The morality of the people of the Red River Delta is to live responsibly, to abandon evil, to do good, to practice a good lifestyle according to Buddhist teachings. Because if one lives without this sense of responsibility, it is an immoral lifestyle, not only will the individual suffer unhappiness, but also the family and society of that person will suffer from disadvantages and unhappiness caused by the life of that individual. Because a moral lifestyle is happiness and building happiness for oneself, family and society is the responsibility of each person. The moral lifestyle of the people of the Red River Delta always directs moral responsibility to the individual, family and society. Therefore, the people of the Red River Delta, under the positive influence of the Buddhist worldview, always keep in mind a moral lifestyle, in order to achieve peace of mind and happiness in the present life.
Third, the Buddhist worldview helps people live sacrificially for everyone (selfless, altruistic).
According to the Buddhist worldview, an obvious truth is that whoever lives knowing how to sacrifice for others (selfless, altruistic) will achieve happiness, joy and liberation. The influence of the Buddhist worldview on the spiritual life of the people of the Red River Delta is to live knowing how to sacrifice for others. People influenced by the Buddhist worldview always keep in mind this way of life, which is to live and work to bring benefits to themselves, to others and more broadly, to society and the community. The people of the Red River Delta always keep in mind that no matter what field or profession they work in, they always maintain their character and virtue, and awaken to all material temptations...
In daily life, the people of the Red River Delta have no ego; on the contrary, egoism has ego. These are two opposing philosophical aspects that are very important in the Buddhist worldview, because they govern all human behavior such as speech and action. In daily life, any individual needs others for two material needs:
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material and spiritual. The Buddhist worldview has influenced the way of life that knows how to sacrifice for everyone, when they realize that their lives need others, they must think of others; if they are not grateful, they must respect or honor them as their benefactors. Because this world is created from the connection of individuals in relationships and by constraints. The people of the Red River Delta understand that each individual cannot exist alone, if they exist alone, it means they will destroy themselves. Therefore, the way of life that knows how to sacrifice for everyone is expressed through the forms of village community activities. When the country has foreign invaders or wars, the people of the Red River Delta are ready to go to the battlefield to protect the country. In current life, the people of the delta practice a lifestyle that promotes conscience, living kindly, tolerant, generous, caring, and sharing with others.
Fourth, the Buddhist worldview helps people live with a noble conscience and soul.
The Buddhist worldview has a positive influence on the orientation of conscience, contributing to the building of a noble soul. This is essentially the sum of moral values in the spiritual life of the people of the Red River Delta. This is essentially the moral law that governs the entire moral life of humans.
Conscientious actions are those that are in accordance with moral standards and recognized by society, that is, the self-awareness of the goodness within oneself, thereby creating dignity, honor, and peace of mind. The Buddhist worldview guides the people of the Red River Delta to live consciously about what needs to be done and what cannot be done because of "tormented conscience" and fear of being ashamed in front of others and public opinion.
When the Buddhist worldview influences the spiritual life of the people in the Red River Delta, people become conscious of their actions, deeds, and words so that they are in accordance with their conscience. When they commit evil deeds,
If they do not follow ethical standards, they will fall into a state of torment, torture of the soul, and questioning of conscience. Therefore, the Buddhist worldview helps people in the Red River Delta live ethically, be responsible for themselves, their families and society, and live in accordance with their conscience, thereby perfecting their personal character and building a noble soul.
3.2.2.2. Some comments on negative impacts
Customs and practices in Vietnam during the process of existence and development have been influenced by many different cultural trends, especially from China's domination of our country for more than 1000 years. In which, the Buddhist worldview has played an important role in shaping and maintaining many folk customs that we still see exist today. However, not all customs influenced and interwoven by the Buddhist worldview are positive, but they also bring negative limitations to social life to this day, we can review some specific negative impacts as follows:
Firstly, the Buddhist worldview focuses mainly on the mind and pays little attention to socio-economic and scientific-technological issues.
The introverted thinking of Buddhism is one of the outstanding characteristics of Eastern thinking. Buddhism conceives of humans as suffering humans with psychological and physiological regulations (desires, ignorance) from within. To eliminate suffering, we must look inward to eliminate the cause of suffering in each person. The Four Noble Truths determine the thinking direction of the entire Buddhist doctrine: introverted humans. In which, the essence of the universe is closely linked to the essence of humans at a universal level through the categories: dependent origination, impermanence and non-self.
