I was wondering...
...is he enlightened?
Does anyone know by what he has said or written?
If so, can you give examples?
Some of his teachings can be found here: http://www.lamayeshe.com/otherteachers/hhdl/index.shtml
I have personally not read much of his teachings, but there is
an article which I showed Thusness. He was particularly impressed
by HHDL's explanation on the nature of mind. In this article both
the relative nature (which is the experience of 'I AM') and
ultimate nature (emptiness) of Mind is explained.
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With kind permission of His Holiness the Dalai Lama, Dharamsala.
From Second Dharma Celebration, November 5th-8th 1982, New
Delhi, India. Translated by Alex Berzin, clarified by Lama Zopa
Rinpoche, edited by Nicholas Ribush. First published by Tushita Mahayana
Meditation Centre, New Delhi, 1982
Many billions of years elapsed between the origin of this world
and the first appearance of living beings upon its surface.
Thereafter it took an immense time for living creatures to become
mature in thought—in the development and perfection of their
intellectual faculties; and even from the time men attained
maturity up to the present many thousands of years have passed.
Through all these vast periods of time the world has undergone
constant changes, for it is in a continual state of flux. Even now,
many comparatively recent occurrences which appeared for a little
while to remain static are seen to have been undergoing changes
from moment to moment. One may wonder what it is that remains
immutable when every sort of material and mental phenomenon seems
to be invariably subject to the process of change, of mutability.
All of them are forever arising, developing and passing away. In
the vortex of all these changes it is Truth alone which remains
constant and unalterable—in other words, the truth of righteousness
(Dharma) and its accompanying beneficial results, and the truth of
evil action and its accompanying harmful results. A good cause
produces a good result, a bad cause a bad result. Good or bad,
beneficial or harmful, every result necessarily has a cause. This
principle alone is abiding, immutable and constant. It was so
before man entered the world, in the early period of his existence,
in the present age, and it will be so in all ages to come.
All of us desire happiness and the avoidance of suffering and of
everything else that is unpleasant. Pleasure and pain arise from a
cause, as we all know. Whether certain consequences are due to a
single cause or to a group of causes is determined by the nature of
those consequences. In some cases, even if the cause factors are
neither powerful nor numerous, it is still possible for the effect
factors to occur. Whatever the quality of the result factors,
whether they are good or bad, their magnitude and intensity
directly correspond to the quantity and strength of the cause
factors. Therefore, for success in avoiding unwished- for pains and
in acquiring desired pleasures, which is in itself no small matter,
the relinquishment of a great number of collective cause factors is
required.
In analyzing the nature and state of happiness, it will he
apparent that it has two aspects. One is immediate joy (temporary);
the other is future joy (ultimate). Temporary pleasures comprise
the comforts and enjoyments which people crave, such as good
dwellings, lovely furniture, delicious food, good company, pleasant
conversation and so on. In other words, temporary pleasures are
what man enjoys in this life. The question as to whether the
enjoyment of these pleasures and satisfactions derives purely from
external factors needs to be examined in the light of clear logic.
If external factors were alone responsible for giving rise to such
pleasures a person would be happy when these were present and,
conversely, unhappy in their absence. However, this is not so. For,
even in the absence of external conditions leading to pleasure, a
man can still be happy and at peace. This demonstrates that
external factors are not alone responsible for stimulating man's
happiness. Were it true that external factors were solely
responsible for, or that they wholly conditioned the arising of,
pleasure and happiness, a person possessing an abundance of these
factors would have illimitable joy, which is by no means always so.
It is true that these external factors do make partial contribution
to the creation of pleasure in a man's lifetime. However, to state
that the external factors are all that is needed and therefore the
exclusive cause of happiness in a man's span of life is an obtuse
and illogical proposition. It is by no means sure that the presence
of such external factors will beget joy. On the contrary, factual
happenings such as the experiencing of inner beatitude and
happiness despite the total absence of such pleasure-causing
external factors, and the frequent absence of joy despite their
presence, clearly show the cause of happiness to depend upon a
different set of conditioning factors.
