Audio recorded at Buddha House Adelaide. Transcript auto-generated and AI-corrected; may contain errors.
About this talk. A dispute over translation anchors this 43-minute session: Geshe Pema Tsering argues that the Tibetan term usually rendered as “renunciation” actually names a joyful mind striving toward nirvana, not a mind of disgust or withdrawal. He builds to this point through Āryadeva’s claim that without genuine revulsion for saṃsāra, liberation is impossible — even positive actions perpetuate the cycle when the motivation is still samsaric happiness. Using the example of longevity and the human body, whose cause, nature, and results are all forms of suffering, he makes the argument concrete. He then traces a two-stage shift: first developing disgust for saṃsāra, then turning joyfully toward nirvana, and finally extending that analysis to all beings to generate bodhicitta. The session closes with commentary on verse three of Śāntideva’s Guide to the Bodhisattva’s Way of Life and the four criteria that qualify a text as an authoritative Shastra.
File metadata (for organising)
File: 03 BS GtL 2005 03 01.mp3
UUID: 8fdf6799-182b-422b-abf4-d5c5093569e5
Teacher: Geshe Pema Tsering
Collection: DB Bodhisattva Guide to Life (Geshe Pema Tsering)
Date: 2005-03-01
Recorded at: Buddha House Adelaide
Duration: 43.6 minutes
Words: ~4,334
So Sorry. Okay. So in the four hundred verses by Āryadeva and in the sūtra that came to be known as the sūtra on which Āryadeva based the four hundred verses. Right? So in both of these things, it explains or it says this without developing disgust for saṃsāra, there’s no way we can sever our attachment to it.
And without severing our attachment to saṃsāra, there’s no way we can attain liberation or nirvana. So what this is saying that if unless we see for what it is, unless we see saṃsāra as being a state in which we experience nothing but suffering and therefore have revulsion or a sense of complete disgust with it, then there’s no way we can turn our mind away from it. There’s no way we can truly work towards nirvana. This is actually something that is probably the most difficult thing for us to work that we need to work on at this stage, that we tend to skip over and we don’t tend to focus on. Without developing disgust with Samsāra, we don’t create the causes to leave Samsāra.
We may have developed some understanding that if we do positive things, we are going to experience positive results. By trying to avoid doing negative things, we stop experiencing the negative results that would have come from those actions. But to actually develop an understanding of what saṃsāra is and to actually develop a a revulsion for it for it that makes us work towards nirvana or work towards liberation is a complete is a different thing. We can understand that positive things lead to happiness and that negative things lead to suffering. But what we don’t understand is that without the motivation of doing something in order to attain liberation, what we’re doing still, whether it’s positive or negative, still perpetuates saṃsāra.
So if we’re doing something that’s positive, that may lead to a good rebirth, it may lead to happiness as as a god or a human, but that’s still saṃsāra. So without seeing that even the happiness we enjoy within saṃsāra is actually a form of suffering, that it is by its nature suffering, without understanding that, without seeing that, then all our actions, whether they’re positive or negative, will just perpetuate saṃsāra. So the the thing is we may have got our heads around the idea that we need to do positive actions, a positive behaving positively or forming virtuous actions is is a good thing, something we need to focus on. But we can we’re still caught in saṃsāra as long as we think that the happiness we experience in saṃsāra is true happiness. As long as we think that it it would be a good idea then that you experience or do something that causes us to experience these positive results in Samsāra, we’re still creating the causes for Samsāra.
So even though we may be doing something that’s positive, because our motivation is such that we’re not working towards nirvana because we’re repulsed by saṃsāra, then even that positive action’s result will still be saṃsāra because it’ll still be So we have this vague idea that we’d like to be Buddhists or we’d like to attain liberation. But without understanding what it is that we’re attaining liberation from, what it is that we want to abandon, then there isn’t any way for us to do that. We actually need to understand what it is that we are turning our backs on. We need understand what it is that we want, to get out of before we can actually start to work towards getting out of it. So, at the moment, this isn’t the way we see things.
