佛陀關於孝道的開示
對孝道的闡揚，貫穿佛陀四十年的說法生涯。証悟之後，他首先開示的就是《梵網經菩薩戒本》。
爾時釋迦牟尼佛，初坐菩提樹下，成無上正覺已，初結菩薩波羅提木叉，孝順父母師僧三寶，孝順至道之法，孝名為戒，亦名制止。
重要的一點是，佛陀從無量世的娑婆苦痛中得究竟解脫之後，當務之急就是雲集於菩提樹下的菩薩、天人、及天龍八部開闡戒規。其目的乃是教導菩提道行非常堅固的行者報雙親恩的方法、並欽命將此妙法廣為流傳。佛陀深知自己覺悟的由來，意欲闡明父母的恩德，所以先宣說菩薩別解脫戒，這也是他無上的慈悲布施。
《梵網經》指出：德出自心地上的戒行，由此產生道德。這種道德（為人之道）告訴我們報答父母師僧三寶四重恩的方法。
聖人證果之後，首先要做的就是回報所欠之雙親恩情。回報父母之恩乃是修行的初衷，也是全世界古聖先賢的共同信念。佛陀首先說戒，傳授孝順至道之法。孝名為戒。依戒律來修圓滿自己仁德者，乃能圓滿人道，証得大智慧，並以方便，弘法利生，令其走上解脫之道。佛就是這樣做的，並將他所行的至道之法傳給了我們。
正如佛陀一樣，《佛說盂蘭盆經》告訴我們，大目犍連尊者亦是孝德深厚。他證得天眼通之後，即環視世間，尋其亡母，見她已墮入惡道。由於往昔惡業，成為痛苦交煎的餓鬼。尊者悲泣白佛哀求救拔。依佛之開示，借助自恣時十方僧眾功德迴向，目犍連聚集了足夠的功德來抵銷其母的惡業，她亦得脫一劫之苦報。此法門流傳了下來，基於這一事實，梁武帝這一虔誠的佛教徒兼孝子，在六朝時設立了盂蘭盆節。
盂蘭盆(解倒懸)法會在中國年年舉行，在日本稱為 Ubon Matsuri 。其目的在於供僧，並藉此給過世的親屬做功德。這兩者均體現了佛陀說《梵網經》的初衷：孝順父母師僧三寶。目犍連對母親的孝心誠心，佛陀的慈悲善巧，感動了梁武帝，也打動了多少世紀中人們的心。
目連救母的故事在民間是老幼皆碑，表明了一點－－証果聖人首先要回報的就是親情。
哀哀父母，
生我劬勞!
欲報之德，
昊天罔極。”
中國歷史上許多禪宗、淨土宗的祖師，就是在為父母三年守孝中開悟的。子女圖報父母恩，既善良，又合乎人倫。聖人、祖師、與那些開悟的人，已靈性圓滿，神通具足，仍侍奉孝敬父母。
比如佛陀在父親去世時，其孝情即得到了充分的體現。佛陀與其弟難陀，堂弟阿難陀，兒子羅候羅，各自抬起淨飯王棺槨的一角送葬，為後世樹立了孝道的聖典。
依佛陀教導的倫理規範而行，人們可以圓滿自身的道德、仁慈，并出生死輪迴之輪迴。這種解脫就是子女對父母至高無上的報答，因此人們出家修道。
在佛陀弘法生涯的晚期，他曾上忉利天稱揚孝德，並讚歎孝行第一的地藏菩薩。佛母摩耶夫人在生產時去世，並往生了忉利天。為報她的恩德，佛金口親宣了《地藏菩薩本願經》。
在五種孝中，佛的忉利天之行可以說代表了盡孝道的極點，也代表了自我修證的頂峰。為了覺悟，他離開了王宮，拋棄了帝王的享受而去過苦行生活，就是為了超越生死，並由此獲得救眾生於苦海之中的方便與智慧。證得佛果之後，他昇天說法以報答母親對他的恩德。佛陀高度讚歎地藏菩薩無邊的孝行與大願，而其內涵則擴展到一切眾生。「地獄不空，誓不成佛；眾生度盡，方證菩提。」
說法四十年，孝道貫始終；所做皆圓滿，將示入涅槃。若孝事自己的父母，所成的是狹義的孝道；孝事一切的眾生，乃能成就廣義的無上孝道。
一切男子是我父。一切女人是我母。我生生無不從之受生。故六道眾生，皆是我父母。
待續
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The Buddha’s Teaching on Filiality
The Buddha taught filial respect throughout his forty-year teaching career, from first to last. Immediately upon realizing enlightenment, the Buddha’s first discourse was the Bodhisattva Pratimoksa precepts, contained in the Brahma Net Scripture (Brahmajala Sutra).19
“At that time, Sakyamuni Buddha first sat beneath the Bodhi tree, after realizing the Supreme Enlightenment, he set forth the Bodhisattva precepts out of filial compliance towards his parents, his masters among the Sangha, and the Triple Jewel. Filial compliance is a Dharma of the Ultimate Way. Filiality is called Precepts, and is also called restraint and stopping.”20
It is important to note that after gaining ultimate liberation from endless lifetimes of suffering in samsara, the Buddha's urgent priority was to explain moral rules to his first audience of Bodhisattvas, Devas, and Rulers of the Eight-fold Spiritual Pantheon gathered beneath the Bodhi Tree. His purpose was to provide cultivators who were firmly established on the Path to Bodhi, with the means to repay parents’ kindness, and to exhort them to propagate this supreme method. The Buddha, keenly aware of the source of his enlightenment, wished to acknowledge the debt owed his benefactors. Thus he spoke the Bodhisattva Pratimoksa (“special liberation) code of ethics; this was his highest gift of compassion.
