Audio recorded at Buddha House Adelaide. Transcript auto-generated and AI-corrected; may contain errors.
About this talk. What makes a practice truly Mahāyāna? In this 103-minute opening session, Ven Jampa Gendun conveys Geshe-la’s Lamrim commentary on the mind of great scope, tracing the full prerequisite chain that bodhicitta requires: recognizing the kindness of all sentient beings, exchanging self-cherishing for others-cherishing, and cultivating renunciation. A verse from the Guru Puja anchors the argument — the mind that cherishes oneself is the door to every evil; the mind that cherishes others the source of every good. The commentary then lists ten benefits of bodhicitta and drives them home with cautionary stories of practitioners who mastered tantric ritual yet, lacking bodhicitta, were reborn as hungry ghosts — contrasted with the point that even one mani mantra recited with bodhicitta becomes a cause for full enlightenment. Suited to practitioners beginning a systematic study of Mahāyāna foundations.
File metadata (for organising)
File: 01 BV.mp3
UUID: 895a1f75-d4c1-450c-8e61-8847d3c6c598
Teacher: Ven Jampa Gendun
Collection: Bodhisattva Vows (Ven Jampa Gendun)
Date: 2007 (exact day not recorded)
Recorded at: Buddha House Adelaide
Duration: 103.4 minutes
Words: ~5,583
May all sentient beings have happiness and the causes of happiness. May all sentient beings be free from suffering or the causes of suffering. May all sentient beings be inseparable from the happiness that is free from suffering. May all sentient beings abide in equanimity, free from desire for friends and hatred for our enemies.
Yeah. Oh, yeah.
So Geshe la wanted to teach on bodhicitta vows. Geshe la wanted to teach on bodhicitta. So Geshe la picked up a text on Lamrim. We are approaching the topic of the text which refers to training one’s mind in the path of the beings of great scope. That topic starts with three divisions. The teaching on the benefits of the mind of enlightenment and so forth, which is the only door for entering the Mahāyāna vehicle.
Then secondly, the way to give rise to the mind of enlightenment, to produce the mind of enlightenment. And then thirdly, having given rise to the mind of enlightenment, then the way to train oneself in the conduct. So then was making reference to that expression says that the mind of enlightenment is the only door to the Mahāyāna. And then and then was saying so we we we all understand what is the entrance door. Right?
The only entrance door. We all understand what is the entrance door. And Geshe la explains, when we the mind of enlightenment, bodhicitta, if if if you if you develop bodhicitta, then you you become a bodhisattva. You become a Mahāyāna practitioner. You become a practitioner of the great vehicle of of the great great scope plus.
I guess, I was explaining. So then what is this mind of enlightenment? This this of enlightenment is the wish, as Geshe la says, this uncontrived wish to deliver all sentient beings to the ground of Buddhahood and and accomplish that, that one oneself attaining enlightenment. Okay? This mind, this intent of delivering all sentient beings into the ground of enlightenment, into the state which is free of every suffering and endowed with every happiness and developing the wish that oneself may accomplish that is something which is very difficult to to produce.
So then we all can we all can give rise to this mind, to these thoughts that may I attain enlightenment for the sake of establishing all sentient beings in the state of enlightenment. We can all produce these thoughts, Geshe-la said. But to produce these thoughts in an uncontrived manner is is something which is very difficult. In order to be able to give rise to the uncontrived mind of enlightenment, the uncontrived wish to establish all sentient beings in enlightenment, Geshe la says: We must, as a prerequisite, must before hand develop a mind that cherishes others a mind that cherishes others regards others is more precious and more important than oneself that’s what Geshe la was saying again giving rise to this to this mind which which regards others as more important than oneself is more pressing oneself is difficult now isn’t it? And then again Geshe la says, in order to be able to produce that what we need is to understand how precious we need to understand that all sentient beings are very precious they are very important and without having this understanding then we cannot produce we cannot cherish all the all sentient beings this. Moreover, first what we need to recognize the kindness of all sentient beings we need to engage in many different reasonings. Geshe la said we have to engage in such reasonings that determine that there has not been one sentient being who has not been our parent or mother in one life or another.
