Audio recorded at Buddha House Adelaide. Transcript auto-generated and AI-corrected; may contain errors.
About this talk. A monk attending an oral transmission of the Buddha’s collected teachings sees not scripture but a pile of meat being consumed — this image anchors Geshe Pema Tsering’s 45-minute commentary on karma, perception, and guru devotion. Drawing from Pabongka Rinpoche’s Lam Rim, he presents a cluster of stories showing how realized masters — Gyalwa Ensapa, Milarepa, Śāntideva — appeared ordinary or even deranged to those with unpurified karma, concluding that we can reliably assess only ourselves, not others. From this epistemological humility, he builds the scriptural proof that the guru is inseparable from all Buddhas, taking Vajradhāra’s declaration that he will appear in the aspect of a teacher as definitive rather than interpretive. The session closes on the practice of merging one’s mind with the guru’s as the present foundation for eventual enlightenment, followed by a student question on how to discriminate a genuine teacher from a charlatan.
File metadata (for organising)
File: 16 LR 2002 02 26.mp3
UUID: 31fd2f0b-e24a-4200-9c20-017f9b998964
Teacher: Geshe Pema Tsering
Collection: Lam Rim 2002 Bodhisattva Deeds (Geshe Pema Tsering)
Date: 2002-02-26
Recorded at: Buddha House Adelaide
Duration: 45.2 minutes
Words: ~2,697
Also, there’s another story given of Gyalwa Ensapa, and there is a story recorded that once he visited the statue at the Jokhang. And he debated some Sakya scholars, and they did not understand a difficult point concerning Buddhist terminology. In that respect, Gyalwa Ensapa was quoting from the Eight Thousand Verse Prajñāpāramitā Sūtra, and he was quoting from that Sūtra in the original Sanskrit. And the monks that he was debating did not accept the quotation that he was giving. And instead, they accused him of being an evil spirit and not an actual monk of the Gelug sect.
In fact, within the Gelug sect, he’s regarded as an instance of a being who on the basis of one body and in one life attained the state of a Buddha. So he’s highly revered in the Gelug sect. However, to those monks at that point, he appeared to be anything but a Buddha. So here we need to keep in mind that only Buddhas themselves perceive the Dharma kaya or the Dharma body, and not even Ārya bodhisattvas on the eighth, ninth, or tenth grounds can perceive it, neither can the arhats and so on. And then also the fact that the Sambhogakāya or the enjoyment body is only accessible or is seen or it appears to bodhisattvas who have attained the grounds, who attain the first ground at least.
To other ordinary beings, the or the enjoyment body of a Buddha is not visible. Also, for a supreme Nirmānakāya, another body of a Buddha, the emanation body of a Buddha, the supreme emanation body, can only be seen by those that have pure karma. And one particular text states that as long as we’re not free of the veil or the the net of karma and afflictions, even if all the Buddhas would have actually appeared to us, we would not see them as being Buddhas. We instead, we would see them as being ordinary in accordance with our own karmic predisposition. So therefore, the supreme body is adorned with the marks major and minor marks of a fully awakened being, are only seen by those that are fortunate enough ordinary beings who are fortunate enough to actually see those things due to their good karma.
And it’s stated that even during the Buddhist lifetime, there were many, outsiders, or or, those that held non-Buddhist views who could not see the marks, the major and the minor marks of a Buddha. They could only see a mass of faults, a collection of faults. In fact, the cousin of the Buddha who was called Devadatta, or Sunaksatra, he saw the Buddha and his actions and qualities as being nothing but a huge mass of faults. So here, we need the right perspective. And the right perspective is to see one’s teacher correctly, not to judge our guru in that way.
There’s also a story of a particular bandit, a highway robber, from the region of Golok. And he traveled to Lhasa to see the Śākyamūni Buddha statue in the what’s called the Jokang or the temple housing the Śākyamūni Buddha statue. And when he entered the temple, he could not even see things like the butter lamps, let alone the statue itself of Śākyamūni Buddha. And then an incarnate lama told him to purify his karma and obscurations. He gave him some advice that if you want to see if you want to actually see the stature, then you should undertake some purification.
So then the the bandit decided that he would follow the advice, and he had a ten thousand he made an offering, ten thousand fold offering performed. And then he also circumambulated many holy objects, but still he could not see the statue. However, he was able to see the butter lamps in the So then there’s a further story about a particular lama from Gomang Monastery, Gomang College of Drepung Monastery. And this lama, Losang Namgyal Rinpoche, was giving an oral transmission of the Kangyur, the collected teachings of the Buddha, discourses of the Buddha. And a particular monk in the audience was unable to hear the transmission of the Kangyur, and he could not see the actual text.