If one were to be misled by the argument that the
above-mentioned conditioning factors constitute the sole cause of
happiness to the preclusion of any other conditioning causes, that
would imply that (resulting) happiness is inseparably bound to
external causal factors, its presence or absence being exclusively
determined by them. The fact that this is obviously not so is a
sufficient proof that external causal factors are not necessarily
or wholly responsible for the effect phenomena of happiness.
Now what is that other internal set of causes? How are they to
be explained? As Buddhists, we all believe in the Law of Karma—the
natural law of cause and effect. Whatever external causal
conditions someone comes across in subsequent lives result from the
accumulation of that individual's actions in previous lives. When
the karmic force of past deeds reaches maturity a person
experiences pleasurable and unpleasurable mental states. They are
but a natural sequence of his own previous actions. The most
important thing to understand is that, when suitable (karmic)
conditions resulting from the totality of past actions are there,
one's external factors are bound to be favourable. The coming into
contact of conditions due to (karmic) action and external causal
factors will produce a pleasurable mental state. If the requisite
causal conditions for experiencing interior joy are lacking there
will be no opportunity for the occurrence of suitable external
conditioning factors or, even if these external conditioning
factors are present, it will not be possible for the person to
experience the joy that would otherwise be his. This shows that
inner causal conditions are essential in that these are what
principally determine the realization of happiness (and its
opposite). Therefore, in order to achieve the desired results it is
imperative for us to accumulate both the cause-creating external
factors and the cause-creating internal (karmic) conditioning
factors at the same time.
To state the matter in simple terms, for the accrual of good
inner (karmic) conditioning factors, what are principally needed
are such qualities as having few wants, contentment, humility,
simplicity and other noble qualities. Practice of these inner
causal conditions will even facilitate changes in the
aforementioned external conditioning factors that will convert them
into characteristics conducive to the arising of happiness. The
absence of suitable inner causal conditions, such as having few
wants contentment, patience, forgiveness and so on, will prevent
one from enjoying pleasure even if all the right external
conditioning factors are present. Besides this, one must have to
one's credit the force of merits and virtues accumulated in past
lives. Otherwise, the seeds of happiness will not bear fruit.
The matter can be put in another way. The pleasures and
frustrations, the happiness and suffering experienced by each
individual are the inevitable fruits of beneficial and evil actions
he has perpetrated, thus adding to his store. If at a particular
moment in this present life the fruits of a person's good actions
ripen he will recognize, if he is a wise man, that they are the
fruits of (past) meritorious deeds. This will gratify him and
encourage him to achieve more merits. Similarly, when a person
happens to experience pain and dissatisfaction, he will be able to
bear them calmly if he maintains an unshakable conviction that,
whether he wishes it or not, he must suffer and bear the
consequences of his own (past) deeds, notwithstanding the fact that
normally he will often find the intensity and extent of his
frustration hard to bear. Besides, the realization that they are
nothing but the fruits of unskilled action in the past will make
him wise enough to desist from unskilled deeds henceforth.
Likewise, the satisfying thought that, with the ripening of past
(evil) karma, a certain part of the evil fruit accrued by former
unskilled action has been worked off will be a source of immense
relief to him.
A proper appreciation of this wisdom will contribute to grasping
the essentials for achieving peace of mind and body. For instance,
suppose a person is suddenly afflicted with critical physical
suffering due to certain external factors. If, by the force of
sheer will power (based on the conviction that he is himself
responsible for his present misery and sufferings), he can
neutralize the extent of his suffering then his mind will be much
comforted and at peace.
Now let me explain this at a rather higher level. This concerns
the strivings and efforts that can be made for the systematic
destruction of dissatisfaction and its causes.
As stated before, pleasure and pain, happiness and
dissatisfaction are the effects of one's own good and bad, skilled
and unskilled actions. Skillful and unskillful (karmic) actions are
not external phenomena. They belong essentially to the realm of
mind. Making strenuous efforts to build up every possible kind of
skillful karma and to put every vestige of unskillful karma away
from us is the path to creating happiness and avoiding the creation
of pain and suffering. For it is inevitable that a happy result
follows a skillful cause and that the consequence of building up
unskillful causes is suffering.