The Brahma Net Scripture teaches that virtue derived from practicing moral restraint on the “mind ground,” (in the cultivator’s deepest thoughts), creates “virtue in the Tao.” This virtue, the “art of being a person” gives the means for repaying the weighty kindness of “parents, masters among the Sangha, and the Triple Jewel (the Triratna: Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha).”
Enlightened Sages, upon their awakening, turn first to the matter of repaying their debt of kindness. To repay the kindness of parents is a prime motivating factor in spiritual history, a belief shared by the ancients and enlightened teachers the world over. The Buddha gave the Precepts first, to bestow “a Dharma of the Ultimate Way, which is known as filiality.” If one can perfect one’s humanity by holding precepts, one can accomplish one’s human destiny in the highest measure, attain Great Wisdom, and the means to bestow Dharma on living beings, thus giving them the path to liberation. The Buddha did it, then left directions to the Ultimate Way that he walked.
As did the Buddha, so did his disciple Ven. Mahamaugalyayana, whose great filial compliance is told in the Sutra of the Buddha’s Teaching on Ullambana.21 After attaining his faculty of spiritual vision, the “Deva-eye”, Ven. Maugalyayana surveyed the various destinies of rebirth, searching for his departed mother. He saw she had fallen into a state of woe, and was suffering grievous torment as a preta, a “hungry ghost” in the hells, as retribution for his misdeeds in lives past. The venerable disciple ran tearfuly to the Buddha for help in rescuing his mother. By following the Buddha's expedient means, and by employing and transferring the aid of his Sangha-brothers, who had assembled from the ten directions to pass the Pravarana summer retreat, Maudgalyayana amassed enough merit and blessings to counteract his mother’s bad karma. She was delivered from aeons of suffering, and the method of deliverance was transmitted for posterity. This historical incident inspired the Ullambana Ceremony, created in China during the sixth century, by Emperor Wu of Liang, himself a devout Buddhist and a filial son.
Ullambana (“rescuing those hanging upside-down”) is celebrated annually in Chinese communities, and in Japan, as the Ubon Matsuri. Its purpose was to make offerings to the Sangha, and thus create merit on behalf of deceased relatives. Both acts echo the Buddha’s motive in speaking the Brahma Net Scripture: “Out of filial compliance towrds his parents, his masters among the Sangha, and the Triple Jewel.” Maugalyayana’s devotion to his mother, and the Buddha’s compassion and skillful means moved the Liang Emperor, and has touched the hearts of people for centuries.
