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remind yourself 
that your family has been doing 
good 
deeds for generations - so how 
can you bear 
to be the one to destroy the family 
name. 
3. Your own age. If you remind 
yourself that at 
your age you ought to know better 
than to 
mess around with various sorts of 
immorality. 
4. Your own past good deeds. You 
have to think 
how can you bear to spoil your 
track record 
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5. Your own knowledge. You have 
to think how 
you can be so stupid to do bad 
things in spite 
of all you have learned. 
6. Your own teachers. You have to 
think of your 
spiritual teachers and academic 
teacher and 
think how they would feel about 
what you 
are doing. 
Another way of thinking is to 
remind yourself that 
there are no secrets in the world. If 
others don't see 
what we are doing, the angels will. 
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Even if the angels 
don't see, we are still witness to 
our own deeds. 
Similarly, fear of the consequences 
of unwholesomeness 
can be developed by recollecting: 
I. Later Regret. If we were to do 
an unwholesome 
thing like this, it is not worth it 
because 
we will only regret it later. 
2. Criticism: If we were to do an 
unwholesome 
thing like this, it is not worth it 
because 
others will criticize us for it. 
3. Retribution: If we were to do an 
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unwholesome 
thing like this, it is not worth it 
because 
we will only be punished later or 
receive 
the bad karma. 
4. Hell Realms: If we were to do 
an unwholesome 
thing like this, it is not worth it 
because 
we will only be born in hell. 
In conclusion we can say that 
unwholesomeness is 
not just breaking the Precepts but it 
is what happens 
to the mind whenever the mind is 
distanced 
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from the centre of the body. To 
avoid unwholesome 
we have to train the mind to return 
and establish 
itself permanently at the centre of 
the body. In the 
beginning we have to keep the 
Precepts, at an intermediate 
level we have to train ourselves in 
meditation 
until we can attain the 
DhammakAya. When 
we attain DhammakAya we can 
meditate oninsight 
and uproot the refined defilements 
from the mind 
too. In order to inspire yourself to 
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train in keeping 
the Precepts and meditate 
conscientiously you 
should cultivate these 
hand-in-hand with your 
conscience. 
E. ILLUSTRATIVE 
EXAMPLES 
E.1 Metaphor: Just as we must 
freshen ourselves up ... 
Just as we have to freshen 
ourselves up thoroughly 
before dressing up smart, before 
we avail ourselves 
of the higher virtues we have to 
make sure we are 
completely free of remaining 
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unwholesomeness. 
E.2 Ex. Cakkana and the Rabbit 
SA. 11.112, 
MA. 1.165, DhsA.103 
There is a story of a young man 
whose mother was 
ill with a bad back. The doctor said 
the only way to 
cure the disease is to treat it with 
fresh rabbit blood. 
Because he wanted his mother to 
be cured he went 
out hunting for rabbits. He caught 
a rabbit but when 
Blessing Nineteen: Abstaining 
from Unwholesomeness 231 
he was about to wring its neck, he 
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saw its sad eyes 
and couldn't bring himself to kill 
it. He let the rabbit 
go and returned home empty 
handed. 
His brother asked him, "Where's 
the rabbit?" 
The boy said, he had let the rabbit 
go so his 
brother shouted at him, "Do you 
think the life of a 
rabbit is worth more than the life 
of your own 
mother?" 
The boy didn't say anything but 
went and bowed 
at the feet of his mother and said, 
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"Mother I wanted 
to kill a rabbit to make medicine 
for you but I 
couldn't bring myself to do it. I 
thought to myself 
that your illness is only due to the 
karmic retribution 
of such killing for many lifetimes. 
Even if I were 
to have killed the rabbit, there is no 
guarantee that 
its blood would help you to 
survive. Whether the 
medicine worked or not, the killing 
would just 
make for more unwholesome 
karma so we would 
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come across the same predicament 
in future lifetimes." 
The young boy made an act of 
truth, saying, "May 
the power of never having killed 
an animal since I 
was born cause my mother to be 
cured". 
Because of the boy's virtue and 
sincerity, miraculously 
the mother was cured. Thus if you 
keep the 
Precepts properly, when it comes 
to situations of 
hardship, your resolution will also 
be effective. This 
isan example of abstinence from 
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unwholesomeness 
by situational avoidance. 
