Audio recorded at Buddha House Adelaide. Transcript auto-generated and AI-corrected; may contain errors.
About this talk. A pumped-up mandarin that looks beautiful but has had its juice extracted — Khensur Rinpoche uses this image to argue that ethical discipline is the living essence of practice in this 97-minute Lam Rim session. Concluding his commentary on the perfection of generosity, he turns to the second perfection, using an extended fertile-soil metaphor to show that ethics underlies every attainment from human rebirth to buddhahood. He then works through the ten non-virtuous actions — three of body, four of speech, three of mind — showing how the mental trio of covetousness, harmful intention, and wrong views motivates the rest, and tracing all samsaric suffering back to attachment, hatred, and ignorance. A key practical thread runs throughout: bad habits cannot be abandoned until their faults are clearly seen, illustrated by the analogy of finally recognising a dishonest friend for what they are. Part of the ongoing Lam Rim 2000 series at Buddha House.
File metadata (for organising)
File: 26 LR 2000 08 22.mp3
UUID: 4c465b66-6f01-4919-af4d-52dc1f5d7478
Teacher: Khensur Rinpoche
Collection: Lam Rim (Khensur Rinpoche)
Date: 2000-08-22
Recorded at: Buddha House Adelaide
Duration: 97.4 minutes
Words: ~3,681
So we shall develop a motivation of altruistic intention. And after having developed that, do the practices of listening, contemplation, and meditation, so will accumulate a vast quantity of virtues in which will give birth to a good result. We want happiness and also comfortable. Likewise, all motherly sentient beings are same by nature. They are same wishing to live comfortably and have happiness, and they don’t want to have any any to want to face any difficulties and go through the they have faced any sufferings.
So, through the method or the skillful means by practicing Dharma we overcome all those unwanted sufferings and uneasiness. To practice Dharma or the teachings, there are numbers of teachings that one can practice. Among the teachings, The teaching or cultivation of bodhicitta, the altruistic intention is the most essence and utmost practice among the teachings. The bodhicitta, the altruistic intention, has been considered the most essential and utmost among the teachings. It is because one the one part of the bodhicitta has is is to to attain or is to over is to bring both self and others towards the state of ultimate happiness and free them from sufferings.
So, although that bodhicitta, a part of bodhicitta is to bring all the sentient beings including oneself towards the state of ultimate happiness, being free from entire sufferings. It has that very It has that altruism of benefit others, but in order to do so or accomplish that wish, one has to first overcome all negativities and attain the good qualities. Without attaining all those good qualities and overcoming the negativities or faults, one can’t accomplish such wishes. For example, if you demonstrate an example here, a person is down in the water or drowned in the water or a river and as well as oneself is also in drowned in the water. And one can have a wish to free or to get that person out of the water, but by mere wish alone one cannot, because one oneself is also drowning.
So without so it is one can’t free or get out that person from the river because one self is stuck in the water or drowned in the water. And in order to accomplish that wish to free the friend or a person from the water, one first needs to free oneself from the water and reach towards the bank or the seashore. Then one can free the person to get out from the water. So, likewise, in order to help with sentient beings, first, one needs to free one’s own oneself or one’s own mind from all the stains of negativities or the faults and attained the good qualities or or perfected the the the the entire kindheartedness. So working for that purpose and working to free all the negativities and attain good qualities — the mind that has such a wish is called the bodhicitta.
So we shall here first develop a mind that in order to free both self and others from the suffering and bring them to the state of ultimate happiness, I shall first work to purify all the negativities. So in order to purify all the negativities and attain good qualities and attain enlightenment for the sake of the entire sentient beings, I shall hear through the practices of listening, contemplation, On this motivation, we shall do a short meditation on this motivation. The we have recited the numbers of prayers just before. And the re the purpose of reciting all these texts is in in each and every practices. The the prep all the practice should be consist of of of preparation, actual, and the conclusion.
So, likewise, any any any work one one one performs or one does, one needs to have a proper preparation before one act one does the actual work. So without having a proper preparation, one will not succeed in the main work. So, likewise, the the the actual practice is to is is to listen the teachings, teachings, and that is to that is to overcome or to eliminate the bad nature or the bad state of mind and and and develop the the the good state of mind as much as possible. So in order to have proper success in the actual teaching, we do the preparation practices which are the prayers we recite. And the conclusion is the dedication of all the good work we have done during the actual and the preparation practices.
