Audio recorded at Buddha House Adelaide. Transcript auto-generated and AI-corrected; may contain errors.
About this talk. A verse from Tsongkhapa — all conditions are met, companions have gathered, and failing to practice means cycling through birth, aging, and death — opens Khensur Rinpoche’s first session of the 1990 Mahāmudrā retreat. In this 49-minute talk, he maps the three-part structure (preparation, meditation, dedication), distinguishes tantric from sūtra Mahāmudrā, and walks through the five preliminary practices. The session’s core reframes the Three Jewels for practitioners who feel Buddhas and the realized Sangha are remote: the teacher stands as Buddha’s emanation, accessible Dharma means abandoning the ten unskillful actions, and the spiritual community is the fellow retreatants beside you. He closes on the awakening heart as the sole criterion of Great Vehicle practice — not the act but the motivation: even giving a crust of bread to a bird with the awakening heart qualifies; practicing Mahāmudrā without it does not.
File metadata (for organising)
File: 01 MR 1990 04 13.mp3
UUID: 14545637-2fa2-4db7-8285-43e4a64b6e12
Teacher: Khensur Rinpoche
Collection: Mahāmudrā Retreat (Khensur Rinpoche)
Date: 1990-04-13
Recorded at: Buddha House Adelaide
Duration: 49.3 minutes
Words: ~2,881
To sever the continuum of attachment to the conception of self and bringing consummate skill and love and compassion in the awakening heart. We pray to the supremely wise Mañjuśrī, father who gives birth to the conquerors of the three times, in the infinite Buddha fields of the ten directions of the universe, that we may quickly attain the supreme Mahāmudrā path of unity, severing the continuum of attachment to the conception of self and bringing consummate skill in our motivation that I must attain perfect Buddhahood in order to eliminate the faults and bring the complete excellent qualities to myself and all sentient beings equal to space. So we’re having attained perfect Buddhahood. I will then separate completely from their suffering and bring consummate happiness to all sentient beings equal to space.
And so in order to achieve that end, I am going to practice the essence of the great vehicle, the Mahāmudrā, in order to be able to integrate it through meditation. And thus developing, we are going to spend five minutes developing the motivation for listening to this teaching on Mahāmudrā, developing the awakening heart as our altruistic motivation. Could you tell the cook that we’ll eat as soon after twelve as as convenient?
So Rinpoche was quoting from a verse by Tsongkhapa in which he was admonishing us to appreciate everything that we possess, that we have a human life, and that we have the basis, and therefore the basis for carrying on a successful practice of the Dharma, that we have eliminated all the conflicting conditions, and we have all the conducive conditions to practice and this is an extremely fortunate opportunity that has presented itself to us. That in order to carry on this most important practice of Dharma that we have everything that we need. That we have the companions to assist us, that we have a teacher to guide us, that this presents a golden opportunity. We have everything that we need to practice. And what do we need?
We want happiness which is divorced of any type of suffering and we have all the conducive conditions to bring that about. Therefore we have this this precious opportunity and we necessarily necessary to take advantage of it. If we don’t practice, if we don’t take advantage of this opportunity then we’re going to again and again go through the process of birth, sickness, aging, and death. Presently we aren’t undergoing these difficulties. But if we don’t practice then it’s definite that they will quickly arrive and then we won’t be able to practice.
Again and again in the future having to undergo these conditions of birth, aging, disease, and death. And just like us, all sentient beings are going through the same experience of birth, aging, disease, death. But other sentient beings unlike ourselves do not have the opportunities, the leisure that we have in order to carry on a practice. And so our practice has to be directed toward helping them. And therefore our practice should be dedicated toward achieving Buddhahood in order to bring complete happiness to others.
So we have we have attained this opportunity to achieve Buddhahood whereby to eliminate the sufferings of all sentient beings. The way in which we bring about this attainment is through the practice of Dharma, the spiritual path. And among the spiritual paths of Dharma there is a lesser vehicle and the greater vehicle. And we are seeking to put in the practice the greater vehicle. But not only that, but additionally, within the greater vehicle, practicing the quickest method by means of the secret mantra in which we can attain Buddhahood in fifteen, twenty or thirty years.
In order to actually bring this about is necessary to practice well. And as a means to that we must know how to practice. That is to say what is to be rejected, what is to be adopted, what is to be abandoned, what is to be cultivated. And in order to achieve that, it’s necessary to listen to the teachings again and again. So today, within the great vehicle, we are going to present the teachings on the profound Mahāmudrā, or the great seal.
So in presenting this teaching, the essential abbreviated — if we condense the practice — we can present them by way of three divisions. The first is the activity of preparation. The second is the actual practice of Mahāmudrā, that is meditation on Mahāmudrā. And then the the at the conclusion, the prayers of dedication. So in general, with respect to the first of these activities, preparation, we can talk about the great vehicle being divided into two.
