Bodhisattva Vows — 2012-09-05

Audio recorded at Buddha House Adelaide. Transcript auto-generated and AI-corrected; may contain errors.

About this talk. In this 109-minute teaching, Tenzin Chogkyi guides practitioners through the heart of Bodhisattva vow practice, beginning with the conditions required to completely break them. She outlines the four binding afflictions—not thinking an action wrong, being happy to do it again, lacking remorse, and having no integrity—explaining that all four must be present to lose the vows entirely. She then walks through three levels of transgression and their remedies: complete loss requires retaking the vows; medium transgressions require confession to three Bodhisattva vow holders; minor ones need confession to one person and purification practice. The second half introduces the forty-six secondary vows, which cannot cause complete loss of the vows even if broken. Chogkyi covers the first seven, relating them to the perfection of generosity: making daily offerings to the Three Jewels, subduing miserly attachment, respecting senior practitioners, answering sincere questions, and accepting sincere invitations and gifts. She stresses that the Bodhisattva path is highly practical and specific, not vague, and grounded in the real challenges of modern ethical life.

File metadata (for organising)

File: 2012 09 05 Bodhisattva Vows.mp3

UUID: 7c40551d-1cba-4ebb-8a28-f20d56e82b08

Teacher: Tenzin Chogkyi

Collection: Bodhisattva Vows (Tenzin Chogkyi)

Date: 2012-09-05

Recorded at: Buddha House Adelaide

Words: ~14,654

Begin as we usually do by just sitting for a few minutes, watching the breath to settle and focus our minds, and then we’ll take a minute to set our motivation. So first of all, just sitting your meditation posture with your back straight. And let’s just focus on the breath for a few minutes. Either the sensation at the nostrils or deeper in the body, the chest rising and falling, the diaphragm expanding and contracting, Just using the breath as an anchor to get yourself here in this room in your body ready to attend to the teachings this evening. And now let’s take a minute to set our motivation.

So our topic is the Bodhisattva vows, very specific detailed guidelines about how to behave following the ethics or morality laid out for beings practicing practicing their spiritual path not just for their own benefit, but to be of benefit to all living beings. So that’s the core motivation for these guidelines that we’re studying, the wish to lead all beings to not only temporal but ultimate freedom from suffering to liberation and enlightenment. The way we do this is by developing all of our own qualities and becoming a fully enlightened Buddha. So take just a minute to set this motivation for our session tonight. Okay.

So we’ve been going through the Bodhisattva vows using this booklet that comes from the FPMT and I think we’ve got a couple of new people tonight. Who need did you get a booklet? You got one. Great. Anybody else need one of the booklets?

Okay. Where’s Bill? Let’s see. We need two more. Bill said he made some more and now he’s disappeared.

Oh, would you get Bill and get two more booklets? Great. Thanks, Sarah. Okay. So what we’ve done so far in our class is talked a bit about the background to the vows and then we started going through the root vows.

The Bodhisattva vows, we have eighteen what we call root or primary vows and then forty six secondary vows. So we’ve made it through the root vows so far, the important, you know, the more important vows, the primary vows. And we were just at the point of talking about how do you break a vow? What conditions need thank you, Sarah. What conditions need to be there in order to break a vow?

And it was about three minutes after nine last week. So I ran through that list really quickly and said we’d review it and talk about it more today. So that’s kind of where we’re up to and in the booklet, for those of you that might be new we have the eighteen root vows starting on page eight of your booklet and you can read through that we’ll take a little break maybe later on and then the four conditions that are required to completely break your Bodhisattva vows are halfway down page ten. So those four conditions. So that’s kind of where we were up to And the first night, we did a go around and people said, you know, why they were interested in the class and what their background was.

Several people confessed and said, oh, I’ve taken Bodhisattva vows years ago, but I’ve I know I’ve broken them. And I said, Don’t be too sure because to actually break them and completely lose them is more difficult than you might think. You know, it may not be that you’ve kept, you know, perfectly the vow, but to really lose the plot completely is a little bit more difficult than you might think. So it’s kind of reassuring. So we’re gonna look at that now and review what we went through really quickly last time about how to break a vow.

And in order to completely break and lose your Bodhisattva vows, so the first half of the flip chart, we need to do that action with what’s called the four binding factors sometimes called the four binding afflictions. So these have to be present in your mind when you’re transgressing that vow. Okay? So the first one, not thinking the action is wrong And this is the state of mind. You’re an educated bodhisattva vow holder.

So you know that it’s a bodhisattva vow that you’ve taken but you just don’t care. You don’t think it matters. You don’t think it’s wrong. You’re not thinking of the law of cause and effect. So this isn’t ignorance about the vows which you may have had four weeks ago.

You know, lot of people said, oh, I took these vows and I don’t really know what they are. There’s some list with a couple of phrases and I don’t really know what’s going on. That’s not that. This is saying you know that it’s a Bodhisattva vow that you’ve taken and you’re just breaking it and you don’t care, don’t think there’s anything wrong with breaking your vows. Okay?

Now, what does that sort of presume in your mind that your thinking doesn’t matter? Really essential thing and some of you were in the four noble truths class. Do you remember, Jan? Yeah. That would be including which wrong view?

Which wrong view would that touch on? Well, it’s really fundamental, really fundamental. What’s such a fundamental kind of teaching that the Buddha taught that’s probably the most fundamental tenet of Buddhism? Anybody can help her. If you know that it’s a vow and you just don’t think there’s anything wrong with breaking it, what are you ignoring?

Yeah. But what are you what are you just actions. Cause. Effect. Yeah.

Okay. So remember, sounds like karma. karma. Right? So the law of cause and effect, you’re just going, doesn’t matter.

Either saying, doesn’t operate. Is it gonna operate for me? Oh, mister karma’s not looking now. You know? So you’re just basically, you know, disrespecting, just sort of dispensing with the law of cause and effect, which is so fundamental.

In fact, it’s said, you know, when we talk about Buddhist tenets, there’s certain things that Buddhists, you know, sort of buy into as a worldview, and the law of cause and effect is maybe the most fundamental one of those. So in order to have this binding affliction, you’re just saying, I know it’s a vow and I just could care less. Right? So pretty heavy. Pretty heavy, isn’t it?

To have that kind of a mind, like really from the depths of your heart, you know. There are times that we might know that the action is wrong and just be overpowered by our disturbing emotions. You know, Lord Buddha isn’t saying we’re gonna be perfect at all. And remember I said, one of the ways that these the word vow can be translated is, what do they call it? Factors of training or, you know, guidelines or training factors because we’re not gonna be perfect, but this is saying we’re just completely disregarding the law of cause and effect and going, who cares?

I know it’s a vow, but I could care less. Okay? So that’s the first binding factor that needs to be there. And then the second one, not abandoning the thought to do it again. And that’s saying, I’d happily do it again.

Sure, I’d do it again. No problem doing it again. Right? So not having that thought to abandon doing it again. And again, we may do things.

Of course, we’re gonna transgress our vows. You know, it’s just natural because we’re not enlightened yet. At least, I don’t know about you guys, but I do it all the time. But if at least you go, oh, I know I messed up and I really hope I don’t do it again. You know, I feel bad about doing it again.

But having the thought of like, I don’t care that I messed up and what the heck? I’ll just go ahead and do it again. Okay? The last one, being happy about having done the action. So that says being happy and satisfied about having done that action.

You know, feeling good, having some sense of satisfaction about it. Yeah. That’s good that I praised myself and criticized that other person. That was good that I did that. You know, I built myself up, and now people are gonna respect me, and they’re gonna lose respect for that other person.

That was awesome. I’ll do it again. Nothing wrong with it. Right? So it’s that kind of a idea.

And then the last one, having no shame or consideration. And these are two words that you’re gonna come up against over and over when you study karma, vows, any of these things. I’m not crazy about the translation shame as you might imagine. Some of you know I it’s like self respect or integrity. Okay.

So what this means is shame, I mean, they always translate it as shame. So we’re kind of stuck with it. It’s like the word renunciation. We’re a little stuck with that. So we’re a little stuck with shame.

