Audio recorded at Tibetan Buddhist Institute, Adelaide. Transcript auto-generated and AI-corrected; may contain errors.
About this talk. In this 65-minute teaching, HH the Dalai Lama addresses the Western reception of Guru Yoga, the practice of relating to a spiritual teacher as a manifestation of omniscient mind. He opens by contrasting Western culture’s embrace of “soft nihilism” — a desire for meaning without commitment — with the Eastern religious tradition that understands the guru relationship as foundational. The talk moves through several interconnected ideas: whether omniscient mind is philosophically possible (drawing on both Buddhist logic and non-traditional reasoning); the three qualities Westerners lack when relating to teachers — awe, majesty, and energy — that Tibetans naturally bring; the problem of inauthentic prostration performed out of social conformity rather than genuine veneration; and the paradox that we must choose to see our teacher as enlightened while being permanently unable to know whether he truly is. He argues that the spiritual friend functions as a boundary phenomenon, a mirror for seeing our own projections, and ultimately the goal of all practice. The talk closes with a sobering assessment: most Westerners cannot authentically practice Guru Yoga because the psychological and cultural conditions for genuine relation to a teacher have collapsed in the West. A challenging teaching aimed at serious students willing to examine their actual capacity for this foundational practice.
File metadata (for organising)
File: The Idealized Father 1 – KR.mp3
UUID: 0123dfa1-43c5-40e2-920d-78622432bc8f
Teacher: HH Dalai Lama
Collection: Ilia Seminars
Recorded at: Tibetan Buddhist Institute, Adelaide
Words: ~7,738
Since you all assembled, I think we can start quietly. On the other hand My watch says I’ve got six It’s an Australian watch. A b c d e. So you have a bibliography here for those of you who would wish to pursue some some work on this. And so far, our talks have been general introductory talks.
So we have not had any preliminary prayers since it’s a mixed audience, is Buddhist and non-Buddhist. Today, we will be passing from preliminary background material to more specifically Buddhist material. So I think it is perhaps appropriate for those who are Buddhists to simply recite refuge and to make a symbolic prostration to the triple gem. So this talk was initially articulated the idealized father. And I was going to proceed to a presentation of Guru Yoga as a spiritual practice in the light of psychoanalysis.
In the light of the way these talks have been evolving, it seemed wise to shift somewhat the focus. So we will be focusing more what I would like to call a contemporary presentation of Guru Yoga. And this contemporary presentation of Guru Yoga, arises in the context which we have established in the previous talks, the last two talks. Specifically, if you remember in the first talk, we established that contemporary Western culture is broadly speaking a culture of the fragmentation of desire and a culture of desire. In the last talk, we tried to show the dynamic of Western civilization as one leading from the extreme of eternalism to the extreme of nihilism.
And we mentioned some key historical events in Western history, specifically the three great revolutions. The American Revolution of seventeen seventy six, the French Revolution of seventeen eighty nine, and the Russian Revolution of nineteen seventeen as three critical events where we can say that there has been a de facto affirmation of nihilism as the civilizational philosophy. Now, our present situation is the outcome of that. I would say that we lived at present in an age of soft nihilism, as opposed to the hard militant nihilism of the Russian revolution or the hard militant nihilism which led the Chinese communists to occupy Tibet in 1959 and to wantonly destroy the entire culture. Soft nihilism in the sense that none of us openly espouse the nihilist positions which can be described in the myth of Sisyphus.
But they are very much in the background. Most of us, perhaps not in this room but on the outside, if we were examined about our beliefs would subscribe to some form of benevolent skepticism. It is quite striking that any Buddhist books or any texts by Western Buddhist authors which go in this direction, sort of ambient benevolent skepticism are tremendous successes in the library. A case in point is Stephen Batchelor’s Buddhism Without Beliefs, which might be better called Buddhism without Buddhism. Now, the book is hugely successful and Batchelor is very bright.
So, the huge success of the book tells us something about the culture on the receiving end. The culture on the receiving end is a culture of soft nihilism. It’s a culture which wants meaning soft. In other words, meaning without a lot of commitments, without a lot of hard positions, without anything too disturbing. This is unfortunately very difficult to get.
And it is in this milieu that the contemporary reactions against nihilism have arisen. Now, what is quite striking is that André Malraux, the great French philosopher, who was in many respects a visionary, said the twenty first century will be religious or will not be. And this state that will be religious or will not be. Will not be. And this statement, which at the period, which is in the sixties, I think it was made in ’68, was greeted with bewilderment by French intellectuals, is starting to seem more and more true.