And we dedicate all the virtues, the merit we have attained, for the betterment of the entire sentient beings. So if one man maintained to or able to do a practice which consists which which con which consists the proper practices of preparation, actual end to the conclusion, then that practice will become like a object with a very good quality. The earth or ground, the land is considered to be very important — we are demonstrating an example to explain this. Say, the land or earth is very important that entire object based or or based or depend on the earth. The movable and unmovable objects: the moving objects are said to be any kind of sentient being that walks around, and they depend on the land and without it they cannot exist.
And the unmovable are those objects like rock, mountain, hills, and so forth which exist and stay but can’t move. But where they stay or exist is on the ground or earth. So, the land or earth is very important to all objects because all objects depend on the land and this is the reason that we have lots of wars or the arguments or many the things happened on this between the countries and so forth saying that land belongs to us or that is our boundary so and so, and because of that, because of the land, many countries or the people fight or have wars, like so forth, so this is because the land is very important. So they it’s been considered very important. It is because on because because all these things, you know, which produces give give give us happiness are are based or found on the land, like food and shelter, the different types of animals or creatures, grass, mountains, and so forth, the beautiful land or beautiful, yeah, beautiful areas.
The all these things based on on the land and through and from those having all those wonderful objects, we attain we receive some happiness because of our so because of our happiness comes from that all those objects which based on the land, that’s this is how the land has been considered considered very important. So, all these objects like the grass and so forth are based or depends on the earth, and and and those objects produces us a a a happiness. So likewise, the ethical discipline is like a ground. And on on on on on that ground of ethical discipline, the basis, the entire qualities which we attain which we one can attain, like the upper rebirths of gods, demigods, humans, and having good companions, attaining arhathood or becoming a foe destroyer, being free from saṃsāra, and becoming Bodhisattvas, Buddhas, or attaining the happiness without sufferings. All those good qualities arises or so arise from the the the base basis of ethical discipline.
So ethical discipline is like the root of all those good qualities one can attain. So we were dealing in the we have been dealing on the practices of Bodhisattvas, bodhisattva which are the six perfections. We shall conclude here the the the practices of the first first perfection, which is perfection of giving or generosity, and we shall start here today the ethical discipline and ethics. So the the ethical discipline is like a soil or a earth. And now about the earth, there are different types of about I mean, for the soil or a earth, there are different types.
Some soils are very fertile and very good, and some are very bad. So if if if the land is full of rocks and sand and so forth on that on that on that bad land, one one cannot grow much crops. And and the land with a good soil can produce a very good trees and have fruit. The trees which grow on a good soil or good land, the soil, yeah, good soil will have a very strong or firm root, and on that basis of that root, the tree itself have a very strong how am I going to say now? Okay.
The the good good tree with a good trunk and have beautiful leaves and can produce good fruits. So and and, yeah, that is the that is the benefit of that these are the benefits from from or having a soil, land with a good soil. So it is like Australian land — a very, very good land. As the land which has no good soil can’t produce a good crop or good trees or grass on it. So likewise, a person with the lack of ethical ethics cannot yeah, Has will or have difficulty to attain or or achieve achieve good qualities.
And if we sow a seed of good qualities within a person or a person who has a good ethical good who has maintained or who maintains a good ethics, then it will become like sowing a seed on a on a very fertile soil. The root of the good qualities will become very strong and firm, which can produce good branches, fruit, and so forth. So likewise, if we want to attain good qualities and have achieved the happiness, we should maintain or cultivate a good ethic or ethical discipline. So so it is like the the the ethical the ethical discipline or ethic, the body or a person upon who upon which the ethical ethics and the good good ethic or good good ethical discipline basis. Where the ethical discipline put it this way ethical discipline and the basis on which the ethical discipline, say the body or a mind or a person on which ethical discipline exists, they support each other that because of that ethical discipline, good ethical discipline based on that body or a person, the person or a body eventually becomes very powerful and because of powerful or strong and because of having the firm basis, the good, the body or a person is very powerful or strong, then which can maintain good qualities upon it and in which and help the the ethical discipline to maintain maintain strong.
