(Clearwisdom.net)
I asked some fellow practitioners and myself, "Which one of the Teacher's articles can you recite most fluently?" The most common answer was "Lunyu." (On Buddha Law) I then asked, "Which one of the Teacher's articles do you think is the most difficult to recite?" The most common answer was also, "Lunyu." Why? The reason is simple. We can recite Lunyu so fluently that it becomes difficult for us to stay focused when reciting it. Sometimes, we recite it while our imagination runs wild. Then is it truly us reciting it? Only each individual can know his or her own situation.
For practitioners who are imprisoned, what they recite most often is Lunyu. Before I was arrested, I had memorized Teacher's many articles and the first two lectures of Zhuan Falun. I know that Lunyu encompasses the meaning of the entire bok Zhuan Falun. However, to me, it seemed like studying Lunyu was not as effective as studying Teacher's other articles, so I didn't pay enough attention to learning Lunyu.
One night, about two months after I was detained in a forced labor camp, I had a dream. In the dream, I picked up a book at a bookstore. It was a book on music. There was a picture in it, where a conductor was directing a very large band. When I took another look at the picture, it came alive. It was like a TV screen and I felt as if I was at a live concert.
It took some time before I understood the meaning of the dream.
Sentient beings in different dimensions at various levels have different ways and abilities of communicating with one another. Beyond the dimension where we live, the environment and the capabilities that the Fa created for other living beings change. That's why the picture that I saw in my dream carried sounds, images, and the live atmosphere within it.
Then what about the levels that are even higher? Teacher said in Zhuan Falun,
"When two great enlightened people meet each other, they can understand everything with a smile. This is due to soundless telepathy, and what is received is in stereo sound. When they smile, their ideas are already communicated."
(The Third Talk, Cosmic Language)
I came to realize that one smile covers tons of changes in the firmament and thousands of years of history, and the levels below them had experienced countless jie (hundreds of millions of kalpa. Kalpa: a period lasting two billion years; here the term is used as a number) and transformations. All of this was communicated in that one smile. Those two enlightened beings' wisdom and abilities are beyond the imagination of the sentient beings below their levels.
Teacher is spreading the Fa in ordinary human society. It must be extremely difficult for Teacher to use the language of human beings to explain such profound Fa principles that even gods didn't know in the past.
"... it is very difficult to use human language to express the high-level, profound principles of the Fa." (from "Using at Will")
As I understand, the difficulty is not just for Teacher, but also for practitioners since the notions that we accumulated during the past thousands of years are all barriers preventing us from truly understanding the Fa principles.
For example, Teacher talked about the universe in Lunyu. When I saw, read, or recited this word before, I used to understand it based on my understandings of the universe. However, my understandings included the concepts formed by modern science, the feelings I gained from what I saw, and even the so-called "wisdom" formed over the many years of my lives in the past. It is hard to recognize this problem of using notions to understand the Fa since it has become a habit. When I recited Lunyu before, I could do it without thinking. That is because I used my notions to judge everything, including Lunyu. I know Lunyu covers Zhuan Falun in its entirety, but I only understood this Fa principle at a very superficial level.
I gradually came to realize what hard work Teacher has done for us! Teacher is using human language to explain the true situations of the cosmos. I started to have a totally different feeling when reciting Lunyu. Teacher said in Lunyu,
"BUDDHA LAW can allow people to thoroughly understand immeasurable, boundless worlds."
We have been shown everything, and now it all depends on us. The degree of Truth we can see is directly related to how many attachments we can get rid of. I thoroughly enjoyed reciting Lunyu again and again. It even made my days in the forced labor camp less difficult. Ever since I started to enjoy reciting Lunyu, I didn't seem to have so many troubles.
Modern science's degenerate notions
The first benefit from reciting Lunyu was uncovering and eliminating from my mind the degenerate notions of modern science. I am a computer engineer. Before I began cultivating Falun Dafa, I liked to read books on science to keep up with the latest developments. In fact, I became interested in cultivation from reading an experience-sharing article by a practitioner who is a scientist. I knew I had a lot of thought karma from my notions based on modern science. Every time scientists attempted to smear the Fa, my thought karma would agree with them. I made a feeble attempt to fight back and I was constantly on the defensive.
In Lunyu, Teacher directly talked about the essence of modern science,
"The ideas that guide today's science are only able to confine its development and research to this material world, as a subject won't be studied until it is known--it takes that approach."
Basically, the notion that seeing comes before believing is drenched in the pursuit of unlimited physical interests, and completely opposes Truth, Compassion, and Tolerance, the principles of the universe.
