Audio recorded at Buddha House Adelaide. Transcript auto-generated and AI-corrected; may contain errors.
About this talk. A morning spent in Tuśita that stretched to fifty years on earth anchors Geshe Pema Tsering’s account of how the Buddha’s teachings reached Tibet. In this 45-minute talk, he traces two parallel transmission lineages: the lineage of profound view, running from Nāgārjuna through a chain of Indian masters including Śāntideva; and the lineage of extensive deeds, whose principal texts Asaṇga received directly from Maitreya during that single morning in Tuśita. He shows how Atisha united both streams in the Lamp on the Path, the first Lamrim text, organising the path into three scopes. A Q&A then explores whether enjoying Dharma perpetuates saṃsāra, how to apply rejoicing wisely, the importance of unbroken transmission, and a wheat-and-rice metaphor for uprooting negative habits while simultaneously cultivating the path to liberation.
File metadata (for organising)
File: 04 PP 2003 07 22.mp3
UUID: 9e323fad-b43b-4b40-86c0-7c5b3776b000
Teacher: Geshe Pema Tsering
Collection: DB Presenting the path (Geshe Pema Tsering)
Date: 2003-07-22
Recorded at: Buddha House Adelaide
Duration: 44.9 minutes
Words: ~2,895
Different ones of his students were assigned different parts of the different texts to be the guardians of those many years went past after that five hundred years and this man came along called Nāgārjuna. Those five hundred years, there had been these people held some of these teachings in this world and other worlds, but didn’t know what they meant. They were the holders of the teachings, but they didn’t understand the teachings. Nāgārjuna, who was a Bodhisattva, and he actually understood all the different teachings. He had teachings from Mañjuśrī and Maitreya, who were main disciples of Śākyamūni Buddha as well, and he understood all the different teachings. So Nāgārjuna is said to have lived for between three hundred and five hundred years around this time, five hundred years after the Buddha had passed away into Parinirvana.
So in his lifetime, then he he he went through all the different texts of the Buddha or the teachings of the Buddha. So after studying the after studying the all of the different teachings of the Buddha, then Nāgārjuna actually worked with the deity Mañjuśrī to produce what are called the six works of of Nāgārjuna, which have all different names and covered all different topics of the Buddha’s teachings. So they’re generally known as the six main texts of Nāgārjuna. They cover such things as logic, discussing emptiness, reflections on the sutras and there is another one about ethical conduct. Basically all of the six of them discussed the teachings of the Buddha or commentaries to the teachings of the Buddha and covered all of his different types of the different sutras that the Buddha had taught.
So the main emphasis of Nāgārjuna’s teachings was on the aspect of emptiness how phenomena exist so that was the main aspect of Buddha’s teachings he focused on Now all of the Buddha’s teachings can be said to be included within two different lineages of teachings the lineage of the profound view and the lineage of extensive deeds Nāgārjuna actually got the teachings on the lineage of the profound view or the lineage of explanations of reality from the Buddha Mañjuśrī. And Mañjuśrī is said to have gotten them from the Buddha Śākyamūni. So Nāgārjuna actually got them directly from a Buddha, these teachings. So because he got these directly from a Buddha, he’s considered one of the founders of the two lineages. In this case, he’s the founder of the lineage of profound view.
Okay. Just trying to remember one of the names. Okay. So from Nāgārjuna Nāgārjuna was the teacher of a man called Āryadeva. From Āryadeva the lineage went to yes, to Buddhapālita, from a man called Buddhapālita to Bhaviveka, from Bhaviveka to Candrakīrti.
These were all Indian saints who continued on the lineage of Nāgārjuna. Now after Candrakīrti, there was other people that were included in this lineage including Śāntideva, who wrote the Guide to the Bodhisattva’s Way of Life and then a man called Shāntarakshita, who was actually the first one of the first pandits to go to Tibet. He went to Tibet and ordained the first seven sangha in Tibet. And one of his students, who was called Kamalaśīla, who actually went to Tibet as well. So through all these different Indian pundits, this this lineage was passed down.
We’re trying to find how many years after the Buddha Asaṇga came along. Okay. Alright. So nine hundred years after the Buddha, there was a man called Asaṇga, who was another Indian pundit and Indian saint. So he came along there then, and he’s the founder or the main proponent of the other lineage of extensive deeds.
Okay, so Asaṇga did have trouble finding a teacher, but eventually he created enough merit to have vision of Maitreya the Buddha and took teachings directly from Maitreya the Buddha. Now Maitreya took Asaṇga up to the pure realm of Tuśita, it’s called. And he spent a morning in Tuśita getting teachings from Maitreya. When he came back to earth, it had actually been fifty years in earth time. But it was so one morning in the God realms had been fifty years in earth time.
And when Asaṇga came back to earth with these teachings, fifty years had passed. So in this one morning in Tuśita, the Pure Land of Tuśita, then Asaṇga received what are called the five books or the five texts of Maitreya from Maitreya. Now the five texts of Maitreya are divided into three, there’s what’s called the two ornaments. So we have the ornament of the sutras and the ornament of clear realization or the Abhisamayālamkāra and the Mahayānasūtrālamkara. So then, there’s also what’s called the two discriminating texts.
