Audio recorded at Buddha House Adelaide. Transcript auto-generated and AI-corrected; may contain errors.
About this talk. The interpreter’s aside — that the sign of “clean bedding” sounded as though bodhisattvas don’t wet the bed — gives this 46-minute session one of its most memorable moments: Geshe Pema Tsering clarifies it means having no mental attachment even to the basic necessities of shelter and clothing. He works through items five to seventeen of the signs of irreversibility on the path of preparation in the Ornament for Clear Realisations, distinguishing two versions of the five obscurations and explaining why harmful organisms naturally cease to trouble the body at this level. Student questions close the session: whether bodhisattvas reborn mid-path regain their realizations immediately (Geshe-la says it depends on the sharpness of inherited faculties), and why two English translations of “supreme mundane quality level” turn out to carry opposite meanings.
File metadata (for organising)
File: 10 OCR 2005 03 10.mp3
UUID: 49729dac-c08d-4df2-986e-0c486ce4f7e7
Teacher: Geshe Pema Tsering
Collection: Ornament for Clear Realisations (Geshe Pema Tsering)
Date: 2005-03-10
Recorded at: Buddha House Adelaide
Duration: 45.7 minutes
Words: ~3,035
Doing these with the motivation that they will be used for the ultimate perfection, which is and also dedicating the virtue accumulated through these perfections to the benefit of all sentient beings. Okay. So the it doesn’t actually say anything about the exchange of yourself and others in this number five in Tibetan. It says that it’s all the practices of a bodhisattva. And so it’s the practices of six perfections, and the dedication of those six perfections to all beings become enlightened.
So this includes the practice of giving and taking, and the practice of exchanging self and others. That’s general practice of all bodhisattva. That’s a general part of all bodhisattva practice. So it’s not just practice of Tonglen, it’s all the practices of a bodhisattva. And it shows how all of those practices are based on this idea of being motivated to benefit sentient beings and dedicating the activities that you’ve done to the benefit of sentient beings.
Okay. So the number six is to get rid of all doubts about emptiness. So this actually takes a lot of work to get to that stage, but if we’ve gotten rid of doubts about emptiness, then that’s the way we start to perceive things as existing, as being empty in their existence. The next one, which is number seven, is to perform activities of the three doors, which is to perform mental, physical, and verbal activities based on love for sentient beings. Okay.
Okay. So the next one, right, number eight, it says getting rid of the five obscurations. Now here it’s got these five afflictive states, desirous aspiration, malice, sleep and lethargy, excitement and regret and doubt. And Geshe-la said, that’s fine, they can say that. But you could also say that there’s these things called the five obscurations, which he seems he said that now usually more more regularly referred to as the five obscurations.
And they are the obscuration to liberation obstructions to liberation, obscuration to omniscience, obscurations to Okay. So the other one is the imprint obscurations. And the high obscurations are actually the imprints from the obscurations to omniscience, which are imprints. So I’m not quite sure how that works for me. So the obstructions from the obstructions that are obstructions that are the imprints of obstructions to omniscience.
So that’s three. Then the fourth one is obstructions to meditative equipoise, which you get rid of before attaining calm abiding. And the fifth one is obscurations of the lower, which means obscurations which could lead you to following the lower part. Okay. Okay.
Geshe-la said, did you tell them the five that are on the translation, or did you say the the five that I said as well? I said, I said both because you mentioned both. And I try and translate what you say, he went, Oh, that’s good then. And then he said that oftentimes I can’t I got in trouble saying oftentimes. Hello.
Don’t use archaic. Often, the obscurations are subsumed into the obscurations to liberation and the obscurations to omniscience. And in fact, the obscuration the imprint obscurations, which are the obscurations that are the imprints of the obscurations to omniscience can be subsumed within the obscurations to omniscience. Alright? So they can be the imprints of the things that are imprints.
Right? So they can be subsumed within that. Mhmm. So the next one is destroying dormant latencies such as ignorance. So that means that they are developing the ability to get rid of states of mind that aren’t necessarily manifest.
They also develop a continuous mindfulness and introspection or alertness. So number eleven, where it says their dwelling, their bedding, their and their clothes and so forth are clean due to consistent pure behavior. It doesn’t mean that they don’t, like, wet the bed and that before then. Right? It means that they because I was like, What do you mean?
That doesn’t mean and guests would go, No, no, no, it doesn’t mean that. It means that they don’t have any attachments. And the cleanliness, it says, it’s clean, it doesn’t mean the bed clothes themselves. It means their relation to the bed clothes. So it means that they because it does sound like they’re wetting the bed or something, doesn’t it?
Anyway, it means that there’s no attachment even to the clothes they wear, the place they’re sleeping, or the fact that they have bedding or not. Even if they’re using these things, they’re using clothes, they’re using bedding, and they have a dwelling to live to that. So in that way, it’s pure. It’s purified. It’s clean.
