Chapter 49: Productivity of Merit Making
Chapter 49: Productivity of Merit Making
Merit is good energy earned when we
have wholesome thought, speech and action from any of the Ten Meritorious Deeds
namely (1) giving (2) morality (3) meditation (4) humbleness (5) dedication of
merit (6) appreciation of merit (7) learning Dharma (8) teaching Dharma (9) helpfulness
and (10) correcting one’s view. Once,
the good merit energy is accumulated more and more, it is crystallised into
perfection which can enable one’s enlightenment and passing to the Nirvana
where one can become permanently blissful and has no more suffering and
reincarnation.
However, it is important that one must
do the best not to contaminate one’s energy from merit making with sinful
thought, speech and action which may co-exist during merit making. As such, in Dhammonomics, we express this in
the form of a graph showing ‘productivity of merit making’ where one can maximise
merit earning and minimise co-existing sin.
To do so, we derive a graph with two
parabolas whereas the upper one reflects the merit from wholesome mind, speech
and action. The more value on the axis,
the more intensity of good mind (+x), good speech (-y) and good action
(+y). With the parabola, there are the
area of ‘merit 1’ and ‘merit 2’ representing the merit energy consequently earned
from virtuous thought, speech and action.
Next, there is another parabola at the
bottom of the axis which reflects the minimised sinful mind (-x), speech (-y)
and action (+y). With this parabola, we
come up with the area ‘merit 3’ and ‘merit 4’ which are merits earned
additionally from eliminating immoral thought, speech and action during a merit
making or daily life.
It is important to note that ‘virtuous
or moral mind’ and ‘eliminated immoral mind’ are different variables. To exemplify, when we visit an orphanage to
treat free meals to orphans, the generosity in our minds is a virtuous mind
which is regarded as one positive factor.
If we happen to get displeased and irritated by the delayed meal
delivery service, the displeasure and irritation are regarded as negative
factors. Then, to eliminate the feeling
of displeasure and irritation, one’s mind becomes additionally meritorious as
one can rid of such polluted feelings.
So, if the meritorious mind, speech and
action can be maximised while the defiled mind, speech and action can be
minimised, the merit earned from a merit-making will be more as shown on the
graph that Total Merit earned = Maximised Merit + Minimised Sin = Merit 1 +
Merit 2 + Merit 3 + Merit 4.
Copyrighted by Pirajak Tisuthiwongse
31 December 2022
www.Meditation101.org
