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Sutra on the Net of attachment
Translated by Thich Nhat Hanh from the Chinese DhammapadaSutra on the Net of attachment
As light as a cloud or fine water grass
Yet it can fill or empty the ocean of love
Nguyen Du (Tales of Kieu)
What a bag of blood and puss,
How many years of
suffering and attachment!
King Tran Thai Tong (Khoa Hu Luc)
You tear apart the net of love.
(from a Lamp Transmission Gatha)
1. When the mind goes in the direction of sensual love, the tree of sexual love springs up and quickly sprouts branches. The mind is dispersed because the object of sensual love generates a violent fire in us. Those who look for sensual love are like monkeys that search for fruits jumping from branch to branch.
2. Sensual love binds us to a burden of suffering and attaches us to the worldly life. The anxieties and misfortunes that come about from sensual love increase day and night like an invasive grass with tangled roots.
3. Blinded by attachment sooner or later we will fall into sensual love. Anxiety grows daily like a trickle of water filling a lake.
4. In life there are many worries and sorrows, but there’s no greater worry than that brought by sensual love. Only being able to let go of sensual love, can a practitioner release all worry.
5. If we want to be happy and joyful, then we must be determined to let go of attachment. Free from attachment we are no longer caught in the circle of Samsara nor burdened by anxiety, nor restlessly searching for what is unwholesome. The absence of attachment will lead to true peace and joy.
6. If we have been deeply caught in love, then on our death bed, surrounded by relatives, we will see just how long the path of worry and suffering is before us. The suffering caused by love often leads us into unsafe situations and numerous disasters.
7. As a practitioner we should not go in the direction of sensual love. We must start by finding a way to uproot the tree of sensual love, so that its roots can no longer sprout. It’s not like simply cutting reeds above ground.
8. The roots of sensual love are deep and firm. The tree may be cut, yet branches and leaves sprout again. When sensual love is not uprooted, the suffering it causes will come back.
9. Like a monkey that jumps from one tree to another, people jump from one prison of sensual love to another.
10. The mind of sensual love is like a stream of water that goes with the flow of habit energy and pride. Our thoughts and perceptions can be embellished by the colors of sensual love and then we ourselves hide the truth and cannot see it.
11. That stream of the mind continues to flow freely and allows the knots of sensual love to form and be entangled. Only real insight is capable to discern and to see clearly this reality and help us cut through its roots in our mind.
12. The stream of sensual love permeates our thoughts and perceptions in order to grow strong and be entwined together. That stream is bottomless and makes old age and death grow very quickly.
13. The branches of the sensual love tree continuously grow with stopping because they are nourished by the food of sensual love. This food nourishes it causing it to become a great mound of hatred and resentment. Those who have little insight, impatiently go into that direction.
14. In prison there are chains and stocks, but wise people don’t see them as the most solid restraints. The chains of attachment that bind people to the cycle of bondage are the real strong chains.
15. Wise people see sensual love as a solid prison that is very difficult to escape from. They know that we have to put an end to sensual love in order to truly be at peace and happy.
16. If we see a physical form and are infatuated by it that is because we don’t know how to look deeply at impermanence. The ignorant person believes that this physical form is wholesome and beautiful. Not knowing that the outer appearance doesn’t contain anything that is real and long lasting.
17. By imprisoning ourselves in sexual desire, we are like a silk worm that spins a cocoon. Wise people are capable to cut through and let go of their perception that lead to desires. Having no longing for the object of sexual desire, they can avoid all suffering.
18. Someone whose mind is dispersed tends to see the object of sensual love as something pure and doesn’t know that this increase and strengthening will bring a great deal of bondage in the suffering.
19. Someone who is mindful is capable to see the objects of sensual love are impure, that is why they can let go of their desiring mind, and he will escape from the prison and overcome the misfortunate’s of old age and death.
20-21. By tying ourselves in the net of sensual love and taking shelter under an umbrella of sensual love, we are binding ourselves in the cycle of attachment like a fish that swims into his own trap. Caught by age and death, we just circle around the object of our love like a calf looking for his mother’s utter. If we are able to let go of desires and do not follow the tracks of the love vehicle, we can get out of the net of sensual love and nothing else can harm us anymore.
22. If we are able to go the whole way, leave behind all the fetters of attachment and suffering, and if we are liberated from all kinds of discrimination and go beyond all dualistic notions, we are a monk of great understanding.
23. Don’t keep company with those who go against the true teachings and don’t let yourself be pulled along on the path of attachment. If the practitioner has not yet transcend time and space, he is still caught in dualist views.
24. Seeing and understanding the true nature of things without being caught in any of them and we know how to undo the ties of sexual desire in our mind. Then we have grasped the meaning of the Buddha’s teachings.
25. Offering the right teaching is the most precious offering. The scent of morality is the most fragrant one of all. The most effective way to live according to right teaching is the greatest happiness amongst all kinds of happiness. The practice of putting an end to sensual love once and for all is the practice of putting an end to sexual desires.
26-27. The ignorant person often ties himself with the rope of sensual desire. He doesn’t yet desire to cross to the other shore. Craving creates corruption and brings about disasters and misfortune to others and himself. The greedy mind is the field; craving, anger and ignorance are the seeds. For those who are capable of practicing generosity and liberating others, the merit he harvests is immeasurable.
28. With few traveling companions but a large amount of merchandise to convey, the merchant falls into the state of anxiety and panic. The wise ones don’t run after desires, because they know that the infatuation with sensual pleasures is the brigand, who can destroy his life.
29. The five kinds of sensual desires arise, when our mind feels satisfied by them. When we can speedily put an end to those five kinds of sensual desires, we can truly be called a Hero.
30. When we no longer have sensual desire, we have no more fear. At that point we are free, peaceful and happy. When desire is ended the internal formations also end and because of that the practitioner comes out of the deep abyss.
31. Dear sensual love, I know your roots: the desiring mind comes from misperceived wishes and wrong perceptions. Now I don’t have any more wishes or wrong perceptions about you. So how can you arise?
32. If we have felled the tree of sexual desire, but we have not pulled up its roots, it will sprout again. If the monk or nun felled the tree of sexual desire and completely uprooted it, he or she will realize nirvana.
33. If a person doesn’t want to cut down the tree of sexual desire, its branches and leaves will continue to a greater or lesser extent arise. When our mind is still caught in sexual desire, we are still like the calf that always needs its mother’s utter.
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