the absurdity of the human life, why it goes round in birth and death, death and birth, deep within us we would have a longing, a thirst for liberation.

Reflecting, we see that the Buddha's giving up the throne, yielding the throne in order to go forth, was also a great practice of yielding that came from the superior wisdom of a holy one. Considering the circumstances of the time, this was not at all simple. We can understand it like this: in the Buddha's time, the Indian kingdom comprised many small states. In the north was a large kingdom, the kingdom of Kosala. The small state of Sakya, of the Sakya lineage, the Śākya line, lay to the northeast of this kingdom of Kosala. Apart from the small state of Sakya, the neighbouring states were all vassals of the kingdom of Kosala. The kingship of the vassal states, including that of the Sakya lineage, could continue to exist only with the consent of the great king of Kosala. King Suddhodana's kingship was chosen by many of his courtiers and accepted by the great king Maha Kosala. After King Maha Kosala came King Pasenadi (that is, King Ba Tư Nặc, a contemporary of the Buddha) who succeeded him. In the small state of Sakya, too, the passing on of the kingship was decided by an elected council and agreed to by the great king of Kosala. So the throne was not a given; it was always eyed by many. King Suddhodana was a man of ability. At the age of forty with no child, he too was worried. If he had no son, the throne would pass to other branches, though still within the Sakya royal clan. Perhaps one of his ministers would be elected king when he died. So when Prince Siddhartha was born he was overjoyed, thinking that he would have someone to succeed him. More delightful still, he saw Siddhartha's outstanding character. Meanwhile the ministers around him were very disappointed, because the throne of Sakya, which everyone was eager to seize, might now fall into Prince Siddhartha's hands. From childhood Siddhartha's character was already remarkable. His appearance was beautiful and his dignity radiant. From his gait and posture, from his voice and gaze…, the Prince radiated a brilliance and majesty that won everyone's admiration.

Moreover, he was an excellent student. Of all the teachers invited, he grasped what each taught deeply, sometimes understanding even better than his teacher. He was truly accomplished in both letters and arms. As he grew, people saw ever more clearly that this was the one who would rule the small state of Sakya in future, that no one could contest it, and that he might even extend its borders far wider. But with the wisdom of a holy one, the throne of Sakya was hardly worth our Buddha's concern. His vision went beyond such ordinary things. From childhood, the elder Brahmins had predicted that he would become a Wheel-turning King (Chuẩn Luân Thánh Vương), meaning one who would not only be king of the small state of Sakya but would make all the surrounding countries submit. His merit was enough for him to rule a vast empire.

Of course, when he grew up, everyone told him this, especially King Suddhodana, because the king did not want him to go forth. He wanted him to stay and hold the throne and always hoped that, just as the prophecies said, when he became king Sakya would no longer be a vassal of Kosala. Then he would rule Kosala and also Magadha, the two very large kingdoms beside it. Although King Suddhodana and many others repeated that prophecy with hope, he took no notice of it. He saw high rank and power as merely dust clinging to the soles of his feet. His wisdom went far beyond such ordinary things, so he left the royal palace to go forth. He left quietly because he wanted to yield the throne to others. If King Suddhodana died, the throne would pass to someone in the Sakya clan. For his son Rāhula was then too young to do anything. He knew this but still did not care. In the Sutra of Forty-two Chapters he said: "This whole world is meaningless." Indeed, the whole world was to him like grass and rubbish, like sand and dust; what was there in it worth anything? He left to seek values that are more lasting and more lofty. He wanted to leave those values forever for all sentient beings, while glory and rank are only impermanent and illusory.

So the degree to which we yield to others depends on our heart and morality. If our heart is narrow, we can yield only small things. When great things are touched, we will fight to the end to win them. Only great hearts can renounce everything, yield everything to others and keep nothing for themselves. The Buddha's yielding of the throne, and his not seeking benefits for himself, his child or his clan, gives us a great lesson about yielding and about the noble heart of a human being. For a person of great heart, nothing in the world can bind them. The Buddha proved this. We must try to follow his example throughout our lives of practice, regarding nothing as so important that we must hold on to it or compete with our fellow monastics and fellow human beings over it, even if it is only a reputation or an affection.