This is the case because man cannot abide for long in a state of nihilism. And the reactions against nihilism tend to be as extreme as a cause which provoked them. The most extreme reactions our entire generation has been experiencing for the last seven or eight years. These are reactions of whole ranges of mankind which refuses the type of valueless, meaningless, hedonistic societies which we have come to propose. And their reaction is as violent and as extreme as the model against which they are reacting.
So these reactions obviously are profoundly destructive reactions. But they are reactions against a very real problem. The very real problem is the absence of any structure. And as we mentioned last time, there is in our society both a wish for structuration and at the same time a profound reticence to accept that auto-structuration is impossible. And this was why, I pointed out the analysis of the great French sociologist Olivier Rey on the the shift in the position of the infant in the pram, which seems to have marked everybody far more than anything I had talked about last time.
But it is very symptomatic, and I did bring it up for the following reason, because it ties in very elegantly with the topic we’re going to be broaching today. Je Tsongkhapa says in Lamrim Chenmo that one of the 10 metaphors for the relation of the student to the spiritual teacher is that the student relates to the spiritual teacher as a child to his father, or as a child to parents. And then he develops this by saying, How does a child relate to his parents? A little boy is always staring at the face of his father to see if he has done right or wrong, and if he sees the slightest frown of displeasure on his father’s face, he immediately amends his behavior. Now for the little boy, in other words, disciple, to stare at the father’s face in that way, he must be facing him.
In other words, there must be communication. If the child, if the disciple is facing away from the Father, is facing away from the spiritual friend, then even though there is a semblance of communication, there is no authentic communication. He does not see the father’s face. He does not see the spiritual friend’s face. And that is why I thought this, the analysis of, this very minor shift in parent child relation which Olivier Rey initiated is very interesting for us because it is that initial educational relation we have with our parents which is the foundation for everything else in our life.
The relation to the spiritual teacher is an amplification and a development of that initial educative relationship. If that initial relationship has been one of devotion from the side of the parents, which it generally is, and one of faith, intimacy, and confidence from the side of the child, then later developments to worldly teachers, for instance, first in school, then at university, and then even mentors in the professional field, will become relations of confidence and trust. And eventually this can be used as a springboard to develop to the ultimate teaching relation, the relation to the spiritual friend. If this is absent, and this is a situation in the West nowadays with the collapse of family as we know it, with very strongly confrontational relations between parents and children, and a refusal of all type of authority, all figures of authority. This is not value neutral.
This we bring with us in our relation to the spiritual friend when we try to build it. So for us the question is going to be very much how we can move to build a relation with a spiritual friend from a very very decadent and inauspicious basis. I always was very struck by the fact that in Milarepa’s beautiful songs, when Milarepa speaks of his teacher Marpa, who was extraordinarily harsh with him, Milarepa refers again and again to Mahba in Tibetan as Palama, father, guru. So this powerful identification with the ultimate father figure, the spiritual father, the spiritual instructor, is clearly present in Marpa’s work, in Milarepa’s work. And then, what we are going to try to do today is to present this difficult topic.
It’s not so much difficult in terms of the ideas as difficult in terms of how we have to live it, in two separate sections. The first is going to be a tentative contemporary presentation of Guru Yoga, which is going to be a presentation of Guru Yoga largely in the light of our situation. I will try to bring in contemporary philosophical concepts. And the second is going to be a more traditional presentation on par with what was done last year here. The criteria in the selection of an appropriate basis for projection and transference.
In other words, the criteria in the selection of a spiritual teacher. And the most practical aspect, which is going to be the issues of resistance to structuration, which concern all of us. So, what we have clearly established is that we are working basically socially at present in the state of spiritual void. Someone in the Guardian compared our present situation to a spiritual nuclear winter. It’s not that far removed.
There is a wish for structuration that is around us. And we have intimated that auto structuration is not possible. We need an other to structure us. The first step in the spiritual path is accepting the necessity of an other to structure us. And then, we have to understand that there are two types of structuring.
There is authentic and inauthentic structuring. Structure in itself is value neutral. It can be beneficial or harmful. Authentic structuring is most definitely what is a benefit to us. But how do we find an authentic structuring other?
One who can structure us in a meaningful way. And does such a person or such a being exist? If he doesn’t exist, then the search is vain and meaningless. If he exists, we need criteria to understand what an authentic structuring other would be. And, I think, although it is a painstaking process, this gradual establishment of what an authentic structuring other is, is capital for us to eventually be able to relate soundly to the spiritual teacher.