So through this, it seems that they both help each other. So it is like this: if any object has not lost the main taste or the gist of the quality of the object, then the object will become very powerful. For example, like the milk, the the the the most essence of the milk is the butter. And if the milk has been processed or whatever, and the butter has been taken out from the milk, that milk won’t taste as good as the milk with the butter. So the unpasteurized milk is much tastier than the pasteurized milk, and likewise, the yogurt or a curd.
The curd with that unpasteurized milk has butter in it and that curd or yogurt tastes better than the opposite one. In in in India. Alright. Okay. There are some fruit like a mandarin, right, where the main gist or juice has been extracted through injection or something, so all the main essence of the mandarin has been taken out, and those sorts of mandarins are being sold in the market, sorry.
Externally, it looks beautiful, but it’s huge, like it’s been pumped up. And but once you when you eat it, it doesn’t taste good at all because the main taste has been taken out through injection. So the ethical discipline or the ethic is the main gist of our body. So when during our childhood, a baby when we were baby, we had a very good ethic or good ethical discipline. And because of that, we have a good juice or we have the essence that’s been was good during our childhood.
Because of that, the skins, everything looks beautiful during our childhood. And when we then the next moment, we started growing and growing and started to lose our beauty. And then we start growing and when we reach the age of fourteen, fifteen, sixteen, during that time, we during that stage, we already have lost the certain kind of qualities of a body which we had during our childhood. Yes, when we were kids.
Yes. We have already lost the qualities of the body during the age from fourteen, fifteen, sixteen and going up, and our body is more or less become like those Mandarin in India. And so we started to lose the quality of our body.
It is because of cultivating the ten non-virtuous actions. And because of accumulating those, we lose. It is caused by the all from by all the ten non virtuous actions, but mainly from the three non virtuous of the body that due to the sexual misconduct, stealing, and the killing of producing all these actions of the body, non-virtuous actions of the body, we started to lose our qualities. And also the non-virtues of speech cause us to lose our qualities. Four non virtues, four verbal non virtues are telling lies. The harsh speech telling lie, harsh speech, idle gossip, and the the the, divisive speech.
So by by involving or engaging in those seven non virtues of the body and the speech, three from the body and four from the speech, we lose or or fail to maintain the good act good ethics or good ethical discipline. So the the the the three known virtues of the mind will also encourage one to lose which will make us to decrease or fail us to maintain good ethical discipline, but it is not considered that those three known virtues of the mind will directly affect one does not consider that they consider that they directly affects us to lose the d yeah. The affects to maintain a good ethical discipline. It is because because those three, the non virtuous actions of the mind which are the covetousness, harmful intention, wrong views. So those three act as a act the the covetousness is like is is the attachment, and the harmful intention, which is intention to harm others, and wrong views, which one obscured ones and mislead ones to understand in the narrow way or or or yeah.
Which one which yeah. Or which obscured the obscured one to see the reality. So those three, there can be an action which has been motivated by the three of them, but most of the time, any actions are likely to be motivated by any of those. It can be from both three of them or one. So because they act as a motivational intention which activates those the person to engage or cultivate the rest of the non virtuous ten non virtuous actions, the three of body and the four from the mind.
Speech, sir. So the three non-virtuous actions of the mind are like the motivation or intention to produce the rest of the non-virtuous actions. Due to this, these three are like the ground from which the non-virtues of the body and the speech arise. So, from those three non virtuous actions of the mind comes the rest of the seven non virtuous, the body and the speech. Because of those two acts as a motivation or intention, they provoke one to cultivate or involve the rest of the non virtuous actions.
By performing those actions, one cultivates the bad action or bad karma. This shows that the three non virtues of the poor mind are the root of negative actions. So those three non-virtuous actions of the mind — the covetousness, harmful intention, and wrong views — are the three roots from which the non-virtuous actions arise. Like the rest of the seven. Those three are the disturbing emotions.
