Audio recorded at Tibetan Buddhist Institute, Adelaide. Transcript auto-generated and AI-corrected; may contain errors.
About this talk. Kyabje Rinpoche distinguishes cause from condition in this 46-minute teaching, using food and diarrhea to show discomfort arises from past karma ripening in contact with conditions, not from the food alone. He develops this principle through the Buddhist teaching that all phenomena require both a substantial cause and cooperating conditions, illustrated by a flower seed needing soil and sun. The teaching then grounds itself in practice: understanding that happiness flows from constructive actions and suffering from destructive ones motivates ethical conduct. Rinpoche covers the three main destructive physical actions — killing, stealing, sexual misconduct — and their opposites, showing how harm and benefit to others return to the doer. A closing Q&A addresses how accomplished masters appear to suffer despite pure karma, clarifying that teachers help by removing the conditions of suffering, not the karmic causes.
File metadata (for organising)
File: 1989-02-20 – 4B – Patience – KR.mp3
UUID: e97903bd-89db-43fa-ba9a-2500cefdac86
Teacher: Kyabje Rinpoche
Collection: Bodhisattvacaryāvatāra
Date: 1989-02-20
Recorded at: Tibetan Buddhist Institute, Adelaide
Words: ~3,104
So, you know, we take an example of if we were to eat some food and due to having eaten this food, we get sick, we get maybe diarrhea. And we think, oh, I have this diarrhea because of my lunch, that food I ate. But in fact the food is not the cause of your diarrhea, not the cause of your discomfort, it’s simply a condition, a cooperative condition. The actual main cause or the substantial cause is your karma, the negative karma of which or the negative action of which this is a result of it. Potency to become sick and experience discomfort.
That this karma that you created in the past, this negative action that you created in the past coming together, combining with this cooperative condition of the food, by the force of this, you actually experience diarrhea. You experience discomfort. If in fact the discomfort were only to were to arise only from the food then it would then there would be a suffering which did not arise from a a karmic cause. This would contradict law of cause and effect. On the other hand, if we were to eat some delicious food and we experience pleasure from this, that this pleasure in fact does not arise that the food acts as a condition for the experience of pleasure.
The actual, the cause of the pleasure was the positive action that we created in the past which has a consequence of pleasure, has the potency whereby we’re able to eat food and experience happiness. That it’s due to the, the, our karma or past negative action coming in contact with their proper condition and these two together give rise to a pleasurable sensation. If in fact the pleasurable sensation would come about only by way of the food, then we would have a happiness without a karmic cause and this would contradict the law of cause and effect. So within the within the Buddhist context it is said that that all conditioned phenomena, that all things arise must arise through a combination of causes and conditions. Simply they cannot arise in dependence upon a cause without conditions or without or in dependence upon conditions without the cause.
It is a combination of causes and conditions which gives rise to all conditioned phenomena. And if we take a simple example of the way causes and conditions operate together, In the case of a flower, in order to develop a flower we have to have both causes and conditions. The cause of the flower is the flower seed. In dependence upon the flower seed coming in contact, coming together with the correct conditions such as water, soil, fertilizer, warmth, etcetera, then we the seed germinates and a flower a flower will eventually develop. If on the other hand we had the seed and we had no cooperative condition, we didn’t have any fertilizer, we didn’t have any soil, then this seed could remain for hundreds of years and it would never develop into a flower.
So, you know, if we in gaining conviction in this relationship between causes and effects, the karmic causes and their consequences that we can, begin to apply it to our daily life in the sense that we are thinking, well this body and mind which I possess and all the happiness and joy that I experience, you know that they arise from causes and what types of causes that they arise from. They arise in dependence upon positive actions or positive karma, constructive actions. And therefore thinking this way, wanting to extend, develop, and increase one’s happiness and joy, you are motivated to engage in very positive types, constructive types of actions in order to find the happiness that we are all looking for. On the other hand, when you are considering our body and mind, the various experiences that these two factors undergo, the sufferings of sickness of the body and the sufferings of depression, etc, that we experience within our mind that we can question well these also arise these experiences also arise in dependence upon causes and types of causes. And these are dependent upon negative actions we created in the past.
Is destructive activities, destructive non virtue. And therefore seeing this as the case, being motivated to begin to lessen, decrease, and eventually abandon all types of negative and destructive actions that we engage in. These types of actions are as if a thief stealing all our happiness from us and bringing us only suffering. So even in the insignificant case of insect bite, which causes us some kind of discomfort, that this discomfort arises has as its main cause past negative action that we created in the past. That the insect itself is simply a cooperative condition.