When people realize the impermanent nature of the universe, of existence as well as their own egolessness, they realize the origin of suffering and from there, proactively and consciously escape suffering. The Buddhist concept of liberation is consistent with the inward path. On that path, each person realizes
Realize your own ability, foundation, and level to go and reach your destination by yourself, without relying on the grace or salvation of any supernatural being. Once you realize your true nature, you will consciously stay away from lust and the causes that create karma and reincarnation, which is also the final destination of the path to liberation.
Buddhist culture has blended into the national culture. For Buddhism, the policy of eliminating desire, how to promote economic development, as well as stimulate consumer demand, paying attention to economic development and scientific technology. The Buddhist worldview is contrary to the material; Introversion is contrary to extroversion and technology; commitment to the world; the desire for a comfortable life, profit, success, development... Buddhism determines people's attitudes towards the world, towards others and towards themselves. Science and technology are the mother of economic development. Therefore, to some extent, the Buddhist worldview has negative effects on social development, on labor production.
Second, in the Buddhist worldview, attention is paid to mental suffering and less to material suffering and social development.
As presented in the previous section, one of the outstanding characteristics in the thinking of Eastern people in general and Vietnamese people in particular is introverted thinking. Buddhism was born in ancient India, one of the cradles of the most brilliant Eastern civilization and also the oldest civilization of mankind. Therefore, it is not by chance that when Buddhism was introduced to Vietnam, it was accepted by our people to be suitable for Vietnamese thinking.
Introverted thinking is inclined towards studying the inner spiritual world. With the concept of impermanence, the Buddhist worldview believes that humans are a dynamic combination of elements (five aggregates), so nothing can shape them and thus they are also egoless (without self). Therefore, all things are just illusions.
nominal, not real. From there, people's perception of the world is also just an illusion, real like a dream. It is with that delusion (ignorance) that people suffer even more. Many believers, people and researchers, due to not fully understanding and absolutizing between introversion and extroversion, easily lead to pessimistic and negative understanding and actions, not because the Buddhist worldview itself is negative or positive.
The Buddhist worldview believes that the body is the root of suffering (the body is the root of suffering). Without the body, where would anger, fear, lust, etc. come from? Hinayana believes that the human body is impure, it is made up of dirty, filthy substances. All suffering in the world such as hunger, thirst, heat, cold, fatigue, birth, aging, sickness, and death are all in the body. All things and phenomena are impermanent, so the human body is also subject to that law, it is also impermanent, today it seems young, tomorrow it seems old. Therefore, the Buddhist worldview only focuses on explaining that people are oriented towards the inner mind (introverted thinking), finding ways to liberate people mainly in spirituality. It is not by chance that Zen Buddhism proposes the principle of "transmitting the mind with the mind". This point influences the thinking of Vietnamese people in life, emphasizing the "mind", emotional lifestyle, cultivating temperament, morality and ethics rather than learning and cultivating modern knowledge. Because we do not understand that inner transformation will lead to right actions and benefits for ourselves and the community, not just pure mental training, negating activities that benefit the community.
Third, some forms of Buddhist activities distort the Buddhist worldview.
Superstition is a negative social phenomenon that has existed for a long time and still exists in our time. In fact, the phenomenon of superstition often interferes with the forms of religious and belief activities to practice. Determining the phenomenon of superstition is mainly based on its negative manifestations and consequences. Superstition is a person's fanatical belief in supernatural forces.
supernatural power to the point of being blinded by the extreme, excessive, inhuman, and anti-cultural behaviors of some people called fanaticism. Therefore, along with respecting and ensuring the freedom of belief and religion of the people, we must gradually eliminate superstition in order to improve the spiritual life of society. If the phenomenon of superstition still exists, the seeds of idealistic ideology will still cause great harm to social development.
The custom of choosing the date and time is deeply rooted in the Vietnamese people's customs. Whenever they are about to do something important such as building a house, a funeral, a wedding, or going out... people often go to the temple to ask the monks to choose a good day to do it and a bad day to avoid. According to the Buddhist worldview, this is also a type of superstition. The Buddha taught that for those who do good deeds, every day is a good day for those who do good deeds. All years and months are good days for those who do good deeds. Sowing good causes will reap good results. It is based on the theory of cause and effect.
