Speaking of the monk's faults is evil

Buddhism established the monastic community from the very day ordained practitioners emerged. The demise of the ordained monastic community signifies the demise of Buddhism itself, a principle grounded in scriptural authority. All those who undergo tonsure and receive the precepts of monastic ordination belong to the Three Jewels, serving a representational function for the Dharma. They represent Buddhism. As for how well they represent it, that is an internal matter for the monastics and the monastic community; outsiders have no right to interfere.

Ordained practitioners are bound and regulated by precepts and the law of karma. Even if they violate precepts, laypeople are not permitted to criticize or comment. Therefore, the Buddha prohibits laypeople from studying the monastic precepts, lest they use the rules to scrutinize monastics' words and deeds, thereby giving rise to arrogance, levelling accusations, or publicizing the faults of monastics. This would create the evil karma of slandering the Three Jewels, a retribution too dreadful to contemplate. Monastics are managed by the monastic community itself, which handles their faults and transgressions. Where there is no monastic community, or where the community is unable to act, Dharma protectors and the law of karma will manage it. Laypeople, however, have no qualification to manage it; laypeople absolutely must not speak of any faults of the Sangha.

On the day of Pavāraṇā (invitation), monastics confess their own violations of the precepts and point out each other's violations and faults. Laypeople are not allowed to overhear this. If anyone secretly listens, Dharma protectors will cut off their heads with swords. This is precisely to prevent laypeople from learning about the precept violations and faults of monastics and then criticizing or publicizing them. If laypeople criticize or publicize the faults of monastics, regardless of whether the faults are real or not, it constitutes the evil karma of slander. Upon death, the retribution will be rebirth in the three evil destinies or hell. For those with grave evil karma, the immediate retribution (flowering of karma) may manifest in this very life, not waiting for the future karmic fruit.

Some people only see the shortcomings of monastics, failing to see the worldly benefits that monastics have renounced. Even if monastics frequently violate precepts and often create evil, could it be that laypeople create more evil? Laypeople consume fish and meat daily, constantly struggle with greed and desires they find hard to relinquish. Comparatively speaking, whose karma is greater? Otherwise, why do so many people who consider themselves pure and lofty not renounce household life to take on the identity of a monastic? Is renunciation difficult? It is not difficult. It is precisely because they cannot let go of the various worldly greed, desires, and enjoyments; worldly benefits are hard to relinquish. Therefore, they uphold the lay identity as superior and great, constantly criticizing monastics and the monastic community. Since the monastic community is so flawed, why not generate a great resolve, renounce worldly greed and desires, and courageously renounce household life for the sake of Buddhism, for sentient beings, and for your own liberation over countless kalpas? Wouldn't protecting Buddhism and sentient beings with an ordained body be far more beneficial?

During the Buddha's time, figures like Devadatta and the Bhikkhu Sunakkhatta, no matter how much evil they committed, were restrained and disciplined by the Buddha and the monastic community. Others had no right to interfere. If the Buddha could not manage them, and the monastic community could not manage them, the law of karma would sanction them, sending them to hell while still alive. During the Buddha's time, the group of six monks committed countless evils; even after the Buddha's parinirvāṇa, they remained monks. At the time of the Buddha's parinirvāṇa, these six monks were feasting, drinking meat, and loudly celebrating the Buddha's passing. The Buddha, helpless, concealed this from the divine beings and heavenly beings, preventing them from seeing or hearing it, but the Buddha did not manifest supernatural powers to punish them.

While the Buddha was in the world, the Buddha was supreme. After the Buddha's parinirvāṇa, the precepts are supreme. Whichever has the greater authority of the precepts is regarded as supreme and revered. The manifestation of the precepts being supreme is: 1) Monastics and laypeople do not live mixed together; those with different precepts do not live mixed together. Even among monastics, if their precepts differ, they cannot live mixed together. 2) In walking, standing, sitting, lying down, performing Buddhist ceremonies, or during the Uposatha (confession/recitation ceremony), precedence is always given according to the sequence of precept ordination: those who received monastic Bodhisattva precepts come before those with lay Bodhisattva precepts; those with lay Bodhisattva precepts come before those with the five lay precepts or the eight precepts.