An authentic structuring other is an other who understands the full import of our existential predicament, the full range of suffering we are experiencing, and who also understands the full range of remedies which can be applied to this. If we analyze well, we will see that the ideal authentic structuring other is an omniscient authentic structuring other. And therefore the first step in analyzing clearly the import of Guru Yoga is establishing whether or not omniscience is possible. If omniscience is possible, then we should strive to find an authentic structure in other which is omniscient. If omniscient is not omniscience is not possible, then we may have to settle for second best.
So the issue of omniscience is a is a vexed one. I would in no way pretend to propose demonstrations for the existence or non existence of omniscience. I think, however, there are two broad lines of reasoning which are very beneficial. One is a non traditional one and one is a traditional one. It depends a little bit on one’s mental makeup, which one is more appealing for oneself.
I will first perhaps present the non traditional one because it’s a little bit more straightforward in presentation. The non traditional one is complex, but it is also quite powerful. The traditional presentation for the existence of an omniscient mind relies first and foremost on the characteristics of mind. Those of you who attend tenets know that mind has three broad characteristics: it is clear cognitive and impermanent. Impermanent is implied in the cognitive component, but we will bring it out.
If mind is clear cognitive and impermanent, from Dharmakīrti standpoint in Pramānavārttika, this is the foundation on which the existence of omniscience can be established. Since the impermanence of mind entails its changeability, in other words, its capacity to be transformed, Its clarity refers both to its non material aspect, which means the fact that it has no boundaries, and also to its ultimate capacity to cognize. And the term cognitive, which is also present in clarity, indicates a function of mind, which is a mere reflection of its object. So from the Dharmakīrti standpoint, this would intimate that we are dealing with an object or an entity which is unbounded, cognitive, and changeable. And there is no reason to assume that all of the thoughts in such an entity could not be eliminated and all the qualities could not be actualized.
Since the foremost function of this entity is cognition, then the actualization of all qualities means the actualization of ultimate cognition, the cognition of everything, in the full Mahāyāna sense of the term of omniscience, which means a simultaneous cognition of all phenomena. This is a traditional presentation. The non traditional presentation I’ve been working upon I will not enter too much into because it’s quite complex. It starts out with the broad lines of Dharmakīrti’s analysis but tries to formalize them by stating that basically we have a function which relates, the sum total of events, in our universe with the perceiver of those events, which is the mind. And then you have to distinguish between whether the sum total of events can be said to be denumerable or not, and you can use what is called induction to demonstrate that for denumable event events, the function in question actually can be said for the totality of these events, an a fortiori, you know.
For a non denumable set, this is very complicated, and I don’t have the answer. I think, however, it might be accessible. In both cases, what is important, whether we choose a more traditional presentation or the contemporary analysis, which indicates the possibility of the existence of omniscience, is to break down the mental barrier we have which says there is no such thing as an omniscient mind. It’s an unacknowledged mental barrier in most of us. We go through the motions most of the time.
But, once we have at least acknowledged, which I think certainly Dharmakīrti’s demonstration makes evident, that the Buddhist definition of mind opens the way to omniscience, then we have opened ourselves to the beginning understanding of the role of the spiritual friend. Now, when we say that the Buddhist definition of mind opens the way to omniscience, as we said, the Buddhist definition of mind is threefold, that mind is impermanent, clear and cognitive, Of these three factors, two are empirically accessible to us. In other words, they are accessible through examination. If we examine our own minds in meditation, we can see that our minds are impermanent, in other words, are changing. And we can also see that our minds are cognitive, that the function of the mind is actually the mere reflection, the mere cognition of its object.
It would be very difficult for us empirically to establish that the mind is non material. This is critical, because what is material is bounded. If the mind were material, it would exclude the possibility of omniscience. If the mind were non material, it would open the possibility to omniscience. It does not entail it.
There are non material phenomena which are bounded. For instance, the mind of an ordinary being is a non material phenomena which is bounded. But there are also non material phenomena which are unbounded. So that is why, like space, that is why the goal is to try to get to the point where we generate some type of conviction that the mind is non material. Without that, we can’t even begin to talk about Guru Yoga.
So these are lines of reasoning we have to pursue for ourselves, reflect on the nature of mind, and reflect on the infinite expandability of mind. Therefore, on the possibility of the existence of omniscient mind. If an omniscient mind existed, as we said earlier, it would be the authentic structuring other. It would be the ideal teacher. And generally speaking, in Prajñāpāramitā literature, the commentaries on Maitreya’s Abhisamayālamkāra, specifically Gyaltsab Je’s commentaries, a great Sūtra commentator.
