Sri Lanka’s message to the world on Sambuddhatva Jayanthi:

Dispel craving, the root of all problems

by Ven. Bengamuwe Nalaka Thera

Sri Lanka was known as Sinhaladweepa in the times of yore. People in other countries successively called it by the names Sinhalan, Seelan and finally under British Colonial rule it came to be known as ‘Ceylon’. All these names are linked to the word Sinhalaya or Sinhaladweepa. By Sinhalaya it meant the land which belonged to or in which the Sinhala people lived.

That land is a beautiful island in the Indian Ocean which boasts of a recorded history of over 2,500 years. In the Third Century BC when King Devanampiyatissa was ruling this country, Emperor Dharmasoka was the ruler of neighbouring India. Emperor Dharmasoka’s son Mahinda entered the Order of Buddhist priests and attained the noble State of Arahath. Arahath Mahinda arrived at the Sinhaladweepa and having secured the confidence and cooperation of King Devanampiyatissa, established the Buddha Sasana there on. Since that historic event, the land of the Sinhala people became a Sinhala Buddhist country.

It was after King Dutugemunu that protecting the Buddha Sasana or the Buddhist dispensation became a prime duty and a responsibility of Sinhala Kings. The great and noble slogan of the warrior King Dutugemunu declared: “This effort of mine is not all for enjoying kingly comforts and pleasures; it is for the firm establishment and protection of the Buddha Sasana in this country”. That was an honest assertion of his intention.

For strengthening of the economy, the Sinhala Kings systematically built irrigation facilities such as tanks and canals and for the spiritual and moral development of the people they established Buddhist temples in all villages where Buddhist priests resided and guided the people. The tallest and most prominently seen structure of the temple was the dagoba in which was enshrined the holy relics of the Buddha. Also a tank or wewa was built in the village to store water for irrigation and other needs. Under this arrangement economic and cultural development prospered. This concept of development is graphically symbolised by the slogan. weway dagabay gamay pansalay meaning village served by wewa, dagoba and temple. Dagoba was the symbol of spiritual and moral development of the village, which was the grass roots level unit of the rural community. The Buddhist temple was the seat of the Buddhist priest who guided and educated the people, overseeing their welfare in all respects.

With the arrival of the Portuguese in 1505 AD, the country began to experience the threat of Western influence. The Portuguese were successively followed by the Dutch and the English who exerted pressure on us to secure trade advantages and ultimately to establish their suzerainty on us. This invasion of Western powers resulted in serious damage to the traditional culture of the country. But none of these three European powers or any of the South Indian powers which invaded the country earlier could conquer the whole country.

The reason was the unity that prevailed among the people and the sound war strategies they followed. The English, whose empire earned the panegyric “the empire over which the sun never set” too were not able to conquer the whole country. In the end, the patriots of the upcountry who fell to the deception of a wily Government Agent called John Doiley handed over the rule of the whole country to the English on an agreement. On the basis of this agreement of 1815, the then British Governor Brownrigg, was put in charge of the administration of the entire country. From that day onwards, up to 1948, the British ruled the Sinhala country as a colony, naming it ‘Ceylon’.

As the British Government carried on the administration in flagrant breach of the conditions of the Agreement of 1818, threats and offensive action began to be levelled against the British rule by the Sinhala people. In the face of this, a mercenary army was brought down to the country from outside and the emerging freedom struggle of the Sinhala people was suppressed. As an indirect way of weakening the Sinhalese community, the British granted a greater measure of privileges to the minorities of the country.

Action was taken also to provide English education to them and they were placed in important positions in the public service. At that time the rulers referred to those minorities as Tamil-speaking people. The English rulers resort to this strategy of suppressing the Sinhala people made use of the leaders of the Tamil people who formed the majority of the Tamil-speaking community to create a special section partial to them within the population of then Ceylon.

Political party

The first seeds of this force were sown in 1931 and the political party named Illankai Tamil Arasu Katchi (Tamil State Party of Ceylon) established subsequently under the leadership of S.J.V. Chelvanayagam. That party was introduced to the Sinhala people under the name ‘Federal Party.’