But what it really means is not having any wish not to do it just because of your own sense of self respect or integrity. Like even if nobody else would know about it, you just wouldn’t do that because that just wouldn’t be right and proper to do. Right? So it’s not about what were our other people gonna think about me doing it or is anybody watching? It’s just about, wow, you know, I just have the sense of self respect and integrity and I’m not gonna do the wrong thing even if nobody else would find out.

So, that’s that one. So, I really like self respect and integrity because shame to me I don’t know. That means something else. It’s got this other connotation of I’m ashamed or something but this doesn’t have anything to do with anybody else. It’s just from your own side.

Right? You just feel like it’s not right to do that and consideration is not wanting to do something that’s you know a transgression of your vows because of the influence it might have on other people. And this doesn’t mean so much because sometimes people say, but, oh, isn’t that sort of proud that you’re, you know, or hypocritical to act in a certain way just because you’re worried about how other people would think. But this is saying if for example people know that you’re a Buddhist and they would see you acting in a way that was, you know, negative, they might it might disturb their mind. They might lose their faith for example and be upset to see somebody that they know and that they admire doing something wrong.

It’s that. You know, it’s not so much about being proud or being hypocritical or pretentious. It’s just about guarding other people’s minds. For example, I when I when I got ordained, was reading an article that a friend of mine had written who’d just gotten ordained as a nun about a year before and she said walking around in robes really helped her behavior in public. She said she’d been this really impatient person as she’d been waiting in a queue.

She’d be complaining and like, I mean, not really shoving in front of other people, but thinking about it, you know, and all this stuff. And she said, wow, it’s really amazing, like going around in robes. She said she really realized she had a responsibility for other people’s view of Buddhism like she had to behave in a certain way and she said it was so good for her mind and really kind of subdued her mind. She couldn’t just be out of control the way she could be when she was wearing like jeans and a t-shirt and nobody knew, you know. Suddenly, was this sense of sort of responsibility for other people’s minds and that’s what this one is, you know.

It’s that sense of consideration of thinking about the effect that your behavior would have on other people. So, this is saying the fourth binding factor, you don’t have that either. You could care less the effect your behavior has on other people’s minds or the effect it has on your own sense of self respect or integrity. So, wow! Imagine, you know, if you do something that’s one of those first actually sixteen not eighteen, we’ll get to that in a minute, but those first vows and all of these factors are complete, you’ve lost your Bodhisattva vows.

You’ve lost it completely. Okay? That’s what breaking your vows and losing your vows means. So now I’m gonna pick on somebody and I bet Jegg is exactly the person, talk me through talk me through your state of mind breaking a bodhisattva vow with all of these four factors complete. So, pick one of the ones and just imagine what your state of mind would be and kind of talk us through what it would be like to break a vow with all of like, pick one praising yourself, criticizing others, not sharing the dharma, not sharing wealth.

One of the ones, your favorite. That’s not a bodhisattva vow. Oh, Jack, I’m so disappointed. I always think about the. I mean, it’s really good not to do it, but it’s not a Bodhisattva vow.

That’s another conversation. So Okay. So talk me through doing that with all four of these complete. So, scenario, work situation with friends, whatever. Imagine doing that with all four of those complete.

Yeah. Yeah. But you’re not trying to talk yourself out of it yet. I’m just asking for an example of doing it with all four things complete. Yeah.

So that would be like, for example, for Jegg’s example of praising yourself. Let’s say, because I think Jen had this. Jen, who’s not here tonight, had an example of a work situation because we’re saying, right? What would be a situation in our life that we would do that? Because remember the praising yourself and criticizing somebody else is due specifically to a wish for material gain or respect.

So we’re saying, okay, in a work situation, you wanna everybody’s worked together on a project, but you wanna really get the credit for it, so you sort of criticize other people’s involvement and build yourself up. And if you did that, not thinking there was anything wrong with doing that, going, well, I was part of the team, so it’s okay that I talk about, you know, I’m exaggerating, but it’s really okay that I do that. There’s nothing wrong with it. And in fact, why not? Dog eat dog world, you know?

We all just have to do that. Nobody’s gonna praise me. I’ve got to praise myself. You know, we’re all out there to get to the top. So having that kind of an attitude, being happy about having done it, again, like, well, it’s what you have to do in the workplace, you know.

I can be a Bodhisattva in the dharma center, I can be a Bodhisattva at home but man, in the workplace, I can’t keep those vows. Are you kidding me? I never get a promotion. Right? So having this idea of being happy, of having done it, you know, and not having any feeling about how it reflects on you as a spiritual practitioner.

Right? Or your own sense of integrity. So that would be an example of having all four of those things complete. Okay? So you can imagine it.

It’s not that impossible to imagine and as part of this training, we’re supposed to really be checking, you know, these four criteria, right? When we’re, you know, checking our motivation, checking these four criteria, keeping them in mind. Now, you imagine doing something where not all four of these were complete. For example, one of the Bodhisattva vows is not sharing the dharma. So what if somebody in Bodhisattva vows class had to miss tonight’s class because she had to work.

There’s somebody in that boat and next week she asks you for your notes. Can I borrow your notes from class? Right? Now, what about a situation where maybe you’d have some of the some of these four but not all of them. Okay?

Let’s say you don’t think anything’s wrong. You say no. Okay? You say no. I’m not gonna loan you my notes.

You don’t think it’s wrong. You know? You just feel like, hey, if she cared enough, she would have been here and taken notes. It’s not up to me to give her my notes. But you feel like, okay, but maybe next time I’ll try and do something about it.

You know, maybe maybe it’s true, but maybe I should do something to help her out next time. So abandoning the thought to do it again. Maybe you don’t feel so terrific about it, actually, because you go, well, you know, I’m really supposed to be generous and that wasn’t so generous. But, you know, she might spill coffee on it. She might lose them.

So I feel really okay about not doing it, but I’m not so happy about it. You know, it’s okay, but not terrific. And not having any shame consideration. You don’t think at all about how your refusal reflects on you or on her on her mind, you know, somebody in my Bodhisattva vows class won’t even loan me their notes. That’s pretty pathetic.

Right? So she might think that and you’re not thinking that. So you have some of them but not all. Right? Because you weren’t so happy about it and you thought maybe I wouldn’t do that again.

But you’ve got the first one and the second level of transgressing the vows now you haven’t lost the vows completely is having number one and any combination of the other ones but not all four. Okay, so if you have all four, you’ve lost your Bodhisattva vows, you no longer are a Bodhisattva Vow holder. To get them back again, you have to take them again fresh. Okay? If you work up that motivation.

If you have number one and any of the others but not all four, that’s called a medium level of transgression. Okay? So you haven’t lost your vows but this one is the most important factor so it’s pretty heavy. It’s not the heaviest, it’s medium heavy. Now in order to repair your vows if you break them completely you have to start all over and take them again.

For this level of number one plus some of the other ones but not all, you have to confess to three other people. Preferably three other people who hold the same vows that you do or at least understand what you’re trying to do with your life and your Bodhisattva behavior. So, work on putting together your Bodhisattva vows response team. Three friends that you trust that you can confess to because that’s what the texts say to do if you have this factor plus any of the other ones. Okay?

That’s a medium level transgression. Now a mild level of transgression is anything but this first one. So you know it’s wrong but you still have one of the other factors. Knowing it’s wrong is so essential, you know. If you admit to yourself, Yes, I know that’s a Bodhisattva vow, I know it’s wrong but, you know, I have one of the other factors, that’s considered a minimum or a lesser transgression of the vow.

For that, confess to one other person and then do your purification practice. So I’ve got that written down because I think that’s this one isn’t in your in your booklet, what to do so for a complete downfall with all finding afflictions retake the vows you know because you’ve lost that Bodhisattva shape to your life completely. You don’t think ‘s anything wrong with it. You’d be happy to do it again. You’re happy you did it.

You have no sense of integrity or respect for other people. If you have a misdeed of a medium level of binding affliction, that’s number one plus zero one or two of the others but not all four confess to three people who are Bodhisattva vow holders or understand what you’re trying to do with your life like at least understand about about your practice. The misdeed of lesser binding affliction you haven’t done number one but any combination of the others confess to one other person. Okay? So, questions about those four binding afflictions and what to do about it?

That’s best or somebody who’s just sympathetic to what you’re trying to do, you know? It might be a Buddhist student who hasn’t taken the vows yet but understands about the whole Bodhisattva track and has respect for it. You know, don’t confess to your fundamentalist Christian mother who hates the fact that you’re a Buddhist anyway. She’s just gonna rejoice about it. Not a good idea.

