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ESSENCIAIS

PARA

AVANÇO ADICIONAL

III

2004 / 2005

LI HONGZHI

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Master's Fa Taught in the International Teleconference .............................. 3Teaching the Fa at the 2003 Atlanta Fa Conference   .................................. 3Stop the Evil Acts with Righteous Thoughts ............................................. 42Eliminate the Dark Minions With Righteous Thoughts ............................. 43Teaching the Fa at the 2004 Western U.S. Fa Conference  ....................... 45Teaching the Fa on Easter, 2004, at the New York Fa Conference ........... 80Be Clearheaded........................................................................................... 86Teaching the Fa at the Meeting with Asia-Pacific Students  ..................... 87Master's Comment on a Student's Article................................................. 125Teaching the Fa at the 2004 Chicago Conference.................................... 125To the Fa Conference in Montreal, Canada.............................................. 136Master's Message to the European Fa Conference Held in Vienna.......... 137On Reading Weathering the Storm 1........................................................ 137Teaching the Fa at the 2004 Washington DC Fa Conference .................. 138Let Go of Human Attachments and Save the World's People.................. 142In Fa-Rectification Your Thoughts Have to be Righteous, Not Human .. 143Master's Comment on a Student's Article................................................. 144Greetings................................................................................................... 144My Version of a "Stick Wake-up"............................................................ 145Teaching the Fa at the 2004 International Fa Conference in New York.. 148To the 2005 European Experience Sharing Conference........................... 217We Are Not "Getting Political" ................................................................ 218New Year's Greetings ............................................................................... 221Turning the Wheel Towards the Human World ....................................... 222Teaching the Fa at the Western U.S. International Fa Conference   ........ 224Teaching the Fa at the 2005 Manhattan International Fa Conference...... 264Teaching the Fa at the 2005 Canada Fa Conference ................................ 273To the European Fa Conference in Stockholm......................................... 282Teaching the Fa in the City of Chicago.................................................... 283Study the Fa Well, and Getting Rid of Attachments is Not Hard ............ 288Shed the Human Mindset ......................................................................... 289To all Dafa disciples around the world and in mainland China, a happyMid-Autumn Festival! .............................................................................. 289................................................................................................................. 289

Walk Straight Your Path .......................................................................... 290To the Prague Fa Conference ................................................................... 290The Closer to the End, the More Diligent You Should Be....................... 291The Red Tide's Wane................................................................................ 292Master's New Article: Mature .................................................................. 293To the Israel Fa Conference ..................................................................... 294Teaching the Fa in San Francisco, 2005  ................................................. 294A Reply to the Dafa Disciples of Peru ..................................................... 346Teaching the Fa at the Meeting on Writing Music................................... 347

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Master's Fa Taught in the International Telecon-ference

The book1 does a certain amount to expose the evil's persecution of Dafastudents and to save people. You can publish it in ordinary society, enthu-siastically spread it among everyday people, or publish it in installments oncertain websites meant for the public. However, don't promote it among ourstudents so as to avoid causing them disruption. Nothing should interferewith how students progress towards Consummation and validate the Fa.As far as its content goes, many passages in the book were written with hu-man attachments. We absolutely cannot promote among students somebo-dy's being attached to writing a book to expose the persecution and for thatpurpose being transformed by the evil. Do you know what "transformation"means? In fact, what Gods see is: the person got out of there to expose theevil because she could no longer endure it, and her pursuit of getting outwas really an attachment that she wasn't able to let go. Under absolutely nocircumstance should a Dafa disciple be transformed by the evil--even if it'sto expose the persecution. Besides, exposing the persecution is not the ulti-mate purpose of a Dafa disciple's cultivation. So we cannot have other stu-dents who haven't completely removed their human attachments followsuit, and even less so should the book be promoted among students on thewebsites for students.Cultivation is a solemn thing. I want you to cultivate into gods, and in thatprocess you are able to validate the Fa. That is why I have imparted the Da-fa to you, and why I have given you unprecedented, eternal glory. It is notto have you simply become a hero among everyday people in counteractingthe persecution. Rather, it is to have you validate the Fa while negating theold forces' arrangements and opposing the persecution, and to, through this,progress towards godhood.Li HongzhiJanuary 19, 20041 Translator's note: A reference to a certain book published by a Dafa practitioner. Future Clearwisdomarticles will discuss this book and relevant matters in greater detail.

Last updated: January 25, 2004.

Teaching the Fa at the 2003 Atlanta Fa Confer-Teaching the Fa at the 2003 Atlanta Fa Confer-Teaching the Fa at the 2003 Atlanta Fa Confer-enceenceence  

(Li Hongzhi, November 29, 2003)Hello, everyone! (Students: Hello, Master!) There are some Fa conferencesthat I do attend, while some others I might not. You all know that Dafa dis-ciples have now become more mature. In validating the Fa, and on this pathof gods, you all know what to do. At such a time, it may be that the less I

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speak, the more it benefits you all. And why do I say that? Because this pe-riod of time is precisely given to each of you as an opportunity to temperyourselves, this period of time is precisely given to you as an opportunityto establish your mighty virtue. So I can't always have you do things with-out thinking them over on your own, and I can't have you not blaze yourown path while validating your own Fruition. If you are always led by Mas-ter, if I still tell you what to do when it comes to specific things in valida-ting the Fa, that doesn't work. Once Dafa disciples reach Consummation,your Fruition and levels won't be low. In other words, the responsibilitiesthat you will have for future beings are immense. Then if that's the case, ifyou don't possess that kind of mighty virtue, haven't blazed your own path,and don't know what to do when you need to do things independently, thatwon't do. So I have deliberately given you this period of time, so that youcan have opportunities to temper yourselves and become mature.In fact, I've been quietly observing and watching. Since you're all in themidst of cultivation, you still have human attachments. You have human at-tachments, so you're able to cultivate; you have human attachments, sothey'll show themselves. Then, while doing anything that has to do with va-lidating the Fa, including doing things as a group and doing things on yourown, you'll think for yourselves and try to come up with ways to solvetough problems. And when you are thinking things over, whether you usehuman notions or the righteous thoughts of a cultivator is going to determi-ne the different results you get. The same holds true for when you work to-gether to do things. And when you put your heads together to figure some-thing out, this is the case, too, and you might even get into arguments overcertain issues. This is due, of course, to the human attachments you have,but there's also something positive about it. When you argue you can seeyour attachments and your shortcomings. If you can put the Fa first, let goof your self, and deal with your problems with righteous thoughts, you willbe able to reach a decision quickly and do things well in validating the Fa.And actually, compared to the past few years, things are quite good now.You've all truly matured. I don't want to say more about this today. I main-ly want to talk about clarifying the truth.As soon as the subject of clarifying the truth comes up, a lot of practitio-ners think, "When we clarify the truth, our goal is to expose the evil, sup-press it, and bare it to the light of day so that people all over the world cansee it for what it is, and then the evil will have nowhere to hide." This iswhat you need to do, but that's not what is most important. The most impor-tant goal in clarifying the truth is to save all beings.Every Dafa disciple will shoulder immense responsibilities in the future.There are so many beings that need you to save them--there are so many li-ves that need you to save them. During this period of time, you yourselvesneed to harmonize and consummate everything that's needed for your ownFruition and countless beings. Your mighty virtue and everything of godsare within it. That's why I often say that in validating the Fa, you should do

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well the three things Dafa disciples need to do, and everything is encom-passed in them. So I say that the most important goal for you in clarifyingthe truth is to save even more beings in the process. This is what's fore-most, and this is the real purpose of clarifying the truth.During this persecution, no matter how the old forces have arranged things,no matter how viciously the evil people in the world have acted, no matterhow frantically the evil beings in every dimension have persecuted Dafadisciples and how many of the world's people they've poisoned, have youthought about something: can they damage Dafa? Not a chance. Andyou've seen that after experiencing the most evil persecution in history,which has lasted four years, other than Dafa disciples tempering themselvesand becoming more mature, more clearheaded, and more composed duringthe persecution--you've become more and more rational, your righteousthoughts have become stronger and stronger, and the moment when youwill return to your positions is getting closer--other than that, what else isthere? Isn't that all there is to it? Haven't those Dafa disciples who were kil-led by persecution reached Consummation? It's true that during the perse-cution a portion [of our students] stopped cultivating--if they aren't goodenough they will be sifted out, and what remains will be gold.Of course, once a being studies my Dafa I will take care of him and treathim as a Dafa disciple, as a student. If he truly can't enter [this practice]himself, then that's his own business. So everybody should be clear on thispoint. Whether it's the whole persecution or all those arrangements the oldforces made, in reality, I took those things into consideration when I plan-ned my Fa-rectification long ago. They can't damage the Fa. I don't ack-nowledge the persecution. That's for sure. Are they allowed to control andeven beat to death a being that has listened to the Fa and cultivated in myDafa? They'll definitely have to pay for it in the future. And of course thereare other factors at work. When it comes to those who genuinely do well,they truly don't dare to touch them. When it comes to those who oppose theold forces' arrangements and who have very strong righteous thoughts, theycan't touch them. In other words, during this period of time, no matter howbad the persecution is, if the Dafa disciples' minds are very upright, theyhave very strong righteous thoughts, and understand everything clearheade-dly and calmly, a lot of losses will be averted.You need to be clear that a Dafa disciple's cultivation is about stepping outof humanness; it is to step out of the old colossal firmament that is restrai-ned by all kinds of factors that result from endless, countless, innumerablebeings in this old cosmos; it is to gain a new life, emerging from an envi-ronment that is at the last of the last stage of the formation-stasis-degenera-tion-destruction process of the colossal firmament. Who can step out of allof this? To escape everything and be able to truly enter the future is indeedvery hard. As a matter of fact, the difficulties you've run into cultivatingamidst the persecution are manifestations here among humans. But in reali-ty, in other dimensions that the world's people can't see and that are beyond

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this environment of ordinary people, things are even more intense. It is theshocking and soul-stirring process of immense disintegration and reintegra-tion. The entire cosmos's beings are watching this affair, and countless, me-asureless gods are also watching. Encompassed in all of these changes arethe factors of Dafa disciples validating the Fa. What are displayed in thehuman world are the three things that you're doing at this time. As for thebehavior of the evil, that's it [acting] in an irrational, crazed state before itsdisintegration, and it provides Dafa disciples with the conditions to reachConsummation.Clarifying the truth during the gigantic changes has already become the ma-jor way of saving all beings and the world's people, so in doing this, thewisdom that Dafa has given you and the enormous capability that the Fahas provided you with are manifesting. Your clarifying the truth inevitablyinitiates a sort of chain reaction. Once a person knows the truth, he realizes,"Oh, so that's how it is. Dafa is so great, after all!" Some people who'velearned the truth may think about taking up cultivation, some may be quitesympathetic, and others might offer support in the form of concrete actions.These responses that came about through clarifying the truth spread fromperson to person, heart to heart. The evil factors are losing their habitat. Da-fa and the righteous factors are covering and enriching everything, and atthe same time, in terms of the persecution, this will bring about changes insociety and on every front, and the wicked people will thus have no audien-ce and the evil beings nothing to exploit. That's the inevitable effect.Things look ordinary and uneventful when you clarify the truth, but theeffect is huge.In fact, you've all seen that in the course of Dafa disciples clarifying thetruth, the people of the world have been changing. It's completely differentnow from back when the persecution started on July 20 of '99. And it's notjust that the people of the world are becoming clearheaded, other livingbeings and material factors are going through these changes too. In otherwords, the situation is totally different. Of course, it's not that the evil hasstopped persecuting, but that those factors the old forces arranged, in beingdestroyed, have become less and less, and the evil no longer has muchstrength. But even without that much strength, as long as it still exists it'sstill very evil, very bad. But the evil no longer has that much strength and itdoesn't have the environmental factors that it needs, so it can no longer con-trol that many of the world's people or other beings. And then when theworld's people and all other lives aren't controlled by the evil, it's much ea-sier at that point for you to clarify the truth. If you do it well, then the peo-ple of the world and all beings will wake up. And once the beings wake up,the evil has no audience at all and it really can't do things rampantly. Peo-ple will oppose it and isolate it, and the evil won't be able to do whatever itwants, since nobody will listen to it. That's what the current trend is; it isthe change that's come about in the course of saving all beings.Actually, I used to tell you about how in the past a cultivator couldn't care

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less about what the world's people said about him. If somebody said he wasgood or he was bad, it was [to him just] something humans said, not gods.In fact, there have been a lot of people in history who the world's peoplesaid were bad, and it's even been put that way in textbooks and historicalaccounts, but it's possible they became gods. And there are those who theworld's people exalted as role models but who went to Hell after death.That's because when people talk about good and bad it's all based on hu-man interests. Human principles are reversed: when people think some-thing is good, it's not necessarily truly good, and when people think some-thing is bad, it's not necessarily truly bad. In other words, cultivators didn'theed what people said. But today's Fa-rectification is different, and whethersomeone says Dafa and Dafa disciples are good or bad determines that per-son's future. In the current campaign of persecution, in particular the perse-cution of Dafa disciples, this suppression brought on by the evil, it's interfe-ring with me and the Fa-rectification itself, so it's different from cultivationin the past. It is absolutely a sin to persecute Dafa disciples, and everyoneinvolved will pay for it--none of the lives that participated in it can escape.The cosmos is going through Fa-rectification, so think about it everybody,during the Fa-rectification the entire cosmos, from the microscopic level tothe surface, is constantly making breakthroughs. No matter how big theenormous cosmic body is, no matter how many lives it has, no matter whet-her it is a life or not, no matter if it has intention or not, no matter if it hasan existence or not--nothing can escape, because everything in the futurewill be completely renewed. It's even more the case for the human race he-re in this world and all the lives at the surface--they have no way of esca-ping. The Fa-rectification also encompasses all of the higher beings, andright now no god dares to say that this Fa-rectification has nothing to dowith him. Of course, right now nobody dares to say that, nobody can esca-pe from it. So during the Fa-rectification, there must be a complete recko-ning for what each life has done. It's not that if some life did something badit will be destroyed and that's the end of it. That wouldn't work. It still hasto pay, while undergoing complete destruction, for all of the bad things itdid. I treat all beings with the greatest mercy. No matter how great a sin orhow big a mistake any of the lives in history committed, I could overlooktheir faults and sins, and I could remove their sins. The prerequisite is ofcourse that during Fa-rectification you can't interfere with it; I would saveyou even if you didn't do a single thing. But once a being interferes withFa-rectification what it faces is elimination. And those who've committedthe most egregious sins have to pay for everything they've done whilebeing eliminated. However much was done, that's how much has to be paidfor; however big the things it did, that's how much it has to pay for. So thistime, when it comes to the evil beings that interfere with Fa-rectification,no matter how wicked they are, what they face is a terrifying end that's ne-ver been seen before in the cosmos. And this includes the old forces them-selves. Even though they thought they were making a contribution for

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Dafa's sake, in reality they were looking at things based on their own con-cepts. They never truly looked at themselves or used Fa-rectification itselfto evaluate themselves, or used this Fa to evaluate themselves. But sincethe future is this Fa, and the beings of the future are created by this Fa,what other than this Fa could be used to evaluate things?So when it comes to the issue of truth-clarification, since it's so important,you should do it even more calmly and level-headedly, and you should re-cognize more clearheadedly the different kinds of opportunities, ways ofhandling things, and approaches that we encounter while clarifying thetruth. It's something you all need to pay attention to. You know that when Idisseminate the Fa I don't pay attention to what group in society a personbelongs to or his social status, and I don't differentiate between rich andpoor, the various professions, or a person's status at his job. I don't look atanything except a person's heart. You should do the same when you clarifythe truth. Don't think about him being some elite figure and create an extramental obstacle for yourself, as if you're there to ask for his help. What'sactually happening is that you're saving him, and you're giving him a chan-ce to choose his future. That's for sure. So you should consider saving theworld's people as the primary objective of clarifying the truth.Everything that Dafa disciples are doing today and everything in societyyou encounter, I can tell you, you are saving all beings. So no matter whatkind of person you meet, what strata of society he's from, or what profes-sion he's in, don't think that you're just going to him to explain the truth me-rely because evil is persecuting Dafa disciples. I'll tell you, saving allbeings is first and foremost, and clarifying the truth is the way to save peo-ple. When people understand the facts and find out how wicked the perse-cution is, people will naturally know what to do. And if afterwards you askhim to lend support and do something about it, that's him choosing a future.So with those people who've been deceived in the persecution, all the moreso, how could you not give them a chance? If you don't tell them the factsthey will lose their futures forever.Also, with those people that you run into by chance, who you run into indaily life, and the people you run into at work, you should all clarify thetruth to them. Even when in your daily life you pass by people so quicklythat you don't have a chance to talk to them, you should still leave themwith your compassion and kindness. Don't lose those who should be saved,especially those with predestined connections. Actually, a lot of Dafa disci-ples say when they're clarifying the truth, "I'm going to go clarify the truthnow," as if at that moment they're going to clarify the truth, but they don'tclarify the truth normally. Saving beings should permeate every single as-pect of your daily lives at this time. If you can all understand and really seeits importance, I think you'll probably save more beings. Now the world'speople are gradually becoming more clearheaded, and the impact of clari-fying the truth right now is even greater. The audience those evil beings ha-ve is getting smaller and smaller, so you must understand this issue clear-

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headedly.There is a small number of students who are privately becoming like bud-dies and pals--"we do things together, we're a little group"--and they oftentalk about a bunch of useless things, wasting large amounts of time. Rightnow every minute and every second is crucial. If you miss out during thisperiod of time, you miss out on everything. History won't recur. The histo-ry of the cosmos and the Three Realms have gone through so many, long,long years--what have all the beings been waiting for? What are they all he-re for? For exactly these few years! Yet there are [Dafa] students who aresquandering their lives during these few years, not seizing the time. Andyet you are shouldering such huge responsibilities for all beings and for his-tory!Yes, some students aren't clearheaded enough and feel that obtaining the Fawas quite a coincidence. [They wonder,] "Do I have such a huge historicresponsibility? Am I able to take it on?" In reality there's no need to evenask that, I've already spelled it out quite clearly in the Fa. Not everyone cancultivate in this Dafa that I'm imparting today. Why is it that so many peo-ple can't enter? Of course, there are a lot of new students who are now gra-dually coming in, and that's due to your clarifying the truth. It's like a mas-ter key, unlocking that old-force factor that seals the world's people off andprevents them from learning the Fa. Only your clarifying the truth can dothis. To put it another way, not everyone can obtain it. With things that ma-nifest in the human realm it’s hard to tell what's true and what's false, thetrue state of the cosmos isn't allowed to show itself, and the special statesof Dafa disciples that set them apart from the world's people cannot becompletely displayed. After all, it's cultivation in the maze--it's about culti-vating in that kind of state and breaking free from it. Don't underestimateyourself. Every Dafa disciple, as long as you've cultivated according to thisFa, you should do the things Dafa disciples are supposed to do.Actually, I've said that for an ordinary person who has done somethinggood for Dafa during this period, at this critical time, it's possible for eventhat person to reach Consummation as a god, let alone you, who are cultiva-ting in the Dafa, who are doing what Dafa disciples should do, and doingall of it under tough conditions. You can't see much of a difference on thesurface, but it does manifest in other dimensions--that is precisely the diffe-rence between humans and gods. The changes are gigantic. This place ofhumans is enshrouded in delusion, and the real state of things and what'shere in this human place are totally different. Only those Dafa discipleswho fall behind in Fa-study will display a lack of diligence and feel dejec-ted during this period of time, even to the extent that they don't know howprecious this time is and don't seize the time to do what Dafa disciplesshould do.Even now, in fact, there are some students who are doing very poorly withFa-study. Being able to study the Fa well is the fundamental guarantee thatyou can head towards Consummation, it's the fundamental guarantee that

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you can emerge from here. All beings were forged by this Fa, as are yourfutures. As for the cosmos's future beings, because many, many lives havebeen weeded out during the Fa-rectification, there are many places in thecosmos that are empty. But they won't remain empty forever. Dafa willcreate from the Fa all of the lives, along with various factors and matterthat are needed by those levels of cosmic bodies. And Dafa is forging all ofthe new lives that are needed. The old lives may renew themselves only af-ter assimilating to this Fa, and in this way enter the future. All lives are en-compassed by this.Actually right now the overall Fa-rectification is already coming to the sur-face more and more. The last factors that remain can't be called lives any-more, they can't be called anything, there's no language to express whatthey are and no concept to describe them, but everything is in this final pro-cess of Fa-rectification. Actually, if we were to use the concepts of "thecosmos" and "beyond the cosmos" to describe it, Fa-rectification alreadyfits the concept of "beyond the cosmos." Meaning, Fa-rectification is nowworking on those factors that allow the firmament to exist, and even thefactors in the factors.That being said, right now you still can't feel it, but from the current situa-tion of Dafa disciples' Fa-validation you can see that the situation has chan-ged. The evil can't be sustained anymore, and that's because the evil livesand factors have been destroyed to the point of very little being left, andthere's no comparison with how things were on July 20 of '99. I've descri-bed to you what it was like back then: evil beings from other dimensions at-tached to each blade of grass and each tree. As you walked down the streettree branches would whip you in the face, the grass would trip you, and theair was filled with evil. It's not that all of that really turned evil, it was theeffect of bad lives and factors that were pushed down into the Three Re-alms during Fa-rectification. Everywhere, things were saturated with evilfactors. They attached themselves to everything, doing the worst things inthe Three Realms and among humans. If this Fa-rectification wasn't done intwo parts and instead I did it in one step, then the wave of persecutionwould have been global, just like the European prophet said: in 1999 theKing of Terror would descend from the skies, and people the world overwould feel the frenzy of the persecution. This time when the evil arrived,other countries around the world and other nations didn't experience theevilness of the persecution against Falun Gong that began in '99, and that'sbecause this was to be done in two parts; having other nations or more ofthe world's people cultivate Dafa is something left for the next step. Andyou've seen that today it is Fa-rectification Period Dafa Disciples' cultiva-tion, and things aren't directed at more people around the world. That's whythe kind of persecution that took place against Dafa disciples in Chinahasn't happened in other countries, and as a result other nations haven't ex-perienced evil of that magnitude. But because the evil factors were just so,so many back then, for Dafa students, no matter what country the student

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was in, he or she would feel mental pressure.Right now the situation is no longer like that. The overall Fa-rectification isdestroying evil factors in mass quantities, and Dafa disciples have clarifiedthe truth while validating the Fa, along with this sending righteous thoughtsto continually cleanse themselves and clear out the evil in other dimen-sions, as well as all the other things you've done validating the Fa. All ofthat is destroying those evil beings and factors that the old forces arranged,and it has had a huge effect. When a Dafa disciple's righteous thoughts arestrong his existence in the world has a positive effect. So take a look, every-body--isn't it true that the amount of evil factors left now is tiny? It's now-here close to the situation of July 20 in '99.However, even though those evil factors aren't as many, the remaining onesare still pretty wicked. I always told you in the past: the closer it is to thesurface the less power it has, but the closer it is to the surface the more evilit is. So it's making up for its weaker power by being more evil on the sur-face, and the evil still appears quite wicked. But you've seen that the envi-ronment has already changed. The evil can only be sustained in those pla-ces directly controlled by that evil ringleader--those places where hopeless,evil people are still doing evil. Right now they can't even be sustained atthe surface of Mainland China's society; the evil's suppression is being car-ried out covertly, and they're afraid to let the world's people see it. Actual-ly, all of the righteous forces are destroying it, and the evil is scared. Theydon't dare to do things out in the open, and they're carrying out the suppres-sion by sneaking around. They're afraid more of the world's people willlearn of the evil things they've done, and those things can't stand the lightof day. They won't even let cadres--even high-ranking cadres in the CentralGovernment--know about it. They're even lying and covering up the perse-cution internally. But it's only those few wicked, worst dregs of society thatare making wicked people below them carry out the evil persecution.They're doing their utmost to cover up the despicable means they've used inthe persecution, and they're even making false reports to the Central Go-vernment's cadres. They're using lies to sustain the evil persecution. Theevil has now been destroyed in massive amounts, and it looks like the evilones can no longer run wild. Back when the evil was rampant, there werecountless rotten ghosts propping it up so that it could run wild, and evenwhen others knew the truth of things they didn't dare to speak out. AroundJuly 20 of '99, when that evil ringleader was stomping around making aruckus to get its way, nobody dared make a sound. At that time the evil fac-tors supporting it were just so numerous, and it wanted to suppress [FalunGong]. The situation is different from what it was like back then, all of thefactors arranged by the old forces are being cleared away and becomingless and less numerous, and the current environment appearing in the hu-man realm is different. It doesn't matter how frenzied the evil people get,it's all over for them.But in this period you've all seen something, and that is, how many lives

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have sinned against Dafa (and that's not including those who've committedthe worst, most wicked sins). Once they understand the truth, is that the endof it? It's not that simple. But, when you have somebody understand thingsby clarifying the truth, that is giving him a chance. If he truly has anupright thought, it gives him a chance to atone for his sins. A person has topay for whatever he has done--that's a law of the cosmos, and all beings aresubject to it. When the persecution first started, how many people had topitch in to bring about that evil situation back then? If nobody played sucha role, and nobody did or said anything, could that evil environment backthen have been created? Whether they were in China or abroad, as long asthey played such a role in that process, pushed the persecution forward, oractively contributed in words or deeds, they have to pay for it. No life canescape, unless he has made up for the losses he caused Dafa and Dafa disci-ples.The gods of the entire cosmos are staring, wide-eyed. Boundless, countlessgods are watching this tiny little Earth, watching intently every life's everythought. They're afraid even to blink, as they don't want to miss an instantor let a person's single thought slip by. At this time, I talk about thesethings to tell you to calmly, level-headedly, and more clearly understandwhat you're currently doing. No matter what you're doing, Dafa disciplesmust make validating the Fa the number one priority.But, you have to clarify the truth rationally and in line with people's logicand ways of thinking. If you talk about it in a strange, otherworldly way,not at all based on people's logic and way of thinking, and not consideringwhether people can accept it or not, then you're doing harm and the result isopposite what was intended. Make sure you do it rationally and clearheade-dly. When you clarify the truth to people you have to consider their level ofacceptance. You'll be able to see and observe this, so you have to do wellclarifying the truth. Don't just go to talk for the sake of formality. Whene-ver you talk to someone you need to have him understand. Of course, thereare those that absolutely can't be saved, since they've gone all the way overto the opposite side. That kind of person no longer has anything righteous,and when you talk to him he can't accept it since whenever he accepts a litt-le bit, a little bit of him has to be destroyed--whenever he accepts a littlebit, a little bit of him is destroyed. If he completely accepts it, then he'scompletely destroyed, because he is evil. So there are those that can't be sa-ved, but that's an extremely small minority, ultimately.There are also some people who, even if you want to save them, like I saidearlier, even if you give those people a chance and they understand, theystill have to repay their debts. That's how it works. That's speaking from theFa's principles. But you shouldn't worry about those things, since as Dafadisciples you cultivate Shan, and you have to be compassionate to allbeings. As for how those lives should pay off those debts, naturally there'sthe Fa to determine that. Whether or not they should remain is determinedby the Fa's standards. So as Dafa disciples, just do your best to save them,

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that's all.Why should you save them? I've said before that the beings in today'sworld are different from the lives in history, and they're different from thepeople in the past. When any life arrives in this world and enters this worldof delusion, it's truly terrifying. For a god, you know, just a moment agowhen you saw him he was a magnificent god, but once he enters this world,enters a human body, and that brain is washed clean, that's really scary, andnow he can't distinguish things; so based on his actions you can't tell theorigin of his life, and you can't see the essential difference between him andhis life in the past.That is what I wanted to talk about, actually--to just talk with you about thesubject of clarifying the truth. You still want to talk with me about somethings, so I think I'll use the time that follows to answer some questions foryou. If you have a question you can write it down on a slip of paper. (Ap-plause) Let's not take too long since in the experience sharing conferencethere are still people who need to give their speeches.

Explaining the FaQuestion: Beijing students send greetings to Master (Teacher: I'm going toskip reading this part). When the Fa-rectification ends, or in other words,right before we reach Consummation, will I be able to see you? If thatdoesn't happen it will be my eternal regret. I don't know if I should thinkthis way. Will my wish come true?Teacher: Aren't you seeing me right here and now? (Everyone laughs) Youwant to see my True Image. (Teacher laughs) Cultivate yourself well. Eve-ry Dafa disciple will be able to see it as long as he can reach Consumma-tion. (Applause) Dafa disciples not only have the kind of predestined rela-tionship that you have today, one that countless beings don't have, but infact, I have prepared for you a being's eternal and everlasting glory in thefuture. (Applause)Question: Dafa disciples in Wuhan City, Hubei Province miss you and sendgreetings to Teacher.Teacher: Thank you! (Applause)Question: Some people say that Falun Gong is good, but they aren't willingto help practitioners, for example, when we try to place our newspapers [inthose places], or when they don't announce Dafa's name during activities. Ifthese people aren't able to change, how will they end up?Teacher: Actually, some people aren't clear about Dafa at this time. Andthat's especially so for those who've been too deeply deceived during thispersecution that's so evil. If Dafa disciples aren't able to untie the knots inthose people's minds when they clarify the truth, it's possible they are stillin the process of coming to understand Dafa, and for the time being theycan't be judged conclusively. At this time it can't be said that they are goodand it can't be said that they are bad. It's possible you haven't done enoughin clarifying the truth.

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Question: How should we understand "The great disclosure of the truth willleave the world in amazement"?Teacher: As a matter of fact, I used a gods' word, "amazement." Thinkabout the immense changes of the entire cosmos, everyone. Just hereamong humans, in the next stage a lot of evil people will be weeded out,and the number who will be weeded out is large and terrifying. At the be-ginning people will still feel shocked, while by the end they'll be numb toit. What kind of state will a person be in when he sees dead people strewneverywhere on the street? The things that people don't believe in and histo-rically have taken to be "superstition" will all unfold. People understandthis material world through modern scientific concepts. When they disco-ver that's not how it is at all, what will they think? Once the things that peo-ple don't believe in all appear, when they're faced with huge changes in thisso-called material dimension, what kind of state are they going to be in?People will see that it turns out gods really do exist. "Whoa! It turns outDafa disciples are all gods! It turns out everything Dafa disciples have beensaying is true!" At the beginning they'll still have those kinds of thoughts,and then, while enduring suffering to pay for their sins, people will gradua-lly become as if they don't have any thoughts. It will truly be "leaving theworld in amazement."Question: I want to write a historical chronicle of Falun Dafa and record allkinds of feats that have been accomplished since Master began to spreadthe Fa.Teacher: I think it'd be remarkable if Dafa disciples could accomplishsomething like that. You may do it, but the effort will take a lot of time andenergy. The Dafa disciples' three things are all major ones. Balance your ti-me well.Question: Please advise me as to whether I can write at a slightly higher le-vel about righteous thoughts and righteous actions? Would it transcend Da-fa?Teacher: No matter how high a level you write at, you can't transcend Da-fa, (everyone laughs) because it is just too enormous. The things that youcan know are only what can be shown in the ordinary human society andthose things that our Dafa disciples have done while using human actionsto validate the Fa. There shouldn't be any problems with using those. Afterit is completed you can solicit feedback from other people, and that waycertain things will be done even better.Question: I used to write martial arts fiction that had to do with cultivation.Is it OK to use the form of martial arts fiction to expound higher princi-ples? How can I do a more intricate and detailed job in terms of artistic ex-pression so that people of the world will accept correct cultivation conceptswithout realizing it?Teacher: I think if you want to write a historical chronicle, that would besomething more serious. Writing fiction is fine, but if you turn this wholematter of Dafa into fiction, it seems like the fictional aspect isn't all that ap-

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propriate. I think that with a historical chronicle it wouldn't hurt to covermore specific details and put more into bringing characters to life. With afictional work, if it focuses on a certain disciple, a certain region, or a cer-tain event, as it's just picking a subject matter, then that's fine.Question: I would like to send greetings to Master on behalf of Dafa disci-ples in Mainland China.Teacher: Thank you! (Applause)Question: Secret agents use the gaps that we Dafa disciples have in Inter-net security to persecute us. But a portion of overseas Dafa disciples andthose who are in positions of responsibility don't pay much attention to it,which has caused interference and damage to Fa-validating tasks and Dafadisciples. Master, please give us some guidance.Teacher: I think everybody should pay attention to this point. Even thoughwe don't have anything to hide, we can't let the secret agents interfere.Speaking of secret agents, this occupation, which in the eyes of gods is thedirtiest human profession, causes people to become mentally twisted afterleading lives that can't bear to see the light of day and that consist of doingthings in a shadowy, secretive manner for long periods of time. It's actuallya very tough life. And don't think they are all that capable. Not too longago, a Taiwanese practitioner went to Shanghai and was arrested. Those se-cret agents in the State Security Bureau saw his fear and insisted on makinghim a secret agent. We all know those tactics were filthy and shameless,and only evil places are able to do things that way. Actually, I knew abouttheir set of tricks a long time ago. Before they do this they first get to knowyou well. They even get to know what you like and dislike when it comesto food, clothing, living quarters, and transportation. And it includes gettingto know the subject's relatives and friends well. Then they set a trap for youand arrest you. At the very first meeting they scare and threaten you, ma-king you feel as if you're about to get shot to death. Then they take advanta-ge of your mental state of being afraid and talk to you. If you don't want totalk, they'll share with you the things they gathered a long time ago. Duringthe conversation you feel as if they know everything already, and it seemslike they even know things only a very small number of people know. Un-der the influence of the attachment of fear, you strongly feel as if nobodyaround you is dependable, and you develop this erroneous notion that eve-ryone is a secret agent, that nobody is trustworthy, and that you could bemurdered at any time if you don't comply with the evil's demands. Actuallyit is your attachment of fear being taken advantage of. It's a ploy, and it is aset of methods that are used exclusively by spies. Of course, right now no-body in a democratic country dares to do things that way. Only an evil regi-me would dare to use that kind of evil method to violate people's humanrights. In a democratic country that person would have been brought to acourtroom by now.Don't be afraid of them making trouble. You shouldn't be overly concernedwith every little thing, but you should all keep alert. You need to think

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about whether the evil can do harm to what you plan to do. You need tothink about this. We don't have anything to hide, we don't have anythingwe're afraid of letting the world know, and we haven't done anything ille-gal. But as for the evil, we shouldn't give them any opportunity to do evilthings. When it comes to the evil, the things Dafa disciples plan to do mustnot be made known to the evil. So, many times you all really must pay at-tention to this matter. We can't let the evil people move first and do badthings before you have a chance to do something. That causes trouble andmakes it harder for you to clarify the truth and bring salvation to people. Soyou must take these things seriously.Question: Five hundred thousand Hong Kong residents took to the streetsto protest Article 23. But some of those people still don't know the true si-tuation with Falun Gong. Is it true they won't be saved just for opposing Ar-ticle 23 and that they need us to clarify the truth to them in more depth?Teacher: That evil Article 23 legislation, which has been rejected by all ofHong Kong's people, was from the beginning aimed at Hong Kong Dafadisciples and meant to persecute them. And it was aimed at Hong Kong'speople so as to persecute them, too. So many people in Hong Kong stoodup to oppose it. No matter what kind of perspective or what kind of moti-ves they had at the time, when it was all said and done they were able toplay a positive role in this matter. I think that with Hong Kong's residents,you could say they've chosen a very good future for themselves, and interms of their attitude towards Dafa they already have a very good start.Many people knew Falun Gong well, and they were precisely against it [thelegislation] for that reason. They laid a very good foundation for being sa-ved in the future. As for those who are still unclear about Falun Gong andthe reality of it being persecuted, you should clarify the truth in moredepth, that's all.Question: When inviting some big companies to participate in the Gala, ifwe don't clarify the truth and just invite them to celebrate the New Yearwith the Chinese people, it isn't enough, is it?Teacher: Of course it isn't enough. Everything that Dafa disciples aredoing today is for the sake of saving people. Otherwise what are you doingit for? Clarifying the truth in an upright and open manner are the verythings Dafa disciples should do. I'm also telling you that all beings in to-day's world came for the sake of the Fa. If you want a being to clearly un-derstand this point, you should go and clarify the truth to him. It is a masterkey, the key that can unlock that thing all beings have had sealed off for along time and been awaiting for ages. (Applause)Actually, I'm thinking that with everything you, the Dafa disciples, aredoing today, you aren't doing them for Dafa, and you aren't doing them forme, your master, either. You are doing them for yourselves. You are har-monizing your own worlds and establishing your own mighty virtue. Youare collecting and saving beings that you need. You are all doing things foryou, yourselves. From my perspective, as your master, I certainly have to

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tell you to do these things, because I want to harmonize everything of yoursand I want to lead you to success. Only when you need things in certain re-gards do I tell you to go and do them.Also, from the perspective of cultivating goodness and compassion, youshould do these things. I'm just giving an example here. It doesn't stop atthe Gala. It applies to all kinds of other things that you encounter and needto do. It applies to all those things. Saving all beings is what's most impor-tant. You shouldn't think [you are doing things] in order to add more pro-grams to the Gala, and even less so are these things done to bring peoplesome momentary happiness. I am asking you to save all beings. (Applause)If you're able to stage a high-quality gala that's filled with Dafa's positiveenergy, that in and of itself can have the effect of saving all beings.Wouldn't you be only too happy to do it? Isn't it an opportunity? (Applause)Question: Some practitioners respect Dafa from the bottom of their hearts.They also are very diligent when clarifying the truth. But they just can'tmeet the standard when it comes to their own individual cultivation andthey make mistakes frequently. They are bothered by it too.Teacher: That's apt to happen. The reason is, you all understand the broa-der principles of the Fa, but when it comes to individual issues, those fac-tors of ordinary people that remain on an individual basis will in fact leadto attachments, and can manifest themselves. It might seem quite inconsis-tent but it actually isn't inconsistent, and when attachments get too big, badcultivation states are going to emerge. When big problems arise you mustpay attention to them. That's the most dangerous.Having said that, another thing occurred to me, and that is, you shouldn'tlook at things in absolute terms. And that's especially true when it comes tothose crooked principles that the evil in China propagates. For example,they spread, "if you want others to do well, you have to do well yourselffirst." Think about it everybody, is that saying right? Many people hold onto that saying and use it to hide their own mistakes that they don't want tocorrect. And that's especially so for those who have problems--they take itas the truth and won't let go. I can tell you, though, that this is absolutelywrong. Can't a person who isn't perfect tell you to do well? Can't a personwho's made mistakes tell others to do well? What kind of logic is that?How many people have thought this over carefully?As you know, Jesus said that all human beings have sins. So just becauseyou have sins, you shouldn't tell your own children to behave well? Becau-se you have sins, you shouldn't tell others not to commit crimes? That's de-finitely a ridiculous theory, isn't it? In reality, who among humans hasn'tmade a mistake? As soon as a person is born he creates karma. Everyonehas made mistakes. Just because you have made mistakes it doesn't meanyou can't tell others to do well. By the same token, just because someonehas made mistakes, it doesn't mean that he can't tell you to do well. It de-pends on if what he says is right or wrong. That's how gods look at things.And in fact, that's how humans should look at things, too. That's the right

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principle.The evil regime's propaganda has twisted that principle into this: if youwant others to behave well, you have to behave well yourself. It's a veryevil saying. On the surface it looks like, "Oh, it's true. That saying makes alot of sense." But it doesn't make one bit of sense, and it can only play a ne-gative role. Who can behave so well? Where can you find a perfect humanbeing? Even with a cultivator who's reached the last step in his cultivationand not yet completely shed his human body, he still has sins and karma,and he still has attachments. But, when he reaches that step in cultivationhe has far surpassed ordinary human beings. If we go by that saying, nobo-dy can tell anybody else to behave well. Wouldn't society be done for?Dafa disciples have attachments, ordinary human attachments that they ha-ve yet to eliminate by cultivating, and they have areas in which they fallshort. But that doesn't mean a Dafa disciple is completely no good, itdoesn't mean this being isn't up to par, and it doesn't mean this Dafa disci-ple hasn't cultivated himself well. In many, many areas he has cultivatedvery well. He makes mistakes because he still has attachments that need tobe revealed so that he can realize his own shortcomings, and that's whythey manifest. It's only possible to cultivate them when they show themsel-ves. If things stay hidden and aren't displayed it's rather hard to removethem with cultivation, and if even he himself doesn't realize they exist, thenit's really hard to cultivate.Question: Master, please talk about how the media outlets operated by Da-fa disciples should clarify the truth, especially the future outlook for coope-ration in clarifying the truth inside Mainland China.Teacher: Our current situation is basically like this: out of considerationsfor safety, conditions aren't yet ripe for Dafa disciples in Mainland China toset up media outlets; but they do distribute flyers and VCDs, and there area lot of things they've done quite well. As for outside of Mainland China,the media outlets operated by Dafa disciples need to help the Chinese peo-ple see the true picture of the persecution as much as possible, they need tohelp all Chinese people see the truth--they must help all the Chinese peoplesee the truth! (Applause) You need to save them. You need to help Chinesepeople see what kinds of things Chinese people have done during the perse-cution and what terrifying consequences await the Chinese people if it con-tinues.Question: I could never completely eliminate my own attachments. I'm re-ally worried about this, but I'm never able to do well.Teacher: Study the Fa more, study the Fa more. (Teacher laughs) There'sno magic pill. "Let's take a pill and the attachments will go away." (Everyo-ne laughs) Actually, Dafa's mighty power is even more effective than somecure-all magic pill. Of course, you're all busy right now and have to do allkinds of things, there are a lot of things to do, and there are household cho-res, jobs, and other responsibilities to attend to. But you have to always cul-tivate yourself, so you still need to study the Fa.

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Question: On this holiday, please accept all Dafa disciples' respect and gra-titude. We will definitely do well and make Master happier and less wor-ried.Teacher: Thank you! (Applause) Dafa disciples are all still being persecu-ted. You want me to be happy, but I can't be. How many Dafa disciples arebeing persecuted in those evil labor camps in China at this very moment!But I do appreciate your goodwill.Question: I've been thinking about the following: is it OK for those Dafadisciples who are well-known in society, for example the contact people ofcertain regions or disciples who've written many articles to clarify the truthabout Dafa, to talk about their own thoughts, understandings, and analysisof certain issues in the human world, for example the issue of the [Chinese]territory, as members of society while participating in local activities, Chi-nese community activities, and activities of the "Bring Jiang to Justice Coa-lition"? What's the best way to do it so as to avoid misunderstandings fromordinary people?Teacher: For Dafa disciples, cultivating and validating the Fa today arefirst and foremost. Dafa disciples must validate the Fa. For you, clarifyingthe truth and saving all beings are first and foremost.In society certain democracy activists, and this includes some individualswho were involved in [the massacre on] June 4th, have been constantly as-saulting the evil, brutal regime. They too promote things like human rightsand freedom of belief, and their sharp criticism along those lines has had apositive effect in terms of exposing the persecution of Falun Gong. So fromthis perspective, they share common ground with us on this point. So thensome of our practitioners want to speak from those angles, too. Actually,you need to remain level-headed and calmly analyze whether the thingyou're doing has anything to do with Dafa and validating the Fa. If the ans-wer is yes, you should go ahead and do it. If the answer is no, youshouldn't. You should never lose your way.Do you know about your master? This cosmos is so immense. There arecountless and immeasurable beings and countless and immeasurable cos-mic bodies. So many beings are capable of dramatically affecting the hu-man world with just one thought! There are so many beings, so many fac-tors of the old forces and old beings, all of whom want to control this Fa-rectification and interfere with this Fa-rectification. None of them can chan-ge me. The path I've walked is straight. (Applause) They aren't able to inter-fere with me in any way. They can exhaust their ways and nothing willwork. Here among humans there are all kinds of things that interfere, butnone of that has any effect.Isn't there a saying among people that, "You have your thousand brilliantideas, but I have my own way"? In other words, Dafa disciples need to rea-lize what they're doing. [You] must keep clearheaded about whether some-thing is related to validating the Fa or not. We expose evil for the sake ofsaving all beings. As long as it has to do with the things Dafa disciples are

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doing today, you should go ahead and do it. And if it doesn't, you shouldn't.If a person goes in the wrong direction doing things and develops attach-ments as a result, those things will hurt the practitioner. If a task has to dowith Dafa, and has to do with your validating the Fa or saving beings, thenyou should go ahead with it. In that case, the more you do the more wide-open the road becomes. That's the case for sure. You absolutely must notget mixed up in the political struggles of ordinary people.Question: Dafa disciples in Singapore and Malaysia send greetings toMaster.Teacher: Thank you! (Applause)Question: When I have a lot of thought karma, can I send righteousthoughts at any given time and place?Teacher: Do it based on your own situation. Some thoughts that you deve-lop are actually interference, which can be eliminated by sending righteousthoughts. Some are the product of your own attachments, and some are con-cepts that you've formed in the human world; those things can't be elimina-ted by sending righteous thoughts just once. So they surface from time to ti-me, and it seems that after you send righteous thoughts they still appear.That kind of thing happens. But it's not that you haven't done anything andit's not that what you did was not effective. It's just that each time only aportion of it can be eliminated. Those things that were arranged by the oldforces have been divided into countless, countless portions by the factors oflives that come from higher levels. So, each time you send righteousthoughts you are only able to eliminate one or two portions, but more stillremain.It's not limited just to this. Within the Three Realms they have done manybad things and made arrangements for many things that they wanted.What's more, many of those things have become warped. During the passa-ge of such a long period of time, even the so-called gods of the old forceswho originally did those things cannot resolve them. If there were no Fa-rectification they couldn't be resolved. There are a lot of things in the cos-mos like that, and it's hard to resolve them without the arrival of the wholeimmense force of Fa-rectification. But as for thought karma, it can be com-pletely eliminated through sending righteous thoughts.Question: How should we deal with truth-clarification pamphlets that con-tain photos and stories of former practitioners who have "enlightened"along a wicked path?Teacher: They "enlightened" along a wicked path because of coercion du-ring the persecution. When they are released they will come to their sensesafter some time. But it's a different matter for those who have caused irre-parable harm to Dafa and Dafa disciples.Question: Recently new students have come to do the exercises. Howshould we guide them to study the Fa and encourage them to attend ourgroup Fa-study?Teacher: It's fine to encourage them to join group exercises and group Fa-

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study. But don't be overly anxious and tell new students to immediately doDafa disciples' things, since many of the new students belong to the nextgroup. But at this time there are some who've gradually entered and belongto this group. Owing to the effect of your clarifying the truth, that lock hasalready been opened, and the future cultivators have begun to emerge. Bothsituations exist.Question: In our media work we have published many reports that exposethe XX Party's attempts to fake domestic peace and prosperity and that ex-pose its evil nature. But revered Master, please let us know the relationshipbetween these reports and directly saving all beings and validating Dafa.Teacher: The truth is, its goal in faking peace and prosperity nowadays isto cover up the substance of its persecution of Falun Gong, giving peoplethe false impression that there's no persecution going on. Behind the scenesthey are carrying out the largest, worst, filthiest, and most evil persecutionin history. You can directly expose this. As for other facets of it, you needto see if they're related to validating the Fa. If they are, go ahead and do it.When Dafa disciples outside Mainland China use the media to expose theevil's nature, they're doing that to help the world's people see more clearlyits evil nature throughout history. Some practitioners have been continuallyexposing the tricks the evil uses to fake peace and prosperity in order to co-ver up its crimes, exposing the evil and dirty things it's done behind the sce-nes.Question: When clarifying the truth to the Chinese people on a large scale,in order to communicate more easily with ordinary people, we make use ofthings that align with their interests that inevitably have deviated factors,since everything of humankind has deviated. But, everything that Dafa dis-ciples do will be left for the future. How do we reconcile these two things?Teacher: When you are wisely clarifying the truth to save all beings, the-re's no such problem--what's left for the future people is the spirit of Dafadisciples rectifying the Fa and their path of returning to what is right. Nomatter what approach you take to clarify the truth, the goal is to have theworld's people truly understand this persecution. Freedom of belief and hu-man rights being trampled on are things people can understand. As for refe-rencing some examples, that too is done to save people. When you makeuse of the different aspects of humankind's deviated culture today to clarifythe truth, you have to be careful, because you don't know what this personis attached to. Perhaps what you use is exactly what he's attached to, andyet you can't spend a lot of effort thoroughly explaining what he's attachedto, so it may have a bad effect. Try your best not to get involved with ordi-nary people's other issues.Speaking from another angle, this is how everything of human beings isnow--everything has deviated. And not only have things deviated, there'salso a great deal of demon nature. Everything of human society has degene-rated. If it weren't for Fa-rectification human history wouldn't have made itthis far. So many catastrophes in the cosmos have been avoided because of

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it. What did people invent the atomic bomb for? Everything on Earth is theresult of gods' making human beings do things, and everything has a purpo-se. Even though those things have passed, nothing of humankind exists bychance. When it comes to those things that aren't related to Fa-rectification,try not to discuss them when you clarify the truth. Also, don't talk about thetruth at too high a level--the effect isn't good. Nothing of humankind isgood anymore, that's the reality.Question: Do new disciples who have just begun cultivation have the po-wer to intimidate the evil when they clarify the truth?Teacher: Yes. That's because while I clean out the evil factors as a whole,all dimensions of humankind and of the colossal firmament, and all dimen-sions in the Three Realms, are saturated with Dafa's factors. And I'm notjust talking about the new cosmos. When a being plays a positive role, Da-fa's factors will empower him, and that being will have good fortune in re-turn from then on. Don't we already know of many cases of this? In otherwords, when a new student clarifies the truth, the factors of Dafa, Master'sLaw-bodies, and those righteous gods who fully cooperate will all help himand play positive roles. That's for sure. But the pre-requisite is that the newstudent has to do it himself first.Question: During this urgent time in Fa-rectification, how do I balance Fa-rectification things and guiding children to cultivate?Teacher: It's up to you to handle these specific things well.Question: How should we understand conforming to the way of ordinarypeople?Teacher: In your daily life, just try your best to conform to the way of or-dinary people while cultivating. Dafa cultivation has no precepts, so inyour daily life you basically keep the same ways as ordinary people asmuch as possible. On the surface, you basically conform to the way of ordi-nary human society. That's how it is, and at the same time you're a cultiva-tor. I've already talked about this many, many times; in a lot of lectures I'vetalked about how to do things.Question: Many people haven't heard about Dafa or the facts about thepersecution, nor have they participated in the persecution. Master, pleaseenlighten us on the need for clarifying the truth to them.Teacher: Some people haven't heard about Dafa, nor have they heardabout the persecution, but clarifying the truth to them is still very impor-tant. People in this world have been sealed off for an extended period of ti-me, and it has caused these beings to not understand for the time being thisevent which they've been waiting for over ages of reincarnations. Whenyou clarify the truth to them you're not just telling them about this eventthat's been unfolding in this world, you are also telling them about Dafaand what Dafa is, and doing so will unlock the predestined opportunitythey were sealed off from but had been waiting for, and it will help them re-alize that what they've been waiting for has arrived.Question: I haven't done well for a while. If I start doing well now, will the-

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re still be enough time?Teacher: As long as the Fa-rectification hasn't entered the human worldyou still have a chance. Whether you'll have enough time is up to you your-selves. Some people seize the time well, some don't. Some people have ma-de huge mistakes and yet they don't want to pay for them, and they're stilllike they were before, leisurely spending their time. In that case, then it'shard to say. So, as long as this thing hasn't ended there is still a chance.Question: Recently, many students who have shouldered a lot of work havefelt very tired. Their energy level and state aren't as good as before. Howdo they break through it?Teacher: This has to be addressed from two angles. First, the students havebeen working hard, truly hard, and they've volunteered to shoulder a lot. Soperhaps we could find more people to help out, or think of a way to solvethe problem. That's one point. Another is, a lot of our Dafa disciples are in-deed quite tired, but on the other hand, they haven't taken Fa study and cul-tivation seriously. They've done lots and lots of things, but they haven't cul-tivated themselves, and so they'll feel fatigue, feel tired, and feel that it'shard. Actually, I've always told you that doing cultivation doesn't compro-mise your Dafa work, for sure. That's because doing the exercises is themost effective way to get rid of fatigue, it's the best way to quickly makeyour body recover.Question: Does Dafa have ways to resurrect all the beings that were wee-ded out by the old forces and have them return alive to the new cosmos?Teacher: Beings that have been weeded out by the old forces...This ques-tion gets big if I talk about it. If the old forces hadn't interfered I could haveeliminated the sins and karma of all beings, no matter how much they sin-ned throughout history. Among the vast beings, the complicated gratitudeand resentment harbored toward one another throughout history, no matterwhich level they are at, even the jumbled, deep resentment and intricate re-lationships that are interwoven and crisscrossing from top to bottom--Icould balance all of them. I can do everything and anything. In otherwords, I could save all the beings in the cosmos. But the old forces insistedon weeding out a bunch.Of course, I still have ways that the old forces cannot imagine. Whenbeings have been totally destroyed and have disappeared without a trace,and even when they've been turned into other creatures or plants and latergone through various changes over the long course of time, I can still locatethem and bring them back. Since I can transcend the utmost microcosm ofall beings, I can find them. (Applause) I can even bring back beings' origi-nal matter and factors that would never exist again, bring back the factorsthat originally made up their beings, and bring back all the factors that ma-de them up, in the way they were, and I can eliminate the part, the process,and the history in which a being sinned against Dafa--I can have a being re-born as if he'd never gone through that part of history. I can do anything,but I don't do things casually. I need to look at the cause. Master has to con-

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sider things for the sake of the future cosmos, the wonderfulness of the fu-ture, and the beings of the future. (Applause)Question: Did the old forces have a contract with Master that specificallyrestricts Master's Fa-rectification? If they did, all contracts should be abo-lished, and everything should follow the arrangement of the Lord Buddha.Teacher: I can tell you, the fact is that the old forces managed to do manythings in history by taking advantage of my split bodies reincarnatingamong ordinary people. When I was reincarnating lifetime after lifetime inthis world, they took advantage of the opportunities and manipulatedthings. Since during those times [I] wasn't spreading the Fa, and was entire-ly in the state of a human being perfecting humans, they forcefully addedsome of the things they wanted. Those things weren't at all what I wantedto do, yet they happened in this world. There were a lot of such things ineach period. As my split bodies reincarnated in the world, they would comeand influence things. That's why they shift the blame to me for a lot ofthings that happened in history. They would say, "You did all that." Ofcourse I can't accept that. History has been so long, and over this long pas-sage of time they constantly did those things. Those things got too compli-cated and could no longer be resolved, so they would have to wait to be re-solved in Fa-rectification. That's why once I started Fa-rectification, theyrealized that it wasn't at all what they wanted, so the old forces started to re-sist, and its manifestation became more and more pronounced.During the ten-plus years of spreading the Fa, what you've seen is just theinterference at the surface, while in fact, in other dimensions it's incrediblyshocking and evil to the extreme. Of course, for you, Dafa disciples, thesethings have nothing to do with your personal cultivation. Cultivating, im-proving, and getting rid of your attachments are what you need to attend to.Their interfering with me is geared towards the process and the future ofhistory. With the old-force beings, in order to save them I constantly ex-plained the Fa's truths to them. Some listened, and some knew those thingswere wrong but were unable to resolve them because those things had al-ready taken place in history; the specific things they planned had deviated,which made it even less possible for them to resolve things.Many people are reflecting on the issue I just discussed (Master smiles).What I said was just about some major events in history itself, and itdoesn't involve Dafa disciples.Question: When we do Dafa work we need to study the Fa, but there iswork that just needs to be done, too. During Fa-study there are often phonecalls coming in, and I feel torn. If I only take care of myself and study theFa, is that being selfish?Teacher: I think when you study the Fa you should just study the Fa, andno one should interfere. That's because if you don't cultivate yourself well,you won't have mighty virtue in anything you do. If you called an ordinaryperson over and gave him something or gave him some money and askedhim to do Dafa work, would he do it? He would, but then that would be an

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ordinary person doing Dafa work, wouldn't it? But what would be the pointof that? What would be the ultimate goal of that? So Dafa disciples need tocultivate themselves well, and validate Dafa while establishing their mightyvirtue. That is what Dafa disciples do, and you know how to do it and howyou can do it well.But the condition is, it has to be when there aren't major things at hand andit won't cause major problems for others--then it's right to set everything el-se aside and study the Fa. For example, to avoid interference while you stu-dy the Fa, you can switch your phone to "voice mail" mode. (People laugh)Question: With truth-clarification there's a lot we should do, and no matterwhat we do we can never cover everything. I can't finish the things I'm sup-posed to do. What should I do about this?Teacher: I think you all realize now that time is pressing. There are a lot ofthings that need to be done. Just do your best to arrange your time well.Everyone is doing these things. Work together with each other and coordi-nate your efforts, and maybe you can get things done faster.Question: All disciples from World Falun Dafa Radio send greetings toMaster.Teacher: Thank you. (Applause)Question: Often we get requests from disciples to record Master's new arti-cles so they can use them for Fa study. Since it doesn't contain Master'svoice, would you please tell us if it could still achieve the effect of listeningto the Fa?Teacher: In the past, when my taped lectures on the Fa were being transla-ted, I talked about this issue, and that it's okay if Master's voice is there.Yet my writings don't have my voice to go with them. I think that duringthis special period of Dafa disciples validating the Fa it's fine to do it thisway, but the humans of the future can't do so.I've made many things easy for Dafa disciples as they validate the Fa. The-re are a lot of things that actually can't be done in cultivation but I have al-lowed you to do them under special circumstances. And that includes someof the approaches you use to clarify the truth. Since they are done to saveall beings, you're doing it like that, and it's not wrong. If they were associa-ted with personal cultivation, though, many of them wouldn't be allowedand couldn't be done.Question: I obtained the Fa after July 20th. Recently I met with a big ordeal.I can't tell whether it's a test given by Esteemed Master, or caused by myown attachments. I feel unworthy of Esteemed Master's merciful and ar-duous salvation.Teacher: For sure some things in cultivation can't be figured out veryquickly. Many attachments or causes can't be detected so quickly, and that'swhy you might feel it's hard sometimes. But from a different angle, if a cul-tivator could figure everything out right away and pass whatever tests ins-tantly, wouldn't that be too easy? (Laughing) It would be a little too easy.I'm referring to personal cultivation.

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Of course, in some cases what's at work is the old forces interfering. Theyimposed certain things that the disciples should not have to overcome at all,and even problems that are very hard to resolve, and what's more, thosethings and problems have the effect of interfering with this historic processof validating the Fa and saving all beings--there have indeed been things li-ke that. So what should Dafa disciples do then? I think you should try yourbest to do well, study the Fa a lot, and do more of what a Dafa discipleshould do. A lot of things will be settled effortlessly if you walk an uprightpath and do things well. You can't solve a problem for the sake of solvingthat problem, as that might easily generate new attachments.Question: How do we handle things well when clarifying the truth from theangles of ancient Chinese science, culture, and history?Teacher: There are a lot of things from history that you can draw upon,and you can cite facts from various fields of study. That should be fine, butit has to be done in an appropriate way. If the examples you use aren't ap-propriate then they won't be convincing. [It should be done] just right.Question: My brother and I are English writers. We'd like to know whetherwe could select certain people from history as examples of traditionalwork. Shakespeare had quite an influence, as did the ancient Greek writers.Can we write in styles similar to theirs? Are we setting our standards toohigh by doing so?Teacher: You're setting it too low. (People laugh) You are Dafa disciples,and there's never been anyone like you. You are what all other beings wantto be but can't. You are creating new styles for the beings of the future--isn't that something "high"? You may draw on the positive aspects of somehistorical figures, but I think Dafa disciples still need to walk their ownpath, right? Only then is it pioneering something. (Applause)Question: May I ask that Master talk again about the stance of non-involve-ment Dafa disciples assume with politics, for example, putting that chiefwretch on trial?Teacher: That evil being is the primary culprit in the persecution of Dafadisciples. Our suing it isn't getting involved in politics. It has persecuted somany Dafa disciples to death, shouldn't it pay for it? Shouldn't we exposeit? Shouldn't this evil persecution be stopped?All beings in the Three Realms came for the Fa and were created for theFa. In other words, this includes all forms in the Three Realms, includingall the various forms that exist in human society, among which, of course,are today's laws, as well as the other forms belonging to mankind. Since allthese were created by the Fa, why can't they be used by Dafa in validatingthe Fa? They can. But we choose those that are upright and good, and servea positive role. We're using them selectively. That's looking at it from abroader perspective.Looking at it more narrowly, we haven't gotten involved in politics. Whet-her mankind is good or bad, and what kind of social system the Chinesepeople choose, those are all human affairs. My Dafa disciples and I have

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never said what kind of system or way of life should be adopted. For ins-tance, many democracy activists advocate for a democratic society, and I'venever let Dafa disciples get involved in that. Dafa disciples only aim at ex-posing the persecution. We're only trying to stop the persecution. Shouldn'tthat be done? When your family members have been killed by persecution,wouldn't you reason things out with [those perpetrators]? But when you re-ason with them they say you've involved yourself in politics--is that reaso-nable? No, it's not!Since the day I, Li Hongzhi, started teaching this Dafa, neither my studentsnor I have gotten involved in politics. We have no interest at all in it. Butour Dafa is beneficial to society. It's beneficial to all people and nationsthat are under different social systems--no matter what social system you'rein. Only that most irrational, most evil, most stupid thing in the wholeworld and of all time would do something this dumb, persecuting the kin-dest group of people who are the most beneficial to society. That's becausein their eyes there is nothing but power, and they couldn't care less aboutwhether something benefits the people. Whenever anything happens in so-ciety they immediately think about whether it threatens their power. What atiring way to live, and what a tiring way to sustain that power! They've do-ne evil for that reason. I'd say it's about time their power was over. (Applau-se)While you clarify the truth some people who've been deceived by the pro-paganda's lies say that you're involved in politics. They only say that becau-se they've been poisoned by the evil. We'll explain things to them, and helpthem see things clearly and become aware. Otherwise those people will se-ver their future. Of course, what a person chooses is his own business.Question: Recently there have been isolated cases in which the lives of Da-fa disciples were taken away by the old forces in the form of the sicknessdemon. Please tell us, could they achieve Consummation?Teacher: I've talked about this issue many times, and a number of our stu-dents have in fact come to understand what it's all about. From the perspec-tive of cultivation, for a person to rise above ordinary people, he has to getrid of all human attachments, and that's how the old forces took advantageof this and arranged all those things. For instance, they arranged for certainstudents to appear sick at certain times, and for certain students to departfirst at a certain time. The old forces arranged for some people they pickedto come in [to Dafa]. Those people seem to be cultivating Dafa, and someeven appear very diligent, but in fact they came in under the old forces' ar-rangements to enable those things to happen when the time came. It wasthe old forces' intention all along to weed out those beings. So, they madethem commit sins by doing things that would interfere with Dafa--that's therole they wanted them to play. Of course, they only did that with the beingsthey'd selected for elimination. Among my Dafa disciples there are somewho were used and deceived by them in the past, for example, [they mighthave said] "for you to reach Consummation you'll have to do such and such

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at such and such time." There are cases like that. That's why the true and fa-ke ones are mixed together, and it's difficult to tell right away which oneshave come to stir up trouble and which ones are Dafa disciples.But, I don't look at any of that. Whether you are arranged by the old forcesor a Dafa disciple who was deceived by the old forces, once you've read myFa and become my disciple, you are a Dafa disciple, and you don't acknow-ledge any of the arrangements the old forces made. Then I will be responsi-ble for you. However, the occurrence of those things has indeed interferedsome with Dafa disciples. Those students all knew not to acknowledge theold forces' arrangements, but they had no way of escaping them. I savesuch beings as well. (Applause) Of course, as for deceived Dafa disciples,there's no doubt about it, Consummation is for sure. But with those whotruly played a bad role and were irrational, it's a different story.Actually, during this time period the majority, including both people arran-ged by the old forces and deceived Dafa disciples, have done quite well,and they haven't caused additional losses for Dafa. And their family mem-bers have done pretty well in different respects.In fact, out of those killed by the persecution in Mainland China, many we-re Dafa disciples deceived by them, while some were arranged by them;they all agreed to it at some point in history, and that is why it's hard tohandle. Also, while being persecuted, they weren't clearheaded or rational,and didn't remember that they were Dafa disciples, nor could they remem-ber Master, as if it were all just human beings persecuting other humanbeings. Plus, they were arranged that way by the old forces back in history,so they couldn't reject it. You tell me, how do you handle that? So, a lot ofthings aren't as easy as you'd imagine. Cultivation is a serious thing, andthe Fa-rectification is by no means something trivial.Question: The Chinese consulates threaten and entice overseas Chinesegroups with the promises of profit and gains. They take advantage of over-seas Chinese people's patriotic sentiment to incite hatred against FalunGong. What should we do?Teacher: Clarifying the truth is the master key. They win people over withmoney and incentives, which are all ordinary people's things, and they onlylast temporarily. Yet what you give them are things that have to do withtheir eternal existence, and the beings on Earth all exist for this event. Don'tundervalue what you're doing. When you've really clarified the truth to theworld's people in-depth, it will be different. If that still doesn't work, thenit's a matter of people choosing their future.In the time between when I asked you to clarify the truth and today, alt-hough this passage of history hasn't been long, the changes are already tre-mendous. When I asked you to clarify the truth at the beginning, there werestill many factors obstructing things. Now there are still some, but they ha-ve become very few. So in other words, as you clarify the truth, there arefewer and fewer interfering factors, and there are more and more factorsthat allow the world's people to understand what is going on. Before, your

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truth-clarification didn't have good results sometimes. That was foreign,evil factors interfering. Now it's different. Since you're compassionate, let'sthink of ways to save the world's people, and have more people know thetruth.All the things Dafa disciples do are magnificent, and very important. Asyou clarify the truth, the words you speak and the energy you emit have theeffect of intimidating and eliminating the evil. You are crucial in determi-ning whether the beings in this world stay or get eliminated. If your wordsare pure and righteous they will really go right into the innermost part ofpeople's thoughts, and instantly make people understand.Question: When we were making cartoons for truth-clarification we foundthat there were bad factors behind some of the 3D cartoon software. Somestudents felt unwell after using them for a while. Should we stop using tho-se software?Teacher: It's true some things are bad. Actually, when you use somethingyou're selecting those beings and saving them. Some of what's contained inthere will be benevolently resolved, and some will be weeded out, or chan-ged and replaced. From a different perspective, your using it is being com-passionate toward it. Some deviated things need to be rectified or weededout, and that's the same as saving a life. But some things are extremely bad,so you need to use them selectively.Question: Only after having cultivated this long have I realized what myfundamental attachment is, which is the attachment to my self.Teacher: Yes. To put it plainly, that's the fundamental factor of beings ofthe past. In the past, when it came to this, you all had it, and many peoplereally couldn't realize it. With all of you improving as a whole, it isn't thatpronounced anymore.Question: When we were validating Dafa before, although things were do-ne to validate Dafa, looking at them today they were done on a selfish, self-validating basis. Our question is: why did we become aware of this so late?Teacher: Validating the Fa is also cultivation. The cultivation process isone of continually recognizing your own shortcomings and then disposingof them. It's only that the earlier a lot of fundamental attachments are re-cognized the better. Recognizing them is, in itself, improvement. Beingable to eliminate them, or overcome them, weaken them, and in the endcompletely eliminate them--that process is one of continually improvingyourself, and it's the fundamental transformation of a being.Question: I'm the Assistant in a region in Australia. I haven't been diligentenough in Fa-study, and have attachments to reputation and gain. I've beeninterfered with. I feel regretful, and fear that this may have a negative im-pact on Dafa. As a Fa-rectification disciple, I need to improve. EsteemedMaster, should our region select a disciple who studies the Fa better to bethe Assistant?Teacher: Being able to recognize it is itself a big improvement. That's howcultivation is--when you constantly recognize your shortcomings you are

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improving yourselves, but how to strengthen your resolve is the most cruci-al thing for you to walk well the path that's ahead of you.In passing I'll talk about something. In Mainland China, before the persecu-tion happened, there were indeed a lot of students who practiced FalunGong with different mentalities. They saw others doing it so they did it,too. "It can heal people, so I'll practice it too." Basically they didn't studythe Fa attentively, so even less did they have a solemn understanding ofcultivation, and you couldn't see their righteous thoughts. They were likethat for a long time and in some cases it even dragged on for years. Manystudents liked to look at others, "Oh, he got healed by practicing. So I'llpractice then." "He didn't get healed. So I won't do it anymore." What'seven scarier is that a lot of people would look at the Assistant, and do what-ever the Assistant did. When the Assistant did well, they would too. Whenthe Assistant did poorly, they would follow suit. I ask every Dafa discipleto do well in walking his own path independently in cultivation, to esta-blish his own mighty virtue, and to have himself truly reach Consummationand become a King who presides over his own domain. How could you notwalk your own path, not study the Fa well, and not establish your own righ-teous thoughts?Actually, when I select people to be Assistants I don't go by whose level ishighest. In my eyes the beings are the same. I don't see beings as you beingbetter than him or him being better than her. I only look at whether the per-son has the experience and enthusiasm of working for a group. That's theonly thought I have. I don't have thoughts like, "This person is able to culti-vate himself well and is better than others, so I'll make him the Assistant."From the start of an ordinary person's cultivation until he reaches Consum-mation, how he cultivates himself in the process and whether he can achie-ve Consummation, everything depends on whether this cultivator himselfcan do it.In fact, many regular Dafa disciples who are quiet and you don't hear muchfrom have cultivated very well. Some have built an excellent foundation,some have excellent bases, and some are great in every regard. But if youask them to do administrative work they might not be able to do it. So, I se-lect those students who are able to pull things together, do things, and whoare willing to put in for others, and have them be Assistants. I've talkedabout these things a number of times. But, some Dafa disciples' Assistantshave performed truly well while some have performed a bit poorly. At theoutset of the persecution there were Assistants who compromised with theevil since they hadn't studied the Fa for a long time, and that had an awfuleffect. So when some of those students who had all along been watchingand following how others did things saw the Assistant do that, they wouldthink, "Oh no, how come he can't handle it anymore? Since he stoppedpracticing, I will too." It's precisely those attachments that I want to elimi-nate from our students. I want students to cultivate themselves and bringout their own righteous thoughts. I don't want the goal of your cultivation

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to be helping the head of the practice site, an Assistant, or the head of anAssociation to cultivate. What everybody has to cultivate is himself.During the persecution many of these students have matured, become clear-headed, and grown rational. They finally understand, after such painful les-sons! In fact, I talked about it many times in the past, but they just wouldn'ttake seriously cultivating themselves. There are no role models in cultiva-tion. You can't watch how others cultivate, and you can't just fix your eyeson others--"If you do well, I'll do well. If you don't do well, then I'll forgetabout it, too"--having no independent thoughts of your own at all. Tell me,when it comes to those students, how am I supposed to guide your cultiva-tion? Are you the one cultivating? You're always foggy headed, and yourwords aren't genuine. In cultivation you can't watch others, you can onlycultivate solidly on your own. How do you cultivate? Just study the Fa alot, and don't watch others. If you want to watch gods, that's okay of cour-se, but gods don't cultivate here. So, those who are cultivating here are allhuman beings. Only with this human body can you cultivate yourself out ofhere. As long as you haven't gotten rid of all human things you're still a cul-tivator. Only when everything on the surface has finally transformed willyou be completely separated from human beings. But while cultivating youshould have clear awareness, cultivate away your deficiencies, restrain yourshortcomings, and eliminate your shortcomings. You must have a sense ofconstantly climbing up. That's cultivating.Question: After Master taught the Fa on creating fine art, some discipleswent to learn the basic skills of drawing and painting. Does this affect theirtruth-clarification work?Teacher: It does. I'll tell you, the basic skills of painting and drawing arenot something that can be trained and learned in one or two years. Manypeople began their training at a young age, and it takes a long time. All tho-se highly accomplished painters have honed their skill for over ten years oreven decades. You might say, "I want to paint a painting now, I want topaint a work of art," but we can't exhibit yours! (People laugh) What I tal-ked about was mainly for those Dafa disciples who'd acquired the basicskills of painting or drawing or who specialized in that, or in other words,those who are specialized and accomplished in that area. My words weredirected at them, telling them to change those notions of theirs that havebeen influenced by modern ideas, and to have them present upright thingsto humankind. If you try to learn [those skills] now it won't work, becausethat's not something that can be accomplished in a short time. And besides,I want them to present a high level of artistry. Be it sculptures or paintings,mastering the basic skills is one of the most basic issues. Creating a workof art is a painter's biggest challenge, it's really hard. Depicting what's ta-king place in the subjects' minds and their expressions through painting orsculpture, really bringing them to life, is not something that's achieved justby mastering the basic skills. Upright, true art is a major skill passed downto human beings by gods!

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Question: How can we help more students step forward and do the Fa-recti-fication work well together?Teacher: Just do it with a lot of care and thought, like when you clarify thetruth.Question: What are the three souls and seven spirits, and how are they rela-ted to cultivation?Teacher: Those are human things, and it's better that I don't talk aboutthem right now. Of course, I've talked about some things regarding man-kind to small groups in isolated situations, and that didn't impact mankind.In the next phase, when human affairs are involved, I'll talk about thingswithin the Three Realms, including mankind's true history, the purpose ofthe Three Realms' existence, the roots of the ethnic groups and the origin ofthe human race and life, the true factors that compose the human body, andwhy everything in the world exists.The master soul (zhu yuanshen) and subordinate soul (fu yuanshen) thatI've told you about before were discussed while I was imparting the GreatLaw. As for truly discussing the Fa of mankind within the Three Realms, Ihaven't done that yet. So, all those things are to be discussed in the future.Since it's divided into two stages--Fa-rectification and the Fa's rectificationof the human world--the future stage is to handle the human place here, and[I will] comprehensively explain the Three Realms, mankind, the relations-hip between the planets and earth and between life and the human body, thereason for each stage of development in human society--which is mankind'strue history--gods creating human beings, and so on. All human affairs willbe discussed, and everything that human beings don't believe in will mani-fest.Question: Is there any overlap between the old Fa-principles and the newFa-principles?Teacher: They're very different, and there is no overlap on fundamental is-sues. The basis before was self-serving, whereas everything forged by Dafais not attached to self. When it comes to some specific issues the understan-ding is the same. The concrete manifestations of good and evil are basicallythe same. But many things have undergone some changes, and life will bemore wonderful in the future.Question: Can we charge for the newspaper run by our students?Teacher: Of course you can. If a lot of people read the newspapers yourun, you can try it out by charging for a portion of them first. Actually, thenewspaper you've created has already truly become the groundwork for thelargest Chinese newspaper in the world. (Applause) It's available even insmall towns in the U.S.--I've seen it even in tiny towns. That's somethingthat other Chinese newspapers cannot cover or reach. You're sure to keepimproving it, and when the conditions are ripe it can gradually enter a posi-tive cycle.Question: As a media form for clarifying the truth, how can a radio stationdo better in assisting and coordinating with the overall Fa-rectification si-

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tuation and play a better role informing people of the facts?Teacher: It's the same as the other media forms created by Dafa disciples.Learn from each other, draw from each other's strengths and supplementthe weaknesses, and you can all do well. At the very least you can sharenews information and a lot of other resources, and that is something othermedia don't have. You can give it a try. So to have people know the truth,expose the evil's persecution, and save more beings, try to make the radiostation known to more people--even the Chinese people in Mainland China.That would be great.Question: My husband doesn't cultivate. He has attended many Fa confe-rences and has done some things for Dafa, but he did bad things. He wan-ted to correct himself, but there was a force that tormented him mentallyand he could no longer stay at home. We divorced. Does someone like thisstill have hope of being saved?Teacher: During this persecution, I can tell you that strictly speaking, a lotof Chinese people have sinned against Dafa. So if you don't save them asyou clarify the truth, they really have no hope of salvation. When you clari-fy the truth, aren't you giving them a chance? Aren't you saving them? Ofcourse, many of those people were your family before. Give it a try. If theyreally prove to be hopeless, then it's different, and in that case you won'tneed to ask me--you'll know whether he is savable.Question: When we write scripts for a film, should we directly write ascript about the true situation, or use an everyday person's approach thoughmixing in some content that clarifies the truth? Which is better?Teacher: You're just talking about different angles. Both ways are fine.But no matter which form you use to write it, you are a Dafa disciple, soyou know how to validate Dafa and you are able to handle it well. So I'dsay however you write it is fine.Question: Is it appropriate to teach modern science on our TV station?Teacher: I'll tell you that when Master discusses science, actually I'm notnegating it. It is a product of the cosmos. Actually, I treasure everythingthat is forged by beings over a drawn-out period of time, so long as it's notby nature damaging to the cosmos and it helps the cosmos flourish. Thecourse of life is not simple. I was only saying that science is unsuitable formankind. Haven't its deficiencies now been exposed?You've seen how under the influence of science human beings believe ingods less and less. And yet human beings were created by gods. Not onlywere they created by gods, the purpose of creating human beings was to al-low lives that come from high levels to be saved when Fa-rectification ta-kes place. What's more, mankind will become a level that is truly indispen-sable to the future cosmos, and will thus be connected to the overall cos-mos. It has such a huge purpose, and there's such a grand background, andyet this science thing is damaging human beings' basic proper thoughts.When beings use science on a large scale, it indeed has a very bad effect inthe cosmos. The cosmos is a cycling entity, and all factors of matter are cy-

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cling. In the process of being eliminated, the beings that have sinned ridthemselves of those sins. They are eliminated, eliminated, and eliminated,until in that elimination process they are reduced to only death matter withno life whatsoever, and then they will gradually rise one level after anotherand be utilized. The cosmos is a cycling entity, and if a substance is warpedthat will be a bad situation. The warped substance will be absorbed by lo-wer-level beings, the high-level beings can't go to the low levels to resolveit, and when the substance that can't be resolved by lower-level beings isused again, it sublimates during the cycling, and after the initial warped-ness sublimates, higher-level beings can't completely resolve it, either. Asit sublimates it can't be completely resolved at any of the levels, and whenthis happens to numerous substances it causes a large part of the cosmos tobecome warped.You know, the steel and iron we have today, most are composites of manydifferent metals. When they are re-smelted you cannot again make the me-tal pure, and no technology can completely separate them anymore. Youknow, once chemical fertilizers are applied to soil, you can't grow anythingout of that soil if you stop chemically fertilizing it; it won't grow anythinganymore. The seeds that were chemically fertilized require the chemicalfertilization each time around. The warped seeds can't sustain themselveswithout chemical fertilization. The chemical fertilizers, you know, they'recomposites of chemical things.There are many ways in which substances cycle. I'll just talk about the sim-plest way in which substances cycle: the substances of plants, animals, andthe human body are all composed of particles, and there are gaps amongparticles. When you magnify and look at the gaps, you'll see that the gapsare huge. From those gaps smells are emitted, and those smells themselves,from the vantage point of a microcosmic level, are in fact fields that arecomposed of particles as well, so all animals and plants are emitting micro-cosmic substances. Those things are continually used by the level abovethem, and when all kinds of factors that compose water, air, and substan-ces--which are needed in composing human beings and other living orga-nisms--have warped due to the initial pollution, then what's used by the di-mension one level above is now fundamentally warped.I've told you before that because of alien science and technology, one layerof the human body, one of the human body's layers of particles, has beenplaced fully under the control of aliens. It consists entirely of alien planets'elements, including numbers, mechanical structures, electronic compo-nents, and so on. It consists of that stuff. And those things are continuallycreating a warped effect. The large-scale modern industries brought aboutby science have impacted many low-level dimensions in the cosmos. In myFa-rectification I've found that quite a large layer of the cosmos has beencontaminated by those things. And those warped things have had a conside-rably large resisting effect in the Fa-rectification.Think about it, those things are warped, and yet they've elevated to such

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microcosmic levels, so if gods then absorb them, wouldn't those gods beco-me warped too? And wouldn't the gods' worlds become warped? That'swhat has happened, in fact. Think about how horrifying that is! That's whyI said that those things aren't suitable for mankind and can only be used bybeings within appropriate, extremely small parameters and in an orderlyfashion.I'll tell you, the air has become so polluted that no one can restore it back tothe degree of purity it had before. We don't need to go too far back: it can'teven be compared to the air one thousand years ago. Human beings havewarped too, and they've gotten used to it. And water has been so contami-nated that there's no way to purify it to the purest degree, since water cy-cles, as well.I've told you before that water is water, and ocean water is a different sub-stance and not the same substance as freshwater. Freshwater can be extrac-ted from ocean water, and it's the same as how metal can be extracted fromrocks. It's extracted. Freshwater usually flows to a lower point, and when itgets even lower it's the ocean, as the ocean is certainly lower than land. Soit flows into the ocean. But after it flows into the ocean, the freshwaterdoesn't disperse. Particles of water are smaller than the particles of the sub-stances in ocean water, so the water flows through those particles and flowsaway, it works like the network of energy channels in the human body, andso the water then circulates back. That's why some rivers continually flowfor tens of thousands of years or hundreds of thousands of years. Some peo-ple say that rivers flow due to the flow of underground water and due to icemelting. But as you can see, how could those rivers be so huge? Andthey've been flowing robustly for tens of thousands of years. For instance,the Yangtze River and the major rivers in the U.S., those rivers are so large,how much water is needed to sustain them endlessly? Some say that watercomes from ice-capped mountains, but some rivers don't originate fromice-capped mountains whatsoever. The reality is, water cycles. After itflows away--its cyclical process is also its purification process--it is puri-fied and it returns. But the pollution of water has gotten way too severe,and what pollutes it are not normal factors of human substances, but rather,what pollutes it are modern science's industries which were brought overby aliens. So it can't be purified to that degree anymore, and that's why wesay that after it has warped nothing can purify it.Some people erect dams to block major rivers or minor ones in order to ge-nerate electricity and change and accommodate people's electricity usage,and resolve energy problems. Actually, it's as if they are cleaving the bodyof the river right in the middle, just as if it were done to a human being oranother life, because rivers are lives, too--isn't every object alive? If you sa-wed off a person at his waist, what would that do to him? Since a river is solarge and since its time is different from that of human beings, you can't seeits changes right away, but it is dying, dying slowly. Its dying process islonger than that of humans, taking decades or even more than a hundred

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years. Don't people push for changing and re-creating mountains and rivers,and changing and remaking nature? To change and remake nature is to da-mage nature, and to change and re-create mountains and rivers is to damagemountains and rivers. There's an underlying order to everything that godscreate. Gods view heaven and earth differently from how human beings do,and they've arranged the equilibrium of all things very well. Human beingsshould only utilize things in a friendly way and not damage them. Many ofmankind's natural disasters were caused by the fundamental damage scien-ce has done. In its effort to "develop" science mankind has excessively andwantonly harnessed energy and resources, and everything is being dama-ged.You know, during the last century industry was flourishing in Europe andthe U.S., especially the steel and chemical industries, and at that time theresultant pollution was quite severe. But the Europeans and Americans rea-lized this in time and improved their protection of nature and ecology, anda few decades later the environment there really did improve. That's whyyou can see that the water in U.S. rivers is so clear, and the lakes are nolonger polluted. Human beings' waking up can really have this effect, butstill it's very hard to achieve the previous degree of purity. Haven't today'sscientists also realized the harm science has done to mankind? But that'smerely what people can see and perceive with their eyes.Did you know this? Science's development in the microcosmic realm iseven more terrifying. In its study of the more microcosmic particles, it ma-kes the more microcosmic particles undergo fission, which causes the mi-crocosmic particles to have continuous, chain-reaction fissions, which ex-plode and split nonstop. The scientists have become aware of this and nowthey're afraid of it. If the explosions continue on like that, it won't take longbefore the entire earth disintegrates and is gone. At present none of the sci-entists who did those things are able to stop this type of explosion, and thefission and disintegration keeps on going. Those Chinese folks who knitsweaters know what this constant unraveling is like, with one link afteranother. And what science has brought upon mankind doesn't stop at that--isn't it terrifying?Mankind thinks computers are great--they make things so easy! I'm notagainst computers, and I'm not against science. What I'm saying is thatthey're not suitable for mankind. Other beings can use it within a certain li-mited scope, since it is a product of the cosmos. Nowadays some people areso dim-witted that without computers they don't know how to do simplearithmetic, and without computers they don't know how to think thingsover--they rely solely on what's stored in computers. And when you reasonwith them they won't listen--"Let me see what the computer says." Whenyou explain things to them they refuse to listen. Mankind is heavily depen-dent on computers now and can't do without them. What's more, the com-mands computers send out, whatever they say goes, and all the users haveto obey the computers. Some people follow what computers say so closely.

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Aren't computers controlling people? If computers are developed further,people's dependency will grow greater, and computers' commanding naturewill get stronger. That's when human beings will really be controlled bycomputers. If robots are made almost flawlessly and are just like the humanbody, and when robots are able to make robots, mankind will be destroyed,because they will continually make robots that will eliminate humanbeings. This sounds horrifying, and if it weren't for Fa-rectification, whichhas curbed the unbridled development of man's science, we would have al-ready reached that point today. You can see how nowadays when a lot ofgovernment staff handle a person's affairs, they don't listen to him and justgo by whatever the computer says. That's how bad it's gotten. Isn't that hor-rifying? They go by computers--human beings have to go by computersand the information stored in computers, since they're supposed to be accu-rate. But human beings are complex, dynamic, and ever-changing; theirthinking changes too. And human beings are unstable and changing bet-ween being kind and wicked, good and bad. Also, the things in the humanworld aren't stable, and human beings aren't some static substance that canbe summarized with a conclusion. These are the negative things science hasbrought upon mankind.Of course, nowadays that's what everybody is learning, so if you don't te-ach it what else are you going to teach? So there's nothing you can do aboutit. That's what you have to do during this period of history, and it's not con-sidered wrong, since the rectification of all things is what's to be done inthe future.Question: Some Filipinos would like to translate Zhuan Falun into Filipino.If someone is going through the book and reading it but hasn't become acultivator, can he help to translate it?Teacher: He can help to translate it, but Dafa disciples need to take the lea-ding role. That's because everyday people can't understand the Fa, that's forsure, so you really have to be careful about this.Question: We have been working hard on clarifying the truth to everydaypeople, and we have been clarifying to them why this persecution of Dafais the most evil in history. We tell them that this persecution is worldwideand is a persecution of humanity, kindness, and conscience, and that it's notlimited to killing people physically. Could Master please give us more gui-dance on this?Teacher: That's true. What they're damaging is the last bit of consciencethat's left after the degeneration of mankind's morality. And it's not limitedto just those things [you mentioned]. If this Fa couldn't save people, man-kind would have no hope.Question: Clarifying the truth is crucial for solving all problems, and weneed to do it comprehensively and in depth, so we plan to set up museum(s)that document the facts of the genocide that has befallen Falun Gong stu-dents, helping government officials, those who invest in China, students,and media to understand the truth in depth, thereby saving beings on a

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broad scale.Teacher: That's an excellent idea. Those places can display exhibits thatchronicle Dafa disciples being persecuted and their validating the Fa, andserve as a place to save beings and clarify the truth.Question: Compassion arises after emotion is removed. So how is mightyvirtue cultivated?Teacher: You walk this path of Fa-rectification well, you manage to over-come your limitations in cultivation, you let go of your attachments, yousave all beings with righteous thoughts in your mind, and you handle eve-rything you face with righteous thoughts--that is mighty virtue. (Applause)Question: In the Fa-rectification process I did pretty well at the beginning,but later on I didn't do well and my righteous thoughts faded.Teacher: Then do things well. You live in ordinary society, so all kinds ofpractical temptations in society appeal to the attachments you haven't elimi-nated in cultivation. When you can't handle them well problems will comeup. Now that you've recognized it, just do things well again.Question: During truth-clarification, some people ask, "Why would Dafadisciples bear so much torture and refuse to give in?" It's not easy to ans-wer this question at the level of everyday people. How can we answer thisquestion better?Teacher: You can ask him back, "Why didn't the Christians change theirfaith even though they were persecuted for over three hundred years?" Ac-tually, answering this question for everyday people isn't a big deal really.Haven't there been a lot of people in Chinese history who preferred deathover giving in? Actually [the question comes up] because the morality oftoday's people is no longer up to par, and they don't even understand the es-sence of being human. There were many people in ancient China whowould rather die than go back on one promise, so why is this matter so hardfor today's people to understand? It's because today's people have warped.You can give them some examples to explain it from different angles. It'sokay to talk about it.Question: There are some Chinese people overseas who basically unders-tand the truth about the persecution in China, and they've expressed theirsympathy and their condemnation of the evil, but they don't believe in Dafaor that Master can save people, and instead, they even say some things thatare disrespectful of Master.Teacher: Then don't talk to them about how Master saves people. You canjust stop at talking about the persecution. Don't talk about things at suchhigh levels. If people ask about it and they can understand, then you cantalk to them about it, but don't talk at a high level.People can't understand cultivators, and you can't explain things clearly in afew words, so the result will be the opposite of what was intended. Don'ttalk at a high level. If in one shot you want to tell him all the Fa-principlesyou've understood while cultivating you'll scare him. You've come to thisstage of understanding only after so many years of cultivation, and you

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want him to instantly reach a level as high as yours? How could that bepossible? Even for you, you cultivated up step by step, so you can imaginewhat it's like for him, an everyday person listening to the truth. And what'smore, he's somebody who was poisoned. So really make sure you don'trush things.Question: There is an adult class teaching the Chinese language to Wester-ners at our Minghui School. We want to use Zhuan Falun as our textbookfor teaching Chinese, and we're not sure if that's appropriate since we can'texplain [the Fa to them]. Thank you, revered Master.Teacher: You can teach them using Falun Gong. In the beginning you canuse Falun Gong. I've talked about how to discuss things. You can discussthem based on your understanding and say, "This is just my understan-ding." Or you can say, "This is how much I understand right now, but it hasmany more, higher inner meanings, and what I say isn't absolute." You cansay those things and talk with the students.Actually, a lot of people are studying the revised edition of Falun Gong,and you don't need to explain things. The person will understand if you willjust read it to him, because the Fa is at work. If there are isolated caseswhere they don't understand certain words per se, and you want to explainthose words, you need to add, "That's how it's understood based on the mo-dern language's grammar, but there are other meanings in Dafa." Therewon't be any problem if you explain it that way. As for learning the vocabu-lary, just explain the Chinese characters themselves [and it should workout].Question: How can we have kids participate better in clarifying the truth?Are the people who'll obtain the Fa in the next stage doing so during or af-ter the Fa-rectification of the human world?Teacher: The people who'll attain the Fa in the next stage are already be-ginning to come. That's actually something for the next step, when the Farectifies the human world. But now they're already coming, because it's soclose, and when Dafa disciples have a really good effect clarifying thetruth, the cultivators of the future will come. Kids can clarify the truth ba-sed on the circumstances. They shouldn't be held to the same standards asadults.Question: Some disciples have realized that it's also important to clarify thetruth in the economic sphere, because right now the evil...Teacher: Yes, I thought of this long ago. Of the people in the world, thereare a lot of heads of big corporations, and I can tell you, they had a wish intheir previous lives to make money to use for Dafa. They've now becomelost, and not only have they not used it for Dafa, they're using it for evil.This time the old forces won't let those people come and attain the Fa, andthat's because they think: if you had too much money the persecutionwouldn't exist; if you had a few extremely rich people supporting you be-hind the scenes, could that evil in China keep being so evil? It doesn't wantthe Chinese people to know the truth, and what if you made a few satellites

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and sent them up there, and broadcasted into China non-stop? The old for-ces' obstruction has indeed ruined some people, and some people havecommitted grave sins.You can do what you mentioned, just do the best you can. Sometimes it'snot that easy to get through to those people.Question: When there are disagreements over the coordination and harmo-nization of the whole body, should we always look for our own problemsfirst no matter what?Teacher: When there's a heated disagreement, think about whether or notyou have an attachment. If everyone kept righteous thoughts the coordina-tion would definitely be harmonious, and any problem would be resolvedquickly. When you're having a heated disagreement and nobody is willingto give ground, you need to remember to look at yourself. Some studentsbelieve that the argument is for Dafa's sake after all, and they use this to co-ver up their attachments. When doing things for Dafa, your competitive-ness, desire to show off, clinging to your own emotions, feeling like yourreputation is being challenged, and other attachments might be mixed in.Question: For those who have never heard of Falun Gong, is there a need tomention the persecution in China?Teacher: Of course you should, because sooner or later he will hear aboutit.Question: Master, you've said before that when we cooperate well and dothings together we're powerful. Is it correct to say that Dafa disciples as awhole haven't shown cohesiveness?Teacher: The whole body of Dafa isn't cohesive? That's not accurate, it'swrong to say that. The truth is, nobody can damage the Fa. Living beings,with the exception of myself, no life and no god knows my Fa. And withthe exception of a few gods at the beginning who saw the form of an extre-mely small part of this Fa, no other life in this entire cosmos really knowsDafa's true manifestation. The Falun that you can see is the manifestationon the gong-side, but as for the Falun that truly stabilizes the Fa, other thanmyself no being can see it--and it's boundlessly powerful. (Applause)This Fa is found in everything in the new cosmos, and everything is per-meated with Zhen-Shan-Ren. As for how well Dafa disciples cooperatewith each other, that's a matter of understanding of Dafa and personal culti-vation. The Fa is complete, it's something that nobody can touch or see, andno life can budge it. While bringing with me Dafa and everything that wascreated by it, I am advancing quickly and forcefully, advancing towards theentire cosmos, towards the most microcosmic, towards the greatest gods,and towards everything there is, continually advancing towards the mostsurface, the lowest level and the world. Nobody can block it, it's an unstop-pable force. (Applause) I am working on everything in the cosmos with tre-mendous speed and force.Question: Your disciple has sinned, but I wish to atone for my fault bydoing good. May I?

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Teacher: Yes, you may.Question: Guangzhou Dafa disciples, Changchun, Beijing, Hubei, Tianjin,Australia, Jiangsu, Zhejiang, Hangzhou, Shandong, Yantai, Xingtai, Han-dan, Jilin City, Zhanjiang city of Guangdong, Lanzhou, students in En-gland, the whole body of Dafa disciples in Toronto, the whole body ofyoung Minghui School disciples, Kansas, Pingxiang City of Jiangxi,Shanghai, Kai'an, Dafa disciples in Japan, disciples in New Hampshire, Da-fa disciples in Fengcheng City of Liaoning, Guangxi, the whole body ofDafa disciples in Scotland, Shihezi in Xinjiang, North America's Dafa dis-ciples, Yichang Dafa disciples, Dafa disciples in Vancouver of Canada,Weifang, Mudanjiang, Dafa disciples of Mt. Emei, the whole body of Hen-gyang Dafa disciples, Shanxi, and Dafa disciples of Russia all send their re-gards to Master.Teacher: Thank you all. (Applause)Question: Recently in our activities, we often interview ordinary peopleand various political parties and groups. Since they show support for Dafa,this is going to lead a lot of people to think we have political inclinations.Teacher: What I think is, it's not a problem no matter what political partyit is that supports us, because they're people first of all, they're beings to besaved, and you don't need to worry about what people with bad motives aregoing to say. What Dafa aims at is people's hearts, we don't aim at organi-zations, and it's fine for anybody to support Dafa. Whoever plays a positiverole in regards to Dafa, that's good, that's them choosing their future. (Ap-plause) We don't have political goals, and we don't look at organizationsper se. We only look at people's hearts.Question: In the process of making phone calls, [we've found that] theMainland has a small number of veteran students who seem to harbor somefears of persecution, and they don't want to say anything or they change thetopic. And there's one veteran student that came to the U.S., who, owing tohis attachments to reputation and gain, of late appears to have quit cultiva-tion and often gets together with ordinary people of his own initiative, andvery seldom does he participate in Dafa activities. I'd like to ask Master,can these people still cultivate?Teacher: Whether to cultivate or not is up to the person himself, it's all upto the person to decide for himself. If a person wants to cultivate then hecan cultivate, and if he doesn't want to cultivate then he doesn't. You canonly offer him some good advice. I have taught this Fa to him, and I can sa-ve him when he cultivates, but whether or not he wants to be saved, that'ssomething a person decides for himself. I'd never force anybody, and Dafadisciples wouldn't force anybody either. What I'm doing stems completelyfrom compassion, and it's totally for the good of all beings.Originally I didn't want to speak for so long today, but all the same I'vespoken as long as I have. (Long applause) There's a lot, in fact, that I don'tneed to state in detail. Dafa disciples are all fairly mature now, and there's alot you understand. Sometimes when I see the articles you've written I'm re-

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ally in admiration, and I feel proud of you. I feel that the Dafa disciples tru-ly have matured, and you really are able to grasp the Fa I've taught, to real-ly grasp it at a deep level. This understanding is based on the Fa's truthsand it arises out of righteous thoughts. When clarifying the truth now a lotof Dafa disciples are doing a really great job and doing it solidly. They'redoing things quietly, with resolute righteous thoughts and rationality, andthey are not afraid of hardship. Everything of the Dafa disciples' futures isborn of your doing the three things, especially clarifying the truth. When Isee everything you're doing I am thinking: truly amazing, you've truly, tru-ly matured.At present I don't say anything or say very little for a reason. It's to let youtruly walk your own paths in validating the Fa, to let you correctly realizeeverything of your own and your mighty virtue. In fact the most importantthing I've talked about today is the matter of saving all beings. I've centeredon this topic, and I want you to become even clearer on it. There are a lot ofthings you know how to handle, and if I were to speak further in too muchdetail I'd be depriving you of your opportunities to create the future, ofyour opportunities to walk your own paths, so oftentimes I don't want totalk more and I'm just quietly watching you. I know that you've really beco-me more and more mature.And the same goes for the Dafa disciples in Mainland China. Amidst thepersecution they've become more and more strong, rational, and clearhea-ded--and this point is the most important one, clearheaded--they know howto handle things, and it's not just that they know how to handle things: witha lot of things they've done a great job. Disciples who do true cultivationmust validate the Fa, and a huge number of disciples have done a great joball along. The reports that come out [from China] are the rather dramaticinstances of persecution. The reality is that there are many who've done ex-tremely well, only they don't say anything themselves, and they're justquietly doing things. There are a lot of extraordinary things. A lot of Dafadisciples have done extraordinarily well. Later on everybody will realizethis.So, seeing these things I really feel gratified (applause), I feel that my Dafadisciples haven't let me down. Before when I used to speak, I'd say that Ididn't do things in vain. But now I can't put it that way, because now it's notjust a matter of not doing things in vain: I feel that the Dafa disciples havetruly matured amidst the tempering, that they are truly validating the Fa,and that they are truly walking the final leg of the path to godhood. (Roa-ring applause)

Editor's note: The translation is subject to further improvement so as to be closer to the original text.Last updated: March 19, 2004.

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Stop the Evil Acts with Righteous Thoughts

Compared to the past, right now the evil factors that persecute Dafa disci-ples have become minuscule, yet the bad people and wicked policemen arestill committing acts of evil against Dafa disciples. That is human beingscommitting sins directly against gods. Therefore, you may stop them by ta-king all kinds of approaches, such as exposing the evil acts, clarifying thetruth, and directly telephoning those people.Everything Dafa disciples are doing at present is to save the world's peopleand all beings, to expose the persecution, and to put an end to the persecu-tion. So you cannot accept any of the evil's persecutory acts, and even lessshould you allow the evil to do whatever it wants persecuting Dafa disci-ples. If the wicked policemen and the bad people can't be dissuaded andpersist in doing evil, you can stop them with righteous thoughts. When Da-fa disciples have strong righteous thoughts and no fear, they can use righ-teous thoughts to turn the tables on the evildoers. Whether it's when thewicked policemen are using electric batons or when bad people are injec-ting drugs to persecute you, you can use your righteous thoughts to redirectthe electric current or the drugs back to the person doing violence to you.You can do it with or without your palm erected--it works as soon as yourrighteous thoughts emerge.When you are persecuted in any way you can use righteous thoughts to turnthe tables on the bad people and stop the persecution. And this includesthose who assault the students with punches and kicks: strong righteousthoughts can make the person's punches and kicks land on himself, or makethe wicked policemen and the bad people lash out against each other, andthey can transfer all the pain and injuries over to the wicked person or poli-ceman who assaults you. But the premise is that you have strong righteousthoughts, no fear, and no human attachments, apprehension, or hatred; onlywhen you're in that state will it be effective, and it will take effect as soonas your thoughts emerge. While sending righteous thoughts, don't panic orbe afraid, and as long as that wicked person keeps being violent, keep sen-ding righteous thoughts. This is not to be done with anyone or anything el-se in the world outside of the persecution. The basis of what Dafa disciplesdo is saving people and doing good. These righteous thoughts are to stopwicked people from doing evil, to warn other bad people, and to preventthe world's people from committing sins, and their purpose is still to saveall beings.Li HongzhiFebruary 15, 2004Editor's note: The translation is subject to further improvement so as to be closer to the original text. Lastupdated: February 22, 2004.

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Eliminate the Dark Minions With RighteousThoughts

With regard to things at present, the rotten demons that have taken part inpersecuting Dafa disciples have been eliminated to the point that the remai-ning ones are extremely few and can't have much of an effect. In this cir-cumstance, all of the various types of gods that the old forces let in frombeyond the Three Realms before--those that they themselves want to weedout, that are at low levels, that have turned bad, and a portion of whom ha-ve the form of Buddhas, Daos, and other Gods--should have disintegratedand been weeded out long ago amidst the old Fa's law of formation-stasis-degeneration-destruction. The reason the old forces let them into the ThreeRealms at the start of the Fa-rectification was to have them interfere withthe Fa-rectification and take part in persecuting Dafa disciples.The old forces knew that doing those things was an enormous sin. Theywere afraid of being cast down to hell for directly sinning against the Fa-rectification, so they have controlled from beyond the Three Realms thosebad gods (the dark minions)[1] that are within the Three Realms, and thedark minions have in turn directed rotten demons to interfere with the Fa-rectification and to persecute Dafa disciples. All of the persecution againstDafa disciples in these years was done under their direct command. Theirsins are boundless now, and the weight of the evil and sins they have com-mitted is now beyond what they can pay for.The destruction of the old forces as a whole, and all of the last factors thatwill be eliminated, are related to the enormity of the dark minions' sins.The dark minions have been a part of all the disruptions to things big andsmall that have happened to all Dafa disciples since the start of their culti-vation and all the different situations [that have arisen] in Dafa disciples'personal cultivation; they have seized every opportunity. The number ofdark minions is large, while in this dimension their manifesting bodies arequite small. They range from being as big as a coin to as small as the tip ofa pen; most of them are the size of a pen's tip. They could hear all of the Fathat I have been teaching over these years, and I have given them chancesall along, yet they have kept on doing the evilest of things. As a result ofthe advance of the Fa-rectification and Dafa disciples' righteous-thought-guided actions, the rotten demons have been destroyed to the extent thattoo few remain to be of use to them, and so the dark minions are now them-selves taking part in the things that the rotten demons have been doing.They are directly persecuting Dafa disciples and interfering with the Fa-rec-tification.For this reason, all Dafa disciples, new and veteran students alike: whenyou send righteous thoughts, besides the targets that you specifically lockin to, aim directly at those dark minions and completely eliminate them.Along with this, when you send righteous thoughts you need to have your

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mind be more focused, purer, and steadier, so as to mobilize your greaterabilities, disintegrate all of the dark minions and rotten demons, and elimi-nate the final disruptions that are in other dimensions.Stop letting the evil exploit gaps, and stop being interfered with by humanattachments. Do well the things that Dafa disciples should do, and walk thelast leg of the journey well. Righteous thoughts, righteous actions.

Li HongzhiMarch 16, 2004[1] Translator's note: The term used here in the Chinese text, hei shou (lit. "black hand/s") has sometimesbeen translated as "behind-the-scenes helpers," and should not be mistaken for a different term.

Editor's note: The translation is subject to further improvement so as to be closer to the original text. Lastupdated: March 20, 2004.