We think that if we are healthy and, wealthy and we’re not experiencing any acute sadness, and then we’re okay. That’s our understanding of what happiness is, being healthy and wealthy and not upset. Alright? This is what we think It makes you happy. And the reason we think that that’s what true happiness is is because we don’t understand nirvana.
We don’t understand liberation. We don’t understand the the difference between something that’s a temporary state and something that is absolutely a state in which we’ve gotten rid of all of the causes of suffering. So as soon as as as sorry. As long as we are striving to experience happiness in saṃsāra, we are still striving for a form of suffering. So as long as we have this idea that if we do certain things, if we even if they’re positive things, if we do these things, then what we’re trying to get out of it is a a positive experience as a god or a human, then what even though we may not have understood it properly, what we’re actually striving for in that instance is is suffering.
So we may think it’s happiness, but it it by its nature, its nature is suffering. The happiness we experience in saṃsāra isn’t true happiness. It is, by its nature suffering because it doesn’t last. So, if unless we can unless we focus on attaining liberation by being repulsed by saṃsāra, we’re not creating the causes for true happiness. And if we are working, if our motivation is I wanna be happy in this way, I wanna be happy in that way, and and this is still within the bounds of saṃsāra, then we’re creating the causes for saṃsāra.
Any any result that’s based on a karmic action, whether it’s a positive karmic action or a negative karmic action, results in a form of suffering because its result it is a result of grasping an inherent existence and and therefore a result of afflictive states of mind, which have their root in ignorance. So as long as we have we’re grasping onto this idea of me wanting this, then we are creating saṃsāra, and we’re creating suffering. So if we investigate the so called happiness that we experience in saṃsāra, then we’ll come to learn that by its nature, is actually suffering. So whatever it is that we think we are that we think is happy happiness in saṃsāra, its causes are still going to be neurosis or afflictive states. And because its causes are afflictive states, then its nature is suffering.
So if we take, for example, something that people tend to view as being a a good thing, a happy situation in Samsāra is if someone lives for a very long time. Alright? So we have this idea that if you live for a hundred years, that that’s a very long time and a very good thing. So but but then we need to look at this idea and think, Why why is it considered such a good thing to to live for that long? And the reason is because it’s very rare.
It’s very rare for people to live to that length of time. Now the reason it’s very rare for people to live to that length of time is because this body that we take for being something that we can rely on and something that we need to that can actually cause cause us happiness is by its nature disintegrating. From the moment we’re born, our body is is moving towards death. It’s in constant process of change. It’s a constant process of aging.
So as our body ages, we experience its true nature, experience its suffering. The fact that we don’t see aging until we move to the last latter parts of our life doesn’t mean that it’s not happening. It’s that our body is in a constant state of disintegration and change in this because it is it has come into being based on I’m sorry. The reason that it comes into being, the reason that we take a body that we that we experience being in a physical body, negative states of mind, was afflictive emotions and the karma that we created from those afflicted states. And so because of that, the nature of this body we experience that we have is suffering.
It is by its nature something that is not permanent, is constantly changing, we cannot rely on, and is a cause for many different experiences of suffering. So because the cause for the body that we have now is suffering, that means that the body as we experience it is suffering. So its nature is suffering as well. So its cause was the afflictive states that caused us to the afflictive states and the karma we created based on those afflictive states that made this being this body come into existence, the bodies we have now. Now these bodies are, by their nature, suffering because they’re constantly in a state of disintegration and as disintegrating.
And we can we can if we look really carefully at our experience of being in a physical body, of experiencing this body, then we’ll notice that this is true because it’s very difficult to even spend one day without physical discomfort for anyone. And to experience a whole twenty four hour period without any sense of physical discomfort is almost impossible. And that’s just twenty four hour period. So if it’s like if we look at the way that our body changes over over time, we’re constantly experiencing discomfort because of the body in one form or another. This is because its nature is its nature is suffering.