You know, so somebody who has I you could say respect for kind of the Bodhisattva track. Best is somebody who’s taken the vows because then they’ll really understand completely what you’re talking about and it might really help inspire their practice as well. So that’s great, you know, if you can. Any questions about about Sojong is a practice for a confession of the Prātimokṣa monastic vows, not the bodhisattva vows. Yeah.

No, it doesn’t work for bodhisattva vows. It just works for in fact they say for bodhisattva vows the best purification practice is prostrations to the thirty five Buddhas. That’s very specific according to Lama Tsongkhapa for purifying Bodhisattva vows. Alright. So you ready?

Are you going to get your during the break? You can put together your first responders team for your broken Bodhisattva vows. Not that anybody’s going to do that in this class. I’m going to keep them perfectly because you have a perfect explanation. Alright, so let’s start looking at the secondary vows and we have forty six secondary vows.

Now for the secondary vows, if you transgress the secondary vows, the four binding afflictions don’t apply to the secondary vows. If you transgress the secondary vows, there’s no way that that transgression makes you lose your bodhisattva vows completely. Now, the four binding factors might be there but it’s not the same level of severity as the primary Bodhisattva vows so you’re not in danger of losing your vows completely by transgressing the secondary ones. Okay? Which is why they’re called secondary.

They’re just a kind of a lesser level. Now these get quite specific about our behavior and it’s kind of cool because like I said the very first night, you know, we kind of think about Bodhisattva activity and you kind of have this vague idea that means just being nice to people and you know helping people and just you know it gets very vague. These vows get really specific about what we should do and what we should avoid doing. So, they’re great check ins for our behavior and for our mental state. I mean, it’s very cool and not much has changed for two thousand six hundred years.

I mean, that’s the thing too, they all apply to us. There’s not really I can’t think of any of these that I would just go, Oh no, that was just historical. I mean, the way it to implement them has changed and the technology has changed a bit but the underlying, you know, what we’re trying to do to sort of take care of ourselves and not take care of other people that basic tendency hasn’t changed much. Now for the secondary ones, we say that we can do them in an afflicted way and in a non afflicted way and we’ll look more at these when we get into the secondary ones. If you do one of these secondary ones out of anger, jealousy or some strong disturbing emotion, it’s considered an afflicted way of breaking the vow.

If you don’t do or if you do one of these things just because you’re careless, forgetful or lazy, that’s considered to be non afflicted. So we’ll see when we get into some of these but it’s good to differentiate because obviously if you do it with a strong disturbed mind of anger, jealousy or one of the other afflictions, it’s heavier karmically than not doing it just because you forgot or you were careless. Okay? So the first one, not making offerings every day to the Three Jewels with your body, speech and mind by making prostrations, offering praises and meditating on their qualities. This is really easy.

If you’re taking the Bodhisattva vows, the basis of that is refuge and if we’ve taken refuge, we have a commitment to take refuge and recite a verse, right, every day, three times in the morning, three times in the evening. So put your hands together. That’s considered a physical prostration. Recite the verse out loud. And as you’re reciting the verse, think about the qualities of the Three Jewels.

And that’s a way to fulfill this vow. So very simple for those of us who are already refugees as you will be if you’ve taken bodhisattva vows. Okay? It’s on the basis of having taken refuge. So very easy.

Doesn’t mean necessarily you need to set up a huge altar and offer bowls and bowls of fruit and flowers every day. If you wanna do that, that’s terrific. But it just means paying respect physically, verbally, and mentally every day to the Three Jewels. That’s the offering. It’s an offering of respect and reverence.

Okay? So that one’s that one’s straightforward, quite easy. Now, if you don’t do it because you’re angry or mentally, you know, disturbed, that’s not doing it in an afflicted way. If you don’t do it because you’re just lazy or careless, that’s a non afflicted way of breaking that vow. So you can see the difference between the two kind of sets of motivation for doing it.

Okay. The second one, allowing improper thoughts of desire to go on. Okay? And what this means is you have a state of mind that’s just not satisfied with what you have. You know, it’s always wanting more.

You’re completely distracted by sensual desires all the time and you don’t do anything to try and stop it. That would be breaking the vow. You know, you just let that distraction go on and don’t do anything to try and curb it. One of our practices as Dharma practitioners is to try and practice satisfaction with what we have and really look at our attachment desire energy and just that mind of being dissatisfied and always wanting more. That’s one of the fundamental things in Buddhism too is that happiness comes from within and not from external objects.

So if you’ve taken a Bodhisattva vow and your whole life is geared towards your own spiritual development so that you can benefit others if you’re constantly distracted by thoughts of desire and sense objects and just let that go, You’ve broken this vow. You know, if you make an attempt to stop it and you’re not successful, you haven’t broken the vow because we’re all still under the control of disturbing emotions. We’re not always in control of our minds, but at least, you know, we should attempt to subdue our minds. Okay? So any questions about that one?

Is that clear? Okay. Oh, by the way, the first seven vows have to do with the perfection of generosity or the perfection of giving. Now, we’re getting into the six perfections. Okay?

How did the first two relate to the practice of generosity or giving? Money. Yeah. That’s right. Yeah, yeah, that’s right.

So the first second one is saying curb your miserliness and attachment and greed. Right? Which is the antithesis of generosity. Right? Good.

Good. So we’ll see as we go through how they relate to one of the six perfections. So we’re told on the Bodhisattva track, the perfection of giving, perfection of generosity. This is giving us really specific pointers about how to do that. Okay?

So it’s relating. The first seven are relating to that. Not respecting elders. And what elders means here specifically is somebody who took Bodhisattva vows before you did. Doesn’t mean necessarily somebody who’s chronologically older than you, but somebody who’s older in terms of their spiritual development and holding vows.

Because we’ve got a lot we can learn from those people who are senior to us in terms of their vows. Now specifically, this is talking about somebody who’s senior in terms of Bodhisattva vows but it’s good also to keep in mind anybody who’s senior as a dharma practitioner period. You know, they have a lot more experience than we do. We can really learn from them. So this is saying respecting them, paying respect.

There’s some traditional Asian ways of showing respect like the thing that we do when the teacher walks in the room and we stand up, you know, helping them. You’ll often see, for example, with the older Tibetan Lama’s, the young monks kind of scurrying around and helping them with the luggage and getting them a chair and, you know, bringing the food and all of that. Now, how does this one relate to the perfection of giving or generosity? Perfection of giving or generosity? Yeah, giving of your time and energy, your kindness, also protection.

You know, if it’s somebody who is older than us also chronologically, we’re helping them, you know, physically by showing respect. Right? Helping them in a way that leaves them not in a state of, you know, vulnerability. Right? So, all of those things.

Right? Right. All of those things. Kindness, protection. We talked about the four kinds of giving.

We can give dharma, material things, love, loving kindness and protection. So all of those could be included in this one. Okay? The next one, not answering a question, either not answering a question, giving an inadequate answer to a question and this isn’t just a Dharma question because we had the root vow, didn’t we, about not being generous with the Dharma. Right?

And if somebody asked us for a teaching or asked us for Dharma, we weren’t being generous. But this is saying just anything, any old question that anybody asks, not answering it. Right? Out of a motivation, it’s afflicted if it’s motivation of anger or spite or pride. If it’s just laziness or carelessness, it’s unafflicted.

Okay? This is basically just saying, you know, be responsible for other beings and if they sincerely ask you a question, even if it’s how are you doing? Doesn’t need to be a profound, could please explain the meaning of the ultimate nature of reality. This is like, how’s it going? And you just sort of blow them off.

Right? Sorry. I’m using getting back to California slang. Right? Just you know, this is saying no.

You know, give them attention. So this is being generous with your time, being kind with your attention. Now there’s some exceptions to this one. If you’re sick, if you’re asleep and they just ask you a question to wake you up, okay, if you’re a sleeper, groggy, If you’re teaching and it interrupts the flow, this happens, amazingly enough. I had a student in California and it was a big class, it was maybe forty people.