Besides position, money is also an important factor for building the practice of yielding. We must admit that money plays a very important role in human life. No one can live without material things and money. Some even say "money is joined to the gut": for anyone to part with their money is like tearing away a piece of their own gut, an unbearable pain. So for property that was built only through sweat and tears, with the heart and blood of one's life invested in it, people do not easily yield it to others. Precisely because money has such meaning for people, it has become the second important factor on which we practise yielding.

The third important thing is honour. We know that honour is not something material that can sustain a person like money and a bowl of rice, yet it gives us delight and pleasure. It can give a person a feeling of happiness. Living among others, we all hope always to be admired and praised by others, and no one wants to be criticised or despised. That is ordinary psychology too. Anyone who experienced as a child the moments of being praised for their school achievements will hardly forget that feeling of delight, excitement and pride. When we are grown, each time we find a clever solution to a difficult situation and are admired by everyone, we too feel immensely pleased. So not a few people, wanting to attain that feeling, think they must acquire and seize honour for themselves.

Quite some time ago, a rumour concerning human honour appeared among writers and artists. What the truth of the story is, no one has dared to announce to this day. It is the case of a writer who brought out a rather good work that became widely known. Gradually this author was promoted and held important positions in the Writers' Association. But some decades after that famous work was published, the author did not write another book. This made many people doubt and look into the origin of the matter. In the end the rumour spread loudly that that book had not been written by this writer's own hand but was the work of his friend. During the war this writer had a very close comrade. It was that person who wrote this work but died before he could publish it. The friend who survived claimed it as his own and took it to the publisher for a licence. Unexpectedly, the book was highly rated and widely distributed. And so the "author"… the false one became famous.

If this is a true story, let us ask why, before dying, that author handed over all his belongings, including the literary work, to his friend. Surely, while alive, the two were close friends who had treated each other well. The one called the author may earlier have yielded small things in life to his friend: yielding a bowl of rice or porridge to each other, yielding a pill when one was ill… But faced with glory, with the honour of being the author of a famous work, he could not bear it and took it for himself. To him that honour was too great, and he could not bring himself to let his friend enjoy it in vain while the friend was already dead.

So although honour is nothing, it is very hard for people to let it go and yield it to others. In life, when an honour is about to be ours, anyone who is ready to accept loss so that another may live in a feeling of delight and happiness through fame and honour deserves to be regarded as a person with the noble practice of yielding.

The fourth factor called an advantage on which to build the practice of yielding is affection. In human life, affection is regarded as the most troublesome and complicated field. Problems connected with affection are all very hard to settle completely because they are delicate. In reality, people are always competing with one another for affection. It all comes from selfishness. When we love someone, we usually want that person to belong only to us. No one wants the person they love to share their affection with others. Even within one family, when the parents love one child more, another child feels sad and slighted and becomes resentful. When we grow up, in our relations with friends, once we begin to have romantic feelings for someone, if we see the person we love talking with someone else, no one can bear it and the heart begins to be jealous without cause. People are like this; everyone is selfish in affection, always wanting to claim affection for themselves and unwilling to yield it to others. That is why it is truly rare to meet in the world a noble love that loves a person yet accepts that person going to love another, and is glad on seeing them happy. On the contrary, we witness so many tragedies in the world that arise from love. Not a few people, out of jealousy, in grabbing at the one they love, have spoken to their rival with a knife or with acid.

That is about the world. In the temple, if we are not careful, we practitioners also fall into selfishness in affection. For example, when lay Buddhists admire us and often come to see and talk with us, if we are selfish we want them to keep that affection for us alone. A person who is not selfish, however, always wants to share the affection and wants lay Buddhists to love all their fellow monastics. When lay Buddhists come to the temple, we should create conditions for other fellow monastics to meet them so that the lay Buddhists come to hold them dear as they once held us dear. That too is a way of yielding and sharing affection with others.