Therefore, it is of the utmost importance that we strive by
every possible means to increase the quality and quantity of
skillful actions and to make a corresponding paring down of our
unskillful actions.
How is this to be accomplished? Meritorious and unmeritorious
causes which result in pleasure and pain do not resemble external
objects. For instance, in the human bodily system different parts
such as lungs, heart and other organs can be replaced with new
ones. But this is not so in the case of karmic actions, which are
purely of the mind. The earning of fresh merits and the eradicating
of bad causes are purely mental processes. They cannot be achieved
with outside help of any kind. The only way to accomplish them is
by controlling and disciplining the hitherto untamed mind. For
this, we require a fuller comprehension of the element called
mind.
Through the gates of the five sense organs a being sees, hears,
smells, tastes and comes into contact with a host of external
forms, objects and impressions. Let the form, sound, smell, taste,
touch and mental events which are the relations of the six senses
be shut off. When this is done the recollection of past events on
which the mind tends to dwell will be completely discontinued and
the flow of memory cut off. Similarly, plans for the future and
contemplation of future action must not be allowed to arise. It is
necessary to create a space in place of all such processes of
thought if one is to empty the mind of all such processes of
thought. Freed from all these processes there will remain a pure,
clean, distinct and quiescent mind. Now let us examine what sort of
characteristics constitute the mind when it has attained this
stage. We surely do possess some thing called mind, but how are we
to recognize its existence? The real and essential mind is what is
to be found when the entire load of gross obstructions and
aberrations (i.e. sense impressions, memories, etc.) has been
cleared away. Discerning this aspect of real mind, we shall
discover that, unlike external objects, its true nature is devoid
of form or color; nor can we find any basis of truth for such false
and deceptive notions as that mind originated from this or that, or
that it will move from here to there, or that it is located in
such-and-such a place. When it comes into contact with no object
mind is like a vast, boundless void, or like a serene, illimitable
ocean. When it encounters an object it at once has cognizance of
it, like a mirror instantly reflecting a person who stands in front
of it. The true nature of mind consists not only in taking clear
cognizance of the object but also in communicating a concrete
experience of that object to the one experiencing it.*
Normally, our forms of sense cognition, such as eye-consciousness,
ear-consciousness, etc., perform their functions on external
phenomena in a manner involving gross distortion. Knowledge
resulting from sense cognition, being based on gross external
phenomena, is also of a gross nature. When this type of gross
stimulation is shut out, and when concrete experiences and clear
cognizance arise from within, mind assumes the characteristics of
infinite void similar to the infinitude of space. But this void is
not to be taken as the true nature of mind. We have become so
habituated to consciousness of the form and color of gross objects
that, when we make concentrated introspection into the nature of
mind, it is, as I have said, found to be a vast, limitless void
free from any gross obscurity or other hindrances. Nevertheless,
this does not mean that we have discerned the subtle, true nature
of the mind. What has been explained above concerns the state of
mind in relation to the concrete experience and clear cognizance by
the mind which are its function, but it describes only the relative
nature of mind.
There are in addition several other aspects and states of mind.
In other words, taking mind as the supreme basis, there are many
attributes related to it. Just as an onion consists of layer upon
layer that can be peeled away, so does every sort of object have a
number of layers; and this is no less true of the nature of mind as
explained here; it, too, has layer within layer, slate within
state.
All compounded things are subject to disintegration. Since
experience and knowledge are impermanent and subject to
disintegration, the mind, of which they are functions (nature), is
not something that remains constant and eternal. From moment to
moment it undergoes change and disintegration. This transience of
mind is one aspect of its nature. However, as we have observed, its
true nature has many aspects, including consciousness of concrete
experience and cognizance of objects. Now let us make a further
examination in order to grasp the meaning of the subtle essence of
such a mind. Mind came into existence because of its own cause. To
deny that the origination of mind is dependent on a cause, or to
say that it is a designation given as a means of recognizing the
nature of mind aggregates, is not correct. With our superficial
observance, mind, which has concrete experience and clear
cognizance as its nature, appears to be a powerful, independent,
subjective, completely ruling entity. However, deeper analysis will
reveal that this mind, possessing as it does the function of
experience and cognizance, is not a self-created entity but Is
dependent on other factors for its existence. Hence it depends on
something other than itself. This non-independent quality of the
mind substance is its true nature which in turn is the ultimate
reality of the self.