Instead, he thought that he saw meat stacked up in front of the Rinpoche who was giving the transmission. And then as he gave the transmission, it seemed as if the monk giving the transmission was actually eating the meat. This is what it appeared as to him. And then at the end of the day, he thought that he saw people then gathering up the meat that had been placed on the table. So therefore, as Pabongka continues, anything is possible.
It’s possible to imagine anything happening or for anything to appear to oneself, in dependence on one’s karma initiating such appearance. So the amount by which we purify that karma then tends to determine the type of appearance that occurs to us. So therefore, we should reflect that what appears to us is not reliable. So therefore, far from being able to assess really the status of our own teacher, really, we’re not in a position to assess anyone, to hold to our, our appearance or hold to what appears to us in relation to anyone, that is our our colleagues, our friends, dogs and gods and so forth, demons. What does appear to us we’re really uncertain about.
And in that sense, all that we can be certain about is ourselves. We can really only assess ourselves and our level, our status. So, therefore, what is within our range is ourselves. So therefore, we are able to assess ourselves. And if we go beyond that, then really we have some doubt about the level of other beings.
We don’t really know what their level is. So we’re subject to doubt. And further, Gyalwa Ensapa, who was a great practitioner, practitioner, who had achieved the state of Yuganaddha or union or the highest level of tantra, even though he was such a great practitioner and a great yogi, there were those that called him mad or crazy, crazy and daft, crazy and mad.. There’s also a story about Chögyal Kyabpa, a particular practitioner who was a close disciple of Je Tsongkhapa. And once Je Tsongkhapa was about to disclose some profound and difficult points concerning the secret tantras, and this particular person, Chogyal Kyabpa, stopped him.
However, this upset another student by the name of Gyeltsab Rinpoche, and Khedrub Rinpoche had to tell him not to make such a fuss. So in fact, all of these are very highly realized disciples of Je Tsongkhapa, but some fuss arose through the nature of appearance. So then also it said that the Buddha himself mentioned that only beings like myself can assess the worth of a person. Only a Buddha really is capable of assessing the status of another being. Otherwise other being otherwise, beings themselves shouldn’t hold to their estimate of another.
Further, there’s a story that occurred in India where a novice monk, on one occasion, went to an island off the coast of India. And it was said that that island was inhabited by dakas and dakinis, or sky goers, these beings, these practitioners. So he went there. But while he was there, he could not see anything but just these ordinary beings, you know, walking to and fro without any qualities whatsoever. And not only that, in the end, he developed faith in one particular person, a charlatan, a sort of a fake who had no qualities but pretended to have qualities.
So there’s also a further story about a particular practitioner called Naro Bönchung, who happened to say this about Milarepa. People who’ve not seen the famous Milarepa say great things about him. He’s like the great Indian masters or the great Indian siddhas who have attained great attainments and so forth. However, when they go to see him, all they find is this old naked man. So then as Pabongka Rinpoche continues, these stories really reveal how we’re slaves to appearance, that these stories, as Pabongka says, they make a mockery of everything we see.
We therefore know nothing about even our most intimate friends. So this means that we have various friends around us, dharma friends, and at times we see their faults and so forth. However, the point here is that we really don’t know whether they actually have these faults or not, whether they’re appearance or is our karma influencing the way they appear to us. And so for that reason, we should be harmonious with those around us. And then a further instance here is the story of Śāntideva.
And many many thought that Śāntideva was an ordinary being that was only involved in the three gatherings, that are eating, sleeping, and defecating. And, however, Śāntideva himself was a greatly realized highly realized being that simply appeared, in that way, to others. So therefore, as the text continues, we cannot be sure that what we think is a fault is actually a fault. It may appear to be a fault, but we’re we’re not sure, in fact, whether, in fact, in actuality, it is a fault. As there’s a first story about a monk at the time of the Buddha called Udayana.
And he knew the entire teachings of the Buddha, the three baskets, the ethics, discourses, and Abhidharma. Yet still, he had a mistaken view of the nature of the Buddha because he thought that the Buddha possessed faults. And as he said, that he thought that he could see the Buddha exactly as he was and that his teachings were for particular ends, his own ends, the Buddha’s own ends, and not for the benefit of others. And that he thought that the Buddha possessed various types of faults. Also, there’s other things that arise.