Because affection is also an important factor for people and people sometimes compete over it so fiercely, to yield it to others is very hard. If someone still holds that the nature of affection in this life cannot be shared, we still always keep in mind that we must know how to live for others. When it is needed to bring joy and happiness to others, we can yield what we have, even what is most precious. Living like that, we have accomplished the practice of yielding.

Yielding usually takes two forms. Sometimes it is yielding what we already have to another. Sometimes it is something that is coming, where we have the advantage to obtain it but are ready to yield it to another.

In the first case, yielding what we already have has a meaning like giving and making offerings. We possess something, and when we yield it to someone else, it is no longer ours. For example, we have a book needed for our studies. The book is important but very rare, and the whole class has only a few copies. Feeling that if we keep it with us, our fellow monastics who come to borrow it every day for reference will be inconvenienced, we yield it to a certain fellow monastic, because that person has a proper bookshelf and it is more convenient for the others to consult it there. So for everyone's benefit, we are ready to yield what we have.

The second case is a little harder: yielding to another what is coming to us. For example, one fine afternoon a lay Buddhist comes to the temple intending to offer a clock. That person does not yet know exactly whom to offer it to, but because they meet us first, they intend to offer it right there. So we are the one with the advantage to receive that gift. But thinking that we have nothing special to deserve the clock, and that we do not need it very much (there is already a large clock in the room), we decline and suggest that the lay Buddhist offer it to someone who needs it more. That is yielding to another what is coming to us (while we have none).

2. THE MORAL MEANING OF THE PRACTICE OF YIELDING

Speaking of the practice of yielding, we understand at once that this is a matter with a moral meaning. So we do not need to prove why yielding is moral, only to recognise the moral meaning of this practice.

First, yielding is close to the practice of giving. This is easy to understand, because from what we have or are about to have, we yield to others and no longer have it. That is an expression of morality, of a mind that is not selfish.

Second, yielding needs a root of love. Only when we can love others can we yield to them the advantages we have. Without love, whether in the world or in the Way, we cannot yield to anyone. Once we think of others and hold them dear, we are ready to yield to them the benefits we have. The tendency of love is to want the one we love to be better off and to have more advantages. The greater the benefit, the greater the love must be for us to be able to yield. If love is smaller than the benefit, we will never establish the practice of yielding.

For us practitioners, being appointed abbot of a large temple can be considered a great benefit. If some lay Buddhist offers a large temple and we are the one our teacher chooses to be its abbot, it is hard for us to yield it to another because the benefit is so great while everyone in the temple dreams of having it. But we see that among our fellow monastics there is one who is moral and magnanimous and deserves to enjoy this benefit. In the course of living together, we have been loved and supported by that person bit by bit. Although we study better and have been chosen by the teacher to be abbot, we still find a way to tell the teacher, asking him to let our elder fellow monastic be abbot and offering to go there as the administrator to help him. So being abbot of the large temple is a great benefit, but our love for our elder fellow monastic is even greater, so we are ready to yield it. That is why we say yielding needs the root of love.

To accomplish the practice of yielding, we must be people of little craving, little ambition and light attachment to self. Here we need to distinguish clearly two concepts: craving (tham muốn) and ambition (tham vọng). Both are forms of greed, but ambition is greed for big things (usually position, power, fame…), while craving is greed for small, everyday things in life. So to be able to yield, these two kinds of greed must exist in us only slightly. If we always find the heart naturally light, unburdened, wanting nothing for ourselves, we will easily yield to others. From small things like a nice pen or a clock to greater ones like a post in the Sangha…, in our hearts we do not want it to be ours, so we are ready to yield it to our fellow monastics.