Teaching the Fa at the 2004 Western U.S. FaTeaching the Fa at the 2004 Western U.S. FaTeaching the Fa at the 2004 Western U.S. FaConferenceConferenceConference  

Li HongzhiFebruary 28, 2004, in Los Angeles

Hello! ("Hello Master!" Applause) This persecution has gone on for years.But, when it comes to those evil beings, their habitat and chances of survi-val are getting smaller and smaller, and life is becoming more and more dif-ficult for those bad people who orchestrated the persecution in this world.In terms of the Fa-rectification's overall situation, right now when it comesto this persecution that the dregs of humanity and the scum orchestrated,the people of the world are becoming clearer and clearer on it, and the peo-ple in Mainland China, in particular, are waking up to it--people have seenthe evilness of the persecution and have come to know the reasons behindthe persecution. You could say that the current situation is becoming moreand more favorable for Dafa disciples to clarify the truth, save the world'speople, and expose the persecution. Right now, because the majority of theworld's people have been able to become clearheaded after the evil wascleared away and they're able to rationally reflect on the persecution of Fa-lun Gong on their own, it's getting harder for the bad people to keep up thewicked suppression. The fact that the world's people are waking up has ma-de the evil quite afraid. The people of the world no longer want to be bla-med for what the evil beings have done, and this is making the evil factorsand vile people truly unable to keep up the wicked persecution anymore,and yet it's hard for them to pull themselves out of it. When the evil beingsare in a frenzy and irrational, they keep escalating the persecution but to noavail, so they become even more frenzied. It looks to me like now theycan't escalate it any further, but they can't back down; they can't back downyet they've lost their footing. The world's people have seen right throughthe evil suppression now, but the harm that this most wicked persecutionhas done to Dafa disciples is huge, and in all of history there has never

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been a persecution this malicious. From a different perspective, whateverthey've done to Dafa and Dafa disciples is the same as doing that to them-selves, because in the future they will have to pay for it many times over.In the cosmos there is good and evil, negative and positive, and virtue andvice, and these bring about mutual-generation and mutual-inhibition in thecosmos. In reality people aren't able to see, and the vile people are evenless likely to think of, the fact that from the very beginning the persecutionwas doomed to fail, and that in the process of it, it has enabled Dafa disci-ples to succeed in their cultivation. In other words, the vile people's inten-tions were wicked, but they happened to provide conditions for Dafa disci-ples to establish themselves as Dafa disciples. Of course, I didn't want thissituation to come about, and while being persecuted, Dafa disciples and Ihave been working to stop the persecution and to not let beings sin againstDafa. Those beings that are beyond saving insist on doing evil, but theydon't know the principle of positive and negative emerging simultaneouslyout of every word and action. Because at this level of the old cosmos thereis the principle of mutual-generation and mutual-inhibition and the two dif-ferent factors of positive and negative, something positive and negativeemerges at the same time whenever a person does something. And that in-cludes everything that's done in human society, those two factors simulta-neously manifest in everything. It includes whenever someone says some-thing, does something, or even has a thought--positive and negative factorswill manifest in all of these. Likewise, with this persecution, you all knowwhat its goal is and that the intention behind it is really evil, but the outco-me is that when they've done evil things they have also enabled Dafa disci-ples to, while opposing the persecution, be tempered to the point of maturi-ty. And, the more severe the persecution is, the more it's able to establishDafa disciples. The vile people don't know about this principle at all. Frommy perspective, as your master, during the Fa-rectification I absolutelydon't accept the using of this evil persecution to test Dafa disciples, and Da-fa disciples shouldn't have the wrong idea that they can cultivate higher byenduring persecution. Dafa and its disciples oppose the persecution, that isDafa disciples' duty. If you don't cultivate yourself based on the Fa, youcan't cultivate higher by just enduring persecution, much less reach thestandards for a Dafa disciple. Don't acknowledge this so-called "environ-ment" that the old forces have provided, because during the Fa-rectificationI would have had all beings assimilate to Dafa, and it wasn't at all necessa-ry to temper Dafa disciples amidst this kind of evilness. The Fa-rectifica-tion will definitely succeed, and Dafa disciples will definitely succeed. Mydisciples will succeed with them doing these things, and my discipleswould have succeeded without them doing these things. It's only that theevil insisted on doing all this, which has interfered with the Fa-rectifica-tion, has led them to commit sins in the course of their doing evil, and hascaused many beings and people, themselves included, to be weeded out. Inthe cosmos this factor of a-positive-comes-with-a-negative and a-pro-co-

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mes-with-a-con truly manifests.Human beings can't see this principle clearly. When an ordinary personwants to do something in society, in reality as soon as his thought appears,or as soon as he does something, two effects are produced. In the past culti-vators had a saying, "good and bad outcomes come from a person's onethought." Another layer of meaning those words have is that in the processof doing something there can truly be two effects. With persecuting Dafadisciples, they didn't expect that it would end up tempering the Dafa disci-ples, that's something they couldn't expect. The past principle of the cos-mos was absolute in terms of having negative and positive manifest at thesame time, and it held for human society as well, with it manifesting in eve-rything. With whatever everyday people want to do, positive and negative,and good and bad, come with it. For example, when someone hits or insultssomeone he doesn't like, he gives the other person virtue while hitting or in-sulting him, and he will also have to pay the other person back in a concre-te way later on. This is how it is with regard to things people can't see. Thesame is true for what people can see. For example, when people teach theirchildren, they often want them to come out on top, but it doesn't occur tothem that their kids are straying further and further from being pure andkind, further and further from the cosmos's nature, and further and furtherfrom divine beings. People worry about their children getting harmed, sothey teach them to retaliate and attack others, but it doesn't occur to peoplethat when they tell their children to do that, they're harming human beings'moral values and kindness on a fundamental level. Whenever people dosomething, it produces the two effects.In the past few years, the persecution of Dafa disciples has fully demonstra-ted that as well. How can a political power deny people their beliefs? Howcan it deny people freedom of thought? What it's doing is unprecedented.How could it possibly succeed in doing that? In order to achieve that, it haseven sought to completely destroy thousands of years of ancient culture.They have tried to entirely overturn, completely topple, and even "stompon" so as to "never let rise again" the things that have sustained human mo-ral standards for thousands of years. Whether or not they were really ableto achieve that, what they've done will bring about retribution, and that'ssomething that doesn't occur to them. Ever since they did that, the Chinesepeople no longer believed in anything and lost the standard for their morali-ty and behavior--people like this dare to do anything, and are capable ofdoing any kind of bad thing. Every facet of society is corrupt, lies just rollright off the tongue of today's Chinese people, to them lying is as normal asmaking small talk, and there's nothing they're ashamed to do. Then is agroup of people like this good for the political power that brought it about?People didn't anticipate any of this.The pro and con exist simultaneously, and it's totally impossible for humanbeings to achieve something they want in ordinary society. Whenever hu-man society goes through any changes, or when something takes place in

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human society, it is in fact all controlled by divine beings. Only when divi-ne beings direct people to do something, and under the influence of divinebeings, can different circumstances come about in human society. Trying todo something out of sheer human wishes won't work, and the wretched de-mons and the divine beings in low-level dimensions can't just do what theywant, either. Only the most wicked, stupidest thing could do something soirrational as to persecute good people, cultivators. In the future people willhave a new understanding of history, especially the history of the past hun-dred years or so--it will be evaluated anew.In any case, in the course of opposing the persecution you've seen that Dafadisciples have been maturing and the world's people have been waking upmore and more. The evil and the vile people who've orchestrated the perse-cution in this world are becoming weaker and weaker. The authority thatthey've utilized and all of the methods they've used to rule will be elimina-ted by history along with the persecution of Falun Gong students. You'veall seen that it's inevitable. Then, for Dafa disciples, in this kind of situationit's no longer hard to save the world's people and clarify the truth. That's thesituation we see right now, and going forward it will become even easierfor you all to clarify the truth, because the people of the world are beco-ming more and more aware. People will come to you on their own to hearabout the true situation, and people will come to you on their own to learnour practice. That's about to happen, and in Mainland China the entire po-pulation is going to step forward to oppose the persecution. (Applause)Whatever human beings do, they're doing it to themselves. Persecuting Da-fa disciples is in fact the persecutors persecuting themselves. That is some-thing determined by the nature of the cosmos. Back when all this started,the persecution of Falun Gong was a campaign that mobilized the entire po-pulation. There is a pro and a con to it. Let's wait and see the final result.Human beings aren't able to just do whatever they want to do. Humanbeings think that they're powerful, but no matter how wild your propagandamachine gets it's no use. That bunch of villainous lies and deceit is uselessagainst cultivators. When you do something that is not allowed by divinebeings, after you're done making a ruckus, divine beings will settle the sco-re with you. That's how it works.As Dafa disciples you should be more clearheaded, and before the evil hasbeen completely destroyed you still need to work hard on clarifying thetruth and saving the people of this world, and do well the things Dafa disci-ples should do. All of the things that Dafa disciples do today is Dafa disci-ples' validating the Fa, and is your walking a divine path. You can't slackoff in the final stages; keep doing well with what you should do.Some students need to pay attention here: every time I mention that the evilis getting smaller and smaller, and becoming less and less able to carry on,a lot of students think, "Hmm, then I'm going to drop everything else andjust do Dafa work." You can't do that. You can't go to extremes with anyt-hing Dafa disciples do. Just live a normal life and cultivate normally, and at

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the same time do what Dafa disciples should do. That's how it should be atpresent. In ordinary society, other than doing what Dafa disciples shoulddo, there isn't any difference in form [from ordinary people], on the surfaceit looks the same as ordinary society, only you're a cultivator. That's how itshould be. What you're doing today is establishing things for the future, andthat's how this path should go. This is the most upright path and what culti-vators of the future will follow, so you can't behave in an extreme way atall or go to any extremes, as that would create unnecessary obstacles andtrouble for yourselves. Any and all extreme ways of thinking are not fromwhat I've told you, and they could be a form of attachment and will causetrouble; we've already experienced a lot of things like that. I think that asDafa disciples who have come this far today, you are supposed to be veryclear on a lot of things and be more and more rational now, and you shouldknow what's going on when you run into problems. So in these areas youshould be very clearheaded now, and you should no longer be interferedwith by certain things.Another point is that everything Dafa disciples are doing right now is vali-dating the Fa, because your understandings and improvement all comefrom the Fa. Then as Dafa disciples, of course you should validate the Fa,that goes without saying. But everything that's done in validating the Fa isdone for yourselves--not a single thing is done for me, and that includes thethings I've told you to do. Since every Dafa disciple has to establish hisown mighty virtue in the process of going towards Consummation--espe-cially since you are beings forged by Dafa--you have demonstrated [yourability to do that] in validating the Fa. So all of what Dafa disciples do ismagnificent. That includes what seem like the simplest things, such as han-ding out flyers, clarifying the truth to the world's people, sending righteousthoughts at the consulates and embassies, Dafa disciples validating the Fain various ways to government, to society and the community, and to themedia, etc.--all of it is establishing mighty virtue for yourselves, and all ofit is the path that leads to the final Consummation. In other words, all thethings you're doing, including the small and insignificant things, all of themare done for yourselves, and not a single thing is done for Dafa, nor is a sin-gle thing done for me, your master. (Applause)In the future you'll all see that other than saying what needs to be said at Faconferences, I usually say very little. That's because everyone needs towalk his own path, everyone must walk his own path. Only then can migh-ty virtue be established. So I can't push you along at every moment and inevery instance, as was done before. The time of just studying the Fa andcultivating oneself has passed, and the present time is for Dafa disciples toconsummate their final things, all the things that you need. It looks likeyou're doing things for Dafa, and some people may be thinking, "I'm doingthings for Master, because Master told me to do them." (Master smi-les/chuckles) In fact that's not the case. The things I tell you to do, those tooare done for yourselves.

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No being can damage the Fa. It existed before and was brought here; it'ssomething that pre-existed before. It's just that it is imparted to all beings tosave all beings, but how many beings can see the true, specific forms thatthe Fa manifests in? That's pretty difficult to do, they can't be seen, andthat's why the substance of the Fa can't be seen. The Falun that you see isjust a form of the gong; it's pretty hard for ordinary beings to see the wheelthat is truly stabilizing the Fa, and even those at high levels can't see it. Sowho can really damage the Fa? Nobody.I've told you that it's hard to save sentient beings, and that in order to allowthe beings as a whole and beings at different levels to obtain the Fa and besaved, the choice of teaching the Fa at this place of humans, who are the lo-west-level beings in the cosmos, had to be made so that beings at each levelcould hear it. Then with the Fa being taught here, who among the people inthis world would be here to listen to the Fa? There had to be such beings,and such beings are today's Dafa disciples. (Applause) The choice had to bethat Fa-rectification take place when the old cosmos reached the final stageof formation-stasis-degeneration-destruction--in other words, the most dif-ficult time--to save sentient beings and the entire firmament. The purposeof creating the Three Realms way back when was to have it be used by theFa-rectification at this stage. So who would be the sentient beings in theThree Realms, what kinds of beings would be here, and what kinds ofbeings and what ways of existence for beings would be needed later on--which includes the beings' ways of thinking, how they conduct themsel-ves, their cultures, and so on--all of these things would take shape over thecourse of history. But looking at them [now] during the Fa-rectification, [itseems] they were planned poorly, and that's because the old forces cameabout. What I'm saying is, many aspects of mankind aren't the way they areby accident, they're orderly. Exactly because they are quite orderly, theyseem natural. But when it comes to things like whether or not a Dafa disci-ple can enter Dafa's door when the Fa is being taught, whether or not he'llcontinue to cultivate when going through a test, whether or not he can even-tually progress towards Consummation, and whether or not a Dafa disciplecan do well in validating the Fa when persecution or other forms of distur-bance take place, these things depend on the individual himself. So in vali-dating the Fa, you've all seen that there's a problem, namely, the old forces'emergence seriously interfering with the Fa-rectification and Dafa disci-ples. But no matter how they've interfered or how evil the things they'vedone are, when you look back you'll see that in fact nothing has "escapedfrom the Tathagata's palm."[1] (Applause) And that's for sure. No matterwhat the old forces, the wretched demons, or the wicked human beingswant to do, in the end things will have to be completed according to my Fa-rectification's requirements. Whether it's the various forms of disruptionthat occur during the process or the different kinds of behavior and statesthat certain students have shown, these things are no more than states mani-fest by the old cosmos's beings during the last stage of formation-stasis-de-

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generation-destruction, and [are no more than] certain disruptions to the Fa-rectification. But when it comes to Dafa itself, no one can damage it. Andno matter how awful the pain is that Dafa disciples experience, in the endthey will reach divinity.From the Fa you've all realized this principle: in this cosmos, no being willsuffer in vain. This is especially true for someone who cultivates Dafa, andon top of that is a Dafa disciple in the Fa-rectification period--as long ashe's still in the Fa, no matter what ends up happening to him, what awaitshim is Consummation. In other words, no matter how the evil persecutes usit can't achieve its goal, and in the end everything has to be harmonized ac-cording to the Fa-rectification's inevitable outcome. That's how it is. Whenthere's disruption to the Fa-rectification, then during the Fa-rectification [I]make use of the situation of disruption, and in the end the goal that Fa-recti-fication needs will still be accomplished, and that's for sure.In the future, after Dafa disciples have made it through and you take a lookat everything, you will definitely see that that's true. When divine beings inthe cosmos saw that during the cosmos's process of rise and decline it wasprogressing toward the last stage of formation-stasis-degeneration-destruc-tion, they found it horrifying. No one wanted to be destroyed, and everyonewanted to save himself. In order to save themselves they would have had tosave the entire cosmos, and yet, after exhausting all their ideas, the beingsstill couldn't achieve their goal, particularly because the ideas that thebeings came up with and the things that they did at that time couldn't beconsidered good. No matter how high a being was, he couldn't be conside-red completely perfect or completely good. That's why they couldn't achie-ve their goal. Yet the beings in the cosmos saw the final, horrific end andwanted to do something about it. And that's why the cosmos's old forces ca-me about.As the whole Fa-rectification in the cosmos has come to this stage today, Ican't in fact describe it accurately with human language anymore, as humanlanguage can no longer express it. I can only describe things in general.The things that I planned way back when have all been completed. In fact,our own cosmos has been completed. (Applause) The only things left arethose final factors that make it possible for this gigantic cosmic body toexist, and all of those factors are things that are separating the human surfa-ce on a fundamental level.At present, the situation manifest in human society is very similar to the si-tuation of Fa-rectification in the cosmos. Things are becoming clearer andclearer [for people to see] now. And I think this situation might start chan-ging even more quickly. When the Fa-rectification of the human worldstarts, that's when it will really impact human beings. At the beginning ofthe Fa-rectification this Three Realms area had already been encircled. Sothe Three Realms was separated from the original cosmic body, the beingsup above could no longer have contact with the beings down below, and inthe future when human affairs are being worked on it will be unrelated to

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what's outside the Three Realms. In recent times, the beings in upper re-alms saw all of this, and before the Fa-rectification they descended and in-carnated in this world in large numbers. So to human beings those appearto be the same human skins, but in fact the persons inside the human skinsare different now. Many high-level beings came to obtain the Fa and incar-nated as human beings, and many are beings from different, faraway cos-mic bodies. And actually, while Dafa disciples validate the Fa at this time,a lot more people were supposed to obtain the Fa, but for various reasonsthey were separated back then by the old forces, who wouldn't allow themto obtain the Fa. And during this persecution some beings have even sinnedagainst Dafa--something they can never fully pay for--and now face elimi-nation. And there are also ones who haven't sinned against Dafa but aren'table to cultivate; they will be humans in the new epoch. These are all futurematters.Let me take this opportunity to mention something. Recently a lot of Dafadisciples have written books. I've looked at a few of them briefly. The in-tentions behind them are good, and many of the books are about cultiva-tion, being persecuted, and opposing the persecution. However, they cannotbe circulated among Dafa disciples. Their starting point is affirmed--they'revalidating the Fa using the form of books, they're saving the people in thisworld, and they're doing what Dafa disciples should do. But as you know,Dafa disciples need to reach Consummation, so nothing should interferewith the form in which today's Dafa disciples validate the Fa--this is extre-mely critical. Don't add anything in beyond Fa-study. So you absolutelycannot circulate among Dafa disciples anything that isn't a part of Dafa it-self, and you absolutely cannot disrupt Dafa disciples in any way.I've talked about these things before. In today's special situation and uniquecircumstances, and with the occurrence of the special situation of being per-secuted, I'm bringing it up again. Those books can be promoted in ordinarysociety, Dafa disciples can help advertise them using the media outlets esta-blished by Dafa disciples, and you can spread them in ordinary society. Allof you can help do it, and that's all good. It's just that you can't cause a stiramong Dafa disciples. From now on, besides Dafa books, don't sell at Faconferences any materials, or any audio or video materials, etc., that aren'tpart of the Fa itself. Even less should you make Fa conferences or our stu-dents your primary customers. You cannot make money off of Dafa disci-ples. Materials for spreading the Fa, clarifying the truth, and so on, shouldtarget society. That's how things should be done.Next, I'll take some time to answer some questions for you. (Applause) Youcan pass up question slips. Let's get right to it.Question: Can we use legal means to deal with the French policemen's be-havior?Teacher: While the Chinese leader was visiting France, you went there toappeal to and welcome him. It was originally a very good thing. But someof those gangsters from the group that persecutes Falun Gong had to stir up

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trouble, which led the French policemen who didn't know the truth to ha-rass our students. The incident was certainly the work of the evil, the workof that bunch of gangsters that persecutes Falun Gong. [The French police,]the law enforcement agency of a democratic country, completely followedthe orders of another country, a government controlled by evil, and violatedhuman rights. For a country that advocates democracy and human rights, Idon't think that's something to be proud of. It's completely appropriate touse legal means to resolve the problem.Question: Dafa disciples in Thailand send greetings to Master.Teacher: Thank you. (Applause)Question: While clarifying the truth, some students aren't coolheaded andthey speak in an extreme way.Teacher: Dafa disciples should do everything cool-headedly and with Shanthoughts. Whether you're clarifying the truth to people or participating inan activity, you should always have people see the goodness and kindnessof Dafa disciples. Absolutely don't do anything that's too extreme. Whenyou save beings and clarify the truth, if you speak in an extreme way itwon't have a positive effect. That's because when you lack Shan you won'tdisintegrate the evil elements that exist in the minds of those people whohave been poisoned, so you won't be able to achieve a positive effect.I've told you before that Shan isn't something pretended, nor is it a statethat's just maintained on the surface. Shan truly comes from within and canonly be attained and embodied through cultivation. When you're beforesentient beings, as soon as words come out of your mouth and as soon asyour thoughts emerge, they are able to disintegrate bad elements and thebad things that poison the world's people and that exist in people's minds.And then people will come to understand, and you'll be able to save them.Without the mighty power of true Shan at work, you won't be able to disin-tegrate those things, and you won't achieve anything in clarifying the truth.Those who do things in an extreme way, in particular, let me tell you that itabsolutely won't have a positive effect. That's because the abilities you'veacquired in cultivation won't manifest, and your Shan won't manifest. So,while doing anything, don't have any combative thoughts, that's wrong.Don't go to extremes, even when you go to the consulates and embassies.You should be compassionate to people. But it's different when it comes toevil beings. When we send forth righteous thoughts, we clear away the evilthat doesn't belong to mankind, and the demons, ghosts, and monsters thathave engaged in the persecution. However you handle those wretched de-mons and dark minions is fine. But you need to be Shan to people. Aren'twe saving people? Since we are saving the world's people, how could yousave people if you're not Shan to them?Question: As more beings are created, some beings grow selfish, and theydrop down. Is that one of the reasons why the cosmos has degenerated?Will there be as many beings in the future?Teacher: Selfishness is a fundamental attribute of the cosmos of the past.

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Because of that attribute, formation-stasis-degeneration-destruction andbirth-aging-sickness-death are inevitable. In the future the Fa will be all-harmonizing, perfect, and selfless. The change in that fundamental attributeof the cosmos leads to fundamental changes in the cosmos's progressionand beings' characteristics. The fundamental attribute of the cosmos has de-termined the fundamental state that the cosmos is in. The impurity ofbeings, and even the dropping down of beings that have gone bad, havebeen caused by formation-stasis-degeneration-destruction. And formation-stasis-degeneration-destruction, in turn, results from the fundamental attri-bute of the cosmos, but it doesn't seem to relate directly to the fundamentalattribute.You're now thinking about matters of divine beings with a human mind. It'snot like what you think. The number of beings in the cosmos is fixed, and ithas nothing to do with beings degenerating or not.Divine beings are present everywhere, and beings are present everywhere,and there are so many of them they're impossible to count. You know, withthe air, there are so many particles that make up air. Everything we seewhen we open our eyes is composed of microcosmic particles and even mo-re microcosmic particles that form particles of the next larger layer. Thereare beings in every layer of particles, and there are even gigantic groups ofbeings in every layer of particles. Some manifest in different dimensions.Presently they can't be seen using scientific methods, but they do exist.That's how numerous they are--if you pick up a speck of dust, there arecountless beings on it. And I'm not referring to bacteria here. If you magni-fy a particle so that it's as large as the Earth, take a look at it and you'll seehow many beings are on it. And that tiny speck of dust isn't the most micro-cosmic particle. There are more microcosmic particles, even more micro-cosmic particles, and ones that are almost infinitely microcosmic. This isabout the microcosmic things. Then what about larger particles? In the ma-crocosm, how many beings are there in gigantic cosmic bodies that are lar-ger than molecules, even larger, and larger still? How many beings mustthere be altogether?! The cosmos is a richly diverse and incredibly largecosmic body. Everything is alive and everything is a being. There are somany beings that they're everywhere. Whether beings are good or not hasnothing to do with their number. The lengths of all beings' lives were deter-mined by the nature of the past cosmos; in the past, the law of formation-stasis-degeneration-destruction caused that. In the future the Fa will be all-harmonizing and perfect.Question: Is our current appearance identical to our soul's (yuanshen's)appearance and our appearance after we've completed cultivation?Teacher: I've talked about this before. The higher up you go, the morewonderful and the younger [you look], and you'll still look like you. Whet-her you are old, middle-aged or young today, your soul may not be likethat. But the higher up you go, the more wonderful and more beautiful youlook, for sure. Well, since it's wonderful, being wonderful includes being

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beautiful. So when you reach a very high level, say you've cultivated to acertain point, you will find that you're so beautiful that you don't look likeyou do now, and that you don't look at all like people on earth. It's a mani-festation of the realm that comes from ascending there out of humanness.Question: Where in the body is the energy field particularly strong? (Peoplelaugh)Teacher: This is from a new student. It makes no difference where, thestrength is the same everywhere. It's just that different parts of your bodyare sensitive. You wonder where it's sensitive and where it's particularlystrong? Under the effect of gong, the changes are the same everywhere inyour body.Question: There are some students in Mainland China who haven't steppedforward because they're afraid. What will their future be?Teacher: At present I don't want to say anything conclusive on thesethings. You're actually all quite clear about this: when a person has benefi-ted from Dafa, yet in order to protect himself, when Dafa is faced with ad-versity, he doesn't say anything about the true situation, does that persondeserve salvation? Let me give a simple illustration. There was this personwho saw that another person was in danger and saved his life. Then the per-son whose life was saved sees that the person who saved him is in big trou-ble, but he ignores it. Is that a good person? You are a being that was crea-ted by Dafa and have had a new life given to you by Dafa, so when a situa-tion arises where Dafa disciples are all being persecuted and Dafa is beingharmed, yet you aren't able to safeguard Dafa, are you still a Dafa disciple?You can't even be called a good person in the most basic sense. Besides,you've truly benefited [from Dafa]. In the eyes of divine beings, you are theworst being, even worse than those who've directly persecuted the Fa.That's because the people who have persecuted Dafa disciples didn't benefitfrom the Fa. So, such a person is even worse than those vile people. What'smore, this is the Great Law that created all life in the cosmos. As for howthey'll be dealt with, the Fa has its standards.Question: Do the "excessive thoughts" in "All excessive thoughts extinguis-hed // Cultivating Buddhahood is not difficult" [2] refer to thought karma?Teacher: Yes, that's right. Thought karma mostly manifests as going off in-to flights of fancy or indulging in wild imagination, which is all human at-tachments. Most of the time, those are wild thoughts of wanting to getthings that one desires, things that one wants but can't get. That's whythey're called "excessive thoughts," thoughts that are useless, futile. (Mas-ter smiles/chuckles) That's the idea.Question: When reporting news from Taiwan, what angle should we use inorder to highlight the contrast between the two sides of the Strait?Teacher: "When reporting news from Taiwan, what angle should we use inorder to highlight the contrast between the two sides of the Strait?" Thequestion isn't written clearly. What you're actually trying to say is that theyhave different attitudes regarding Falun Gong. How to contrast the two?

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The attitudes that the two sides of the Strait hold in and of themselves forma contrast. They have the same ancestry and the same culture, yet the twoplaces have two different attitudes toward Dafa. Isn't that itself a contrast?In truth-clarification articles you can contrast them and help the world'speople see it.Question: How do we clarify the truth to large corporations?Teacher: At this point I make no distinction as to whether they're big cor-porations or small corporations. No matter what, we should save all thosewho should be saved. You should do whatever you're supposed to do, savewhoever can be saved, and do whatever you can do. Whether people wantto be saved is their own issue.Question: A Dafa disciple in our area is too busy doing Dafa work and hasthus neglected the responsibilities he's supposed to fulfill in his family.Teacher: The student who raised this question seems to have an attach-ment, too. Don't try to use Master's mouth [to criticize others]. What I'vetold you is that you should be a good person wherever you are and have ot-hers say that you are a Dafa disciple. You need to handle the things in yourfamily well and handle the things in your workplace well. As Dafa disci-ples, how well you've cultivated is precisely reflected in these areas, infront of the world's people. You might say, "I've cultivated well, I'm a Dafadisciple." Yet when you're dealing with the world's people your behavior inthose areas isn't good. Then how could you show that you've cultivatedwell? (Master smiles/chuckles) Right? Of course, some of our Dafa disci-ples have cultivated well but it's just that they've overlooked those things.But the state of having cultivated well isn't something that can be acted, it'sjust how a cultivator is.Question: That chief evil thing in China that was chosen by the old forcesmust have a shameful past. Could Master tell us its background?Teacher: It actually doesn't have much of a background. It was a puff ofevil air emitted by a decomposed body that was thousands of years old, andit turned into a toad embryo and was chosen by the old forces. Being proneto jealousy that stemmed from its short temper and pettiness, and throughits wheeling and dealing in bureaucratic circles, it developed its ways ofhurting people to get ahead, forming cliques, having no noble aspirations,bootlicking, and doing utterly shameless things. The old forces felt that itcompletely met the standard for being human scum--it had more than satis-fied all the requirements--and had all kinds of wickedness. The old forceswere incredibly fond of it and they knew it was sure to be quite usefulwhen the time came. It was selected by the old forces and was then delibe-rately molded. When they were making the selection back then they werelooking for something that's evil and stupid. That's why it completely beha-ves as it does.Question: Please tell us more about the significance of sending righteousthoughts and appealing in front of the consulates and embassies. We practi-ce in front of them every day, rain or shine. Although the conditions are

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poor, we're all quite steadfast.Teacher: The consulates and embassies in different countries are placeswhere overseas Chinese people can go to express their views. Of courseyou can go there. There are people there, too, who can be saved. So it hasgreat significance. Also, everything that you do there can be seen by theworld's people. But for Dafa disciples it really is strenuous. In the Northwinter is very cold, with its freezing winds that chill to the bone, yet Dafadisciples still keep up their efforts. They're amazing, truly amazing! Eve-ryone is walking his own path of validating the Fa. Those students too arewalking their own paths of validating the Fa.Question: You've often talked about the mighty virtue of Dafa disciples. Ofcourse I believe everything you've said. But it's difficult for me to see themighty power of the small things that I do. They just look like a drop ofwater in a mighty river. I'll continue to study the Fa, and things will beco-me clear through the Fa.Teacher: It does feel that way because basically all beings in human socie-ty are living in delusion, and human beings are the most deluded. I've tal-ked with you about the purpose of that. It's to give human beings a chanceto return, a chance to cultivate while being in delusion. While not beingable to see the true picture, if humans are still able to do well and on top ofthat persist in cultivating amidst suffering, then that's the key to returning.If people could all see the true picture of the cosmos and the existence ofdivine beings, then everyone would do well. There wouldn't be any need totalk about giving human beings a chance and it wouldn't be necessary to sa-ve human beings. Everyone would try to do well. Every day they wouldn'twant to do anything else anymore, and they wouldn't want anything elseanymore--they would all want to cultivate themselves. In that case would itstill count as cultivation? Even if they were able to cultivate, I think theywould definitely cultivate very slowly since they'd have seen the true pictu-re--"Divine beings are right there. There's the goal. Let's go, and we won'tstop until we get there." But while being in this delusion you can't see theend, and you can't see your goal. And you can't even see the true effects ofthose magnificent things you do. Exactly in such an environment, if you'reable to emerge from it and succeed in cultivation, divine beings will all bewon over. They'll think that after going through such hardship, being insuch delusion and in an environment where there's all kinds of disruption,and resisting all kinds of worldly temptations like fame, self-interest, andemotion, you were able to break away and step out of humanness. Onlythen will the divine beings be won over. Only then will they think thatyou're remarkable and worthy of being a divine being. That is mighty vir-tue. If all that weren't the case, the Three Realms and mankind would bethe same as other levels of the cosmos, with the true picture being knownto each level. Then this wouldn't be mankind here, it would be a world ofdivine beings here. At a minimum we'd be able to say that these were divi-ne beings at the lowest level, instead of human beings who are at this lo-

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west level. That's how these things are related. When today's Dafa disciplesare able to do well with what they're supposed to do, and are able to makeit through these few years that are full of trials and tribulations, in the futu-re you will see everything. Cherish it. Cherish it! You must cherish the partof the journey that you've already completed, and you have to do well withwhat's left ahead, too. (Applause)Question: How do we understand the Chinese character "bei" in the term"ci bei" (compassion/mercy)? [3]

Teacher: I don't impart Dafa in order to explain words, because thesethings are too insignificant, so insignificant that they amount to nothing.Let me endow you with two sentences: "Without 'nothing,' it is a humanfeeling. If it is a human feeling, then it's not bei (compassion)."In human society, over the course of a very long time--as I've told you be-fore--China has been the stage of this grand pageant of history. For thou-sands of years the groundwork for everything was constantly being laid forhuman beings so that when the time for obtaining the Fa came they wouldhave the right culture, thinking, behavior, way of life, and the ability toknow and understand the Fa; it also included how amidst delusion, peoplewould be affected by attachments and wouldn't be able to see the true situa-tion, yet at the same time, as long as they developed righteous thoughtsthrough studying the Fa, they'd be able to break free from it. This is preci-sely the kind of environment that was created. Really, a great deal of effortwas put into it, and today's mankind was created. But because of the oldforces' meddling, what we have here is no longer the best situation, and I'mjust making use of it wisely. There are many white students, black students,and students of other ethnicities. Today you're not in the setting of Main-land China, but let me tell you, over the course of history almost everyonein the world came out of Mainland China. (Applause) Your thinking is dif-ferent from today's Chinese. But some time in history you laid the ground-work for that kind of thinking. Deep down inside your being you unders-tand. In other words, you can understand the Fa I'm imparting today. Thewords at the surface [of each language] are different, but what's containedinside is the same. You're able to know what's contained in the Fa, and areable to experience and sense what's contained in the Fa. That's why yourcultivation won't be affected.So, the [concept of] ci bei was created when culture was being establishedfor mankind. Ci bei describes the state of a godly feeling being displayed, afeeling that transcends human beings. Of course, the two-character term ci-bei is now being used in ordinary human society as well, but it's definitelynot something human beings can attain. That's happened because today'sculture has become confused. People don't believe in divine beings anymo-re, and don't know that they should cultivate anymore. Humans dare to beblasphemous against Buddhas, against Fa, and against Gods, and use culti-vation terms among ordinary people. Humans have done all of that. Butthose are not ordinary human terms, it's just that ordinary people have ta-

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ken them up and used them.Question: "The entire nation will defy it." Could you elaborate on that mo-re?Teacher: Heaven's secrets can't be revealed too early on. (Master smi-les/chuckles) (Audience laughs, applauds) As I've told you before, the per-secution of Falun Gong has caused misunderstandings about Falun Gongamong Chinese people, so what I'm saying is, although a lot of peoplearen't familiar with Falun Gong, everybody condemns that wicked ringlea-der. Isn't it like that now? (Applause)Question: Recently, I've been fighting a strong element. I feel like I mightnot be able to keep it up, and I've never felt so tired mentally and physical-ly.Teacher: Send forth righteous thoughts to clear away the dark minions. Atpresent, whenever Dafa disciples have abnormal and persistent interferencewhile they validate the Fa, then it must be the work of the dark minions.When you eliminate them, be sure to dissolve them completely. But thosestudents who obtained the Fa later on or stepped forward later on, your cul-tivation and validating the Fa are joined together at the same time, and thatwill make the pressure on you seem even greater. Of course, this is cultiva-tion, and as long as you have strong righteous thoughts you'll surely be ableto overcome it. There are bound to be difficulties. Human beings have kar-ma before they cultivate, they need to eliminate karma during cultivation,and when they eliminate karma they suffer. That's the karma you owedfrom before, and Master can't eliminate all of it for you. If you were to be-come a divine being without paying off any karmic debt, divine beingswould find your presence to be a nuisance: "How can you be among us?Have you paid off those debts you owed? They were all taken off and paidoff by your master. Since when does it work like that?" Of course it doesn'twork like that, and that's why you need to endure a certain amount of suffe-ring when you cultivate.Yet relatively speaking, for students outside of Mainland China, the suffe-ring you endure is a far cry from the suffering borne by cultivators in thepast. How hard it was back then! Today it's not as hard. Do you know whe-re the suffering lies today? In the past, people suffered both mentally andphysically, and now you only suffer when you can't let go of your attach-ments. Your suffering only comes from not wanting to let go of your at-tachments--"My! How come I feel so awful! Why do some people alwaystreat me so badly? Why is my body always eliminating karma?" Humanbeings just can't let those things go. What's the maximum you can let go?Can your thoughts be righteous and can you be like a true Dafa disciple?Be upright, dignified, and confident, and regard yourself as a Dafa disciple.If you can truly let go of your attachments in any circumstance, and treatyourself as a Dafa disciple who is different from an ordinary person, I be-lieve everything will change. Veteran students have experienced this dee-ply, as they have gone through all of that. So, newer students should ask

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and seek advice from veteran students in these areas more often, and spendmore time reading the Fa I taught before. These questions have been explai-ned quite a bit. Another thing is, recently the bad divine beings (dark mi-nions) that crept into the Three Realms have also been directly participatingin persecuting Dafa disciples. Very often they've been the ones doingthings. When you send forth righteous thoughts, destroy them and elimina-te the disruptions.Question: I'm very grateful to Master for saving me. But I'm in serious fi-nancial debt, and have all kinds of human thoughts and attachments. I'm ve-ry worried. Esteemed Master, please help me.Teacher: I can save you, but I can't help you for those reasons. (Audiencelaughs) I can only tell you to cultivate. If you say that "I owe so much mo-ney now, I can't calm my mind and cultivate. Teacher, help me make a for-tune and pay back all the money so that I can cultivate without worries," letme tell you, that's not cultivation. I don't want you to cultivate that way.That's because human beings all have debts to pay off that are owed overhere and owed over there, and everybody has suffering they have to gothrough, and it's precisely during such difficulties that you show whetheryou can cultivate. If you can, then everything might change. But your culti-vation has to be solid, real, and self-motivated. If you say, "I'll cultivate andI'll do the exercises every day," but deep down inside you're secretly thin-king, "As long as I practice, Master said all those troubles of mine will beremoved and changed," then if you have such thoughts, things won't chan-ge. That's because in that case you have a gap and you're covering up yourattachments. You might fool yourself, but you can't fool divine beings.When you truly become a cultivator, become a Dafa disciple openly andnobly, everything will change.All the same, there are some cases where the dark minions are interfering.You should seriously eliminate the disruptions with your righteousthoughts.I'll mention another thing in passing. Recently many students have noticedthat a very small number of students are disrespectful of Master. The truthis, I can forgive all of that, but be careful: the various factors of the old for-ces and the beings in the cosmos that haven't been rectified by the Fa won't.They'll jump on this and do what they want with you. This type of thinghappened quite often when I was imparting the Fa in the Mainland wayback when. Once somebody is disrespectful of Master, they will for surepush him over to the opposite side. All beings came for the Fa, to play ei-ther a positive or a negative role. Those who play a negative role will bedestroyed in the end. So, when they see a student acting that way, they'lldefinitely push that person over to the other side, and have him do as manybad things as he can from then on.Very dangerous. So, once such situations come about, the old forces willdo that right away because they will have found a reason to do that. They'llsay the person's huge debt was eliminated by his master and borne for him

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by his master, who scooped up a being like him--one that was as good as inhell--allowed him to become a divine being, and gave him so many things.Although he doesn't see them, all those things are real and have truly beengiven to him. They'll think, "How could he dare to treat his master thatway?" And so they will insist on pushing him over to the other side, gethim to do bad things, and eventually have him destroyed.Of course, I don't acknowledge these arrangements of the old forces, and Idon't allow them to do those things. And that's why I try my best to havestudents realize these things themselves. But if our students don't pay atten-tion to this, it will be hard for you to break free from this kind of tribula-tion. This issue just came to mind a moment ago. You do need to take thisseriously--all deviant paths are fraught with danger and pitfalls.Question: I obtained the Fa only seven months ago. Am I a Fa-rectificationdisciple? Will I go back when the Fa rectifies the human world?Teacher: I can't say that what you're asking is wrong. But you have an at-tachment there. Whether you're a newer student or a veteran student, andno matter which category of disciples you fall into, now that you've enteredthe door of Dafa cultivation--now that you've entered the door of true culti-vation--don't be attached to anything. A single human thought can becomean obstacle that hinders your improvement. That's why there's a saying incultivation, "Have the desire to cultivate, without the desire to obtaingong." You can cultivate but you can't be attached. When you have no hu-man desires and aren't attached to anything, you'll cultivate quickly, impro-ve quickly, and have fewer ordeals. Whenever you have attachments yourcultivation will be slow.Don't worry about whether you're a Fa-rectification period disciple or a fu-ture disciple. Now that you've taken up cultivation, you're already a beingthat's envied by countless other beings. So just walk your path well. Withanything a being does in the cosmos, he'll get returns for it. There will bereturns for doing good, and there will be returns for doing bad. Cultivationof course involves returns as well--it's the good return of achieving an At-tainment Status for validating your Attainment Status. This is an absolutetruth in the cosmos. Don't think too much, and don't get concerned withwhat your own situation is. If you can do what it takes and you can cultiva-te, then go ahead and cultivate.Question: Teacher, please explain "benevolent solutions."Teacher: By saying "benevolent solutions," I was referring to a way inwhich beings in the cosmos are assimilated to the Fa during the Fa-rectifi-cation. Some beings aren't worthy of a benevolent solution, in which casewhatever should be done will be done. For some beings who have sinnedagainst the Fa-rectification, they deserve still less of a chance for a benevo-lent solution. The moment the Fa-rectification passes through, they are pur-ged. The beings that are handled with benevolent solutions are assimilatedto the Fa by the best method. And Dafa disciples are getting somethingeven better than a benevolent solution, because Dafa disciples are cultiva-

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ting proactively, and cultivating themselves toward the future, so it's moreprecious than being benevolently resolved.Question: All French Dafa disciples give Master their best regards.Teacher: Thank you. (Applause)Question: In France, there's a Dafa student with mental problems. Oncewhile he was handing out flyers to Chinese tourists, he lost control and be-gan yelling in front of many Chinese tourists, which had a negative effect.When he sends righteous thoughts in front of the embassy he can't stay still,and he wrote things all over the Chinese Embassy.Teacher: When it comes to these things, as Dafa disciples you should han-dle them well. That student, being a Dafa disciple, can't do that. We can on-ly save beings with compassion. Doing things irrationally will bring aboutnegative effects.When a very few students can't keep their own emotions under control, ot-her students should stop them. Dafa disciples are one, and you should coo-perate with each other and not allow things like that to happen anymore--when they have happened, you should resolve the problem appropriately.If the person really does have mental problems, then I think we should tryto persuade that student to practice at home; Master will look after him allthe same, and there's no need for him to go out in public. If it's not an issueof mental problems, then you should help him.Question: Everything in the cosmos has a certain predetermination to it. So-me beings are doomed to be destroyed. What determines that for that kindof being?Teacher: "Everything in the cosmos has a certain predetermination to it"refers to the cosmos overall. For instance, the old Fa-truths predeterminedthe fact that the cosmos would go through formation-stasis-degeneration-destruction. That's the extent of that old Fa's wisdom. Although the destinyof the cosmos is predetermined as such, and although the fundamentals ofthe specific beings within it are connected to the cosmos historically, as forwhat a being does specifically and how much karma he has, he needs topay for all that, and if his karma gets large he'll be destroyed. These are allmatters that have to do with that being himself. And also, what direction abeing himself takes, these are things that are basically unstable. But,through what a being does, people can see what will happen with him inthe cosmos next, and then next, and then next. In other words, away fromthe time setting of this dimension of ours, in another time setting you cansee what he'll be doing later on, a continuation of his current state. If hispresent state suddenly changes, then his state in the next stage will changeas well, so these things are unstable. But the overall formation-stasis-dege-neration destiny for the cosmos is stable.Question: [Whether someone can become] a Dafa disciple is to a large ex-tent determined by his predestined connection with it. Then what's the rootcause of the predestined connections?Teacher: I've talked about predestined connections in Zhuan Falun, and

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I've talked about them in many other Fa lectures. I've specifically talkedabout Dafa disciples' predestined connections. There are three types, Dafadisciples fall into three types of situations. I don't think I should repeat ithere, as we don't have much time here. I might not end up answering all ofthe questions. (Master smiles/chuckles) Look up my Fa-teaching from befo-re.Question: Many fellow cultivators have different views on how we shouldperfect and complete[4] the Fa at this human level.Teacher: Perfecting and completing this human level? That's an incorrectstatement. If you haven't done things well, that's a cultivation issue, and itdoesn't involve any issue of "perfecting and completing."Question: How can a person break through his base[5] or the limitations ofhis base?Teacher: You shouldn't be attached to these things in cultivation. That'snot relevant. Don't worry about how your base is. When a being has mana-ged to enter Dafa today, his base is not bad. Look at the world's people--there are more than 7 billion people in the world, and how many Fa-rectifi-cation period Dafa disciples are there? Yet you are one of them. So whyshould you still talk about your base? (Applause)Question: While being part of a group, if a few project coordinators havestrong human concepts, how can we manage to work together better?Teacher: Every Dafa disciple is cultivating, every person is walking hisown path, and each person still has human attachments, which is why youcan still cultivate. Then the human attachments will show. Don't be unwil-ling to work with other students when there are conflicts or differences ofopinion. Keep in mind that all of you have been through that state, andfrom time to time each person may experience that state. You should forgi-ve others and be understanding of others, and you should help each other.To be able to work together and do well the things that Dafa disciples do tovalidate the Fa--now that's what you should do.Question: What will happen to those countries where there are no Dafa dis-ciples? How should we spread the Fa and clarify the truth in those distantcountries?Teacher: Dafa disciples are doing what Dafa disciples should do. If you'reable to, you can go do that. You can go spread the Fa in places where thereare no Dafa disciples. But when it comes to places where it's too difficult orplaces that have very close ties with that group of gangsters in China thatpersecutes Dafa disciples, you shouldn't go for the time being, because the-re are things that will need to be done during the next stage.Question: If the beings become degenerate again in the future, will Fa-rec-tification be necessary again?Teacher: This is something that has never happened before and will proba-bly never happen again.If the cosmos's beings had become even more degenerate, then Fa-rectifica-tion couldn't have been done. Fa-rectification happened, this undertaking

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began, exactly at a time when the beings in the cosmos and mankind wereno longer good enough and were about to be weeded out, but hadn't gottento the point of being beyond salvation. It was then that the Fa was impar-ted. If they truly become as bad as beings that go to hell, then at that pointthey're no longer worthy of salvation, even though I can certainly do anyt-hing and everything and could save them.Question: When a rocket travels beyond the scope of the nine major pla-nets, will it have gone beyond the Three Realms?Teacher: That's only the range that's made up of the layer of molecular par-ticles. It's really hard to use human language to describe the range of theThree Realms. Now when I tell you how large the Three Realms is, I'musing concepts from human sensual and visual perceptions, and from theparticles that are at the same level. The biggest difference between how di-vine beings and how human beings look at the cosmos is that divine beingsdon't look at things on the basis of the structure of this one layer of parti-cles. They simultaneously look at things from all directions and three-di-mensionally, on the basis of the combined cosmic structures of the differentlayers of particles below that and the different layers of particles abovethat. They can see the whole structural appearance of things at different le-vels in the cosmos, and see what they look like on a fundamental level. Hu-man beings, on the other hand, can only see this world that's composed ofthis molecular layer of particles; they can only see things that are composedof this layer of particles. But the cosmos isn't composed of just this onelayer of particles. Human beings can't see the true picture; human beingscan only see this one layer. This results from the separation and restrictionthat's due to various factors, and the limitations of the human eye's structu-re, all of which are meant to produce this false picture of things for humanbeings. Humans just aren't allowed to see the true picture. In other words,even when it comes to things that are composed of this layer of particles,human beings aren't allowed to see the full picture, and human beings aregiven this kind of eye precisely to limit their perception of the cosmos,which makes for this culture here. Everything has been created with a cer-tain purpose.You know, besides infrared and ultraviolet light, there are other invisiblekinds of light and inaudible sounds, but they do exist. Today's scientific de-vices can detect and recognize that they exist, but human eyes can't seethem. In other words, human eyes aren't even allowed to see all the thingsthat are at this level of the human world. The kind of world human beingsare allowed to see is deliberately designed so that human beings' cognitionis stabilized in this state. But actually it's not absolutely stable or impenetra-ble--through cultivation a person can break through it. But how much a per-son can break through and how much of the truth of the cosmos he can seedepend on the cultivator's level. Conversely, the more materialistic a personis, the more he's trapped inside this maze. The more materialistic a personis, the more so his thoughts and understandings are trapped in this "reality,"

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and the more he is within this "reality."The larger boundaries of the Three Realms are the size of the small univer-se. The Three Realms' boundaries in the microcosm are actually, when youlook at it in the microcosm, I'd say that "inches away" is an overstatement.You know, microcosmic particles make up particles of one level higher. Soin other words, particles at different levels are all composed of smaller par-ticles one level below. It can be said that the Three Realms' boundaries areright here, right amidst everything, in the microcosm of all things. There isno distance in the way that modern people think of or understand it--you al-most can't calculate their distance. But the particles of the different levelsthat constitute the Three Realms have their boundaries at different levels.That is, when you look at them on different planes, the different levels havetheir boundaries and distances. The cosmos is a very complex entity. TheThree Realms that we talk about is a range that was designated for use bythe would-be Fa-rectification. But there are identical particles in identicalstates that exist along with the Three Realms and they are connected withan even broader area. And many divine beings at the very highest levels ge-nerally refer to that, too, as "the lowest level." The Three Realms that werefer to, though, is this specially-designated range. The scopes of those ot-her related dimensions that are composed of particles in the same class asthose of the Three Realms are incredibly immense.Question: Why do Dafa disciples call you the Lord of Buddhas? Why is itthat you came from a higher, more distant place?Teacher: (Master smiles/chuckles) I actually don't have any titles. Just be-cause I wrote in one of my writings, "The Lord of Buddhas' mercy...," stu-dents speculated: is Master the Lord of Buddhas? The fact is, anything peo-ple call me is inaccurate. Each person's life has a place of origin in the cos-mos and at the same time has more ancient, remote factors, and this inclu-des beings at the lowest levels--even the grass on the ground has a place oforigin and more remote factors. There are different plants in different histo-rical periods, and over the long winding course of the cosmos's history, pla-nets and particles have been continually disintegrating and then being re-born, disintegrating, being reborn, continually being renewed. And a lot ofthe dust in the cosmos may be factors of beings that disintegrated a very,very long time ago. A lot of the dirt that's fallen to the ground may be mat-ter from very, very far back. Then the grass absorbed matter from that dirt,and perhaps that grass also has various factors from way back. This is tal-king about it in terms of the surface of matter. Everything is alive--as longas it exists, it's alive.From another perspective, the Bible said that Yahweh created man out ofclay. In fact, what Yahweh created was one species of white people, not allwhite people. White people don't all belong to one species of man--theywere created by several divine beings. Yellow people were also created byseveral divine beings. And other peoples, for example the people of India,the ancient Egyptians, and so on, were all created by different divine

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beings. People believe that God created man in his own image, when in factthat's simply how a divine being's ability works--the man he creates isbound to be of the lowest part of him and the lowest level of particles ofhim, that's all. Plainly put, it's a particle at the bottom of the divine being'sfoot; you could also call it a cell. I've told you in my Fa lectures before that,every cell of a being--humans, animals, plants, and so on--is in the imageof the main body.Everything of the human beings that were created way back when, inclu-ding all that makes up their souls and beings, was created with substancesand elements from within the Three Realms. Then of course the divinebeings that created the different peoples would watch over their own peo-ple. This continued all the way until recent times, when the time for Dafa tobe spread was imminent, at which point many of the souls inside the humanskins consisted of beings that came down from high levels, instead of thesouls of human beings, as before. Another thing that needs to be clarifiedis, everything made up by the layer of particles at the human-surface levelis called human skin, and that includes a person's bones, internal organs, aswell as his skin at the surface. This surface human skin dies from old age,but many of the things that the surface skin receives during its lifetime arepassed down to the next generation. Over ages and ages, generation aftergeneration, humans have been passing on the cultural contents that divinebeings created for man. On a cognitive level human beings don't knowabout these things, but they are part of them internally. When it got to re-cent times, when many beings that came for the Fa reincarnated as humans,the souls of the humans that were created by divine beings stayed in thenetherworld, and divine beings that came from high levels beyond theThree Realms reincarnated as humans and put on that clothing (the humanskin). So in other words, the human skin created by that divine being in thepast was put on by a different divine being.Then something else needs to be clarified here: that different divine beingmight not be lower than the divine being who created the human being; hemay be higher, or, of course, lower, or at the same level; he came and tookover the human that [a divine being] created, which means that another di-vine being has entered the boundaries of the divine being that originallycreated the human being. I often say that today's people all have a signifi-cant background--few if any of the world's people have the souls divinebeings created back then. No matter who it is, when he has entered thisworld of delusion, everything he comes into contact with and sees with hiseyes is like this, this is how he sees the world from the moment he's bornfrom his mother's womb. And in this society of delusion he'll generate kar-ma just like everyone else. What's more, the mankind of recent times hascreated a culture that makes people even more lost in this society, raising it-self in this materialistic culture. It's extremely hard for human beings totranscend the thinking here--for someone to comprehend what's beyond allof this, he can only achieve that through cultivation.

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There's another phenomenon, too. Different divine beings created differentpeoples, but over the past few thousand years various religions have beenspread beyond their region or ethnic group. As a result, some people havebegun to believe in another divine being, which has made the divine beingwho created them quite sad. What's more, the divine being that the personnow believes in can't save people created by another divine being. And ma-ny ethnic groups no longer have any idea who their true god is. This situa-tion has come about quite often in the course of history, leaving the divinebeing who created those humans no choice but to abandon the humans hecreated. Once this happened, many ethnic groups became people withoutroots and have no divine beings watching over them. Things like social tur-moil, losing rationality, and disrespect for divine beings mostly come fromthese peoples. These ethnic groups and individuals are all impoverished.As for why Master came from a higher, more distant place, actually, per-haps a lot of Dafa disciples in the audience here also came from some hig-her and more distant places. (Applause slowly begins and increases.) It'sjust that I came from a slightly more distant place, and because of that, du-ring the Fa-rectification I can save everyone. As for where I came from, forthe beings in the cosmos, it's now irrelevant whether I came from a high orlow level--what's most important is that I'm going towards what is the hig-hest and the most ultimate. It's enough for you to know that I came to im-part and build up this Dafa.Question: Some Dafa students believe that systemically clarifying the truthto lawyers, learning the details of the law, and eventually seeking the mostfavorable resolution is being distrustful of lawyers. Would Master pleasesay a few words on this?Teacher: Human society has been boxed into a very tight space now byman himself. Human wisdom is limited, and many restrictions are boxinghumans in. A lot of things are indeed difficult to resolve, and it's hard to sa-ve people now. Handle these things with wisdom. As for what to do, it is ofcourse not a problem to clarify the truth. Act according to your specific si-tuations. None of the things that you come across in the course of valida-ting the Fa are the same, so it's impossible for me to comprehensively covereverything or talk about these specific things here, so you still have to han-dle on your own the things you encounter. Figuring out how to do thingswell is part of your validating the Fa and walking your own path.Question: Does demonstrating the exercises for people, including touristsfrom China, count as clarifying the truth?Teacher: Demonstrating the exercises can achieve a certain effect. Everyt-hing you do can achieve a certain positive effect. But, if you don't talkabout the facts, don't get into the specifics and only do the exercises, thenyou won't be able to resolve the many perplexing issues in people's mindsfor the time being.Question: Dafa disciples from China's Xishuangbanna of Yunnan Province,Qinghua University in Beijing, Jiayuguan in Gansu Province, Hebei Pro-

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vince, Guangdong Province, New Zealand, Peru, the City of Tianjin, Mon-treal Canada, the City of Changchun, Beijing, the City of Shenyang, the Ci-ty of Harbin, Leshan of Sichuan Province, Emei Mountain, Guangzhou, theCity of Zhengzhou, and Mudanjiang send greetings to Master.Teacher: Thank you all. (Applause)Question: What should a person do if fellow practitioners mistake him for aspy?Teacher: Let me talk a little about the issue of spies. (Master smiles/chuck-les) (Audience laughs) Do you know how Master actually looks at these is-sues from a different perspective? Of course, those things that the old for-ces concocted are tests that target Dafa disciples, but in fact I'd say they arean insult to the Fa, they bring shame to mankind, they disrespect the Fa,they are disruptions to the Fa-rectification, and they shouldn't have happe-ned. But it's exactly because beings are no longer up to par that Fa-rectifi-cation is necessary. Such an occupation has, after all, come into beingamong humans. So, is it true that only the most vile and the worst peoplewere chosen to become spies? No. What a person does is largely determi-ned by his own preference, but there are also many people who reluctantlydo a job under the circumstances, and there are those who've been pickedbecause they are considered smart and able to do a certain job. In otherwords, the choice of a person's occupation is not determined by whether hisnature is good or bad. Are there good people among spies? Definitely. Thedifferent occupations in human society don't tell us whether a person isgood or bad, or whether that being can be saved.I saw this issue, so since the time I started to teach the Fa I've said--and I'vefollowed through on it--that I don't draw lines based on occupations or soci-al status; I'll save you no matter what your line of work is. My door is wideopen, completely open, so open that there's really no door left--as long asyou want to cultivate you can come in. I'll save anyone, no matter whatyour line of work is. But whether or not a person enters is up to that personhimself, and whether or not he obtains the Fa is his own issue. It's hard fortoday's people to dictate what occupation they'll do--how could someonejust go and do whatever he wants in life? How could it be that easy? It's re-ally hard. In other words, a person who lives in this world can't just choosewhatever occupation he wants. I saw that, and besides, all human beingshave come here for the Fa, so no matter what work you do, no matter whatyour job is, I can save you. But whether or not you can persist in cultiva-ting well depends on you, and whether or not you want to cultivate is up toyou, too.I've been up front about this and have put it into practice, but over theseyears a lot of our students still haven't truly understood the purpose behindyour master's words. I've completely opened the door, and I let in peoplefrom any occupation or segment of society. Then why do you still insist onmaking unnecessary distinctions and drawing lines? (Applause) It's becauseit is human beings cultivating, not divine beings. When humans are cultiva-

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ting, humans have human thoughts, and human thoughts include occupati-onal habits and attachments and tendencies caused by their professions,which are all at work subconsciously. When a person hasn't cultivated well,his habitual attachments that were formed at his job will show. Then ofcourse, a person's tendencies as a spy or special agent will show too, and hemight even do wrong things when he can't pass a test. During this timewhen Dafa disciples are being persecuted, specifically, when he's unable topass a certain test he'll go report some information in a moment of confu-sion. But on a fundamental level, whether this is a bad person and whetherhe can be saved can't be determined just by how he is at one given time.You have to allow him to make mistakes and give him the opportunity tocorrect his actions--that is what's magnificent about our Fa. (Applause)I've said before that nobody can undermine Dafa, and that only when Dafadisciples don't do well can they undermine Dafa. So during this persecu-tion, that bunch of gangsters wants to use Dafa disciples to undermine Da-fa, but in fact they can't undermine Dafa one bit. The premise of what I saidwas that a Dafa disciple is truly cultivating, but during his cultivation hedoesn't understand the Fa's principles that deeply or that thoroughly, and hedoesn't walk his path correctly, which has a bad effect. Actually it can onlyhave an effect here among humans--nobody can affect the essence of Dafa.As for those who've gone over to the opposite side during the persecution,they're not Dafa disciples anymore, but those who can come back, though,are a different matter. When they are no longer Dafa disciples, they've es-sentially become part of that evil bunch of persecutors, and they deliberate-ly do bad things, intentionally undermining things, turning the truth upsidedown, and stating lies as facts. That can't undermine Dafa, and can onlyhelp Dafa disciples become more and more rational, and their thoughts be-come more and more upright, and make them become more and more clear-headed and aware. Isn't that the outcome of the persecution? Haven't youall matured? What I'm talking about is, only when Dafa disciples don't dowell themselves can they have a bad effect and impact in this world. If aDafa disciple has an ordinary person's mentality and isn't doing well, orwas a spy before, or a student did something wrong because he couldn'tpass a test, and thus everybody drives the person out or regards him diffe-rently, truly causes his predestined opportunity of thousands of years to re-ally be ruined, and causes him to go over to the opposite side, then, let metell you, that would be truly doing something bad. (Applause)Only when we're able to be forgiving can we save people. If every Dafadisciple could think that way, then think about it, with that power fromcompassion, would there still be any room for bad factors to exist? Withthat said, let me tell you, the professional spies aren't able to get in. [Thespies among us] are [Dafa] students who used to be in that line of work be-fore 1999 and who didn't cultivate well, or students who gave in to the evilat one point out of fear and didn't do well. If you were to tell them to reallyharm the Fa, they wouldn't do it. It's just that they became confused at a

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certain time, didn't do well, and couldn't pass the test, at which point theytook the wrong path. There are also some Dafa disciples who are attachedto those little things that they have, and some who just wanted to doenough to get the rogue spy agencies off their back. The reality is, it's im-possible for anyone to truly harm Dafa.So this has happened exactly because some students still have human at-tachments and still haven't done well in some respects. As for the idea thatspies have truly infiltrated us and snuck in, I'll tell you, that's impossible,since what we're doing is cultivation. They want to use students to providethem with some so-called "intelligence" for them to find targets. But all ofthat's useless, and they're only fooling themselves. Those spy agenciesknow full well that Falun Gong has no secrets at all, and they know verywell that Falun Gong is a group of good people who are just against thepersecution. They know that themselves. One of the crooked means theyuse is to generate a climate that pressures people and whips them up--inChina they're used to creating these campaigns. That's all they know how todo, and they hype certain things up to influence people. Does that work oncultivators? A few years have gone by, and haven't Dafa disciples becomemore steadfast and more rational? (Applause) Has anyone been scared byit? Nobody has. Under such a wicked persecution, have any of the Dafa dis-ciples in Mainland China been scared? Of course, there are those whocouldn't come through it, but those who couldn't were deliberately arrangedto get in by the old forces. I've said that all beings came for the Fa, but notall of them came to play a positive role. The old forces' purpose was to ha-ve that type of being play a negative role so that Dafa disciples could betempered, that's all; it's not that the vile people have the ability to do anyt-hing. Humans can't see these things clearly, and humans are just attached towhat humans want to do. But whatever humans have done, they have topay for it, that's for sure. (Applause)But I also know that there really are special agents taking advantage of thegaps in students who have attachments. That's caused by the students notdoing well and being too attached. The few students who aren't clearheadedhave got to pay attention to this now.Just now I taught this Fa from a positive angle. But I also know that whileMaster is giving chances again and again there are still a few people whodon't get it and who haven't been taking Master's continued mercy seriouslyand have been doing the dirty work of spies, betraying their own conscien-ces and betraying Dafa disciples. They've been repeatedly providing so-cal-led "intelligence" to the evil, and in the eyes of divine beings, the negativeeffects that their actions have brought to Dafa are now beyond what theycan pay for. That kind of involvement in interfering with Fa-rectification isin fact directly participating in the persecution, and the consequences willbe the same as for that group of gangsters in China that is persecuting Dafadisciples. I now have nothing more to say to these people, and what I said alittle bit ago doesn't hold for this type of person. As I got to this point, a di-

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vine being just said, "It looks like all they have left is a chance to plan theirfunerals."Question: You said that by doing the three things well everything is encom-passed. Does this mean that all of a person's attachments and the conflictsa person has had will be benevolently resolved? I sincerely ask Master toenlighten me on this.Teacher: (Master smiles/chuckles) If a person can't resolve those funda-mental problems of his in cultivation, then you can't say that he's cultiva-ting. What is cultivation? What is the ultimate goal of cultivation? It's toemerge from among ordinary people. When you're no longer one of them,can ordinary people's various conflicts, attachments, and different factorsstill have an effect on you? Absolutely not. But whether you can emergefrom it and cultivate out of it, whether you can forge ahead diligently,whether you will progress quickly or slowly in cultivation--all of that de-pends on you, yourself. I, as your master, will absolutely be responsible toyou. But whether or not you can move forward diligently is still up to you.Could a divine being be swayed by all kinds of human attachments? Not achance, of course it's impossible. So anything can be resolved. It just de-pends on how you cultivate. If you're just cultivating with your mind focu-sed on solving that problem, then you're not truly cultivating. Cultivationhas to be completely unconditional.Question: The level of the cosmos created by a Dafa disciple won't lastlong. Could Master please clarify that?Teacher: I didn't tell you that it wouldn't last long. Right now you folks arethinking with a human mentality. (Master smiles/chuckles) A humanthought... since humans don't have any abilities, what they send out is like abubble of air, it's tiny, and it dissipates in no time. But the things that arisefrom a Dafa disciple's thoughts are strong, and the higher the disciple's le-vel, the more powerful and bigger the things that emerge out of histhoughts, and the longer they last. For a gigantic divine being, his onethought can create cosmic bodies and cosmoses. Well actually, there aremore fundamental factors involved. The Fa is all-encompassing and all-per-fecting, and all of the imperfect factors in the cosmos of the past are per-fectly resolved this time during the Fa-rectification. So since it's an all-en-compassing and all-perfecting Fa, even the cosmos's fundamental nature offormation-stasis-degeneration has changed, and its time concept can't becomprehended with a human mind.Question: Lately fellow practitioners have often been using electronic soft-ware to share understandings and study the Fa, and are even strongly en-couraging its usage. As a result, people have less opportunities to sharetheir thoughts and study the Fa in person.Teacher: Indeed that's not right. Except for little disciples, you shouldn'tdo that. But that's not to rule out using it occasionally when you're very bu-sy, just don't make a habit of it. That isn't something I want to pass down.There's no problem with you studying the Fa in person as a group, and stu-

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dying the Fa and exchanging thoughts in person. You can take advantage of[such software] when you're busy, but you can't all do that, and you can'tdo it frequently.Question: I don't understand very well the difference between matter beingimpure and matter having deviated. Master, would you please explain?Teacher: Matter's impurity and deviation is the fundamental reason for thefall of the old cosmos, and it was caused by the old cosmos's nature. For-mation-stasis-degeneration-destruction was the extent of the wisdom of theFa back then, and it was a way to cyclically purify different specific do-mains, but when the whole thing reaches that stage, that's the end. As far asmatter's impurity and deviation goes, if you look at it in terms of human so-ciety, the modern-science-wrought impurity of air, soil, metals, water, andvarious chemical elements cannot be resolved by mankind. In the eyes ofdivine beings, mankind's thinking has deviated so much that it is no longerhuman. Everything in the cosmos is cycling, so after those things are ex-tracted by higher-level beings they'll make the elements and beings in high-level dimensions impure. That's just putting it simply. Take a look at mylast few talks on the Fa.Question: As for the role of the Minghui website in clarifying the truth,how should overseas students work together and help?Teacher: The Minghui website's role in clarifying the truth is irreplacea-ble. It's the most important window through which we get the truth outabout the persecution and the overall situation of Dafa and Dafa disciples'validating the Fa. When it comes to the things of Dafa disciples, youshould always cooperate with each other and work well together.Question: Recently I came across a student who claimed that he had rea-ched Consummation and could switch to cultivating in another disciplinenow. May I ask if he has enlightened along an evil path or was just lettinghis imagination run wild?Teacher: I'd say he's got a fever, (audience laughs) and he's become fog-gy-headed from the fever. Well actually, whoever says that is in a dange-rous state. Beings who don't have rational, upright thoughts and clear headsare the ones divine beings look down on most.Question: Is it appropriate for media to publish Master's photo?Teacher: I think it's fine, no problem, because I have my ways. (Mastersmiles/chuckles) (Applause)Question: Master said in Touring North America to Teach the Fa, "I do notknow who I am, either." I don't understand that so well.Teacher: What about it is hard to understand? What's past is past, and nowI'm a puzzle to all beings, and in the future nobody will know where I am. Iam omnipotent, and nothing can hinder me. Anything you call me won't beaccurate. In the future different beings will see me in the image of theirown ethnic group. Everything was created by me, and yet I'm not amidstanything--that's the idea. (Audience laughs, applauds)Question: Currently diseases that are transmitted from animals to humans

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such as the bird flu and mad cow disease are appearing all over the world.May I ask revered Master, how is this phenomenon related to the progressof Fa-rectification?Teacher: Mankind has too much karma. It's because human beings have al-ready slid down into a very dangerous situation in all regards, their karmahas gotten greater and greater, and on top of that their attitude about Dafa...much of it was caused by man himself. This doesn't appear to be directlyrelated to the Fa-rectification, but everything revolves around Dafa, andnothing happens by accident. People are being warned through thesethings.Question: Why is it that those who engage in spying among the studentsstill aren't awakening? If we expose who they are right in front of them,would that be uncompassionate?Teacher: Doing that to protect the Fa can't be considered uncompassionate.Why don't you sober them up, then, or you can expose them if you want.It'd be better if we could save them, but if they can't be saved that's theirown choice.Question: Some Dafa disciples have posted some articles on the Internetabout Dafa-related miracles, and this has caused some Internet readers tomisunderstand Dafa.Teacher: Discussing things about that topic responsibly isn't a problem.Don't worry about misunderstandings, but don't do things in a weird and in-comprehensible way, either. If you validate the Fa magnanimously and ra-tionally, there won't be any problems. Dafa disciples are, after all, cultiva-tors; we aren't some ordinary people's political group in society, we're agroup of cultivators, and we cultivate divinity, so of course miracles haveindeed happened. (Applause)Question: You've said that if sexual attraction and desire aren't relinquis-hed the person absolutely cannot reach Consummation. Currently there arestill many disciples who haven't let go of their sexual attraction and desire.Would you please tell me what the unit of measurement for Consummationis? Is the unit of measurement calculated by particles?Teacher: Nobody's ever said that--did that come from some wild thinkingyou had? I've never said anything to you about any relationship betweenConsummation and some unit of measurement. Dafa disciples: I said longago that sexual attraction and desire are a fatal roadblock that a cultivatorabsolutely must overcome. [Those people are] driven by human feelingsand emotions way too much. If they can't even pull themselves out of thislittle thing, then it would seem that back then the old forces should have ar-ranged to put them behind prison walls in Mainland China, as only underthose circumstances would they correct the problem, right? I wonder howyou'd behave in a brutal environment like that. Are you like this becauseyour life is too comfortable? All those who don't remove that attachmentand make excuses for their behavior are fooling themselves and trying tofool others--it's not like I've made any special arrangements for you.

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Question: Is it true that we don't need to send righteous thoughts at set ti-mes?Teacher: Didn't the Minghui website announce that all Dafa disciplesaround the world should send righteous thoughts as a group at certain ti-mes? I think that's a pretty good idea, and so why don't you do that, then.When it comes to any other specifics, you can do things according to thedifferent situations in different regions.Question: Every time I see Master all of my questions vanish without a tra-ce. With Teacher here, with the Fa here, there's nothing that can't be resol-ved. We should really cherish this period of time.Teacher: With strong righteous thoughts, everything can in fact be resol-ved. And with strong righteous thoughts, everything becomes clear. Whena person doesn't have clear thinking, that's always when he has attachmentsthat he can't let go. When he feels uneasy inside he doesn't think clearly.Question: Would you please tell us whether including magic acts in ourDafa disciples' concerts is appropriate in light of our efforts to validate theFa?Teacher: I actually don't think there is anything wrong with that. To me,forms of performing arts are forms of performing arts. If it's something thatpeople enjoy and like to watch, and it's not in bad taste, then I think it's fi-ne.Question: Through its mechanisms, Dafa ensures that the beings in the fu-ture won't develop attachments or selfishness even after they go through avery long period of time in the cosmos, and thus the cosmos will be perfectand harmonized and will never perish.Teacher: No, that's not how it is, it's not the right understanding, and that'snot the idea. Dafa is perfect and harmonized, and the fundamental nature ofthe cosmos is selfless. When a being cultivates and reaches that realm,that's how he'll become, too. The Fa has provided for all beings' existence,the Fa has created for all beings the mechanisms of the cosmos and the richvariety in the cosmos, and the Fa has created all beings, all the myriadthings, heaven-and-earths, human beings, and divine beings. But how thebeings conduct themselves is to a certain degree their own choice.Question: Greetings to Master from Dafa disciples in Yichang and Gezhou-ba of Hubei Province, Three Gorges, Melbourne, Haiban Province, Non-gan, Kaian, and Jilin City of Jilin Province, Heze of Shandong Province,Heilongjiang Province, the North Gate area of the Temple of Heaven inBeijing, Sichuan Province, and Ziyang of Chengdu City.Teacher: Thank you all! (Applause)Question: You've said in your book that when others treat you badly, theyare giving you virtue and you should be happy about that. But if we arehappy about it, are we not being compassionate enough?Teacher: (People laugh) That's not being uncompassionate. Only true cul-tivators and Dafa disciples are able to remain unmoved when self-interestand feelings are involved. As for the one who strikes giving virtue to the

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person who is hit, that results from the nature of the cosmos; it's not some-thing you can get just by being happy. When the person who was hit feelsno resentment or hatred while experiencing pain and settles what was doneto him with a smile, isn't that compassion? From a human perspective, noone would say he's being uncompassionate--when someone hits him, heresponds with a smile and feels no resentment. Of course, a cultivatorshouldn't smile or laugh the way an ordinary person does after he gainssomething (people laugh); you should feel quite at ease, and everyone willsay you're a good person. When someone does bad things to you, you canadvise him to do good so that he doesn't lose virtue, and that is your beingcompassionate to him. If he doesn't listen and still wants to do evil, thenthere will be retribution as a result of his evil action. Just like in the case ofthose vile policemen and bad people in labor camps in China, it is they whowant to do evil and refuse to listen when they're urged to stop. In that casethere's nothing we can do; they insist on beating people and can't be stop-ped no matter what. Then after they carry out the beatings, they are goingto hell when the time comes. That's not Dafa disciples being uncompassio-nate.In each dimension there are the Fa-truths of that dimension. Althoughtruths become higher at higher levels, in any given dimension, if a beingcan follow the truths in that dimension, then he's a good being in that di-mension. When you can transcend those truths, you will have transcendedthat level of beings. No one is happy about being hit, human beings areunhappy when they suffer--that's how human beings in this dimension are.No ordinary person would say, "No matter who mistreats me, I'll still behappy." Only cultivators are able to do that, and that's being in a higher re-alm than ordinary people. Being able to maintain your xinxing while endu-ring physical pain, that's a cultivator's compassion. As for others giving usvirtue, it's not as if Dafa disciples took it from them, it's not as if those peo-ple could give it out if they wanted to, and it's not as if anyone could get itif he just wanted to. It's the mechanism of the cosmos that does that trans-formation, it's the nature of the cosmos at work. What I've done as yourmaster is to teach the Fa-truths to all beings.Question: Since pregnant disciples don't have the essence of the human bo-dy, how could they cultivate their bodies?Teacher: Who says pregnant disciples don't have the essence of the humanbody? Nothing can interfere with Dafa cultivation. Quite the opposite, it'sgood for the baby.Question: My husband, [name omitted] , was just freed, but he's still inMainland China. He learned that I was coming to this Fa conference andasked me to tell you that he misses venerable Teacher.Teacher: Thank you. (Applause) As their master, I won't leave behind asingle Dafa disciple in Mainland China, except for those who've gone overto the opposite side and can no longer be saved. (Applause) I'm thinking ofall of them.

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Question: Recently I've felt that time is going even faster now. Has the timein the Three Realms already been replaced?Teacher: Yes, time is going very fast. Before the Fa-rectification of the hu-man world reaches this dimension of ordinary people, the time at this hu-man place won't slow down completely.Question: In the old cosmic system, one wrong thought of a high-levelbeing could cause countless beings to go awry. But in the new cosmos thatwill never happen. Is that because the mechanism of the new cosmos is mo-re perfect?Teacher: That's not the right understanding, as that can happen in the newcosmos as well. Why do I say that both the Fa-rectification and [your] culti-vation have to meet the standard? No matter whether it's those who've beenassimilated or those who've been rectified by the Fa during the Fa-rectifica-tion, all of them absolutely must meet the standard. Dafa disciples, if youcultivate to a very high level and will be governing a high-level cosmic bo-dy, a single thought of yours will indeed be all-powerful within your owncosmic body. That's for sure. That's why Dafa disciples must cultivatethemselves well and become upright by cultivating. Of course, your culti-vating yourselves is only part of it. In addition to that, during the Fa-rectifi-cation Master is helping you resolve the things of yours that are impure attheir most fundamental levels. So, in the future [you] will definitely be veryupright.No matter how long the period of time [you spend] in the human worldlasts, even if it's tens of thousands of years, when Unlocking of Gong takesplace this will all in fact feel like a dream to you. It will be so vague that itwas like a dream, and gradually it will feel like you've forgotten it. Youwill no longer have the human thought structure or think about mankindwith human thoughts, you won't have thoughts like that, and your thoughtstructure will be that of a divine being. I've said before that a TathagataBuddha knows the thoughts of even cattle and horses, but he would neveruse their ways of thinking to think about things.Question: Verses of Master's poems occasionally come up in my mind. CanI say them out loud? If I do that, do I have to recite the entire poem? If I re-cite only two verses, do I need to add Master's name to note the source?Teacher: No, that's not necessary when you're just saying them out loud. Ifyou put them down in written form or make an audio or video recording ofthem, then it's different. A lot of the poems I've written are actually relatedto Dafa cultivation, and thus they too are part of the Fa. So they can't beused at will by someone else as his own things. When you mention them toothers or quote them in articles, just bear that in mind.Question: Russian and all Russian-speaking Dafa disciples around theworld, Dafa disciples in Vancouver of Canada, Yujiaweier, Taiwan, Korea,Japan, Nanjing City of Jiangsu Province, Texas of the U.S., Shanghai,young disciples in Vancouver of Canada, Anshan of Liaoning Province,and Chaoyang of Liaoning Province send greetings to Master.

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Teacher: Thank you all! (Applause)Question: Dafa disciples who have technical expertise, especially thosewho are eminent among ordinary people, are really jealous of each otherand have big egos. Master, please offer some guidance on this.Teacher: It's not that serious, is it? But I won't rule out unremoved attach-ments manifesting. If you haven't cultivated yourself well and have thosekinds of attachments, you need to get rid of them. Don't be conceited nomatter what special skills you have. Do you know that the only one whocan fully explain the whole cosmos and all of mankind is me, Li Hongzhi?No other being can possibly do that. (Applause) But I have never put onairs before you. So Dafa disciples, you must not get bigheaded if you've ac-quired some little human skills. They're nothing to get bigheaded about.The fact is, you've learned what you've learned because you had that wishand accordingly arrangements were made for you back in the past since itwould be needed in validating the Fa, that's all.Question: I feel as though right now time passes quickly every day and the-re are a lot of things I haven't been able to do well in a timely manner. In asharing on Minghui, a student said that when he's in a very good state he isable to do something well in a short period of time. Could Master pleasetalk about the issue of time?Teacher: This is actually still what I think: it's all right for our Dafa disci-ples to have human attachments, but how you manage to establish yourown righteous thoughts is what's key. If your righteous thoughts are strongand you're like a cultivator at every moment--or, instead of saying "everymoment," let's say when you come across certain things you can act as aDafa disciple does--then you'll know how to handle things, you will produ-ce miracles, you will demonstrate extraordinariness, you will be able to tellright from wrong, and you will be able to do everything well. (Applause)You're cultivators, after all. You are different from ordinary people. Eventhough you're all cultivating in delusion and it's hard to have many of Dafadisciples' things manifest, it's actually not as if you don't know anything. Ifyour righteous thoughts are strong supernormal things do manifest.Question: I brought with me some friends and children. Even thoughthey're seeing you they don't understand what you're saying. Are their mas-ter souls listening? Can they return to their homes?Teacher: You need to know that I'm teaching the Fa to Dafa disciples.(Master smiles/chuckles) If an ordinary person comes today he won't knowwhat I'm talking about, and for kids it's even harder. But human beings allhave a side of them that's aware; that side will know and will benefit fromit. But don't focus too much on these things. In the case of a person whocan't be saved, it's useless even though that other side of him is aware.Question: When it comes to the materials being used to clarify the truth topeople in China on a large scale, some students believe that "cultivation iswhat you handle, gong is what the master handles," so the selection of con-tent is not that important.

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Teacher: Then they've gone to another extreme. In validating the Fa youneed to do things rationally. How you make the selections and do thingsbetter, that's your validating the Fa and that's your blazing your own pathrighteously. If everything were done by me, you would've turned into a ty-pewriter, then why would I have you be Dafa disciples? You might as wellreincarnate as a typewriter, right? (People laugh)Question: Would you please tell us whether the people who will obtain theFa and cultivate in the future include Dafa disciples who haven't done wellenough during the Fa-rectification period?Teacher: No, they won't be included. I can give you a definite answer onthis. For this batch, this group--this is it.Question: Now disciples are very busy with their Dafa work. Is it necessaryto have disciples take time to write ordinary people's articles for use by anewspaper Dafa disciples run? Or should we try our best to use articlesthat have already been written by ordinary people?Teacher: I think that depends on your needs. However you handle it is fi-ne. Don't think that writing ordinary people's articles is not saving beings.You have a share in the saving of beings that results from everybody's col-lective efforts with that media outlet, even though what you wrote were or-dinary people's articles. (Applause) Of course, you won't be writing ordina-ry people's articles all the time, you'll do some other things that a Dafa dis-ciple should do, right?Question: Dafa disciples in both northern and southern California give theirregards to Master. Esteemed Master, some veteran students pursue super-normal abilities, energy, etc., and like to show off. And one person fell as-leep when he was doing the exercises and sending righteous thoughts, yetwhen we brought it to his attention with good intentions, he got angry. Wedon't know what to do about him.Teacher: If he gets angry, so be it. If he gets angry it means there's a pro-blem in his cultivation. Why should he be angry when he's done somethingwrong? Even if he's going to get angry, you still have to let him knowabout it with the intention of being responsible to him, in which case, justdon't worry about him getting angry. (Applause)What's the point of showing off supernormal abilities to Dafa disciples?What's there to show off? Why don't you show them off to the wicked darkminions? Wouldn't that be better? Haven't all of your abilities actually beengiven to you because you cultivate Dafa? Don't go showing things off to ot-her students, and don't feel smug and think you're so able--what can thoselittle abilities of yours do, anyway? Don't make Master reprimand you overthese things again--you should at least have some self-respect. You've beendriven by attachments so much that you're not seeing straight anymore. Ot-her than those few people who listen to you out of attachment when youshow off, do you realize how other students view you?As soon as you show those things off they become nothing. Don't be atta-ched to those things, and even less should you spread, with human attach-

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ments, among our students what you've seen. In fact, it's not that thosethings can't be discussed among cultivators, and it's not that you can't havesupernormal abilities. What's key is the intent behind the act. If it's used ina positive way it will benefit Dafa disciples; if it's to show off, you will beinterfering with them.Today Dafa disciples are consummating their incomparably high honorsand glory as well as Attainment Status as they validate the Fa. Nothing canget in the way--whoever gets in the way is committing a sin, and it's absolu-tely prohibited. If you refuse to listen to others the first or second time ithappens, and you carry on for a long time, then you must be doing that be-cause the old forces want to push you over to the other side--that will bethe kind of role you're playing. If you really reach that point, you will beconsidered beyond redemption. I don't acknowledge the old forces' arrange-ments. Master is rescuing and saving you and giving you second chances.Don't continue to be like that time and time again. If your divine powerstruly manifest in a magnificent way as you clarify the facts, save beings,and defy the persecution, then all the Dafa disciples and I will praise you.Isn't that so?The cosmic body is so immense that it's beyond description. There are a lotof things that I don't tell you. What you know is so trivial. When a veryhigh-level divine being sees the broadness and the enormity of a larger cos-mic body he is shocked and dumbfounded; you know, even a divine beingwill be like that. So when a human being learns a little bit about a larger di-mension, of course he gets stirred up by it. But Dafa disciples must be rati-onal.Question: The media outlets run by Dafa disciples are powerful and influ-ential overseas. At this, the final stage of the Fa-rectification, should thesemedia outlets be entering Mainland China on a large scale via our existingtruth-clarification channels, such as the Internet, postal mail, etc.? Also,should we consider the levels at which the Chinese people can understandand accept things? I ask because the people in Mainland China are diffe-rent from those overseas. They've been badly poisoned by the lies.Teacher: I'd say that the things we're doing right now are being done in arational way, for the most part. Whether it be people who live in MainlandChina or Chinese people outside the Mainland, they can both understand it.I think the way the media outlets are being run is fine. In terms of how theyreport on things and the articles they've written to clarify the truth, the peo-ple in Mainland China are fully able to understand and accept them.Right now it's still not feasible to fully target Mainland China. In the futurethe newspaper run by Dafa disciples will be the biggest newspaper in theentire world, (applause) because all those media that have made up lies ha-ve committed sins, and those people will have to pay for that, as will thosemedia of theirs.[Well, it looks like] I still answered all of your questions. (Applause) Hu-man society has gone through a process 100 million years long. And all

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beings have come for the Fa--all beings in the Three Realms came for theFa, were created for the Fa, and were formed for the Fa. That includes allthe myriad things. And everything in the human world has been revolvingaround Dafa, whether ordinary people sense it or not; whether you thinkthey're aware of it or not, everything is revolving around Dafa. That inclu-des all the people in the world today, regardless of whether they seem indif-ferent toward the persecution or concerned about it--they all revolve aroundDafa. The Fa-rectification requires that some people be in a certain statewhere they are sealed off and kept there so that the next batch of peoplewill be able to cultivate. In other words, even though everything appears tobe disorderly, it is in fact orderly, and everything is closely linked to theFa-rectification.Everything we're doing is magnificent. Everything Dafa disciples are doingis saving beings. And everything Dafa disciples are doing is simply unpre-cedented. It is magnificent because it's of Dafa, it's magnificent becauseDafa is establishing this batch of cultivators, and also because Dafa is beingspread in the Three Realms and in the human world and yet this tiny Earthis in fact having an impact on colossal cosmic bodies. Things appear to beordinary, and they don't look much different from ordinary people's things,but the mighty virtue corresponds to the highest cosmic body.Dafa disciples have already gone through such a difficult time. I hope thatall of you will walk the last leg of your journey well and treasure the jour-ney you've already completed. Everything of your future is shown in howyou validate the Fa. (About one minute of applause)1 Translator's note: This is a phrase commonly used to suggest that someone has complete control ofsomething, regardless of how hard others might try to change things or how things might appear to be.2 Translator's note: This is a translation of two lines from Hong Yin, Master Li’s book of poetry.3 Translator's note: These two sentences are a sort of play on words. The Chinese character "bei" consistsof two parts, one that can be understood as "nothing" and the other as "feeling."4 Translator's note: The Chinese term rendered here as "perfect and complete" is sometimes translated as"harmonize."5 Translator's note: The Chinese term rendered here as "base" is sometimes translated as "inborn quality."Editor's note: The translation is subject to further improvement so as to be closer to the original text.Last updated: May 2, 2004.

Teaching the Fa on Easter, 2004, at the NewYork Fa Conference

(Li Hongzhi, April 11, 2004)

Hello! (Audience: Hello Master! Applause)We have a grand occasion here. (Applause) A lot of people have come tothis Fa conference, about four thousand it seems. (Master laughs) Lookingat the current situation, I'd say that when it comes to the Fa-rectification'soverall state, Dafa disciples have done extremely well in the Three Realms,and they've played a crucial role. Master thanks you all for this. (Warm ap-plause)

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Over these few years we have been under severe persecution. The Fa-recti-fication is by nature a serious thing that affects all living things. The cos-mic body is infinitely large, and the number of beings is measureless--somany they're countless. Even on a tiny particle there are measureless,countless beings. Then how many beings does such an enormous cosmicbody have? Fa-rectification impacts something that huge, and yet the oldforces, along with some low-level beings they're using, and whatnot, are in-terfering with Fa-rectification, attached as they are to their wants, and areusing every conceivable means to try to steer the Fa-rectification. The sin ishuge. It's actually clear to me that, in essence, the old forces and those fi-nal, final old beings want to use this Fa-rectification to eliminate and weedout the beings they don't want kept, and that's why they make some beingsinterfere with Fa-rectification. Even a little disruption or bit of disrespecttowards Dafa by the old forces or a being who isn't able to see Dafa theright way--and not one of them is outside of this--will mean they can't re-main. Ultimately those high-level old factors want to dispose of those nu-merous beings that they don't want, and that's why they let loose and direc-ted a huge number of beings to do things that interfere with Fa-rectifica-tion. On a fundamental level they know that no being at any level can harmthe Fa-rectification. While I'm controlling the fundamental things, those fi-nal beings in their respective realms are overseeing the safety of this affairout of self-protection, and the number of beings they want to weed out isdownright huge.Very early on in the Fa-rectification I realized something: Whenever I wantto clear away any group of beings at any level, there's not much to say ordo--one thought disintegrates everything, and it's extremely quick. Howe-ver, in the Fa-rectification, keeping certain beings, that's just extremelyhard to do, with challenges piled atop one another; beings that have interfe-red with the Fa-rectification aren't qualified to stay now, having interferedwith Fa-rectification as they did. So in the Fa-rectification, once a beinggets involved and has the effect of interfering, which I don't accept, it's indire peril. I'm talking in essential terms here. In this process, in all realms,and at all levels, the beings that affect the Fa-rectification all act in theirown specific ways, and they are different in their levels and realms; andbeing in the realms they are in, they have different understandings of Fa-rectification. That's because the chaos resulting from the different unders-tandings of the Fa-rectification at the vast number of levels, and held by thevast number of beings, has fully reflected the actions of the multitude of de-generate beings in the final stage of the old Fa's law of formation-stasis-de-generation-destruction.So what does "a measureless number of beings" mean? Think about this:Even with any ethnic group or country on this tiny Earth, whenever some-thing happens there are going to be plenty of people who are for it andplenty against it, and people will have all sorts of takes on it. Then with thecosmos--such a gigantic cosmic body--and Fa-rectification--such a major

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thing--and when the situation is that beings don't realize what danger thegreat firmament is in or the peril all beings face, and when it's that Fa-recti-fication involves the vital interests of all beings, you can imagine howbeings will react differently and how complicated it all is. A lot of studentshave been thinking, "So with validating the Fa, if I could see what happensin other dimensions I could do better." But the fact is, in a few cases wherepeople have their Third Eye open and can see those things, they're actuallymore apt to get interfered with. For a few people their attachments causedwhat they saw to interfere with their cultivation and validating the Fa.That's why I think that during this period, the best way to go is to ensure agreat deal of Fa-study. If each Dafa disciple can evaluate everything withthe Fa, you'll go about things in an even more upright way, and then ourstudents won't be prone to problems, whether they can see [other dimen-sions] or not. That's because with the Fa here, you can just go by the Fa'srequirements. No matter what states other beings are in, none of their va-rious, ever-changing, complex manifestations can interfere with a Dafa dis-ciple.So looking at the current situation, the whole mighty current of Fa-rectifi-cation is getting closer and closer to the outermost surface, and closer andcloser to what is highest, final, largest, and most central. I've said that manyprophecies aren't accurate in their depiction of the final times; they wereplenty accurate about the course of things along the way, but they're off themark toward the end. The reason is, even though our cosmic system is im-mense beyond compare, the concept of the multitude of cosmic bodiesalong with the incalculable number of beings that I've talked about, they'reall within this system. And this persecution that the old-being-formed for-ces arranged to "test" Dafa disciples, along with the specific reasons thatthe old forces came about, the Fa-rectification itself, the beings to be saved,and so on, they're all within this [system's] scope. But this enormous cos-mos of ours, no matter how big it is, it's not the only thing there is in thecosmos; there are factors beyond this cosmos, and those factors all have todo with the fundamental issue of whether or not the cosmos can exist. Tho-se factors are even more microcosmic, and all of the changes [that have un-folded] have been caused by those enormous factors being affected in theFa-rectification.In other words, it's a question of whether this cosmos can exist indepen-dently after I'm done with Fa-rectification. To give an analogy, if you holda ball in mid-air, once you let go it will fall, and once you let go of a bal-loon it will fly away. These analogies aren't all that accurate, it's just to giveyou the idea; in fact it's not quite like that. The factors beyond the cosmosneeded to be worked on too, but whatever the case, working on those thingsduring the Fa-rectification is no longer an issue. Those factors are not wit-hin the range of the gigantic cosmic body of this cosmic system of ours.Everything that was to be done during the Fa-rectification as well as the oldforces' arrangements, and this includes how all the beings would act, are

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within this range. The issues beyond this range no longer exist. But theirexistence caused a separation in the microcosm, and that separation is kee-ping the final, surfacemost human world separated. Right now the Fa-recti-fication is already in the process of resolving these problems. After the pro-blems are resolved, then basically everything is resolved. In the last Fa lec-ture I said that actually this cosmos has already been completed, and that'swhat I meant.Even though more than four years have gone by, the persecution hasn't en-ded, and that's because the final reasons have yet to be completely resolved.But the overall situation has undergone tremendous changes. As you'veseen, the evil factors have become very, very few, and the dark minionsthat I asked you to clear away, those bad gods that made their way into theThree Realms, they too have been cleared away to the point that only a feware left. And along with this, outside of the Three Realms some high-levelbeings that have played a negative role are in the process of being clearedaway. So as things now stand, because the forces that affect the Fa-rectifi-cation have been shrinking, and all of the disruptive factors in the ThreeRealms have been greatly reduced, the people in this world are becomingever more awake. And it's not just the people in this world--all beings inthe Three Realms are waking up and thinking things over for themselves.There are still some people whose heads are somewhat foggy due to theevil's propaganda, but when you do a good job explaining things as you cla-rify the truth, people will immediately get it since there is no more evil'scontrol at work.In the process of clarifying the truth, Dafa disciples are indeed playing animportant role, and they've done a great job. Your circumstances are quitetough; even other people know that Falun Gong has no money. Some Dafadisciples are in straitened circumstances. But in this situation, you still needto consider the image you project in society and to everyday people, becau-se a Dafa disciple needs to be a good person wherever he is, right? So outin ordinary society, at work, in the family, or in whatever interactions itmay be, you should leave people with a positive image of Dafa disciples.Your resources are limited, and that's why it is so trying and hard to do. Buteven so, we still need to make our Fa-rectification path a straight andupright one and we cannot go astray. If we're to make it a straight one,then, well, you know, there's only one path that is straight, and just one stepoff the path means going amiss. We cannot go astray, and this means ourpath is none too wide or easy to walk, it seems. You can't do as you pleaseor do whatever you want--if that were the case, the Fa wouldn't be righ-teous. You need to make your path of validating the Fa a straight andupright one. Every single step, every single thing, including a Dafa disci-ple's words and actions, and your conduct in every respect out in societymust be upright. As far as this goes, Dafa disciples as a whole have basical-ly managed to do that, and the image of Dafa disciples that's been presentedto the world's people is a good one. Now the members of society are quite

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clear on this and they know that Dafa disciples are all good people, and notjust good people but the best bunch of people. The fact that the people inthis world can recognize this is the result of our Dafa disciples' great sacri-fices and laborious efforts validating the Fa; it's only with these that theworld's people have come to recognize it. There's such a vast number ofbeings, there are more than 7 billion people in this world, and relative tothe entire world, Dafa disciples are but a drop in the ocean. So how muchsacrifice did you have to make to achieve this? How much effort did youhave to expend? Extraordinary, just extraordinary! (Applause)Because the world's people have woken up, right now this persecution thatthe evil created is getting harder and harder to sustain. Around the globethe evil beings are losing the environment they need to do evil, and in Chi-na too they are losing the environment they need. You've seen and heardabout this, and in doing work to clarify the truth you have come to knowthis full well. Right now in Mainland China a lot of people are extremelyannoyed by this persecution. Of course, there are some people who don'tknow the truth yet, and in this situation those beings are waiting for our Da-fa disciples to further bring the Good News and the truth of the situation.But there are always going to be some people who just aren't up to par. Ifeveryone were up to par then there wouldn't be a Fa-rectification. If all ofthe beings in the cosmos were up to par, then there really wouldn't havebeen any validating of the Fa. It's exactly because they aren't up to par thatthey really do exhibit the state and behavior of the beings of the past cos-mos during the last stage of formation-stasis-degeneration-destruction.Because the Fa-rectification hasn't ended yet, even though people are wa-king up to the persecution of Dafa disciples, the morality of the world'speople is still declining fast, and that's extremely scary. The longer the endtime drags out, when it comes to saving the beings of the future... Thatdoesn't pose a challenge for me, and even if you've fallen down into Hell Icould still do it, but whether it'd still be worth doing and whether it couldstill be done, that would be a question. While Dafa disciples clarify thetruth, when they allow the world's people to see the truth, that has the dualeffect of stopping man's moral decline, to some extent.Of course, Dafa disciples and I don't acknowledge anything that has to dowith the old forces. Dafa has forged the Dafa disciples, and Dafa discipleswill definitely safeguard the Fa as they cultivate. But, the ability of Dafadisciples to validate the Fa isn't for the purpose of enduring this persecu-tion, and even less is it for clarifying the truth among the world's people. Ionly asked Dafa disciples to clarify the truth because persecution has takenplace and has caused this situation. To put it more clearly, Dafa disciplesdon't exist in order to clarify the truth; we do that because the old forcescaused this persecution and we were left with no choice. We are makinguse of this persecution while we defy it, and we are establishing even grea-ter mighty virtue for Dafa disciples as we clarify the truth. What Dafa disci-ples have given absolutely will not be in vain.

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As you know, there is a law that's part of both the old cosmos's Laws andthe new cosmos's Laws: No matter what kind of hardship a being enduresor what blessing he receives in any dimension of the cosmos or in any envi-ronment, there will be payback--either a reward for good or retribution forevil, and that's for sure, absolutely. Then since Dafa disciples have done somuch for the beings, none of their enormous sacrifices while being wronglypersecuted were endured in vain, that's certain. So what awaits Dafa disci-ples in the future is sure to be most, most wonderful. (Applause) No matterhow many beings there are doing evil, the suffering and persecution theyhave imposed on Dafa disciples--no matter what the motive or what the me-ans--will bring those beings the most severe and most terrifying consequen-ces, and that's for the persecuting they did. This kind of payback is the retri-bution they get for committing the greatest sin--interfering with the Fa-rec-tification--and what's in store for them are the most horrible things. WithDafa disciples, on the other hand, even though they've endured all kinds ofinterference and persecution, what Dafa disciples have gained from it is amost distinguished, most magnificent, and highest mighty virtue that willlast forever and ever. (Applause)The journey of Fa-rectification won't go on for long, it won't always be likethis. So those Dafa disciples who, during this period of time, have made itthrough, have managed to do very well, and have managed to walk theirown paths well despite all kinds of things interfering, they have all establis-hed their own mighty virtue. Each of the true Dafa disciples has done whathe should do, and has established all that is best for a being in the future.With that much achieved, I can now rest assured, and I no longer worryabout whether you can make it through. (Applause) What's transpired isproof that you have made it through. In the future, when you look back,[you'll see that] this path was brilliant and promising, magnificent, andsomething that's never existed--even since the beginning of time. You cantalk about how such-and-such number of the cosmos's gods came down tothe world before to save people and established such-and-such mighty vir-tue, but I'll tell you, my true Dafa disciples: Your future mighty virtue willsurpass that of any god who came to this world before at any point in histo-ry, (applause) for you today are part of Fa-rectification. You need to treasu-re it--you have to treasure the path you've walked. Only when you treasurethe steps you've taken can you do well on the path ahead. Not much of thejourney is left. Do even better on your path and do things even more righ-teously.During this persecution every Dafa disciple has become clearheaded and ra-tional. Back when I'd just started to impart the Fa, as I looked at the peoplein the audience, I was thinking about something. At the time, those people'sheads had few righteous thoughts in them, and it was even rare for them tohave their true, own thoughts. Human beings are influenced by all kinds ofideas out in society, and with their postnatal concepts they form fixed ideasabout various things in the human world. And what's more, some outside

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factors control and interfere with people. That's the kind of beings I facedback then. At that time when many students said "Dafa is great," they we-ren't sincere, and some people had some doubts about the huge changestheir bodies were going through. As I looked at those beings, I would thinkto myself, "Can they do it? Will they be able to come out of that statethey're in?" And then there were factors in their cultivation path that wouldbring interference to their cultivation and my Fa-rectification. How hardthat was! Back then I thought about this all the time. But now I'm not wor-ried about those things anymore. Those Dafa disciples who have made itthrough the persecution, I'll tell you, they've become more and more coo-lheaded and more and more aware of what they're doing, their righteousthoughts are getting ever stronger, and their awareness is increasingly clear.Not only have I stopped worrying about those things, I'm even happy to seethe state you're in. (Enthusiastic applause) These beings have truly becomeaware, and their lives are now in the hands of their own righteous thoughts.On top of that, they're beings that are cultivating themselves in the Fa-recti-fication and who are clear about the paths they want to take and clear aboutthe goal and meaning of their existence. How extraordinary. So looking atthe present situation, I don't worry about anything now, and I know that thefurther we go the better you will do. In validating the Fa, you are the oneswho've come up with many of the ideas, and you've resolved many a pro-blem yourselves. And with validating the Fa, you are thinking about how todo well validating the Fa, this most magnificent task, and Dafa disciples theworld over are thinking about their shared tasks. You're all cooperating to-gether, discussing, and debating and analyzing things with each other to co-me up with the best approaches. Whatever the case, this is Dafa disciples'unique way of cultivating, and it's something history has never had before.(Applause)Today is Easter, the day of a god's resurrection! (Enthusiastic applause)This is all I'll say today. On this special, glorious day, may Dafa disciples'divine sides also be resurrected! (Long period of enthusiastic applause)

Be Clearheaded

If you, as a student [of Dafa], do not follow Master's requirements, it is de-finitely no simple thing. The old forces have arranged for all Dafa disciplesa set of their things, so if a Dafa disciple doesn't follow Master's require-ments, he must be following the old forces' arrangements. The old forcesare in essence gigantic trials and tribulations that accompany you at all ti-mes, focused on whether in Fa-rectification Dafa disciples are able to stepforward.If after going through this ordeal some students are still not clearheaded,then they will miss [the opportunities presented in] all of this. Only when

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you follow Master's requirements are you validating the Fa and cultivatingyourself as a Dafa disciple, and only then are you a true Dafa disciple.Li HongzhiMay 8, 2004Comment on a student's article

Teaching the Fa at the Meeting with Asia-Pacif-Teaching the Fa at the Meeting with Asia-Pacif-Teaching the Fa at the Meeting with Asia-Pacif-ic Studentsic Studentsic Students  

(Li Hongzhi, April 12, 2004, in New York)

Question: Some coordinators aren't able to listen to different opinions.They've become like the bureaucrats found among everyday people.Teacher: Coordinators have to be willing and able to listen to different opi-nions. But if you think about the coordinators, they're cultivators too andthey're not perfect. Some students wonder, "Why don't we pick whoever issmartest and who's cultivated best in our area to be the coordinator?" (Au-dience laughs) It doesn't work that way. And why don't I come out and dothings directly myself? I want to leave you with the opportunity of Con-summating and forging mighty-virtue. If I were to do everything, or to tellyou how to handle each specific thing and you just followed my direction,sure the coordination would be good, since [you'd think,] "That's what Mas-ter told us. There are no if's, and's, or but's about it. Let's just follow Mas-ter." But would you have any mighty-virtue then? What would you haveforged? Would you have walked your own path in the face of challenges orhardship? Only when you find ways to do things well as you validate theFa and meet with challenges, and when your success comes from your ownefforts--only that is extraordinary.The coordinators among Dafa disciples are in fact just coordinators, pointsof contact, and people who relay information. Don't think of them as Mas-ter, and don't have such high expectations that you rely on them as you cul-tivate and expect them to handle everything just right. It's not like that. Ifthe coordinator were really like Master, or able to consider things from allangles and never be wrong, then a lot of people in that area couldn't cultiva-te successfully, since with him thinking things through so well there'd benothing left for you to think about. If he were to do everything just rightyou wouldn't have a chance to show your great qualities. You see the idea,right?Actually, long ago I told the regional coordinators to manage things loose-ly, and that, except when it comes to group efforts, which need coordina-tion, they shouldn't restrict the path that each Dafa disciple takes as an indi-vidual who's validating the Fa. So other than when it's a case of somethingbad for Dafa and the coordinator needs to put a stop to it, each Dafa disci-ple has to fully play his role and proactively do what he should as a Dafadisciple. As you go about validating the Fa, whatever you think of, see, en-

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counter, or can recognize, go ahead and do it, and only then are you wal-king your own path and forging your own mighty-virtue. Isn't that how itworks? (Applause)With some students, I'm finding that they're still fixated on the coordina-tors, thinking, "How come this coordinator just isn't up to par?" (Masterlaughs) If the coordinator were indeed really good and could think of eve-rything ahead of time, then I think the other students in that region wouldreally have no way to put their skills and abilities to work. If a certain re-gion is doing well, then it's definitely something like this: the coordinatorsjust say that something needs to be done, and Dafa disciples, of their owninitiative, coordinate with each other and overcome the challenges together,fully utilizing Dafa disciples' wisdom, to get it done well and in a more ide-al way. Even when the coordinators don't think things through too well orhave even overlooked some things, the Dafa disciples will perfect it alongthe way--and that is your mighty-virtue. Don't get resentful when things aretough, and don't think that you need to have people see what you're doing.Master can see everything you do, and so can all gods. When you have do-ne well that's your own, eternal mighty-virtue.In your cultivation you can't always look at others. You need to look atyourselves, and cultivate yourselves. When there's a problem, examineyourself and try to find the problem on your part. When you see that some-thing is lacking, figure out how you can do each thing well, keep your thin-king right along the way, and manifest the righteous thoughts and righteousactions of a Dafa disciple when faced with challenges--now that is extraor-dinary. And as a Dafa disciple, that is your validating the Fa with righteousthoughts, and only then are you truly worthy of being a Dafa disciple.Question: Some countries in the Asia-Pacific region have close ties withthe evil, and the disparity in how we've done saving sentient beings is huge.Teacher: Just do however much you can, and do things that are withinyour ability and where conditions are ripe. You can hold off in areas wherethe evil is rampant--that's okay and not our students' fault. Of course, whe-rever there are no Dafa disciples there will be problems saving lives in thefuture; since you're Dafa disciples you will think of this. Do things accor-ding to the situation, do however much you can, and when it comes to thethings you can't do, we'll see what we can do later on.Question: When we don't have any [preconceived] notions or preset plans,the effect of validating the Fa is excellent, and when the opposite is true theeffect is poor.Teacher: Yes, with a lot of things you do, when you are free of human no-tions your own attachments won't get mixed in. If, beyond being responsi-ble to the Fa, you have no human attachments, none of your own things,and none of your personal factors mixed in, then you are sure to do thatthing well. Whereas once you've mixed in your own factors, then you can'tdo that thing well.There's something you must pay attention to: you are validating the Fa, not

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validating yourselves. A Dafa disciple's responsibility is to validate the Fa.Validating the Fa is cultivation, and what you remove in the cultivationprocess is none other than the attachment to self; you can't, instead, go andexacerbate the problem of validating oneself, even if you do it unwittingly.When you're validating the Fa and cultivating, that is a process of removingself, and only when you do that are you really validating yourself. That'sbecause ultimately you have to let go of all your human things, and only af-ter you've let go of all your human attachments can you step out from thethrongs of everyday people.You are a cultivator, so you need to have mighty-virtue. And where doesyour mighty-virtue come from? Doesn't it come from letting go of self andbeing selfless in this grueling environment, and being completely responsi-ble to the Fa as a Dafa disciple? Isn't that, itself, mighty-virtue? And what'smore, you did it in a grueling environment. The more you put you first ormix in [factors of] self, the less mighty-virtue you have, and that's why it isless likely that you succeed at things or do them well. Dafa's things shouldbe the most sacred, and that's why the less you have of your own notionsand involve your own factors, the better you can handle them and the morelikely you are to succeed.Question: Can we include photos of Master going through the exercises inthe big poster boards we use to display the truth about Dafa?Teacher: I don't think it's a problem if it's meant to clarify the truth--andhaven't you done that already? (Audience laughs)Question: (Teacher: I won't read out loud all of the courteous words beforethe questions, okay?) The television media outlet that was created by Dafadisciples needs manpower, material resources, and money to operate forthe long haul. And fellow cultivators at the TV station often say to me, sinceI'm a Taiwanese disciple, "There are 300 to 500 thousand people in Tai-wan cultivating Dafa, so when the TV station needs help we shouldn't al-ways have a hard time finding people." Master, could Taiwan focus moreon the medium of television to clarify the truth?Teacher: Those who know the technology or have the special skills, whet-her they're from Taiwan or elsewhere, they are usually welcome, for sure.Question: When the progress of a translation gets bogged down, is it due tointerference?Teacher: Usually the specific things Dafa disciples do are related to theirown cultivation, and are, at the same time, related to their circumstances.With specific things like this you still need to discuss together and figureout how to handle them better and walk your own paths. None of the fo-reign-language Dafa books were translated by me (Master laughs, audiencelaughs), and every Dafa disciple who is involved shoulders different res-ponsibilities. The translation work isn't assigned by somebody. It's all doneby people actively discussing [to arrive at their best translation] and coordi-nating with each other. So just figure out how to do it better. In everythingyou do, you are validating the Fa and cultivating yourselves, and those are

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all things you should do.Question: Should we be selective about admitting students to a Minghuischool? (Audience laughs) Master, please give us some guidance on this.Teacher: What I think is, you are running a school now, so you shouldn'tbe selective about admission. Actually, you know, Dafa is about cultivationonly--Dafa has nothing but cultivation. And even though today the path ofcultivation Dafa disciples take is different--in order to clarify the truth, tosave more of the world's people, to keep the persecution in check, and soon, some students have gotten together and started up media outlets or donethis or that--none of that is part of Dafa itself. Those are cases of studentswalking their own paths validating the Fa, and those are things created bythe students themselves. So that too forges your mighty-virtue, and it's re-markable .Since it's not part of Dafa, then it must be part of ordinary society, and so itshould align with ordinary society. Who you're saving are the lives in ordi-nary society, so all the more so you need to come closer to ordinary societyand have your media outlets become something the general public loves tosee and hear. Only that way can you achieve a better effect.The same is true for Minghui schools. Dafa itself doesn't have schools, butDafa disciples are saving sentient beings and clarifying the truth, are lea-ving behind the best things for the people of the future, the beings of the fu-ture, and they are nurturing new, young Dafa disciples. So what it comesdown to is, what you are doing are all good things. Then since you aredoing good things for sentient beings, you can't make distinctions betweenwho can enter and who can't. Wouldn't it be better to admit more peoplefrom ordinary society? Put differently, if you want to move toward havinga positive cycle--it's draining to always have Dafa disciples fund it--thenyou have to be rooted in society and get into a positive cycle. That's theway to go.Question: Can we set up a Minghui class within the educational system andat an existing school?Teacher: Just do it according to your circumstances and however you do itshould be fine. There are no restrictions or set schemes when it comes todoing good things for sentient beings. Whether it be you setting up a Ming-hui school or holding Minghui classes yourself, or maybe you're a teacherand you teach the students according to Zhen-Shan-Ren in class, there's noproblem with any of that. And of course, setting up a Minghui school is justa great thing. Now that they've been set up, I hope you will run them betterand better, make them bigger and bigger, and set up more and more ofthem. They are, for all beings, a blessing, and for the evil beings, it clearsthem away.Question: There are often people who come to learn Falun Gong in order toapply for asylum. How should we handle these things?Teacher: (Teacher laughs) Actually, that's really a disgrace for the Chinesegovernment. How come it's not people from other countries applying for

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asylum? (Audience laughs) Why are so many people from China applyingfor asylum? Isn't China claiming to be "strong"? Ever heard of a strong na-tion having so many people flee it to become asylees? Sounds like that"strong" bit is bogus.Looking at it another way, all motives aside, if people want a chance to re-main in the United States or in another developed country, the easiest wayright now is to apply for asylum using the name of Falun Gong. I've heardthere are seminars in New York City's Chinatown on applying for asylum,and (audience laughs) they specifically teach in there how to learn FalunGong. Of course, they're not really teaching people Falun Gong. They'retelling people how many movements there are, how many exercises, andwhat books there are in Falun Gong, along with what the immigration offi-cer will ask in his test (audience laughs). That's what they are doing.Anyway, once somebody applies for asylum in the name of Falun Gong, hehas given his future to Falun Gong. That's because he is changing his fateusing Falun Gong's name--whether he's aware of it or not. That's putting itin ordinary human terms. The truth is, everyone came here for Dafa, and ifthe whole world came for Dafa, then of course it's no big deal if they bene-fit a little from Dafa. So go ahead, then. (Teacher laughs) As long as the lo-cal government doesn't object, we won't either.However, when somebody has gained political asylum using Falun Gong'sname, he is indebted to Falun Gong since it changed his fate. Then that per-son absolutely cannot be against Falun Gong, or he'll be severing his future.There is nothing more dangerous. So with people like him, it's fine if theycome to learn the practice or do the exercises, but along the way you shouldtell them about what's at stake: "Make sure you don't get involved in perse-cuting Falun Gong, don't even think about doing that. This is for your owngood. I'm telling you this only because you want to use Falun Gong; other-wise I wouldn't say anything."Question: I, a disciple, would like to write in the form of poetry to assistMaster in Fa-rectification. I'd like to ask Master, how can I improve mycreativity and writing skills?Teacher: Actually, I know that what you want to ask is how you can enrichyour wisdom to good effect validating the Fa. If you have the foundationthat's needed, you will be able to compose good pieces, for sure, whereas ifyou're completely lacking one you'll have a certain amount of trouble atfirst. For example, if you want to write Tang-style poems then you need tofirst learn about things like what Tang poetry is like, [or similarly,] whatSong verse is like or what Yuan drama and verse are like, and then you cantry to compose something. Since you're a Dafa disciple, perhaps when youreally want to do that, you will be able to, and well, and you will definitelystart off more quickly and mature faster than others, for sure. There are se-veral Dafa disciples who write poetry very fast and without much effort;when they want to compose something they can just compose it right away.With ordinary people, though, it's a big strain for them to compose some-

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thing, and they have to get in the right mood and think of some approach orother. But with Dafa disciples things should go quickly, whatever it maybe. When you let go of self even more, your wisdom for validating the Fawill naturally come forth.Question: Recently you mentioned that certain words in your writings needto be revised. Can we directly paste the correct words over the old ones,instead of scratching the old ones off?Teacher: Actually it's fine however you do it, as long as you correct them.The students in Mainland China don't have the means to do this. I knowthat in the past, most of the books printed in Mainland China used news-print, and it was pretty thick, so it won't be damaged if you scratch it lightlywith a thin blade. I'm just giving you an idea. You don't have to do it thatway. (Audience laughs)Question: Out of economic interests, some Asian governments pretend theydon't see the persecution that's happening in China. Should we put moreeffort into helping them see the truth about China's economy?Teacher: You can do anything as long as it benefits sentient beings. Peoplethink about things differently, and they have different norms they live by.Some people might not consider material gain that important, and you willget good results after they learn the facts. But I know human beings tend tobe tempted by material interests.So let me talk a little about the people in this world. Material interests arenecessarily the driving force for lives of the past, who are selfish. Theworld's people just live for and are driven by self-interest. And more thananything self-interest can make a person agonize or feel happy, but even ifsomebody fulfills his desires, what he gains isn't something everlasting forhim, or something concrete and real. Besides, no matter how hard humanbeings fight for such things, it's not truly in their hands, since a person'swhole life in this world was determined far in advance, and gods controlevery step a human being takes. No matter what a person wants, thatdoesn't count, though a person's pursuits can become attachments. Theworld's people invariably do things out of self-interest, even though theycan't really achieve what they want. That's how human beings are. Regar-dless of whether human beings can obtain something, they will act on it,and that's human behavior. And it wouldn't work if they just sat there andwaited for good things to drop in their laps--human beings have to dothings. When it's something that belongs to a person, he has to work to getit; and when it's something that doesn't belong to him, out of attachmentshe'll labor to get it just the same. That's how human beings are. The truth is,beyond being attached, while human beings live in this world they are ne-ver able to take their fate into their own hands. There's no way they can getwhatever they want. For a person to get something, it has to be somethingthat's preordained as part of his life; if it's not preordained for him he willnever have it. I've said before that two things can change a human being'slife. One is cultivation, and the other is for that being to start declining.

