Audio recorded at Buddha House Adelaide. Transcript auto-generated and AI-corrected; may contain errors.
About this talk. The meditation example is striking: meditate to feel calmer and you get a calm mind; meditate to attain Buddhahood and you get Buddhahood, with the calm mind included as a by-product. In this 46-minute session, Geshe Pema Tsering builds toward that point by unpacking a verse from Śāntideva’s Guide to the Bodhisattva’s Way of Life that contrasts ordinary beings — perpetually trying to make themselves happy and failing — with realized beings who work for others and reach enlightenment. He then moves into close textual commentary on the opening verse, examining why Śāntideva writes “entrance to the discipline” rather than simply “the discipline,” how the phrase “according to tradition” guards against accusations of fabricating teachings, and how these two lines implicitly satisfy the four requirements a great Buddhist text must meet.
File metadata (for organising)
File: 09 WBS 2005 02 22.mp3
UUID: cace19d6-8c3e-4558-827a-8a2a44d9fb59
Teacher: Geshe Pema Tsering
Collection: Bodhisattva Way of Life 2005 Feb-Mar (Geshe Pema Tsering)
Date: 2005-02-22
Recorded at: Buddha House Adelaide
Duration: 45.7 minutes
Words: ~3,834
So somewhere in the Bodhicaryāvatāra, and I asked Geshe-la exactly where in the text, and he said in the bit that deals with bodhicitta. And considering it’s a Bodhisattva’s way of life, then that kind of is a bit broad. It says, Ordinary beings work for their own benefit, and extraordinary beings or realized beings work for the benefit of others, and look to see this difference. What this is referring to is the fact that ordinary beings, as ordinary beings in saṃsāra, we are constantly looking for our own, to benefit ourselves, to help ourselves. Where that gets us is saṃsāra.
We experience suffering in saṃsāra and keep creating the causes of saṃsāra. Beings who have realized emptiness and have developed bodhicitta are working for the benefit of others, and where that gets them is Buddhahood. Through working for the benefit of others, for working to help others, the results of that is Buddhahood. So we need to look at the distinction between these two types of beings. We need to look at their their differences and the results of the the different results of their activity.
So ordinary beings in saṃsāra have this constant spontaneously arising urge to make themselves feel good or to make themselves be free from suffering. It’s the motivation for everything that they do. Everything a small ant does, everything a human does, everything any type of creature does is to make themselves feel good and to alleviate suffering and to experience happiness. This is the constant motivation for everything that we do and everything that everybody, every being in saṃsāra does, it doesn’t actually get us anywhere. It doesn’t actually create happiness.
We’re constantly motivated by the wish to be happy, by the wish to make ourselves happy, but we don’t actually ever achieve that. We are we are we don’t actually ever achieve our goal because by constantly working for ourselves, constantly trying to make ourselves happy, we do a lot of negative things. We fight with people. Wars have started because people are trying to make themselves feel better. We hurt others in different ways through harsh speech and being incredibly attached to things.
So even though the motivation is to help ourselves to make ourselves feel good, the ways we go about trying to make ourselves feel good don’t work. And we’ve been trying to make ourselves feel good in bad ways since beginningless time. It’s something we’ve been doing in life after life after life after life, and it hasn’t got us anywhere. We still experience suffering. We still experience saṃsāra and still create saṃsāra.
So the only kind of real benefit that we can have from working for our own benefit is to achieve a good rebirth as a god or a human. So if we can focus our selfishness on the next life at least instead of this one, then we will actually get something positive out of selfishness. But this is the or out of being focused on the self, because this is the only only positive thing that we can get out of it. And then even even then, it’s a little bit strange because the reason that we consider human and god rebirth to be superior to other rebirths is not just because of the lack of suffering that is involved in these states. Fact that the degree of suffering experienced in these states is less than as animals and so on.
But it’s because in these states we have the capacity to practice Dharma and the capacity to work towards enlightenment. So for some beings, it’s too difficult to think of working towards enlightenment, working towards liberation because they have doubts about whether liberation or Buddhahood exists. If it seems like it’s a long way away or it’s too difficult to get there, then if they can transform the urge to benefit ourselves from focusing on this life to focusing on the next life, then that will at least benefit them in the short term. Okay. So we shouldn’t be very dismissive of this idea of transforming our motivation from focusing on this life to focusing on at least the next life.
