When asked about generosity in terms of “would you like me to pay for whatever is the sense of owing something to someone is not really generosity in a transcendent practice. It is a quid pro quo…in other words, the lowest form of giving a “one hand washes the other.”
One hand washing the other is materialistic – you go to the store and pay for the goods. Buddhism, and I’d say all spiritual practices need to go beyond the mercantile exchange of goods and services. The mercantile exchange is not to be forgotten – but it is not generosity, and it is also not unselfishness.
Generosity is interior for the giver and arises without any selfish expectation or payback of ‘one hand washing the other.’ It is part of meeting the Buddha on the road and killing him. This teaching was given in the ninth century by Linji…and it comes in handy when giving comes up for any one of us. We first must kill the Buddha – meaning if we think we are doing good, if we believe we become more and more Buddha by giving then we are far away from the Truth. For thinking and believing something about our ego-selfish self is polishing the ego. And when the ego is involved, it measures the giving and concludes the debt is paid and we are now even. Again, a mercantile, materialist exchange.
Generosity, fearlessness, and the death of the ego selfish self-construction is a triad. We give without reward, without a quid pro quo – we remain fearless because we have no concern for ourselves and this generosity does not get tallied on and by the ego, e.g., I gave and now I owe no one. What a relief.
The ego must be without wanting anything in return. Christmas giving is in general a mercantile exchange of gifts.
We need to give without expectation of paying a debt or being a good person. No credit. Just giving. It is rare to find someone who gives without self-regard. Our tendency is to choose for self and not for the unborn, undying, immutable Self called by many names.
We do not ask for so and so or this or that. We, however, encourage each of us to contemplate ‘generosity, fearlessness, and selflessness. It is akin to: THOU will be done…not by me, not for me, not because of me…more along the lines of to open to generosity and see within what generosity, fearlessness and no-self responds to life. The work is within. The clarity is there.
Fashi Lao Yue