People with much craving are always longing to have many things. So their minds are very tired and troubled, because they must always compete, brood, have wandering thoughts and devise every scheme to gather every benefit for themselves. Genuine practitioners, meanwhile, have hearts light as clouds and wind, unconcerned with fame and gain. A person with little craving and little ambition will certainly have a very light attachment to self. Yielding to others in whatever comes up, they will not resent or flare with anger when others offend them.

Besides these factors (having love, little craving, little ambition and light attachment to self), we know that yielding also comes from right thinking. For example, at the time of the Buddha's birthday, lay Buddhists bring cloth to offer to the temple. We are the one who directly receives that cloth and know very well that, compared with the number of monks in the temple, the cloth offered is a portion short. We know that if it is shared out from top to bottom, we will certainly get a share as one of the senior members of the community, but certainly someone will not receive any, so we struggle in our thoughts so much that we cannot sleep. If we yield to others, we will have none. If we stay silent, we still get a bolt of cloth, and the others have to put up with going without, but our conscience does not allow us to do so. In the end it is right thinking that helps us yield to others easily.

First, we think that if we do not take a share, our fellow monastics will receive enough and everyone will be happy. Second, although we do not get a new set of clothes, our old ones are still good. We do not need it very much, so we yield it to others who need it more. Besides, without cloth we will learn to be proactive in saving fabric. On the other hand, we think that being the first to know the cloth is short and doing nothing so that others bear the shortage would not be worthy of the morality of one who has left home. And this is also an occasion to test our morality… After thinking like this, we decide not to take our share but still tell no one, because if we told, we would be boasting of our good points. That is not good at all. Moreover, not telling is because we want our fellow monastics to be at ease, since if they knew we had no share, they would feel uneasy and fall into anxiety. That is a case where we know how to yield thanks to right thinking.

Or when our teacher appoints us to represent the school at a major Buddhist conference, we keep wondering whether we should accept that honour. For more than anyone, we know ourselves well. Although we study well and are also somewhat quick and lively, looking carefully we find that we do not truly have authority and moral stature. In daily life, there are things we say that still do not persuade our fellow monastics. If at the conference what we say is not good, it will affect the reputation of the school. So we ask the board of the school to let another fellow monastic go in our place. In talent, that person may not equal us, but they certainly have greater authority and moral stature. In daily life that fellow monastic has often spoken and been listened to and followed by others. So thanks to right thinking, we yield honour to another.

The last factor is that, through the power of concentration, we can yield easily. A person with concentration usually has nothing in the mind. In fact concentration has many layers. At the first layer, a person who has just attained concentration looks and sees that the mind has nothing in it, but in truth afflictions still lie hidden within. When concentration becomes deeper and breaks through many afflictions, the practitioner will see that there is nothing in the mind. It is precisely this state of having nothing in the mind that shows us this is a capital for living, something running against people's usual idea of how to live. For when the mind is not yet concentrated, we think happiness is attaining what we must have. But when we have attained concentration and seen the happiness of having nothing, we understand that until now we had a mistaken idea. A person who understands that having nothing is itself happiness will be able to yield very naturally and easily. Whatever comes, they do not want to hold on to it for fear of the trouble. Meanwhile, keeping the mind free, they feel much better.

For a person with concentration, the mind is not located in the head but pervades everywhere. We spoke of this in the lesson "Harmony". A person without concentration, looking at others, sees themselves and others as different. But a person with concentration, whose mind covers everyone, sees no difference between themselves and others. What they have is as if others have it, and what others have is as if they themselves have it, with no winning or losing, no competing. So when benefits come, they yield them to everyone easily, keeping nothing for themselves.

So concentration has the power to make it easy for us to let go, to yield and to form morality.

3. YIELDING: AN IMPORTANT FACTOR LEADING TO HARMONY, SOLIDARITY AND AFFECTION

We say yielding is an important factor leading to harmony, solidarity and affection because, first, it is like giving and can help us form good affinities with others. In other words, yielding makes people hold us dear and feel indebted to us. For example, we have a beautiful object but see that a friend likes it so much, so we yield it to them. On receiving the gift we yielded, the friend will surely come to love and value us more. The act of yielding here is just like giving. It is forming good affinities with others.

