5.11.
The sermon
“My
siblings, have you ever thought of the Caodai doctrine or its ideology?
“My
siblings, is there any loss of objects or money as dangerous and harmful as
loss of consciousness or soul?
“Oh
my siblings, wearing a piece of coarse garment, dwelling in a straw hut, going
sight-seeing at leisure with a soul of purity and peace - this is much better than travelling in busy traffic,
living in luxurious conditions, toing and froing to scramble for worldly gains
whilst ignoring the loss of oneself. The means are borrowed to serve the
ultimate end. Do not let the ultimate end be buried in the vanity means. The
truth is not something sparsely accepted.
The truth is the pure and simple enlightenment.”
* Contemplation
11: Means versus end
His Holiness Pope Lý did introduce the topic of his sermon at the end of
paragraph 5.2: “What I would
like to speak of today is the Caodai form and the Caodai doctrine or its ideology.”
Thus, to begin his sermon, He did not use the narrative strategy of delay.
In the eight subsequent paragraphs, however, He did not instantly say what the
Caodai ideology means; hence, we easily have a mistaken thought that a put-off
introduction is being used here.
Actually, in the eight subsequent paragraphs He talks about personnel and
the Caodai administration system (5.3; 5.8; 5.9), senseless objects and saintly
soul (5.4), God personal versus God impersonal (5.5), cultivating the heart
field (5.6), the Path of Bodhisattvas (5.7), form versus content (5.10). For
each issue, He presents both of its opposing sides. Through such a
presentation, He shows that the strong points and the weak ones in our process
of self-cultivating and doing the Dao depend upon our consciousness.
Then, His Holiness Pope Lý reiterates his topic by asking, “My siblings, have you ever thought of the Caodai
doctrine or its ideology?”
Referring to ideology means mentioning a spiritual or immaterial value,
which the majority of people often neglect. So, to awaken us, Pope Lý asks, “My siblings, is there any loss of objects or money
as dangerous and harmful as loss of consciousness or soul?”
In the Second Universalism, Jesus
Christ once similarly asked, “What good will it be
for someone to gain the whole world, yet forfeit his soul?” (Mt 16:26)
Jesus asked a rhetorical question. Today Pope Lý can ask a rhetorical
question, too; however, He immediately replies, “Oh
my siblings, wearing a piece of coarse garment, dwelling in a straw hut, going
sight-seeing at leisure with a soul of purity and peace - this is much better than travelling in busy traffic,
living in luxurious conditions, toing and froing to scramble for worldly gains
whilst ignoring the loss of oneself.”
Living in this dualistic world,
one must always face a choice; the matter is how to make the best choice. In
the preceding paragraph 5.8 Pope Lý has mentioned the means - what is
expediently borrowed. Now, reiterating it in relation to the end (the ultimate
purpose), He says, “The means are
borrowed to serve the ultimate end. Do not let the ultimate end be buried in
the vanity means.”
What Pope Lý says is the truth, and He adds, “The
truth is not something sparsely accepted.” Actually, the truth of means versus end was once
similarly taught by Shakyamuni Buddha in the Second Universalism. The Complete Enlightenment Sutra
(Chapter Six: Pure Wisdom) reads, “Knowing Sutra-Dharma is also just like the finger
pointing to the moon, look at the moon and know that the finger is never the
moon...”
How can the truth be widely
accepted? In the history of humanity, a certain “truth” was once made accepted
by force. In the humanistic spirit of Caodaism,
respecting each human as a subject of freedom, Pope Lý maintains, “The truth is the pure and simple enlightenment.” Again,
accordingly, the role of education, and also of preaching, is implicitly
confirmed herein.
5.12.
The sermon
“The
Caodai true ideology is so bright that humans are dazzled and then, what a pity to say, they do fancy that the Caodai
truth is just the light within their limited range of vision or within their
own lingering imagination.”
* Contemplation
12: Limited perception
These Pope Lý’s words themselves do not need an explanation. Here, He
reveals that our perception is limited due to our worldly mind. Delivering a
sermon in London in 1896, Swami Vivekananda (1863-1902) also pointed it out by
saying, “Everything limited by the [worldly] mind
becomes finite.” (Swami Vivekananda, Jnana
Yoga. Germany: Jazzybee Verlag, 1964. Chapter 6: The Absolute and Manifestation, p. 51.)