"Believing comes before seeing."
(Falun Buddha Fa - Lecture at the Canada Fa Conference)
No sentient beings can see principles and scenes above their own levels, since they would already be in that higher level if they were able to see the true manifestations at that level. Only by believing in Teacher, believing in the Fa, setting higher standards for ourselves according to the Fa principles, and getting rid of the degenerate things, can we move up and see greater truths. Viewed from this perspective, the directions given by modern science are fundamentally wrong.
Reciting Lunyu, I also came to realize the origin of modern science, the history of aliens, and the relationship between the old forces and other things.
"... as advanced as computers may be, they can't compare to the human brain ..." (Lunyu)
I came to know that no sentient beings can create other beings at their own levels, even a great enlightened being that can create a universe with one thought. This is because the wisdom and the abilities needed to freely create lives come from more microscopic elements. Aliens wouldn't be able to create such advanced modern science by themselves. Could an everyday person improve his or her gong level by simply practicing some movements? Would the aliens be able to break into other dimensions and acquire the ability to control time and space by doing some scientific experiments while opposing Truth, Compassion, and Tolerance? No. Without higher-level beings' protection and involvement, aliens wouldn't have been able to achieve that. They would have been eliminated long ago.
The technology developed from scientific experiments that we use is an illusion similar to the "supernormal abilities" gained through simply practicing some movements, or wealth acquired through "hard efforts." They are actually the results of the interactions among the microscopic elements shown in this superficial dimension.
"During the long-drawn-out thousands of years, how many people were not lost in illusion." (Zhuan Falun, Volume II, provisional translation)
After digging out the root cause of my thought karma, I started to send forth righteous thoughts to eliminate it every day. In just a few days, those bad things were nearly eradiated and could no longer affect me.
Dig out the origin of atheism
The second benefit was completely eradicating the poison of atheism in my mind. I had been receiving education based in atheism for many years. How much influence does atheism have? Actually, many people gave in to the old forces or even "enlightened" along an evil path because of deep-seated atheism. At critical times, the notion of atheism broke their will. Atheism essentially denies human nature, since our lives were granted by gods and came from pure compassion. A denial of the existence of gods is a denial of one's origin and a betrayal of our original good nature. I believe that the notion of atheism comes from some high level degenerate beings. Unable to see, they don't believe the existence of higher-level Fa principles, and thought what they saw and owned were absolutely perfect and correct. They became so arrogant. The manifestation of this notion in ordinary human society is atheism. I came to realize that atheism also has its physical existence. How many of these things are still residing in my dimensions? It's terrible not to totally eradicate them. We need to hurry up to send forth righteous thoughts to completely eliminate them.
Every day, I enjoyed studying and reciting Lunyu. Every day, I had new understandings. The "pleasure" that I got by assimilating my life to the Fa from inside out and from my origin to my superficial body is beyond words. I think many fellow practitioners can understand.
What prevents me from striving forward diligently?
After some time, I found that I didn't have new understandings no matter how much I recited Lunyu and studied the Fa. I couldn't keep up with my previous state of quickly improving myself and striving forward diligently. Before, when I had similar experiences, I thought it was normal because I recognized that the part of me that had obtained the Fa was separated. I could regain my spirit of striving forward if I kept studying the Fa and practicing the exercises. I shared my experiences on this with many fellow practitioners. Many of them had similar problems. We felt helpless and we would act passively when we got stuck in this kind of situation.
I finally felt I needed to think about this issue more seriously. What is the thing that prevents me from striving forward diligently?
"...'natural' does not exist ... "
(Expounding on the Fa)
I started to calm down, keep my main consciousness clear, and peacefully look inside. My main consciousness quietly watched the whole situation. Then I found there was another "me." When I studied the Fa, "he" was also studying the Fa and he tried very heard to find higher and newer understandings from the Fa. However, where is the true "Me?" Rendering a judgment based on the Fa, I realized that the Fa created all the elements and all the microscopic particles at different levels of my life. What else do I need from the Fa? No matter which level I enlightened to or how much wisdom or how many abilities I acquired, viewed from a higher level, I am still
"...just like grains of sand, and they're granular and in motion ..."
(Zhuan Falun, The Second Talk, About the Third Eye)
Where am "I"? Didn't the Fa create everything of mine?
"The space of the universe is inherently good, and its nature is to be True, Good, and Endure, and when a person is born he has the same nature as the universe."
(Zhuan Falun, The First Talk, Truly Guiding People Up to High Levels)
The true me is one body with the Fa and doesn't pursue what I think I need from the Fa.