And it in dependence upon this main cause that we created in the past, this destructive action, negative karma coming into contact with this condition, then this negative experience arises, this discomfort. So the great master Vasubandhu said that all the varieties of objects in the world arise in dependence upon karma, actions. And whatever it might be, whatever good there is in the world it arises in dependence upon constructive actions that we’ve created in the past. Whatever bad there exists in the world it arises in dependence upon destructive actions that we’ve created in the past down to even a pebble that everything is dependent upon actions. But we might think, well, you know, we’re constantly talking about karma, about actions.
We say the entire world arises in dependence upon actions. But this is only Buddhism which talks about karma. It’s only within Buddhism that karma applies. So, but, so we can discuss well, you know, what is the, how does karma arise? What are these actions?
So karma is simply, karma is accumulated or actions are accumulated to doing activities or work. So there’s three types of activities of body, speech, and mind. And if we take we take an example of physical physical action of activity of body, a bodily action, Then we can take a killing, for example, you know, taking as a basis as some other sentient being. The agent is a there is a person who is committing an action and then there is the activity itself. So, when we talk about karma action in this this example, the activity of killing, taking the life of another person is the karma of killing or the action of killing.
And these actions, this type activity, have certain consequences. For example, that one will experience a short life, one will have many illnesses. So, you know, we take another physical action. For example, within physical action there are three types which are generally spoken of three destructive types of actions of killing, stealing, and sexual misconduct. And taking another example of stealing, that the basis of the action of stealing is another person’s possession.
The agent is, for example, a thief, and the activity is actually taking the possession of another without their permission. And this has consequences or results. And one of the results of stealing is being poor. So the idea which is being gotten at here is not that karma or actions are somehow simply a Buddhist idea, that these activities of taking someone else’s articles, that being a thief, that being a killer, taking someone else’s life, no matter whether we understand these are not particularly Buddhist types of activities. Therefore Buddhist idea of karma or action simply does not apply within a Buddhist context because these apply everywhere.
That there are people who take other things and people who take other lives. So they’re engaging in karma. They’re engaging in activities which are going to have certain types of consequences. Nice. And extend this to the to the third type of physical destructive action, that of sexual misconduct, you know, Taking a partner who has committed to another partner in some socially accepted manner in a sexual relationship as a basis.
Actually engaging in a sexual relation which brings some type of bliss as the activity. And this would be an example of an activity of sexual misconduct. So these are all physical actions killing, stealing, and sexual misconduct. Are just activities that everyone engages in, not particularly to people who have belief in karma or don’t, or to Buddhists or not.
And we term these as destructive actions. Know, actions can be either of two types, constructive or destructive. And these types are particularly termed destructive because they harm oneself and they harm others. And this is the determining standard which we’re using as a method to distinguish destructive and constructive actions. Destructive actions have a negative consequence, that is suffering.
Constructive actions have a positive consequence, that is happiness. So these activities have an ethical value and have a experiential consequence of happiness and suffering. So what is the reason in the context of these examples that we gave in which we term them as destructive actions? Why do they why should they bring us some suffering in the future? It’s because all of these types of actions that we just listed as examples of killing, stealing, sexual misconduct in some way are going to bring harm to others.
They’re bringing suffering to others. And the consequence of causing others suffering is that oneself experiences suffering as a reaction. So this is has a cyclic effect, this reactive effect. And bringing harm to others, oneself is harmed. And bringing happiness to others, oneself has brought happiness.
If we take the contrary example of of those types of actions which bring happiness, if the circumstance arose that we were going to we were going hunting and we were going to kill some type of animal and that just as you were about to kill the animal there you began to consider the, the, what you were about to do. That in fact, you developed, compassion for this animal, that this animal doesn’t want to suffer, that it has feelings, that you know, perhaps in the past life was actually your mother or your father that was a sentient being in the in the past. You know, that that to seeing that this this that is being in front of you doesn’t want to be hurt. It has it experiences feelings just as yourself. And therefore developing compassion, thought not to harm it, and developing the attitude of compassion will act to prevent the mind which intends to bring harm from arising.
And then one abandons the attitude of seeking to hurt this being, but in fact determines that I’m not going to engage in this action. And this becomes the action of abandonment of killing, which is a constructive action. So in abandoning the intention to kill and actually engaging in the constructive action of giving life. That rather than shortening the life of another being, rather than causing harm to another being, then in fact one that you actually give happiness, you allow this being to remain, to live out its life. And this has the consequences in giving life that one’s own life in future as a reaction will be longer and that one will not undergo the suffering of having harmed others in the past, but in fact the consequences will be happiness for oneself.
So out of motivated by compassion, abandoning of the thought, the intention to kill, but in fact giving life is constructive action and this will have a happy effect or positive effect. And the same applies to the destructive action of stealing and of taking others possessions. That by taking others possessions that we deprive them of having things that in fact they have no things. They have no material possessions. And they also have to incur the suffering of having the loss, the worry which is about by losing their things.
