Audio recorded at Buddha House Adelaide. Transcript auto-generated and AI-corrected; may contain errors.
About this talk. The image of grains of rice swirling in a boiling cauldron is Geshe Pema Tsering’s shorthand for hell-realm suffering in this 88-minute Letter to a Friend commentary. He works through torments of the hot hells and neighboring hells — the Shalmali forest of razor-sharp trees, iron-beaked birds, rivers of worms — noting that “iron” describes karmic intensity rather than literal metal. He addresses duration (billions of years until propelling karma is exhausted) and names three ways to avert those results: confession and purification, realizing emptiness, bodhicitta. The practical minimum: avoid the ten non-virtuous actions. Being the last session of the year, the talk ends with Q&A and a mandala offering ceremony, explained as offering the imagined universe to one’s guru to generate merit and deepen the teacher-student bond across lifetimes.
File metadata (for organising)
File: Geshe Pema Tsering – Sunday_nov29th_Geshela.mp3
UUID: 05f2d094-2fca-4458-a9e9-55ac334150bb
Teacher: Geshe Pema Tsering
Collection: Unallocated multiple years (Geshe Pema Tsering)
Recorded at: Buddha House Adelaide
Duration: 88.1 minutes
Words: ~5,421
Patient then with the intention then of establishing all beings in the spirit of enlightenment, and I myself must attain enlightenment. And I’m going to study the stanzas of the Letter to a Friend and practice accordingly in order to accomplish that goal. And then we start with the preliminary prayers. We start with the Heart Sūtra. The motivation that we may obtain a new house very quickly.
One time, the Bhagavan was dwelling on Vulture’s Peak mountain, and Rajagriha together with a great community of monks and a great community of bodhisattvas. At that time, the Bhagavan was absorbed in the concentration of the categories of phenomena called profound perception. Also, at that time, the Bodhisattva Mahāsattva Avalokiteśvara looked upon the very practice of the profound perfection of wisdom and beheld the five aggregates as empty of inherent existence. And through the power of Buddha, the venerable said this to the son of the lineage Śāriputra who wishes to practice the activity of the profound perfection of wisdom. He said that any son of the lineage or daughter of the lineage who wishes to practice the activity of the profound perfection of wisdom should look upon it like this, correctly and repeatedly beholding the five aggregates as empty of inherent nature.
Form is empty. Emptiness is form. Emptiness is no other than form. Form is also no other than emptiness. In the same way, feeling, discrimination, compositional factors, and consciousness are empty.
Śāriputra, likewise, O son, phenomena are empty without characteristic, unproduced, unceased, stainless, without stain, not deficient, not fulfilled. Śāriputra, therefore in emptiness? There is no form, no feeling, no discrimination, no compositional factors, no consciousness, no eye, no ear, no nose, no tongue, no body, no mind, no visual form, no sound, no odor, no taste, no object of touch, and no phenomenon. There is no eye element and so on up to and including no mental no mind element and no mental conscious element. There is no ignorance, no extinction of ignorance, and so on up to and including no aging and death and no extinction of aging and death.
Similarly, there is no suffering, origination, cessation, and path. There is no exalted wisdom, no attainment, and also no non-attainment. Śāriputra, therefore, because there is no attainment, Bodhisattva is relying on and dwelling in the perfection of wisdom, the mind without obscuration and without fear. Having completely passed beyond the error, they reached the end point of nirvana. All the Buddhas who dwell in the three times also manifestly, completely awakened to unsurpassable, perfect, complete enlightenment and reliance on the perfection of wisdom.
Therefore, the mantra, the perfection of wisdom, the mantra of great knowledge, the unsurpassed mantra, the mantra equal to the unequal, the mantra that allays all suffering should be known as truth and said it is not false. The mantra, the perfection of wisdom is declared. The profound perfection of wisdom like that. Then the Bhagavan rose from that concentration and commended it saying, well said, well said. It is like that.
Is like that. One should practice the profound perfection of wisdom, which as you have indicated. Those surrounding their entirety along with the world of gods, humans, and Gandharvas were overjoyed and spoke, overjoyed at what was spoken by the Bhagavan. Then we will recite the praises of Prajñāpāramitā.
