Audio recorded at Tibetan Buddhist Institute, Adelaide. Transcript auto-generated and AI-corrected; may contain errors.
About this talk. In this 98-minute commentary, Kyabje Rinpoche systematically unfolds the ten topics that comprise the entire path of the great vehicle. Beginning with mind generation—the commitment to attain enlightenment for the sake of all beings, rooted in love and compassion—he walks through precepts, the realization of emptiness, and the six perfections: giving, ethics, patience, effort, concentration, and wisdom. Each perfection receives practical detail: what giving truly means (material gifts, Dharma teachings, compassion, or freedom from fear), how ethics operates as mental restraint, how patience means non-retaliation. He then describes the four achievings—armor, engagement, collection, and definite emergence—that move the path from intention through preparation to practice to fruition, illustrated by a car factory. Pitched at practitioners with Dharma background, the teaching emphasizes that the quality of mind and motivation determines whether activity is worldly or spiritual.
File metadata (for organising)
File: 1990-03-08 – T5 – Tape 5. Poor quality – KR.mp3
UUID: 8741224c-13db-428e-83c4-922f36b4d31b
Teacher: Kyabje Rinpoche
Collection: Ornament of Clear Realization
Date: 1990-03-08
Recorded at: Tibetan Buddhist Institute, Adelaide
Words: ~4,490
So, again, there are the subject of discussing omniscience, there are 10 topics which are to be discussed. To name the first five at least 10, the first is mind generation, second is precepts, The third is four branches of definite discrimination. The fourth is naturally abiding lineage. The fifth is objects of reference or objects of observation. And then the the remaining five.
The sixth is objects of intent. The seventh category seventh topic is achieving through armor. So in understanding these 10 topics, we will understand the complete path of the great vehicle. So these these these 10 topics are extremely important, both within the context of the eight categories and the seventy topics. The first of the 10 topics included within omniscience is mind generation.
As the text says, the definition of mind generation. Mind generation is synonymous with the awakening heart or the mind of enlightenment. We generate this motivation prior to each teaching. The text defines mind generation as the wish to attain perfect, complete enlightenment for the welfare of others. This is the definition of mind generation.
Essentially, what we mean is that for the sake of all sentient beings, for itself and others, in order to establish them in complete happiness and separate from them all their suffering, to commit oneself or promise to achieve, to attain Buddhahood. Commitment to attain Buddhahood. So in dependence upon what cause does the mind of enlightenment arise, the the mind generation arise. The root cause of mind generation is love and compassion. Without love and compassion, then the mind generation can mind generation cannot arise because there is not kindheartedness.
But therefore, it’s necessary to have both of these root causes in order to develop mind generation. So the root cause of mind generation is compassion and love, develop into altruism, the thought to benefit others. Essentially, in developing the mind generation, we are seeking to care for all sentient beings. That we develop the thought, wouldn’t it be wonderful if all sentient beings were separated from their suffering? Then to carry this further, we then generate the wish, may all sentient beings be separated from their suffering.
And finally, developing the greatest exceptional resolve which commits oneself. I myself will separate all sentient beings from their suffering. In speaking of compassion, it does not have the factor of being associated with happiness, but it is associated with the wish to separate others from suffering. On the other hand, love is not associated with the factor of suffering, but is associated with the factor of wishing happiness for others. So with respect to love, wishing that all sentient beings have happiness and the causes of happiness.
And likewise, this has the various degrees of intensity. First, with the mere thought, Wouldn’t it be wonderful if all beings had complete happiness? And then may all sentient beings have complete happiness. And finally, I myself will cause all sentient beings to have happiness and the causes of happiness. But generally, we we associate we relate these to love and and compassion.
We abbreviate them into the one thought. May all sentient beings be separated from their suffering and have complete happiness. I myself would will go through this. I will bring this about myself. So such a person has developed this quality of compassion, is to say this altruism beneficial intention has not actually developed a mind generation.