So on the other hand, if we were to reverse from that then in fact forego abandon the intention to steal, but in fact commit the opposite. The consequences of that stealing would be in keeping with the negative, in keeping with the activity that we’re engaged in, in causing others not to have things we in the future will not have things, we will be poor. Likewise, we are going to causing others suffering by depriving of their things, causing, because through losing their things, we are going to experience suffering in the future. On the other hand, if we do the opposite, we engage in generosity in giving, then this would be a cause for us to have things in the future and to have the happiness which is associated with having things. So, you know, if we just kind of state this briefly, then the Buddha has said that whatever actions that we create we will experience result in accordance it.
That if today we if presently we harm we engage in the actions of harming others, then in the future we will that harm is going to return to us. On the other hand, if presently we engage in actions of abandoning harming others, and further than that seek to benefit others, then in the future that benefit will come back to us as a reaction. Harmful activities are termed destructive actions, destructive actions, negative actions, negative karma. Whereas beneficial activities are termed constructive actions, positive karma, positive actions. So however much we benefit others to that same degree we ourselves will be benefited.
However much we harm others to that same degree we ourselves are going to be harmed. So we have to think about, you know, what we want to experience in the future and act in accordance, practice in accordance with that determination. Sorry. If you have a maybe a quick question. We run over time.
So this is, you know, they’re actually experiencing suffering, this is a sign that they really aren’t great lamas. This is a sign. If in fact they are, once we achieve arhatship, once we become an arhat, once we achieve Buddhahood then we don’t experience any of the suffering. We don’t have any negative consequences to suffer.
So this would be a sign of a real accomplished master. Sort of what can I say? Nothing gets harmed unless it deserves to be harmed. Yeah.
So whatever we experience, whatever suffering we may experience we have created the cause for that. And everyone has created that. So something’s harmed each day deserves to be harmed. Deserves.
So this I’m using the best word I can for deserve. I’m using the word something like proper or reasonable. Reasonable. Appropriate. And I say, yes, it’s appropriate.
Whatever is being any harm that a sentient being is undergoing is appropriate to that being. So the once one spiritual teacher was talking to one of his students and this student was undergoing some suffering, some sickness and this student was very upset about it as if he didn’t he thought he was worrying about it as if he didn’t deserve it. And the teacher simply said that, you know, that what you’re experiencing now is quite appropriate to the actions that you have created in the past. And therefore, you know, why worry about it that you’re getting exactly what you what and keeping to what the action that you’ve created in consequences of as a consequence of positive actions we experience happiness, as a consequence of negative actions we experience suffering this is quite appropriate.
So, you know, why worry about it? Just accept it as a consequence of some action that you created in the past. So it’s said that in the case of, for example, the Buddha when Śākyamūni Buddha was passing into parinirvāṇa that he displayed signs of becoming ill, the signs of suffering, and finally displayed the signs of dying, of death. But in fact from his own side he wasn’t actually experiencing any of these processes that this was only from the side of his pupils and only for their benefit to show them the consequences of negativities and the consequences of just as a teaching on impermanence. That from his own side he wasn’t actually experiencing it.
So it was just a show. Buddha was really a great lama. I mean, Okay.
So aside from the the the only way a a for example, a person can help another person to eliminate the suffering is, for example, in the case of a Lama, a teacher who explains to their student that they have accumulated a great deal of negative action in the past and they’re going to experience this negative action unless they do something about it and help him or her to apply the antidotes to these past negative actions that they’ve created. That is to say that they created the cause and they should try to eliminate the causes for experience of future sufferings. Other than that, there’s no way that we can eliminate another person’s suffering. In this case, when giving medicine to another person, we’re eliminating the conditions for their suffering. Yeah?
You to follow that up? You mean you mean like lessen lessen the suffering? So less So we say lessen? So we can only help others by alleviating the conditions which are bringing about their difficulties, suffering. In the same way, you know, we talked about the example of food that the developing diarrhea or sickness from food, eating some kind of bad food.
That The cause of the diarrhea of experience of suffering is the actions one’s karma, one’s created. The condition which gives which ripens, activates that karma is this bad food. Now, we could alleviate that person, we could remove that food from that person. We could give them medicine and this would separate them from that condition of the bad food. But, and they might get better.
But still the cause, the karmic cause might be there, so one day they might get better and We we still have to help people.
We can help people through eliminating the conditions which cause their suffering. But in the meanwhile, they have to be so we can help them by eliminating the conditions which cause them to suffer, but in the meanwhile they have to work on the karma that they’ve created and eliminating the basis of the suffering, the cause of their suffering. So we help them by helping to eliminate the conditions and they themselves must help themselves by eliminating the karma or the actions which are causing the suffering.