I was actually teaching the Heart Sūtra at the time. He was sitting kind of where Jag is sitting and he sort of was acting like he and I were just having a conversation. Like, line that I was saying in the discourse to explain the subject, he would just pipe up with, like, whether he thought that was true or not or how did he think about it or he’d ask a question. The other people in the class were just like, oh my god. And I finally just had to go like, okay, you know, we’ll have questions at the end of the session.

I just had to say, not to be disrespectful to his questions, it was just inappropriate because it was totally interrupting the flow. Yeah. There’s often, you know? Yeah, there’s often. So that, you know, you’re doing something beneficial, whether it’s teaching or some something else beneficial and somebody’s questions is interrupting the flow of the greater benefit, then you’re allowed not to.

If they’re if they’re asking from a bad motivation, okay, either to be argumentative with you, you know, to find ammunition so that they can refute you or if they’re being really disrespectful. And I gave the example last week of the guy sitting next to me on the Air New Zealand flight from San Francisco to Auckland, who just to pass the twelve and a half hours, you know, decided to ask me to tell him everything about the four noble truths, and I realized he didn’t really have a sincere motivation. I was just gonna be his entertainment because he’s seen all the in flight movies already. You know? So I checked a little bit to see if he was sincere, and he just dropped it.

So if you feel like the person isn’t being sincere in their question or they just wanna be argumentative, then you’re allowed not to. Okay. So the next one, not accepting a sincere invitation. And this kind of goes back to the monastic way of life. We are meant to be supported by lay people and strictly speaking, we’re not supposed to ask for anything.

We’re just supposed to have our four food, housing, medical care, and clothing offered by laypeople. So this is saying, laypeople are offering you. I mean, is the origin of this one. They’re trying to make an offering and you refuse their offering because often, you’d be invited, you know, in the time of Lord Buddha, the monastics would be invited to someone’s house for a meal. So that would be a typical thing.

And out of spite or anger or jealousy, you refuse the invitation. Right? That would be refusing out of an afflicted standpoint or just out of carelessness or laziness. You can’t be bothered to go. That’s what this would be.

Now, when I first was studying the Bodhisattva vows, I was still a layperson, a new Dharma student and I think I read something about just not accepting invitations and I kind of freaked out because I was trying to be really serious about my Dharma practice and I just didn’t want to go out with my friends all the time so much anymore and I thought, oh my god, I’m breaking a Bodhisattva vow because people want to party and I’m not into it anymore. And I remember talking to my teacher about it, and he was like, no. That’s not what this means. It means people are trying to really offer you something with a sense of respect, and you’re just, you know, not accepting their sincere offering. It doesn’t mean you have to go to every party that you’re invited to, especially when you’re trying to keep the fifth lay vow of no intoxication.

It’s not talking about that. That was my big worry. Right? This is saying somebody sincerely trying to make an offering to you. Happens to us.

We may not be monastics that are being offered a meal out of respect for our vows, but somebody’s trying to be generous to you, for God’s sake, accept it. Just accept it. Even if you don’t want it, just take it because it allows that person to practice generosity. You know, if they’re being sincere, it allows them to practice generosity. Now, we’re allowed to refuse if we feel like the person is and in fact, this is true for the second one, the next one too.

In fact, let’s let’s put these together because the next one is not accepting money, gifts, and so forth when they’re sincerely offered and this is kind of the same tone And again, if you refuse out of anger or pride, it’s afflicted. If it’s out of laziness, it’s unafflicted. Now, you’re allowed not to if you know you’d get too attached to whatever the possession that they’re offering you is. Right? If you’d have attachment to it, if you know that the person offering it would later regret it.

And this happened to one of my teachers, this woman, he gave this incredible teaching. And this woman, of course, was Chinese because only a Chinese person would do this, offered him her house. Like, was so inspired by the teaching she ran up. I mean, I I say that, but it is really true because Asian people tend to get the, you know, the giving thing a lot better than Western people, offered her house. And he said, no.

That’s okay. I’ve got a place to live. It’s really okay. Because he knew that she was doing it in this instant of inspiration, which was great, but that later she would regret it. Like, was so inspired by the teaching.

So it was okay for him to refuse that offering. Right? So if you know that the person would regret it later or if it would really deprive them of their livelihood, if it would be a deprivation. This is there’s another story about monastic vows. We are back in the time of the Buddha and sometimes even now in some of the southern Asian countries, people will go on alms round.

Now there’s a lot of protocol for begging your food, and you aren’t supposed to go to the house first with the best cook and the best food. You have to go to the houses in turn, one after another until you’ve gotten your food for the day without skipping, without being choosy, without saying, want a little bit more of that and, you know, no, I don’t need that. But, the one kind of house that you’re allowed to skip is a benefactor that’s so devoted, they’ll give you all their food and go hungry. Right? That’s the only kind of house you’re allowed to skip and it’s called something like householders undergoing the training.

And the monastics in the time of Lord Buddha would discuss and they’d go, these people are so devoted and they’re so poor that they’re going hungry because they’re giving the monastics all their food. So similarly, if you feel like the person would be deprived of their livelihood by making offerings to you, you’re allowed to not accept. Okay? So any questions about that one or the invitation one? Yes, Kathy.

Yes. Yeah. Now according to the monastic rules, you like, for a monastic, you have to accept everything. You don’t have to eat everything. Right?

So it it’s happened to me that, you know, that I don’t eat meat and, you know, one of my teachers has given me meat momos or something because that’s like their absolute favorite thing. And then you just have to it depends on the situation. Once I was eating with my teacher and his niece was cooking for like four or five of us and I was sitting next to a friend of mine who did eat meat and I kept trying to slide my meat momos over onto his plate and I thought I was doing it so surreptitiously like I was looking at my teacher and Lama Zopa Rinpoche, they were and when they’d be really intensely talking to each other, I’d sort of slide the meat Momos over onto my friend, which of course he was thrilled at that. But then later, the niece had been looking through the door and she said, oh, you didn’t like my Momos, you know, I was like, Oh no, I should have just eaten them and gotten sick afterwards or whatever. So yeah, it’s difficult.

It’s difficult. I mean, better is to make it clear that you don’t eat meat at, you know, when they invite you, make it clear what the dietary restrictions are. That’s best. You know, but you’re you don’t have to eat everything you’re offered. You know, you can accept it and just leave it.

And you’re still accepting the offering. Yeah. Yeah. And and depending on the situation, like I said, I thought I was getting away with it, but then it, you know, I ended up really hurting her feelings. And then I explained and, you know, there’s this whole thing.

But, yeah. Yeah. We’re not always situation where we can get away from it so easily. Yeah. Alright.

Any other questions about that one? No? Okay? Okay. Alright.

So, now, one thing is, we if you are given something that’s more than what you can use, you can keep it and think that you’re keeping it in order to give it away later. Okay? But if you think that attachment will develop, then you’re also allowed to say, I can’t accept it. Like if you think that it’s just too compelling, you know, and that you’ll develop big attachment by accepting something that somebody gives you. That’s another scenario that we’re allowed to refuse an offering.

Okay. But in general, other people to practice generosity by accepting their invitations and accepting their offerings. Okay. Number seven, out of hatred, laziness, jealousy, miserliness, a grudge grudge or negligence, not giving teaching to someone who’s interested and sincerely approaches you for Dharma. Okay?

Now, in this list it said miserliness but which one was miserliness? That was back in the root vows, wasn’t it? So this is for different motivations. So I think this is a mistake where it says miserliness as one of the motivations. Here it would be anger, hatred, laziness, jealousy because miserliness would be the third root vow of not giving the dharma.

Okay? So this is not giving it for other motivations. And again, if the questions are sincere, and we talked about this in terms of general questions, the people need to be respectful. They’re not looking to argue with you. They’re not looking for ammunition so that they can just argue with you.

You know, they’re listening to what you’re saying. They’re not so full of their own ideas because this happens sometimes too. People will ask you a question, and it’s just kind of a ploy for them to say what they think about it. And then it’s okay to just let them talk and be quiet. You know, you don’t need to keep trying to insist that they listen to you if it’s clear that they’re really not going to, you know.

But this is just saying just not offering the dharma if people are sincere. And as we’ve talked about before, if you don’t feel that you know the answer to the question, it’s much better to say I don’t know than to mislead them by like making something up, especially if it’s something about the profound view of emptiness. You know, don’t make it up. If you really don’t know the answer, just be honest about it. Don’t mislead them.

