Saka Dawa
Chaz
The Remarkable ChazAnywhere, Everywhere & Nowhere Veteran
By the Tibetan Calendar we are begining Saka Dawa, the period we observe the Buddha's birth, enlightenment and paranirvana.
Khenpo Jigme at Vajra Vidya Retreat Center in Crestone offered this to his friends today ....
During this month the merit of any good deeds that you perform are considered to be multiplied 100000..
Here are some good actions that are commonly taken to accumulate merit during Saka Dawa, specially on the 15th day, are:
Refraining from eating meat
Offering donations to monasteries/nunneries, or to individual monks/nuns
Praying and reciting mantras (such as the refuge prayer, for one example, and the om mani padme hung mantra)
Making prostrations around holy sites.
Giving money to beggars..
Lighting butter lamps
Making pilgrimages to holy places
Buying all kinds of animals they are going to be killed and releasing them. (Fish, for example)
Circumambulating around stupas or other holy places. (Basically, this means walking clockwise around a holy site while praying or reciting mantras with a good heart...
Comments
All very valid, worthwhile and commendable actions.
I would however, hesitate at "Buying all kinds of animals that are going to be killed and releasing them...."
This has actually been recorded as doing some really, truly dreadful damage to the ecological balance of a site chosen to release such animals.
The intention is wonderful, to be sure, don't get me wrong.
But the result is often miscalculated, and definitely unforeseen...
Fresh water fish released into the salt water and vise versa
Introducing creatures into habitats where they have upset the local ecological conditions.
Releasing domesticated animals into wild conditions they are not capable of surviving.
I respect the ideal.
Just not the idiocy of blindly mimicking it without thinking it through.
I'm with you on animal release. As much as I appreciate the sentiment involved, many times the animals released have no place in the system they are released into and the action can cause more damage than good.
Gampo Abbey, a monastery in Nova Scotia founded by Chogyam Trungpa, has an annual release of lobsters. This makes sense because lobsters are native to those waters.
You could go to a bait shop and get minnows. Many bait shops source their bait minnows locally from people who trap minnows in the wild. You can find out what lakes the minnows come from and just put them back where they came from.
Just the same, it's probably best to not take chances. Find other ways to observe Saka Dawa.
A lot of states have websites where they list which fish are present or stocked, so you can just look up where to return minnows (as long as you pay attention to what kind minnows you get) to. Or, get nightcrawlers and release them in your garden!
As a sangha we observe the no-meat-eating suggestion, per the request of our teacher. He leaves for Asia at this time of year, so he brings a list of all our names with to the monastery to offer blessings, which is nice of him. We won't see him again until November.
The 'crawler idea isn't so good. Most baitworms are not native. Sportfishers, releasing these exotic 'crawlers, rather than lug them home, have reeked havok in national forests with the worms devouring duff that provides ongoing nutrients, habitat and even runoff control.
Not a good idea.
I'm giving thought to a no-meat day on the 15th day.
I gave thought to a 'no-meat' lent a few years ago. Still here...
Still 'miss' it though, I admit.
It's possible that even releasing native animals into a natural habitat where they already thrive, would also tip the balance unfavourably.
But I'm not sure why the discussion is ensuing on this specific matter.... I though @Chaz was shelving that part of the 'devotion'....
Support to you for other avenues explored, fellah....
The releasing animals bit may no longer be possible in quite the same way..after all in Tibet it would have meant releasing them back into the environment from which they came...
Now you have situations like Chinese crab fishermen who wait round the corner out of sight until pilgrims release crabs into the sea, then when the pilgrims are gone they scoop the crabs up and sell them again..
Some of them are species which started off in a different country and were transported live.
But...its still Saka Dawa and many of the things on Khenpo Jigme's list will bring great benefit.
Khenpo-la mentions "any good deed" . Such activities aren't limited to that list. You could volunteer to work in a homeless center or a soup kitchen or your local food coop.....any activity that benefits beings.
Going on retreat at this time would be perfect.
Hang prayer flags.
It could be a long list.
I paid for part of a pensioner's shopping when she was short of the final total. She didn't even realise it.
I could scarcely afford my own food.
I don't say that to sound grandiose, special or particularly virtuous. I merely mention it in context because when we drop all defilements and attachments, and cease clinging to 'Pain', opening the heart to others is much easier.
@Chaz, good point. The ones from here are caught here, mostly by people who spray down their yards and grab the worms as they come up. Not saying they are native of course, just that they are wild caught and sold here. I think the point is that anyone doing such activities needs to be aware of what they are doing, and the environment they are releasing them into. Good intentions can still cause harm if one doesn't use knowledge as well.
Went to a charity event last night, paid £100 to attend and another £20 went into the raffle - won the magnum of champagne - yeah! Sometimes it comes back immediately ... \ lol / ...
I must stop liberating quorn fillets..
directly or indirectly.....?