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Those things can change a person's life. Besides them there's no other wayfor a person to change his life.So then for a human being what's the meaning of life? It's to experience thefeeling you get from being attached to self-interest and enjoying the courseof a human life soaked in emotion. Think about how pitiful that is, andwhat kind of feeling that really is. They're happy when they get somethingand miserable when they lose it; when they eat meat they find it tasty, andwhen they eat candy they find it sweet... but in the human world there's al-so bitter, biting, and painful things, there are the feelings young people ha-ve which come from emotional attachments, and then there are the feelingspeople in different social strata have as they chase after, gain, or lose thingsover the course of their lives--even though those gains and losses aren'tsomething that really come from effort. That's how people are when they li-ve in this world. People are so pitiable! And yet people just can't seethrough this so-called "reality," nor do they want to.Now for gods, if they're going to make all those feelings human beings ha-ve in this world intense, there have to be some factors involved. For exam-ple, they created emotions and feelings for human beings; they gave them apair of eyes that can't see the true picture of the cosmos, and the illusion ofmaterial things; and of course there are a lot of other factors. Only thencould they make people attached to enjoying these feelings, feelings thatgods give man alone, and intensify such feelings. So to have people expe-rience such intense feelings, it was also necessary to make people desirethat feeling one has when he gets what he wants. To put it plainly, the liveshuman beings lead are really just motivated by self-interest--it's self-inte-rest that keeps a person going. Out of self-interest two people will fight; outof self-interest two nations will battle; and out of self-interest a World Warcan break out. It's because humans have this attachment, this desire, of self-interest. And exactly because these factors exist, it's easy for gods to con-trol things.Don't people talk about human rights, freedom of belief, and whatnot thesedays? Dafa disciples have seen--as cultivators all of you can see clearly--that nothing here in the human world is reliable, and when self-interest isinvolved those things are just scrapped. In the West aren't a lot of countriesworking for democracy, freedom of belief, and human rights? It seems likea sign of modernity's progress, but then when they're enticed by self-inte-rest, how many governments speak out against those vile gangsters in Chi-na who are persecuting Falun Gong students? What we've seen is, theydon't dare to confront the issue, even though many areas that are alwaysthought of as markers of "progress"--such as human rights, freedom of be-lief, and so on--are being abused. When self-interest is involved they turnso lifeless and weak, they ignore what they see, and they don't dare tospeak out. All of that talk about democracy, freedom of belief, and... allthose things people hold in such high esteem and advocate for so stronglyinstantly become meaningless when material gain is on the line.

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As Dafa disciples, you should be clearer about this: we can't be attached toanything in this world. We cultivate while conforming as much as possibleto ordinary society, and even when we're clarifying the truth now via thingslike human rights and freedom of belief, that's still to save sentient beings,that's all. Back when Communism came along, weren't people fanaticalabout it for a while, and didn't a lot of people think it was society makingprogress? It's not enough for you, a cultivator, to just be detached from thehuman things here--you need to also be sober about them.I'm not saying you should oppose those things. That should be clear to aDafa disciple. What I'm doing is conveying, telling you, a truth of the Fa.For mankind to reach this point today, to be able to rationally reduce peo-ple's suffering, there's nothing wrong with that on man's part. But what canpeople really accomplish? Actually, being irrational when self-interest is in-volved is also something under the control of gods. And that's why whenyou clarify the truth to the government or the business sector, you'll get thefeeling that people definitely make their own practical interests the priority,business people will definitely be thinking about their own company's fi-nancial status, since for them those things are the most important. Whenyou go and clarify the truth to them, they don't want to listen when thething at hand affects their vital self-interest. I've seen that, too. But peopleare different, and like I just said, there are people who live by differentprinciples. That's how it is. You can go and do that [form of truth clarifica-tion], but you need to be perfectly clear on things, and you need to knowhow mankind is.Question: As your disciple, I'd like to ask, why was it arranged in history tohave Hong Kong and Macau exist in Mainland China under the form of"one country, two systems"? What is the historical origin of these places?Teacher: In terms of their historical origin, they are part of China's territo-ry. On this point, you can't say they're another country's territory. As for"one country, two systems," since everyone knows that Party is no good,and they themselves even know everybody thinks that way, well, whilethey wanted to take the territories back and have them ruled by the Party,they also knew that Hong Kong and Macau wouldn't agree to it, nor wouldthe world, so that resulted in, "one country, two systems." (Audiencelaughs) It's really a shameful thing. How come when other countries hadterritory returned they didn't keep two systems? Isn't it because people don'tlike that stuff of yours?Question: Is the real purpose of having "one country, two systems" to givethe Chinese people a chance to learn the true situation?Teacher: Of course, nothing happens by accident, and nothing happens justfor one reason. When gods arrange something they don't think like humansdo. When they arrange something, the issues involved are huge and all-en-compassing. When human beings look at the world, they do so from amidstone level of particles. For example, this world that human beings see is bet-ween two types of particles--molecules and planets--and they look at this

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world from amidst the particles that are made up of molecules. Gods aredifferent. A god looks at, within the scope of his abilities, the outcomes ofwhat will happen with all the particles in the cosmos as they relate to onething. They look at things multi-dimensionally and from all perspectives,and that's why multiple goals are achieved by the things they arrange.Also, even with how it is, human beings aren't even allowed to see everyt-hing in this world that's formed by this level of particles. The reason being,if they let humans see everything, there would be a lot that science couldn'texplain, and then people would believe in gods even if you didn't let them.So in order to keep human beings from seeing this world with perfect clari-ty, they had to create for human beings a pair of eyes like this. Since humanbeings' eyes are made up of molecular particles, why is it that they stillcan't see some things that are made up of molecular particles and withinthis scope? That's because they set up a lot of obstacles for man. The realpurpose of the two systems is to meet the design-needs of the world in thishistorical period. I've talked about these things before.Question: I often use the literary form of poetry to write truth-clarificationarticles for Dafa websites, and sometimes, to express the inner meaning ofvalidating the Fa, I didn't strictly follow the rules and forms of classical po-etic composition. Was it wrong to do that? If it is done to accurately ex-press inner meaning, it's not necessary to strictly adhere to the rules andforms of classical poetic composition or stick to conventions--is this un-derstanding correct?Teacher: You want to break their rules--is that what you're saying? Actual-ly, that's precisely modern man's mentality after his morality has declined--that is, going against tradition and what's orthodox. I'm not talking aboutyou here. I'm saying that in terms of the Fa that is where mankind is rightnow. The truth is, mankind is spiraling downward and growing ignorant.Chinese culture is something gods passed down to man, and every dynas-ty's culture, including its poetry--be it Tang poetry, Song verse, or Yuandrama and verse--they're all forms of culture that different cosmic bodiesbrought to human beings when they came to form karmic connections. So,if you want to compose those things it's best to follow their rules. If yousay, "I don't like rhyming," well, if you don't like rhyming then there areprose poems nowadays, so you can write prose poems. Those don't havetoo much that needs to be followed, and they are in keeping with modernforms. But actually, I think those poems are too bland and don't have anydeeper meaning. The poems composed with ancient forms are, on the otherhand, something you can savor.Question: I'd like to send you greetings on behalf of Chongqing Dafa disci-ples and to pass along their thoughts. They asked me to make sure to relaythem to you.Teacher: Thank you all. (Applause) Master is fully aware. Tell them thatMaster is fully aware.Question: Some disciples are taking some wrong turns after being impriso-

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ned in a labor camp, and other disciples are quite anxious and worriedabout their state. How should we help them?Teacher: If they should be helped, help them. Lies are easy to expose.What "repentance"? Where's that "repentance" going to lead? Isn't all thatjust deception? Upon returning to society and thinking things over calmly,everything will become clear. With all those who were supposedly "trans-formed," didn't they become clear about things not long after they got out?How many of them have stayed foggy-headed this whole time? As for tho-se who couldn't measure up this whole time, that's because they feel thatthey did too many bad things, they know they were wrong, and they're tooashamed to face [fellow Dafa] students, and now they're attached to thatshame. That's the reason.Question: Is it okay for our students to spend money to rent a place fortruth-clarification work?Teacher: Actually, when it comes to clarifying the truth, Dafa disciples ha-ve always used their own savings and salaries to do things. But you doneed to take into consideration how you live: not only should you considerhow you live, but also how your family lives, and consider others. If youcan't handle your family life or your own life well, that's going to make ithard for you to clarify the truth. Or from another perspective, if your lifeisn't stable and you even have trouble feeding yourself, then you'll have todivert your attention to that, and wouldn't your truth-clarification work infact be disrupted? So you have to consider your circumstances. I can seeyour hearts. Just do what you can.Question: Could Master talk a little more about the future of the cosmosand mankind?Teacher: Talking about the future at this time has no real meaning for you.Mankind's future will be wonderful and the people who remain will beblessed. That's because Dafa was imparted here and so this place is kept,and the beings who didn't sin against Dafa in this period will be blessed.Because Dafa was imparted and spread here, it established for the futurebeings favorable conditions for them to live here. Maybe the grains of thefuture will be in the form of fruit-bearing trees, with each grain of ricebeing this big (depicting with hands something like an American football).Just a little humor. But, relatively speaking, the amount of labor involvedwill be a lot less; the water and air will be clean; those poisonous things,bugs, mosquitoes, flies, [etc.,] will all be gone; and the world will truly bewonderful. The old gods can't imagine the wonderfulness of the new cos-mos since they can't see it, and they don't dare to, and aren't able to, imagi-ne what it is like--it's built entirely on a different foundation. The beings ofthe past were selfish, but the cosmos of the future is not founded upon sel-fishness, and everything will be better.Question: In the near future a lot of people will come over to obtain the Faof their own initiative, so should we expand our practice sites?Teacher: Of course that's what you should do, and you've been doing that.

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(Audience laughs) When there are too many people for one site to hold, juststart a new practice site. Yes, that's how it should be done.Question: Some students in Japan don't trust each other, which makes ithard to carry out a lot of our Fa-validation work. I feel sad, and really ho-pe that we can improve together as a group soon.Teacher: Indeed. Actually, regardless of the situation, when bad factors ha-ve a foothold, that's because our students have problems. Yesterday a stu-dent brought up the problem of fake writings, and I would ask this: you area being forged by Dafa, so how could you be deceived by that fake stuff?And why don't you evaluate things with the Fa's standards? Then didn't theevil gain a foothold because of your attachments being too strong? Actual-ly, some people are still not rational, and their righteous thoughts aren'tstrong enough.Question: In Japan there are more than a thousand religions being spread,and Japanese people always describe Falun Gong as a religion.Teacher: Here's what I think about this. From now on, when somebodysays Falun Gong is a religion, just let it go. If they want to learn more youcan tell them how Falun Gong is not a religion; and if they don't want tolearn more, you don't need to talk about whether it's a religion. If somebodywants to call it a religion, so be it, since in society the term "religion"doesn't have any bad connotations. Dafa disciples don't take up the form ofreligion when cultivating, since you don't observe rituals and don't wantthose rituals to interfere with you. What I'm telling you is a basic principlein the Fa. However much ordinary people can understand it... in fact, I toldyou long ago that ordinary people would call us a religion. I discussed thatbefore when I was teaching the Fa.Question: In the Japanese edition of Zhuan Falun should the character " ,"as in " ," also be changed to the character " "?[1]

Teacher: With Japanese it's a different story, since its meanings are diffe-rent from those of the Han Chinese characters. I think it's better not totouch the Japanese version.Question: Isn't it true that the students who are part of the Falun Dafa Asso-ciation shouldn't stifle everything that other students do? (Audience laughs)Teacher: With the things that students do to validate the Fa and save allbeings by clarifying the truth, they shouldn't stop them, and whoever doesthat is wrong. But some students tend to go to extremes with things, andthat can easily have a negative effect. In that case it is necessary to stopthem. Many of you here are the coordinators in different areas, and youshould remember one thing: except for when overall coordination is neces-sary to get something done, let's loosen the reins and let students temperthemselves, and let's give them a chance to create their own mighty-virtue.You have to give the students opportunities and let them do things. Youmust remember this. Even I, your master, am setting the reins down and let-ting our students walk their own paths. When a student has done somethingwrong you should point it out to him. And if he truly has had a bad effect,

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then you should talk to him with all due seriousness, and figure out how tocorrect it and make up for the bad effect. But don't say he is a demon. It'shard to avoid making mistakes in cultivation, and of the mistakes, some aregoing to be big and some small.Then as for our students, you should take a serious look at yourself. You'rea Dafa disciple, so you can't be irresponsible to yourself or to Dafa. Youare, after all, a being forged by Dafa, and your mighty-virtue will shinebrightly in the cosmos of the future. So how could we afford not to walkour paths well? So, let's not place too much blame on the coordinators. Saythe coordinator became perfect, he finished his cultivation, but your gazewas always directed outward, instead of going inward cultivating yourself--then would you still be a cultivator? The person you are cultivating is you.If there really is something wrong with the coordinator, then calmly point itout with good intentions. You are all cultivators, and cultivators still havehuman attachments that they haven't yet removed, human attachments arereally vulnerable to getting provoked, and when they are provoked they'reapt to play a negative role. So you should be kind and resolve things in akind way, you should be friendly and cordial, and explain things clearly,out of goodwill. And then things will work out. But, if a coordinator can'teven listen to different opinions that are offered up with good intentions,that means he's got problems.On the other hand, a very small number of students are like this: on the sur-face they're kind to others, but what they say carries a lot of their own fac-tors, even factors that irk others. But on the surface what they say is plentygentle. (Audience laughs) That's being slick and fooling people, and it's ab-solutely not the state that a Dafa disciple should have.If the coordinators in a particular area aren't cultivating based on the Fa,and/or the Dafa disciples there aren't studying the Fa diligently, then thekinds of complicated things we're talking about will appear. But all Dafadisciples and coordinators should be clear on something: a person's humanattachments that haven't yet been cultivated away will come out, but thatdoesn't mean he is no good; and a lot of his well-cultivated facets won't bedisplayed, since he's cultivated away those human attachments, after all.The fact is, when a cultivator is among ordinary people but no longer hasany human attachments, he really has nothing that can manifest, and ofcourse when he has truly cultivated to that point he will Consummate. Soas long as somebody has human attachments they'll show themselves, butthat doesn't mean he hasn't cultivated or that he hasn't cultivated well. It'sjust that he didn't do so well with some particular issue or in some area.You should all pay attention to this.In other words, it's no big deal if human attachments come out as we culti-vate ourselves. What's key is that everyone handles himself as a cultivator,and when problems come along, you look inside. If everyone can do that,the cultivation state of that area is sure to be great and conflicts are sure tobe few.

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Question: There are no leaders in cultivation, and Dafa has no organiza-tion. When the members or head of our Association interact with othergroups in society and with government agencies, is it appropriate to usethe titles of Chair or Member of the Association?Teacher: I'd say it's appropriate--wasn't the association created so that youwould conform to ordinary society? Then why not use that approach to cla-rify the truth in ordinary society? Of course it's okay, and the governmentallows you to register. But you can't have an attachment to showing off, foryou are validating the Fa, not yourselves.Dafa disciples are true cultivators. If today's society weren't how it is, I re-ally wouldn't even want you to set up these [Dafa] Associations, and we'djust have practice sites at different locations along with some coordinators,and then some coordinators for the region, that's all. In fact, a coordinator issomeone who gathers people together, and he too is an ordinary cultivator;he's somebody who serves others and gives more of himself.Question: A group of cancer patients wants us to go teach them the practi-ce. Can we do that? [And another question is,] we don't have the basicskills for singing and dancing, but if we really put our mind to learning andpracticing them, can we put together a large-scale performance in a short ti-me?Teacher: As for this [second] thing, do what you can in keeping with yourcircumstances and abilities. But if you don't have the basics needed to do alarge-scale performance, yet you insist on having one, then the audience isgoing to laugh at you. It's fine to entertain people, but if people are criticaland making fun of you, then I think that'll be counterproductive. So whatyou do should be subject to circumstances.As for cancer patients wanting to learn the practice, it depends on motiva-tions . When the world's people want to obtain the Fa, cultivate, or say thatFalun Dafa is great, that is human beings proactively validating the Fa andproactively choosing their own futures. But if you use Dafa as some kind oftool for healing, and do that among ordinary people, then that's actuallybeing disrespectful to Dafa.You can go to prisons to introduce the practice, and you can go to hospitalsto teach it to patients. We do that to validate Dafa. Your thinking has to bethe same as when you go elsewhere to teach the practice, and in essenceyou're doing it to save sentient beings and have people obtain the Fa andgain salvation. If you make Dafa into a tool for correcting people's mista-kes or curing people's illnesses, or think of it as a way to change the ordealsordinary people have [in store for them], then that's a problem. Dafa isbeing spread in human society for the sole purpose of saving people. Youmust be clear on this. Some people say, "Falun Gong is incredibly good atcuring cancer. You should all come practice it," in which case it definitelywon't work, since your thinking is off. Dafa is not here to heal people. It re-solves problems for people for the purpose of saving them on a fundamen-tal level. If that's the starting point then the result is going to be good, for

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sure. But if you go about it with an attachment to some ordinary thing, thenthe effect won't be good.Cultivation is a solemn thing. Li Hongzhi absolutely did not come here tolead you to heal people, and even less so for some human thing, and abso-lutely not to lead you to start some religion in society. I came to teach youto cultivate and out of a sense of responsibility for saving your life.Question: During Taiwan's presidential election, some students' human at-tachments got stirred up. Was it a test arranged by the old forces? What'sthe right way for us to handle this?Teacher: Even if the sky were to fall, a cultivator's righteous thoughtswould stay unshaken--that is cultivation, and that is remarkable. (Applau-se) A cultivator is not attached to anything in this world. Dafa disciples'cultivation takes a different form today. In cultivation you do your best outin the world to conform to ordinary society, you have normal jobs in ordi-nary society, and you have your families, jobs, and all that--you are closelytied to society. With the Taiwan election, some students thought a certainperson was pretty good and so they wanted to vote for him, while othersthought a different person was pretty good and wanted to vote for that one.People have their own, different views, and there's nothing wrong with that.A person's own actions out in society don't represent Dafa. But you can't beattached to those things the way ordinary people are.Whoever you vote for, I can't, as your Master, say that you're wrong, nor doI get involved in those things. That's because the path I ask you to take hasyou cultivate in ordinary society. Cultivators can only benefit a society.You cultivate in ordinary society but you don't steer human society in onedirection or another.So for each student, it's fine for you to vote as an individual for whomeveryou want. It's just that you can't be too attached. But through the persecu-tion against Dafa disciples in Mainland China, Dafa disciples have seenthrough something, and so some are thinking, "Whoever is close to the evilthat's persecuting us, I won't vote for him." (Applause) And as your MasterI have no objection to that either. (Audience laughs, applauds) Those arethe students' own thoughts, and as your Master I haven't told you who tovote for. Still less will I tell you to take any group action, and that's not al-lowed. (Audience laughs)As far as students discussing certain things with each other, that's what theydo, and do as individuals, with their fellow cultivators. And when you talkabout who you'll vote for or who somebody else is going to vote for, thoseare all the actions of individuals and have nothing to do with Dafa itself orthe Dafa Association. A coordinator in the Dafa Association can, just thesame, support a certain party, and that's his personal action. I say that be-cause he is cultivating and at the same time a member of society. Couldyou ask him to completely do away with all human things while cultiva-ting? That can only happen when his cultivation is Consummated. So whilehe's cultivating in ordinary society, he will be interacting with society, and

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he'll vote for whomever he wants to. He will have his own views, and the-re's nothing wrong with that.Whatever the outcome of the election, it shouldn't lead to clashes out in so-ciety--that'd be awfully dangerous. As a cultivator you should be stricterwith yourself, and that's why I tell our students that you can't be affected byhuman attachments or be impulsive like ordinary people. The reason is,you carry energy and have abilities, what you do drives very large factors,and the impact you'd have on society would be huge. So you can't followthe lead of ordinary people. I did see some students get affected by ordina-ry people to the point that they were angry and emotionally charged, andtheir righteous thoughts weren't strong; at that point nobody could see yourcultivator's image. You can't do that. During our April 25th appeal yearsback, we were peaceful and perfectly rational. We are good for society.Question: Now that not many of the old forces' dark minions and evilbeings are left, what's interfering with students when they don't do well?Teacher: A lot of the old forces' dark minions have been eliminated,they're contracting around Mainland China, and from time to time they co-me out to do something bad. (Audience laughs) And what I want to purgeare those bad gods who are outside the Three Realms. They are directingthe evil beings, and some are even doing things themselves. But in any ca-se, when it's at this point, if a god dares to directly take part in those things,then even if I don't purge him, those above will. Things are now changingfast.Question: What does "Lasting or momentary--all caused by time" mean?Teacher: "Lasting" refers to having gone through long, drawn-out yearsand everything that unfolded over that time. The "momentary" part just re-fers to a brief segment of time. Whether it be lasting or momentary, as godssee it, the time-concept's length is the same. And perhaps a moment of timethere will result in long, drawn-out years for the lives here. And to our eyeswhat is but a moment, that moment could be a long, lasting period in ano-ther time field. Meanwhile, what's a long, lasting period in our world is buta brief moment to certain gigantic gods. It's time that causes all of this, andit's time that is playing tricks. That's what it means.Question: I had a chance to run for city council, and I got to make friendswith many people from different walks of life, and that laid a good founda-tion for clarifying the truth in the future. Because I wasn't familiar with thecity council position, I had to spend some time learning about issues in thecommunity, participating in community service work, and learning abouthow to be a council member. Sometimes I feel pretty conflicted about it, asI think I should spend the time producing television programs or on otherforms of truth-clarification work.Teacher: The Fa I teach is about cultivating in ordinary society. And whenyou cultivate in ordinary society, you're going to have all kinds of interac-tions with society as a Dafa disciple. The different jobs you have inherently[mean you will] interact with society. There's no conflict there.

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Actually, a lot of our students have different jobs and they clarify the truthalongside their work. It's just a matter of how to plan and use your timewell, it's a matter of how to do better. I'm not against your having certainselect jobs. No matter how big a business you run or how high your posi-tion is, none of that's at odds [with what we're doing]. I want to affirm thatpeople from any walk of life can cultivate, and I'm truly setting a precedent[by allowing this]. In history there were very few cases of rich people orpeople in high-ranking positions being saved. But I don't discriminate ba-sed on that, I only look at people's hearts. I'll save everyone. (Applause) Li-ved experience has proven that that was right--not only is it doable, my Da-fa disciples have succeeded at cultivation. In the past, because there was noGreat Law, the truths that different gods validated and enlightened to werenot the fundamental truth of the cosmos. Today the Great Law is being pas-sed on, so anything can be done.Question: We have a lot of work and activities for validating the Fa. I don'thave the time to ensure I get everything done, and every day I have little ti-me for doing the exercises and studying Fa.Teacher: Yes, that is a problem. If you're really busy with certain concreteDafa work, you can ease up a bit on the exercises and find time later on tomake it up. That's okay. The reason being, with these exercises, you can dothem more when you have the time, and you can do them less when youdon't. Master has told you about this. When it comes to Fa-study, though, Ithink you still need to squeeze in time for study, even if it means for a littlewhile only. But when you squeeze in time for study there's a problem that'sapt to come up: you can't calm your mind, and if you can't calm your mind,you're in fact studying in vain and wasting time. If you're going to study,you need to set aside everything else that's on your mind, keep your mindsteady, quiet your mind, and truly study. Even if you just study a few para-graphs [this way], it's better than reading the entire book with a restlessmind. When you study the Fa, you have to absorb it.Question: Is it true that all of the ordeals disciples now go through are cau-sed by the old forces' targeting the Fa-rectification?Teacher: No, your ordeals are all part of your cultivation, and the old for-ces' interference targets the cultivation of only a small number of you. I'msaying that I don't acknowledge the old forces' interfering with Dafa disci-ples, because the Dafa disciples are my disciples, and nobody else is wort-hy of handling them. And even less could we let them succeed in their plotto use Dafa disciples and impose things on the Dafa disciples to achievetheir goals, ruining my disciples. The reason they've been able to interfereis, they have seized on your attachments and shortcomings, and then there'syour karma left over from your past. The persecution also stems from thesefactors. The Fa-rectification beyond the Three Realms doesn't have that di-rect of a connection with you, but you are here during the Fa-rectificationperiod and you're here when Master is here, and you are Dafa Disciples inthe Fa-rectification period.

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Question: Some students think that if they just stay home and send righ-teous thoughts, and use phone calls to clarify the truth, they count as Fa-rectification disciples and don't need to come out. Is that okay?Teacher: If they're not all that busy with Dafa things, then it's not quiteright if they don't come out for group activities to validate the Fa and clari-fy the truth, or for other activities like group Fa-study. Group Fa-study isan environment I created for you and a form that I've left for you. I thinkyou should still participate. That's because it has stood the test of experien-ce, and cultivating that way allows our students to improve the fastest.When you cultivate on your own, you miss out on factors that help you im-prove. And haven't you, as Dafa disciples, said that you would do as yourMaster says? Haven't you said that you should walk straight on the paththat a Dafa disciple should take?I can see your challenges, so I don't want to say that you "must do" suchand such. I rarely say that, because I know it's tough for you. Besides, incultivation you've got to come to understand things on your own. I spell outthe Fa's principles, but you need to walk the path yourself. If I told you thatyou "must do" such and such, but you had an omission with something,then the omission would in fact be Master's fault; Master wouldn't have letyou come to your own understanding of that thing or let you handle it your-self, so that part of you wouldn't be cultivated. That's why I rarely putthings that way. A Dafa disciple should recognize his responsibilities andwhat he should do as a Dafa disciple.Question: I've participated in important activities to validate the Fa many ti-mes, and discovered that when we try to accomplish something big, there isoften a lot of interference, karma elimination, etc.Teacher: There's been disruption from day one, so disruptions come alongsometimes, both big and small. The remnants of the old forces and thosebad things just won't quit. Every time I teach the Fa, they can hear it. Justlike you they hear it, and at the same time as you, but they just insist ondoing those things. Their sins are so great that they can't be measured interms of their lives anymore. In the future they will pay for their sins en-dlessly, but even so they won't be able to pay for all of it--that's how hugetheir sins are. And when it comes to the old forces' remnants in the ThreeRealms, and the variety of degenerate factors in the cosmos, those final oldfactors are sacrificing them and making them carry on all the way to theend. Those things' sins are so huge that their sins could incinerate them. It'sthe savagery of those bad factors that has made them that way.Question: Is it better to have a simple or complicated mind? And for whatreasons?Teacher: In the eyes of gods, if a person's mind is simple and clean, godsconsider him a good person. And if a person's mind is complicated, thengods consider him bad, because as gods see it, hasn't it become complicatedbecause of attachments formed in the human world? Isn't being complica-ted a result of being attached to the human world? So this is a truth in culti-

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vation.Having a simple mind doesn't mean you have little wisdom, and having acomplicated mind doesn't mean you have wisdom. And that's not at oddswith the form of cultivation Dafa disciples do here in the setting of ordina-ry people or any of the things you're doing today to validate the Fa. A Dafadisciple's wisdom comes from righteous thoughts--divine thoughts--andthat kind of wisdom is different from the concept of a complicated mindthat has formed among ordinary people and in society. That stuff is allabout self-interest, it's selfish, and it's a form of cunning developed by sche-ming against other people. A Dafa disciple's starting point, on the otherhand, is validating Dafa, and there's no seeking something for oneself. Soit's fundamentally different. The latter is great wisdom, while the formershould be called complicated thoughts. And their manifestations are diffe-rent, to be sure.Question: For a long time now, our area has had a lot of veteran studentswho haven't come to group Fa-study for quite some time, and they don't dothe exercises with us outdoors, either. They think that they can, without co-ming to group Fa-study, study the Fa well at home just the same, and thatat home they can likewise do a good job with the exercises. They think thatgoing about things that way doesn't prevent us from improving as a whole.Teacher: Actually, I'd say that if there really are people like that, then it'sthe result of their human attachments. If you don't believe it, dig into theroots of your mind and you're sure to find attachments. To put it lightly,you are lazy. Put more seriously, you're afraid. Of course, some veteran stu-dents are tied up with specific work, and that's different.Question: If someone followed that disgraceful person in Hong Kong atone time, can he still participate in the media projects we're now doing?Teacher: It's better not to ask Master a specific question like this. Some ofour students have made mistakes, but as long as they have corrected themit's fine--who has never made a mistake? So from the student's perspective,when other students don't trust you, don't stubbornly go against them. It'snot a bad idea to avoid the issue a little bit, as that way both sides have lesspsychological pressure on them.If people don't let you do those things, you can just go out on the street topass out flyers, which saves sentient beings just the same. Or you can go tothe consulate or embassy to send righteous thoughts or do other things.You can do any of that, so why do you have to be attached to some onething? The more attached you get, the worse the impression you'll give ot-her students, right? So why insist on it? And won't the old forces use yourbeing like that to cause commotion? So with anything you do, if it can stemfrom your considering Dafa, then I think things will be different and the si-tuation will change. I'd suggest that all the students who are being regardedwith suspicion go to the consulates or embassies and out on the street topass out information, go to the places that need you most and directly, face-to-face, clarify the truth to people, and don't get involved in the inner wor-

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kings of projects for now. Show everyone whether you're real, whetheryou're up to par.As for those who really are a problem, you don't need to worry about them.Those people are among Dafa disciples but not in the Fa, and once the oldforces are done with them their lives will be ended. Actually, I know thatsome of the ones with problems do know Dafa is good, but because theyfear that the spy agencies will publicize the shameful things they did beforewhich harmed people, their fear has led them to keep doing bad things whi-le begging, all the while, Master's Law Bodies to make things easier forthem. But how could they? Cultivation is so solemn, especially a Dafa dis-ciple's cultivation--how great the mighty-virtue! Yet they're begging likethat out of attachment, and on top of that they have a filthy fear. They won'tget any approval, that's not possible. But the old forces' remnants and rottendemons can see those people's attachments, and so they impersonate Mas-ter and lead you along or tell you it's okay to do certain things. By doingthat they're trying to persecute you to death.Question: All Taiwan's Dafa disciples and young disciples in Taiwan'sMinghui schools send their greetings to Master. (Teacher: Thank you.)(Everyone applauds) All young disciples in Taiwan's Minghui kindergar-tens send their greetings to Master. During the Fa-rectification period,how can we better use the approach of education to validate Dafa?Teacher: Actually, what you are doing is validating Dafa. The students atthe Minghui schools have become young disciples, and that's had an impacton society, it has impacted schools, and impacted educational circles. So tohave things done in greater depth and with more breadth, that, in fact, iswhat I'm hoping you'll do. (Teacher laughs) (Applause) I said that's whatI'm hoping for, but to put it more accurately, that's what all lives are hopingfor. (Teacher laughs) (Applause)Question: In one area, after some people had just arrived from China andclaimed they were Dafa disciples, some fellow cultivators immediately hel-ped them apply for asylum. Do we need to take some time to learn moreabout them before we help them to gain refugee status?Teacher: When it comes to these issues, students can decide for themsel-ves what to do based on the circumstances. If the person is a true Dafa dis-ciple, then you can't refuse to help when he has hardship. Ask him a lot ofquestions from the Fa and it'll be clear, won't it?Question: Some students go to extremes when they do things and have hada bad effect on Dafa.Teacher: The beings that gods respect the least are those who can't findthemselves and whose righteous thoughts are lacking whenever they dothings. If somebody can't find himself, if he doesn't say what he means, ifhe goes to extremes when he does things, and if the real him isn't in control,then tell me, who would I be saving? Which one is you? Gods have theleast respect for beings like that. Even though those people have joined theranks of Dafa disciples, they're actually not part of Dafa. That's truly sad.

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They have no righteous thoughts.Question: Some students who have supernormal abilities think that, whenthey send righteous thoughts, the lives in other dimensions should be sa-ved, and that it's a bit uncompassionate to eradicate them...Teacher: If Fa-rectification didn't exist, or if when this happened it wasjust the master of some discipline guiding his disciple, then you couldn't re-ally say it was wrong for his disciple to have that understanding, though themaster would think you were lacking in proper thoughts. With any master,if he had a disciple like that, that disciple would get sent home sooner or la-ter, because if you don't do what your master tells you, what kind of a disci-ple are you? Today what's happening is different. Fa-rectification is unfol-ding and it goes well beyond a being's self-cultivation. When a being inter-feres with you and with Dafa, that being should be cleared away, and it's nolonger a matter of whether you as an individual are merciful; rather, it's amatter of whether you are responsible to Dafa.You're a Dafa disciple, so don't think that the goal of saving people is justfor you yourself to cultivate to Consummation. It's not. A Dafa disciple'sresponsibility is to validate the Fa. Will you not even validate the Fa?When Dafa is being damaged, are you indifferent? The Dafa disciples inMainland China were killed by persecution from those things--does that ha-ve nothing to do with you? You've gained everything from the Fa, whileDafa does not need anything from you in return. But since you're one of theDafa disciples, if Dafa were gone, could you possibly exist? Isn't safeguar-ding Dafa safeguarding yourself? Actually, I think the problem this studenthas goes beyond mere confusion. I didn't finish reading what's on the ques-tion slip...Question: ...invented a set of things that involves reciting Lunyu a certainnumber of times and adding specific mudras,[2] saying it has a powerfuleffect. (Teacher: See, didn't I say his problem went beyond mere confu-sion?) (Audience laughs) And he quietly went around teaching other stu-dents.Teacher: That's interference. He's being used by demons now, only it's notyet that serious. So as for this student, his level has dropped badly, andcompared to the Dafa disciples who are validating the Fa in an upright wayand with dignity, he comes across as so paltry, (Teacher sighs) and he'sway behind. In reality he can't interfere with other students, since a lot ofstudents can tell that he's not right, and only a small minority who havestrong attachments are going to be affected.Question: I feel that the old forces arranged for us some critical juncturesand want to keep us down, but as long as we pass those tests and overcomethose ordeals we will be able to let go of our fundamental attachments andthereby do better.Teacher: Yes, if you weren't attached to anything the old forces would ha-ve no excuse and could do nothing to you.Question: What is Taiwan's role in the Fa-rectification period, and what

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will it be after the Fa rectifies the human world?Teacher: The Fa rectifying the human world is a future affair. As for Tai-wan's role, I can only tell you that while [it and the Mainland] have the sa-me ancestors and belong to the same ethnic group, the attitudes towardsDafa on the two sides of the Strait are different, and it's a sharp contrast.Question: How, specifically, will Dafa disciples know it's the day when theFa-rectification period ends?Teacher: Don't be attached. When that day comes, the history of this oldcosmos will end, and Dafa disciples will Consummate. That instant whenyou Consummate and become Unlocked, for a sentient being, that's just amatter of moving from one second to the next--and it's not even a second--from one instant to the next, and the dividing line between being humanand divine is crossed. A Dafa disciple's cultivation goes from the micro-cosm to the surface, and that's why the part that has been fully cultivated inthe microcosm will not do anything when the main body isn't controlling it,but it knows everything since it has finished cultivating, after all. There is apart of you that's in the highest realm you have cultivated to and in eachsingle realm below it, all the way down, and you'll know the state of affairsin all of the realms you are in. So between one second and the next, one ins-tantly goes from being a human to being a god. And at that instant you willknow everything, and at that instant you will become an omnipotent, mag-nificent god.Question: Is the current political situation in Taiwan the old forces' design,or was it caused by Dafa disciples' attachments?Teacher: Looks like our students are really concerned with this. Dafa disci-ples didn't cause the situation; those things have nothing to do with our Da-fa disciples. They were all caused by factors that the old forces left behindin the past. But judging by things at present, the old-force remnants seem li-ke they can't carry out their wishes anymore.Question: There is a student who went to Beijing to make an appeal afterthe evil began its persecution. But after that he would only read Zhuan Fa-lun and not the newer writings. We've shared our thoughts with him manytimes, hoping he would snap out of that crooked understanding, but none ofit was effective. May I ask what kind of "heavy hammer" should be used towake him up? (Teacher laughs) (Audience laughs)Teacher: Talk to him with good intentions and see what his attachmentsare. He has a mental obstacle due to an attachment, and he has fear, andthey are what brought about that state. He believed the evil's lies and propa-ganda--what else? But he does know the Fa is good, so he's conflicted, andhe can't let go [of some things]. If he really can't get up to par, then that'shis own issue. But if there's still hope of saving him, then you should helphim.Question: Recently we've been using the form of artistic performances toclarify the truth to the community, and the results have been great. Somegroups have invited us to demonstrate the exercises and teach the practice,

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with one group consisting solely of cancer patients. I'd like to ask, howshould we handle it? Also, we're planning to organize a large-scale perfor-mance. Can we charge admission? Can we raise money for other groups?Teacher: You absolutely cannot raise money for other groups, and youshouldn't do things that have no significance for Dafa disciples. For Dafadisciples, validating the Fa, clarifying the truth, saving sentient beings, andnegating the persecution is the first priority, and nothing should interfere. Ifyou do things that have no connection to Dafa, what you get won't be worththe effort.Some people might be thinking, "If I raise some money for them, thosepeople might be good toward Falun Gong." That's not how it works. I'vetaught the Fa for so many years now, and I've never thought about using fi-nancial means, some sort of authority, or personal influence to get peopleto obtain the Fa. If he doesn't come for the Fa then it's no good.Question: While the lawsuits are going on, can our students clarify the truthto the judges? Would that compromise the integrity of the judicial process?Teacher: Talking about the persecution shouldn't be a problem, and itshould be fine for students who aren't part of the lawsuit to clarify the truth.In the human world people have sealed themselves off with a slew of res-trictions, but if you do things with wisdom, you won't be doing somethingbad, and there shouldn't be a problem.Question: A coordinator who has clarified the truth at a particular touristspot in Hong Kong has managed to rectify that place so well, it's really ad-mirable. Some students think of her as a god. And some students have saidthat going there to clarify the truth for a week is better than cultivating inTaiwan for a whole year. (Audience laughs) (Teacher: Now that's extre-me.) Because a lot of students go there out of admiration...Teacher: Our students--remember this--some of our students have donewell, but she is still cultivating. So if we do those things, won't it lead stu-dents to form new attachments? And won't it make the students a little toopleased with themselves? So I think you still need to be careful. Yes, whena student has cultivated well in some regard, we should learn from him. Butthe student is still cultivating and still has human attachments that haven'tbeen removed yet, so you still need to use the Fa as your standard.Question: ...recently the woman has insisted on changing the way to sendrighteous thoughts. She altered the order of the five-minute segments, chan-ging the first five minutes from purging all the bad thoughts in her ownmind to eradicating the dark minions. And she makes other students followher formulas.Teacher: See, here we go. (Audience laughs) It caused her to form attach-ments--see what happened now? You led her to do things her own way.That's why I tell you that you need to study the Fa a lot and use the Fa asyour standard. Whenever a person cultivates well in some regard, that's be-cause she has cultivated well in the Fa, not because she is better than theFa. So if you follow somebody's example instead of learning from the Fa...

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[remember that] before the person has finished her cultivation she still hasflaws, and when she's good in one regard it doesn't mean she's good in eve-ry regard. Now it's really happened, you've triggered the student's attach-ment. Be careful with this type of thing.Question: Master, would you please talk about how we can spread to diffe-rent people the Zhen-Shan-Ren quality of the cosmos using the media in asubtle and wise way? And what are beings in the Daoist paradises like?Teacher: What are you talking about? (Audience laughs) "...spread to diffe-rent people... using the media in a subtle and wise way?" Why does itsound to me like that's not something a Dafa disciple would say? Maybethis is a new student. There's no "subtle and wise" way. Dafa disciples areall doing things according to the Fa; they have compassion for all beingsand are letting sentient beings know what's wonderful. They're doing thisbased on what fits their respective circumstances and based on their owndesire to do so.What are the Daoist paradises like? The Daoist system, as I've said before,the Daoist system didn't have paradises in the past. Daoists cultivate soloand in complete solitude, and even in the heavens they stay in caves. Andthe Daos in the heavens wander about, too, and only in a small number ofcases do they have Daoist temples. In recent times, with the appearance ofthe Daoist religion some Buddho-Daoist disputes have come along. That'swhy the Daoist religion was established, and the Daoist religion, too, beganto have Buddhas and Bodhisattvas. All of these things have been resolved.Question: When a husband and wife are both Dafa disciples and they haveconflicts and problems that can't be resolved, can they divorce? (Audiencelaughs) Does it have anything to do with cultivation?Teacher: Actually I'd say you have omissions in your cultivation, eventhough some students might say that you're doing all right. Aren't you over-ly attached to those human things? If both of you could let go of self andcultivate well and not have such a strong sense of self, then could you nothandle those things well, given that both the husband and wife are Dafa dis-ciples?As for divorce, I've told you to conform to ordinary society as much as pos-sible; today, whether it's getting divorced or getting married, I won't sayanything. I discuss things in terms of Fa's principles. But I'll tell you, thosethings won't be allowed in the future. They result from the current state ofmodern society. I can't force you to do things a certain way, but the lives ofthe future won't be allowed to do this, nor would they [if they could].Also, let's talk a little about human beings. Nowadays people consider emo-tion really important, yet emotion is one of the most unreliable things."When you're nice to me I'm happy, and when you're no longer nice to methe feeling is gone." Then how could you count on that thing? Could emoti-onal ties sustain a marriage? With human beings there's not just moral obli-gation involved, but also, between man and wife, you are indebted to eachother. So in terms of the woman, when she has put her whole life in your

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hands, the man should realize, "This woman has entrusted her whole life tome. I have to be responsible for her." The sense of indebtedness that a hus-band and wife have for each other is something people don't recognize orvalue today. Of course, the state of society now isn't like [what I just descri-bed], so I don't hold you to that. As Dafa disciples you should handle your-selves well and try your best to avoid such things [as divorce].Of course, just now I only talked about men. I need to talk a little about wo-men now. (Audience laughs) Well, I'll go easy. (Audience laughs) As a wo-man, you in turn need to be understanding of your man. Women: you allwant your man, your husband, to be a strong, upright and dignified, manlyguy, but in your actions you always keep him down, keeping him undersuch tight control that he's like a woman (audience laughs). So how couldhe be manly? When the whole society is in this state, think about it, the so-ciety's men have all become she-men, (audience laughs) and all the womenhave become he-women , (audience laughs)--it's the inversion of yin andyang. Of course, that's how society is, and I won't insist that you be a cer-tain way. We do have some female students who are indeed really talented,and there are some people who are really amazing, (Master laughs) and so-metimes they surpass men in terms of abilities. But all the same, a lot of ti-mes you really need to be considerate of your men. As a cultivator, you ha-ve to be a good person wherever you are, and you have to be considerate ofothers--so in the home why can't you be considerate and understanding ofyour own husband? Aren't we to leave the future mankind with the bestthings? When both of you are cultivators you should each be considerate ofone another, and with that how could you talk about divorce? Marriageshould be something unbreakable. (Audience laughs) (Teacher sighs)Question: I'd like to ask you to please talk about how to clarify the truth tobusinessmen.Teacher: Human beings are attached to self-interest. For ordinary people,self-interest is above all else, and that's just how human beings are. Whenyou tell them about the truth, they'll understand, "Oh, you're good peopleand you're being persecuted. But I still need to go make money." Becausedifferent countries keep investing money over there at this time when FalunGong is being persecuted, it has given the evil the ability and funds to per-secute Falun Gong, and it has made those countries who invested the mo-ney dependent on that market, so they don't dare to expose anything or takea stance against the persecution. That's just how human beings are, unlessthey take up cultivation, so that's as far as we can go to get the messageacross to them. As far as businessmen go, you can leave it at that.Question: I'd like to ask Master, Shakyamuni validated and enlightened to"Precept, Concentration, Wisdom," so while we assimilate to the Fa wemust also validate and enlighten to, within Dafa, our own principles that as-similate to the Fa, is that correct?Teacher: Yes, but I haven't finished summarizing those things that you areto validate and enlighten to, so you don't know what they are yet--you

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won't know until you are Enlightened, for our cultivation method is diffe-rent. Don't go and create something just to be different. If you go off andinvent some new term tomorrow, and claim "This is what I'm cultivating,"then you'll have gone astray.Question: Dafa disciples from Australia, Japan, Malaysia, (Master: I thinkI will read these.) Australia, Japan, Malaysia, Indonesia, Singapore, Ma-cau, Korea, Taiwan, New Zealand, the Dafa disciples illegally detained inBeijing's Women's Forced Labor Camp, Liuzhou in Guangxi province,Meizhou in Guangdong province, Shenzhen, Yangzhou in Jiangsu province,Sydney, Japan's Minghui schools, Ningbo in Zhejiang province, Zhuhai,Hangzhou, Qingdao in Shandong province, Haiyang, Shanghai, Yanbian,Wuhan, Shanxi, the city of Jilin in Jilin province, the city of Shuangchengin Heilongjiang province, Weihai, Fanyu in Guangzhou province, Xi-an,Beijing, and the city of Jiangmen in Guangdong province send their highestregards to magnificent, esteemed Master.Teacher: Thank you all. (Applause) I know. And that's especially so forthose students in Mainland China, I know what they're feeling, I know theirlonging for Master, and in fact I feel the same way toward them. The evilwill be eliminated; dark clouds cannot eclipse the sky.Question: When I called Beijing to clarify the truth, a fellow cultivator ans-wered the phone. I told them, "Dafa disciples around the world are thinkingof you. Please firmly believe in Master and Dafa. It's hard to endure, butyou can endure it. It's hard to do, but you can do it." The practitioner askedme to send his regards to Master when I see you. Everyone misses you.Teacher: I thank you all. (Applause)Question: I'd like to relay greetings to Master from public security officersin Guangdong province. Currently there are (Teacher: I'll skip the partthat tells the number of them here) who see the persecution for what it is.Teacher: The situation of clarifying the truth and saving beings is chan-ging faster for Mainland China Dafa disciples than internationally, andthat's because there are, after all, a great number of Dafa disciples there; al-most 100 million Dafa disciples are exerting a gigantic influence negatingthe persecution. Clarifying the truth all around the world and saving thebeings outside Mainland China has helped people everywhere to becomeaware of the truth and condemn the persecution, and it has cleared awayevil. It is the result of Fa-rectification and the concerted efforts of Dafa dis-ciples all over the world. But for the persecution in Mainland China to stopbefore Fa-rectification arrives, the Dafa disciples in Mainland China wouldstill have to play the main role. As for the current persecution, many mem-bers of the general public in China are annoyed with it, and it's not just thegeneral public, at higher strata of society too and even in the upper echelonof the government, many people have stepped forward to talk directlyabout the facts of the persecution against Falun Gong. Soon the people willstand up and condemn this persecution.Question: In recent writings you have mentioned greater responsibilities

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awaiting us in the future. Did that refer to our descending to the mortalworld after Consummation to save our sentient beings?Teacher: What you're doing right now is saving sentient beings. You can'tgo up and then come back. (Audience laughs) Who'd want to come back?You are here and think that this place is pretty good, but that's because youreyes can't see the reality of things here. Once you arrive up there and take alook back, you'll find it just filthy here in this human world, and youwouldn't want to come back even if you were asked to. And that's why Isay those beings who dared to come here and obtain the Fa are all worthcherishing. But the persecution by the old forces has caused sentient beingsto sin against Dafa, and the actions of human beings during this persecutionhave truly ruined a lot of people, and ruined a lot of lives.Question: How should handicapped disciples handle sending righteousthoughts? I ask because my right hand is crippled.Teacher: Then you can use your left hand. It doesn't matter, because it'seven fine not to use any mudra when you send righteous thoughts. I askedyou to use mudras to help you have a stronger sense that you are sendingrighteous thoughts, to give you a greater sense of command, that's all.Question: In Taiwan, how can we encourage fellow cultivators to changefrom being passive to proactive validating Dafa, and to treasure the final lotof time in Fa-rectification?Teacher: Now about this, actually, I'm the least worried about the studentsin Taiwan. Because of the government's attitude toward Dafa there, thatdoesn't worry me much. And because with the Fa available, the studentsthere have done very well. Sometimes I feel like what they're doing is simi-lar to what took place back when I was in China. (Applause) As for a verysmall number of people not doing well in certain regions, it's a manifesta-tion of the process of a student's gaining a better understanding and the pro-cess of new students maturing, and all of that will gradually get better. Thedisruptions they encounter in their personal cultivation aren't the same aspersecution in Mainland China, but there will of course often be tests forthe individuals. So as cultivators you have to understand it correctly. Youcan't be afraid of ordeals and tests. Would you be cultivating if you spentall your days in total comfort and happiness?Question: When we study the Fa with Chinese students, we read a para-graph in Chinese and then a paragraph in Japanese. Some Chinese studentsthink that studying the Fa this way is too slow and it's not as effective as re-ading as one [language] group.Teacher: I think either way is fine, it's okay to have the Japanese-speakingstudents reading together and the Chinese-speaking students reading toget-her. Whatever is easier for you. There's no absolute rule. Just do whateverhelps people improve.Question: I'm pretty young. When I see attachments in some fellow cultiva-tors who are older than me, I don't dare to bring them up. Is this fear--an at-tachment?

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Teacher: Don't be afraid. When you see something that's wrong you canspeak up about it. Even very, very young disciples can talk about what theysee.Question: I know a student who made a huge mistake several years ago andreally had a negative impact on Dafa. Now he's in a really tough situation.Should I help him?Teacher: If the person did bad things and stopped practicing, then youcan't call him a student. Right now you're all busy clarifying the truth, soyou can judge for yourself whether it's worth it to spend a lot of time hel-ping him. Whether the person can still be saved, and what the trade-offs areof doing something like that given what you have right now, those arethings you should decide based on circumstances.Question: Taiwan is where Chinese-language newspapers are read mostoutside of Mainland China. Master, would you please give us some guidan-ce on the future of publishing a daily newspaper in Taiwan.Teacher: I'll still say the same thing: make the decision yourselves basedon our students' circumstances and abilities. Don't ask Master to affirmsomething. Once Master says something, you'll say, "Master said it," anddisregard whether it's feasible, whether there are challenges, and whetherconditions are ripe, and you'll disregard everything and insist on doing it.That's why I say that you have to plan things subject to your circumstances.Question: How should we understand "I brush off the enshrouding dust,and all their realities are seen"?Teacher: "Brush off the enshrouding dust"... from the dawn of time in thecosmos up through the present, a measureless amount of time has passed.There are always cosmic bodies disintegrating, just like metabolism. Theydisintegrate and then re-form, and form and then disintegrate again. Becau-se of this, mankind's science actually believes that a big explosion is whatbrought about the universe. The cosmos's dust has been falling downward,and bad elements are continually going downward. From top to bottom, nolevel is as pure as it was back then. And the Three Realms, in particular,has gotten worse and worse; it has been enshrouded with dust for so long,and the dust is getting ever thicker. When the moon was sent up before, itwasn't as big as it is today; now the thickness of its outer surface has increa-sed by dozens of kilometers. So as for, "I brush off the enshrouding dust,and all their realities are seen," sentient beings have been covered by someexternal factors, and many bad elements have made even the beings them-selves impure, and mankind, specifically, has been controlled by outsideevil during the persecution of Dafa. So after these things are cleansed wewill take another look and see how those beings are. That's what it means.(Applause)Question: Overall planning and coordinating are both present with any is-sue. Why is it that you encourage coordination but not overall planning?Teacher: You just need to get together and discuss how to do things. Fa-rectification has its own progression. Actually, what you're doing are just

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the three things; the premise has already been set. With the three thingsbeing the focal point, you figure out how to do them well and at the sametime cultivate yourselves well and save sentient beings--the hardest part issaving sentient beings. Doing things well is actually a matter of coordina-tion. When I say coordination, I'm talking about cooperating and workingwell together. Validating the Fa is also cultivation, and if you all look wit-hin you will be able to cooperate well. Dafa is cultivation, and there's not-hing else. Dafa disciples are doing things to clarify the truth to, for one, sa-ve all beings, and secondly, to restrain the persecution, to expose the perse-cution, and oppose it. We have no other objectives. So as for the activitiesthat Dafa disciples organize and truth-clarification via the form of media,you get together to plan things out, and those are things our students do asindividuals.Question: Are the factors outside the cosmos the same thing as lifeless, stillwater?Teacher: The lifeless water that I talked about is only a form at a certain le-vel of the cosmos. The cosmos is so complex that it can't be described withman's language. At a certain point there's not even water, it's no longer wa-ter. The cosmos is incredibly immense, and in each enormous realm thereis a fundamental reason behind the creation of that cosmos, but none ofthem is the most fundamental reason. But to the beings in a given realm,when they see all of that they think it is the fundamental reason. That is avery common phenomenon.Question: Can coordinators in the Dafa Association place themselves abovethe students? The students aren't able to raise criticism, and the main coor-dinator is forming factions and cliques.Teacher: I think that if a coordinator does in fact have that problem, thenhe really needs to pay attention to it. Why do the students think of you, acoordinator, like that? Maybe it is the case that we have a lot of problems?You should really think it over now. Coordinators, well actually, when Isay coordinators, or the people with positions of responsibility, it's just aname. What are they "responsible" for? Could you be responsible for Dafa?Could you really handle that? Actually you're just liaisons, people who ser-ve others, and you have no power or authority. Coordinate everyone well,and that's the best function you can serve helping Master at the human sur-face level.It doesn't seem appropriate to say that the coordinators are rounding up co-horts to form a clique. Aren't all the coordinators actually taking care ofand overseeing all the students? Maybe sometimes he seems closer to thosearound him, and it's apt to give other students that impression. If certainstudents have issues with the coordinator and make known the coordina-tor's shortcomings among some students, then the problem doesn't just in-volve the coordinator. You're cultivating, so why aren't you looking inside?You're stirring up antagonism among students toward the coordinator,you're leading a group of people to go against the coordinator, and that is

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being irresponsible to both yourself and Dafa. I look at both sides.So as for the coordinator, you do need to do well; and as for the students,you can't always focus on the coordinator. You are a Dafa disciple, andeach person is cultivating himself, but what are you doing? Are you onlyhelping the coordinator to cultivate? Don't you cultivate yourself? Isn't thatthe problem? But as for the coordinator, do you truly have a serious pro-blem? If you can't help Master lead the students in your area well, thendon't you have problems yourself? Do you know what I think? I can't leavebehind any of the Dafa disciples. Every person is family to me, so how canyou treat different members of my family differently? I'll definitely supportyou, the coordinators, when it comes to Dafa work, and guiding the localstudents well is really a great contribution. There's a saying ordinary peoplehave: "Don't utilize a questionable person; if you utilize someone don'tquestion him." That's what ordinary people say. Dafa is forging you, but asour Dafa disciples you should remove all your attachments, including theattachment to being a coordinator or a leader. Everyone is a cultivator. It'sonly that you are someone who gives more for others. So coordinators,that's what I require of you as your Master.Doing Dafa work is also cultivating, and none of the work methods in ordi-nary society have anything to do with how you go about being a coordina-tor in Dafa. In other words, this form or way of work didn't exist before,where someone both has responsibility and is an ordinary cultivator. Youare exploring your own paths, and each Dafa coordinator is tempering him-self. At the beginning maybe he didn't do too well, but gradually he shouldmature. And during that process he'll certainly have shortcomings and ma-ke mistakes, and that is the process of being tempered. That's how I look atit as your Master. I can't replace him with somebody else before he hasbeen tempered to maturity and start tempering the new person from scratch,because in that process there would be a lot of mistakes and students wouldhave a lot of complaints, and that could even impair Dafa's overall state anddisrupt Dafa disciples' validating of Fa as one body.When a coordinator has a problem, students should point it out to him, andeven put it to him in serious terms. As for the student, you should put Dafafirst, instead of always putting your own opinions first and pointing outhow others are wrong. If a particular coordinator in the Dafa Associationreally is holding students back from doing things, then he has a serious pro-blem, as it amounts to interfering with each Dafa disciple's walking of hisown path validating the Fa. If the person truly is like that, then we need tothink about whether the person is suitable; it won't work if he goes on likethat. But if it's otherwise, or if some students have in fact botched things,and they aren't willing to listen to the coordinator's advice and turn itaround and claim he's interfering with the students' validating of Fa, thenthat's no good. In that scenario why can't the Dafa disciples look at thingsfrom the standpoint of Dafa? I want each person to be tempered to maturi-ty.

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Looking at it from another angle, your conflicts are in fact tests that youneed to pass in the process of improving. You are all improving yourselves,and each person should look inward at himself. On the coordinator's part,when those problems come up, we can't say you're not responsible--you dohave to bear responsibility for it. When you haven't done well leading sucha large group of students the responsibility is major, and you should realizethis. As your Master, I can't leave behind a single disciple, and I'll tell youthat as a coordinator, you can't leave behind a single one of my disciples.(Applause) When a student is on good terms with you, you do things withhim, and when someone doesn't listen to you, you exclude him? You can'tbe like that, and as your Master I don't want that kind of coordinator. Youneed to coordinate in a way that allows people to work together, and youneed to continually improve based on Fa and form an upright environment,so that Dafa disciples can do well the things of validating Fa, like clarifyingthe truth, saving sentient beings, and restraining the persecution.Question: In the past four years, some Falun Gong students from MainlandChina have spent a lot of money to come to Korea to work. Their immigra-tion status is illegal, and their monthly income is seven to ten thousandyuan. They aren't able to recognize the responsibility a Dafa disciple hasduring the Fa-rectification period, and have come here just to make moneyand send money home. They even say it was arranged by Master. I'd like toask how we can convince these students to return to China to validate theFa?Teacher: When a Dafa disciple sees that the situation in China is grim, thatstill more Dafa disciples are being persecuted, and that many of the world'speople are being poisoned, if a Dafa disciple doesn't do the things a Dafadisciple does, then is he still a Dafa disciple? It's okay to leave China to doDafa things, but if somebody doesn't do Dafa things, how could he still beworthy of being a Dafa disciple? Whether they're in Mainland China orabroad, they should still be Dafa disciples. Once they become the same asordinary people they are ordinary people. So in terms of these students,you have to explain to them clearly that if they want to remain there theyneed to do what a Dafa disciple should do.Question: Recently, the differences of opinion and misunderstandingsamong fellow cultivators have been pretty big. I'd like to ask Master, is thisbecause the further we go in the latter stages of cultivation, the bigger thedifferences among fellow cultivators' levels? Or is it the old forces interfe-ring?Teacher: It's true that the differences among students' levels are gettingbigger, but the old forces' interfering has never stopped, either. So whene-ver there are personal factors in a student's opinion, it's going to be exploi-ted. This phenomenon doesn't occur that much anymore. Actually, I've tal-ked about this kind of thing many times. The cultivating students are a col-lective entity, and all kinds of not-yet-removed thoughts will manifest. Ifyou don't want to look inward and cultivate yourselves, then a complicated

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situation will take shape. So when these problems come up in some area,it's for sure there is a problem with that area's Fa-study. All of those invol-ved are [partially] responsible and haven't cultivated themselves well, or atleast in terms of that one issue.Question: How are we different from a religion?Teacher: Dafa is formless! The path I'm taking you down today is the pu-rest. We've cast aside every thing with form, and look only at the heart.Cultivation is the cornerstone of a being's elevation, whereas anythingthat's about external form is going to stir up attachments. Look at how ma-ny religious people there are today who don't uphold Buddhas, Daos, orGods but instead religion's forms. What they believe in is not gods, but theform of religion and the cause of building up religions--there's a world ofdifference. Believing in gods and believing in religions--they're poles apart.Religions evoke people's attachments to the forms themselves, and they'veseverely affected people's righteous faith in gods. There are factors in theforms that affect a cultivator's improvement.Question: Sometimes when I meet with ordeals I don't know if it's a resultof my own karma or the old forces' arrangements.Teacher: Regardless of whether it's the old forces' arrangements or karma,we should first of all examine ourselves. I ask you to cleanse yourselvesfirst even when you send righteous thoughts. Look at yourself first, and ifyou discover that you have a problem, take care of it. With that the old for-ces won't be able to do anything; when they can't find anything to holdagainst you they will back off. Of course, at the current time even if the oldforces want to back off that doesn't cut it--clear them away entirely. Afteryou cleanse yourself when you sit to send righteous thoughts, clear themaway. (Applause)Question: After reading "Waist Drum Troupe" in Hongyin II, I came to un-derstand that the waist drum formation has the effect of eliminating eviland rectifying the Fa.Teacher: Yes, the sounds of your drumming carry Zhen-Shan-Ren in them,and in those sounds Dafa disciples' abilities manifest.Question: The young disciples in Taiwan have formed a Western-styledrum troupe. I think they should form a waist drum troupe. (Audiencelaughs)Teacher: Don't let forms limit you. Everything Dafa disciples do validatingthe Fa has power. Actually, the waist drum troupe was just an idea the NewYork students came up with. We often participate in ordinary communityparades, and we wanted to show the world's people the ordinary side of aDafa disciple's life. Every time they were in a parade they had Tang Dynas-ty costumes, celestial maidens, and so on, so they wondered, "Can we comeup with something else?" And thus the idea of a waist drum troupe cameabout. We can use a variety of forms, so if you have an idea and think it'sdoable, that's okay, too.Question: No matter the circumstances, we will all be steadfast in Dafa,

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and will always follow Master, each step of the way, to complete our mis-sion of validating the Fa.Teacher: Yes, as Dafa disciples, all of you here might have that thought,and that's why there have been huge changes in the situation of validatingthe Fa in this world, that's why the evil has shrunk today, and that's why wecan save sentient beings. (Applause)Question: I think some students in Australia aren't following the Fa but fol-lowing people and just going along with the crowd, and they're disruptingthe Fa-rectification and our effort to save the world's people. And there aresome students who like to monopolize things and when they're not able toaccomplish something they won't openly tell everyone. They don't discussthings with everyone and don't do things transparently. Other people thinkthey're doing grand and amazing things, when in fact they didn't accom-plish anything substantial, and they won't tell everyone that they have was-ted precious time. They squeeze out those students who actually do things.Teacher: I know about Australia's situation. Some students' human attach-ments are still quite strong. Master is looking to see when you can all stepout of self.Question: If an ordinary people's organization doesn't let us participate in aparade under Dafa's name, can we use another name or should we just notparticipate at all?Teacher: If that's the case of course we can't participate. Are Dafa disciplesjoining them for fun? Dafa disciples came to save sentient beings, so [wejoin parades] to show Dafa to the world's people and let them know thatDafa is here. If they won't let us do that, then of course we won't participa-te. But not participating isn't a solution--why won't they let us [use Dafa'sname]? You should go talk to them, and you can clarify the truth. If theyhave an underlying political motive, then we can also resolve it via legalmeans; no matter how long it takes, it needs to be resolved on a fundamen-tal level.Question: With regard to the media run by Dafa disciples, in most Asian re-gions they haven't developed as fast as in North America. How can we dothese kinds of work better?Teacher: Just do things according to the resources you have available andyour current setting and situation. Master doesn't force you to do anythingand can't direct you that specifically. With validating the Fa, you are wal-king your own paths, and I can't sit here and say that you have to achievecertain things, for each situation is different. Do things based on your situa-tion locally.Question: Over the past two years only a small number of students havebeen coming to the practice site to do the exercises. Is it true that the stu-dents overseas can all do the exercises at home?Teacher: Of course not. Actually, I know that the biggest reason is that ourstudents have taken on a lot of concrete work to clarify the truth, and be-cause they're so busy they have less time to come out and do the exercises.

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If that's the case it is normal. But if it's not, then it's abnormal. Find out mo-re from those students who aren't coming out.Question: Japanese disciples have been interfered with during their recentactivities. What should we do?Teacher: Japan... well, wherever a problem comes along, that's where youshould go to clarify the truth. The Japanese spirit is to not give up untilsomething is achieved. Dafa is good for people on all accounts, and where-ver we go to clarify the truth, we are actually spreading the seeds of Good-ness (Shan), clearing away the bad factors there, and bringing blessings tothe lives there. People have a side that's aware. With a lot of things, wheneveryone cooperates with each other they'll go better. I hope that you canfocus less attention and energy on who has done well and who hasn't, who'sgood and who's bad, or how this or that person is--focus all of your atten-tion and spend all of your energy on validating the Fa. (Applause) When allof you can cooperate with each other and do well in the things to validatethe Fa, that's when you establish your mighty-virtue. When you are com-menting on who's good and who's bad, gods won't even look you straighton.Of course, some people do have problems and should be criticized. Weshould resolve the problem out of a sense of responsibility for the Fa anddo so with goodwill, making the Fa the first priority, and should absolutelyavoid using an ordinary human's approach.Question: I'm a disciple from Korea. Some fellow cultivators want to knowwhether it's appropriate for some of the fellow cultivators who run a mediaoutlet to be getting paid salaries.Teacher: Here's what I told people at the start: I said that Dafa disciplesdid a good job setting up media outlets, and that you need to reach the soci-ety, get into a positive cycle, become financially independent, become justlike regular media outlets where you're able to pay salaries and to meettheir living needs so that they can work for it full-time--which would ofcourse be great--and become mainstream media outlets. But until you reachthat point and have funds for salaries, paying salaries with money contribu-ted by our students is absolutely not allowed. While others are putting outfor Dafa, could you be getting something for it? As a Dafa disciple youshould just pitch in what you can--be it money, effort, or whatnot. If youcan truly operate [like other media outlets] in society, and become profita-ble and pay salaries, then even if it's not a lot, everybody can get a share,and when there's more money you can share more. If you then have moreprofits and can reach the level of the going salary, then your Master will behappy for you. So, the condition is that before you reach that point youcan't pay salaries using contributions from our students.Question: The newspaper project has taken up more than fifty people. Howcan we plan [our resources] better? This has affected other projects.Teacher: You need to coordinate these things well. The newspaper is in itsearly stages, so it does need help from a lot of people, but try not to waste

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human resources. Fifty-some people is too much, because you have to con-sider the fact that each person needs to walk his own path and do otherthings. At the beginning stage of running a newspaper things might be pret-ty hard, and it takes some people, but don't have too many involved. Youshould coordinate these things well, because clarifying the truth in othersettings is important, too.Clarifying the truth directly and clarifying the truth via the media comple-ment each other. You can't rely on just one way of clarifying the truth. Asyou've seen, right now there are a variety of ways, you have come up witha lot of approaches: the Internet, television, radio, distributing VCD's, tele-phone calls, letters, faxes, distributing literature, directly clarifying thetruth in person, and the students in China do postering, and of course thereare projects being done that jar the evil in different ways. You're using mul-tiple forms together.Question: The assistants and coordinators of various places in Korea havechanged too frequently, and there's no principle being followed in appoin-ting or removing someone. A lot of disciples who are proactively doing Fa-rectification cultivation and who are walking at the forefront were removedand replaced. Some people have already been appointed and removed twi-ce. Some of those who were recently appointed only obtained the Fa a fewmonths ago, and they're busy handling human affairs all day long. Master,would you please tell me if there is a general standard for the Dafa Associa-tion's appointments and removals? Is it appropriate for the AssociationChair to just make the decision as he pleases?Teacher: Now about this, I think I'll give a suggestion to our coordinatorsin Korea: so that our students may cultivate well, and in order for all stu-dents to mature in their cultivation, don't make all those changes, as it ac-tually dampens students' enthusiasm. Another thing is, if you're constantlyswitching people like that, you are replacing students before they have ma-tured through the tempering [effect] of Dafa work, and then the next onewho's assigned is again replaced before he matures. Dafa work is differentfrom any kind of human work. You are finding your way through unchar-ted waters. Figure out how Dafa disciples' assistants and coordinators indifferent regions should do their work and temper themselves to maturity,and help them to mature. No mundane bureaucrat's or leader's ways suitDafa cultivation, so we have to find our own way and allow everyone to betempered.Of course, if the coordinators are really thinking in the interest of the stu-dents and doing so based on the Fa, and trying to help that person removehis attachment to being a leader, I won't oppose it. But if that's not the casethen you shouldn't do it the way you are. On the coordinator's part, if you'rethinking, "I'll appoint whoever listens to me, and if someone doesn't we'llhave him removed," then that's being irresponsible to Dafa, and that ap-proach isn't fit for Dafa work. A coordinator should often exchangethoughts with students, see himself as one of the students, and have a "let's

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do things well together" attitude. When students come to know you wellthe Dafa work will get done faster and better.This isn't criticism. I'm just suggesting that you discuss things with others.So as for our students, you should help our coordinators out more. And asfor our coordinators, you should really increase the communication withour students--more students and a wider range of students. Make sure youdon't pose as some kind of leader. That's not criticism. I'm just teaching youa little know-how. (Applause)So as for Korea's Dafa disciples, a lot of times you've actually done a greatjob, and a lot of Dafa disciples there have cultivated well. Whenever I seeyou do well, and, in particular, whenever you cooperate with each other asa whole and have a great impact, the multitude of gods praise you. Andyou've played an important role clarifying the truth and opposing the perse-cution. Capitalize on your strengths and put to use the righteous thoughts ofDafa disciples, and do even better. Your doing well in and of itself scaresthe evil. Master hopes that the coordinators will lead all of the studentswell, and hopes that the Dafa disciples will mature more fully.Question: I want to wholly and completely assimilate to Dafa, solidly anddiligently advance with purity, put forth my best effort with the threethings, and not let down Master, who has mercifully and laboriously savedus.Teacher: If all of you have this understanding, we'll manage to do ourtasks well. You mentioned how Master has mercifully and laboriously sa-ved you, but if you ask me, I'd say you are the amazing ones, having cometo where you are today. (Applause)Just yesterday I talked about something: Do you know what kind of stu-dents I was faced with at the beginning? Whether it was in Mainland Chinaor other regions, there were a lot of students who, the first time they ente-red the lecture hall, I'd look out at the audience and see them with all kindsof worldviews that they'd formed among ordinary people, and hardly any ofthem truly had their own thoughts or could look at things with clear minds.Many people were wavering, and even when they said that Dafa was greatit wasn't from the heart. Add onto that all those notions they had, and somepeople had learned all kinds of qigong--so many it became addictive. Couldthose people cultivate into gods? As you can imagine, they were milesaway. But making it to where you are today, for you to accomplish thatmuch today, that's truly magnificent.Of course, as your Master, what kind of people do I have the highest regardfor? Actually, gods see it the same way: someone whose thinking is clear--and I'm not referring to people who are cunning or clever in a trivial way,that's not what I mean, [I'm talking about] someone who has his own righ-teous thoughts, has his own thinking, who thinks with his mind, and isn'tinfluenced by any foreign messages. His head isn't foggy, and he's not [likesome people], where when others say something is good, they say it's good,and if others say something is bad, they say it's bad, as if they have no iden-

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tity. But today, what I see is that you're all rational and calm, and you dothings on an even keel. The truth is, you're no longer one of the ordinaryhuman beings, and you couldn't even go back anymore, you really can't.(Applause) The difference between you and ordinary people has growndownright large.Question: Do the old forces know about the law of mutual-generation andmutual-inhibition?Teacher: Of course they do. Aren't the old forces an expression of god-hood?Question: Master, you talked about how a lot of gods wanted to reincarnateas humans but that there weren't enough human skins, so a lot of plants andanimals are them. Since animals can't obtain the Fa, is it true that they canonly assimilate to the Fa?Teacher: Yes, that's true, but the premise is that their attitude toward Dafahas to be positive. Back when I was spreading the Fa, to ensure that in thefuture cosmos this Fa would never fail or wither, I had to walk a straightpath, and so I set the rule that animals could not obtain the Fa. Long ago itwas also the case that animals weren't allowed to obtain the Fa. And thenover the ages, gradually everything began to deviate, and animals were al-lowed to cultivate, and gradually more and more animals cultivated. Soback when I was spreading the Fa and I laid down that animals were not tocultivate in Dafa, whoa, my goodness, all the many realms raised a ruckus.But still, rules are rules. If an animal wants to obtain the Fa, you can rein-carnate as a human and I will give you the chance. In any case, todayyou've arrived at this world, and in Fa-rectification, regardless of whetheryou're an animal, plant, or any kind of thing, I just look at your attitude to-ward Dafa. For those who are positive toward Dafa, I can resolve everyt-hing. The most common scenario is that I have it return to wherever it camefrom after it assimilates. I can resolve the issue. Animals aren't allowed todirectly cultivate in Dafa, as that would be disrespectful to Dafa.Question: In this final stage of Fa-rectification, we have a fellow cultivatorwhose family member (also a fellow cultivator) is going through karma eli-mination so severely that he requires IV's. As a result, they can't smoothlydo work to validate the Fa, and they are affecting each other. I'd like to askrevered Master, does this stem from their own problem or interference?Teacher: For cultivators, nothing is by chance. Usually it's related to thecultivator's process of improving. If it's a new student or somebody who isnot diligent, then that situation will come along when he doesn't pass a testwell. But if severe interference like that happens while Dafa disciples arevalidating the Fa, then it must be dark minions or rotten demons persecu-ting us. Send righteous thoughts to eliminate them. New students or stu-dents who aren't diligent enough, you should watch and examine yoursel-ves more with respect to this.Question: Recently, a coalition for freedom of speech and human rightshosted a symposium in Tokyo on the current state of human rights in China

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and the global effort to bring Jiang to justice. Someone from the JapaneseFalun Gong Association gave a speech at the conference, and other spea-kers included those from the global rescue effort and the Global Coalitionto Bring Jiang to Justice. Some fellow cultivators feel that this course of ac-tion wasn't quite proper.Teacher: You can't look at it that way. We should recognize the fact thatordinary people came to support us, and so hadn't we better attend? That'dbe like the world's people wanting to validate Fa but us not affirming it.We're restraining the persecution and exposing it, and when ordinary peo-ple are involved that doesn't mean we're getting involved in politics. WhenI was spreading the Fa, I didn't look at the organization, and I didn't look atforms, I only looked at people's hearts. It doesn't matter what organizationit is, as long as it's not the criminal underworld or one of those horribly ba-se or corrupt ones, if it approaches us to support Dafa, we should give peo-ple a chance to validate the Fa--didn't we come here to save all beings?Even if it's individuals from those really bad groups I just mentioned whohave the heart to come validate Dafa, then you should still give them achance to, right?But there's one thing to keep in mind: Dafa disciples absolutely can't goand participate in some [political] thing ordinary people put together--inso-far as it has nothing to do with our Falun Gong, you can't participate in it.But if people are organizing something to support Falun Gong, then itwouldn't be right if we didn't go.Question: In Zhuan Falun the dot on the Taiji is either blue, red, or black,but what's printed on some materials is white. Is that wrong?Teacher: Actually, you know, the colors in the cosmos's dimensions--red,orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo, and violet--they change. The Taiji is asymbol that reflects the Daoist view of the cosmos, and so we can only sayit is a symbol that represents the Daoist system. For example, the black-redand indigo-red types that I've talked about have the form of the Daoist sys-tem. With regard to the Taiji's opening, I investigated it further, and itshould be transparent, white, that is--the openings of both types of Taiji arewhite. Actually, it's only an emblem in its manifest form.Question: My child calls himself a Dafa disciple, and he likes the Fa, tellsothers about the Fa, and clarifies the truth. But he won't take it upon him-self to study the Fa or do the exercises. If I require him to, is that inappro-priate?Teacher: If the child is very young you can't force him. When a child is ve-ry young he follows what adults do. When he's older and can study the Faby reading the books on his own, then he will be cultivating on his own.Question: I feel that there are still some fellow cultivators in Singaporewho often think about Dafa with human notions. (Teacher: Yes) How canwe resolve this problem?Teacher: Yes, with anything Dafa disciples do, they should do it based onthe Fa and think about things in terms of the Fa. There are indeed some stu-

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dents whose human attachments are too strong, and there are some that ha-ve done bad things behind people's backs. I'm watching all that.Question: When I cleanse myself before thinking of the word "Mie" to eli-minate the evil, can I think of the word "Chu"?[3]

Teacher: Just do as I tell you to. No matter what you come up with, what Iask you to do is definitely the most powerful. (Applause) Some students'righteous thoughts are always lacking, and whenever they get big-headedthey come up with something different. That's when you'll be used by de-mons, and you will go astray and have problems. Those who have gonewrong didn't go wrong overnight. They slowly began like that.Question: All of Hong Kong's students send their regards to Master. Howshould Dafa disciples handle activities organized by ordinary people thathave political or other agendas?Teacher: What ordinary people do has nothing to do with us. But when or-dinary people support us by opposing the persecution of Falun Gong, orwhen they oppose China's suppression of human rights, you can't say that ithas nothing to do with Falun Gong. In Hong Kong, at this time, when ordi-nary people invite us to be a part of things that are related to us, and if it'speaceful and rational, then we can participate. I'm only saying that HongKong can participate. If it has nothing to do with us and isn't related at all,then we can't participate. You need to be clear about this.Last time when they were opposing Article 23, for example, when therewas that grand and dynamic event, didn't they do it for Falun Gong? (Tea-cher laughs) And after that took place, democracy activists, people fromvarious community groups, people in political circles, and many peoplefrom mainstream society began carefully looking into Falun Gong. Andthat's why I think Hong Kong's general public has a clear understanding ofFalun Gong now. Of course, as the saying goes, "an announcement postedeverywhere still can't make the illiterate aware," so there are still some thatare left out for sure, there are still people who don't know the truth for sure,and that's why you need to keep doing things to clarify the truth.Question: How can Hong Kong play a better role using media to validatethe Fa?Teacher: The newspaper needs to gradually get into a positive cycle in so-ciety and become a mainstream media outlet. The media outlet run by Dafadisciples will definitely become mainstream media. (Applause) Not onlywill it become mainstream media, but in the future it will be the world'sbiggest media outlet. (Applause) In fact, the framework for the newspaperyou run is already the largest. Take a media outlet in any country, and it on-ly covers the countries in that region. No matter how big the country is, it'sstill only a national media outlet, even though the newspapers can be distri-buted in other countries. And none of them have that much influence.In the past, some Chinese-language newspapers did have a wide distribu-tion, but a lot of them were bought off later on, and now they've lost theirsense of justice and don't dare to report the truth. If someone wants to see

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truthful reports he has to read the media that you run.1. Translator's note: The question is in reference to changes Teacher recently suggestedto the Chinese text. The Japanese script uses many characters that originated from Chi-nese.2. Translator's note: This term has been translated elsewhere as "hand gestures" or"hand positions."3. Translator's note: This is a similar word that means "get rid of," "eliminate," or "re-move."Editor's note: The translation is subject to further improvement so as to be closer to theoriginal text. Latest Update: June 21, 2004.

Master's Comment on a Student's Article

All Dafa disciples, whether they are in Mainland China or other parts of theworld, should, with the approaches they take to counter the persecution,keep close in mind the safety of Mainland China's Dafa disciples. All ac-tions that jeopardize Dafa disciples' safety should be stopped.Li HongzhiMay 31, 2004Revised on October 8, 2005

Teaching the Fa at the 2004 Chicago Confer-ence

(Li Hongzhi, May 23, 2004)

Good afternoon! (People reply, "Good afternoon, Master!")I've said before that when the overall Fa-rectification moves forward andeliminates the evil, and when you help people become more and more clearabout us as you clarify the facts, that's when the evil beings become fewerand fewer. Although the old forces no longer exist, the things they arrangedin the Three Realms are still having an effect. So in other words, eventhough the evil beings left now are few, and today the world's people as awhole are rapidly awakening, the evil still won't quit just like that. So du-ring this time, before the evil beings are ultimately and completely elimina-ted, they still play a role and they are still that evil--it's just that their powerhas diminished now and there are fewer places where they can do evil.At present, in addition to a Dafa disciple's own, personal cultivation, youneed to do a large amount of things to clarify the facts. So I think that forDafa disciples clarifying the facts has become a unique way of cultivationfor you cultivators today. This has never, ever happened before. And it canbe called Dafa disciples' magnificent feat of validating the Fa and savingsentient beings during the Fa-rectification. You know, in the past whenpeople cultivated they only sought their own Consummation. But the things

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Dafa disciples have in front of them are major. You know, I've said manytimes that none of the people in today's world have a simple background. Ifnone of them have a simple background, then the people that you save, thelives that you save, the sentient beings that you save are not ordinarybeings, and it's not something an ordinary cultivator could do. Only Dafadisciples of today's Fa-rectification period are able to do that as they valida-te the Fa, only they are worthy of doing that, and only they are allowed todo that. So what I'm saying is, the historic responsibility you shoulder issignificant, and you are laying the foundation for the future.You know, the work being done by the Fa-rectification on everything in thecosmos is in its final stage. But in this Three Realms very very final, hig-her-level beings still exist, and their existence is having a separating effect,and so the evil [beings] are still able to do evil in the world. Even thoughthe Three Realms is minute compared to the enormous cosmos, it corres-ponds to it, similar to how the focal point of the cosmos would. Althoughthis Earth is minute, and although who we are dealing with are beings atthe lowest level of the cosmos--human beings who are similar to gods andhave the outer appearances of gods--and even the way you cultivate is onewhere you begin from the lowest method of cultivation in the cosmos, youhave enormous missions.As Dafa disciples have clarified the facts you have saved many beings whowere supposed to be saved, but it's not enough. In fact, so far, what you'veaccomplished is still limited, and in terms of numbers the proportion is stillquite small. The Dafa disciples in Mainland China, in particular, have thegreatest responsibility. The main body of Dafa disciples is in China, so theDafa disciples there should do even better; through lessons learned theyshould become more rational and more clearheaded, and do things morerighteously; they should allow more sentient beings to be saved; and theyshould have the effect of the main body of Dafa disciples. Everything theDafa disciples in other regions do revolves around the main body of Dafain Mainland China, and is restraining the evil's persecution, lessening thepressure for the Dafa disciples in Mainland China, and helping the Dafadisciples in Mainland China to clarify the facts. Overall, looking at the si-tuation of Dafa disciples validating the Fa as a whole, in the Fa-rectifica-tion period Dafa disciples have basically played the role of Dafa disciples.Of course, there are still a small number of people that are exceptions, andthere have always been people who aren't diligent, because, after all, thereare three different situations with Dafa disciples. The first one is wherethey made an agreement early on with Master to come here, and the secondone is where they formed a karmic connection in history--the people whoformed a karmic connection with me in different historical periods. And thethird group are those who came in when I imparted the Fa this time and hadthe door wide open; they had a good base, and seemed pretty good and likethey could make it. But in actuality, how they have acted hasn't been thatsatisfactory. Even today there are people whose conduct in their personal li-

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ves is not at all that of a cultivator; as for people like that, no matter howmany things you do, you can't Consummate. While [Dafa disciples] clarifythe facts, [some people] squander the money Dafa disciples have scrimpedand saved for making materials. I have always taught you to think of othersfirst in everything you do, but does that even cross your mind when youuse Dafa disciples' money or possessions? The evil takes advantage of theslightest gap and glares menacingly at every single word and action ofyours. Whatever you're attached to, that's what the evil beings will strengt-hen, and when your mind is off they will make you irrational. Everyone isputting out for Dafa, and yet some people shamelessly ask for compensa-tion from other students. Are you cultivating? Who are you negotiatingterms with? Why do you come across as nothing like a cultivator? Andhow are you going to establish a cultivator's mighty-virtue? Do you thinkMaster is leading you in some ordinary people's political thing? There arealso people who haven't been clearheaded or calm, they aren't mindful ofsecurity matters, and even less so are they mindful of other people's safety.Back when this [third] group of students joined the ranks of Dafa disciples,it was known that, when they experienced trials, when they experienced tri-bulations, and as their enormous karma was reduced and eliminated, theirtests would be severe; but it wasn't known at that time whether they wouldbe able to make it. Of course, that group of irrational people is small.Looking at the current situation, I think most of them are basically okay,but there are still ones who aren't, who look at the Fa in a human way, lookat the persecution of Dafa disciples in a human way, and look at the threethings that Dafa disciples should do in a human way. And especially whenit comes to informing people about the facts, there are still many peoplewho aren't making it a priority. Here I'm mainly talking about the studentsin Mainland China. Some people's righteous thoughts are still inadequateand they aren't able to make a priority of informing people about the facts.And during the persecution some people have even had a very bad impact;sometimes they're with it but after a while they get foggy-headed again.Human beings... no matter where you come from, and no matter what kindof a base you have, once you come to this human place you have entered aworld of delusion, and it is indeed hard for someone to step out of this pho-ny state of a human society and this phony culture created by the old for-ces. But at the same time each being is not entirely in delusion, as he stillhas a side of him that's aware and still has the fundamental base of hisbeing that's founded on his own, inborn, original nature. All these thingscan have a positive effect and should have a very good effect. In otherwords, you should have righteous thoughts. In terms of how people havedone in reality, I see that some people have performed very poorly. But youknow, what has Master come here for? In terms of the Fa-rectification mypurpose is none other than to save all beings, and that includes the world'speople, the people on earth. (Applause) So [I] have got to save those whocan be saved. How I look at things is different from how you or the world's

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people do. When a human being sees someone make a mistake he finds italmost unforgivable. But I don't look at things that way. I look at an entirebeing overall, and even when there's just one thread of hope, I'll give himhope. (Applause)Some everyday people say, "Doesn't your master have great abilities? Whydoesn't he do such and such?" Things are not like what they think. People'sTrue Thoughts determine who of them is to be weeded out, and yes, theycan be destroyed in the turn of a hand. But what have I come here for? Whyhave I endured so much for all beings? [If I did things that way,] wouldn't Ihave done all of that in vain? A being on earth corresponds to the cosmosand corresponds to major things, so this is a focal point, and when a personsins it is not a matter of one person sinning--think about it, it could verywell involve a gigantic cosmic system. If that's the case, then when onebeing is destroyed perhaps a gigantic cosmic system is destroyed. And insome cases it goes beyond this, because if a being on earth has committedsins, then [what about] those who have used him, who arranged it, who ha-ve manipulated him, who instigated it, whose factors were playing a role...what's involved is not just one cosmic body, or two cosmic bodies, but gi-gantic cosmic bodies, which are all responsible for it. This is the cosmos'slaw! And this is a fundamental standard by which the cosmos's Fa-rectifica-tion positions all beings. When someone has done bad things at this humanplace, if you just go after the human being, the human being can't bear thefull responsibility, and no matter to what extent you destroy him he can'tbear the full responsibility, as it's not a simple matter of a human being ha-ving sinned--it results from having the factors of high-level beings invol-ved.But on the other hand, if the person's righteous thoughts truly come forthand he becomes clearheaded, then when he wants to do something, thehigh-level beings will look at that side of a person as well. If a person trulywants to do good things, then nobody has the right to make him commitsins, and whoever does that will be cast down. When a being's main bodycan have a positive effect, then even if in history that being had becomebad, his sins can be reduced, because the Fa-rectification criterion for theentire cosmos is to look at a being's stance towards the Fa-rectification. Theoverall state of the human beings on the earth is controlled by higher re-alms, so human beings' attitudes are, [in turn,] affecting those higher realmsand even higher levels.Many students have the ability to see some scenes and situations, but ac-tually, let me tell you that all of those are specific manifestations of certainbeings at different levels in the enormous cosmos--they are all manifesta-tions of those different lives' and different gods' individual beings. Butwhat's most important are the manifestations of their enormous Main BodyKings, who usually know much of the true situation and whose manifesta-tions are different from those of their specific beings. That's why what so-me students see are not the manifestations of the Main Bodies. So for our

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Dafa disciples, clarifying the facts in actuality far transcends your personalcultivation. Your personal cultivation only makes for the fulfillment of onebeing, yet the role that you serve in saving sentient beings makes for thefulfillment of a great multitude of Main-Body beings, boundless numbersof beings, and even greater cosmic bodies--that's how big what you areshouldering is!Of course, we don't acknowledge any of the things that the old forces arran-ged--I as your master don't acknowledge them, and Dafa disciples of coursedon't acknowledge them either. (Applause) But after all, they did do whatthey wanted to do, so there's all the more reason for Dafa disciples to doeven better and cultivate themselves well in the course of saving all beings.When you encounter ordeals during your cultivation, you have got to culti-vate yourself and look at yourself--that doesn't mean acknowledging the or-deals arranged by the old forces and trying to do well amidst the ordealsthey've arranged, that's not the case. We negate even the very emergence ofthe old forces and everything that they've arranged; we don't even acknow-ledge their existence. We're fundamentally negating all of their things, andall of, and only, the things you do while negating and getting rid of them ismighty-virtue. It's not that you're cultivating amidst the ordeals they crea-ted. Rather, you are to walk your own path well while not acknowledgingthem, not even acknowledging the elimination of their ordeals' manifesta-tions. (Applause) So looking at it from this angle, what we need to do iscompletely negate the old forces. Dafa disciples and I don't even acknow-ledge the manifestations of their last-ditch efforts.There's a law in the cosmos that all of you know about, and that is, allbeings have to bear responsibility for all the good consequences and badconsequences they've brought about throughout history. In eliminating allof the persecution arranged by the old forces, how much Dafa disciples putin is how much they'll get out. Even an average, ordinary being will, afterbearing responsibility for the good things and the bad things, be rendered inthe future everything he accumulated. All of the persecution and pain thatDafa disciples have been subjected to during this persecution will result ingreater glory being bestowed upon Dafa disciples in history's future. Thatkind of glory is something that has never existed for any of the beings inthe cosmos since the beginning of time, because Dafa disciples are disci-ples forged by Dafa during the Fa-rectification period and they are part ofthe Fa-rectification. This affair itself has raised Dafa disciples to a veryhigh position. What's more, they are Dafa disciples who are directly savedby Master.This affair itself brings a great deal of honor, so Dafa disciples need to beworthy of such an honor. But now that Master said that, don't go and act li-ke you've again realized something, and then some of you might immedia-tely stop doing everything else and focus solely on, and do nothing but, Da-fa things. In that case you might then be used by the old forces, becausewhat they are doing is taking advantage of your gaps. Today, what I'm tel-

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ling Dafa disciples to do is to cultivate among ordinary people in a way thatconforms to ordinary people as much as possible. You can't go to extremes.Just go about things steadily like that and fully play the role of a Dafa disci-ple as you validate the Fa. You have many, many challenges; in addition todoing well in things to validate Dafa, in this world you also need to main-tain relationships with other people, with your family, and in society. It ishard. It's hard, but that is the path that a Dafa disciple must take.I said long ago that I'm doing this in two steps. If I were to complete this inone step, then the tribulation would have been a global one. There would bebillions of Dafa disciples obtaining the Fa, but there would also be manyplaying a negative role; it would be at least in the hundreds of millions, andthat would have made this tribulation worldwide. If this were done thatway then the whole world would be caught up in it and no one could escapeit. Every single person, every single being, would have to position himselfin that one round--those who can cultivate, those who can step forward,those who oppose it, those who have different views... they would all bepositioning themselves. Then if you had billions of people who came all atonce to cultivate in Dafa, if this approach to cultivation weren't used, thenwhen you'd have billions of people leaving the secular world to devotethemselves to cultivation, that'd be a disaster for human society, and itwould be irresponsible to mankind and to the Fa at this level. Although Iseparated it into two steps and those things didn't happen, won't there bemasses of people cultivating Dafa in the future? Well this approach to culti-vation may just be the path left for the future masses of cultivators.In terms of Dafa disciples' responsibilities, there are still many things thatneed to be done in greater depth, especially clarifying the facts. Doing abetter job of informing people about the facts more deeply is tied to thepeople of the future obtaining the Fa, tied to all beings being rescued, tiedto negating the old forces, tied to eliminating the evil and this persecution,and tied to your own Consummation. In fact, some students haven't reallydone too well all along; many Mainland students are still making all kindsof excuses for not stepping forward; and there are some who have been"transformed," they are ashamed of it, but then they're embarrassed andcan't lift up their head and step forward, and they are discouraged. Andthen there are a number of people who are like this: they too haven't step-ped forward all along, but have been hiding at home and reading [Dafa]books, and have even been making excuses for doing that, when the truthis, it's their fear at work. I hope that the other Dafa disciples in MainlandChina will help these people and ask them to step forward and do what aDafa disciple should do. This thing hasn't ended yet, so for any being it stillpresents an opportunity and a chance.The way gods see it, saving sentient beings is absolutely not something do-ne in a manner like in human society, where after someone makes somemistakes human means are used to correct him. Gods are merciful and havethe greatest capacity to forgive, and they are truly responsible to beings,

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instead of focusing on a person's actions at a given time. That's becausegods awaken a being at a fundamental level, and enliven a being's Buddha-nature at a fundamental level. So looking at things from this perspective,you still need to step up your clarifying the facts some, and still need to doit in greater depth, do it better, and do it more solidly; you absolutely can'tjust go through the motions. Only when you do it earnestly can you savethat many people. So no matter what excuses a small number of people andsome people with ulterior motives in Mainland China use to stop the [Dafa]students from informing people of the facts, they are interfering, and it's theevil using human beings to interfere with you. People who do that eitherhave a crooked understanding or have been used by the evil, or it's a casewhere some people with ulterior motives are playing a negative role. Clari-fying the facts is something you must do, and you must do it to the end. It'snot something we do according to the old forces' arrangements; we comple-tely negate everything of the old forces.There's another thing I want to talk about. As you know, as Dafa disciplescontinually cultivate themselves while they validate the Fa, many badthings that were formed among everyday people have been gradually remo-ved during your cultivation process, but some things have only been redu-ced, while many things have truly been removed. So the things that havebeen reduced aren't completely removed. There's a reason you can't get ridof them completely yet, and it's to allow you folks, before you Consumma-te, to live in ordinary society, to save sentient beings in ordinary society,and to do the things that a Dafa disciple should do today. But since these at-tachments will often show up in your cultivation and your life, they showup in your words and actions in different settings, and can even show up inevery single thought of yours during your daily life. When you're affectedby a human attachment, then at that moment, or for that short while, or onthat matter, your behavior is the same as an ordinary person's. If you oftenfail to follow the requirements for a Dafa disciple, a cultivator, then aren'tyou an ordinary person?It's fine to have those human things--when you are able to restrain them inyour actions, strengthen your resolve, firm up your righteous thoughts, andhandle yourself well, then that's cultivation. Without those things itwouldn't count as cultivation. It's exactly because you have those littlethings that you're able to cultivate yourself and strengthen your resolve inthe process, and when you are able to cultivate yourself in this complicatedenvironment and amidst this persecution, you demonstrate even more thegreatness of a Dafa disciple. That's how these things work. But if you're notcareful then a lot of times they will make you come across as very attached.In fact, as Dafa disciples validate the Fa, a lot of times they argue amongthemselves in order to do well informing people about the truth and in ot-her Dafa disciples' things. You've seen how some students have acted, theirhuman attachments are quite strong, and some students are easily affectedby their human attachments. I've noticed a situation for a long time now,

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but I haven't discussed it with you because the things you do to inform peo-ple about the facts and the other things you do to validate the Fa are all ve-ry important, so I didn't want them to be watered down by this, and that'swhy I haven't discussed it in all this time. Have you noticed that a lot of ourstudents can't take criticism from others? As soon as they are criticized theyget mad and aren't able to take it. These things stick out pretty badly now.Think about it carefully. You can't even take criticism from me, your mas-ter. Today you all know that Master is truly doing things for your sake andhas been speaking about the Fa to you with compassion. If I were to changemy demeanor and talk to you bluntly, immediately you wouldn't be able totake it, really. Some people say, "No matter how Master puts it to me I'll beable to take it." That's what you think. Your cultivation has to be solid andsound, so you must truly meet the standard.You know, why is it that many things, many attachments, can't be removedjust like that? Why is it so hard? I've always told you that particles make upparticles level by level from the microcosm all the way to surface matter. Ifyou took a look in the extreme microcosm at the material formed by whatyour mind is attached to, [you'd see that] they are mountains, huge moun-tains, made of hard, granite-like rock, and once they are formed there's sim-ply no way for a human being to move them. You know, in the cases ofmany cultivators in the past it was their subordinate soul that was cultiva-ting, their masters couldn't do anything at all about those things, and that'swhy in their cultivation there was just no way they could keep this body.It's because they couldn't get rid of those big mountains, they couldn't takedown those big mountains. They could only try to restrain them--restrainthem while they were in concentration (ding) or in a state of no-thoughts--not let them have an effect during their current lifetime, and not let thosethoughts arise during their cultivation. That was all they could do. Theytried their best to prevent the side of them that can be Enlightened throughcultivation from being affected, [they tried to] avoid getting so bad thatthey'd stir up those attachments, as those bad effects could make their culti-vation fail and make them drop down--they tried to prevent things fromgetting that bad. That's why at a certain time when they were able to reachConsummation they would hurriedly discard this body. They couldn't delayfor even a second.When a cultivator doesn't want to get rid of his attachments, quite often hisexcuse is, "When other people criticize me, I don't want to hear it, but ifMaster says something to me I'll want to hear it." But if Master said some-thing to you, would that big mountain of yours just be gone by itself?Would that hard rock just dissolve without cultivation? If I did that for youthen it wouldn't count as you cultivating, so I can't do that, and you your-self have to cultivate it away. There are many things that you can't do butthat Master can. And so how does Master do them? It's not like as soon aswe come into contact I'll remove them. When your righteous thoughts arefirm and when you can repel those things, I remove them for you bit by bit;

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however much you can do, that's how much I remove for you and diminishfor you. (Applause) But since you're a cultivator, you have to truly holdyourself to the requirements for a cultivator. Even though sometimes youstill can't quite get there yet, you've got to at least have those righteousthoughts, and you've got to cultivate yourselves.Right now a lot of students don't recognize [these problems] at all. WithMaster not having addressed this type of issue for a while, a lot of peopleare really indulging these things. I talked about these things in Zhuan Falunlong ago, and they are things a cultivator needs to take care of right at thebeginning. "Not hitting back when attacked, and not talking back when in-sulted" is not just something you say, rather, you should be completelyunaffected, and it's something you come to understand from the Fa. I'vetold you to study the Fa a lot, to study the Fa, study the Fa, study the Fa...When you don't give weight to Fa-study, those things are bound to be in-dulged. You don't want to hear displeasing things, you only want to hearpleasing things, and [you say or act like] "I can't stand it when other peopleirritate me." Think about it, everyone, isn't it ordinary people who, living inthe ordinary world, care about enjoying those pleasing things and who en-joy hearing pleasing words? You're a cultivator, so do you want those ordi-nary things? Let me tell you, since you're cultivators and you're among or-dinary people, you just have to listen to those displeasing words, and youhave to be able to listen to those displeasing words. (Applause) Otherwise,when you haven't even resolved this most basic cultivation issue, howcould you call yourself a Dafa disciple?You're a cultivator, so why is it that sometimes you have lengthy argu-ments where you refuse to give ground? Why do you always say it's becau-se of other people's attitudes? Why is it that whenever someone else sayssomething you're affected? Aren't you supposed to remain unaffected evenwhen someone verbally assaults you? Many of the factors that contribute toa conflict are caused by that thing at work. Whenever someone hits on thatthing you become rash and worked up, your heart even starts to pound, andat that moment you don't think of being responsible to the Fa but just getangry and can't get over it. Some people always insist, "My, how come thatperson always has such an attitude? Why is he like that with everyone?"And there are some people who say, "Well nobody thinks too highly ofhim." But if you ask me, your master, you're all wrong. When none of youare attached anymore to wanting to hear pleasing things, when none of youare affected when you're insulted, see if he'll still be like that. Exactly be-cause you people have those attachments, there exist factors that hit onyour attachments; and exactly because those attachments of yours are stir-red up, you get irritated; when all of you have those attachments, the situa-tion where everyone is irritated by the person who hit on their attachmentscomes about. If you can all keep a calm and steady state of mind whilebeing assaulted by strong words, and you're not at all affected, then see ifthose factors still exist.

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Didn't I tell you that nothing that happens to a cultivator is by accident? Ha-ven't I told you many times that a cultivator should stay unaffected? TodayMaster just has a flesh body appearance in the human world, but Masterhas many, many abilities, and I have countless Law Bodies, and all of themare resolving the things that should be resolved for Dafa disciples, they'reresolving Fa-rectification related matters during the Fa-rectification, anddoing many, many things. But none of that manifests here. What I've beentelling you, though, are upright principles, Fa-truths of the cosmos, and Fathat creates Great Enlightened Beings. You're a Dafa disciple, so whatshould you seek and what should you cultivate? Have you even forgottenthese most basic, simplest things?Yes, you are clarifying the facts, are busy doing a lot of things, and thereare many things to do; that has demonstrated the extraordinary side of Dafadisciples. But don't forget to cultivate away the most basic things! It's notlike "at the critical moment I'll be good enough"--that's not necessarily true.A conflict always arrives when you don't expect it, so at a critical momentyou might not be good enough, because it's not like what you think, nor isit something you can just say. Just like when you cultivate Buddhahood,you might say, "When I really get up there I guarantee you I'll be goodenough, and I won't be attached to anything." But how are you going to begood enough when those factors of yours are still there? You won't be, andit's because this is how a being is made. A stone is a stone no matter whereyou place it, and a piece of gold is a piece of gold no matter where you pla-ce it.You all know that during your cultivation, even when you don't specificallythink about something, bad thoughts come up on their own. And why isthat? Isn't it because that thing is there? When any conflict arises or anyt-hing happens, I've told you that not only should the two parties in the con-flict look for reasons on their part, even any third party should think abouthimself--why are you the one who observed it? When you are a direct partyin the conflict, that's even more the case, but why won't you cultivate your-self?Today I brought this up because I felt it was time for me to address it, so Ithought I'd use this opportunity. Now that I've talked about that, you needto be mindful of it and should take it seriously. Make your actions as Dafadisciples validating the Fa more sacred, and don't act like ordinary people.When an ordinary person does Dafa things he only accumulates blessings,but the things Dafa disciples do to validate the Fa are meritorious contribu-tions, so you should Consummate yourself well.I'll talk about another issue. You know, many things of Dafa disciples willbe left for the future; they won't necessarily be left for human beings, per-haps they'll be left somewhere in the cosmos. Since you are validating theFa, you are exploring whether you can do certain things in certain ways,and are blazing a path for the future. Even though these things manifest he-re on the earth, at this human place, if you magnify them [you'll see that] in

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different realms they manifest in other ways. Each Dafa disciple has to ma-ke and complete his own path, and your paths in cultivation are all diffe-rent; in other words, each person's cultivation path is different. All of thefuture states of the various kinds of beings that are at different levels of thecosmos might manifest in you to a certain extent, so it all depends on whet-her the paths you yourselves walk in validating the Fa are straight, good,and will work. Factors this huge are involved.Some of you have supernormal abilities while cultivating; some people cansee things, and some people can use certain supernormal abilities. As I justsaid, everyone is walking on a different path that a Dafa disciple shouldwalk, and the paths you make and complete will have an impact on the fu-ture of the cosmos. So there must be a reason for letting a certain Dafa dis-ciple have supernormal abilities while he cultivates; it must be for the pur-pose of laying the foundation of something for the beings of the future.That's how enormous Dafa disciples' responsibilities are, that is, you havesuch important tasks on your shoulders! There are many things that I ha-ven't told you about or don't want to tell you about fully, lest you developall kinds of attachments.If these people who have supernormal abilities while they cultivate don'twalk their paths well, if they're interfered with today, they develop a croo-ked understanding tomorrow, and something gets them all in a frenzy andthey can't tell up from down the day after tomorrow, then I'll tell you thatyou haven't walked well the path that's been arranged for you. Such a pathhas been arranged for you because there are such factors in the cosmos,which have been given to you, and you are entrusted to walk that path. Doyou understand what I mean? (Applause) However, a small number of stu-dents who have supernormal abilities have failed to live up to their greatmissions and have not done well. They're smug about the little tiny abilitiesthey have, and their problem even goes beyond showing off, they've evengone on a long detour, some of them have even developed crooked unders-tandings, and still they haven't realized it! You have failed to live up to thegreat trust placed in you by the cosmos, and that's no minor thing. So,being a Dafa disciple you need to be mindful of every facet of things.When Dafa disciples look back at the path they have taken, [they'll see that]in different settings each person was walking his own path, and that therewas a reason behind even the type of job you had in the human world, thelifestyle you had, etc.The Fa I'm teaching here today applies to all students, and that includesthose in Mainland China and those outside of Mainland China. These areproblems that have arisen with the whole body. Dafa disciples have actual-ly done very well while they validate the Fa during this time, and there aremany specific things that I don't want to talk about, because I'll wait and letyou see for yourselves those wonderful, amazing, and sacred things. At thistime, as long as you can steadily do well with the three things that Dafa dis-ciples are supposed to do, you will be able to make it through--you'll defini-

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tely be able to make it through. (Applause)I'll say this again: I don't want to leave a single person behind. That's whyMaster's thinking is usually different from yours. Sometimes you think thatcertain people are iffy, certain people are unsavable, certain people are thisor that... but my thinking is different from yours. You know, today I haveopened the door for saving people so wide; the way things are in terms ofjobs the sentient beings in human society have is such that people are doingall kinds of work, and I want to save each person. As long as someone haslearned the Fa, I want to save him, I don't want to abandon those people.(Applause) When you Dafa disciples develop even stronger righteousthoughts among you, that will be what's most magnificent. Starting fromeach person, let's truly make our environment a very righteous one, andthen all the unrighteous factors will dissolve, and all the students who ha-ven't conducted themselves well will see where they fall short, and it willmake them do better.With human beings... when a being can obtain the Fa today in history, it'sno ordinary thing--he's so fortunate! But as soon as he loses the Fa, do youknow what he faces? It's really horrific, because when he fails to fulfill themajor responsibilities and the huge missions that were bestowed upon him,then, accordingly, that's like the inverse of a being's Consummation, and hewill truly have to enter the gate of no-life. You folks can't just go and aban-don a person without trying hard enough. No matter what kind of mistakessomeone has made, or what kind of a person he is, I still want to give him achance. Of course, in human society there are, after all, a number of peoplewho aren't good enough anymore, so just let them be. Today I'm mainlysaying that our Dafa disciples need to do better, and we should cherish tho-se who have obtained the Fa.Those who haven't done well should think carefully about these things, andbe sure not to take Master's mercy lightly. You don't have to believe me;you can go about things your own way. But I have repeatedly said that thefact that such a major thing has come about in human society, that such amassive number of people have done all that they have in society, and thefact that the Fa that I, Li Hongzhi, have taught is something that peoplethroughout the ages always wanted to know about and wanted to obtain butcouldn't, (applause) none of these things are by chance. Think it over calm-ly. Those who haven't done well, make sure you don't destroy your eternallife because of your irrationality and human attachments.That's all I'm going to say today. Thank you. (Long, enthusiastic applause)

To the Fa Conference in Montreal, Canada

Greetings! Through Dafa disciples' constant efforts over the last severalyears, and through your clarifying the truth, the world's people have beco-me more and more clearheaded. You have saved more and more beings,and along with this have been establishing Dafa disciples' futures. This is

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commendable and worth congratulating.

In our Fa conferences you are continually summarizing [what you've expe-rienced and learned]. While validating the Fa and putting into action howDafa disciples should cultivate, you still have some shortcomings. Fullyutilize the good things you've learned and strengthen your righteousthoughts, and doing so will allow you to do even better with Dafa disciples'things.

This Fa conference is a grand gathering of Dafa disciples, and it is a reflec-tion of Dafa disciples establishing their mighty-virtue. Don't let up withyour efforts, and let's do even better in this final time. I wish you completesuccess.Li HongzhiJune 20, 2004

Editor's note: The translation is subject to further improvement so as to be closer to the original text.Last updated: June 21, 2004.

Master's Message to the European Fa Confer-ence Held in Vienna

To the European Fa Conference held in Vienna:Greetings!We should make our Fa Conferences grand gatherings in which we summa-rize what we've experienced and learned, find where we fall short, draw onwhat we have achieved, and establish the righteous thoughts of Dafa disci-ples. Cherish all of what you've done, and on the path ahead may you doeven better.Master is watching you all, and always looks forward to good news fromyou.Lastly, I wish the Fa Conference complete success!Li HongzhiJune 20, 2004

On Reading Weathering the Storm 1

Born into a sphere of sufferingMan struggles just to surviveOne day, behold, the Great Law gainedCease not your steps on the path of returnLi HongzhiJuly 19, 20041 Translator's Note: A Chinese novel, recently published online, telling the tumultuous story of a FalunGong practitioner's life under persecution in China.

