By Jing Yuan

(Clearwisdom.net) One month ago, Teacher published the article "Thoroughly Dissolve the Evil." I thought of an issue that had occurred to me many times before: Dafa practitioners should not be persecuted at all during the Fa-rectification, and this persecution should not have lasted for so many years. It's not merely that having a belief is not a crime or that practicing cultivation is not a crime--this is from the perspective of ordinary people. From the perspective of cultivators, if we could have truly lived up to the standard of the Fa, this persecution never would have taken place! Even if it had, if we had immediately changed ourselves and met the requirements of the Fa, this persecution would have ended long ago. Many opportunities to completely end this persecution have presented themselves in the past seven years, but we were not up to the standard as a whole body. We let the old forces take advantage of our omissions again and again. We permitted the persecution to continue.

I also see that after seven years of persecution many practitioners have formed a notion. They think the persecution has become a huge, objective existence, and we as individual cultivators are incapable of ending it. Opposing the persecution has become a "natural" component that we have to accept in our daily cultivation. These are newly-formed notions and do not reflect strong righteous thoughts. It's the reason why the persecution has lasted year after year, and it's also one of the main reasons why we missed opportunities time and time again to actively end the persecution.

From the perspective of ordinary people, we are persecuted for pursuing "Truth-Compassion-Tolerance," and we are completely innocent. From the perspective of high-level cultivation principles, is each one of us really completely "innocent"?

Because many of us are actually not mature as cultivators and did not truly improve quickly from the Fa, this is one of the main reasons the evil took advantage of our gaps and started the persecution and continues it until this day. Although this is a cultivation issue and we have Teacher looking after us, not to mention that the old forces and their evil beings have no right to interfere with us, the truth is, our immaturity in the Fa gave them an excuse to launch and keep up the persecution, which created more complexities and difficulties for Teacher during the Fa-rectification. For example, if at least half or more of the 100 million practitioners had realized on April 25, 1999 their responsibility to safeguard Dafa, which is their divine mission, and more than just the 10,000 practitioners had stepped forward clear-headedly to uphold the Fa, April 25 would be a historic day when the persecution was disintegrated before it could take shape.

If the majority of Dafa practitioners could have clear-headedly and selflessly stepped forward on July 20, 1999, and in the following months had regarded clarifying the truth and upholding the Fa as their top priority instead of stepping forward to achieve personal consummation, then Jiang's regime would have been impotent, unable to assemble their evil, overwhelming forces so speedily. The same reasoning applies to these other issues: if there weren't so many people waiting to step forward only after others have already done so; if there weren't so many people enslaved by the fear of losing money, reputation and qing; if many practitioners didn't rely on the premier, an ordinary person, to end the persecution for us; if some practitioners didn't pass around fake articles claiming that they were written by Teacher; if there weren't so many practitioners in Mainland China who played word games with such an irresponsible mentality and wrote "guarantee statements" for the evil, etc.

If, after Teacher's article "The Knowing Heart" appeared on May 22, 2000, Dafa practitioners truly and immediately had been able to "Follow Teacher closely, steadfastly cultivating Dafa" ("The Knowing Heart" in Essentials for Further Advancement II); if, after Teacher published "Towards Consummation" on June 16, 2000, Dafa practitioners who felt resistance to setting their sails had quickly found and discarded their fundamental attachments; if, after the editors of the Clearwisdom website followed Teacher's arrangement and published the article on sending forth righteous thoughts in May 2001, the majority of practitioners had immediately paid attention to sending forth righteous thoughts and did it well on a daily basis; if we had quickly examined and corrected the problems Teacher pointed out regarding practitioners as a whole and individual practitioners in more than 130 lectures, poems, short articles and congratulatory statements since 1999; if we closely and respectfully followed Teacher's words and diligently did well the things Teacher said we must do well; if, after the evil harvesting of living Dafa practitioners' organs came to light, Dafa practitioners as a whole body had not been hindered by their fears, doubts, and hesitancy for so long, instead intensifying their efforts to expose the persecution and seizing the opportunity to break through the barriers from the past; if we had not regarded the total ending the persecution as Teacher's responsibility or that of famous ordinary people or that of other Dafa practitioners or that of fellow practitioners who didn't keep up with Fa-rectification, we could then really say we are innocent.

