By Lama Zopa Rinpoche
Yesterday I used the example of different beings seeing liquid
in a container to explain the views of attachment and anger on
seeing an object, such as someone’s body. When you get attached to
or angry with somebody, it doesn’t come from the side of the
object. You get attached to or angry with something that came only
from your mind, to an appearance that is projected by your
mind.
Yesterday, to clarify this, I used the example of how the same
liquid in the same container appears differently to different
beings in accord with the quality of the perceiver’s mind. To those
with an impure mind, to those without any merit, it appears impure,
as pus, blood and other unpleasant things. To those with a pure
mind it appears pure, as nectar. To the pretas, who don’t have
merit, it appears as only pus and blood. But when a human being
looks at the same liquid at the same time it appears to them as
water. When a worldly deva, who has more merit, looks at that same
liquid in the same container, it appears as nectar. And, of course,
for yogis and others who have pure appearance, and especially for
buddhas, who have totally purified their holy minds, it appears as
blissful, uncontaminated nectar.
Therefore, you can see that your view is a production of your
own mind, just as these different beings see different things
according to the different qualities of their minds. There’s no
such thing coming from the side of the object; there’s no such
thing existing from the side of the object without depending on the
mind. To put it in the shortest way: there’s no such thing from its
own side. It’s all appearance. All the objects that you see also
come from your mind; they are the result of the quality of your
mind.
This example is also very good to use in guru devotion and in
respecting sentient beings. For example, even when you see a dog,
the question is, “Is it a real dog or not?” Your seeing a dog
doesn’t always mean that it is a dog. Take Asanga, for example.
Before Asanga had purified his mind, he saw Maitreya Buddha as a
dog. But after he had purified his negative karma by generating
incredible compassion and sacrificing himself for that one living
being, the ordinary, impure appearance of Maitreya Buddha as a dog
disappeared. The same being that had appeared before as a dog now
appeared as a buddha.
You can’t really say who is a buddha and who is not a buddha.
When you see a beggar or an animal, you can’t judge what they are
from what appears to you. Saying “I see a dog” or “I see an
ordinary being” doesn’t logically prove that it is a dog or an
ordinary being.
It also helps to remember what is mentioned in The Essence
of Nectar:
Until I am free from my evil karmic obscurations, even if all
the buddhas descended in front of me, I have no fortune to see the
holy body adorned with the holy signs and exemplifications – only
this present appearance.[1]
We have no fortune to see buddhas in the aspect of buddha. We
see only ordinary beings. The meaning of ordinary is
having faults, delusions and suffering and making mistakes in
actions. That’s the definition of ordinary, as His
Holiness the Dalai Lama explained during the Guru Puja
commentary[2] that the
FPMT requested as part of the Second Enlightened Experience
Celebration in Dharamsala. Later, when I went for an interview, I
mentioned to His Holiness that these words had benefited me very
much.
Until our mind is separated from karmic obscurations, even if
all the buddhas came in front of us, it doesn’t mean that we would
be able to see them as buddhas. We would see only ordinary beings
with faults, or even animals.
If you’re not sure whether a person or an animal is a buddha or
a bodhisattva, your seeing them as an ordinary being with faults
doesn’t prove that they’re an ordinary being. We definitely see
buddhas, bodhisattvas and dakinis in our daily life in different
places, especially in holy places. When we go to holy places such
as the twenty-four holy places, there are numberless dakas
and dakinis there, but it doesn’t mean that we recognize
them. When we are in cities or on pilgrimage, we do meet holy
beings, but it doesn’t mean that we recognize them. We cling
strongly to our ordinary view, totally believing in it. Since we
are habituated to our ordinary view, it blocks our seeing holy
beings. Even if we see some special signs, it’s still difficult for
us to believe that it’s a buddha and to really respect that being
and behave toward them as it explains in the teachings. We don’t
follow them or make requests to them.
We certainly do meet buddhas, bodhisattvas, dakas and dakinis.
It’s just that our heavy ordinary appearance and strong belief in
our own view block our seeing that they are buddhas, bodhisattvas,
dakas or dakinis. Because our mind is impure, our view of someone
as ordinary doesn’t prove that in reality they are like that.
Therefore, since anyone we meet could be a buddha, a
bodhisattva, a daka or a dakini, we should respect everyone we
meet. We should be careful not to get angry with or disrespect
them, which creates heavy negative karma. By thinking that they
might be a holy being, we should respect them and serve them, which
creates so much merit. By thinking like this in our daily life, we
gain a lot of advantages; we make a lot of profit, a lot of merit.
The first thing is not to create negative karma, which is the
obstacle for realizations and the cause of samsara, especially of
the lower realms.
When the mind is not purified, it sees beings as ordinary. The
stories of Asanga and the novice monk Kusali[3] are
inspiring stories that show the benefit of generating great
compassion and sacrificing yourself for even one sentient being. It
brings the quickest, most powerful purification and collection of
merit and enables you to quickly achieve enlightenment. Although
these stories also illustrate the benefits of generating great
compassion for even one sentient being, I’m using them here to show
that our view of someone as pure or impure has totally to do with
our own mind. It’s a production of our own mind, depending on
whether the mind itself is pure or impure.
The following story of Asanga is also helpful in relation to
respecting sentient beings. After Asanga had spent twelve years in
retreat on Maitreya Buddha, nothing had happened. It was only after
he generated unbearable compassion and sacrificed himself to take
care of a wounded dog that he was able to see Maitreya. The lower
part of the dog’s body was an open wound filled with maggots, and
Asanga cut flesh from his own thigh and stretched it out on the
ground as somewhere for the maggots to live. Because collecting the
maggots with his fingers might have crushed them, Asanga then
closed his eyes and went to pick up the maggots with the tip of his
tongue. But he found that he couldn’t reach them. When he then
opened his eyes, he saw Maitreya Buddha.
