Lzh Sarv Bi Pm Pc 47Intentionally Killing Living Creatures
Pāli / Sanskrit:Sañcicca
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Commentary on the Sañcicca Scripture: Killing Living Beings Intentionally
Background
The Sañcicca scripture is found in the Vinaya Piṭaka of the Pāli Canon, the normative doctrinal code of Theravāda Buddhism. The Vinaya Piṭaka is not merely a set of mechanical rules of behavior, but a concrete expression of the Pañca Sīla, the Five Precepts, the ethical foundation of Buddhist study. The Sañcicca scripture focuses on the karmic causality of killing living beings through sañcicca, intention or volition.
The Buddha established the legal system not to punish, but to cultivate the spiritual life. Each rule of training (Pātimokkha, the disciplinary code) was established on the basis of why an act is unwholesome, how it affects the community, and how monastics (bhikkhus) and laypeople can practice in purity. Killing living beings violates the first of the Pañca Sīla, because it is among all unwholesome acts arising from greed, hatred, and delusion, the three poisons.
Main Content
The Sañcicca scripture emphasizes that the nature of the violation of the precept against killing lies in sañcicca, the intentional disposition in one’s mind, speech, and action. If a person deliberately causes the death of a living being (jīva), even one as small as an ant, that act has created a particularly grave violation.
The Vinaya Piṭaka clearly distinguishes between unintentional action and intentional action. The nature of the violation does not lie in the outward result, but in the mental factor (cetanā) directing the action. For a bhikkhu, intentionally killing any living being leads to Pārājika, permanent expulsion from the Sangha, the heaviest penalty in the legal system of Theravāda Buddhism.
This scripture is often linked with specific situations: accidental killing while sweeping, when one does not know there are insects; killing due to mistaken assumption; or killing deliberately. Only when all three factors are present, clear recognition (ñāṇa), the intention to kill (anusaya cetanā), and direct or indirect action (kiriyā), is the violation considered complete.
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