Okay. So that’s another case that we’re allowed not to answer. Okay. Now the next vows, vows eight through sixteen are in connection with the perfection of ethics or morality. Okay?

Before we launch into those, because I’m always really late with your break, so why don’t we take a five break now? So I usually give you a break about twenty minutes before the end of class. So let me give it to you early this time and then we’ll come back and talk about this next Okay. Or maybe not. Thank you.

That’s right. I rang the bell in here, but I wasn’t sure if it projected out to the lobby. Yeah. Okay. So the next grouping is about the perfection of morality.

So it deals with the next of the six perfections, the perfection of morality. So ignoring, belittling, not forgiving and not helping those who’ve moral discipline by cultivating the ten immoralities, defiling their Prātimokṣa vows, committing the five uninterrupted crimes, or breaking the root Bodhisattva vows. Okay? So this is saying ignoring, belittling, people have done serious negative actions. Right?

Because they’re the people that need our help the most. So out of anger, spite, aversion, that would be doing it in an afflicted way and out of just laziness, indifference, or carelessness, that would be doing this in a non afflicted way. Okay? Now as I’ve told stories to some of you and some of you may know I do a lot of prison work, teach in prisons, and I’ve been doing that for many, many years. And sometimes, my fellow Dharma students will say things like, oh, those hardened criminals are just trying to manipulate you, you know, and have a very negative view towards people who’ve done these quite serious crimes.

And that would be an example of, you know, whenever they do that, I was cringing. I’m like, careful because that would be, you know, going against this vow. It’s It’s like not wanting to help someone because you basically think they’re hopeless because they’ve done something that’s been so terrible. You know? Now, it may be and I understand that not everybody is gonna go into prison and lead meditation classes.

You know, it’s not everybody’s cup of tea. People feel fear and intimidation. That’s okay. But this is saying just rejecting, you know, people who’ve done serious bad things or people who’ve broken their vows. You know, your other Buddhist friends that you know have maybe broken a vow or really messed up, broken their bodhisattva vows and having this feeling of not wanting anything to do with them again.

Okay? Lama Tsongkhapa mentions people who are cruel, meaning people who just hardly practice any morality at all, and immoral people, meaning people who’ve broken their vows. So there’s two kinds of people, people who’ve had vows and broken them or people who are just, you know, hardly practice, any morality at all, just, you know, kind of heavily immoral people. Now, there’s some exceptions to this one. You’re allowed to, you know, keep your distance from these people if in order to subdue them, you’re not taking action in the moment and letting them go farther will then you’ll be able to help them more.

You know, sometimes people really need to hit bottom before they’re willing to listen to anybody or, you know, have anybody help them. So if you have the wisdom that says, okay, I’m not ignoring them. It’s just right now I know it’s not gonna really do any good. I’m just gonna wait, let them play it out and then later on they’re gonna be more receptive to my words, something like that. Also, if getting close to them would alienate a lot of other people.

Okay? Sometimes it may be that putting a lot of effort into one person who, you know, is seen by people as being immoral, and that kind of gets back to that consideration thing we’re talking about before. You know, if putting a lot of attention into one person would be viewed by other people and kind of turn them off the dharma, for example, you have to be careful about that one too. Or the vows also say if somehow helping them would be contrary to the rules of monastic discipline. Maybe it would be going again if you were a monastic, it would be somehow going against your monastic vows.

I can’t you know, when I was reading the commentary this afternoon to reviewing, I couldn’t really think of a situation that would be contrary to the monastic vows to help someone or a way that you couldn’t get around that. You know, I’m not sure. Bill, can you think of something? You’re smirking. Run off with her.

Right. Oh, that’s that famous story. Right. Right. Right.

Right. Right. That’s right. That’s the story we’re always told when we’re lay people and we don’t want to take the vow of intoxication and we want to take all the other vows. Our Lama’s always tell us that.

Yeah. But I’m trying to think of a time that you’d be trying to help somebody who, you know, is one of these people and it would be I’m not sure. It must there must be a way you you could transgress or it wouldn’t be in the did you have Sarah? You’re just fiddling with your earring. That’s right.

That’s right. That’s right. And that would be kind of the one before that. Like, it would alienate other people that you’re hanging out with these people who are seen as sort of, you know, the low lifes or something like that. Yeah.

Yeah. That’s a perfect example, and that could happen too. You know, if it would turn other people off. I mean, hopefully, people would know that your motivation was to be helpful to people, you know, but it could be that you could you know, it would be more harm than good. You’re trying to put your energy into one person, but if more people would get turned off or you’d lose your respectability somehow through it and not be able to help, you know, the general population, something like that.

You could imagine a case like that. Now the next one, the explanation in your book must be from a different commentary because I have a different explanation. So what I’m gonna say doesn’t correspond with number nine in your book and there’s different commentarial traditions and I keep meaning whenever I get to this point in the Bodhisattva vows class, keep meaning to write to my friends in the education department and go, what commentary are you basing your explanation on? Because the way it’s been explained many times to me is it’s about failing to follow rules that would, if followed, would inspire faith in other people. Okay?

And this is we’ve talked about this before. We’ve talked about this whole consideration thing and it relates to that one. It relates to protecting other people’s faith. Okay? Keeping your morality really well so that other people will have faith in you.

So it means not being careless about your morality and your vows because then other people will lose faith in the path. So it’s that consideration thing that we were talking about before. Okay? Now, some people say things like, oh, well, if you’re a Bodhisattva, and even beyond that, if you practice Tantra, you don’t have to worry about all of those piddly little ordinary vows, you know, and ordinary behavior. You’re beyond that.

And this is saying, absolutely not. You know? Don’t think that ordinary morality doesn’t apply to you like, I’m a great Bodhisattva now, so I can do I can do whatever I want. You know? I don’t have to yeah.

I know what I’m doing. I don’t have to follow that ordinary morality. This is saying people are gonna lose faith in you if you don’t follow your morality. Okay? Now, some of these next ones, it’s kind of interesting because the next one seems to contradict this.

So it goes back and forth. It’s all dealing with the ethics of morality and it shows that we need a lot of wisdom to know what to do. Okay? Number nine is saying, don’t disrespect your vows and act however you want to because other people are going to lose faith. Number ten says, don’t follow the lesser vows if there’s greater benefit.

So this is saying if it would be of greater benefit to break one of the lesser vows for the benefit of others, don’t hesitate to break your lesser vows. I mean sounds kind of a contradiction but we have to be really careful about this one. What this one is saying, for example, there are proscribed rules. There are things that are seen as naturally non virtuous. Killing, stealing, sexual misconduct, lying.

And then there’s certain rules that are made, for example, for monastics to protect our minds. For example, if you’re a monastic, you’re not supposed to have physical contact with the opposite sex. There’s all these vows to protect our celibacy vow about not having physical contact with the opposite sex. So what this vow would be talking about, and this is a famous example from Sūtra. Two monks are walking along the riverbank.

Bank. A woman’s fallen in and drowning, calling, Help, help. The first monk says, Oh, I have a vow not to touch women so I can’t jump in and save her. The second monk jumps in and saves her. Right?

So he’s saying the lesser vow would be not to touch a woman but the greater benefit is for crying out loud, save her life. That’s what this is talking about. So this is saying, if you’re in a situation like that where to break a lesser vow is of more benefit, do it. Okay? And again, have to be really careful and not use this as a excuse for, what’s the word, licentiousness, you know, just doing whatever we want.

But as a bodhisattva, there’s another example from scripture. As monastics, we’re not supposed to have a lot of property and there’s all these vows about our robes and if somebody gives us material for robes, we’re supposed to make it into a robe within a certain time period. We’re not supposed to be hoarding bolts and bolts of fabric, you know, as a monastic. We are limited in the amount of possessions that we’re meant to have. But there’s another example that comes from the commentaries that says, hey, if somebody offers you a warehouse full of maroon cloth and you know that you can make robes and offer them to all of His Holiness, the Dalai Lama’s monks from Namgyal Monastery, but you’re not going to be able to do it in the twenty nine days laid out by your vows except the offering because there’s more benefit, you know, even it’s a lesser vow to keep that vow about the twenty nine days.