5.13.
The sermon
“Caodai
that is not Caodai is Caodai itself. Caodaism did not emerge on its own for Vietnam
* Contemplation
13: The absolute versus the relative
God is the absolute inconceivable.
Trying to describe God, humans only use the finite to fathom the infinite.
Swami Vivekananda says, “Now if the
Absolute becomes limited by the [worldly] mind, It is no more Absolute; It
has become finite.” In this sense, Vivekananda implies that God is not truly known by our
worldly mind. He adds, “A God known is no more God; He
has become finite like one of us. He cannot be known. He is always the
Unknowable One.” (Jnana Yoga, p. 51.)
In fact, Vivekananda’s words
are not at all new. “The Dao that can be expressed is not the eternal
Dao.” At the very beginning of Dao De Jing, Laozi does say it,
doesn’t He?
Nowadays, His Holiness Pope Lý
says, “Caodai [a] that is not Caodai [b] is
Caodai [a] itself.” Caodai [a] is
the absolute inconceivable; Caodai [b] is the relative in terms of expressions
or manifestations on earth. In other words,
Caodai [b] is Caodai confined to the religion frame; caodai [a] is the Caodai
in the sense of the Great Way, which is above and beyond religion.
Similarly, Pope Lý says, “The truth [a] negates the truth [b] by
itself.” The truth [a] is absolute; the truth [b] is relative as perceived
by the worldly mind.
His Holiness Pope Lý says, “Caodaism did not emerge on its own for Vietnam
His Holiness Pope Lý says, “Caodaism does not belong to this or that
personage. Caodaism is of neither Tây Ninh congregation nor Bến Tre one,
neither the Missionary congregation (Truyền Giáo) nor the Former Heaven one
(Tiên Thiên).”
These words are connected to the
Caodaists’ culture of doing the Dao (mentioned in Contemplation 6). If Caodai religion had not broken into fragments,
Spiritual Pope Lý would not have had to say so.
5.14.
The sermon
“If
you want to establish achievement to create an adequate process so as to
advance towards the Caodai unification, you should understand that any
divergence cannot surpass the whole universe or God’s mysterious sacredness.”
* Contemplation
14: Disproving divergence
Referring to the Caodai branching, certain people intentionally imagine the
so-called “twelve branches” [see Appendix
2]. In terms of the Caodai numerology, number twelve belongs to God. So, do
they imply that the Caodai branching has resulted from “God’s will”?
Nonetheless, their imagination is negated by what Pope Lý says in this
paragraph 5.14 as well as in the subsequent one 5.15.
5.15.
The sermon
“You
should gather yellow ochna blossoms into
a luxuriant ochna branch so as to show beauty before the Lord of Springtime. If
integration is just integration, and divergence is just divergence, it is also
a portent of this world’s complete destruction.”
* Contemplation
15: A metaphor
This sermon was delivered in the mid of the first lunar month (1974), when
it was still the springtime; so, Spiritual Pope Lý mentioned “yellow
ochna blossoms”.
In fact, no one can “gather yellow ochna blossoms into a luxuriant ochna branch”. His words are metaphorical
only.
“A luxuriant ochna branch” symbolises Caodai religion. Each of “ yellow ochna blossoms”
symbolises every existing Caodai
congregation with its own strong points. Instead of the scattered beauty due to
the religion’s fragmentation, let these fragments be gathered into a unified
and integrated entity.
In The Psychology of the Caodaists (Hanoi:
Hồng Đức pub. 2017, pp. 69-70), I express:
“Presently, the
actual history of Caodai religion shows its two opposing effects: On the one
hand, while trying hard to develop Caodaism within its own ‘territory’, each
Holy Assembly can really make effective contributions to the rapid development
of Caodai religion. On the other hand, contrarily, the more each Holy Assembly
endeavours to achieve development in its own manner, the more it expands the
distances among it and other Holy Assemblies, and the more it poses obstacles
in the path of unifying Caodai religion.
“Maybe
each Holy Assembly owns certain strong points; overall, however, the strength
of the whole religion is being scattered badly. If the Caodai Holy Assembly is
a unified and integrated entity, Caodai religion can naturally win its
collective strength to contribute to shortening the path of as well as the time
for accomplishing the ultimate purpose of the Third Universalism of the Great
Way.”