The characteristics of the Dharmakāya, which is another name for the omniscient mind, are said to be threefold. These are omniscience, Empathy and Power. These three capacities are sufficient, if they are present, to guarantee that any relationship to such a teacher will be profoundly beneficial for us. And this is where I think Guru Yoga becomes very difficult for Westerners. Westerners see Guru Yoga as my emotional and affective relation to my sweet teacher.
This is not it at all. It has nothing to do with it. In the Buddhist tradition, there are three levels of practice of Guru Yoga. One can practice Guru Yoga at the level of Vinaya, at the level of Pāramitāyāna, in other words, the perfection vehicle or the Mahāyāna, at the Tantric level. While the core of the practice is the same, the way it is practiced is different.
At the level of Vinaya, it is a little bit contrived, you find in a text I’m translating for the October seminar, Throwing the Dice to the Wind by Geshe Tsultim Gyeltsen, that the student relates to the Vinaya elder, as one who can lead him to the qualities of a Buddha. So this is the teacher student relationship at the level of Vinaya. At the level of Pāramitāyāna, or the vehicle of perfections, the student relates to the teacher foreseeing the teacher, foreseeing the guru as a Buddha in actuality, but not in appearance. The teacher actually is the embodiment of the omniscient mind, the embodiment of the dharmakaya. But he does not manifest physically in that aspect.
At the tantric level, and we will not enter into it too much here, since I think many here are not Buddhist and even those who do not have initiation. The teacher is seen not merely as in nature, the Buddha, but in aspect, the Buddha, which is even more difficult. In every single case, however, an authentic relation to the spiritual teacher implies a connection between the spiritual teacher and the omniscient mind. If the existence of omniscient mind is not established, there is no basis for Guru Yoga. There’s only a basis for an emotional relationship to someone who is thought to be the spiritual friend.
But this emotional relationship is too weak to carry authentic practice. And in this context, I would like to read you a quote from a commentary on the Udānavarga, which is a very famous quote, I think many of you know it already, on the function of the spiritual teacher. Sages do not wash away sins with water. They do not clear away being sufferings with their hands. They do not transfer their own knowledge to others.
They liberate by teaching the truth of reality. This is the sum total of the function of the spiritual teacher in the Buddhist context. It is both very uplifting and rather grim. It’s very uplifting because it means at least there is a teacher who can teach us the way out. It’s very grim because only we can do the work.
That’s a grim bit. And I would also like to read you another quote from Geshe Potowa. Everything that Kadampa Geshe has ever written on the topic is very pregnant for the mind. Geshe Potawa says, For attaining freedom, in other words, liberation, there is nothing more important than the Guru. It is sufficient to learn the activities of this life by watching others, but you will not learn them well without an instructor.
Likewise, without a Guru. How can we succeed in traveling to a place where we have never been, having been just reborn from a miserable realm? So you can clearly see that such an instructor cannot be an ordinary being. For that matter, such an instructor really cannot be anything less than omniscient. Anything less than omniscience is not good enough.
Therefore it is capital for us to establish or not the possibility of omniscience before even starting to engage in this relation in searching for such a spiritual teacher. And, I was actually going to read you some very inspiring passages from the 8,000 verse perfection of wisdom sūtra, which is one of the main sources in the Tibetan tradition for how to relate to the spiritual friend at the level of Mahāyāna. So I hardly encourage all of you, since so many beautiful Sutras are translated in English, to try to read the Sutras in English. Now this is a presentation which is going to be very alien to you. And I would suggest that the best way to listen to it is for those of you who think they have a relation with their spiritual teacher, for instance Khensur Rinpoche, if it is Khensur Rinpoche, compare the level of practice which is being presented in the thirtieth chapter of the 8,000 verse Perfection of Wisdom with how we ourselves practice and ask ourselves whether it matches up or not.
It’s a section called Sadāprarudita and the Merchant’s Daughter. Sadāprarudita, as you know, is wandering across ancient India searching for the perfection of wisdom. In other words, searching for that wisdom which realizes emptiness directly. It’s one of the most inspiring of all of the great Buddhist sutras. And Sadāprarudita, son of a Brahman, is, you know, boundless in the efforts he puts to try to find ultimate truth.
And he’s searching for the Bodhisattva Dharmodgata, who is the main proponent of the perfection of wisdom. Sadāprarudita then reflected: with what kind of honoring gift could I now approach the bodhisattva Dharmodgata? I am poor and have nothing of any value, with which I could express my respect and reverence for him. It would not be seemly for me to come without anything at all, but I am poor and that now makes me sad and regretful. Sadāprarudita then decided that he would sell his own body, and with the price thereof, do honor to the Bodhisattva Dharmodgata.