It’s greater benefit to accept the offering of cloth. You’d be stupid to say, sorry. Thanks. It’s really generous of you, but, you know, I don’t have sewing machines enough to make the whole warehouse into robes in a month. Right?

So that’s the kind of thing that we’re talking about. But, again, be we have to be really careful about these ones. And then the next one is even trickier. We’re getting into deep waters waters with this one. So this number eleven is saying, if you don’t break the first seven vows of morality of the ten non virtues when an extraordinary circumstance requires you’re breaking your bodhisattva vow.

What? Okay. Ten non virtues. We’ve got three of body. Who can tell me what the first three are?

Okay. Killing, stealing, you’re on a roll, Diva. And then, four of speech, lying, divisive speech, idle gossip, harsh speech. So this is saying, if you don’t do one of those things when an extraordinary circumstance calls for it, you’re breaking your bodhisattva vow. What’s left out of the ten non virtues?

The mental ones. How come? That’s right. And you’re it’s never okay to just have a mental non virtue. Right?

It’s in extraordinary circumstances okay to do one of the speech ones or the body ones, but it’s never okay to be malicious, covetous, and hold wrong view. Right? So that’s why it’s very specific to say the first seven. Now, in order to do this, for example and there’s an there’s a really famous example of Lord Buddha in a past life doing this. Anybody know the story?

Anybody remember the example? Yeah. Yeah. Tell me the story, Bill. That’s right.

That’s right. Yeah. So in that case, for killing, and in fact, for all of them, but especially for killing, they say that you need to be in order to do do this, engage in something like killing, you need to have been a Bodhisattva who’s been practicing the six perfections for countless lifetimes, you need to have the extraordinary clairvoyance to know that doing that is the only solution and you need to have a completely compassionate motivation in doing it. And some of the commentaries say, if you have the ability to revive a corpse, you have the a high level of ability to engage in killing. Okay?

So it’s extraordinary person. There was another example more recently in Tibetan history. I mean, that recently, about a thousand years ago. There was an anti Dharma king, King Long Dharma. In fact, he destroyed Buddhism in Tibet and that’s why Lama Atisha was invited by one of the subsequent kings to come to Tibet because Langdarma, this anti Buddhist king, destroyed the monasteries, killed all but three monks in Tibet.

And in fact, to have a full ordination, you need five fully ordained monks. They had to go to the border of China and and get two Chinese monks in order to start the Lineage of Ordination again. And in fact, in our robes, we have this blue piping and that’s to thank the Chinese monks that helped us start our lineage again because they wore this sort of charcoal blue robes. Their King Langdarma was assassinated by a monk who was one of these guys with a high level of motivate I should say an ex monk. Because if you’re gonna do this and you’re a monastic, you give your vows back before you break them.

Okay? So he’s assassinated by an someone who was had been a monk, gave his vows back in order to assassinate King Langdarma because he knew that there was no way to stop him from destroying the dharma in Tibet. There is a reincarnation of that monk who assassinated King Langdarma who just passed away, Chatral Rinpoche, this great Nyingma Lama from who’s one of Lama Zopa Rinpoche’s gurus, who is also in the Yolmo region after he escaped from Tibet, is the reincarnation of the monk that killed king Langdarma. There was a whole so great holy being, as we would say, again, in California slang, took the hit. Right?

And did that act knowing, you know, he had to experience some negative karma even though his his motivation was pure compassion. But he did it just like Lord Buddha did because Lord Buddha the reason Lord Buddha told the story is because once he stubbed his toe, and everybody was like, you’re the Buddha. How can you why did you stub your toe? What was that all about? And that’s when he told the story about being on the merchant ship.

Okay? So extraordinary beings in extraordinary circumstances. So this isn’t carte blanche that if you’re a Bodhisattva, you can just do whatever you want. So these last three, it’s tricky. Right?

And it takes a lot of wisdom and it’s good to review these last three because one is saying, Don’t disrespect your vows just because you’re a Bodhisattva. And then the second one is saying, Don’t keep the lesser vows if there’s greater benefit. And then the third one is saying, Even do something really negative if there’s extraordinary benefit and you’re an extraordinary being. So it’s a little bit, you know, it’s all about dancing with this motivation thing. As a bodhisattva.

You know, how sometimes our highest higher motivation can overrule some of our lesser vows. So any questions about any of those three? Anything to clarify? Interesting. It gets interesting, doesn’t it?

It’s not just about being nice, is it? Yeah. Did you oh, you went like that. I thought that was a hand. Alright.

So next, where are we? So that was number eleven. Okay. So the next one is about accepting things acquired through a wrong livelihood. So either yourself or others could be the ones engaging in the wrong livelihood.

So it’s either directly you’re engaging in the wrong livelihood or somebody else is doing it and you’re accepting things that were obtained this way. The first wrong livelihood, flattery, praising others to gain something for yourself. The second one, hinting, saying, oh, that gift you gave me before was so nice. Oh, that offering you gave me last year to sponsor my trip to see His Holiness teach, that was so helpful. Bribery, giving a small thing to receive a larger one.

Oh, this happens all the time. Do you guys do this thing in Australia? In the States, the nonprofit gives you mailing labels to lure you into giving them a donation. Do you have that? That’s like you get the thing from Greenpeace.

I mean, I always donate to Greenpeace, so I shouldn’t disrespect. But then they sent you all these mailing labels with your name and address, you’re like, oh, god. I guess I have to give them something something now. That would be this one and we have to be careful about that too because I’ve known dharma centers and I often will stop people they want to give like a little something to the people that donate so that you’ll kind of give more because you’ll get a little gift or something like that. I think you have to be really careful about that kind of stuff if it’s luring somebody into giving you a big bigger offering because you’re giving them it’s like, oh, I’ll give them a string of prayer flags if they offer a hundred dollars and I’ll give them a book if they offer two hundred and I’ll give them you know, that kind of thing.

I think we have to be really careful about that in dharma centers, you know, too. But personally, doing the same kind of thing, we have to be careful about. Okay. Extortion or blackmail, that’s pretty straightforward. What do you think?

Or, you know, any any way that you pressure or force somebody into giving you something, which we can also do with fundraising too. So we have to be careful about that. Hypocrisy, changing your usual actions to make a good impression so that others will give you something. There’s a great story from the monastic rules about this one, and it’s the origin of the story how we’re not supposed to brag about our realizations whether we have them or whether we don’t. Because there was a famine in the time of Lord Buddha, this terrible famine.

And there’s all these stories about Lord Buddha was reduced to eating horse food like that Ānanda, his attendant, was trying to, like, cook this horse food and make it into some kind of porridge and it was just the bran was on it. It was just this awful thing. Well, there’s this group of monks that look really good, like this famine is going on and everybody else is really skinny and drawn. They’re kind of sleek and fat and, you know, somebody said to them, Well, wow, how how come you’re doing so well? I mean, it’s this famine.

They said, Oh, we’re just saying that we’re arhats. So, you know, the lay people are giving us all these offerings. It’s great because they think we’re this object of devotion. And, of course, somebody told Lord Buddha and I always just imagine Lord Buddha kind of smiting his forehead and going, Oifei, I can’t believe they did that. And then he makes another vow, you know.

All the vows for the monastics came from some incident. And when when the, you know, the the texts are translated, they always translate Lord Buddha saying, I never thought I’d have to make a vow about that. I never thought they’d do that. And you could just imagine him sort of rolling his eyes and going, I can’t believe they did that. So that’s what this one is about, pretending to be something that you’re not so that people will give you offerings.

Okay? So again, we’re still on morality. Now, there’s some other wrong livelihoods. These are the ones mentioned in this context. There’s some other wrong livelihoods mentioned in some of the texts and that is things like dealing in weapons, intoxicants, animals, things like that.

You know, kind of livelihood that causes harm to other beings. So it’s not just this flattery and hypocrisy thing. It’s like other kinds of livelihoods that cause harm to other beings. So we have to be careful about that. Skins, hides, things like that.

There’s a list in some of the other Oh. Oh, wow. God, that’s hard. Boy, that is really hard. Right.

Right. Because you’re kind of trying to purify it a little bit by having it go in, but that’s hard. That’s really a hard one. I didn’t know that. Well, it’s usually it’s an addiction that usually takes the food out of the mouths of the mothers and children.