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Editor's note: The translation is subject to further improvement so as to be closer to the original text.Last updated: July 19, 2004.

Teaching the Fa at the 2004 Washington DC FaConference

(Li Hongzhi, July 24, 2004)Good morning! (Audience responds: Good morning, Master!)Time is flying by, and in the blink of an eye another year has passed. In thetime that's passed since I attended the DC Fa Conference last year, Dafadisciples have changed a great deal, and so has the overall state of Fa-recti-fication. And Dafa disciples have done really well with the things that Dafadisciples should do as they validate the Fa. When you look at how they'vebeen going, it might be getting clearer and clearer to you that a bright futu-re lies ahead. (Applause)In the not-too-distant future, the persecution and this form of cultivationthat Dafa disciples have will draw to an end. (Applause) This first-of-its-kind form of cultivation where Dafa disciples are part of Fa-rectificationwhile the cosmos undergoes Fa-rectification, along with the mighty-virtueexhibited by the Dafa disciples, and the magnificent feats that astonish theentire cosmos, they'll all come to an end very soon. (Applause)So looking at the current situation, since you have been clearing out theevil with righteous thoughts and righteous actions while validating the Fa,at this point the number of evil lives is miniscule and they are merely tryingto hide. However, in order to keep up this environment of so-called "tests"by evil, the dark minions that are in the Three Realms and that the old for-ces arranged in the past, as well as some gods who are playing negative ro-les--it is they who are directly doing those bad things. In other words, thefactors left by the system of the old forces are still having negative effects.Then those lives won't be able to pay for the interference they've causedFa-rectification or the hand they've had in harming Fa-rectification, and soall of them will be weeded out during the Fa-rectification, for sure. Sothey're part of the bad lives you clear away when you send righteousthoughts. Actually, there aren't many of those lives left. At this point onlyabout five percent of the original dark minions are left, and very few of thegods who have played a negative role in Fa-rectification still remain. Butthey are still playing a wicked role within the mechanisms arranged in thepast by the old forces. So in validating the Fa, no matter what the situationis, none of you should let down your guard, and when it comes to what aDafa disciple should do, you should keep giving your best. Especiallywhen it's toward the end, for some students there's really not much timeleft, and that's doubly-so for those who haven't done well--you should seizethe day and do well.Every time I talk about the state of Fa-rectification, I always need to addthis: This is how Dafa disciples cultivate, and nobody should go to extre-

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mes. Carry on with what you would normally do. Whatever you would do,you should still just go about it as usual. That's because your every thoughtand whim, and each and every action, are affecting major things. No matterwhat big things are happening, pretend nothing is going on and just goabout, as usual, doing what a Dafa disciple should do. This is the pathyou're taking today, and this is the [legacy of] mighty virtue you are lea-ving. The path you, the Dafa disciples, take, is how you have to cultivate asdictated by our cultivation way, and it absolutely cannot change with shiftsin the ordinary world.Looking at the things you've been doing in cultivating and validating the Faas Dafa disciples, you still have lots of shortcomings, and you should aban-don all the things you're attached to. When I bring up attachments, youwon't understand it in an extreme way like you would have before. Thispath that you're taking and the way you cultivate are not attachments. Yourown notions and the crooked thoughts that you're still holding on to amonghuman beings as you validate the Fa, those are what you should abandon.As for this cultivation way of yours that's here in ordinary society--the factthat you work and lead a normal life among the masses while doing cultiva-tion--that's not something I've ever told you to abandon, for it is somethingdetermined by your cultivation way.Over the past few years of persecution you have displayed the mighty-vir-tue of Dafa disciples, but along the way, lots and lots of shortcomings havecome to light. Yet in the process of validating the Fa, the vast majority ofDafa disciples have removed those shortcomings while cultivating and vali-dating the Fa, and that's remarkable. Ordinary people aren't able to let go ofhuman things. But cultivation, you know, that's different from being ordina-ry. The ordinary man lives just to pursue things that ordinary people want.Dafa disciples aren't attached to those things. You have clear cultivationgoals, and you know what you are doing. While you validate the Fa, plentyof the things you do seem identical to what ordinary people do, and that'swhy a few people say we seem to be getting political, or that we're organi-zing some sort of social movement. Well, that's how human beings are. Du-ring this period of time, there's definitely not going to be millions of godsdoing divine things in the human world, and Dafa disciples definitely won'tbe using their godly sides to do large-scale divine things, with full-blowndivine means, in front of the masses of people in the ordinary world. Dafadisciples are utilizing ordinary people's means to validate the Fa. They ha-ven't gotten involved in ordinary people's "politics." There's nothing wrongwith utilizing some forms from ordinary people that are useful to validatethe Fa.Having made it to this point today, Dafa disciples should be even moreclearheaded now. Dafa disciples aren't some ordinary-people politicians--you have lots of ordinary-people abilities, but you're not trying to gainanything of ordinary people. A Dafa disciple's cultivation is for the purposeof achieving Consummation in the course of validating the Fa. But as Dafa

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disciples, you are also saving all beings, you're allowing more lives to besaved and rescued during the Fa-rectification.In the past I often said that none of the people in today's human society ha-ve simple [backgrounds]. Over the course of history, gods of different pe-riods created people of different periods, and the appearances of differentraces are actually the images of different gods. What they created was man-kind's physique in the Three Realms, which is known as "surface-level hu-man skin." When we got to today, and especially when I went public withthe Fa, a multitude of gods came down and incarnated as humans. What'sin many ordinary people's bodies are no longer the souls (yuanshen) fromwhen gods created man, because at that time man's soul was created out ofmatter from within the Three Realms, whereas now many people's souls ca-me from high levels. And why did they come? As I've told you before, not-hing in this world, in fact, is by chance. Every being and every object camefor Dafa, was formed for Dafa and created for Dafa, and that includes allpeople. All of what has transpired in the Three Realms's history was crea-ted for Dafa. Whether it be all the gods in history who came down to savepeople, all the heroic figures who emerged in each nation, or all the diffe-rent cultures that arose in history, they all came about for Dafa's final mani-festation among mankind today. And for that purpose the culture for un-derstanding Dafa was established among human beings, and the characte-ristics of different cultures were created, as were the ways of different cul-tures. Put another way, the process since the inception of the Three Realmsand mankind has been one of establishing human beings' ways of thinking,establishing human beings' behavior, establishing principles for humanbeings, and establishing what allows people to ultimately understand thisFa, to cultivate by this Fa, to understand that they should cultivate, and tobecome Dafa disciples, and allow the masses of beings to be saved duringthe Fa-rectification. All of this was being shaped throughout the course ofhistory for this final moment of the cosmos. In fact, when the many, manyGreat Enlightened Beings in history, such as Shakyamuni, Laozi, and Je-sus, were saving people, imparting the Way, doing good works, and suffe-ring on man's behalf, I can tell you, their true purpose was to establish aculture for the Fa-rectification.The long history of the cosmos made complete preparations for this Fa-rec-tification, and the Three Realms was made and created for, and has grownand progressed for, the Fa-rectification. So all of the lives in that historicalprocess have existed and come about for the Fa-rectification. In otherwords, during the long, drawn-out course of history, no matter how manylives have emerged or how many there still are in the world today, they allcame for, and were all born and created for, this Fa. And this even includesthose lives who were arranged by the old forces and have a negative effect.Back then the old forces arranged for them to have a negative effect so thatthey could Consummate. That's because the old forces thought, based ontheir notions, that those who play a negative role make it possible for those

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who play a positive role to Consummate. If this were just about cultivationin a normal time period, then you couldn't say, at least in a certain realm,that their logic was off. But when Fa-rectification of enormous firmamentsis taking place, then it interferes with Fa-rectification and it's wrong, and ithas caused severe disruption. All of what has played out has been the eviltrying to steer Fa-rectification and the future. And that's what makes the sinof the old forces against Fa-rectification the greatest of sins.But despite that, all lives came for this Fa, so they should assimilate to andharmonize with the Fa positively, and they can't impose things on the Fa oron the future. There are many lives who were supposed to have a negativeeffect in this process as the old forces arranged it. But they haven't, whichmeans they can still be saved. When you clarify the truth, and when Dafadisciples are doing the things they're supposed to be doing, let me tell you,a big part of that is you saving them.As you've seen, your Master hasn't said anything to ordinary people of late,and I don't do anything in person to save ordinary people anymore, andeven when it comes to the things Dafa disciples do I seldom get involved.Maybe you're clear on why that is: I want to leave for you the opportunityto establish mighty-virtue. If I led you in doing something today, then thatthing wouldn't have been done by you, and so you would have lost thechance to establish mighty-virtue. Meanwhile, as a Dafa disciple and amagnificent future Enlightened Being, when saving beings you should fullyshow your magnificence, your compassion, and your grandeur. That's whyI want to give you plenty of chances to save the world's people, to save allbeings, and let you do those things that you are supposed to do. Actually, inthe future you will see that whether it was Jesus, Shakyamuni, or otherGreat Enlightened Beings in history, there's no difference between whatthey did and what you're doing today. It's only a difference in form. So youhave to be clear about this, and you have to do well with what you're sup-posed to do.It's Dafa--such an immense Law--and Fa-rectification--such a major event.That alone lifts you to a lofty place. And what's more, everything that youdo in Fa-rectification is for sure the most magnificent, because even historywas created for it. So you should try your best to do well the things that aDafa disciple should do, and every single thing is of utmost importance.I've asked you to do the three things well. You must do the three thingswell. You should do those things well all the way up to your Consumma-tion. Your mighty-virtue and everything of your future come from thosethings.As for some shortcomings that still exist, you should in fact be able to seethem with greater clarity. A lot of times I notice that when you're discus-sing certain things you still have the problem of your human side being at-tached, and you argue about things that you can't get over, which then af-fects the discussion you're having of the main Fa-validating things. I'veseen that those are attachments which formed among ordinary people, and

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are notions that you can't let go, and it's things that were formed among or-dinary people which flare up as soon as they're hit upon. But you can't be li-ke that. Whatever it is you do for Dafa, you shouldn't do it with your ownnotions. I say this quite often, but some people routinely don't bother tothink about it or don't give it enough attention.There are still plenty of things that you haven't handled well, but in fact, atthis point I don't want to talk about them anymore, because whenever Ispell something out, the part that you cultivate disappears. Having gonethrough the [persecution] ordeal, Dafa disciples should be more clearhea-ded and rational, and they should be even clearer on how to cultivate andhow to act. With a lot of problems, if you calmly think things through, youcan recognize them on your own. And once you've realized what they are,you should correct them and not let them happen again.I didn't want to say much today. This time I planned to talk about somethings with a few specific students, but a lot of students didn't get to seeMaster at some Fa conferences and were a bit disappointed. I think thatwith the Fa here, you should be all set cultivating. And that also holds forthe students in Mainland China. In an environment that trying, and withoutgetting to see Master in person, they've still cultivated very well and havedone an excellent job. When you see me, you're just seeing this side of methat manifests as an ordinary human being. (Teacher laughs) Whether youcan see me or not, I hope that it won't affect you in terms of doing well thethings that Dafa disciples should do, and you should do even better. In fact,when you really aren't able to see me and still manage to do better, thenthat's even more remarkable.Actually, I like to see you, too. You know, in this social world of ordinarypeople, the people you come into contact with, you know, they're all ordi-nary. All those ordinary human thoughts and behaviors that people have arehard for me to take. I enjoy being with you, because you are quite far fromthe realm of ordinary people now. But for the sake of your Consummation,it's best I don't see you too often. (Teacher laughs) That's why I haven't metwith you often. In short, I want to leave you with the opportunity to esta-blish mighty-virtue.Do well with all the things you should do. All the most magnificent, mostwonderful glory and honor of the future await you.I'll end here for today. (Applause)

Let Go of Human Attachments and Save theWorld's People

Dafa disciples as a whole have passed the stage of personal cultivation. At present, be-cause the enormous current of Fa-rectification is charging forward, the stage of Dafadisciples' validating the Fa is approaching completion and history is about to enter anew phase. From now on, the Dafa disciples in China as much as anyone, both new stu-dents and veterans alike, should let go of their long-standing human attachments and

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start to seize the day and comprehensively save the world's people. Once the cur-rent time period is over, the first large-scale process of weeding out sentientbeings will begin. For a Fa-rectification period Dafa disciple, personal libe-ration is not the goal of cultivation: when you came, saving sentient beingswas your great aspiration, and that is the responsibility and mission historyhas bestowed upon you in Fa-rectification. Thus great numbers of beingsare to be saved by you. Dafa disciples, don't forsake the magnificent res-ponsibility that has been bestowed upon you in Fa-rectification, and evenless should you disappoint those beings, as you are now their only hope forentering the future. For this reason, all Dafa disciples, students both newand veteran, should get to work and begin comprehensively clarifying thetruth. This is especially so for the Dafa disciples in Mainland China: eachmust come out and clarify the truth, bringing it to every field and valley,mountain and hill, not omitting a single area where there are people. And asfor people who want to learn the practice after you clarify the truth, youshould arrange for them to study the Fa and learn the exercises as soon aspossible. They are the next group of disciples who will cultivate.When you clarify the truth, you need to make Fa-study a priority. And stopreading and passing around those fake scriptures made by rotten demonswho disrupt the Fa and that are spread by evil taking advantage of studentswho have studied the Fa poorly and harbor strong human attachments.Keep up your righteous thoughts and righteous actions, keep a clear head,and rationally and comprehensively save the world's people.Li HongzhiSeptember 1, 2004

In Fa-Rectification Your Thoughts Have to beRighteous, Not Human

My Dafa disciples who have strong human thoughts: the path I'm leadingyou down heads toward godhood, yet some students just tenaciously clingto human notions. Before, in personal cultivation you always saw Dafa'sbenefits as benefits for human society; during the tribulation, you've takenthe persecution of Dafa disciples by evil beings in this cosmos using badpeople to be human acts; and when hardly any of the evil remains in Fa-rec-tification as Dafa disciples validate the Fa with righteous thoughts andclean out the evil, and as the world's people begin to see things clearly, youare putting your hope for an end to the persecution in ordinary people.

What's happening is that the cosmos is going through Fa-rectification.[What is taking place in] the human world is merely how low-level beingsact when gigantic cosmic bodies are being impacted by the Fa-rectification.What could human beings possibly do to gods? If there were no outsidefactors, would humans dare to do anything to gods? How human society

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unfolds is nothing but the outcome of high-level beings controlling things.When you're compared with those Dafa disciples who have strong righ-teous thoughts and have done well, [I have to ask,] can you really not raiseyour ultimate understanding of Dafa beyond this human plane? What areyou really cultivating for, then? To achieve something for human society?To achieve something for China? To achieve something for the side of Da-fa disciples that's in the human world? Or to merely have the world bringjustice to Dafa disciples in the human world? Did I impart the Fa to you toaccomplish something for human society? What I am doing is leading youtoward godhood in cultivation, leading your understanding, little by little,out of humanness and beyond that of man, and the goal is to lead you toConsummation and the ascension of your being.

Snap out of it! If even this, the most wicked ordeal ever, can't wake you up,then when the Fa rectifies the human world you will only be able to watch--watch with shock and regret, with angst and lamentful despair for havingdone so poorly--the magnificent sight of the Consummation of those Dafadisciples who truly cultivated. It's a case of reaping what you sow. I don'twant to leave behind even one single Dafa disciple, but you have got to im-prove yourselves through real Fa-study and cultivation! With validating theFa, you should save the world's people and do well the three things Dafadisciples are supposed to do. Be diligent! Cast aside your human attach-ments. Godhood isn't far away.

Li HongzhiSeptember 19, 2004

Master's Comment on a Student's Article

This article is excellent. Its understanding of why Dafa disciples validatethe Fa is lucid, the righteous thoughts behind it are strong, and it is logicaland clear. I hope the Dafa disciples in Mainland China will all read it. Dafadisciples are validating the Great Law, and they should not be attached tothe outcome of the vile Party's meeting. This is because everything in hu-man society exists for Dafa and for Dafa disciples' cultivation. Whethersomething be upright or wicked, all the same it can only act in accordancewith the needs of Dafa.Li HongzhiSeptember 19, 2004Revised on October 8, 2005

Greetings

I appreciate the Mid-Autumn Festival greetings and thoughts from the Dafadisciples in Mainland China and of different nationalities around the world.

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In response, Master would like to share a few words. Dafa disciples arewalking a divine path. Don't be affected by shifts in the ordinary world, sei-ze the day to clarify the truth, save the world's people, clean out the rottendemons, and keep your thoughts and actions righteous. The Dafa disciplesin Mainland China, more than anyone, should step up their efforts and dowell the things they are supposed to do, staying always diligent.May all of you strengthen your righteous thoughts this Mid-Autumn Festi-val!Li Hongzhi15th day, 8th month, Lunar Year of Jia Shen

My Version of a "Stick Wake-up"

In Fa-rectification all of the cosmos's final, remaining things will be bornanew as they are disintegrated and re-created, and the moment when the Farectifies the human world draws ever nearer. Over the past five years, asDafa disciples have validated the Fa they have established the mighty vir-tue of gods, in the human dimension they have saved great numbers of sen-tient beings and people through their righteous thoughts and righteous ac-tions, and they have destroyed great quantities of rotten demons and old-force factors. And judging by the way things look in the human world, theyhave lessened the evil's persecution, as well as freed sentient beings and thepeople of the world from the control of the evil beings in other dimensionsand from the factors that interfere with Dafa. People are starting to takeclear note of and think about the persecution of Dafa disciples and theworld's people. And this has started to make the wicked people in thisworld who've had a hand in persecuting Dafa disciples tremble with fear,and now they keep their evil nature nearly at bay; some evildoers have evenstopped persecuting Dafa disciples. All of this has made for a much impro-ved situation. This is what Dafa disciples have accomplished with righ-teous thoughts and righteous actions before the Fa rectifies the humanworld. Dafa disciples are now seen by the gods in a new light, having beco-me beings forged by Dafa amidst the Fa-rectification--the Disciples of Da-fa. The path that Dafa disciples have walked in validating the Fa--where asthey cultivate themselves they also save sentient beings, accommodate theneeds of the cosmos's Fa-rectification, and disintegrate and clear away thedark minions and rotten demons that are negatively impacting the Fa-recti-fication and doing evil against Dafa disciples, as well as all the elements ofinterference and persecution arranged by the old forces--such is the comple-te path of cultivation, Consummation, and becoming a magnificent god thatDisciples of Dafa walk.By contrast, when it comes to those who hide in their homes and "study theFa," no matter the excuse, it's actually due to the attachments they can't letgo of. Those people even form little cliques, complain together and makeoff-base comments to one another, adopt a negative attitude about Dafa dis-

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ciples' validating the Fa and everything that Dafa disciples are doing, cons-tantly nitpick about other students' faults and shortcomings in cultivation,and even spread rumors both in China and beyond. What they do pleasesthe evil and helps the evil in the persecution. Some people say, "I only readZhuan Falun, I don't read the new scriptures." Are you still my disciple?Let me make this clear to you: the period before July 20, 1999, was one ofpersonal cultivation and comprehending the Fa, and in the process of com-prehending it one could arrive at Consummation, but that is not the end of aDafa disciple's cultivation; in the ensuing five years, the situation has beenreversed, who can truly make it and who cannot needs to be seen, thosewho are not truly cultivating are weeded out, and the five years have been atime when those Dafa disciples who truly cultivate establish their mightyvirtue and save beings. Why is it that a being needs to be saved by Dafaand me personally? Or, to put it plainly, [think about] what kind of a beingis worthy of salvation by the Great Law of the cosmos? For a being who issaved, could it just be about personal Consummation? So what kind ofbeing deserves to be a Disciple of Dafa? Would you say those people whohide in their homes and "study the Fa" do? Or those who only want to gainfrom Dafa but don't want to give for Dafa? Furthermore, what about thosewho, while Dafa disciples are being persecuted, don't want to speak up forDafa and yet still "read the book" at home and try to get things from Dafa--what kind of people are they? You be the judge.Master sees that danger is already approaching you. I don't acknowledgethe old forces' arrangements, and that includes this persecution, but I knewthat the old factors who would be impacted by Fa-rectification would dothis, and that it was just a matter of time and of which ones. In other words,it would have been best if the persecution hadn't happened, and if it hadn'thappened, I would have had you take [different] paths in that scenario.Now that the persecution has happened, I've made use of it so as to haveDafa disciples nullify the persecution while validating the Fa, thus establis-hing the mighty virtue of Dafa disciples. Do you think a Dafa disciple's cul-tivation path is supposed to accommodate your fear, your pursuit of com-fort and ease, and all your desires? Do you think that the religious cultiva-tion methods and beliefs of long ago are the only forms of cultivation? Ifthe Three Realms and everything throughout the history of man was plan-ned for the Fa-rectification of the cosmos, then the sole purpose of historywas to enable Dafa to create, throughout the course of history, sentientbeings and mankind, along with the human mind and culture, so that whenDafa would be spread widely people's thinking would allow them to com-prehend the Fa and understand what the Fa is, what cultivation is, what itmeans to save sentient beings, and so on, as well as understand the varietyof cultivation forms. If that's the case, then weren't all the cultivation waysand beliefs in history establishing a culture in this world for the later Fa-rectification of the cosmos? What course is needed for a human being tobecome divine? The gods on high all say that I have given human beings a

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ladder to heaven.And there are some people who think that Master, like the people of theworld, can't do anything about the persecution. Did you know that theworld's big monster is, other than the fact that the old forces are ensuring itlives until the so-called "tests" come to an end so that they can use it, actingunder my command? Haven't some people said that when I tell it to jump,it jumps, when I tell it to go mad, it goes mad, and when I tell it to go wild,it goes wild? Don't you all know that whenever I say or write something, itleads just about its whole hoodlum gang that persecutes Dafa disciples to"study" it right away, day or night? Right now, it looks like it has been castout amidst political rivalry--isn't that because the wicked rotten demonsthat controlled it stopped functioning? That's the only reason people coulddo, and dared to do, that to it. How could you deny that, the impact of Fa-rectification aside, it's the result of Dafa disciples' thinking and acting righ-teously, exposing the persecution, and nullifying the old forces' arrange-ments as they validate the Fa, take action against the persecution, and savebeings?Some people have family members who have been imprisoned in the perse-cution and are being persecuted, and yet instead of hurrying up and wor-king along with everyone else to resist the persecution, stop the persecu-tion, and lessen the persecution of your family members, you're talkingabout things like "studying the Fa at home" and you're still full of com-plaints about everything that [Dafa] students are doing. Did you know thatwhen the persecution of your family members who have been imprisoned islessened or stopped, it's the result of Dafa disciples exposing and shockingthe evil beings while braving evil and danger to take action against the per-secution? When they get out, how will you bear to face them? What haveyou done for them? A cultivating human being is not a cultivating god, andeveryone makes mistakes in the cultivation process; the key is how you de-al with them. Some people are able to recognize them and some aren't, andthen there are people who don't want to recognize them because of their at-tachment of fear and some other factors. Cultivation is not about takingpart in ordinary people's political struggles, and even less is it about figh-ting for power or gain. The notions, bad habits, and tendencies that you'veformed in ordinary society and in political circles and the like are lookeddown on even among ordinary people, so even more so should they be dis-posed of in cultivation.Cultivation is the process that enables a human being to ascend to heavenand become a god, so how could it not be hard? The Buddhist religion usedto talk about "stick wake-ups," so let me give my version of a stick wake-up to those who don't measure up and have put themselves on the brink ofdanger.Li HongzhiOctober 11, 2004

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Teaching the Fa at the 2004 International FaConference in New York

(Li Hongzhi, November 21st, 2004)

You've been working hard. (Applause)As a cultivator, and especially as a Fa-rectification period Dafa disciple,you shoulder enormous responsibility, and you have a great mission thathistory has bestowed upon you. But you have done great, and I, your mas-ter, can say this in front of all the beings in the cosmos. Put another way,you have won their admiration. Even though the things you do in this worldlook a lot like the day-to-day things that ordinary people do, the fact is thatthe Dafa disciples' basis and the purpose of what you do are completely dif-ferent. Because the human world is simply in delusion, being caught up inwhat is real and tangible to them, it's hard for ordinary people to tell the re-al from the fake. So whether ordinary people understand it or not, Dafa dis-ciples are merely making use of ordinary people's forms to save all beings.And for you cultivators, precisely because of the delusion that is here in hu-man society, being in this environment allows you to cultivate, and thosewho succeed in cultivation are outstanding.Most students have done very well overall validating the Fa. Of course, the-re are some who haven't, but they came here specifically to do bad things;the old forces had it arranged from the outset that they would do thosethings. So no matter how they act around Dafa disciples during normal ti-mes, only at the critical times do you see their true side. No matter howwell they talk about things or how well they act in front of everyone, it'sonly at the critical times that how they really are shows through.You have come through difficult times that were full of trials and hards-hips. Looking at the situation now, it's nothing like how it was before.When it first started after July 20, 1999, the evil's fury was so intense, andthe way they lined up their evil forces it seemed as if they would really putthe Dafa disciples in grave danger. But now you have seen, haven't you,that history was not created for those evil beings, but for forging Dafa disci-ples and for saving sentient beings during the final time. (Applause) Star-ting ages ago, mankind went through many, many civilizations in differentperiods. Human beings have been infused with many, many things from allkinds of historical cultures ranging from ancient times to today. As ordina-ry people see it, everything that has happened with human beings' recenthistory and cultures, and everything that happened ages ago with the liveson earth, makes up mankind's history and the process of the proliferation oflife. As scientists see it, it is the process of life's evolution. Well the truthis, it's neither. The entire Three Realms, including all beings in human soci-ety, were constructed, formed, came about, were born, and were created sothat sentient beings could be rescued and saved amidst the Fa-rectificationat the cosmos's final time. In other words, the Three Realms were construc-

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ted for this purpose, for the purpose of saving the beings in the cosmos.During ages even longer ago, in this dimension where mankind is, in thisenvironment where mankind is, and in the material plane that is composedof molecules, mankind simply did not exist. Through exploration modernpeople have discovered that extraterrestrial life exists. Yes, in the past itwas such beings that were spread out over this plane composed of molecu-les, and man didn't even exist. Why did gods create man later on? Becausethe cosmos was to be reconstructed, sentient beings had to be rescued, andthe Three Realms needed an environment like this--one that would becomethe focal point of the cosmos's reconstruction, and one where when theGreat Law would be taught in this special environment the beings in all re-alms could hear the Fa. It was for the great purpose of saving all beings inthe cosmos that the Three Realms, and especially mankind in the Three Re-alms, were created. So everything that has taken place in each of the pe-riods in history, including recent human history, has been for the purposeof creating a culture for man, for today's mankind, so that it may unders-tand the Fa. This was by no means intended for mankind just to live, andeven less was it for mankind to develop or to make some kind of good lifefor itself in human society. Man may long for good things and may worktoward them, but the emergence of the Three Realms and mankind absolu-tely was not meant for that.That being the case, think about it: those things that happened over thecourse of history, even the really major events, didn't they have a reason be-hind them? Weren't they laying a certain foundation for today's mankind?Suppose Shakyamuni, Jesus, Saint Mary, Laozi, etc. never existed, thenwould people know what right faith is, what a God is, what a Buddha is,what a Dao is, how to cultivate oneself, and what cultivation means? Andwhat would heavenly paradise mean to them? If people had no idea whatthose things were, then it would be incredibly hard for me to teach theGreat Law today. If I had to explain those concepts to people from scratch,then it wouldn't be teaching a Great Law. The different states beings ofeach different ethnic group have gone through in each period in history,and their worldviews in terms of telling the righteous from the wicked,right from wrong, and good from evil, all of these things were purposefullycreated by gods for humans over the long, drawn out years, thus enablingpeople to have a basic understanding of what is right and wrong, good andevil. Then when Dafa would be spread and the salvation of sentient beingswould begin, people would understand all of these things and be able to tellwhether this Fa was good and whether it was upright.Over the course of history people have come to know gods. What's a"god"? Although it's only a very shallow sense, people do know that godsare glorious and holy. And even though different lives know and concep-tualize "gods" differently, they all believe that gods are good to people andcan save them. All of the heroic figures who emerged in the various dynas-ties and periods of Chinese history, all those outstanding cultural figures

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that made history, they were all in fact establishing ways for mankind tothink, establishing the structure and ways of thinking that characterize peo-ple today. It has been a magnificent undertaking in which the compositionof the human species's thought was created. It has taken place over agesand ages, where the human race had to experience different things and cul-tures firsthand before it could understand the meaning of them. So that'swhy when something happens a person can know what it means, andthrough that event, he can know what it represents on a deeper level. Forexample, what is "good," what does goodness entail, what are its connota-tions, and what is the scope of the term? Or likewise, what is "evil" like,and what does it mean for something to be "right" or "wrong"? Throughtheir real-life experiences, people came to understand all of these things,and they could truly grasp what they mean. Only then could people have adeep understanding of all of this. These aren't simple, basic things that youcan have people understand overnight.When gods first created human beings, there was nothing in people'sminds, it was a complete blank, they couldn't distinguish between right andwrong, and goodness and evil existed side by side. The extremes [in theirbehavior] were huge: when they were happy, they were kind, and whenthey were unhappy, they were vicious. But modern man is a different story.Why is it that when today's people arrived at modern times they suddenlybecame so much wiser? That had to do with another factor aside from theprocess of creating people that I just talked about, and it is that high-levelbeings have incarnated as human beings. As for the human race itself, itsprocess over the course of history was actually one of establishing humanbehavior and thought, or put another way, it was one of creating the realpeople of today. So what was the point of all these things? To make it pos-sible for man to understand the Fa when Dafa is spread widely today. WhatI'm saying is, this matter was planned ages and ages ago; its establishmentbegan that early.And there's something I want to tell you about, which is, who really doescultivation and who really has right faith. In the past, a lot of people wouldtalk about this or that way of cultivating, about such-and-such practice, orabout such-and-such faith. But I'm going to tell you that in history, regar-dless of how many gods or how many enlightened beings came here, theirtrue mission was to establish the culture of cultivation and right faith thatDafa needed to have established. (Applause) Nobody saved people, and no-body has made it to a heavenly kingdom, the reason being, the cultivationmethods of old came about in order to lay a foundation for this Dafa thatcan truly save people today. With the gods who came down in the past, the-re were indeed some people who as a result of those gods' actions gainedsalvation. Yet that wasn't the person's real self who was saved, but ratherhis assistant soul. And even those gods who came down, the bodies thatthey inhabited in those days... a human being, he's still part of the cycle ofrebirth in the human world, and even those who inhabited those bodies

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didn't get saved. So in other words, in history many have proclaimed thatthey were "saving people," but nobody saved people. When Shakyamuniimparted his Fa ages ago, his disciples asked him, "Master, is it possible forus to cultivate into a Tathagata without breaking our ties to the secularworld?" Or in other words, could they cultivate into gods or Buddhas with-out leaving behind ordinary people's surroundings and the social environ-ment of this world? Shakyamuni thought about it and said, "For that, youhave to wait until the Holy King Who Turns the Wheel descends to theworld." (Applause) More than two-thousand years have passed, and all thedisciples of true religions have been waiting. Waiting for what? For godsabove to make a grand display? For gods to come here, so that you don'tneed to cultivate or care about cultivating well, and it won't matter if anyo-ne is good or bad, and everybody will just go up to Heaven together?Of course, regardless of who I am, people know that I am transmitting theFa and saving people. But the Master who is with you here today teachingthe Fa has an ordinary person's physical body. As for how people think ofme, a lot of ordinary people have their opinions. That's fine--it doesn't mat-ter if they believe in me or not. I haven't said that I am a god or a Buddha.Ordinary people can take me to be just an average, common man, that's fi-ne. All of what I do takes the form of human activity; I'm using the meansof common, plain human beings as I save Fa-rectification period Dafa dis-ciples. No high-level life will, when he saves people in this social environ-ment, in this kind of illusory dimension, use only grand, divine displays tomiraculously save people in the human world. (Applause) But it's differentif what he does is on a small scale, or only involves a few people, or if itwas something done in the past to create culture. That's how things are formankind. Of course, though, nothing is absolute. Maybe when the Fa recti-fies the human world I will use divine means, since at that time thingsmight need to be done that way. But if around the start of the Fa's rectifica-tion of the cosmos things here in society were handled with divine meanson a large scale, that would have led to some attachments on the part of cul-tivators.Some people are thinking, "Gods have a lot of abilities. Why don't they sa-ve poor people and punish bad ones? Why don't they come and perform mi-racles?" The formation of the Three Realms established human society'sway of existence and purpose. This is a society filled with delusion, and it'smeant to be a society where the sentient beings can't see all of the truth.Whoever wants to cultivate here has to do so amidst delusion, and be agood person, do good things using ordinary human means, and let go of at-tachments. Only then can they escape from here, and only then can it becalled cultivation. If a person does something here using completely divinemeans, that isn't cultivation. In history many cultivators of the Dao did car-ry out divine acts in the human world, and that was creating historical cul-ture. Why has that become rare in recent times? It's because the closer itgot to the time when Dafa was to be spread, the less it was allowed for such

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things to occur. In recent times, after Fa-rectification began and Fa-rectifi-cation period Dafa disciples were about to start cultivating, the requirementgrew higher. In particular, when this special group of the cosmos's beingsbegan to validate the Fa and move towards Consummation, the environ-ment here became even more important, so the rule got even more strictand people are rarely allowed to see the true situation. This batch of beingsis to cultivate to high levels, so the requirements for them are correspondin-gly high. This group of beings shoulders great historic responsibilities andthey have to come out of a very trying environment. (Applause) So that iswhy Dafa disciples are remarkable.In other words, the cultivation situation that today's Dafa disciples are in isdifferent from any cultivation method or situation in history. I have alwayssaid that the old forces' participation is a form of persecution and a form ofinterference. If what gods in the past saved were people's assistant soulsand not their actual main bodies, then think about it everyone, would thatmethod of saving people work for Dafa disciples' cultivation today? Themain bodies of Dafa disciples, as well as those of the world's people, are atthe surface. Then is what they did fitting? Would it work? It wouldn't at all.So that's why I say that they are causing interference. This method andform of cultivation that I've told everyone to take today is to cultivate whileconforming to ordinary human society and to validate Dafa using ordinaryhuman means to the greatest extent possible (applause), and that's unprece-dented. Those gods, they don't know anything about how to deal with sucha cultivation method, and what they've done is completely out of line, sothey are definitely a form of interference with Dafa disciples' cultivation.This is not to say they lack abilities, it's just to say that this is how the oldcosmos created such beings, and that's the extent of the wisdom from theold cosmos. During this Fa-rectification, the cosmos has perfected the pastimperfections and changed the things that the cosmos of the past failed tochange. Because of that, Dafa disciples can be saved and can reach Con-summation through cultivation. If the cultivation approach of the past werefollowed today, not a single Dafa disciple could cultivate to Consumma-tion.Only when a person follows the method that Dafa uses today to accomplishthings, cultivate, and truly save people can he Consummate. (Applause)And it's not just Consummation--the person is truly saved, the person'smaster soul is saved. (Applause) As for those so-called gods who interferewith Fa-rectification, they only know a part of it but not the whole, they on-ly know about the past but not today or the future, and only know the surfa-ce form but not the inner content. When they try to do things they aren't ca-pable of doing them, and they have brought serious interference to Fa-recti-fication itself and Dafa disciples' cultivation. That's why I say everythingthat I'm doing today is completely different from what took place in histo-ry. Looking at the persecution of Dafa disciples and that of Christians inhistory, on the surface both were being persecuted. But for these cultiva-

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tors, beings on their way to godhood, what actually takes place is different.They strictly had to endure because in the past the cosmos didn't have theability to resolve those deeply rooted historical issues, causing even high-level beings to persecute gods as well as human beings who were on theirway to godhood. All of that was shameful, both for the history of the cos-mos and on the part of the gods. Today what I'm doing is not just differentfrom the path that they took in the past; it is the difference between the fu-ture and the past. This is the way that the cultivation method Dafa has bes-towed upon people is; Dafa disciples and I are laying a foundation for thefuture. The cultivation methods of the future will be like this forever! (Ap-plause) Only this can be called truly saving people, and only this can trulysave people.None of this could be changed at will. Everyone knows that right now isthe Fa-rectification period--the cosmos is being renewed, rebuilt, and re-created. Only under this circumstance can the imperfections be mended,and the only time that imperfections can be mended is when the colossalfirmament is being rebuilt. So this is an opportunity. No being is allowed tointerfere with or damage this opportunity. Whoever interferes is commit-ting a sin, and whoever interferes has to bear the responsibility.What I said just now basically summarizes the difference between the culti-vation method of today's Dafa disciples and the cultivation of people in thepast. If a person wants to be saved, he must transcend the fact that he is inand experiencing firsthand a tough environment where there is adversity,self interest, emotions and desires. Everything will involve a cultivator'sself-interest, and anything can affect you as a person, your thoughts andemotions, your xinxing,1 and the things that you are attached to inside. Ifyou manage to take a certain path and make certain choices, then you areextraordinary. Otherwise, you are an ordinary person. If you are able tostep out of the reasoning and attachments of ordinary people, then you are agod. (Applause) That's totally different from the cultivation methods of thepast.People in the past went to temples and monasteries or into the mountains tocultivate while avoiding the world's people. Those people didn't physicallyendure too many xinxing tests or have their attachments directly tuggedupon, and didn't have the most direct test of material things. So for the per-son's main body it is as if he didn't cultivate. Even though the person gaveup a normal life during his lifetime, for that person it was nothing morethan taking up a different lifestyle. If his assistant soul really cultivated tosuccess and an assistant soul that came out of his body became a god, thenit meant blessings for him. That person would receive blessings in his nextlife. By "blessings," that meant he would have worldly blessings, nothingmore than that. Looking at it from the perspective of a being seeking some-thing through cultivation, who would cultivate to get those things? Spea-king on a fundamental level, nothing in the Three Realms was created forthat, and no sentient being came for that. Then in other words, the cultiva-

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tion of today's Dafa disciples is the most magnificent, and it is blazing atrail for the future. That's why walking your path well is of utmost impor-tance. (Applause)I've said all along that Dafa disciples can't go to extremes. You must walkyour path well. If you let your imagination run wild, and you have a croo-ked understanding about something today and have a sudden inspirationand do something else tomorrow, or you keep doing stupid things while dri-ven by your attachment to showing off, all of those things are direct reflec-tions of your master soul and of you as a being. How could such a personConsummate? Your actions are displays of your main body that is cultiva-ting, and that is the same main body that's to be saved. Could such a beingbe placed among the gods? No, it couldn't. So you must do things well andcultivate rationally, clear-headedly, and with righteous thoughts. And youare allowed to cultivate while conforming to ordinary people's way of lifeto the greatest extent. As long as Master says something is okay, you canjust go ahead and follow ordinary people's way of doing it, because you aremeant to walk your path in that way, and human beings are meant to be sa-ved in that way. In the future, if a god wants to come and save people, hetoo will have to do it that way. That's because in the future cosmos, when itcomes to saving people, the target will be people's main bodies. So don'tworry about how the cultivation methods of the past and the types of faiththen were, and don't worry about how influential they were--you are the on-ly ones who have truly cultivated. (Applause) The cosmos is undergoingFa-rectification, and the gods that they believe in are repositioning themsel-ves, so where would they go to get saved? How would they get to a heaven-ly kingdom? The heavenly kingdoms are all being reconstructed. Whichheavenly kingdom would they go to? You are the most magnificent beingsand are moving toward heavenly kingdoms while truly saving sentientbeings in an upfront, open, and amazing way! (Applause)What I said just now was meant for our Dafa disciples. Those of you whoaren't cultivators or who are new students might not quite understand whatI just said and find it hard to believe. Don't worry, I am not here to hurtanyone, and there is nothing here that's bad for people. If you didn't unders-tand it, you can come to understand it gradually, and it's fine to come to un-derstand these cultivators incrementally.There's one final thing I want to emphasize. A small number of studentsaren't clearheaded and have very strong attachments! They can hear a littlebit and see a little bit, and they even feel that they have certain abilities orthink that they're some important figure. So they've begun to act in an irrati-onal and crazy-seeming way, and say things that make no sense. How canyou still cultivate? No matter who you are, if I can't save you today, youwill be a ghost in hell! Why are you being so irrational? Why do youspread things among students that interfere with their cultivation and vali-dating the Fa? Is it simply an issue of you breeding demons in your ownmind? You are interfering with Dafa. Is that a small sin? If today I, Li

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Hongzhi, decide not to recognize you as a Dafa disciple, not to recognizeyou as a student of mine, do you think you could remain here? The ThreeRealms was created for this purpose. Even though this firmament in thecosmos is immense, all beings are focusing their attention here, and allbeings here have to be recognized. So I urge those students who are stillbeing irrational: come to your senses and be responsible to your own lives.Your own attachments have led wicked beings from outside to command,interfere with, and control you, making you so irrational.Master's words just now were fairly harsh. You might have noticed that re-cently, sometimes my words to such students have been pretty harsh. That'sbecause I have seen the terrifying consequences that await them. No matterhow you take those words, no matter how the people who don't understandme or Dafa disciples see things, I, Li Hongzhi, came for all beings. I'm sa-ving all beings, and I don't want to see a single being destroy himself, be-cause I came exactly for you! (Applause) I am worried, I am worried aboutyou. Time is becoming more and more pressing. You have seen that, andthe overall situation has changed a lot. If the persecution suddenly ends,then no opportunity is left, and everything will have been decided.It's been a long time since I attended one of your Fa conferences, so I wantto stay with you a little longer. (Enthusiastic applause)I've heard that some students came from Russia and there are others that ca-me from some other Eastern European countries. It was hard for them tomake it here, as they face a lot of challenges, both financial and otherwise.There are also some new students who have never seen me in person andhave always wanted to see Master. And a lot of veteran students likewisehaven't seen Master for a long time. It seems that you all have a lot ofthings to say, and you would be disappointed if I left now. (Master laughs)(Applause) In that case, let's still use our old method--if you have some-thing to say, write it down on a piece of paper and pass it up, and I'll ans-wer questions for all of you. (Applause)You all really have worked hard. The weather is getting colder. During thesummer when you clarified the truth and validated Dafa in front of the con-sulates, on the streets, or in other settings, even though it was hot, it wasstill bearable. When the weather gets cold, the climate poses a certain de-gree of challenge for you. Even so, you haven't let the harsh conditions stopyou. Quite the opposite, you are still working hard and haven't let up.That's truly amazing, and the beings of the future and the world's people inthe future will thank you, because the people that will remain here in the fu-ture will owe that fact to you. (Applause) The world's people are in delu-sion. Dafa disciples are the ones going through so-called tests, while allsentient beings are lost in a state of delusion. But in the future, everyonewill know who the Dafa disciples were. They will all know the greatness ofDafa disciples, and those who remain will feel gratitude toward Dafa disci-ples.Disciple asks: If circumstances allow, can I go back to Mainland China to

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work?Teacher: If the persecution ends and the Fa's rectification of the humanworld hasn't arrived yet, then if you want to go back to Mainland China towork, you can go ahead. Are you asking if you can go back now? Rightnow it's best not to go back because the persecution is still going on. Iknow that a few individual students might have received phone calls ormessages from certain officials in Mainland China or people with certainpositions. They told you to go back and guaranteed certain things, promi-sing that you wouldn't be persecuted and some other things. Think about iteveryone, were those officials the ones that set the policy of persecution?Then isn't the simple fact that they can guarantee something suspicious? Sowho is directing them behind the scenes? (Applause) How is it that theycan make a guarantee? Who is giving them that guarantee? Isn't that suspi-cious? What is meant by "forming a unified front for battle," anyway?When their low tactics no longer work, they start "forming a unified frontfor battle." They're up to their old tricks again, and you need to be onguard. We don't pose a risk to any political power. We simply want them tostop the persecution. (Applause) They persecute people and at the same ti-me try to bring those people over to their side. They have used all the dirtytricks in the book. (Audience laughs)Disciple: Dafa disciples in the city of Chongqing send greetings to Master.(Teacher: Thank you!) (Applause) Master, we promise we will do well atevery moment the things that we should do.Teacher: Wonderful! (Applause)Disciple: Dafa disciples at Beijing's Tsinghua University send greetings toMaster.Teacher: Thank you all! (Applause)Disciple: Dafa disciples who are illegally detained at a women's laborcamp(s) in Beijing send greetings to Master.Teacher: Thank you! (Applause)Disciple: Dafa disciples who are being illegally detained in a prison(s) inBeijing send greetings to Master.Teacher: Thank you! (Applause) No matter what kind of environment youare in, you must keep your righteous thoughts firm, because you are Dafadisciples and you are special beings.Disciple: The European Fa conference will be held in London next year,and we eagerly hope that Master will grace us with his presence. (Audien-ce smiles and applauds) Master, please tell us why "seven Buddhas" hasbeen changed to "six Buddhas."Teacher: I'll talk about it from a couple of angles. One is that no smallnumber of Buddhas have come down to the human world over the courseof history. It's more than six, and in fact more than seven. Of course, therehave been other gods as well. Just talking about Buddhas, quite a few havecome down to save people, yet when it comes to the Buddhas like Shakya-muni who had special missions, there were six of them before Shakyamuni.

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When I've talked about them, I have counted Buddha Shakyamuni as oneof them, so there were seven. But Buddhism has always talked about six,because Shakyamuni's disciples thought of those Buddhas as his disciples,so they haven't counted Buddha Shakyamuni and ended up with six. WhenI have talked about them I have counted Buddha Shakyamuni in, so thatmade seven. But that said, when imparting the Fa you of course need to doit according to people's ability to accept things. So, to do our best to savethe followers of Buddhism, we went with what they say and changed thenumber to six. (Applause)Disciple: Greetings to esteemed Master! I'd like to send greetings to Masteron behalf of students in Romania.Teacher: Thank you! (Applause)Disciple: Most of the students in Romania are new. They have dealt withall kinds of challenges, but they are all very diligent. I respectfully askMaster to talk about how students in Romania can do a better job of partici-pating in validating the Fa, as well as how Romania can play a better rolein validating the Fa.Teacher: I said earlier that relative to the number of people in the world,the number of Dafa disciples right now is very small, but you have a greatmission that history has bestowed upon you. So as for the Dafa disciples inany region, you are basically the hope for the beings in that region to be sa-ved--their only hope, in fact. The beings there need to hear the Good News,and they need to hear you clarify the facts to them so that they can unders-tand what Dafa is. That is why Dafa disciples' responsibilities are weighty.Then you might ask, how can you do better? I think that for you, Dafa dis-ciples, if each of you uses simply your mouth to tell the people in each re-gion the facts, then we won't get to all of them. The energy Dafa disciplescarry as they cultivate and stick to righteous thoughts and actions, as wellas the mighty virtue from their cultivation, have an additional effect.On the other hand, everything that Dafa disciples have done and everythingthat Dafa disciples have said when clarifying the facts causes the facts tocirculate in ordinary human society and creates an environment that fosterscommunication among the people. Then with that environment, the discus-sions people have are another way for those beings to get saved, an indirectway. Another thing is that many beings have been poisoned by the evilbeings, and in their minds there is a lot of propaganda from the CCP's slan-derous media. In that case, it's better if you can clear it away through clari-fying the facts, because the negative thoughts that human beings haveabout Dafa can be taken advantage of and used by those evil beings thatpersecute Dafa disciples. So Dafa disciples can remove them while sendingforth righteous thoughts and through their righteous thoughts and righteousactions. As a matter of fact, if your thoughts are very righteous, when youwalk down the street and go about your life in the city where you live, allof your surroundings will be cleansed. Your mere existence has the effectof saving sentient beings. But, despite your great abilities, you will still fa-

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ce adversity for the benefit of your personal cultivation, since everyone hasa journey that he must make in cultivation. At the same time, the old forceshave created many forms of interference to your validating the Fa. Undernormal circumstances it is very hard to clear away that interference if therighteous thoughts aren't strong enough.As for how to do things well, that means doing well in the three things thatDafa disciples should do--that is doing things best. (Applause) But theamounts of effort being put forth are different. Some people don't put forthtoo much effort while other students are more diligent and put forth more.Of course, Master sees that in society each individual has a family and ajob, not to mention different social obligations due to your ties to society,so you have very little time left over. Master knows about all of this and isunderstanding. As a matter of fact, Dafa's method of cultivation takes thatissue into consideration and won't disrupt things in that area.Disciple: Disciples in Taiwan send greetings to Master. (Applause) Master,please tell us the current direction for the Asia-Pacific Pure Awakeningwebsite.Teacher: Dafa disciples' websites should be run well, because they are avehicle for clarifying the truth and are playing a role in saving sentientbeings. So they should be run well. As for what to do specifically, that's upto you. (Teacher smiles) Why is it that Master doesn't talk about things toospecifically? Master only makes sure that no problems develop in the ove-rall scheme of things. But as for the problems, arguments, and differencesin understanding among students, those are things that reflect the state ofyour cultivation. So when it comes to how to walk your path and how tohandle each thing, those are things that you yourselves must address as apart of establishing your own mighty virtue. If I tell you how to handleeach thing, then it becomes something I did, and no god will acknowledgethat you did it. (Teacher smiles) (Applause) So I have to leave those thingsto you. I can't deprive you of your opportunity to cultivate.Disciple: Dafa disciples in the city of Guangzhou send greetings to estee-med Teacher.Teacher: Thank you! (Applause)Disciple: Esteemed Teacher, could you please tell us if it's okay for Dafadisciples in Mainland China to send [overseas] money that they have savedthrough living frugally, to be used for truth-clarification projects in NewYork City?Teacher: It is okay in principle--if you are very well off financially, thenit's not a problem. But here we're talking about money saved through livingfrugally, so it means the person isn't that well off. In that case, it's best tokeep the money for clarifying the truth in Mainland China, because the en-vironment outside of the Mainland is still much better than inside. (Applau-se)Disciple: Master, please tell us if the truth-clarification activities in Ma-nhattan will continue until the Fa-rectification ends. (Audience laughs)

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Teacher: No, they won't. I talked about this before when students who areclarifying the truth in Manhattan held a meeting. You will do this for only aperiod of time. Manhattan is pretty unique: it's practically the financial cen-ter of the world, and a lot of major corporations all over the world have of-fices or branches here. In other words, it is a point of convergence for thefinancial world and is closely connected to the whole world. And the peo-ple who gather in Manhattan are, owing to its uniqueness, themselves uni-que. Many well-educated people are concentrated here, as well as peoplewith a certain amount of power and financial means in society. In otherwords, the roles that they play in society are no ordinary thing.Even though relatively speaking there are a lot of students in the New Yorkregion, including the area around New Jersey, after what has taken placeover the last few years it still looks like a great many people in Manhattanare indifferent. After such a long period of doing things to clarify the truth,a lot of people still haven't come into contact with Dafa disciples. The CCPhas put a lot of evil here to persecute Falun Gong, and that has resulted insome people here in this environment always having impediments to un-derstanding Dafa.And in addition, there is another problem I've discovered. There are Chine-se employees in Manhattan's many big corporations, and even in some ofthe small corporations and establishments, and the majority of those Chine-se people have been deceived by the falsehoods spread by the CCP's slan-derous propaganda machine, and those things in their heads have not beencleared away all this time. So they have become people who spread venomin American society. It's not that those people are evil by nature. But in-deed, while Dafa disciples are clarifying the truth in one place they are overthere spreading the slanderous things from the CCP in some other place. Itwouldn't hurt for you to write the following on flyers, display boards, or ha-ve the media report it: "The Chinese people in your company have beenmisled and they are helping the CCP spread its venom (applause), so youshould examine the facts for yourselves." (Applause)Disciple: How can I do a better job of validating the Fa if I don't have anyof the skills ordinary people do?Teacher: It's fine not to have ordinary skills. Many students pass out flyersand newspapers on the street and clarify the truth to ordinary people face toface. Those are all things that you can do. Many students gather in front ofthe consulates and embassies year-round, and that too is really admirable.There are a lot of things that you can do.Disciple: Hello, esteemed Teacher. Many characters in Zhuan Falun and ot-her Dafa books have been changed recently. What is the deeper meaningbehind that?Teacher: I'm not going to talk about the meaning behind it. I'll just talkabout it at the surface. Let's take the [Chinese] character "practice" from the[two-character term] "cultivation practice" as an example. If the persecu-tion of Dafa disciples had not happened, I would have given you the path

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that you should have taken. But after the persecution started, those sham qi-gong practices and all kinds of messed up things started participating in thepersecution, and even went on TV to attack Dafa. Of course, the reasonthey did those things was that so many people were learning Dafa--theirown people included--that they couldn't make money anymore. So they be-came jealous and hateful. That's why some students raised the question,"Master, in the character 'practice,' when we use it to describe other qigongpractices, could we change that one part of the character from the one mea-ning 'fire' to the one meaning 'silk'? They don't practice true cultivation inthe first place."That's just an example. In all kinds of other places there were many factorscaused by deviations arising from the deviant culture. Chinese is a specialwritten language, and it is similar to the written language in the heavens.And oral Chinese is similar to the language spoken in the heavens, becauseit is a form of culture that gods directly created for mankind. Also, sincewhat was established in China was a semi-divine culture, the form andsound of Chinese characters are interconnected with the cosmos. It's diffe-rent from the written languages in the West and the written languages of ot-her ethnicities. That's because from a certain perspective, the written lan-guages of other cultures are actually sets of symbols that gods created forhuman beings so that they could await the Fa in those regions after formingpredestined connections. That way the people awaiting the Fa in those pla-ces could lead normal lives and temporarily have a set of symbols to com-municate with each other. But if the sound and form of Chinese charactersare interconnected with the cosmos, then think about it, what kind of inter-ference could they have on mankind, on Fa-validation by Dafa discipleswho have obtained the Fa and cultivated on this plane, and even on Fa-rec-tification? Put another way, the old forces used those factors to exploitthings in Fa-rectification. Let's take the word " " (mu di or "destina-tion") as an example. In ancient times when the word "destination" or otherwords used to describe reaching a certain place were written, the character"di" was always the same "di" as in the Chinese character " " (tu di or"earth"). In modern times, with the apparent rationale of standardizinggrammar and making it easier for people to master grammar, that " " (di,as in "earth") has been written as " " (di, a grammatical article). So evenafter you have supposedly reached the "destination," you still haven't gottento the "place." (Audience laughs, applauds)There are problems with many factors. In modern times the old forces havedamaged Chinese culture and left a big mess for me to deal with as I impartthe Fa. There are just so many damaging factors in a myriad of areas, so alot of things needed to be put right. But there was no time to do that, so thecorrections simply addressed a few things. The good thing is, the Fa's innermeanings aren't affected. The book Zhuan Falun manifests differently ineach dimension, and the Zhuan Falun in the heavens looks completely dif-ferent from the one on earth, so it hasn't been affected.

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Disciple: I haven't been able to cultivate while conforming to ordinary peo-ple to the greatest extent possible. Will that leave me with a lot of regrets inthe future?Teacher: So you haven't managed to cultivate while conforming to ordina-ry people to the greatest extent possible, well, "to the greatest extent possi-ble" means meeting the requirements completely. So if it ended today, whi-chever level you belonged to would be fixed. It hasn't ended today so, sinceit hasn't ended, when it comes to the standards that you have or haven't met,and the things that you have or haven't cultivated well in, those are still justparts of the ongoing process, so no one can conclude that this is just whatyou are. If you have come to recognize your shortcoming, and I believe thatyou must have since you submitted the question slip, then correct it and dobetter. (Applause)Disciple: Esteemed Teacher, the word "? " (cheng du or "degree") fromprevious editions of Zhuan Falun has been changed to "? " (cheng du or"degree of accomplishment"). But one of my fellow practitioners said thatthe Minghui website hasn't published that change, so, should it be changedback to the original?Teacher: There have been several rounds of character changes; there werejust so many things to change. Once one matter is dealt with, a lot of thingshappen, so as of now the changing of characters ends and no additionalchanges will be made. To find out about the changes that have been made,you can refer to the edition of Zhuan Falun that will soon be published andthen make your changes based on that edition. This happened becauseMinghui was only sometimes notified of the character changes, so that's thesituation.Disciple: Is the structure of the cosmos that you have talked about referringto the new cosmos's structure?Teacher: The structure that I talked to you about before was all about theold cosmos's structure. The state that is evident during the Fa-rectificationis also the state displayed by beings of the old cosmos. The new cosmoscan't be talked about. Not only can't it be talked about, but the secrets ofheaven cannot be revealed. (Teacher smiles) (Audience laughs, applauds)Many of the secrets of heaven in the old cosmos can no longer be called se-crets of heaven, because those things will be altered, they will undergochanges. But the old cosmos does have many many good beings and fac-tors, including structures that are good, so those will be kept. So, a greatmany beings and the vast majority of the structure of the old cosmos havebeen kept.Disciple: With the time for saving sentient beings being so pressing, whydo my selfish thoughts persist as they do? I am worried about myself.Teacher: I think that being able to see your own shortcomings is cultiva-tion. That's actually very normal. When you can recognize it, that's the firststep to improving. If you can manage to pay attention to those things on aday-to-day basis and do them well little by little, then you are improving.

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Don't get anxious, as doing so will lead to attachments. When you see pro-blems, make changes, and when you see shortcomings, overcome them.There are a lot of things that you might not be able to do, and I've takenthat into consideration in every respect, and I foresaw it when I dissemina-ted the Fa. In other words, what I want to save is mainly the master soul,the person himself. How much ability does a person have? If a person canrecognize his own mistakes and overcome them, then he is cultivating, butwhat happens if the elements that make up a person's being become de-viant? Or, more specifically, what happens when a person's way of thinkingis deviant? Case in point: for so many years the CCP has intentionally edu-cated people in a way that reinforces its own things. Many people haveseen that the Party is not good, but they're only able to say that the Partyisn't good from within the culture fostered by the Party's education. Theyhaven't truly recognized it and can't see it for what it is outside of the cultu-re of the Party that has been instilled in them. That's a deviant way of thin-king. What can be done in that case? That's why I say that there are certainthings that you can do, and you're not a cultivator if you don't do the thingswithin your power. But whatever you can't do, Dafa will certainly do thosethings for you, and Master definitely has ways to do them. (Applause)In other words, you must cultivate the part that you are supposed to cultiva-te. As for the things that you can't cultivate, and can't detect or recognize--or take care of even if you could recognize them--Master will take care ofthem. Of course, it doesn't mean that when you see attachments that youcan't get rid of you can use the excuse of "I can't do anything about that"and thereby shrug off your responsibility. (Audience laughs) That won't do.What I'm talking about is, when it comes to the structures of your beingand your way of thinking--things that you can't detect at all and can't takecare of--Master will definitely take care of those things.Disciple: Master, is the time when the persecution ends the time that the Fawill rectify the human world?Teacher: That is quite possible. (Applause) It's better if I don't talk aboutthose things, though. As soon as I talk about that, everyone's mind will be-come unsettled. I'll leave the wonder and magnificence of that for you tosee for yourselves.Disciple: Master, could you talk about the origins of the evil political partythat persecutes Dafa disciples? (Audience laughs)Teacher: As far as how that thing came into existence on a fundamental le-vel, I think it's better that I don't talk about it at a Fa conference. As far ashow it came into existence in the human world, that is something that eve-ryone already knows without my saying anything. Actually, whether youwant to talk about a crooked political party or an evil political party or anyother kind of political party, as cultivators we have absolutely nothing to dowith that. No matter how evil a party might be, it's something of the humanworld, and no matter how good it might be, it is still something of the hu-man world. Being a cultivator means stepping out of the human world, and

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when it comes to cultivating in the human world, cultivators don't get invol-ved with all those worldly conflicts and issues. Things that are evil, well,there are reasons for their existence, and with things that are good there arereasons for their existence too. It is determined by the state of human socie-ty, and Dafa disciples don't concern themselves with those things at all. Buteveryone saw clearly that back when that arch devil started persecuting us,it was yelling that its political party "must defeat Falun Gong" and "I refuseto believe the *** Party can't defeat Falun Gong." I know that it did thosethings out of jealousy and resentment, but I also know that there were ele-ments of its political party behind its words. Put another way, we exposedthem only after they persecuted us. We don't recognize this persecution. Inthe process of clarifying the truth, we will tell the world's people why FalunGong is being persecuted, what Falun Gong is, and what that political partyis. Whoever it is that has persecuted Dafa disciples should be exposed andthe malignant influence that has spread among the minds of the world'speople should be cleared away.After listening to students clarify the truth, some people still say, "FalunGong is pretty good, but I think the *** Party has its reasons." And thereare a lot of people who think that what the CCP says can't be wrong, and sothey refuse to listen to the truth. Those people haven't seen that it is evil tothe core. Some people say, "Falun Gong is pretty good, but the Party hasn'tdone anything wrong. It's that arch devil's fault." In that case, we shouldtell the world's people why it persecutes Falun Gong and what kind of moti-ve it had when it began persecuting Falun Gong; we should help people seewho the evil cult really is and what the Party is all about. The Dafa disci-ples that are being persecuted should expose its disreputable past.Worldly affairs are not the concern of Dafa disciples, who are cultivators,but I, Li Hongzhi, know about all such affairs. (Applause) I've been explai-ning these things all along over the last several years of persecution, andyet the persecution continues. The new leadership of the CCP has been inpower for two years so far, and the persecution continues. Is it just a matterof isolated individuals committing evil acts? Then why shouldn't we tell theworld about the fundamental evilness of that political party? If you didn'tpersecute us, we wouldn't want to have anything to do with you, and wewouldn't want to say anything about you. The lives of so many Dafa disci-ples have been taken, and the persecution continues. How evil! Also, theParty has used the one-sided media to broadcast slanderous propaganda toevery corner of the earth, and it's even worse than that of the Cultural Revo-lution. It is targeting a group of such good and kind people. Even if I for-bear it and tolerate it, none of the gods will stand for it! (Applause)Disciple: Because of my attachment of emotion, I have made mistakes. Ifeel remorse over the path I have taken. How should I make up for it?Teacher: (Teacher sighs) These are in fact the things that pain Master themost. For a cultivator, it's just so shameful. It's shameful even for an ordi-nary person, but you are a cultivator, so how could you even raise this for

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open discussion? It is just so shameful. Did you know that in old-time culti-vation, as soon as a cultivator broke the rule pertaining to this, he wouldn'tbe able to cultivate again for the rest of his life. That's how serious it is.So, what can be done? Dafa is merciful, and Master looks at your being inits entirety, and you will still have chances before the Fa's rectification ofthe human world arrives. But you can't make those mistakes again. Youjust can't. And during this period of time especially, the evil will capitalizeon your emotion to aggravate its persecution of you and will cause your de-sires and attachments to be particularly strong, to the point where you can'thandle yourselves well and will take an evil path. Master has seen that. Ifyou can walk your path well and cultivate well, that sin will belong to theevil. But if you still don't walk your path well, that sin will be your own. Ofcourse, the evil that is interfering with you will be eliminated, and after thatanything you do will be yours.During the Fa-rectification period, when the Fa is rectifying the entire cos-mos, do you know how Master is doing it? As for all the beings in the enti-re cosmos, including the world's people, and beings that are lower than thisworld--even ones that are down very very low, including beings in the un-derworld and hell--I have been doing things according to one principle: nomatter what sins or mistakes a being committed in its past, I disregard all ofthat; I can get rid of all those things for you and make everything good. No-body has ever treated sentient beings like this before. If a certain place inthe cosmos was no longer up to par, it was destroyed through explosion andthen recreated. If a certain place was no longer up to par, it was just like themetabolism of the human body, where if a cell is no longer up to par it diesoff and a new one is created. Treating all beings with such mercy is some-thing that has never ever happened for as long as the cosmos has existed.(Applause) I've been doing this all along, and I have achieved this. But the-re is one thing. If a sin was committed against Dafa during the Fa-rectifica-tion period, interfering with the Fa-rectification, then that sin cannot be for-given. There is just this one stipulation. If even this stipulation weren't the-re, the Fa of the cosmos would no longer exist. Beings of the futurewouldn't have the Fa to follow and abide by, and it would be the same thingas the cosmos not having a Fa, making it a messed up, chaotic world. Thatcannot happen! That would be the same as harming the cosmos, so havinga negative effect in Fa-rectification means having committed such a sin.For a being, it could be caused by just one misplaced thought, but the con-sequences are devastating.Disciple: Greetings to esteemed Master. I'm a Korean disciple from Hei-longjiang province. Please allow me to greet Master on behalf of all Dafadisciples from Heilongjiang and the different truth-clarifying teams in Ko-rea.Teacher: Thank you. (Applause) The Dafa disciples in Korea have donequite well. There are also many Dafa disciples of Korean ethnicity in Main-land China and they have been persecuted very severely. I know about all

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of this.Disciple: Our truth-clarifying team focuses on clarifying the truth to theBeijing area, putting 80% of our effort there, and using the other 20% onother things, including efforts to rescue students. When we strengthenefforts to clarify the truth to the Beijing area, will the evil that's concentra-ted in Manhattan be reduced?Teacher: The right way to put it is this: when Dafa disciples from differentplaces are all doing very well, the evil can't deal with them all and it is clea-red away in all places. The evil that came to Manhattan is in the process ofbeing completely eliminated. Right now, the evil in the Three Realms hasbeen eliminated in large quantities. You can see that the current situation ischanging, and even the weather is changing. The Dafa disciples that havesat in front of the New York Consulate know that it was the coldest place,and our Dafa disciples have really endured a lot over these years. Lookingat the current situation, the Dafa disciples from different places are fullyutilizing their skills and talents to do things to validate Dafa, so it is cau-sing this evil to become less and less. It's really difficult for it to concentra-te itself and do anything.

Disciple: How can I and everyone else work together so that we can look atmatters broadly and put Dafa first?Teacher: This is a question that all Dafa disciples should think about. Asfar as what to do, only by studying the Fa well and acting according towhat Master tells you can you walk this path righteously.Disciple: It isn't easy for us disciples from Mainland China to get to theU.S. to attend Fa conferences, and it is rare for us to see Master in person.We would like to sincerely ask Master to address the disciples from Main-land China who went to Korea to help Master in Fa-rectification. Please tellus how we can do well what we should do and fulfill the vows we made be-fore history.Teacher: Dafa disciples are all the same, and you should do well no matterwhere you are. Whether you are abroad or are in an environment where youare directly persecuted by the evil, you should display Dafa disciples' righ-teous thoughts and righteous actions, as that strikes fear into the evil. Theevil is raucous on the surface, but inside it is afraid. You are Dafa disciples,and you can't have fear inside. If a cultivator can truly let go of [the fear of]death, then that death will forever be far removed from you. But this isn'tsomething you can will to happen--it's a point that you cultivate to in theFa, one at which you become that kind of being. When the persecution inMainland China started, if all of the Dafa disciples had managed to act fair-ly righteously like now, the persecution would have never gotten off theground, and those evil things would have been destroyed instantly. The hu-man world is no place for them to make a display of evilness.Now you folks have gradually become more clearheaded, calmer, and morerational, and you know what to do, and one might say that a lot of your hu-

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man attachments have been cultivated away. Well, actually, with some stu-dents it's not that their human attachments have been cultivated away butthat the students have been too scared to do anything out of line, and if theenvironment eases up a little bit they will dare to do those things again.That's no good. If a person can't cultivate in the Fa, then he isn't able to tru-ly understand the Fa. Only when a person has truly grasped the Fa can hewalk the path righteously and can his being be assured a good outcome. Ot-herwise that kind of being remains in the most perilous situation, becausethe evil can take advantage of his gaps at any time. If he were an ordinaryperson, no matter how bad he was, the evil wouldn't pay any attention tohim. Because he wants to cultivate, though, the evil will try to stop himfrom cultivating. And when you don't cultivate solidly you become a targetfor the evil's persecution.Disciple: A few students are very enthusiastic about clarifying the truth, butthey have never been able to go beyond the petty confines of attachment toself. They haven't done well in overall cooperation and coordination, andmore seriously, they have affected some other students. If they still can't dowell with fellow practitioners' help, I'd like to ask Master, what kind of con-sequences will those students face in the future?Teacher: In my opinion, right now you can't say how students are or drawconclusions about them, because there are all kinds of different manifesta-tions in the process of cultivation, and all ordinary people's attachmentswill show. As long as a practitioner doesn't remove them they will definite-ly show. As for the part that has cultivated well, it is nowhere to be seen,because the part of him that has cultivated well can't be shown. And thepart that hasn't been cultivated well will be seen by others whenever it sur-faces. What's key is how he deals with it and whether he can recognize hisshortcomings when others point that part out or when his attachments comeout in conflicts--that's what is critical. Once you recognize something youneed to overcome it, and only that is cultivation. When all is said and done,I'd say that it's a question of diligence.If a person doesn't cultivate well and affects another Dafa disciple or a lotof other Dafa disciples, and causes their cultivation to fail, that is the severesin of interfering with Dafa disciples' cultivation, one that cannot be absol-ved even after a being descends down to the eighteenth level of hell. Somestudents aren't able to remove their longstanding attachments, leading totheir being interfered with by the evil. All of you are thinking that thesepeople are done for and can't make it. Right now you can't look at it likethat. Some students have in fact gotten rid of many other attachments, anda lot of attachments are gone and won't show themselves, but those attach-ments that they haven't cultivated away still show up. Master will definitelyhave those come out and be affected in conflicts, and will for sure haveeveryone see that, and the goal will be to have them get rid of those. Whenyou see one, you need to point it out to them. If you don't point it out that isbecause you have an attachment of fearing to offend others. In that case,

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they will be made to have clashes and conflicts with you so that both youand him will recognize those attachments. And the goal is to cultivate awaythose human attachments. But when you look at the students who have at-tachments that show, you can't think that they're no good. So misunderstan-dings and mistakes among Dafa disciples are unavoidable. The key is thatyou can't have real conflicts and clashes among yourselves or start to mis-trust one another.Recently, I have often stressed the issue of cooperating and coordinatingwell with each other. Whether or not those bad attachments of yours havebeen removed, you have to cooperate well with each other just the same.Why is it that at times you see arguments coming up a lot, and sometimesthe arguments go on and on? Why is it that in validating the Fa, disciples'opinions are time and again not unified? This is something that's been quiteprominent recently in Mainland China. What's the real problem? It's verysimple--it is a question of whether you are validating the Fa or validatingyourself. If you are validating the Fa, no matter what another person saysabout you, you won't be affected inside. If someone counters your opinionand you get riled up and don't like it, if when other people raise an opinionopposite yours based on some problem you have or disagree with your opi-nion and you don't like it, and you stand up to oppose it and argue on yourown behalf, and when this leads to your going off topic and not listening toothers, [in all such cases] you are--even if you are defending and explainingyourself with the best of intentions--still just validating yourself. (Applau-se) That is because you didn't put Dafa first, and at that time the thing thatyou couldn't let go of most was self.But people's thoughts are complex, and sometimes it's hard to tell. Somepeople truly are thinking of the Fa, really do feel that such-and-such way isright, and are not attached to themselves. They're just holding their groundlike that. Some may say, "You're so insistent, aren't you validating your-self?" So at those times you have to be calm and collected. In fact, wheneveryone is thinking of the Fa the problem of not cooperating is non-exis-tent. We should be good people wherever we are--aren't we supposed tothink of others first when we do things? Why is it that Dafa disciples don'tthink of others first when dealing with each other? You're thinking, "We'reall cultivators and everyone is cultivating, so when we're with other disci-ples there is no need to think about how we talk to each other." Isn't thatwhat you're thinking? Well, that's not right. Do not forget this point: youare human beings that are in the process of cultivating, you are not godscultivating, so you must be considerate of others.Disciple: Students in Korea are using all sorts of ways to step up the effortto clarify the truth to different kinds of people, and they are gradually get-ting people's attention and support. The truth-clarification has yielded bet-ter and better results, and at the same time, all over the country great num-bers of new students are pouring in. But recently, one after another, a fewstudents have had accidents and died tragically. One died when the bus he

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was riding in flipped over, one drowned, and another died in an accident atwork. One of those students was very active in clarifying the truth. The oc-currence of several such incidents caused some of the newer students to wa-ver.Teacher: I just talked about the old forces' interference to Fa-rectificationand Dafa disciples. So why do the old forces do things like that, then?What is their goal? They think, "All of you have come here to cultivate andyou think that Dafa is good. Is your understanding of Dafa's goodness trulybased on the Fa truths? Or rather, do you just go along when other peoplesay it's good? Or is it that you say the Fa is good when you feel like you'vebenefited from it?" Cultivation and Dafa are solemn, and they can turn hu-man beings into gods. The old forces can't stand that, so they want to testyou. They want to see if you will still say Dafa is good and stay and culti-vate when they have people pass away who have reached the end of their li-fe spans. The old forces have done that, so when a student faces life-threa-tening danger, you can't say that he is not good or that he has some seriousproblems. That is actually the old forces creating a disturbance by takingadvantage of human attachments. One thing is that it's easy for some stu-dents to waver, and if those kinds of students had all cultivated very welland solidly, those problems wouldn't have taken place. If certain studentscan't manage to get rid of long-standing attachments inside themselves,they can be persecuted and interfered with. [They might think,] "I've beendoing the exercises, and my illnesses have been cured. I feel so good. Mylife has become easier." Their understanding always remains at that leveland they can't understand the Fa on the basis of the Fa, and that makes it ea-sy for problems to come up. Of course, these things don't always stem fromthat type of problem. The old forces have been doing this for a long time,and these kinds of things also happened before in the cultivation of studentsin Mainland China. So that's why in cultivation it is imperative to look atthings with righteous thoughts and clearly recognize that cultivation is themost serious of matters.Of course, certain things have happened. Students in different regions havepretty much become clearheaded, they are able to understand things on thebasis of the Fa, and they can thus handle those things correctly. There usedto be some students who would often say, "So-and-so at our practice sitehas done so well! We'll do whatever he does." Let me tell all of you thatyou absolutely must not do that and absolutely must not think that way.Cultivators can't take other human beings as their role models. They musttake the Fa as the teacher! (Applause) As soon as you start doing things [li-ke I described] and thinking in that way, two problems will surface. One isthat you will likely push that student to a place where there is no way outfor him. And it's likely the old forces will lead him to have problems andeven make him leave us early in order to test other students. [They'll think,]"You're all looking to him. With things like this, are you still going to stu-dy, and are you still going to cultivate?" Under circumstances like this, the-

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re are really some students who think, "If even he couldn't make it, will I beable to?" They waver. Isn't that the old forces taking advantage of gaps? [Inthat situation] even I, your master, can't say anything! The old forces say,"Take a look. See how that test ended up? What we did was right, wasn'tit?" So when the righteous thoughts are not strong, people's minds waver.You absolutely must be on guard against that! You should take the Fa asthe teacher. You can't look at how well a certain individual has cultivatedand as a result learn from that person instead of the Fa.Weren't there students like that when the persecution in Mainland Chinafirst began? Many students were looking to the assistants and doing what-ever the assistants did. When the assistants gave in, they followed suit andgave in too. Of course, students are students of Dafa after all, so when theycalmed down later on, they realized that they had been wrong. They startedto study the Fa anew, and realized that that understanding of theirs hadbeen wrong and that what they did was wrong. But, looking at that one partof it, didn't it bring shame to them? They did do that thing at one point, sofor a cultivator, isn't that a black mark? So, causing people's minds to wa-ver will bring trouble to the cultivation environment. You absolutely mustbe attentive to that.All kinds of things might happen during cultivation. Some people saw thatsuch-and-such people had their illnesses cured after they started practicing.They thought, "Wow, even such serious illnesses have been cured." Or,"Wow, that person's cancer was cured after he started practicing." "I'll prac-tice too." But why did that person end up coming? He came because of thecancer and for the purpose of getting healthy. He didn't come here to trulycultivate. But I realize that everyone has to start somewhere in understan-ding the Fa. One person might start to understand the Fa at one point andanother at a different point. But once someone enters the practice he musttake studying the Fa as first and foremost--only then is it cultivation. In thatcase, when you can truly understand the Fa during cultivation, you will beable to get rid of any attachment. You will think, "I've obtained the Fa, andI am not afraid of anything. If I die, so be it. Even if I die, I have obtainedthe Fa. What's going to happen to me after I die? I won't end up in hell. I'veobtained the Fa, after all." A person like that will not encounter anythingthat endangers his life and he won't have any health problems (Applause).That is because the state of mind he demonstrates is that of a true cultiva-tor. He has truly understood [what cultivation is] and has truly elevatedhimself, and he has let go of all attachments. At least in this one regard hehas transcended humanness, he has gone beyond the realm of humanness.Only ordinary human beings have health problems. Once he lets go of hisattachment to being healed his health problems will be gone.Certain people haven't managed for a long time to let go of their attach-ments to getting healed. Under normal circumstances when a person suffersfrom a terminal illness he has actually reached the end of his lifespan. He'ssuffering from a terminal illness and his life is supposed to end, but now he

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has studied Dafa. Even though he comes in order to get cured, he is still al-lowed to keep studying the Fa to understand the Fa. He also sees examples[of the Fa] playing out in people's lives, but he still can't understand the Faon the basis of the Fa. He doesn't read the books, so he can't understandthings on the basis of the Fa. He only follows others in doing the exercises.He is still thinking, "I've become a student of Falun Gong. I keep doing theexercises. Why haven't I been cured?" Cultivation is a serious matter. Thattest of one's mind is a black or white issue. The more attached you are, theworse you will feel. When you go to the hospital for an examination youwill be made to see that your illness has gotten worse. Yet you still don'tenlighten to it. Since you still don't enlighten to it, it becomes more andmore serious, and in the end you truly can't make it. That happens becauseyou are not a genuine student, you don't study the Fa, and you can't let goof your attachment to your illness. You are just an ordinary person whowants to get his illness cured. The purpose of my disseminating Dafa is tosave people at the fundamental level of their being, not to help ordinarypeople get cured. If you can truly cultivate, when you can truly let go ofyour attachment to living or your fear of death--and not just act that wayfor others to see while constantly thinking about it inside--then no matterwhat kind of illness you have, it will be cured. In cultivation, the differencebetween humanness and godhood is just the difference of one thought. Thisdifference of one thought sounds easy, but it can be achieved only with adeep and solid foundation in cultivation. If you can really devote a lot ofeffort to studying the Fa, you will be able to achieve that.Of course, whenever that situation comes up, usually the person is givenone chance after another in Dafa over a long period of time, because he hasobtained the Fa, after all. He is continually given chances and doesn't die,and he is given chance after chance. But if that person still doesn't get it af-ter being given chances for so long, even if he has cultivated for years andhas followed others in doing Dafa work, if he still can't let go on a funda-mental level of his attachment to getting healed, then on a fundamental le-vel he is still not a student, and he will depart when he reaches the end ofhis lifespan. Ordinary people can do Dafa work too, and what they get areblessings. When cultivators do Dafa work, they don't seek ordinary bles-sings or a good life; the thing that is most important [to them] is raisingtheir level. Cultivators don't seek the things of this world. Isn't being atta-ched to your illness a pursuit of something in the human world? Some peo-ple say, "Once my illness heals I'll be able to do so many good things forDafa! Why haven't I been cured yet?" Your getting well, your cultivating,and your becoming a Dafa disciple would all be conditional. You wouldcultivate and acknowledge [yourself as a Dafa disciple] only when your ill-ness was cured. Cultivation is done unconditionally though, and things aregained naturally, with no pursuit.Nothing is absolute, of course. What I was talking about were Fa truths.People's situations are different, and I was just giving an example. If eve-

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ryone has a good understanding things will go smoothly. But when a per-son can't let go of his attachments it becomes really hard.Disciple: I'm a Dafa disciple from Ireland, and I would like to send gree-tings to esteemed Teacher. For a long time now I haven't been doing wellin spreading the Fa or in personal cultivation. Is there still time for me tomake up for it?Teacher: Then you should go ahead and do that. Since it's not over yet,yes, there is still time left. (Everyone smiles and applauds) Even if you ha-ven't done well, no matter what, Master still doesn't want to leave any ofyou behind. (Applause)I've said before that the Fa-rectification of the cosmos is one stage and theFa's rectification of the human world is another stage. What that means is,Master is doing this in two steps. So I haven't taught you the Fa of theThree Realms, I have only taught you the Fa of the cosmos. I haven't talkedabout the structures of the different living things in the Three Realms, theorigin of life, the structure of life, the history of the world, or the theories inthis world from religion to science, such as where those things came from,what their purposes are, the reasons behind the different conflicts that takeplace in the human world--well, everything in history. And as for the stateof the structure of the Three Realms and the different heavenly bodies inthe Three Realms, I haven't talked to you about those things because they'reso insignificant in the cosmos. The Three Realms doesn't deserve to betaught in Dafa, as they are too low. When I teach you the Great Law it en-compasses the Three Realms. In the future you will know everything, andthere won't be any need for me to tell you about things of the Three Re-alms. In the future I will handle things that have to do with human beings,and at that point I'll talk about the Fa of the Three Realms. When in the fu-ture it's time to do things in the Three Realms, that will be when the Fa rec-tifies the human world.Because things are being done in two steps, a certain phenomenon has hap-pened in the cosmos. What kind of phenomenon? It's that the Three Realmshas been closed off all this time--the beings inside the Three Realms can'tget out and the beings outside of the Three Realms can't get in. I was theone who closed things off from the beginning. The elements created earlyon by the old forces were and are still there and haven't been cleaned awaycompletely, and before things are done at the surface of the human world,that portion of the old forces' elements is still having a negative effect. So,because the Fa-rectification and the Fa's rectification of the human worldare being done in two different steps, the Three Realms needed to be sepa-rated from the cosmos. Since the beginning of my Fa-rectification--duringthe last ten-plus years--it has been continually moving away from the cos-mos. Astronomers have seen that the heavenly bodies in the cosmos are nolonger the heavenly bodies of the early times, and the Milky Way's positionis no longer the same as it was early on, and the other star systems that we-re around the place where the Milky Way existed early on are no longer the

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same. That has happened because the Three Realms is being separatedfrom the cosmos. Scientists discovered that fact when it was in the processof being shifted, and they are saying that the cosmos is expanding. In actua-lity it is the heavenly bodies separating themselves from the Three Realms,as well as the Three Realms moving further and further away from its origi-nal location. During the last ten-plus years, the Three Realms has been mo-ving out of the cosmos nonstop. As that has been happening, scientists havediscovered that the heavenly bodies have undergone immense changes.Stars that didn't exist before have appeared, heavenly bodies that didn'texist before have appeared, and star systems that didn't exist before haveappeared. So where did the stars and star systems that were originally therego to? Why has the cosmos undergone such enormous changes? Thosethings have in fact come about as a part of the movement of the Three Re-alms as it separates from the cosmos.Hasn't the PureInsight website reported that? The cosmos is disappearinginto the distance faster than the speed of light, and the Milky Way is beingseparated from the cosmos. Since it has reached the point where even hu-man beings can see this phase, it means that the separation has arrived atthe most surface level. Early on when I was beginning to do this, somegods told me, "In the future, human beings will all be able to see the thingsthat you did, and they will realize in the end that you were the one who didthem." That is the case because certain manifestations will gradually con-verge on where I am.Once the separation is complete, the dimensions outside of the Milky Waywon't even exist. Human beings will find the emptiness terrifying. The starsthat used to exist outside of the Milky Way and all the heavenly bodies thatwere scattered everywhere outside of the Milky Way will be gone. The Pu-reInsight website reported that our Milky Way will become the "lonely souland roaming ghost" of the cosmos. You might wonder, "What would be thereason for that phenomenon?" It seems as though people--including scien-tists--are indifferent to it, but it's only because they don't understand it. Ifsuch a thing had happened in the cosmos in the past, then the Milky Waywould not have existed anymore. If separated from the cosmos, [the MilkyWay] would not have been able to exist and would have disintegrated. TheFa-rectification of the cosmos and the Fa's rectification of the human worldare being done in two steps, so the Three Realms has to be separated fromthe cosmos. If the Fa-rectification of the cosmos was complete--and everyt-hing was new and pure--but the Three Realms was still so filthy, it wouldpollute the cosmos. It wouldn't do to have such a filthy place inside such awonderful cosmos, so it needs to be moved out and taken care of separate-ly. That's why they will be separated. (Applause) Scientists have now disco-vered what I described.Disciple: What do we do about correcting the Chinese characters in "OnBuddha Law / Lunyu" that some practitioners have hanging on theirwalls...?

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Teacher: Yes, you can correct the "On Buddha Law" text hanging on yourwall. Just make the corrections with the appropriate color. Well actually,any method will do.Disciple: How can we help newer students in China step forward?Teacher: When it comes to newer students, you can't be too hasty withthem since they need to go through a process of improving their understan-ding. If of their own initiative they offer to do something, then let them.But if they don't want to do something out of their own initiative, I don'tthink we can compel them to do anything, since they are still newer stu-dents after all.Disciple: How should we view the big corporations outside of China thatare poised to make investments in China, and how should we look at our fa-mily members' wanting to go back to China?Teacher: If your family members don't cultivate and want to go back toChina, then that's fine. If you are a cultivator it's best that you don't goback--wouldn't you be setting yourself up for persecution? As a Dafa disci-ple, you wouldn't be able to bear not doing what Dafa disciples are suppo-sed to do, but if you did those things you would be persecuted. And also,there are things here that you should do.As for a lot of corporations planning to make investments in China, don'tdo anything about that for now. You should just clarify the facts and tellpeople what Dafa is about and why it's being persecuted. Bring to light thedespicable farces and all of the low acts committed by the government whe-re they made up lies and slander, expose the evil's suppression, tell theworld's people about these things and help them see all of this clearly--thenyou will have reached your goal. When you clarify the truth just talk aboutthings at that level and don't go any higher. As far as some company wan-ting to make investments somewhere, if you get a chance, all you can sayis: "It's only because of investments from you guys that the group of evil-doers in China has the money to fund the persecution. You can see howscary it is when they display their wickedness, right? Hasn't your companybeen subjected to its coercion?" We won't get involved with whether theymake investments there. All we can do is talk to them using principles at avery shallow level.But I think that with material gain right in front of them some people arewilling to listen and some aren't, so that issue isn't the focus. The focus is totell people why Falun Gong is being persecuted and how evil the persecu-tors are, and that will be enough. Once people can see those evil thingsclearly, that will expel from their minds the poisonous elements from thepropaganda produced by the slanderous media of China's communist go-vernment. This means you've saved those people, and that one act enabledthem to make it to the next stage. Otherwise when the Fa's rectification ofthe human world arrives and that powerful gong comes...the Fa-rectifica-tion has standards, and at that point they definitely won't have any otherchances to understand [the truth]. The standards hold true from the highest

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place in the cosmos down to the lowest. However a being is at that point,that will be it, and everything will be dealt with in the fastest time. Thosewho should be weeded out will be weeded out, those who should remainwill remain, those who should be raised up will be raised up, and those whoshould be lowered will be lowered. It will be over in a flash. Whatever is ina being's mind determines what he [or his situation] is, so there won't beany more chances at that point. If a person has the poison from that wicked,villainous gang cleared away, then he will make it past that stage. So at thevery least he'll be able to witness the changes that happen in the future.Disciple: I'm a little disciple from Taiwan. On behalf of the little disciplesfrom Taiwan, I'd like to present a lotus flower to Master. (Master smiles)(Audience smiles and applauds) We thank our magnificent Master.Teacher: Thank you. This little lotus flower is truly beautifully done. (Ap-plause) This is the sort of consideration and thought that Dafa disciples ha-ve put into clarifying the truth. You've really worked hard and have comeup with so many ideas to save people. Today's people are really hard to sa-ve. [It seems as though] they'll listen only if what you tell them is in linewith their ideas, and they'll listen only if you talk to them in a way that theylike. In other words, if you want to save them, they have conditions for youto do so. (Master smiles)Disciple: Master, one of my family members practices and says that he'sspecial. He doesn't send righteous thoughts or clarify the truth, and he sel-dom studies Fa other than Zhuan Falun. Right now in the Fa-rectificationperiod we are busy with all sorts of projects. If I spent a lot of time helpinghim, I would find it hard to make enough time for other things.Teacher: That's true. If he is a newer student, then you should show someunderstanding towards him. If he is a veteran student, then he's definitely inthe wrong. As far as how to help him, there is no special method for doingit. Take a look to see where he's off track and take the appropriate course ofaction to address it. Remove the hurdle in his mind and find his attachment.Disciple: How do we truly break apart the old forces' arrangements, movebeyond selfishness, and become true Fa-rectification disciples?Teacher: The cosmos in the past was based on selfishness. Let's take manas an example: when it came to crucial moments he truly couldn't care lessabout others. When I started Fa-rectification, some gods said to me,"You're the only one who gets involved in others' business." I know, youfind this hard to believe, because you are altruistic beings created by Dafathat have roles in Fa-rectification and that have truly enlightened. If I didn'tdo that, with the end of history all lives would end. When a being is consi-derate of others in doing things and displays tolerance in the process, it'sbecause his starting point is selfless.When Dafa cultivators find selfishness in themselves, they should gradua-lly work to overcome it. Becoming aware of it means that you have takenanother step forward in cultivation, because a non-practitioner can't becomeaware of it and it doesn't occur to him to think about whether he is selfish.

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Only cultivators make a practice of examining themselves and looking wit-hin.Disciple: Dafa disciples from Fushun send their greetings to you. (Mastersays "Thank you.") I have a slow-paced personality. I'm normally slowwhen I work and am often criticized for it. Do I need to change my wayswhen I'm doing work?Teacher: There are indeed people who have a slow-paced personality. Iknow I have a fast-paced personality, and I do everything very very quick-ly. If you say something needs to be done, I'll be out the door before othersare even ready. (Master chuckles) (Applause) Put another way, I've develo-ped this fast pace, and I hurry up and hurry up with everything I do. Ofcourse, I'm not saying that a slow-paced personality is not good. Some peo-ple have just gotten into the habit of doing things that way. But I think it'sbetter if we can speed up a little when it comes to saving people. (Mastersmiles) (Audience laughs and applauds) But it's not that you have to chan-ge your personality.This is how beings in the cosmos are. Everyone is different: some are slowwhile others are fast, and some tend to be anxious while others are even-keeled. For some, they are just slow-paced with everything they do, andthat can't be called an attachment. However, you should hurry up in mattersof saving people and the things that Dafa disciples should do. I don't thinkthat has anything to do with your personality. You should know what "hur-rying up" means no matter how slow your personality is.Disciple: I am a newer disciple. I'm very anxious to travel the Fa-rectifica-tion path well, but I am not sure, is that a type of attachment? How do Itell?Teacher: You are a student who recently obtained the Fa, so don't be over-ly anxious. With many things you can't be held to the same requirements asthe veteran students. But there are indeed some newer students who havebeen doing really well. They are deeply involved in doing things for Dafaand are doing what Dafa disciples need to do. They are truly amazing. So-metimes I really think those latecomers have great awakening capacity.Cultivation consists of step-by-step improvement, and it's not realistic toexpect you to soar to a high level all at once and be like veteran students,since they, too, got to where they are through cultivating and improvingstep by step. Now that you've obtained Dafa you have nothing to worryabout. Just go ahead and systematically do what needs to be done, and dowhat Dafa disciples should do--go as far as your understanding takes youwith things. There's no problem with any of that.Disciple: Would Master explain what effect it will have on our work if Dafadisciples do well in their coordination and cooperation, and what the resultwill be if we don't do those so well?Teacher: The evil will take advantage and cause trouble if you don't coor-dinate and cooperate well. With a lot of the Fa-rectification things, it's notthat there is no way to do them. No matter how hard it is, there is a path for

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you to take, even though it is a fairly narrow one. You have to go down thatpath correctly, and it won't work if you come up even a little short or straya little bit. Nevertheless, there is a path for you. In other words, you need togo down it correctly. If you don't, the evil that currently exists will take ad-vantage of it and cause trouble. In fact what I've just been talking about isthe question of validating yourself versus validating the Fa when you worktogether on something--that's the issue.When everyone is discussing something, you may get upset over someoneexpressing disapproval of your idea, but if nobody raises objections andeveryone says, "This is a pretty good idea, and that one's not bad either"--sothat nobody gets offended--I'd say that these students aren't being very res-ponsible to Dafa or to their own cultivation. They don't dare to face a con-flict and don't dare to address things directly, and they don't dare to speakup when they see a problem. That is being too attached to self, and that'sselfishness. If you deal with a problem without the attachment to self andcalmly put forward ideas about how to tackle the problem well, I don'tthink others will feel uncomfortable upon hearing it, because you're doingit for the Fa. This is one point.Another point is, if someone's proposal is rejected and that person feels up-set, then he really has a problem. Usually the only time when discussionsabout matters of validating Dafa go off track is when some attachment toself is stirred up. Go ahead and watch for this attentively--if you don't belie-ve me, when you leave here and go home watch for it attentively. Whenyou're talking something over, look at who is taking the conversation offtrack, and the person who is doing that has a problem for sure. (Audiencelaughs and applauds) The person who goes off topic is being attached toself, or when his concepts are challenged, driven by a human mindset hegets upset and sets aside Dafa's things. At those times he will be taken ad-vantage of by the evil--he will stray further and further from the originalsubject as he argues, and the evil will take advantage. At that point he willget more and more upset, and the more upset he gets, the more his humanmindset is in fact intensified by the evil and the less he is in a state of culti-vation, so the evil will take advantage even further. Where do you think awicked understanding, or "enlightening" along an evil path, come from?Isn't that where they come from? The evil takes advantage of his attach-ments and makes fake thoughts show up in his mind, but he considers themreal and thinks they're quite reasonable. He's thinking, "None of you un-derstand me, and when all is said and done your cultivation levels aren't ashigh as mine, and none of you understand the Fa as well as I do." (Masterchuckles) That's how it ends up.Disciple: Dafa disciples' efforts in New York City have changed the situa-tion a lot, and many ordinary people have been moved by what they've seenat our anti-torture exhibits. But more and more Westerners have told usthat they are seeing too many of those horrifying images, causing them tolose sympathy for us. Would Master please enlighten us on that?

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Teacher: Maybe they say that the anti-torture exhibits you hold to clarifythe truth are too shocking, but what I can tell you is that your actions arepositive, and the energy is righteous and compassionate, so it absolutelywill not shock people in any kind of negative way. Instead, the discomfortthat some people feel must have been caused by bad thoughts in those peo-ple's minds. Don't people hang everywhere that graphic image of Jesusbeing crucified, with his hands and feet pierced by nails and bleeding? Ha-ven't people been viewing that image for hundreds or thousands of years?So the problem doesn't lie in what is presented. Haven't Dafa disciples beensubjected to similar ordeals in the persecution? You are not trying to use artto portray evil acts, you are saving people. There must be a reason why so-me people have negative reactions, there must be problems with their stateof mind. Perhaps the evil is controlling their minds, or if not, then it's thattheir notions are not right. Even the people who sympathize with Dafa dis-ciples have notions that have come out of ordinary society, and in terms ofunderstanding, they may feel uncomfortable because of that. Don't worry,though, this can be resolved by a little more thorough explanation.A human being may form different notions in the world. Some people thinkspicy food is good, some think sour food is, some like sweet food, and so-me like bland. Those are all tendencies of one's own making. Even if a co-medy is playing in Manhattan, there are still a whole lot of people whodon't like it and criticize it. That's how human beings are. There are peopleon both sides, positive and negative, and humans just live within the princi-ple of mutual generation and mutual inhibition. They can't all be the same.Maybe there are more people out there who think the anti-torture exhibitsare good, only they haven't said so. We can no longer keep making compro-mises to accommodate those with a lot of obstacles in their minds at the ex-pense of saving good people. We are saving the world's people. Some can'tbear to see these things, but there are more people who can, and who aremoved, awakened, and saved. (Applause)If someone thinks he can't stand it, well, let's think about it. With such arighteous field and the evil exposed so explicitly, and all of what is shownis actually happening in real life, yet there's this person who still raises is-sues like that, then doesn't that person have problems? He does, for sure.No matter how hard you work and how much you put into clarifying thetruth, let me tell you, there will always be people in this world that youcan't save. There is always going to be a portion that can't be saved. Wecan't be discouraged or demoralized because of those people. How couldwe be affected by and thus go along with whatever some people might say?We are here to change people, not to be changed by them. (Applause)Everything we are giving people is wonderful, and we are saving people.We can't compromise to accommodate those who are no longer good andwho obstruct the salvation of people, leading to good people not being sa-ved. Of course, when we talk about those who are no longer good, they arenot necessarily completely bad, and perhaps it's caused by their notions.

