Audio recorded at Buddha House Adelaide. Transcript auto-generated and AI-corrected; may contain errors.
About this talk. In this 46-minute session, Khensur Rinpoche makes a striking claim: karma — the subtle relationship between actions and their results — is actually harder to understand than emptiness, and only a fully enlightened Buddha grasps it without error. This observation prompts him to pause the Wheel of Sharp Weapons commentary and announce that future sessions will address karma more directly. The talk then opens into Q&A, covering how to build genuine conviction in cause and effect (seeing harm return to the actor, not merely witnessing it), the spectrum of healthy motivation from altruism down to renunciation, and a “quality control” analogy for recognising one’s own faults. Khensur Rinpoche illustrates karma’s outer reach by comparing the material circumstances of Australians, Africans, celestial beings, and animals, showing how external environment is a direct expression of accumulated internal karma.
File metadata (for organising)
File: 20 WoSW 1993 03 30.mp3
UUID: 0b8f25d9-a2bc-4811-8239-9cfd069b4102
Teacher: Khensur Rinpoche
Collection: Wheel of Sharp Weapons 1992-1993 (Khensur Rinpoche)
Date: 1993-03-30
Recorded at: Buddha House Adelaide
Duration: 46.0 minutes
Words: ~1,977
The transmundane view is the view held by superiors, the direct realization of emptiness, and we have not achieved that view yet. So what is important for us as ordinary persons is the mundane view, the view of the ordinary people. If we abandon our various faults, then we will bring about the cessation of resultant suffering. If we cultivate various excellent qualities, then we will bring about resultant happiness. So if we gain a conviction in this view itself, then our practice will go well, that we will carry on a very proficient practice.
But without this conviction, in this view, then it’s very difficult to practice. So if we hold this view in a very forceful fashion, then our practice will be pure. Our practice will be very effective, it will go very well. That is to say our practice consisting of abandoning negative ways of acting on the one hand and cultivating positive ways of acting on the other. And dependence upon that view, then we will quickly generate the transmundane view within our mind.
So this view is the view of actions as causes and the results, or karma. The view of karma is the law of cause and results. Simply that from positive causes, positive results arise. From negative causes, negative results arise. So this is extremely important to try to gain a forceful conviction in the effectiveness of the law of cause and effect.
So it’s in order for us to be able to develop a strong conviction with respect to this view, it’s necessary that we investigate both the general law of the cause and effect, but also the specific application of karma as action and result. For example, external phenomena, we apply what is called the general law of cause and effect. For example, from the caused seed, a result sprout arises. When, so this is in terms of external phenomenon that we apply the general law of cause and effect. But when it’s in terms of internal phenomenon, that is to say the experiential quality of suffering and pleasure, of suffering and happiness, that those types of results which are related to the suffering and happiness, then we term this karma as actions and their results.
That is to say that the certain causes have a potentiality to bring about certain types of results which are experienced as a quality of suffering pleasure. So we can see the working out of the law of cause and effect quite easily with respect to external phenomena. But the process of the law of cause and effect in terms of karma as actions and results is much more subtle. It’s much more difficult to understand. Actually the karma as actions and their results is more difficult to understand than emptiness.
It is only a Buddha who can realize the workings of, in an unerring, unmistaken fashion, the process of these relationships between subtle causes and subtle results in terms of actions and the results. Even even the bodhisattvas who have a direct realization of emptiness cannot have the same do not attain the same degree of realization with respect to the subtle workings of the actions and the result. So I’m of the opinion that it would be quite useful to discuss further the karma as actions and the results. I think it’s extremely important that we gain a conviction with respect to this process. Otherwise our practice in terms of what is to be adopted and what is being rejected will not be pure and won’t be very powerful.
So I hope that though the text on mind training is presenting an application of karma as actions and the results. I’m going to present it in the future teaching in a more clear cut manner. So we’re going to stop the teaching on Wheel of Sharp Weapons now, but I think it’s, you know if you have questions and we’ll discuss your questions, we’ll get answers. And it’s very useful and extremely beneficial to create these doubts and to have them resolved in various qualms. Yes.
From seeing the result as opposed to seeing the cause. I’m seeing the relationship between these two. Can you wanna develop that a little bit more? Is that the way one gains conviction? Really seeing the suffering that one causes to another would not be sufficient for generating a conviction with respect to actions as causes and effect.
If one enacted a negative, acted negatively toward another person bringing them harm, one saw that they were harmed and one continued one thinking that oh that harm is gonna come back to me one day. And then in that way, by means of that way of thinking, one could gain conviction in actions as causes and results. Yeah. For negative action? No.
No. I I just clarified your question. I wasn’t making a comment. Line between. Wrong So there are varying degrees of healthy motivations that we can have.
