'Buddha gave his students the outer rules to protect them from losing their way. Their goal is to avoid thoughts, words, and actions that stand in the way of a calm mind and to help people let go of attachments.
Buddha gave five promises, which are part of the Eightfold Path, that apply to lay people in today's world:
- Do not kill. Most people at that time were farmers and slaughtered their own animals. Today city dwellers can strengthen that promise,
- Do not lie to harm others or wrongly present one's own spiritual attainments,
- Do not take what is not given,
- Do not bring sexual harm to anyone,
- Do not get intoxicated.
-- Quoted from 'The Way Things Are' book by Lama Ole Nydahl.
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