The secret mantra and the perfection vehicles. And likewise with respect to the practice of Mahāmudrā, we can speak of it there are two types. There is the Mahāmudrā which is contained within the sūtra, or that is the perfection vehicle, and Mahāmudrā which is contained within tantra, or secret mantra. So the order of presentation within the teaching is that in the beginning Mahāmudrā according to mantra — that is to say tantra — is presented. And then after that Mahāmudrā according to the perfection vehicle.
So according to Mahāmudrā — Mahāmudrā according to the mantra vehicle — we’re discussing the first of these three divisions, that of preparation. So the preparation is the preliminary practices, and these preliminary practices are: first, going for refuge; the mind generation, that is to say the awakening heart; offering of the mandala; the practice of Vajrasattva; and that of Guru Yoga or union with the spiritual teacher. So in general, the first of these preliminaries, the first two, that is the going for refuge in generation. And this is contained within this verse that we’ve all recited, that to the Buddha, Dharma, and the Sangha. And the Buddha refers to the Buddha jewel, the Dharma to the Dharma jewel.
And here it says Sangha. Actually, the literal translation is the supreme assembly, which means the Sangha, the spiritual community, having gone for refuge. And then it states that I go for refuge until I’m enlightened. And on the basis of concern about future dissatisfaction and the seeking to attain all of the excellent qualities, we continually will go for refuge to these Three Jewels until our own actual enlightenment. So we go initially for refuge to the Buddha jewel, and this is the elimination of all faults, bringing to consummation all the excellent qualities. And this is done to bring about the ultimate welfare of both oneself and others.
And why do we go for refuge to the Buddha? It is because it is the Buddha, the Buddha jewel, which shows us what is to be adopted and what is to be rejected, what is to be abandoned, shows us the means of practice. And therefore, we go to the Buddha for refuge in order to come to this understanding. Then we go for refuge to the Dharma jewel and there are two types of Dharma jewels. First, we have to understand that we ourselves are experiencing dissatisfaction and that questioning what is in order to abandon that suffering, that dissatisfaction, we have to understand from what is the root, from where is our suffering coming from.
And it’s coming from a distorted awareness, that is to say ignorance, and specifically ignorance which conceives of a self, of persons. Out of this misconception we create karma, and out of this karma arises all our various sufferings. Therefore, when we talk about the dharma jewel, the first type is that realization of selflessness, which is free from this distorted conception, this distorted awareness. Therefore, the first type of Dharma jewel is the direct realization of emptiness. It is by means of this that we cut the root of suffering.
Just as in the case that we cut the root of a tree, we eliminate the entire tree. Likewise, by eliminating the root of our suffering, all suffering is eliminated and we achieve a type of happiness which is completely divorced of any suffering. It is through the development of the Dharma within ourselves that we are able to eliminate all our suffering. And how do we do that? How do we actually develop the Dharma within us?
We make use of the teachings of the Buddha, that is, following the practices outlined by the teacher of the Dharma as to what is to be adopted and what is to be rejected. But in the pursuance of implementing these teachings, it’s necessary that we have those who assist us, that we cannot do it by ourselves alone. And therefore we go for refuge to spiritual community jewel or the Sangha jewel. And the Sangha jewel are those who have achieved the realizations of the teachings and therefore are in a position to help us in our practice to implement these teachings for ourselves and realize the Dharma Jewel within ourselves. So these are the Three Jewels by means of which we are able to go beyond all our anxieties and our dissatisfactions.
And understanding that we must continually make use of these Three Jewels until our own Buddhahood itself. And they are gaining conviction in these Three Jewels, you know, pinning our hopes on these Three Jewels to actually go beyond our present dissatisfaction to achieve Buddhahood and going to this refuge until we actually realize Buddhahood ourselves. So in talking about the these Three Jewels, the Buddha, Dharma and the spiritual community jewel — we are presently in a position where there are no Buddhas present. There are no superiors of the spiritual community. They are as if far away from our present level.
So we’re in a position presently where there are no Buddhas present, that the Dharma is far away from us, that that spiritual community and those who have generated paths within their continuum are at a great distance. And what are we to do in such a position? That even though this may be the situation which we’re in, still there are emanations of the Buddha present, that one’s own spiritual teacher is to be seen as an emanation of the Buddha, that spiritual friend, the spiritual teacher, teaches the same path in accordance with what is to be adopted and what is to be rejected as the Buddha would himself. Therefore, it is to be thought that the spiritual teacher is a representative of the Buddha. So it’s extremely important that we practice in accordance with the teachings of the spiritual teacher.
So as was previously mentioned, we said that Dharma seems to be very far away from us. What we mean by that Dharma is the actual Dharma of the realization of emptiness, that is in the continuums of superiors. And what are we to do since that dharma is far away from us? What dharma is close to us? And what is the substitute for that type of Dharma?
