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20020409GRAABWL

CD of 04-09-02

I have just returned from India and I did have the opportunity to talk with His Holiness the Dalai Lama and found him well recovered. He said that the tests also showed that there was no tumor or anything. I told His Holiness that he had to live long, otherwise apart from Buddhism there would be big problems for the Tibetans. The transition would be very difficult. He said, ‘Yes, I can see that, so I am planning and praying to live for over hundred years.’

Lets continue with the teaching:

Verse 124

Therefore as I have caused harm to living beings,

Today I openly declare all my unwholesome acts

That have brought displeasure to the Compassionte Ones.

Please bear with me, O Lords, for this displeasure I have caused you.

If I hurt Mr. A or Mrs. B, why should Buddhas feel hurt?

Audience1: Buddha’s wish is for everyone to be happy, so if you cause suffering for someone that will make Buddha unhappy. Buddha does not experience anything that we would consider as unhappiness, but on the other hand I feel that Buddhas cannot feel anything when somebody suffers.

Audience2: Buddhas don’t have any unhappiness in terms of physical and mental pain. But maybe they can feel unease or displeasure.

Audience3: Buddhas have made vows, wishes and have a compassionate intent, so if any being is being hurt, they don’t like it.

Rimpoche: Do Buddhas have vows?

Audience3: I understand that the Buddhas have committed to further the enlightenment of every being.

Rimpoche: What is the difference between commitment and vow?

Audience3: I am not sure, maybe vows is not the correct word. Buddhas have plans for every being to be enlightened and although they cannot suffer, we can still upset their plans.

Audience4: When the Buddhas have ultimate compassion for all beings and those beings suffer, then the Buddhas’s feeling of compassion must connect with that suffering.

Audience5: I think that the Buddhas don’t experience pain but they experience compassion for our Buddha nature that has not yet flowered within us.

Rimpoche: So they don’t experience pain?

Audience5: No pain, but compassion. No pain as we would know it.

Audience6: In addition to being displeased with a person being harmed I am sure that Buddha would also not be happy about the person doing the harming, because they create suffering for themselves too and delay their own spiritual progress.

Rimpoche: It is an interesting point. We think that Buddhas are totally free of pain and negative feelings and so on. Of course, we have to say that the Buddha stage is the stage of no suffering. On the other hand, suffering is there. If it is there, it must be known to the Buddhas. If they don’t know, then their knowledge is limited. Perhaps many of you think, ‘What difference does that make to me?’ I think it makes a hell of a difference to us. We project the Buddha level as something totally beyond and free of everything, the greatest ever paradise. But now, it seems that although they are not supposed to experience suffering in the way we suffer, maybe they suffer differently. In any case, they suffer. So they do have suffering.

We say that the Buddha level has unlimited knowledge. If you know everything you have to know suffering as well. You may say, ‘They know suffering, but they don’t have any suffering.’ But then they would not be in touch with people. They would be some kind of academic professor who knows all, yet does nothing about it. I don’t think we want such a Buddha. Just talking about it but not getting into it, that is the way of the academics. That is objectivity perhaps. If you get into it, then you are not objective. An objective person has to remain outside and observe everything. In that case they have no personal knowledge. If we think Buddha exists in that way, we create a stupid Buddha, someone who has no experience, no idea how people suffer. They would be completely out of touch. It would be like George Bush Sn, when we went to a grocery store and had no idea what was going on in the real world.

The next question: Do the Buddhas have any dislike? We have to know that because to become a Buddha is our goal, our objective. If we don’t know about that, we could be wasting all our time. Yes, I am inclined to agree that the Buddhas don’t experience pain as pain, but they do experience pain. Sometimes, what is painful for people can be pleasure for a Buddha. There is a story in the sutras:

One time, during the annual summer retreat, Buddha and his whole retinue, were invited by someone who was not very generous to them. He kept giving them the grains that you normally feed to the horses. They had to eat that for 3 months. Shariputra said to Buddha, ‘This is acceptable to us, but how can he give such terrible food to you Buddha?’ Buddha said, ‘You have no idea what I have been eating. If you don’t mind, I give you a taste.’ He got a little grain from between his teeth, gave it to Shariputra and said, ‘Tell me how that tastes to you.’ Shariputra ate that little grain and had the phantastic experience of tasting nine different tastes altogether. It was such a beautiful taste that he was never even able to dream of. Buddha said, ‘This is the extraordinary quality of the Buddha.’ The grain might have been inferior, but to a Buddha the taste is like that. So our experience of pain could be pleasure to him. Yet, Buddha also has total knowledge and experience of the pain that we feel. This is not just information to him, but experience. This are things that are beyond our ordinary comprehension, beyond our imagination. That is why we read in the Heart Sutra: gone gone gone beyond – gate gate paragate parasamgate bodhi soha. The Buddha does not miss any feeling and any experience, yet these feelings become joy.

In the last verse of Chapter 1 of the Bodhisattvacaryavatara says,

I bow down to the body of him

In whom the sacred precious mind is born.

I seek refuge in that source of joy

Who brings to happiness even those who harm him.

Not only the ones who have been helpful will experience joy, but even the ones who hurt the Bodhisattvas, even then they are connected with joy. It makes a difference to us to know what happens on the Buddha level. Our spiritual goal is to become a Buddha. If we have no idea about Buddha, it is not very good.

