Audio recorded at Buddha House Adelaide. Transcript auto-generated and AI-corrected; may contain errors.
About this talk. Khensur Rinpoche opens this nearly two-hour Precious Garland commentary by grounding practice in other-centeredness — cherishing others more than oneself as the indispensable foundation of love, compassion, and the awakening heart. He then works through generosity teachings prompted by a verse advising a king to place roadside vessels of grain and water: why accumulating creative potential purifies past negativities (explaining why diligent practitioners still fall ill), offerings before and after meals, and the origin of the post-meal hand-formed ritual cake — the Buddha’s arrangement with a hungry ghost who killed humans daily to feed five hundred newborn children, the five ridges pressed into dough symbolizing them. A four-fold classification of actions by temporal and ultimate benefit follows, illustrated by a snake-bite analogy, before Rinpoche closes with the Lamrim argument that renunciation of one’s own suffering must precede genuine compassion for others.
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File: 19 PG 1991 07 09.mp3
UUID: 23795e88-1e96-4fae-9b27-093023a7fbc7
Teacher: Khensur Rinpoche
Collection: Precious Garland 1990-1991 (Khensur Rinpoche)
Date: 1991-07-09
Recorded at: Buddha House Adelaide
Duration: 111.6 minutes
Words: ~4,663
Begin by cultivating the awakening heart. In cultivating the awakening heart, we begin by holding others more dear than ourselves. That is to say, we hold all sentient beings. We cherish all sentient beings more than we do ourselves and seek to benefit them. With respect to cherishing others, it is the fact that our self centeredness, that is to say, holding only ourselves dear, is the foundation of all our various faults, whereas other centeredness or cherishing others is the foundation of all excellent qualities.
In dependence upon other centeredness, so cherishing others, we can go on to develop love and compassion, but without this other centeredness, there’s no way to develop love and compassion. And without love and compassion, there’s no way that we can develop the awakening heart. Therefore, it’s very necessary that we begin by cherishing others more than we do ourselves. We may think that holding others dear, practicing other centeredness, through that I will not achieve any of my own welfare, and my own purpose will not be fulfilled. But this is a mistaken notion that by cherishing others, that we ourselves will be able to develop love and compassion, that we’ll be able to develop an awakening heart, that this quality will be the foundation of all excellent qualities and our own welfare will ultimately be fulfilled.
Prior to the actual generation of the awakened heart, it’s necessary that in the context of holding others more dear than ourselves, that we generate love and compassion, and compassion expressed in the thought, May all beings be free of suffering and the causes of suffering, and love expressed in the thought, may all sentient beings have happiness and the causes of happiness. In the context of cherishing others more than myself and wishing to free them from their suffering and the causes of suffering and wishing to bring them happiness and the causes of their happiness, then how can I bring this about? The only way I can bring this about is if I myself were to rid myself of all my various faults and to bring myself to the consummation of all my excellent qualities. Therefore, it is only in this way that I can bring about the happiness of others and to eliminate their suffering. Therefore, in order to free all sentient beings from their suffering and to place them in happiness, I myself must eliminate all my various faults and bring to consummation all my excellent qualities.
And in order to eliminate my various faults, to bring to consummation all my excellent qualities, that I must listen to the various teachings on the great vehicle and upon listening to them, reflect upon them and then go on to meditate on them. And it is by the generation of the power of wisdom that I will ultimately be able to rid myself of all my various faults and to bring to consummation all my excellent qualities. So for the next three minutes, develop the kind hearted attitude that in order to achieve the end as described above, that I am now going to listen to the essence of the great vehicle Dharma, the teaching on the Precious Garland, and having listened to it, I will put it into practice to be of extensive benefit to all sentient beings. The beginning verse from Precious Garland reads, please have small containers in the shade filled with sesame, rice, grains, food, molasses, and suitable water. The Buddha said it’s extremely necessary that we accumulate creative potential.
By the accumulation of creative potential, the various negativities, the unskillful actions that we may have created in past lives can be purified and eliminated during the course of this life through some slight discomfort such as a headache or a toothache. By the slight circumstance of these discomforts, then these various negativities created in the past can be completely eliminated if we have accumulated creative potential. So this is because they may arouse doubts in some practitioners’ minds as to the effectiveness of Dharma because some say, Well, you know, I have been practicing the Dharma well, but still I get sick, I have all kinds of troubles, I have hassles with other people and obviously this Dharma isn’t very effective because I still have these difficulties. Well, this is not the case. It is because of these, it is through the combination of your practice that you are having these difficulties and are able to eliminate the various unskillful past actions of the past.