We may perceive it as being something that causes us happiness, but its nature is suffering. And then its result is also suffering because based on the idea of based on the fact that we have a body, we do all sorts of things that create suffering for us in the future. We experience intense desire, we experience repulsion, sorry, revulsion, and we experience anger, we experience protectiveness, we experience jealousy, all of these negative states, which lead us to create the causes for more suffering in the future. So in this way, something that we consider very precious and as a source of happiness is by its cause, by its nature, by its result actually an instance of the truth of suffering. So we went through how the cause for having a human body or any type of body in saṃsāra is afflictive states and negative karma, and therefore cause of suffering.
The experience of having a body is and the result of having a body is suffering. The other thing that is the way that having a body results in more suffering is that having one body results in us taking another body in another life. So it means or creating another body in another life. So it means that based on the idea of having of being attached to our body and working to make it feel comfortable all the time despite what how that harms other people and despite what negative states we get into to bring that about. That creates the causes or the karmic cause for us to come back in the next life in another form, in another physical form.
And so in this way, we get stuck in saṃsāra. Our our existence in saṃsāra and this idea of being attached to the way we exist in saṃsāra makes us create the causes for perpetuating this this cycle, for perpetuating the cyclic existence. One body leads us to struggle to protect that body, leads us to take on another body, which in turn we try and struggle to protect and are incredibly attached to. That attachment and those negative states create the causes for us to take yet another body that we’re again very attached to and perform and develop negative states based on that new body. It becomes a cycle.
For us to actually get out of this cycle, we need to understand there isn’t anything about our existence in saṃsāra that is actually worth hanging on to, that is actually worth being attached to. We need to understand that it is by its nature suffering. Our existence in saṃsāra is by nature suffering. And then we can work towards what is true happiness, which is actually nirvana and liberation and not our limited understanding of happiness that we experience in terms of having a human or a god rebirth. So because of our limited understanding of what happiness is at the moment, we find it difficult to try and con even conceptualize what nirvana or Buddhahood are like.
And because we don’t focus on what nirvana and Buddhahood are about, we get caught up in what we think is the happiness that we experience in saṃsāra. So in order to break out of the cycle of saṃsāra, we need to be focused on the how we get out of how of we get out of them in the states beyond them. So this means to focus on on Buddhahood, to focus on nirvana, and to try and develop an understanding of them. If we develop an understanding of what they’re about, then we’re not going to be very much interested in the so called happinesses of saṃsāra. So the way that we do this is by looking at the people who’ve gotten there beforehand.
And there’s heaps of Buddhas and there’s heaps of arhats who have achieved these states beforehand and before us. And before a long time ago, they were just like us. Many, many, many, many hundreds and hundreds of lifetimes ago. That’s okay. So many, many, many hundreds and hundreds of lifetimes ago, they were just like us.
They’re experiencing suffering. They’re experiencing afflicted states of mind that led them to do negative things. And then they met teachers who could explain to them what it was they needed to abandon, what it was they needed to practice. They followed the instructions of those teachers, progressed along the path and became arhats and Buddhas. So if we focus on what they did and we focus on what it is that we need to abandon and what it is we need to practice in order to get to the states that they got to, then we can get out of Samsāra.
So in this way, we have to work on in two things. We’re developing a revulsion for saṃsāra and its suffering, and also we focus on nirvana and Buddhahood and what it means to achieve those states. So that’s this is why Āryadeva says in the beginning of this verse, you need to develop a revulsion or complete disgust with saṃsāra. Because unless you develop this disgust, you don’t get out of it. In order to want to leave something, you have to that is so ingrained in our being, you have to have a a revulsion for it, a a true wanting to get out of that state.
