Audio recorded at Buddha House Adelaide. Transcript auto-generated and AI-corrected; may contain errors.
About this talk. In this 24-minute session, Geshe Pema Tsering makes the case for bodhicitta through a chain of cautionary stories. Geshe Potowa always redirected teachings toward bodhicitta — not from ignorance of tantra but because no practice works without it. A Hevajra yogi practicing without bodhicitta achieved only stream enterer; Atisha noted he was lucky, since two earlier practitioners ended in hell. A three-year retreat yogi was reborn as a regional spirit; a Yamāntaka practitioner became a hungry ghost with the deity’s own form, haunting his former sponsors for smell offerings. Geshe Pema closes with the doctrinal summary: bodhicitta is the “father” pointing only to Buddhahood, wisdom realizing emptiness the “mother” — and bodhicitta alone determines whether any practice, however profound, becomes Mahāyāna.
File metadata (for organising)
File: 05 Great Scope – Jul.mp3
UUID: ac9461b8-7818-46a4-a224-b2258017ebdc
Teacher: Geshe Pema Tsering
Collection: Lam Rim 2002 Bodhisattva Deeds (Geshe Pema Tsering)
Date: 2002 (exact day not recorded)
Recorded at: Buddha House Adelaide
Duration: 24.3 minutes
Words: ~1,464
Without bodhicitta, one will not be able to attain enlightenment within one lifetime no matter how profound teaching is. Got it. Right. Therefore, once, you know, two masters, and Tibetan masters, and one is called Potowa Rinchen Sal. So when he would teach any, like, giving teachings or initiations so forth, he always talks about Dalai Lama teachings and cultivation of bodhicitta all the time.
And once many of the students and approach the Geshe Potowa saying, when talk, teachers, any teachers always ended up talking about bodhicitta and so forth, it looks like he doesn’t know anything, you know, about, you know, the tantric teachings of generation and the completion stage and so forth. And Geshe Potowa said to the disciple, this is not the case. He is very qualified teachers, he’s expert, has perfected all the teachings, but he is very skillful, he knows without having developed bodhicitta or a certain experience or attains bodhicitta, no matter how profound the teaching he explains, it’s not going to help at all. Therefore, the teachings he has been giving to you are the very key the basic, the important essence teachings, which are to be practiced by the disciple first.
This is what he said. Because he was not should not say that he is not qualified. He’s a great master, but he understand. He’s very skillful. That’s why he’s showing the key practices for the very beginning.
And there is also another true practitioner, a true story. And once there was a practitioner in yeah. In a region who the tantric practitioner or the yogi who practices so called the Hevajra Tantra. And Hevajra is a deity. And he practised the Hevajra tantra without bodhicitta.
It is said that the practitioner had a very kind heart. But practised the Hevajra without the bodhicitta altruistic intention. And as a result of that, he attained the so called the stream enterer, which is one has attained the path of seeing of the Hearer schools, the lower vehicles. And that message was heard by the great master Atisha heard the story and he was curious and surprised and laughed actually because a person practised the Mahāyāna, the highest yoga tantra, Hevajra — a practice which is supposed as a result to lead to enlightenment — and it became a lower attainment.
But attained a lower vehicle’s attainment. But when he heard that news, Atisha said, well, it was good for you, it was lucky that you have attained that stream enterer. There have been two stories in the past of those who practised the Hevajra tantra without bodhicitta and ended up in a hell realm. So it was lucky for you to attain the stream enterer. But so Atisha was a bit shocked.
So and there are many other, yeah, practitioners in the past have been who practice the wrathful deities without the tantric wrathful deities without the bodhicitta. And as a result, they ended up being in, you know, rebirth in the hell realms or becoming a devil or monsters. Devils is better. Yeah. And this one?
And once there was a true story that in Tibet, the region called Chushul region. And one practitioner who did the three year long retreat — three years retreat could be Yamāntaka or Vajrayoginī or any three year retreat. And that retreat was performed without generating a bodhicitta. And as a result, what happened when practitioner passed away, he was born as the spirit or so called the regional protectors of the particular land. Yeah.