But you know, I mean, it really does Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. That’s a tough one. Yeah.

Yeah. Well, that’s it. I mean, it’s Yeah. Yeah. That’s a hard one.

Like taking money that’s made out of a livelihood that does do a lot of harm. Yeah. Right. Yeah. I think I personally, like again, with a lot of these vows it gets, it’s more useful to think about it really personally too.

You know, it’s not like to say, this is wrong or this is right, sort of in general. I mean, I think it’s really good to start thinking like that, but this is just about saying, am I going to get my livelihood personally through, like you, if your salary is coming from that money, you know, it’s a choice that you need to make kind of ethically of, is, you know, is my salary? Do I really want my salary coming from a source like that? Like, I think the more kind of general and global we get, I mean, it’s good to have those conversations, but this is really about, like, if I’ve taken bodhisattva vows, I have a responsibility for where my livelihood is coming from and, you know, making some choices and decisions about that. Yeah.

It’s sort of like, you know, socially responsible investing. You know, if you’ve got money to invest, a lot of people feel a lot more comfortable really screening, you know, the companies that they’re going to invest their money for things like weapons and gambling and, you know, in the environment and all this criteria because then you feel like, sure, some of that money is coming back to you and it’s at least, you know, somewhat clean. So, yeah. Yeah. Practicing with, I think, especially the Bodhisattva vows is there’s so many shades of gray and it puts us into the position of having these ethical dilemmas like, you know, the ten non virtues are way more black and white than some of this stuff because some one person’s flattery in hinting may not be flattering in hinting to somebody else.

How many degrees separation do you have from the source of the money? Because like you say, it’s all interdependent. Yeah. That’s right. Yeah.

And I guess it’s sort of you know, for me, it’s sort of, where am I gonna draw the line? How indirect, you know, am I gonna be? And what’s gonna what’s gonna be sort of the threshold in a way of my morality? Like, how many degrees separated from these things am I? For for example, in the US, you know, so many of your tax dollars go to the military and to being the global domination of the entire planet, you know, at least under previous administrations.

And I was never brave enough not to pay my taxes, like when I was earning enough money to pay taxes. And I had a friend and she would not pay her taxes, but she would calculate how much her taxes would be and donate them to educational organizations, file her tax return with a cover letter to the government going, I’m not cheating, I’m not taking the money, but I can’t support what the government is doing in terms of, you know, all the money going to defense. So I’m gonna take that money that I would have owed the government and put it into education because that’s something I believe in. I was never brave enough to do that. It was sort of one of those things.

It bothered me that I didn’t. No. She no. She got you know, they came after her eventually and she was willing to go to prison for her beliefs. And I remember no.

That didn’t with her at all. But she was willing, like, was making a statement. She didn’t really think it was gonna fly. She knew that they weren’t gonna accept it, but she was just making a political statement. And I remember feeling like, I wish I were brave enough.

I don’t want to go to prison. So I’m just going to pay my taxes and and feel bad. You know, so it’s it’s like that. Like, how far are you willing to go? How close are those ethical dilemmas to your life?

And it’s not black and white. It’s not easy. I mean, these are, you know, these training guidelines and how we all interpret things like this in our own lives is a real personal decision, you know. So, it’s tough. Yeah.

That’s right. Yeah. Yeah. It could be. And maybe and maybe you’re thinking it’s really good that all the money from gambling is going into, you know, that’s one way of looking at it.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Right. Right.

So, it’s Yeah, I mean, that’s one way of looking at it. But then, you think, does that whitewash it enough that people aren’t taking as many steps to stop gambling because they feel like, oh, well, it’s really okay because the money’s all going into all of these social services. Yeah. Yeah. It’s tough.

It’s tough. And it’s not like I said, it’s not black and white and it’s all, you know, in terms of our perspective, how we see these things. And just and, again, just making personal choices about, you know, what’s acceptable to us in our lives. But it’s a great example of exactly how we’re facing things like this. Sorry.

It’s day two, Susan. I didn’t you know, the timing is It’s great though. It happened for a reason. Yeah. Yeah.

Right. Right. It would be an interesting discussion to have. Alright. We’ve got ten minutes and we’ve got thirteen vows to go.

Oh, to stay on track. No. The next one, having your main interest be in idle gossip, frivolous activities and so forth. Lama Tsongkhapa says, being primarily interested in entertainment. I think that’s a good way of putting it.

Okay? And this one is just basically saying, just being involved in worldly time wasting activities, you know, to with the greater proportion of your time. And there’s all these examples given listening to the radio, drinking, involving others in frivolous talk, blah blah blah. Now, the commentaries say, of course, you can’t be serious and talking about the Four Noble Truths all the time. You know, we need to relax.

We need to take a break. In fact, Master Śāntideva says, part of the Bodhisattva’s way of life is knowing when you’re becoming overwhelmed and you need to back off and relax. But this is just saying, let’s, you know, our precious human rebirth is really precious. Let’s not just spend all of it in distraction. And again, this is for somebody who’s taken on, you know, that engaging bodhisattva vows.

You’ve decided that the focus of your life is all about your spiritual, you know, work for the benefit of all other living beings. So to spend a lot of time in all of this frivolity is would be going against your vows. Now the commentaries say, if you’re stopping somebody else’s grief or depression, if you’re creating a better environment for people, gaining their trust, attracting people to Buddhism who wouldn’t otherwise come, who are attracted to somebody with a jolly happy nature, then it’s okay to chat, getting to know people, and so forth. This is just about being primarily interested in those distracting activities. We all know what they are.

Again, the choice is yours, where you draw the line. Right? So but just being aware, you know, again, if our whole motivation of our life is all about being a benefit to others, how much are you just distracting and entertaining yourself? Okay. The next one is to counteract a wrong view that people on the bodhisattva track are not attempting to gain liberation, are not viewing delusions as something to be eliminated.

So we talked before about the two tracks, kind of this track towards liberation and the track towards enlightenment. The track towards enlightenment takes longer. Bodhisattvas make a vow to keep being reborn in Samsāra to be of benefit to others. Sometimes this can be misunderstood just because they are saying that they’ll be reborn to benefit others. This is misunderstood that they don’t have any aversion to saṃsāra.

They don’t see afflictions and delusions as anything that’s problematic. Bodhisattvas have even a stronger wish to overcome their delusions and afflictions and get enlightened even than people who are on the track towards liberation. So it’s a wrong view. Right? So this would be saying holding that wrong view and saying that Bodhisattvas don’t wish for liberation.

They just want don’t wanna stop with personal liberation. They’re aiming towards full enlightenment. That’s the difference. Okay? So this and I’ve heard this wrong view spoken.

People say, oh, if you take Bodhisattva vows, it means that you’re stuck in Samsāra forever and you’re never gonna get out. You just keep being reborn in Samsāra. No. You know, that’s not what it means. It means you’re willing to be reborn.

It’s not Samsāra for you. Right? If you’re over you’re no longer under the control of karma and delusion. Is it saṃsāra for His Holiness, the Dalai Lama? I don’t think so.

Right? What’s the force that has caused him to take rebirth? His compassion. And that’s the difference. That’s the difference.

Okay? So it’s a fundamental difference of what’s the propelling force for your rebirth. You know, if you’re upper level Bodhisattva, it’s the force of your compassion and the pure prayers that you’ve made to be a benefit. So it ain’t saṃsāra for you. You know, they might be sitting here in the room with us.

It may be saṃsāra for us. But for a bodhisattva, it would not be saṃsāra because they’re no longer under the control of their karma and delusions. Okay? So that would be saying, don’t have that wrong view. Now the next one, not avoiding a bad reputation.

So there are two parts to this one. One is about keeping your morality pure so you don’t get a bad reputation in the first place. And then the second one is if you have done something or people think that you’ve done something and it’s ruining your reputation, doing something to correct it. Now, again, why do we care about our reputation so much? Isn’t that just pride?

And isn’t that something we should get over? What do you think, Mani? Yeah. Setting a good example. It again, it’s the consideration thing that we keep going back to.

Okay? It’s not about being proud or having a good reputation so that everybody will respect you. It’s just about setting that example. Right? People know you’re a practitioner.

If you get a bad reputation, whether it’s something you did or something you didn’t do, do something about it. If it’s something you did do, apologize. Right? Make it right. If it’s something you didn’t do, try and clear the air.