And that that wanting to get out of that state is how you become how you reach nirvana. And then when you wanna get out of saṃsāra, you work towards nirvana and you achieve nirvana. Alright? Without wanting to get out of saṃsāra, you don’t. So in order to achieve nirvana, you have to wanna get out of saṃsāra.
And in order to wanna get out of saṃsāra, you need to know how bad it is. So this means that you need to focus on the faults of saṃsāra, which we don’t tend to do. Okay. So if we develop this revulsion with Samsāra, this complete disgust that we don’t want anything to do with it, and then we are able to attain renunciation. So so I was just, like, saying to Geshe-la that I’m I’m having trouble with this word.
It’s usually translated as renunciation, And I just kept translating it as renunciation because that’s what others did. But now I’ve decided that it’s wrong. Because it doesn’t mean renunciation. Okay. So you develop a disgust with saṃsāra.
Alright? And then you turn your and then you think, okay. What do I want then? Don’t want Samsāra. I want nirvana.
Yeah? And so you’re working towards nirvana. Now the word that is usually translated as renunciation means that state of working towards nirvana. But it isn’t a mind of disgust, it’s a mind of joy. And renunciation is a mind of disgust.
There’s something turning away. Yeah? And this is a so it’s striving for nirvana, being happy about working to nirvana. That’s where they usually translate it as renunciation. It doesn’t quite work.
Right? So and it doesn’t work with what Geshe-la just said because he said, first of all, you develop a mind of just you you your mind doesn’t wanna be involved with saṃsāra because it just is nothing but fault. You you don’t see any of the qualities that you used to see in it that because you understand what its true nature is. You’ve seen its true face. You’ve seen its true nature.
You don’t want anything more to do with it. Alright? So then then you by developing that mind, the next that way of thinking, the next thing you do start focusing on how to get out of there. Alright? Which is the mind working towards nirvana.
Now taking joy in that experience, having a joyful mind that’s working towards attaining nirvana is not wanting to be involved with saṃsāra is this word that’s usually translated as renunciation, but it’s more like happy to be out of here. So if you have this, if you have this as a if you’re looking towards nirvana in a kind of unfabricated way, you don’t have to conceptualize, don’t have to convince yourself that you want to get out of saṃsāra because of all of the bad points. It just happens spontaneously. If you do this in an unfabricated, spontaneous way, then that means that whatever action you perform is a cause for you to get out of saṃsāra. Right?
Whatever you do becomes another reason for you to come out of saṃsāra. So in this way, you progress rapidly towards attaining nirvana. So that’s that’s the that’s the way that you developed this mind striving for nirvana or personal liberation, and that’s the way you actually get out of saṃsāra. Now if you actually wanna try strive for Buddhahood, based on this idea that saṃsāra is an experience of suffering and that there is no way to attain happiness within that state. So you want to get out of it, you then start looking at others instead of just focusing on your own personal liberation.
So develop the mind working toward Buddhahood when you abandon your own interests and start focusing on others. If you’re thinking, it’s not just good enough for me to not be experiencing this state to get out of saṃsāra, but all sentient beings are exactly like me, and they are experiencing suffering They don’t want to experience suffering. So I need to work to get all of them out of that state. I need to work to get to lead all of those beings out of that state they are in where they are experiencing suffering in this way by being in saṃsāra. So in this way, you focus in in the same way as was as we’re talking about with developing the mind seeking nirvana or liberation, in that you think of all the the the suffering that sentient beings are experiencing.
How even though they may think they’re experiencing happiness, they’re actually experiencing suffering, and that there is nothing that they can depend on that’s actually going to make them happy in in saṃsāra. If they want to experience true happiness, the only way to do it is to get out of saṃsāra, to stop perpetuating the cycle by being attached to the things that they perceive as positive in saṃsāra. All of the things that we went through in talking about developing a mind striving for nirvana, you then look at in terms of all beings. And then you think, well, how do I help beings in this way? The only way to do that, the only way to really take them out or lead them out of saṃsāra is to become a Buddha.