And the earlier Hevajra tantra practitioner, the yogi who practised without the bodhicitta, he was a good practitioner. And as a result, with a kind hearted and he achieved that stream enterer, it is said that if he had practised with the bodhicitta, he would have attained enlightenment. It was a true story. And once, you know, the the Atisha was teaching in Tibet.
During that time, it is said, one Yamāntaka yogi, the practitioner who practised Yamāntaka in India, practised without bodhicitta, and at the end he ended up being born as a devil or a spirit. And it was said that he was traveling to Tibet, and the great master Atisha, through his clairvoyance, knew the person was coming, which was very harmful for the land. And he performed the ritual practice of torma — torma is what we call the ritual cake or torma cake, okay? And through his ritual practice, giving one to that spirit and let him return back. He said, not come to Tibet.
And, yeah, And also, it is said there was one practitioner of the Pembo region in Tibet, who was said to be a Yamāntaka practitioner. And and without the bodhicitta. And as a result, when he passed away, he was born in the hungry ghost. And within the hungry ghost, he has a shape like you know, this body because he was a Yamāntaka practitioner, he exactly looks like Yamāntaka. But being in and and he was born in the hungry ghost and always waiting for his sponsors to to to to do the burnt smell offerings.
Because because he’s in the hungry ghost, all they can eat is smell. So they’re waiting for the smell offerings. They weren’t doing. So it’s many stories like that. So therefore, these days, you know, people tend to practise and do meditation and so forth to attain, you know, like deity yoga or clairvoyance, some miraculous feat or a power and so forth.
But whatever meditation one person do and aiming to attain all this attainment, if one performed the meditation without the bodhicitta, no matter how good meditation one does, to achieve all those, instead one ended up in a lower rebirth. And and there’s a danger of being born in low rebirth and the hell realms so forth. If one has cultivated the bodhicitta and achieved the uncontrived bodhicitta and one fails to attain the deity yogas or clairvoyance and so forth, still okay. The the good news is one one’s been able to build the foundation or the root of the Mahāyāna practice. So therefore so if the whatever the highest the the Mahāyāna teaching is, the sūtra teachings or the tantric teachings.
If one do not have the altruistic intention, then one’s practice won’t become a Mahāyāna practice even though it’s the Mahāyāna teachings. If one has the Mahāyāna, if one has the bodhicitta altruistic intention, then the teachings will become these teachings are also Mahāyāna teaching, and one practice will become Mahāyāna’s practice as well as even just giving a single fruit or offering to an animal will become a Mahāyāna practice. And not only that, if one has the bodhicitta, even in the neutral actions like one one sleeps with the bodhicitta, then entire sleep will become a cause for the attainment of enlightenment. So therefore and the great bodhisattvas who have bodhicitta altruistic intention, because of that having bodhis bodhisattva, the altruistic intention, they can convert the non virtuous actions into a positive actions.
So therefore, the the bodhicitta is very important. For example, the emptiness, wisdom realizing emptiness is very important and very in terms of attainment of Buddhahood, one has to have both the the method and the wisdom. Method is bodhicitta, and wisdom is wisdom realizing emptiness. So wisdom realizing emptiness is inevitable. So whatever either one wish to attain the liberation of the highest school or solitary realized schools or Buddhahood, the of the Mahāyāna school, the wisdom realizing emptiness is important.
Without wisdom realizing emptiness, one can’t attain any of those, like liberation of the lower two schools and the enlightenment of the Mahāyāna school. But but if if one has the wisdom, realizing emptiness and do not have bodhicitta, then one’s practice will become the lower lower way called the practice, and it won’t become a practice. No? So, therefore, this is the reason it’s called the wisdom realizing emptiness is called the mother, and and the the bodhicitta is called the father. Because bodhicitta will the will will only result one to the enlightenment, buddhahood, whereas wisdom realizing emptiness will become a cause for any of those, to the the enlightenment as well as to the solitary realizer’s liberation, and here is liberation.
That’s called. It’s a cause for entire three attainments. So it’s called the mother and wisdom realizing emptiness. So the bodhicitta is called the father because it only leads to the Buddha. So if one do not wish enlightenment state or Buddhahood, then it’s a different case.
If one one wishes the Buddhahood or, yeah, Buddhahood, then should should should consider or consider the bodhicitta as the root or a key practice. Yeah. So, yeah, we’ll stop here.