A Zen master said: once a person has attained the Way, they should go and form affinities with sentient beings in order to teach them later. Sometimes, going out and meeting someone, one might curse them a few words so that they curse back, which is also forming an affinity for teaching them later. In truth, Bodhisattvas do not do that. Bodhisattvas form only good affinities, so that when they meet again, sentient beings hold them dear and listen to their teaching, and they never form bad affinities with sentient beings. Yielding is the best way to form good affinities. Living together in a large community, when each person knows how to yield to the other, good affinities form among them. Everyone will look at one another with eyes of affection, creating solidarity and closeness.

Living in this world, people have fought fiercely to seize each and every benefit from one another. That fighting, whether open or hidden, all comes from selfishness. Sometimes, seeing another person loved by everyone, we say nothing, but jealousy arises in our hearts. When there is a chance, we will secretly speak ill of them to lower their standing. That is hidden competition. Or sometimes the competition is more open and more fierce. Look at some countries in the world each time they elect a President or Prime Minister…, and we will see this clearly. They try every means to win the people's support to gain position and rank for themselves, even abusing and speaking ill of their rivals in the election. At such times they do not need to hide their ambition or their intentions. They only know how to fight fiercely, with no politeness and no yielding.

In a world full of such fierce competition, a person who knows how to yield naturally steps out of it, at ease and free. That is also a kind of liberation. Just look at dogs playing happily together who suddenly turn and tear at one another when someone throws them a bone, and we will be startled to think of our own condition as human beings. At ordinary times everyone lives together very happily. But faced with some benefit (money, honour, position…), they begin to look at one another with uneasy eyes, suspicious of one another, and try every means to grab the benefit for themselves. Life is like this. In the spinning wheel of birth and death, a liberated holy one is one who steps out of the cycle of birth and death at ease and free. At present we do not yet have the strength to step out of the cycle of birth and death, but if we have morality and know how to yield, we will step out of life's harsh machinery lightly and serenely, like the image of one who has been liberated. And once we have yielded, we naturally are no longer an object of jealousy.

We already know that, living in this world, people greatly need love. No one can live alone without relation and exchange with others. Everyone has a heart that thirsts for love and always hopes to love others and be loved by them. That is the greatest happiness of human beings. So a person of moral character always has the awareness to build solidarity and affection between people. Whoever destroys harmony and solidarity between people, especially within the Sangha, commits a very grave wrongdoing. Among the five great wrongdoings mentioned in Buddhism is the wrongdoing of destroying harmony. In its narrow scope, it is breaking the harmony of the Sangha, causing the Sangha to split. But understood more broadly, it is destroying solidarity between people. That can be regarded as one of the five heinous offences, a great wrongdoing.

On the contrary, a person who builds harmony for the Sangha will have very great merit. There are many ways to build harmony between people and within the Sangha, but the best way is still yielding. If everyone knows how to yield and does not compete with others over anything, the Sangha will be happy and harmonious. We can take a simple example: one day the Sangha elects someone to hold some post, but everyone wants to yield to their fellow monastics. This one yields to that one, and that one yields back. In the end one person is chosen, but the person elected does not want to hold the post either. So although someone does hold a higher post and has more advantages, there is no division in the Sangha, because deep down everyone wants to yield good things to others and no one is anyone's object of jealousy.

So with only the mind of yielding, we create immense merit because we build harmony for the community. Lay people are the same: to keep affection between people, they must know how to yield to one another.

To easily win the goodwill of others, another point to note is that we should always take the smaller share and stand in the lower place. If in a crowd we always push forward to stand in front of everyone, we will make them feel uncomfortable. For seizing the best position makes people think that we want to stand out and enjoy more benefits. Then people will not feel goodwill toward us and will look down on us. If instead we always look for a modest place to stand and always take the most disadvantaged share, we will naturally be loved by everyone. That is also a very good life lesson that each person needs to learn.