And not only that, do we eliminate the various negativities of the past, but additionally, through the accumulation of creative potential, whatever we may wish, both within the secular and spiritual realms, we can attain. And furthermore, in dependence upon the accumulation of the creative potential, we can develop vast wisdom and especially the wisdom which realizes emptiness and by this means through the wisdom realizing emptiness, eliminate all our afflictive emotions and thereby be able to attain a state of liberation and Buddhahood. So, on the one hand, by means of the accumulation of creative potential, we are able to purify previous negativities and therefore their result in suffering. Generally, we can say creative potential corresponds to skillful action. Those types of activities which are the opposite of developing creative potential are unskillful actions.
Another third type of action by means of which one takes rebirth in the celestial realms is unmoving karma or unmoving actions. So, it is extremely important that we accumulate creative potential and here in Precious Garland, though this advice is being directed to the king, we as practitioners must take it to heed and also create creative potential. So, the advice which is presently being given to the king is that he should put various vessels along the sides of the road, such as vessels filled, and these vessels should be filled with sesame, rice, grains, food, molasses, and also water should be placed in a shady place such that by sprinkling the water on yourself, you could be refreshed on a journey. So as some of you may know that when we offer a fire offering, a burnt offering, then various offerings are made and amongst these are some of those which have been listed here such as rice and grains, sesame, etc. And additionally, amongst these are Ita Nam and Tashi Nam which are the offerings where we sprinkle water and this is as it’s being described here.
In this case, in the case of a burnt offering, we are offering it to the deity and as a way of accumulating positive potential by offering cooling water. And likewise, in India it’s extremely hot and so these water vessels with this cool water should be placed so that people can refresh themselves and likewise, we can, by this means, accumulate positive potential. And then the next advice which is being offered is the practice of generosity in which a mixture of rice and grains and molasses sugar should be made and placed at the openings of anthills as a practice of generosity. The next advice is the practice of generosity and making offerings, prior to one’s eating and subsequent to one’s eating, the making of offerings of one’s food. And when we take the twenty four hour great vehicle precepts, at the mealtime there’s often made small tormas along with three hand formed offering ritual cakes, okay.
We offer various small ritual cakes along with three hand formed ritual cakes which are made by squeezing of the hand on dough or soft food. And these are prior to eating lunch, making offerings to the Buddhas, etc. And then subsequently making offerings of these ritual cakes to the various hungry ghosts but also making offerings subsequently of some food to dogs, ants, birds, etc. It was customary in Tibet that in general that both those who hold monastic vows and those lay practitioners would generally make these various types of formal offerings before, ritual cake offerings before the eating of their own meal, but especially on those days when they took the twenty four hour great vehicle precepts. But and especially with respect to those who are holding monastic vows, after eating the meal, they would form a ritual, a hand ritual cake which by the squeezing of some type of soft food and it would cause five ridges to be formed in this ritual cake and then there was recitation of a mantra and the snapping of the fingers to eliminate any obstacles to the offering and this would be the offering and this was the Buddha’s prescription for offering after the meals.
So, the origin of this hand offering was that in Bodh Gaya in India, there was a being by the name of Thumma and this being was a hungry ghost and it went about killing many sentient beings and many human beings. Each day, it killed more and more and the Buddha went to this being and requested that he cease killing and he said, But I have to kill. I give birth to, I have five hundred newborn children every day that I have to feed and therefore I have to kill and the Buddha said, if he will cease killing, then I and my followers will offer you a hand offering each day and the hand offering has these five ridges symbolizing these five hundred children which are born every day to this being and we will make this offering to you and those who are followers of me will all make this offering to you. So, by squeezing together some type of soft food, in your hand you form five ridges symbolizing these five hundred children. Then the next advice which is directed toward the king is that those countries in which there are wars and individuals are being persecuted or various victims of disasters and those who are stricken with disease should be given food, clothing, and medicine that they should be extensively cared for.