All sentient beings have been greatly kind to us. All sentient beings have been as kind to us as our mother in this present life and so forth. There are many, many reasons that we have to go for in order to establish the great kindness of. And then if reflect in this way, then we’ll be able then to understand how all sentient beings are very precious, all sentient beings are very important, how they are all very kind to us. And then in this way, we’ll be able to develop that that mind that cherishes others.
Even though we understand that these thoughts still even though we understand that for example one’s mother is very precious is very dear, Geshe la is still the mind that cherishes ourselves our own selves is still much stronger than that and it actually arrests that mind that cherishes others more than oneself. I guess I was just saying, from one from one perspective, what we have to think about, the sort of reasoning, the sort of thought we have to give rise to is to realize that all sentient beings are just like ourselves. That all sentient beings are equal to ourselves, exactly the same as ourselves. That all sentient beings wish only Only wish for happiness and do not wish for any suffering.
Even insects want that. Then Geshe la was saying, all sentient beings are exactly like this. Having given rise to this thought of how all sentient beings are equal to oneself, then one has to understand, Geshe la says, how every happiness that we have experienced is in dependence upon the kindness of all sentient beings and how every suffering that we experience is a result of all the work we do for the sake of our own selves. I I wasn’t saying even even enlightenment is attained in dependence on North Asian beings. Buddhahood is attained in dependence on North Asian beings.
All the grounds and all the paths are attained in dependence on North Asian beings. Even in temporal realm, still, with regards to this to this present life, everything that we, every good that we experience here, the food and the clothing and so forth, it all comes in dependence on all sentient beings. And, Geshe la was saying, again, pointing out that we have nothing actually to cherish in ourselves. And still, we engage in all sorts of work and everything. Geshe la was saying, even though we want to accomplish happiness, that’s very difficult.
Want to we see in all the the scriptures and the text that we have to accomplish virtue. But it’s very difficult to accomplish virtue. Even though we we work to it, we do not, we would not actually accomplish it in any other way. So then what what happens instead is that every time we think think of, how to get good food or tasty food, we think I need the good food. I need the good clothing.
I need the money. I need the wealth. I need the good looks. It’s always the I coming up. And then then out of this out of this mind, then we we engage in all sorts of activities in order to accomplish those things.
Out of this, only suffering comes out. Out of this, only all the afflictions comes out of anger, attachment, belligerence, pride and so forth. All of this come come out of this mind. So we can see how can see how this this mind accomplishes brings about every suffering isn’t it it makes us makes us angry makes us with harmful intent so forth towards others. It only brings suffering and then we can see how every happiness comes from all those sentient beings.
Right? We can see that. Right? Then, Geshe la concludes, the one that gives us suffering is the self, isn’t And the one who gives happiness are others. This understanding Geshe la says, we have to cultivate it, have to meditate and cultivate it a lot.
Cultivate the thought, the understanding that oneself is the source of every suffering, the cause of every suffering, and others the givers of every happiness. And then Geshe la quotes the one verse of the Lama Chöpa, the Guru Puja, which says: The mind that cherishes oneself is the door for everything that is bad, every evil. And the mind that cherishes others is the source of every good. And Geshe la was saying, if we if we were to think in this way, to reflect, contemplate this in this way, then we would be able to we would we would be able to produce the mind that cherishes others, isn’t it? And Geshe la says: But still, in order to understand, in order to be able to produce that mind, that wish, to see all sentient beings free from every suffering and endowed with every happiness.
Geshe la says, first, need to understand our own suffering. If we cannot understand our own suffering condition or situation, then the wish. We cannot see the suffering of others and develop the wish to see them free from suffering. Most people, you know, nearly everybody says I am happy, I am okay when people ask how are you? And they say, I’m alright.
How are you? Isn’t it? Most people do say that, isn’t it? Geshe la was just saying then, and so when people ask how are you, and the answer back is oh I’m okay, I’m alright, I’m well, that very mind which is thinking I am well, that is an afflicted mind. Geshe la was saying that very mind which is thinking I am well is a mind that is looking down on others.
It is a mind of pride. As such, it is an afflictive conception, an afflicted mind, and as such, is the cause of suffering only. Not only that, that very mind is suffering of change. It says now, the mind is thinking, now I am well and in the next moment, one is not well anymore. So there is absolutely nothing whatsoever within cyclic existence which is not suffering all those those things that we think of as happiness they are all suffering.