Asanga saw Maitreya Buddha not only as a dog, but as a wounded
one filled with maggots. He saw something very awful. It is similar
with us in our daily life. We can never tell whether in reality
someone’s a sentient being just because we see them as a sentient
being; they could also be a buddha. Even someone very ugly, awful
or terrifying could be a buddha. Asanga didn’t see even an ordinary
human being but a dog, and even that, a dog with great
suffering.
The other story is about Kusali, the Vajrayogini practitioner
who went to the Vajrayogini pure land. Kusali’s guru,
Krishnacharya,[4] was
going to the holy place called Oddiyana to engage in tantric
conduct, the final part of tantric practice. It seems there are all
different kinds of tantric conduct, in accordance with the
individual person; there’s not one particular fixed conduct. Chöden
Rinpoche said that one monk in Ganden Monastery who was about to
achieve enlightenment and was engaged in tantric conduct built a
huge house. There was no particular use for the house; he just
built it.
On the road to Oddiyana Krishnacharya met an extremely ugly
woman riddled with leprosy and oozing pus and blood. No one would
dare to touch her. She asked Krishnacharya to pick her up and take
her to the other side of the river, but he didn’t pay any attention
to her and went straight across the river.
After some time, his disciple, Kusali, a monk living in
thirty-six vows, came by and saw this leper. The woman asked him,
“Please carry me to the other side of the river. Please take me
there.” When Kusali saw the woman, he generated unbelievable
compassion for her. Even though he was a monk and even though she
was a leper oozing pus and blood, without any hesitation and with
incredible compassion he lifted the woman onto his back. When he
reached the middle of the river, she then appeared to him as
Vajravarahi, not as an ordinary woman anymore. She then took
Kusali, in that same body, to Dakpa Khachö, the pure land of
Vajrayogini, where he became enlightened.
Here, because of the unbearable compassion he generated for just
one living being, Kusali completely sacrificed himself to take care
of that being. This brought such powerful purification of his
impure karma and defilements that, without crossing the whole
river, when he reached the middle of the river, his view of that
woman was only of a deity, Vajravarahi. She then took him straight
to the pure land without his needing to die or go to the
intermediate state or a next life. In that life, in that same body,
he was able to go to the pure land of Vajrayogini.
Here, Kusali seeing an ordinary leper was the view of his impure
mind. By purifying the impurities of his mind, he then had the pure
view of her as a deity.
Another angle of this story is the importance of generating
compassion as strongly as possible. The stronger you generate
compassion, for even one living being, the quicker you are able to
achieve enlightenment.
I’m using these stories to help you to understand that all the
objects that you are attached to or get angry with in your daily
life are your karmic view; they all come from your own karma.
They’re creations, productions, of your own karma. The view of
things as ugly or undesirable manifests from your own karmic
imprints, as does the view of any object of attachment. The view of
something as desirable is also a creation of your own karmic
imprint. It means that there’s nothing there from the side of the
object, from outside. What we normally believe is totally wrong.
When attachment, anger or any other delusion arises, we normally
believe that it doesn’t come from our mind but from its own side.
We think that the appearance of an object of attachment or anger
exists from its own side or comes from outside, instead of thinking
that it comes from our mind, that it is the view of our karmic
imprint.
In conclusion, there are three points to consider. The first is
that this moment’s appearance of a friend, enemy or object of
attachment comes from this moment’s concept. Your mind merely
imputes, or makes up, that label and believes in it, and it then
appears to you. After you label it, it appears to you in that way;
you see it in that way. So, this moment’s appearance of things has
to do with this moment’s concept; it’s a creation of this moment’s
way of thinking
The second point is that the appearance of this friend, enemy or
object of attachment is the production of karma. It came from the
karmic imprint, which means it came from your own mind. Again,
there’s nothing from the side of the object.
Now I want to tell you about the third point. The truly existent
friend, the truly existent enemy, the truly existent object of
desire, the truly existent harm, the truly existent help and so
forth don’t come from their own side; they are projections of the
negative imprints left on your mental continuum by past ignorance.
This is the third point. There’s nothing coming from the side of
the object, as we normally believe in our daily lives. It’s the
total opposite.
These three points give you an idea of how your view of an
object comes from your own mind. It’s very important to do this
meditation, this analysis, and use it in your daily life when
you’re in danger of giving rise to delusions. It proves how
delusion is a wrong concept because there’s no such object as it
apprehends. In the case of ignorance, there’s no phenomenon that
exists from its own side. Every phenomenon exists by being merely
imputed by the mind in relation to a valid base. Because a valid
base exists, that phenomenon is merely imputed by the mind.
Therefore, nothing exists from its own side. No phenomenon exists
from its own side; all phenomena are totally empty. That’s the
reality. All these things appearing to us one after another as not
merely labeled by the mind, as existing from their own side, are
total hallucinations. They are totally false – not even an atom of
them exists.
This analysis proves that this ignorance that apprehends things
as existing from their own side is totally wrong. It proves that
ignorance is a false mind. And it is the same with anger,
attachment and any other delusion: they are all wrong concepts. A
superstition is something that you believe when in reality no such
thing exists. So, all delusions are superstitions.
Excerpted from Kadampa Teachings, a new book freely
distributed by the Lama
Yeshe Wisdom Archive.
Kadampa Teachings
is a dynamic collection of teachings inspired primarily by the
histories of the Kadampa geshes and their spiritual
advice.
1 See Essential Nectar,
p. 193, v. 121.
2 Published as The Union of
Bliss and Emptiness.
3 Getsul Tsembulwa, in
Tibetan.
4 Nagpo Chöpa, in Tibetan.