E.3 Ex. The Man and the Python 
(MaIgaladEpanE 
2/158/129) 
There was once a young man who 
used to go to the 
temple regularly and request his 
Precepts from an 
arahant. He didn't have any special 
virtue except 
for the Precepts he had requested. 
One day he went 
to work in the forest. On the way a 
python captured 
him and coiled round him with the 
intention 
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to crush him. Normally, forest 
travelers will keep a 
dagger on them for such an 
eventuality. Every time 
you breath out, the python will 
tighten its coils, but 
if the victim puts the knife between 
themselves and 
the coils normally the snake will 
release them.The 
young man immediately pulled out 
his dagger with 
the thought to stab the python in 
the head. Then he 
thought, it is such a rare 
opportunity for me to be 
born at a time when Buddhism is 
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still known and 
practiced. It is so rare for me to be 
able to meet an 
arahant. If I were to die, I don't 
know how many 
more lifetimes it would take before 
I would have a 
similar chance again. If I were to 
kill this snake then 
there would be no end to the 
vicious circle of karma. 
It would also break my Precepts. It 
is also equivalent 
to lying to an arahant. He had to 
think to himself 
which was more important to him 
— Precepts 
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or his own life. Finally he decided 
his Precepts were 
more important so he threw away 
his knife and 
concentrated at the centre of his 
body. The merit 
filled his mind. A strange thing 
happened. The 
snake, even though it was a 
humble beast, suddenly 
felt sorry for the man and let him 
go. This is an example 
of abstinence from 
unwholesomeness by 
planned avoidance. 
E.4 Ex. KukkuEamitta the Hunter 
(DhA.iii.24f1) 
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In the time of the Buddha there 
was a woman who 
had been going to the temple with 
her mother since 
the age of seven. At that time she 
had already become 
a stream-enterer. A stream-enterer 
keeps the 
Precepts automatically the whole 
of the time and is 
unable to break their Precepts. 
Sense-grasping is still 
in the mind of a stream-enterer, 
however. Thus even 
though she was a stream-enterer, 
she still had subtle 
desires. As the daughter of a 
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millionaire she had her 
own castle and each day she would 
look down from 
the castle at the people coming and 
going in the 
market place (because she had 
nothing better to do). 
One day she saw a hunter coming 
to sell the animals 
he had killed in the market place. 
She fell in 
love with him on first sight, and in 
the end eloped 
with him. Even though she could 
no longer bring 
herself to kill, steal, commit 
adultery, lie or drink alcohol, 
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she could not help herself falling in 
love. Before 
long she had seven sons. When 
they married, 
she had another seven daughter 
in-laws. The Buddha 
saw that the time had come when 
the family 
could profit from his teaching so 
he passed by the 
home of the hunter. The Buddha 
spread loving-kindness 
so that no animals in the area got 
caught in any 
of the hunter's traps. The Buddha 
sat in the forest 
and meditated. When the hunter 
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couldn't catch any232 
A Manual of Peace: 38 Steps 
towards Enlightened Living 
thing he thought that someone 
must be stealing the 
animals out of the traps, so he 
looked for the culprit. 
He saw the footprints of the 
Buddha and followed 
them to where the Buddha was. 
The hunter aimed 
an arrow at the Buddha but was 
unable to shoot and 
stuck there at the spot. All the 
seven sons came out 
looking for the father, and tried to 
shoot the Buddha 
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and ended up the same as the 
father, frozen to the 
spot. Later in the day, the woman 
came out looking 
for the rest of the family along 
with her daughters 
in-law. When the woman saw the 
Buddha and what 
her husband was trying to do she 
called, "That's my 
own father. Don't harm him!" 
When the sons and 
father heard their mother's voice 
they thought that 
the Buddha was really her father 
and so laid down 
their bows. The Buddha was able 
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to teach them until 
all of them could attain 
stream-entry in that family. 
From that time onwards no-one in 
the family 
could kill any more. This is an 
example of abstinence 
from unwholesomeness by 
transcendental avoidance. 
Blessing Twenty: Restraint from 
Drinking Intoxicants 233 
A. INTRODUCTION 
A.1 Western values concerning 
alcohol 
Alcohol in the West is a substance 
primarily associated 
with relaxation and celebration. 
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