Going for refuge in the Sangha. We pay homage to the great Prajñāpāramitā, surrounded by all the Buddhas and Bodhisattvas. In the past, the king Indra dispelled the maras by reflecting on the profound meaning of the wisdom gone beyond, reciting the profound words in daily meditation. In that same way, I also reflect on the profound meaning of the great Prajñāpāramitā and recite the profound words in daily recitation.
May all diseases, bad conditions, all the negative conditions, that which happens due to past karma and immediate conditions, may all this be dispelled, may become nonexistent, may be pacifying. All sentient beings have happiness and the cause of happiness. May all sentient beings suffering and the cause of suffering. May all sentient beings never be separate from the happiness that is free from suffering. May all sentient beings abide in equanimity, free from attachment for friends and hatred for enemies.
So we’re approaching the next topic, which is in the specific suffering of of the hot hells. So we read the next verse for that for that one topic. Others still are forced to swallow drops of burning molten bronze that flares and sparks. Some impale some impaled and and threaded onto skewers, barbed and fiercely blazing stakes of steel. So Geshe-la was just reading the commentary because there’s not much need to to explain much in this extreme hot hell and again people are forced to swallow this this draft of molten bronze is poured into their mouths and and they have to swallow it and then and then the the the body is split open like like a flower because of the of this of this molten metal.
And then some of them are impaled or or completely pierced and threaded with with this hot iron threads, barbed barbed iron and so and hot barbed iron and so on. And then the specific sufferings, the next topic, then will be the specific sufferings of the neighboring hells. And then we have two verses, the next two verses in that regard. Geshe-la was reading the first one of those two. Some whom savage dogs with iron fangs will rip to shreds, in dread, throw up their hands, and others powerless are pecked by crows with sharpened beaks of steel and razor claws.
And then Geshe-la was reading the next verse. Some there are who roll about and wail devoured by worms and multicolored grubs. Ten thousand buzzing flies and bees that leave stings and bites unbearable to touch. English language. Just go and search the documentary again because, again, there’s not much need to explain the meaning here.
So there are there are those places in neighboring house where people are cut into pieces by the the trees who have razor sharp leaves and and branches and so on, and and others who who are cut in pieces by these these crows with with metal beaks and and and these claws of iron. And so they are all cut into pieces either by the trees or by these these crows. So this place where these these trees and these birds are present is called the Shalmali forest. And, again, this is a place where these these trees, they have this razor razor sharp, leaves and branches that cut, the people. They are powerless to to do anything about it.
They just walk about in in these trees and cut them to pieces. And then and if the trees are not cutting them to pieces when they reach to a certain spot, then the birds, go on and and then devour them. They cut them to pieces again because the birds have these iron beaks and these, iron claws. So and they are power less to do anything about it. Then there is another neighboring hell in which the people are they have to walk through these rivers of worms and and and and maggots and whatnot that’s that eat them, and then they have all these insects, flies and bees and other insects that then sting them thousands and thousands of them and again there is nothing they can do about it.
Have to walk through this place and they have to walk through these rivers of worms and and grubs and whatnot and they have to put up with all these flies and these insects and everything. They just sting their whole bodies to a point that it is unbearable. Hard. It’s very it’s impossible to bear with. Okay.
Okay. And Geshe-la is explaining that when we hear these descriptions of the Shalmali trees and the birds with iron razor sharp leaves and iron beaks and iron things and all that. We don’t mean it literally. They don’t really have razor blades as leaves and they don’t really have iron beaks and iron claws. The point is that those leaves are of such nature that they are hard enough to cut through the body of those beings that they are living in hell and those beaks and those claws are hard enough to to to to, how do say, to shred into pieces the bodies of those beings, the flesh of those beings.