Cultivating the three opposites of those — non-covetousness, non-harmful intention, and eliminating wrong views — and performing the three opposite to them, which act as the motivation to produce the rest of the seven opposites of the non-virtuous actions. By doing so, one cultivates the good karma or good action, and that will result one to result towards the good produces a good result of happiness. So because of this, the the the ethic or ethical discipline, maintaining a good ethical discipline is very important. So, because of the three disturbing emotions, the attachment, anger, hatred, and the confusion or ignorance.
They act as a motivation or a basis on which produces the non virtuous actions, and that will cultivate a karma. Because of having bad karmas, one will undergo through the sufferings of saṃsāra or cyclic existence. So this implies that the disturbing emotions, the main one, attachment, hatred, and the ignorance or confusions are the root of the entire sufferings of saṃsāra. And then opposite to those three, the non attachment, non hatred, and non confusions are the root of the entire happiness, the happiness taking human happiness of the human god, demigods, arhats, liberations, bodhisattvas, enlightenment, so forth. So, Even though there are ten non virtuous actions, but the non virtuous actions of the body and the speech, are in seven seven in number, are the main to to to to to fail to to maintain a good ethical discipline.
So restraining from the seven non-virtuous actions of the body and speech is to maintain a good ethical discipline. So to maintain a good ethical discipline, first, one needs to cultivate a mind which the mind which has a firm determination of not cultivating those seven non virtuous actions of the body and speech. Having that firm mind, then one can maintain good ethics. So, to be able to maintain a good ethical discipline, one needs to cultivate a mind which has a strong or firm determination of abandoning the seven non-virtuous actions of the body and the speech. So in order to do so, one need to see the disadvantages or disadvantages or the faults of cultivating those seven non virtuous actions.
Seeing that doing those seven non virtuous actions, it produces or one undergoes through the the sufferings of saṃsāra and the suffering of lower rebirth in particular. So by knowing all this, that one has a lot of disadvantages or not have a bad effect on doing so. So, seeing the faulty part of doing such actions is very important. By seeing all these defaults or, yeah, faults, then one can maintain one can cultivate a very strong to determine mind not to cultivate any of of those actions. And doing so, that will help ones to maintain a good ethical discipline.
So without seeing the fault of those, one can’t cultivate such a firm, determined mind because it is like meeting someone from the first sight, going out with the person, and so on and so forth. Later on, finding the bad side of the person that he’s such a liar, has a strong, very short temper, has strong anger and steals and so forth. Knowing that bad part of the person, then one will promise or determine oneself will never see that person or never make friends or make deals with that person. Likewise, seeing the disadvantages or the faulty part of doing those actions is very important. To see them, those are the root where from them comes all the sufferings of the saṃsāra.
So we face a lot of sufferings and undergo huge sufferings, have difficult times, and are unsuccessful and so forth. It is because of not knowing the source of those causes, or the root of those miseries. On top of that, we don’t know the source of that. Because of not knowing where do those problems come, one stay or live with those roots of the sufferings, and by living with the root of the sufferings, one receives or one suffers all the time. So in order to abandon the bad actions, one needs to see the disadvantages or the faults doing the faults of the bad actions.
Knowing all this is very important, because by knowing the disadvantages of the downfalls of doing so and so, one can abandon, one will develop a mind not to commit such actions. If we don’t understand, then we’ll keep cultivating the same bad actions which produces us suffering all the time. Likewise, for example, the people who use intoxicants, because of not knowing the proper faults of drinking alcohol or taking drugs and so forth. Because of not proper understanding of the faults of those, one keep going with the habits of alcohol, drugs, and so forth. And at the end, the person suffers.
Eventually, the person may even commit suicide at the end. So to see the bad part or the fault part, seeing the fault of doing such any actions is is is very important. So and, yeah, important. So our practice is — it is very important for us to see, to understand good action as good and bad action as bad. And by knowing this, we engage in the practice, and through such, we attain the happiness free from sufferings.
So therefore, the practices of abandoning the ten non virtues and cultivating the ten virtuous actions are set forth by the Buddha Śākyamūni and for the in general, which are to be practiced by both the laypeople as well as the ordained ones. So we’ll stop the teaching here and also not take any questions today because we have something to do afterwards, after the teaching, probably. Yeah, and today After the dedication prayers, we will do the Words of Truth.