There is there is nothing in the whole of our existence which is not suffering. And, Geshe la was saying if we think about it we can see how there is no lasting reliable or stable happiness in cyclic existence isn’t it? All the way until until we attain liberation, there is there is no lasting happiness. Cultivates this understanding properly then one will understand how one is sick or ill with suffering and one is truly sick with suffering.
So guess what I was gonna say when we when we understand when we understand that then we’ll be able to develop the mind that wishes to be free from all the suffering. We understand that this human birth and every other birth and everything was propelled by actions and affective afflictive conceptions and we understand how everything is in the nature of suffering, everything is unreliable in this way And Geshe la was saying, so that even though everything is in the nature of suffering everything is this sickness or disease of the suffering of actions and the results of actions and afflictive conceptions that’s what Geshe la was saying, actions and afflictive conceptions still we can do something about it we don’t have to just sit with it. We can we can still accomplish the causes of happiness right now. Geshe la was saying that we have to develop that state of mind which sees every phenomenon which is the result of actions and afflictive conceptions in the nature of suffering, as poison, something whatever it is a flower or whatever it is, Geshe la was saying, yes as something which we dislike we do not want it but not desire undesirable or the more intense this dislike for everything that arises out of actions and afflictive conceptions grows then the stronger our wish to be free from these things will grow and when we keep cultivating it in this way when we achieve this such an uncontrived mind in this way then we have achieved we have attained renunciation.
Then this is this is the is the mind of renunciation, is the mind that sees all all the cyclic existence that is in the nature of suffering. There is no happiness here. Everything that arises out of actions and afflictive conceptions is in the nature of suffering. Such a mind which sees everything in this way and wants to be free from all these things in this way, this is renunciation. So the mind which was that having developed that mind which is to be free from all this suffering of of saṃsāra, which we used to abandon and give it up.
Then one understands that all other sentient beings also were born out of actions and afflictive emotions and conceptions and that they all experience all the same sufferings that we experience. Reflecting this way, we can see how the suffering of all other sentient beings is much greater than our own suffering. Because we are only one and all of the sentient beings are innumerable so then we develop then the wish to free all sentient beings from the suffering and establish them in this state we endow them with every happiness. In order to accomplish that, to attain Buddhahood itself And so Geshe la was saying, this is the mind of enlightenment itself. So, Geshe la was saying, the in the text, it says that if without the understanding of one’s own suffering condition, one will not be able to properly give rise to the intention of freeing all sentient beings from suffering. We can see then how we need as a preliminary, as a prerequisite, prerequisite, need renunciation.
So, we can see how giving rise to the mind of enlightenment, to bodhicitta, we can say bodhicitta is something which is absolutely not easy to develop, to produce, isn’t it? So we we always how do you say? We always give rise to those thoughts. You know? Guess what I was saying?
Nowadays, we give rise to the thought of the mind of enlightenment. We think attain enlightenment for the sake of. But as it is right now, because we haven’t realized all the prerequisites of of this mind, then that is not the the authentic or genuine mind of enlightenment. And as it is right now, it remains only as as words that we say out of our mouths. That’s it.
Again, we can see going through having gone through all this, we can see how how how difficult it is to produce bodhicitta, to give rise to bodhicitta. It doesn’t stop there, Geshe la says. To give rise to this uncontrived mind of the relative bodhicitta, we also need to attain calm abiding. This uncontrived mind is a mind which is abiding single pointedly in its object. We also need calm abiding in order to develop it.
Preparation. Yes. Preparation. Yes. Geshe la was saying there are two. This last point is explained in a way that I was not familiar with, but Geshe la was saying there are two that you can develop, you can produce the mind of enlightenment with these two.
How can I say it? It’s a preparation concentration or the actual concentration. Geshe la was explaining what they were. The actual concentration is this union of calm abiding with special insight, Geshe la was saying. And this preparation which Geshe la was referring to is calm abiding alone. And one cannot develop the mind of enlightenment with either one alone, with calm abiding alone or with calm abiding and special insight. And so, Geshe la was saying, again, we can see then how difficult it is to give rise to bodhicitta. We have to train our minds a huge lot, a great lot. Geshe la said it’s not without meditating and training ourselves a lot that we can develop. And Geshe la was, lastly, emphasizing how important it is to develop this knowledge, this awareness of the nature of suffering.