Because if we watch the way that our minds work, most of the time, we focus on this life. Even though we may consider ourselves to be Dharma practitioners and do things like meditate or come to Buddha house or go to different teachings and do different practices, If we watch the reason if we watch for the reason why we’re doing these things, then most of the time it’s to benefit our own benefit ourselves in this lifetime, to make ourselves feel happier, to make ourselves feel calmer, or we’re praying to Tārā or Chenrezig to get something we want now. So if if we’re we’re thinking, okay, I do a Tārā practice because I want something now or I’ll do a Chenrezig practice to alleviate this negative situation. Any of these motivations aren’t actually Dharma practice. Because any of these motivations, we’re not actually practicing Dharma.
It may look like Dharma, it may be the same external activities as Dharma practice, but the motivation, by the force of the motivation, it isn’t Dharma. If it’s Dharma, needs to at least be focused on the next lifetime. In order for something to be a Dharma practice, motivation needs to at least be to get a good rebirth in the future. So we can be meditating with the idea that meditating will make us calmer, happier people, or that med meditating will relieve some tension in our bodies or our minds or that we, because we have nothing better to do, we get a happy feeling from doing Dharma practices or going along to being part of a community. So we can have all of these reasons for practicing Dharma sorry, for doing Dharma practice.
But if we’re doing Dharma practice for any of these reasons, what we’re doing isn’t practicing Dharma. So it’s not just the Dharma practice that we do with this motivation to benefit us in this lifetime. We do many different things, different types of jobs, many different activities. We engage in many different activities, usually motivated by the idea of trying to make ourselves better or happier or healthier in this lifetime. So because that’s our motivation for whatever it is that we’re doing, that’s the only result that we will get out of it.
If if we’re motivated by achieving something for this lifetime, then the best we can hope for activity is to get something good in this lifetime. If we are motivated by the idea of reaching of achieving a good rebirth, then the best we can hope for in that in that activity is to get a good rebirth. If we’re motivated by the idea of achieving liberation, personal liberation or liberation or nirvana, then the best that we can hope is to achieve nirvana. And if we are if we are motivated by the idea of becoming a Buddha and to benefit all sentient beings, then that’s the the best that that will be the ultimate result of any activity that we participate in with this motivation. So this means that we’re limiting ourselves.
We’re limiting what we can get out of life because we’re only focused on very short term, unimportant goals. We may work a lot of the time to achieve them, but they don’t actually help us very far. So if we can expand our motivation, we don’t actually have to change what we’re doing very much. It’s not as if we necessarily change the things we’re doing, we just change our reason for doing them. So instead of thinking that what we’re doing will help us in the short term in this lifetime, if we think this will be a cause for me to attain a good rebirth, this will be a cause for me to attain nirvana, or this will be a cause for me to attain Buddhahood, then their the vastness of the motivation makes the results vaster.
So at the moment, we’re limiting ourselves. We are constricting ourselves by being caught up in a motivation that only extends to a very short period of time and very limited results. If we’re able to extend that motivation out to include other beings our motivation, to include longer, loftier goals and more beneficial goals in our motivation, then the results will be so much greater. And it’s not as if by working towards Buddhahood, we don’t benefit in this lifetime. If we work towards Buddhahood, then the other lesser and not as not as beneficial goals are also achieved.
By working towards Buddhahood, we do become happier in this lifetime. We do attain nirvana. We do attain a good rebirth. All of these lesser goals are included. It’s just that they come along with this much vaster, more expansive view.
I meant to say something else. So if, for example, we were going to meditate, and our motivation for meditating would be to achieve a happiness of mind and a healthy body in this lifetime, and we meditated for that reason, then that would be the outcome of us meditating. We would have a happier, stabler mind and a healthier body. This would happen. If, on the other hand, we’re going to meditate in order to attain Buddhahood, it’s not as if we wouldn’t get a healthier a healthier body and a more stable mind.
That would come along with it. But our goals wouldn’t be limited in this way. The activity would be the same. The meditation process would be the same. It’s just that the outcomes of that meditation will be completely different.
And then if we are actually working towards Buddhahood in order to be of utmost benefit to all sentient beings, that’s the vastest goal that we can work towards, that we can be motivated by when we meditate. So all other goals are subsumed within that. They come under the umbrella of that. So if if we’re going to do exactly the same thing, we might as well try and do it with the motivation that we’re going to get the best profits or the best results from, the best the most back from. So if we’re by having a healthy body and that’s all we get, that doesn’t make as much sense as being motivated by achieving Buddhahood when we’re working towards the vastest goal that we can be working towards, and the results are so much vaster.