For instance, there are some practitioners, and here, really talking about monks living in monasteries, who therefore make their practice to even go without sleep in order to read pecha, to sit there reading Pecha and to recite mantras, do their recitations, recite sadhanas, and so forth. And others around them, their students and so on, may see this as a fault because of their attachment to sleep. They see the teacher not sleeping. They’re engaged in practice all the time. And they can even hold the teacher to be at fault in doing that because the students themselves want to go to sleep.
They want because they like sleep and so forth. So they view their teachers having that fault. So also, some students may count themselves lucky, those especially that drink alcohol, if they have a teacher who himself or herself drinks alcohol. In fact, when they find out that they do, they rejoice in the fact, oh, they drink alcohol. It’s good.
Because it tends to make them feel a bit more at ease for the fact that they drink. So as it says, not only may the things that we see as false not be false, but also we can’t we can’t be sure that what also what, in fact, are good qualities. And also in terms of faults, we cannot be sure that one’s teacher is not just, feigning, a particular fault, as a teaching for our own particular benefit, when we see a fault in our teacher. So then there are various other sutras, such as the Meeting of the Father and Son Sūtra and the great sūtra on the Buddha’s nirvana, which speak at great length of how the Tathagatas how the Buddhas manifest as hostile persons, as misers, cripples, madmen, immoral people, and so on, where this will be of benefit. Then also, as the text continues, in general, the sutras and tantras are divided into definitive and interpretive works.
And there are various interpretations as to whether scripture should be taken literally as it stands or it needs to be interpreted. However, when vajradhara says that in future he will appear in the aspect of a teacher, in the the aspect of the teacher or as a guru, then we can take that statement as being definitive, as literal, and it does not need to be interpreted. So then, as the text continues, we can understand that there is no one other than the guru or the teacher to teach us the path to liberation and omniscience. And it would be contradictory for us to think that my guru, who according to Vajradhāra is a Buddha, is not a Buddha because he has such and such a fault. So this particular type of proof that’s been given here is a positive proof.
This is a particular type of reasoning that’s applied. And from that, we can understand that the guru has been a Buddha from the very beginning. And we have developed a realization into how to devote ourselves to the spiritual guide when we are convinced of the above logic and scriptural references, and we see them to prove comprehend them to prove that a guru, that our teacher is, in fact, a Buddha. So therefore, as it states, that when we are convinced that the above logic that’s been recited in the previous pages and those scriptural references prove beyond any doubt that the guru, one’s teacher, is in fact a Buddha and experience a kind of mingling of one’s teacher with all the Buddhas, then one is establishing the basis of proper reliance on on one’s spiritual teacher. So then as it says in the text that by mingling one’s own mind with that of one’s teacher or guru, with one’s teacher or guru, then when one is becomes fully enlightened, when one attains a state of full enlightenment, one’s mind and the guru’s mind become which is one’s guru’s mind, which is the nature of great bliss and the dharmakaya, then mingle and become in one taste.
So what this means is that one is practicing at present in merging one’s mind with one’s teachers in order to eventually actually attain that state in the union of or the mingling of one’s guru’s mind with one’s own mind that’s a state of enlightenment. And as it says, at this point, when you are enlightened, becoming by nature a guru, you achieve the guru’s state. Your body, speech, and mind are inextricably mingled or merged with the gurus. So therefore, in order to achieve that state ultimately, one begins to establish the foundations for achieving that at present. So this is the point of our having a close relationship with our teacher at present.
Our mind must continually come closer and closer to conforming with the guru’s mind in order to achieve that result. So if there’s any questions that may have come up in relation to the text? So here’s the states in the text that we we have doubt about whether that fault actually exists or not because it’s simply a fault in the continuum of the student. So one sees it as being a fault of the student. So in fact, here it’s taken to be fault of the student.
When they look at their teacher, they see faults. This is should be seen to be coming from the side of the student themselves, just their karma producing appearance of such faults and so on. They’re not actually taken to be belong to the teacher themselves. And in accordance with the various examples that are given, you know, at times, you know, as a teacher may be seen to be at fault, may be seen to be committing a negative action like killing or something like that. But this is seen to be a fault more on the side of the student as and the awakening of So it’s also said there that we can assess our own and that’s about as far as we can go.
We can’t really assess other beings. Yeah. So it’s already stated that we have doubt about beings other than ourselves. How then do you discriminate discriminate between a genuine teacher and a charlatan? I