And and and they’re just that hard that they can impart just that much damage, and that’s why we we refer to them as iron or iron like. Again noting that all those things they arise in dependence on cause and conditions. Arise in dependence on the karma of the people who have performed those actions and they do not have any existence from their own side independently. So again it depends entirely on the cause and conditions that are involved in the process we’re going through the next topic again, is some of the, specific, sufferings of the hot hell. Again, some in heaps of blazing red coals are burned without a break, their mouths agape, and some are boiled in cauldrons made of iron cooked like dumplings, heads turned upside down.
Okay. Okay. Okay. And then Geshe-la is going through the commentary. Again, the commentary is is very, simple.
Say, again, some people, in this in this hot hell, they they, they have to they are burned onto these heaps of red coal, ceaselessly, constantly. Others are with their mouths are wide open and all that. So they, and others are boiled instead. So some are some are put on on these blazes and so on and these heaps of red hot coal and others are boiled, boiled in huge cauldrons made of iron. And the analogy that is given so in the verse we have cooked like dumplings with the heads upside down.
And the other analogy that we are given is like is like when when you have the water is boiling, you know, in in is boiling really hard and you put a little bit of rice in it and you can see the rice going up and down and and turning around all the time. So you you are boiling in these big cauldrons like this. That’s how we we are boiling just like these little grains of rice. So the next topic then is is is giving rise to fear of death. So producing, developing fear of these sufferings of the hell realms.
And because I was reading the first one, there’s two verses for that, the eighty three and eighty four. Geshe-la was reading the first one. The very instant that they cease to breathe, the wicked taste the boundless pains of hell. And he or she who hearing this is not afraid, a thousand fold is truly the first the first line of that verse is talking about those those people who have negativities and negativities who would then cause them to be born in hell. And and they are not they’re really not far away from hell at all.
All it takes is for them to breathe out and not breathe in again, and that’s just how far you are from hell. And then in the very next moment, you are born in the hell realms. So for those people who have those negativities, who have such negativity, so those those people people who have negativities in general that we just we are just that close to hell. And following through the rest of the verse, Yusala is saying that he or she who hearing this is not afraid. So the idea is that we are taught these teachings about the hell realms and so on so that we can develop fear.
The idea is that we must feel fear because by force of this fear then we will be compelled to avoid the causes of suffering, avoid the causes that will lead us to this kind of birth and will instead put us and we will instead accomplish the causes of happiness instead. And then if simply seeing pictures of the hells and hearing, thinking, reading of them scarce or making sculptured figures, need we say how hard to bear the ripened fruit will be? So Geshe lah is going through these two verses and pointing out again the ideas that we develop fear from these sufferings. Nobody wants to experience any kind of suffering at all much less these very extreme kinds of suffering. So we have then to avoid the causes performing, engaging the causes that lead to the experiences in the future.
The problem is that we are always engaging in causes that lead to this. The causes that lead to this kind of rebirth are all our actions that are driven by attachment, by aversion, by ignorance and jealousy and so on. So because in our minds we have these afflictions arising all the time then every one of those minds, every one of those thoughts and actions that follow from those thoughts are causes that lead to these kinds of rebirth. So we have to endeavor then to stop these kinds of minds and the actions that follow from these minds and instead cultivate such minds as the mind of refuge, mind that thinks of impermanence, the mind that thinks of actions and their results, the mind that thinks of compassion, the mind that thinks of the view. All these are correct minds and so we should endeavor instead to busy ourselves, our minds, our thoughts with these correct minds.
English is going for the for the commentary again. So having having heard of all this for for those people who who have who are certain to experience these these sufferings of the hells because they have the the the the perform engage in the negativities that lead to that. When having been so close, being so close to these experiences themselves being just like one breath away from these experiences of the hell realms when they hear of these sufferings, if they when they do not feel any fear, when they hear of these sufferings and do not feel any fear about that, then they are really they are really like a diamond hard. I mean, they’re really, really in a way, it’s a really, really thick headed. That’s what it is.
That’s what it means. They because they should be really scared. And so so in the comment the commentary goes on to tell us that from those things, we should we need to be fearful. We need to be extremely afraid, the text the text is saying. We we don’t want to have if if even seeing the pictures of the bodies of these hell beings or these places or even hearing the tales or or having statues or any sort of depiction shown to us.