So this means that the best motivation there, the most beneficial motivation, the motivation that gives us the most back, that’s results are the best, is the motivation of bodhicitta, the mind of enlightenment, to be motivated by working towards enlightenment in order to benefit all sentient beings. And so whatever we do, whatever Dharma practices we do, whatever things that we can do to help people, if we can try and be motivated by this thought, then we will get the most beneficial, the vastest results from our activities. So please think, in order to attain enlightenment, so I can be of the utmost benefit to all sentient beings, in order to know how to walk the path to enlightenment, that I’m going to listen to these teachings on the Bodhicaryāvatāra. By listening to them, may I develop understanding of them, and, by understanding them, put them into practice and attain Buddhahood. So please meditate on this idea for a couple of minutes.
It’s hard. Is there any way you can move that curtain over a bit so I guess I can see? Yeah. Guess he said his eyes aren’t that great, so it was reflecting on his glasses. Was just explaining to Geshe-la that I have to think before I speak because this is a very detailed commentary on this text, but it goes into the meaning of all the different words.
And the way that you structure the words in Tibetan is the same way as you structure them in English. So I have to try and figure out ways to transform the commentary so it fits the English as opposed to going, you know, well anyway, that word should be over that way. Anyway, that word should be over there, and it should mean something different. Anyway, so we’re up to the section where it says, according to tradition, I shall now in brief describe the entrance to the Bodhisattva’s discipline. Now this this section of the text is what’s called the introduction introducing the subject matter.
Right? And this the bit bit where it says, I shall now in brief describe the entrance to the Bodhisattva’s discipline. That introduces what the text is going to be about, the discipline of a Bodhisattva. Now the interesting thing about these two lines is that by saying the entrance to the Bodhisattva’s discipline, he’s indicating that he is not showing the that he’s not expounding the bodhisattva’s discipline in the same way the Buddha did. Alright?
So if you say the entrance into something, it’s a way into it as opposed to an introduction to it. Alright? So the Buddha introduced the way of the bodhisattva. Alright? Śāntideva is giving an entrance into that behavior, a way into that behavior, to the behavior of Bodhisattva.
So in this way, he’s distinguishing himself from the Buddhas. Now, the word that they have translated as Bodhisattva is literally the sons of the Sugatas. So the Sugatas being the Buddha is another way of saying Buddha. So in saying that the Bodhisattvas are the sons of the Buddha or the sons or daughters of the Buddha, offspring of the Buddha, problematic because in Tibetan they don’t differentiate between the sexes in that instance. So by describing the Buddhas as the children of the Buddhas, it’s indicating that a bodhisattva grows up to become a Buddha.
That by following this this discipline, they actually become a Buddha. So by calling the Bodhisattvas the children of the Buddhas, and it’s saying that he’s going to show a way into their behavior or their discipline, then it’s saying that he will describe the generation of bodhicitta, the practices of a bodhisattva, and the realization of Buddhahood, the whole path. And it’s just it’s a lot clearer why it says it in Tibetan than it is in English. Oh, this is fun. Alright.
So there’s some some texts and some descriptions of a Bodhisattva’s activities just say that they are showing the the bodhisattva’s discipline. And by just showing a bodhisattva’s discipline, they actually limit what they explain. So they talk about that which restrains the bodhisattva’s mind. This word that’s translated as discipline has two meanings. It has this idea of restraint and it has this idea of activity.
So it has what they do and the restraints they put on their minds in order to achieve this. The things that they abandon in order to achieve this. Or it describes this discipline just merely in terms of the Bodhisattva vows. Alright? And in Śāntideva’ text, doesn’t do this.
He uses this idea of discipline to cover the entire path of the Bodhisattva from one who is developing bodhicitta right up until achieving Buddhahood. So there is this idea of He’s not just focusing on one part of a bodhisattva’s activities or limiting his description of what a bodhisattva’s activities are to the development of bodhicitta. He’s talking about the whole path to Buddhahood. Somehow or other, this is indicated by the fact that it doesn’t say just according to tradition, I shall now in brief describe the bodhisattva’s discipline. Right?
It says, I shall now in brief describe the entrance to the Bodhisattva’s Discipline. Now, even if you take the entrance bit off there and you have this idea of to the Bodhisattva’s Discipline, it gives the idea that it’s more of a path, and it shows the whole thing as opposed to as opposed to if they just said, I briefly described the bodhisattva’s discipline. That would more likely imply just the vows of a bodhisattva. Okay. So the next bit, right, where he says the entrance to the discipline.
Now this section where it says the entrance to the Bodhisattva’s discipline and then in the next lines it says no sorry in the previous line it says according to tradition. So the bit where it says according to to tradition and the bit where it says the entrance to. Alright? Those two bits having those two bits in the first verse indicates that Śāntideva didn’t make this stuff up himself. Alright?