For through the long night of the past, in the measureless cycles of birth and death, thousands of bodies of mine have been shattered, wasted, destroyed and sold, again and again. I have experienced measureless pains in the hells for the sake of sense pleasures, but never yet on behalf of dharmas of this kind, never yet for the purpose of doing honor to beings of such a kind. Sadāprarudita then went to the middle of the market place, lifted up his voice and cried: Who wants a man? Who wants a man?
Who wants to buy a man? Mara, in other words, the Buddhist tempter, the evil one, thereupon so disposed the Brahmins and householders in that town that they could not hear the voice of Sadāprarudita. Shakra Shakra was one of the Hindu deities who acted as protector of Buddhism. In the form of a young man then manifested and said to Sadāprarudita, On behalf of what do you want to sell yourself? Sadāprarudita replied, From love for Dharma I want to sell myself, so as to do worship to dharma and to honor the holy bodhisattva Dharmodgata.
But I do not find a buyer for this body of mine. I have therefore thought to myself that, alas, I must be a person of exceedingly small merit indeed. The young man said, I myself have no need of a man, but my father is due to offer bloody sacrifice. For that I require a man’s heart, his blood and the marrow of his bones. Those you may give me and I shall pay for them.
Sadāprarudita then thought to himself, Now I know that my body is sufficiently perfect for me to win the perfection of wisdom. Shakra, the young man, asked, What price do I give you? Sadāprarudita answered, Give me whatever you will. He then took a sharp sword, pierced his right arm and made the blood flow. He pierced his right thigh, cut the flesh from it, and stirred up to the foot of a wall in order to break the bone.
This is the level of practice we’re talking of. I can see on your faces a mixture of disgust and fear. The next time you say you have a spiritual teacher, please think carefully. Because we go through the motions, we don’t have spiritual teachers. Westerners do not relate correctly to the spiritual teacher.
And because they don’t, the topic is in the process of ceasing to be taught to Westerners. Those of you who were here last Thursday, when Geshe Jampa Gyaltsen was giving the teaching on the essence of nectar, noticed that how relying on the spiritual friend is the first topic presented in Lamrim. Geshe-la said that he would not present in a week, could just read about it. The reason for it is that in the last forty, fifty years, there has been a pattern of Westerners thinking that they have entered into a relation with a spiritual friend and entering into an inauthentic relation. A relation which from their side probably was largely grounded on emotion and affections, not related onto this authentic sense of the spiritual friend as a manifestation of the omniscient mind.
Without that sense, there is no relation to a spiritual friend. You’re better off saying you don’t have a relation to the spiritual friend. Because the track record of Westerners in this matter has been a track record of abandonment of the spiritual friend, time and over again, To the point where Alan Wallace came out with an article a couple years ago, which was in Tricycle First and republished in Snow Lion. Tibetan Buddhism in the West, does it work? The answer was no, it doesn’t work.
Doesn’t work. It It’s been forty years. Where are the great Western yogis? Where are the great Western practitioners? Where is the stability of the community?
Why doesn’t it work? It doesn’t work for the very same reason it wasn’t working in Tibet when Atisha came. Atisha came to Tibet, and Tibetans asked Atisha, How come we don’t have yogis with siddhi, with paranormal powers? Where are our greatly realized practitioners? And Atisha answered: Every realization, from Vinaya all the way to the highest tantric realizations, depends on relying on the spiritual friend.
You do not move beyond seeing the spiritual friend as ordinary. Therefore, for you there are no realizations. This is the situation we are in now. The 8,000 verse perfection of wisdom text gives us an inkling of how a practitioner at the Pāramitāyāna level relates to the spiritual friend. This is not the Tantric level of practice, which is even more demanding.
The reason such a relationship is capital is because it is through seeing the spiritual friend as a manifestation of the dharmakaya, as a manifestation of the omniscient mind, that we actually will put everything he says into practice and abandon everything he tells us to abandon. Such a relation is not one to be entered into lightly. It’s certainly not a relation to be entered into on the basis of emotion or affection. More than once, I have had before and after teachings, people, if you will forgive me for saying this, generally ladies, coming to me with this picture of their teacher and saying, He’s extraordinary. Doesn’t he look so cute?
What is one supposed to say? Where is cuteness mentioned as a criterion for the spiritual teacher? How can a relation arise on this basis? So the result of this has been, time and over again, that students have first given all the signs of coming very close to their teacher, and then walked away without even blinking. I saw this happen with Steve Bachelor.