The custom of praying to the stars to ward off bad luck is very popular and deeply rooted in Vietnamese customs and has the participation of the Buddhist worldview. The cause also originated in China, then passed to Vietnam and then to Buddhism. From there, it gradually became a means for some people to abuse for some types of Buddhist activities.
The custom of asking for lots and fortune telling is a type of superstitious activity that is quite popular in pagodas, temples, and shrines at the beginning of the new year or on major holidays. This is an unhealthy custom due to the belief that the luck and misfortune of fate are pre-arranged and pre-arranged. But according to Buddhist teachings, good or bad is up to you, not the lotteries.
The custom of burning votive paper is very popular in Vietnam and was adopted by Vietnamese people from Chinese Buddhism. Many people mistakenly believe that this custom originated from the Buddhist worldview of cause and effect and reincarnation, therefore
It has existed in Buddhism from ancient times to the present day. Therefore, relatives in the living world must worship relatives in the underworld to reduce their sins or to be warm and well-off and escape from this life. After the death anniversary, on the death anniversary day, the deceased will receive the offerings and money and burn them. Therefore, the custom of burning votive paper is a superstitious and unreasonable "custom" . According to Buddha's teachings, living beings are reborn in good or bad realms according to their good or bad karma. When our relatives die, they will also be reborn in the six realms according to their good or bad karma. Not sitting around waiting for the burning of votive paper is both immoral and a waste of money.
The issue of ritual in Buddhism is not considered as important as the philosophical or practice and meditation factors. Because ritual satisfies the primitive emotional needs of some newcomers to the religion. Therefore, ritual can easily go astray, leading to a decrease in the value of ritual.
Since the country entered the renovation process, building a socialist-oriented market economy, in addition to positive changes in the economy, people's lives have gradually improved, but superstitious activities are very complicated and worrying. The harshness of the market economy has led to a segment of the population, both rich and poor, lacking faith in life, they need the blessing, virtual compensation, and help of religion. In the market mechanism, people come to Buddha more or less in a "market" way, they come to pray for a luckier, more fulfilling, better life to be able to compete in the market mechanism. On the part of the pagoda, material needs also need to be improved to suit the current life "only with food can one practice religion". At the pagoda, some monks and nuns also practice worship to make a living. They meet all the ritual requirements of the masses at agreed prices, some pagodas also post the price list of some rituals. On the one hand, they also contribute to teaching Buddhist scriptures but mainly for economic benefits, considering "customers as gods". Through that, a set of
The people's perception of Buddhism through the rituals of these people in a negative sense leads to a misunderstanding of the Buddhist worldview.
The downside of the market economy will bring about moral degradation, a lifestyle that chases after money, a mentality of worshipping money, people can do everything for money. Nowadays, many people go to the temple to pray with money, so the temple responds and gives more merit. Many temples believe that the more money one offers, the more Buddha will bless and help them and they will be lucky in life. From there, the phenomenon of superstition tends to develop in temples. This is an act that is not in accordance with the spirit of the Buddhist worldview.
In the past, begging for alms was the official practice of the Buddha. But now there are monks begging for alms, asking for money, selling incense... These elements are also diverse, but they are usually between 25 and over 40 years old. They often appear in large numbers during holidays, when the pagoda does religious work, or when the State mobilizes people to participate in supporting compatriots affected by floods, natural disasters, droughts and crop failures... Another deceit is that they have a golden book to record the merits of Buddhist families supporting the pagoda. People with such a compassionate and kind heart, meaning a religious act, do not know that their kindness is being taken advantage of. That is the time when the government and relevant agencies need to take strong measures to prevent people from being unreasonably taken advantage of and losing money to fake monks and nuns who are operating everywhere.
Besides the monks and nuns who are exemplary in morality and profound in Buddhist studies, there is still a group of monks and nuns who have degraded in virtue. The phenomenon of those who cultivate themselves in the place of Zen have worldly motives, increasing the element of superstition and heresy, seriously violating the precepts of Buddhism. Some monks and nuns practice religion not according to the tenets of Buddhism but rather focus on financial gain, even doing things that Buddhism never allows.