So we have the text discriminating between extremes and So the so the sorry. The the text discriminating between extremes and the text discriminating phenomena. There’s also what’s called the sublime continuum or the Mahayanottara Tantra, which is referring to Buddha nature. So he received all these five texts in one morning in Tuśita from Maitreya. So from Asaṇga, the teachings were passed down to his younger brother Vasubandhu, who is another Indian pundit.
It also was passed on to different teachers like Haribhādra and Vimuktasena and Vimuktasena and Paranasena. They’re from Maitreya up until the teachings were passed down to a man called Atisha. There is said to be seventeen different holders of the teachings. These seventeen different holders of the teachings all wrote texts, all expounded on the teachings and are called the seventeen pundits or the seventeen experts of India. Then then both of these lineages were passed down to So Atisha was another Indian pundit who had held both these lineages.
He went and got teachings from different teachers from both of like the lineage of extensive deeds and the lineage of profound view. And then he wrote a seminal text called The Lamp on the Path. Now the Lamp on the Path is the first Lamrim type of teaching. And it holds within it the first explanation of the three principal aspects. So all of the Lamrim teachings have this lamp on the path as their main source or their main reference point.
So in this Lamp on the Path of Tissue also divided the path into the stages of the three persons or the stages of the three scopes. This and all Lamrim texts from then have this division in them. So that is the the path of the lower scope, the path of the middling scope, and the path of the greater scope. So in this way, these teachings have been handed down from Śākyamūni Buddha. Śākyamūni Buddha handed them down to his two students, Maitreya and Mañjuśrī.
From Maitreya and Mañjuśrī, they were handed down to the Indian pundits Asaṇga and Nāgārjuna. From Asaṇga From Asaṇga and Nāgārjuna, they have been passed down through Atisha, through the teachings of the Lamrim up until today. There hasn’t been any break in the transmission of these teachings. They have been continually passed down from teacher to student up until today. So if we stop there.
So if anyone has any questions, yes. So if nothing do you mean, like, practicing Dharma. Dharma. Eyes, you’re coming here. Okay.
So you’re coming in here and enjoying it. Right. Renounce. You’re not supposed to renounce. I thought you’re going to say not supposed to enjoy.
Okay. So the So the reason that you’re actually enjoying coming here at the moment is because you’ve done something positive in the past to enjoy coming here. But that thing that you were doing that was positive in the path, that result is enjoying coming here now is still a cause, is still a saṃsāra cause, right? But if you’re doing whatever it is that you’re doing now, whether it’s practicing Dharma or coming here or whatever, if you’re doing it in order to attain liberation or in order to attain Buddhahood, then it’s not a cause for Samsāra, it’s a cause for liberation. So if you are enjoying creating causes to get out of Samsāra, then that’s a good thing, but it depends on the motivation.
Is I’m coming here to enjoy myself, then that’s that’s a cause for perpetuation of Samsāra. So enjoying practicing, enjoying doing Dharma stuff is a really good thing, a really good thing. It’s not something that we should not be enjoying. But we if some if you think to yourself, what is the purpose of me coming here? What is the purpose of me practicing Dharma?
And we think to enjoy myself, then that’s a very limited reason for doing it. If we think it’s to enjoy myself now or enjoy myself in the future or to enjoy myself in future future lives, then that’s a limited a limited motivation and will only have a limited result. Yeah. Mhmm. Other people’s things the other things that they’ve done.
Yeah. Right. Yeah. Okay. So we have to examine and we have to see whether the thing is that we’re rejoicing in is positive or negative.
So if rejoicing in something that’s positive, then that’s a good thing. But we don’t wanna rejoice in something that’s a negative thing. And that refers to works of art and music and everything as well. If someone has done something that’s a work of art or a song that is a negative song, then we shouldn’t necessarily rejoice in that. People can write very nice songs about very bad things or exclaiming about negative things.
So we have to watch that we’re not rejoicing in those kind of things. But if we see someone practicing or doing something from a good motivation, and they’ve come out with something beautiful that is a positive thing, then we should try and rejoice in it as much as we can. We don’t renounce rejoicing or being happy about what other people do, but we have to examine. We have to see whether what they’re doing is positive or negative. We don’t want to try and rejoice when someone’s done something negative.
So we have to examine it, not get rid of rejoicing, but examine what we rejoice about. Yeah. Yeah. You’re right. You’re first.
Okay. Just wanted to especially, like, I I repeat something. Uh-huh. In the five texts that I saw there was. Yeah.
Discrimination. Yeah. The first one is between the extremes. Yeah. And the second one was I’ve gotta get them in because yeah.
Okay. Okay. So it would be discriminating the dharmadhatu. So the sphere of phenomena, discriminating the sphere of phenomena. And the other one is discriminating between the center and the extremes or discriminating the extremes.