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But you have to stay coolheaded and rational when it comes to this. Don'tbe swayed by that small number of people and don't be affected by people.You should be very clear in your mind about what you're doing: you are sa-ving people, you are doing the most righteous and most magnificent thing!(Applause) Our students have taken such great pains and overcome somuch adversity in putting together the anti-torture exhibits. It's no smallfeat.The key is actually that we ourselves be clearheaded. We should act withthe power of conviction, not timidly or hesitantly. You can't see the factthat you are beings walking the road to godhood. (Applause) So you aredifferent from ordinary people and you cannot be affected by them. Thegods all admire you for the things you're doing in Manhattan, they truly ad-mire you. Whether it's the gods that are playing positive roles or the onesplaying negative roles, they all admire you. The world's people do too. Theuniversal values of what is good and what is evil haven't changed.Disciple: Is the question of priority involved when it comes to the Dafawork we do in Fa-rectification? If some students want to do Dafa work re-lated to a specific nationality or language because of their own nationalityor native tongue, shouldn't they put that aside for the time being and focuson the Dafa work at hand?Teacher: It's not wrong to want to do Dafa work related to one's nationali-ty or language. Master can't give you specific answers to these questions,because every student is doing things to clarify the truth and save sentientbeings. Maybe those people have things that they have to do. But when it'snecessary for you to work together on something as a group, Dafa disciplesneed to cooperate well.Disciple: I have a question. You said a little earlier that once the persecu-tion is over everything will be set. I'd like to ask, will the ordinary peoplewho are still deceived have any more chances?Teacher: A being will be whatever is contained in his head, and both for abeing who is to be eliminated and one who is to have things end well forhim, it will be over instantly in one pass. Some people may say that theyjust believe in a certain political party or that they just want to work for thatparty. If the Law of the cosmos considers that party good, then they will bekept when that flash of a moment comes; if the Law of the cosmos consi-ders that party evil, then they'll be wiped out when that moment comes. Atthat point clarifying the facts will be no more and giving people extra chan-ces to come to some understanding will be no more. At that point therewon't be such things anymore, and people will be a member of whateverthey contain and will be seen as an element of it. A person will be a part ofwhatever his head contains, and everything will be over in the blink of aneye.Disciple: We often participate in community parades in the United Statesand have been well received by a lot of groups. Would Master tell us howwe might help people come to know about Dafa while conforming to the

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way of ordinary people to the greatest extent? When we have disagree-ments, should we leave them for our own discussion or report them to Mas-ter? (Audience laughs)Teacher: When you encounter problems you should talk them over toget-her since you are cultivating. It can't be that whenever you have a problemyou have Master go cultivate. (Audience laughs and applauds) Isn't thattrue? So when you encounter problems you should figure out how to ad-dress them, and whether you overcome those challenges or resolve themupon agreeing on a solution, those are opportunities for you to establishmighty virtue. That process is in fact the process of maturing, of moving to-wards the future, and is one of the steps you take on the road to godhood.(Applause) You definitely shouldn't leave the specifics to Master. (Audien-ce laughs)So how should you help all beings come to know Dafa? Once you've clari-fied the facts and have truly helped people understand the persecution andknow that Dafa is a positive thing, that's good enough. If a person thinksthat Falun Gong is really good and expresses a desire to know more aboutFalun Gong, then you may explain to him at an extremely basic level thatFalun Gong asks its practitioners to be good, and in the end you may tellhim that we are striving to become better and better people and to reach spi-ritual perfection. That is all you can tell him, and you can't go beyond that.You would scare him if you started telling him things at higher levels.And people's realms of thought are different. For example, if you taughtcollege classes to a first grade kid, he'd refuse to go to school and hewouldn't go to class anymore. (Applause) You have reached your currentrealms and levels step by step through cultivation, and if you want to tellhim everything all at once, that's the same as wanting to lift him up frombeing an ordinary person to where you are instantaneously. (Master chuck-les) Even I, your Master, don't do that. (Audience laughs) I can have abeing, after he is rid of all low-level factors, reach a level of any height,and I can create beings at any height. But if you want a low-level being tounderstand things at such high levels, under normal circumstances thatbeing can't handle it. So people have to understand step by step. Why do Iask you not to talk about things at high levels? Why do I ask you to clarifythe facts rationally? That's why. So when some students are not quite rati-onal and talk about things at very high levels right away when clarifyingthe facts, and when they even talk about gods-this and gods-that to govern-ment officials and tell them that their Master is so-and-so (Audiencelaughs), people think that you're talking nonsense. (Audience laughs) That'snot the way to clarify the facts. The understanding of a cultivator is acqui-red step by step through cultivation, and in general people will find it veryhard to comprehend if you want them to understand things at such high le-vels right away. If they can't understand, then it becomes counterproductiveand in essence it will have a harmful effect.Disciple: Some new students have entered the Way and obtained the Fa

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over the past two years in San Diego, California, and predestined peoplekeep coming every week to learn the practice. Some of those newer studentsare quite capable and are qualified to get involved in projects to validatethe Fa. Shall we have them go straight into doing the three things or askthem to study the Fa and do the exercises only, and then involve them lateron in projects to validate the Fa?Teacher: I can see that you are very shorthanded and are anxious to get so-me capable new students involved. But I still think it's better not to be has-ty. Why is that? Because when veteran students talk about things togetherand are in that state where they are not very mindful of the way they comeacross, it will scare the new students. [Because of] your energy, eventhough your words might not be strong, to them they are strong. Andthough you might not raise your voice, to them it sounds like thunder. (Au-dience laughs) That's truly how it feels to them. So you should wait and notget the newer students involved until they've gained a certain level of un-derstanding and knowledge, and had a chance to improve gradually--atleast until they have some deeper insight into Dafa. That way it won't leadto their giving up cultivation out of a lack of understanding on something.Disciple: Ever since the persecution began I've been bogged down with thecourses at my research institute and have had no time for anything else. Ihaven't had much time for Dafa work and I surely haven't devoted 100%my time to Dafa work. Will I reach the level I'm supposed to?Teacher: If your job truly has you tied up it's not a problem. As you doyour job well, make time to study the Fa and use whatever chance you getto do the things that Dafa disciples should do, like clarifying the facts. The-re are always going to be busy times and not-so-busy times, and it can't bethat everyone is busy at the same time or everyone is not busy at the sametime. Some are busy when others aren't busy. For a cultivator, however,nothing is constant forever. Whether for the moment you are busy or not,just do what you're supposed to do, and everything may change as time pas-ses. So this is what I think: don't use being busy as an excuse for yourselfto not do anything or to neglect Fa study. And there are those who get real-ly worried when they're busy, and that won't do, either. Do what you canbased on your situation.What I just said does apply to clarifying the facts in Manhattan. Those whohave the ability and whose circumstances allow them to come may come,and those whose circumstances don't allow them to come shouldn't. It's notthat all of you have to do things the same way. When all of you are doingthings from your hearts, then that is genuine. Master has never ordered youto do anything. All I've done is to tell you what you should do, and somestudents go and do it. Just do what Dafa disciples should do based on yoursituation and your ability to do so. It won't work if you force things whenyour situation doesn't allow. If you do that, you will bring about problemsin both your daily life and your cultivation, and that's no good.Disciple: Dafa disciples in Turkey send their greetings to you. When might

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you be willing to visit Turkey? What do you think of Turkey?Teacher: The principal part of every single nation's population came forDafa, so I don't want to leave any nation behind as Dafa is spread. And thatis why I ask you to go clarify the facts. Dafa disciples in different regionsshould indeed do well the things that should be done. The sentient beingsare waiting for you.As for when I will visit Turkey, I'll definitely go when the opportunity co-mes along. (Applause) I will travel to every corner of the globe in the future(enthusiastic applause), because I have to take care of every person you sa-ved as you clarified the truth.Disciple: I've seen some fellow practitioners who, after playing the role ofthe evil policemen a lot in the anti-torture exhibits, demonstrate more de-mon nature than before. Is there a correlation? (Audience laughs)Teacher: No, there isn't. That's just in your mind. (Master smiles) It will beokay once they go home, study the Fa, and adjust their mindsets a little.Disciple: Some Dafa disciples recently started a center for and school ofthe arts, which are open to the public. I'd like to ask for Master's advice onhow we should go about playing our roles before the Fa rectifies the hu-man world, given the fact that there are so many Dafa projects going onand finances are tight.Teacher: Whether it's Dafa disciples running companies or openingschools, I think these are normal activities that they do as members of soci-ety. They are means to make a living and might create job opportunities forfellow practitioners at the same time. Also, some ordinary people can be re-ached through our interacting with society in this way, and they might co-me to benefit from it.You asked how you should go about playing your roles before the Fa recti-fies the human world. You can do it according to your ability. Running aschool of the arts is different from other professions. A school of the artscan teach students to be good people by following Zhen, Shan, Ren. Andthe school can participate in performances sponsored by Dafa disciples,helping people see another side of the Dafa disciples and see for themsel-ves the contrast between the evilness of that political party and of that archfiend and the goodness of Dafa disciples. So this should be a really goodthing. The Chinese New Year Gala sponsored by New Tang Dynasty TVaims to reach out to and engage more Chinese people so as to clarify thefacts to them and save them. If the performances were poor, then nobodywould watch, and we wouldn't achieve our goal of saving beings. Goodperformances will serve that purpose, or at least serve as a bridge. If theschool really becomes a success then it can participate in our performances.So all of this is good.Disciple: Some students have been cultivating for a long time and seem tounderstand the importance of validating the Fa, yet they haven't been verydiligent. How do we help them?Teacher: There are no miracle cures. Everyone has to cultivate himself so-

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lidly before he can rise to higher levels. As far as those who aren't diligent,take a look to see where their thoughts are stuck. There must be a reasonfor their inadequate understanding of what Dafa disciples must do--try tofind out, what do they care about most right now? Since they are our stu-dents, we have to take responsibility for them and talk to them. If they wereordinary people we wouldn't need to worry about it. It is fine for ordinarypeople to care about whatever they'd like. They don't want to cultivate, sowe won't bother them. Once somebody starts cultivating, though, that per-son will be in danger amidst the evil's persecution if he can't keep up, soyou have to take responsibility for him.Disciple: The "Nine Commentaries on the Chinese *** Party" that hasbeen carried by the newspaper run by Dafa disciples are great, but I worrythat ordinary people who don't understand us will say that we're gettingpolitical.Teacher: That won't happen. Everyone knows that that political party ispersecuting Falun Gong. All we're doing is telling people why that politicalparty is persecuting Falun Gong and, meanwhile, telling them what thatparty hopes to achieve through its persecution, why the CCP is persecutingFalun Gong, and what fundamental differences there are between FalunGong and the CCP. So we'll just talk about what that political party is andwhy it is opposed to Zhen, Shan, Ren. But as far as cultivation is concer-ned, one of our principles of personal cultivation and of clarifying the factsis that we don't get involved in those things. There is an important connec-tion between the media's exposure of the CCP's persecution of Dafa disci-ples and saving all beings. The persecution of Falun Gong has been carriedout in the name of that certain political party, one that has poisoned manypeople in the course of its persecution. In order to save those people it's im-portant to help them see that party for what it is.The Minghui website has not reported on this because, from a perspectivethat's closer to Dafa cultivation, it is not a key issue. The media reports areanother way of saving all beings.As far as who will govern China in the future, whoever wants to, let him.That has nothing to do with us. Whether he is good or bad, that's a humanmatter, and we are cultivators. If you didn't persecute us, then we wouldn'tneed to expose you. You have the gall to do those terrible things, so whydon't you have the courage to face up to it?Disciple: A lot of students who were involved with making FGM televisionprograms don't do them anymore since they are tied up with the recenttruth-clarification efforts in Manhattan and preparations for the NewYear's Gala.Teacher: Master can't say anything about that because those are things foryou to work out yourselves. They are all important. I watch all of the pro-grams done by FGM--every one of them. (Applause) So they are all impor-tant, and you shouldn't overlook any one of them. In fact, I see that all ofyou are truly busy, and each person is working on multiple projects. Coor-

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dinate among yourselves, Master can't say anything specific.Disciple: (Translated question) Since the great firmament was created byDafa, how could it be in such an improper state today that it needs Masterto rectify it? Disciples from Hamilton, New Zealand, send their greetings toMaster.Teacher: Thank you. (Applause) The cosmos's former characteristics deter-mined the cycles it went through. So, what were the characteristics? Theywere " formation-stasis-degeneration-destruction-emptiness, " and that iswhat the old cosmos is like. The cosmos is enormous, and when degenera-tion and destruction took place on a small scale or in a localized area, thatarea was blown up in an explosion, and then a void followed. After it beca-me a void, the matter still existed, so the gods would use that dead matterto create a new layer in the cosmos from scratch. The process is very simi-lar to human metabolism. If problems cropped up in a larger area, then thatlarger area had to be blown up and new beings were created afterwards. Noone thinks about whether his metabolism has anything to do with mercy.Well, high-level gods in the cosmos look at the process of formation-stasis-degeneration-destruction the way humans look at metabolism--they haveno concept of whether it's merciful or not. The cosmos is alive, and if thecells in part of this organic body were no longer up to par, then that partneeded to be weeded out and replaced. That's why a similar process occursin humans: birth-aging-sickness-death.The future cosmos will be different in that regard. Once something reachesthe stage of degeneration, it will be made whole and renewed so that it be-comes good again. So that is different from the old cosmos. (Applause)All of the future beings will be selfless, while the beings of the past wereselfish. (Applause) Some beings have no regard for others as they pursuethe things they want, and that has been demonstrated in this world tho-roughly. For the sake of proving a point or to save face, some people in theworld go to any length to harm others and never consider others' welfare.Some people's selfishness surfaces in a very vicious way--some of them de-liberately seek out people to push around and always look down on others.Who gave them the right to do that? Nobody. You shouldn't be like that,nobody that cultivates in Dafa should be like that.Disciple: Thank you, venerable Master, for your merciful salvation. Pleasehelp us understand how to put the skills we've acquired in society to use intruth clarification.Teacher: I think that every Dafa disciple is making use of his skills andabilities to save all beings and validate Dafa. Dafa disciples are runningwebsites, and media outlets such as radio stations and TV stations, and it'sall for the singular purpose of clarifying the facts. At this point the Chinesecommunist government and that arch fiend's evil, villainous faction haveused financial leverage so that they now have society's media in the palmof their hand. Nobody is reporting on the persecution we're being subjectedto, so with no other recourse, Dafa disciples have worked together to do

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these things. What I mean is, you have taken it upon yourselves to do thesethings, and Master didn't specifically take the lead on any of these things.It's true that Master has affirmed what you've done or told you what I feltyou should do--that much I can say. But, as for what each person shoulddo, Master can't tell you too specifically. That's because once Master saidsomething, others would think, "Master has asked him to do that," and youtoo would think, "Master has asked me to do that," so then you wouldn't door take care of anything else. And when you were needed with other things,you would have an excuse: "Master asked me to do this." (Teacher chuck-les) I would have given you an attachment, and that's no good. So you needto do a lot of things on your own. You should establish your own mightyvirtue, and that is what's truly magnificent.Disciple: As we're clarifying the facts, if some people acknowledge that thepersecution is wrong but Dafa doesn't resonate with them, and we don't ha-ve time to clarify things more thoroughly for the time being, what shouldwe do? Should we make helping people know about the persecution firstpriority and do that on a large scale?Teacher: It doesn't matter whether Dafa resonates with them or not. But ifthey have a negative view of Dafa, that is a result of being poisoned by theevil, and it's necessary for you to clarify things to them. In general when itcomes to clarifying the facts, it means talking about the persecution--youdon't need to talk about things related to Dafa cultivation. It's fine if peopledon't want to cultivate. You should tell them that we are a group of goodpeople, and our Dafa teaches people to be good. [You might want to havean attitude like,] "It doesn't matter whether it resonates with you, I'm nottrying to persuade you to learn Dafa. I'm just trying to tell you that the per-secution is wicked and that what you know is actually venomous disinfor-mation." And that will be enough. Those who come to learn the Fa do so oftheir own accord, not because they were dragged into it. You absolutelymust remember this: we don't want to impose anything on anyone.Disciple: We have been sending a lot of e-mails to China. The e-mail teamhas been dealing with tremendous challenges, both with technology and interms of manpower. Is this because of xinxing problems with the people lefton our team or is it because the old forces blocked us off?Teacher: You each have your own path. I think there are two reasons be-hind what you brought up: first, there are just so many things to do and as aresult you are shorthanded; and second, maybe you've overlooked things inyour personal cultivation, so the evil has taken advantage of the gaps, asDafa disciples need to do each of the three things. Some people have said,"Master, in recent years, especially since July 20, 1999, I've found that myimprovement through reading the book has slowed down. It's not like befo-re, when I had that really good feeling of making a breakthrough every dayand of my understanding improving really quickly." Why is it that youdon't feel as good now reading the book as you did before? It's not that theFa isn't powerful anymore. It's that the requirements are higher, and that

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Dafa disciples must do all three things well before they will see improve-ment. (Applause)Some people who started studying the Fa in the earlier period say that theyread the book at home and that they won't go out and do the things that Da-fa disciples must do. I'm thinking that those people are not too far awayfrom having a wicked understanding, and they are lucky if they haven't be-gun to stray. Over the past few years, Dafa disciples have been validatingthe Fa amidst the persecution and saving beings through clarifying thetruth. Those people won't improve at all, no matter how much they may re-ad the book at home. If you don't do the things that Dafa disciples shoulddo, not only won't you improve, but you will only slide downwards. "Dafadisciple"... "Dafa disciple," what does being a "Fa-Rectification Period Da-fa Disciple" mean? It is the foremost title and the most magnificent beingin the cosmos. If you only care about your own salvation, will that do?How could that be called being a "Dafa disciple"? What is a "Fa-Rectifica-tion Period Dafa Disciple"? Have you validated the Fa? You came whenDafa benefited you, yet you hid out and didn't dare to speak up for Dafawhen it faced danger. You have shown yourself to be less worthy than anordinary person, so what's the point of "studying the Fa at home"? Allbeings are being poisoned in the persecution, so how could you feel at easebeing in hiding? Why are Dafa disciples clarifying the truth and savingbeings? Because that is Dafa disciples' duty. That is the kind of being that I,Li Hongzhi, want, and a Dafa disciple is that kind of cultivator.Disciple: It seems that fellow practitioners as a whole do not pay much at-tention to overcoming the evil's economic persecution, so a lot of practitio-ners have long been at low-paying jobs, and have thereby been limited bytime and financial constraints in validating the Fa.Teacher: That problem does indeed exist, but sometimes it's our owndoing or our own shortcoming of not taking everything into considerationthat causes those things to happen. Dafa disciples are walking on a righ-teous path in validating the Fa and are saving all beings, so all aspects ofthat path, including financial conditions, should come together. If you don'tdo well in certain regards the evil will take advantage of the gap. Withanything, as long as you do it well, everything will change.Disciple: Would you say a few words to disciples who are involved in com-posing music? We haven't done as well as the disciples who are artists.Teacher: We're not concerned with comparisons between artist disciplesand musician disciples and who's doing better than whom. (Audiencelaughs) Those are just matters of self-improvement and differences in level.The Dafa disciples who compose music have a special duty to do so, andthat is on top of clarifying the truth. To save all beings, Dafa disciples havecomposed some songs, including ones performed at the Gala. Those songswere composed by Dafa disciples themselves, and it's pretty remarkable.On the day when I taught the Fa to the artist Dafa disciples, I also attendedthe meetings of the disciples responsible for creating music and theatre arts,

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and I taught the Fa there. It wasn't recorded at the time, though. I'll say mo-re on this in the future when the opportunity comes along. (Applause)Disciple: There are many disciples who do not pay attention to their appea-rance and how they carry themselves, such as the way they look, speak, andbehave.Teacher: Let me talk about something extra here. Traditionally differentgods have had different views on individual human beings' appearances.You may know that some people who cultivated the Dao in the past didn'tcare much about how they looked. At least the Daoists who cultivated inthis world were like that, and especially the lesser ones, who cared evenless about outward appearances. They were pretty slovenly and didn'tgroom themselves. A small number of them even cultivated in a dirty set-ting on purpose. Why was that? They felt that for a cultivator, being tooparticular about the way one dressed was an attachment and that it was bet-ter to be casual about it. And what other phenomenon did they see? Culti-vation forms in the past cultivated assistant souls, so they discovered some-thing in their cultivation, which was, over time as a person cultivated, eve-rything on his body started to have energy on it. Those people looked badon this side, but in the eyes of the assistant souls that had completed culti-vation on the other side, those things all looked good. That happened be-cause the matter in this dimension changes as a person cultivates, and itgains energy. So as the energy increases, what shows on the other side issupernatural treasure made of energy, from the other side the dirt and mudall over the person's body look like treasures covering the body, glitteringand dazzling. But on this side--the human world--what one saw was filthcovering the person's head and entire body, he was just dirty from head totoe, with just a lot of dirt and mud on the body. Consistent practice led tothe mud and dirty things being fortified by the energy gained through culti-vation, so the things the assistant souls took away were all good ones. Theysaw that, so they intentionally refrained from grooming themselves.Now let's look at it from another angle. As you know, in Western societypeople care a lot about appearance and demeanor. Since they don't havethat culture of cultivation, they have no concept of these matters. The culti-vation in Buddhism teaches that everything a cultivator has was granted tohim by the Buddha--he will get whatever Attainment Status the Buddha gi-ves him, and he will get whatever he is supposed to get and not get whathe's not supposed to get. The same goes for gods in the West. Of course,though, Dafa is different from all prior forms of cultivation.Before the 1960s, as the Western students may recall, the men were gentle-manly, well mannered, and civilized. The women were gracious and placeda lot of importance on being well educated and cultured. Humans might ha-ve thought it was good, and actually gods didn't think it was all that bad, ei-ther. But it led to human beings easily becoming obsessed with it. It got toa point where a person's worth was judged by his manner of speaking anddemeanor. A person was deemed noble--or not--based on that, rather than

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on his fundamental character. Later on, since all human beings came hereto obtain the Fa, all actions and tendencies that stood in the way of cultiva-tion had to be removed, and so the old forces got involved and they did thatwith the approach of using a bad thing to fight a bad thing. Do you knowwhy, once the 1960s began, hippies and street artists appeared, people star-ted having a slovenly appearance and acting against traditional values, andwhen it came to clothes, the more casual it was, the more fashionable itwas? People's outer layer of clothing was smaller than their inner layer,their sleeves covered their hands and only their fingertips were left expo-sed, the waists of their pants got lower, with their pant legs bunched up ontop of their feet--basically, the sloppier it was, the better. I can tell you thatit was definitely not just a fashion trend. The old forces did it in order to re-move that human fixation on appearance by using a bad thing to fight a badthing. There is actually nothing wrong at all with dressing neatly, but not-hing should become a fixation. Once something becomes a fixation, the hu-man mind has deviated and that leads those human beings to go to extre-mes with it.Before the Cultural Revolution in China, the Chinese were quite neat,clean, and civilized, with five thousand years of civilization behind them.You know that the Japanese have always been very clean and neat, right? Afew centuries ago when things were not as developed, the Japanese wouldbathe in a wooden barrel every day with water that was heated in a big pot.They did that even during periods that were extremely underdeveloped.And do you know what? That was the way people lived in the Tang Dynas-ty, too--it was exactly the same with people in the Tang Dynasty. It's notthat the people in ancient times were not clean. It's that today's people don'tknow how the ancients lived. The people in different dynasties and diffe-rent periods were all the same, they didn't change. The only difference waswith the way they dressed. Today's people portray the ancients as beingbackward, but that actually comes out of reasoning based on the theory ofevolution. The Cultural Revolution did away with the "Four Olds"[2] andthought of cleanliness and tidiness as a "bourgeois mentality"--to quote theabsurd words of a certain political party, it was a "bourgeois mentality."They would cut off women's braids, if they found someone walking downthe street with high heels they would take the shoes off their feet and chopoff the heels, and they would use scissors to cut apart any nice-looking clot-hes you might have on. That political party in China put forward the sloganof "get a hand full of calluses, roll around until covered with mud, and livewith 'revolutionary bugs' all over the body." (Audience laughs) It took onlya few years to completely ruin the Chinese civilization.I do know that some Caucasian students frown upon the appearances of so-me Chinese students. [That kind of appearance] is a product of being in thatsociety, and over time they got used to it and it came to be a habit, and theyaren't aware of the inappropriateness of their actions and demeanor. Not-hing should go to extremes, of course, so keep to the way of human beings

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as much as possible, and act like a normal, dignified person. You can't betoo sloppy, casual, careless about manners, or informal.In fact, from a cultivation perspective, even though it doesn't make a diffe-rence whether or not you pay attention to the way you look and it won't af-fect your cultivation, the key is that you can't get attached either way. TheChinese would say, "I just like to be casual. The more casual the better. It'sso much easier to be sloppy and untidy." I would say that isn't good. A Da-fa disciple should be a role model for others and look like a dignified hu-man being. When I was teaching the Fa and giving classes in MainlandChina, I always dressed formally, and it was to set an example for you. (Ap-plause) And that is because some people feel that actions speak louder thanwords. Whether those people are right or not, some practitioners just wantto copy what Master does--"I'll dress how Master dresses." (Audiencelaughs) So I pay attention to the way I look and so should all of you. TheCultural Revolution did indeed ravage the Chinese culture so terribly, itdestroyed five thousand years of civilization in a matter of a few years. SoChinese should pay more attention to their appearance and demeanor, Wes-tern students should refrain from judging people based on appearance, andAsian students as a whole should mind their behavior more. (Audience ap-plauds) No one should go to extremes.Disciple: How should we look at things that have had a negative effect onordinary people in the Fa-rectification period?Teacher: Yes, you might clarify the facts very well, but if people find youto be too displeasing to the eye and hear you using crude language, theywon't think you are credible. If you don't do well in truth clarification youwill have a negative effect. You need to bear all of this in mind.Disciple: How should we as disciples look at the incident that happened inArgentina?Teacher: As far as that goes, I think that if anyone persecutes Dafa disci-ples we should hold them accountable. We will explain the facts if that'swhat is needed, and when someone is injured, we'll take it to the courts ifnecessary. There are precedents for all these things, and you can do what-ever you need to.Disciple: If my mind isn't clear or calm when I do the exercises, can Icleanse myself the way we do during the five minutes right before we sendforth righteous thoughts?Teacher: You may send forth righteous thoughts whenever your mind isnot clear and calm or your mind comes under interference. If you want tomake an adjustment or send forth righteous thoughts, you don't have to beconstrained by time. You may do it at any time and you can just stop whenyou feel your head is cleared and your righteous thoughts are strong.Disciple: Are the requirements for doing the three things that Dafa disci-ples do the same for kids as for adult disciples?Teacher: No, they're different. The little disciples are different in terms oftheir skills, communication abilities, and the attention they can get from so-

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ciety. So the requirements can't be the same. Kids and adults are not the sa-me--kids are kids. I've talked about this many times before.Disciple: You've been talking for nearly three hours. Master is working sohard. Many disciples would like Master to drink some water. (Applause)Teacher: It's no problem. I think that since there are still so many questionslips, I won't address those that have been touched on already.Disciple: Some students say that we can ease up on going to the consulatesand embassies for now since Manhattan is more important.Teacher: They are all important, and no place can be overlooked. (Applau-se)Disciple: We are a married couple who are both disciples, and we have aten-year-old boy. He's been attending the Minghui School for three years,yet he still often fights with people, lies, and exhibits bad manners.Teacher: A kid, well, sometimes he might still have the traits of a kid, andthe people he comes into contact with will play a role in it as well. Man-kind is a big dye vat, and if there were anyone who was untouched by thisdye vat, then he would be a god. Even Dafa disciples who are cultivatingneed to clean themselves off often, and that's even more so for a kid.And also, if the parents have problems in certain respects, the kid will re-flect that. Those will be intentionally shown to Dafa disciples and to the pa-rents. Let's not go on about this too much. He's a kid, after all.Disciple: The Korean language used to include lots of Chinese characters,but since the beginning of modern times it has generally used Korean only,and that gets in the way to a certain extent with Falun Gong spreading wi-dely. Please shed some light on this.Teacher: I remember that in the past the entire Asian region, and I'm notreferring to Middle-Eastern countries or India, used Chinese characters orat least partially used them, since there were a lot of Chinese people there.The Chinese were doing business or even became government officials the-re, so there were quite a lot of Chinese schools, too. In the past, the Chineselanguage was widely used in the Asian region, whether in business or cultu-ral exchanges. That made things quite easy. But the old forces were just in-tent on impeding the world's people from obtaining the Fa and at the sametime creating adversity for me to do Fa-rectification. So it asked that politi-cal party to do a terrible thing.The old forces thought, "If the Chinese language is used [by all of thesecountries], it will be too easy for people to obtain the Fa and too easy foryour Falun Gong to spread around the world." Then the old forces wouldn'thave been in control when it came time for them to do what they wanted to.In order to do what they wanted to, they took advantage of people's conceptof nationalism so as to have them promote their native cultures, creatingsymbols [for language] that gods don't see as words. One time at a confe-rence of Communist nations in the then Soviet Union the CCP stated open-ly, "There are so many of us Chinese in Southeast Asia, a huge number.With just one rallying cry from us those places will turn into nations of our

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political party." And you know, there were a lot of journalists attending thatconference, and they quickly spread that news to the entire world. The con-ference hadn't even finished when the entire Southeast Asian region begana major campaign against the Chinese. Did you know how that "rejectionof the Chinese" started? That's where it came from. In South Asia in parti-cular, the schools run by Chinese were forced to close, the Chinese peoplethere had to take on local surnames and given names, and the use of theChinese language was prohibited. Furthermore, many countries passedlaws and amendments to their Constitutions that prohibited use of the Chi-nese language. So that created a great many challenges for people in certainregions when it comes to studying and obtaining the Fa today.Of course, the old forces couldn't anticipate Dafa's might. People not just inAsia, but anywhere in the world, can translate the Great Law into differentlanguages, and the inner meaning of the Great Law remains unchanged nomatter what language it is in. But the obstacles were immense for the firstgroup of Dafa disciples, who joined during the Fa-rectification period. Theinterference against those who obtained the Fa early remains quite intense.Disciple: The literature that disciples are distributing in Hong Kong con-tains several stories with the theme of "recite 'Dafa hao'[3] silently and yourhealth problems will be cured." This has led some Mainland Chinese tou-rists to mistakenly think that we're pushing the idea that if people havehealth problems they don't need to take medicine and will be healed just bysaying to themselves that Dafa is great.Teacher: Saying "Dafa hao" is not only effective for ordinary people, butalso for Dafa disciples since it clears away the bad things in the mind.When you have every cell in your body saying that Dafa is great, you willfind that your entire body feels the reverberations. (Applause) It is the Fathat your mind is invoking, so that's why it is so powerful. But I think it'sbest to clarify the truth with wisdom. Outside Mainland China you don'tneed to do this or to clarify the truth this way. The environment is more re-laxed and you can clarify things to people based on reason. In MainlandChina the environment is different, the extent to which people have beenpoisoned by the slanderous propaganda varies and they thereby have diffe-rent views on Falun Gong, and people from Mainland China have a certaindegree of cultural context for and background on qigong, so you can do itthis way among the broader populace in Mainland China. But you don'tneed to do it this way in urban areas or if you're outside Mainland China.You don't need to do it this way in Hong Kong either. Just tell them thefacts in an open and dignified way, and that will be fine.Disciple: As we've spread the Fa and clarified the truth, some Western or-dinary people have been moved and have brought us cookies, fruit, and ot-her things. We would like to ask if it's appropriate to accept them. We'vediscussed this a few times and students have had different opinions.Teacher: It depends on the situation. If people give you something out ofsincerity and earnestness yet you refuse it, that really is a little impolite.

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Those things aren't too expensive, so it's fine to accept them after you thankthe person. But you need to take it case by case. If somebody wants to giveyou a huge amount of food, then it really wouldn't be appropriate to acceptit. Handle it on a case-by-case basis, and as an alternative you could givethem money for it. Some people truly do that out of kindness, though. Theysee that you are cold, and they bring you some coffee or food, so you cango ahead and thank them for it. It's fine too if you want to give them mo-ney. If they don't want to take it, then just thank them a lot. Deal with thesethings based on the situation.Disciple: There are some ordinary people's media and TV producers whowant to do programs about Dafa now, and they want some of our footage.We'd like to ask Master how we should handle that.Teacher: It depends on what kinds of programs they want to do. If theywant to shoot our parades and anti-torture exhibits, they are free to do so,since those are public events in the first place. But if they want to do pro-grams about the special aspects of your lives, about how you study the Faand cultivate, then I'd say turn them down. Why turn them down? Becauseyou don't know what they're after and how far they will go with it. Besides,studying the Fa and cultivating are a very solemn thing, and it's not solemnto put them in the middle of some ordinary people's commentary. That'swhy you should turn them down, and also, it's really hard for people to tru-ly understand us.A little earlier I talked about how cultivators in the past were sloppy anduntidy. I want to stress again that you shouldn't get attached to that. Someof you are thinking, "Wow, those untidy and dirty things might turn intogood things. Then I'll be dirty too." (Audience laughs) I want to make itclear to you: that's when it is the assistant souls who are getting things! Soyou shouldn't copy those things. Even if those things could really turn intogood ones and the master soul could get them, that's not the way we culti-vate in Dafa. Dafa disciples, let me tell you, in the future you will have eve-rything. (Applause)

Disciple: (Translated question) I haven't done well in clarifying the facts tomy family and thus have not explained clearly the things I'm doing in vali-dating the Fa. I want them to understand that Falun Dafa is good and thatI am not doing anything extreme. I'd like to ask Master, how should we ex-plain to our family what we're doing? Also, I would like to greet Master onbehalf of students from Spanish-speaking countries!Teacher: Thank you! (Applause) Western society is actually quite unfami-liar with the kind of cultivation that Chinese practice. When I started tea-ching the Fa, I was thinking, "How high a level of understanding will theybe able to reach? And how will the public view it?" Actually, although thedifferences in culture have caused them to find foreign the [Chinese] waythat thoughts are expressed and the concept of a human becoming a god,the goodness and kindness that cultivators show and the positive energy

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Dafa emits can lead anyone to think that it's good. Just like with clarifyingthe truth, you should talk to your family in increments about cultivation inDafa. You should first tell them what Dafa is all about and then slowly letthem know that you are learning it. Actually I don't think this is a big issue--a lot of times, it's just your own human thoughts.Talk to them openly and straightforwardly, but make sure you don't talk attoo high a level. They may be your family, but if you say, "I don't want tohide anything, so I'll tell them everything I know"... (Audience laughs)Master is not telling you to lie. I'm saying that you shouldn't talk aboutthings at high levels, or it will scare them. Since understanding the Fa is do-ne step by step, if you talk about things at a high level right away they willbe unnerved. What you can say is, "This practice is really good and it'sgreat for health. It's good for the mind and body and it raises people's moralstandards. This book is excellent. Do you want to read it? Would you be in-terested in knowing more about it?" Just talk about it starting from the mostbasic level, and let them discover more about it on their own and read itthemselves. Since Zhuan Falun starts from the truth at the level of the lo-west beings, the human level, people can understand the Fa by readingZhuan Falun. If you start talking about it at a low level, your family mem-bers that don't know much about it will not oppose it. If you talk aboutthings at high levels and mention Buddhas and larger universes right fromthe beginning, they will wonder if there's something wrong with you. (Au-dience laughs) And that is because they truly can't accept what you say. Be-sides, Western religions teach that there is only one god; their understan-ding is that there is only one god in the cosmos. So that kind of thing is re-ally hard for them to accept. Understanding has to come bit by bit.Disciple: Hello, Master! I'd like to ask if in the future Chinese characterswill be standardized according to the traditional style. Thank you.Teacher: Actually, I haven't thought about that. In fact, the traditional stylethat people use nowadays is itself something that has evolved from themost ancient characters, and it went through incremental changes to get towhere it is now. People in the current cycle of human civilization startedout using inscriptions on bones and shells. From there that developed intogreater and lesser seal scripts, and later it was official script, followed byregular script. There haven't been any major changes after regular script.Then of course in recent times, various forms of decorative script haveemerged, such as the boldface style, the Song typeface, and so on. As far asthe traditional script versus the simplified script, it's all fine as long as Dafadisciples can read it and understand the Fa. Don't worry about that, as it is amatter for the people of the future. Even if [what you described] is some-thing Master will do in the future, it has nothing to do with Dafa disciples.After Consummating, why would you be concerned with what goes on herein the human world? There would be no point. Let's stop worrying aboutthese things. It will become another attachment if you think too much aboutit. Leave what belongs to the future for the future.

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Disciple: How do we balance doing everything righteously and conformingto society as much as possible? What do you think about taking out loans todevelop media? How about pyramid schemes, something which has stirredup a lot of controversy among fellow practitioners both in and outside ofChina?Teacher: Dafa disciples cannot do bad things. Pyramid schemes are notused in Western society anymore. That's outright cheating people. It ripspeople off tier after tier, and the latecomers get exploited the most.[You're asking about] Dafa disciples getting involved in pyramid schemes?Is it right to be obsessed with making money off others? No, it's not. If youdo that, you are not doing legitimate business. There should be a loss forevery gain, with commodities changing hands, but what are you doing?Racking your brain to rip people off. You can't do that! I told you that longago. You can't get into pyramid schemes, and whoever does is wrong.Among the Dafa disciples in China, whoever gets into pyramid schemes isdisrupting the form of cultivation that Dafa disciples do. They will have tobear all the consequences for that later on. (Applause)As for taking out bank loans to develop a media outlet, I don't support it.That's because when it comes to Dafa disciples, if you ask them to do me-dia work or write articles, that front line work, they can do it. But it's reallyhard for you to manage a business of some sort or solicit ads, since you ha-ve grown a little unaccustomed to interacting with ordinary people. So howwould you repay the loans once you took them out? The advertisements arehard for you to come by, yet you want to take out a loan when you can't getadvertisements for the media? If you were to pay it off, you would have topay with advertising revenues and newspaper profits. I don't support yourtaking out loans--don't ever go into debt. You shouldn't go into debt.Disciple: Ever since Master told us to spend more effort helping students inMainland China, I have often made phone calls to fellow practitioners inChina who stay at home to cultivate. But still they won't step forward. I amreally worried about them, especially since the Fa-rectification has enteredthe concluding stage. May I ask Master what I should do to help them?Teacher: Helping fellow practitioners is something that should be done,and there is nothing wrong with not wanting to leave anyone behind. But ifthey really can't step forward, well, you've done your best. Actually youcan try to find out what their mental hurdles are and where their obstruc-tions lie. Once you determine what their hurdles and obstructions are, thenthose can probably be resolved. But for a lot of people, I think they're justafraid. For a god or a cultivator, fear is considered a major attachment, andit truly won't do if it's not removed. So do what you can based on their si-tuations, though there is nothing you can do if they truly refuse. Some peo-ple really will leave you disappointed by not fulfilling their potential andnot living up to expectations. There wasn't anything like this with the culti-vators of the past, as they would just think, "Who cares about you. If youcan't make it or can't live up to expectations then you're finished. Just go

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home and that's it, it's not as if I am sitting here just dying to save you." On-ly Dafa disciples would do what we do. (Applause)Disciple: Over the past two months, we have seen that a lot of people fromthe middle or lower segments of society in New York have accepted ourfliers, whereas 70% of the people from the main part of society have notgotten our literature. How do we break through that? If we dressed formal-ly, like we're doing today, would that make a difference?Teacher: That's not the problem. The problem is what I explained earlier:the Chinese who work in the companies here have been poisoned by theslanderous propaganda of the wicked, base group that persecutes Dafa, andit is those people, who don't know the truth, that are helping the evil tospread the venom. They are the main cause [of the problem]. You have tostart there if you want to resolve the problem. Americans think those peo-ple are credible since they are colleagues, and so they listen to them notknowing that those people, too, are victims.Disciple: A lot of Asian countries close to China have been interfered witha great deal. I'd like to ask esteemed Master, can Western disciples go the-re to help improve the situation?Teacher: The students in those nations are basically doing that. But a hand-ful of governments are really afraid of China's communist regime, so somegovernments have acted very badly. If you are busy with something else,you don't have to work on this matter for now. But if you have the time,you may try to see if you can do something. All I can say is that you can gi-ve it a try and see how it goes. When looking at those countries' behavior,treat that as you would a person failing to live up to expectations.Disciple: Dafa disciples from Australia send their greetings to Master.Teacher: Thank you. (Applause)Disciple: May I ask Master how we should handle the balance between cla-rifying the truth in various countries and local areas, and clarifying thetruth to people in New York and Beijing?Teacher: They are all important. You should do it wherever your circums-tances best allow.Disciple: Greetings to Master from all Dafa disciples in Singapore. Indone-sian Dafa disciples also asked me to relay their greetings to Master when Isaw you.Teacher: Thank you. (Applause)Disciple: Master, are conflicts among people the same as conflicts amongcultivators? Why does it seem to me that conflicts among cultivators are al-ways difficult to resolve? On the surface they are getting along, when in ac-tuality they are displeased with one another. If this goes on for long, whatshould we do about it? (Audience chuckles)Teacher: What should you do about it? (Audience chuckles) Indeed, whatshould you do about it? You're cultivators, so how could you be like that?But I know, and I'll tell you the same thing again: although certain pro-blems with certain people may seem glaring, they have in fact cultivated

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very well with some things that don't show. You can't compare them to or-dinary people, and even less should you think that the conflicts they haveare simply conflicts. Those are opportunities for them to improve themsel-ves.If you were all one big harmonious group, everything was really calm andjust fine with all of you, no one upset anyone else, and everyone was ma-king others happy, then that would be bad, (audience laughs) it reallywould be, for you couldn't cultivate then. If nobody's antagonism came tothe surface and you couldn't help each other improve, then it wouldn't be acultivation group. What differentiates us most from ordinary people is,when conflicts and tensions arise, we are able to examine ourselves. (Ap-plause) It's absolutely not that we don't have conflicts come up. When cer-tain aspects of ourselves that we have not cultivated well come out, therewill be friction, and there will be discord and differences in opinion. Thenlook to see where the problems lie. Each person should examine himself forthe reasons: "Did I do something poorly, and that's what made people disa-gree with me?" And the other party should do some thinking too: "Was the-re a problem with the way I brought up the issue, and that's what made peo-ple not accept it?" If each person can examine himself, then that is cultiva-tion. If you didn't examine yourself then you have not cultivated, or at leastin terms of that one issue.There are cases where the conflicts last quite a long time, but sooner or la-ter they will have to see where their problems lie. It's better to get rid ofthem sooner than later. No one should expect to achieve Consummationwhen they are still enmeshed in conflicts and attachments. (Applause)Disciple: Buddhism originated in India, but later on it disappeared fromIndia. Nowadays in India there are many different cultures and languages,and that makes it hard for Dafa to spread there. Is this because of the oldforces' arrangements? Esteemed Teacher, please give us some guidance onthis.Teacher: It's the same as China in that regard. China is such a large area,and the dialects of many regions are unintelligible to people in other re-gions. But everybody speaks Mandarin, the national language, and so peo-ple can understand each other. In India it's actually the same. India too hasan official language, and many Indians speak English. The British were the-re for quite a long time, so a lot of older people speak English. India has alarge population and a sizeable land mass, so there are bound to be differen-ces in language. I don't think that is stopping them from obtaining the Fa.For sure it's the old forces stopping them. The Dafa disciples in China wereable to resolve this issue, and the ones in India can, too.The people of India have changed a lot since taking up other religions andan assortment of beliefs. In the past, Indians were a people of primal sim-plicity; the Indian race was created by a Buddha.The human beings on earth were created by different gods. It's as if the feetof some gods in the cosmos were planted here, the Three Realms--there are

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Buddhas' feet, Daos' feet, and feet of all kinds of Gods. At the bottoms oftheir feet--the particles at the lowest level--are the Three Realms and theEarth, on which are the different people of this world, with different peoplecorresponding to different gods' systems. Shakyamuni often said that thefeet were dirty. In fact what he meant was that this human place is at a lowlevel. In other words, once a god created a person, the person became partof that god's system, and that is why gods looked after people. But later on,because Fa-rectification began, the gods that created man abandoned theThree Realms and mankind; the gods who created man all separated fromthe Three Realms, so man became isolated. This surface human form, alsocalled the human skin, still assumes the images of different ethnic groups,but it no longer has any ties with the gods above. In other words, it no lon-ger has ties with the gods who created man before. Didn't the gods fromhigh levels in the cosmos come down one after another, taking on a humanform to obtain the Fa? Put another way, most human bodies today are beingused by beings who descended from higher realms to become humanbeings here. This clothing is being donned by beings that came from higherrealms. Once they arrive at this human place you can't call them gods any-more, because in the past beings that came down to this human place couldnever return; once someone arrived at this realm he became a being of thisrealm. So in other words, he became human, with the only difference beingthat he came from high levels. Well, at this point in the discussion, what Iam saying is that the former gods who can't be saved when my Great Lawis widely spread will, provided they are not so bad they must be weededout, forever be human beings here. And we are talking about those who ha-ve not sinned against Dafa and are not overly bad. They will be humanbeings in the next period, when the future mankind truly begins.The mankind of today was not meant to be an everlasting level in the cos-mos. The Three Realms was created for the Fa-rectification, and no matterhow long its history is, the beings here are meant for the purpose of Fa-rec-tification and existing alongside the Fa-rectification. Gods directed man-kind by shaping its cultures, behavior, and ways of thinking, as well as itsbiological makeup. That process was a part of history that was meant to fa-cilitate the Fa-rectification, it took place for the Fa-rectification, and it wasfor Fa-rectification that the different dynasties of man constantly changed.In other words, human beings are in fact not truly beings that belong to thislevel of the cosmos. This level of beings that are humans and this societywere created with a purpose. If during this Fa-rectification human beingsact well, mankind will be blessed. Because the Great Law is spread here,the true history of this level of beings--humans--will really commence inthe future, and the Great Law will establish the lives of human beings forthis future level. Put another way, in the future man will really exist, andthis level will become forever a part of the cosmos's composition, this levelwill forever be a level of the cosmos. (Applause) So in the future the peoplewho do not sin against Dafa but do not cultivate in Dafa will forever be hu-

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man beings here.Today's human world is scary indeed, and no one dared to come here befo-re. Once they got here they would have entered the delusion, and with theirminds wiped clean, no matter how high a level a god was from, he wouldn'tknow anything once he got here. After getting immersed in the reversedprinciples in this world, and driven by the human self-interest and qing ofthis world, people are capable of doing anything. All a being can do here isgo down the road to ruin, and it's hard for him to extricate himself. At thishuman level, qing manifests like water; it is smaller than the particles ofwater that people can see and highly dense. It is a god, but it is formless,and it's called "qing." It is a god that was created when the Three Realmswas created, and it just plays the role it does. Here, any being that is com-posed of particles within the Three Realms is submerged. When looked atfrom a microcosmic level, the molecules in the human body are large pel-lets, and there are gaps between those pellets. So as human beings are sub-merged here, and the spaces between the molecules in the human body--and even the spaces inside the molecules--are immersed in qing, it is as ifthey are submerged in water. Who can say he's not affected by qing? If so-meone can break out of qing, then that person is divine. (Applause) Yourbeing happy, your being unhappy, your liking something, your dislikingsomething, your being angry--any emotional response from you--your li-king certain physical objects, your liking certain work, your wanting to ha-ve certain foods... all of these things are from qing.The surface body of man--despite the fact that this being came from highlevels--the surface body of the human being is composed from the differentfoods in this dimension, but at the same time, the surface that you see isquite complicated. Human beings have a True Body. (Of course, this Fashould be taught in the future, as it is Fa that is within the Three Realms.)The composition of the human body is complex. When a person is born,the lower-realm gods in charge of human beings' reincarnation have to givethat person a human skin. That human skin is very small at the time; its ma-nifestation in that dimension is quite small. Starting from when it is an em-bryo, the matter from this dimension that its parents give it--what peoplecall "nutrition"--continually makes it fill out and get bigger. This process offilling it out and making it bigger is the process of growth. It fills out andenlarges because it is continually substantiated by this dimension's matter,which continually fills out and enlarges the true skin. The same is true withthe process of a person's growth after birth: whatever human food you eat,your body will grow, and that growth is in fact your true skin being filledout and enlarged by cells formed as a result of the food you consume afterbirth. Then when a person dies, usually his true skin is extracted and takenaway. It is more microcosmic than the matter at the outermost surface, sogods can take it away effortlessly. As soon as the true skin is taken away,the body at the surface starts to break down and rot. Since it was composedof matter of the earth in this dimension, it needs to return to the earth, so it

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has to rot here.I'm talking about the Fa in the Three Realms. (Master smiles) (Audiencechuckles, applauds) Your human surface likes to hear it, but it serves nopurpose in high-level cultivation. In other words, as I said a little earlier,beings that came from upper realms are actually wearing this set of clothesnow--the human skin that is, this human body at the surface. Since humanbeings' surface appearances were created by gods before, in the past theywere always connected to those gods, so they basically had those gods' ima-ges. They were identical for the most part, with only minor differences.Each person might have his own appearance, but overall he has that god'sbasic image. So different gods created different human beings. But, due tothe Fa-rectification period starting, they all abandoned mankind. Some peo-ple say they are of such-and-such ethnicity, but in the eyes of gods they ac-tually don't belong to any ethnicity. It's just that their bodies at the surfacestill have the appearance of that ethnicity; the true them is not part of it.They might very well have reincarnated from other ethnic groups, and ma-ny beings came from the heavens.When gods created man they did not do so in the heavens, they did it onearth. That is, they used the matter on earth to create man. Apparently itwas said in the Old Testament that Yahweh created man of clay. In fact,molecules are one kind of particle that are at the surface of the lowest levelof the cosmos. Put differently, in gods' eyes this layer of particles is theearth, the clay. [They see it that way] because their matter is the best matterin the cosmos, and the further down you go in the cosmos, the lower thingsare and the larger and coarser the particles get, which means the worsethings are, and in their eyes the filthier things are. So heaven and earth intheir eyes are different from how human beings perceive them. When peo-ple say that someone has gone to the heavens, he has in fact only gone hig-her and traveled further among the molecules. He still hasn't left this di-mension of molecules, so he is not really in the heavens. The heavens thatgods refer to are composed of microcosmic particles--those are the real hea-vens.Scientists ask, "Where can you find the gods? We've seen the heavens withour telescopes--where are the gods?" That's not the true heavens, but justthe heavens as humans think of them. It's not the true "heavens" spoken ofby the beings in the cosmos. And "Earth" as we know it doesn't fully en-compass the true idea of earth. Human beings look at Earth and think, "Oh,this earth, it is our earth. We are standing on the earth. The earth is round."Gods say that it isn't round. [People might think,] "How is it not round? Wecan see it more clearly than the gods." But think about it, gods think of mo-lecules as dirt on the ground, and isn't this dimension's matter made up ofmolecules? Isn't the air, which our human eyes can't see, made up of mole-cules? And in the air there are substances just like the air, numbering in thehundreds of millions, that are distributed all throughout the Three Realms.It's just that eyes cannot see molecules and the smaller particles, though

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everything in this dimension is packed full of them. Mankind is buried inthe piles of molecules and smaller particles. The surface forms in the hu-man world are different forms made up of surface matter composed of mo-lecules. Some of the forms were made by gods, some by man. The onesmade by man are things such as this building. The ones made by gods are:water, rocks, soil, the air, metals, plants, animals, and human beings, aswell as the stars in the sky and the earth. Human beings are merely percei-ving the world from within the dimension made up of this layer of parti-cles, and perceiving the cosmos from inside this very narrow dimension.The heaven and earth that are in human beings' minds are not the true hea-ven and earth. Earth, like the air, is composed of molecules, so in gods'eyes, all of it is earth. [Looking at it from] the microcosmic level, the di-mension made up of this level of particles is in fact earth, whereas the re-alm made up of more microcosmic particles is the true heavens.A moment ago I said that Indians were created by a Buddha. The way theytalk and carry themselves is very much like a Buddha. In the past the re-semblance was even stronger. In modern society things have gotten a bitjumbled due to issues with race. The Arabs and the Chinese are close to In-dia, so a large portion of the Indians of recent times are of mixed race. Inthe past the Indian race was very pure. You can see what I described in In-dian ethnic dance. Their hand gestures and movements closely resemble themudras and postures of a Buddha. I find them very, very similar. (Applau-se)Disciple: In Russia there have recently been several incidents of terroristattacks on tourists, so a lot of people don't want to hear about the terrorist-style persecution happening in Mainland China.Teacher: That, too, is a form of interference. It doesn't matter--clarify thetruth as you would normally. [The evil] is intent on trying to interfere withyou. Don't let it interfere with you, though, and just go on doing what youwould normally do. It's hard for the time being, but it won't be hard forlong.Disciple: With regard to the correction of the Chinese characters, is it tobe done only with Dafa books? Since media work...Teacher: When it comes to the articles you write for ordinary people, don'tchange the characters in them. If ordinary people couldn't understand them,that would be a problem, right? Let's not involve these things in ordinaryaffairs at present.Disciple: I have bad thought-karma. I have refused to acknowledge it allalong and I have been trying to get rid of it. But it's been a long time and Istill haven't managed to get rid of it. I am able to tell that it is not me.Teacher: If it's something truly bad, then eliminate it. And sometimes thereis another approach that has good results, and it's not necessarily an extre-me way to handle it. You can have this thought: "During the Fa-rectifica-tion of the cosmos, I can make a reasonable arrangement for those of youwho don't interfere with my validating the Fa; I can have you become

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beings in the future. Those of you who seek a benevolent resolution shouldleave me and wait in my surroundings. If you really cannot leave me, thendon't have any part in interfering with me. In the future I will be able toachieve Consummation, and I will offer you a benevolent resolution. Thosewho are completely bad, who still interfere with me and who cannot remainwill, according to the standards, have to be eliminated. Even if I don't eli-minate you, the Law of the cosmos won't let you remain." If you have thatthought, it is tremendously merciful to some of those extremely low-levelbeings, and it will make it easy to eliminate those who still interfere.The Fa-rectification of the cosmos has standards. If you do it that way noone will have any grounds to challenge you. The principles are clear, asthose who are supposed to be eliminated are to be eliminated. And yes,when it comes to many low-level things you may eliminate them complete-ly--there's no problem with that in terms of the principles. But when youhandle it as I just described, no being can say anything in objection. Thosewho continue to do bad things will have no justification whatsoever, andwhatever is supposed to be done will be done. (Applause)Disciple: In translating your teaching of the Fa, some students think that itshould be done word for word according to the original text, and somethink the translation should conform to the conventions of the foreign lan-guage.Teacher: I think that translating word for word, except in the cases of someAsian languages where it might work, may not be so easy to do; that's espe-cially so with Western languages. It's fine just to translate the most surfaceideas using words of similar meaning. Making the translation consistentwith the original meaning as much as possible is pretty much good enough.These questions come up a lot with translation. The translation should bevery close to the surface meaning, and that will be fine.Another thing is, some people have felt it's better to make the translationsmore like spoken language. Take English, for example. One book wastranslated in a fully oral style. Some people say that kind of translation iseasier for people to understand. Of course, there's nothing wrong withdoing that, but I think in fact it's best to do it both using standard structureand diction as well as making the translation consistent with the originalmeaning as much as possible. Scholars of English and of language mightnot be able to accept vernacular that's too specific to any one region. If youuse standard structure and diction, then everyone can study it and everyonecan read it. Don't worry that people might not be able to understand it.Don't we already have so many English-speaking students? Didn't they allunderstand it? It's not a problem.You are holding a Fa conference, but I'm taking up all the time--that's notgood, right? (Applause signifying that it is all right) There are a lot of gree-tings.Disciple: Greetings to Master from all Dafa disciples in Spain, Austria,Hungary, Portugal, Vietnam, Indonesia, New Zealand, France, Japan, the

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Netherlands, Belgium, Germany, Italy, the United Kingdom, Australia, Lat-via, Ireland, Singapore, the Greater New York area, Scotland, Laos, Iran,Russia, India, the Czech Republic, and South Africa!Teacher: Thank you all. (Applause) Here are some from Mainland China.Disciple: Greetings to Master from all Dafa disciples in Guangdong,Jiangmen, Henan, Zhengzhou, Xuzhou, Pingdingshan, Xi-An, Hainan,Wenchang, Tangshan, Jiamusi, Heze of Shandong, Harbin, Hunan, Huai-hua, Shandong, Gaotang, Pingxiang of Hebei, Xinxiang, Sanheyanjiao,Tianjin, Beijing University, Tsinghua University, Chinese Academy of Sci-ences, Jinan of Shandong, Shijiazhuang, Laiyang of Hunan, Nanchang,Hongdu, Zhejiang, Fuyang, Ningbo, Qiqihar, Hubei, Hong Kong, Shang-hai, Guangzhou, Liaoning, Shanhaiguan, Shandong, Guangxi, Shenyang,Hefei, Dandong, Yanji, Dalian, Zhanjiang, Guizhou, Chongqing, Chengdu,Wuhan, Jinzhou, Yunnan, Macau, Zhuhai, Lanzhou, Hebei, and Jilin!Teacher: Thank you all. (Applause) Since there are a lot of question slips,if I read all of them, I'll be doing all the talking at today's Fa conference.(Applause signifying that they would like Teacher to continue) I'll read asmany as I can. (Applause)Disciple: We would like to establish a charitable foundation for Dafa disci-ples' orphaned children. Would Master please give us some advice on that?Teacher: That would be a good thing, and you may do that. I've been thin-king about this all along. After some Dafa disciples were killed by the per-secution, their children became homeless and they have been staying in fos-ter homes. I can't do nothing about it, so I thought that we could collecttheir names and then figure out a way to rescue them out of China. (Ap-plause) We'll raise them, and we can set up a school(s) for them. (Applau-se)Disciple: The question I'm running into is: how do I know which project ismore important and more of a focus for me to do well in?Teacher: That is for you to figure out. (Audience laughs) That's too speci-fic. Don't ask Master that, okay?Disciple: A student suffered from psychosis a few years ago and had to stayin the hospital, but in the last few years he has not had a problem. Rightnow he is taking part in Fa-validating work. Should we advise him to ap-pear in public as little as possible, keep a low profile, and do behind-the-scenes type work?Teacher: That's a good suggestion. If some students can't handle themsel-ves well or suffered from psychosis before learning the Fa, then it's okayfor them to cultivate at home. Back when I was imparting the Fa, I alwayssaid that those who had psychosis were not allowed in the seminars. When[those] people took up the practice, I would take care of them, and if theystudied at home, I would save them just the same. But they were not allo-wed in the seminars. We needed to protect that cultivation environment ofDafa disciples and prevent interference, and that is why I didn't allow criti-cally ill patients or those who had psychosis to attend the seminars. Stu-

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dents who used to have psychosis can do some things that are in the back-ground, and it's okay if they do less or nothing when it comes to clarifyingthe truth.Disciple: Dafa requires students not to sit by, watch, and ignore things likemurder and arson. In Mainland China students are losing their lives rightnow. I really cannot just sit idly by and wait at home. I want to go to Tia-nanmen Square to tell people "Falun Dafa is great" and that Dafa savedmy life.Teacher: It's still quite evil over there right now. While you cannot sit byand watch Mainland China's students being persecuted, I don't want you tobe persecuted, either. Work harder on clarifying the truth to stop the perse-cution. As your Master, I need to first consider your safety. (Applause)Disciple: When we create art, how should we balance and handle appro-priately creating art that today's people can accept and art people shouldhave in the future? Are we establishing new art?Teacher: You should do your best to make the cultural performance showsput together by Dafa disciples more upright and better. What a work of artdepicts is only an issue of its subject matter, whereas the artistry and quali-ty of the created work is often the key that determines whether the audiencewill be receptive to it.Disciple: I am prone to sinking into a despondent mood. I think the mostpainful thing in my life is loneliness, as I don't have the warmth of family. Ifind it hard to get rid of the cloud cast over me by the feeling of loneliness.How should I look at this problem? Is it caused by karma from my past, oris it certain factors that I need to get rid of in my cultivation?Teacher: If it's karma or interference, then eliminate it. As a living being,why do you no longer have the excitement you had when you initially ob-tained Dafa, pride in having obtained this Dafa, and the feeling that you ha-ve something that others cannot get? Are you not diligent anymore? Is thatit? Or, even if you were too busy clarifying the truth to mull over your fee-lings, that would be because you were doing Dafa things or working on sa-ving sentient beings. Why do you feel lonely? If you go do things to savesentient beings and things that a Dafa disciple is supposed to do, you defi-nitely won't feel that way. If you were studying the Fa and diligently culti-vating, could you feel that way? Only when you are not diligent will youhave the leisure to mull over those ordinary human feelings, right? (Ap-plause)Disciple: A fellow cultivator has been giving me financial support recently,which has enabled me to stay in New York to do more Dafa work. I don'tthink it is quite right to accept others' help. Master, is my understandingcorrect?Teacher: Yes, I think that since all Dafa disciples are giving of themselvesand you too are giving of yourself and clarifying the truth, if you rely on ot-her people's financial contributions, then aren't you doing things conditio-nally? If others didn't provide for you, then would you not do it? When we

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take from others, don't we have a sense of indebtedness? Do we feel rightabout it? Sure, there are special circumstances, and we can't be absolutewith this. It's understandable when students who have their own businessesgive more and support certain projects by students. But under normal cir-cumstances I don't think that seems right. Even when it's for doing things li-ke clarifying the truth, I don't think it is quite right. If you can stay herelong term, then find a job and do [the Dafa] things in your spare time--thatworks, too. In any case, ultimately you have to resolve your financial situa-tion on your own. You can't depend on someone else to provide for you--that would be a problem.I'm talking about this in terms of the Fa's principles. In fact, the observinggods are glaring at you, so you shouldn't be borrowing from people. If cir-cumstances really don't allow, then do other Dafa-disciple things at home.What I said was that those whose circumstances allow could stay here toclarify the truth. If your circumstances don't allow, then go back to your ho-metown and do truth-clarification things there, which is the same.Disciple: Could you please talk about certain members of that despicableJiang's overseas clique poisoning the Chinese people's minds outside ofChina?Teacher: Those things aren't worth discussing at our Fa conference. Abeing is responsible for the consequences of whatever path he takes. Thepath those people took was their own choice. Even when, with your help,they come to realize things, they still have to pay back what they owe. Aperson has to pay for whatever he has done. It's absolutely not allowed if hedoes not. Think about how many people they have harmed with their sprea-ding of the venom, though. That sin is as large as the mountains and theskies, so they can't pay it off, for they have poisoned the minds of too manybeings. So if a media outlet does bad things, its sin is huge; what I'm refer-ring to is when it harms Dafa.Disciple: How can disciples in Poland help the disciples in Mainland Chi-na? Greetings to esteemed Teacher from Dafa disciples in Poland!Teacher: Thank you! (Applause) With regard to Dafa disciples in Poland, Ithink that no matter where you are, you can clarify the truth, and if you ha-ve the time you can do it in other regions as well. All of that is fine, and ithelps the students in Mainland China. Right now the students outside Main-land China have created a better situation [in China] to some extent andeffectively restrained the evil [there]. And also, they are helping the stu-dents there realize that they should step forward and the importance ofdoing so. There are all sorts of things like these that you can do, and if youhave other ideas, that's okay, too.As far as sending money to them, though, don't do that. The money mightnot reach them, and they, too, are cultivating. If the money got to be a lot,their human thoughts might arise and in turn actually lead to attachments.They are in an evil environment, and it is indeed tough in some regions.But as long as they handle themselves well, Master will take care of all of

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them. They need to walk their own paths. Master takes everything into con-sideration; these things are not fundamental problems.Disciple: When some students obtained the Fa they didn't truly understandthings from the Fa and were not strict with themselves. As a result, theirdetrimental behavior affected the newer students around them and causedthose students to lose their desire to cultivate. Can those people be saved?And can the students who affected them make up for the harm they did?Teacher: Whenever a student makes it so that others cannot be saved, it's avery serious matter. As a cultivator, you can only save sentient beings, youcan't ruin them. In the human world you are capable of cultivating into agod, and in the human world you are capable of ruining others. These arethings of equal magnitude, so you cannot overlook the importance of this.As far as what you owed before you started cultivating, those things havebeen segregated, and they are a separate matter. Then what you do duringcultivation is simply huge. If you really cause someone to be ruined, unsal-vageable, or even unable to make it to the future, then that will prevent youfrom ever becoming a god. It's that serious. So be very, very sure you don'tdo anything like that.Of course, things done intentionally and unintentionally can be looked atdifferently, but didn't we come here for sentient beings? When your negati-ve impact causes serious harm, what happened to your righteous thoughtsto save sentient beings? How could you not consider how others mightfeel? Aren't you cultivating to become a righteous enlightened being of arighteous Fa, a being who puts others' interests before his own and consi-ders others first? When you have conflicts with others it affects newer stu-dents, so why did you do that in front of the newer students? Weren't youbeing self-centered and not thinking of others? Sure, maybe it was uninten-tional, but didn't it effectively drive newer students away?You ought to be more mindful when it comes to a lot of things, and youshould make up for what you didn't handle well before. Don't just think,"That's a new student, he came in because we spread the Fa, and if hedoesn't want to practice he can leave." Don't look at it that way. You know,your efforts to spread the Fa merely provide the circumstances, whereaswhether he is accepted is up to Master. It's Master who truly brought himin, so if you drive him away it's no trivial thing. Besides, once someone haslearned Dafa, he is a Dafa student, and many things are to be done for him.When many things are done for him and yet he stops practicing, then doyou have any idea of the consequences ahead?Disciple: If the old forces' persecution hadn't happened, what would thecultivation path(s) you originally arranged for us have been like?Teacher: Things have transpired and the situation changed, so why askabout that?Disciple: With our righteous thoughts and righteous actions, will we beable to end the persecution before the Fa rectifies the human world?Teacher: The truth is, Dafa disciples, in supporting the Fa-rectification,

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your righteous thoughts and righteous actions have already made the perse-cution draw closer to the end. (Applause) Think about it, the evil beings ha-ve let up quite a bit now. If you weren't strong, if you hadn't done well,why would they have let up on you? When some students do fall into theirhands, the wicked people don't dare to persecute them too badly anymore.Why not? Isn't it because they are afraid that Dafa disciples will bring themto justice later on? Isn't it because no matter where those evil ones who ha-ve persecuted Dafa disciples try to escape to, they will eventually be trac-ked down? If during this persecution Dafa disciples had all been beaten in-to silence and had feebly vanished, then would the evil be afraid? Theywouldn't think twice [about doing evil]. The things you are doing can shockand frighten the evil today, can greatly reduce the evil and restrain it, canterrify the evil and prevent it from having the strength to carry on with thepersecution, and can ultimately force this evil persecution to do nothing butend. That's what Dafa disciples are doing in this time before the Fa rectifiesthe human world, and it is magnificent.Disciple: Some students don't participate in group study or exercises. Arethose students at risk? How can we help them get rid of their fear?Teacher: I think that with newer students, you shouldn't be too hasty. It'sall right for them to take their time. But you should try your best to advisethem to take part in group study sessions, because the group study environ-ment is indispensable for your helping each other improve, it is essential.Why, back early on, did I ask people to hold them? Because the form ofcultivation that this Fa takes dictates that it be done this way. Why did thepeople in the past have to leave the secular world to cultivate? They knewthere was a problem: when they were back in the secular world and interac-ted with ordinary people, they became like ordinary people and couldn'tstay diligent. Moreover, they cultivated their subordinate souls. That is whythey left the secular world and grouped themselves together. The cultiva-tors could help each other improve and see how they compared with others,they always had things to share that were specific to cultivators, and theyformed a cultivators' environment.Without that environment, then... think about it, it's the same with today'sDafa disciples: when you go back out there into ordinary society, you are inthe environment of ordinary society. If you don't seize the day [to cultiva-te], then today you might feel like reading and so you read a little, but to-morrow you might get lazy and read less... so without that environment it'shard to stay diligent. After all, it's human beings who are cultivating. Sowith human laziness and all kinds of disturbances affecting people in thisworld, it's very hard for you to see on your own where you fall short. Andin particular, if on top of that you aren't diligent, you don't read the book alot, or you don't comprehend the Fa very well, you won't be able to seeyour attachments at all. That's why you have to participate in group studyand exercises.Right now we are at a time when the persecution is taking place, so there

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are all kinds of reasons why students can't, or can't frequently, do the exer-cises as a group. In the future you will definitely have group exercises. Out-side Mainland China many veteran students are busy doing a lot of thingsto validate the Fa. But, for the sake of newer students, veteran studentsshould create an environment for them so that they can study the Fa and dothe exercises together.Disciple: (Translated question) I'm a Western student. Esteemed Teacher,would you please say something to encourage more Western students tostep forward? A lot of Dafa projects need English-speaking students rightnow.Teacher: It's true that they should be diligent. I've been thinking that The[Chinese] Epoch Times, a newspaper run by Dafa disciples, has had a fairlybig impact in the Chinese community. In fact, The Epoch Times newspaperis already the largest media outlet in the world; it covers many countries,including the entire United States. I've seen it even in small towns in theU.S. It covers a very large area, and on top of that there is the web version.But, that said, it reaches only Chinese people. Beyond Mainland China, thetrue mainstream society, the principal part of society... for instance, theU.S. is an English-speaking society, and that language is what most of thepeople speak. So how could we not have a publication that clarifies thetruth to them? There are limitations to solely relying on clarifying the truthby word of mouth. And even if that were feasible, we should still try asmuch as we can to add on some other ways to better help people see thetruth. Wouldn't that be better? So I've been thinking that whenever the En-glish version of The Epoch Times that you are running can truly get off theground, that will be the greatest thing. And actually, the same goes for ot-her countries. (Applause)Many of the media outlets in mainstream society have business relations-hips with China, and some of the managers and editors have even beenbought off by China's wicked band of gangsters. In this day and age, such asevere persecution is taking place--such a significant thing--yet the interna-tional community turns a blind eye to it. Isn't that odd? Is that acceptable?It's a crime! That band of gangsters is just so evil. If Dafa disciples have alocal media presence, that might resolve these problems. But if these mediaoutlets [we are involved in] are going to achieve a good effect, they need toresolve the challenges of human and material resources, which means thatthey need to increase their staff. So from this perspective, the number ofWestern students who are currently involved is indeed not meeting theneed. The students involved are worried about this, too.Of course, everything will gradually get better. There will be new studentswho will get involved; there will be new students who will understand theFa over time and get involved. Everything will get better. The situationwith the Chinese-language newspaper was like this before, too. They wentfrom being shorthanded to having more people, from not knowing what todo to knowing, from not being familiar with it to being familiar, from being

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immature to eventually becoming mature. So I think that when it comes tonew students who can cultivate themselves according to the Fa, you can ha-ve them get involved in more things. But, if they can't understand thingsfrom the Fa yet, then you really can't get them involved, because they won'tunderstand a lot of things and they don't realize yet that we are the oneswho have to do things to validate the Fa. It is another way to save sentientbeings, so if we don't do it, who will?When a new student doesn't understand, it might even negatively affect himor ruin him. So you should consider that aspect of things. Let them knowthat the things we are doing save sentient beings, clarify the facts, and ex-pose the persecution. I think that each veteran student was a new studentonce, too. Gradually these new students will, likewise, become mature.Disciple: When I've gone through ordeals or tests, every time I have foundfilthy attachments that come from selfishness. I've cultivated for so longnow but I still haven't removed it completely, while the Fa-rectification isdrawing to a close...Teacher: Don't be anxious about that. Removing those things is done layerby layer, and that's why they surface. When it comes to certain things, ifyou really can't do them, Master will do them for you.Ordinary society is just one big dye vat, and the moment you let down yourguard you get corroded by it. So you must cultivate nonstop and resist thecontamination. As soon as you let up it will come for you. You are cultiva-tors, and Master has let you keep the things that allow you to cultivateamong ordinary people. That's one of the reasons [behind what you descri-bed]--it's so that you can conform as much as possible to the way of ordina-ry society in your cultivation. When you aren't diligent, though, those hu-man things of yours will be exploited. But as cultivators you are able tocontinually rectify yourself and continually get rid of bad things throughyour cultivation. However, you might still have some left. Don't think thatyou have failed to cultivate well, though, and even less should you let it be-come a burden. Then it would become an attachment. When there are [badthings], just remove them. Cultivate in a noble and confident manner, anddon't let those things affect your actions. When they show up in yourthoughts eliminate them in a timely manner.Disciple: As the time of Fa-rectification rapidly moves forward, [I am con-cerned that] it's still really difficult to clarify the truth to my family. I find ithard to figure out how to go about clarifying the truth to them.Teacher: Some students do find it really difficult to clarify the truth totheir families. I think for the most part it's actually because you still seethem as people in your family and treat them differently from people in theoutside world. You should remember that they, too, are sentient beings inthe human world, instead of thinking of them first as your family. And youshould find out what in their minds is unresolved. Once you work thosethings out everything can be resolved. Under normal circumstances whenyou clarify the truth, don't think about having people learn the Fa right

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away and the results will be better.Disciple: Although I realize that we are all very fortunate, sometimes I getunhappy. Would you please tell me, does that happen because of the side ofme that hasn't been fully cultivated, or is it a result of karma-elimination,that is, karma?Teacher: Actually, it's normal to get unhappy. Newer students have formedmany notions in the human world, and their notions perceive things diffe-rently. You might find one thing good, some other bad, and so on--peoplehave feelings like that. Those are human notions reacting. Your notionscan't be removed all at once as soon as you start cultivating, so reactionsbased on notions will affect your emotions, putting you in a bad or happymood.These are things that happen in your cultivation. Gradually your understan-ding of the Fa will become clearer and clearer, your righteous thoughts willget stronger and stronger, you will look upon sentient beings with more andmore compassion and mercy, and things will be different.Disciple: Now that the new Zhuan Falun has come out, what should we dowith the ones that have uncorrected [Chinese] characters in them, that is,the old Zhuan Falun? Should we continue to use them?Teacher: It is the Book, it is the Fa, and for just a few words... can't youjust correct the characters? Am I right? You can't go and do something youshouldn't, right?Disciple: The five-thousand-year-old Chinese culture is [a combination of]the cultures of different cosmic bodies in the cosmos. Then are Western cul-tures also cultures of cosmic bodies from ages ago? Are they related to thespreading of Dafa?Teacher: Western gods created Westerners. Whether it be Asians or otherethnicities, they were all created by different gods, so they definitely bearthe characteristics of those systems. As for culture, you should say thatgods created human beings' cultures for them, instead of saying that thosecultures are cultures of the heavens. If you say that the skyscrapers in Ma-nhattan are the same as those in the heavens, that's not true, because theywere brought about by modern science, and modern science was broughtabout by aliens. Yes, the cultures of China's different dynasties bore charac-teristics of the heavenly kingdoms that came to form karmic connections.But, gods determined what was left behind at this human place with speci-fic goals in mind, since human history was laying the foundation for Fa-rectification. Western culture is a surface culture that was created for hu-man beings while they lived and waited for the Fa-rectification.Disciple: I find it very hard to return to Zhen-Shan-Ren. Master, could youplease tell me what it means to truly remove attachments at a fundamentallevel?Teacher: You're a newer student, so don't be anxious. You will graduallycome to realize and understand many things during your cultivation pro-cess. The best approach is to read the book(s) a lot--you have to read the

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book(s) repeatedly. What Master is telling you is absolutely good for you.You saw that in just a few years of my imparting the Fa in Mainland China,100 million people came to learn it. Since leaving China I haven't directlytaught the exercises or the Fa, and it has been the students who have beenpassing it on, holding nine-day seminars, and spreading the word about thisFa. Although the old forces have been controlling certain things, they ha-ven't been able to block it, and a lot of people have still come to learn it.Why is that? Because this Fa can truly guide people's cultivation, it can tru-ly help people improve, and can truly change the state of a being. The evilin Mainland China has been carrying out such a severe persecution, and theevil's pressure felt by Dafa disciples in the international community hasbeen huge as well. So why have they been able to withstand the evil and co-me through? It's because they have come to know this Fa and they have tru-ly improved themselves through this Fa and through their cultivation. Ofcourse it's unrealistic to want to reach a very high level of understandingright away. But, gradually by studying the Fa you will come to know eve-rything.As far as attachments go, if today Master told you to get rid of this or thatone, it would be something forced, and any desire to get rid of it wouldn'thave come from your heart. And as time went by, when you couldn't take itanymore after Master had said a lot of those things, you would become re-sentful and think, "Why should I do that?" But when you've realized thingsfrom the Fa's principles and have understood the effect that doing thatmight have on your existence, only then have you truly improved, and onlythen are you truly able to do it. No external restriction comes out of yourown will or out of true improvement on your part. Restrictions and coer-cion can never change someone or make him improve. And once the res-trictions are gone, the person will go back to being how he was before, sothat doesn't work.Disciple: Since the suppression started in 1999, some students who got outof labor camps have gone to practice Buddhism. The truth is, they were allafraid.Teacher: I think that if they are laden with fear, no matter where they gothey won't be truly cultivating, and they won't be able to reach Consumma-tion. Once they get into Buddhism they will see what it is like. Comparedto the students who have conducted themselves well, they have, of course,done poorly. They came when Dafa benefited them, but when Dafa waspersecuted they ran away. They reaped the benefits, but while we are resis-ting the persecution, they are not speaking up for Dafa and don't want to va-lidate the Fa. In gods' eyes that kind of being is the worst. As far as what totell them in terms of cultivation, all you can do is suggest to them that theydo what's good for them; there's no special method. What a person wants isup to him.Disciple: The Middle East has been constantly plagued by war, and thepeople there don't have an opportunity to obtain the Fa. Would you please

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tell us how Dafa disciples should spread the Fa in that region?Teacher: It is hard indeed. All of that is the old forces' doing.The U.S. government knows that the persecution of Falun Gong studentshas been very severe. The United States was founded on freedom of beliefand they advocate for human rights. The first immigrants to the U.S. werethe Puritans, who came to this land for freedom of belief. The persecutionof Dafa disciples directly involves the most fundamental interests of theU.S. and its founding principles, but why hasn't the U.S. government gotteninvolved? Trying to be understanding of their situation, I'd say that it is be-cause the old forces have been stirring up trouble in the Middle East, whichhas kept the U.S. tied up and prevented it from having the energy to focuson China and do something about the persecution of Dafa disciples.If it weren't tied up with the issue of terrorists right now, I believe the U.S.government definitely wouldn't tolerate evil like this being so rampant intoday's world. That's because the U.S.'s role in the world is to maintain or-der--it is actually the international police. Why did gods make it so power-ful and rich? The gods wanted it to play that role in the world. China is themain stage in this play of mankind, it is the place where the main play is ac-ted out. But someone has to maintain order in the theater--you can't let itbecome chaotic, right? So the truth is, the gods really do want the UnitedStates to do that. The CCP always criticizes the U.S. for being "the interna-tional police." Well, it is the international police, and gods want it to bethat. If the U.S. government really doesn't fulfill that responsibility anddoesn't play that role, then the gods won't have it be so strong or rich. It'snot that Americans are supposed to be special but that gods arranged it thatway. (Teacher smiles)Disciple: Myself and some Dafa disciples around me recently had babies.It feels like we no longer have as much time to clarify the facts as we didbefore, and we're a bit troubled by that.Teacher: I don't think that's a problem. A lot of Dafa disciples have chil-dren. If the child is very young, it's all right to spend more time taking careof the child. When you have time you can do work to clarify the facts, andwhen you have little time you can do a little bit in a supporting role, whichis fine, too. When the baby gets older and your hands are freed up, then youcan do more, and that's okay.Disciple: (Translated question) When we hold anti-torture exhibits, a lot ofordinary people pass by many times in the same day and have already ta-ken our truth-clarification materials, but some Chinese fellow cultivatorsstill walk up to them and stuff materials into their hands.Teacher: Perhaps they were different students and didn't know that thosepeople had already taken the materials, so they gave them the same mate-rials again. You should be mindful of things in this regard. As time goeson, when some people have become familiar with you and have learned thetruth, if you stuff the same material that you gave them before into theirhands, it's actually wasting resources. Don't treat it like ordinary people do

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when they distribute materials, where you've done your job when everyt-hing has been given out. You are saving sentient beings. Otherwise whatare you here [in New York] for?Disciple: The City of Atlanta and the Georgia State Senate are pushing tohave a Chinese consulate established. Is that happening because our truth-clarification hasn't been powerful enough, or is it due to the old forces' in-terference?Teacher: They can build whatever they want to build, it doesn't matter.Whether or not they establish a consulate has nothing to do with us. Andwho knows whose consulate it will be in the future. (Audience chuckles) In-deed, we are not concerned with ordinary people's affairs. We're just culti-vators. Look at how China is now. The CCP is really sitting on the mouthof a volcano this time, teetering on the edge. It looks grandiose and high-flying on the surface but it's already beyond cure. Its clothes on the surfaceare glamorous, but inside it is all rotten.Disciple: As of now what phase has the Fa-rectification in New York rea-ched?Teacher: There are no phases. Just clarify the truth, help people understandby telling them [the facts], and help the world become aware of the truth.What you actually want to know is what the overall status is now. In fact,in the time since you started clarifying the truth like this, a lot of peoplewho live in New York City have come to understand the truth. More thanhalf, in fact. They understood things quickly. But those who only work inNew York and don't live here account for only a small portion of them.That's the state of things.Disciple: Because of security concerns, there are some things we want tokeep secret. But going too far with this hampers sharing and communica-tion among students and dampens people's enthusiasm. How can we handlethis better?Teacher: Cultivators, you know, need to think about others no matter whatit is they are doing, and even more so should they think about Dafa. Sodon't be upset when somebody doesn't disclose something to you. Someprojects can't be discussed in big meetings, they can't be known to everyo-ne. When a larger number of people know about such a project, people letdown their guard. One person talks about it, and another talks about it, andbefore you know it those secret agents from China's band of gangstersknow about it, too. Their means of monitoring and eavesdropping on whatyou do are getting out of hand. Whether you have your phone turned on oroff, they can [use it to] listen in on you. So for security's sake, a lot of thethings you do to save sentient beings can't be known widely before you dothem. You have to be clear on this point: you need to make allowances forstudents [when they don't let you in on things]. They're not trying to hidethings from you--they are trying to keep them low-key. For example, let'ssay you want to hold an art exhibit to clarify the truth, and before thingsstart up the consulate makes a phone call to intimidate the gallery, saying,

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"If you let them use the gallery, you'd better watch out: there will be an ex-plosion." No underhanded behavior is beneath them. So with some thingswe can't have a lot of people involved. As Dafa students you have to be un-derstanding of every student.Disciple: Some students have done a great deal of work and put forth a lotfor Dafa, but while doing the work they often lose their temper. Can some-body like that cultivate to Consummation?Teacher: I don't think that would affect something as major as Consumma-tion. Why would he lose his temper? Of course, if it's just a matter of get-ting angry, then we can't conclude that he has cultivated poorly. But, losingyour temper really does have a terrible effect. The impact on newer stu-dents is too much, it's almost enough to scare people away. You are all stillcultivating--it's humans cultivating, after all, not gods--so you will causemisunderstandings [when you get mad] and cause disruption. You can havedifferences of opinion or feel upset all you want, but you still need to talkthings out in a calm way. Don't our Dafa disciples have to not return blowsor insults, even in the face of evil? Don't you have to forbear? To patientlyclarify the truth? Then when you lose your temper, what was that for?What is there for a cultivator to get angry about? And shouldn't there beeven less of that when you are with other cultivators? No matter who youare, you are cultivating. How come you always get mad at my disciples?Did I agree to your acting like that towards my disciples?Disciple: Because of my strong attachments, at the time of a Fa conferenceI snapped a few pictures of Master in haste and they didn't turn out so well.I've come to realize that doing that was disrespectful of Master.Teacher: Well, that's the reason I tell you not to take pictures. The secondsome students spot me, "click-click-click," they start snapping pictures. I'mnot so worried about it, and it doesn't matter to me personally if the imagesdon't turn out well. But after you take the pictures you won't feel so goodabout it. Just bear that in mind from now on. In cases like I just described,when it's tough to handle, just give all the photos to me and I'll deal withthem.Disciple: (Teacher: This one has a lot of words on it.) Differences comeacross in the way Chinese and Westerners distribute truth-clarification ma-terials. For example, our Western students invariably hold the leaflets intheir hands and quietly stand aside, waiting for people to take them. But ve-ry few people take the initiative to come over and get them. Meanwhile,[with Chinese students,] especially those from Taiwan, they always handthem out politely and enthusiastically, and usually they manage to give outa lot of them. But they often get asked not to do this by the Western stu-dents, especially when we are clarifying the truth at anti-torture exhibits.For many reasons, our hope is that Western students can be more proacti-ve in clarifying the truth and not feel like they have to wait for people [tocome to them].Teacher: My sense is that our Western students do have that view for sure,

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which is to say, they feel that since we're cultivating Zhen, Shan, Ren, weshould be polite and show people a Dafa disciple's Shan. That's surely whatthey are thinking, so they don't directly approach people and prefer to waitfor them to come take leaflets on their own. I don't think there is anythingwrong with that view, but that said, saving people is a really urgent matter.Dafa disciples have given up the comforts of home, sacrificed their careers,and overcome all kinds of challenges, and on top of that their finances aretight. So coming here to clarify the truth and save people really hasn't beeneasy for them. So, since this is about saving people, it's good to be a littlemore proactive. But you do have to be polite.Be both a little more polite and a little more proactive. That way peoplewon't be put off and we'll be able to give them materials, too--I think thatwould be better. If you wait for people to come take them, while it's possi-ble your thoughts are on saving those people and you are telling them [inyour mind] to come take it, when people's human side gets strong, the kno-wing side won't be able to come into play. The people in Manhattan, forexample, are all really busy. Their minds might be occupied with thoughtsof making money, going to meet someone, or closing some kind of deal,and so they hurriedly walk by. So while they are thinking about something,that thought you send out could make their knowing sides want to comeover and take your materials, but their human sides are still strong, and sothey might miss the opportunity. So, what I'm thinking is, it would be greatif we could greet them politely and be a little more proactive.I know that this approach is hard for our Western students. They alwaysfeel bad about bothering people, about actively bothering them. But that'snot how it is. What you should keep in mind is that you are saving people,and things will go fine. (Applause)Disciple: When clarifying the truth in Manhattan to the employees in theskyscrapers, we still encounter a lot of obstacles. How can we do better inbreaking through the layers upon layers of obstacles and check points thatthe old forces set up, and thus bring the sentient beings in those buildingssalvation? Would Master please...Teacher: Yes, in fact when we go to those buildings to clarify the truth, itreally is hard to get in, since everybody there is working. While everyone isworking, if we go there to clarify the truth, their bosses will be upset for su-re, and then they will think badly of us. Of course, that's not to say it is al-ways that way. When circumstances permit we can do it. As for the em-ployees in those companies, there are usually three times of day when youcan come into contact with them. One is when they go to work, another iswhen they get off from work, and the last is when they eat lunch. Most ofthem come down for lunch. So at those three times we can opt to make aneffort to reach them, and perhaps the results will be better.Disciple: I'm a Dafa disciple from Beijing. Before departing [for the U.S.],my fellow cultivators told me to be sure to pass their regards on to Master.(Teacher: Thank you. My thanks to the Beijing students.) (Applause)

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Though they all do sense that Master is constantly by their side, they can'thelp but miss Master greatly--tears well up at the mere mention of Master'sname. These past two days I have joined in with the activities put on by theoverseas Dafa disciples, and found it deeply moving. Though we [in Bei-jing] are in the evil's other hub, some fellow cultivators have gotten into amode where they're following a mechanical routine since the persecutionhas gone on for a long time. It's not like the overseas Dafa disciples, whoare so diligent and maintain a sense of urgency. Here one truly feels thatthe pace of things is so swift and each Dafa disciple is so hard working. Ican sense the difference between us and the overseas Dafa disciples. I willdefinitely bring back and share with fellow cultivators in China what I'veexperienced in Manhattan firsthand and the magnificence of the New YorkFa conference. We really need to pick up the pace and be ever diligent.May Master put his mind at ease: we will achieve this, we definitely will.Teacher: I believe you. (Applause) Actually the evil over in Mainland Chi-na has been given quite a scare by the Dafa disciples there and around theworld doing things as you described and making such efforts. This has do-ne a great deal to restrain the persecution, and massive amounts of evil ha-ve been destroyed along the way. So when the situation is such as this, ifwe still have students not stepping forward and not doing things because ofthe fear in their hearts, then they really are losing their opportunity. Somepeople say, "We know Master is good and we know Dafa is good. We'restudying [the Fa] at home and clandestinely doing the exercises there." Butthe fact is that Dafa has been imparted to you, and it was given so that youcould save all beings, it's for you to establish even greater mighty virtueand be responsible to all beings. Haven't I said this before: lives of the futu-re do things for others' sake, not for their own? This process is exactly onein which such qualities are forged in you, so you can't think about onlyyourself. What is it that you fear? Just about everything, it seems. Yes,when there is such cruel persecution going on, I don't want to see studentssuffering persecution, either. But the current situation is gradually chan-ging, and that means we should do even better. In fact, with the studentswho have done very well all along, didn't they have to make it through thesevere, cruel persecution?So my hope is that the students in Mainland China can really learn fromand emulate the students outside of China. In order to lessen the evil's per-secution of you, take a look at what they're doing. They have worked sohard. Some barely sleep day after day, each person is doing many things,and they are all shouldering a lot of projects. And I'm not talking about justa few of them--it's the majority of them, and they really are working hard.So with this, when we compare things, even though their environment is re-laxed and comfortable, as Dafa disciples, it's still about being diligent. Ifunder very harsh circumstances you failed to do things or failed to do themwell, maybe it was indeed the product of circumstances. But now things ha-ve changed and you should step forward and do well.

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Before, when so much evil was pressed down here, the Three Realms wassaturated with it, and it filled the air. Take a breath and it would get suckedinto your belly--that's how much there was. Evil was everywhere, and eachand every little thing was dominated by that evil. The grass would trip youup, and tree branches would whip you in the face. When you walked besidea wall it would hit you in the head. It all seemed natural to you, but itwasn't--that was how evil it was. Now that evil has been cleaned out andour surroundings are getting ever more relaxed and easy. In many areas theevil flees at the sight of Dafa disciples. It doesn't dare in the least to visitthose areas, for the Dafa disciples there have done well. Then with so manyDafa disciples here in Manhattan, why would the evil dare to come here?It's because the old-force elements are--as if sweeping up trash--driving theevil over here, sweeping it here, and gathering it here, so that Dafa disci-ples and the multitude of gods can eliminate it. Otherwise the evil absolute-ly wouldn't dare to come here right now.Now when we look at Mainland China, with the environment how it is atpresent, if some students still can't step forward, then they are about to trulylose their chance. Of course, many students have done a great job there,and they have been doing things all along. That is really magnificent.Disciple: People have different understandings on sending righteousthoughts at the consulate. Some people believe that if we send righteousthoughts after each exercise, the evil won't even have a chance to catch itsbreath. Is that thinking going against Shan?Teacher: The evil that persecutes Dafa disciples simply has to be cleanedout. As for the specifics of things, I'll leave them to you to work out.Disciple further asks: Some people are of the understanding that to do itthat way [that I described] is using human thinking. Sending righteousthoughts is something solemn, and the Fa's principles dictate that thingsare gained only when we are free of pursuit, that we should let nature takeits course. Only when we send righteous thoughts after doing the standingexercises and again after the sitting exercise will it not impact our own cul-tivation. Could you tell us if there's any problem with breaking up an exer-cise and doing it over the course of a few hours?Teacher: Don't develop an attachment. Follow the requirements that havebeen set forth when you do the exercises. As for sending righteousthoughts, you can, except for when it's done collectively, do it at any timeyou choose. My thinking is that doing the exercises is doing the exercises,so just do them normally. As far as sending righteous thoughts goes, youcan do it any time, any place. So long as you haven't worn yourself out, youcan send them forth, and it should be fine. All of what you expend willquickly be replenished. Doing the exercises just to do the exercises isn't thepoint--the exercises strengthen your mechanisms, and it is the automaticmechanisms that really elevate you and replenish your energy. Twenty-fourhours a day you are being refined by the gong and by the Fa, so no matterhow much energy you emit forth when you send righteous thoughts, none

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of it is lost. And as for your supernormal abilities, they will return on theirown. Other things that are depleted will likewise be swiftly replenished,and that is because your standard is there at that height. It's like I have said:however high your gong is, that is due to your xinxing being at that height,for there is a measure. When that measure is there at that height, the gongcan't help but go up to that point, and things are thus quickly replenished.Increasing gong is actually really easy. It is raising xinxing that's hard. Sothat is why gong is so hard to build up. (Applause)I've now read all the question slips. (Applause) Our Dafa disciples reallyhave been working hard in the past few years of validating Dafa, clarifyingthe truth, and saving sentient beings; for a lot of Dafa disciples so much sothat they feel really fatigued, and many people have overcome challengesof every type along the way in doing these things. You can't help but saythat Dafa disciples are amazing. Actually, though it's me saying you areamazing, I'm just repeating the words gods are using. It is they who sayyou're amazing. If it were just me saying you are amazing, well, I'm yourmaster, so of course I'm a little partial to my disciples. The broader range oflives had to be convinced, and that's why, no matter how it may seem,things are getting better overall for our disciples even though you mightmeet with a lot of trouble and setbacks as you validate the Fa.The Fa's rectification of the cosmos is sure to succeed. Even those thingsarranged by the old forces wouldn't dare to have it not succeed. It's onlythat their plans interfered with the Fa-rectification and harmed a lot ofthings in the Fa-rectification, which is why the factors of the old forcesmust be thoroughly eliminated. Dafa disciples won't be validating the Faforever here in the human world, for the time when the Fa rectifies the hu-man world will definitely arrive. Soon the Fa-rectification that Dafa isdoing in the cosmos will draw to a close. People now know that the cosmosis growing further apart from the Milky Way. In other words, all of thisisn't just something that only I am saying, and it's not something that justDafa disciples can know: even human beings will gradually come to knowit.Everything that man doesn't believe in shall unfold before his own eyes.Every unsolved mystery of the past will come forth here in the humanworld, and when that happens it will be the time of the Fa rectifying the hu-man world. With everything that you Dafa disciples have done, you haveshown yourselves worthy of all that Dafa has given to forge you. I can saythat the Dafa disciples' validating of the Fa has, on the whole, achievedwhat it should, and they have fulfilled their responsibilities. (Applause)And though there still remains the rest of the journey to take, and thoughsome things remain to be done, I think none of that should pose a problem,for the most trying time has passed and the most evil period is over. (Ap-plause) The road ahead should grow only broader, while everything shouldbecome ever more clear, and you will become more and more mature. Andbeing cultivators, you should embody ever more greatly the poise and bea-

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ring of a Dafa disciple. In the time to come Dafa disciples will be given re-compense for all that they have given over the entire Fa-rectification pro-cess. And even when it comes to the persecution and losses suffered bymankind, in the time ahead mankind too will be compensated. (Applause)Dafa will establish a future for mankind, and when a person can act in anupright manner during this time when Dafa is being spread and Dafa disci-ples are in the harsh predicament of being persecuted, that kind of personshould be blessed. Such a person has done what a person is supposed to, soin the future a real, true environment for human living will be establishedfor them.Before long everything will change, but as Dafa disciples, you can't waverin any way before Consummation. You should do what you have to, just asyou have been all along. If so much as one thought or idea of yours is extre-me, and if you don't consider the consequences, or if you don't think of Da-fa's sake, I'll tell you, then you have not walked your path well. Since yourpath is to be left for the future, you must succeed in blazing it. Your culti-vation's goal goes beyond self-Consummation, as you are to save sentientbeings, and you are helping the lives of the future to establish that future.Your responsibility is big, but the payback that awaits you is enormous.What you will gain later on far exceeds what you put in, as much as thatmay be. So I hope that under no circumstance will you waver. Whether theverdict on Dafa is overturned by people or not, whether a new situation co-mes about or not, whatever the case, Dafa disciples should still save thesentient beings that need to be saved. Keep doing what you should do allthe way until Consummation! (Long, enthusiastic applause)1. "mind-quality" (lit.), "character," or "thought"2. Defined as "old ideas, old culture, old customs, and old habits."3. "Dafa is great"

To the 2005 European Experience Sharing Con-ference

Greetings to all Dafa disciples at the conference!

While going through the persecution that has lasted for over five years, theMainland Dafa disciples have--much as have the European Dafa disciplesand Dafa disciples all over the world, who are exposing the persecution,clarifying the facts, and saving sentient beings--done what Dafa disciplesshould do. The Dafa disciples' combined efforts have made the truth knownaround the entire world and will leave the evil with no place to hide. Thishas fully displayed the magnificence of the Dafa disciples of the righteousFa and righteous belief.

Everyone, keep up your diligent efforts! Human history does not exist for[people] to take being human as its final goal, nor is human history a re-

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creation ground created for the evil to display its viciousness. Mankind'shistory was established for the Fa-rectification, and only Dafa disciples areworthy of displaying their glory here.

Once again, I wish complete success for the Dafa disciples' experience sha-ring conference!

Li HongzhiJanuary 15, 2005

We Are Not "Getting Political"

With regard to the persecution of Falun Gong by the malevolent CCP, ma-ny Chinese people who don't know the truth have over the past few yearsbelieved, owing to that party having infused the Chinese people with itsParty's culture over half a century of rule, that the persecution was justified.The CCP has led the Chinese people to judge things, consider things, andact based on a mindset steeped in that Party's culture--a culture created withspecific ends in mind. Having been through this ideological remolding, theChinese people can no longer judge things, consider things, or act as donormal people. Under the influence of the Party's culture, whenever foreigncountries are brought up, the basis of these people's thinking is "those capi-talist countries that oppose the malevolent CCP." But the reality is, thosecountries are normal forms of society in the world. Whenever problemsthat exist in China are brought up, the basis of the Chinese people's thin-king sees it in terms of "anti-China forces." The extent is such that if so-meone mentions the CCP there will be people who think he is referring toChina itself. And when someone talks about "the Chinese nation," therewill be people who conflate that concept with the CCP. And it goes evenfurther: whenever a problem needs to be addressed, the first thought isabout how to crush others, and the means include rule by force, attacks,launching political campaigns, suppression, denunciations, and the like.Right now, the CCP is at the end of the line, being mired in corruption andbeset by crises on all fronts. Yet when the Chinese people curse the male-volent CCP, their opposition to that party is still within the context of theconsciousness created by that same party's culture, and they are in fact stillviewing the Party from within the Party's culture. Some people even havethe mentality of, "How could China exist without that X party?" But overthe 5000 years of Chinese history, which dynasty wasn't followed by a newone after its fall? And haven't the countries of Eastern Europe done just fi-ne since the malevolent party collapsed there? And don't forget that humansociety is in the hands of gods. It will fall into chaos if such is their will,and nothing can disturb it if they wish otherwise.When Chinese people come to Western society, the people of this society

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can't understand their words or actions, and they find them odd. The wordsand actions of CCP leaders on their visits overseas make Westerners ques-tion their rationality. Then just how warped has this Party's culture madethe thinking and culture of the Chinese people? Even people at the level ofthe Central Committee of the CCP can't escape that warping of thought, ac-tion, and culture. The deviation of human thought has made it easy for theCCP to find a legal pretext for its constant litany of suppressions of theChinese people. Even today, when the slogan "our party has always beenright" no longer works, the CCP has--in order to maintain the legitimacy ofits monopoly on power--driven this confusion further so as to capitalize onand stir up the Chinese people's ardent patriotism and keep heightening pa-triotic sentiment, even mixing in ideas like "If there were no X Party therewould be no China," "To love the country is to love the Party," and, "To lo-ve the Party is to love the country." They keep making people's thinkingconfused and deceiving the Chinese people.Following its failure in persecuting Falun Gong, the CCP rolled out asaying: "Falun Gong is colluding with anti-China forces." After FalunGong exposed the truth about the CCP's persecution, the CCP again stirredpeople up, saying, "The Falun Gong are unpatriotic." That has resulted inFalun Gong students indeed seeing, as they go about exposing the persecu-tion and clarifying the facts, that some Chinese won't listen one bit to whatthey have to say. Those people truly believe that what the Party says is su-rely correct, that what the Communist government says is surely correct,and they believe that Falun Gong really is as the CCP portrays it.Dafa is saving people. Dafa disciples are compassionate. For the sake ofmankind's future, they are telling the world's people the facts of the perse-cution so that people may see clearly the persecution's wickedness, and thatis stopping the persecution. But with the CCP's "one hall, one voice"1 andits overwhelming, slanderous propaganda, some people have indeed beenfooled by that deceptive, false propaganda. And these people include thosewho felt deceived and cheated after experiencing firsthand the mass cam-paigns of the past, or were even persecuted in them, and they include aswell those who grew up amidst the Party's culture right from birth. But the-re truly are many among them who are good people and have good inbornquality. Even so, they have been fully taken in by the Party's propagandaand brainwashing.What should be done, given these circumstances? The only thing that canbe done is to strip naked this vile party that persecutes Dafa disciples andlet the Chinese people and people of the world see this party--a party theyhave believed and that has always claimed to be "great, glorious, and cor-rect"--for what it really is. After The Epoch Times carried the Nine Com-mentaries on the X Party, the CCP again started cooking up stories and tel-ling lies, alleging that, "Falun Gong is getting political." The fact is, whoe-ver has something to say about the Party will be called "getting political,"and that is in turn used to deceive the Chinese people. Actually, the Chine-

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se people are fearful of and attach a negative sense to "getting involvedwith politics" because of the very Party-culture that the Party has instilledin them. Anywhere outside those nations ruled by the malevolent CCP,being a "politician" would seem a rather elite designation.Falun Gong is not involved in politics. That's something lived experiencehas shown, and it is something the world has recognized. If our efforts tostop and expose the persecution by evildoers and the CCP are now being la-beled as getting political, then we might as well spell things out complete-ly--like what Falun Gong is, what the malevolent CCP is, and why the ma-levolent CCP wants to persecute Falun Gong. As for what Falun Gong is,Dafa disciples have explained that to the world's people in their all-outefforts to clarify the facts, and people the world over have come to unders-tand. Then what's left is to help the world's people see what the malevolentCCP is about and why it persecutes Falun Gong. And that is done, in fact,to stop the persecution, not to get political. We have no political motives.We are cultivators, people walking the road to godhood, we transcend thehuman world, and we neither seek nor covet the fame and profit found inthis world. We expose the evildoers and that vile party in order to stop thewicked persecution, and it is done to awaken and save the sentient beingswho have been deceived by the evil.In order to prevent misunderstandings by those who have lost their way inthe Party's culture, I told Dafa disciples in Mainland China not to incorpo-rate the Nine Commentaries as they clarify the truth. But the Fa-rectifica-tion is progressing rapidly and the circumstances in which Dafa disciplesvalidate the Fa are changing. Recently the CCP's lies and propaganda haveagain been pushing fabrications such as the "self-immolation" and beenspreading fake versions of the Nine Commentaries so as to further poisonthe minds of the world's people. This has created more obstacles for clari-fying the truth and saving the world's people. And so, to have the world'speople be aware of that vile party's nature and why it has persecuted Dafadisciples, it has become necessary for people to learn about the Nine Com-mentaries.Actually, nowadays is there a single Chinese person who still believes inCommunism? Even between that evil ringleader and the current CentralCommittee of the CCP you can't find a single person who really believes inthe malevolent CCP. The moment the Party and that evil ringleader exclai-med that they wanted to "defeat Falun Gong," the gods gave the verdictthat the Party must be dissolved and destroyed. At present the gods arecomprehensively destroying all of the Party's factors. Who in their rightmind would want to now, at this final juncture, be the scapegoat for all thecrimes committed by the malevolent Communist Party over the last one-hundred-plus years? Well, somebody is about to end up bearing all the bla-me for the malevolent Communist Party's crimes, and [the fact that he ris-ked this situation] must be the result of his having been intoxicated by poli-tical power. In reality, though, the exposing of the Communist evil spirit is

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not directed at certain people. The Nine Commentaries aim to save allbeings whose minds have been poisoned by the evil, which includes mem-bers of the malevolent CCP, those in the CCP's most powerful organs, andthe common people. The goal is to help beings in all realms see clearly thefactors behind the malevolent CCP.Actually, it's not all that wrong for the people of this world to live for po-wer or their own gain, but why do you have to join the ranks of those wic-ked beings that poison and harm the human race? People, you need to wakeup! If you have truly lost sight of the purpose of being human, then nothingcould be more terrible! If you, as somebody in this world, are truly waitingfor and searching for the path of return, then wise up!I'll share with the world some Truth: when a God or Buddha descends tothe world, and when an upright Fa is taught, there are bound to be depraveddemons that interfere. A whole range of things described in legends andthings passed down through religions might well be, right now, happening.Don't let your human thinking block your true nature, and even less shouldyou sin against people who are on the road to godhood.Li HongzhiJanuary 26, 2005

New Year's Greetings

Dafa disciples in Mainland China, Dafa disciples around the world, HappyNew Year! The Year of Yiyou has begun. During this year, Fa-rectifica-tion's enormous force will bring changes to mankind. That being the case,all the more so should you do well the three things that Dafa disciplesshould do, let go of attachments, and not look with human thoughts at whatDafa disciples need to recognize: the persecution and the true nature of theevil party that has been persecuting us.

We have not been doing political work, we have not been picking fightswith the human race's real evil cult, and even less so do we want any worl-dly political power. During the persecution, we must be clear that we aresaving the people in the world who have been misled by the Party's culture,because they believe in that cult so much that they won't even listen to thetruth. Also, what we are doing is having those students who are not clear-headed on this issue recognize its evil nature. It is a human attachment thatmust be let go and a step that has to be taken as part of the process of vali-dating the Fa. Don't use human notions to judge the Fa-rectification or theform in which Dafa disciples cultivate, and don't always prolong the pro-cess of improving your understanding due to your human thoughts. You arepeople walking the path to godhood, and every single attachment will hin-der you.

The path that Master tells you to take is sure to be righteous. I hope you

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will complete--soberly, rationally, and with righteous thoughts--your jour-ney to Consummation.

Li HongzhiNew Year's Day, The Year of YiyouFebruary 9th, 2005

Turning the Wheel Towards the Human World

Those Dafa disciples who haven't lived in Mainland China find it hard tounderstand what goes on under the rule of the CCP. In particular, when theDafa disciples from Mainland China and Dafa disciples in Mainland Chinarenounce the various organizations of the CCP, they see that many Dafadisciples were Communist Party members, and they can't come to termswith it and think, "How could Dafa disciples be Communist Party mem-bers?" It is especially hard for Dafa disciples in non-Communist countriesto understand. The reality is, in Mainland China, before Dafa disciples tookup cultivation they, too, were educated in the Party's culture. At that time inMainland China, the CCP was China, and China's upper-middle class hadto be a class of Party members. It had become the way of things in society.When under those circumstances many people joined the Party, it wasn'tbecause they wanted to become a part of it, nor was it because they actuallybelieved in it. Rather, it was the only way for people to make it in that soci-ety. It seemed as though Chinese people just had to go that route; to do ot-herwise would get you branded a heretic and made a target for public de-nouncement by the CCP. Of course, the Party's truly evil henchmen are adifferent story. And some people didn't join the Party of their own will--many were pressured to join or joined as their work units collectively joi-ned. Even though Dafa disciples have issued statements publicly withdra-wing from the CCP, they in fact stopped being members of the CommunistParty or the Communist Youth League long ago, because according to theCCP's regulations, those who don't pay party dues for six months are auto-matically considered to have withdrawn from the Party. When the CCP be-gan to persecute Falun Gong in 1999, didn't they say I had joined the Com-munist Youth League in the past? The truth is, back then there were onlytwo people in my entire work unit who were still not members of the Com-munist Party or the Communist Youth League, and I was one of them. Atthat time my work unit stipulated that every single person had to join eitherthe Party or the League. If we still didn't join we would have been conside-red by the CCP heretics, so it was more like going through the motions.In the Fa-rectification, Master is actually saving all beings, not just thegood ones; evil ones are of course included as well. I have often said thatduring the Fa-rectification I don't hold the past faults of any sentient beingagainst him, and that I look only at a sentient being's attitude toward Dafaduring the Fa-rectification. In other words, no matter which beings they are

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or how huge the mistakes and sins they committed in history, as long asthey do not play a negative role with regard to the Fa-rectification, I can gi-ve them benevolent solutions and eliminate their sins and karma. That isthe greatest mercy and true salvation. That's because in the universe positi-ve and negative beings co-exist, and that is the principle of yin and yangand their mutual generation. It is the CCP itself that chose to make Dafa itsenemy. From the moment it proclaimed that it must defeat Falun Gong, theevil spirit of the CCP and the CCP's wicked, base group that has been per-secuting Dafa disciples in the human world were condemned to death by allof the cosmos's gods. Actually, when I spread Dafa it was done in theCCP's society. Had it not persecuted Dafa disciples, it would have ended upmaking the greatest contribution in all of the cosmos. Besides, my teachingthe Fa in that society benefited the society in many, many ways and did notan ounce of harm. When people's health improved, for whom did that redu-ce medical expenses? When people had healthy bodies, to whose societydid those people contribute? That Party has done so many bad things that itis afraid of losing power and thus always stresses "social stability." WhenDafa was being widely spread people's morality improved, and due toDafa's overall situation the society began to truly stabilize. Of course, Dafawasn't spread for the purpose of stabilizing human society; that was a resultof the improvement in morality. Many people, ranging from the CCP's cen-tral leadership down to the different classes in society, had recognized thatfact. However, the CCP's true nature is, after all, that of a cult which con-tains all evilness there is. It couldn't stand Dafa despite [the benefits itbrought]. Its extremely arrogant and twisted mentality that desires to con-trol heaven, control earth, control people, and control people's minds,couldn't handle even that little bit of irritant. And even though it had benefi-ted from the spreading of Dafa, that made no difference, and it was dead seton eliminating Falun Gong before it could be satisfied. Furthermore, thatwretched one in the human world of course was driven out of its mind byjealousy, and stubbornly went ahead with its wishes, refusing to listen to ot-hers. It made a perfect partner for the evil spirit of the Communist Party.They not only made Dafa their enemy, but during the persecution they havealso exhausted all means of persecution and have persecuted to death or se-verely injured numerous Dafa disciples who were or are on the path to god-hood and who had been chosen ages and ages ago. Tens of millions of peo-ple have been persecuted through a variety of means, and the righteousfaith of 100 million people has been suppressed. This enormous sin of theages, this enormous sin whereby the [perpetrators] are brimming with eviland guilty of countless crimes throughout the firmament, has enraged all ofthe gods in the colossal firmament! Now even the elements of the old for-ces that had controlled and manipulated it are hurriedly dissolving it and itsevil spirit. The evil furor is gone. It's not that those bad people have chan-ged, though, but that the evil spirit that was controlling them has been deci-mated. In other words, the CCP's demise is not the result of a decision ma-

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de at the beginning of the Fa-rectification that it would be eliminated. Fa-rectification is to rectify all bad beings, thereby saving all lives. It is theCCP that chose to make Dafa its enemy. Of course, cultivators have no ene-mies, and nobody is worthy of being Dafa's enemy. The purpose of expo-sing the evil is to stop it from doing evil. In the past when we clarified thetruth we always said that we were not against the Party, but that absolutelydidn't mean [we] loved it or recognized it, and it didn't mean we repudiatedit either. It meant that cultivators have nothing to do with any organization,political party, or substantive form in human society. In other words, if theCCP hadn't done evil against Dafa, whether a person is a Party member ornot would be a non-issue. And if we look at it from this perspective, wasn'tmy joining the League when I was young giving it an opportunity? Now,however, not only has the Party committed acts of evil, but its sins are un-forgivable and its nature is no longer the same. And that naturally imperilsCCP members. If a person doesn't withdraw from it, he is a part of it, oneof its particles, and a part of its composition, and he will become a targetfor elimination by all gods. When that chapter of mankind's history starts,there will be no more chances for human beings. Through clarifying thetruth, Dafa disciples have given plenty of chances to human beings. In to-day's historic time, human beings must choose a path for the future of theirexistence. Whether someone listens [to us] or not is a way in which hechooses his future. Taking into consideration the above situations, [you willsee that] although some Dafa disciples were members of the Party or theLeague at some point, it wasn't their fault, and the fault lies with the Party'shead and the Party's evil spirit that chose to do evil. Dafa disciples do notwant to leave behind any blemishes; their making a renunciation is not"getting political," and even less is it going through a formality. Rather, itis an attachment that needs to be removed in cultivation. No one can reachConsummation if they remain marked by, or if they acknowledge, the mostevil thing in the entire cosmos. In addition, only when Dafa disciples areable to clearly recognize it for what it is, purge it from their minds and nolonger let it interfere with their thinking, can they have stronger righteousthoughts and do well what Dafa disciples should do; it is a step in cultiva-tion that you have to take.Li HongzhiFebruary 15, 2005

Teaching the Fa at the Western U.S. Internation-Teaching the Fa at the Western U.S. Internation-Teaching the Fa at the Western U.S. Internation-al Fa Conferenceal Fa Conferenceal Fa Conference  

(Li Hongzhi, February 26, 2005)(Long applause) Good afternoon! You've been working hard.Winter is over and spring is here. Just like the cycle of spring, summer, fall,and winter, changes have been happening throughout the long process ofhumankind's history, and all kinds of things have been continually taking

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place, thereby establishing and creating for humankind the culture thatwould be needed at the final stage. Over the ages there have been many cul-tivators and many cultivation ways, but there are differences among all ofthe cultivation ways. During the last two thousand years or so some reli-gions of upright faith emerged. Although the people in those religions be-lieve in gods, the religions' cultivation methods are different, and they evenoppose and disapprove of one another. Of course, there is a reason for theiropposing one another: it is so that they can keep the forms of their religionsstable and unchanging. In other words, people's upright faith in gods has ta-ken different forms. Before the Fa-rectification began in the human world,no single cultivation way was specially designated in the cosmos as the setmethod that had to be uniformly [practiced], where all people in the worldwho believed in gods would have to follow that path. That is somethingthat never happened before. As you've noticed, the cultivation way that Da-fa disciples practice today is likewise different from the religions and thecultivation ways of every period throughout history. It's not just different:in fact, when you look at it the differences are enormous. In the past thegods all saw an issue, which was that they thought human beings couldn'tcultivate successfully unless they chose to leave ordinary society and notcultivate in the secular world. When people are faced with things that invol-ve their self-interest or practical gain, and when all kinds of humanthoughts interfere with a cultivator in the "real" world, it is really hard forcultivators to improve themselves, and it makes those who are trying to sa-ve them feel hard-pressed to fulfill their aspiration. That's why no one da-red to take this path before. As for saving people on a large scale and ha-ving a large number of cultivators involved, they felt that there would be noway to manage the cultivators or to save them when they became mixed inwith the ordinary society. That's why with the cultivation methods and me-ans of salvation of the past, no one even dared to think about, much less ac-tually have, cultivators carry this out in the secular world.The path Dafa disciples are taking today is unprecedented. A fixed notionhas formed in the minds of many people in the world, which is that whensomeone is devoted to a religious faith or is a cultivator, it won't work outunless he withdraws from society and leaves the secular world. The Dafadisciples' way of cultivation, then, has no predecessor and no model. I havealways said that in cultivation Dafa disciples have no role models. And it'snot just that in your personal cultivation you have to walk your own path--even the form of cultivation I have imparted to you has no example to fol-low. So you just have to blaze this path yourselves. And why is that? Youmight have realized it already through your experiences in cultivation, andI have spoken before in different settings about this Fa: it is because thehistoric responsibility that has been bestowed upon Dafa disciples is tre-mendous, an enormous number of sentient beings are involved, and the re-quirements for Dafa disciples are extremely high. In addition, in today'sworld the innate foundation[1] of the sentient beings' souls[2] is substantial.