But the reality is by no means so, and thus we are not so innocent! We are all responsible for the persecution having lasted until this day. I am not pointing fingers at anyone. We should look back so we can do well now and in the future, so we can bridge the gaps in terms of understanding and live up to Fa's standard.

Since we all have responsibilities we cannot take things lightly! Many practitioners have relaxed after several years of doing truth clarification. I have experienced the same problem. I live outside China and started to make great effort to clarify the truth on a large scale on a daily base even before July 20, 1999. I went through several very difficult years. I have not had a break for many years, and I rarely sleep before 3:00 a.m. I sleep a little more now, and I think I am very diligent. For the last year approximately, however, I felt weariness and passivity in the depths of my heart, which I could not get rid of. After Teacher published the article "The Closer to the End, the More Diligent You Should Be," I was greatly shocked and I discovered the reason I had not meet Dafa's requirement in some respects for many years. My thoughts have since become much clearer on how to quickly live up to the Fa's requirements, and I feel my words and actions melt better into the Fa each day.

I just want to say here that we cannot take anything for granted in cultivation. We cannot think that we simply have to do it; or that we are already working hard and have made much improvement; or it's enough to achieve a certain level and we don't need to reach any higher; or thinking this attachment is not important and that that notion is not a big deal. Thinking this way would make us regard cultivation with human notions. We would be making assumptions. Cultivators must be clear at all times of the importance of the Fa. We must keep reverence toward the Fa in our hearts and quietly listen to the Fa and diligently study the Fa. Only then can we constantly absorb the Fa and realize our attachments, improve on our understanding of Fa principles and not be blocked by ordinary people's notions and illusions. In fact, I am not a lazy person with poor enlightenment quality. On the contrary, before I practiced Dafa I was a hard working person who thought a lot. Due to family influence, I was used to thinking of others before myself and serving others before my own family. The only thing is that the goodness among ordinary society is not comparable to the goodness the Fa requires. The difference in quantity and purity is too tremendous.

A while after Teacher published "The Closer to the End, the More Diligent You Should Be" I eliminated some wrong notions that I was not aware of, including attachments and influences brought by both positive and negative things resulting from a long period of reincarnations. I truly feel that now I can think and do things in a harmonious manner and can understand Teacher's Fa-rectification needs and Dafa's requirement for me.

I increasingly understand that we did not meet Dafa's cultivation and behavioral standard in the past. As a result, many things that Fa-rectification requires of us cannot be done smoothly, and I feel ever more keenly the pressure of time. We not only have to study the Fa well and do well with the three things, we also have to effectively help other practitioners. We are a whole body and have obtained the Fa during the period when Teacher rectifies the Fa. This is how the universe looks at us. No one can represent or replace another person in cultivation. The Fa has requirements for cultivators as a whole body. If the 10,000 practitioners who appealed on April 25, 1999 could have represented all of us, then the persecution would not have taken place on July 20, 1999, because then the old forces would not have been able to take advantage of us as a whole body. The omission of a whole body is the result of certain numbers of individuals who didn't improve themselves on the Fa on certain issues over a long period of time.

Completely disintegrate the evil. Is the Fa's requirement for cultivators so high it's unattainable?

No. Dafa indeed sets very high requirements for cultivators and tells us to "Attain the righteous Enlightenment of selflessness and altruism." ("Non-Omission in Buddha-Nature" in Essentials for Further Advancement) Dafa requires of us beings who are cultivating among ordinary people to not only cultivate ourselves well but also rescue as many people as possible, which can't be easily done. We can only achieve this goal by taking solid cultivation steps. The Fa has different standards for different levels. Each Dafa practitioner is going to a different realm. From a certain perspective we can say that we go back to where we come from. Of course, I am not speaking of going back to the old universe, but of levels. We thus have different cultivation paths, and the Fa has different requirements for each practitioner. Every practitioner, however, must meet the basic Fa requirements for cultivators. Particularly after the onset of the persecution, although we want to end the persecution, we must do better and live up to a standard higher than that before the persecution started.

