Some thoughts about Sangha / community

At our Mandala night class we are, as many of you know, exploring the themes from the four talks given by Bhante (Sangharakshita) in 1976: Buddhism for Today and Tomorrow.  We are now in the block looking at the talk called The Nucleus of a New Society. I wrote about this in a previous blog so won’t repeat myself here about the cultural conditions in which Bhante was giving these talks.  I wrote then quite a bit about the New Society but today I want to concentrate on the Nucleus. 

From the original talk in 1976:

"…it’s as the nucleus, at least, of a new society that the Friends of the Western Buddhist Order* offers itself. The nucleus of which the Order is the central and most essential part. It offers itself, not as an organisation but as a spiritual community; a community of individuals, of individuals committed to personal development, by themselves and in association with others similarly committed. And it offers itself as an open community, that is to say, as a community willing to welcome into spiritual fellowship all those who want to grow, who want to develop."

*The previous name of the Triratna Order and Community.

So, in looking at this talk, we are thinking about sangha, about community—a topic which is important to me. It is what we are all about at the GBC.  Obviously people can enter and participate in community as much or as little as they want to but I see it as crucial that the possibility is there. In another talk which I often mention (and have written about previously), Bhante suggests finding a community that supports our values to be an important part of our being able to deal in an appropriate way with the problems of the world. (Evolution or Extinction) 

So, today I want to look at creating sangha, at what strengthens sangha and what might work against that. Firstly the term sangha. In modern Indian languages sangha means an assembly, a gathering. I think this is a useful way to think of it. It is not static, it changes like a mandala with every addition, every sangha member. We can think of it as a verb as well as a noun. A gathering is something we do, we create, we participate in. 

In many ways the sangha jewel is the hardest to relate to and yet, if we truly believe the Buddha gained enlightenment and we have faith in the dharma as the Path he opened then at the very least we can have faith in the POSSIBILITY of sangha in the sense of Awakened beings. We know that others have awakened. When we talk about Sangha in this way we mean the Awakened Sangha, what is known as the Arya Sangha. When we stand before the shrine and call to mind the 3 Jewels, then the Sangha we are calling on is the Awakened Sangha. And yet, it is clear that when we talk about sangha in terms of our Triratna community—something which for us is so central—we are not claiming to be an Awakened Sangha. The Triratna Order is not a perfect sangha but an aspiring sangha, made up of humans with all our victories and our failings. I think it is important to find a way to hold both of these truths. The truth that we are imperfect and the truth that we are aspiring.

We seem to often fall into two poles, each of which has its strength and its danger. One pole is to be idealistic. This is important because we need vision, we need idealism. The world need it. But we are more likely to be disappointed with the reality. As well as disappointed, we also might become cynical and dismissive of what is good. If we are overly idealistic we can become quite dogmatic, rigid, literal, unable to hold imperfection. On the other pole we can be very realistic. The positive side of this is that we have our feet on the ground and we can be positively accepting of others' mistakes. The down side, though, is that we can be pedestrian and not expect enough from each other. We don’t even aspire. So, let’s be realistic and also visionary. Let’s be visionary and also realistic. I did go into all of this in my talk last night which I will post on FBA soon. Let’s we be willing to struggle for the Ideal but with kindness and willingness to acknowledge our own and others' faults.

What makes a group of people into a true Sangha, rather than just a gathering, just a group? Harmony is one aspect of sangha. We often confuse harmony with mere agreement, niceness, absence of conflict and a smoothing over difference. But harmony isn’t unison, harmony needs difference.  Harmony doesn’t come from one chord only. Monotone is uniformity; harmony is differentiated unity—we can see this clearly in the analogy of an orchestra or a choir. This is a theme Sangharakshita often returned to: unity is not uniformity. The Sangha flourishes because different people bring different strengths, temperaments, and gifts.

True harmony requires depth and is not the result of avoiding difficulty, but of practising with kindness with our differences. We could say that kindly friction can deepen harmony, that truthful disagreement can serve love if done with good intention and skilfulness. An old saying of Bhante’s comes to mind. “Honest collision is better than dishonest collusion”. Of course, all must be held with love, compassion and kindness.  It is no accident that, in the Order we take four speech precepts. We commit to truthful, kindly, helpful and harmonious speech.  Not always easy but certainly a way to create a culture of kindness, a culture in which the sangha can flourish. 

And we can remember that the sangha in this context is a Nucleus of a New Society. If we can cultivate these qualities then the sangha can be a culture of kindness in a world where kindness is sadly lacking, often with terrible consequences. A world where people are ostracised because of their race, their gender, their class, their sexuality. A world which truth itself is manipulated, destroyed in the cause of prejudice and hatred. If we can be a culture of kindness within society then hopefully we truly can be  Nucleus of a New Society.

I did say I would talk about what might work against creating sangha but I will leave that for another time.

Meanwhile, as always

May all beings be well, may all beings find true happiness and its causes and may all beings be free from suffering.

Where the Bodhichitta has not yet arisen

May it arise

Where it has arisen

May it flourish

Where it flourishes

May it never die