And those farmers who are stricken with difficulties in having no seed to plant, they should be given seed and all the various necessary conditions to help them, to aid them. What has been described up to now in terms of giving is the direct giving of some substance, some actual thing as a way of benefiting. But there are also ways of giving benefit to others which is not in terms of directly giving some type of substance. So, with respect to this non-substantial way of practicing generosity, as has been previously mentioned, this advice is being directed toward the king and the case was that previously there were kings who had placed exorbitant taxes on their people and the following advice is that one should not place exorbitant taxes on the people, but should reduce the taxes so as not to bring them any difficulties, not to cause them any troubles through tax. And also, you should not practice usury, that is to say, charging exorbitant interest on money loaned, that it should be a nominal amount of interest.
So, the next advice is that to protect the poor from the pain of wanting. Any type of activity which would bring about wanting with respect to those who were already poor should be ceased, should be foregone. And the next advice is that the toll charged on the robes in your kingdom should not be exorbitant, that they should not cause difficulty to others having to pay the toll. And that you should eliminate thieves and robbers in your own and other’s countries. And one should set one’s prices fairly and just, in general, they should be set in order to benefit others and not to, in any way, harm others.
And those things which, such as earth, water, fire and wood, which have no specific owner, should be allowed to be temporarily used by others and one should not hold on to them selfishly. If one can practice the giving of one’s own body and possessions, objects of enjoyment without seeking to hold onto them selfishly, one will create a potential equal to space as the bodhisattvas do. By giving your body and possessions to all sentient beings and not holding on to them selfishly, one creates a vast accumulation of creative potential. So thus far we have been talking about sentient beings, the practice of generosity with sentient beings in general, but now we’re going to talk about general sentient beings previously. Now we’re going to talk about particular sentient beings, specific sentient beings.
So, here the advice is that one should give beautiful girls, well adorned. So the results of giving away beautiful girls who are well adorned is that one will be able to retain the excellent Dharma, that whatever teachings one has listened to previously, one will be able to hold within oneself without forgetting it, and additionally upon teaching the Dharma, others will readily understand what one is teaching. Girls well adorned. The Buddha himself gave away his own mother, his spouse, his children, all the objects of enjoyment, his own body. And in dependence upon this accumulated extremely extensive vast collection of creative potential.
And one should lovingly give various glittering clothes, ornaments, perfumes, garments, objects of enjoyment. And if in providing the supportive conditions for those individuals who are unable to listen to the Dharma, to be able to listen to the teachings of the Dharma is said to be the supreme gift that we can give to others, that this is the perfect act of generosity. And the Buddha said that if it’s beneficial, then we can even give poison to someone if it’s going to help them. On the other hand, if it’s not going to help them, if there’s no benefit, we shouldn’t even give that which is excellent or even delicious food would be of no benefit to give. So, in general, with respect to our various activities, though there may be some temporal difficulties, if there is going to be a deep benefit gained, then we should seek to forbear in the activity and continue on.
So, by way of exemplifying the necessity to forbear temporal difficulties in order to bring about some sort of ultimate benefit or a deeper, more far reaching benefit, would be in the case of if one were bitten by a poisonous snake. The poison will spread very quickly. If your finger was bitten, it would spread down your arm. But finally, if it were to spread to your heart, then you would die. So though it may be quite painful temporarily, having been bitten by a poisonous snake, if you were to cut your finger off at that moment.
It would be quite temporarily painful. Ultimately, it would be of great benefit. It would save your life. The poison would not be able to spread to the rest of your body and to your heart and you would therefore not die. Therefore, in order to save your life and to create a greater ultimate benefit, it may be necessary to forbear some kind of temporal pain or difficulty.
With respect to activities, the various types of activities, we can classify them into four types. There are those types of activities which are both temporally and ultimately beneficial. There are those which are both temporally and ultimately harmful. There are those which are ultimately beneficial but temporally harmful. And those which are temporally beneficial but ultimately harmful.
So with respect to those types of activities which are both temporally and ultimately beneficial, then we should engage in the practices of those types of activities even though it might incur some difficulty. Though it may be difficult because we want happiness, that such activities will bring about both benefit and happiness that we are seeking and therefore, we should be willing to forego the difficulties incurred. Then with the second type of activity, those which are both harmful temporally and ultimately, then whatever the activity might be, we should cease it. Then with respect to the third type of activity, those types of activities which we find some happiness in, a slight type of happiness, but which ultimately bring us suffering, ultimately will bring us no happiness, those types of activities are to be abandoned. Then the fourth type of activity in which there is some temporal trouble or difficulty, some type of suffering involved, but ultimately there is benefit and happiness.