Ending the existing fragmentation
to restore a unified and integrated entity is not simply like addition in
arithmetics. If the existing fragmentation still endures as something natural
or predestined, it is truly a too great sorrow for what is named “the Great
Dao”. But it is not only a sorrow, as warned by Spiritual Pope Lý, “If integration is just integration, and divergence is
just divergence, it is also a portent of this world’s complete destruction.”
The phrase “integration is just integration” makes us think of
addition in arithmetics. Whoever becoming part of such integration due to a
certain reason might be not different from those sharing the same bed with
different dreams (i.e., they are alien bedfellows). Lacking a specific kind of
glue, sooner or later they will disintegrate. What glue is it? During the said
evocation seance at the Nam Thành holy house on Monday 31 March 1969, Great
Immortal Lê Văn Duyệt said, “Sooner or later, any integration without harmony
will disintegrate.”
The phrase “divergence is just divergence” implies a chronic
divergence which naturally creates a negative image of Caodaism because in Contemplation 1 this question is raised:
While Caodai religion itself remains fragmented, how can their adherents urge
mankind to build up a Great Dao free from differentiation, separation, and
discrimination?
As we know, there is a saying attributed to Confucius: “Don’t complain about the snow on your neighbour’s roof when your own
doorstep is unclean.” In the said sermon on 31 March 1969, Great Immortal
Lê Văn Duyệt similarly said, “Wishing to
create the harmony-amongst-humans condition for mankind, firstly we had better
create it for ourselves. So, what we must decide first is the
harmony-amongst-humans condition to be created within Caodaism, and then it
will be used as kinetic energy to construct the whole world.” Harmony
amongst Caodai congregations is crutial to integrate Caodai fragments.
5.16.
The sermon
“God
is still life-loving, divergent but non-divergent, and integrating but non-integrating.
That is the significance of life-loving circulation.”
* Contemplation
16: The monistic language
Living in the dualistic world, we inevitably perceive and express God in
terms of dualism, using our dualistic language.
In this sermon Spiritual Pope Lý helps us get familiar with the monistic
language; so, in paragraph 5.13 He says “Caodai
that is not Caodai is Caodai itself”, and in this paragraph 5.16 He says, “God is (…) divergent but non-divergent, and
integrating but non-integrating.”
Here, in paragraph 5.15, Pope Lý says, “God
is still life-loving…” But, even more than that, during an evocation seance
at the Ngọc Minh Đài holy meditation house on Wednesday 08 February 1967,
Caodai God said, “Love is the body of
Mine.”
Any divergence
is against love. Whoever truly loves His Master (God) cannot accept divergence.
5.17.
The sermon
“What
I teach you today is pretty enough for your luggage on the path returning to
God so as to avoid hindrances and faults.
Step
briskly on the true holy path
and
set your mind
on
saving humans through spreading
the
truth Caodai.
Then
watch the Creator’s
mechanism
circulating,
Elimination and
preservation are well defined.
* Contemplation
17: The bestowed luggage
Realising the Caodai ideology is not an easy journey. Stepping on his
thousand-mile road, every journeyer always needs some luggage, whether light or
heavy. And, loving His worldly siblings, Pope Lý as the Spiritual Eldest
Brother did bestow the luggage: “What I teach you
today is pretty enough for your luggage on the path returning to God so as to
avoid hindrances and faults.”
On his long journey of realising the Caodai ideology, the journeyer very
easily finds himself lonely. Thus, His Holiness Pope Lý advises him:
Step
briskly on the true holy path
and
set your mind
on
saving humans through spreading
the
truth Caodai.
And the journeyer should do his utmost, unshakeably believing in the Divine
Principle:
Then
watch the Creator’s
mechanism
circulating,
Elimination
and preservation are well defined.
5.18.
The sermon
“I
bestow blessing upon all of you here today.
“I
will protect you all so that your steps are stable on the path of
self-cultivation and doing the Dao. Now I say goodbye and retreat.”
* Contemplation
18: Love and protection
Completing His sermon on the
Caodai ideology, Spiritual Pope Lý says goodbye to His mortal siblings. He
says, “I bestow blessing upon all of you
here today.”