And this is the abandonment of the ten non virtuous or the ten unskillful actions and implementing the skillful actions. We can practice that. We can do that. And recognizing what are the ten unskillful actions. And this is our our actual Dharma for us.
So understanding that we there is a Dharma which we can implement even now, and that is beginning to abandon the ten unskillful acts and implementing, putting into practice the ten skillful actions, and to recognize the ten unskillful actions such as the three physical unskillful actions of killing, stealing, and sexual misconduct. The four verbal unskillful actions of lying, divisive speech, harmful speech, and idle gossip. And the three mental unskillful actions of covetousness, that is, being without a contented mind, harmful intention, and perverted view that is disbelief in karma, the existence of the Buddha jewels, etcetera. We can do this. We can practice these.
We can abandon the unskillful ones and practice the skillful ones, and this becomes a basis for happiness, eliminating our suffering, and this and we can steadily improve upon this practice until we generate the actual Dharma within our mind. If we’re practicing in this way, then we are not only going to be happy in this life, but we are also in future lives. Not going to take rebirth in bad migrations. We will attain rebirth in happy migrations. And we will have a basis for developing, generating the actual dharma within our mind.
That is the ability we will eventually eliminate completely the root of suffering and attain liberation. And with respect to jewel of the spiritual community, as we said, this is those superiors who have generated the wisdom which directly realizes emptiness. And what is relevant for us since they are not these beings that seem to be at a far distance from us as far as the spiritual community? And these are our actual Dharma friends. Those people like ourselves who are gathered here now.
Those are our Dharma friends who we regularly practice with, that we do retreat with, that we study with. These are our spiritual community. It is said that a bodhisattva takes all sentient beings as their teacher and assisting them in the development of their practice. Even an insect for example. We have depended upon a great kindness of our spiritual friends to have this opportunity to listen to this teaching.
That this teaching on Mahāmudrā is dependent upon the listeners as well as the teacher. And that it could come about if there was only one person, this teaching. And that this gathering, that we have this opportunity, is dependent upon the collective kindness of all of your spiritual friends. Your development in developing the Dharma is dependent upon the collective kindness of your spiritual friends. And we should seek to develop a trust, a liking, and a beneficial attitude towards our spiritual friends as the spiritual community, because it is by that means that we quickly develop and improve in the Dharma. So we shouldn’t allow ourselves to develop the minds of jealousy and harmful intention toward our spiritual friends, but on the contrary, develop the qualities of trusting in them and developing a beneficial intention toward them to help them and rejoicing in whatever practice they do.
So we go for refuge to the Buddha as the source of the Dharma, and to the Dharma as the actual practice, and to the spiritual community as the assembly of those who assist us in implementing the Dharma and putting into practice the teachings. And we specifically go for refuge to the Buddha Dharma and the spiritual community as a distinction. Since we are seeking to implement that spiritual path which was shown by the Buddha. So we go for refuge to the Buddha. But likewise, having faith in the teachings of Christ, then one would go for refuge to Christ and the teachings of Christ in trying to implement them, and go for refuge to the fellowship of those who would assist in implementing them.
And the same would hold true for the, if we went for refuge to the founders of Islam or Hinduism, whichever religion, whichever spiritual practice, distinguishing between the teacher and the methods and those who assist you in implementing those methods. Having taken refuge, we then develop mind generation. And that is contained in the the latter of the two lines. Through the merit I create by practicing giving, and the other perfections may attain Buddhahood for the sake of all beings. And this is mind generation, or the awakening heart.
Having gone for refuge to the Three Jewels, abandoning unskillful actions, beginning to implement skillful actions through the skillful actions of meditating on love and compassion, in dependence upon those various actions we are seeking to attain Buddhahood for the sake of all sentient beings — the development of the awakening heart. And we are seeking to put into practice the great vehicle. And what is the distinctive quality about that is determined by the motivation. And that the motivation for in which the practice becomes the practice of the great vehicle is that what I am doing, I am doing it in order to achieve Buddhahood for the sake of eliminating the suffering of all sentient beings and bringing them complete happiness. That is the distinguishing factor of the motivation of the awakening heart.
And the quality of the great vehicle is not determined by the act itself — the size of the act, how powerful it might appear to be. Whether it’s Dharma or whether it’s the great vehicle is determined solely by our motivation. Even if it’s giving a crust of bread to a bird, if this is done with the motivation of the awakening heart, then it is a practice of the great vehicle. On the other hand, if we are practicing or seeming to practice Mahāmudrā, and we don’t have the motivation of the awakening heart, then it’s not a practice of the great vehicle.
The same holds true for secret mantra. Initially, it’s necessary to develop the motivation of the awakening heart. Otherwise, it’s not a practice of the great vehicle. This is the necessary preliminary preparation for the great vehicle.