The object of this course is to enter into the apparently simple practices which are used daily as part of larger practices which have been reduced to mere ritual dogma and ceremony. These are not explained as a profound teaching and as such, actually generate a subtle virus of intellectual indifference towards the practices themselves.
SUPERSTITION, EMPTY RITUAL AND CEREMONY IN THE USE OF PRAYER WHEELS AND FLAGS
First I will call your attention to a Chan tale.
A master asked a student to look at a flag waving in the breeze and asked him to tell him if it was the flag or the wind moving.
The student replied…. "The wind." The master said, "No,"… and waited…. The student then declared, “Then it is the flag”.
"No," replied the master… "It is your MIND that is moving."
Now here we have moving flags and prayer wheels. It is clear that it is the mind that is moving. It is the mind that sees that generates that concept, MOVEMENT. But it also interprets that movement.
Some may believe that the movement itself and the energy invested in that movement generates “benefit.” If they believe that then they are in a world of superstition. The actions may indeed make them feel calm, being protected by their action or by some external force. But that ritual is empty.
If one views a moving flag and reflects upon that seeing clearly that the mind is moving then that is useful… If one moves a prayer wheel or other device, knowing that it is the mind that moved to generate the action and that it is the mind that generates the illusion of movement also, that too is useful.
If the flag has a symbolic message, for example compassion, then it does no good at all to know that intellectually. One may use that symbolic writing on a flag to generate a stimulus within oneself to grow in compassion and project compassion to others specifically or to the world in general.
But don’t believe for a moment that the world will receive that mesage or benefit from it directly. Do not believe that an individual, unless he or she is close physically, will receive that energy of compassion. The idea is to generate the projection of compassion to others also symbolically to increment your habit strength against egoism and to reinforce intentions generated later, which can be transformed into action.
You can see that the weak practitioner will need the prayer wheels or flags to remind humself… The wise practitioner will use all that is around him.
He may for example see a moving flag of the United States and ignore the mundane patriotic ideas and declare…
"It is my mind which is moving … I will use this moving mind to generate (what he wills) for the benefit of all sentient cretures."
But he can also do it with a moving train, a flash of lightning, anything at all.
I will go further and say he can do it with any spontaneous thought that arises.