Verse 124 says that if someone causes harm to living beings, that creates displeasure for the Buddhas. They want every being to be helped not hurt. So naturally, hurting someone can never make Buddhas be happy with you. They may try their best, but one day they will say, ‘We tried our best, gave him so many chances, but he always creates trouble, even we get fed up.’ Can Buddhas get fed up? That is another question. We look today at the trouble in the Middle East. It is very unfortunate and nobody is happy about it, whether you are supporting the Palastenians or the Israelis or whether you are not supporting any of them. No one can be happy with that is going on there. The same thing goes for Afghanistan. We think the war is over, but unfortunately, not quite. The US has a great military and where they go in, they win, because there is no equivalent. But what happens afterwards? That is a huge problem. The current Defense minister almost got killed a few days ago. The refugees can’t get back from Pakistan, because farmers are blocking them. The story does not end there. This shows that violence only brings terrible results. That is why the Bodhisattvacaryavatara goes to the extent of saying that it will make the Buddhas be fed up with us. We humans have tremendous qualities. We can be wonderful. On the other hand, the dark side of the human beings can have an equally powerful effect. It can be very mean. That is the reality of the human beings. If you look at the bigger picture and see nations at war, you can see it clearly. Some time ago I said, ‘Whether you are a Taliban or Northern Alliance follower is only a matter of shaving off your beard or not.’ The situation is not good, it is terrible. All over the world, different countries and groups are doing violent things. There is war and terrorism.

Now look at the individual level. That individual person plays the whole game too. It is the same thing. Sometimes we try to be good, sometimes we go against that, there is lot of push and pull, we suffer tremendously and torture ourselves. So even within one individual there is this conflict. That is the other side of the human qualities. It is our dark side. That is why we have both, positive and negative emotions. That is why spiritual practice is a struggle too.

The Buddhas tell us, ‘Hurting people is the worst thing you can do’. This message has been given in the style of 1000 years ago and the strongest message they could give was ‘The Buddhas will be unhappy with you.’ In the judeo-christian tradition they say, ‘If you do this, God will be upset with you’. Human beings are human beings, whether you are in the east or in the west.

When we have created trouble, we should not just leave it there, we should purify. That is what verse 124 is also telling us. It is very important. You don’t have to tell everybody what you did. I always say, ‘You don’t have to go into the confession box if you want to purify because you will never know who is listening on the other side.’ If you don’t mind, and if it does not cause you any trouble, you can say it. But in our culture we don’t really want to say things like that. A lot of people don’t even want to let other people know if they are sick. For example, a lot of people have advised me, ‘You cannot say that you are diabetic. You don’t have to tell everybody.’ That is sincere advice. Luckily I don’t have the problem that they have. They wouldn’t want to have the statement in their resummee that they are diabetic. They may not get another job. For the time being at least, I don’t have to run around looking for another job. So I don’t mind saying that I am diabetic. But a lot of people don’t want to say to anyone that they are seeing a psychologist. They want to leave that out of their personal history.

If you don’t want to tell others what you did you have to at least acknowledge it for yourself. You have to make it absolutely clear to yourself what you are purifying, why you are doing it, how and what for. You need to have those answers. If you don’t have them, you are fooling yourself. We don’t have time to fool around. Time is very limited.

Verse 125

From now on, in order to delight the Tathagatas

I shall serve the universe and definitely cease (to cause

Harm).

Although many beings may kick and stamp upon my head,

Even at the risk of dying may I delight the Protectors

Of the world (by not retaliating).

So this verse is saying, ‘I will cause pleasure to the Buddhas. I am promising not to cause harm any more. This may seem like a childish play, but our mind is such that we do have to treat it like a child at play. So you have to tell yourself, ‘In order to make the Buddhas happy, I am committing from now onwards, I am going to cease harming anybody.’ Can we actually manage? Probably not. We will repeat. That is our habit, our addiction. We will continue causing trouble to our mother – in law or whoever. Doesn’t matter. Give the commitment not to do it again. When you realize you have made a mistake, purify it and correct it. It is like the kids learning to walk. They fall down and get up, fall down, get up and so on. That is what we have to do on the spiritual path, get up, fall down, get up, and so on. Just don’t lie down there, get up again. When you do that, you are working, you are moving, you are putting efforts in. When you are just lying down there, you are doing nothing good for nobody.

This verse says that even should people stamp on my head, even at the risk of dying, may I delight the protectors of the world by not retaliating’.

All right, does that mean I should allow myself to become a door mat, let others stamp on me and do whatever they want? At this moment for us, we shouldn’t let ourselves be made into doormats. If we do so, we are going to cause ourselves more trouble than help. When a Bodhisattvas reaches a certain level, they can manage. Remember, one of the forms of generosity is to give one’s life, one’s eyeball, ear, nose, tongue, etc, without hesitation. That is meant for those practitioners who can manage. We, on our level, can simply pray that one day we may be able to do that. Right now we are not fit to do that. The teaching has to be taught. It has to be taught for everybody. It cannot be just taught to beginners, medium and advanced people separately. It is taught together. From the western point of view that may seem to be disorganized. Here you are talking to the advanced level too, at the same time as talking the preliminary level. But that is how we gain knowledge and can develop. Then our knowledge becomes our development. We are gaining wisdom that follows from information. When you contemplate and analyze that, it becomes the wisdom following from processing thoughts. After that you get an even better wisdom, the wisdom following meditation. We are right now picking up the wisdom following information. Then you analyze that and then you meditate on it and get the meditative result, you gain experience. These three kinds of wisdom have to be applied at each and every point. Every point of understanding has to be developed through this three-fold process. For example: ‘Not to displease the Buddhas’ – you have to do all three stages of the wisdom developing process on this point and in the same way for all other points. That is how you improve your spiritual path. If you only have information, that is not good enough, if you only think, you can’t think much, because you don’t have enough information and even the information you have can be wrong. Not everything written down in a book is correct. The book stores pick up books, because they are a book store. That does not mean that every book sold in the book store is a correct book, especially on the spiritual path.