Audio recorded at Buddha House Adelaide. Transcript auto-generated and AI-corrected; may contain errors.
About this talk. Khensur Rinpoche opens this 97-minute session with an unusual contrast: secular leaders need only master their domain, while spiritual leaders must transform themselves entirely. Commenting on Nāgārjuna’s Precious Garland — a letter to King Udayi, a man who had killed his own mother yet later attained arhatship — Rinpoche traces how the two collections of merit and wisdom drive the path to Buddhahood. He recounts how the seventh-century Tibetan king Songtsen Gampo arranged marriages with Chinese and Nepali princesses specifically to bring two sacred Buddha statues to Tibet, then contrasts his reign with the demon-incarnate King Langdarma, who dismantled the sangha in 841. Nāgārjuna’s instructions then turn practical: advising the king to stock roadsides with shoes, umbrellas, medicines, and poison antidotes as acts of merit-making. A closing Q&A distills the principle to four factors — motivation, field, intention, and conduct — showing that vast merit requires no wealth, only right intention.
File metadata (for organising)
File: 18 PG 1991 07 02.mp3
UUID: 0855150b-87ab-4687-8f5f-f59b09db7b70
Teacher: Khensur Rinpoche
Collection: Precious Garland 1990-1991 (Khensur Rinpoche)
Date: 1991-07-02
Recorded at: Buddha House Adelaide
Duration: 97.0 minutes
Words: ~3,918
We have found this wonderful human life possessed of very sharp intelligence that we can understand whatever it is that we seek to understand. We have this tremendous capacity. So having found this wonderful opportunity of the human life, we must ensure that we make use of it. If we were not to be able to make use of our life, then impermanence, the transitory quality of our human life will confront us, and this would be a great fault not to have made use of it. How can we make use of our human life?
Our main objective goal should be the elimination of our own and others unwanted suffering and the achievement of a stable complete happiness. And how are we to achieve this goal? Initially, it’s through the development of healthy attitudes. Out of healthy attitudes, we’ll flow forth healthy ways of conduct, and out of that, we will be able to achieve, we will be able to abandon that which we do undesirable and gain that which is desirable. What are the healthy attitudes of which we’re speaking?
Firstly, that the longing that oneself and others be free from their suffering and the causes of their suffering, that is to develop compassion. And secondly, the longing that oneself and others have happiness and the causes of happiness, that is the quality of love. And how are we to achieve this end of freeing ourselves and others from the unwanted suffering and finding of happiness? That in order to achieve that, it’s necessary that we ourselves practice what is to be adopted and forego that which is to be rejected. Out of this, if we bring this training to consummation, we will have eliminated all our various faults and brought to consummation all our excellent qualities.
And in doing that, we will have brought about our own welfare. But not only that, we will be able to lead others to the same end. And how are we going to bring about this fulfillment of the welfare of both oneself and others? It is by the elimination of our various faults, such as the afflictive emotions along with their latencies, and additionally accumulating the various collections, the collection of creative potential and the collection of wisdom. In doing this we can eliminate not only our own suffering, but we can eliminate the sufferings of others.
In order that we be able to eliminate our various faults, all the various afflictive emotions along with their latencies, In order that we be able to accumulate the necessary collection of creative potential and wisdom, it’s necessary that we understand what are the various faults to be abandoned, what are the various methods to be implemented. In order to come about, for this understanding to come about, I am going to now engage in listening to and reflecting upon and meditating on the essence of the great vehicle as set forth within the present text, the Precious Garland, and develop such a motivation for the next three minutes. So beginning with the first verse in which it says, With respect and without stint, should construct images of the Buddha, reliquary monuments and temples, and provide abundant riches, food, necessities, and so forth. To eliminate all the defects and maintain the virtues and the practices of high status to wipe out all misconceptions through the consciousness is the practice of definite goodness. We’ve talked about the Buddha, and the Buddha is one who has eliminated all their various faults and brought to consummation all their excellent qualities.
In order to do this, we must accumulate the two collections, the collection of creative potential and that of wisdom. In order to become a leader within the various countries, for example, whether it’s India, America, Russia, or Australia, to become a leader of such a country is necessary that one be not only of intelligence but one have trained well, studied, have gone through the training methods. Likewise, the Buddha is a spiritual leader, and in order to have achieved that end, it was necessary that he had trained, going through the various trainings and in that process accumulated the necessary collections, eliminated all the various faults, developed all the necessary excellent qualities, and had brought his training to completion. But the ways of the secular are not the ways of the spiritual in this respect. Those who become leaders within the secular in worldly ways simply have to know the ins and outs of the object, the area of their concern.
