Audio recorded at Buddha House Adelaide. Transcript auto-generated and AI-corrected; may contain errors.
About this talk. Here is the draft paragraph:
In this 16-minute closing session, Khensur Rinpoche fields a recurring question about Buddhist cosmology versus modern science — citing the Dalai Lama’s reminder that the Buddha came to develop minds, not deliver geography lessons. He then explains the precious wheel from among the mandala offering objects: four varieties — gold, silver, copper, and iron — each linked to a type of universal emperor and dominion over a different number of continents, with the Vajrayoginī self-initiation recommended for deeper study. Rinpoche closes by announcing that the Preliminary Practices series is essentially complete: the first five practices, deemed the most essential for individual practitioners, are now covered, while the remaining four will be taken up within Vajrayoginī and Yamataka teaching contexts. Suited to practitioners already engaged with Vajrayāna practice.
File metadata (for organising)
File: 16 PP 1989-08-05.mp3
UUID: 7c9bf559-2956-4af9-9b27-2fdf9f0be522
Teacher: Khensur Rinpoche
Collection: Preliminary Practices (Khensur Rinpoche)
Date: 1989-08-05
Recorded at: Buddha House Adelaide
Duration: 15.6 minutes
Words: ~644
Joseph: where there is — it’s surrounded by water and is lots of water in the area. But if a hungry ghost were to be in this area, it would just be a vast open plain completely dry without any water. So, so you’re probably tired and so we’ll spend maybe ten minutes with questions. But least if you have some good questions. The one question which has come up in the past which is the difference between the scientific approach and how it’s presented in the knowledge text, the nature of the makeup of the universe.
And what we’ve discussed here is for our own personal benefit. We’re trying to so it’s not we’re not trying to decide who is right, whether the scientists are right or the scriptures are right. It’s just we’re practicing. This is a way of practicing to benefit ourselves. So the Dalai Lama said that, you know, it doesn’t really matter whether or not Mount Meru exists or not.
The Buddha didn’t come into this world in order to give us a geography lesson. He came into this world in order to develop, help sentient beings develop their minds. And this was the reason that he taught everything that he taught. So this is the, we should keep this in mind. Yeah.
So the explanation of all of these precious substances and objects is quite extensive. Just with respect to the first precious wheel, previously there were four types of wheels: there were gold, silver, copper, and iron wheels, and each of these were held by various kings — chakravartin emperors, wheel emperors, universal emperors. And the highest type was the golden emperor who held the golden wheel, and this wheel would ever go wherever the emperor desired to go. And so these four types of kings represented by these four types of wheels arose as a particular unique type of karma. So we’re creating this type of unique karma by offering this particular type of wheel in order to become a wheel emperor, a universal emperor.
The different types of wheels, are different sizes of wheels, there are different substances in which they are made. It’s quite an extensive explanation. There is an explanation within the Vajrayoginī self initiation where the wheel is mentioned and if you are interested in this then this would be a good place to look for a further explanation of the wheel, of the precious wheel. So, of these four different wheels has a different bestows a different power. If you have the golden wheel then you are emperor over the four continents.
If you have the silver wheel, you are emperor over three continents. The copper wheel over two continents, and iron wheel over only one continent. So, you know, we, in general, there are nine preliminary practices we have completed. Given an explanation on the first five of these preliminary practices. Generally there are four remaining practices, the preliminary practice of the offering of water bowls, the offering of Tzatzah or tablets.
Then there’s the Döndrup Kadra fire offering, and then there’s the Samaya Vajrasattva preliminary. These we these first five are the most important for one’s practice, that having completed these most important first five, Rinpoche now thinks that we should keep our Saturday mornings for the commentary to the teaching on Heruka. So if there are other places that this is taught, the remaining of these four preliminary practices such as in connection with Vajrayoginī or Yamataka, and this can be explained at those times, the remaining four, but we have completed what are the most important five for the usual practice. An individual practitioner would make use of these first five. And these other four can be explained at another time.
When Rinpoche gave his teaching at Chenrezig Risa, he explained these latter four in one day.