If even that alone is enough to make us fearful, to make us scared, then how much more so it will be to actually experience those things. So we should be afraid. It is right for us to be afraid and then then develop those things, those thoughts, that thing, you know, I I I don’t want to experience these sufferings of such sufferings as these as these from this hells. I don’t want to experience the ripening results of the actions that will lead me to them to experience this suffering and this hell. So one then one has to avoid these these causes and then engage in the opposite of them.
So again, Geshe-la is saying, we we nobody wants to experience suffering. Nobody wants to experience these kinds of suffering. So we we are afraid. We have to be afraid if just hearing and seeing pictures and depictions of it is enough to make us scared. Again, We ought to be afraid of what the real thing might actually be.
Being afraid alone is not enough. Being scared alone is not enough. When we talk about being scared, also talking about taking action being compelled, propelled to act by that fear. So we need them to do whatever we can to the best of our ability to avoid the causes that lead to death and accomplish the opposite of that, which will lead to happiness. And the minimum that we can do is then that will that will stop us from being born in such places is to avoid negativities.
That is to avoid the ten non-virtuous actions. And and by engaging in the that is that avoid the ten non-virtuous actions to the best of one’s ability you know killing, stealing, and so on then one will be able to avoid these kinds of suffering and then the measure of the intensity of these sufferings. Regarding that, we read again the next two verses, eighty five and eighty six. So of all the forms of happiness there are, the lord of bliss where cravings fully spent. The Lord is bliss where cravings fully spent.
So, to of all the misery there is, the pain in torment unsurpassed, which is the name of the hell, is the worst. So, again, there is this one, kind of happiness, of which craving is is fully spent with it. So one is one is so immersed in it that one cannot do anything about it, when it’s stuck up in it. And the other one, again, the other the other side of it is this torment unsurpassed, this hell of torment without respite. That is the worst kind of suffering.
For one whole day on earth, three hundred darts might strike your heart and cause you grievous pain, but that could never illustrate or match a fraction of the smallest pain in hell. English. Let’s go again for that second verse. For one whole day on earth, three hundred darts might strike your heart and cause you grievous pain, but that could never illustrate or match a fraction of the smallest pain in hell. And, again, Geshe-la was explaining that verse.
I can see if you can imagine if you were beaten with a stick three hundred times every day. And and you try to imagine how much suffering there will be if you were beating hard with a stick. Now you take the smallest suffering in in hell realms, and that amount of suffering from being beaten up with the stick wouldn’t make up to a fraction of that suffering. So, again, Geshe-la is pointing out how how hard it will be for us to bear with this beating. And then and and if that is hard, then we can we can easily imagine that if that is not even a fraction of the smallest suffering, then there is no chance we will be able to bear with any kind of suffering in hell realms.
So so again we ought to be we ought to be scared of it. And and so, Geshe-la, is going through the commentary very quickly. So, again, of all the happinesses there are, the greatest happiness of all is that happiness of of nirvana from which there is no more craving. There’s no more suffering. That’s the greatest bliss there is.
And then likewise, of the all of all the sufferings there are, are, resulting from negativities. From amongst all of them, the the greatest suffering is experienced in this the hell of of torment without respite. It is the the worst of the hell realms and of which the suffering is is so extreme that is completely unbearable, impossible to bear, and the hardships are are extreme beyond imagination. So if if we were to take again the the commentary goes for the whole verse again. If we were to take one human day and we were to be beaten up by with a stick three hundred times, and we take that suffering and compare that to the smallest suffering of of of the hell realms.
Again, that suffering of being beaten up very hard with a stick, which is a suffering which is already very extreme and unbearable in in and of itself, that wouldn’t make up to a fraction of the sufferings of the hell realms. And then we are given a verse from Śāntideva in where Śāntideva is saying, look, when you see a fish out of the water, the the fish outside of the water struggling, and we see the fish struggling, beating up and down. We are that that is enough to to cause us to fear, to to be scared of the sufferings of this life. We suffering that we can see in this life, and we are scared of it. So why is it that you are not afraid of this incredible sufferings, this unbearable sufferings of the hell realms?