They do not have to transform themselves, but those who seek to be leaders within spiritual matters, it’s necessary that they transform themselves by eliminating all their various faults and bringing to consummation all their excellent qualities. The leaders in the secular area do not need to do this. So secular and spiritual leaders are different from this point of view? So the way in which the Buddha as a spiritual leader brought about his transformation was in terms of accumulating the two collections, the collection of creative potential and wisdom. In dependence upon these two collections, he was able to eliminate all his various faults and bring to consummation all his excellent qualities.
So if we are to become like a Buddha, then it’s necessary that we too accumulate the collections. Here in this present discussion, specifically the collection of the creative potential, and it goes into great detail on the way in which we can go about accumulating the collection of creative potential or merit. The present text of Precious Garland was specifically composed for a king, And so the detailed advice which is being given as a means to, as methods whereby to go about accumulating the collections is in terms of a king. But we can though in terms of a king’s way of accumulating the collection, we can understand it in dependence upon this explanation as presented here. I think that though we can make great use of this text, and it was an argument for public consumption, that he wrote this text mainly for the king.
And why was this? Because previously in India, the kings were all powerful rulers, that they had great control over the affairs of the country in which they governed, and that if they governed well, then things would go well in that area. On the other hand, if they didn’t govern well, things would not go well. So, the situation was such that the general quality of the life within a particular area was controlled very much by the quality of the way in which the ruler governed. But things are different nowadays.
We no longer have all powerful kings. We have democracies which are run by bureaucrats. So, was, but previously it was the case that if the king governed well, that is the leader of that particular province governed well, then the quality of life would go well within that country, and this was my experience in Tibet. Previously there was a Dharma King who was an emanation of Chenrezig by the name of Songtsen Gampo in six forty one. It was at this time that the Dharma was newly propagated in Tibet.
Previous to that, the Dharma didn’t exist. Songtsen Gampo took two wives. One was a princess from China and the other was a princess from Nepal. So why did he invite these princesses to his kingdom? It wasn’t particularly that he wanted a happy marriage with them.
It was that in China there was a statue of Śākyamūni Buddha, which was known as Jowo Rinpoche, and he wanted that very much as a gift from China to be placed in the cathedral, the main cathedral in Lhasa. Therefore, he invited the princess to marry him. Then he married the Nepali princess in order also to have another statue of Mikyodorje, which I can’t think of the Sanskrit at the moment. So that was the reason he invited the Nepali princess to his kingdom. Upon inviting these two princesses, one from China and one from Nepal to marry him, he was asked by each of them what types of gifts shall we bring with us from our countries as a dowry?
And Songtsen Gampo said, I only want from the Chinese princess the statue of Jowo Rinpoche of Śākyamūni Buddha, and from the Nepali princess, I only want that statue of Mikyodorje. So in order to get these statues, he went about in this way. So in this way, he was able to bring the two statues to Tibet. So that these two statues came to Tibet and but additionally, Songtsen Gampo also invited many Indian masters to come and teach the Dharma and to propagate the Dharma in Tibet, and it’s through the kindness of Songtsen Gampo that the Dharma came to exist in Tibet. Then in eight forty one, there came to power a king by the name of King Langdarma.
Eight forty one. What did I say? Eight forty one. King Langdarma. And he had horns and a tail.
He was an emanation of a demon. And under his orders, many monks were disrobed, were killed, and in general the Dharma degenerated in Tibet. So this exemplifies that according to the quality of the ruler, then the quality of the area will follow likewise. The leader has such great control, that in governing well, things will go well, and governing badly, things will go badly. So this is the reason why Nāgārjuna composed this letter, which was mainly addressed to the king, King Udayi, in which he admonished him to act well in his conduct of ruling his kingdom and to create positive potential by supporting the various monastic traditions and the people in general, and in doing this, ensured that his country would prosper.
Actually, this king, King Udayi wasn’t a very nice guy. He had actually killed his mother previously. But out of this teaching of Dharma and following the various advices, putting it into practice, then this king actually achieved a level of a foe destroyer, arhat. Nāgārjuna is talking to the king, and he says, you know, you’ve created a great deal of negativity in the past, so you must make effort to create objects with respect to which you can accumulate collection of creative potential. So what are these newly constructed objects towards which he can create potential?