This person must go on in reflecting wishing to, though I wish to, though I wish to separate also the degrees from suffering and establishing complete happiness, do I have this ability? And reflecting on understanding upon reflecting on understanding that in fact they don’t. But carrying out an investigation and thinking, well, who does if anyone? And one sees that only a Buddha has such ability and therefore to establish sentient beings in happiness completely divorced from suffering. And thinking in this way, prior to this, one did not have one’s mind was not empowered such that was toward enlightenment.
But now, one sees that it’s only by enlightenment that one will be able to achieve one’s wish, establishing all beings in a type of happiness with divorce from all suffering. And one goes on to understand that just as the Buddhas of the past have been able to attain it, I am no different. There’s no reason why I myself cannot attain Buddhahood. And therefore, in order to establish all sentient beings in happiness, free of all suffering, I myself will attain Buddhahood. And making a commitment to the attainment of Buddhahood for the sake of sentient beings, making this determination in one’s mind is the actual mind generation.
So, mind generation is characterized by this promise, this commitment which is a quality of one’s motivation to practice the great vehicle to benefit sentient beings. Though we have this promise, this impetus, we have to cultivate it so that it grows greater and greater through habituation. By familiarizing ourselves with this attitude may I achieve Buddhahood for the sake of all sentient beings, soon it become come automatically without any effort. When it has reached this point, then it is a fully qualified mind generation. So the distinguishing factor determining the vehicle, one is a practitioner of a great vehicle or not, is determined solely by the development of the awakening heart.
This is the root of the path, just as in the case of whether it is Australia or India. They’re distinguishing factors according to where how it is governed, who holds power over it. Likewise, whether it’s a great vehicle practice or not, the the foundation is the awakening heart. So this this mind of of mind generation is a quality of committing oneself, and it’s a commitment to to the achievement of Buddhahood in order to separate all sentient beings from their suffering and to bring them complete happiness. It’s a quote.
It’s like a a promise. But but having made a promise, we simply just can’t leave it there. Just as in the case, if one said, Oh, I’m going to eat, but didn’t do anything about it. That statement, I’m going to eat, but not throw your stomach, we have to actually go through the motion of thinking in order to do that. Likewise, having made a commitment, which is no great surprise that we have to go on from there and seek to make effort to achieve our purpose.
So we we must actually set out to achieve our purpose. That is to attain Buddhahood for the sake of all sentient beings whereby to eliminate their suffering, to bring them complete happiness. How do we actually achieve that end? What do we do? We to practice such types of practices as those which eliminate all the faults within our mind whereby we can develop all the various excellent qualities, the collection of positive potential, the purification of negativity.
That is to say, we have to make effort in various types of practices. In this way, we can attain the goal of the object of our commitment. If we don’t make this effort, then we’re never going to achieve our goal. So it becomes apparent that we have to eliminate all the various faults and develop all the necessary excellent qualities. But, you know, what did how are we to go about doing this?
Well, we have to understand the various practices by which to actually achieve these ends. We have to listen to the Dharma Just as it is explained in the teachings on the graduated path, first, in order to understand what is to be practiced, we have to listen to the teachings. And if we don’t listen, then there will be no understanding. This involves And listening to the teachings as presented by the spiritual master in the form of the various precepts. That is by precepts what is to be adopted and what is to be rejected.
So the second topic, this leads us into the second topic which is in order to understand what is to be practiced, in order to achieve our goal, we must listen to precepts. The second topic is precepts. So, it is necessary for us to listen to the various precepts as with regards to what is to be adopted, what is to be rejected in order to gain an understanding of the practices. Upon gaining an understanding of the practices, then we begin the actual process of meditation. The main object of our meditation is emptiness.
With respect to emptiness, we have developed special insight. We have achieved the path of preparation which is the third of these 10 topics. So in having attained a realization of emptiness, we gain the realization on the basis of the mind That the mind is empty of true existence. By obtaining this realization, we empower our lineage. In other words, it is translated as our Buddha nature, is activated.
With that, all the various excellent qualities begin to arise. It’s just like in the coming of rainy season to the field, and then every day the crop grows more and more. So with this realization, there is activation of the uncommon great vehicle lineage or nature, lineage whereby we begin to recognize natural defects as the enemy. This brings us to the fourth topic. With that comes the understanding, one begins to remove superimpositions with respect to all phenomena.