4. ISSUES WITHIN THE SANGHA

At present, in the Sangha too there are many things over which monks compete with one another very fiercely. Among them, followers are also an object of hidden competition between monks and between temples, because they are a source of income and also of honour. A temple or a monk with many followers feels more glorious and more famous. If they want to build a large temple, they will have more people contributing, and life is easier… Saying this, we feel pained, but it is an undeniable truth. Sometimes, wanting to win lay Buddhists over to themselves, some monks look for ways to lower another monk's reputation. Often such a monk even shows displeasure on hearing that lay Buddhists have taken refuge at another temple. This is the very cause that divides the Buddha's teaching. Such people will later lose everything, because if they meet a person of wisdom, that person will judge at once that they are not good, since at the first meeting they speak ill of others. That is the near cause. Further off, a person who often speaks ill of others will receive the karmic result. Later, they themselves commit many base acts, lose their honour and lose everything, and no one respects them any more. According to the law of cause and effect, only those who always yield to others will later receive everything. Of course, not everyone who yields does so wanting to receive everything later; they yield only out of love, but the result will be so.

To create an atmosphere of harmony in the Buddha's teaching, at the refuge ceremony the preceptor should remind lay Buddhists to remember that taking refuge in the Sangha means taking refuge in the Sangha of the ten directions. Although they take refuge with only one preceptor, lay Buddhists should go to rely on, learn from, serve and make offerings to monks and nuns who practise genuinely wherever they may be. Even in doctrine, we do not always share the same view as everyone. But even when our views differ, we must not create division in the Buddha's teaching because of it. Where we have not reached agreement, we should offer our opinions and build together out of love, and must not criticise, sneer or speak ill of others, leading to division.

Posts in the Sangha are also a cause that makes many people within the religion fight and grab at one another. In some places people find ways to fight, act covertly, and bribe the authorities in order to hold some post in the Sangha. Meanwhile, those monks who are truly capable and of true virtue do not want to hold any post at all. At present there are also good people in the Sangha who look after the monks and nuns, but such cases are very few. This too is a painful thing that remains in Buddhism.

The position of abbot in Buddhism is the same. After the original founder, the abbot's position also becomes a fierce competition among fellow monastics. When the senior teacher has passed away, fellow monastics of the same rank each want to be the one to succeed the teacher as abbot. This too is a hard situation. The story of Venerable Thiện Phát, who once served as abbot of Thường Chiếu Temple, is also a lesson in yielding. Earlier, when he was in the Mekong Delta, because he was a man of virtue, his master left him the temple to be abbot when the master passed away. At that time there were only two fellow monastics in the temple. But the junior fellow monastic was determined to rally lay Buddhists and fight to seize the temple. As soon as he saw that intention in his junior, on a pitch-dark night, the Venerable left the temple with only a bag and a few sets of clothes in his hands. He did not want to see rivalry and mutual slander, so he left the junior to stay and be abbot of the temple. After that he carried on with his studies. But a person of morality, above all with a mind of yielding, usually has merit and so is respected wherever they go. As for the junior who stayed on as abbot of that temple, he did wicked things, because his being abbot came from a bad mind, a mind of grabbing and seizing. Once the starting point is not good, people go on doing what is not good. That is only natural.

At present the Sangha often holds training courses for abbots so that the monks who serve as abbots gain more knowledge and better views on doing the Buddha's work. This too is good. But if we are not careful, this practice easily gives rise to negative things. For after the course ends, everyone dreams in their hearts of becoming an abbot one day. Many of Buddhism's tragedies begin from there. For example, if there are 50 monastic students in a class and each dreams of being abbot of a temple one day, then if that came true, 50 more temples would have to be built. How could lay Buddhists possibly have the means to build 50 more temples? Moreover, if everyone hopes to be an abbot, temples will spring up indiscriminately, contributing to the further weakening of Buddhism.

