20 MINUTES TO MASTER ... BUDDHISM by Kulananda

Author:Kulananda
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: HarperCollins Publishers
Published: 2013-02-19T00:00:00+00:00

The Buddhist scriptures have very little to say on the subject of sex. Monks and nuns take a precept of chastity, and their monastic codes go into great detail about what kinds of act this precludes, but for those who are not living monastic lives not much is said. Usually this precept is interpreted as implying an abstention from rape, adultery and abduction, but there is clearly more to it than that.

Sex is a very important issue for all of us. The sexual instinct is very strong, and drives us to all kinds of strange behaviour. One thing that marks Buddhist culture, however, is that it has never sought to control sexuality by means of guilt, and on visiting some of the countries of Asia one finds them refreshingly guilt-free.

Buddhism doesn’t discriminate between people on the basis of their sexual preferences. You can be heterosexual, homosexual, onanistic, transvestite or celibate. Nor has Buddhism ever ennobled the nuclear family. Marriage is not a sacrament in Buddhism; it is simply a social contract, and if one looks at the various Buddhist cultures around the world one finds socially accepted instances of monogamy, polygamy and polyandry. These are just different ways of arranging your life.

The important thing is that one doesn’t harm other people by one’s sexual behaviour or put a disproportionate emphasis on the value of sex itself. We live in a culture which places a massively disproportionate emphasis on sex – it is at the centre of so many people’s lives. In Going for Refuge to the Three Jewels, however, one begins to move sex from the centre to the periphery of one’s life and to decrease one’s attachment to it.

The tension of sexual polarization and sexual desire hardens the subject/object duality. In a state of sexual arousal we see the person who is the object of our sexual desire as just that – an object. For many of us, our consciousness is never so hardened into a state of anxious separateness as when we are sexually aroused, especially if our sexual desire is frustrated. The opposite of this state is contentment – a state of being at ease with oneself and with the world which comes about not through the satisfaction of desire but ultimately through its non-arising.

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