That is to say one understands the mode of abidance or the reality of all phenomena, taking them as objects of reference, or maybe references or observation. All phenomena become the object observation in order to settle the meaning and to practice what is to be adopted and what is to be rejected with respect to all phenomena. Therefore, is the fifth topic, object of reference or observation. The object of intent in the practice of the great vehicle in order to achieve the goal of establishing all sentient beings in happiness and removing their suffering is Buddhahood. So that is the object of our striving to practice in the great vehicle is to attain Buddhahood.
And we do this by practicing. So the sixth topic is the object of intent which is Buddhahood. This is what we are seeking to strive. And the means by which we actually achieve it are the four achievings. This is the actual method, the practices by which we achieve the object of our intent.
Buddhahood. So we make use of the four Achievings which are the Achieving through Armor, Achieving through engagement, achieving through collection, and and the definite issuing achievement. So the bodhisattva and being motivated by the awakening heart is seeking to attain Buddhahood. In order to to achieve Buddhahood, it puts in the practice the four achieving. And his main practice is the six perfections.
So the fourth the six perfections. Perfection of giving, ethics, patience, effort, meditative concentration, and wisdom. So the bodhisattva motivated by the awakening heart is dedicated toward the achievement of Buddhahood, thinking I must achieve complete and perfect Buddhahood for the sake of all sentient beings, whereby I can establish them in complete happiness and separate them from suffering. In order to achieve this, I am going to practice these six perfections. Now, the actual practitioner, the agent of this practicing is the mind of the bodhisattva.
It is the mind which is practicing. This mind has extremely great intent upon achieving this in. Intention or aspiration. The first of the minds which are going to practice is the achieving through armor. This is the mind which is going to put into practice the six perfections.
And in order to practice that with this great intention, he takes each of the six perfections and practices the six perfections with respect to each. With respect to the first perfection, the perfection of giving, he combines this with the practice of the entire six perfections. With the practice of ethics, the perfection of ethics, he also practices in combination with the entirety of the six perfections, making a total of 36 divisions of practice within this due to the power of his great intention to practice So if we go into a little bit of detail of what we mean by the various perfections, such as taking as an example, the first, the six perfection is the perfection of giving. We can enumerate four types of practices with respect to giving. There is the giving of material things, such as giving of food, clothing, these types of things.
Secondly, there is the giving of explanations of Dharma, the teachings. Thirdly, there is the giving of compassion. We meditate, may sentient beings be separated from their suffering, generating this quality of mind. Fourthly, is the giving of freedom from fear. For example, if there was an insect which was in water taking it out of the water, if there was an insect which was going fly into a fire, protecting, making sure it didn’t fly into a fire.
If someone was going to kill an insect, saving that insect’s life, then all of these would be the the giving of freedom from fear. That they be a perfection of giving, they must be motivated by the awakening heart. So any of these four practices that are motivated by the awakening heart, are practices of the perfection of giving. So in the practice of giving, in order for it to be a practice of the perfection of giving, there must be two qualities to one’s motivation. The giving is done in order to separate sentient beings from their suffering and in order to bring happiness and to achieve Buddhahood.
So there’s the the two parts which are necessary in order to make it a practice of the perfection and giving. The the one one’s giving must be motivated by the awakening heart, And then there is the intention to give motivated by the awakening heart. And one gives an explanation of Dharma or gives some material thing. But additionally, there must be the intention that I am giving in order to attain enlightenment. When these two factors are combined, then it becomes a practice of the perfection of giving.
So if we were to give, for example, a dollar, then that dollar is not the giving. This is the substance of giving, or the material of giving. Giving a is the what we mean by giving is the the generous mind or the giving mind. This is the the what is to be perfected. So giving is a skillful action.
It is it is skillful or virtuous. If we were to give a piece of bread, then In the case of the second perfection, perfection of ethics, and by ethics we mean the mind of of guarding or we can translate it as observing in a sense of guarding. It is a type of restraint. But for example, if we were to if we had the impulse to utter some kind of hurtful words towards someone, then we thought, oh, that that that would upset him. Therefore, we restrain from harming.