So Geshe will say so does it sound like so before you achieve the path of preparation, you first need to clean your clothes. He said, No. It means that from that state onwards, even the very basic necessities that they have become merely implements for them to attain enlightenment’s benefit or sentient beings. Everything they have, there’s no it’s not talking about stains as in that hasn’t been washed often. It means or or recently.
It means stains as in mental stains as in that they don’t have any attachment to these things, and they’ve become merely tools for them to be able to maintain their body to work towards enlightenment. So at this level, the bodhicitta they’re developing bodhicitta so well that every single action that they do is for the benefit of other beings. Okay. So on the second set of six signs, the level six signs of irreversibility and the peak level of the path of preparations. The first one of which is that the eighty thousand different types of microorganisms do not occur in the body at this level.
I said, does that mean that there are no worms? And this is a pun, but I don’t know if it translates. And the word first of Buddha’s body or honorific word for body is the same way as they use statues. And I said, does that mean that there is no Buddha’s and so I thought I’d translate it. I said, does that mean that there’s no worms in a Buddha’s body?
Right? And he said, probably in that one over there, there is. Yes. And I said, well, okay. And I’ll try and put it again.
Does that mean that there is no worms in the body of like he said, bodhisattvas aren’t supposed to have any beings harming them. So be beings just naturally do not harm them. So if there’s microorganisms in the body that aid the body, then they probably they may still live in the bodhisattvas and may allow them to be there. But if they they don’t suffer from harmful organisms, the different types of harmful organisms that could invade the body. Alright?
So that’s what that means. Now they don’t have a dishonest mind. They’re not trying to trick people into anything. They oh, that’s strange because it doesn’t say anything about twelve weeks. So they have they have to engage in certain activities that enable them to progress towards Buddhahood, and they do these with enthusiasm.
That’s what the next one says in here anyway. It doesn’t say about the twelve excellent qualities. It talks about qualities, but not twelve. And then the next thing is that they don’t have miserliness. And then the number sixteen is that they are that everything that they’re doing is a practice that is leading them towards the realization of the perfection of wisdom.
So that means that all their activities and all their actions actually accord with an understanding of the nature of reality. So nothing that they’re doing is creating more obstacles to their perception of reality. And this is what the development of the perfection of wisdom is about, is working towards the state where your being accords with reality as opposed to opposing reality. So that’s number sixteen. And seventeen is that they, at this level, are wanting to take rebirth in hells and other states so that they can benefit sentient beings.
It’s as if it’s for them, as if their own children are reborn in these states and they can go and help them. Okay. We can finish there. Yeah. Okay.
So says, can we know any of these things? And I’m like, well, no. We can’t know if someone’s being miserly because we don’t know why they’re doing not giving people things. We can’t tell if people are being disingenuous because we can’t tell why they’re doing it. So we kinda get goes, see, I told you we don’t know any of these.
But if someone says to us, yes, but how many signs of irreversibility are there on the path of preparation? We can answer, I went, nineteen. And he went, no, twenty. I got confused with the last one that I was nineteen. Okay.
So Geshe-la said if it was someone who was actually a reincarnation of oh, it was the next incarnation of a being who was on the path of preparation, then they wouldn’t know everything from the start if it was on the path of preparation because the realizations that they had developed in the past, those realizations and that understanding had come about in dependence on faculties, like sense faculties, mental faculties, that you lose at the time of death. Your faculties dissolve at the time of death, and you move on to the next lifetime. So because their understanding and their realization because their understanding and their real their understanding of these things were based on that those sense faculties, then when they take a new rebirth, they have new sense faculties. So they don’t have the same understandings. But what they do have is very, very strong imprints for that.
So it’s still on the path of preparation, as soon as they hear it, then they develop understanding of it again. He said sorry. He just one second. Alright. Sorry.
Sorry. So on the path of preparation, there’s just that there there are bit Okay. So whether they have the ability to understand things or not depends on the depends on their genes, he said. Right? Like so a being can have the be on the path of preparation and have the karma to be reborn into a certain family.
Right? And then on the way that that body is structured and their their their capacity is structured in their in their with those genes that they inherit. They may have sharp genes. I don’t know if this works scientifically, but they may have a predisposition to be very clever and quick. And this can actually mean that they remember things from previous lifetimes.
Right? So the combination of having developed along with these realizations and having sharp genes can mean that they remember everything straight away and they don’t need to be retaught. There’s those that can have like middling genes, and then they can get things really quickly as soon as they’ve heard it. And there’s those that can even be a bodhisattva on the path of preparation and have very dull genes, yeah, and or dull capacity, and they have to be told things again and again and again. Eventually, they get it, yeah, they’re like, oh, I remember this, yeah?
But it has to be up until they up until they have may have to work hard to get it. Right? So this can happen on the path of preparation. It definitely can happen on the path of accumulation. And but it can’t happen on the path of seeing because on the path of seeing, you’ve seen emptiness, so you’ve got to control it.
Irreversibly Mhmm. Part of preparation. Mhmm. Hang on. You it was Jo had a question, and guess they’re interrupting her, and now you’re interrupting her.