It seems like this is very important. And Geshe la was saying, it’s very difficult for us to recognize suffering. Geshe la was saying, we might refer to those people in Africa who do not have enough food to eat or clothes to wear and so forth. And we think, what a pity. Geshe la was saying that the matter of the fact is that there’s nothing, how can I say, there’s nothing surprising, it’s not surprising, there’s nothing impressive about it really because this condition that they’re experiencing now it hasn’t always been like that this condition it changes it can change so now they experience it in this way and it can change they can get the food and get clothes at some other point?
So, again, it’s always the same. There’s nothing to be impressed about because if our present situation will also change into a similar situation as the one that they’re experiencing Geshe la was saying even though we shouldn’t be impressed with it, doesn’t mean that we should turn our backs to it. We should contemplate that we are also going to experience such sufferings. We have and we will experience such sufferings. In this way, we should develop the wish that all beings be free from such sufferings.
So then so then we we we have we must cultivate, train our minds in bodhicitta, and and this is how this how we go about training our minds in bodhicitta. So, Geshe la then, is going back to the text, and then Geshe was just saying, now we’re going to go through the the benefits of giving rise to the mind of enlightenment which Geshe la was just saying are the some of the preliminaries to to giving rise to the mind of enlightenment itself that which precedes giving rise to the mind of enlightenment itself. Those those things, those contemplations, which precede us. So then, I was just saying, when we talk about in in the in in the text, when we talk about bodhicitta, there are generally two ways of giving us a bodhicitta. There’s the one which is equalizing and exchanging self for others.
And there’s the other one which is the seven-point cause and effect teaching. Has has already in in all the Geshe la has said so far he has explained these two methods these two ways of giving rise to bodhicitta. When Geshe la explained all the steps from renunciation to recognizing their kindness and so forth that is the teaching on the seven point cause and effect and when Geshe la was talking about understanding how all other sentient beings are more important, more precious than oneself, and and how all the happiness comes from all sentient beings and so forth, that is the teaching on equalizing and exchanging self for others. And Geshe la was approaching the one topic in the text, which is saying that in order to be able to train in the path of being of a great scope we have to first give rise to joy, to delight in it. So Geshe la was saying in order to be able to develop bodhicitta, we have to understand what are the benefits of giving rise to bodhicitta. And without understanding the benefits of giving rise to bodhicitta, producing bodhicitta, we won’t have the wish to strive for it.
And again, without so then and with this understanding, we will we will have this this joy, this liking, this this delight in striving to attain it. So then and the text goes on to say that there are ten benefits listed in the text. So the first one, we are told is that the mind of enlightenment is the only door entrance door to the Mahāyāna, to the great vehicle. And then, also, by by by giving rise to bodhicitta, one will attain the the how can I say that? The name of of a child of the conquerors or the of the victors.
Child. And then, again, one will by bodhicitta, again, by the force of bodhicitta, one will outshine both hearers and solitary realizers. Luska. Five fifty five. The five five five.
The And then you will become a supreme object of offerings. And then you will be able to amass the great accumulations of of of merit. You’ll be able to easily amass the great accumulation of merit. You’ll be able to you say. You know?
Loss. You’ll be able to quickly purify one’s negativities and obscurations. And you’ll be able to accomplish anything that you wish. You and you will be able you won’t be hindered or you won’t be bothered by harm or or obstacles or hindrances, loss? This one.
Loss. And then you will be able to quickly complete all the the grounds grounds and the paths. And then And then you become you become you become a field of of we say, the text in English says that you become a fertile source or fertile field for every happiness for for the happiness of of the other being to arise. Is it the same text? So then as for the first one of those topics, which is then the only entrance way to the Mahāyāna is is is developing bodhicitta, which is the first benefit of developing bodhicitta.
He’s saying that And then the the text is saying that what what determines one one entering or not entering in this great vehicle is bodhicitta. So if one has bodhicitta, one enters the mahayana, the great vehicle, one that joins the great vehicle. And if one does not have bodhicitta, one does not enter the great vehicle. This verse which well, not everybody has the both.