What is His blessing? Why does He
bestow it? This is the answer, “I will
protect you all so that your steps are stable on the path of self-cultivation
and doing the Dao.”
Nonetheless, though He does bestow
blessing, it is sometimes not received because someone who neglects
self-cultivation and ignores doing the Dao does not deserve His blessing.
Ngô Văn Chiêu did not receive the
Papacy on Saturday 24 April 1926, causing the vacancy of the Papal seat. On Friday
29 October 1926, Caodai God bestowed the Spiritual Papacy upon His Holiness Lý
Thái Bạch. Since then, Pope Lý’s responsibility is much heavier. If His worldly
siblings wholeheartedly do the Dao, they consciously share His responsibility
with Him and thus, they are naturally and always loved and protected by their
Spiritual Eldest Brother.
His Holiness Pope Lý’s love and
protection for those accompanying Him on the path of Caodai mission was once
confirmed by Himself during an evocation seance at the Organ for Universalising
Caodai Teaching on Friday 30 August 1985 as follows: “I have come to you since the mandate by God
and the Three Teachings Council. I am always instantly responsive to each of
your steps, your deeds and even your innermost feelings. But you have not
perceived My response, have you?”
Thoroughly apprehending the Caodai
ideology and wholeheartedly dedicating oneself to it is not at all simple or
easy. Consequently, Pope Lý’s goodbye is not purely a goodbye. It conveys His
boundless love for His companions. It is also His promise to protect and assist
them.
6.
In lieu of a conclusion
The front cover photo of this book
is borrowed from LIFE Magazine (New York City, July 1948). Inside the Thunder Sound Drum Tower
Since the ancient times in various
cultures, drums have been used for various purposes. For instance, they are
used as a means of communication over great distances. They are also used to
motivate troops, to help set a marching pace, and to call out orders or
announcements, etc.
His Holiness Pope Lý’s sermon on
the Caodai ideology is just like the drum sounds to awaken Caodai
congregations, motivate their leaders to free themselves from sectarian
mentality and return to Caodaism what is the true nature of Caodaism, as Pope
Lý briefly says, “Caodaism is just
Caodaism.” In other words, that is a Caodaism free from sectarianisation.
However,
after nearly a century of fragmentation, the sectarian mentality cannot be
uprooted within a day or a night, as an ancient saying reads, “The rivers and mountains may change, but
not one’s own nature. 江山易改, 本性難移.” Or as the Old Testament reads, “Can an Ethiopian change his skin or a
leopard its spots?” (Jere 13:23)
Such perception is
not destructive or pessimistic; contrarily, it helps to apprehend why before
preaching about the Caodai ideology, before asserting, “Caodai that is
not Caodai is Caodai itself”, His Holiness Pope Lý called on
Caodaists, “[Y]ou should dedicate your
lives to serving God’s holy body.” Here, “dedicating one’s life” bears its
sublime significane; it means eliminating the self, the localism, etc. from
Caodai leaders.
The Caodai ideology
in terms of Spiritual Pope Lý’s teaching is to be taught to future generations
of Caodaism. It is essential to help those virgin souls absorb and treasure the
absolute value of what is maintained, “Caodaism
is just Caodaism.”
Teaching the Caodai
ideology is to be carried out regularly and permanently, directly and
indirectly. Indirect means are Caodai publications. Direct education is carried
out through preaching sessions twice a month at parishes (as stipulated by the
Caodai New Law), through short-term or long-term training courses. If a Caodai Academy
- The history related
to the Caodai fragmentation during the 1930s should deliberately rid Caodaists
of the myth of the so-called “twelve branches” - number
twelve, which belongs to God, is an imagination so as to imply that the Caodai
fragmentation is subject to “God’s will”!
- When teaching the
Vietnamese psychology (or the psychology of Caodaists), it is essential to
point out that parallel with constructive traits of psychology are chronic defects
denominated factionalism, localism, separatism, and partialism. It should be
investigated to see whether those unconstructive traits partly affected the
process of Caodai religion’s fragmentation.
If an individual
Caodaist cultivates himself only for his own salvation, perhaps he does not
need to learn the Caodai ideology. Contrarily, if the true significance of “the
Third Universalism of the Great
Way
05 November 2017
Huệ Khải