Steve Bachelor walked away from my teacher Geshe Rabten. I saw it happen with many people. It’s very difficult. So, the next topic I would like to address with you, since we’re talking of authentic and inauthentic relations, is the issue of prostration. That’s why I suggest that we make prostration at the beginning.
Because in the same way as the child in the pram is symbolic of a relation to the teacher, Prostration, and the fact that in our societies prostration is totally absent, is not meaningless. If you think carefully, there is not a single other Westerner to whom you would prostrate. And for that matter, if Kevin Rudd demanded that you prostrate to him, you would probably storm the government palace in Canberra and send him to play with the kangaroos, or whatever you Australians do. Right? The three revolutions we talked about: the American Revolution, the French Revolution, Russian Revolution, or to put it bluntly, revolutions against prostration.
They are a refusal of hierarchy in human society. The challenge we are facing is how do we as Westerners integrate spiritual hierarchy when we have rejected human hierarchy? Ours are societies which are built on militant egalitarianism. We are all equal. And in addition to that much of modernity, are all animals as well.
But, with that viewpoint, how do we integrate the relationship of ultimate veneration for the spiritual friend? How can we be all equal at the social level and suddenly when we go to the temple the spiritual friend is this transcendent figure? How is this possible psychologically for us? The answer in a nutshell is it is not. And that is why I would say that the prostrations we offer are very probably inauthentic prostrations.
An authentic prostration is a prostration which manifests ultimate veneration for the other, the structuring other, to such a degree that we abase ourselves into the dirt. Here we prostrate on very fancy floors, but in India you don’t. You prostrate in the dirt, you know. That is an authentic prostration. An inauthentic prostration is a prostration we perform because it’s what everyone else in the temple does.
They’re doing it, I do it, I want to be part of the community. This is what Buddhists do. Or to put it more bluntly, it’s a hypocritical prostration. Because it is not born out of mental prostration. It is born out of a desire to fit in, a desire to try things out, the endless Western desire of fitting in some rather eccentric Asian community and practicing suspension of disbelief more or less indefinitely.
Until eventually it becomes impossible to practice suspension of disbelief, the westerners believe. This has been much of the history of the entry of Tibetan Buddhism in the West for the last forty or fifty years. So if we are going to offer prostration as westerners, we have to ask ourselves, are we going to offer prostration? It has to be authentic prostration. His Holiness the Dalai Lama no longer allows Westerners to prostrate to human in private audience.
When I met him last, he would not allow me pro to prostrate, so I had to sort of prostrate when he was far away, when he was approaching, you know. The reason for this is because His Holiness obviously feels our prostrations are not sincere. And His Holiness does not like like insincerity. So for us this issue of prostration puts the finger on much of the problems we have with the reception of Guru Yoga. Can we practice Guru Yoga?
If we do not practice Guru Yoga, is there any practice without Guru Yoga? Certainly, all of the texts, the scriptures, all the great teachers say that Guru Yoga is a foundation of the practice. So, if there is no practice of Guru Yoga, what are we left with? If there has to be a practice of Guru Yoga, how are we Westerners going to practice it authentically and sincerely? And not in a hypocritical way, which eventually wounds the teacher.
And then, there are some aspects of the authentic structuring other, in other words, a spiritual teacher, I refer to it for now as a spiritual teacher. I think I have used the term enough, which are completely alien to us. And I have drawn these terms mainly from the great German historian of religions, Rudolf Otto in his text, The Idea of the Holy. But I have seen in the way Tibetans relate to the spiritual teacher, these qualities of the spiritual teacher manifest in their in their relation. These three qualities are what Rudolf Otto calls tremor, which means awefulness.
The awe in the traditional English sense of the awefulness, the sense of awe in front of the spiritual teacher. Majesty and energy. This is completely absent in the Western relation to the spiritual teacher. But when you see Tibetans meet His Holiness, or those of you who were here when His Holiness came, when you see young Tibetans meeting the Sogyal Rinpoche, the relationship is fundamentally different. Why is it different?
It’s because we relate to Sogyal Rinpoche, to Khensur Rinpoche. As sweet, if you forgive me for the term cute father substitute figures. We do not relate to them as living manifestations of the omniscient mind. Because we do not believe, a, that there is an omniscient mind, and b, if there were an omniscient mind, that our teacher is a manifestation thereof. So it’s perfectly legitimate not to believe this.
But be very aware that if you don’t you are not practicing Guru Yoga. You do not qualify. You are not practicing, in other words, the basis of the path. And what you call your relation to your spiritual friend is a purely affective relation, which is neither here nor there. Because as a purely affective relation, what it means is that when the spiritual friend is kind, you will be close, and when he is unkind, you will move away.