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As you know, you are Dafa disciples, and you are part of the Dafa disciplesof the Fa-rectification period. Fa-Rectification Period Dafa Disciples haveenormous responsibilities, and the meaning of that title is extremely vast.Your ability as Dafa disciples to achieve that much mighty virtue is whatdetermined the uniqueness of your cultivation way. If you weren't to takeup this form of cultivation, or if you were to take up any of the cultivationmethods of the past, then you, the Fa-Rectification Period Dafa Disciples,couldn't achieve the goals of your cultivation, you couldn't fulfill the enor-mous responsibility of your missions, and even less could you reach the le-vels Dafa disciples are to reach or achieve the Attainment Statuses you areto achieve.This, then, brings about an issue: it's extremely difficult for a person tobreak out of the secular world, to successfully cultivate out from among hu-man beings. Besides, no examples from history have been left behind to re-fer to, and cultivating by following the religions of the past or of modern ti-mes doesn't work. People have known how Buddhist monks cultivate, howDaoists cultivate, how Christian and Catholic cenobites cultivate, and howthe world's people should believe in god(s). But believing in god(s) is ofcourse different from being someone who cultivates himself, because whenyou [just] believe in god(s), the best-case scenario is that the god(s) willwatch over you to some extent and give you blessings, or, in the case of ex-ceptionally good individuals, they can ascend to a god's paradise and beco-me a common being there. But in all of those scenarios no one gains an At-tainment Status. Believing, in an average sense, does not equate to cultiva-ting, and through cultivation one can achieve an Attainment Status. In otherwords, with an Attainment Status the person won't be just a common beingin the heavens--he will have a divine position. And as for Dafa disciples,they are required to achieve extraordinary Attainment Statuses. Since theresponsibility is huge, the cultivator is pushed to that level. He has to takeon that much responsibility, so the extent of the hardship that comes aboutis huge. Here I'm not talking about the degree of the challenges that are for-ced upon you by the old forces, but rather the degree of hardship caused bythe cultivation way itself. You have experienced and felt the hardship invol-ved and the tribulations to be endured in this cultivation way, and how hardit is to break out of humanness. During the course of your cultivation, youexperience all sorts of human thoughts, all sorts of things involving yourself-interest, and all sorts of notions that come at you [to temper you] inevery regard, and intertwined with that are irrationality caused by emotionand delusion, and the feeling when you're foggyheaded that it is hard to se-ver your human attachments. And, in your day-to-day life you have family,society, work, and cultivation to handle, plus the pressure on you as Dafadisciples that was brought about by the persecution and the challenges inevery regard due to the persecution. In fact, all of that is only the part youare able to sense--there is also a part that you can't sense. What you doseems ordinary, and the things you do appear very similar to what ordinary

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people can do by enduring hardships. But it's different. The same thing,when done by Dafa disciples rather than ordinary people, is different, aswhat you bear and endure is different.On the surface it appears as though the conditions are the same, but in factthey are different. And why is that? I'll give you an example. There areChristians in various parts of the world who, whenever the anniversary ofJesus' suffering and death comes around, they hold an event where somepeople actually nail themselves to a cross. Maybe they do that to show theirgod that they, too, experience that suffering. But that's absolutely differentfrom what Jesus suffered. So why is it different? When Jesus was crucified,human beings could not see that he was atoning for human beings' sins, andthat an enormous amount of sin and karma from a great number of peoplewas pressing down on him--both the number and the amount were huge,and it was extremely dense. That was what caused him such enormous suf-fering. At that time, were he not tortured he still wouldn't have been able tostand steadily. His burden was so great that even to breathe was a challen-ge. The kind of suffering that came from the pressure from sentient beings'enormous amount of sin and karma, the horrible mental trauma, and the re-actions from the harm inflicted upon each cell in his body--those are notthings an ordinary person could withstand. That's not something ordinarypeople could withstand. And imagine what it was like for him to be cruci-fied on top of such agony. [Some things that seem] the same are actuallybeyond what ordinary people can imagine. [Some things may] appear to bevery similar to ordinary people's things, when in fact the situation behindthem is completely different--they are like night and day.Even though Master has reduced a substantial amount of the karma Dafadisciples had originally, since the responsibilities shouldered by Dafa disci-ples are great, during the Dafa disciples' cultivation, except for the difficul-ties brought about by a certain amount of karma that they endure, basicallyall of their suffering results from the process of improving their xinxing.This persecution is something forced upon us by the old forces, and it's notsomething that the Fa-rectification needed. Despite that, you have made itthrough. No matter how hard and arduous the journey has been, you havenot stood by when faced with these difficulties, and you have continued onthe path of divinity. Of course, some of you just keep tripping over yoursel-ves as you go forward, stumbling and falling one time after another. Somehave proceeded pretty well and steadily. No matter what, though, the situa-tion of Dafa disciples' cultivation overall and the situation of Dafa disciplesvalidating the Fa have been very steady and solid. As gods look at it, theysee that the situation and trend of the Dafa disciples' cultivation cannot bethwarted. In other words, no matter how hard the journey has been, eventhough no cultivation way like this ever existed before, the Dafa discipleshave successfully battled through the challenges. As you validate the Fa, alot of things look similar, or identical, to the form of ordinary people'sthings. However, the factors behind those things, and the Dafa disciples'

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starting point for doing things, the responsibilities the disciples shoulder,and their goals, are fundamentally different from those of ordinary people.Right now, due to the partition and interference brought about in human so-ciety by the old forces' factors and the factors of the old cosmos, gods can-not openly appear here, and the interfering demons and how they are struckdown and destroyed can't be shown to sentient beings. The ways in whichcultivators are completely different from ordinary people have always beenblocked from view by the partition. The evil has been doing harmful thingsduring this time before the Fa's rectification of the human world arrives.The purpose of doing the Fa-rectification in this human world here is abso-lutely not to put Dafa disciples or Fa-rectification in delusion. The settingof the Three Realms was created for the Fa-rectification, the purpose beingto make this the place for Fa-rectification and to not disturb the divine re-alms. That's why we use this setting and use these human approaches to va-lidate the Fa. But that doesn't mean we approve of the old forces interferingwith the Fa-rectification, it doesn't mean we approve of the things they ar-ranged. Human society is in delusion, and people cannot see how the cos-mos truly is or the real situation of beings. That's how beings are at this le-vel, but the situation during the Fa-rectification is presided over by Dafaand it changes according to what is required so that Dafa can save sentientbeings. The fact is, at this time Dafa disciples have to do divine things, be-cause for Dafa disciples their personal cultivation is no longer first and fo-remost. Saving sentient beings and reconstructing the colossal firmamentduring the Fa-rectification are the purpose. You have to do Fa-rectificationthings and things to save sentient beings, so you need to clear away the ob-stacles presented by this environment and validate Dafa. In this situationwhere you can't see completely, as gods do, the real changes in yourself du-ring your cultivation, you have instead been relying--amidst interferenceand the trials in which you painfully sever your attachments--on righteousthoughts that come from your constant study of Dafa, and you have beenforging ahead. It's really hard to make it through, but Dafa disciples overallhave made it through. That is especially remarkable given the past severalyears of persecution against Dafa disciples that was set up by the old for-ces. Dafa disciples as a whole have truly made it through. No matter whatkinds of things happened with you during this period of time, and eventhough certain things that really shouldn't have happened did take place andsome unsatisfactory things occurred, overall it has been really good, and asa whole you have kept moving forward.The journey has not yet been completed, and the persecution has not ended,so you have to continue on your path. In terms of the remainder of the jour-ney, I think you have some assurance now. Although it's too late, many ofthe evil beings that persecuted Dafa disciples and interfered with the Fa-rectification are deeply remorseful now: "Why did we persecute FalunGong back then? If we hadn't persecuted Falun Gong, we would never havebeen in this awful predicament." What I am saying is, the future that lies

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ahead for Dafa disciples is getting brighter and brighter, and you can all seethat now. The overall situation of the Fa-rectification in the cosmos hasbeen changing rapidly, because Fa-rectification has been charging ahead ata speed that transcends all times. It is getting closer and closer to this "real"dimension, and is getting closer and closer to the range that is visible to thehuman eye. It has been coming closer to the surface from the microcosm,and the range [of space] that is left is very small now. Of course, althoughthe remaining range in the surface human dimension is smaller now, as youknow, the final factors are of higher levels, and the volumes of the partitio-ned factors are larger now. That is why the deficiency of the evil after thereduction of the low-level spirits and foul demons is being made up fornow by the partitioned factors. Even though the progression is accelerating,there are still impediments. But regardless, right now it's as though goodand evil are standing on two sides of a scale, wherein the evil has complete-ly lost the balance [that it once had] while the Dafa disciples' side is weig-hing down almost to the bottom. In other words, the success of Fa-rectifica-tion and of Dafa disciples' cultivation are inevitable realities now. Ourwork is not yet completely done, though, and in terms of personal cultiva-tion, each step might be critical in determining whether each Dafa disciplecan reach Consummation. I think that no matter how far things go at theend, however bad the interference gets, or if Fa-rectification makes you be-come completely aware of everything, you still need to cultivate in a nobleand upright manner, and not be affected by any positive or negative things--make sure you're not interfered with by any favorable turn of eventsbrought about by the situation or by whatever situation that might arise.Actually, having been through so much, you are quite levelheaded now,and you can look at a lot of things with righteous thoughts and calmly thinkthings over. With the impact of your righteous thoughts you have effective-ly stabilized the overall situation of Dafa disciples' validating the Fa. Sinceyou have now matured you understand a lot of things. That prevents anywaves of interference from being stirred up, and leaves no gaps for the evilfactors to exploit. Whenever human thoughts emerge among Dafa disci-ples, it is something the evil will take advantage of, and the evil beings willuse it to do the bad things they want to do. When Dafa disciples' humanthoughts become minimal, when their righteous thoughts become strong,and when they are levelheaded and steady, the evil has nothing to capitalizeon then, which makes the situation of Dafa disciples' Fa-validation morestable. Recently, unsteadiness that arises internally among Dafa discipleshas been rare. And I'm not just talking about [the Dafa disciples] outside ofMainland China. The same goes for the Dafa disciples inside MainlandChina: they have become steadier and steadier as well.Of course, this being cultivation, some attachments that arise from humanthinking are bound to manifest, because it is human beings cultivating, notgods. So since it is human beings cultivating, human thinking will show it-self during cultivation, and that's why we will see cases of people who are

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not diligent. Some students are prone to becoming impulsive, and there aresome students whose righteous thoughts are quite poor. They have beenused by the old forces to do some bad things. Through these lessons, youwill all be attentive to this as you validate the Fa, and you won't be used bythe evil factors in the time ahead. As for those students who don't study theFa, whose righteous thoughts are weak, who have too many humanthoughts, and who keep doing bad things, let me tell you: the number ofchances you have left is diminishing. I know that even though you have do-ne much that is a disservice to Dafa, you don't truly want to leave Dafa.When all of this comes to an end and when all the Dafa disciples are rea-ching Consummation, though, what are you going to do? And before thathappens, a weeding out of human beings will unfold on a large scale. Whatare you going to do when that weeding out comes? Master knows everyt-hing, but I won't say anything. Go ahead and show how you are, whether itbe something positive or negative. You can either be a noble and uprightDafa disciple or be attached to your human side. In the ordinary world youcan live your life for whatever it is ordinary people pursue, or out of fearyou can drag out an ignoble existence in the shadows. But since you havecome close to Dafa, I hope there is a chance to save you, and that is why Ikeep giving you chances. I will always give you chances, but as for whet-her you can become a Dafa disciple, whether you want those chances, andwhether you can sober up and live in a way that's accountable to yourself...at this point in time things can't continue to be dragged out. Even if you be-gin to make up for all of that and try to catch up now, very few chances areleft. I think that after a short while even these few chances will be gone.The things that Dafa disciples are doing now to counter the persecution ha-ve astounded the world's people. People have seen the tenacity, extraordi-nary kindness and forbearance, and rationality that Dafa disciples have dis-played while being subjected to frenzied attacks and suppression. Manypeople are saying: "Falun Gong students are so extraordinary. They're suchstrong people, and they have withstood such enormous evil." The entire go-vernment, which is controlled by the most wicked, malevolent party, hascarried out attacks and suppression full throttle, and the country's entirepropaganda machine has fabricated lies on an overwhelming scale to decei-ve the public, causing nearly the entire population to take part in the perse-cution. Dafa disciples have managed to withstand and make it through thismost malevolent suppression and such ruthless Red Terror. That has trulyamazed the world's people. And that's despite the fact that the world's peo-ple can only see the side that is tangible and real to them. They can't com-prehend what lies within Dafa disciples or the deeper meaning of Dafa, andthey can't understand the state of Dafa disciples as cultivators, yet the tangi-ble manifestation is sufficient to awaken those people who are going alongwith the evil and not thinking clearly. How have Dafa disciples managed toact so remarkably? How have they been able to keep their righteousthoughts so steadfast amid this persecution? How have they been able to

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make the evil collapse on its own as it persecutes Dafa disciples? It's becau-se they are beings of Righteous Fa and Righteous Enlightenment who areforged by Dafa, and they are Disciples of Dafa who have great innate foun-dations and who are on the journey to godhood, endowed with missions. Infact, during this time before Dafa's mighty Fa-rectification force arrives,they have effected changes in the state of this world. Also, everything thatDafa disciples have shown through their righteous thoughts and righteousactions has now created a field of Dafa in this material dimension of humanbeings, and this field has had an enormous, positive impact. You are all stillin the process of cultivating, [and if it weren't for that,] if another approachwere taken, the manifestation of this field would have already become do-minant. If it weren't for the fact that your path of cultivation is still unfinis-hed, this righteous field of Dafa would have made every wicked factor inthis world and all of the crooked factors of the past dissolve, be clearedaway, and vacate their places. You saw how rampant and vicious the evilwas in persecuting Falun Gong before. Why is it acting so differently now?It's because the evil things, the various factors that were sustaining the badpeople, and the fields they formed in the past have been destroyed, and theenormous righteous factors of Dafa are restraining and destroying thoseevil things. The bad people have lost the driving force behind them andthey are now at a loss.In other words, there are still some people who are foggyheaded while the-se gigantic changes are taking place. It's time that they wake up and beco-me aware of what they are doing. The truths and principles that I, LiHongzhi, have made known have never been disclosed for thousands, well,billions of years, or by any saviors before, no matter who they were, by anyof the enlightened beings who came down to this world, no matter how ma-ny there have been, or by any of the immortals who enlightened to certaintruths, no matter how many there have been. (Applause) This isn't some-thing an ordinary person could do. And what Dafa disciples have demons-trated, have shown in their cultivation, during the process of their cultiva-tion, and what they have been able to enlighten to and validate is allbeyond what ordinary people can comprehend, and it cannot be comparedto the cultivation states of the past. What's more, as for saving people onsuch a large scale, and this loosely organized form of cultivation--especial-ly how people are when they cultivate under this loose management--thesethings, too, are unprecedented. In other words, no matter what angle youlook at it from, it should lead you to calmly, really think things over foryourself and to try to clearheadedly comprehend this phenomenon in whichDafa is being spread on a grand scale.The situation since July 20, 1999, has been changing constantly. You haveall seen that the situation of Dafa's Fa-rectification in the cosmos has beenchanging faster and faster, and it is manifesting more and more in what istangible to human beings here. But there have always been some students--and of course what I'm talking about here includes students in Mainland

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China--who say, "We want to keep up with the progress of Fa-rectification.Whatever Master says, we'll do." But in fact when something really needsto get done, I may not explicitly tell you that that is the new situation. Youall know that in validating the Fa the situation does change, and that is ine-vitable. There is definitely a difference between this time when Master isdoing Fa-rectification and the time before Master did Fa-rectification. Withanything, before and after it's done, and even during the process of it beingdone, things gradually change. And when something covers a large scope,it involves changes in the situation.So everyone talks about keeping up with the progress of Fa-rectification,but when the Nine Commentaries came out, a lot of students didn't unders-tand. Then I wrote two short articles, including Turning the Wheel Towardsthe Human World. At that point everyone seemed to suddenly realize: "Oh,Master has done that, so we should do it too." But actually, if Dafa disci-ples had thought about it calmly, sensibly, and without using human thin-king, they would have understood it immediately: could you possibly reachConsummation with any faith in the CCP or the idea that the CCP, whichsuppresses Dafa disciples, is good? That's absolutely impossible, right? OurDafa disciples have read the Nine Commentaries, and since that party issomething of that nature, think about how many people in the world havebeen misled by it and thus don't believe in gods, and how many people arefollowing it and persecuting Dafa disciples and sinning against Dafa. Couldwe not save those people? Could we possibly approve of it? So I could seethat some students were still holding themselves back by way of humanthinking, and some lacked righteous thoughts and thought that it was get-ting involved in politics. That's why I wrote those two short articles. Evenso, I know that in Mainland China there is still a group of students whosehuman thinking is acting up and they don't want to understand. In reality,isn't it fear and the attachment to self-interest that are causing them not tolet go of it? In offering salvation, we couldn't have made things any easier--hasn't it been said that people could even make their declarations usingaliases? It doesn't matter what name is used, as what gods look at are peo-ple's hearts. Gods can see what people are thinking and what they aredoing. As for those with reasons that are beyond their control, they can useany name. People's names on earth are not used in the heavens anyway.When people on earth give someone a name, do you think gods followalong and call him that? They don't. Besides, there are a lot of people withthe same name. The people on the earth are numbered, and they refer tothem by number. (Audience laughs)Bringing up these things is not to say that some students can't keep up withthings or that they are dim-witted. What it is, is that some people's thinkingis being interfered with by the evil party's factors--the evil party's factorsare having an effect. In the midst of the party culture that was created bythe evil, those people's thoughts that would enable them to see it clearly forwhat it is have been muddled. That warped culture was formed through its

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being purposefully instilled in you since elementary school, then highschool, and all the way up to adulthood, and it started even as far back aswhen you started to learn and remember things. In other words, nowadayseveryone in Mainland China is thinking in the evil-party-culture's way. Ofcourse, if in Fa-rectification the malevolent party hadn't persecuted FalunGong, then it wouldn't have been an issue, because a lot of confused cultu-res and ideas will be naturally set right in Fa-rectification. Cultivatorswouldn't have needed to do anything in that regard, and the evil specter ofthat party would have been rectified as well and thus saved. But once itstarted persecuting Falun Gong, it became the most evil specter, for this isa time when Dafa disciples are validating the Fa and Dafa is carrying outthe Fa-rectification. So Dafa disciples need to see it clearly for what it is,and people that are represented by it need to clearly state their stance interms of whether they will follow that malevolent demon or choose what isbright and an eternal life. They must understand this issue soberly now.The gods are set on purging it from humankind. And also, it has indeedbeen persecuting Dafa disciples and interfering with Fa-rectification overthese years in a terribly evil way. So why, then, do the world's people needto state their stance? Because everybody [from Mainland China] has saidthings about following it. When people took an oath as they were inductedinto the [Communist] Party, the [Communist Youth] League, or the [Com-munist Young] Pioneers, they all raised a fist and swore that for their entirelives they would struggle for the sake of evil Communism and that theywould devote their lives to the malevolent party. The evil specter of the ma-levolent party is seizing on this and persecuting those people to the point ofdeath. The evil specter asserts that those people made a pledge back thenthat they would give their lives to it, so it uses that to persecute people. Al-so, the malevolent party's factors still exist in the minds and bodies of thosewho don't see it clearly for what it is. So how could you not see it clearlyfor what it is? And after you do that, you have to eliminate it.Of course, I wasn't very explicit about the matter of the evil party before,and that's because at the time I wanted to keep giving chances to sentientbeings, including the evil-specter-possessed malevolent party. Another rea-son is that at the time, many, many external evil factors were taking part ininterfering with Dafa and persecuting Dafa disciples, so with that greatmultitude of gigantic, diverse evil beings that were pressed into the ThreeRealms in front of us, the best approach was to concentrate on eliminatingthose. After they were eliminated, we needed to ferret out the one who hadcaused those awful demons to come here in the first place. Who initiatedthe persecution of Falun Gong in the world and has been playing a leadingrole all along? It was that evil party and that ludicrous wretch of the humanrace. That ludicrous evil ringleader was the head of that party, wasn't it?Driven by jealousy, it took the lead in doing evil against Dafa disciples inthis world. That thing, which resulted from a low-level spirit reincarnatingas a human being, is nothing on its own. Its jealousy was just right for the

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evil specter of the malevolent party to make use of. So that bad person andthe evil specter became partners in crime. The bad person took the lead,while the evil specter of the malevolent party has been the real culpritwhich has attached itself to human bodies so as to persecute Dafa disciples.And all of the evil factors that have come down from beyond the Three Re-alms have been using the evil specter of the malevolent party to togetherpersecute Dafa disciples, and in the persecution all evil has been involvedin it. You know these things that I'm talking about. The Nine Commentarieshas been published for quite a while now, and many students are very clearabout this already.The situation during Fa-rectification is bound to change constantly. Someo-ne once asked me, "Master, what point should we have gotten to now?"And I said, "Just do what you should be doing at present." Fa-rectificationin the cosmos won't change momentarily as we speak. (Audience laughs)When in Fa-rectification some sort of change needs to happen, a situationwill definitely arise, but the emergence of the new situation will stir up cer-tain attachments that arise from human thinking. Because it is humans cul-tivating, the attachments that are still there will have an effect. That is whyan emotion that isn't right will arise inside some people, and they will evenget foggyheaded and understand things as an ordinary person would. Afterthe Nine Commentaries were published, at one point some students whodidn't understand were talking about things like whether we were gettingpolitical. In fact, the bad people who persecute you could label anythingyou do as "getting political," and anything you do can get twisted around,because they are dead set on persecuting you, they're set on doing foulthings to you. So they will use anything you say and turn it around to slan-der you, and no matter how good something you do is, they will say thatyou have done something bad. When you expose their persecution they willsay that you are "getting involved in politics" and use that to rile people upand to try to justify their persecution. Don't let what those bad people sayaffect you. Ordinary people can't affect cultivators. Cultivators can't be af-fected by ordinary people. Having gone through all of this, you have indeedbecome more rational. I think that from now on none of the factors thatwant to interfere with Dafa and disrupt the situation wherein Dafa disciplesvalidate the Fa and save sentient beings will be able to make Dafa discipleswaver. Recently, I basically haven't gotten involved in, and have said verylittle about, many of the things Dafa disciples are doing. That's because youall know now what you should do. Just do things according to how Fa-rec-tification progresses.Each person has his or her own journey of validating the Fa. A lot of stu-dents have gotten together and established different media outlets, and a lotof students have found different ways to validate the Fa as well as differentways to clarify the truth and stop the persecution. It's fine to just go aheadand do those things. I know that you have done really well recently, andyou are getting better and better. Master is truly pleased. Sometimes when I

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take a look on the Web, browse the newspapers, or watch the televisionprograms, as I listen to and look at the things you are doing, I feel quiteovercome. I rarely felt this way before. Now the situation is changing veryfast, and Dafa disciples have matured. The righteousness that they have dis-played is really extraordinary. The students who are clarifying the truth inManhattan, in particular... in the frigid weather, under challenging circums-tances, and when resources and money are very much lacking... those Dafadisciples have overcome all sorts of challenges and have been working toclarify the truth, save sentient beings, and validate the Fa. The firm resolvethey have shown has shaken heaven and earth. All the gods have seen it.It's extraordinary, truly extraordinary. Of course, the same holds true in ot-her settings. [For example,] there are those who have continued to clarifythe truth and validate Dafa at the consulates and embassies or under diffe-rent circumstances. No matter where they are, Dafa disciples glow with ashining light and are playing a role in validating the Fa.I'll stop here. In the time that remains, if you want to ask about anything,let's do it the usual way (applause)--you can write down your question on apiece of paper and pass it up, and I will answer it for you. I will answer so-me questions [you have now] based on the current situation. If you havequestions, you can pass up your slips of paper.Disciple: Venerable Master, please spell out what "Holy King Who Turnsthe Wheel" is about. (Audience laughs, applauds)Teacher: Our students who have read Shakyamuni's scriptures probablyknow that back when Shakyamuni taught the Fa, he talked about a "HolyLaw-Wheel King," otherwise known as the "Holy King Who Turns theWheel." The name Holy King Who Turns the Wheel has been used moreoften in the human world, whereas Holy Law-Wheel King is the title usedin the heavens.Buddha Shakyamuni once said that the Holy Law-Wheel King is the mostomnipotent and powerful Tathagata in the universe. A Tathagata Buddha isa King of Law.3 The king of a Buddha's paradise is a Tathagata. We call it"Tathagata" based on ideas in cultivation and enlightenment. "Tathagata"4

means that the Buddha has come with the truth and the power to do whathe wants. So the world's people call Kings of Law "Tathagatas," which isanother correct way to understand it, since they [the Tathagatas] grasp thetruths at that level, and among all of the beings in their respective domainsthey are the highest and grasp the highest truths of those levels. That's whythey are Kings of Law, that is, kings of the beings at a given level or of thatgroup of beings. There are many Kings of Law. Of course, to humans thereare countless beings who are Tathagatas, one of whom is the Holy Law-Wheel King. Why did Buddha Shakyamuni name specifically the HolyLaw-Wheel King? It was because the Holy Law-Wheel King was going todescend to the human world to teach the Fa and save people. Of course,you might have heard that Buddha Shakyamuni also said that Maitreyawould descend to the human world and save people. Actually, "Maitreya"

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is a name, and "Holy King Who Turns the Wheel" is a title--the title of aking--which, if it's put in human terms, is, well, a job title. (Teacherlaughs) (Applause)As I have explained before, the gods at the levels close to the Three Realmsneed to be replaced after a certain period of time. The act of replacementbrings about a problem, namely, that the sentient beings in lower realms aresupposed to have a perpetual concept of gods, and yet if, say, one god lea-ves and people were not to know where he had gone, if nobody knew, thenthis kind of constant replacement could leave the sentient beings of theThree Realms in a state of disarray. The sentient beings of the low realmshave emotion (qing), so they would be puzzled. The beings would think,"What happened to the god I believe in? Oh no, he's gone. Then who is tolook after me in his absence?" That's the problem that would arise. So thegod who takes over continues to look after the people who were going to besaved by the previous god. And because he replaces the previous god, hethus assumes the previous god's title and even his image, all at the same ti-me. Their images are not identical, but they are basically the same, they'requite alike and similar. Fundamentally speaking, though, what is taken overis the god or Buddha's title. Everyone is familiar with Bodhisattva Gua-nyin. Well, you know how many Bodhisattva Guanyins there have been? Ifthey were all to sit together it would make for quite a crowd. Phew... itwould probably take some time to count them all! And what about BuddhaShakyamuni--how many of him have there been? It is again a sizable num-ber. Over the past twenty-five hundred years there have been as many asthousands of him. How many Buddha Amitabhas have there been? Howmany Jesuses have there been? How many Saint Marys have there been?How many Honorable Divine of the Origin have there been? They toowould amount to large throngs with their numbers. And I'm not talkingabout things like their Law Bodies or when they replicate themselves. Be-cause they are so close to the Three Realms--and when one is close to theThree Realms the emotion in the Three Realms, what the sentient beings inthe Three Realms act out, and the factors that come from the many notionsthe worldly people have, are seen directly and are directly projected to whe-re one is--these things will interfere with those gods. They are gods outsideof the Three Realms and are different from the sentient beings inside theThree Realms, but still, when things carry on for long, it amounts to interfe-rence for them.You know, I've told you a principle before: everything a person sees is in-fused into his brain. When he is infused with a lot of good things, he willbe a good person. And if he is infused with a lot of bad things, he will be abad person. When a Dafa disciple continually reads the books of Dafa, he isa being of upright Fa, and when he cultivates into a god he will be a Kingof Law. Gods observe from high places the behavior of sentient beings inthe Three Realms. And though they are gods, they can be, over time, affec-ted just the same. The beings in the Three Realms, though very different

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from gods, can still affect them. That's why at a certain point in time thegods beyond the Three Realms need to be replaced. They have to leave, togo away. When they leave, the people down below who they were trying tosave still call out to Jesus, Shakyamuni, Bodhisattva Guanyin, [or whoeverit is]. Then what happens after that god leaves? Who will look after them?When a god leaves, he really stops handling all of the things he handled be-fore. So before he leaves, he will save someone and bring the person up toreplace him, give him the same Fa power, and have him cultivate an identi-cal image, which is a divine body; they end up having the same image. Be-cause the previous god had him cultivate the previous god's image, helooks very similar to the previous god. But his own factors are incorporatedas well, so there is a difference in how they look, though the similarities arestrong. And their mighty virtue, grace, and divine powers are about the sa-me. That is because the one who takes over has to reach that level before hecan do so. It can't be that your name is, say, John Doe, while his is JackSmith, and when you get up there and someone asks you who you are, yousay that you are John Doe and not Jack Smith. That wouldn't work. Youwill have to be Bodhisattva Guanyin, you will have to be Jesus, you willhave to be Buddha Shakyamuni, you will have to be Honorable Divine ofthe Origin, and so on. Your earthly name can no longer be used. So all ofthis is to say that after a certain length of time gods are replaced, though thedivine position, the divine title, and the god's mighty virtue aren't changed.As for Buddha Maitreya, you know, in the human world there have beenmany who have managed to become Buddha Maitreya by cultivating. The-re was a "Cloth-Bag Monk," for instance, who cultivated into Buddha Mai-treya. When he was in the human world, he always had a cloth bag on him.When he was begging for alms he would put the food he received insidethe bag and carry it on his back. Cloth-Bag Monk was often in the Hangz-hou area. During the summer it gets pretty hot in the region south of theYangtze River, so he often left his shirt unbuttoned, exposing his belly; andhe was kind of chubby. So, ever since, Buddha Maitreya has been depictedthat way in China's Han region. [They made that association] because whenhe reached Parinirvana [and was about to depart the earth], he left a poemindicating that he was Maitreya, saying "Maitreya, Maitreya, the true Mai-treya." Monks and others back then didn't understand what that was about.They thought that he was a reincarnation of Maitreya. They thought, "Oh,so Cloth-Bag Monk was actually a reincarnation of Maitreya." But in fact,he wasn't a reincarnation of Maitreya. He had cultivated into Maitreya. Andit's for the same reason that in Tibetan Buddhism monks are taught to culti-vate toward a designated god. They aren't clear on what the fundamental re-ason is. But that is in fact the purpose. Once the person completes his culti-vation, he becomes the replacement of that previous god. But it has alwaysbeen the assistant soul who was cultivating and doing the replacing.Many persons throughout history have cultivated into Buddha Maitreya.Each was in fact chosen from a heavenly paradise and sent down to cultiva-

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te. Maitreya is the position of a Buddha, and the Fa-name of a Buddha. Du-ring Buddha Shakyamuni's time, one of his disciples was going to cultivateinto Maitreya, so Buddha Shakyamuni talked about how Buddha Maitreyawould descend to the human world at the Time of Law's End. But he wasn'tin fact talking about the Maitreya of that time. He was speaking of a Budd-ha title and how in the future a Buddha Maitreya would descend to the hu-man world. In other words, since it was the title of a Buddha, who that suc-ceeding god is was not something to reveal to the world's people, and hisoriginal name no longer was important. But having arrived at this point to-day in history, sentient beings have learned that the Holy Law-Wheel Kingand Buddha Maitreya were to descend to the human world and so the exactrelationship between the two becomes important. Just who really would bethe Buddha Maitreya that comes this time becomes something sentientbeings are concerned about. Before, human beings weren't allowed to knowabout the succession of the Buddha titles, and even less could they knowwho really is the god who holds that position. But talking about it in thesphere of celestial beings, among Dafa disciples, is okay.So in other words, the Maitreya that Buddha Shakyamuni spoke of is as amatter of fact the Buddha Maitreya who descends to the world to save peo-ple during the final time of the world, in man's final days. In fact, somepeople in the human world did know--and it's not limited to people of theEast, as some in Western society knew as well--that the one who would re-ally come is Maitreya. The god who holds that Buddha title is the only sa-vior of the cosmos's sentient beings, is the supreme King of Kings in theheavens, and saves the cosmos's sentient beings under the title of BuddhaMaitreya. So, given that he uses the title of Buddha Maitreya, who was hebefore he descended to the human world? He came from an even higherplace, reincarnated at many different levels, and as he came down, level bylevel, he was different gods at various levels and he assumed the Fa titles ofthose levels as he passed through. And when he descended to the Fa Realm,he was the Holy Law-Wheel King, otherwise known as the Holy King WhoTurns the Wheel. (Applause)Under normal circumstances it is rare to have someone from a high levelcome down and directly replace a certain god. And it's rare to have a goddirectly replace [another god] of the same level in the heavens. But it isnormal to have gods created at the same level as one another. It's not as ifall the gods have to cultivate up there from down below. In other words,many [gods] are created in higher realms in the normal course of things,and since the time of the Three Realms' creation the number of those whohave been sent down and who then cultivated back up hasn't been small.That's why later on the practice of inheriting the title of a Buddha or a godbecame quite common. The Holy Law-Wheel King is the Maitreya whowould descend during this period of time to save people. And "Maitreya"has become a Buddha's title. Shakyamuni said that the Maitreya who wasamong his disciples held the attainment status of Bodhisattva. So in peo-

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ple's minds, especially among [believers of] the religion, the idea formedthat before Maitreya would descend to the human world he would hold theattainment status of "Bodhisattva," and that when he would descend to thehuman world and complete his task of saving people, he would validate theattainment status of Tathagata, that is, the attainment status of "Buddha."Buddha Shakyamuni was talking about a general principle that holds undernormal circumstances, instead of the full story of Maitreya or the specificsof a particular Maitreya. In fact, though, the Holy Law-Wheel King wasspoken of by Buddha Shakyamuni in great detail, he said much about him.As you know, the Buddhist scriptures were compiled some five hundredyears after Buddha Shakyamuni had left the human world. So as later gene-rations handed them down, they came to lose, little by little, much of whatthe Buddha had once said. When the Buddhist scriptures were composed,much of what was recorded was not Buddha Shakyamuni's original words.And on top of that, the scriptures couldn't fully capture the circumstances,the times, or the places of Buddha Shakyamuni's Fa-teachings or just whatexactly he was referring to. So what was said about the Holy Law-WheelKing's descent to the human world wasn't recorded in full.I'm not saying that the scriptures of Shakyamuni's Buddhism aren't good. Inthe past people could cultivate by his scriptures, and there were Buddhaslooking after things. But because the human world is a vile world that's fullof vice, the upper realms stipulated that any Fa to be bequeathed to theworld's people couldn't be entirely true. That is why much of Buddha Sha-kyamuni's original words couldn't be recorded in his times. As humanswould put it, it was "Heaven's will." As gods see it, it was what Fa-rectifi-cation dictated. Why was it that Jesus' original words were likewise compi-led from memory by those who came later? Why did Lao Zi leave behindmerely five thousand words after a lifetime of teaching the Dao? Exactlybecause true and complete scriptures couldn't be left to the vile world; hig-her gods had forbid true and complete scriptures from being left to man.Actually, true scriptures aren't left to man because, for one, human societyis not a society of gods, and, the Three Realms is supposed to be a worldwhere principles are reversed. Leaving true scriptures here would be an in-sult to the gods. Only the Fa Realm and the realms above it are worlds ofgods and Buddhas that have true Fa and true scriptures. Another reason is,gods would never do something just for one purpose alone, and thus many,many factors are involved. They knew that the ultimate reason for the crea-tion and existence of the Three Realms and the human race was for them tobe used, at last, in the Fa-rectification. They didn't want the Fa they hadtaught to be left behind to man and interfere later on with the fundamentalGreat Fa of the cosmos that would be taught during the Fa-rectification atthe end. That's the fundamental reason. When people later on recollectedcertain things and compiled scriptures it was a matter of people trying to dogood and searching for god, and that's altogether different. (Applause)Student asks: Does the requirement that you set forth in Zhuan Falun about

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not drinking alcohol hold for all beverages and food that contain alcohol?For example, having a beer as a beverage with your meal (audiencelaughs), having a bowl of fermented rice porridge for breakfast, or occasio-nally having a piece of chocolate with an alcoholic filling in our daily life(audience laughs). Do these things violate the rule against alcohol?Teacher: If you really understand what cultivation is for, you will unders-tand all of these things. But today's society has made a mess of everything.Even when you don't drink alcohol there are alcoholic things mixed in tothe food we eat. So even when you haven't drunk any alcohol you still havealcohol in your stomach. Now that society has become this way, to avoid italtogether you'd have to stop eating, wouldn't you? Also, in Western socie-ty there is the matter of custom: they (especially the French) have an alco-holic beverage with their meal, it's part of their diet. So when everyone isdoing that and you don't, your family might think you are a bit weird. Thatis why back when I first imparted the Fa I said that if this is the situation,then for new students drinking a small glass of it isn't a big deal. In cultiva-tion what matters is your heart and mind. But being a cultivator, if youwant to be diligent, you will take cultivation very seriously. If a person cantruly hold himself to a high standard, he will manage to do better with suchthings. But if instead he thinks these things don't matter, then he will bemore lax with himself, and that's how you get differences.While we're on this subject, I will talk a little about myself. You know, afew years back Master seldom stayed in one place for long. That was be-cause amidst the persecution swarms of evil beings in other dimensions we-re searching everywhere for me. There were so many evil factors at the ti-me that they saturated all of the Three Realms' dimensions. And theywould have bad people look for me so as to disrupt my focus on doing Fa-rectification and eliminating the evil things. That's why I kept movingabout. At the time I was basically in a car around the clock, traveling daily.A line from a poem I wrote, which said, "Journeying thousands of miles bycar," is in fact describing what it was like. With my constant movement,and with the protection of gods and powerful gong, things were kept invisi-ble to the evil, and the evil couldn't locate me. Hardly anybody knew whereI was. I wanted to swiftly eliminate the evil factors and speed up the pro-gress of Fa-rectification, and I needed to prevent many matters of Fa-recti-fication from being disrupted. Along with this I was watching how our stu-dents were doing. This led to a problem with eating. Not everywhere I wenthad Chinese restaurants (everyone laughs), so a lot of times I had Ameri-can, Japanese, Korean, or European food. All kinds of food are fine for me.But with many restaurants, when you go in there and just eat without orde-ring anything to drink, the owners get a bit upset (Teacher laughs), espe-cially when there's a long line to be seated; a lot of restaurants make mostof their profits from drinks. So I came up with a solution. There is non-al-coholic beer nowadays, and so I would order a non-alcoholic beer to getaround that. Now with that said, I'm not telling you to follow my example.

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Talking about this reminds me of something. In all these years there is onefacet of Fa I haven't brought up with you. When the persecution was reallyintense, back in 2000, students in Mainland China were exposing the slan-derous propaganda about Master that the evil had made up, and somethingsaid by one student has really stuck with me. And it is a view that needs tobe corrected. The evil ringleader and the CCP made up lies and told ourstudents how their teacher was so rich, how he had such-and-such luxuryapartments in Beijing and Changchun, and how he led such an extravagantlifestyle. When I taught the Fa in China my lifestyle was in fact quite basic.Well, a student in Mainland China said, "Our Master is the best and hewouldn't be like that. If our Master were that way I wouldn't follow Him." Iwas saddened by that, and more than ever I understood the hardship andpains felt by the previous divine beings who had descended to the world tosave people. Cultivation is about cultivating oneself--why look at others?I have taught you cultivation, but that doesn't mean I am cultivating just asyou are. If that were the case, and if we had become bad, then you'd juststop cultivating? Is that how it would work? Nothing in the Fa I've taughtsays that the Master must go through grueling cultivation just as cultivatorsdo. The evil has assaulted me because I have been suffering on behalf ofsentient beings. And when it's Dafa cultivation--where people don't leavethe secular world to cultivate, and the disciples are from all walks of life--how could the Master be the same as all his disciples? And why would hehave to live like those of his students who have the most karma or the mosthardship? If it happens that your Master does things differently from youand you find it objectionable, then are you going to stop cultivating? Isn't[your notion that] the master who saves you must be like his disciples, theresult of being poisoned by the Party-culture of the CCP? Do human beingsreally want their master, who brings people salvation, to undergo humansuffering along with them? And only then will they approve of him? Infact, what I want to establish and the problems that I intend to resolve du-ring the Fa-rectification include no longer having divine beings who comedown to save people be persecuted by the sentient beings in the Three Re-alms. Divine beings who save people come down to rescue them, so theycan't be the same as human beings. In the past they went through the sameordeals that human beings experience, or suffered even worse than humans,for it was hard to save people, and those divine beings bore the karma ofhuman beings. That was also to leave their own examples and to help peo-ple learn from them. They willfully went through that for the sake of hu-man beings and to teach people how to live properly. So should divinebeings, who don't have karma, have to suffer even a bit? It was humanbeings' karma weighing them down.Divine beings who save people really can't be the same as those being sa-ved. Say someone has fallen into a mud pit: would it make sense for him torefuse help if I offered to pull him out, and he insisted, "You have to jumpin here and be like me before I'll let you save me"? There's no such thing.

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During this evil persecution, [think about] how many students who hadsuch thinking fell after seeing, reading, or hearing the slanderous propagan-da against Master. While teaching the Fa before, I discussed a principle. Toillustrate the issue, one thing that they say in the CCP's Party-culture is,"Before you advise others to do well, you have to first do well yourself."So after some people have done something bad and others point it out tothem, they say, "You haven't done well yourself. Don't tell me what to do.If you want to tell me what to do, you first have to do well yourself." Justlike with the notion I mentioned above, their reasoning is deviant here.There is no such issue as a master who saves people not handling himselfwell. That is a crooked idea born of the malevolent Party's warped culture.In other words, the idea that a divine being, regardless of what approach heuses to save people, must be the same as human beings is absolutely not thecase. Divine beings might choose, though, to teach people with words or byexample, but that is an act of those divine beings being merciful, and abso-lutely not because they are supposed to do that. You must be clear on this.(Applause) While they walked the earth Shakyamuni and Jesus did suffer alot for human beings. But the fact is, they didn't have to do that at all. Thatwas caused by the enormous karma they bore for human beings and the factthat there were related things that couldn't be harmonized by the cosmos'spast Fa. It entailed that they beg for alms among human beings and be mis-treated and harmed by them, even to the extent that their entire lives weredifficult. You all must be clear about this.Going back to what I was saying before, if there is something alcoholic inyour meal or in a piece of chocolate, that's not a big deal. But if you set ahigh standard for yourself you will do better in these situations. New stu-dents and students who haven't studied the Fa much won't be thought of asnot doing well just because of these things. Gauge it for yourself. The Faon this has been taught, and Master has taught you to conform to ordinarypeople as much as possible as you cultivate. As always, though, there arepeople who are set on being more diligent [than others] and have higherstandards for themselves. That's what accounts for the differences [betweenpeople]. If you, as a Dafa cultivator, say that you just have to drink alcohol,then you have an attachment.Student: The Fa's rectification of everything in the cosmos has reached itsfinal stage and history is about to enter a new stage, but our gesture of salu-te to Master is still not uniform. (Audience laughs)Teacher: You mean how you should greet Master? I've actually made clearsince I first taught the Fa that people can address me in whatever way: youcan call me by my name, call me Teacher, call me Master--whatever is fi-ne. Master isn't a stickler for these things. But if you are a true Dafa disci-ple, you can't address me directly by my name. It doesn't matter if ordinarypeople call me by my name--they can call me whatever they want. But Da-fa disciples should call me "Master," or "Teacher," etc. It's up to you, andyou can address me however you like. But be sure not to address me as

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"Buddha." That's because whatever the case, Master is teaching the Fa witha human body and saving you using a human form, he is manifesting in thisworld with a human body. A human body cannot be called a Buddha. Cal-ling a human body Buddha blasphemes Buddhas. Some students mightthink, then: "I know in my heart who you are." Well, that's you knowing inyour heart then (audience laughs, applauds), and it's fine for you to call mewhatever you want to in your heart. (Teacher laughs)Disciple: Dafa disciples from Chengdu and Nanchong of Sichuan provincesend Master their highest regards and wish to pass on greetings to Master.Master, what should we do about those people in remote mountainous areaswho have no access to information?Teacher: Thank you, Dafa disciples from Nanchong. It's not a problem.Let's not forget that as for many things, aren't there Master's Law Bodies?And there are many gods who are playing a positive role helping out, too.What's more, there are so many Dafa disciples in Mainland China, and theywill do many things. Even if those people really can't access the informa-tion, there are still ways to handle things. And if they are really getting leftout, then there are ways to take care of that. But they actually won't be leftout. Did you know that after the Nine Commentaries came out, within justone month's time all of China knew about them? Since they are for all peo-ple--and especially Chinese people--everybody will for sure be given an op-portunity. (Applause) Some remote villages are pretty isolated, but godsare helping to spread them. And as they are spread, people will learn ofthem quickly, since at this most crucial time everyone must give their stan-ce.Disciple: For many people in Mainland China, especially the 60 millionCCP members, coming to see clearly the evil Party's wicked nature andcompletely break from it takes some time. Once the denunciation and remo-val of the malevolent Party begins, what will happen to those people whohave been branded with the mark of the beast?Teacher: When gods go about doing something they definitely take everyt-hing into consideration, and all will be given an equal chance. As you willsee in the future, it will have been impossible for somebody to go withouthearing about this [Dafa] during this Fa-rectification and at this time whenDafa is publicly spread. When the world's people try to avoid being perse-cuted and say that they have never heard of Dafa, that's just not true. Ofcourse, this time around, where Dafa disciples cultivate as they validate theFa, is different, and not everybody can become a Dafa disciple. But this is amajor thing that involves sentient beings' very existence; even the ThreeRealms' existence is for the sake of Fa-rectification. If the salvation of allbeings--something so significant--were not relayed to every single personon earth, if it weren't relayed to the sentient beings when all was said anddone, then I, he who administers the Fa-rectification, would definitely notlet those responsible off the hook. (Applause) All people will know aboutit, not a single person will be left out. And then the choice is in their own

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hands, and that is the crucial thing. The entire Three Realms, the long,drawn-out years of history, and the sentient beings in the Three Realms we-re all created for this, so how could today's people be left out? That's im-possible. I don't think [what you described] should be a problem.Disciple: Venerable Master, recently certain students have felt substancesfrom other dimensions badly repressing them. Does that have to do withthe state of Fa-rectification?Teacher: Some students were coughing a while ago, and some students ha-ve had certain abnormal reactions, especially in the period after the NineCommentaries came out. It was the work of the factors, lodged in people'sbodies, that belong to the malevolent Party's evil specter. You need to eli-minate them when you send righteous thoughts. They can't have that muchof an effect on Dafa disciples, but they do interfere. Basically all of the re-cent interference, including interference of other sorts, has been the work ofthose evil factors.The evil factors that were pressing down into the Three Realms frombeyond at the time of July 20, 1999, have been cleaned out to the point thatbasically few remain. Before the mighty force of Fa-rectification reachesthis surface dimension, there will still be factors here which were createdby the old forces before that, along with the factors of the malevolent Par-ty's evil specter, doing evil. But since in this dimension there is gong that Ileft here earlier on, and there are some righteous gods, along with Dafa dis-ciples and their righteous factors, they have now cleaned out the evil fac-tors that persecute Dafa disciples to the point that not even one out of 100million parts is left--a lot of the evil has been cleaned out. What remains inthe surface dimension now is only eight or nine percent of what used to behere. (Applause) And the factors of the malevolent Party's evil specter arebeing destroyed on a large scale; and of late, especially, they have beencleaned out rapidly. They have been eliminated in the other dimensionswhere Fa-rectification has been completed. [What remains in] the surfacedimension now doesn't even amount to one ten-thousandth of the totalamount from before, and it only accounts for about seven percent of thesurface dimension. The field that Dafa has established in this world occu-pies forty-five percent of what should be filled up in this dimension. If youlook at the proportion, [you will see that] the factors left by the old forcesin the surface dimension, the rotten demons, and the factors of the malevo-lent Party's evil specter altogether account for fifteen percent, while thefield established by Dafa in this dimension occupies forty-five percent--andthat doesn't even take into account the effect of Dafa disciples themselves.When I added up all of the evil factors that persecute Dafa disciples, theyonly amounted to fifteen percent. This says that during this time before themighty force of Fa-rectification arrives at the surface, Dafa's factors occupyforty-five percent of the dimensional field at the surface, where humanbeings are, and that doesn't even include the Dafa disciples themselves.Disciple: Please talk about how we should distinguish our cultivation from

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our work. A lot of our projects now face challenges in their management.Teacher: If it's something that involves Dafa disciples working on valida-ting the Fa, then that [process] in itself is cultivation. But you can't replaceFa-study with doing Dafa work--that wouldn't do. Haven't I said that youneed to do all of the three things, and do them all well?Outside of Mainland China some students have set up media outlets and ot-her company-like entities that aim to validate the Fa, and they are mana-ging them in the way ordinary companies are run. And there is nothingwrong with that, don't think that this is wrong. If something can't be run ina normal manner, then that might not be good for validating Dafa. Runninga media outlet, starting a company, etc.--these are forms in human society.Human beings take a methodical approach to managing things, and Dafadisciples can learn from it, which you can't say is wrong. But for a certainperiod of time before the company is fully able to operate normally, therewill be some challenges. Gradually you should arrive at the point where itreally is run like a company, though, and that way it can more effectivelyplay its role of directly or indirectly validating the Fa. So I think youshould do your best to cooperate with others and coordinate things well.When something is beneficial to Dafa disciples' validation of the Fa, youshould try your best to do it well.Disciple: Some of my family members who don't cultivate cannot unders-tand why the Nine Commentaries were published. This reflects shortco-mings in my, your disciple's, cultivation in the past. How can I clear awaythis kind of interference?Teacher: Even though your family members understood things before, itwas at a shallow level. You didn't help them to really understand the truth.Since the time when the Nine Commentaries came out, one thing that hashappened is that [some students have] made declarations of withdrawalfrom the Party on behalf of their family members. When a few of the fami-ly members refused, [the students would say,] "You can't refuse! I'm goingto represent you and withdraw you from the Party." (Audience laughs) Infact, it really doesn't count if they refuse. You may do it on others' behalf,but they have to agree to it, and it doesn't count if they do not consent to it.Even gods have to look at what a person chooses. This shows that manystudents haven't done well, done enough, or had success in clarifying thetruth to their families. Do you know what the biggest reason for that is? It'sthat you see them as your family, rather than as part of the sentient beingsor as just like all of the other independent lives. You should earnestly andcarefully clarify the truth to your family members, just as you would withother people in the world. When you regard them as family members anddon't take it seriously, the results won't be that good. Or, if you think, "He'sfamily, so I can represent him," that won't work. Even the formation of theThree Realms was done for the sake of today's Fa-rectification, so peoplecan't be flippant about something as monumental as this. Is any life thatsimple? At the critical moment, is there any being who can be fully repre-

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sented by someone else? Is there any being who can be denied the opportu-nity of choosing his own future? At the critical moment, all beings have toverify how they are. So if in your family you have this scenario [you descri-bed], then you need to carefully clarify the truth. You can do any ordinarythings on your family members' behalf, but when it comes to somethingthat involves a being's future--something that major--nobody can representsomeone else. If you really want to save your family members, then clarifythe truth to them as you would to other people. That's because their kno-wing sides all realize, "In this life you are my family member, but in thenext life who knows who we will be related to. Just in this lifetime is ourrelationship predestined." It's just like staying at an inn: you lodge therebriefly for a night and then part ways the next day. Who could possibly ta-ke someone else's place? That's really how it is.Disciple: How can we help the lawsuits in Africa against the evil people tomove forward better? Right now there is constant interference. What's therole, in Fa-rectification, of the lawsuit against Jiang in Africa?Teacher: I affirm all of these things that you have done, and you have donea great job. I'd say you have done several brilliant things in Africa, whichhave shocked and frightened the evil and the bad people, helped the world'speople to see the nature of the evil, and had a good impact in saving sen-tient beings and with many other things. They are things that should be do-ne, and you haven't done them in vain. As for how to do things even betterand how to move things forward, that is still up to you. And the extent towhich you accomplish things depends on you as well. Actually, as far aseach cultivator goes, you are all walking down the path that you need to ta-ke on your own. And you have done those things very well. Sometimeswhen I look at the things you have done, I really want to say "Bravo!"Disciple: A relative of mine is a [Communist] Party member and lives inMainland China. He doesn't want to quit the Party. I have tried to persua-de him many times but he refuses to listen. When the weeding-out takes pla-ce, will he lose his life? (Audience laughs)Teacher: (Teacher laughs) Whether someone will be weeded out or not, orkept or not, these are things that belong to the next stage. Right now weshould just think about saving people. Getting attached to [what will hap-pen in] the future does no good, for when the Fa-rectification arrives here ithas its standards [to judge by]. But one thing is for sure: no matter what wedo, a large portion of people are no longer savable. Among them may bethose who don't want to listen to the truth, who refuse to listen when thetruth is told, and who don't want to read the Nine Commentaries. That istheir choice. You have done what you should do. While being subjected tothe most evil persecution, Dafa disciples are still saving sentient beings andovercoming all sorts of challenges in order to tell people about the truth.Yet some people don't want to listen. And what's more, Dafa disciples aresaving people while being persecuted. Well, people's unwillingness to lis-ten to or read about [the truth] is also a way by which people make their

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choice. If they don't want to be saved, then we have no option but to letthem go with the malevolent Party.Disciple: I didn't work before I started to cultivate and I haven't workedsince. Since taking up cultivation I have had a good amount of leisure timeto do things to spread the Fa. Is this in accordance with our cultivationway that conforms to ordinary society? Do I need to go out and look for ajob now?Teacher: If your family has no financial hardship or other burdens, thenit's up to you whether or not you work, and it has nothing to do with beingout of line with our cultivation way. I know that some students have borro-wed a lot of money and yet they don't go out to work, saying that they're"too busy validating the Fa" to work. They can't pay off the money they ha-ve borrowed, and yet still they keep borrowing more. That is a problem.Have you thought about the principle of Fa that Master has taught about theobligation to pay off debts? If you, having taken up cultivation or reachedConsummation, were to leave or consummate and become a god and yethave not paid off any of your debt, who would pay it off? Even if the debtis owed to a Dafa disciple, that's still unacceptable. Of course, when somestudents say, "I don't want it back. It's a gift to you," that is a different mat-ter. That's a gift then, and it is a different concept than incurring a debt.You cannot go to extremes. You might be thinking, "Since validating theFa will end soon anyhow, I won't need to pay back the money I owe you.When the time comes everything will be over and it'll all be wrapped up."(Audience laughs) How could it work that way? Is that thinking right? It isbeing irresponsible. Haven't I said that a Dafa disciple should be a goodperson in every circumstance? Most Dafa disciples are both working jobsand validating the Fa. Of course, if you don't need to work, have no finan-cial challenges, and don't have to worry about affecting your family whenyou do things, then that's different. Everybody has family and societal obli-gations, and everybody is cultivating himself in the setting of human socie-ty and validating the Fa in the secular world. Why must you [who don't payyour debts] do something that diverges from the Fa's requirements? Ofcourse, if those you owe say that they don't need the money, or if your fa-mily doesn't need you to work, then that's a different matter, and of coursenot a problem.Disciple: Master, please spell out for us the deeper meaning of "Turningthe Wheel Towards the Human World."Teacher: "Turning the Wheel Towards the Human World"--so whichwheel is it that's being turned? Of course it is the Law Wheel (Falun). (Ap-plause) Isn't turning the Law Wheel towards the human world doing Fa-rectification towards the human world? That is what it means. (Applause)Disciple: Since Master's scripture "Turning the Wheel Towards the HumanWorld" was published, some disciples have thought that the scripture is fordisciples to read, while others have thought it should be run in newspapersso that ordinary people could read it. I'm not sure how to handle this.

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Teacher: It's okay to let ordinary people read it, too. Among ordinary peo-ple, there are some who are clued-in and who can understand it. But thereare definitely many foggyheaded people who won't be able to understand it,so it might have a negative effect. That's how human society is now. Sowhen it comes to specific things, discuss them among yourselves. It's justlike with printing Master's photos in the newspaper: since Master said thatyou could do that, you did that, and it was no problem. But you can't printin flyers what I have written or what I have said and then distribute them.You need to do these things as rationally as possible. Being responsible tothe Fa and to saving sentient beings is being responsible to yourself.Disciple: In Western society there are some ordinary people, especially pro-fessors and scholars, who are heavily into studying evil Communism andevil Marxism-Leninism. But these ordinary people are not members of themalevolent Party in China. Master, please tell us how we can help these or-dinary people.Teacher: Show them the Nine Commentaries and ask them, "How does ourstudy fare against yours?" (Applause) Right? We have come from that soci-ety and this is our study, which is born of first-hand experience. Let's seewho has researched it more thoroughly and astutely, and let's hash it out.(Teacher laughs) (Applause)Disciple: I obtained the Fa last May. Thank you, Master, for mercifully sa-ving me. After I obtained the Fa I soon got involved in Dafa work, and so-metimes I am so busy that I have simply no time to do the exercises. I'm ve-ry worried about this. Master, please tell us again how a new student canwalk well the path of cultivating himself and validating the Fa.Teacher: There's no shortcut in cultivation for any student, and that holdsfor new students too. Just cultivate steadily and solidly, and do well thethree things that Dafa disciples should do. Those things may appear ordina-ry, but all of your mighty virtue, and everything that Dafa disciples willconsummate in the future, come from them. Don't get anxious, and don't doanything extreme. Just do things normally and rationally. That's how youare supposed to cultivate. "Where there's a will there's a way."Disciple: How should Western students look at withdrawal from the Party?Have Western students who lived in Mainland China before been affectedby the CCP's evil specter?Teacher: Some have, and some have not. When Westerners go to Chinamany of them don't necessarily become part of Chinese people's circles, somost of them are not affected. But there are a very small number who havetried to make their way into the malevolent Party. As far as Dafa disciplesare concerned, [the specter] won't affect them, wherever they are.Disciple: Greetings, Master! I have already quit the Party. But party duesare being automatically taken out of my salary. What should I do aboutthat? (Audience laughs)Teacher: Consider it robbery by the evil cult. (Audience laughs, applauds).It's not a problem.

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Disciple: Some students want to help withdraw their deceased relatives orfamily members from the Party. Is that necessary?Teacher: That's fine. There is no problem with that, for they have passedaway and it's not as if they can come over and ask the Epoch Times to pu-blish their statements in print or online, right? (Audience laughs) (Applau-se) So yes, you can do that. And does it make any difference? Yes, it does!(Applause)Disciple: Some overseas disciples use aliases when they quit the Party. Isthat the same as quitting the Party using their real names, that is, in termsof their righteous beliefs, righteous thoughts, and righteous actions?Teacher: It is the same. As I said earlier, using an alias is fine, for godslook at people's hearts. But the formal act [of public renunciation] can ins-pire people in human society and is necessary for saving people.Question: How should I apply my wisdom and use cinema or televisionmedia so that we can do better in making our way into mainstream society?Teacher: If you have skills of that sort then go for it. Using those approa-ches to validate the Fa, expose the persecution, and save sentient beings isof course better. You can make your way into mainstream society as longas you solve one issue, which is, to truly be able to produce good work. Butfinancial constraints should be taken into consideration as well. The samegoes for the media entities. If they are truly run well, they will definitelymanage to make their way into mainstream society and join the ranks ofmainstream media. That would of course be great. I know that you have infact been working hard on many things and that you will do them well. Ibelieve that with time that day will come, it definitely will. (Applause) I'llrepeat what I said before: they will not only be run well, in the future theywill definitely be the number one, primary media. (Applause) When the hu-man race comes to understand all of this I don't think it will have much in-terest in anything else anymore, and being able to hear Dafa informationand choosing a wonderful future for themselves will be what's first and fo-remost to them. (Applause)Disciple: When products that are made in China are sold in the U.S., themoney will flow to China and be used to persecute Falun Gong students.So I will no longer purchase a product that is made in China. Is my thin-king right?Teacher: Of course there's nothing wrong with that. Aren't many of our fel-low students boycotting them, too? (Teacher laughs) But it appears thatwhen only our students boycott them, the impact isn't that big. (Teacherlaughs) And don't do that if it's going to bring you financial hardship. Ifyou buy them owing to life's necessities, then it doesn't matter. But if allpeople in the world could realize what you've hit on, it would be terrifyingto the evil.Disciple: If an ordinary person has a positive attitude toward Dafa butdoesn't yet have the right understanding of the evil Party and its evil spec-ter, what will happen to him?

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Teacher: Then it depends on his specific circumstances, since a person'sattitude toward Dafa is first and foremost. But if he is dead set on suppor-ting the evil Party and recognizing the evil Party, then he is in grave dan-ger.Disciple: Students in Mainland China would like to ask Master: Many ordi-nary people were at one point members of the [Communist] Little RedGuards and the [Communist] Youth League. Please tell us if they too needto still withdraw [from those organizations]?Teacher: It's necessary to remove the mark left by the evil. Even thoughdeclaring withdrawal is a formality, if the person can come forward andmake that statement, that is, if he is able to take that step, then his thinkingis changing through that process and his body is cleansed of the poisonousfactors. Some people have said, "I don't need to write it out. In my heart Ihave withdrawn." That might not really effect a cleansing of poisonous fac-tors from the body. And gods are watching whether people are firm. Sincethe deeper motives behind a person's thoughts are complicated, his actionsare the most accurate expression of himself.Disciple: Many ordinary people are saying, "I stopped paying dues to theParty or the [Youth] League long ago. I stopped being a Party member longago. I don't need to go through the formality of withdrawing from the Par-ty." How should we look at this?Teacher: It's still the same issue. The problem is not just with the formalityof joining the Party. [The Party] has truly branded people with the mark ofits evil cult and made people join its ranks. That mark must be erased. Themark doesn't manifest in the human world, and what is at work also inclu-des the [Party's] factors that are inside people's bodies. People made deadlypledges to its blood-red flag, promising to give even their lives to it, sowould you say that only thinking about it in your heart, instead of renoun-cing it openly, could do the job? Actually, now that we're on this subject,[I'll say that] this malevolent Party is truly evil to the utmost degree. It askspeople to make deadly pledges to its blood-red flag, to dedicate their livesto the evil Party, and to dedicate their whole lives to doing its bidding.From ancient times to the present, not a single political party or human or-ganization has been so sinister or brutal.Disciple: Some Western students think that the tone of the Nine Commen-taries makes them hard for Western society to accept. What should we bemindful of when we introduce the Nine Commentaries to Western society?Teacher: It's not like that. Doing it the way you have been is just fine.Don't emphasize those things. There are differences between the Easternand Western ways of thinking, sure. But there are divine factors behind theNine Commentaries, and they will have a positive impact on people, Asiansand Westerners alike. In some people's cases, factors left by the old forcesare preventing the person from getting involved in Dafa for the time being--they might be restraining him. It depends on the specific situation. ManyWesterners haven't been harmed by the poison of the malevolent Party, and

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in those instances the person might come across as a bit indifferent. That'snot a problem. As for the Nine Commentaries, at this time they are an im-portant step in saving humankind. Perhaps, during the next stage, every sin-gle person on this earth will soon have to give his stance on whether hewants that evil Party around or not. Each person must choose his future. Incountries that aren't ruled by the malevolent Party, Communist things arestill, in reality, being practiced. Didn't a prophecy say that **** would rulethe world?Some people have said that the Nine Commentaries are too long and haveasked whether they could be made more concise. The answer is no. Duringthe last hundred or so years, the gangster-like Communist clique has beenconstantly at war with the free world, but nobody has been able to spell outwhat this malevolent Party really is. The Republic of China [Taiwan] hasfought with the CCP for decades, and articles about the CCP have beenwritten one after another. But they too haven't managed to really spell outwhat that malevolent Party is. We have managed to completely explain it,which is a first. How could it be made more concise? Should it be turnedinto a short, toothless article like what's been done before? Could such a pi-ece take on the enormous responsibility [this one must] and fulfill the dutyhistory has bestowed upon it? The goal of our fully explaining that malevo-lent Party is to expose its malevolent nature and help people to see it forwhat it is, thus saving the world's people. It is also done to help the world'speople understand why it has persecuted Dafa disciples so wildly. Wearen't "playing politics." And this isn't something politics could handle. Inmy heart is a great wish to save sentient beings. We needn't promise anyt-hing to the beings who have crooked thoughts. History will prove everyt-hing. I have given that malevolent Party many chances, and when its evil-ness peaked I warned it time and time again, saying, "I, Li Hongzhi, knowand can explain everything." But the evil has gotten so wild that it has lostall reason. Even today it is still senselessly persecuting Dafa disciples. Let'ssee what is in store for it.Disciple: Some ordinary people think that the Nine Commentaries aregreat, but they don't accept Dafa.Teacher: A lot of the thoughts that ordinary people have result from theirnotions taking effect, and they say things without really thinking it overfirst. They often say things they don't really mean and say things that maymean something else. When that's the case, you need to help them come totheir senses. What do you mean by "they don't accept Dafa"? That theydon't want to learn it? If they won't learn it, that is fine. No one is forcingthem to learn it. Only an evil cult would force somebody to learn its things,and it won't let people out even if they wish to leave. In Dafa, however, wedon't go in for those things. If you want to learn it, go ahead. And if youdon't want to, that's fine. What I tell people today is to make people awareof the truth: I want people to know what Dafa is and why the malevolentParty has persecuted it, and I do so in order to help people rid their minds

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of poisonous factors. As for whether people want to learn it, that's up tothem. If they really don't approve of Dafa then they have chosen their futu-re.Disciple: Ever since the Nine Commentaries came out, I've been very intowriting articles that expose the evil Party, but I have slacked off in my Fa-study. How should I balance things?Teacher: That's not necessarily interference. You just need to find time tostudy the Fa. Study the Fa steadily and solidly, and don't just go throughthe motions. You have to do all of the three things. Writing articles is a partof your validating the Fa, but it can't take the place of the other two things.Disciple: Some fellow practitioners in Mainland China think some Minghuieditorials go against the spirit of Dafa. How can we win over those fellowcultivators in Mainland China?Teacher: That's not a problem. When someone says there is a problemwith Minghui, isn't that helpful for the Minghui Dafa disciples' cultivation?It can have a positive effect. If that happens they should just cultivate them-selves more, and if they were wrong they should just correct themselves. Ifthey weren't wrong, then they should hold firm and not be affected by thosestudents who have human thoughts. Of course, it's not always the case thatthe students [who question Minghui] have human thoughts. It is possiblethat they know of better approaches to things. Overall, Minghui has grownonly better with time, and it is on a proper course. The situation in Main-land China is complex, indeed. There are some students who, owing totheir human thoughts, have very strong attachments, and the malevolentParty's factors are at work interfering. And then there are some bad peoplewho pose as students. But that's no concern to us, as they can no longer in-terfere with Minghui.Disciple: When Master was teaching Fa in the early days he said that thesalvation of monks and nuns would take place last. So is clarifying the truthto them a lower priority?Teacher: Right, the salvation of people in religions was planned for last, tobe done in the next stage. Some people have said, "Why are Dafa disciplesso special, even more so than those in religions? Why didn't you save theothers first and have them become Dafa disciples, and instead you are sa-ving these people right now and having them become Dafa disciples?"When human beings look at people they see only this one lifetime. But infact, out of the people here today, many of them were, in history, the firstgroup of disciples in the major, upright religions of the East and West--thepeople who heard in person Shakyamuni and Jesus teaching the Law. Dafadisciples are true believers with steadfast and upright faith. (Applause) Thewell-known saints, monks, Daoists, and Christians in history are right hereamong Dafa disciples. (Applause)Disciple: Some Buddhists don't understand the story about Buddha Shakya-muni that Master tells in the seventh chapter of Zhuan Falun. They saidthat they looked through the entire Tripitaka but couldn't find it. That has

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affected their understanding of Dafa.Teacher: Right. I can tell people about everything in the Fa. I can tell peo-ple about everything of all Buddhas and Gods in the heavens. And I can tellpeople about the past, present, and future of Buddha Shakyamuni. None ofthose things are in any scripture. And I can tell people about the cosmos'spast, present, and future, and about all things and all beings. I can tell peo-ple about even the gods that Buddha Shakyamuni never mentioned, andabout even how they came about and their entire histories. I can tell peopleabout the greater Cosmos up to its greatest expanse, about what the diffe-rent levels of the heavens are like--and of course the different levels of theheavens are gods, too--about how the cosmic bodies of different levels ca-me about... about the fundamentals of anything and everything. And only Ican tell people about these things. (Applause) What I can tell people inclu-des everything of man's history in the Three Realms, from the minutiae tothe biggest events in history. Could the Buddhist scriptures possibly recordall of that? The scriptures didn't even record much of what Buddha Shakya-muni said while he walked the earth. Buddha Shakyamuni taught Fa forforty-nine years--did he teach merely what's in those few books? That's im-possible, right? Human beings... they always hinder themselves with hu-man notions. Don't worry about those things that ordinary people say. Whoare the ones that are cultivating? Who are the people who are truly walkingon a path toward godhood? Who are the people who can truly succeed atcultivation? In all of history, from the past on to the present, only you havedone this! (Applause)As I have said before, the cultivation done in the past, the religions of thepast, and the gods of the past who descended to this world to save people--did they truly save people? What they really did, in fact, was establish aculture for the Three Realms and mankind, which was to pave the way forthe final Fa-rectification of the cosmos. And what's more, those being sa-ved were people's assistant souls (fu yuanshen) instead of people's true sel-ves. Still, the assistant souls who were being saved were designated beingsthat were sent down here. The reason was that after the Three Realms wascreated, some cosmic bodies were too close to the Three Realms, and godsclose to the Three Realms saw and were even exposed to the Three Realms,so those gods were prone to being contaminated and thus fell. In the ThreeRealms there is emotion, the sentient beings' principles are reversed, the en-vironment is harsh, and people have strong attachments. Upright gods, onthe other hand, are compassionate, and they are prone to being interferedwith by the sentient beings who are in the trying environment of the ThreeRealms. That is why the gods close to the Three Realms needed to be fre-quently replaced. In terms of human beings' time, they had to be replacedsometime within every ten-year span. That was the issue that arose. Me-anwhile, the scenario came about wherein people made use of the form ofthis ordinary society in the Three Realms to go about laboriously cultiva-ting themselves, and after they reached Consummation their assistant souls

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would replace the gods that needed to be replaced. Some beings from theparadises of gods above were sent down, and they were to cultivate in thisworld as people's assistant souls. And some actually reincarnated as otherlife forms, and after they achieved Consummation they would return andbecome the gods whom they were to replace. This scenario emerged onlyafter the Three Realms came into existence. Before that there was no suchthing as switching gods. This wasn't the goal of creating the Three Realms,though. It was a phenomenon that appeared after the Three Realms wascreated, and it was a way to resolve the fact that gods were interfered with.It was really for Fa-rectification that the Three Realms was created. Duringthat earlier period, everything related to the Three Realms that the gods did,and everything that manifested in the world, was part of the process of esta-blishing a culture for mankind and was to lay a foundation for people to un-derstand the Fa later on.It's easy for me to say these things today, and it's easy for you to hear, un-derstand, and grasp them. Time, space, history, all things, heaven and earth,all beings, all happenings, cultivation, yin and yang, hardship and joy, manand gods--talking about these things is effortless for me. But did you knowthat every word's concept and meaning have played out over thousands ofyears of real, lived history and have evolved to be what they are today, andthat over the course of history the words' meanings were built up and deve-loped? I'm mainly talking about the Chinese language. All things and everyhappening that mankind understands can be covered, described, and expres-sed in human language and words. That's not something you can bringabout just by inventing a language. There has to be something deeply in-grained, something that people have truly felt, experienced firsthand, and li-ved through--a process created for people that is grounded in real experien-ce and that leaves a deep impression. Only then can people really unders-tand the meaning conveyed by a character, word, or term. You can graspthe Fa taught today without even the slightest delay, but without that histo-rical process it's possible you would have no idea what I'm talking about to-day.What is "cultivation"? What does cultivation mean? How does a personcultivate? What does cultivation look like? What are cultivators like? Itwould be a problem if people didn't understand all of this. So the likes ofBuddha Shakyamuni, Laozi, and Jesus had to descend to this world and allof these things had to be played out in lived reality so as to leave to man-kind this culture, teach people what it means, and enable them to unders-tand what it is. And what I'm talking about includes the process that culti-vators underwent whereby their laborious cultivation and upright faith ledto Consummation, along with similar things. Buddhas, Daos, and Gods leftbehind the improvement process of reaching one's Attainment Statusthrough upright faith and upright cultivation, and people have come to un-derstand what these are. But with that said, all of that is still different fromthe form of cultivation that today's Disciples of Dafa practice. And that is

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why I say there is no model for Dafa disciples' cultivation--you have to bla-ze your own paths.

Disciple: In the process of trying to rescue the orphans and in clarifyingthe truth, the Rescue Team has found it to be a great means and process tofurther clarify the truth to all sectors of society, such as the governmentaland financial sectors, for example. We also find it to be a process of tryingto coordinate and work better with other truth-clarification teams. Master,please guide us as to how we can duplicate our efforts less and do better inutilizing the limited resources Dafa disciples currently have so as to dowell rescuing the orphans.Teacher: [A lot of] you are thinking about and planning how to do whatyou described. It's in progress. It is the right thing to do, and it should bedone. Since these things involve many, many facets of society, includingthe U.S. government, they will have the effect you wish for only when youdo them solidly. It's better if I don't get into the specifics of things, becauseyou are the ones who need to handle the details. But this initiative has to bedone. We can't not look after Dafa disciples' children--children who havelost their families. Those are my little disciples and your little fellow culti-vators. As their master, I have been thinking about this all along. I havewanted to bring them to the mountain, gather them together, set up a schoolfor them, and have them be raised together. (Applause)Disciple: At present some students still think that when they are physicallygoing through karma elimination and can't get out of bed it is the result oftheir own karma, and that because we have come to the final stage the kar-ma has to be eliminated. Is that way of thinking correct?Teacher: Not entirely. It happens because a person creates karma as longas he lives. When you cultivate, it is, among other things, a process of cons-tantly eliminating your karma. As long as a person lives in this world hecreates karma. So, during the course of your cultivation, karma is continual-ly reduced and eliminated. But Dafa disciples are doing Fa-rectificationcultivation, and so their karma is far less than that of ordinary people, andthat kind of karma should no longer be hard for them to eliminate. Haven'tI told you that these things have been arranged for you, the cultivators, eachstep of the way? So [your karma's elimination] has been arranged, step bystep, right up through today. You do have as well a small amount of karmathat is newly generated, but such things can play a positive role once Dafadisciples view and handle them correctly, and there isn't so much of themthat they can interfere with Dafa disciples' validating of Fa. With the stagewe are currently at, things of this sort have basically been reduced to a veryminimal amount, for they aren't supposed to interfere with Dafa disciples'validating of Fa.Why have there been some rather serious episodes, then? As I've told you,all kinds of evil factors take advantage of the gaps that Dafa disciples havewhen there are still attachments or are human thoughts that the disciples ha-

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ven't detected yet. Currently the largest, most obvious type of interferenceis the work of the evil specter of the malevolent Party. Especially now,when other evil things have been eliminated to the point that few remain,what stands out is the work of the evil factors of the malevolent Party. Thevarieties of interference and persecution that take place today stem fromthis. So you need to recognize and address them seriously and eliminatethem. Ordinary people don't believe that the malevolent Party has an evilspecter and rotten demons to it, but Dafa disciples do believe so. It is theevil specter's field that enables the malevolent Party to have a footing inthis world. In the one hundred years or so since the Paris Commune, theevil specter has formed a large field in the human dimension. The densityof the field was quite high before. Even though the West is against the Par-ty and its wicked doctrines, the West has, in reality, itself been practicingevil Communism of the malevolent Party's evil specter. The high taxationand high degree of social welfare now practiced in Western society areexactly what the evil Party initially advocated. It's just that the evil Partyhas used violence to forcefully seize things from people, whereas in theWest it is done via legislative means. In essence they are all practicing thestuff of evil Communism, rather than operating in the way a true human so-ciety should. Why has this phenomenon come about in spite of the fact thatWestern society opposes Communism's wicked doctrines? It is exactly be-cause the evil factors in other dimensions are at work. In China, they arepracticing evil Communism in form, while in substance they're a pack ofgangsters and a cult rolled into one. In the West, they are against evil Com-munism in form, while in substance they are practicing it.Disciple: Of late the Epoch Times has published many prophecies aboutthe collapse of the evil Party. Master, would you please give us some gui-dance on this matter.Teacher: Those were left to ordinary people for them to read, and it wasdone by gods from different levels who had come down to this world. Dafadisciples should just focus on walking their paths of validating the Fa.Disciple: You talked about how the Milky Way would depart from the cos-mos so as to purify the Three Realms. Does this mean that the Three Re-alms is the Milky Way and not the Solar System?Teacher: Yes, I have said that before, haven't I? Well actually, the preciselocation of the Three Realms is not something that can be understood withhuman [concepts of] a fixed expanse. Seen with man's modern, matter-ori-ented views, the Solar System is the boundary of the Three Realms at thislevel. But, other components that the human eye can't see, components for-med by different microcosmic particles, correspond to different, even broa-der dimensions. At the surface plane where human beings are, it corres-ponds to the Solar system; the expanse of a certain microcosmic plane cor-responds to the Milky Way; and more microcosmic planes correspond toeven larger expanses. The Three Realms is formed by a compound of nu-merous particles which range from microcosmic in size to larger ones. Dif-

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ferent particles form different realms and different expanses. Actually, thisis merely what can be expressed with human thought and human language.And this is only to describe the expanses that human eyes can see, that canbe described, and that the different dimensions formed by particles corres-pond to. In fact, an even larger expanse of the Three Realms corresponds tothe entire small universe. The "heaven and earth" that [the god] Pangu crea-ted, as myth has it, was actually this expanse. But it's not accurate to descri-be this expanse that way either, for [some of the things] within this bounda-ry also correspond to realms whose inner components are outside of theThree Realms. Human language is limited, and teaching the Fa in keepingwith human thought makes it impossible to articulate the Fa in terms thatencompass ideas and thinking that involve all facets and principles of all le-vels. When the Milky Way departs from the rest of the cosmic body, it ap-pears that this expanse is separated, and that you don't see the cosmic bodyanymore beyond the Milky Way; no matter how capable the human eye orhuman beings' telescopes are, they can't see it anymore. But actually, the si-tuation varies in the different realms that form the Three Realms. The Fa istaught, though, to human beings who are in the process of cultivating. Dif-ficult and complicated language could make it hard for many people to cul-tivate. Only when a person truly succeeds at cultivation and achieves Con-summation can he see how the cosmos truly is. Earth and the Three Realmscan only return [to their positions] after the period in which the Fa rectifiesthe human world and the full purification of the two has come to pass.Disciple: I have found that when certain things that hadn't been done wellare made up for later on, our overall Fa-rectification then proceeds muchfaster. So when disciples in certain regions don't do well, does it affect theoverall progress of Fa-rectification?Teacher: The progress of Fa-rectification isn't affected, but Dafa disciples'validation of the Fa can be, it can hamper things. The reason being, in thosecases, other places are fully cleaned up while in that place [that lags] theevil still has an effect, the persecution can't be ended, and the evil can't becleared out. You know, nowadays people are sliding downhill faster andfaster, and the morality of people today has declined horribly. If that didn'tcome to a stop, then human beings really couldn't be kept anymore, despitewhatever one may wish.Disciple: The Epoch Times is a media company that's meant for the public.Right now only a small number of students are involved in selling ads. Re-cently a coordinator in the [Falun Dafa] Association has been actively hel-ping along these lines, but some students don't understand that. Master,please tell us how we can get more students involved.Teacher: Yes, it's good that a coordinator wants to help with the Epoch Ti-mes work. A person who has a position of responsibility is actually a coor-dinator, and getting more capable people involved is what's key. How bigof a role can any one individual play? Only when the group as a wholeplays its role has the coordinator done well. When a coordinator does well

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himself, well, if you're the only one doing well, then you should just be anaverage student in that case. The key is that you have got to play the role ofand fulfill the duties of a coordinator. And I'll mention another thing. Thecoordinators in all regions must abandon the approach of overseeing allthings big and small. Each region should give free rein to the students inthat locale and support them when they take the initiative to validate the Fa.Don't hold them back, unless it's those who often go to extremes. VeteranDafa disciples have matured now, and they are walking their own paths to-wards Consummation. You need to be clear on this.Disciple: Should students from Eastern Europe withdraw from the [Com-munist] Party and Youth League?Teacher: Every person on this earth needs to give his stance on it, but rightnow [what you brought up] isn't most important. The malevolent Party inEastern Europe has disintegrated, after all. If there are still people therewho are staunch believers in and followers of that malevolent Party, thenthey too will be eliminated just like others. The CCP is the last major entityof the malevolent Party's evil specter, and to save the Chinese people [weneed] to disintegrate the malevolent Party's evil specter.Disciple: I think the Western students consider the Nine Commentaries tobe our Chinese students' business. Could you please give us some guidanceon this?Teacher: It does mainly have to do with Chinese students. That's not a pro-blem. But everyone in the world has to give his stance, and a lot of peopleeven in the West don't see the malevolent CCP for what it is.When people say that Falun Gong is remarkable, there are multiple mea-nings to it. One is, for over a hundred years there has been a nonstop battlebetween the world of the communist bloc and the free world, and it hasbeen really intense; during the Cold War it seemed as though people werealways under threat of nuclear war. But still, nobody managed to explainwhat the wicked Party is. Did anyone say it all? They were just hurling in-sults at each other. So many people and institutions were researching thatmalevolent Party, and yet nobody had it figured out. The Nationalist Party(KMT) has fought with the CCP for decades, and yet they have never beenable to explain what the malevolent CCP is. Falun Gong, meanwhile, hasmanaged to completely and clearly explain the malevolent Party. Isn't thatextraordinary? Hasn't it led the world to see Falun Gong anew? Why dolots of people in ordinary society admire Dafa disciples? Ordinary peoplecan't begin to explain many of mankind's affairs, yet Dafa disciples canspell them out, and that is extraordinary.It's not just the West--all of mankind failed to see the wicked Party for whatit is. Now what you urgently need to do is save those Chinese people whohave been poisoned worst and help the Chinese people to clearly see themalevolent CCP for what it is. But many in the West, too, don't see the wic-ked Party clearly, and a very small number even support that wicked Party.So aren't they in danger? It's only that right now what is urgent is to resolve

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the issue of so many people in China having been poisoned by it; that iswhy we haven't made those other, not-too-severely-poisoned nations thepriority. In other regions [outside of Mainland China], as of now the num-ber of people who have been poisoned is, after all, extremely small. Mostpeople don't believe, and even disapprove of, what the malevolent Commu-nist Party preaches. But the Chinese people are different. Having been edu-cated for decades in the malevolent Party's culture, how many of the Chine-se people can still see that malevolent Party for what it is? Before the NineCommentaries came out, no Chinese person could clearly explain or recog-nize the malevolent Party. Even when they would bash it, they couldn't doso outside the confines of that culture which it engineered. They have beenso deeply poisoned by it that they are no longer clearheaded. Even in theirstatements of withdrawal from the Party they use terms devised by the ma-levolent Party, such as, "I was born in the 'new' China," "I'm part of the ge-neration that grew up under the red flag," "I have worked my whole life for'the Party,'" and so on.Disciple: Greetings to Master from the Bulgarian disciples. We are transla-ting Zhuan Falun into Bulgarian. Could you please say a few words to gui-de us?Teacher: (Teacher smiles) Being able to translate Dafa books well invol-ves, in fact, a process of cultivating yourself. Don't fully use a cultivator'shigh-level understanding to do the translation, for each of your cultivationlevels is different and everyone's understanding of the Fa of even the samesentence is different, and that is why you have debates that go unresolved.As long as the meanings of the words and sentences are in keeping with thesurface meaning as held in human culture, it's fine. Since high-level mea-nings are something revealed by the Fa, the inner meanings can't be captu-red in translation. There are differences in how people think East and West,so during the initial stage of understanding the Fa it will be a little awk-ward. But if a person truly tries to learn it and read it, then that won't affecthim, for gods are at work.Disciple: Is the origin of evil Communism different from that of the malevo-lent Party?Teacher: The evil Communism is simply something made up in order forthe malevolent Party to deceive people. There is no difference really, theyare the same thing. A member of the malevolent Party is an individual, anda bunch of Party members is a Party collective. The collective came upwith an idea to fool people: they said that they would create a "kingdom ofheaven on earth," which is the so-called, wicked Communism. How couldthe earth be turned into a kingdom of heaven? When gods created the ThreeRealms they did not by any means intend to turn it into a kingdom of hea-ven. Rather, it was meant to be used for Fa-rectification. (Teacher laughs)When in the future the Three Realms continues to exist, then the form ofhuman society will forever be that of a human society, for that is what'sneeded by the cosmos. Turning it into a "kingdom of heaven"?? Heavenly

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kingdoms abound throughout the cosmos--they far outnumber human[worlds]. Anything beyond the surface dimension is a world of celestialgods, and heavenly kingdoms are everywhere in the cosmos.Disciple: What was the massive tsunami in South Asia all about?Teacher: Problems arise when mankind's karma reaches an enormousamount. But from a lot of things you can see that much of what unfolds to-day and implicates mankind is the doing of old-force factors, and thosethings do nothing positive for people. When something happens to man-kind, it has to help it learn a positive lesson, and only then can it lead peo-ple to truly see that it was gods punishing people so as to save more per-sons. But when the punishment is just for the sake of punishing people, itonly weakens people's belief in gods. Those things done by the old-forcefactors do nothing positive for mankind; when people grow bad they justweed them out. The tsunami's occurrence at this time was a warning to peo-ple--three hundred thousand people were gone within a matter of seconds.Back when the big Tangshan Earthquake struck China, didn't hundreds ofthousands perish in a flash? The CCP claims that it has a military that's mil-lions strong. If they turn really wicked, perhaps all of them will be gone inan instant, too. (Teacher laughs) (Audience applauds) The old forces' fac-tors don't care about human beings one bit. Only Dafa disciples are savingpeople.Disciple: A number of veteran students in Mainland China are seizing thefinal opportunities to step forward and validate the Fa, and some usedtheir real names when they withdrew from the Party. They asked us to passon their greetings to our venerable Master. The Dafa disciples working inMainland China's governmental offices send their greetings to reveredMaster.Teacher: Thank you all. (Applause) The students who have been persecu-ted the most severely by the evil [have suffered like that] due to their at-tachments. And because of their attachments they have gone back andforth: they would write a "repentance statement" under pressure one day,then after they got out they would regret it and make a declaration [to nulli-fy the repentance]; then on another day they would get arrested by the evil,their lack of righteous thoughts would lead to severe persecution, and thenthey would write yet another "repentance statement," and after they got outthey would make yet another declaration. Those students are the ones whohave been persecuted the worst. Some students, on the other hand, have ve-ry strong righteous thoughts and have truly done outstandingly. SinceMinghui's reporting is mainly for the purpose of exposing the persecution,collecting the stories of those Dafa disciples who have done really wellhasn't been made the priority. In reality many, many students have handledthemselves well.Student: How should a new student who took up Dafa just a few monthsago divide his time between studying Zhuan Falun, Teacher's new writings,and the many older writings? We obtained the Fa during the Fa-rectifica-

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tion period, so I would like to be clear on what's more of a priority.Teacher: New students should primarily study Zhuan Falun and read theother Dafa books as a supplement. When you have the time you can readwritings from any period, including Essentials for Further Advancement.But don't think that time is tight and yet you still have to read everything.That's not the case. When new students are able to do what Dafa disciplesshould do, that is really outstanding. Reading Zhuan Falun is the most im-portant. Read the others as a supplement. Read them when you have time,and when you don't, just read Zhuan Falun.Disciple: Could you please talk about the importance of our performances?Teacher: You put a lot of hard work into devising and preparing for the[Chinese] New Year's gala that you put on. The program was done well,but it was of course over after just one show and it really felt kind of hardto leave it at that. And besides, it can have a great, positive impact, so whynot bring it to more people? You could tour a few major cities and performfrom place to place so that more people could see it. Wouldn't that begreat? But you'd have to keep one thing in mind: this can only be done bythose who have the means and circumstances to do it; nobody can go to ex-tremes, and nobody should disrupt the form that his own cultivation shouldtake or his circumstances. I said "those who have the means and circums-tances to do it," so those who don't cannot [do the touring]. You can't quitschool or take an extended leave from school for it. Or if someone doesn'thave the financial means and yet quits his job to be a performer [on thetour], that won't do, either. Besides, it's only needed around New Year's ti-me, so the duration won't be long. Don't stop going to school or quit yourjob. Don't go to extremes. Doing so would bring about a lot of trouble.Disciple: When the Fa rectifies the human world, the CCP will completelydisintegrate in the human world, a great plague will spread, society will bein chaos, and so on. Which of these factors will be the most important?Teacher: There won't be any chaos, will there? Human society is control-led by gods. When gods want chaos in human society, a lack of chaos isn'tan option. And when gods want it to be stable, it has no choice but to bestable, right? And then there's the fact that something so major has been ar-ranged for Fa-rectification, so how could things not be under control?Disciple: I would like to organize a new project among the disciples whoare teachers in the Taiwan area that involves putting together a series ofChinese textbooks for the first through twelfth grades. Since this projectwould involve a lot of work, I wonder if it would affect other, more impor-tant, Fa-validating work?Teacher: If it has to do with validating the Fa, then go ahead. If it has not-hing to do with validating the Fa, then you can't take up [Dafa] students'energy. It's also okay if it will help to restore mankind's moral values. Thenyou can give it a try.Disciple: Some students are businesspeople but their goods come fromMainland China. Should they do that kind of business?

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Teacher: That little bit of business you do is negligible when there are tho-se international financial syndicates out there that keep providing life sup-port [to the CCP]. Our students need to make a living, validate the Fa, andhave conditions for validating the Fa, so that doesn't amount to a big issuefor us. And besides, if those big financial syndicates were to stop what theyare doing, that little bit of business you provide couldn't revive the CCPanyway. Also, with anything Dafa disciples do, elements of Dafa disciples'validating the Fa are involved.Disciple: In Mainland China, after some people withdrew from the Partyusing aliases, the CCP decided to reinforce the study of Party ideology andrequired Party members to study it and take notes. If those who have with-drawn from the Party with aliases are forced to participate in those studysessions, will they again be marked by the beast?Teacher: Once someone withdraws, that's it. He understands things deepdown inside. And once he declares his withdrawal, there will be certainbeings looking after him. (Applause)Disciple: There are disciples who work as card dealers in casinos. Doesthat increase their karma? Should they not take that kind of job?Teacher: A job is a job. Now that human society has come to be what it is,if you say that the job in the casino is bad, well, which of society's jobs arein fact true human jobs these days? With society how it is today, everythingis changing along with the shifts of society. So that job is just a job. If thereare other jobs available then you can try to switch to one of those. If therearen't, then just go ahead and do the one you have, since that's how societyis now.While we're on this topic I'll bring up another thing. Often when Wester-ners go to casinos they are there in fact for fun and recreation. But withChinese people, and Asians from some other countries, they go there to re-ally gamble, and they even gamble a lot of money. Their reasons for goingare different.Disciple: You said that Dafa disciples can't achieve Consummation whilein debt, but I bought a house with a mortgage of $50,000, and it will takethirty years to pay off. (Audience laughs) How should I handle this?Teacher: Nothing among human beings is by chance. If you have a loanfrom the bank and it is going to take you decades to pay it off, yet Dafa dis-ciples all need to reach Consummation, then you can't wait for decades,right? So how will these things be handled? Well, these things involvemankind's next stage. And in that case, during mankind's next stage the se-tup of human society and how society is will change. Also, when Dafa dis-ciples are really about to reach Consummation, Master will need to resolveand take care of everything for you. Actually, at that time you will yourselfhave the ability to handle such things. (Applause) This is a different matterfrom what I discussed earlier, as this is something that happens in the nor-mal course of a person's life. [The problem is when] some students are thin-king, "I can borrow money without paying it back. I'll just leave and that

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will be the end of it." (Audience laughs) That starting point doesn't work.You can't have the wrong motive.Disciple: (Translated question) I have practiced for a year and a half now,and I have benefited greatly and in many ways. I thank you from the bottomof my heart.Teacher: Those things are all things that you have validated and enlighte-ned to. Master is just helping you along. If you can steadfastly make it tothe end and not be swayed, and if despite the different forms of interferenceyou encounter, you can truly, steadfastly keep going, then you don't need tothank me--all of the cosmos's gods will admire you! (Applause)Disciple: Dafa disciples from twenty-one countries and six regions--Shan-dong, Changsha City in Hunan Province, Hengyang, Foshan City inGuangdong Province, Heyuan, Guangzhou, Maoming, the City of Zhongs-han, Dongwan, Shenzhen, Hainan, Shanxi, Chengdu, Luzhou, Guiyang,Jiamusi, Fushun, Taiyuan, Anshan, Beijing, Beijing's Fengtai district andChongwen district, Beijing University, Qinghua University, Tangshan, Shi-jiazhuang, Chengde, Tianjin, Zhanjiang, Dalian, Yantai, Benxi, Qinhuang-dao, Shanghai, Kunming, Xinjiang, Fuzhou, Hubei, Hunan, Hefei, Harbin,Kaian, Shanxi, Nanjing, Liaoning, Inner Mongolia, Hohhot (audiencelaughs), Holland, Japan, New Zealand, France, Germany, Indonesia, Sin-gapore, England, Australia, Denmark, Nepal, Taiwan, Macau, Sweden, To-ronto, San Francisco in California, Auckland, San Jose, Cupertino, Malay-sia, Argentina, Hong Kong, India, Turkey, the Caribbean, Vietnam--sendtheir greetings to venerable Master!Teacher: Thank you all. (Enthusiastic applause)

I have answered all of the questions. No matter how much I say, you stillhave to walk the path of cultivation yourselves. To walk this path well andprogress to its end--nothing is more extraordinary. I say that because duringthe journey you will have hardships, tests of every sort, unforeseen ordeals,and you will have unexpected interference from all kinds of attachmentsand emotion. The interference will come from family, society, good fri-ends, and even fellow cultivators. And along with this there is interferencefrom changes in the state of human society and from human notions thatwere formed in society. All of those things can drag you back to being likean ordinary person. But if you can break through all of it, you can advancetowards godhood. So as a cultivator, what is truly remarkable is when youcan be steadfast and have righteous thoughts so firm that nothing can swayyou. Be solid and firm like diamond, or granite, and then nothing can affectyou--evil will be afraid at the mere sight of you. If upon encounteringtrying circumstances your thinking can be truly righteous, then, when facedwith the evil's persecution and when faced with interference, just one sen-tence of yours fortified with steadfast righteous thoughts can instantly ma-ke the evil disintegrate (applause), and it will make those who are beingused by the evil turn and flee, it will make the evil's persecution of you dis-

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solve, and it will make the evil's interfering with you disappear without atrace. One thought born of righteous faith is all it takes. And whoever canhold firm that righteous thought and go the distance will become a magnifi-cent god forged by Dafa. (Long applause)I look forward to hearing more good things from you. (Enthusiastic applau-se)[1] The Chinese term here, genji, has been translated elsewhere as inborn quality, base, innate base, etc.[2] The Chinese term here, yuanshen, has been translated elsewhere as chief spirit, master soul, primordialspirit, etc.[3] Or "Fa King."[4] Translator's note: The Chinese term here, ru lai, could be rendered as "thus come," as in "the Thus-Co-me One." The explanation given in the text here thus relates to the sense and meaning of the two Chinesecharacters ru and lai. We have followed convention in using the Sanskrit gloss "Tathagata."The translation is subject to further improvement so as to be closer to the original text. Last updated: Oc-tober 22, 2005.

Teaching the Fa at the 2005 Manhattan Interna-tional Fa Conference

(Li Hongzhi, April 24, 2005, New York City)(Enthusiastic applause)Good afternoon, everyone! (Enthusiastic applause) (Audience: Good after-noon, Master!)You've been working hard! (Applause) As Dafa disciples you have beenthrough trials and tribulations, and you have been tempered and becomemore and more mature. The same holds true whether you are Dafa disciplesin Mainland China or Dafa disciples outside the Mainland--you are beco-ming increasingly rational, increasingly clearheaded, and increasingly awa-re of how you should walk your paths. Now, when you are confronted withpersecution, and confronted with all sorts of negative opinions, you canhandle it rationally. And when you clarify the facts, you do that out of a de-sire to save sentient beings, so you have a great impact.The current situation shows that now, and especially since the publicationof the Nine Commentaries, many of the world's people have woken up. TheChinese people, more than others, have been kept in the dark for too longby the Party culture's false appearances that were created by the evil Com-munist ideology. People are gradually becoming clearheaded and theirown, true natures are reviving. Since the publication of the Nine Commen-taries, you have experienced a great many things, things of all kinds--bothpositive and negative. Most notably, on a daily basis thousands of peoplehave been withdrawing from the Party, and this has terrified the malevolentParty's evil specter and the bad people. Now, before its imminent collapse,the evil is once again saying--as it riles people up, confuses and poisonspeople, and makes up lies--that we are doing political things. Even thoughyou really aren't doing political things it insists that you are. Whenever theyhave persecuted and attacked people, they have always made up lies, riled

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people up, and attempted to justify their persecution. And when they attacksomebody they always call the person whatever names they feel like callinghim. Dafa disciples just do the things that Dafa disciples are supposed todo. They are clearheaded and rational, and they know what they are doing,and none of the evil lies or the accusations that stem from the Party culturecan interfere with or jar them.When it comes to cultivators, no ordinary people's approaches, ploys, per-secution, incitement, or confusion and poisoning can affect them, and evenless do those things work on Dafa disciples. The persecution has beengoing on for so long now, and yet what's laughable is that those rogues, ro-gue spies, and ringleaders of the rogue gang who have had a hand in perse-cuting Dafa disciples still haven't managed to see who Dafa disciples are,they still don't know what these cultivators are really about, and they stilltry to use those ordinary human approaches on them. Isn't that laughable?Indeed, it's true that when ordinary people look at the surface things, whenthey look at things with ordinary people's thinking, and especially whenthey look at things with the Party culture's warped logic and notions, theycan't understand the realm or state of mind of a cultivator. When they lookwith ordinary human thoughts, nothing matches up; none of the approachesthat the bad people have used in the persecution have worked. So neverwill any attempt by those at this human level to affect levels and realmshigher than the human world meet with success.Since the publication of the Nine Commentaries, many ordinary peoplewho have been influenced by the lies of the malevolent Party's evil specterhave been saying that we are getting political. But as you all know, we ha-ven't "gotten political." Even if people who are being persecuted do get po-litical, that's not something to be ashamed of; it's only logical and natural.But none of what we have done has a political motive behind it; we don'tdo things with political motives. How could true cultivators possibly get in-volved with worldly politics? Fa-rectification is taking place in the cosmos,and right now cultivators of Dafa are validating the Fa and their goal is tosave sentient beings. During the Fa-rectification period, for the purpose ofvalidating the Fa Dafa disciples can make use of any form in ordinary soci-ety that is favorable for the Fa-rectification, but even then they only usethings selectively based on what is needed to save sentient beings. [That isall right] because everything in the Three Realms was formed for the Fa-rectification. When you see sentient beings who need to be saved, what'scrucial is getting the beings saved. When we use these things of the humanworld, it is done only after carefully considering what sentient beings canunderstand and what can help them be saved. The formation of the ThreeRealms was for today's Fa-rectification, and all of the myriad things andsentient beings in the Three Realms came for the Fa-rectification, werecreated for the Fa-rectification, and were formed for the Fa-rectification. Inother words, all of the sentient beings and the myriad things came here forthis. And every event here has been established, created, and formed for the

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Fa-rectification. So during this Fa-rectification Dafa disciples can use atwill any method that makes it easier to save sentient beings, so long as it'ssomething the world's people can understand and can thus be savedthrough. All the same, we have been using things selectively and in a goodand upright way.Let's take the Nine Commentaries as an example. The primary goal of pu-blishing the Nine Commentaries was to expose the CCP's nature so thatpeople who had been deceived by the CCP could see it for what it is and re-cognize the CCP's evilness, and thus be saved. It was [done] because whenDafa disciples were clarifying the truth, a lot of people refused to listen, forthey were under the influence of the malevolent Party's evil specter and theParty culture's propaganda that was utilized by the CCP's bad people. A lotof people would abruptly say, "If the Party says you are bad, you're bad."And a lot of people whose thinking was warped by the Party's culturewould say, "If I were in that position I too would have suppressed it, likethe CCP has." In addition, many people are still deceived and they believevery much in what is said by the CCP-controlled propaganda machine; theyeven still believe the CCP's rogue regime and still take its wicked doctrinesas truth. With that situation before us, what should we do? Can we just cea-se to be compassionate? Can we not save those people, then? We of coursehave to save them. As I have always said, none of today's Chinese peopleare simple or ordinary. Don't be fooled by the fact that the human skinlooks the same--the person that's in charge of it is actually no longer who itused to be, and in most cases beings that descended from high levels are incharge. And a great many kings from different nations throughout historyreincarnated in China. So the group of people in China today is far from or-dinary. It's just that when a person reincarnates or a divine being comesdown to this world he enters the delusion, and people in delusion are sus-ceptible to being used. But they were all meant to obtain the Fa and be sa-ved, and they have great predestined connections.With many beings, if they come to the Three Realms they have no way toget back to where they came from. No being in history who came here toassume human form has made it back. And in no past case where peoplesuccessfully cultivated into gods or Buddhas was it that person himselfwho truly succeeded. It was always the person's assistant soul that used theperson's main body to cultivate, whereas the person's true, master soul--thevery person himself--never cultivated to success. In the cases of those whocultivated well, after a lifetime of cultivating someone in their image did in-deed cultivate to success, but that was the assistant soul, whereas the mas-ter soul--or, that person--had to reenter the cycle of rebirth. In other words,think about why so many high-level beings dared to take such a perilousrisk and come to the Three Realms. They are gods, so how could we not sa-ve them? Didn't they come to obtain the Fa? If you look at it from anotherperspective, wasn't their bravery in coming here a way of validating the Fa-rectification and placing their hope in the Fa-rectification? That's why I ha-

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ve said that we cannot leave them behind, and that we must save them andthink of ways to save them! Even though they may be confused at the mo-ment, or they may have lost their capacity to recognize truth or reality,owing to their concepts being warped by the Party culture over time, westill have to find ways to save them.Right now the biggest obstacle is that the Party culture is influencing sen-tient beings and rendering them unable to see or listen to the truth. Withthat situation at hand, the Nine Commentaries were published with the pur-pose of helping people to see the CCP's fundamental nature. After seeingits evil nature clearly and learning that the malevolent Party has corruptedour culture, a lot of people have stopped saying that they believe in the Par-ty, and a lot of people have stopped believing in that rogue government.Our goal and starting point are not political in nature, and we don't want or-dinary people's political power. We are saving people! If the CCP, while inits death throes, still tries to use different tactics to tamper with the salva-tion of sentient beings, then we have other ways to deal with it--the BuddhaFa is boundless! (Enthusiastic applause)This Fa-rectification set out to save all beings. Whether a being was goodor bad, or however big the mistakes he had made in the course of history,none of that would be held against him. When the entire cosmos has gonebad, in some cases you know certain beings have done wrong, and in somecases you don't, so what point is there in determining who is good and whoisn't, or who is up to par and who isn't? So those things weren't going to belooked at, and everyone was to be saved. But there is one thing, which isthe most crucial of all: the Fa-rectification of the cosmos cannot be interfe-red with. Then as for all of the beings in this entire cosmos, including thebeings and people in the Three Realms, their attitudes today toward Dafaare of utmost importance. That was the only standard--we were going tolook only at the beings' attitudes toward Dafa today. So in other words, theintention before wasn't to eliminate that malevolent CCP even though ithad done every conceivable evil deed, created that wicked Party culture,and murdered countless people and other lives. That was because in Fa-rec-tification everything that is not upright could have been rectified, andthings wouldn't have even needed cultivators to deal directly with them orfix them--those things would have been rectified at a fundamental level du-ring the Fa-rectification. In other words, those matters wouldn't have beentouched at the surface level at all. Even those evil specters of the malevo-lent Party could have been rectified and turned into good beings. But du-ring this Fa-rectification, what was beneficial to society at the ordinary peo-ple's level [became persecuted]. During the years when Falun Gong wasdisseminated in Chinese society, it led to fundamental changes in manypeople's outlooks there, their moral standard improved and they becamephysically healthy. The CCP knows that its political power is illegitimate,so it has repeatedly barked about "stability" and desired to protect its politi-cal power. Of course, those are all ordinary people's affairs and we ignore

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what they do. But when Dafa was disseminated in China, wasn't that goodfor the people in that society? Didn't it effectively stabilize that society?When people wanted to do good, when all of them were fulfilling their res-ponsibilities at work, and when all of them were acting as good people inevery situation, that mental strength was turning into material strength, sothink about how much economic benefit it would have brought to the coun-try and its people, and how much good it would have done. It helped bringthe populace's moral standards back up--think about how stable that societywould have become. And who was governing that society, so who wouldhave benefited from that? Wasn't that obvious? But that evil-specter-pos-sessed malevolent Party and its gang of bad people, who were accustomedto doing evil at will and without restraint, nonetheless chose to persecuteus. Then, well, since they chose persecution, from the day that they chosepersecution the gods decided to have them weeded out. They will have topay for everything they have done to the Disciples of Dafa during the per-secution and for poisoning the world's people. But in fact their even greatersin is that they interfered with the Fa-rectification.You know, in Fa-rectification a lot of the beings in other dimensions arebeing eliminated instantaneously as the Fa-rectification's mighty currentpasses through. It's done very quickly. No matter how fast the overall Fa-rectification pushes forward, though, it still requires a process. That's be-cause the cosmos's dimensions consist of different times. Each planet hasits own time, each particle has its own time, each area formed by particleshas its own time, and each area formed by planets has its own time. Thearea of the nine major planets, the Milky Way, other galaxies, the entiretyof all galaxies, this universe, the universes beyond this universe, the univer-ses of greater reaches... all of them have their own times. The times in eachof these universes and cosmic bodies are different, and the differences arehuge. Looking at it from the perspective of the entire cosmos, it seems thatthis Fa-rectification of the cosmos is completed as fast as a wave of thehand. But as that hand is waved, the time in certain dimensions is so fastthat tens of thousands of years have passed. In some dimensions time elap-ses almost at the same rate as the wave of the hand. In some it takes hun-dreds of years or thousands of years. In this place of human beings it's real-ly not so bad--it has been just over a dozen years since the Fa-rectificationbegan. Of course, though, Master was working on this even before impar-ting the Fa. The fact is, it has progressed very swiftly. Those evil spectersand bad people who have done evil to Dafa disciples are doing it only du-ring this difference in time before the arrival here of Fa-rectification. Thetime it takes is in fact very brief. If mankind's time had been arranged toprogress at the same rate as Fa-rectification, then this would have been overin the time it takes for a wave of the hand. It feels like time drags here atthis human place, but it actually is moving really fast. Since Fa-rectifica-tion's speed has to be very fast, the speed at which it is pushing forwardsurpasses all times in the cosmos. The old forces in the cosmos are also

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operating quickly in order to interfere with Fa-rectification, and the time inthe Three Realms has sped up in conjunction with that.I've told you before that time here among human beings has become reallyfast. I have talked to you about that on several occasions, and [the pace ofit] changed a number of times. At one point I said that one day now passesin what used to be the passage of a second, and later I told you that oneyear now passes in what used to be the passage of a minute. But eventhough the pace has been so fast, the beings in here can't detect it. And thatis because the objects inside this place and all of this place's factors are, ac-cordingly, going at a faster pace. Time and space have created different en-vironments in the cosmos and different forms of dimensions. The beingsand all things that are here are accelerating along with the time. That is whyyou can't feel it accelerating. Not only is the Fa-rectification pushing for-ward at a rapid pace, the old state of affairs is operating at an acceleratingspeed as well. With all that, the time now is very brief. The matter that ma-kes up human beings has its limitations, so if time goes too fast, the sen-tient beings in the Three Realms won't be able to bear it. It has almost rea-ched the limit now of what human beings can adapt to in terms of time. Theonly way human beings can detect time's acceleration and how it comparesto before, is by a sense they might have based on their impressions. And ol-der people know this even better: before, it felt like a person could do a lotin a day, one day felt long, and it seemed as though it would never get dark,whereas now dusk comes soon after dawn and it gets dark before you havedone much. Another thing is, the capacity of the human body wouldn't keepup [if time were sped up too much]. The matter in each layer is subject tothat layer's limitations, so the material elements wouldn't be able to keepup. The speed of Fa-rectification is, in fact, extremely rapid. No matter howrampant or ferocious those evil beings may seem, their terrible end is immi-nent! (Enthusiastic applause)So since the publication of the Nine Commentaries, through clarifying thefacts and saving sentient beings Dafa disciples have really helped manypeople come to understand the true situation. And notably, many people ha-ve wanted to withdraw from the Party and separate themselves from thatevil thing. Let's consider it further. Some people might say, "I don't need torenounce the Party. I know that it's no good, and I stopped paying dues along time ago." But this is not a case where you can just think about it andthat will count. Back when you enthusiastically raised your fist and made adeadly pledge to that blood-red flag, you said that you would give your lifeto it, that you would devote your entire life to it. So if today you don't pu-blicly declare your intentions and withdraw, how could it count? You thinkthat just having had that thought in your mind counts? People's thoughts areunstable. A person's brain is just a processing center, and all kinds of mes-sages and information go through the human brain, play out and displaythemselves, and affect that person. The origins of a person's thoughts areextremely complex. So if you want to judge a person's attitude, what he

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does, and what kind of person he is, you have to go by his actions. Histhoughts don't count. Why should we always go by a person's actions? If aperson wants to do something bad, you can't charge him with a crime befo-re he does it; only after he does it can you charge him. That's because thesource of a person's thoughts and the thoughts themselves are extremelyunstable. A person has a master soul and an assistant soul(s), he has allkinds of notions that have been formed after birth, and both good and evilare part of his nature. Also there are external factors that play a part. A per-son's actions are the true reflection of that person. So the way gods see it,the evil specter and the malevolent Party have already been incriminatedbecause they have persecuted Dafa disciples and interfered with the Fa-rec-tification. They now consider them the most evil and have decided to elimi-nate them. How will they be eliminated, then? And who will be included inthe elimination? Will it be enough just to eliminate the malevolent Party'sevil specters? Members of the Party and the Youth League who have hel-ped the malevolent Party's evil specter do bad things are doing its evil bid-ding in this world. Put another way, even if you haven't done anything bad,when you are one of its members you are a component that fortifies it, aparticle of the evil, and thus a target for elimination. What's more, [the evilspecter(s)] is having an effect on all of the dimensions in the Three Realms,especially the human world. A lot of people became part of it without beingforced to and are willingly being used by it and helping it. That being thecase, then isn't what CCP members have in store for them terrifying?For a long time that malevolent Party with its evil specter has deliberatelydragged into its ranks people who are accomplished, capable, and outstan-ding figures so as to strengthen itself, show that it is great, and make it lookas if it really is made up of stellar individuals. The truth is, even the evilknows that those people aren't necessarily sincere, and that is why they arevictimized whenever a [CCP] political movement comes along. When it'stime to settle accounts with the malevolent Party, though, and when theFa's rectification of the human world really takes place, none of that will betaken into consideration; as long as you are a member of it, everything willbe instantly purged in the process. Because Dafa disciples are saving sen-tient beings, they have been informing people of the truth--even as they arebeing severely persecuted--by fully utilizing every opportunity and riskingtheir own safety. They have told the world's people about these things andare saving them. Some people won't listen, though, and by refusing to lis-ten, well, they have given their stance. Some people have read [the Com-mentaries] but still don't want to withdraw, in which case their not withdra-wing has likewise given their stance.Dafa disciples have been doing what they're doing out of compassion and awish to save people, giving their best effort, and doing all they can to savepeople. So from day one to the present we have always been saving sen-tient beings and we have never done anything specifically to achieve someworldly political thing. We don't care about political power. A cultivator's

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goal is to go beyond the human world and achieve the Consummation ofhis being. When he is attached to getting worldly things or to self-interesthe can't reach Consummation. When a cultivator cultivates in this world heis to get rid of all sorts of human attachments, and only then can he becomea divine being. Otherwise, any attachment or any element in the humanworld that weighs on your mind becomes a lock that fastens you down andprevents you from leaving. That's why when you validate Dafa and savesentient beings you cultivate yourself at the same time. You're all veryclear on that. In other words, we don't seek human things whatsoever.Ordinary people--people who haven't obtained the Fa, people who don'tknow what Dafa disciples are about, and outsiders to cultivation--are inca-pable of understanding Dafa and Dafa disciples. In the minds of people to-day self-interest is number one. There are a lot of democracy activists andpeople from various non-governmental political groups who also opposethe malevolent CCP. But I find that it's hard for them to accomplish things.And some of their behavior is really poor, and troubling. If they were reallyentrusted with political power there, would it work? They are so stronglyattached to self-interest. Now, even before they have done much, whentheir self-interest is involved and at stake, they start fighting among them-selves before moving on to do anything else. How could gods entrust themwith responsibility over a nation? (Applause) So, human beings... they havereached this stage, and I'm not talking just about certain individuals... thestate of the entire society and the morals in society are both going downhillfast. They are quickly going downhill without people realizing it, and peo-ple have become small-minded without realizing it. Their attachment toself-interest has surpassed their political aspirations, their political pursuits,and their desire to fight for their goals. What I'm saying is, moral values areimportant for ordinary people too. If someone's values are lacking gods re-ally look down on him. With any person, any being, only when he has bothaspirations and morals can he accomplish things, to be sure. When the Farectifies the human world, or, prior to that, when the malevolent CCP falls,who will govern [China]? We Dafa disciples won't govern it, for we arecultivators, people whose bodies are in the secular world but whose mindsare beyond it. And we're not interested in political power there anyway.(Applause) Who will be fit, then? Gods will look for those who have greataspirations, who have the ability, and have high moral values. That you cancount on! As for those everyday people who are able to validate Dafa todayand who break away from the malevolent CCP--and I'm not talking aboutDafa disciples--you are extraordinary, and my hope is that, if you trulywant to accomplish some things in society, you will begin to place impor-tance on refining your behavior. Only then will you be able to live up to amajor responsibility like that.What I was just talking about were peripheral things. With cultivators thereis actually no need to talk about those things, but I did so because I knowthat in the audience today there are some new students as well as people

