The Precept Against Consuming Intoxicants


Excerpted from Nagarjuna Bodhisattva's Treatise on the Great Perfection of Wisdom

As for not drinking alcoholic beverages, alcoholic beverages are of three kinds: the first is alcohol made from grain. The second is alcohol made from fruit. the third is alcohol made from herbs. As for alcohol made from fruit, it includes grapes and the fruit of the ari.s.taka tree. All sorts of others such as these are known as alcohol from fruit. As for alcohol from herbs, this refers to all manner of herbs which, when combined with rice or wheat and sugar cane juice, can turn into alcohol. This includes also alcohol from the milk of hooved animals. One can produce alcohol from any fermented milk. To summarize, whether it is dry or wet or clear or turbid, all such things as these which are able to influence a person's mind to move or backslide are referred to as alcoholic beverages. One should not drink any of them. This is what is meant by not drinking alcoholic beverages.


The Thirty-five Faults Associated with Alcohol


From Nagarjuna's Treatise on the Great Perfection of Wisdom
(Dharmamitra Translation)

Question: Alcohol is able to dispel coldness, benefit the body and cause the mind to be delighted. Why should one refrain from drinking it?

Response: The benefits to the body are extremely minor. The harmful aspects are extremely numerous. Therefore, one should not drink it. It is analogous to a marvelous beverage into which one has mixed poison. What kinds of poison? As told by the Buddha to the upaasaka Nandika, alcohol has thirty-five faults. What are the thirty-five?

1) Valuables owned in the present life are exhausted.
2) It is the entryway for the manifold diseases.
3) It is the basis for strife.
4) One's nakedness is shamelessly exposed.
5) One has an ugly name and bad reputation and is not respected by others.
6) It obscures and submerges one's wisdom.
7) Those things which one ought to obtain are nonetheless not obtained whereas that which one has already obtained is nonetheless scattered and lost.
8) Matters which should remain secret are told in their entirety to other people.
9) All sorts of endeavors deteriorate and are not brought to completion.
10) Intoxication is the root of worry. How so? When one is inebriated, much is lost. After one returns to a condition of mental clarity one feels shame and blame and abides in a state of worry.
11) The strength of the body decreases.
12) The appearance of the body deteriorates.
13) One does not know to respect one's father.
14) One does not know to respect one's mother.
15) One does not respect Shrama.nas.
16) One does not respect brahmans.
17) One does not respect one's uncles or venerable elders. Why is this? One is so stupefied by drunkenness as to fail to make any such distinctions.
18) One does not honor or respect the Buddha.
19) One does not respect the Dharma.
20) One does not respect the Sangha.
21) One befriends and associates with bad people.
22) One remains distant from the worthy and the good.
23) One becomes a breaker of the precepts.
24) One is devoid of a sense of shame or a sense of blame.
25) One does not guard the six sense faculties.
26) One falls away into sexual profligacy.
27) One is detested and abhorred by others. They find no delight in seeing one.
28) One is abandoned and rejected by all of one's highly-valued relatives and friends.
29) One engages in dharmas which are not good.
30) One relinquishes good dharmas.
31) One is not trusted or employed by intelligent people or wise personages. Why? Because, through intoxication, one has become retrograde.
32) One departs far from nirvana.
33) One plants the causes and conditions for becoming crazy and stupid.
34) When the body deteriorates and the life comes to an end, one falls into the wretched destinies into niraya.
35) If one succeeds in becoming human again, wherever one is reborn one is crazy and stupid.

On account of all sorts of faults such as these one should abstain from drinking.


A Verse Describing the Faults of Drinking


From Nagarjuna's Treatise on the Great Perfection of Wisdom
(Dharmamitra Translation)

Through drinking one loses the quality of awareness.
One's physical appearance becomes murky and detestable.
The mind of wisdom is shaken and confused.
Having been shamed and blamed one is then robbed.
One loses mindfulness and increases hateful thoughts.
One loses happiness and damages the clan.
Being like this, although it is referred to as drinking,
It is actually just drinking deadly poison.
Where one should not be hateful one is nonetheless hateful.
Where one should not laugh, one nonetheless laughs.
Where one should not cry, one nonetheless cries.
Where one should not inflict blows, one nonetheless inflicts blows.
What one should not say, one nonetheless says.
One is no different from a crazy person.
All of one's good qualities are stolen away.
One who knows a sense of shame does not drink.