We should forbear these types of activities though they might be difficult and seek to practice them. In the case of the example which has already been given, in the case of the poisonous snake having bitten your finger though it’s temporarily quite painful to cut your finger off, ultimately it’s a great benefit. And additionally, if one has to necessarily undergo an operation, though temporarily it’s quite painful and it’s very difficult. Still because of the ultimate benefit to be gained in going through the operation, we should forbear and incur the difficulty. In this, we can describe how we should carry on our practice such that we can ensure that it will go well.
What we’ve done in the past is finished, it’s gone. What has been done is done. But with respect to future activities, we should reflect upon those activities which we’re contemplating engaging in and examine them before we do them as to the quality of their benefit or harm. Whether they will bring about some type of temporal benefit or temporal harm or ultimate harm. We have to ensure that because we want to be happy, we don’t want to suffer and we have to ensure that what we’re doing is going to bring us what it is we want.
Those types of activities which may bring us some kind of temporal pleasure but are ultimately harmful, we should not engage in. We should abandon. We should cease. But those types of activities, though temporarily may be difficult, but will bring about our ultimate welfare, we should definitely practice. And especially those types of activities which are both temporarily and ultimately beneficial and bring us happiness.
We should ensure that we make a point to engage in these types of practices. So, in this way we can begin to examine our various activities and ensure that we will find an ultimate happiness and will be willing to forbear in incurring temporal difficulties. With respect to our activities, should reflect upon those in terms of the three times, the past, present and future. Examine what we have done in the past and understand that we’ve made various mistakes in the past. We’ve acted unwisely.
We’ve acted out of unknowing and have created many negativities in the past. Additionally, we examine what we’re doing now. Is what I’m doing now of any benefit or is it going to bring me harm? And the activities which one is contemplating engaging in the future, examining them as to whether there will be a benefit and a harm. If they are going to be of harm, then drop them.
If they are going to be of benefit, then practice them. And we can do this examination of these three times with respect to our activities each day and if we do this, then our practice will go well. Previously, out of unknowing, we’ve created many mistakes. We hadn’t listened to the teachings on the Dharma and therefore created many errors in the past. We simply didn’t know what was of benefit and what wasn’t.
But now having listened to the Dharma, having had explanations of what is beneficial and what is harmful, If we were to continue in this unknowing manner and still continuing in these mistakes, then this would be a sorry situation. Now that we have some understanding as to what is beneficial and harmful, And from the point of view that we want happiness and we don’t want to suffer, we should know how to practice because we though wanting happiness, if we do not create the causes of happiness, then we will not experience happiness in the future. And though not wanting to suffer, if we continue to create the causes of suffering, then we will experience suffering in the future. So knowing that we want happiness, knowing how to create that happiness, knowing that we don’t want suffering, and knowing how to avoid suffering, we should implement what we have heard in our practice. If we continue in our erroneous and mistaken way of acting and continue to harm ourselves, what to speak about loving others if we don’t even love ourselves?
So, if we don’t love ourselves as individuals, it would be extremely difficult to love others. Why is that? Why if we don’t have love for ourselves, would it be difficult to have love for others? Because love for ourselves is in terms of renunciation. That with respect to renunciation, seeing our own troubles, we develop a longing to be free from our own suffering and the causes of our suffering.
And therefore, we develop love and compassion with respect to ourselves and without this basis of renunciation, this longing to free ourselves from suffering and the causes of the suffering, then we can never develop love and compassion for others which wishes to free others from their suffering and the causes of suffering and to bring them happiness. If the longing to bring about one’s own welfare has never even appeared to you in a dream, then how can you ever hope to generate it toward others? So, if the awareness which longs that we as individuals be free of our suffering has never even appeared in a dream, what to say in a waking state, it has never even appeared in a dream, then how can we ever expect it to arise with respect to others? This is why the order of training is set forth in this manner in terms of the graduated path of the Lam Rim in which one as a prerequisite to generating the path of being of vast perspective must necessarily train in the practices of the being of narrow and middling perspective. That is to say, renunciation must precede the development of compassion for other sentient beings.