Now the in in Buddhist history and the development of the teachings or the development of the Buddhist tradition, one of the biggest insults that someone could throw at a Buddhist teacher was to say, you’re making it up yourself. Alright? So there’s two different types of making stuff up yourself. Alright? One’s good, one’s bad.
The the making stuff up yourself that’s good is when you are reinterpreting the teachings according to your own experience. Right? Making stuff up that’s bad is when you’re presenting something that isn’t Buddha’s teachings. Alright? And presenting it as the Buddha’s teachings.
Yeah? So if what Śāntideva is saying here is that he’s by using this idea of it being an entrance into the bodhisattva’s discipline as opposed to saying, I will show you the bodhisattva’s discipline, he’s giving this idea that he’s not making it up himself, he’s following the words of the Buddha. And also by saying according to tradition, alright, he’s indicating that he will teach according to the way that the Buddha explained the path of a bodhisattva as opposed to deviating from from that tradition. Tradition. The reason we can see that he’s not making it up himself as we go through the text because he explains the entire path of a bodhisattva all the way up to attaining Buddhahood in the same way as the Buddha explained it in his in his sutras.
So according to scripture, according to the words of the Buddha who’s called the teacher, he explains a way into the path of a bodhisattva, a way to practice the teachings that the Buddha has set forward. Okay. So the next question that may come up is, well, if it’s all being explained before, if it’s according to tradition, why bother writing a text about it? And this problem or this query is overcome by the bit in here where it says, I shall now, in brief, describe the entrance to the Bodhisattva’s discipline. So the Buddha explained bodhisattva’s discipline, but he did it I keep hitting this microphone.
But he did it in particular instances to benefit particular disciples. This meant that the descriptions of the bodhisattvas discipline the Buddha gave are vast, they’re huge, there’s many different sutras that are very, very long describing what bodhisattvas have to do. So because it’s difficult for many people to study all of the sutras of the Buddha and then try and understand what the Buddha is saying, then Śāntideva is saying that he will explain in brief so it’s easy to understand the path of the Bodhisattva as set forward by the Buddha. So by saying this in brief bit, then he is getting rid of what is called abandoning abandoning accusations of repetition. Getting rid of accusations of repetition.
So the the other thing that we need to look at in looking at this first verse in general is how it explains what are called it introduces the four dharmas. Now the four dharmas are said to be the topic, the reason, the final reason and the dependence of the different parts of the text. So there’s these four different parts that a text needs to have in order to be considered to be a Buddhist a great Buddhist text. So for the first one, says it needs to have a topic. Right?
So the topic has been explained in this in this first verse because it is said to be the the results and path of the Mahāyāna, the the great vehicle. So it explains what the path of the Mahāyāna is and what the result of the Mahāyāna is, which is Buddhahood. So this is the topic of this text, and that’s explained in the first verse. It then says that the result. Right?
The result of this text is that if you rely on it, you’re able to enter into the practice of a Bodhisattva. Right? So this is what is called the result of the text. Now the final result is that once you have entered into the path of a Bodhisattva you are through practicing the doing the practice of a Bodhisattva you attain Buddhahood. So this is the final results of this text.
Interdependence of these three things is shown by the fact that the latter ones depend on the earlier ones. That is to say, if this text isn’t composed explaining the whole path, then you can’t practice the Bodhisattva’s path depending on this text. And if you don’t practice the Bodhisattva’s path, you don’t become a Buddha. So in this way, these three things are: the writing of the text enables people to practice the path of a Bodhisattva, which enables them to become a Buddha. So these three different individual things relate to each other.
This one? Mhmm. Oh, yeah. One. Mhmm.
Mhmm. Mhmm. And so the next verse is actually a a verse that is what’s called the oath to compose, or it deals with and it it it Śāntideva making a promise that no matter what happens when he’s trying to write this text, he’s going to get to the end. So the oath to compose in this section is made up of three different parts. The first of which is called the reason why he’s happy to write it and is is also getting getting rid of arrogance or practicing modesty.
Okay. Alright. So in this section where he’s making a vow to compose a text, there’s three different parts. In the first part, which is called showing modesty or getting rid of arrogance, Śāntideva says that he is composing the text mainly for himself and not for others because he doesn’t have the ability to help others. So this is a way of showing modesty.
And in the second bit, it is saying that he’s happy about writing the text. He’s happy about composing this commentary because it will benefit him in the short term. And the third section describes how he hopes or he thinks that perhaps those who were born in a similar situation. So it says equal to myself and fortune. Those who were born in a similar situation to him.