It went through this verse which is saying again that it’s not enough that the Dharma or the teaching is a Mahāyāna teaching. Geshe la was explaining okay there’s not enough that you are you know you have some Mahāyāna texts and then you say oh I practice these teachings and just merely saying that does not make you a Mahāyāna it does not make you a Mahāyāna being it all depends entirely on you having actually produced bodhicitta or not and that’s what determines you being a Mahāyāna if not and then even if it is a teacher what was the teacher he was referring to that is even higher than that? Even if it was the Guhyasamāja tantras, again, without this bodhicitta, it won’t be of much benefit anyway. The verse in its entirety is not enough that the dharma is to be the Mahāyāna.
The person must also belong to the Mahāyāna. You become a Mahāyāna by having bodhicitta. If you merely understand bodhicitta, you are not yet a Mahāyānist. That’s what the verse is saying. And then I was reading from the commentary which Geshe la is explaining.
It’s saying that that person, that being, that person which has an understanding, which understands the mind of enlightenment, which understands bodhicitta, is not a Mahāyānist. In order to become a Mahāyānist, you have actually to produce bodhicitta. That person is is is is the only person who understands bodhicitta, but it’s not a person who has bodhicitta. Oh, yeah. So then So, Geshe I was then just just reading from the next part of the text.
Again, which is saying that if if you do not have bodhicitta, bodhicitta, but you practice something like the, again, then that practice will not be the cause of your enlightenment, and that won’t even help you to accomplish the path of accumulation. So yeah. This one? And Put aside even that, not only would we not accomplish the path of accumulation of the Mahāyāna, that practice wouldn’t even be Mahāyāna practice at all. It wouldn’t be anything.
It wouldn’t be Mahāyāna at all. And then again Yeah. And then on the other hand, if you have bodhicitta, then if you just merely say one mani mantra, that that saying one mani mantra will become a cause for enlightenment. And then having said that, the text goes on to quote.
Oh, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And then goes on to quote Nāgārjuna from the Precious Garland, which says if you desire supreme enlightenment for yourself and others, for yourself and the world, know that the root of it, its root, is bodhicitta. So which should be as firm, as stable as the king of all mountains.
Okay? And then again, going back to the verse, saying again in more colloquial terms, I was saying, if you want what the verse is telling us is that if you if you want to attain enlightenment, if you want to attain the benefit of oneself and others, for yourself and for others, then you have to which is as strong and stable as the king of mountains. Okay. Yeah. Yeah.
And then goes for the for the another part of the text after that verse, which is saying that if you do not have the mind of enlightenment, then even though you might be practicing the, this tantric meditation of the generation stage and so forth, guess that wasn’t saying, look, even though you might be doing all sorts of meditations, contemplations, offerings, tantras, so forth. And the text goes on to say, with a strange translation, which Geshe la was explaining in a different way, it is just the same as just going sightseeing in the temple, you know, like people doing the circumambulation. They go taking pictures of his his home in this temple, isn’t it? And and Geshe la was saying. You know, when when we go to the sightseeing in the temple and look at the altars, in the sense that, of course, there are some imprints coming out of it.
Right? You get some imprints, you get a little bit of benefit. There’s really not that much coming out of it. English I wasn’t saying it’s the same. If you don’t have bodhicitta and you are doing all these meditations and tantras and so forth, it’s not that you’re not going to get any benefit at all.
You get some benefit. You get the imprints or something like that, but it’s not going to become the cause of enlightenment. Say how what’s the name for that? Is that what? Bello.
Bello is how you say it. Okay. And then so, Geshe la was going through the text and and saying, so your Geshe la was first talking about the generation stage and now the completion stage of of the tantra, which is when when they say about breathing in, holding it, and then and then expelling expelling it. In other words, all these tantric practices of the completion stage, there will be nothing more than nothing more than this working bellows. And then then Geshe la was explaining what the text is saying that the fact that the secret tantras are so quick in making us attain enlightenment is because they increase our bodhicitta so much, we are told.
And it’s in dependence on this on this bodhicitta again. Geshe la was saying it is in dependence on bodhicitta again that the tantras work so quickly. Otherwise otherwise, they don’t. And then Geshe la started reading another quote from that was said by Chengawa Rinpoche Dorje. Okay?
