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Dharma Talk – Prajñā, The Fourfold Sangha (7)
Pure precepts is a shortened way of saying “the body of pure precepts,” meaning the body is kept intact, not damaged or defiled. The Threefold Pure Precepts can be understood in three groups, including:
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- Embracing precepts: protecting the precepts and the mindfulness trainings for the sangha, family, and society
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- Embracing wholesome dharmas: protecting what is beautiful and wholesome—customs, environment, and existing ethical values
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- Embracing living beings: serving and benefiting all beings who are still suffering, helping them to maintain the body of pure precepts
Keeping the body of precepts intact brings happiness, freedom, and fearlessness; the body of precepts leads to right concentration, then insight, then liberation. In the practice community, every half month the sangha needs to recite the precepts, practice repentance, and renew the body of precepts to prevent cracks and fractures. Monastics and lay friends both have the responsibility to build the sangha—a place to acknowledge and support families in keeping the precepts, to heal families that are declining, so that the Dharma can spread through the physical body, the Buddha body, the Dharma body, and the Sangha body.