And so Nāgārjuna advises him to build reliquary monuments, stupas, temples where the monks can congregate. They should be luxurious and large. And that those who congregate within the temples, the monks and nuns, should be fed, clothed, and should be provided for their illnesses. And within the temples that he should have precious images of the Buddhas made, that there should be beautiful paintings of various holy beings painted. So he is advising that all of these be newly constructed, that the reliquaries and temples and that the monks and nuns be newly provided with clothing and food.
And with respect to those which had already been, that is to say, previously we were talking about things that are new: creating new objects. With those which are older objects, old objects which already existed such as books, then he should republish them. He should make offerings to the monks and nuns who were already present aside from those who he’s helping to newly become monks and nuns. And with respect to having newly constructed the reliquaries, they should be, offerings should be made to them as a means of revering the reliquaries, and they should be presented with such precious substances as jewels such as gold and silver, garlands, ornaments, diamonds, corals, pearls, emeralds, various precious jewels. With which. So the various offerings should be made to the reliquaries and the statues newly constructed and with respect to teachers and the bodhisattvas, monks and nuns, that they should be provided with food and clothing, they should be given various goods and performed various services and that they should be ensured that they are in no way harmed or interfered with. And he goes on to advise that you should not respect, revere, or do homage to others, that is the tirthikas.
That is, those who are not understanding the Buddhadharma do not have faith in it and that to such ones you should not make prostrations or offerings. What would be the fault of making offerings to such people? Why is there this fault? Why would there be the fault in making offerings to such people? Because if the king were to act in such a respectful manner, making offerings to these individuals, who in fact may not have any excellent qualities at all.
Others would see acting in this way, emulate or mimic, would copy the king in his conduct and there is the danger that they might become followers of individuals who do not possess any excellent qualities. If the people took a liking toward and became attached to these individuals who in fact may have no excellent qualities, then they’re not understanding the Dharma, they would, the people would receive no benefit. So becoming followers of such individuals who have no understanding of the way of Dharma, then these followers would become confused, especially the way in which to create creative potential, and out of that not creating any creative potential, then the happiness of this life, but not only that, the happiness of future lives would be deteriorated. And not creating any creative potential for their future happiness would be a terribly poor situation for them. In order that the people be enabled to accumulate creative potential, you should ensure that there is a supply of paper, ink, and pens.
And additionally, having published these books, you should provide the supportive conditions where the public may be able to listen to explanations by those who are adept in explaining what is to be rejected and adopted, that they might be able to listen to such teachings and reflect upon it and meditate on it. Additionally, that you should supply those who are troubled with various sufferings, the old, the young, the sick, with medicines, doctors and barbers. He used to say surgeons. You should also construct along the robes, connecting the various villages and towns, rest houses supplying the requisites of food, drink and clothing. And you should, wherever there are obstacles in passing, should repair roads and construct new roads for the easy passage.
For the villagers, you should build parks, flower gardens, amusement centers. Like Australia. And for those areas without water, you should supply water vessels. For those who are sick, are without protection and troubled by suffering, you should compassionately care for them with love. Generally, the winters are cold, but there are intervals during the course of the winter where the weather becomes warm.
And likewise, the summer is generally warm, hot, but there are intervals during the course of the summer when the weather becomes cool. During these unusual unseasonable periods, there are crops and fruit that grow which are of exceptional quality. The advice is being given to the king that he should not keep these exceptional crops and fruits for himself alone, but should share them with others. So essentially what is being said is that other people also like rare foods and that you shouldn’t keep them all for yourself. The king is also advised that along the robes, because people often stepped on thorns by going barefoot, that he should leave in various places along the road shoes.
That because in the hot weather, he should leave along various places along the road, umbrellas. Also because people do step on, also fans, supply people with fans. That because people do step on thorns, he should supply them with tweezers to remove thorns. They should be supplied with needles and threads to repair their clothing and also medicines for sickness. And he should also supply along the robeside the three medicinal fruits and such medicines as butter and honey.
And also for those who are sick from poison, then there should be left in these various places antidotes for poison and specific mantras written out to be read as the antidote for poison. They should supply salves for wounds of the body, feet, head, also benches. He also says that there should be supply of vessels of drinking water, axes for cutting wood. Essentially anything which is a supportive condition or helpful items should be supplied. So what is being said is that whatsoever would be conducive conditions to bring about the happiness of the people, you should make this available out of a sense of altruism. So, as a practice of Dharma out of kind hearted attitude, supplying all of the various conducive items and conditions for their welfare.