Or if we were going to steal and steal something and we thought, oh, that’s that’s not a good thing to do, and we were to restrain. We’re we’re going to kill something and say, oh, that would that would hurt that that being, and we restrain ourselves. This this restraint this this restraining mind And the third perfection is that of patience. This is the mind which does not become upset with respect to harm, it is a mind of forbearance. When another person harms ourselves through words, through doing something wrong, it is the mind which does not allow ourselves to return that harm, it can it’s a matter of how we are able to voluntarily take that harm.
We think, you know, We’re just thinking it doesn’t matter. It only hurts them if it doesn’t hurt myself and therefore not returning harm for harm. Therefore by patience we mean a non returning of harm and the mind and mind which does not become upset in the face of harm. The fourth perfection is that of effort and this is the mind which with enthusiasm and joy willingly engages in skillful actions in the context of Dharma. A mind with enthusiasm and joy willingly engages in skillful actions in the area of Dharma.
So this has to be what we mean by effort in terms of the six perfections, it has to be in the area of Dharma. are actions which are unskillful and unvirtuous. And to take joy and enthusiasm enthusiasm for engaging in unskillful and unvirtuous activities not what is meant by the perfection of effort nor is it simply engaging in dharmic activities when maybe somebody is watching and you really exert yourself. But there is no joy or enthusiasm when when when they look away. I’m glad it’s finished.
This also is not perfection. Has to be a sense of joy and enthusiasm in engaging in this Dharma or to qualify as a perfection of effort. And the fifth perfection is perfection of meditative concentration. And this is the the abiding of the mind. The single pointed abiding of the mind in an unmoving manner with respect to a skillful object.
Object, for example, emptiness. So it’s a single-minded single pointed abiding of the mind in an unmoving manner with focused upon skillful object, for example, emptiness. Then the sixth, not the sixth, perfection of wisdom. Here in the perfection of wisdom, excludes the type of wisdom which has arisen as a consequence of having been trained in previous lives. Here it is the wisdom which arises through the three activities of listening, reflecting and meditating, reflecting and meditating.
Mainly, it is the mind which is clear clear and has the function of investigating the nature of phenomena. It has the function of saying this is this, that is that, this is this, that is that. So it is the mind which has arisen through training and reflecting, listening, reflecting, and meditating, and which is clear in its understanding performs the function of examining and investigating phenomena as to their nature. Sir, it is with in in explaining these six perfection that we can understand what we mean by achieving through armor. It is not only does the achieving through armor engage in the practice of the six perfections, but it has the great intention of practicing each of the six perfections with respect to of the six perfections.
So each perfection, the six perfections are applied to each of of the the six six perfections. Perfections. So the achieving through armor has this great intention, but it is the next, the eighth of the 10 topics, achieving through engagement, which actually engages in this practice of applying the six perfections to each of the six perfections. So achieving through armor has this great So it is with respect to the six perfections, achieving through armor has the great intention of practicing the six perfections in this way of applying each of the six perfections to each of the six perfections. That’s the great intention.
It’s said that achieving through engagement is the great preparation. Great preparation whereas armor was great intention. Engagement is great preparation, and it is it is preparing this there’s so there’s these two minds. One is intending, and one is preparing. And then which brings us to the ninth topic, achieving through the collection.
Through intention and actually preparing in these practices, one collects the two accumulations of potential and wisdom. So if we apply this to a worldly example, if someone were engaged in some type of business, some type of activity in the world, that first they would develop a plan. This would be their intention. Then they would make the various types of preparations to carry out this plan. Having created all the necessary conditions, then they would involve themselves in the actual activity itself.
And having done that, then the final result would come about. There’s no doubt that they would achieve a great yield in this manner. So this is this is the same way in which the bodhisattva achieves his end in the same manner. First, the bodhisattva has great intention, and depending upon that great intention, he makes great preparation. Having made that preparation, creating the vast amount of accumulation or collection.
And depending upon that, there is the definite issuing or the definite arising, emerging of of the fruit, the result, which in this case is is Buddhahood. So however so however however much collection is created, that much more quickly will the result arise, be a definite emergence. And what we mean is that by definite the of these 10 topics, definitely achieving achievement is that Buddhahood, in dependence upon these previous nine, will definitely be issued forth, will definitely arise. Recently, Rinpoche went to a motor car factory. And so we applied this example to this car factory.
