Buddhist belief obviously belongs to the spiritual category, and economic life is closely related to our material life. On the surface, there seems to be no necessary connection between the two. In fact, Buddhist belief runs through the whole economic life-everyone who believes in Buddhism should embody his own Buddhist belief in his own economic life. People who believe in Buddhism set a good position for themselves in economic life, implement their beliefs, let us become people with healthy spiritual and material lives, live a high-quality lifestyle, and let people who don't believe in Buddhism vividly see the benefits of believing in Buddhism from us, so I chose such a topic with great practical significance. Economics is a complete and systematic knowledge. I only have some perceptual knowledge of economic problems and can't rise to the rational level. Although I haven't fully thought about this issue myself, I might as well take this opportunity to bring it up for your consideration and study.
I think Buddhist belief should be carried out in our economic life. First of all, everyone who studies Buddhism should use our developed wisdom and hard-working hands to create wealth. If a person lives in society, if you can't create wealth, you will objectively become a consumer of society. I divide people's life into three stages, from birth to 20 years old, which belong to the consumption stage. During the 40 years from the age of 20 to 60, consumption is still creating wealth; After the age of 60, it belongs to the consumption stage. If some people are less than 20 years old, 40 or 30 years old, and can't create wealth for society with their brains and hands, then the total amount of social wealth will decline, eventually leading to poverty, which will lead to a series of social problems and endanger our bodies, minds, families and society.
In the past few years, due to the lack of positive propaganda on religion, many people mistakenly believe that monks are parasites and a burden to society and consumers, and some campers have also raised similar questions. Their misunderstanding is that they don't really realize that monks are also creating great wealth. Wealth, in sociology, is divided into two categories, one is material wealth and the other is spiritual wealth. Material wealth solves food, clothing, housing and transportation. After the problem of food and clothing is solved, people will meet the needs of spiritual life, and the core part of spiritual life is religious belief-for Buddhists, it is of course Buddhist belief. Monks create spiritual wealth. Without spiritual wealth, the development of a society is bound to be deformed, and material civilization cannot advance by leaps and bounds. There is an all-round exchange relationship between material wealth and spiritual wealth. For a practitioner, if these two aspects can be skillfully and reasonably embodied in himself, it will play an inestimable role in the development of Buddhism.
We should create wealth with wise minds and hard-working hands, so as not to become a social consumer objectively; If a person does not actively create wealth, he will be deprived of the right to exist, which is a shameful life. If a nation depends on the relief of another nation or other countries, it may be expelled from the game. If I can't advance my understanding of some social problems and reach a high level of understanding of Buddhism today, then I will be unable to move, because this is my responsibility and obligation. I must think ahead and explore in the spiritual scope. Only in this way can I reflect my life value in social life. Life needs wealth, but some people who believe in Buddhism can create wealth with their own hands when they don't believe in Buddhism. After they believe in Buddhism, their understanding of wealth has deviated, which has affected their normal work and family life. Therefore, it is urgent to understand and establish a correct view of Buddhist wealth.
Buddhists should have a good social outlook, and there are many ideas to straighten out when they appear in society. This is called right view in Buddhism. We should also have a positive view on wealth, so that the belief in Buddhism can be well combined with economic life. That is to say, in all aspects of economic life, we can show that we are Buddhists, with the wisdom, compassion and equality of Buddhists, and turn all the teachings into current actions, so that Buddhism has a wide range of social significance. If these teachings and teachings are only in the books of Buddhist colleges, in the mouths of Zen monks and in the Dharma meetings of preaching, they cannot penetrate into everyone's life and cannot be regarded as universal laws in people's lives, their significance is not great. Therefore, Buddhism is originally popular Buddhism, and it is ordinary Buddhism. It is not a patented product of a few people, and it has never been labeled. Buddhism is only used in temples. In Southeast Asian countries, Buddhism is a kind of culture, and its beliefs have been reflected in daily life as the standard of living for all people. In our vast Han areas, when we talk about Buddhism, we will mistake it for temples, nuns and monks and nuns, and think that Buddhism belongs to this group of people, outside the "world of mortals", divorced from social life and has nothing to do with the lives of most people. So I think it is very important to turn Buddhist ideas into concrete social life, especially our concrete economic life.
I was at Yichang airport with some magicians yesterday. I told you, the economy in the southeast coast is very developed. The magician there has a computer, a steering wheel and a diploma from an institution of higher learning. Then a magician said that money is similar to a poisonous snake. With money, monks can't practice. I said, technology or money is just a tool. The question is not how much wealth you have, but who holds this tool. For example, uranium, if used to build an atomic bomb, may be a disaster all over the world in the hands of unsympathetic people; But if it is used to generate electricity, it will benefit mankind. There are many children who are out of school around us, and we can often see them by boat and car. They are setting up a stall to do business. I asked them why they didn't go to school. They said they had no money. If I give him 300 yuan, I can solve the problem of going to school for one year. If a person has the will, wisdom and compassion of a bodhisattva, I hope he can master high technology, and I also hope he can have wealth. Just like the summer camp we are holding now, if there are no people who believe in Buddhism and have money, if there is no ambition, all of us may be the ends of the earth and it is impossible to get together. Therefore, money and technology are just a tool. Because believers and idealists often avoid practical problems from subjective wishes and take it for granted that these things are harmful to our practice, then I think the key to the problem lies in mastering its subject-people. Being indifferent to fame and fortune and letting go of the obsession with wealth does not mean giving up the rational use of wealth.