For example, from my personal understanding, if the majority of practitioners had had a clear understanding regarding sickness karma before April 25, 1999, then certain meddlers in science circles would not have been able to make up slanderous articles based on this issue. Since we didn't do well with this, lies emerged, which then made it necessary for us to not only have a clear understanding ourselves but also to be able to clearly explain the issue to other people in a way they can understand, which is a somewhat higher requirement than before the evil took advantage of us.

If the majority of practitioners were not so heavily influenced by Communist Party culture and atheism, if we could give up our attachments to personal interests and emotions under any circumstances, place Dafa and Dafa cultivation at a sacred and high place where they belong, and spread Dafa with rational and easily understood language, then the evil would not have been able to poison the minds of sentient beings by seizing on our attachments and omissions and making up lies that correspond to our omissions and attachments. This persecution is not human against human; instead, the evils in other dimensions manipulate people in ordinary society to persecute cultivators. Since the persecution has taken place, we not only have to position correctly the relationship between science and cultivation, the relationship between self-interest in ordinary society and Dafa--we also have to validate our comprehension obtained from Dafa with our actions.

However, the Fa's basic requirements are not so lofty that cultivators cannot attain them. So what are the basic requirements? My personal understanding is this: we not only should strive to follow the form of studying the Fa and doing the exercises, but, more importantly, we must understand more and more of Dafa's profound meanings with righteous thoughts as Teacher requires of us from Fa study. We must understand Dafa and Dafa cultivation with righteous thoughts and remember at any time the relationship between Dafa and ourselves, Dafa and sentient beings.

We know that cultivation is more sacred than anything else in ordinary society. We understand the opportunity to obtain Dafa and cultivate during the Fa-rectification period is exceedingly rare and precious. We understand that Teacher wants to save all sentient beings to the maximum extent. We also should understand that cultivators are not only good people or relatively good people among ordinary people. We are, after all, disciples of Dafa, names registered in the heavens and removed from hell. Although we eat, sleep, and work like ordinary people, our purpose for being here is fundamentally different from that of ordinary people. We are beings on the path toward godhood and should diligently climb the ladder to heaven on a daily basis and step out of the framework of humanness.

In the past seven years we have made great progress in maturing and striving forward in the Fa. In terms of how to disintegrate the persecution, are there still some practitioners who regard themselves as ordinary people? When opposing the persecution, as soon as they encounter difficulties, do they see themselves as an ordinary person who has suffered injustice, an innocent person who has been wrongly persecuted, a common person who has no connections or supernatural powers? In fact, thinking this way has confused the words we say to the ordinary people for the sake of clarifying the truth with the true nature of cultivation that we should grasp at all times. We have to use concepts and methods understandable to ordinary people in order to rescue them and expose the persecution, but we cannot confuse the significance of exposing the persecution with seeking help and sympathy, such as when ordinary people suffer injustice.

The fundamental reason for this persecution exists in other dimensions. The old forces and their various elements want to eliminate lives instead of doing their best to save lives. They do their best not only to eliminate ordinary people but also people they see as unqualified Dafa practitioners. If a practitioner does the three things with the mentality of a wronged and persecuted ordinary person, he or she would be doing ordinary people's things as an ordinary person, no matter how much we expose the persecution, because ordinary people cannot disintegrate the persecution. We should no longer cling to illusions and misunderstandings on this issue. The discrepancy between a misconception and a righteous thought in this regard may have only one instant thought, but it results in a heaven-and-earth difference.

It takes the true thoughts, godly thoughts, and righteous thoughts of all Dafa practitioners to sweep away the last remaining evil.

The above is the limited personal understanding of my current level. I wanted to share it with fellow practitioners, because we have been cultivating amid the persecution for too long, and we are too indulgent of old elements. We often regard ourselves too much as ordinary people. Countless people in the universe are fixing their eyes on us at all times. They do not see us as ordinary people. We ourselves should not be deluded by the illusions of ordinary society either.

Teacher has published, "Thoroughly Dissolve the Evil." My personal understanding is that this article is yet another sounding of the trumpet for all practitioners, especially the main body of Dafa practitioners in Mainland China. All practitioners should take Fa study seriously so we will no longer regard ordinary notions in our minds and external interferences as our true selves. Any and each day could be the day for us to completely end the persecution.