That’s what it means. In other words, the spiritual friend’s capacity to transform you as people is absent. Then the spiritual friend has no function to play. The function of the spiritual friend is to guide the students, and guidance is only possible if from their side the students see him as the bearer, the receptacle of all that is holy in their minds. If they are not able to do that in the absence of these three qualities, awfulness, majesty and energy, love and power, The absence of these three qualities indicated, then it is a fictitious relationship.
It is not a transformative relationship. It is not an authentic relationship. And what is capital for us to understand here is that for a, we must strive to generate conviction in the existence of an omniscient mind which manifests for the benefit of others. And while we strive to see our spiritual teacher as such, at the same time it is impossible for us to know whether or not he himself is a manifestation of the omniscient mind. This dilemma has to be kept.
The reason for this is that we ourselves have no access to the mental continuum of others. We have absolutely no way of knowing who is who. We have no way of knowing whether someone has realizations or not, whether their seemingly holy behavior is authentic or hypocritical, whether their seemingly depraved behavior is authentic, or perhaps they are behaving in this way for the benefit of others, we have no way of knowing. Because we do not have access to their minds. As Buddha Śākyamūni says in Gyaltsab Je’s Thar Lam Sal Je, which explains the path to liberation: Apart from I and those like me, let no one judge others.
In other words, apart from those endowed with an omniscient mind, who can therefore see the totality of the continuum of another being, no one is qualified to emit a judgment on others. As Pabongka Rinpoche, which he says, in Liberation in the Palm of Your Hand, the boundary of our knowledge is the boundary of our perceptions. And that in turn is conditioned by our karma. So the situation we are in, as I was saying, is one of a dilemma. On the one hand, for our spiritual growth, we must generate this conviction that an omniscient mind exists and manifests, manifests as spiritual teachers.
On the other hand, it is impossible for us to know whether our individual spiritual teacher is or is not in actuality enlightened. We choose to see him as such. We must see him as such. We are unable to know whether that is a case or not. Therefore, it is an arbitrary and intentional choice of a basis for projection and transference.
When we enter in a relation with a spiritual friend, this is why the relationship is powerful and dangerous. We intentionally choose a basis on which we will project all of the good qualities we ourselves are striving to attain, and which we will also use as a basis of transference in the psychoanalytical sense. In other words, all of the negative qualities which appear from the side of the spiritual friend, we will have to train to see as appearances which are fictitious and projected from our side. This is not a light venture. For this to be a legitimate procedure, such beings which are enlightened must at least exist, otherwise the foundation is not there.
And this is why we must first strive through study, reflection, analysis, to generate conviction within ourselves in the existence of an omniscient mind, which manifests for others. In other words, such beings, there is an omniscient mind, the omniscient mind manifests. Then we have a basis for choosing to see an individual spiritual friend of whom we will never be able to say until we ourselves are fully enlightened, whether or not he himself is enlightened, choosing to see him as enlightened. And the three levels of practice we mentioned, Vinaya, Pāramitāyāna, or tantra. in dependence on this choice, we ourselves will reap all the benefits of his actually being enlightened.
As Khensur Rinpoche said, just Wednesday, the blessings we receive from the spiritual friend are contingent on how we see him. If you see your spiritual friend as an ordinary person, you will reap the non existent rewards of the blessings of an ordinary person. You will not follow his advice, you will do the opposite of what he says, and your purpose will go nowhere. If you see the spiritual friend as a fully enlightened being, you will reap the sum total of rewards of the blessings of enlightened being whether or not he is enlightened from his side. You will have never have any means of knowing whether he’s enlightened or not.
So it is an intentional choice of a basis of projection and transference. And this choice, because it engages our entire spiritual future, since our goal is to become one with a spiritual friend, this choice cannot be made lightly. This choice must be made on very careful criteria. It is much better not to enter in a relation with a spiritual friend than to enter lightly and break the relationship. You are much better off without a spiritual friend.
As Geshe Chekawa said, relating to a spiritual friend means a risk of abandoning the spiritual friend. Abandonment of the spiritual friend is the end of one’s spiritual life. And this issue of the unknowability of others is one which those of you who have the possibility to study later on will address when you study Pramānavārttika. There’s a whole fascinating section on the so called reasons of non observation, where one starts to understand how the non observation of a criterion in no way implies its non existence. So the very fact that we do not observe the criteria of an enlightened being in the spiritual friend are not a sufficient basis for inferring that the spiritual friend is not enlightened.