I often think that if Buddhists were proud of poverty, there would be no Buddhism in today's society. Buddhists should become outstanding producers, creators and owners of material wealth and spiritual wealth. Only in this way can they become role models for benefiting the public and serving the society. If we summarize the classics of agama and Mahayana Buddhism, as well as the Buddha's thoughts, sayings and enlightenment, we will find that the Buddha's exposition of wealth is included in the Eight Meanings, Four Pictures, Six Degrees and Six Rivers.
The first of the four photos is giving, which can be said to be the fastest and most convenient scissors for Buddhists to save all beings in the real society. The first kind of charity is economic charity, which requires Buddhists to have wealth first. Giving alms to society with property is the most convenient and quick way for us to spread Buddhism, benefit life and save all beings, which is immediate and direct. Can save people in dire straits, can play the role of timely assistance. How can a Buddhist give wealth to others if he can't even solve his own food and clothing problem? If you are just a consumer of society and have no wealth, we can't embody this kind of compassion and wisdom in society.
Charity is two-way, which has long caused a situation in Buddhism, as if monks should accept the support of others. With the China of Buddhism and the popularization of Mahayana Buddhism, we have a deeper understanding of the two-way nature of charity. Whether in wartime or in peacetime, Buddhism has always had a tradition of sending doctors, helping the poor and benefiting the society. For example, temples have accumulated the net wealth of ten parties, which is collectively owned and given to the society in the form of Buddhist spirit when the working people of ten parties need it, forming a two-way communication and a virtuous circle. This contribution to society itself is irreplaceable by other groups. In recent years, there are many Buddhist temples engaged in Hope Project. In the past 20 years, the Chinese Buddhist Association has called on the Buddhist community in China to donate money to the disaster-stricken areas. Then these tens of millions of out-of-school children and children who are receiving relief are immediate interests. Buddhists in Hongkong and Taiwan Province Province bought quilts and daily necessities directly when they were in Anhui for disaster relief, and delivered them to the victims one by one. The victims are crying. They don't appreciate these monks with round necks and square robes, but they feel the warmth of Buddhism when they are in the most difficult time. I think this kind of liberation behavior embodied in social life is itself the best promotion of Buddhism, which is very vivid and concrete. There is always a process for a theory to run through practice, but it is very direct to ignore many intermediate links in the process of financial giving. All this is based on a rich material foundation, so Buddhist believers and groups must have a clear understanding of wealth-poor Buddhism is not Buddhism, and poverty should not be the best choice for Buddhists.
I came to this conclusion not out of thin air, but from my contact with many Buddhists. I found that they were proud of being unemployed and poor, so I felt very painful. When he sat in front of me, he said, I want to quit my job and practice in the mountains. I think money hurts people, and I don't want any more money. I will feel very painful for him. I think Buddhism was originally a good medicine to save the world, but it has turned into poison here. Therefore, his family has a strange view of him. His object thinks he is insane, and society thinks it is best not to associate with such people, who will become a burden. Of course, for personal practice, you can adhere to the principle of being poor and guarding the Tao, but for family and society, you can't use being poor and guarding the Tao and being hungry and stealing. Only by actively assuming the responsibilities and obligations of the family can we have material wealth and spiritual wealth and vividly reflect the objective interests of believers. People around us will gain the strength and confidence of faith from our high-quality life goals. Because people are most likely to ask questions from reality, find answers and draw conclusions about beliefs and other issues. If a believer does not have the ability to survive in real life, the result can be imagined. If believing in Buddhism will make people poor, then no one dares to believe in Buddhism. If Buddhism is poor, cultivation and preaching can only be an armchair strategist, let alone development. The above is the conclusion of my thinking.
Take Bailin Temple today as an example. Without tens of millions of yuan as wealth accumulation, it is impossible to have today's modern equipment and freedom. If it is run by a company, each of you may have to charge 600 yuan, so this material wealth is all reflected in your life and home.
We should ask ourselves deeply, often: what material wealth and spiritual wealth have we created for society? If we make this kind of dedication and creation, we are worthy. Because I am not a pure consumer society, I also created wealth in a way, in a cultural way, in a way of thinking and in a spiritual way. Therefore, I am very open-minded and don't care about other people's comments. I think this is very important. From a macro perspective, it is necessary to give spiritual food to the working people in society, and then the society will exchange with Buddhism in the form of material wealth. In today's economic society, temples should support themselves and use their wealth from ten places to ten places, such as clothing, medicine, poverty alleviation, hope project, etc., to reflect Buddhist compassion with concrete actions.
Therefore, the premise of Buddhist charity is to have wealth. Without wealth, giving is empty talk. Moreover, people living in a material society are most likely to feel the benefits of Buddhism from specific economic interests. So if Buddhists are all poor, our compassion will only become a theory and cannot be expressed in life.