-16- The Dry Remains of a Brook

~ By Buddhadāsa Bhikkhu ~

The remains of a brook are on Suan Mokkh’s boundary line beyond the women’s residential area. They start on top of a hill and then disappear below. During the dry season, it’s bone dry. Its remains show that it once had a lot of water because the brook bed was cut into a deep channel. But deforestation has made it dry – not a drop of water remains. That brook is named ‘Huai Chin Tai’ (the Brook Where a Chinese Died), and it has already died. On this side of Suan Mokkh, we have another brook named ‘Huai Than Nam Lai’ (the Flowing-Water Brook). It is dying. When I first came here forty years ago, it had a lot of water. Now it has useless, muddy water during the dry season. It will surely be dead because the forest at its origin is continually being destroyed. Nobody can do anything about this, which is the case with every major problem in the South of Thailand. Destruction of the source of a river or a brook is devastating, as you can see. I used to fight against deforestation but had to back down. The encroachers said that they needed land for their livelihood. After they destroyed the forest, the brooks became dry.

We should remember that this is a problem of man, who destroys what nature or God has created. The farangs believe in God, so they say that ‘God creates but man destroys.’ We Buddhists do not have God; we therefore say that ‘nature creates but man destroys.’ It has been thousands of years of continual destruction by man, and no one knows how much has been destroyed. Nowadays, the destruction is extremely intense, so intense that rivers and seas are polluted. Do you know that the Chao Phraya River will be completely polluted within a few decades? The seas will be the next victims. This is a result of man’s destruction of what nature or God has created. Now come back to the remains of the two brooks. They have been destroyed. This matter is associated with government and politics. Although it is not directly associated with Dhamma, we can talk about it in Dhammic terms: man’s foolishness and selfishness are the cause of this destruction.

Let me step aside a little from the present context. The great flood that occurred the other year resulted from man’s selfishness. The people involved knew that the sources of rivers were very important, but their selfishness – the thought of taking this and staking a claim for that – shut their brains off. There was selfishness behind the permission given by the government authority to logging companies. They knew that the sites were where rivers originated, but they still allowed logging there. The logging companies who were commissioned also selfishly destroyed the forest by overlogging. The result of this selfishness was a flood, as you all know. After it occurred, the people affected were not adequately helped. When help did come, selfishness accompanied it. It’s improper to talk about this, but one can say that help was given selfishly. There was fraud and embezzlement of donated provisions, and even unwillingness to help. This was due to selfishness. The incident began and ended with selfishness. Anyway, it teaches us Dhamma and tells us what we should remember.

Selfishness destroys everything, whatever it is. Buddhism, through the principle of voidness of self, teaches us not to be selfish. If we really see the state of not-self, we will not be selfish – because there will be no self to be selfish about. Thanks to Dhamma and the religion, which teach us not-self, we can be selfless and cause no problems.

Selfishness destroys peace and everything in the world. I can challenge you to see that you can find it in everything evil. If one is selfish by himself, he suffers alone. But if his or her selfishness also involves other people, then many people – probably the entire world – will suffer. The world is getting closer to doom because of the ever-increasing selfishness of people.

(From "Benefits You Should Get from Coming to Suan Mokkh," a talk given by Tan Ajahn in December 1988 at the request of Tan Dusadee Bhikkhu, as translated from the Thai by Aj. Mongkol Dejnakarintra.)

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“24 Benefits of Suan Mokkh,” is a series of weekly posts published to commemorate the 88th anniversary of the foundation of Suan Mokkh in May 1932 in Chaiya, southern Thailand.

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For other Dhamma teachings by Buddhadāsa Bhikkhu (audios, free ebooks, interviews, poems), please visit Suan Mokkh – The Garden of Liberation.

Buddhadāsa Indapañño Archives collection (Ref. C-05912)