Chengawa Rinpoche Dorje was saying that he had studied with a lama, which is a. And when this lama, was going to give an initiation, he would always in the context of the initiation, he would always teach the whole of the. And then Chennga Rinpoche Dorje goes on to say that if if people some people would would would see him teaching in this context teaching the in this context, it would appear to some people that he didn’t know much about tantra. But the the the fact of the the fact, in actuality, the case is that he actually knew, understood very well the the crucial points, the very important points of the path and how important the Lamrim the Lamrim teachings are. And then there’s another there’s another story that is being told again.
There’s the a practitioner who did not have any bodhicitta attained the state of a stream enterer. Then Atisha was saying, when he heard that, he was he was surprised. And he says, it it just shows that he does not have my bodhicitta. Even more people who have meditated on Heruka Vajra will go to hell. He says this person meditated on Heruka and he attained the state of stream enterer because he did not have bodhicitta.
Right? Which I will ask Geshe la to explain. Then Atisha, when he heard that, said he was really surprised. He said, this shows that he does not have bodhicitta. And he says, even more people like him who do not have bodhicitta will end up in hell.
So then this stream enterer, that which is called the stream enterer, is the equivalent of the path of seeing of hearers and solitary realizers. Geshe la was explaining what Atisha was saying. That was good. It was good for this person that he attained this path of seeing, but there there are many other people who actually end up in hell. And then, again, the the text goes on to say that that that yogi who attain enlightenment siddhi of stream entry, again, he he was actually he has actually done quite well because there are actually many other people who were practicing the spells or the rituals for wrathful wrathful deities.
And then they ended up whilst they did not have bodhicitta, and they ended up being born as as ghosts, evil spirits, hell beings, and so forth. And then the text goes on to tell another story of a local deity of a place called and this the story goes that this this deity was formerly was a person who was practicing many retreats. But later, after practicing all these retreats, he ended up only taking birth as a local god, spirit. Then if Pabongka was going on to say that if that vajra yogi who was referred to before, the one who achieved stream entry, had had bodhicitta, he would attained enlightenment in that very life of his. Instead, he achieved the result of a Hīnayāna practitioner, and he has not accomplished even one cause of enlightenment in this way.
And and it’s all because of his lack of. And that’s and that’s why and that’s why it is called the profound dharma. The bodhicitta, the mind of enlightenment, is said to be a profound Dharma. And then, again, there’s just another account of another story, a similar story of a Brahmin who was called Chanaka, an Indian Brahmin. He was called Chanakya.
And he was practicing the Yamāntaka tantra, and he was born as reborn as an evil spirit, as a harmful spirit. And then he went to Tibet. And then once in Tibet, he was then expelled from Tibet by Lama Atisha, when Lama Atisha made some special offerings, offering cakes and so forth. Oh, And and and he expelled this evil spirit from Tibet. Then there’s another story which goes on to say tell of of of a yogi who was practicing the Yamāntaka tantra.
He was from Pempo. And he was reborn as a hungry ghost, but as a hungry ghost who had the shape, the body, of the deity Yamāntaka and then he went to hang around this sur offerings, the burnt tsampa offerings that are made for the dead. He went to hang around these burnt offerings at the home of some of his neighbors and benefactors around where he used to live. And then goes on to explain that in these days nowadays that many people who prize and go after things like having visions of deities, attaining clairvoyance, clairaudience and so forth like that, but still without bodhicitta, without having bodhicitta, one can still go to the lower realms and being clairvoyant or having any such powers would be of no help whatsoever And then on the other hand, if you have bodhicitta, you have this mind of bodhicitta, then even though you don’t make much effort in any other practice or any other thing, still you have the very root of the Mahāyāna Dharma within you. And again in any in any context be it sūtra sutrayana or the mantrayana it being mahayana or not it being a great vehicle path or not it depends entirely if you have bodhicitta or not and then we’re told if you if you have bodhicitta if you already have bodhicitta then just merely give a a little dough ball of of barley barley flour, a little ball of barley flour to to an animal.
That is already cause that will be the cause for you to gain full enlightenment.. What is this? Yeah. I know. It’s it’s and then it goes on to say that if if if you have if you have bodhicitta, you can even turn that which would normally be a non virtue.
Will become virtue because such beings who have bodhicitta, they are always doing everything with. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Oh, can I borrow no? I have here.
A pen. I have. I have. I should have. Oh, I didn’t bring my pen.
No. Yeah. Yeah. Thank you.
Right?