The Five Branches of spiritual practice

(NGŨ CHI CỦA CÁC TÔN GIÁO by Hữu-Huyễn on 13 Apr 2009, 13:35)
Translation by Ngoc Xuan, edited by Dian and by Xiao Bai Yun

The Yantra of Old_Guru Secret Teaching (Celestial Scroll) represents the Supreme Creator (Mahavairocana Buddha) supported by Buddhas and the heavenly five armies which are composed of Immortals, Saints and Deities, and it is also representative of the five branches of all religions in the universe, namely the Human’s Way, the Deities’ Way, the Saint’s Way, the Immortal’s Way and the Buddha’s Way.

Those who cultivate the Human’s Way (such as Confucius’ Three Moral Bonds and Five Constant Virtues), become virtuous and law abiding citizens but will not have any religious achievement or recognition from Heaven as they do not have any merits nor any great deeds.

Cultivating the Deities’ Way involves serving one’s country (in the fields of military and politics); they were the exemplary government officers when they were alive, and when they die, they will achieve a ranking among the Deities (or gods). Examples include famous Vietnamese generals who have temples erected all over the country for worship by the people, and in fact, because these generals were deified by heaven’s court, their worshiping has proved to bring miraculous results. The righteous kings in particular, can achieve sainthood as (for example King Fuxi, Shennong, Chou Wen-Wang…). As to Muhammad the prophet and his armies, even though they worship Allah, the Creator, and claim to achieve Sainthood, because they used warfare to establish His religion, it is categorized as the Gods’ Way.

The Nomination of the Gods and Mysticism has clearly stated that:
Following a meeting in Heaven’s court, the three religious leaders (namely Yuan Shi Tian Zun, Tai Shang Lau Jung, and Tong Tian Jian Zhi) had told their disciples that Heaven’s Plan had decided to punish the Shang dynasty and establish a new ruler of West Zhou. The disciples of both the Righteous and Evil schools had to carry out Heaven’s Plan. Jiang Ziya himself had to obey his master and leave the mountain to join the mundane world so that he could help end the Shang dynasty and establish the West Zhou. He had to create the list of nominations of the Gods for those disciples who cultivated the Way of the Immortals but only achieved the rank of Gods.

Thus, the story demonstrates that all wars and conflicts on earth are designed by Heaven although the reasons behind them are unknown.

In cultivating Sainthood, one serves the Government as a civil officer, performs good deeds and does not get involved in any killings. In the case of Christianity, Jesus initially preached Sainthood but later on his disciples became eager for fame and fortune and went to war for it; therefore they could only achieve a Deity’s rank. Actually there were some popes who were bribed by the German Nazis to turn a blind eye to the massacre of millions of Jews and the seizing of their assets; popes also colluded with the Italian Mafia and other political powers; also there were Christian clergymen who followed the French army to colonize Vietnam and other countries (see “Christianity and Colonialism” by Professor Cao Huy Thuan).

Besides, the history of Christianity is full of killings between the Catholics and Protestants and internal struggles within the Christian community for power, not to mention the many bloody wars between Christianity and Islam from ancient times to the present.

According to Lao Tzu’s teachings, one can achieve the same recognition as that of a Bodhisattva which is just slightly higher than that of Sainthood: “At this time, Grand Master Yuan Shi has the mission of teaching people the practice of becoming an “Immortal” (a fairly high rank in the spirits realm); for that he is called the Religious leader of the “White School,” or the righteous school. Grand Wizard Tong Tian Jian Zhi is the leader of the “Black School,” or the evil school, because most of his students come from animals, trees, or stones… They also cultivate the Way (spiritual path) hoping to achieve the Immortal rank but because of their low nature, only a few achieve it, the majority become Deities in various fields – The Nomination of the Gods and Mysticism.”

Those who practice Buddhism observe the law of “Thou shall not kill”. However, for a very long time, although there were many who practiced Buddhism, few achieved Buddha hood, as it requires a high degree of virtue and righteousness, considerable blessings, great wisdom and much merit in serving mankind.

Although Buddhism is considered ‘top of the pyramid’ because it advocates helping all sentient beings, one should not mistakenly assume that monks with high status and rank in the Buddhist hierarchy (Reverend, Venerable, Most Venerable …) are superior to the generals or political powers in the secular world. The reason is that monks only have the title of being Buddhists, but in essence they are simply people who have just started on the religious path, and have not even achieved the god’s status. They don monks’ robes, sheltering behind the Buddha, and they always think they are high and mighty, to the point that they don’t even know that they should have respect for the Deities.