The Fa enabled my main consciousness to uncover this attachment. When reciting Lunyu again, I completely threw myself into it. Like a wood chip dropped into molten steel, I gave my whole self, whether it was righteous or unrighteous and whether it was from my nature or from what I learned later, to the Fa, without holding anything back and without any pursuit. At that moment, I felt how happy one could be when truly "assimilating to the Fa!" Later, when sending forth righteous thoughts, I no longer tried to concentrate on reciting the Fa-rectification verses that Teacher gave us. Instead, I felt myself transforming into those verses, "The Fa rectifies the cosmos, the Evil is completely eliminated." My righteous thoughts were countless and boundless, covering the whole firmament, encompassing all of it and leaving out nothing.
I have undergone so many huge changes by learning the Fa!
I could feel huge changes every day. When I looked back to the past, I could hardly recognize myself. It was as if I had started a new life, yet the huge changes happened in just one month. I couldn't help but sigh, "I have experienced so many huge changes by learning the Fa!"
In my past Fa study, I had known that all the things that we saw through our eyes are false illusions. Then what are the true situations?
"...when your Third Eye is open you can magnify things to look at them ..."
(Zhuan Falun, "Why Doing Cultivation Exercises Doesn't Increase Gong")
For example, a malicious person in this dimension might be an evil rotten ghost when seen with our Third Eye, while actually in a more microscopic dimension there was a higher level being controlling the ghost. The higher level the Third Eye is, the more "true situations" can be seen. Then how do we deal with the following issues? First, What if my Third Eye sees nothing? Secondly, even if we can see through our Third Eye, who's to say that what we see is the true situation? The great gods in the old forces have many supernormal abilities. They can see and manipulate things below their levels, but do they see the true situations?
Teacher has told us to view all problems with righteous thoughts.
"Everything in the cosmos is created by the cosmos's Fa-principle of Zhen, Shan, Ren. All matter and every factor of a living being are brought into being by the characteristic Zhen, Shan, Ren."
(Falun Buddha Fa, Lecture on the Fa at the U.S. Midwest Conference)
What are the true manifestations of what we see in front of us, what we feel, or don't feel? Aren't they simply Truth, Compassion, and Tolerance? Though Teacher didn't carve these three words into our eyes, if we can truly render judgments based on these three words, wouldn't we be able to see the true situations of everything? And that is the most righteous of the "righteous thoughts!"
That winter, I was locked up in the coldest cell in the forced labor camp because I refused to be brainwashed. Because of long-term persecution, I was extremely weak and had a very painful stomachache. One day, the temperature suddenly dropped. Cold winds combined with unbearable pain made me feel miserable beyond belief. But when I calmed down and viewed the situation with righteous thoughts, I came to realize that no matter how hard the environment appeared to be, nothing could go beyond the control of Truth, Compassion, and Tolerance.
Indeed, anything that goes against the characteristic of Truth, Compassion, and Tolerance will ruin itself since all lives and materials, and their wisdom and abilities, are composed of microscopic particles brought into being by this characteristic. Going against the principles of the universe is to ruin oneself. When those malicious people smeared the Fa and Teacher, when those people who didn't know the truth held hatred against the Fa, and when the old degenerate high-level beings started the so-called "test" of the Fa, they were betraying the Fa and were about to destroy themselves since their lives were supported by the Fa. However, the Fa and Teacher are still maintaining their lives, giving them one more chance. What a great compassion! No human language or any words can describe the immense benevolence!
I feel incomparably happy when I think of this with righteous thoughts. Everything, including the bitter winter, the scorching summer, the sunshine, green trees, good people, vicious persons, even the prison cells and instruments used to torture Falun Dafa practitioners are all simply stage props or roles in a play. Nothing is separate from the Fa. To me, "Fa" is no longer those few books. Instead, myself, the layers upon layers of elements around me, all the matter everywhere, and the boundless and countless firmaments that are beyond my imagination, are actually all particles of the Fa! Looking at all these things, I was moved to tears.
?
"The truth is, BUDDHA LAW is not limited to the little portion in scriptures, which is only BUDDHA LAW's initial-level Law. Instead, there is nothing that BUDDHA LAW cannot explain--it thoroughly unravels all mysteries, from those of particles and molecules to those of the universe, from small things to great things. It is a different discourse at different levels on the nature of the universe--to be True, Good, and Endure--at different levels, what Daoists call 'the Dao,' or what Buddhists call 'the Law.'"
(Lunyu)