And then the next topic. So for how long do we have to experience? For how long do they last? So and in the next verse, the frightful pains and torments just described are lived and felt throughout a billion billion years. Until those evil deeds are fully spent, one will not die and shed this life in hell.
So, again, Geshe-la, was going for the commentary. Very simple, very straightforward. So, again, this the sufferings of the hell realms, which are extremely unbearable, we will have to experience them for for billions of years. In the translation, we have a billion years. In the Tibetan, we have a number which is basically a number that which is hard to measure.
It’s so long, so big that it’s hard to measure. We cannot we cannot measure it. So so we have to experience that. We have to experience this suffering for as long as the propelling causes those actions that propelled us into that rebirth are exhausted until they are exhausted. We will not die that life in hell.
We will not shed that life in hell we will have to stay there until that those causes are completely exhausted And Geshe-la is in explaining that the we ordinary how we we we we imagine things that if we were to be beaten or impaled or or or burned and boiled like that we have been described, if that happens to us right now and we die. Right? We would die. If we were to be beaten up like that, if we were to be boiled like that. We would die.
And this is this is how we think. And yet in hell, we don’t die. In hell, these sufferings just compound, and they increase time after time. Okay. Okay.
Okay. Okay. So so So so and also, we are told one one will whatever the results of the actions that one has performed and one oneself has engaged in, none of that will be will go to waste. There’s not gonna be one will have to experience the whole lot of it. If one has performed, one will have to experience the results entirely.
And and there is certain. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay.
Okay. So so, again, we are we are given two lines of verse from the the king of concentration sūtra. And and those two lines are just saying, basically, if you have performed it, if you have performed the action, then you have to experience the results. There is no question about it. Now there are exceptions to that rule, and the exceptions come when we practice the purification practice, when the the confession and purification practice.
If you engage in the purification practices properly, then we you won’t have to experience the the the ripening results, which means those causes will not ripen into suffering results. Or you you you realize emptiness, then, again, you won’t have to experience the results of the of those actions. Or, you know, if you if you have cultivated properly cultivated refuge and and and develop, how to say, compassion and bodhicitta, and then then again, you won’t really have to experience those results. But if you if you do not engage in this practice if we do not accomplish these minds, these paths then we will have to experience the results So we we have been going through all these talks about hells and durations and sufferings and developing fear and what not. And this is one of the last topics that’s going to follow about health and the sufferings, which is then abandoning the need to abandon its causes.
And Geshe-la wants to stop here. We keep on. We take up we take this up again next year so abandoning the causes that lead to this kind of sufferings So again we have seen all these sufferings and we need them to develop the ideas that we we we are we feel fear for the possibility of being born in hell and that we then by force of this fear we take action to abandon the causes that lead to this kind of rebirth and the causes that lead to this kind of rebirth are the negativities, non virtuous actions and the ten non virtuous actions and so on so we abandon them. That’s the idea. We abandon those causes and then we live an ethical life.
You know? And and this way, we we we can avoid the sufferings. Geshe-la is saying we all know the ten non virtues, there are the three non virtues of body, are four non virtues of speech, three non virtues of thought. So we all know what these non virtues are. This is something which is relatively, compared to the rest of the training, relatively easy to practice.
So Geshe-la is asking us to please, you know, think about those things, contemplate these things, think about the ten non virtues and and try do your best to avoid these non virtues deeds. Now if you have any questions, you can ask. So the idea is you didn’t know that, you haven’t heard that, because that is something which is beyond our reach right now so because Geshe-la was saying because we are not able or capable of doing so right now developing great compassion or realizing emptiness right now, he only teaches us about the confession practices, purification practice of confession because that’s what we are able to do. We are able to do that. So that’s why you haven’t heard.
But So you have you have you you heard that by realizing emptiness one attains liberation have you heard that by realizing compassion with compassion one attains enlightenment so in order to attain liberation and enlightenment also one has to abandon the ten non virtues and negativity is what’s going so even though those things are not explicit it is implicit in those teachings that one has to abandon the ten non-virtues Do you understand? A little bit. Do you understand that by realizing emptiness you attain liberation which is a stage free of every suffering? So basically basically don’t be shy. You can ask more questions.