The Sangha should regard the abbacy as a system of running the temple and not as the position of one person. Besides the abbot, a temple has teachers, administrators, supervisors, treasurers… These are people responsible for supporting one another and working on the Buddha's work together, creating a united strength that lets Buddhism develop more and more. So the training courses for abbots need to add more on the value of those who stand in supporting roles to the abbot, rather than speaking only of the abbot's role, which makes monastics love only looking for a temple to be abbot of instead of gathering together to support one another.

If all 50 people in the course did not want to be abbot, because they had no ambition, liked yielding and liked to support others, the Buddha's work would go very well. If everyone competes for the abbacy, then with one person to a temple, spending all day busy competing with other temples for lay Buddhists, how could they look after the work of the religion? Instead, of those 50 people only 3 temples would be needed, where everyone lives together and looks after the Buddha's work together. Even if two or three hundred more people had to be taken in, the temple would still be full of love and still harmonious and united. Thanks to that, the Buddha's teaching would be brilliantly revived. That is the merit of the Buddha's teaching and the merit of sentient beings.

While we are still in the community, we must practise yielding. We begin by yielding small things such as a word of praise, a little cloth, cakes and fruit, or a mark of favour… By practising yielding, we eliminate the mind of greed and rivalry. Later, faced with greater benefits, we will easily yield them to others.

5. CAUSE AND EFFECT

So what is the cause and effect for a person who knows how to yield?

First, a person with the practice of yielding will have happiness in the present, with a serene heart. Once we are not greedy and do not compete with anyone, always yielding good things to others, our hearts will be calm and at ease with nothing to be troubled about. Moreover, if we know how to yield, we will be loved and held dear by many people.

In the practice of meditative concentration, a person who knows how to yield is one without greed and anger and so enters concentration easily. Such people will surely reach true liberation later.

In the long run, a person who always yields will receive good karmic results that come naturally, smoothly and lastingly. The case of King Lý Thái Tổ (that is, Lý Công Uẩn) is an example. When King Lê Ngọa Triều died, the court officials naturally elected him king without his having to fight or grab against anyone. That was the karmic result of yielding in previous lives. That result came naturally, gently and lastingly because no one competed or was jealous. Of course, when we yield we hope for nothing for ourselves, but that is how cause and effect works: good things still come naturally, lastingly and firmly.

6. FOUR KINDS OF PEOPLE IN LIFE

In life, people are usually divided into four kinds: the petty person (tiểu nhân), the gentleman (quân tử), the cunning schemer (gian hùng) and the hero (anh hùng).

The petty person is one of little talent and no virtue. This kind of person has a narrow mind and a deceitful nature, and specialises in speaking ill of and attacking others.

The gentleman is a person of morality but not necessarily of great talent. Although this kind of person has not yet done anything great for the world, their morality radiates around them and makes everyone feel comfortable and at ease.

The cunning schemer is a person of great talent but also very scheming, crafty and treacherous. Because of their talent, they can influence and sway many people. Because of their scheming, they can seize power and money, manipulate and greatly affect life. This kind of person has great talent but does no good for others. If they get hold of money and power, they become a calamity for society.

The opposite of the cunning schemer is the hero. This is a person of great morality and high ability. Only such people can stand against cunning schemers and protect life. Without them, we would live all our lives in the shadow of, under the power of, cunning schemers. If there are many heroes in life, people can resist the plots of bad people. Being talented yet highly moral, when they gain power and influence, heroes never act for themselves but always for the benefit of all.

In fact, the gentleman has a great weakness: having morality but not talent, they sometimes become weak. Faced with conflict and rivalry, they often give up and are ready to yield position and responsibility to bad people. So power in society and in institutions easily falls into the hands of bad people, and of the incompetent and useless.

Although we encourage everyone to practise yielding, yielding must be reasonable and directed at the right person. Mistaken yielding is also a calamity for many people and sows an unwholesome karma for oneself. For example, a person of virtue and talent who deserves to be district chairman, faced with others' competing for it, yields the position at once. The one yielded to is a bad person, so when they take power they embezzle and take bribes, ruin the State's credibility and harm the people's interests… So that yielding has done harm to everyone and is a very grave wrongdoing.