Efforts to achieve a Tamil separate state in Sri Lanka was strengthened by 1977. The Tamil United Liberation Front which contested the General Election of 1977 under the leadership of Amirthalingam MP won the position of Leader of Parliamentary Opposition, augmenting the strength of the effort towards this end.

In the course of these developments, a terrorist movement began to raise its head. The armed struggle started in 1976 with the assassination of Alfred Duraiappa, the Mayor of Jaffna and subsequently turned into LTTE terrorism with Veluppillai Prabhakaran as its head, with the aim of establishing a Tamil Eelam. That is actually what happened and not a retaliatory response to any injustice perpetrated on the Tamils by the Sinhalese or, as some allege, not a conflict resulting from the annexation of any Tamil territory by the Sinhala Government.

The Tamil terrorist movement thus launched for the establishment of a Tamil Eelam continued for 30 long years and, ultimately, the menace could be rooted out and an atmosphere could be created which enabled all communities-Sinhala, Tamil and Muslim to live together in unity as one people under one banner due to the wise leadership given to the national struggle by President Mahinda Rajapaksa. The LTTE terrorist movement, by that time, had grown to be the most diabolical terrorist outfit in the world. President Rajapaksa’s great commitment of abolishing LTTE terrorism has made him an example for terrorist control in the eyes of the world.

The 2600th Sri Sambuddhatva Jayanthi, ie the 2600th Anniversary of Gautama Buddha’s Attainment of Buddhahood or Supreme Enlightenment has arrived at a moment when we are living in an incomparably great satisfaction, free from the constant harassment of terrorism. It is hardly necessary to state that the spirit of Buddhism helped us in great measure to psychologically fashion us in keeping with the spirit of the noble teachings of the Buddha to take a humane course of action in overcoming this cruel terrorism.

Putting an end to the armed terrorist scourge of limitless cruelty which embraced the whole country, instilling fear of cruel death into millions of hearts through a humanitarian operation motivated by love towards humanity is, undoubtedly, a charitable action of the highest order and deserves to earn the approbation of all who value moral conduct. However, those who derive huge profits by trafficking in narcotics and armaments will not value this service to the people, because the existence of terrorism facilities their illegal activity. At this critical moment in history, Buddhism conveys to the world the important message of helping people to live and guiding them to do so without doing violence to human morality as far more important and noble than collecting dirty lucre.

Fear and sorrow rob the people of the opportunity to live with peace of mind. If we are to be really happy, we have to clean our minds of the defilement of craving. Today, the people of the so-called developed countries are engaged in a hectic struggle to amass the material comforts of life, egged on by craving. Multinationals perpetrate deceptions on people to earn huge profits because of the craving that drives them to earn more and more profits. As a result of the questionable ways they resort to exploit the resources of the planet which will yield themselves to be used for a long time if properly made use of, are likely to get exhausted in double quick time.

Because of deforestation, the atmosphere warmed up and the earth became the target of attack by Nature. This harmful trend will deprive humanity of the chance to exist on the planet with at least the minimum facilities. This position creates a sense of insecurity in people all over the world.

Buddhism clearly states that the cause of suffering is craving. The first sermon of the Buddha states as follows: “Katamauchauso dukkah ariya sachcha? yaya tanha pono bhavika nandiraga sahhagta tatra tahtabhi nandani seyyathidau kama tauha, bhava tauha, vibhava tauha” “O! Bhikkhus, what is the cause of suffering? It is this craving that leads to repeated becoming, delighting now here, now there, namely craving for sensual pleasures, craving for existence and craving for non-existence”

This craving that becomes active in the minds of men has become the cause that gives rise to various questions, problems and disputes between people all over the world. It has become mainly so because of man’s desire to indulge in sense pleasure and the craving for acquisition of power. All manner of human misconduct such as one nation waging war on another to acquire loot, interference with nations to disrupt unity among them through jealousy, plotting against a country to disrupt its attempt to be prosperous and aiding and abetting terrorist movements such as the one that harmed Sri Lanka till recently, has craving as its motive force. Realising this and ridding our minds of the defilement of craving is the only way available to us to bring peace to our minds and to live contented lives.