The The supreme motivation is, as you mentioned, altruism. That is to say, foregoing one’s self consideration consideration in terms of suffering and happiness, but being out of love and compassion concerning oneself completely with the the bringing of happiness and elimination of another suffering, then to act in that way is the supreme way of acting. It’s motivated by the supreme motivation of altruism. But that’s not to say that that is the only healthy motivation. Even one who, an individual who sees the various faults of cyclic existence, the drawbacks of cyclic existence and understanding that develops a longing for liberation, and out of this longing for liberation to be free, meditates on the path, makes prostrations, makes various offerings, then though this is this is still a healthy motivation even though it’s for one’s own welfare, but it’s not to the same degree of quality as the motivation of altruism, but it’s still a healthy motivation.
So previously we were very much like little children. We just didn’t know about what was fault and what was an excellent quality. We didn’t even think about it. But slowly we began to gain some recognition of well what faults are really faults and what are excellent qualities. And we began to note faults, but we also must note our own excellent qualities, that we have both.
Then within terms of our thoughts, begin to understand that we begin to practice in such a way that we don’t involve ourselves in these thoughts, and we begin to bring about their cessation on the one hand, and we begin to cultivate to carry on practices which develop excellent qualities. This, you know, just being aware of faults and excellent qualities is really wonderful. Then to practice in this way, to bring about a cessation of our negativities, faults, to practice development of excellent qualities is method of practice whereby we will achieve happiness in the future and eliminate our suffering. So we have various faults within our mind, and to see these faults is really excellent because it is good in because we will practice a means to bring them to an end. If we recognize our faults, then we can ultimately eliminate them.
If we never recognize our faults, they’re always going to remain. So that same holds true with respect to any type of work that we involve ourselves in. If we see our mistakes, the defects in our way of working, we can determine tomorrow I’m not going to make that same mistake again. And in this way, our defective ways of operating, gradually diminished and our work goes much better until it’s finally, we removed all the mistakes from our work. On the other hand, if we never see, you know, in process, in our work, if we never see the mistakes that we’re making, then we’re simply going to repeat them again and again, and, our work is not of good quality.
So it’s really important to have quality control. In various works where they have a high degree of quality control and you can depend upon what they’re producing. On the other hand, it would be very wrong to hide the defects of one’s work. It is because that people are investigating the quality, that things are improving, that we can depend upon things in that way, and that they’re not allowed to hide the defects which might be there, that we can, we don’t have the continuation of faulty materials, that we can rely upon things because of these quality controls. Internal cause and effect would have an external component.
That’s part of it. So there’s a relationship between the internal process of cause and effect and the external process of cause and effect. Respect to Australians, they have accumulated, the people in Australia, because they have accumulated positive karma, positive actions in the past, as a result they have a very positive environment. They have lots of material affluence. They have food, clothing, all of these things.
There’s a relationship between its internal process and what occurs outside. And so, but the other extreme would be the people in Africa in general, have no food, no clothing, the difficult environment which to live. And this is again this external result is related to internal process of cause and effect that they have not accumulated positive karma in the past to bring about that type, to bring about the positive external environment. And to to carry that further, the celestial beings, compared to our embodiment, their bodies are much more beautiful. They’re much better bodies than we have.
They have much more pleasant surroundings, many more friends. They have many more luxurious possessions than we do. Why? Because they have, this is due to their karma, having accumulated more positive actions in the past that bring this about as a result. They have complete material happiness due to the force of having accumulated these positive karma in the past.
We can also look to non human beings, like for example animals. We can see their situation, what know what kind of food and shelters do they have to put up with. But there are other beings which we cannot see, know, the various types of hell beings and hungry ghosts. Look at the the sufferings of the hot and cold that they have to endure, the types of embodiments, poor types of embodiments, the poor places they have to exist, the poor food that they’re able to eat. So the quality external environment is dependent upon the quality of the internal factor of karma action.
A negative, poor quality environment arises through unskillful action. A high quality type of environment arises through skillful action. And what is it that creates these actions? It is sentient being. Actions are not created by stone or the ground or inanimate object.
It is sentient beings who are creating these actions, bringing about these environments. So with respect to actions there are four types of results. The initial result is that of the type of embodiment that the being takes. And final result is the type of environment in which that embodiment dwells in terms of its quality of the environment, the food, is in that area. So there’s a definite relationship between the external and the internal.
Okay, so you know you’re taking these Greek villagers who live in a very poor environment. But they are very generous, they’re very generous minded. What do they have to give? So whatever they have, they they will make it. So this is so this is the a tradition they have.
According to that particular So this is different areas have different traditions and just as in China, they have a tradition of giving whatever they have, then this would be the same type of tradition.