Probably the same Okay. They wouldn’t have them then in that case because they have been they have been reversed, and they they said they’re still on the path of preparation at that stage. Right? But they probably wouldn’t show the signs of irreversibility at that stage. Because said again, Ornament for Clear Realisations is a text about those with sharp faculties.
Alright? So these signs of irreversibility are not you don’t relate them to the beings of middling capacity or or dull capacity, and they’re the ones that have to relearn everything. Yeah. Joe? Uh-huh.
Yeah. It wouldn’t be able to be these because we’re talking about, like, this is, like, bodhisattva realizations, but you just mean in general. Because this is like beings on the path of preparation who’ve realized emptiness and realized bodhicitta. Not even on the path of seeing. Okay.
Sure. Sure. Okay. Right. So first of all, I don’t know if this actually translates in terms of the words.
There’s a bit more that’s usually translated as arrogance means to think more of yourself than is there. Right? So if you’re someone on the path of accumulation and you think I’m someone on the path of accumulation, that’s not arrogance. Alright? It’s the same thing as thinking if we think I’m a human, that’s not arrogance.
It’s true. Alright? So if you are on the path of accumulation and you think I’m a person on the path of accumulation, it’s not arrogance. It’s only arrogance when you think you’re more than you are. Okay?
That’s the first thing. Now in terms of knowing when you’re in the path of accumulation or not, it’s not something that you would have a doubt about. Right? It’s not something you can think, is that possibly where I’m at or anything? You would know for sure.
Now the reason that you would know for sure for sure is similar to the reason that we would know, for example, if we have a vow saying we don’t kill. Right? And we don’t kill, so we’re holding that vow, then we think I’m a person who’s holding this vow. Okay? It’d be just as clear as that if from the path of accumulation.
So if you have any doubts about whether you’re in the path of accumulation, then you you’re not. Alright? So that it’s it’s not something that’s like a mystical experience of I’m on the path of accumulation. It’s something that you know very clearly in the same way that you’d know you’re someone who has the vow of not killing. Yeah?
It’s just something that you do. Yeah. Yes. When you talked earlier about the peak of the supreme, the unknown Oh, the whole translation confuses me. That’s totally different.
Totally different. Totally different. Right. Okay. So I think Yeah.
So what are they translated as? Supreme mundane I’m sorry. Supreme mundane quality. Supreme mundane quality level. Okay.
So the cutoff line between whether something is mundane. Yeah. And what’s the word they used apart from it in the succession thing? Supreme. Okay.
So this is the problem with this it’s supposed to be to watch, supreme, I mean. Right? Because it just means in that instance, they could have translated as worldly and nonworldly as well, would be another way to translate it. I’m not sure if that helps. But the cutoff level where something becomes supreme or nonworldly or noble is this this level.
Right? As soon as you hit the path of seeing, it’s a Ārya path. It’s a supreme path. It’s a nonworldly path. Alright?
Anything below that path of seeing is mundane. Okay? So what it’s saying here is that this is the final point that’s mundane. The supreme part, the the ultimate part of not ultimate. The last bit, the best bit of the mundane level.
Right? So the the a very, very literal translation of it would be the best, the best of the mundane. The best so so I guess you said out of all the things that are in the mundane world, right, which is the mundane world is all experiences and everything right up until you perceive emptiness. Yeah? This is the best.
Okay? Anything past that is not mundane. So what the problem is that what they’re translating here is supreme mundane level. Right? It means the best of the mundane.
And in the other translation, what they’re translating is supreme is that which isn’t mundane. Yeah. So they’re like then yeah. They’re opposite. They’re not the same.
Could because that one could be mundane and non non mundane as well. Yeah. Yeah. So this is the best of the mundane. The other one is not talking about mundane.
Just a little bit. Mhmm. He wants to know why you wanna get rid of sleep. Uh-huh. So if you if you are per se if you perceived emptiness and you’re and and you are meditating on emptiness whether you’re awake or you’re asleep, it’s it’s no there’s no difference.
Yeah. But guess I didn’t know I can’t understand where they got those wrong, so that’s a bit tricky. I’m sleeping. So he he said he Sleep is a changeable state. It can be the negative or positive.
Yeah. It’s it’s it’s it’s changeable. So sometimes it’s positive and sometimes it’s negative, but it is something that needs to be gotten rid of. He thinks it’s not something you get rid of until the path of meditation. He said he has no idea.
It’s probably what she’s done since she was He doesn’t think it’s giving up sleep or getting rid of sleep in some just to have it. But he doesn’t know. But know. Yeah. And Geshe-la said, but if you are not a if you’re an ordinary being and you try not to sleep, you’ll probably die.
Yeah. Yeah. You fall asleep. Yeah. You can’t stop it.
You end up just falling asleep. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
Yeah. Yeah. You’re right. I’m looking for a methodology To get hungry spirits out of the the hungry spirit realm and into being humans. Yeah.
And I I I get for what we can do, Only you can create positive karma. That’s the only way. But that’s also the anyway,