So this is the mind of bodhicitta that is the cause for becoming a Buddha, that acts as the cause to become a Buddha. Okay. So because the text that we’re looking at tonight is called a guide to the bodhisattva’s way of life. And a bodhisattva is someone who is striving towards Buddhahood. And then this mind of enlightenment, this bodhicitta that is working to get all sentient beings out of this state of saṃsāra is the most appropriate motivation for us to be listening to these teachings with. So if we can think, I’m listening to these teachings on Guide to the Bodhisattva’s Way of Life to develop understanding of the process that Bodhisattva goes through so I can put that into practice and become a Buddha to benefit all sentient beings, then this is the best motivation we can have for listening to teachings.
So I guess I’ll say, we meditate or focus on that idea for a couple of minutes? So we’re going through the opening section of the guide to the bodhisattva’s way of life. And last week, was and Śāntideva was explaining that he was doing things for his own benefit. And so in this next couple of lines, he explains that he’s also doing it for others’ benefit. So in this way, he is describing how the idea of writing this text he hopes to benefit himself and others.
And last week, we talked about how he hoped it would benefit himself, and this section talks about how he hopes it will benefit others. So the two lines that we’re talking about are the two lines that say that others who now but others who now chance upon my words may profit also equal to myself in fortune. Okay. So so in this way, in the previous section, he talks about how, by writing it, it will help himself because he won’t forget the things that he needs to know in order to become a Buddha. Alright?
And not only will he not forget what he needs to know in order to become a Buddha, but his understanding of the path to Buddhahood will be refined and clearer through having written this text. And now he talks about how it’s will benefit others by saying that if someone is in an equal situation to him, then they also need to have a really clear understanding of what it is that they need to do to become a Buddha. So if you are in the same state as Śāntideva, then reading a text like this will really help you. Now because of Śāntideva’s learning and understanding and the fact that he possessed bodhicitta, it means that he’s talk in one way, he’s talking about beings who are like him in that they are bodhisattvas. So if someone’s a bodhisattva and they read this text, it would definitely benefit them because it sets out very clearly what exactly they need to do in order to become a Buddha.
And if they’d already developed bodhicitta, then this text would be very easy for them to understand and they would be able put it into practice immediately. And for people like us who are still somewhere within the realms of being equal in fortune to Śāntideva in that we are human, then it means that we are able to to develop understanding through looking at the text as well. So it seems like you could also give an alternate reading to these two lines and and say so say something like, those who are equal in fortune to myself will, benefit from this text and anyone else who sees it. Alright? So in that way, it could be, read as being, those who are in a similar situation to Śāntideva himself or just anyone who happens to come across it will all will all be benefit by it.
So either that or thinking that those who are equal in fortune who come across it may be benefit benefited. So there’s two different ways you can read it. But the main thing to remember, though, is that that he’s basically set out in these two different verses in verse number two and verse number three, that he’s writing this for the benefit of himself and others. And that he hopes that that everybody is benefited enlightened not enlightened, enlightened, but enlightened, yeah, by by the text coming into existence. This one.
Okay. So and when we were going through the reasons why Śāntideva was writing it for himself, there were said to be four different components that needed to be included within something in order within a text in order for it to be considered a Shastra or a one of the authoritative commentaries on the Buddha’s teachings. Now the first of these is that it will explain the path to Buddhahood and the results of the path which is Buddhahood itself. The second thing is that in dependence on this explanation, beings will be able to develop understanding of path. The third thing is that in dependence on developing understanding and putting into practice a path that will achieve the final result, Right?
And the last thing is that the previous things depend the last things depend on the previous things. Alright? So this doesn’t just work for Śāntideva composing the text. It depends it it works for all beings who come into contact with the text as well. So that is to say that the text will explain the path to Buddhahood and its result.
Alright? And there’s in dependence on this text, in dependence on developing understanding and putting to practice this text, beings will be able to