And actually, you debate on Pramānavārttika, when you debate on Buddhist logic, when someone addresses these false reasons to you that you cannot infer that you can infer that the spiritual friend is enlightened from the signs, you will typically answer in debate the tshol, doubt. In other words, faced with that topic of debate, can either say yes or no. You are in doubt. So as we said, the spiritual friend becomes therefore the arbitrarily chosen basis for the projection of all the good qualities which we ourselves are trying to generate. He is also the mirror on the basis of which transference occurs.
The spiritual friend, therefore, is the main litmus test of our practice. Not only do we strive to see his deeds in the light of the six perfections of the Buddha, not only do we strive to see him as fully enlightened, but we see ourselves and our thoughts in the mirror of his being because we see all of the negativities which we think we see in him as manifestations of our own inner projected negativities. Obviously, for such a powerful practice to occur, the actual distance between the spiritual friend’s authentic nature and full enlightenment must be small. You can practice Guru Yoga with any basis. You could practice Guru Yoga choosing a beggar as your guru in ancient India.
And if you saw the beggar as a Buddha, you would reap the merit of serving a Buddha. But we would not have the strength to do so. We do not have the capacity to do so. So we need spiritual friends whom, as far as we can ascertain, have a maximum of qualities. Because our capacity to handle the cognitive discrepancy between who the spiritual friend is visualized as being and who he appears to be is very limited.
And this is the raison d’etre of what we will address later on, which are the criteria for the selection of an appropriate spiritual friend. Therefore, I would put it to you that we can see the spiritual friend perhaps as a boundary phenomenon. A boundary phenomenon between the boundary of our finite mind and its limited capacities of perception and the manifestation of the infinite mind, the omniscient mind of the dharmakaya. It is at that boundary that the spiritual friend appears, the Guru appears. The spiritual friend appears from among the infinite manifold of forms which enlightened mind can take as the one best able to help us.
So his mode of appearance is totally contingent on the disciple. For a disciple who is of a very choleric nature, the spiritual friend will appear in an awful form. For a disciple who is very sensitive and weak, the spiritual friend will appear in an extraordinarily loving and sensitive form. This is not a choice of the spiritual friend. It’s a natural function of the fully enlightened mind of the dharmakaya to spontaneously manifest in this form best helping beings.
And his appearance at the boundary between the consciousness of ordinary beings and the omniscient mind is just because this is the only place where contact actually can occur. So we are trained by whichever manifestation is most appropriate for training us. And we choose to see our spiritual friend. Should we choose to go this route, and as I can I have been trying to point very clearly to you, I don’t think it is a route for most Westerners, because I don’t think most Westerners can relate to a spiritual friend? And as I mentioned to you last year when I was asked by Rinpoche to start to give these talks, I ask you at the peer to relate to me as a university lecturer, not as a teacher.
Because I don’t have the qualities and you don’t have the capacity. If you can’t relate to your Tibetan teachers, you can’t relate to a Western teacher. The question for us as Westerners is, can we relate to a teacher? Period. That’s the question.
And then, in addition to this aspect of the spiritual teacher as a boundary phenomenon, as a support for projection of the qualities, as the mirror of the transference of the thoughts present in us which we see on the teacher and which enables us to then understand ourselves and correct our thoughts. The spiritual teacher is also a goal. Our goal is union with the spiritual teacher. This is why all of the Guru Yogas, which start with the creation of this figure of the spiritual teacher through visualization always end with the union with the spiritual teacher who dissolves in the disciple. The disciple then acquires the qualities of the spiritual teacher and even trains to visualize himself in the appearance of the spiritual teacher.
So we can say that our entire practice Basis, Path and Result, is the practice of getting ever closer to the spiritual teacher, visualized as omniscient. You can therefore see why abandonment of the spiritual teacher means abandoning one’s entire spiritual practice, and also why choosing the spiritual teacher must be done with extreme care. Extreme care. You are better not having a relation than having a bad relation. Once a relation has been created, it is irreversible.
It’s a one way street. You can go in, you can go out. You can go in, you can go out for a very simple reason. You yourself, from your own side, have said, this one being is a sum total of my ideals. This one being is the being on the basis of which I will understand my thoughts through the process of transference.
This one being is who I want to become. When you turn away from that, there’s not a lot you can reconstruct. So if you’ll forgive me for the worldly metaphor, it’s very much like falling in love. You want to be very careful. If you fall in love with the wrong person, you’re gonna be badly damaged.
That’s just at the mundane level. At the spiritual level, if you fall in love with the wrong person, or if you yourself are too weak to handle a relationship, the spiritual damage is huge. So, I think we have time for a tea break.