It’s not always possible. Some people are accusing you of things and they don’t want to hear your reasons or excuses or anything like that. There’s not much you can do. This is saying if there is something that you can do about it, clear it up. And then the first part was don’t get in that position in the first place.

You know, keep your morality purely so you don’t get a bad reputation in the first place. Okay? So, again, back to that consideration thing. Now, number sixteen, not correcting others who are committing negative actions even if it must be done forcefully. So if you see people who are under the control of strong afflictions who are behaving negatively, This is saying, correct them even if it must be done forcefully.

Don’t be wimpy just because, oh, maybe they won’t like you or maybe they’ll get mad. You know, somebody’s really doing something negative. This is saying intervene and stop them if you can. Don’t say, oh, no. You know, they’ll probably yell at me or they won’t like like, God forbid, somebody doesn’t like you.

The world will come to an end. You know, this is saying, take responsibility for their morality by being forceful and stopping them, you know, if you can. It’s not always possible but if you’re in a position to do that, do it. Okay? Kathy’s frowning.

What’s happening, Kathy? Well, if they’re in the middle of doing something negative, we’re supposed to take responsibility for all sentient beings, you know, right? Yeah. They may do it when your back is turned but if you’re there and they’re engaging in something really heavily negative right in front of you, yes, stop them. Explain it to them later, you know, but if they’re doing it right in front of you, stop them in the moment at least from creating that karma then try and talk talk to them later.

Right? Yeah. Yeah. What would be an example of that? Can anybody think of an example?

Yeah, that’s right. Yeah, that’s right. That’s right. Stopping somebody. Say more about what you mean.

Not if it’s just a discussion, if somebody’s beating somebody up and it’s safe for you, I mean, just because we’ve taken Bodhisattva vows doesn’t mean that we want to get in the middle of the gang fight between the Crips and the bloods, you know, or something like that. I mean, we also have vows that says don’t, you know, don’t just throw away your precious human rebirth by doing stupid things, but, you know, if somebody is really inflicting harm on someone else and you see that happening and there is something that you can do about it, you know, yeah, do it. I’ve had that happen on the street. You know, I’ve seen somebody getting ready to beat up their girlfriend or their dog or whatever, and I’ve intervened. I think it’s really helpful that I’m bald and six and a half feet tall.

I mean, they’re usually like sort of shocks them into stopping, you know, so it’s quite useful actually to have this appearance. But like that, that would be an example. Yeah. That’s right. Yeah.

But, you know, that kind of thing, like, if you really see engaged in something and again, out of compassion for them, not anger, you’re stopping them for their sake. It’s just like that example. The Buddha stopped the murderer mostly for them to save the murderer from the karma of killing four ninety nine people. Now, if people are having a lively discussion, you know, that’s alright. But we’re talking about something that would actually harm them because they’d be engaging in negative karma.

Yeah. And this is saying, don’t hesitate just because, God forbid, they won’t like you anymore or they they’ll yell at you or something. Yeah. Saying not to be wimpy in that way, which we can, you know. Yeah, that’s right.

Yeah. That’s right. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That’s right. That’s right.

Yeah, yeah. And for us, it’s going to be mixed. You know, it’s going to be mixed. For sure, we might still I mean, I have this thing for animals. As you all know, we had this great thing on Sunday.

We had nineteen dogs and one bird that got blessed with all these mantras. It was so much fun. And then I turned into, like, the doggy Santa Claus or something. Like, everybody wanted their picture of their dog on my lap, which, of course, I was in heaven. So, when I see somebody beating on a dog, I can’t say I’m filled with compassion for them.

I at least try and muster that. I mean, I still feel really angry. Right? But at least I try and muster as much compassion as I can going into it, but it’s mixed, and it’s gonna be for a long time. Right?

We’re not like pure compassionate beings and only thinking of the karma of the poor person. But at least if we try to come from that place, for me, if I’m in that situation, I at least try not to express the anger that I might still be feeling and try and intervene skillfully in a way that’s not blaming and angry. But I still, you know, I notice I’m hyperventilating and I’m feeling all of these feelings and it’s gonna be probably a long time before I’m totally over that. But, you know, you just Yeah. That’s right.

Yeah. Yeah. I learned something. I had a I took these trainings in conflict resolution for a long time and I had a conflict resolution mentor that I would bring these situations to. And she taught me the neatest trick for that kind of situation.

I was having a really similar problem with somebody that I was supervising who was bullying other people and it was just bullying and I tried everything and couldn’t get through to her at all and my mentor said, Why don’t you just present it to her and ask for her advice about how to deal with her? And it worked. I was like, I never would have thought of that! And she said, Just go to her and go, Wow! It’s really I’m having such a hard time, you know, when you throw staplers at people and shout at them and do these things and I’m I just can’t think of a way to get you to stop doing that.

Can you help me? And it worked. She was like, wow, well, you could when I’m in the middle of a, you know, hissy fit, you could say this and that and she really helped me come up with a solution and I never would have thought of it in a million years and it was so effective and it totally changed the energy. I was just really out there with the problem I was having and asked for help about how do I manage you when you’ve lost it like that? Like, I’m at the end of my rope.

I don’t know what to do. And she’s like, oh, wow. Okay. Let me think about that. It was great.

It was awesome. So maybe try that. Yeah. Alright. Gosh.

It’s already after nine and we’re only on where did we get up to? So we’re up to the perfection of patience. We’re doing alright. We’re up to sixteen. So we’ve got how many more to go?

Thirty more to go. We’ll be alright because we had to talk about the four binding factors. By the way, one thing I forgot to tell you, there are two of the root vows. We’re just gonna like circle back to the root vows at the eleventh hour. Two of the root vows that you can break without having all of the four binding afflictions.

Anybody know? Great. Holding wrong views. If you hold a wrong view, which is what, Deva? Yeah, rejecting the law of cause and effect.

What else? There are three main things when we talk about wrong view. One is the law of cause and effect. Yeah, that you can’t it’s not possible to become enlightened and rebirth. Okay, rebirth.

If you reject those ideas, you’ve lost your bodhisattva vow because if the premise of the whole idea of getting enlightened so that you can benefit all sentient beings, cause and effect is in there. Right? Absolutely has to be. The possibility of enlightenment is in there. And what you’re gonna do it all in one lifetime?

I don’t think so. So if you hold a strong wrong view, that sort of just pulls the rug out from under that whole bodhisattva kind of shape to your life. And then what’s the other one that you’ve lost it completely without the four binding afflictions? No? Giving up Bodhicitta which you can only do for a split second.

The next second, you’re not holding your bodhisattva vows anymore. Right? So giving up Bodhicitta also automatically wipes out your bodhisattva vow. And that makes sense too. Right?

So bodhisattva vows this whole kind of shape and structure to your life and again, you just pulled the rug out from under. Now, it doesn’t mean that in a moment of discouragement when you go, oh, I don’t know if it’s possible to help all sentient beings. It doesn’t mean that. It means from the depths of your heart, you totally give Right? It’s not sort of you’re having a bad day or you try and help somebody and they just yell at you and it doesn’t work and you get discouraged.

It means really from the depths of your heart, you completely give up the whole Bodhicitta idea. So those two, you don’t need the four binding afflictions. You know, when you do those two from the depths of your heart, you automatically lose that Bodhisattva structure. Okay? So that’s important to, you know so sixteen of them, you need the four binding afflictions to blow it for those two just having those two seriously from the depths of your heart.

You’ve lost your Bodhisattva intention. Okay. I’m glad I remembered. Alright. Let’s take a minute just to dedicate the positive energy from our session tonight.

So wonderful to have the opportunity to really look at this bodhisattva activity, these bodhisattva vows, factors of training and really look deeply so that we can implement them in our own lives creating all the causes and conditions for our total enlightenment for the benefit of all living beings. So let’s dedicate all the positive energy from tonight Okay, so next week is our last session so we’ll speed through the last thirty secondary Bodhisattva vows and then if we have time after that we’ll learn some tricks of the trade for keeping and training yourself in attva vows. Now, Bill ordered and I heard that this great commentary called the Bodhisattva Vow by Geshe Sonam Rinchen is now available in the bookstore. This is a really great