The universal appeal of Maugalyayana’s story attests to the primacy of the parental bond that enlightened Sages honor first.
“Alas! My parents,
Who bore me and toiled on my behalf.
The debt of kindness I owe them
Is higher than the heavens.”22
In China, among the stories of Chan School and Pure Land Patriarchs, many cases exist of filial sons who realized spiritual enlightenment beside the graves of their parents, while observing a traditional three-year period of mourning. The urge to show gratitude to parents by a child is wholesome and proper. Sages and Patriarchs, enlightened men and women who have fully matured their mental and spiritual faculties, attend to and revere their parents’ debt of kindness.
For example, when the Buddha’s father died, filial service was elevated to magnificent stature. The Buddha, his brother Nanda, his cousin Ananda, and his son Rahula, each took a corner of the late King Suddhodana’s coffin, serving as pallbearers for their father, and leaving an example of noble filial piety for later generations.23
Following the ethical code of the Buddha, one can perfect one’s virtue and humanity, and leave the turning wheel of death and rebirth. This liberation is the highest form of gratitude a child can show his parents, For this reason one leaves home to cultivate the Way.
At the end of the Buddha’s teaching career, he went to the Trayastrimsha Heaven to praise the filial conduct and great vows of Kshitigarbha, “Earth Treasury” Bodhisattva, who is foremost in filial compliance among all enlightened beings. The Buddha spoke the Sutra of Earth Treasury Bodhisattva’s Past Vows24 in order to repay the kindness of his mother, Lady Maya, who died in childbirth, and who had been reborn in that heaven. Of the Five Modes of Filial Respect25, the Buddha’s sojourn in the Heaven of the Thirty-three at the end of his life represents Ultimate Filiality, a culmination of his successful quest for self-knowledge. He left the palace in search of enlightenment; he renounced the comforts of a King’s life for the austerities of an ascetic hermit. His purpose was to transcend death and rebirth, and thereby gain the wisdom and resourcefulness to rescue others from the ocean of suffering. Having accomplished Buddhahood, he ascended to the heavens to repay his mother for the sacrifices she made while bringing him into the world. The Buddha lavishly praised the selfless compassion of Earth Treasury’s infinite filial devotion and vows, the scope of which expands to include all creatures. “I vow that I will not realize Buddha-hood until the hells are emptied. I vow that only after all living beings have been rescued will I myself accomplish Bodhi.”
Thus at the end of his life, the Buddha came full circle, having taught the lessons of filial respect throughout his entire forty years of speaking Dharma. Performing filial duties for one’s own parents, one accomplishes Limited Filiality. Expanding one's family identity to include kinship with all living creatures reaches Ultimate Filiality.
“All male beings have been a father to me in past lives and all females have been my mother. There is not a single being who has not given birth to me during my previous lives, hence all beings of the six destinies are my parents.”26
To be continued
Notes:
19. T. 1484.
20. Ven. Tripitaka Master Hsuan Hua, The Buddha Speaks the Brahma Net Sutra,
Buddhist Text Translation Society, San Francisco, CA, 1981, p. 40.
21. T. 685.
22. The Book of Poetry.
23. The Sutra on the Parinirivana of the White Rice King. T. 512, see Appendix II.
24. T. 412. English Translation: Ven. Tripitaka Master Hsuan Hua, Sutra of The Past Vows of Earth Store Bodhisattva, BTTS\IASWR, New York, 1974.
25. The Five Modes of Filial Respect include 1) Limited Filial Piety, being filial within one’s own family; 2) Extensive Filial Piety, taking all fathers and mothers as one’s own; 3) Contemporary Filial Piety, according with present-day models and standards of making one’s parents happy; 4) Classical Filial Piety, being filial to all the myriad creatures, in the same way that the Twenty-four Paragons of Filial Virtue were in China; 5) Ultimate Filial Piety, accomplishing the Supreme Tao and rescuing nine generations of ancestors, ultimately vowing to deliver all living beings from suffering.
26. Brahma Net Sutra, ibid., p.100.
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