When we talk about great compassion, we simply don’t mean that one becomes a little bit upset by seeing troubled sentient beings and maybe gives them some food or medicine. But the fact that the mind, one’s mind, is generated in the entity of great compassion, that one’s own mind is great compassion, that when we meditate, we’re generating our mind in the entity of the object of meditation and likewise with renunciation, the mind becomes the mind of renunciation. It’s generated in the entity of that. In meditating on the awakening heart or compassion, one’s own mind is generated in the entity of compassion. One’s own and in terms of renunciation, one’s own mind is generated or transformed into the entity of renunciation.
So, it is said that some may think, well, you know, I don’t like to meditate on compassion. It upsets me. I don’t find it very, I find it uncomfortable. You know, it is true. When you meditate, when you cultivate compassion, you are observing suffering sentient beings in your mind and this brings some uncomfortability to your mind.
It’s not pleasant. But because out of this, one will develop the awakening heart, one will create a vast collection of creative potential, and the power of the mind is increased to the point where one can attain Buddhahood. And therefore, though it’s temporally discomforting, it is ultimately beneficial and therefore we should forbear, we should be patient and practice and cultivate great compassion. The same holds true with respect to the meditation on renunciation. It’s necessary that we meditate on renunciation, but no one likes to contemplate suffering.
It’s not very pleasant. We don’t like to hear about suffering. We don’t like to see suffering. We don’t like to think about suffering. But still, we must meditate on it.
We must cultivate its understanding because there’s great benefit to be derived out of developing renunciation, which arises out of contemplating suffering. Having developed renunciation, you will go on to develop compassion. And in dependence upon developing compassion, you will develop an awakening heart. And out of developing an awakening heart, you will achieve the ultimate result of Buddhahood. So therefore, it’s necessary that we contemplate, though we don’t like it, suffering and we have to contemplate, for example, the four attributes of the first noble truth, the truth of suffering, the attributes of impermanence, dissatisfactoriness, emptiness and selflessness. And it’s not very pleasant to contemplate these things, but it’s quite necessary because it is of ultimate great benefit.
It will bring about renunciation and ultimately Buddhahood. So the sense which we’re trying to convey here is that it may be difficult to cultivate, it may be temporally difficult to cultivate many of these understandings because of their great ultimate benefit one should forbear. We’ll stop there, but if you have some questions. So after this present explanation of the way of accumulating the collection of creative potential will then take up the way of accumulating the collection of wisdom. In order to achieve Buddhahood, it’s necessary to accumulate both of these collections of creative potential and wisdom.
The the verse here. This verse in which it sets out that one is allowed to give away beautiful women well adorned. It was an answer to a qualm which was arisen as to whether it was allowable, whether it was permissible, addressed to Nāgārjuna: you know, can I give away a beautiful woman as a means of accumulating the collection of creative potential? And Nāgārjuna says yes because and he goes on to cite the fact that the Buddha had given away thousands of beautiful women in the past in order to create creative potential. So, the Buddha himself gave away his male and female children, his spouse, all of his various objects of enjoyment and he did this in order to ensure the longevity of the teachings of Dharma.
Upon request, he actually gave them away. She has to want to be given away. She has to want to be given away? It would be difficult if she didn’t want to. The. So you take, if you have rice or bread, make a dough out of it and you squeeze it in your hand and then you flatten it at the top and the bottom.
And then you recite that mantra. And then you should visualize that you’re offering to hungry ghosts and imagine that the ridges which have been made along the offering substance are as great as mountains, Mount Meru, and offer it in this way. So later on he can give you the mantra and then there’s a verse of offering and when you recite the verse of a mantra you snap, snapping the fingers and making the offering. If through the power of our visualization and our intention, if we imagine that this offering is as big as a mountain, then through that kind hearted intention, they will be able to receive an offering as big as a mountain. And it was later found in speaking to a hungry ghost that rather than having received a horse, the hungry ghost had received a donkey.
Didn’t get the horse, they got the donkey. So, according to our visualization and dedication, we receive a corresponding substance. So there’s a great variety of dedications we can make. We can dedicate a urine when we pee, when we spit, the mucus from our nose. We can dedicate all of that.
If they don’t dedicate it, then they don’t get it. So there’s these teachings on the different rituals of dedication.