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who are not yet Dafa disciples. Whatever the case, I want what is good forpeople. Having reincarnated in China in this life, I, Li Hongzhi, have adeep understanding of that nation and I want what's good for it, too. (Ap-plause) Since time is limited and you still have papers to present, I won'ttalk more. (Applause, asking Master to stay longer) If I say too much it willinterfere with the current state of affairs wherein you validate the Fa, be-cause students will ask a lot of questions that aren't related to the current si-tuation of validating the Fa. If I said a lot today it would dilute the thingsthat you need to do at present. So we should attend to the current circums-tances and not dilute the things that now need to be done. That's basicallyhow things are now. If there are new things that need to be done, Dafa dis-ciples will naturally know.I'd like to take this opportunity to tell you this: while saving sentientbeings, don't forget to cultivate yourselves. (Applause) You need to do allof the three things. You should always keep your thoughts righteous, andwhen you are confronted with evil or with certain situations, you shouldsend forth righteous thoughts a lot; you need to clarify the truth and savesentient beings, but even more so should you cultivate yourselves well. Ifyou don't cultivate yourselves well you won't have mighty virtue, what yousay will not be in line with the Fa, and then you can't possibly save sentientbeings. When what you say has no mighty virtue and no power, it will haveno effect, and the evil will capitalize on that. What's more, if you don't cul-tivate yourselves well and your righteous thoughts are lacking, when youhandle certain things you will tend to slip into human ways of thinking, andthen you won't be able to have the effect of saving sentient beings. A lot ofordinary people are helping Dafa disciples do things, as a matter of fact, butthey are ordinary people doing the things of Dafa disciples. You, on the ot-her hand, are Dafa disciples. What you are doing are things you are suppo-sed to do, and you are establishing your mighty virtue and moving towardsConsummation on a divine path. So it will not work if you don't cultivateyourselves. I won't say more on this. I won't take up more of your time.Study the Fa a lot, read the book a lot.No matter how hard things may be for Dafa disciples and how trying yourjourney may be, your future is bright. More and more, you are seeing howbright your future is and are becoming clear about the kind of path youwant to take. Master has prepared the best of everything for you, but youneed to make it there! (Warm applause)Having gotten to where they are today, Dafa disciples have won the admi-ration of beings at all levels, high and low, and the evil beings are scared,terrified. Right now the evil beings are basically following, in an irrationalway, the factors originally arranged by the old forces; they are being usedand are doing things that interfere with the Fa-rectification. Some evilbeings get up and flee the moment they are in proximity to Dafa disciples.Some tremble with fear, hesitant, while they do bad things now. So Dafadisciples should not be afraid, and they should handle everything in an

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upright and dignified way. It is the evil beings that are scared. At the begin-ning of the persecution Dafa disciples appeared to be isolated, and that wasbecause there were so many evil factors at that time. But in reality they we-ren't isolated even then, as there were gods and Master's Law Bodiesaround, there was gong, and the side of you that had been fully cultivatedwas there. Things are even better today. Many of the evil factors are gone,the malevolent Party's evil specters are fewer, and the field Dafa has for-med in the world has become enormous, with its density being very highnow. The main thing the field is doing is helping Dafa disciples in savingsentient beings and in restraining the evil beings, particularly the majorones. So it basically leaves the mundane affairs of ordinary people alone. Ifthis field were to produce a widespread effect, the effect would be quite sig-nificant and would far surpass the evil field of the wicked CCP. Meanwhi-le, the field of the evil-specter-ridden malevolent Party is dissolving andshrinking dramatically. So the evil beings are terrified.In fact, [Dafa's] field not only helps Dafa disciples with what they aredoing, it also encourages the world's people, builds up the courage of theChinese people both inside and outside Mainland China, helps them to freethemselves from the control of those evil factors, and has a positive effecton all fronts. So I hope you will do even better in the journey ahead, beupright and dignified, have stronger righteous thoughts, and do even better.No matter what situation you may encounter or in what circumstances youmay find yourself, you have to be like a Dafa disciple and you can't act im-pulsively. You need to have enough righteous thoughts. (Applause)The form and state of the cultivation that Dafa disciples practice today aredifferent from the cultivation forms of the past. You are the ones who aretruly saving sentient beings on a broad scale, and you are the ones who tru-ly have such a great mission. That is why the state you manifest is comple-tely different from that in the cultivation of the past. And for precisely the-se reasons, it is even more important that you not neglect your own cultiva-tion or use these things to make excuses for your shortcomings. So I hopeyou will do well on the path ahead. Okay, I'll end here, that's all I will saytoday. (Long and enthusiastic applause)

Teaching the Fa at the 2005 Canada Fa Confer-ence

(Li Hongzhi, May 22, 2005, in Toronto)(Enthusiastic applause) Good morning! (Applause) (Audience: "Good mor-ning, Master!")I remember that, before July 20, 1999, our Toronto Fa conference was heldhere. (Enthusiastic applause) At that time, when the evil CCP's suppressionand persecution were about to begin, I said something to you: I said thatjust by remaining unmoved you could handle all situations. (Enthusiastic

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applause) Of course, some students grasped what I said, while others tookit to mean, don't do anything, don't take any action. (Teacher laughs) (Eve-ryone laughs) Being "unmoved" refers to a person's steadfast righteousthoughts and righteous faith being unmoved. It wasn't about ignoring a Da-fa disciple's responsibility of saving beings and not even taking the path ofcultivating and improving yourselves through ordeals. How could thatwork? So however it was people did, it's cultivation, after all, so each per-son had a different understanding and each had taken up Dafa having diffe-ring degrees of human attachment; in the cultivation process there are hu-man thoughts that are hard to remove, and this makes for different unders-tandings and grasps of the Fa. So amidst this ordeal, different students' un-derstandings of Dafa and the amounts of their attachments have been fullyshown, and you have seen how differently people have acted during thepersecution. This persecution was forced upon us and it is not to be ack-nowledged, but through the persecution shortcomings in cultivation haveindeed been seen, just as the magnificent side of Dafa disciples has beenseen. For you to have followed Master to this point and come through thepersecution, that indeed is magnificent! (Enthusiastic applause)I've said that if it were not for this persecution, Dafa disciples' cultivationwould have taken another form. Of course, what's past is past, and it's basi-cally a moot point now. But with things as they are, in these circumstances,it truly is magnificent when genuine Dafa disciples can really keep firmand improve themselves in the Fa, save sentient beings while negating thepersecution, and make it to where they are today. You have seen how wic-ked, harsh, and underhanded the persecution has been, and on top of that, ithas something that sets it apart from the persecutions of disciples of enligh-tened beings in the past: throughout history, persecutions were done out inthe open, whereas today, the evil CCP has in its hands all the wicked expe-riences and filthy tactics from the persecutions of people in the course ofhistory, so in this persecution and wicked suppression, many unspeakabletactics have been carried out on the sly. So when it comes to helping theworld's people learn about this, helping society to become alarmed, havingthe world's people react in outrage at this persecution, or leading them tovoice their support of Dafa disciples--this seems very hard to do. The rea-son is, the evil has been concealing the truth, and their persecutory tacticshave been terribly wicked. Never before has something like this happened.It is the product of the wicked Communist Party having accumulated forover a century the most wicked of experiences, and they are covering uptheir criminal acts in the persecution in an extremely secretive way.In other words, this ordeal that was forced upon Dafa disciples is withoutprecedent in history. Back when the persecution first began, the [bad peo-ple] did things publicly, and they tried in vain to suppress Dafa discipleswith a sinister, overwhelming atmosphere in which it felt as if the worldwas collapsing. But the evil forces, the rotten demons, and the malevolentParty couldn't succeed. Later on they realized that their approach would, as

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time went on, draw international attention and aggravate the Chinese peo-ple, and the broader public would support Dafa disciples and the effort tothwart the persecution. So they gradually made the persecution into a co-vert one. Then, for one thing, it looked on the surface like the malevolentCCP had again won a victory, and secondly, it painted a false picture wherethings seemed calm and harmonious on the surface. Meanwhile, behind thescenes it continued to underhandedly persecute Dafa disciples in a sinisterfashion. In the latter stages it has gotten to the point that even the CCP'sstate-controlled radio stations, television stations, and newspapers no lon-ger mention it. But it has never let up in its means of oppressive persecu-tion. These are the persecutory means of a gangster regime, the likes ofwhich have never been seen before. You have seen that under these cir-cumstances the mainstream media outlets of each country around the worldhave, for the most part, not reported on the persecution of Dafa disciples,keeping silent while crimes and sins are committed.Of course, there is another factor, which is that China has now become aneconomic marketplace for the entire world, and many countries like thelooks of the investment conditions there. It's not that the CCP has excepti-onal resources, or that the CCP has changed for the better and improvedChina's situation, or that the wicked Communist Party has some great ap-proach, and thereby attracts investors from all over the world. In reality it'squite simple: the CCP has made the Chinese people poor and fearful, andso they want to save up more money; also, the Chinese people's work ethichas led them to work steadily and long term at their jobs. That has attractedinvestors. In many cultures, once people have made some money they stopworking, and they won't work again until they have spent it. But the Chine-se people, having been made poor and fearful by the CCP, have this charac-teristic that they want to keep saving up money, and so, as long as they cankeep saving money they will keep working. That has attracted a great manyinvestors who need a stable workforce, especially one of technical person-nel. So the wicked CCP has seized upon this frame of mind that the Chine-se have, and it has been using the Chinese people and using the investors'funds and massive amounts of financial, material, and human resources tosuppress people and persecute Falun Gong. And so it is that many coun-tries, out of economic interest, haven't given a stance on the persecution.Through the persecution we've seen that nothing advocated for in humansociety is reliable. There are many people around the world who talk abouthuman rights, and there are many countries that pay lip service to freedomof belief, to the point that seemingly everybody the world over takes thesethings to be life's most basic needs, a person's most crucial rights. But whenthe CCP persecutes the Chinese people and tramples on their human rightsand freedom of belief in a terribly evil and severe way, many governmentsand media throughout the world have remained silent. In other words, whenmaterial gain is at stake, all of that talk about freedom of belief and humanrights suddenly means nothing to them. As for people's consciences, well,

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we can see that in this circumstance people's so-called consciences likewisebecome nothing. It turns out such things are promoted just as a means toguard certain people's practical, vested interests. Dafa, on the other hand, isthe real Truth of the cosmos that you have come to understand through cul-tivation. It is forever unchanging and immutable. Its upright teachings areto be upheld in all situations and circumstances; they are what people needto follow no matter the situation. In any circumstances, as long as the culti-vator's righteous thoughts are strong, he can gain improvement, guidance,and assistance from it, thereby strengthening his righteous thoughts andhelping him to ward off interference from whatever human tactics or eviltemptations might come his way. This is the cosmos's Law and man's righ-teous belief in gods, and it is the manifestation of the Truth as cultivatorsprogress in elevating themselves. Nothing that ordinary people tout for thepurpose of guarding ordinary people's interests can compare to it. In otherwords, all of this transcends ordinary people, and that is why Dafa disciplescan make it through the persecution.Along with those two reasons, there is actually another factor at the mostfundamental level that is behind the many governments and almost all themajor media around the world not taking a stance. And that is, the old for-ces' factors in the old cosmos have been blocking off all of the world's peo-ple who haven't obtained the Fa, not letting them get involved in this affair.Their goal is to have the Dafa disciples be "tested" in certain locales. If theworld's people did get involved, then the "tests" of Dafa disciples wouldn'tbe that wicked or reach the goal of determining, through the harsh, cruel"tribulations" that they designed for them, whether Dafa disciples are up topar. That's the ultimate reason why they have done this.No matter what, though, throughout the persecution Dafa disciples and Ihave fully resisted the persecution. So while we completely resist this per-secution, to follow your Master's requirements, my requirements, and main-tain the unique cultivation state that you have, and to do well everythingyou are responsible for as a Dafa disciple--that is what it means to be dili-gent. I've told you before that, when it comes to cultivation, any cultivatorin the past would, like you, have a tough cultivation predicament, one ofgrueling, long-term tests. And especially when a person cultivates withthings that benefit him in practical ways right around him, that's truly hard.Many chances to gain are right there, tempting cultivators, and when youlet down your guard just a little bit, your thinking, your understanding, andeven your human thoughts will lead you to drift along with the current. Sothis form of cultivation is very hard. But because it's hard, seen from a dif-ferent angle, it shows that the Dafa disciples today are able to cultivate tohigh levels. If the environment were not so trying, then the direct tests ofthe cultivator's human surface and of the main body of that person's beingwould not be so intense.You know, whether it was religions or the various cultivation forms in his-tory, they weren't responsible for the outermost surface of the person, the

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true figure, in the person's cultivation. In other words, it didn't matter tothem whether the person's master soul (zhu yuanshen) could succeed in cul-tivation. That's why most of them involved cultivating for extended periodsin a state of stillness (ding). The various states that manifest when attach-ments are removed in stillness can act only upon the cultivator's subordina-te soul (fu yuanshen). But this form of practice, one in which Dafa disciplescultivate in human society, has the cultivators' remaining human attach-ments and the many temptations of self-interest for the person at the surfa-ce manifest in a most direct way. And this leads to an emphasis on the cul-tivation of the cultivator who is at the surface, thus making changes in thesurface human side the key. This then becomes the most challenging pointof emphasis in cultivation. On top of that, the premise is that the person'smain body is the target of salvation and what is to be improved, so the truecultivation of the person becomes what is foremost, and the cultivation wayis such that the surface of the person is tested directly. The tests of the su-bordinate soul and the other beings present in the human body are not so di-rect, for they are all breaking through the delusion to some extent, whereasthe person [at the surface] is being directly tested by all the things thatcould benefit him in a practical way. That is what's unique about Dafa dis-ciples' cultivation. And that is what I meant when I said, "Human beingscan now truly cultivate into gods." I said that, "In form it is now truly theperson himself who is cultivating," because the human body has becomethe primary body in the cultivation process.Back when this Dafa was first taught, a lot of gods didn't understand, andtherefore said, "You value humans too much." The implication was, "Ins-tead of focusing on us, you are focusing on humans." Who ever took hu-mans seriously in the past? Human beings have so many attachments, theirconduct is so shoddy, and their reasoning is so muddled. "Why would youwant to save humans?" they thought. Of course, there are many reasons in-volved that they didn't know about. I have shared with you in past tea-chings that low-level gods don't know the true state of things at mankind'ssurface level. Over the course of so many years, so much has happened inhuman history, and the surface human beings have endured tremendousamounts in their various incarnations. Fa-rectification is saving all lives, sohow could those lives not be saved? When Dafa rectifies the Fa in the cos-mos, things are carried out in a way different from in any cultivation formof the past, where [the cultivation form] would be responsible for only oneparticular type of being or the beings within only a certain range. Fa-rectifi-cation is to save all beings that can be saved, which includes all forms of li-fe that are created by gods and are present in a person's main body. What'smore, many people have undergone great hardships over the course of thelong, drawn-out years, so how could they not be saved? Aren't humans theprimary beings in the Three Realms? Don't all of the beings in the ThreeRealms need to be saved? Then this cultivation form as well as the founda-tion that the human race has laid and the suffering that it has gone through

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over the course of the long years of history--isn't it exactly these things thathave enabled human beings to gain the greatest mighty-virtue of all time?And shouldn't these beings be deemed the most outstanding and consideredfirst for salvation? When this human place is made the base point of Fa-rec-tification, isn't it only fitting that the first priority be to set free this group ofbeings, human beings?Of course, it's none too simple. Everything of today was foreseen in thepast. Back when the Three Realms was first formed, arrangements began tobe made, and then in the human form at man's outermost surface the beingsand the conditions that would later be needed by the Fa-rectification periodwere gradually arranged, and this then allowed those beings to gain enor-mous mighty-virtue in the process of going through such long years. In ot-her words, what is at a human being's surface is not just simply a human.[Human beings'] deficient conduct and wisdom are the result of limitationsbrought about by the realm human beings are in, the environment of theThree Realms, and the standard used when man was created. This can't beperceived merely in the manifestations of things, because the higher a fac-tor's level is, the harder it is to detect it at the [level of the] human body'ssurface. With those things undetected, man's true situation has forever beenveiled from the beings at the multitude of levels. It's not that every godknows the relationship between the Three Realms and the cosmos. As youknow, over the course of history much culture and many prophecies werepassed on to human society, but of the gods, even those closest to the ThreeRealms don't know about many such things. Isn't that curious? So why isthat, then? Why don't they know? When human beings can comprehendcertain upright teachings found in some of the philosophies of the past, aswell as the highly accurate prophecies left here during the course of humanhistory, how could gods not know?There are actually many mysteries in the human world and in the Three Re-alms, and a lot of mysteries are unknown to gods. And there are great andnumerous differences between the time of mankind and those of many, ma-ny gods. Supposing a human being is a particle, then, a divine being that isthe size of a larger particle--speaking in terms of volume, that is--what hecan detect, be aware of, and know regarding the long, drawn-out history ofthe human world is quite limited. When it comes to a particle whose volu-me is smaller than the human race's particles, or a god who is smaller thana molecular particle, his time passes by very fast. That is why many beingsknow nothing about the essential history of the Three Realms, the reasonfor the Three Realms' existence, or the true meaning of life's existence. Agod doesn't really die, but he is reborn in his realm. I'll just use the word"rebirth" to describe it. He too starts over again owing to the [law of] for-mation-stasis-degeneration-destruction that has existed in the cosmos, simi-lar to how human beings go through birth, aging, sickness, and death andthen reincarnate. At the time of the cosmos's creation the principle of cycli-cal renewal was set in the Fa-truths, and so this phenomenon has similarly

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existed in the realms of gods. It's just that for gods, the time in their [res-pective realms] seems to be endless. Also, gods are aware of their own pro-cess of rebirth, unlike human beings, who find the idea of death terrifyingand who are unsure whether there is an afterlife. These things are part ofthe delusion and not things that humans are allowed to know. But gods, intheir divine state, do know them. It's just that when they are reborn theirmemory from before is erased--when they are reborn all memory of thepast is gone. That's how they are. But to them, everything is so long that it'sas if life never ends. In the process of rebirth they come to no longer knowabout things from the past. So over the long years not all gods in the cos-mos know the history that has unfolded in the Three Realms. And evenwith today's Fa-rectification, not all gods know what it is about, nor evencan all of them understand or see each step of Fa-rectification. The beingsof the numerous realms see Fa-rectification only when it is almost right be-fore them, they don't see it until it arrives. That's why the cosmos's beingshave acted in different ways in this Fa-rectification. Some have a positiveunderstanding, some have a negative one, and some have a passive one.That's how they are. All of the different ways we have seen human beingsact in today's human societies, I can tell you, are fairly similar to howthings are in the higher realms.Before July 20, 1999, back when Dafa was being spread widely, in whatkind of state were the beings and the gods of different realms? They weresaying, "Wow, Dafa is so great. What a pity such a good Law is taught tohumans, and done so when humans are at their worst." Some of themthought, "Perhaps only by spreading it in a time like this can the magnifi-cence of Dafa be shown." There were also beings who thought, "Li Hongz-hi is merciful, so let's push all of the bad things onto him and have himwork off the sins and karma." They seized the opportunity to do bad things.The karma that was pressing down [on me] was as enormous as the sky,and many gods who saw it were thinking, "Will he still be able to take it?"Though they had different thoughts and understandings among them, theroles they played were largely positive at the time. But once the persecutionbegan on July 20, 1999, their thinking changed. Great numbers of beings indiverse realms assumed a resigned, passive attitude and just watchedthings; they did nothing upon seeing the rotten demons do evil and carryout the persecution, as if they were watching to see if [I] would make itthrough. They thought, "If you can make it, then wow, that's simply extra-ordinary and I will support you." But, owing to the obstacles that arose af-ter the old forces and old beings were roused, and upon seeing the world befilled with an evil, overpowering force, the beings each had selfishthoughts. The majority thought, "It will be really hard for this to succeed. Ifit doesn't work I will be affected." So they didn't declare a stance. Almostall beings in the multitudinous realms were like that. What the Law of thecosmos intends to save is precisely the beings in the multitudinous realms.The requirements for the beings can't be too high, though. If everyone were

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so upright the cosmos wouldn't have needed Fa-rectification. Exactly be-cause beings have become like this, where they are no longer good, theyhave acted as they have. And that is how the gods acted towards this Fa-rectification and Dafa disciples.Of course, as the overall Fa-rectification continually pushes forward, the si-tuation in the world and that of the entire Three Realms changes constantly.The actions you have seen by people today bear much resemblance to howthings are in the heavens. Put differently, if the lives of many of the world'speople correspond to those of celestial bodies and have certain back-grounds, then think about it: doesn't [how they act here] relate directly tohow things are in higher realms at this time? Of course, humans at the ou-termost surface aren't clear on things. Right now many people are willingto step forward, because a lot of the different realms' beings and kings cansee that Dafa's success in Fa-rectification is unstoppable and certain. Soone after another they are giving their stance and showing it in their ac-tions. The final factors of the old cosmos saw the coming of this stage longago. There are many still higher, final beings in the cosmos, and eventhough they are not related to the old forces' factors, they are nonethelessold beings and are holding on to the concepts they formed after deviating.When they look at Dafa disciples they hold on to the deficiencies of thepast cosmos and its warped characteristics, and they are trying to uphold allof those things. They think that this kind of persecution can help Dafa dis-ciples cultivate. Their notions are having an obstructing effect, and they ha-ve created a partition between the surface world and other realms, hinde-ring people's understanding of the Fa. They think that only when somebodymakes it through under these circumstances is it acceptable, and that thebeings in the lower realms and the world's people can be kept only if theygive their stance under these circumstances. Making the choice under thesecircumstances does bespeak of a being's magnificence, but is it necessary tohave that state wherein they can't comprehend the Fa-rectification? Andmost importantly, the future cosmos doesn't want things done this way.And Fa-rectification doesn't acknowledge these negative, antagonistic fac-tors. Furthermore, it is a being's attitude towards Fa-rectification at this ti-me that is crucial, and this holds for those "final, highest" beings that try toinfluence Fa-rectification.The Fa-rectification affects the futures of all lives, instead of only Dafa dis-ciples, the world's people, or beings from different realms. Given the Fa-rectification's immensity, who could be left out? At the same time, becauseof the utmost importance of a being's attitude towards Fa-rectification, no-body has the right to seal off sentient beings and make them ignorantlycommit sins against Fa-rectification and Dafa. Meddling from those factorsof the old forces should never have happened in the first place. It is real on-ly when the sentient beings are able to look at this affair and take a positionwithout being controlled in any way and in the absence of interferencefrom any factor. When that's not the case, isn't what they devised a manifes-

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tation of their arranging certain beings to do good and certain beings to dobad things based on their wishes? Is that the true behavior of those beings?It's not! But as the situation currently stands, the cosmos's old, final factorsare still interfering with what is wanted and what needs to be establishedfor the future.Today the actions of the lives in this world that we witness are such thatdespite the old forces' influence, the beings and gods in different realms aregradually coming to approve of and support Dafa. This approval, however,isn't a true, unconditional acceptance of Dafa, Fa-rectification, and Dafadisciples, but instead the result of the great momentum of the Fa-rectifica-tion's success pervading the entire cosmic body, leaving them with no choi-ce. Of course, there is a significant portion of them that do truly unders-tand, for they can now see this trend of Fa-rectification and that everythingfor the future is sure to be achieved. Of course, the world's people aren't ac-tually aware of all of this. They can see only that [Falun Gong] hasn't beencowed by the persecution from the gangster-led CCP government, and theyhave shown a human-level realization, "Wow, that Falun Gong is some-thing. After all this time Falun Gong hasn't been scared into submission bythat wicked, evil CCP. Instead it has increasingly flourished and thrived,while the CCP has destroyed itself in the process of persecuting FalunGong. Falun Gong is incredible!" Also, for the Chinese people, the quali-ties arising out of the righteous thoughts displayed by Dafa disciples sug-gest that there is hope that the moral values of Chinese civilization will berestored. Those greedy, corrupt officials and the crimes being committedare raging out of control in that society ruled by the CCP. Another thing is,in order to allow the Chinese people to comprehend and obtain the Fa, theminds of the Chinese people were freed up when Fa-rectification first be-gan, leading them to become very smart. However, during this persecutionthey haven't put those smarts to use in understanding the Fa, and have ins-tead used it to commit crimes. So during the past few years of persecutingDafa disciples, they have attacked Zhen, Shan, Ren and promoted wickedthings, and this has made the ways in which sentient beings commit crimesbecome extremely covert and complex. The CCP's rogue gang has no wayto deal with China's current predicament. They have simply no way to re-verse the crimes they have committed and the complicated problems in so-ciety of their own making that they now face.I said all of this just now because I'm sitting here again today teaching youFa. (Enthusiastic applause) Five or six years have passed, and I am tea-ching the Fa here again today, and you might have a different feeling, andthat might be even more so for those students who were here last time. Wehave basically made it through the wicked, cruel persecution, [and I can saythat] since during this Fa-rectification the wicked CCP's factors are beingdrastically and rapidly destroyed in great numbers. Just like I said, they arewicked, malicious, and bad. As long as they exist they will keep doing badthings. So in China, even though the restraint on people there from the wic-

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ked Communist Party's evil factors is, as with many other people aroundthe world, being eliminated, slowed down, and lessened, and it is no longerthat effective really, the persecution against Dafa disciples is still being sus-tained. [That will continue] unless they are fully eliminated, and at thatpoint the persecution will end. Those evil factors of the wicked CCP willdefinitely be cleared away by gods in the Fa-rectification! (Enthusiastic ap-plause)The wicked CCP itself can see that it is teetering on the edge and that all islost. Many people want to leave themselves a way out, and many are tryingto cover up the crimes they committed in the persecution. And of course,even more people want to withdraw from those wicked Party organizations.All of this throws those die-hards of the wicked Party into despair and terri-fies them. Notably, the withdrawals from the Party are making them trem-ble with fear. All is lost for them, and they can already see that it's over forthem. No matter what kind of attitude ordinary people have [towards what'shappening] or how they worry about what will happen to Chinese societyand civilization, they are worrying in vain. Since ancient times gods havenever loosened their grip on any nation or any individual. When gods wanta society to fall into chaos, it will fall into chaos; when gods want a personto go on a rampage, he will go on a rampage; and when gods want a societyto be stable, it will be stable. Despite how big that wicked Communistcamp was, when [gods] wanted it to dissolve, it dissolved in a matter ofdays. (Applause) It all depends on whether gods need something or not.Isn't that so?Everything here in human society was established for Fa-rectification, andall that exists today exists for the sake of my Dafa disciples validating theFa. Remember: you are the stars of today's world, you are the lives that sen-tient beings are watching the most intently, and you are beings who are de-termining the future of every person in the human world! (Applause) So,saving all beings and cultivating yourselves well are of the utmost impor-tance for you, the Dafa disciples. It's not done just for the Consummationof your own being--it is also about fulfilling the hopes that have been pla-ced in you by sentient beings, by more beings! Okay, I'll stop here. (Long,enthusiastic applause)Right now [you should just focus on] the things that you are doing, so Idon't want to distract you from what you are currently doing by talkingabout too many other things. The things that you are doing now are crucial,so I won't say more. I thank you all! (Enthusiastic applause)

To the European Fa Conference in Stockholm

To the European Fa Conference:

Greetings, Dafa disciples.

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Everything in the world was established and created for the Fa-rectifica-tion, and Dafa disciples are the great figures of our time. Since ancient ti-mes the beings in all realms have waited in anticipation. Gather up and res-cue the beings that you are to save! Have righteous thoughts and righteousactions, dissolve all hindrances, and spread the facts widely. Divine beingsare among men.

I wish the Fa conference success.

Li HongzhiJune 12, 2005

Teaching the Fa in the City of Chicago(Li Hongzhi, June 26, 2005)

Good afternoon, everyone! (Disciples, "Good afternoon, Master!") You'vebeen working hard!Recently I have made it to just about every Fa conference. As you know,there are constant changes in the situation during Fa-rectification. For ins-tance, right now in saving sentient beings, it is necessary to resolve the is-sue of how people understand the CCP, so you have been working onthings related to the Nine Commentaries. If I were to talk too much aboutother things right now, it might distract from what you are doing, and thatis why I don't plan on talking too much. Since arriving in Chicago, I hadbeen considering whether I should come to the conference. (Master smiles)Then, after I thought it over, I decided to come, because at each of these re-cent conferences there have been some students who have just stepped for-ward and students who have just come here from Mainland China. And ofcourse, the students want to see Master, so I thought I would come see youin person. (Enthusiastic applause)Let me take this opportunity to mention something. You know, as Dafa cul-tivators in the Fa-rectification period, the historic mission that you have--this great responsibility--is indeed enormous. What lies before you is notmerely personal cultivation or saving a few people. The entire human raceis before you, and the Chinese people, in particular. The situation will chan-ge later on, and it won't be as hard to [save people then]. But with things asthey now stand, it is extremely hard to save Chinese people, enormouslydifficult. So you have come up with all kinds of ways to do it--whichshocks the wicked people and strikes fear into them--and this is having agreat effect in clarifying the truth and saving sentient beings. You have do-ne well in these things, but sometimes you are too hasty and overly eager.You might have heard recently that the matter of putting the CCP on trialwould be postponed. Here is a thought on the subject. I told you a long ti-me ago that a Dafa disciple, or a cultivator, has no enemies. The only thing

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you have a role in is saving people, and you have nothing to do with usinghuman means and human principles to punish or pronounce judgment onpeople. This is a fundamental issue!But in order to stop the evil, the people who are no longer salvageable, andthe diehard followers of the CCP, it has been necessary for you to organizesome activities and do some things. Certain things are to be done by non-practitioners, however. Specifically, in society many people are participa-ting in the [China] democracy movement and have formed various politicalorganizations. They have political aspirations and they want to have a cer-tain political system put in place in China. Whatever they do, those are hu-man affairs. But in terms of exposing the CCP's evil nature, they have in-deed had a big impact. In this vein, the media outlets Dafa disciples haveset up are part of society's media, and can, in order to expose the CCP'sevilness, provide extensive coverage of those activities and support whatthey do. It helps the Chinese people see the wicked CCP's evil nature and,to an extent, it has the effect of rescuing Chinese people. So that's not a pro-blem. But if we do things exactly as non-practitioners do, or if we do thesethings directly as Dafa disciples, then it's not so appropriate. Still, Masterdoes affirm the ideas you have come up with and the formats you haveadopted--they are not wrong.In a time to come, not only will mankind need to put these extremely badpeople on trial and have them dealt with accordingly, it will also be neces-sary to establish a correct means of deciding things by law, and at thatpoint it will be fine to do these things. Dafa disciples can help non-practi-tioners coordinate some of the correct human things that they are doing,there's no problem with that. The process of doing that can serve to exposeand stop the evil. People who are to be saved, however, should not bebrought to trial. Think about this, everyone: before you began to cultivateDafa, many of you present here were also once fooled by that wicked Partyinto becoming members of it, so do you really want to bring to trial theCCP members who have been fooled by the evil? You should understandthat they, too, have been deceived by the wicked CCP, and they are all sen-tient beings for you to save. You must make a clear distinction here. Youcan only do that [bringing them to trial] with a very small number of peo-ple, that is, the extremely bad ones. As I said earlier, it's not wrong to dothat, as it ends up shocking and frightening the evil, and the future mankinddefinitely will not let those wicked people off [anyway], but that said, don'tget too eager. You can't go and actually do that yourselves. Are you allclear on what I just talked about? (Applause)I was saying that there is nothing wrong with your using legal means tostop the evil's persecution, but you should be clearheaded when it comes tohow to carry that out and how to look at the matter. So I have addressed it,and that is how you should look at it. The various ways that you havethought up to dismantle the evil are excellent, as they simultaneously expo-se the persecution and save sentient beings, leading more people to break

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from the evil and causing the evil to disintegrate as it carries out the perse-cution. Having been ruled by the CCP for decades, today's Chinese peoplehave been thoroughly brainwashed. The words that Mainland Chinese peo-ple use, the way they think, and how they look at things are all brimmingwith what the CCP has instilled in them. Only after Mainland Chinese peo-ple come to Western societies and stay for a while do they realize what theCCP has turned them into. At this point in time you all understand andknow what a tragic state the Chinese people are in, and looking back [youcan now see that] the CCP is truly wicked. Right now, though, a lot of Chi-nese people in Mainland China don't understand or see any of this, for theyhave grown accustomed to it. That's what they grow up on, starting fromday one, and they think that is how normal societies really are, and thatmaybe that is just the human condition. So when the wicked CCP sayssomething, they basically don't even think about it, [saying to themselves,]"Whatever it says is good must be good, and whatever it says is bad mustbe bad, so when it says that Falun Gong is bad, then you Falun Gong peo-ple most likely really are that way." They don't listen when you try to clari-fy the facts to them. Given this situation, what should we do? Dafa disci-ples have a mission to save them. So we will expose the wicked Party's ig-noble nature, from past to present, and thereby help the world's people seeit for what it is and decide if they still want to believe what it says. Expe-rience has shown that once people come to know these things, upon our tel-ling them the facts again they understand everything, and they are willingto listen. That is what the Nine Commentaries is doing.Judging by the withdrawals from the CCP and the change in the situation inMainland China, you can see that everything you are doing has broughtabout tremendous changes in the state of the world. The evil may appearvery powerful, but at one time, back when there were two major opposingforces in the world, the wicked Party's bloc was so strong that the Westernworld was helpless in dealing with it. And yet, when gods wanted it dissol-ved, it fell apart instantly. It will cease to exist once it is no longer needed.The main part of Dafa disciples is cultivating and being tempered in China.So, could the political situation in China and the existence of the CCP beaccidental? The entirety of the wicked Party's so-called socialist front hasbeen dismantled, but why hasn't [the CCP] been dismantled? Isn't it becau-se the old forces planned it that way for Dafa disciples? So, none of this iscoincidental. Even though we oppose the old forces and don't accept or ack-nowledge this persecution or any of the things that they have forced on us,these things are having a destructive effect. As we negate them, we arewalking a straight path while at the same time thinking of every possibleway to save all beings, save the people of the world, and save the Chinesepeople.Many of today's people, especially Chinese people, don't have simple back-grounds. As I have mentioned before, many Chinese people were oncekings of different nations throughout the world in different eras who later

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reincarnated in China. And of course it's not limited to kings--practicallyentire royal courts reincarnated in China. Of course, not only does a personhave his past in the human world, he also has a place where his being ulti-mately comes from, which are both extraordinary. And this is why the peo-ple that Dafa disciples need to save are certainly not just ordinary beings.The cultivators of old used to talk about saving sentient beings, but didanyone really save sentient beings? Other than the great enlightened beingswith True Enlightenment such as Shakyamuni and Jesus, who has savedsentient beings? Nobody has. The beings Shakyamuni and Jesus saved we-re intentionally placed there for them, and that laid cultural groundwork inhistory for Dafa. At the same time, [what they went through was] an indica-tion of the problems divine beings would come across and encounter ontheir path, played out in history for today's people to see. And they of cour-se wanted me to see it. That's what it was all about. What [those enlighte-ned beings] were dealing with at the time was a purely human race in itsearly stages, with early-stage human bodies; whereas the human beings youare dealing with have human appearances and human bodies, while in reali-ty the beings inside are no longer so simple.Then what kind of people does Dafa save? What kind of people do Dafadisciples set out to rescue? It's no simple matter, for sure. Why is it that we,who are being persecuted so severely, still want to save sentient beings?Why is it that we, while experiencing such ruthless persecution, are stillthinking of others? [Because] it is something that history has entrusted youwith, for these people [you are to save] represent immense groups ofbeings. So this isn't just about people, but is about the hope that the beingsof the cosmos have placed in you, and placed in the fact that Dafa is sprea-ding broadly throughout the world today. It is a predestined opportunity forthem. So if any being misses this predestined opportunity, it might well bethat he has lost it forever.The Three Realms look to be small, and human society seems to be minus-cule when set in contrast to high-level beings, yet this place has in fact be-come the focal point of Fa-rectification. I have spoken before about why Ispread the Fa here. Then when the Fa is being spread here, could thingssuch as the surrounding environment, the beings that come here, or any ofthe things you face just be simple matters? Absolutely not, though thesethings do come across as being no different than things that happen in soci-ety or previous human states of affairs. A human being is just that, a humanbeing, and he definitely can't just become divine. From antiquity to the pre-sent, it has been [a process of] creating a form of being such as this and ofmolding what humans are like now, including people's thoughts, overallstate, and the way of life that characterize today's people. That is the pro-cess that has taken place. And it is here in this setting that we spread the Fa,save people, and rescue sentient beings. Even though many elements thatwere part of that process were forced upon me and the Dafa disciples--thatis, by factors in the old cosmos--it is still hard for you to distinguish those

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things since they were mixed together [with other things]. We reject all ofthe old arrangements, and the path we take is our own. So that problemswon't arise for you, Dafa disciples, I have often told you to study the Fa alot and keep up your righteous thoughts. When you do these things, it isthen possible for you to walk correctly on your own path and to do well atwhat a Dafa disciple is supposed to do. No matter how busy you get, youneed to study the Fa, no matter what.As for what lies ahead, things might change more and more quickly. But,as I brought up when teaching the Fa to you before, whether the change inthe state of society is negative or positive, or, put another way, whetherwhat comes about is bad or good, it is a test for our Dafa disciples all thesame, and not a reason to become content. If things really do change for thebetter, it will be a different sort of test for you, and you still shouldn't beco-me content. By all means you need to do what a Dafa disciple should do,maintaining your righteous thoughts.I'll stop here for now. As Dafa disciples do things for Dafa today, some ofyou are responsible for working on many projects simultaneously. And the-re are things at home to handle, Dafa things, work-related things, and socialor other things, all of which puts quite a strain on you. I see this. But nomatter what, you have managed to think of Dafa's things as most important,and at critical times you have remembered that you are a Dafa disciple andneed to handle things well. From that perspective, you are really terrific. Inany event, Master sees and knows this. So many years have passed over thecourse of history, the Three Realms have existed for so long, and so manysentient beings have come here over time, but all hopes are being placed inthis one moment out of all the ages. This instant is precious beyond measu-re. Completing the last leg of this journey well is what's most magnificent.So for this reason, though during this stage your time is tight, and you arevery tired and have little time to rest, when Master sees how many of youhave managed to do well he can't help but feel gratified. And it is on thisaccount that I thank you all. (Long, roaring applause)A lot of people have said we are involving ourselves in political affairs, andsome students of ours who haven't studied the Fa diligently are confused,saying, "Isn't the Nine Commentaries getting us involved in politicalthings?" It is for the sake of Dafa that human society exists, and historywas arranged accordingly. You know, we can consult the example of thesages from antiquity, the great enlightened beings of True Enlightenment.Take for instance the five thousand words Lao Zi imparted: if we just con-sider the superficial, most obvious things he talked about, they are mostlyabout how to rule as a king, how to administer the country, and so on. If welook at it from a human perspective, isn't it political? But, it is not political.We could of course draw upon many historical examples. Have youthought about this: what the wicked CCP is doing are the actions of an evilreligion that unifies church and state, and it thereby drags China's entire po-pulace into political affairs. When we help people break from and see

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through the wicked CCP, aren't we in fact helping people break from poli-tics? (Applause) The reality is that our fundamental goal is not to overth-row the wicked CCP, and I'm not fighting against it--it's not worthy! (Ap-plause) How could those who are on their way to divinity get caught up infighting with people? Even if the wicked CCP is an evil spirit and viciousfiend, it's still not worthy. Fa-rectification is Fa-rectification, and as Dafadisciples go about saving beings, they must dissolve all evil things that ob-struct people's salvation.It is for the purpose of saving all beings and saving the people in the worldtoday that we help people to see the wicked CCP for what it is. Of course,no matter how the CCP tries to hide the evil face of its wicked gangster re-gime, once the world's people come to know it for what it is, they will reali-ze that it is evil, and they will not cooperate with it anymore, choosing ins-tead to withdraw from the Party. And that is when it ceases to exist. Butthat is not what we are trying to do--our goal is to save sentient beings. Ma-ny things here in the human world, here in the delusion, are hard to see forwhat they are, so it's a matter of how people look at and understand things.Of course, being Dafa disciples--and this especially goes for the many stu-dents who have studied the Fa solidly--you can grasp this. In the course ofclarifying the facts, you have come up with many examples to illustrate thisand explained things well. So the path we have taken has not been wrong,and it is just a matter of how to do even better. I'll stop here for today. Ithank you all. (Long, roaring applause)Master continues to hear about and see the good things you are doing.(Warm applause)

Study the Fa Well, and Getting Rid of Attach-ments is Not Hard

This article is very well done. Those students who are still not clearheadedabout the methods Dafa disciples are using to validate the Fa and save allbeings should read this article. Even though the article is not as comprehen-sive as it could be and is limited in its depth, it is clear about everythingthat Dafa disciples should do to validate the Fa and save beings.The fact is, those who can't step forward, regardless of the excuse, are con-cealing fear. Yet for cultivators, fear or lack thereof proves [one's] humani-ty or divinity, and it is what differentiates cultivators from ordinary people.It is something that a cultivator must face, and the biggest human attach-ment that a cultivator must remove.Li HongzhiJuly 20, 2005Comment on a student's article

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Shed the Human Mindset

This article is well written, and the understanding it expresses is even bet-ter. Some students really haven't regarded studying the Fa as something im-portant, and often look at situations that arise among Dafa students with anordinary human mindset; and it's not limited to blindly admiring certainpeople. The display of this human mindset truly, in fact, bespeaks of the[difference between] a cultivator and an ordinary person. This brings upononeself many problems in cultivation, and interferes with efforts to validatethe Fa and the coordination and cooperation that takes place among stu-dents and that is based on the Fa. The most prominent manifestation of thisis the severe persecution many students face as a result of their strong hu-man mindset and lack of righteous thoughts. The solution is to without ex-ception make studying the Fa a priority and to study the Fa diligently. ThisGreat Law is able to rectify the colossal firmament and allows people tocultivate to Consummation-shouldn't you treasure an opportunity as rareand precious as this? And this is an opportunity that will be gone in an ins-tant!Li HongzhiSeptember 1, 2005Comment on a student's article

To all Dafa disciples around the world and inmainland China, a happy Mid-Autumn Festival!

A Will That Ebbs Not(in Song Dynasty poetic form)Surpassing time and space,

Fa-rectification dashes forwardMassive is the challenge,

but your will is firmUnbridled are the wicked,

yet you keep your bearingsPurging evil as if but whisking dust away

My disciples,walk straight the path of Dafa

May your radiance grace the human world,as you transcend the Three Realms

Disciples of Fa,be diligent, with a will that ebbs not

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The countless years of hardship were all for this time

Li HongzhiMid-Autumn FestivalSeptember 18, 2005

Walk Straight Your Path

Fa-rectification means rectifying the cosmos's past Fa-a Fa no longer right-and it encompasses [rectifying] all living beings, high-level as well as low,found in the cosmos. Of course, this also includes the Fa that they have leftat different levels, among which are the Fa they have passed on to humanbeings to guide man's cultivation. Fa-rectification Period Dafa Disciples areto take validating Zhen-Shan-Ren and attaining the Dafa of the new cosmosas fundamental, so how could they disseminate and validate things that arenot part of Zhen-Shan-Ren or the new cosmos? Don't let the pursuit of so-me particular goal cause you to ignore the meaning of a Dafa disciple'sexistence. In fact, making progress in one's own cultivation is a part of theprocess of saving beings. Saving beings, improving yourself, and resistingthe persecution are all acts that validate the Fa; only walking straight yourpath amounts to validating the Fa. Also, don't use the wicked things thathappen during the persecution as an excuse for not validating the Fa or notvalidating it well, for the reality is, the wicked persecution arranged by theold forces was put in place to test you. Even though we don't acknowledgethe old forces' existence or arrangements, they have done what they've do-ne. You play the leading role in this period of history, and the existence ofeverything at present, whether it be evil or the upright gods, has to do withyou. It is walking straight your path that is most important. In the final ti-me, the evil's factors will dwindle, circumstances will ease up, and theworld's state of affairs will change, but never will the path that you are towalk straight change.Li HongzhiSeptember 25, 2005

To the Prague Fa Conference

Greetings to the Dafa disciples at the Prague Fa Conference!I hope our Fa conference is a success.Improve together, demonstrate the demeanor of Dafa disciples, do well thethree things Dafa disciples are supposed to do well, and ensure that our Faconference is a success and brings results.Li HongzhiOctober 2, 2005

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Last updated: October 3, 2005.

The Closer to the End, the More Diligent YouShould Be

A person has many tests to overcome in the course of cultivation, one rea-son being, from the time of birth on, a person ceaselessly forms notions ofevery sort as he comes to an understanding of human society, and attach-ments result. Because human society is a place in which suffering goeshand-in-hand with enjoyment, life does abound with suffering, howeverwealthy you may be or however high your status. Because pain is hard onpeople, they try to, consciously or unconsciously, ward off suffering in ho-pes of leading a more pleasant life. And so it is that in the pursuit of happi-ness people form ideas about how to avoid harm, how to live well, how toget ahead in society and achieve fame and success, how to acquire more forthemselves, how to come out on top, and so on. To this end, as they gainexperience people come to form notions about life; and those experiences,in turn, come to fortify these notions as people live out their lives.But in reality, what human society takes to be truths are, from the perspecti-ve of the cosmos, inversions of truth; when humans go through hardshipand suffer it is so that they may pay off karma and thereby have happinessin the future. A cultivator thus needs to cultivate by correct and uprighttruths. Going through hardship and suffering is an outstanding opportunityto remove karma, be cleansed of sin, purify the body, elevate your plane ofthought, and rise in level--it's an extraordinarily good thing. This is a cor-rect and upright Fa-truth. But as cultivation is lived out, when the sufferingbears down on you and conflicts come up that hit upon the deepest part ofyou--and especially when it rattles the rigid notions you have--the test is re-ally hard to pass. It can even be to the point that you know full well it's atest but still can't let go of your attachments. What's more, Dafa disciplesare cultivating in this "real" world that brims with temptation, so it beco-mes even more difficult--and even more important--to change those no-tions. That is why I often tell you to study the Fa a lot as you cultivate andwhy I periodically publish articles meant to point out common problems,continuously correcting the direction of things. Even then, new problemsdo arise from time to time on your path of cultivation. As far as how thingsare now, in the course of the cosmos's Fa-rectification and Dafa disciples'validating of the Fa, gigantic changes have been effected in the circumstan-ces of the persecution that arose on the Dafa disciples' path of cultivation.The cultivation environment and the perceptions people have are both un-dergoing changes on a fundamental level. This phenomenon indicates thatFa-rectification and Dafa disciples' cultivation are in their final stages. Andyet a small number of students--veteran students, even--have to differingdegrees exhibited a despondent state and slackened in their resolve to be di-

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ligent. They haven't realized that this is an attachment to the duration of Fa-rectification, or is caused by interference from incorrect, acquired notions,which results in their gaps being exploited by interfering factors that theold forces left behind early on in the surface of the human dimension, wic-ked specters, or rotten demons--things that have magnified and strengthe-ned those attachments and human notions--all of which has brought aboutthis despondent state.Actually, if you think about it, the cultivators of the past didn't dare to slackoff for even a second, and that was when it took an entire lifetime to com-plete the journey. So how can Dafa disciples--who are to achieve the At-tainment Status of a being who is saved by Dafa and who have the mostconvenient cultivation way--not be even more diligent when they are giventhis most glorious honor of Fa-validating cultivation in a brief cultivationperiod that passes in the blink of an eye? You already know that the formof a Dafa disciple's cultivation has one cultivate here, in the world, amongordinary people, and that the cultivation directly targets one's mind. All hu-man attachments and notions that interfere with validating the Fa and sa-ving sentient beings must be removed. For cultivators traveling a divinepath, is it really that hard to get rid of those attachments that arise from hu-man thinking and to change those notions? If a cultivator doesn't want toget rid of even those things, well, how is he to show that he's a cultivator?Of course, most disciples who are in this state are that way because, at thebeginning, they didn't realize that they had subtle attachments or werebeing interfered with by their own notions, and so the evil has exploitedthis gap and magnified those factors. I know that after you become clear onthis you will quickly catch up, but you should take fewer detours on thismost magnificent, divine path; not leave reason for regret in your futures;and not fall so far behind in terms of levels. That is my hope, your hope,and the hope of the beings who are counting on you.Li HongzhiOctober 8, 2005

The Red Tide's Wane

(In Ci Lyric Verse)

The Red Tide fades as ordained,

its time now past

Signs of decline make ever so visible

the wicked Party's evil

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Shameless are the acts, done for power

Greedy officials courting danger

Minds devoid of good thoughts

More high-handedness

breeds only more resentment

Who'd want to still persecute?

The day of reckoning draws near

Li HongzhiOctober 19, 2005

Master's New Article: Mature

Having read the papers from the mainland Chinese Dafa disciples' Internetexperience sharing conference, I find that none of them are written nowwith human attachments; there is no sense that the papers were written tocomplete some task, nor, in either form or content, done using cliched, bo-gus, vacuous Party-style rhetoric; absent is the attachment of reporting ac-complishments with the mentality of "If I don't tell people, how will theyknow"; and for the most part they are free of the Party culture's logic. Icould also sense in them a maturation in the authors' cultivation.The form cultivation takes for Dafa disciples is one in which they cultivateamong ordinary people, and it is among ordinary people that they validatethe Fa, save sentient beings, and work against the persecution. In this, a cir-cumstance in which no cultivation form was left by any predecessors as areferent, it is incumbent upon the cultivators to blaze their own trails, and itis required of each person that he affirm the path that he himself has cometo realize--role models aren't set up to follow. The path that each person ta-kes can be an example only to posterity. And there is no [cultivating] inanother's place--the one who cultivates gains. Under the intense, sinisterpressure that was forced upon them; on a cultivation path with nothing toreference; living in a most materialistic and practical society of man; withhuman morality sliding downhill fast; and with strict requirements for self-improvement set forth for Dafa disciples by the Great Law, you have nonet-heless made it through. The papers mostly involve rationally analyzing anduncovering shortcomings, and they exchange thoughts for the purpose ofvalidating the Fa, reducing losses, helping fellow cultivators to think andact righteously, thinking of ways to help fellow cultivators who are being

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persecuted, and saving more sentient beings. Gone are the flowery expres-sions meant for affective show: the papers are full of substance, and theyare accurate, clean, and free of human sentiments. They are not somethingan ordinary person could write, for the inner world of a cultivator is pureand clean.This is but one of the feelings I had from reading the online papers sharedby the mainland Chinese Dafa disciples. My overall impression is that mostDafa disciples have matured; the way in which they are cultivating has ma-tured; the understanding cultivators have of cultivation has matured; andthe rational behavior that comes from a progressive decrease in humanthoughts has, likewise, matured. When all Dafa disciples are like this, theevil will be completely eliminated and Gods and Buddhas will grandly ma-nifest.Li HongzhiOctober 29, 2005

To the Israel Fa Conference

Greetings to the Dafa disciples of Israel and those attending the conference!Dafa disciples' Fa-conferences are the Dafa disciples' environment in ordi-nary human society in which to learn from each other. Owing to the factthat so much time is spent amidst the reality of ordinary human society, thetime Dafa disciples have together is all the more precious, and Dafa disci-ples' Fa-conferences are furthermore an excellent opportunity for Dafa dis-ciples to come together and improve as a whole. Master is confident thatthrough this experience sharing conference you will be enriched, and Iwould like to wish the Fa-conference success. I hope that you will do wellthe three tasks, just as I hope that you will walk well, with righteousthoughts and actions, the path of cultivation.Li HongzhiDecember 3, 2005

Teaching the Fa in San Francisco, 2005Teaching the Fa in San Francisco, 2005Teaching the Fa in San Francisco, 2005  (Li Hongzhi - November 5, 2005)

(Roaring applause. Students say, "Hello Master!")Good morning! (Applause. Students: "Master, please sit.") If I stand youcan see me better. You've been working hard. (Applause) I haven't been outWest for quite some time, and all along I've wished to see you. Now is thetime of Dafa disciples validating the Fa and saving sentient beings, and youhave labored hard. But regardless of the situation, Dafa disciples are nowmaturing ever more fully. And as the overall Fa-rectification process hasmoved forward continuously, the overall situation has changed a great deal.You have seen that, judging by the attitudes people have towards Dafa and

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Dafa disciples, and by people's capacity to see through the shameless ac-tions of the CCP's slanderous media, everything has changed. That beingthe case, for Dafa disciples it amounts to being tested under new circums-tances and conditions. And so it is that when circumstances ease up, one isprone to becoming lax; when the pressure lets up it leads a person to feelrelaxed and not make every minute count as before. But that's not accepta-ble. The fact is, you are cultivators, and you can't afford to cease being dili-gent no matter what kind of circumstances you encounter. The more rela-xed or comfortable things get, in fact, the more serious is the test you face.Regardless of how the situation may change, the terms of cultivation andthe cultivation state required of you will never change, and for this reasonyou cannot let up. Moreover, as you have seen, though the situation ischanging, the evil specter has yet to be fully cleaned out, and right now it isstill having a very negative effect.Take San Francisco, for example. I've found that the environment of thedowntown area and that of the whole Bay Area still isn't up to par; the evilfactors here are still abundant. The fact is, you should make these placesthe focus. You should go where there are a lot of Chinese people and clari-fy the truth, and save those badly-poisoned Chinese communities. You ha-ve all seen that the places where tourist groups from mainland China shutt-le in and out are where they are concentrated. There are a lot of Chinesepeople in other parts of the Bay Area, too, but they are scattered. The goalof your clarifying the truth is to save as many sentient beings as possible,and those who have been poisoned the most severely are none other thanthe Chinese people. Superficially speaking, what Dafa disciples are doingis counteracting the persecution, but in reality your greatest duty is to savesentient beings, and that is the true embodiment of validating the Fa. Thepersecution that has been perpetrated upon Dafa disciples and upon thepeople of China was launched by the wicked Party in mainland China, andthis means that you need to focus on mainland China, to focus on the peo-ple of mainland China. Chinatown is precisely the kind of place that main-land Chinese patronize the most, so you can't let up there and lose out onthat place, a place where Dafa disciples stand to have a tremendous effect.For this reason you should all take pause and seriously ask yourselves: Hadyou been feeling that those places were a bit too evil and were you a littleafraid? But think about it--who should actually be afraid of whom?Under the cruelest of persecutions, the Dafa disciples of mainland Chinahaven't been frightened and have come through it; they have even, in fact,cultivated to the point of maturity. If you take a look back at things, in fact,though the persecution seems to have no order to it, wouldn't you agree thatthe changes in the situation and the different circumstances that have comeabout all have a purpose? Whether [something is due to] Master's wishes orthe old forces' control, isn't the goal behind it the successful cultivation ofDafa disciples and the disintegration of the evil? Could all of this have hap-pened arbitrarily? It's merely that the bad people are not allowed to see the

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order behind it. Whenever the wicked CCP regime has decided to knock so-mebody down, who has been able to hold up for even just three days? You,meanwhile, have made it through six or seven years, and that is somethingthat the sinister Party simply never considered possible. Is that somethingordinary people could do? Could they withstand it? Then are these ordinarythings that we're dealing with? Are they things ordinary people could bringabout? Only people who cultivate, only those who are looked after by gods,could make it through. Isn't that true? So there is nothing for Dafa disciplesto fear. And that is especially so outside of mainland China--isn't the set-ting more favorable, relatively speaking? Then what's there to fear? Andwhat is more, you are truly saving people--openly and with dignity savingtheir very being--and they will be able to sense that. On top of that, as yougo about clarifying the truth, the benevolence you exude and the righteousthoughts you project disintegrate the evil, awakening those lives you saveand causing them to recover their very selves, and that can lead a person totruly come to rationally see these things for himself. And of course, as soonas people wake up, things are immediately different.There are also some students who don't have a good understanding of thechanges in the situation that have come about due to Fa-validation, and thisphenomenon, applying to a handful of cases, can be seen in every region.Namely, every time Dafa's progress enters a new stage, there are some stu-dents who evaluate Dafa cultivation with human thinking. The path of Dafadisciples' cultivation is such that your cultivation doesn't involve breakingfrom the secular world, it's that kind of path. So, as you cultivate in the so-ciety of ordinary people, you are either being polluted by ordinary societyor you are changing ordinary society. And that's for sure. Thus, throughoutthe course of Fa-rectification, Dafa is and has been transforming everythingat lightning speed, while Dafa disciples have been validating the Fa, savingsentient beings, and purging the evil that persecutes Dafa disciples. Thechanges in the overall situation will ceaselessly continue to bring forth inthe human world different states of affairs at different time periods. This iswhat students refer to when they speak of "the progress of Fa-rectification."But as soon as obvious changes in the state of things come about, a handfulof students can't keep up. And whenever they can't keep up, they pull outthe top excuse: "Aren't we getting political? How can we cultivate likethis?" But the truth is, those who say this are, on a fundamental level, loo-king at cultivation and conducting themselves based on human thinking.The ultimate source of this is fear taking hold.As I have said before, this is the form that Dafa disciples' cultivation takestoday--the cultivation is done among ordinary people, and you cultivatewithout breaking from the secular world. I discussed this before in teachingthe Fa: It's precisely because Dafa disciples cultivate this way that they canachieve something never seen before in history--a human becoming divinethrough cultivation. (Applause) Because it's done amidst the realities of hu-man society, it is truly the cultivator himself who handles himself well

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amidst the lure of worldly gain, who under intense worldly temptation ma-nages to discard human attachments, and discard all sorts of entanglementsthat arise from emotion. This form of cultivation directly targets the humanmind, meaning, it targets the cultivator's most surface sensory perceptionsand his thoughts in reaction to them, as well as his direct actions. Then forthis person, if in cultivation he can cast off all of that, isn't he cultivatinghimself? Isn't he positioning himself while amidst real, immediate inte-rests? Can ordinary people do that? They can't. And could the cultivators ofthe past? Neither could they. So the cultivation methods of the past, all thevarious cultivation ways left to human society in history, took the approachof leaving society to cultivate. They didn't dare to cultivate in the secularworld, and believed that cultivating there wasn't feasible. That was becausethey didn't have the Great Law (Dafa)--they didn't have the Great Law toguide their cultivation. Today there is the Great Law to guide people. Nowyou can accomplish this, and indeed, this is something that you have put in-to practice and accomplished. In other words, not only has this path of cul-tivation been blazed, but also, your actual experiences have abundantly pro-ven the correctness of this path and the maturity of Dafa disciples as a re-sult of the cultivation process. You are now in the last stage of heading to-wards Consummation, and all along, right up to today, you have beendoing so in an extremely steady and solid manner. Even if shortcomings ha-ve shown themselves in one way or another, the fact is, that's going to bethe case for any cultivation form, because on every path there are thosewho fail midway--all of that is normal. Under the tests that the human mindis put to, a state will come about in a cultivator when understandings bornof both divine and human thoughts are present and collide. When humanthinking gains the upper hand, that person heads toward humanness; whendivine thinking and a person's righteous thoughts gain the upper hand, heheads toward godhood.Let's think about it, actually: What is "politics"? With some people, whene-ver they don't understand the actions we take against the persecution, theystart saying we are "getting political." The way I see it, those certain peopleamong our Dafa disciples [for whom this is the case] have fear inside. Fun-damentally, it's fear that is causing mischief, leading to human anxiety. Asfor how ordinary people look at [what we're doing], Dafa disciples don'tneed to be concerned about that. So long as you, a Dafa disciple, do thingsrighteously, you will transform the environment around you, and you willchange people. You don't need to say that much. My Dafa is taught to to-day's Dafa disciples, not to ordinary people, and you shouldn't get overlyconcerned about what people think. As long as you walk straightly yourown cultivation path here in the human world, everyone will see you in apositive light.What is "politics"? There are different ideas about this even among ordina-ry people. I'll tell you that the concept of "politics" that Chinese people ha-ve involves taking whatever activities people do in response to the form of

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the political system or that have to do with the state's policies and calling it"getting political." In Western society it's different. As they think of it, thethings that people do in the public sphere, when they don't involve moneyor religion, count as political. But regardless of how the term is defined orhowever it's understood, what I want to convey is that the form cultivationtakes is not bound by strict limitations. The cultivation you know aboutfrom history includes Buddhism, original Buddhism, Daoism, and originalDaoism and their cultivation forms, along with Catholicism, Christianity,etc., and their religious practices, and then there have been ancient religionsand different forms of belief in the divine. Religious faith is itself a form ofcultivation activity, and in the process of believing, a person can elevate hisrealm of thought--it's that kind of practice. Whether or not they have theconcept of "cultivation" in Western culture, it still counts as cultivation allthe same and similarly requires a person to improve himself. Isn't the pro-cess of a life moving towards divinity one of cultivation? Whatever theform a person adopts, though, whichever one it may be among those thatwere left to us from the past, I will tell you, they are not the only forms ofcultivation, and much less do all lives in the cosmos--especially the humanrace--have to adhere to these few forms. So they are not the sole paths togodhood. They are just a few forms of cultivation culture given to man bythe measureless, countless gods, and nothing more than that. Moreover,they can't truly enable the person himself, or, his master soul, to cultivateinto a god. In the past it was always the subordinate soul that did the culti-vating. The true person, regardless of the method he cultivated with, wouldhave his subordinate soul depart and the person himself would remain inthe cycle of rebirth. Buddha Shakyamuni stated that there were 84,000 cul-tivation disciplines, but that was an understanding communicated based onhis realm and within a certain scope. The Daoists hold that there are 3,600cultivation disciplines, and that is likewise an understanding based on theirparticular realm. The truth is, the Fa principles they taught were limited.Then how many paths are there in the cosmos that can enable a life to as-cend, to return to a higher realm? There are countless ways. However manysentient beings there are, that's how many paths there are. There are thatmany. With so many cultivation forms, then, of course they can't all bebrought here to human society. The cosmos has a measureless, incalculablenumber of Buddhas, countless Gods, and moreover, to each of the multitu-de of gods, the cosmos at their position seems to already be at its zenith,with no lives existing above them and nothing existing above where theyare. But in fact, in larger realms there are still more incomparably massiveand high realms and even more Buddhas and gods that are innumerable,and when they look upon the gods below them, they see them as ordinarypeople. Then just how many paths are there? They, too, are countless. Youknow that Buddha Shakyamuni validated and enlightened to his cultivationdiscipline, which is summarized by the words "precept, concentration, wis-dom"; that's the path Shakyamuni validated and enlightened to. There are

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so many Buddhas in the cosmic body, they are simply immeasurable, incal-culable, yet in the cosmos there is no second Buddha whose validation andenlightenment consisted of "precept, concentration, wisdom." In otherwords, every god has his own path, and each god's system has for its sen-tient beings its own realm's unique standards and its own criteria based onits Law for a life's rise or fall. Then wouldn't you say there are many ap-proaches to cultivation? The number is enormous.Having said all this, I should tell you: Since there are so many cultivationforms in this cosmos, someone viewing this from a human perspective[might wonder], in Fa-rectification is there any cultivation form that Icouldn't have Dafa disciples adopt and use to cultivate? To be explicitabout it, if I, your master, didn't have you take this path you are walking to-day and instead used a different form, then you could still cultivate to Con-summation. You know that the cosmos is going through Fa-rectificationand everything is being created anew, and this is equivalent to recreatingthe cosmic firmament, recreating the cosmos. As for what form the futurecosmos or future lives are to take, and in what fashion they will exist, orwhat type of Fa and what means of saving people will be left to the future--this isn't something that the lives of the past can determine, and it's notsomething that just any life can determine regardless of how high in levelthat life may be, for this is about what the future needs. Since the future'sneeds are the determining factor, think about it, if Master were to have youcultivate within the framework of society's politics, would that work? (Ap-plause) Yes! It would for sure, it definitely would. As long as it had theFa's standards and requirements, as long as lives could elevate, and as longas lives were able to reach high realms, then it would definitely work, forthat would be the future's choice, the choice of the future cosmos, the choi-ce of what cultivation form Dafa disciples are to go by. (Applause) It is me-rely that Master didn't choose to have you take that path, to walk the pathof cultivation in that way. I have imparted to you a broader, most idealform of cultivation, for, "the Great Way has no form"! (Applause) Each ofyou is a part of society, belonging to different social strata, each havingyour own job or profession in society, and having your own skills that youhave acquired. In each respective setting, under the guidance of Dafa andfree of form, all are able to cultivate; there are no rules or regulations, noreligious formalities, and no commandments. This is something that not asingle divine being in the past dared to do, but today, the Dafa disciples andI have done it. (Applause) Why is that so? Because this Fa is immense, andthe Great Law of the cosmos is directly saving the Disciples of Dafa. Onlythis way could it be achieved.Let me in fact go a step further. What's meant by "getting involved with po-litics," and what's meant by "cultivation form"? This is where a lot of peo-ple err. Suppose that I, Li Hongzhi, had chosen in this life to be an emperorand to lead a group of subjects to cultivate. Would that work? (Applause)Yes! It definitely would! As long as the Fa was upright and could truly en-

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sure that lives elevated, and as long as the path was walked righteously,then it definitely would work! If it really were as I described, then that, too,would count as the future's choice, and it too would be the requirement ofthe future cosmos. Master didn't have you take that path, that's all. What-ever is chosen and whichever path is taken, that has to do with what the fu-ture needs, and it is what Master gives to the Dafa disciples. I chose thebest form of cultivation to give to you all. (Applause) What I just talkedabout, being principles of high levels, would be hard for an ordinary personto understand. He simply can't understand such things. I am teaching the Fato Dafa disciples, and you are quite clear as to what Dafa disciples aredoing. Back in the years when Master was spreading the Fa, I talked aboutsomething, and it's something many students have heard about before. Na-mely, how the Buddhist and Daoist systems fought over which outward ap-pearance--Buddhist or Daoist--I would choose. They argued fiercely overwhich kind of god's outer form I would assume to spread the Fa, since whi-chever kind of god's appearance was chosen would bestow glory and honoron that group of gods and on those lives. Think about it everyone, at that ti-me the Daoists wanted me to use a Daoist form to spread the Fa, and it wasfor this reason that in recent times the Daoist religion appeared in China. Inthe past there was no Daoist religion. It was passed down from a master toa single disciple and done so in private, so it couldn't save sentient beingson a large scale, save all sentient beings, bring up that many disciples, orhave all that many people reach Consummation. It was because of this thatthey established the Daoist religion. This is all in the past, though, and the-se are things I have talked about before, so I won't repeat things further. Allof this is to say, which theory for cultivation, which method for carrying itout, and which outward form was adopted for Dafa disciples' cultivationwas very significant, and especially significant was which method Masterwould adopt. That's because in history they knew well beforehand that Da-fa would be spread here in human society, and so the old forces long, longago started making arrangements for things. And actually, it's not just theold forces that made arrangements of this sort. With a cosmos this immen-se, no matter how I explain things to you, I do it within a scope that youcan comprehend. Regardless of how this material entity ascends and whichrealm it reaches, it is merely one gigantic system, and generally speaking itis in regards to this system that I explain things to you. In fact a cosmic sys-tem of this sort, a system so enormous, seems to the sentient beings withinit to be boundless and limitless, and even to a gigantic god that is how it ap-pears to be. But in the context of a yet more distant, still more immensecosmic body, it is actually but a speck of dust. And in even more remoteplaces there are still other countless cosmic bodies like that; and in placestoo remote to reach--places that even gods can't reach--there are still evenmore immense cosmic bodies. What are the lives there like? How do theydiscern [lives'] levels and how do those lives improve themselves? Thegods in other systems have no way of knowing this, and in fact wouldn't

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understand it. These things that I am discussing are unfathomable to thegods of other cosmoses.What I'm telling all of you is that many things in human society are notsimple, either. You know that in today's society there are truly a dazzlingarray of different professions. It seems that this modern society is quiteprosperous and has anything and everything. Why is that so? Why wasn't itlike this in ancient societies? It is because, as I said earlier, many lives fromdistant cosmic bodies brought their things here to the human world. Whydid they do that? I just talked about how Master had to choose betweenBuddhist and Daoist [images], how even the external appearance was reallysignificant. Well, how could it be limited to only those things? The paths ofcultivation, the different kinds of cultivation ways that were created in his-tory for mankind, and even the forms of existence of many ethnicities andthe characteristics of different cultures were all a result of those gods fromdistant cosmic bodies putting in their piece and presenting for Dafa all thatwould be involved in their paths. The point was to get here everything thatLi Hongzhi would have to choose from, so that it would be fair to everyo-ne. Let me give a few simple examples. You all know that along with pain-ting there is music and sculpture. Those things and also modern scienceand technology are all different skills for various facets of human life. Itseems as though human beings created those things themselves and did soto enrich human society, but that's actually not the case at all. What's the re-al reason, then? Let me tell you that those are in fact [parts of] cultivationand unique characteristics of the realms of lives from distant systems. Ele-vation in that kind of realm involves combining the understanding of thoseskills with the Fa. It requires elevating one's understanding, a limitless up-ward climb. Particles that make up high-level dimensions are smaller, andthe sound-field there is also composed of microcosmic material particles,so the music is more pleasing to hear and the colors are more beautiful. Allsuch matter is composed of high-level, microcosmic particles, which can'tbe found by lives in low-level dimensions. The works and the skills thereare more advanced and magical, and a life's elevation means the dual eleva-tion of realm and skill, and improvement of that life's understanding in dif-ferent realms. In other words, if I'm to use the concepts of people on earthto describe it, when you are able to create good things, it is because you area good person or because you have done something good. Conversely, onlywhen gods see that you are a good person will they grant you wisdom andallow you to create things. (Applause) Isn't human society controlled bygods? These things all in fact have elements of the Fa in them. If I had youadopt those methods, would you still be able to cultivate? Yes, you couldcultivate just the same. It's just that I didn't have you take such paths. Thoseare methods adopted by different cosmic bodies and different lives.While in the process of rectifying the Fa I discovered a certain situation.What situation, you ask? In an enormous cosmic body that is quite faraway, the elevation of lives there is very different from what is understood

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by lives in the cosmic system that you are in. They are sustained by theirskills and the continual improvement of those skills. The gods at a higherlevel, then, have tied whether the lives at the lower levels can invent thingsand whether they can produce things onto the elevation of their realms. If aperson's realm is elevated, his wisdom will be opened up, and he will be al-lowed to produce things, create things, and elevate. After he elevates, hewill realize again and again that he is able to accomplish those things onlybecause of the rise in his morality, and realize that he is able to elevate onlybecause his own realm has risen. That entire incomparably gigantic systemis like this, elevating while in pursuit of some type of skill. That's complete-ly different from what sentient beings in this cosmic system, especially inmodern times, understand cultivation to be. So, the gigantic colossal firma-ment is actually extremely immense, complicated, and orderly. When it co-mes to what is shown to mankind, what mankind is allowed to know about,and even the skills and the different kinds of cultures and different ways ofexistence for mankind, human beings think that these things are meant forhuman society to prosper. Human beings see knowledge and various skillsonly as things that, through acquisition via real-life experience, have enri-ched their own lives and created their own cultures. None of that is true.Human beings haven't created anything and are incapable of creating anyt-hing. If something doesn't exist in the cosmos, then human beings have nochance whatsoever of creating it. Even the most worthless, degeneratethings in society were brought in by various gods. That was done becausehuman society goes according to the principle of mutual generation andmutual inhibition, so alongside the good it is given the bad. Yet having itbe bad was not the purpose of bringing it in. The reason is that those thingsare so different from mankind's ideas and the differences in the lives' formsare so great, and some are the complete opposite of the upright forms. Ofcourse, some things have become even more rotten since being broughtover here among humans, for in human society there is the issue of emo-tion, and under the effect of emotion these things have become more baseand even very filthy. They have become a lot worse than they were origi-nally, and this was caused by mankind itself.Just now we talked about the issue of politics and what getting involvedwith politics means, and it led Master to talk about those things. That wasto help free up your thinking so that you can take a look at this cosmos andknow how to look at various things of mankind. They are not as mankindimagines them to be, they're not that simple. There are many different met-hods of cultivation. This Dafa that I have imparted to you is so enormous,yet there are very few people who can truly understand just how huge, howextraordinary, and how magnificent it really is. Only cultivators at differentrealms can experience how sacred it is in those realms, and only just thatlittle bit. As cultivators move towards Consummation, and especially afterreaching Consummation, the things that cultivators will be shown are soglorious, magnificent, and wonderful that they are simply indescribable.

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Even gods who are able to make it through the Fa-rectification will marvelwith unparalleled awe after seeing all of it. The new cosmos is incompara-bly glorious, magnificent, and sacred.As cultivators, you can understand and comprehend what I've just said.There is no need to tell these things to ordinary people. When you clarifythe truth don't talk about these things. If you talk about these things, youwill scare people off and throw their thinking into disarray. It will be veryhard for them to understand it. If when you clarify the truth you talk aboutthings at a level that's just a little too high, let me tell you, you will no lon-ger be saving sentient beings but instead pushing them down. You can'ttalk about things at too high of a level. Talking about things at a high orlow level is not a simple question of whether you are exercising good judg-ment. It is a question of whether you are saving sentient beings or des-troying them. So when you clarify the truth you absolutely must not speakat too high of a level. Right now when you clarify the truth you only needto talk about the persecution of Dafa disciples, how the evil party has beenviolating the human rights and the freedom of belief of the Chinese people,how historically the evil party has persecuted the Chinese people and thepeople of the countries belonging to the wicked Communist bloc, and howit is persecuting Dafa disciples today in the same way. And that's enough.As for high-level cultivation and gods, you shouldn't talk about thosethings. It's very hard for ordinary people to understand them. You can un-derstand these things, but remember that you too started out as an ordinaryperson and have come to understand and accept high-level Fa principles af-ter cultivating step by step up through to today. In teaching the Fa, Masterlikewise started from the simple and progressed to the profound. If I hadtold you these things right at the beginning, if I had taught you these thingsright away six or seven, or seven or eight, years ago, you wouldn't havebeen able to accept them. And even if you could accept them, you wouldn'thave understood clearly what I was talking about. That being the case, younot only need to clarify the truth, you also need to be wise while doing so.You should do it with wisdom and not talk about things at too high of a le-vel.It's been a long time since I last came here, so you probably want me to talka little bit more. (Applause) (Many practitioners say, "Master, please sitdown.") Let's do it this way. Just as we've done before, you can write ques-tions on slips of paper and pass them up, and I will then answer them. Wri-te the words big. Try your best not to ask questions that have nothing to dowith cultivation, and try your best not to ask questions about the manythings that you can resolve on your own while cultivating, for you have towalk your own path. The same holds for every student. If [you were to suc-ceed] because I brought you there, then you absolutely couldn't be conside-red someone who cultivated, and you wouldn't have cultivated. It is extraor-dinary only when all of the tests are overcome by you yourself. Didn'tBuddha Shakyamuni validate and enlighten to his own "precept, concentra-

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tion, wisdom"? He made it through on his own. It's the same with you: Youall must walk your own paths. Okay, now you can pass up your questionslips. (Applause)It makes no difference whether you started early or late in cultivation. Eve-ryone seated here today, regardless of whether you are a new or veteran stu-dent, when it comes to cultivation all of you are treated the same. Masterwon't treat you differently just because you are a newer student, nor will Itreat others differently because they are veteran students. But being Dafadisciples, you are cultivators. [And since you are] cultivators, you have tocultivate as such. Of course, for newer students there is always a process ofunderstanding things, and that's not a problem. As long as you can trulycultivate based on the Fa and study the Fa regularly, you will be able toquickly catch up.You can now go ahead and pass up the question slips.No matter how much power Master has in Fa-rectification, on the surfacethe old force is still causing a partition, and it has separated Master's enor-mous power from the surface. Under normal circumstances it wouldn't beable to create this partition, but they are using the method of lining up agreat multitude in a constant stream, and using as a partition a giganticmass and the long, drawn-out time-space contained within that mass. Loo-king at it from beyond the cosmic bodies, one can see that very soon it willbe broken through, but it feels like a few years when measured with the ti-me of the human dimension. But once it is broken through, then this entirecosmos's Fa-rectification will be complete. So as [I go through] the processof crashing against it, they do a few things against Master, and have someeffect on Master's surface body. Since July 20, 1999, the evil has done a lotof bad things, but I won't talk about those things too much. There is such anenormous amount of evil for Master to clear away, and Master has to bearthe karma of many students, so there is a certain amount of harm done to[Master's] surface body.

Disciple asks: Dafa disciples from Chengdu city send their greetings to res-pected Master!Teacher: Thank you! Master knows about all the things that are happeningin Chengdu.Disciple asks: In explaining the three withdrawals[1] to ordinary people, ifwe talk about prophecies and epidemics will that be putting it at too high alevel?Teacher: Talking about prophesies and epidemics can be used only as asupplement to clarifying the truth, and don't go beyond just mentioningthem. Don't take them as an indispensable part or a major part of truth clari-fication. If you do, [your efforts] will depart from what you want to do andyour goal, and [you will] be far too reliant on those prophecies. They canplay only a supporting role for you. Don't say too much about them--youcan touch upon them and then leave it at that. Only by clarifying the truth

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with wisdom can you save people.You all know whom I'm referring to when I say the "archfiend." It has kil-led so many Dafa disciples through persecution, and it's not that Gods andBuddhas don't want to punish it. In fact Gods and Buddhas, without excep-tion, utterly detest it. When I say "utterly detest it," I'm of course using hu-man language to express it, meaning that it is detested by all. Then whyhasn't it been disposed of? Although the old forces' system has been clearedaway, the surface of this world has, as you know, not been broken through.In this world that has not been broken through, the old forces set up manythings ages ago--tens of millions of years ago. One thing that they set up isturning like a dial. Once it reaches a different position, a celestial phenome-non emerges in the world, and it's connected to the human body. If thething the old forces set up early on isn't destroyed, it will keep moving andfunctioning. That's the reason it has not yet breathed its last and gone downto hell.But why is it like this? As you know, the old forces' goal is to test Dafa dis-ciples by having these clowns stage this persecution, isn't it? They think,"The test of Dafa disciples isn't over yet. Those students who have not yetstepped forward should be doing so continuously, and you have let thosewho haven't done well, do well." If we're going to talk about hindering theFa-rectification's progress in this world, well, these students really are slo-wing it down. If [I] don't look after these people they will be destroyed andutterly finished, but they made vows in the past, and a being can't be judgedbased on one lifetime only, and should instead be judged comprehensivelybased on what has happened over time. So how could they not be lookedafter?

Disciple asks: Dafa disciples from Qingdao city, mainland China send theirgreetings to Master!Teacher: Thank you. The rampant evil there doesn't have much time left.Disciple asks: Will music in the future be developed based on music fromthe Tang Dynasty?Teacher: Human society has gotten to where it is today, and it won't workto try to completely adopt any form from history. Mankind has, after all, re-ached the point where it is now. If mankind were to return to a human wayof life or the way of life in ancient times, well, that would now be a verydifficult adjustment. Even during the period when the Fa rectifies the hu-man world, it will be only the complete, true picture of society that is dis-played. In the future, only when the next cycle of humankind begins, will itbe possible to start anew and return to a human path.Disciple asks: All Dafa disciples from Chengde city, Hebei province, sendtheir greetings to Master! (Teacher: Thank you.) All of the Dafa disciplesare missing respected Master, will steadfastly walk well the final path ofvalidating Fa, and live up to Master's merciful salvation.Teacher: I know that the Dafa disciples in mainland China will do well,

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and everyone has seen this put into practice--[they] have become increasin-gly mature and done better and better. Cultivation, as I have said before, islike great waves sifting sand--what's left will be gold, and gold is indeedgold.Disciple asks: In terms of the elimination of karma that we do when wesend forth righteous thoughts, is that primarily referring to thought karmaor does it include all karma in the body?Teacher: Sending forth righteous thoughts, during the part when you're fo-cusing on yourself, is not aimed at eliminating karma; it's to eliminate theelements that interfere with the righteous thoughts in your mind. In fact,sending forth righteous thoughts, strictly speaking, does not put much em-phasis on karma itself, and it's even unnecessary for cultivators to sendforth righteous thoughts directly toward karma. Cultivators have very littlekarma, and some karma is placed at various critical junctures and used foryou to break through tests and improve yourself. Sending forth righteousthoughts is mainly to eliminate the interference in your mind, to enable youto target the evil persecution with a clear mind and stronger righteousthoughts, and to eliminate those wicked specters in other dimensions. Togive you a sense [of what you are dealing with], after the evil Party's wic-ked specters and evil dragons are destroyed and broken apart, they turn intofragmented, deformed evil beings. Then after large quantities of thosebeings are eliminated, the few that remain, combined with the rotten de-mons that have not been completely destroyed and that are pressed down[here] from different dimensions, meaning the bad things that those wickedfactors brought over--what I call "rotten demons," and which are truly de-formed, very low, and even very filthy beings--are participating in persecu-ting Dafa disciples and interfering with Fa-rectification. Then of course,when I refer to evil beings in general, that includes the Fa-defying gods thathave snuck into the Three Realms, gods that are interfering with Fa-rectifi-cation and that have turned bad, the old forces, and some interfering factorsthat the old forces arranged. Within this material dimension, originally the-re were also some wicked specters that interfered with Fa-rectification andDafa disciples, and though there are but a few of them left, those are all stillcausing interference. Regardless of how their actions manifest, whetherbeings interfere with Fa-rectification by upholding the principles of the oldcosmos or simply are evil, as long as they play a negative role in Fa-rectifi-cation and toward Dafa disciples, they are all what I call "the evil." Sincethe cosmos is changing and innumerable sentient beings are to be saved inthe process of such a huge cosmic body being changed, any beings that co-me to interfere are committing a heinous and unpardonable sin.Disciple asks: Please talk about some disciples' laziness and their desire forthe good life.Teacher: Ordinary people want a life in this world that is filled withwealth and power and that brings honor to their ancestors, so that they canstand out and strut around in pride. This is what humans are after. When

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they die they will have to go down to hell to pay for the karma they incur-red, and this is the cycle that humans go through of accumulating karmaand paying for it. As cultivators, you are not after these things. Not goingafter these things, though, is not a simple matter of saying so and havingthat be the same as cultivating. You need to be able to put it into practiceduring cultivation. Though you won't be able to completely get to that pointfor now, you need to make a diligent effort towards it and try your best toimprove. Some students forget that they are cultivators and become unhap-py as soon as they run into anything troublesome. Some students becomeunhappy whenever they encounter conflicts or emotional turmoil. In thatcase, are you still cultivating? Cultivators look at things in just the oppositeway. They see tribulations and suffering as good opportunities for improve-ment. [To cultivators] these are all good things, and the more there are andthe faster they come, the faster the improvement. Some cultivators want topush them away and think, "Don't come." Whenever [conflicts and turmoil]come up they think that others have a problem with them and they can'tstand it when others say anything negative about them. You just want to li-ve a more pleasant life, but is that cultivation? Can you really cultivate thatway? If to this day you still can't come around on this concept, then as yourmaster, I don't know how you will ever move towards Consummation. Sin-ce you seek to live comfortably, well, you can go right ahead with that.Master won't say anything when an ordinary person pursues a life of com-fort. That's because no one can say that it's wrong for an ordinary person toseek to live comfortably; a human goes about his life with such pursuits.That's what human society is presently like. Master doesn't want to sayanything about things of ordinary people right now. But as cultivators, youcan't see things that way.Disciple asks: It has been a year since the publication of the Nine Commen-taries, yet only 5.3 million have quit from the Communist Party. How canwe help more of the world's people quit the Party?Teacher: Think about it, everyone, what will happen if a huge number ofpeople quit the Party? If all of a sudden tens of millions of people quit theParty, the wicked Party would cease to exist just that quickly. But the evilelements arranged by the old forces are interfering, and they want to sustainthe so-called conditions for testing Falun Dafa disciples. They won't con-sent to that many people quitting the Party all at once. The evil doesn't dareto interfere in this very weighty matter where people are making a choicethat determines their survival or destruction, but the evil elements are inter-fering with message transmission and reception capacity. That means eachday, whether the medium is phone calls, e-mails, or information relayed bypeople who have traveled outside China, only so many requests for with-drawals can be received via the various information channels. And commu-nication channels are not the only problem. There are many people in main-land China who want to quit the Party but can't find a means to do so, andcan't find people to file their requests. This is why the number of people

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who ask to quit the three communist organizations each day is kept at thislevel. Otherwise, the number would be very large, and once there are a lotof people [quitting], it will pose a very serious threat to the evil.As you know, the surge of people quitting the Party since the Nine Com-mentaries was published is a matter of people choosing their futures, soeveryone has to take a stance. What will happen as more people quit, youwonder? Because the Nine Commentaries is being spread more and morewidely in society, its influence is growing. As soon as the wicked Partystarted interfering with Fa-rectification and persecuting Dafa disciples,Heaven decided to weed out the wicked Party. There was unanimous agree-ment among both gods who play a positive role and old forces who play anegative role. It was only that some bad elements insisted that it be used totest Dafa disciples, and they didn't want it to be weeded out immediately;however, it will be weeded out for certain. At most it was meant to play itsso-called role of testing Dafa disciples during the process of it being wee-ded out, the idea being that those students who hadn't done well would begiven another chance to temper and improve themselves, and make itthrough in terms of understanding. If the evil specters all vanished instant-ly, the wicked Party would immediately fall apart, and then who would da-re to persecute Falun Gong? Who else has such nerve? (Master smiles) Sowouldn't the Dafa disciples who haven't done well be out of chances, then?It is true that Master does not acknowledge the persecution, but things havegotten to where they are today and the persecution has, after all, happened.Besides, there are so many Dafa disciples who have done very well and co-me through. But as for those who have gone over to the opposite side andwritten something for the evil, what can we do about the stain? What canwe do about those who had earlier benefited from Dafa and then didn't vali-date the Fa during the persecution? They have to be given a chance, right?The continuing growth in the number of people quitting the Party is theprocess of the wicked Party crumbling. Before long, a phenomenon will ap-pear in Chinese society: when a group of people are sitting in their office,or they are in their factory or a store, or they are sitting around a dinner ta-ble, or even as they are entertaining friends at home, their conversation willgo something like: "Have you quit?" (Audience laughs) "Yeah, I quit a longtime ago." "Oh, why didn't you tell me when you quit the Party?" (Audien-ce laughs and applauds) Think about it, everyone, when Chinese societygets to this stage, will the wicked Party still exist? The bad people thinkthat they will be fine since they have the supposedly powerful tools that gowith dictatorship. The evil will continue to disintegrate imperceptibly, andthe wicked Party will be helpless in the face of the people's choice. In fact,prior to July 20, 1999, I said in my open letter to them that the persecutionwould cause them to lose the public's faith. In fact, when the number ofpeople quitting the Party hit 5 million, the foundation of the wicked Partywas uprooted. So when the number of people quitting the Party reached 5million, the members of the CCP, from top to bottom, no longer had confi-

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dence in the wicked Party. (Audience applauds) That was because theyknow that nothing could revive this wicked Party when it is on its death-bed. No one has a way to do that. (Audience applauds)Disciple asks: Ordinary people say that the Olympic games will give Chinaa chance to shine on the world stage, and after that the wicked Party willcollapse. What should we make of that?Teacher: Ordinary people can say whatever they wish. Well, the Olympicsare a few years away, so it's questionable whether the wicked Party willmake it that long. And whether or not it will be given a chance to shine isnot up to humans. Human society wasn't created for it. What's there to shi-ne, anyway? You know, before there were people who fretted about whatwould happen to China if the wicked Party fell--a laughable thought instil-led by the wicked Party's culture. When the wicked CCP disintegrates,won't China still be China? Of course, there are very few people who arestill holding on to that concern now. People now are actively thinkingabout things and know that the wicked Party is doomed. The Chinese peo-ple are now talking about how to stabilize Chinese society when the wickedParty falls. This is what people are saying now. People's mindsets and wayof thinking are changing. Think about it, everyone. China is China, and ithas had five thousand years worth of civilization. When one dynasty is go-ne, is it necessary to worry that a new one won't take its place? When godswant something to fall into chaos, it will surely do so, whether [the peoplewithin] it want it to or not; when gods don't want it to fall into chaos, it su-rely won't be chaotic, even if [the people within] it want it to be so. (Ap-plause)The wicked Party is attaching itself to the ideological system of the Chine-se nation, to human bodies, and to Chinese culture. At the same time, it isundermining Chinese culture and persecuting the Chinese people. If thewicked Party crumbles and its evil specters are all destroyed--as if it sud-denly evaporated in the human world--won't China still be China? (Applau-se) Moreover, if the Chinese people and those in power can truly realize theevil of the wicked Party and consider what's in the nation's best interest,then that society will surely make a stable transition. But of course, theseare just words, and as to how it's going to go, it won't be driven and direc-ted by human will--gods have their arrangements. (Applause)Disciple asks: Respected Master has talked about fine arts and music, so dothe Truth-Compassion-Tolerance Art Exhibitions and New Year's Gala ha-ve far-reaching significance?Teacher: No matter what talents Dafa disciples have and no matter whataspect of culture these involve in human society, these are talents that hu-mans possess. This is how it should be understood at the moment, at least.Dafa disciples are using their unique strengths as they validate the Fa. The-se are things Dafa disciples should do, and it can be said that they are ma-king the most of their talents to do what Dafa disciples should do, so that isa great thing. In fact, isn't this the case with everyone? Those of you who

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are good at computers are breaking through the Internet blockade and clari-fying the truth online, and of course there are those with other talents. It'sall the same. Those who really don't have special talents are handing outflyers on the streets, and the mighty virtue is the same. No one will fail toreach a high realm in cultivation because society doesn't consider what heor she does scientifically or technologically advanced. That's impossible.(Applause)Disciple asks: Our media has highlighted ancient prophecies that said theCCP would die in the Year of the Rooster and similar things. But everyt-hing is changing during Fa-rectification. If what happens does not match upwith the prophesies, will that damage the reputation of our media?Teacher: As for the reputation of our media being damaged, well, there'snot much to say about that. But [I do want to say that] media is just media,these things aren't some sort of Ultimate Truth, and Dafa disciplesshouldn't get too attached to them. Some people are always attached towhat prophecies have said and why it didn't happen that way. They've be-gun to take these as the Fa. Don't forget that since the start of Fa-rectifica-tion, everything has had to be determined by what the future needs, inclu-ding what process the Fa-rectification itself goes through. Prophecies canbe used only when they are conducive to saving sentient beings. There arealso people who say, "Something Master said seems to mean such andsuch, but why didn't it happen when the time came?" [People who feel thatway are] actually all just speculating. Isn't an attachment to time an attach-ment? Only when you cultivate without any omissions or gaps is it the bestcultivation. Dafa disciples are to do what Dafa disciples are supposed to do,openly and with confidence. When you [are able to do that] and have nothoughts of being dependent on other people or things, the evil won't dareto exploit your gaps, and bad things will flee at the mere sight of you, be-cause you have no omissions that it can exploit. When the evil can persecu-te students, isn't that because it manages to exploit the students' gaps ari-sing from their attachments? Isn't that why it can persecute students in thefirst place? This includes some students feeling physical discomfort, evento the point of having seemingly serious conditions or in some cases evenpassing away prematurely. There are factors arranged by the old forces atwork there, but there's also an element of the students themselves not ac-ting so righteously. If [you] act in a truly righteous manner, nothing will da-re to lift a finger against you. (Applause) It's easy to say, but for cultivators,it is very tough to do as you cultivate, and Master sees that. But there is apoint I want to make: No matter what, have righteous thoughts and act righ-teously, and there will be no test that you cannot pass. Even if things do getvery grave and you don't know where your own problem lies, you can't bewithout righteous thoughts. No matter what the circumstances, your funda-mental faith in Dafa cannot waver, because when [your faith remainsstrong], even if you can't fully understand something or you haven't donesomething well and didn't pass a major test, or even if you lost your human

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body and left this world, you will nevertheless achieve Consummation.(Applause) That's because Master does not acknowledge this persecution,and that thing was done to you by the persecution. So you must make sureto heed this. At that moment, if you suddenly switch sides and turn bad inthat instant, then everything of yours might be finished. Your righteousthoughts must be strong enough, and even when you haven't passed a testwell, you cannot waver on the most fundamental issue. Dafa disciples, letme tell you about a principle. If an ordinary person can do Dafa disciples'things during this time when Dafa disciples are persecuted, this person willbecome a divine being for sure, even though he is an ordinary person whohasn't cultivated. (Applause) You have done so much, and if it is a matterof one or two tests or a big ordeal arranged by the old forces not beingovercome--if that's all--it is only a matter of the level of your Consumma-tion, not a matter of whether you reach Consummation at all. (Applause)Disciple asks: Is Lei Feng[2] a product of the evil Party's culture? Can he re-main in Zhuan Falun?Teacher: The evil Party has attached itself to the Chinese nation and Chi-nese people's bodies and culture. It is using Chinese people and Chineseculture to do harm to the Chinese people and their culture. Lei Feng actual-ly has a subordinate soul that is a pratyekabuddha (self-enlightened one).Of course, this is the situation of divine beings in the old cosmos. As far ashow he'll be positioned in the future, that is something that belongs to thefuture. How far back his relationship goes and what kind of direct connec-tions he has with the evil Party will be seen in the future.Disciple asks: Can we read Zhuan Falun out loud and broadcast it via theradio station? For fifteen minutes per week?Teacher: It is not that you can't broadcast it via radio, but it seems that thetiming isn't quite right yet. Programming needs to be based on what today'saudience likes to watch or listen to, and [what you proposed] is doable onlywhen people have widely understood Dafa. Currently, only when your pro-grams suit the taste of the audience will you have more listeners. And onlyafter that happens will you be able to achieve the effect of clarifying thetruth and saving sentient beings. If content related to Dafa takes up toomuch time, ordinary people who don't practice cultivation will not find itinteresting. The inner meaning of Dafa can't be put out there for ordinarypeople so casually like that, so broadcasting it that way will not be effecti-ve. Shouldn't saving people be done with wisdom? When people have acertain level of understanding about Dafa, it might be acceptable to do that.At this stage, the timing doesn't seem very appropriate.Disciple asks: Did Fa-rectification begin a very long time ago?Teacher: It started two years before I began teaching the Fa. But some stu-dents have seen that it began in the distant past, tens of thousands of yearsago, tens of millions of years ago, or even beyond that. Can that be the ca-se? Yes. That's because the time here is different than the time there. Here,if I started something a second ago, over there it has already been a very

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long time, perhaps ten thousand years. So far we have seen sixteen yearspass. In some dimensions millions of years have passed. That's the idea.There is this difference in time.Disciple asks: Right now, many students are acutely aware of colors. Mas-ter, please talk a little about the colors red and black.Teacher: In the cosmos, darkness normally suggests negative beings anddimensions; particularly in lower-level dimensions a dark appearance gene-rally signifies a negative being. Of course not every case is like that. Forexample, some Daos wear black clothing. As a matter of fact, though, nega-tive beings indeed like darkness, and they also like irregularity. However,as for those negative beings, regardless of which dimension they are fromor even if they are demons, or whatever kind of beings they may be, if theydon't get involved in damaging Dafa and don't affect the matter of Fa-recti-fication, they are not beings to be weeded out during Fa-rectification.It is necessary for negative beings to exist in the cosmos. If everything inthe cosmos were positive and every realm was positive, then positivitywould cease to exist. Of course, where Buddhas are, there are definitely nobeings as filthy and bad as those on earth. At their realms, both positive andnegative beings exhibit themselves, but the realms of those negative beingsare also at those same levels. At lower levels, the not-so-good beings lookeven worse, while the good beings are not as good as those at higher levels.This is caused by the difference in realms. If there were no negative beingsin the cosmos, think about it everyone, if the entire cosmos were positive,then what would being positive mean? No one would understand what itmeans to be positive, since there would be nothing to compare to. If everyt-hing were good, then where would you find the bad? Because they havebad things to compare with [good ones], people can understand what isgood and what is bad. Because of the evilness of demons, people have co-me to know what the benevolence of Buddhas is. Just as I have said before,tribulations will bring about this state of mind in beings: only after puttingforth great effort will people come to understand the pains required toachieve something, and consequently feel happy to have it. And during theprocess, the vitality and brilliance of sentient beings and the universe willbe manifested. That's how things truly are.Also, as you all know, the evil Party has manifested itself in this humanworld as idolizing the color red and has made it the symbol of the wickedParty. In the heavens, its original image is a red, evil dragon. That's whyhere on earth right from the start it began establishing red regimes, red re-volutions, the Red Army, the red revolutionaries in the Cultural Revolu-tion, the Red Guards, red armbands, red collar badges, red flags, the fivered stars, big red lanterns, huge red pillars, red walls--in any case, everyt-hing is red. The evil Party calls it a "new world filled with red." It's reallyscary to human beings, though--a world filled with red. And now todaywhen the evil Party is about to utterly collapse, look at what the evil Partyis putting on stages for performances: red curtains, red lighting, red costu-

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mes, red sets--my goodness, the whole stage is filled with red. If it's not hu-ge red lanterns, then it's red flags filling up the stage. I generally refer to itas "evil Party red." Bright red, from an aesthetic point of view or from theperspective of what it usually signifies in society, should be used only tocomplement and enhance, not as a base color. You can't use big blocks ofred as the backdrop, because if you do that, all the other colors can't standout. That's why the color red should be used only to complement andenhance. Then why does the evil Party so idolize red? It is in fact a reflec-tion of its worship of blood and of its need to satisfy a bloodlust. The evilParty culture openly admits that the red flag was dyed with blood. The evilParty wishes the streets were awash with people's blood. Many people areactually disgusted by the way red is being used. Some students sitting inthe audience here are wearing red, but of course, there is no element of theevil Party there, as you are Dafa disciples. There's a purpose behind the"evil Party red" being used even more rampantly now. Right now, the wayit is being used in movies and on stage has reached a mad, incoherent level.If you haven't noticed, you can take a closer look at its programs. They'redoing that because few evil spirits and beings remain and the evil is aboutto fall, so it is trying to fill their ranks and bolster their nerve.Disciple asks: I find some of my fundamental attachments to be very stub-born, and they have affected my improvement and saving sentient beings. Iask Master in my heart to remove those stubborn parts of my being and re-create them.Teacher: Master is actually taking care of everything. If you don't resist itor don't handle things with righteous thoughts, but instead often let attach-ments guide your behavior, then that's not cultivation. How can it be rightto ask Master to do everything! If I were to recreate you, you would reallybe recreated, and it would not be completely you. That's why you have tocultivate yourselves. The Fa-principles are all laid out there. Why is it thatothers can achieve that, but you can't? Study the Fa more, and take a lookat some of the articles on Clearwisdom that students publish to share witheach other. They are truly wonderful, and indeed very mature. Some of thearticles were really well written. Compare yourselves with those and seewhere you fall short. You have to walk your own path. Otherwise, whenyou ascended to the heavens, others would question you, saying, "How didyou get up here? Which part is a result of your own enlightening? You we-ren't able to overcome even such a major problem, and only after your mas-ter removed it did you make it through. You can't say that you were cultiva-ting. You didn't cultivate your way up here. Isn't that so?" You wouldn'tfeel comfortable staying up there and would go down. (Master laughs) Anddo you think you could cultivate again once you went back down? Don'tmiss this predestined chance. What's so hard about it? Think about it, [andyou will see that] this is about not cherishing enough your predestined op-portunity to cultivate, about not cherishing the Fa enough, and not cheris-hing your own life enough. When you truly understand these things, you

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will do well.Disciple asks: Disciples outside of China attained the Fa abroad becausethey have their own special mission. Now that all the Dafa disciples are in-volved in media work, is it true that more disciples should come out andjoin the media work? According to my understanding, overseas disciplesshould all be doing media work.Teacher: Who told you that? (Audience laughs) What I was just talkingabout was how Dafa disciples are all validating the Fa according to theirown strengths. When it comes to doing media work, if you can write, knowhow the media works, or can sell advertisements, or you can do other sup-plementary work for a media outlet, that means you have the right skill setto do media work and you can go right ahead. Isn't everyone putting hisown abilities to use and finding the right spot to validate the Fa? You aren'tall doing the same thing. I just talked about this, right? [Didn't I say] thatthe Great Way has no form, and everyone is proactively validating the Fawithin his own social stratum and profession using his own uniquestrengths?Disciple asks: When we study the Fa with little disciples, is it okay to skipthe characters that they don't recognize?Teacher: They can ask about the characters they don't know and informeach other. If none of the children recognizes the word, then it's not a pro-blem to skip it--they can ask the adults about it later, and there is a processthere. When they run into a word that they don't recognize, if they then stopthe study for the day and wait [to study again] until they ask and find outwhat the word is, that won't do.Disciple asks: Did the evil specter of the wicked Party exist on the previousearth?Teacher: No, it's just a recent product of this earth. The old forces feel thatit is quite an achievement to have sustained the evil Party for the hundred-plus years since its creation. That's because it is against the cosmos, andbeings throughout the entire cosmos are enemies of it and want to eliminateit. Some people think that the United States and Western society want todefeat the evil Party. That's not human beings' wanting to defeat the evilParty: that is cosmic forces manifesting in this human dimension. Humanbeings themselves, though, are also against the things such as violent revo-lution and class struggle that the evil Party advocates.Disciple asks: What do the other dimensions of non-cultivating ordinarypeople look like?Teacher: Why do you care about a non-cultivating ordinary person's state?It's hard to say whether they even have other dimensions. Many people des-troyed them when doing bad things. Some have them, some no longer do.Disciple asks: I am a Taiwanese Dafa disciple living in North America.Taiwanese Dafa disciples send greetings to revered Master.Teacher: Thank you all. (Applause)Disciple asks: Can the students who petition in front of the Consulate in

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San Francisco distribute the Nine Commentaries to people, Chinese andnon-Chinese, visiting the Consulate?Teacher: They certainly can. As we are talking about the Nine Commenta-ries, I want to talk with you about this a little bit more. When the NineCommentaries came out, some people said that you were getting political,and some students who had fear acting up in their minds shared the sameview. But what's there to be afraid of? If the Nine Commentaries were notsomething Master asked to have done, could Dafa disciples have done it?You know the purpose of distributing the Nine Commentaries, right? Sincethe day the persecution started, Dafa disciples all over the world, includingthose in mainland China, have kept writing to the evil Party's central go-vernment. Each of the seven members of the Politburo Standing Commit-tee, including that archfiend, have been burning a huge number of lettersevery day. The archfiend has burned a bin of letters each day. We clarifiedthe truth to it and asked it to stop the persecution, yet it insisted on conti-nuing the persecution. In the end, it still launched this persecution on July20, 1999. Even with that, I still gave it chances. We clarified the truth to itagain, and while we were being persecuted, we gave it another year. Theletters addressed the impact that the persecution would have on [the arch-fiend] itself, on the nation, and even on the evil Party. Things were explai-ned very clearly, but it still kept on with the persecution. In other words,the persecution did not stop even after one year of persuasion. It still keptup the persecution. Then Dafa disciples told the world that it was the arch-fiend who was single-mindedly, obstinately using the evil Party's power topersecute Falun Gong students. That clown really thought it was emperor.Its jealousy, twisted mindset, and irrational rage led to this persecution. Wethen exposed it before the people of the whole world and let the wholeworld know about that clown who had lost its mind. When the persecutionstill continued, we brought lawsuits against it around the world. Though itis so vicious, it's actually very cowardly. When it saw disasters loomingright in front of it, it got scared to death. But the evil specter of the wickedParty and bad, chaotic ghosts and beings controlled this buffoon, who wasin a situation where it was impossible to back down gracefully. To continueto persecute Falun Gong students they took advantage of its vile thoughts.And the persecution still didn't stop. Dafa disciples then further exposed itand sued it on a larger scale all over the world. After that it could no longershow its face. No other country's leader anywhere in the world has been sodisgraced. In the history of China, there has never been an emperor whoseevil deeds were exposed by the people so thoroughly during his reign. Theactions arising from that twisted mind have really disgusted the world'speople. Regardless of how bad the first Qin Emperor may have been, peo-ple talked about and judged him only after he passed away. No emperor hasbeen completely exposed like this while still in power--exposed, that is, tothe point of being putrid and untouchable. Leaders in many countries aretalking about it, believing it to be mentally ill and irrational, a mentally de-

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ficient fool.Cultivators are on a journey to divinity. They don't see any human beingsas their enemies, and they try their best to save all sentient beings. Even if aperson has become so bad that he can no longer be saved, we still won't al-low him to continue carrying out persecution. As you all know, it was re-moved from power during the periodic change of government officials. Thetruth is that it had gotten too crazy and out of hand, and the old forces madeit step down. The old forces know that it was afraid of being held accounta-ble for the bad things it was doing, and it therefore placed its own people athigh levels of the evil Party. The old forces thought that this way theycould balance the power just right. In addition, such an arrangement wouldallow the evil Party's factors to come to the surface. These [two things] ha-ve, after all, been using each other all along. Given that, Dafa disciples areto expose the evil Party, helping everyone take a look at why the evil Partyhas wanted to persecute Falun Gong, what the evil Party is about, and whatFalun Gong is about. All along Dafa disciples have been explaining whatFalun Gong is, and now you will explain as well what the evil Party isabout.The reason for Dafa disciples to do this is not to overthrow the evil Party,and even less is it a plot to seize power. Dafa disciples expose it to helppeople see its true nature clearly and stop collaborating with it in the perse-cution of Falun Gong. (Applause) That is our goal. The Buddha Law is aserious thing, however; once a decision is made, once an undertaking is be-gun, it is to be finished. So, I knew that when the Nine Commentaries cameout, once the true picture was shown to the world's people and the Chinesepeople, the evil CCP would for sure disintegrate. After all, the power ofBuddha Law is at work. Of course, I have said before, and I wasn't joking:If the Nine Commentaries don't work, we have other means. (Applause) Wewill not resort to violence, and we will put to use every peaceful means the-re is to end the persecution. As the saying goes, "Buddha Law is boun-dless." If you don't believe it, just wait and see. (Applause)Of course, the Nine Commentaries will be more than sufficient. (Teacherchuckles) Since the gods decided to destroy the evil Party the moment it be-gan to persecute Falun Gong, each Chinese person's belief or lack thereofin the evil Party has become something that determines whether he will beweeded out in the future. This is the role that the Nine Commentaries playsin truth clarification. The gods have seen that, and that's why all of the hig-her beings, positive and negative gods alike, regardless of their origin andpurpose, all are using ordinary people to promote the Nine Commentariesin China. Those transporting the Nine Commentaries into mainland Chinaare not limited to Dafa disciples; ordinary people, too, have been bringingin the Nine Commentaries in large quantities, some even in cargo contai-ners. Also, many ordinary people are putting together and printing the NineCommentaries in print shops. All the gods are doing these things. This me-ans Dafa disciples are not the only ones playing this role in saving beings.