Of these two aspects, viz. the ultimate true nature of mind and
a knowledge of that ultimate true nature, the former is the base,
the latter an attribute. Mind (self) is the basis and all its
different states are attributes. However, the basis and its
attributes have from the first pertained to the same single
essence. The non-self-created (depending on a cause other than
itself) mind entity (basis) and its essence, sunyata, have
unceasingly existed as the one, same, inseparable essence from
beginningless beginning. The nature of sunyata pervades
all elements. As we are now and since we cannot grasp or comprehend
the indestructible, natural, ultimate reality (sunyata) of
our own minds, we continue to commit errors and our defects
persist.
Taking mind as the subject and mind's ultimate reality as its
object, one will arrive at a proper comprehension of the true
essence of mind, i.e. its ultimate reality. And when, after
prolonged patient meditation, one comes to perceive and grasp at
the knowledge of mind's ultimate reality which is devoid of dual
characteristics, one will gradually be able to exhaust the
delusions and defects of the central and secondary minds such as
wrath, love of ostentation, jealousy, envy and so on.
Failure to identify the true nature of mind will be overcome
through acquisition of the power to comprehend its ultimate
reality. This will in turn eradicate lust and hatred and all other
secondary delusions emanating from the basic ones. Consequently,
there will be no occasion for accumulating demeritorious karma. By
this means the creation of (evil) karma affecting future lives will
be eliminated; one will be able to increase the quality and
quantity of meritorious causal conditioning and to eradicate the
creation of harmful causal conditioning affecting future
lives—apart from the bad karma accumulated earlier.
In the practice of gaining a perfect knowledge of the true
nature of mind, strenuous and concentrated mental efforts are
required for comprehending the object. In our normal condition as
it is at present, when our mind comes into contact with something
it is immediately drawn to it. This makes comprehension impossible.
Therefore. in order to acquire great dynamic mental power, the very
maximum exertion is the first imperative. For example, a big river
flowing over a wide expanse of shallows will have very little
force, but when it passes through a steep gorge all the water is
concentrated in a narrow space and therefore flows with great
force. For a similar reason all the mental distractions which draw
the mind away from the object of contemplation are to be avoided
and the mind kept steadily fixed upon it. Unless this is done, the
practice for gaining a proper understanding of the true nature of
mind will be a total failure.
To make the mind docile, it is essential for us to discipline
and control it well. Speech and bodily activities which accompany
mental processes, must not be allowed to run on in an indiscreet,
unbridled, random way. Just as a trainer disciplines and calms a
wild and willful steed by subjecting it to skillful and prolonged
training, so must the wild, wandering, random activities of body
and speech be tamed to make them docile, righteous and skillful.
Therefore the Teachings of the Lord Buddha comprise three graded
categories, that is sila (training in higher conduct),
samadhi (training in higher meditation) and
prajna (training in higher wisdom), all of them for
disciplining the mind.
By studying, meditating and practising the three grades of
trisiksa in this way, one accomplishes progressive
realization. A person so trained will be endowed with the wonderful
quality of being able to bear patiently the miseries and suffering
which are the fruit of his past karma. He will regard his
misfortunes as blessings in disguise, for they will enlighten him
as to the meaning of nemesis (karma) and convince him of the need
to concentrate on performing only meritorious deeds. If his past
(evil) karma has not as yet borne fruit, it will still be possible
for him to obliterate this unripe karma by utilizing the strength
of the four powers, namely: determination to attain the status of
Buddhahood; determination to eschew demeritorious deeds, even at
the cost of one's life; the performance of meritorious deeds;
repentance.
Such is the way to attain immediate happiness, to pave the way
for attaining liberation in future and to help avoid the
accumulation of further demerits.
* These two
aspects, 'taking cognition' and 'communicating experience' refer to
knowing what the object is and how it feels, tastes, looks,
etc.