The Supreme Creator and the Divinities (who generally speaking are Buddhas, Bodhisattva and the Divine Spirits) are the top echelon, heads of all celestial departments, commanding and managing all of human affairs very closely, and true to this saying: “Heaven’s net is sparse but not even a hair can escape”. Heaven’s net has been cast upon every nation in the world, from small tribes to the superpower states.

So far, the American governments have believed deeply in GOD, the Creator- even though they cannot explain succinctly about it, and would often pray, especially before they sent their armies to war. Recently, during the Iraq conflict, the press had reported that Congress and the President had abstained from eating for one day to pray for American soldiers who had been stopped in their tracks from entering Baghdad by a sand storm which also caused a helicopter to crash (03/26/2003). By doing so, the American government was not being superstitious, but demonstrating that they fully understood that battles are not won only by the powers of weaponry or people, but also by the will of Heaven. History has shown them that many world conflicts had been lost just simply due to a snow storm or an outbreak of a disease. The American government had publicly proclaimed their belief in God by the motto written on the $1 note … “In God we trust”, but in fact, they only believed in the Creator God and not in the Christian clergymen, whom they fully well understood to be just their political and social tools. That is why they used the clergy at times and at other times they brought priests to be tried in the court of law as criminals.

Sociologists have made the following observation: “Every religious faith is involved with politics and many are henchman for politics.” Why is that so?

History has shown that although religions may worship the Creator (Supreme GOD/Buddha…) they have been either used or repressed by political powers. Following are some examples:

The Cambodian government had used first, Brahmanism, then Mahayana Buddhism and finally Theravada Buddhism to rule over the Khmer people. From past to present, the Cambodian monks have been under the command of political leaders. In Myanmar (previously known as Burma), recently the generals ordered the quelling of the demonstrations – monks were chased, beaten up and imprisoned exactly like the conditions suffered by Tibetan monks in their country.

In Japan, monks were the government’s servants: “…monasteries were managed by monks and financed by the imperial court. They served as schools, hospitals, pharmacies, orphanages and nursing homes. The growth of Buddhism in its initial stage had been nurtured with such a high cost that, by the 8th century it became a burden to the country….” (Quote from Quintessence of Secret (Esoteric) Buddhism, by religious scholar Trieu Phuoc)

This unfortunate situation happens because a religion’s officiates only have superficial appearance of being religious (the title given by their order) when in truth their virtues, their spiritual roots (cultivation from past lives) and that of their spirit guardian are inferior to those of the military and political leaders. Although they claim to follow Buddha’s Way, the monks themselves cannot escape from the web of fame and power, therefore they also want to build their fortune through power struggles, and in doing so they fall into the Way of the Gods, and not the Way of Buddha. The fact that religions are repressed or exploited by political powers in their political chess games proves that political powers have Heaven’s mandate, and that is superior to that of religions.

There have also been times when religions have a superior mandate to that of Government, as during the Middle Ages, when the popes performed coronations for European kings; or in China, where tantric Buddhist monks were appointed as chancellors of the country for three successive governments during the Tang dynasty; in Tibet, the Dalai Lamas were religious leaders as well as national heads… Those were true religious people, having higher spirit guardians and spiritual roots than their contemporary kings, and who therefore had gained the respect of the earthly powers and had become their teachers. However these people are very rare and can be counted on the fingers.
The purpose of spiritual cultivation is to serve the purpose of the Great Plan. In order to achieve any high position in the religious realms, one must humbly study the Tao (Nature and Heaven’s laws – Dharma) from the ground up according to one’s spiritual root. If one’s spiritual root is not at the Deity’s level, then whether they don yellow or red monk’s robes and proclaim their high spiritual cultivation, and whether they falsely call themselves practitioners of the Buddha’s Way, 90% of them are under the Deity’s jurisdiction.

Anyone practising according to any of the five branches of spiritual practice but who fails to achieve any position in the spiritual realm will be a public servant for the government when alive, and when dead will become a ghost or spirit soldier under the command of the Deities of Cities and the earth-gods.

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