First, they laid out the plans for the factory. They had an intention, they developed an intention to build the factory and then they went about actually making the preparations, erecting all the buildings and putting in all the various equipment. Then they actually brought in the workers, and they actually engaged in in in the activity of making cars. And this was okay. And then as a result, then they’re now able to produce 162 cars a day.
Great. So they had great plans, and they made great preparations, and then they had great work workers who were engaged in great activities, and now they had a great result. So likewise, in this in these various achievements. First, we have we the bodhisattva has a great intention to achieve Buddhahood. He makes great preparations for it.
He creates a great he creates a great collection, and it it depends upon that arises the definite emergence of the good result. So the way the the way the world operates and the way the Dharma operates are exactly the same. They both whatever we seeking, first we have a motivation whether it’s a worldly business or whether it’s a Dharma business, we have a motivation for engaging in it. And dependence on the motivation means we actually engage in it in the activity. And it depends upon the activity, we achieve some sort of result.
But the difference lies in the quality of the motivation. Whether it’s a skillful motivation or an unskillful motivation will determine whether the activity is a Dharma activity or worldly activity. Between these worldly activities and Dharma activities, there is a difference in determining which activity can be classified as such, by the quality of the motivation as the determining factor. What is the difference between the motivation? A worldly activity is one which is motivated with seeking the good things of this life only, such as food, clothing, housing, whatever.
Seeking happiness only for this life. On the other hand, a Dharma activity is that which has motivation of not looking to this life, but mainly looking toward benefiting the happiness of future lives. Seeking as a result of an activity happiness in future So in in dependence upon the difference in intention, we will have a difference in preparation. Instead of preparation, then application. And dependence upon a difference in the intention, we will have a difference in application.
It depends upon the difference in application, we will have a difference in the result. So the degree of negativity of an activity or the degree of positivity is determined by the quality of the mind. The mind is the foundation all activity, determining its quality and the mind in the sense of our intention, why we’re doing an activity. If the the mind is intended upon seeking happiness only for this life, then that that type of activity we will gauge in will be for this life, and its fruit will be for this life. If it, on the other hand, is for future but if it’s for future lives, if the intention is for that, then the activity will have as its final result a happiness in future lives.
Whether our activity is skillful or unskillful, whether it’s Dharma or worldly, is determined by the quality of the intention residing in the mind. So the within the Buddhadharma, there are a vast variety, array of teachings and methods. And what is the necessity for this? What is the necessity for such extensive teachings? Because we understand that the root of all the teachings, the root of practice is the mind itself.
Essentially what we’re trying to do is to decrease negative minds and to increase and develop positive minds. There many different methods whereby we can bring these two about. We are seeking to rid the mind of varying degrees of faults and finally to cease all faults altogether. We are trying to promote the positive factors of the mind. In order to do that we employ various methods.
So the various degrees of positive quality of mind, the various degrees of developing positive qualities, ceasing negative qualities, each requires a specific method for various individuals. If we didn’t have all of this vast array of teachings which act as a method to do these main two things of increasing and decreasing, what could be the nature of the mind, then we wouldn’t be able to develop ourselves properly. Sorry. So in this instance, you should save the fly because the the the spider’s not gonna die because because in this instance, that saves this particular fly. And that doesn’t mean that the spider is is forced to die.
Just because that’s not to save this fly. You should when if there’s no harm going to be brought to another being, you should you should always try to save it. It’s like taking the the fly out of the water, removing it. Likewise, removing this fly from that situation. On the other hand, if it were if there were a situation where it would harm, it would be harmful to say that fly.
Then the only thing then there’s nothing much you can do except make merit by not killing an animal. If there would be benefit, you could explain to him not to kill that animal, trying to convince that person not to kill that animal, then then you should if there’s going to be benefit. But it’s possible that he’s trying to convince him could actually make the situation worse, in which case, it would have been better not to have tried to convince them. So you have to look at whether it’s going to be beneficial.