Human body

Buddhism clearly states what the world is like: “Ahau emasmiuyeva byama mattake kalebare lokau ca pannapemi. Lokau samudayau ca pannapemi. Lokau nirodhau ca pannapemi. Lokau nirodha gamini patipadau ca pannapemi”. In this human body about six feet in length, I perceive the world, its arising and its destruction and the path leading to the cessation of the world”.

According to the Buddha’s word, man himself is the world. Each man constitutes a separate world. There is no world devoid of man. Accordingly, development or fashioning the world means the development and fashioning of man. When man faces destruction, the world too faces destruction.

In another context, the Buddha has taught as follows: “uno loko atitto tanha daso”. The world is empty, insatiable a slave of craving”. Here also what is meant by the world is man. The human mind is always a void. It becomes necessary to fill that void. However much things are put in there, the void does not get filled. That is because the human mind is insatiable and is a slave to craving”.

Just as craving, hatred and delusion are thoughts that arise in the human mind and crate utter confusion in it, these mental conditions could also be described as attachment, conflict and delusion. As these mental conditions form the root cause of all de-meritorious actions of man, in Buddhism they are also known as “Akusala Moolas” or root causes of bad acts.

When the mind develops a craving for some object, man strives to acquire it. If he succeeds, he remains attached to it. If he fails, he would develop a hatred towards it in his mind. That means a conflict. That state of mind comes about due to delusion.

Unless he peeped into his mind and keenly observed the working of his mind, this mental condition cannot be understood, The method of peeping into and keenly observing the nature of the working of the mind is called meditation or Bhavana. Especially through the Anapanasathi system of meditation, that is, through concentration on the in-breathing and out-breathing process, this mental training exercise could be started.

By peeping into one’s mind and observation of its working, where ones’ mind proceeds on the right track and where it errs could be understood. Especially how the Akusala Moolaas’ of craving, hatred and delusion contribute to one’s wrong-doings could be understood and this danger to moral life could be avoided and a life free from those defilements could be gradually perfected.

Society could be brought on to a morally sound basis by the practice of this method of moral improvement on an individual basis by the people. This is the mental purification system pointed to in Buddhism as practicable and that proceeds on a horizontal plane in society instead of a top-down attempt at installing morality and discipline in a society embracing masses of people which is not found to be practical or successful.

Today, most socialist, capitalist or democratic political systems try to implement social reforms of the latter type. It cannot be considered a successful system of social reform to improve the morality of the people. Further, that approach of social reform gives rise to various social problems and unrest in societies.

It has to be pointed out that social problems could be resolved and a high level of social morality realised only through the reform effort of making the people morally good and virtuous on an individual basis by urging them to be good individually. It is this system of social reform and development that has been operational throughout the long history of Sri Lanka. This approach could realise the spiritual, as well as, the economic prosperity of Sri Lanka in great measure.

In addition, it equipped them with the strength to resist and be victorious against all forces that sought of conquer them. This system of development did not foster in them any warlike attitude which impelled them to wage war and despoil any outside people. To the contemporary world, where unjust wars are rife and where individuals and organisations seek to plunder the resources of the planet, the greatest and noblest message Sri Lanka could convey is this methodology of mental culture endorsed by Buddhism and which has to be practised on an individual basis so that the expansion may take place horizontally across society.

It is the Sinhala Bhikkus of who protected and preserved for posterity Theravada Buddhism in its pristine purity which teaches the way to lead virtuous lives in this world and ultimately after a long perfection of merit to escape from the cycle of births and deaths to permanent bliss and all canonical literature on the doctrine. It was the Sinhala community and the Sinhala kings who assisted the great Theras in the performance of that gigantic task.

These bhikkhus protected and preserved at great sacrifice the noble teachings of the Buddha, not only for the Sinhala community, but for the benefit of the whole of humanity. For this great service, the gratitude of the world community which values, virtuous human conduct should go out to the Sinhala people and particularly to the community of Venerable Bhikkhus.

All countries of the world should oppose the unfair attempt that is now being made by some defeated and disgruntled elements and vested interests to create a separate state in the island of Sri Lanka, disrupting the peaceful life of all races living in the country and their culture. Such elements should be convinced of the grave unfairness of their attempts and dissuaded from pursing it.

The writer is Secretary of the Patriotic Bhikku Front and Advisor to the President.