I’m just doing this for the end. That’s what we were told. Yes. Yeah. Naughty part, which means a very short or non existent bad if you Yeah.
If you’re bad, yes. Yeah. There’s no nothing is is written on on on stone. There’s nothing carved on stones here. Okay?
So, again, there is again Geshe-la, look this is just a general rule these things are not hard in stone again there are there are those beings who die and are immediately born in the in the hells. There are those beings who die and are immediately born in the hungry ghosts or animals or gods. Okay. That’s easier. Of course.
Of course. Yeah. Oh. Okay. That’s not fun.
Now that I did all the rice. Okay. Okay. Any more questions? It doesn’t have to be related to the Dharma because it’s the last teaching.
It can be about anything. Sorry? That’s the mandala. That’s the like I said, the Mount Meru and the four continents. We’re gonna offer it to the geshe you are going to offer it to the Geshe. Sara, go, you, you..
Shall we do that? Can you tell us the significance of the because he’s there. He’s got gaps. I’ve got gaps. And that’s often out of respect.
Well the idea is that we are going to we are if Geshe is our teacher then we we see him as our guru as a buddha himself and and in order to cultivate this this loving relationship of student and teacher of master and disciple then we make offerings and the idea is that when we make the mandala offering we are offering everything in the universe the mandala represents the entire universe the sun, the moon, Mount Meru, the four continents as in the cosmology but in the whole planet earth the whole universe everything that is beautiful everything that you like everything everyone that you’re fond of everything you put there is represented in there and you’re imagining it that is the basis for upon which you imagine all those things and you offer you give it to the Geshe and then on top of that you’re giving the body speech and mind of the Buddha the body which is a statue of the Buddha the speech which is a text of the Sūtra and and the mind which is the stupa the stupas are representation of the mind of the Buddha and you offer all those things to to the Buddha to your Buddha and in this way you have this connection you have this relationship and you you guarantee that you’re going to meet with him in the future that you’re going to keep on receiving teachings from him in the future and so on So the idea is again that we accumulate merit in this fashion, great amount great amounts of merit in this fashion and that we have this this, like I said, this relationship, we create this dependent arising, this relationship with dependent arising.
We are creating causes here to accumulate merit to meet with the teacher again to receive the teachings to get enlightened really in this relationship in this in this cause and effect relationship in this dependent arising relation interdependent arising relationship we are creating the cause of our own enlightenment of enlightenment of everybody here alright so, what we do now and we start with the low mandala offering. On page eighty six, at some stage, who is going to offer the body, speech, and mind? We know that Sarah is going to offer the mandala. Who’s gonna offer body speech in mind? So we’re just gonna do the the short mandala.
Okay? Yeah. Yeah. In the page here, it’s having orange and the little leaflet. Doesn’t matter.
I pray to divine assembly that bestows immutable life to please bestow the siddhi of deathlessness on my root guru whose kindness is without equal, whose body all the conquerors of the three times. I pray at the feet of my glorious guru who bestows unfortunate disciples all the stages of the path of sūtra and tantra, that forms the inner essence of the Muni’s teachings and compassion and feelings disseminates the conquerors words. May this great guide of migrating beings have long life who possesses all the characteristics of a holy spiritual friend, such as pure and the three vows, undaunted, and altruistic qualities derived for experience from hearing, contemplation, and meditation. May this great holder of the traditional teachings have long life, who teaches the pure path of sūtra and tantra without contradiction as they are, who protects the internal states of the orders of the Vinaya, who has realised the two stages and has lit the torch of self-knowledge and roused the fire of diligence in practice. May I live long protector who is held in the lotus petals of pure white Dharma and expounds the teachings of the Conqueror with all embracing skill and means to eliminate the darkness and confusion of unfortunate migrating beings.
By the strength of my pure intent, the truth known as the selfless dependent arising of karma and effect. Pure pleasure in the feet of my guru. Many, of this prayer be quickly and easily fulfilled.