Cleansing the Heart: Buddhist Bowing As Contemplation

By Rev. Heng Sure - Institute For World Religions

Contemplating the nature of mind is a hallmark Buddhist occupation. The Buddha called the mind “a monkey," and "a wild horse." The monkey mind calculates and schemes, chases thoughts of self and others, clings to rights and wrongs, and quarrels over me and mine. The wild horse mind loves to run away into fantasies and false-thoughts, to wander far without warning and to return when it pleases. It is difficult to break the wild horse mind to the saddle of mindfulness and discipline.

The nature of the worshipper and the worshipped is empty and still,

This Bodhimanda [i] of mine is like a pearl in Indra’s net;

Shakyamuni Buddha manifests within it.

My body appears before Shakyamuni,

Bowing at his feet, I return my life in worship.

                                                                                    -Buddhist Bowing Contemplation Verse

To the Chinese, both feeling and thinking are represented by a single written character xin, which we will translate as "heart/mind." [ii] So the first half of our topic, "purity of heart," viewed from a Buddhist perspective, would be more accurately expressed as "purity of heart/mind."

To assume that the mind of a meditator automatically rests in a state of permanent purity is to never have tried to meditate. Random, discursive thoughts rise and fall without cease, like waves on water. Purity of heart/mind is not a product that one attains like a possession, rather it is a process, a practice. From the perspective of practice we might begin by replacing the noun "purity" with the infinitive "to purify,” or employ the gerund form, "purifying," to indicate the dynamic and continuous nature of purifying the heart/mind. One purifies the heart by emptying out its cluttered thoughts and turbid emotions, over and over. Purifying requires letting go of attachments, “truing” or rectifying thoughts, and reining in desire's appetites.