Ajahn Jayasaro

Question: What single thing most impressed you about Luang Por Chah? With examples according to your experiences.

Answer: I arrived at Wat Pah Pong in December of 1978. It was the uposatha (observance) day. I was already an anagarika but I hadn’t shaved my head. I had been travelling. One of the western monks, Than Pamutto took me to his kuti and shaved my head and then we went to pay respects to Luang Por. The moment I saw him, I had a very strong feeling that he would be my teacher and that I didn’t need to go anywhere else.
Before I left England, Ajahn Sumedho gave me a piece of advice. He said, “don’t look for the perfect monastery, it doesn’t exist.” Even so I got a little side-tracked and went to stay with another teacher for a few days. But then I came back to Wat Pah Pong and thought now I can stop travelling.
I felt Luang Por was unlike anybody I had ever met before. I felt he was the only totally normal person I had ever met and everyone else was a bit abnormal compared to him. It felt as if I’d spent my whole life listening to people singing just a little bit out of tune and this was the first time I’d ever heard someone sing in tune. Or like I grew up in a country that only had plastic flowers and then one day I finally saw a real flower. “Ah, so that’s what a real flower is. I’ve only ever seen plastic flowers before.” Plastic flowers can be beautiful, but nothing like real flowers.

Question: Ajahn Chah couldn’t speak English, and you, when you came, couldn’t speak Thai, so how did you learn from him?

Answer: The teaching that you receive in Desana (a Dhamma talk) and in other verbal teachings is only one part of what you get from a teacher. From the very first day, the thing that I received from Ajahn Chah and the thing that impressed me most was this very strong confidence that he was an enlightened being, and therefore enlightenment is real and possible. I had that belief before, from books I’d read and to a certain extent from other teachers, but it was only when I met Ajahn Chah that this became really grounded in my being, this confidence that the path to Nibbana can still be followed and that it is possible to realise all the fruits of holy life. So I was impressed with who Ajahn Chah was, his being, as much as his teaching. Of course I was very inspired by his teachings and there are many teachings that I treasure and have made great use of in my practice.

When you become a monk, you go through periods of feeling very positive and you can also go through periods where you feel discouraged and you feel very unhappy. I think if you look closely at what sustains you when you feel down, it’s not so much the wise teachings and reflections as much as the faith that what you’re doing is really meaningful, that the path of practice does lead to Nibbana. I’ve never had any disrobing doubts since I became a monk. Other monks who have understood or studied the teachings more than I have disrobed. It didn’t help them. But because I had the presence of Ajahn Chah, and afterwards the memory of Ajahn Chah, it seemed to me there’s no alternative, there’s nothing else that makes sense except to be a monk and to follow this path.

I also loved his being and how he expressed himself, his voice. If you gave Ajahn Chah a newspaper to read, or just some names from a telephone directory, I could still listen to him talking for hours because of his voice and who he is as much as the actual words he speaks.

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