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Even ordinary people are doing it, many ordinary people. The evil Partyhas been persecuting Chinese people for so many years. During the yearsthat it has been in Chinese society, it has, in the time since its founding,harmed more than two thirds of the Chinese people in its many politicalmovements, and many hate the evil Party. For some in China it is a reallyburning hatred. Those people are doing it. The gods are using every oppor-tunity to promote the Nine Commentaries. You'll see, soon it will be overfor the evil Party. (Applause) These things are happening because whetherpeople stay or go is related to whether beings at higher realms can stay, andthose are enormous groups of beings. Moreover, it has a connection with al-most all celestial beings, directly or indirectly.Some people have asked, "Do people from other countries need to announ-ce their withdrawal from the Party?" It's not a big issue for people from ot-her countries. The evil Party in Eastern Europe crumbled because the peo-ple were against it. The people there already did what they were supposedto do. The Chinese people have not. The Chinese people must make thatstatement. By whatever means, you have to publicly announce that youwithdraw from the evil Party. That's because for Chinese people, starting asa Young Pioneer in primary school, all the way to becoming a member ofthe Youth League and then a member of the Party, you have made pledgesbefore the flag of blood. The pledges you've made are no simple matter.Gods consider those to be blood oaths. That's why Chinese people mustclearly state their withdrawals; otherwise it doesn't count. You may say thatyou already withdrew in your mind a long time ago and no longer pay Par-ty dues. No, that doesn't count. When you made that blood oath to the hea-vens before the flag of blood, an act directly witnessed by countless gods inthe heavens, you said that you would dedicate your entire life and yourbeing to the wicked Party. Having uttered those words and having madesuch a serious blood oath, now you want to take care of it so casually andperfunctorily? That's not acceptable. So if they want to make it to the nextphase, Chinese people must publicly announce their resignations from theParty. They must take action to make the announcement, and it's not accep-table simply to take a stand without any action.Disciple asks: We Vietnamese students are in the process of translatingZhuan Falun. We always feel that our translation isn't accurate, and this hasgone on for over two years. Master, please give us some guidance.Teacher: As far as translating Zhuan Falun goes, talk to students who didthis with other languages and you may come to understand that to translateit perfectly accurately is impossible. Of course, if you used original, classi-cal Vietnamese, you almost wouldn't need to translate it because at one ti-me Chinese characters were used in almost all parts of Asia. But later whenthe French created those characters for the Vietnamese, it cut contemporaryVietnamese thinking off from its ancient culture. The modern-day Vietna-mese people have indeed been affected in terms of their way of thinking.There is almost no inner meaning in the contemporary Vietnamese langua-

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ge, and that's why it is so difficult to translate it accurately. So you shouldjust take the translation approach used by English and other languages. Doyour best to express the surface meaning clearly, and that will be goodenough. There's no need to translate the Fa-principles at higher levels. TheFa will display the higher-level inner meanings, and that is the manifesta-tion of the Fa's inner meanings at different realms.Disciple asks: How should we handle the issue of investment versus specu-lation? I'm encountering this problem at work.Teacher: If you are referring to doing this as a profession in human socie-ty, it's not something you can call a part of cultivation. Even though you area Dafa disciple, your work in society isn't cultivation, but your cultivationwill be reflected in your work in society. That's how they're related. What-ever your profession in ordinary society may be, you have to do it accor-ding to human society's rules and forms. That's how it works. As for thedistinction between speculation and investment, it's a matter of the state ofsociety. Our students should try their best to handle themselves well. If youfeel there is a business prospect, an opportunity, then go ahead and do it.An investment opportunity is not necessarily the same as speculation; itdoesn't necessarily fall into the category of speculation. That's because asthe business world has developed in society, all the sectors seem to havebeen saturated, especially in recent times. So latecomers find it hard to esta-blish a foothold, and when someone finds an opportunity, it's a businessprospect. Things will thus work out fine if you have a clear understandingon issues like this. Work itself is not cultivation.Disciple asks: I can't keep pace with Fa-rectification's progress and, of thethree things, I haven't done well in clarifying the truth. I'm really anxiousabout this. I am working hard on studying the Fa and memorizing the Fa,though. Will I be able to have a rapid breakthrough? On behalf of Dafa dis-ciples from Beijing's Fengtai District, I send our greetings to Master!Teacher: Thank you all! If you haven't done well, try to improve gradua-lly. It's good that you know you need to focus on it. There is no use inbeing anxious, and that's an attachment. Don't be anxious and just do whatDafa disciples should do. Look at how others are doing it and follow theirlead. Gradually you will blaze your own path, and gradually you will beable to do it in your own way.Disciple asks: Peruvian and Spanish-speaking students send their greetingsto respected Master!Teacher: Thank you! (Applause) Now the number of students in SouthAmerica is gradually increasing and the more-veteran ones are beginning tomature. These are great developments. Dafa disciples have become almostthe only hope for humanity in some regions. Even though on the surface so-ciety is still functioning and Dafa disciples seem to be going virtually unno-ticed by the various industrial and professional sectors, that's not the reali-ty. The divine beings and all sentient beings in the cosmos are watching.The positions Dafa disciples are in and the roles they are playing are both

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tied to the survival of humankind.Disciple asks: In exposing the CCP's evilness, how can our media handlethings well so that ordinary people can continue to accept and support us?Teacher: You should remember that your righteous thoughts can changeordinary people and that you are not to be directed by them. If ordinarypeople say something or interfere with you, don't take it to heart, and justdo what you need to do. The sources of human thoughts are very complica-ted, and in many cases it is people's notions talking, not their true thoughtsor their true beings. So the things they say are often specious and not whatthey mean. They forget the things they just said right after saying them.They don't even take their own remarks seriously, so why would you?Don't worry about what they say, [but] every word that you say is like athunderclap to them.Disciple asks: A very small number of veteran students have for quite sometime been doing Dafa work without studying the Fa or doing the exercises.If it keeps on like that long-term, are they cultivating?Teacher: This problem indeed exists. Many Dafa disciples are shoulderingseveral Dafa projects, and things that validate the Fa do need to be done, sothey don't have time to study the Fa or they have less time to study the Faand do the exercises. They indeed can't continue doing this long-term.That's because we all know that, especially when it comes to the students inmainland China, whether a student can walk the path righteously and wellunder those circumstances is entirely contingent on studying the Fa well. Ifyou don't study the Fa your righteous thoughts won't be strong; if you don'tstudy the Fa the changes on the surface will be slow for you and your rolein containing the evil in society will be weak.Disciple asks: What's the old forces' situation like currently? Is their exis-tence only for the sake of disciples' cultivation and sentient beings positio-ning themselves properly?Teacher: To put it simply, they exist for the sake of their own existence.Everything they do is for the sake of their own existence. If they were tosucceed in manipulating Dafa disciples, this universe would end up as ifnothing had changed and remain as before. That's the situation. But that isnot to be. The future doesn't acknowledge anything of the old forces, andthe change is inevitable. The old forces' overall system has already beendestroyed, since the Fa-rectification has destroyed it at the highest place.It's just that the things the old forces left in this world in the past are stillhaving a superficial effect; the things that have not been destroyed are stillfunctioning. As for what will happen to sentient beings, human beings inparticular, the old forces couldn't care less.Disciple asks: The beings and humans that haven't yet awakened will beweeded out. Will they have opportunities in the future to be saved?Teacher: The beings that have not yet awakened still have time to do soright now, don't they? As for the future, we haven't set anything in stone.Dafa disciples should just go ahead and do Dafa disciples' things. If the

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beings that truly can't be saved are weeded out, well, that's not somethingto form an attachment about and that's what the Fa-rectification requires.When the enormous force of Fa-rectification comes, there won't be muchfuss over this or that. It will be like things being wiped out, and it will be fi-nished in an instant.Disciple asks: It has been almost a year since the Nine Commentaries havebeen disseminated, and the number of people quitting the Party has stabili-zed at around 20,000 every day. If the wicked Communist Party collapses,does that mean that the time of Fa rectifying the human world has come?Teacher: What you are asking is actually two questions. [You're sayingthat] the daily number of people quitting the Party is always 20,000, [andyou are wondering whether] it could reach as many as one hundred thou-sand or 10 million a day. I addressed this question earlier.If the wicked Party collapses, is that the time when the Fa rectifies the hu-man world, you ask? That's still an unknown right now. If the wicked Partyfalls before the Fa-rectification of the human world begins, it will reallylead to a period of modern society where there is no wicked Party. Andwith regard to China specifically, this will bring about some issues specificto a society free of the wicked Party. When the Fa's rectification of the hu-man world does arrive, we will see the way of life for the next stage of hu-manity. You shouldn't be thinking about any of this right now, nor is itsomething for people to be concerned about. It's going to be a completelydifferent state of human society. I will address this from another angle: it isan act of compassion for Dafa disciples to save all beings, and you aretrying to save as many sentient beings as possible. If you are able to savehalf of the human beings, then Master will truly be happy for you!Disciple asks: I have a question, Master. There are a few ordinary people inthe Bay Area who actively undermine Dafa and are hostile to Dafa, whichhas negatively affected other ordinary people quite a bit. This is attributableto our local Dafa disciples not having done well. How can we do better?Teacher: When the Dafa disciples' righteous thoughts are a bit stronger,everything will be changed by the Dafa disciples and the evil will be elimi-nated. Then what will the bad people amount to? Aren't those few bad peo-ple doing these things under the evil's control? When the evil is eliminatedand you stand in front of that person, will he dare to say a single negativeword [about Dafa] to you? Facing a god, he won't dare. (Applause)Disciple asks: Master, please explain the connection between levels and di-mensions.Teacher: The breakthroughs in levels I talk about are breakthroughs in di-mensions. Each level is a dimension, that's the idea.Disciple asks: Our group has always had endless arguments over which ap-proaches to take. One fellow practitioner thinks that the current approachhas no future and is full of inadequacies, whereas his approach is better, haslong-term benefits, and will save human and material resources. Could weask Master to enlighten us on this with Fa principles?

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Teacher: If Master's instructions are required for such specific things thatDafa disciples are doing, isn't that the same as me doing them myself?You'd be no more than one of my hands then, wouldn't you? I want you tohave your own mind and your own body, and be a complete divine being.You need to do what you need to do, and when it comes to those things,you need to handle them, make judgments on them, and coordinate themyourselves. I'm confident you will do them well.Disciple asks: Dafa disciples from the following places send their greetingsto Master: Beijing's Fengtai District; Jiangmen city in Guangdong provin-ce; Chongqing city; Dalian city; Shenyang city; Zhengzhou city in Henanprovince; Shanxi province; Yunnan province; Guizhou province; Beijing;Jiangxi province; Xi'an city; Nanning city in Guangxi province; Shenzhencity; Hunan province; Lanzhou University; Guangzhou city; Shanghai;Shiyan city in Hubei province; Tangshan city; Arizona; Vancouver; Viet-nam; San Diego; Harbin city in Heilongjiang province; Qiqihar city; Da-qing city; Mudanjiang city; Xinjiang province; Tianjin city; Shijiazhuangcity; Qingdao city in Shandong province; and Anshan city in Liaoning pro-vince.Teacher: Thank you. (Applause) Recently some Dafa disciples from main-land China have come overseas and Master knows about that. I hope thatyou will still do a good job with what Dafa disciples should do, given yournew environment. No matter where you are, you are always a Dafa disci-ple. (Applause)Disciple asks: I've recognized attachments such as arrogance and jealousyin myself, so why haven't I been able to get rid of them even after a long ti-me?Teacher: If you truly take these things that seriously, you will be able torestrain them. Then you will be able to weaken them and gradually get ridof them completely. If it's a case where you are aware of it and feel anxiousabout it, but in practice you don't truly restrain and suppress it, then in reali-ty you are just stopping at this mental activity of seeing and feeling some-thing, but you haven't taken any action to suppress that thing. In otherwords, you have only thought about it but not actually cultivated and put itinto practice. Another situation is one where you might say, "I have cultiva-ted wholeheartedly and carried it out through concrete actions, yet this [pro-blem] is still happening." That [occurs] because things developed over along period of time have been separated into layers by factors presseddown here by beings from the old cosmos. So each time a layer is brokenthrough, that layer is wiped out; then another layer is broken through andwiped out; and another is broken through and wiped out. In this way, theywill become weaker and weaker, and there will be fewer and fewer ofthem. They won't be gone all at once, and this is what leads you to expe-rience that [feeling you have]. The same applies to many other human at-tachments, the same happens with them.Disciple asks: Would Master please instruct me on the difference between

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the mind being unmoved and being in a state of indifference, both of whichI have experienced from time to time?Teacher: In cultivation, different states will manifest, and sometimes it re-ally is quite hard for you to distinguish among them. But usually the stateof a very calm mind is such that it's still serene when faced with a lot of in-terference, and it is unaffected by ordinary human emotions such as gettingexcited, feeling wronged, etc. It is very calm, and it won't negatively im-pact doing the things that Dafa disciples should do. There is definitely adifference between that and the human state of feeling helpless, not wan-ting to do anything, and becoming numb to something after seeing it too of-ten.Disciple asks: Some students in our area have been investing in real estaterecently, and doing so with good intentions. But I've continually felt so-mewhat uneasy about this, concerned that buying real estate now and wai-ting for the price to go up before selling is similar to gambling.Teacher: It's not that serious. Doing business is just doing business, andit's fine for Dafa disciples to go and do it well. While we're on the topic ofgambling, I want to talk to you about the issue of speculating in stocks.There are different kinds of stocks. Let's say that I buy a certain number ofshares or invest a certain amount in a company. Taking on these stakes in acompany is just a normal form of investment. Each month I might get a cer-tain amount of profit from it and I haven't been making speculative invest-ments on it based on its price fluctuations. That's not the kind of stock spe-culation that I have talked about before. What I have talked about is "specu-lating" in stocks--you should all remember this--it's "speculating" in stocks,meaning that you watch the price fluctuations every day and your heart ispractically dragged up and down along with the price. (Audience laughs)How could you cultivate then? You couldn't. How could you cultivatewhen your mind is completely focused on your stocks? Your attachmentwould be so strong that you'd become even more ordinary than ordinarypeople. How could you be called a cultivator then? You definitely couldn'tcultivate then, and that's what I was referring to. If each of you had a stakein some company and you didn't have to do anything but get money from iteach month, and then you spent plenty of time doing things that Dafa disci-ples do to validate the Fa, I would be overjoyed! (Applause) That isn't whatI was referring to when I discussed stock speculation. What I just spokeabout includes investing in real estate, too. If you have an opportunity, thengo right ahead, and there's no problem there. Of course you should wait un-til the price goes up before selling. However, sometimes you may not beable to pinpoint it so accurately. What if you fail, then? These are all ordi-nary people's things. It's about how you can handle it appropriately. Theseare matters of work in human society and work is not cultivation, but yourcultivation will be reflected in your work.Disciple asks: Master, please talk about how the various natural disastershappening in the world today are related to the progress of Fa-rectification.

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Teacher: Discussing such issues is a sensitive thing for human society, soit's best that I don't discuss them; there would be no benefit to doing so. Ta-ke a look, though, everyone. Today's society is so complicated, people'shearts and minds have turned so bad, and mankind's morality and behaviorare so bad--how could there not be disasters? There definitely will be disas-ters. But they're not completely aimed at sins committed in persecuting Da-fa disciples, since mankind's karma is itself simply growing larger and lar-ger. Of course, there are also elements at work here related to people's atti-tudes towards Dafa. In addition, the areas where disasters have struck areplaces where there are no Dafa disciples, and in mainland China they havehappened in areas where the persecution of Dafa disciples is severe.Disciple asks: I'd like to ask how the media run by us students in the wes-tern United States should validate the Fa and play a larger role?Teacher: This question is too general. Dafa disciples: do well with whatyou should do. Each student involved has the ability to proactively do wellwith what he or she should do; meanwhile, it is vital to have good coordina-tion and cooperation so as to produce a larger effect and have greater re-sults. The [media you run] will have succeeded when they are able to trulyplay a pivotal role in saving sentient beings.Disciple asks: Disciples from Taiwan send their greetings to Master.Teacher: Thank you all. (Applause)Disciple asks: Disciples in southern Taiwan are preparing for the 2006 NewTang Dynasty New Year's Gala, which has aroused a great deal of interestin NTDTV on the part of the Taiwanese public. May I ask Master if the es-tablishment of NTDTV in Taiwan is an arrangement by divine beings? Al-so, I'd like to ask Master to discuss the higher principles involved in theCCP's loss in the Eutelsat incident.Teacher: These are all matters of New Tang Dynasty TV and do not havebroader application. These things are excellent. As the Fa-rectification hasreached this stage, let me tell you that at Master's side and at the sides ofDafa disciples are many upright gods, and a steady stream of gods is tur-ning upright, which means that they have changed and will now have a po-sitive attitude towards Fa-rectification and Dafa disciples. They want toturn around completely and help play a positive role, and this will constant-ly bring positive results.The Eutelsat incident has been over for such a long time, so I won't talkabout it. One thing is for sure when it comes to the wicked CCP: no matterwhat the wicked CCP does in persecuting Falun Gong, as soon as it doessomething, that thing will turn into a scandal and a failure. This has beenset in stone by gods. (Applause) That's because history does not unfold forits sake, the old forces let it play a role only to test students, and today'shistory was specifically created for Fa-rectification and is unfolding for thesake of Dafa disciples.Disciple asks: Is it all right to take selling ads for The Epoch Times as anoccupation?

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Teacher: If you can make a real living by selling ads, then go ahead and doit. That is an occupation, and there's no problem with doing that. [I saythat] because the media outlet the students at the Epoch Times run is not it-self cultivation; it is something that stands on its own in society and is anormal job. The same holds true with the companies that you run. Or let'ssay that you are running someone else's company, isn't going to work at so-meone else's company the same as going to work at your own company?That's the principle. However, your cultivation will be reflected in thework. On top of that, the media you're running was established by Dafa dis-ciples for validating the Fa, so of course this is an especially good thing. Ifyou are getting ads for it so that it will continue to go on, then aren't youdoing your part for Dafa disciples' validating the Fa? Some people say, "Ican save people directly by clarifying the truth to them. Today I convincedsomeone of the true situation through clarifying the facts. I feel so happythat this person has been saved." Well, as far as the media goes, there tooyou will have a part in the role it plays saving sentient beings. Let's say thatone hundred people are involved in this media work, then if the media sa-ved one hundred people a day, one of them was definitely saved by you.Newspapers are distributed every day, so there are definitely more than onehundred people [saved], right? Then haven't you saved someone each day?That's definitely the principle that is at work here, for you have worked to-gether to keep the newspaper running, which means that you are clarifyingthe truth together.Disciple asks: Some overseas democracy activists specifically asked me torelay their greetings to esteemed Master.Teacher: Then I thank them. (Applause)Disciple asks: They expressed their admiration for Dafa and Dafa disciples.Teacher: Yes, sentient beings, no matter what you are doing today, didn'tyou all come for the Fa?Disciple asks: I feel that the old forces arranged a lot of very bad elementsat a certain university, and sometimes I feel as though things are really dif-ficult. Is this because I haven't cultivated myself well, or is it perhaps just afeeling?Teacher: That's not necessarily always the case. Let's put aside the old for-ces for the moment. The human society that you are dealing with has rea-ched today's stage after going through a complicated process over the cour-se of history. The ways of thinking are complicated, the state of society iscomplicated, and many things--including the righteous and the wicked, thegood and the bad--are all mixed together. Faced with this kind of societyand people, Dafa disciples need to cultivate themselves and save all beings,for what you face and what is put before you are only the hard things. Tho-se are what you see today.Disciple asks: Are the industrial and business sectors in the U.S. still beingrestrained by the old forces?Teacher: I know what you're referring to, you are talking about how they

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go to China and keep on investing in and bolstering up the wicked CCP. I'dlike to tell you all that Master is not against the Chinese nation becomingrich and powerful. I hope that the people there will become prosperous andbe more civilized [in how they handle things]. What I am against is the oldforces sending large amounts of money there during the persecution of Fa-lun Gong and the evil using that money to persecute Dafa disciples. What Iam against is their creating the opportunity for that to happen. Back when Istarted spreading the Fa I decided that China should become prosperous.During the years when I was spreading the Fa, the old forces stood in theway and didn't allow that to happen. When the persecution of Dafa started,they began to send money there and in large quantities, at that. When Ididn't acknowledge what they were doing, they said, "Didn't you want it tobecome prosperous?" They were exploiting the loopholes in Fa-rectifica-tion, and, in reality, doing what they wanted to do. Even so, Dafa discipleshave made it through. The positive factors are playing a decisive role andthe evil's bag of tricks is no longer working. Think about it, everyone. Thewicked Party is about to fall, and if China's economy crashes along with it,won't [it be the old forces] doing something bad again? They'd again be ex-ploiting loopholes, right? These are the things they are doing. Don't worryabout this for now, though. When the wicked Party vanishes, the Chinesepeople will continue to survive.Disciple asks: How can the Chinese and English media outlets cooperatewell with one another?Teacher: The Chinese media outlets have been operating for such a long ti-me now, so the media outlets in English and other languages can drawupon their experiences. As a matter of fact, the English media are makingtheir presence felt right now. So far the situation with the newspaper is pret-ty good. There are difficulties, to be sure, but gradually things will get bet-ter and better. It is very important to have good cooperation. The studentswho distribute newspapers can deliver both papers at the same time, [forexample]. Another example is having all of the Dafa disciples' news resour-ces be shared. These are both examples of very good forms of cooperation.You should continue to improve the cooperation and coordination in otherways, as well.Disciple asks: There are those among ordinary people who have realizedthat spreading the Nine Commentaries widely can disintegrate the CCP, butright now the daily rate of withdrawals from the Party is still only about20,000. What should Dafa disciples do to improve? How can we have asnowball effect in terms of the withdrawals from the Party?Teacher: I don't think it will remain that way forever. Changes will comeas our own problems are resolved and as the effect of the Nine Commenta-ries increases. In reality, the evil and the bad people have already lost theirconfidence. The CCP is like something rotten that's about to be booted outof China--it's already airborne from the kick, it has been uprooted and is onits way out. All of these things are changing along with the situation.

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Disciple asks: How do we get all students to realize the importance ofSound of Hope's broadcasts into China?Teacher: The wicked CCP considers Sound of Hope, New Tang DynastyTV, and the Epoch Times its biggest concern. That's why they say that Fa-lun Gong has three major media groups. They are referring to Sound of Ho-pe, NTDTV, and the Epoch Times. You can tell that the evil is scared todeath over Falun Gong. Indeed, it's not afraid of the United States, andeven less Europe. It fears Falun Gong because Falun Gong knows what it'sall about, more clearly recognizes its schemes, and knows how to make itcrumble. (Applause) As long as it doesn't stop the persecution, we will keepat it until it crumbles. In fact, all Chinese people know how the wickedCCP is, and how those Party leaders that are manipulated by the evil think.But people who live in the Western world and have a normal mindset aren'taware of those things. They have no idea what the evil Party's culture is allabout. That's why I'd say that if one day the evil Party suddenly disappearsfrom China or falls, other governments will be clueless about how it happe-ned. To find out what the evil CCP is about, you first have to learn how itlooks at issues, how it thinks, and how it lies. If you don't have an unders-tanding of even those most basic things, all the intelligence you gather willbe wrong.Disciple asks: Master, please kindly address those students who work at theEnglish Epoch Times and tell us how to do better going forward.Teacher: Whatever you do, initially you will always experience pressureand shortages in the three areas of human resources, material resources, andfinancial resources. In spite of that, you are Dafa disciples after all, and youhave accomplished something ordinary people could not. Since you havestarted [this project], I believe that you will definitely do it well, for sure.As for how to do better, you need to put your heads together and blaze atrail of your own making. I look forward to seeing good news [of your pro-gress]. (Applause)Disciple asks: Since the Epoch Times became the platform and facilitatorfor the Nine Commentaries, I have felt even more deeply the great impor-tance of running the media outlets well. Only with a stronger operationalbase will the Epoch Times have a stronger voice. Today, when I heardMaster talking about how there are different forms of cultivation, I felt thatthe improvement of our professional skills is connected to improvement incultivation. That applies to news writing, doing layout, handling accountingmatters, etc. May I ask Master to give us more guidance on how to run themedia and do better at it?Teacher: Just as I said earlier, if you want to do better, you need to coope-rate and coordinate well, carry out each task responsibly and attentively,and through your collective effort make that media outlet stand out. If all ofyou do well, the media outlet is bound to do well, and it will have a greatereffect in saving sentient beings. However many people it saves, you have ashare in that because it is your collective mouth, the mouthpiece of everyo-

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ne involved in running the newspaper.Disciple asks: Greetings to Master on behalf of Dafa disciples in Yunnanprovince of mainland China!Teacher: Thank you. (Applause)Disciple asks: I'm involved in a media project, and I often see that we lackresources, such as shortcomings in our standard operating procedures orbeing short of funding, and an inability to connect with more students sothat more people can join in. We remain at the level of a workshop [ratherthan a major business]. How do we break through this?Teacher: That is indeed the situation you are facing now. If you havestrong righteous thoughts, cooperate and coordinate well, and walk yourpath righteously, everything will get better. Students in Mainland China ac-tually have a much tougher time. Their materials production sites are basi-cally at a household level, and they spring up everywhere. In other words,people walk their own paths. Each person, or some that are coordinatingwith each other on a small scale, is walking his own path. Didn't I say ear-lier that as far as our cultivation form is concerned, the Great Way has noform? This applies to the things that you do to clarify the facts. It's not likea situation where people go and do things under the direction and urging ofsome head assistant, not at all. Other than under special circumstances whe-re you need to work with each other on something with the head assistantproviding centralized coordination, each person should be taking initiativeand walking his own path. If everything was centralized and done with eve-ryone together, if everything was decided by the head assistant and everyo-ne followed him and did the same thing, then whatever the head assistantcultivated into, you would become no more than sentient beings in hisworld. I don't want that for you. I want every Dafa disciple to become aking. Each person is to blaze his own trail, and each person is to validateand reach his own Attainment Status. (Applause)Having said that, I want to remind all of you, this doesn't mean youshouldn't listen to anyone anymore now that Master has said you should allbe walking your own path. When overall coordination is needed, you needto cooperate well. So, people in charge of different regions need to playtheir roles clear-headedly and rationally. Whenever necessary, you all needto work well with the coordinators.Disciple asks: I work in a restaurant and generally spend little time clari-fying the truth. I go to practice and help with the Epoch Times only onweekends. Am I considered a genuine, cultivating disciple?Teacher: If on a day-to-day basis you can take advantage of the conditionsprovided by your job, or when you make contact with the world's peopleyou still remember to clarify the truth and save sentient beings, and dowhat a Dafa disciple is supposed to do--if you study the Fa all the same anddo all of the three things, you are a Dafa disciple. (Applause)Disciple asks: Recently several older students in the Bay Area passed awayone after another, and didn't manage to make it to the end. What will be the

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position they return to?Teacher: I actually talked about this very early on, in Zhuan Falun. Somestudents aren't diligent, but the time they put in learning Dafa will not be invain, and neither will the time they put in doing Dafa things. Howevermuch they did, that's how much they will receive. The exception is thosewho leave Dafa, particularly those who leave when Dafa is being persecu-ted; if they pass away, [what I described] does not apply to them. There isno hope there.Disciple asks: I feel it's much harder to talk about the facts relating to theNine Commentaries and the CCP withdrawals than earlier times when weclarified the truth about Dafa. I'm often afraid to talk about these two thingsat the same time. I don't know where I'm stuck.Teacher: You are stuck because of your own understanding. You yourselfhaven't grasped why we are doing the Nine Commentaries, or at least youhaven't understood it clearly. (Teacher chuckles) Why do Dafa disciplesdistribute the Nine Commentaries? You are thinking that talking about theNine Commentaries feels like getting involved in politics, and that only tal-king about the other facts regarding Dafa being persecuted is actually ad-dressing something related to Dafa. As a matter of fact, before, when youwere [just] opposing the persecution and talking about the truth of Dafa,weren't there a lot of people saying that you were getting political? The pur-pose of your distributing the Nine Commentaries is to expose and end thewicked Party's persecution, rather than bringing down that wicked Party.As long as the persecution continues, Dafa disciples will keep distributingthe Nine Commentaries, until finally the evil CCP disintegrates and the per-secution stops. Doesn't that give you just cause and full confidence [to dothis]?Disciple asks: Shanghai Dafa disciples send their greetings to Master.Teacher: Thank you all. (Applause) When Shanghai Dafa disciples sendtheir regards to Master, that archfiend squatting in its den in Shanghai getsterrified.Disciple asks: Dafa disciples have a very weak sense for how companiesspend money on advertising. Does that give the evil a reason to block ourincome?Teacher: No, it doesn't. Let me tell you, The Epoch Times is already an in-fluential media outlet in the United States. Everyone, no matter who it is,and especially Chinese people, wants to learn about The Epoch Times andto learn about the news The Epoch Times carries. Of course, along the waythere will be people who resist it, but as we clarify the truth more and do somore deeply, many people change. The media outlet that is The Epoch Ti-mes has become the only multinational newspaper that spans the entire glo-be. That is already the case.Disciple asks: I'm feeling more and more that there isn't enough time. Res-pected Master, how should we deal with this using righteous thoughts? Canwe send righteous thoughts to prolong time? (Audience laughs.)

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Teacher: That's difficult to do, and you aren't capable of it yet. That is be-cause as Fa-rectification proceeds faster, time also goes faster. In otherwords, as Fa-rectification pushes forward more rapidly, celestial bodiescorrespondingly move and turn faster, as does the entire cosmos. That'swhy this is happening on such a gigantic scale. But regardless of that, be-cause Fa-rectification has already taken that into account, all that Dafa dis-ciples can do is their best. It's true that you will feel time is very short. So-metimes, you get up in the morning, get busy running around doing a fewthings, and it's dark before you know it. [You wonder,] how come there's solittle time? That is indeed true. Humans don't have the ability to keep up be-cause Fa-rectification is happening at a very high speed. Many of us re-member that in the past, we always felt the day was very long. When I waslittle, I often heard others saying, how come it's still not dark yet? Peoplewere tired after working all day, and felt the day was so long and they wereworking all the time. Now it's different. Nowadays, people are saying thatit's dark before they have a chance to do anything. That is the biggest diffe-rence that human beings can sense.Disciple asks: I obtained the Fa in 1998, and this is my first time askingMaster a question at an experience sharing conference. Master, I've donequite a few things over the past few years, yet I feel as though I don't havemuch to say when everyone is sharing experiences. Is that because I haven'tstudied the Fa well or because my righteous thoughts aren't strong enough?Teacher: Perhaps that's a personality issue. If you don't have anything tosay, then just spend more time listening. See if there are any gaps betweenyou and the others and do some comparing. Sharing with each other provi-des an environment where Dafa disciples move forward and improve toget-her. That little bit of time is the only time [reserved for that purpose] whileyou are cultivating in the human world, and it is the environment whereDafa disciples come together, a cultivation environment. You spend moretime in ordinary people's society and cultivate in the human world, and youdon't separate yourselves from the secular world. That's why that little bitof time is very precious and very limited for Dafa disciples.Disciple asks: Article submissions over the Internet are being blocked bythe evil, and they are controlling [access to] the websites. Can we set upanother website in the United States? Master, please give us some directionon doing this, and especially on the idea of using them for articles from theNine Commentaries that have been translated into other languages.Teacher: Yes, you certainly can. You should think of ways to solve thisproblem. There are many websites out there today, and Dafa disciples arerunning quite a few. They are all having an effect.Disciple asks: After the Nine Commentaries was published I did my best todistribute it. Around that time my wife brought a lot of tribulations uponme. I dropped down [in level] and had some pretty severe sickness karma.Now I occasionally have serious relapses [of the sickness karma], and Ifind it really hard to endure the tribulations my wife brings upon me. I want

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to overcome this trial as quickly as possible.Teacher: Deal with everything you are faced with as a cultivator, and youwill be able to overcome anything. (Applause) You should ask yourself: ifa divine being were faced with this problem, how would he handle it?When you can't make it through, that's what you should be thinking. Justtry to make it through and handle it that way, and see what happens.Disciple asks: Do Western students living in the United States need to quitthe Party?Teacher: That's not an important issue. Certainly, many students are with-drawing, such as those from former Eastern European countries. Since theyare Dafa disciples now, whether they withdraw or not isn't an importantevent in and of itself, but the psychological impact of their withdrawals onthe evil CCP is quite significant.Disciple asks: You just mentioned not talking at too high a level duringtruth clarification. Does that mean that in our media reports we shouldavoid using phrases like "the evil specter of Communism" and "gods wantto eliminate the CCP"?Teacher: That's not a problem, those things aren't too high-level. The refe-rence to "the evil specter of Communism" is not too high-level. I have beenbringing that to light and gradually giving a thorough explanation of thematter. The Nine Commentaries also mentions it. The talk about "godswanting to eliminate the CCP" is also true and factual. When you talk aboutit, people will be able to feel that, as they have a knowing side. When Imentioned people not being able to accept it if you talk at too high a level, Iwas referring to things in cultivation, because cultivation principles are theopposite of those of human beings. While people feel that living a life ofcomfort is a good thing, cultivators believe that, for the sake of improvingthemselves, the opposite is a good thing. Isn't that an example of a righ-teous principle existing alongside a reversed one?Disciple asks: How do we know about our grand historic vows? When I re-ad Zhuan Falun and study the Fa, I can remember [what I'm studying], butonce I turn around and become an ordinary person, I forget.Teacher: When you become an ordinary person, of course you aren't sup-posed to know the Fa. You should instead say that once you make contactwith ordinary society you forget that you are a cultivator. This is probablydue to lack of righteous thoughts. It's not necessary for you to know thatclearly about whatever grand vows you may have made in the past, norshould you be concerned about that. Today you are someone who has obtai-ned the Fa and, being a cultivator, you should just do what's required ofcultivators. You said that you can't remember the Fa that you studied--that'sall right. Let's say you don't remember after the first reading and you stilldon't remember after the second reading, then put your heart into studyingand you will definitely make a breakthrough. If you truly give your bestand still can't recall it, then it is a test that has been placed in front of you.If that is not the case and your not remembering is caused by not paying

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enough attention, then the issue at hand is for you to become more diligent.Disciple asks: Dafa disciples of Shenyang city give their best regards toMaster. (Teacher: Thank you all.) Master said in Zhuan Falun that hewould protect every disciple until a disciple has the ability to protect him-self. However, many disciples nevertheless didn't finish the journey Masterarranged, and they were killed by the evil's persecution. Didn't those whoare deceased cultivate in vain?Teacher: If every Dafa disciple can think and act righteously as he goesabout things and can look at things with righteous thoughts under any cir-cumstance, none of you will become afraid when facing persecution. If thatis how you are, who would dare to persecute you! If a person is completelyin the Fa no one can touch him. Isn't that having the ability to protect your-self? As a matter of fact, with regard to the veteran students [that started]prior to the persecution, I raised all of you to your positions. As long as youcan go about things with righteous thoughts and righteous actions you canprotect yourselves perfectly well, and that applies as well for new studentsthat joined later. It's just that some students simply don't have righteousthoughts. They have all the things in place, and yet when experiencing per-secution they still look at things with a human mindset and still have a bigpile of attachments. What is Master to do? Should I completely take overeverything that you're supposed to do in validating the Fa? Then would itbe you that's cultivating or would it be Master doing it? Let me reiterate: Itis Dafa disciples, not ordinary people, that Master is protecting amidst thepersecution.I have explained these things very clearly in several Fa-lectures. If you area student that just came from the mainland, seek out the Fa that I havetaught in the past few years and read it, since it would take a long time toexplain it all in detail. Many things are quite complicated. Elements of eachindividual's past, as well as elements arranged by the old forces, are of rele-vance here.I've joked about this with you before, saying that all the famous and promi-nent people in the past were Dafa disciples. The Dafa disciples were sohappy when they heard it, thinking, "We were all of those famous people inhistory!" Many of those historical figures took a lot of lives, though. SomeDafa disciples were bandits and robbers in history, and some even commit-ted terrible crimes. Of course, Dafa disciples, since you are now cultiva-ting, Master can harmonize and benevolently resolve those things, and takecare of all of them. But cultivation is sacred, and it is serious. Master willbenevolently resolve those things and has actually settled many of yourdebts for you; however, with such a major, major issue, in a life-and-deathtest, can the cultivators not be held to high standards? Those students whoare not diligent will have a hard time making it through. Having such greatdebts, at life-and-death moments could you be allowed to make it throughwithout righteous thoughts? When some of you mainland students were se-verely persecuted you reached a point where you no longer took yourselves

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as Dafa disciples. Your head was full of ordinary human thoughts. Whilebeing persecuted, you were attached to an ordinary person's life of comfort.Then how could you be treated as a divine being? How could those debtsfrom the past be settled? Could you make it through the tests so easily? Sothere are many different reasons and various factors that you cannot look atin a human way, thinking things such as, "They cultivated for such a longtime, and now haven't they all cultivated in vain? They were killed by thepersecution, just like that? Isn't Master supposed to be protecting Dafa dis-ciples? Where was the protection?" Yes, I do protect Dafa disciples. But,even when at the brink of death they didn't consider themselves Dafa disci-ples, nor did they remember that they still had me, their master. What wason their minds was: "If I die right here, what will my life have been goodfor? Who's going to take care of my children? Will my wife re-marry?"When they were being persecuted severely, they didn't call out to Master,instead they called out for their mother, or even yelled for Heaven andEarth. When I tried to stop the persecution, the old forces and the gods ofthe cosmos all said: "You have to be firm on matters of principle when rec-tifying the Fa. What Fa are you rectifying? Are you going to take unrigh-teous things and regard them as the righteous Fa? Is that your disciple overthere? Look at him, does he consider you his master?" The more seriouslythe person was persecuted, the more his human attachments grew, insteadof him becoming more steadfast as the persecution went on and havingstronger and stronger righteous thoughts to resist the persecution. You tellme, what could be done? All the way until the time he was killed by thepersecution, he never regarded himself as a Dafa disciple.Fortunately, Master recognizes whatever Dafa disciples have done. Afterhe is killed by the persecution, I recognize the fact that it was because hecultivated in Dafa that he was killed by the persecution. Despite the factthat he didn't do well in overcoming that particular tribulation, I won't lethis cultivation be in vain. (Applause) That's why I have said that whatawaits Dafa disciples, no matter what, is always the brightest and best futu-re. (Applause) What you endured in the persecution does not compare inthe least with what you will be given in the future. And it is true that theold forces exploited the gaps of some really good students and killed themthrough persecution. That happened in the Bay Area also, and it greatlypains Master's heart.Of course, on this subject, there are many different factors. As long as so-meone can act like a divine being, nothing will dare to kill him through per-secution.Disciple asks: How should we look at giving gifts to the head prison guardin order to ease the suffering of relatives imprisoned for practicing FalunGong?Teacher: It can't be called some sort of major mistake. It's just that youshould do your best to act a little more righteously and do a little better. Ifyou could clarify the truth to that head prison guard with very strong righ-

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teous thoughts and get the message across to him, it would be much betterthan giving him gifts. But this is just talk, and when doing it like this in thatkind of environment... the question is, are you going to have very strongrighteous thoughts? Are you able to have really powerful righteousthoughts when placed under pressure by the evil? That's the big question. Itis very hard, but when you turn it around and think about it, wasn't humanhistory created for today? Isn't everything that Dafa disciples need to forgeprecisely about making it through all of this? So in order to go from beinghuman to being divine, don't you need to make it through this way? (Ap-plause)Disciple asks: I'd like to send greetings to Master on behalf of all Dafa dis-ciples from the 8th Platoon of the Liaoning Province Women's Prison.Teacher: Thank you! The wording makes it sound as if the Dafa disciplesare the "8th Platoon" of that prison, doesn't it? You should say, "Dafa disci-ples who are being persecuted by the prison's 8th platoon." It is not our "8th

platoon." Dafa disciples don't acknowledge anything that was arranged bythe old forces, and even less so do they acknowledge the wicked Party'spersecution.Disciple asks: On June 5th of this year, I read a group declaration from do-zens of disciples at that prison, stating that they will firmly cultivate in Da-fa and follow Master to the end. Master, please set your mind at ease.Teacher: If those words had been said three or four years ago, I reallywouldn't have been able to set my mind at ease, but now I am able to. (Ap-plause) Back then it was unclear whether Dafa disciples would be able tomake it through during this persecution, and unclear how many would beable to make it through. Even though gods were protecting them and Mas-ter was watching over and protecting them, while being persecuted couldthe Dafa disciples truly have righteous thoughts and righteous actions likegods? Making it through depends on one's own steadfast righteous thoughtsand firm belief in Dafa. Master can take on the suffering for you, and I caneven bear the pain in your place, but can you position your mind in a righ-teous way when under such cruel and harsh pressure? Are you treatingyourself as a god or as a human being? Do you have ample righteousthoughts? All of these things depend on you, on you yourselves.Disciple asks: Master, there is a trend whereby the differences among stu-dents' levels are growing, and some students are repeatedly being interferedwith by sickness karma and have not been able to break through it over along period of time. How can we better improve as a whole?Teacher: I have talked about this many times before, and many studentshave actually understood it already. When students exhibit severe sicknesskarma, it undoubtedly has two goals. One is to have that person displaysuch a state and then see how people around him or her look at it. It's to seehow and whether your minds are moved by it. Isn't that the case? If everyo-ne is moved, thinking, "Whoa, he's cultivated so well, how could he be likethis?" then attachments rear their heads and human thoughts surface. Some

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people think, "If even he has become this way, will I be able to make it?"All kinds of human attachments thus resurface. Then the old forces say, "Iwas right to have done this, wasn't I? The reason I had that person's sick-ness karma get so severe was to test whether they have righteous thoughtsor human thinking. We did the right thing, didn't we? See, didn't those hu-man thoughts of your disciples return? So many human thoughts have re-turned, so we need to target those human thoughts. We're therefore going toincrease that student's sickness karma and see if all of you still cultivate."No matter what happens, nobody should be affected inside. Each studentshould think only of giving help as a Dafa disciple as he's able, and there isnothing to get worked up about. Even if you can't help that person youshould still face this issue with righteous thoughts. Continue to do whateveryou are supposed to. Don't become attached to it by looking at it in a hu-man way, don't make these problems worse in your minds, look very righ-teously at how it relates to everything else and don't think of it as being ve-ry important, and be very calm. The old forces will then lose interest, thin-king, "These people aren't moved. If none of them are moved, what is thepoint?" They will then let the matter drop, and that person's sickness karmawill disappear instantly. That's one scenario.The other goal applies to that person himself: how well has the person whoexhibits the sickness karma cultivated? Is he able to make it through withstrong righteous thoughts while in such a state? Does he truly treat himselfas a god and pay no attention to any of it whatsoever? Today I read a reporton the Minghui website. A student was beaten so badly that her legs weresmashed and broken into pieces, and they didn't set her bones before ap-plying a cast. It never even occurred to the student that she would becomehandicapped because of this. She didn't pay any attention to it at all. Shejust studied the Fa every day, and her righteous thoughts were very strong.When she was able to sit up a little bit, she started to do the exercises. Thedoctors told her that her bones had been smashed and fractured in severalplaces, and that the cast had been applied before the bones were set. It wasall done by those people in the prison hospital. She didn't pay any attentionto it and just told herself, "I want to cross my legs and do the exercises."She pushed herself and did it even though it was extremely painful to do.As time went by, she no longer felt any pain when she crossed her legs.The end result is that she has recovered. She can now jump up and downwithout any problem, and she's just like a completely normal person. (Ap-plause) If any of you can conduct yourself like that, the old forces will ab-solutely not dare to touch you. Whoever can be like that will be able to ma-ke it through when encountering tests. What are "righteous thoughts"about? That is what righteous thoughts are about.Disciple asks: Some fellow students say that the Nine Commentaries carrythe power of the Fa. Is that true?Teacher: It is true. As for the Nine Commentaries, well, everyone knowsabout clarifying the truth, saving sentient beings, and disintegrating the vi-

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cious Party's evil specter--aren't these things that Dafa disciples need to dowhile validating the Fa, and things that need to be done by Dafa during theFa-rectification? Of course it carries the Fa's power. But you shouldn't stu-dy it as if it were Fa. (Audience laughs). It should be treated as material thathelps one understand the evil Party. But those students who are confusedon this front should read it more, as it will be beneficial. That's the situationwith that.Disciple asks: Some people who have come from Mainland China are verysympathetic towards and supportive of Falun Gong, but they aren't eager towithdraw from the Party. Other than giving them the Nine Commentaries,what can we do to help them more effectively?Teacher: Some people are beyond help. I just said something: if you wereable to save half of the people, it would be a great success. In other words,there are many people that you can't save, many that can no longer be sa-ved. That is reality. But you shouldn't stop doing things to save people justbecause of those who can no longer be saved. You should continue to dothose things. Also, this affair has yet to reach the very end, and no conclu-sion can be drawn. It is still unknown whether a given life will have furtheropportunities or not. As the overall situation changes, he might changealong with it. Right now these things are merely manifestations of what ishappening in this process.Disciple asks: Because of my attachments, I was taken advantage of by theold forces and the evil Party's wicked specter, and I fell out of the ranks [ofDafa disciples] for as long as one to two years. The old forces have mademy doing the exercises ineffective, and all this time I have stuck it out. Ithink that through studying Falun Gong, doing well the three things thatMaster has given us to do, and keeping up with Teacher's Fa-rectification, Iwill definitely be able to make it through.Teacher: Yes, that is the right track. Righteous thoughts shouldn't be merelip service. Instead, righteous thoughts, righteous actions, and being dili-gent are in order. Falling out of the ranks for one or two years is not a shorttime. No matter what, though, since the persecution hasn't ended, chancesabound right now for those who have not stepped forward or not caught upwith the progress of Fa-rectification. Do as well as you possibly can. That'swhat you should do. You need to seize the day.Disciple asks: Is it important for little Dafa disciples to read the Nine Com-mentaries?Teacher: For little Dafa disciples in the U.S., studying the Fa is still moreimportant since they haven't been poisoned and damaged by the wickedParty. Those in China are different--those in mainland China are different.For those in the U.S. it's fine to just study the Fa more.Disciple asks: Some Dafa disciples are very attached to ordinary skills.Master, please tell us how to let go of attachments to those skills.Teacher: If it has to do with someone wanting to do his job well, then itshouldn't be considered a problem. But if it affects Dafa disciples valida-

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ting of the Fa, then the losses outweigh the benefits. It's just a matter ofkeeping things in the proper perspective so that you do well at your job yetdon't let it negatively impact the things Dafa disciples do.Disciple asks: One of the exercise verses has the words "Golden MonkeySplitting Its Body." Does it have a deep inner meaning? Is it a hint that Da-fa disciples should have the ability to identify hidden evil? Dafa disciplesin Guangzhou city ask that I send greetings to Master!Teacher: Thank you! (Applause) Nothing in Dafa is simple and straightfor-ward. Everything has its inner meaning, and everything can be used as ahint and a way to help Dafa disciples understand the Fa more deeply.Disciple asks: Many students have recently started up businesses. Master,could you tell us if there is really an urgent need to do so? How should webalance these types of things [against what we are to do as Dafa disciples]?Teacher: If a person had problems meeting the needs of a normal life andwent about solving the problem, then there shouldn't be anything wrongwith that. But no matter what, a person cannot forget that he is a Dafa disci-ple or forget to do the things Dafa disciples should do. Actually this issue isvery simple.Disciple asks: I would like to record the new scripture that you are givingand listen to it myself, is that okay? Can I turn it into a CD and let otherstudents listen to it?Teacher: No, you can't. Even just recording it and listening to it by your-self is not allowed. I have talked about this issue many times. Nobody canmake his own recording at will, much less distribute it. That is why each ti-me I give a talk I will edit [the transcript that is made] afterwards and thenturn it into a book, and it is for this reason. I do this since what I say on agiven occasion is intended for the students at that setting, and it doesn't ha-ve any direct bearing on other regions. After it is edited and turned into abook, however, it's a different matter as it then has broad applications. Ithus need to make edits to the manuscript. Once it is published as a book,any differences that exist between edited places and the original audio/vi-deo recording will undermine the Fa. And those who undermine the Fa:Gods are watching your every action. In a little bit, you must turn all of tho-se things in to the conference staff, videotapes included. You shouldn't dosuch things, and should pay attention to it! Ordinary people can't undermi-ne the Fa. I've said that only when Dafa disciples themselves don't do wellcan damage occur. Some people say, "I have the audio of Master's Fa lectu-re at a certain place that nobody else has--I alone have a copy." He is quitepleased with himself, and it's a very bad state of mind. It is using solely hu-man thinking to look at matters of cultivation, and in reality it underminesthe Fa. It is an early indicator that a person is about to undermine the Fa.Once that thing is brought out, it will undermine the Fa, even though it is aspeech given by Master. You know how using today's technology anythingcan be faked, sections can be replaced, and things like voice recordings canbe spliced and put back together. Hasn't the evil Party done such things in

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order to persecute Falun Gong? Do you think that what you have is safe?Only talks that have been officially published on the Clearwisdom websiteor formally printed as books can be verified; nobody can undermine those.The old forces haven't gone after you yet, but when you approach Consum-mation and reach the final stage, they will definitely stop you on account ofthis. At that time it will be too late for regrets.Disciple asks: The evil CCP manifests as a red dragon in the bottom dimen-sion. Is it in the image of an Asian dragon or a Western dragon?Teacher: It is in the image of an Asian dragon, but sometimes the image ofa dragon in the West is used and can be understood by Westerners. It is acultural issue and doesn't affect anything fundamental.Disciple asks: Some students devote themselves entirely to doing things forDafa. Some have encountered life-threatening danger. It might be becausethey neglected their own cultivation and didn't pass certain tests well. Butprecisely because they were still cultivators, they couldn't possibly passevery single test well. Why couldn't Dafa protect them?Teacher: It seems you are demanding to know why Dafa didn't protectthem. Each person's situation is very complex, and it's not the case that aperson can pass every test with just that same, small amount of righteousthoughts. Some require quite a large amount of righteous thoughts to getthrough; some can be passed only after the attachment to one's life is castoff. What is cultivation? It is marching toward godhood! [Would it work if]Master bore everything for you, Dafa protected you no matter what dangeryou encountered, and you had an umbrella of safety over your head? If the-re weren't any tribulations at all, how leisurely that style of cultivatingwould be--who wouldn't cultivate? Things are in fact very complicated. So-me students had agreements with the old forces dating back to prehistorictimes, and in that case what can be done if he has to depart at a certain ti-me? Some students never eliminated their fundamental attachments, andthat is an issue of whether or not they are truly Dafa disciples at a funda-mental level. Ordinary people too can do things that Dafa disciples do, butthey can't be looked after as Dafa disciples. Some students' gaps were ex-ploited by the old forces and they were unwilling to let go of their attach-ments, yet the test they faced might very well have been the great test of li-fe or death. And in that case what could be done? Some students had rea-ched the end of their lifespans but were not diligent, and in a few extremelyrare cases [the students] had to depart a little bit early, to name a few exam-ples. You absolutely must not look at cultivation with a human mentality!I just said that the principles of cultivators and those of ordinary people areopposite. Human beings believe that a life of comfort is a good thing, whileDafa disciples believe that having everything be easy is a bad thing when itcomes to their improvement and that discomfort is conducive to improve-ment. (Applause) Have you managed to turn around your fundamental con-cepts? When you meet with a little bit of hardship or a little something hereand there, you can't make it through. And when eventually it accumulates

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to a very large amount, it becomes a major test, and that test is one youcan't pass without letting go of [the attachment to your] life. What could bedone, then? The tribulation could even become so great that you couldn'teven things out even if you did let go of [that attachment to your] life. Theold forces wouldn't let you make it through, and your righteous thoughtswouldn't be strong enough. You tell me what could be done. What wouldyou have Master do? Master has been protecting you unconditionally, yetyou are not diligent, even to the point of becoming like an ordinary person!You say, "I am a Dafa disciple," yet your thoughts and conduct are those ofan ordinary person. It is Dafa disciples that I am bringing salvation to to-day, and I can't go and groundlessly protect an ordinary person. The "birth,aging, illness, and death" an ordinary person faces is a law mandated by theheavens, and it can't be meddled with without a reason. Do you know whatMaster is doing today? I am rectifying the Fa of the cosmos. How am I rec-tifying it? What am I using to rectify it? Can I rectify the Fa of the cosmosin an incorrect way? Unconditionally protecting an unqualified cultivator--is that being responsible to you? Is that rectifying the Fa of the cosmos?Why do Dafa disciples need to cultivate, pass tests, have strong righteousthoughts, and go through suffering? Only those things can be consideredcultivation. In fact, cultivation is about coming here to suffer, not cominghere to be protected in the human world. When one studies Dafa he will beprotected, but cultivating Dafa also requires one to endure suffering. Somestudents say, "When we encounter danger, Master will protect us." Andyes, that's true! There will definitely be protection when a person has righ-teous thoughts and actions.Disciple asks: A minute before seeing revered Master today, a thought sud-denly popped into my head, "Master has come, and he is onstage." Then Isaw you, and I was so excited. My elderly mother who is ninety-five yearsold and illiterate chants every day, "Falun Dafa is good," "'Zhen Shan Ren'is good," and "Master is good." She misses Master a lot.Teacher: The attitudes that sentient beings have towards Dafa don't haveto be as solemn as those of cultivators. What I just said, on the other hand,was very solemn. You are cultivators, so when you still don't see thesemost fundamental issues clearly, I have to put things to you in solemnterms. For ordinary people that's not necessary. They are only pitiful sen-tient beings and should be saved. You are to save others, and it wouldn'twork if you failed to do well yourselves. Were that the case, you wouldn'tbe able to save others and would even fail to save yourselves.Disciple asks: Dafa disciples from the Western region are deeply grateful torevered Master for appearing at the Fa Conference and giving a Fa lecture.Teacher: Thank you all! (Applause)Disciple asks: Those students who have been to New York feel that the pa-ce of the activities that disciples in California hold to validate the Fa is notfast enough, yet disciples in California are very capable and are well off fi-nancially. How can Dafa disciples out West make the most of their

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strengths and be more effective in validating the Fa?Teacher: Students just talked about people stealing our newspapers, abouthow the evil forces are really strong, and about how some people have beendamaging the Fa. But I have noticed that the Chinatown area is a blank spotin your efforts to clarify the truth and validate the Fa. And yet that is themost, most important place in your region out West. For the most part youhaven't paid much attention to it. I walked around the area and didn't find asingle copy of The Epoch Times. With things like this you should all beclear on what Dafa disciples are supposed to be doing!Disciple asks: Is it a good opportunity for us to clarify the truth each time ahigh-ranking Chinese official visits another country?Teacher: Yes, Dafa disciples have done things as circumstances have allo-wed, and you should act in accordance with the situation at hand.Disciple asks: When Chinese officials visit the U.S., how far should we gowith suing them?Teacher: In the cases of those people who have persecuted Falun Gong se-verely and who don't show any remorse, once you have evidence you cango ahead and sue. Actually, though, suing these people is not the point.Suing them is done to have them understand that the persecuting they havedone is not a bad deed that is over with once it's done: there will be a recko-ning, and the evil persecution must stop. It is to have them understand thatthey shouldn't join in the persecution. You must be clear on this.Disciple asks: Master, please talk a little bit about the matter of rescuing or-phans.Teacher: Rescuing orphans isn't something that should be done by our stu-dents, for this matter needs the U.S. government's involvement. Nor shouldit use up additional energy or resources. Rescuing the orphans is but one ofthe many things Dafa disciples are doing to clarify the truth, stop the perse-cution, and save sentient beings, and it isn't the biggest thing. Right nowthere are students working on it with the U.S. government.Disciple asks: Recently some people have been passing around articles bythe Buddhist Association of China that criticize and slander Dafa. Howmight we handle this better?Teacher: You should use a variety of approaches in dealing with these peo-ple. Begin by sending righteous thoughts to clear out the evil behind them,for those in the Buddhist religion who are against Dafa are, like others,being controlled by evil factors that cause them to do things. Among thosein the Buddhist religion there are indeed demons that reincarnated here inorder to play a part in the persecution, and they've had a very bad effect.They will be eliminated in the future. Use positive means to counteract[what they are doing]--first talk to them seriously, and then proceed to ex-plain and prove things out.Disciple asks: How should I, as a physician, deal with being asked to do in-duced abortions? Is this something that I can do for ordinary people?Teacher: I've already made this point perfectly clear in Zhuan Falun: that

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is killing.Disciple asks: How can we help fellow students to become more proactiveand to take initiative? For some time now a good number of students havebeen relying primarily on the assistance centers and assistants to organizethem and get them to participate in validating the Fa. Their tendency ofover-reliance is rather strong.Teacher: Indeed. Just by virtue of my reading out this question slip ourstudents should realize: Dafa disciples all have to walk their own paths.Each person has to proactively play his own role, find things to do, andseek out and save the people he is to save; you can't rely on the assistants totell you what to do. For the most part assistants currently don't organizethings unless they are large-scale activities, so are you going to not validatethe Fa except on those occasions? So the majority of the time it is Dafa dis-ciples doing things on their own.Disciple asks: I'd like to ask, after the wicked Party collapses, will the peo-ple of China still have a chance to declare that they quit the Party?Teacher: How meaningful would it be to quit after it has already collap-sed? Now is in fact the time when beings position themselves, so howcould there still be opportunities to do that after the evil Party collapses?Disciple asks: It seems that The Epoch Times newspaper has almost stop-ped carrying the Nine Commentaries. Should the Chinese- and English-lan-guage editions of The Epoch Times give weight to, and carry on with, run-ning the Nine Commentaries? Dafa disciples of Los Angeles send theirgreetings to Master.Teacher: The Epoch Times should take this question seriously. It's no dif-ferent than with New Tang Dynasty Television, which has broadcast itwithout letting up and kept at it. The Nine Commentaries is saving people.Just concern yourself with doing this; people won't grow tired of it.Disciple asks: Though the Nine Commentaries has been published for aslong as it has, there are still a handful of veteran students who haven't ma-naged to shed the shell of the evil specter, and they even believe that priorto seizing political power the wicked Party was good, that it turned bad la-ter on.Teacher: It was bad even at the point when it seized power. The Nine Com-mentaries has exposed its sinister history. In the past, when out of self-inte-rest it acted a little better towards those who didn't understand the true pic-ture, that was just putting up a front in order to have more people join itsranks. When it rose to power during the time of the Paris Commune, it washooligans revolting. In those years, the Paris Commune revolt destroyedthe glorious culture that gods had wished to leave to the people of this civi-lization. You've seen in Paris the sculptures that line the streets and thepaintings that were preserved, right? I'll tell you that those are no more thanten percent of what Paris once had, for a great deal of cultural/historic sitesand the finest works of art were destroyed by the Paris Commune. It wasterribly destructive. At the time Paris was brimming with works of art, and

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gods sighed in admiration. Such a beautiful city was thus ruined.Disciple asks: Our cultivation right now is cultivation for the sake of ot-hers, cultivation for the sake of saving sentient beings. Is this the right wayto put it?Teacher: No, it's not. It is for yourself that you cultivate. The sentientbeings that you save are encompassed by the cultivation you do, with thegoal [of cultivation] still being to consummate your own world. I've saidbefore that many have already reached the realm of consummation. I'm notjust saying that casually. Back when I said that, ninety percent of our stu-dents had been raised to their positions, and the positions of Dafa disciplesare no ordinary thing, it isn't an ordinary attainment status. That attainmentstatus is unattainable by means of solely personal cultivation, it couldn't bereached by ordinary cultivation means over eight, ten, or even a hundred li-fetimes! (Applause) That's because 1) you are lives saved by the GreatLaw; 2) you are Dafa disciples during the period of the Fa-rectification ofthe cosmos; and 3) you have the gigantic mission of saving sentient beings.And the lives you save are not ordinary either: many sentient beings have,like you, come from high levels. Dafa disciples have such a great mission,and that is why you can cultivate to such heights, validate an attainmentstatus so great, and have such glorious achievements. (Applause)Disciple asks: My husband is a Westerner who doesn't cultivate Dafa. Du-ring these years of Fa-rectification he has endured a lot. He doesn't unders-tand the things I do, and is now asking for a divorce. Your disciple hastried hard to persuade him, but to no effect. Was this brought about by yourdisciple having cultivated too poorly in certain regards?Teacher: As far as things of this sort go, Master can speak only in terms ofexamples. But often when I bring up an example, you take it to be referringto you. That's not the case. Let's take the matter of the family, or the affec-tion between husband and wife, or any of a number of other things. Haveyou looked at these things based on the Fa? Have you truly treated him asif you were being compassionate to a sentient being? If you really had, per-haps things wouldn't be as they are today. If on the home front your con-duct looks completely like that of an ordinary person, then it's possible youwill encounter this sort of thing. Nothing is simple. If you can truly let goof your attachments, and if attachments have no sway over you, then theconflicts will vanish like a wisp of smoke.Disciple asks: There's this person who is very enthusiastic about Dafa acti-vities, to the point where he goes around from place to place to tell peoplethat Dafa is good. However, many ordinary people have a negative impres-sion of Dafa because of interactions with him. For years students have triedtheir best to help him, but it has had no effect whatsoever. This person hasattachments to showing off, fighting, greed, and showcasing supernaturalpowers, and when he does the exercises or sends righteous thoughts thingslook quite odd. It's gotten to a point where non-practitioners have asked us,"Why do you allow him to be one of you?"

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Teacher: There are indeed ones like this among our students. They shouldbe becoming more rational as time progresses closer and closer to the fi-nish. Yet they still aren't up to standard, and they are absorbed in those pet-ty abilities and skills they have, clinging to those little things of theirs andunable to improve. A few moments ago I talked about the height of our Da-fa disciples' attainment statuses, and many of our students were able tograsp it, whereas these persons cling stubbornly to those little things theycan see and fail to make progress, and they're even quite pleased with them-selves. This kind of mindset is such a huge attachment--one of the greatestmagnitude. They are being rendered irrational by all sorts of factors, andyet they think they're pretty rational.Disciple asks: You have said before that when Dafa disciples work togetherand are going in the same direction, the Fa power that manifests is great.Yet when some students find that they are of a different opinion from eachother, they loudly berate the other party in public, leading ordinary peopleto gather around and watch. Some students say the effect this has is bad.Teacher: I'd like to look at this problem from two angles. Our students dofear having people gather around and watch. If there is an attachment ofconcern about saving face on your part, it's possible the other person'smouth will be used at that time to stir up an incident and attract onlookersso that you will see your attachment. It's cultivation after all, so every kindof means will be used to expose your attachments. Of course, when youcan't see what is at work you will say, "the effect is bad." But maybe thoseordinary people really didn't see or hear a thing, and maybe they will evenbe confused about what's going on. So that is one aspect of it. Another oneis that some students don't pay heed at all to the effect it might have on Da-fa. Whatever the occasion might be, they don't take into account Dafa'simage, they stubbornly insist on their own things, and consider their ownopinion to be first and foremost. Then isn't that a formidable attachment?Whoever insists on continuing down that dead end and fails to see his ownattachments, that person's gaps are being exploited by demons and the evil;his attachments are being enlarged, amplified, and expanded; and the morehe believes in his own mind that he's right on that matter, the more he feelsjustified in doing what he does. Any human attachment [he has] is enlargedby demons. He really can't manage to come to his senses at that time. But Iwant to tell you, and this is to keep this sort of thing from happening: Byall means pay attention to the image of Dafa disciples. If you're like that[person that is described in the question], how could you save people? Yourrighteous thoughts need to be strong. Don't let the evil keep taking advanta-ge of your gaps like that.Disciple asks: Could Master please explain for his disciples what the lines"With shared purpose did you come to the earth / And in gaining the Fayou took the lead" mean?Teacher: Sure. Some students have cultivated well and they really obtai-ned the Fa first, and thus they have had righteous thoughts and actions, al-

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ways abiding in the Fa. Some people took up Dafa earlier than others, whi-le others didn't start learning Dafa until later--this is referring to beingahead in terms of taking up the form of it.Disciple asks: Some students regularly go to church, treating it as a place tosocialize. Is that right?Teacher: They haven't learned the Fa deeply. Indeed we do have peoplewho have one foot in our practice and one foot out. If you want to be an or-dinary person, then go ahead--I haven't said that ordinary people can't visitcertain places. If you want to cultivate in Dafa, then you are welcome to doso, and if you don't wish to cultivate, then don't. But as for those who trulycultivate, they need to adhere to "no second discipline." Some people go [tochurches] on account of wanting to clarify the truth there, but when sprea-ding the Fa, you shouldn't specifically make religious groups a target. I,your master, haven't even done that, because that is something of the nextstage. Now is the time when we target all the people of the world--andespecially the Chinese--as we clarify the truth.Disciple asks: There is a veteran student whose son has done many thingsthat brought harm to Dafa. I'd like to ask, can she make a clear demarcationbetween her and her son? How should we look at this matter?Teacher: Everyone is accountable himself for whatever he does, and nobo-dy can take the place of someone else. There's no need for you to draw a li-ne between yourself and him, as either way those are things he has done,not you. If, when clarifying the truth, you and others haven't successfullystopped him, or haven't enabled him to become clear on what is at stakeand the consequences, then it still signifies a problem on his part. If you re-ally did say a lot to him and he still goes about doing those things, then it ishis problem and you can let him go. Nobody can destroy Dafa. You don'tneed to worry, the sky won't fall or anything. What he is destroying is him-self.Disciple asks: There are students in our area who have studied the Fa andcultivated for many years and yet often behave in extreme ways. Moreover,their dispositions are poor. This has affected a lot of people. Some fellowcultivators think that people like this are not really our students, and shouldbe sent away.Teacher: The old forces did arrange for some people among our studentsto cause disturbances. Their purpose is to make sure the environment thatDafa disciples have isn't too peaceful, and thereby cause the students' hu-man attachments to surface. So they seek to stir and muddle things up, andthe old forces take advantage amidst the ensuing chaos. So as for these peo-ple, you have already come in [to Dafa], and as the master, I regard you asmy disciples; whether you want to consider yourselves my disciples issomething that you should really think through again carefully. After youhave made up your mind, then do things in line with the requirements forDafa disciples, in line with my, Li Hongzhi's, requirements, and don't beco-me foggy-headed and do irrational things as the old forces planned for you

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and get yourself, in the end, cast down.Disciple asks: There are many Chinese in San Francisco's Chinatown. Aportion of the people there aren't willing to accept our truth-clarificationmaterials and they don't listen when we talk to them. How should we han-dle these people?Teacher: Things at present are different from in previous years, and thisyear is different from last. And the present is different from even the firsthalf of this year. Give it a try and see, is it still like before? Even if it is,you have to carve out a space via the strength of your righteous thoughts,right? (Applause)Disciple asks: In mainland China there are situations where at the meremention of "Falun Gong" or "Nine Commentaries," people don't dare to lis-ten.Teacher: There are all types of people out there, and there are plenty ofpeople who have been scared witless by the wicked Party. The wicked Par-ty has done evil for so many years. The key thing is for Dafa disciples touse righteous thoughts to purge the evil specters that control people, andthen clarify the truth to them again. Go forth with wisdom. You are savingpeople, after all.Disciple asks: I often feel some formless thing pressing down on my head,especially when I quiet down. I don't know if this is something good or ifit's an evil specter interfering with me.Teacher: If Dafa disciples can do things righteously, and provided theydon't have strong attachments or things they are attached to on a fundamen-tal level, then there won't be any problems. Some say that while studyingthe Fa they encounter such-and-such things. This is something I often say:once you take up Dafa, whatever it is you encounter--good or bad--it is agood thing (applause), for it came about only because you cultivate in Da-fa. Some students experience all sorts of hardships after taking up Dafa. Ifyou didn't cultivate, those tribulations would lead to your destruction. Butprecisely because you do cultivate in Dafa, even though the pressure youface is great when the hardships come at you earlier than they would have,and the tests of your xinxing are tough to pass--and sometimes the testsmay be huge--when all is said and done, those hardships are all things youneed to overcome, they are accounts you need to settle, tabs that you needto pay. (Audience laughs) Aren't they great things, then? So whether it isgood things or bad things you run into, so long as you cultivate in Dafa,they are all positive, to be sure. (Applause)That's all I would like to say for today. (Applause) The Fa Conferenceshould resume. Master has put some things in rather heavy terms, some we-re put a little indirectly, and others, while addressing some serious pro-blems, were put rather gently. But whatever the case, as Dafa disciples youshould do what Dafa disciples are to do, based on the Fa. Some people sayto me, "Teacher, why do I improve so slowly nowadays?" To which Iwould respond: it's not enough if you only read the books, for Dafa disci-

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ples need to do the three things well, and you have done only one of them,so you don't sense any improvement. If you can do all of the three tasks anddo them very well, you will feel yourself improving; it's completely diffe-rent from before, in the stage of personal cultivation and Fa study. That iswhat's at work. The state of things since July 20, 1999, has been completelydifferent from that of before July 20, 1999. That is why doing the threethings well is cultivation, while doing only one of the three isn't--that's howit is, and you won't be able to improve that way. So Dafa disciples must dothem well. Of course, some of you present here today are new students, andthose requirements don't apply to you. Right now as long as you can studythe Fa well and cultivate based on the Fa, that's fine at the present stage.But for our veteran students, you have had a long time, so you have nochoice but to do things on the basis of the Fa. That's because there is a pro-cess of coming to understand things that new students go through, andthough you might talk about the concept of "becoming a Buddha on thespot," that's just a description [not to be taken literally]. Could a person turninto a Buddha just like that, without eliminating his karma, improving interms of understanding, or rising in terms of realms? What kind of Buddhawould that be? That's just a description. Since you are Dafa disciples,through attending this Fa Conference or listening to Master talk you willget something out of it, and you should do even better.Time is really very tight. You've all seen that the changes in this world, aswell as those in the situation of Dafa disciples' validating the Fa, are happe-ning fast. So as time continues to change, will you still have time to dowhat Dafa disciples should do? Why wouldn't you make the most of yourtime, then? Dafa disciples look at hardships as good things and as opportu-nities for improvement, and as the environment improves more and more,the hardship will become ever less. When you no longer need to clarify thetruth and people are taking the initiative to come hear the truth from you orseek you out to learn the practice, won't you have lost the opportunity to es-tablish your mighty virtue? Maybe you are thinking, "That's great, they canall come to learn, and it will save me some trouble." But you won't have theconditions for improving yourself then, right? So what I think is, no matterwhat, you need to treasure this period of time, for it will be gone in a flash. Humans, who are within this time, don't have much awareness of the timeitself. Within but one second a person might go through an entire lifetime.In that one second, though, what the person may sense is the passage of ayear, and it feels about the same to that person as taking a year to gothrough that year. Similarly, there is no sense of anything unusual, for a li-fe, while under the influence of time, cannot sense the rate in which timegoes by. The cosmos is composed of different times such as these, and it ishumans who feel that there is still some time left. From the perspective ofthe highest point in the cosmos, it is but an instant, it's just that with respectto time, you have been restricted to the state of human beings. Regardlessof how very long the cosmos's history has been, regardless of how very

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long the arrangement in history for Fa-rectification has been, and regardlessof how long of a time the Three Realms has brought about, all of this willpass with the passage of time, and all that is new will swiftly appear. Manystudents are eagerly awaiting it, but when it really does appear, your culti-vation will be at an end. Whatever your level is at that moment, that will beyour level, and of course if you are a human, then a human it is. Everythingwill have been finalized then.That's all for now. I hope that you will do even better, be even more dili-gent, and make it such that when I see you again, the change will be evengreater. Thank you all. (Applause)[1]Referring to withdrawing from the three Chinese Communist organizations: the Party, the Youth Lea-gue and the Young Pioneers.[2]A soldier and moral exemplar widely promoted by the CCP in the 1960's.

A Reply to the Dafa Disciples of Peru

Dear Dafa disciples of Peru:

I have received your letter. You've been working hard, and I am fully awareof your situation.

Dafa disciples' cultivation is done among ordinary people, and this is some-thing never done before in history. If you each travel well your respectivepaths there are bound to be difficulties, and going forward to meet thosedifficulties head-on is for the sake of validating Dafa, saving all beings,doing away with the old forces' arrangements, and countering the persecu-tion. The cultivation done in the past never had these things, and Dafa dis-ciples are the pioneers. That is why in cultivation sometimes you will dowell, and sometimes you won't know what to do. When you encounter dif-ficulties, sit down and study the Fa some more, and as long as you are righ-teous in thought and action, there will be no barrier that you can't passthrough.

Your conduct has confirmed that the path Dafa disciples have taken isright, and moreover, that you have traveled it extremely well. With the pro-gress of Fa-rectification everything will change for the better, and Dafa dis-ciples will mature even more fully. I know that the difficulties you face willbe resolved with the progression of Fa-rectification and with your matura-tion and diligent efforts. I hope that you will do even better, for Dafa disci-ples are the hope of all beings.Li HongzhiDecember 17, 2005

Teaching the Fa at the Meeting on Writing Music(Li Hongzhi -- July 21, 2003 -- Washington, D.C.)

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Most of our Dafa disciples are validating Dafa and walking their own pathsin cultivation by using their special talents and what they have learned. Allsocial strata and different occupations in human society can serve as set-tings for cultivation and, under the persecution, for clarifying the truth andsaving sentient beings who have been led down evil paths by the wickedParty. If you can maintain righteous thoughts and righteous actions whileunder the pressure from the evil, that is validating the Fa and proving your-self. Those who have special skills in the arts may blaze a trail in validatingthe Fa. Today we have some students here who hadn't stepped forward andhave come to attend the Fa conference, and this is excellent. Naturally thereare some who fall behind under the pressure of circumstances. To realizethat and start anew is to be responsible to oneself.Many of our students didn't go through the colossal catastrophe that wasthe Cultural Revolution, for they were still quite young at the time. Soamidst the present persecution of Dafa disciples and facing the pressure ofharsh and sinister circumstances, they have been hit psychologically. Theynever went through something like this, and all of a sudden oppressive con-ditions like these were bearing down on them, making for a huge psycholo-gical impact. With this kind of suppression and persecution--one that utili-zes every form of governmental capacity to lie, libel, and frame, and onethat puts to use every instrument of dictatorship and every means of propa-ganda in the evil Party's arsenal--there were indeed some newer studentswho had never been through something like this and students who hadn'tbeen diligent about Fa-study who didn't at the time know what they shoulddo. Some even became outright pessimistic, and then there were those whobegan to completely indulge themselves among ordinary people. And sincethe number of people who had taken up Dafa was enormous, the studentswho were like this back then were not few in number. But for the majorityof the Dafa disciples, Dafa had already taken root in their lives over thecourse of their learning the Fa, and if they were really asked to leave Dafa,I think they, being lives that had gained the Fa, would have felt that itwould amount to their lives losing all hope, to having no future, and thusthey truly couldn't separate from Dafa. As for the students who turned pes-simistic, in reality that was fleeting confusion, though of course there weresome who were far too confused. (Master laughs) But whatever the case, aslong as you can realize it and come back, all's well. Whatever the situation,the persecution has not yet ended, and there are still opportunities to returnto the path of cultivation and do the things Dafa disciples ought to do. Itwill then just count as a test in cultivation that you didn't pass well, and youshould just walk well the path ahead. You didn't do well in the past, butdon't feel burdened. That was actually because you didn't take Fa-study se-riously, and because you cultivate among ordinary people, and so, undercircumstances such as these, the attachment of fear leads you to fall behindthe state of Dafa disciples' cultivation, and over time you are sure to have a

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gap in your understanding of the Fa. But don't be anxious, as you can gra-dually catch up through studying the Fa. As for the rest of our students, youshould help the type of student [I just described]. Be understanding towardthem. All of you, as long as you are counted among the disciples of Dafa,should work together with and help one another.There is a requirement in Dafa disciples' cultivation, namely, you have tosave sentient beings and validate the Fa. Ever since the persecution waslaunched, on the whole you have done an excellent job. Every person hasbeen making use of what he is good at and what he has learned in order tovalidate Dafa, and this encompasses using the means of culture. Of course,when it comes to using the arts, if you want to have good results, you haveto do a good job producing your music or artistic dance. That's right, ifwe're talking about music and dance, we need to have students with specialaptitudes in this area. So let's see if we can't unearth a few. We do in facthave talented people like this. Let's now turn to the topic of creating [musicand dance].If you want to compose good music and put together fine works of perfor-ming arts, you really need to put your heads together and come up with ide-as. Improving the quality of your performances, including those for TV, re-quires your collective efforts. As things stand at present, the talented peoplelike this are very few among our students outside mainland China. Amongthe students inside mainland China there are persons of every sort of talent,and there wouldn't be any problem putting together as many performancetroupes as you wanted. But outside of mainland China that's pretty hard todo. So you need to think of a solution to this. I've had one idea myself.You've seen how New Tang Dynasty TV's programs are more and more onthe right track, but in many regards there are still improvements to be ma-de. Its music and performance programs aren't that rich still. You don'twant your audience to feel that your TV programs are boring. So you haveto think of a way to make your TV programs attract more viewers. If youare to do even better at clarifying the truth, you have to have a lot of peoplewatch, and that means you have to suit the general public's tastes. Only thatway can you be more effective clarifying the truth. That is why you have tothink of a way and work together well. So it's up to you to figure out howto better achieve the maximum possible effect, that is, to make your work,be it each of your performances or each of your television programs, richerin content and higher in level. Let's sit here and discuss this a bit. Whoeverhas a good idea, bring it up, and we can talk it over and see how it mightwork out.At present there are many challenges. One is funds, and another is havingfew persons with special talents--those who are trained professionals areespecially few. These are the most fundamental challenges, and they're themost difficult. But as I see it, you are Dafa disciples after all, and so whenit comes to validating the Fa and saving sentient beings, so long as you tryhard, however much you can do, do. Since our means are limited, I think

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we should see if we can get the most out of what means we do have.I have another idea. Can the TV station put together a New Years event thisyear? Come New Years time the Chinese TV programs in North Americaor wherever it is around the world lack the feel of New Years. And that'sespecially true for the New Years shows on mainland Chinese TV. Manypeople call it "disastrous TV." With that stiff Party culture and those stereo-typical formulas, [those shows] all ridiculously extol the wicked Party forbeing "great, glorious, and correct." The "great state of things" they've inva-riably rigged up for decades was meant to clumsily dupe the people of Chi-na. So how about this time you create a cultural program that's free of thatParty culture, and free of vulgar and crude jokes--one that truly belongs tohumankind? At the very least you can give New Tang Dynasty TV's mainaudience a more satisfying show to watch, and this will help the station'sprogramming overall. Though the persons of talent available now are few,it's not that we have no capacity. In fact I've seen that some of the perfor-mances you have put together are quite good. What we lack most at presentare people who can compose and arrange music; with some of the perfor-mances you do the musical accompaniments are a bit plain. But as a matterof fact, we do have people who can do this. It's just a question of gettingthe Dafa disciples with these abilities to join in and play their role.Those are the main things. Let's discuss and refine them together. Actually,with these sorts of concrete things, you ought to do them yourselves. Thesethings [I've discussed] are really a bit specific, and normally I opt not totalk about specifics. Whenever Dafa disciples hold a meeting they wantMaster to come and say a few words, and this time, it has to do with bla-zing a trail in the field of arts for cultivation, saving sentient beings, and va-lidating Dafa, so I agreed to say a few things so as to help you all be moreclear on the importance of the things you do in validating the Fa. Actually,in the recent period of time you have done quite well, but we need to dothings on a wider scale. You should be able to work together better; yourstrength should become somewhat greater; and the content of the worksyou create can, in each regard, improve somewhat. So that's what I thinkshould happen. Before I came, your meeting had been underway for a bit,so let's continue it. (Master laughs)Disciple asks: Master, could I ask your advice on something?

Teacher: Go ahead.

Disciple asks: I have an old friend who plays the erhu and piano, and hecomposes too. I know him really well, and can say that he doesn't like theway things are in China. I would like to invite him to come over [from Chi-na], and the first thing I would do after he left that place would be to clari-fy the truth to him.Teacher: Actually, I had thought a while ago about the idea you're brin-ging up. The students in mainland China have the means to assemble as

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many performing troupes as need be, and it wouldn't even be a problem toput together large-scale ones; even a huge symphony orchestra could beformed. But outside China the conditions aren't there. Well anyway, an ideais just an idea, and whether or not it's practical to invite him is somethingyou will need to think through well. And the kind of role he would be ableto play after coming here has to be realistic. His stance toward Falun Gong,of course, won't be a problem once he has the truth presented to him. I canonly say try and see.

Disciple asks: I think we're short on talent when it comes to composing mu-sic.

Teacher: Speaking of composing music, there are actually a good numberamong you [who can], and it's possible there are more who aren't here to-day. Right now composing music, as I see it, isn't in fact a big problem. It'show to arrange it that is the challenge.

Disciple asks: Among ordinary people there are many persons who haveoutstanding talent when it comes to arranging music. Can we invite them tohelp us?Teacher: That's an idea, and you can try and see.

Disciple asks: I feel terribly ashamed sitting here today before Master. Yes-terday at the Fa conference my tears fell like rain, because I once speciali-zed in composing and arranging, but I haven't yet stepped forward underthe persecution. All along I haven't been firm, and all along I haven't beenable to discard my own baggage. I ask Master's forgiveness. From todayforth I will get involved, from today forth I will truly step forward. (Ap-plause) I have an idea for the great Tang concert. In England there are somepeople who specialize in researching ancient Tang music, and they haveput together scores for some Tang music. I'm thinking that for the classicalpart [of the concert] we could write scores on the basis of Tang music.

Teacher: You all might wonder why it is I always talk about the Tang Dy-nasty's culture. Tang culture is real human culture, and it is the pinnacle.Whether it be craftsmanship or the culture people had, it was all at the ulti-mate height. Things began to decline after the Tang. Of course, you've seenthat some things were pretty good in the Ming and Qing times, but actuallythey had already taken a turn for the trite, and the literati or artisans all fo-cused their attention on trivial details. Their minds had become very nar-row--excessively detail oriented--and they no longer had the grand air, northe fine and exquisite crafts, of Tang times. But whatever age it was, youcan draw upon [things from those ages] in your creation of performing arts.However, you need to make sure it integrates the traits of the culture thatDafa itself is to give to mankind, blazing a righteous path that Dafa disci-

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ples started and leaving it to mankind. It's not as though you should copyeverything from the Tang times alone. You can draw upon the culture thatthe ancients of the Tang Dynasty or whatever dynasty had, and as for mu-sic, you can make its mood and flair your keynote, and create things thatmake the most of the characteristics of the Chinese people.

Disciple asks: Hello, Master! When dubbing background music I experien-ce unexplained feelings; for instance, when I'm dealing with children's mu-sic, I often feel a sense of joy. I have written two songs that have a jazzfeel, and wonder if this isn't that good to do?

Teacher: Contemporary music or ancient music, whatever the case, youneed to walk your own paths, based on your understandings as Dafa disci-ples. And why do I put it this way? Because any person in this world, ho-wever great his abilities, however great his natural gifts, if you were to askhim to walk a path that is pure and clean he couldn't. Merely having superbtechnique or mastery of a skill doesn't do it. Dafa disciples have becomevery pure in the purifying process of cultivating themselves and validatingthe Fa, and their realms of mind, or the ways they look at things, are diffe-rent [from ordinary people]. And that is why you are able to do it, why youare able to truly steer the "modern" people onto a path that's truly for hu-mans, so you can make such a difference and lay such a foundation formankind. As I have said, the TV station you run, your newspaper, radio sta-tion, etc., all seem to face many challenges. But slowly those challengeswill all be resolved. The crucial thing is to give to humankind a good formof culture. You will see that the people of the future will follow, in eachand every regard, everything that Dafa disciples are doing. It will later be-come the principal culture of the future human race. So what's critical iswhether or not you are able today to produce good things. If you can esta-blish these essential things, the future people will study them, and so whatyou do and what things you produce are extremely important. The ordinary,the ancient, the modern--if it's what we need we can draw upon it. But, youdefinitely need to create upright things. You need to act responsibly towardpeople. (Master laughs) Relax--I'm not saying you have to have a terriblyhard time with whatever you do. Actually, the things you normally produceare already different from those of ordinary people, and if your skills are ta-ken into account those things really aren't average.As I said a moment ago, whether it's Tang music, contemporary music, orwhatever, if you can manage to integrate the strong points of these thingswhile producing your own things, it's guaranteed to be different from thethings of ordinary people. That's because your realms and the deeper mea-ning you have will ensure that the inner meaning of the music you create isdifferent. But there is one thing. If you can find a way to make the funda-mentals of the music itself even better, and do this well, then you will betruly taking a great path.

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Disciple asks: Master, I'm somebody who has received training in Westernmusic, though I now often deal with Chinese music. What do you thinkabout merging Western and Chinese music?

Teacher: There is no problem with doing that per se, and you can drawupon any of them. What's key is to blaze a trail. For example, take the mat-ter of arranging music. Arranging music wasn't something they were allthat particular about back in ancient China. Back then, what they had basi-cally took the form of playing together, and at most they'd have differentinstruments playing the lead or solo parts. So they didn't pay much atten-tion to musical arrangement. The concept of musical arrangement that wehave today in fact comes from the culture of Western music, and it is fun-damentally something imparted to man by gods. It is one of the very bestthings of this cycle of human civilization, and it brings goodness to man-kind.

Disciple asks: Master, the difference between classical Chinese music andWestern classical music is enormous. What sort of difference is there bet-ween them in the heavens?

Teacher: Before the Renaissance the musical instruments and the music it-self in the West were quite simple. After the Renaissance Western musicgradually approached its zenith, and the arts of human culture in no timemade a gigantic leap forward. The contrast between that period and the cul-tural arts man had formerly is dramatic. Now, you mentioned the music inthe heavens. Of course, the varieties of music there are many, and they areformed of the different characteristics marking the states of being that thedifferent lives there have. Today's Western music, be it the use of arrange-ments and musical instruments or the mastery of its instruments' capacities,its overall music theory has developed into a comprehensive system of mu-sic, which counts as a complex and difficult subject of study compared tothe music mankind originally had. Here on the human plane Western musiccan be seen to be a complete system, something gods purposefully passedon to man in recent times. Asian music is a kind of normal culture godscontinually imparted to man over the course of establishing the larger cultu-ral history of mankind. So the discrepancy isn't just one of the two culturesof East and West, for these are things transmitted from multiple cosmic sys-tems, and in other, incredibly numerous cosmic systems those systems eachhave their own unique things, and those are extremely systematic, extreme-ly holy, and mystical. So what we have here is but what gods passed on toman, something that can be expressed using the means of man. And it in-cludes performing arts and painting. Man knows of only oil painting, tradi-tional Chinese painting, etc., when in fact these are simply the traits of thecultures of the lowest lives of multiple systems passed on by gods of va-

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rious systems. In other words, the yellow race corresponds to the gods atdifferent levels of a cosmic body system, all the way up to the highest god,and in that system there is a state in which its own characteristics exist. Thesame is true with the whites: they have their corresponding cosmic system.And found in each such system are the characteristics and ways of existen-ce of the different lives of a given cosmos, which, when expressed in thehuman world, manifest as the characteristics of the different cultures of dif-ferent races. For this reason there are differences in their musical instru-ments and the features and styles of their music. However, the system ofmusic present in the West in recent times, including its instruments, is notin fact something originally found in the heavenly kingdoms of the gods ofthe white race. It belongs to the cosmic system of faraway lives, and it waspassed on solely to Western society; it was brought here for the Fa. The hu-man culture fostered for the Fa-rectification over a long period of time is,for this level of lives, something extremely rich.

Disciple asks: Hello, Master! I'm a student whose major is Jazz. (Peoplechuckle) So I sometimes wonder whether this is something I can do?

Teacher: Here's what I think. At present, it's the stage in which Dafa disci-ples cultivate amidst validating the Fa, and it's not the time of Fa rectifyingthe human world. So, since you are cultivating in ordinary human society,you have to eat, which means, you have to have a job. Some jobs aren't allthat fitting, but, well, what can you do? What I'm saying is, it's okay foryou to maximally conform to the state of affairs in the society of ordinarypeople when it comes to going about your work. Many things in human so-ciety are not in fact good, but that's just how ordinary human society is atthis point, and the world's people accept all that. That's how society is.That's the way mankind will be before the Fa rectifies the human world, sofor now we leave it as is. So you can do your work just as before. But, asyou go about cultivating you have to be clear on which things are uprightand which aren't. So maybe you say that you've studied those things, wellthen at a minimum you have some knowledge of music theory and somemusical accomplishments, you've mastered that knowledge. So then, alongwith getting down your musical foundation, you can, in order to make a li-ving, put to use in the form of a job what you have learned, and if you justdo your best that's fine. At the same time you can produce some more stan-dard and traditional things, and if conditions allow, you can explore otherforms of more standard music, you can choose to study some things thatyou consider to be upright--that's something you can do. Actually, what-ever it is you study, how the notes are expressed is just a matter of style,while the knowledge of music theory to be grasped is the same.

Disciple asks: Ever since the music team was formed, be it in arranging orcomposing, all along I have been up against a great barrier, namely, with

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the things I write or the arranging I help others to do, there's a shortfall inquality. But it seems that everybody has already given their all, and itseems the things I've learned have all been put to use. I really can't figureout how to break through this and improve further. (People laugh)

Teacher: If you ask me, I don't think that's necessarily the issue. Actually,I have heard the music you've played. And if we're to talk about the quality,I don't think it is a problem of the quality being low. What's critical is thatthe things we create be traditional and well-liked, and that we blaze a paththat is upright. Don't ordinary people say that songs need to be catchy? Themoment you sing it, the people near you should want to learn it and be ableto hum along. In other words, it's a question of how you can make it bothupright and suited to people's tastes. As a matter of fact, put plainly, on thequestion of how the things Dafa disciples create fare, quality is not an is-sue. What's key is your blazing your own path.

Disciple asks: Since 1949 China has basically had no music; the momentthe average person opens his mouth to sing, what comes forth is guaran-teed to be the songs of the Party and its culture, and that includes both ly-rics and music. Now we have this opportunity, by drawing upon the powerof Dafa and this opportune time, to truly pioneer a vast field for mankind. Ifeel that the music our students have created overall right now tends to ha-ve a gentle beauty and be extremely calm, but perhaps it lacks a feeling ofbeing glorious or majestic.Teacher: Of the descriptive words you were just using there is one thatwas really well put, and that's "calm." (People laugh) People are excessive-ly passionate or intensely combative, and these are not the normal states ofbeing human. It's in fact something that comes about under the effect of de-mon nature. Good and evil both exist in a person, so when a person is espe-cially worked up, or when his actions even overstep the bounds of what isrational, that mostly comes from the stuff of contemporary music. When aperson is irrational and in the throes of something, when he goes wild andhas lost his reason, that has to do in fact with the things of his negative sidebeing roused. By contrast when a person is in a calm state, he is good, andthat in fact is the true state of a human being. Within calmness there are upsand downs, but it's fully rational, and in calmness there is its own glory,though that glory is based on calmness. (Applause)As I see it you have plenty of ability. There's no need to compare yoursel-ves to what are currently regarded as "elite" standards. Actually, nowadaysmuch of what passes for elite is the contemporary stuff. How many peoplenow can compose truly traditional, decent, great musical movements?They've all gone the route of "contemporary music." The songs in China inrecent times are all the product of the Party's culture, with nothing left thatis truly presentable. No one in China now can produce anything like whatthose Western musicians created before the last century. Of course, the

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West can't produce that now either, for its peak has already passed, and thatchaotic "contemporary" stuff has knocked [its classical music] down to thevery bottom. But the West once had it, whereas China did not. There havein fact been some very good things in ancient and recent Chinese music.Their bases and essential melodies are all the kinds of things that reflect thetrue state of man, and if somebody wanted to create [such music] he couldtruly capture with it enormous, vast dimensions; it's only that now there isnobody putting effort into such things, making it even harder for it to deve-lop into a system. Of course, with a change in dynasty comes a change inculture, and the things of the previous dynasty are washed away by the im-pact from the new dynasty's culture. That too is a reason [for such music'sdisappearance]. So there is no way that the essence of the music of the cul-ture of some 5,000 years could carry through to today; nobody in any dy-nasty has managed to preserve it. The schools for painting and music in theWest didn't come about until the last two centuries. Such schools have sub-ject courses, standards, and norms. And those studying there know what tolearn, and all who graduate from the schools have gone through systematicand standard training. Thus a complete system has been formed. In China'sdynastic history there was never anything like that. Of course, after thefounding of the Republic there began to be people in China who placed va-lue in these things. Gradually there came to be students who returned aftersome time studying abroad, and they had mastered some things of Westernmusic. So from the latter days of the Qing Dynasty on there gradually cameto be persons with these talents. But as for being able to truly systematizevia music the culture, depth, or flair of the Chinese people, or to make of itsomething truly decent and part of mainstream culture, nobody has donethat. The wicked Party has been barking up a storm for so many years,what with stuff like its "Let a hundred flowers bloom" campaign, but that'sall in the interest of its sinister rule. And in fact, it hasn't really done anyt-hing, for this Party culture that's meant to serve the dictatorship is violent,intensely fervent, and it has made a goal of destroying China's ethnic cultu-re. It clashes with the true, calm features of human beings, and it has no hu-man touch, much less of course anything like the depth and flair of China's5,000-year-old classical civilization. And the most foundational stuff thewicked Party came up with was introduced from the Soviet Union.I think you all seem to have rather lofty aspirations and high ideals. If that'swhat you are aiming for, then make a go of it and see. From what I can tell,of the ditties and folk songs that have been handed down in China from an-tiquity to the present, many of those things have the flavor of various dy-nasties, and the things that people in China create nowadays have some ele-ments from various dynasties too, along with Soviet flavor. Back in the ti-mes of Old Shanghai there were a lot of popular songs. Although the lyricsof some of them weren't so good, embodied in those songs was the rich,lasting charm of classical China along with the consciousness of our fore-fathers. So the basis of the tunes then was the rhythmic charm of China's

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ancient traditions. If you can, on the basis of the tunes and rhythms of an-cient China's music, and using the techniques and methods of Western mu-sic, build on them--if you can blaze this path--then that would be magnifi-cent. You're clear on what I am saying, right? I ask since you're expertswhen it comes to these things.

Disciple asks: Western musical instruments have their overtone. I think thata person can sense the connotations behind the overtone. The overtones ofWestern instruments and Chinese instruments each have their own specificproperties and characteristics.

Teacher: That's just your own particular sense. Now as to connotations,human culture has a definite historical process to it, and each note that isperformed has the connotations of that ethnic group's specific characteris-tics as well as an individual's feelings in life. Each piece of music containsthe mood which the performer wishes to convey, and of course the notesused will have to do with expressing connotations, and that includes the uti-lization of overtone. [What you described] is just your own sense of thesethings.

Disciple asks: I'm a student from Austria. We have formed a band in Aus-tria composed of four people. I study classical piano, while the other threeplay jazz. We now have a problem: they say that the music they produce ispure, while in fact it's still pretty much jazz.Teacher: Perhaps it's the notion that they have formed that thinks it's pure.If there were really no notions stemming from contemporary music affec-ting them, the things they create would definitely be different. It's still like Isaid, though: if you perform those things so as to make a living, then that'sfine. However, when it comes to truly producing the music of Dafa disci-ples, you have to blaze your own path. And in that process there are boundto be issues in terms of understanding.

Disciple asks: They do jazz music at school. If we perform on the street isthat okay?

Teacher: If you can truly blaze a trail that is good, your performances willdraw large numbers of listeners--for sure. Remember something I said:mankind revolves around Dafa, and each and every action of Dafa disciplestoday has an effect on mankind. The other day I had a meeting with thosewho specialize in painting, and I spoke with them about why one should gothe route of traditional arts. Before, when they sought out a site for a showand wanted to hold an art exhibit they had a hard time finding one. After Ifinished explaining that mankind should return to the path of traditional art,one could sense that the attitude of the world's people had changed, forgods wanted to make way for the Fa. But that said, if you don't do well

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with things you will meet with obstacles, because whatever Dafa disciplesdo is inseparable from cultivation. The fact is, mankind is revolving aroundDafa. If you really produce your own things--take a look yourself--everybo-dy will listen to it and watch it, and many will even want to learn it.

Disciple asks: I would like to ask Master to spell out some things that haveto do with the principles of creating music. One is, when I am writing aconcerto, can I incorporate the music of Dafa, that is, Pudu, as one of themovements? A second question is, when it comes to forming an orchestrawe are lacking in manpower, and so sometimes when we have only a hand-ful of people performing on stage it doesn't have the impact of a full or-chestra. Could I create some background music and then have people playalong on top of it? A third question is, in the past I have heard music fromother dimensions, and I'm wondering if I can use that?

Teacher: The matter of working together that I just talked about involvesexactly this, for there aren't going to be any clashes over copyrights amongyou. It's a question of how to do a good job of working together, and howto blaze a trail that Dafa may leave to the people of the future. Cultivatorsaren't concerned with the successes and failures one has in this world; it'sordinary people that take success and failure, or even fame and wealth, se-riously. What Dafa disciples seek is the true attainment that comes throughcultivation, and so they attach no importance at all to those ordinary things.Whenever someone does something for Dafa, the gods make a careful re-cord of it to be kept for the future. As for what people here seek to gain, weseek none of it, and that's why you are, for one, cultivating yourself, and se-condly, doing things for sentient beings. You are saving sentient beings,and you are paving for sentient beings the path of the future human race.However, if you want to use Pudu in the music you are creating, it's notthat you can't do it--what's key is that you have not grasped the inner mea-ning of Pudu. In it is the entire process Master went through from prehisto-ry up through the Fa-rectification--could any concerto possibly encompassthat?As for your second question, it's about orchestras. At present it's not possi-ble to put together overnight a large-scale symphony orchestra and have itperform. But we do have a few different approaches right now. For the mu-sic for stage performances such as dance and the like, you can create it byusing a computer to overdub the sounds of the instruments. One violin canbecome many this way, and by overdubbing you can turn a handful of ins-truments into what seems like a full-fledged orchestra. People often do thisto cut costs when they make movie soundtracks. So that's one approach.Another is, you can use a computer to directly simulate an orchestral per-formance. That's fine too. But the quality of some things isn't so good, andyou can tell right away that it's electronic. Since it's a simulation, be sureyour simulation is as realistic as possible. All of you who play music un-

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derstand this, for you should all have some knowledge about the propertiesof musical instruments. So of course, however realistic the simulationmight be, professionals can hear the difference, though your average liste-ner can't make it out. (People laugh) Those are both approaches you can ta-ke. The third question was about music heard from other dimensions. Ifyou can truly produce that, then go ahead, but I think in general it will behard to do. The reason is that when you are not in higher dimensions your-self, you won't have musical instruments that are comprised of more micro-cosmic matter, and as a result you won't be able to bring out that sound.Moreover, sound itself is the transmission of a material field, and without amaterial field composed of matter of higher dimensions there won't be thefeeling of holiness [otherwise present].

Disciple asks: Can Pudu and Jishi be incorporated into our compositions?Teacher: Pudu and Jishi... the first question I just talked about was this,and [I said] there's no issue of copyrights. Other than the two pieces of mu-sic you use with your exercises that aren't to be used elsewhere, other pie-ces can be used; and they're meant to be used in situations where they areneeded, so it's no problem. The exercise music absolutely cannot be usedelsewhere, though, for so much is at stake in its connection to cultivation. Itcannot be integrated into other music. With other music, then, though itwas created by Dafa disciples, it's meant for ordinary people after all. Asfor Pudu and Jishi, you need to know what the inner meaning is that theyportray. Cramming the cosmos into an egg isn't right.

Disciple asks: If the quality of the exercise music deteriorates, can we so-metime down the road re-record it?

Teacher: That's fine to do. There is no problem with improving its quality.

Disciple asks: When synthesizing music it's best to make it sound more li-felike. Then that would mean we need to buy rather good equipment andneed substantial funds.

Teacher: That's not necessarily so. Some rather simple computer softwareis inexpensive, and you can buy it from China. (People laugh) The qualityis acceptable and yet it's inexpensive.

Disciple asks: Thinking in the long-term, would it be okay to take out aloan to buy a better computer?

Teacher: You can think of your own approaches. But there's one thing, andthat is, Master has never said that you should insist on doing somethingwhere circumstances don't allow for it. You should definitely do things inkeeping with your own capacity. Otherwise, though your motivation might

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be good, it would still be going to extremes. If you bring hardship into yourdaily life, if in each and every regard you make things hard for yourself,then it's going to be harder for you to do the things that Dafa disciplesshould do. Don't make things hard for yourself.

Disciple asks: For the concert we bought a zhongruan and a daruan. Whenbuying them we noticed that the music store had a Qing era pipa. After itwas described to us we came to realize that the strings used on premoderninstruments were different from today's. Nowadays they have steel strings,whereas in ancient times the construction was different. Now they are so-mewhat louder.Teacher: In antiquity they used silk strings and beef tendon strings. Theenvironment man had back in ancient times wasn't noisy, people's mindswere quiet, and if you used silk strings back in that setting the volumewouldn't seem too low to people. That's because in antiquity they didn't ha-ve modern Western instruments, whereas nowadays when people composethey want to blend with present circumstances. In antiquity it was alwayssilk or tendon strings, and it wasn't just a matter of not having the manufac-tured goods crafted with modern technology; it had a lot to do with the at-mosphere of antiquity. What we want to do now is blaze our own path, notreturn our instruments to their ancient forms. Man's setting today is alreadyhow it is now, and we have no choice but to use today's instruments.

Disciple asks: If we want to broadcast live our New Years event, at presentwe probably don't have the equipment needed. But if we're to now go aboutpreparing as if to broadcast live on New Years...

Teacher: Here's how I see it: we lack the conditions and a live broadcastisn't feasible. And if we were to have everybody come to the U.S., and gat-her all of our talent for one event, that would be hard to do. That's becausesome people have to work or go to the office, or they can't get away fromfamily, or it's too much of a burden financially--there would be difficultiesof all sorts. But if you could weave together the artistic programs of eacharea and produce a DVD, to bring them all together and integrate them, thatwould work. With computers nowadays you can really make it so that itlooks realistic.

Disciple asks: [I understand that] we can share one another's music, but isthere a copyright issue when it comes to the outside world? To illustratewhat I mean, four years ago when I made a Falun Gong program I used Pu-du and Jishi. A TV station director really took a liking to the music andsaid it was unbelievable. He asked if we might contribute it to the station,and we did.

Teacher: That wasn't very appropriate. Also, people won't treasure it.

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What if they use it recklessly? We don't have time to oversee what ordinarypeople do with the things we create for them, but it's not appropriate to givePudu and Jishi to ordinary people for casual use. Other things are okay. Ge-nerally speaking there's no issue with the songs Dafa disciples create, savefor these two pieces.Now as for copyrights, do you know how we did things during the yearswhen I was spreading the Fa? We had to go through a lot of trouble to haveZhuan Falun published legally. So a press published it, but after printing itfor a while the press came under pressure and stopped. But they knew thebook was really profitable, and they didn't want to go back on the contractwith me. And then there were so many students who needed the book andthey became anxious. And what could we do about it? So many studentswere learning the practice, and the students at the practice sites were increa-sing in large numbers, but they had no books. The books were in short sup-ply. It was at that time that pirated editions sprang up all around the coun-try, and they were being made everywhere. As long as they didn't change asingle character of mine and could guarantee the quality, I didn't mind. Peo-ple live to make money after all, and the merits and problems with whatthey were doing offset one another, so I didn't mind if they made money offof it. Many of our Dafa disciples' things are to be given to people after all.As long as somebody is able to cherish it, he won't use it haphazardly ormodify it. If he does modify it you should track him down, for we still holdthe copyright.

Disciple asks: Good songs can influence generations of people, and rightup through today they are still popular.

Teacher: A talented musician, you know, how is it that he can composesuch quality songs? And how is it that he is able to have a lasting reputa-tion? It's not just that the melodies are exquisite. The connotations of a pie-ce of music come from a person's good character, his rich life experiences,and his innate talent. That's the human side of it. The life of a cultivator hasbeen changed, and what's more, it surpasses the level of ordinary humanbeings. Dafa disciples, when you are able to truly blaze your own paths,your things will be revered by people even more than those of the famousmusicians among ordinary people. They will have a lasting reputation, andfor a thousand generations at that. That's because you are Dafa disciples,and your path is righteous, so what you create will forever be what man-kind will learn and use. (Applause)

Disciple asks: Master, I'd like to ask, is pop singing demonic in nature?

Teacher: The popular way of singing is just the common people's song,and it doesn't need to have the manner of formal vocal performance. Thefolk songs of each country have been passed down through the years like

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that, and it's true of all ethnic groups. These days, however, people havestandardized them into contemporary music's system, and they have addedin modernist coloring, turning it into something of poor taste, a venting ofdemonic nature--even to the point that you have obscene stuff that's a mess.Many young people seek out this stuff. Regardless of what type of singingit is, you can always draw on the good things in it. But you have to walkyour own path.

Disciple asks: Master, I think that there are two tendencies in the songs[that we are] creating nowadays. One is that they are singing things that ha-ve to do with our own cultivation, and the other is that, so as to have ordi-nary people understand what they hear, even things like "Falun Dafa isgood" can't be mentioned in the songs. I don't think that's right.

Teacher: Validating the Fa is something Dafa disciples should definitelydo (and there is nothing wrong with that). So when you are creating musicyou should take as your goal saving sentient beings, clarifying the truth,and praising Dafa disciples. Of course, if we're talking about a televisiondrama, and you want to add in some mood music to the story of the dramaor a performance on stage, then that's no problem. Television dramas areentertainment programs after all, and they are made for a range of viewersto see--especially ordinary viewers. Of course, as for the content of musicalcompositions, some, owing to the needs of the story line or the life storiesof many ordinary people [being depicted], have nothing to do with Dafadisciples. Then does that mean you aren't going to write them? You stillneed to write them, you still need to produce them. And in fact, whateverthe case may be, those will be things Dafa disciples have produced after all,and so they will be different. When it's something that truly portrays Dafaand Dafa disciples in a direct and positive manner, Dafa's things shouldstill be the theme. If you, who are Dafa disciples, don't consider Dafa what-soever, and you just want to create ordinary people's things, then you arean ordinary person. The responsibility of Dafa disciples is to save sentientbeings and validate the Fa. It's not hard to keep these things in perspective.

Disciple asks: Teacher, I'd like to ask something, though I'm not sure it'sappropriate. Doesn't it seem that ever since the CCP seized power in China,that wicked Party has often been using waist drums?

Teacher: I can tell you that the waist drum has a history of almost a thou-sand years in China, and it's a form of culture handed down from the areasof western China and the central Shaanxi plain. So talking about waistdrums, I know there's also another form of drum. You've seen how inShaanxi province there's a kind of drum this size, almost a foot and a halfin diameter, one that only men use, and it has a real air about it when it'splayed. Do any of the people here who are dancers know about this one?

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You can also use that type, it too is good. You know what? When you firstused the waist drum in a parade in New York, many people said, "The Chi-nese people have come." They felt that these were the true people of Chinawho had come. The wicked Party is using the things of Chinese culture toglorify itself. But those sure aren't the wicked CCP's things. That Party is aspirit from the West, an evil spirit. (Master laughs)

Disciple asks: Supposing we want to issue some music that's pleasant to theear, such as a special collection of erhu music, would it be inappropriate tomerge Chinese and Western things when arranging the music?

Teacher: The idea I expressed was that you can draw upon anything that isgood. So of course the method of arranging music they have in the West orits music theory is fine to use. If you say you want to bring those thingsover full-scale, say, half will be Chinese, half Western, then that's not theidea. It's about how to blaze your own path [that I am getting at]. I thinkthat the Western music and Asian music found in the cultures of this cycleof the human race are both good things. No matter what race it is, wheneach first came down here and entered the human world they were firstborn in China. After the passing of a dynasty they would then leave Chinafor places throughout the world. Then by whom were China's things left be-hind? By gods, from the cultures of various dynasties, and from the wholeworld's people. I have talked about these things before. What you are doingis making choices, choosing the good things from the inheritance given tous by history.

Disciple asks: The local folk songs of Shanxi and Shaanxi provinces makeup some 80% of all of China's folk songs. The basic melodies of the musicthere are remarkably beautiful. Some of the lyrics have been distorted since1949, but in fact the original music and the melodies are excellent. I'm notsure if it's right [for me to think this way]. Might Master say a word aboutthis to put my mind at ease?

Teacher: With some of the folk songs from northern Shanxi and Shaanxi,many of the melodies are things of ancient China.Most of our discussion so far has been about music. The creation of perfor-ming arts also needs to keep pace. Generally speaking the bulk of an eve-ning entertainment program involves group dance, and without that itwould seem a little monotonous or dull. If an evening artistic event on sta-ge doesn't have dance in it, then it doesn't really count as evening entertain-ment. Then we need to think about how we might be able to further explorethis front, and blaze a trail. I've seen before evening entertainment pro-grams by song and dance troops in western China where they performthings from ancient culture, and the items from historical culture are many.You can look into those things, but don't completely follow the example of

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someone else. Blaze a path that is your own.

Disciple asks: What should we do to be able to better coordinate with thetelevision station? I ask because we're all scattered around the world.

Teacher: It's not easy for you to get together, and it's hard if you want tocoordinate things. But you can use computers, fax machines, and the pho-ne, and you will be able to communicate about a lot of things. Make themost of these. You're all poles apart, all around the world. For all of you tocome together really is hard. The good thing is, after today's meeting youwill know how to go about things, and can this way chart out a path to take.And in fact you all have latent potential [still to tap].

Disciple asks: Our ensemble would like to play throughout Austria. If ourown songs don't number enough, can we as Dafa disciples play the classi-cal songs of ordinary people? For example, how about the works of Mozartor Chopin?

Teacher: That's not a problem. I've long since said that classical music isfine. You can cautiously use things from times before the Cultural Revolu-tion--just make sure they're free of Party culture. Basically anything thatpredates the wicked Party can be used. Don't use anything from these timesof the Despot, for inside they are brimming with evil; mankind has beencontrolled by demons during this period.

Disciple asks: So if we can't use the music that was made during the decadeor so under the Despot, what about the television programs and moviesfrom that period, should we also not use those?

Teacher: I think that none of the things from that era are good. They havebehind them the factors of all sorts of rotten ghosts which control people.

Disciple asks: We already have some songs. Which songs should we takeas our theme music around which to build an orchestra or a small ensem-ble?

Teacher: Detail-type things like this you will have to talk over yourselves.There shouldn't be any problem.

Disciple asks: Recently a Western student at our TV station produced acouple of music videos, but what he adopted was a contemporary musicstyle that's suited for guitar and electric guitar.

Teacher: That's okay. The TV station has a foot in ordinary society, andit's directed at common, ordinary people. So electrical instruments are fine

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to use. Dafa disciples need to do well, and be upright, on the path of culti-vation they take, but when it comes to ordinary work you just need to tryhard to do a little better than is typical. Our TV programs are for ordinarypeople to watch. Right now isn't the time when the Fa rectifies the humanworld, but rather the phase where Dafa disciples cultivate, clarify the truth,and expose the persecution. At present there's nothing problematic about[what you described].Here's the situation, who here knows how to arrange music? Raise yourhands. Okay, everybody take a good look--especially those of you from theTV station. Whenever your shows are in need of music you can look forthese people. And whoever knows how to arrange can write the songs.Look around--there are quite a few. And I know that there are a lot morewho are not here but are very skilled, and let's have them play their parts. Ifpeople can't do well right on the first try, don't nitpick. With goodwill youcan improve together by sharing and discussing, and each will gradually co-me to mature on his own path; when you have just started it's possible itwon't go well. So, not only do you need to produce your own things, but al-so, later on, you should increase the output. (Master laughs) For example,maybe you produce something and then think you're all set, and you feelsatisfied--"I did it." That's no good. If a Dafa disciple saves just one person,does that do the job? No, it doesn't. You need to save many.

Disciple asks: Master, I'd like to ask something that has to do with the Fa.Buddha Shakyamuni attained the Dao by cultivating many hundreds of mil-lions of eons ago, but our Earth has only had two cycles of Earth, with eachbeing 100 million years long. So does that mean that...

Teacher: It wasn't on Earth that Buddha Shakyamuni did his cultivationbefore. (People laugh) Buddha Shakyamuni came to the world to save peo-ple. In the heavens he is a god, and he has long since attained the Dao. [Hiscoming] that time around was to validate the attainment status of Tathagataand to give mankind Buddhist culture. Many of the stories Buddha Shakya-muni told were about affairs in the heavens, not affairs on this earth. Ha-ven't I said, when a human being sees a Buddha sitting there he is so holy,but when a Buddha looks upon a Buddha it's not like that. They are part ofa collective society of gods.Time is limited, so we have to wrap up the meeting now. You are Dafa dis-ciples, so I am confident you can do well. I look forward to good newsfrom you. (Applause)

Note: Only this much could be assembled owing to matters related to the sound recor-ding.