Okay, so they were referring, they were explaining, what they are actually explaining is which of the Buddhist sutras are interpretive and which ones are definitive. Right? So each of the different pandits or Indian experts in their in their descriptions or in their textbooks had different interpretations of which ones of the Buddhist teach were interpretive and which one is were definitive, depending on whether they were writing from a Svatāntrika point of view or a Sautrāntika or mind only point of view or from a Madhyamaka point of view. They all wrote they all use different texts. The trick is if you only understand one of these person’s writings and you don’t understand all of them, then you may develop a bias or misunderstanding about all the different texts.
So you need to look at all of them to get the the bigger picture because they all wrote a different one. He said I said it’s difficult to know. Yeah. But if you don’t understand them or you don’t understand the the the why they’re saying one thing and the other. Yeah.
Hang on. We got a queue. I think Rob was next, though. Yeah. Uh-huh.
Yep. Yeah. Yeah. Geshe-la said that that isn’t just them that tries and does that. Everybody in Samsāra is trying to create a perfect situation in Samsāra.
Of some sort, we spend a lot of effort and time trying to work towards perfection in Samsāra, but it’s not possible. We have to try and look, if we wanted to try and perfect anything, try and perfect our insight, try and perfect our wisdom. And then we’re not doing something that’s creating circumstances for us to experience more suffering, which we may we would be doing if we’re trying to do it in Samsāra. Yes. Unerring?
Yeah. Sure. Yeah. Okay. So Geshe-la said that, for example, before Nāgārjuna came along, they didn’t understand Dharma properly.
Right? But that wasn’t the unmistakable lineage of the Buddha. Those people who didn’t understand emptiness properly weren’t in the unmistakable lineage of the Buddha, right? The unmistakable lineage of the Buddha went from Buddha to Mañjuśrī to to Nāgārjuna. So that’s the direct lineage there.
It wasn’t those people that misunderstood it. So Nāgārjuna shows the people that misunderstood it the correct path because he held the the real lineage of the Buddha, the unmistaken lineage of the Buddha. In a similar fashion, when Shāntarakshita first went to Tibet, he taught the teachings of the Buddha, and he held the lineage of the Buddha and taught it well. Then after he left, after he passed away, there came a big debate because there was a man from China called Hoshang, who had a massive who was having a massive influence in Tibet. And they it was seen that his teachings weren’t the direct teachings of the Buddha.
And this man, who was a student of Shāntarakshita, Kamalaśīla, came from India and had a big debate with Hoshang. And because he had the true lineage of the Buddha, he was able to discredit Hoshang’s presentation because this lineage was still coming through. And then before Atisha came to Tibet, there was also problems because the people weren’t practicing the true teachings of the Buddha. So Atisha being a holder of the lineage of of the Buddhas came to Tibet to set them right because they had lost the the the lineage here. They hadn’t done it properly.
And I said, okay. What about these days? I just added a bit. Sorry. There there there was problems within the this lineage a hundred years ago where there was one teacher that the Dalai Lama said this teacher who was a holder of the Lamrim lineage made a mistake.
Right? And then Geshe-la said he didn’t the Dalai Lama didn’t say that Pabongka Rinpoche made a mistake about the Lamrim teachings. He made a mistake about something else. And so therefore, there is no doubt about the teachings of the Lamrim because every time they’ve gone off, then someone’s come to pull them back into into order that has been a holder of the lineage. Yeah.
I want to know if the saying in the reading is a good thing for renunciation. If what? Sorry? By the saying in the reading, I want to know if it’s a good thing for renunciation. Okay.
And the saying is whatever bad thing happens, then it happens again. Okay. Okay. So whatever bad thing happens, that it happens to me, is that a good seed for renunciation? That’s a quote by Śāntideva.
It’s a very good quote, but it’s not about renunciation. It’s supposed to be in order to help. It’s a mind training exercise in order to it’s the basis of a mind training exercise in order to develop compassion. So from that, you should develop and not necessarily renunciation. Yes.
I’ll go back to the analogy. I come in, and I’ve got — I wanted to feel the wind. Right. But I come in, and I feel I can see a motivation for the lifetime Yeah. to harvest, because I’m wanting to Right. Yeah.
Sure. Yeah. Renunciation. Yeah. So here’s the field of wheat.
Yeah. It’s the idea that I actually don’t bother harvesting the wheat. It just sits there the whole time, Planting rice, or do you have to chop down the wheat as well? That that maybe in another lifetime, I can actually Okay.
In order for you to grow good rice, you need to get rid of all the wheat. Otherwise, you’re not going to be able to grow rice. So if the wheat is, for example, a manifestation of all the things that we’ve become habituated with since beginningless time, namely desire and anger and arrogance and all these things, then we need to get rid of them and start planting rice. Alright? Which is rice, which is us working towards liberation and towards Buddhahood.
So you need to do these two things at once. We need to be getting rid of the wheat, and we need to be planting the rice. In other words, we need to be getting rid of our negative thoughts and our negative emotions, and we need to be planting seeds for us or striving towards achieving liberation or achieving Buddhahood. So that is automatically He he said then there’s nothing encouraging. If you’re focusing on the rice, then there’s nothing encouraging the the wheat, then it will it will dissipate.
It will it will because you’re focusing on trying to grow rice.