Concepts for Cultivating Meritorious Blessings
The Buddhist Approach to Nurturing Merit and Spirituality

Giving, morality, and meditative practice are three bases of meritorious actions. According to the Buddha's progressive instruction, the practice of giving is the foremost in cultivating merit as practicing giving constantly not only helps us cultivate the mental strength to let go, but also facilitates attainment of the merits for maturing in morality and meditative practice. One can thereby develop insight to see through the essence of phenomena, as well as achieve the ultimate goal of liberation.



Original Chinese text / Dr. Teng Wei-jen (鄧偉仁, Dean of Department of Buddhist Studies of Dharma Drum Institute of Liberal Arts)

More than 2,500 years ago in India, a shepherdess named Sujātā saw an emaciated ascetic. Perhaps out of compassion or her habitual practice of giving, she offered the practitioner a bowl of milk-rice pudding. Little did she know that her spontaneous act of giving would enable the practitioner to survive and continue his practice, eventually becoming the most influential practitioner in the history of mankind, the Buddha Shakyamuni.

In Buddhist teachings we are familiar with, merit (puñña) does not seem to be as directly related to practice for attainment of Buddhahood as the Four Noble Truths, the Three Seals of the Dharma (trilakṣaṇā dharmamudrā), and the three disciplines of morality, concentration, and wisdom. This is because the teachings on merit we are exposed to mostly highlight the practice of giving and doing good deeds, which tends to be interpreted with an emphasis on the resulting karmic rewards in the human and heavenly realms. However, in the Aṅguttara-nikāya, the Buddha gave a clear explanation of the three "bases of meritorious activities" (puññakiriya-vatthu): giving (dāna), morality (sīla), and meditative development (bhāvanā). Therefore, a comprehensive understanding of cultivating merit should include purifying the mind and developing in wisdom, which culminates in attaining Buddhahood and liberation.


Giving as the primary practice in nurturing merit and the entrance to spiritual cultivation

Giving is not only the primary practice in cultivating merit but also the entrance to spiritual cultivation. In the Sutta Piṭaka and the Vinaya Piṭaka, there are frequent mentions of the Buddha's "progressive instruction" (ānupubbī-kathā) for beginners, which all starts with giving, followed by instructions on morality, the faults of desire, the determination to practice renunciation, and the Four Noble Truths.

In Buddhist teachings, giving is the first step to purifying our mind because it helps eliminate our greed, which is the foremost of the three poisons. A mind filled with greed is loaded with heavy burdens, making it difficult for us to make progress on the path of cultivation. The Saṃyutta-nikāya mentions the notion of "overcoming the mental impurities of greed, practice giving." In Buddhist teachings, a true dānapati, or "master of generosity," does not refer to a giver of possessions in general, but rather to someone who has a certain faith in purifying the mind using the merit of giving. The Dīgha-nikāya-atthakathā elaborates on the "master of generosity": "One who gives what they dislike to others is a slave of what is given; one who shares what they like with others is a friend of what is given; one who is content with what they have and still happily give what they value to others is the honorable giver, the master of what is given." Therefore, as indicated in the Saṃyutta-nikāya, practicing giving is like fighting a war; the giver must fight against their inner greed before making up their mind to offer to others the useful things they treasure.

From a short story in the Laṭukikopama Sutta, we can see that what determines our willingness to give is not the amount of possessions we own, but our mental capacity:
 

Cultivating true merits while giving with a proper mindset

If a person understands the benefits of giving for mental purification, they will be vigilant in seizing every opportunity to practice meritorious actions. As the Buddha expounded in the Udāna, "If people know the value of their practice of giving, they will not be reluctant to share every meal they have with others."

Therefore, the Buddha underscored the purity of the motivation for giving. As pointed out in the Aṅguttara-nikāya, there are eight types of motivations that fail to cultivate merit, which one should be especially wary of in practicing giving:
Moreover, according to the Buddha's teachings, giving out of the following motives does not help one to cultivate merit: out of partiality, an intention to maintain family traditions, to attain rebirth in the heavenly realm, or simply because it makes one feel good. As indicated in Aṅguttara-nikāya, one is not supposed to practice giving while expecting future rewards. Only by giving with the intention to eliminate inner greed and ego can one truly cultivate merits.