It is not only matters outside, in the lay Buddhist's life; matters in the temple, in the community and among monastics are the same. For example, if we hold the post of head of the community, the community in the temple is stable. But seeing that someone wants it so much, we yield it to them. When they become head of the community, they lack the ability, and today one matter and tomorrow another prevents the community from practising. So our wrongdoing is also very grave.

Another point we need to note is that we must use wisdom to judge when to yield and when to shoulder responsibility. We usually imagine that liberation is something at ease and free, unhurried, stepping out to the side, unlike the attitude of charging ahead and shouldering responsibility. So faced with the rivalry of this world, we tend not to charge ahead and prefer to withdraw into seclusion. But we do not know that liberation requires very great merit. As for yielding, if we yield rightly it creates merit; conversely, if we yield wrongly we lose merit. Once merit is lost, we cannot reach liberation. This is very hard. So we do not always yield and prove ourselves to be people of morality, because sometimes our yielding brings peace only to ourselves, while other people suffer calamities.

Our Buddha was a person of very noble practice in yielding. He was ready to yield the throne to others to step onto the hard path of practice. But in his life there were times when he was also very resolute and did not easily yield to others. Once Devadatta said to the Buddha:

• Venerable One, you are old now. Please hand over the leadership of the Sangha to me, and I will lead the Sangha in your place.

He answered:

• Devadatta, the Tathagata knows by himself how to do things at the right time; that is, whatever is right and reasonable, the Tathagata will do.

The Buddha did not say outright "I will not hand the Sangha over to you", but clearly he did not yield. In the past he had yielded the throne to others. For the throne and kingship, with their golden palaces and jewelled halls, gold, silver and power, although glorious and splendid, are only fleeting and temporary. When it came to leading the Sangha, he did not yield. Although leadership of the Sangha is not great and holds no glory, to him it was the thread of morality for all time for humanity. He had to preserve that thread of morality for sentient beings. Later the Sangha itself placed itself under the leadership of Mahākāśyapa (Ma Ha Ca Diếp), because Mahākāśyapa was a person of great virtue. And so leadership of the Sangha was gradually passed on to others.

Today, too, there are people who resolve to fight and not yield for everyone's benefit. Not long ago, a monk was invited to be abbot of a temple, but the person who kept the temple secretly tried to drive him away. Knowing this was a person without morality, that monk did not leave and asked that the lay Buddhists be invited to meet so that they could decide. When the lay Buddhists met, all agreed that the monk should be abbot. After that, the temple-keeper tried every way to harm the abbot, but he kept on enduring patiently. He was determined to keep the temple so as to hand it over to a good person. Later the temple was handed over to nuns to be abbesses. What that monk did was entirely right. Even if he could not stay, he would not let a bad person stay, and he resolutely fought to keep the temple for good people in order to help the Buddha's teaching develop.

So yielding is not always the right thing to do. We must weigh and consider according to each person's talent and virtue, and must think of everyone's benefit. For example, faced with some post, we know the advantage lies with us, but if we want to yield it to another fellow monastic, we must weigh ourselves against that fellow monastic and see who has greater talent and virtue. If that person truly has more talent and virtue than we do and can bring more benefit to the Sangha, we are ready to yield for the benefit of many. If, examining carefully, we see that the fellow monastic's talent and virtue could not benefit the Sangha in holding this post, we must not yield. For then our yielding becomes an unwholesome act that loses merit.

In short, we have no clear standard for yielding, but each person must have the wisdom to judge each case for themselves and not fall into illusion. For in some cases, if we are weak and yield to someone of little talent and virtue, we will bring calamity to others. But in other cases, being too subjective, thinking ourselves better than others, we refuse to yield and keep it for ourselves, which also brings calamity to others and creates unwholesome karma for ourselves. Both cases are mistakes. So in this matter we need to be alert and clear-headed.