Doing Abaya dana with wisdom

The story of the swan incident sets me wondering on the virtue of saving lives. In the episode Prince Siddhartha retrieved a wounded swan shot down by an arrow of Devadatta. Both claimed ownership to the swan and the dispute was brought before a council of wise men. The wise men gave the decision: “The swan belonged to the one who saved its life not to the one who tried to kill it.”

In the old days, trapping of birds and small animals for food was as a livelihood to some. So saving or preserving of lives or helping others to preserve or save lives by releasing the birds and animals in traps was a wholesome act of performing abaya dana.

In modern times on Vesak Day, it is prevalent among the devotees of the Mahayana and Tibetan sects to buy captive animals and fishes from pet shops and fish farms to set them free as form of doing good deeds.

Many of these birds were trapped from forests in neighouring countries and supplied to the local pet shops. When set free in a foreign habitat and especially in heavily built up Singapore with few forests the chances for survival was remote and many of them would just perished.

Likewise fishes and turtles purchased from pet shops were bred and raised in farms where they were well sheltered and fed, thus losing the instinct to fend off danger and hunt for food in the open and hostile sea or ponds.

Many devotees have the mistaken notion of buying and setting free captive animals or fishes as a symbolic gesture of compassion. When they were released into the wilderness they just perished. Many became prey for the predators or died, unable to adapt and survive in an alien environment.

Their intentions were good but the deeds were otherwise as they invariably sentenced these creatures to death. Such was an action of doing dana without wisdom. This is not having the right views.

A reader of TODAY wrote “Only two days after Vesak Day, I was horrified to see two small dead terrapins on the ground outside my block in Yishun. The poor animals had been left to die in the blazing sun, on a grassy verge next to a road after – presumably – being released as a way of receiving good merit.

Terrapins are intensively farm-bred for the pet trade and the demand created around Vesak Day meant most of these animals were doomed to die in an unknown environment in which they had no hope for survival.” (‘Want to do good deed? Why not volunteer?’, Jun 1, 2010).

The author wrote in response to my letter “When a ‘good deed’ just isn’t right” (TODAY, May 25, 2010).
Furthermore, trading in captive animals is not a wholesome livelihood and devotees who purchased them are just abetting them to flourish. Engaged in a right  livelihood is a blessing as propounded in the Discourse on Blessings (Maha Mangala Sutta).

Devotees should stop such rituals and when there is no demand, the supply chain will stop.
Traditions and practices run deep and ingrained in their rituals; it is therefore an uphill task but not impossible to educate these devotees and persuade them to refrain from doing such act.
But it is easier for the many temples and religious centers conducting such blessing service to stop rendering it. They should make the devotees to realize on right views reflecting on the first of the five precepts – I undertake to observe the precept to abstain from destroying the life of beings. (Pănătipătă veramanĭ sikkhăpadam samădiyămi).

I would therefore urge these devotees to be mindful and refrain from such practices and rituals and practise to do dana with wisdom. In fact dana occupies first place in the virtues of Buddhism as it is the first of perfections (Paramitha) and first in the list of meritorious deeds (Dasa Punya Kriya). It is also first in Dasa Raja dhamma, the list of deeds of good kings and queens.

Contributor: Chin Kee Thou (YMBA, Senior 1)

Prince Siddhrtha and Devadatta disputed over owneship of swan