In addition to giving with pure motivation, we must also pay attention to the correct manner and attitude of giving. Again, as the Buddha reminded in the Aṅguttara-nikāya, the proper attitude of giving does not give recipients the feeling of being humiliated, belittled, and hurt, because people in need often feel embarrassed and ashamed when receiving help. The act of giving should be performed with loving care and respect, preferably in person, with a sense of human warmth. This helps to create a social atmosphere of mutual care and support between givers and receivers.

The Buddhist practice of giving is of great social value. As the Magha Sutta in the Saṃyutta-nikāya mentions, giving facilitates interactions and solidarity in society, thereby dissolving hatred and promoting fraternity. In addition, the Buddha underscored how giving requires the cultivation of wisdom and prudence, wherein the giver should take care not to cause harm to self and the recipient.

Therefore, if the act of giving results in compromising the giver's or the recipient's mental purity, as well as their physical and mental health, or even causing troubles in society, such way of giving not only fails to gain meritorious blessings, but also creates negative karma.

Apart from emphasizing the mental purity of the giver, the Buddha also placed great emphasis on whether what is given was acquired in a righteous way. In modern society, many corporations have set up charitable foundations to promote social welfare. However, from the Buddhist perspective, making charitable donations with profits gained by immoral means—such as cutting corners by supplying shoddy goods, selling food with safety issues, or exploiting employee–is far from cultivating meritorious blessings.

Lastly, the degree of merit to be earned by the giver also depends on the virtuous character and spiritual quality of the recipient. The Buddha once said that, if, while pouring out the water used to clean a food-serving plate, one makes a wish with a mind of giving by thinking "May the nutrient remains in the water become food for the living beings on the ground," that person will gain karmic rewards, much more offering food to a virtuous person.

As mentioned in Buddhist scriptures, the Buddhist disciples who have attained fruitions of arhatship are unsurpassed fields of merit (anuttara puññakkhetta), and one can gain great meritorious blessings by giving to them. This is because the teachings of noble persons (ariya-puggala), both by example and by words, can provide the power to purify people and society as a whole. Furthermore, the most superior form of giving is that of the Dharma: that is, sharing and spreading Buddhist teachings for the benefit of all beings.


The Cultivation of Untainted Merit: Morality and Meditative Development

As mentioned earlier, giving is the first step among the three "bases of meritorious activities," since the constant practice of giving is conducive to dissolving ego and letting go of desires. However, if a giver lacks the virtue of the precepts, their meritorious blessings won't come to realization. Practicing giving may sow the seeds of blessings, but for those lacking such a virtue and a pure mind, their karmic rewards cannot ripen.

In the Buddha's progressive instruction, gaining meritorious blessings by giving is not an end in itself, but a process of accumulating provisions in preparation for attaining liberation. Without the ultimate goal of attaining liberation, although cultivating merits certainly brings karmic rewards in the human and heavenly realms, the rewards are nonetheless "tainted" (āsrava). As with the case of negative karma, this keeps us drifting in the suffering sea of samsaric cycle of six states of existence. Therefore, regarding the three "bases of meritorious activities" mentioned in Buddhist scriptures, most importantly is to nurture the virtue of Chan practice, or meditative development. Only the merit cultivated through giving, morality, and Chan practice is the "untainted" virtuous merit.

In Buddhist scriptures, there are frequent mentions of Anathapindika, a respected elder who is replete in the virtue of merits of and precepts. However, because he hadn't really engaged in meditative practice to purify his mind and develop insight, he only attained the level of stream-enterer (sotāpanna). Therefore, the true value of cultivating merits lies in progressively guiding sentient beings to purify their minds. That is, through the frequent practice of giving, one cultivates the mental strength of letting go and generosity, which serves as a foundation that enabling smoother accomplishment in moral practice and meditative development. This in turn fosters the development of insight to see through the essence of phenomena, thereby shattering ignorance and achieving the ultimate goal of liberation.

*Note: The scriptures referred by the author of the original Chinese article are in Pali.



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Concepts for Cultivating Meritorious Blessings
The Buddhist Approach to Nurturing Merit and Spirituality

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Reflections and Habits to Cultivate Blessings
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Resource: Issue 437 of Humanity Magazine (January 2020), Dharma Drum Publishing Corporation
Photo credit: Fan Li (李東陽)
Translation: Li Siang-ling
Editing: Keith Brown, Chang Chia-cheng (張家誠)