Out of providing these conditions, those who are ill will be made happy. Out of bringing happiness to them, then he will create creative potential. Nāgārjuna, being a bodhisattva, is setting out a variety of means by which the king can create positive potential, accumulate positive potential or creative potential. So, similarly, as for ourselves, by way of example, that we should make effort in supplying out of our kind hearted attitude whatever will bring happiness to others, be it materials such as food, clothing, etc. But even speaking a kind word is a conducive condition to bring happiness to others and therefore is a means of accumulating creative potential.
However much and however powerfully and quickly we accumulate the collection of creative potential, Buddhahood is that much nearer. Buddhahood is not a place which we walk to. Buddha is not like somewhere you think, well, I’m going to go to some other place than where I’m at now. I’m going to another country. It’s not like going to such a place.
How do we go to the state of Buddhahood? It is in dependence upon our mind, our internal qualities of our own mind. So it’s not a matter of some sort of physical transformation or transmigration. We’re not going through some particular materialistic change. That the Buddhas of the past, the present, and those who obtain Buddhahood in the future achieve their Buddhahood through an internal transformation, the transformation of their own minds.
And this was achieved by means of accumulating the collections and bringing them to completion and by generating to consummation their internal excellent qualities. It’s not as if they had a small body and they got a big body or they had an ugly body and it became beautiful. For example, there have been individuals in Tibet such as Milarepa and Gotsangpa who achieved Buddhahood in one lifetime. In the example of Milarepa, he had an old worn body, he had no clothes, and he just seemed to sit and remain motionless. But his Buddhahood was not something of the body, it was the internal quality of his mind.
Internally he had become a Buddha. And with respect to Gotsangpa, he was a monk, and externally he did all kinds of strange things, and people called him Crazy Gotsangpa, but internally he was a Buddha. Gotsangpa. Gotsangpa was a great tantric practitioner and but externally it appeared to many that he was always playing children’s games and they called him the foolish Gotsangpa. So the means of achieving Buddhahood are by completing the two collections of creative potential and wisdom.
So we’ll stop there, but if you have questions. These reliquary monuments were not ordinary monuments. They held the I can’t think of the word. The remains, the relics. They held the relics of the Buddha and in making offerings of jewels and tsatsa to these special reliquary monuments, holding these relics, hundreds and thousands of times as great a creative potential would be created than offering otherwise.
Out of this, then the creative potential that the king accumulated in this way, he could be of immense benefit to the world. Without having created this creative potential, there’s no way that benefit and happiness can be brought about. That is this is how benefit and happiness comes about through creative potential. So this was really a very skillful way of creating vast amount of creative potential in order to bring about benefit and happiness to the world. As an example, in a home, if the parents have a lot of creative potential, merit, then their children will be happy.
Contrary wise, if their parents don’t have a great deal of creative potential, then there’s no way their children will be happy. So if the jewels were to simply be sold and the money given or whatever was given to the people, then it be extremely limited. Benefit would be very short lived and then it would be finished completely. I’m just not. You need to do both. So in order to create positive potential, offer not only jewels and prostrations, but flowers, incense, various types of substances.
Every being was at some place my mother and one who had to take the sex or what? So in general, we should mentally respect everyone, but in this particular context, though mentally respecting these individuals, to physically make offerings and offer them prostration. Yes? I was wondering, accumulate merit positive type of generosity if one hasn’t got the material absorbed in the machine. What do you do?
So the degree of. Yes. So in in the creating of a positive potential, in accumulating creative potential, it’s necessary to mainly concern ourselves with the object toward which we’re making offerings and our motivation. The actual substance is not of importance in the sense that it’s not in terms of the thing or how much of it we offer that determines the degree of positive potential that we create. If you were to simply offer one dollar but you offered it with the motivation that may this be able to benefit all sentient beings, then just offering that one dollar would create potential equal to space or even just the crust of food given with such a motivation would likewise create a potential equal to space. So if we have this perfect intention and we have a proper object, then there’s no reason why we cannot create vast amounts of creative potential.
We can just have a small image and make offerings to it with respect and faith. Offer just simple flowers and water and make prayers and this is an excellent way to create creative potential if our motivation is proper. So previously we discussed in the teachings on Lam Rim or the graduated path, the way if one understands, if one is skillful in the ways of creating positive potential then in fact one needs very little material substance, doesn’t need very much. We said that the quality of the creative potential was dependent upon four factors. One was the motivation, the second was the field, the object to which it’s being offered, the third was the intention, and the fourth was the way in which the offering was conducted or carried out.
It is in terms of these four factors, these four factors will determine the greatness or the insignificance of the creative potential created, not the substance itself. Milarepa had almost nothing to offer but he brought to completion his practice of generosity. We are much richer than Milarepa was. So these four factors are motivation, field, conduct, and substance.