Audio recorded at Buddha House Adelaide. Transcript auto-generated and AI-corrected; may contain errors.
About this talk. A teacher’s blunt confession — that without conviction in rebirth he would simply commit suicide — anchors Ven Jampa Gendun’s 44-minute inquiry into why this doctrine matters beyond intellectual curiosity. The session opens with practical guidance on accompanying the dying: building rapport, letting unfinished business be resolved, and showing love to someone who no longer feels useful or beautiful. A guided metta meditation follows, expanding goodwill outward from self through strangers and difficult people to all living beings. Gendun then turns to the logic of rebirth, distinguishing substantial cause (the clay that becomes the pot) from cooperative cause (the potter and tools), and establishing that cause and effect always share a similarity of type — the groundwork for arguing that consciousness cannot arise from unconscious matter. Accessible to anyone curious about Buddhist philosophy, with no prior knowledge assumed.
File metadata (for organising)
File: 01 LOR 1988 07 03.mp3
UUID: 470e8b15-5443-4078-80ea-665e6e499593
Teacher: Ven Jampa Gendun
Collection: The Logic of Rebirth (Ven Jampa Gendun)
Date: 1988-07-03
Recorded at: Buddha House Adelaide
Duration: 43.8 minutes
Words: ~4,275
We want to relate with that person’s being. We want to relate with them beneath the superficial level appearances which we usually relate with people at. So it’s most important to create you know we have to try to create some kind of opening, some kind of communication. You know, if you do this then your knowledge, whatever knowledge you may have, will come into use quite naturally. You’ll be quite you’ll be very skillful with it.
It, you know, what you’re doing will work, it will go right. You know, you sort of connect with it fundamentally. So we create some kind of rapport, some kind of communication. You know, you can sort of just kind of hang out and reminisce about the old times, you know, about the good times and the bad times that you had together. You try trying to create some kind of loving atmosphere.
And then you have to be a good listener and let the person talk. Allow the person to say what needs to be said. You know it’s more of a sharing, Helping them to express any repressed emotions. Helping sharing in their fears, sharing in their fears, sharing in their pain. And sharing good times and bad times with them.
This sharing, you know, this being aware of the commonality and the commonality of all our suffering and all our fears that we all have. And it helps people to endure pain and helps them to generate compassion. And we have to comfort them in small ways, whether it’s just adjusting their pillow and wiping their forehead, holding their hand. But don’t make yourself a nuisance. Don’t impose your kindness upon them.
So I think the way you do things is of most importance. So the person has to be allowed to take care of unfinished business. You know, it’s as if he has to catch a train and he has no choice about catching this train. And he’s not quite sure whether he packed everything. There may be some questions whether there’s some kind of unfinished business that needs to be taken care of.
So you have to give him this opportunity to finish his business, to make sure everything’s packed so that when he gets on the train there’ll be no holding back. He can just completely let go. So dying people quite often isolate themselves. They’re no longer beautiful, they’re no longer useful, and our society values beauty. So somehow we have to, you know, convey to the dying person.
You know, have to that they’re still lovable. We have to show them signs of loving, that they’re still cherished. We have to not allow them to see that the feeling that they’re unlovable. They’re going to feel, you know, I’m no longer beautiful. My whole life I’ve been, you know, serving you.
I’ve been, you know, especially I’ve been of use. I’ve been of some function and now I’m useless. I’m of no function. I’m no longer beautiful. And somehow we have to convey to them that they’re still beautiful within our eyes.
But you know, I think you get nervous, you get embarrassed, you don’t know quite what to do, quite what to say. And maybe you talk about the weather, maybe you talk about politics, and a lot goes unsaid. So it’s important to communicate, and it’s important to show your love. You know, however you showed your love during the course of your lifetime together, you do more of that. Show them that, you know, that they’re still lovable, that they’re still cared for, And help them to work through their fears of pain, separation, fears of, you know, going someplace that we don’t know, the unknown.
And all the time, you’re working with them, and sharing with them, helping them to work with their fears of separation, of aloneness, of going into an unknown, aware that you share the same fears, and that someday you’re going to be looking up into somebody else’s eyes and praying that those eyes are loving and caring and full of peace. Ask not for whom the bells toll, they toll for thee. So the contemplation of terminal issues, of death and dying, is not in the least bit morbid. It’s life enhancing. And if we think every day to be our last, then we will receive with joy hours upon which we had not counted.
I’d like to start with the before I give the talk on rebirth to begin with the meditation on loving kindness. So if you could take a comfortable posture, the one that you can hold fairly reasonably without moving for say twelve, thirteen, fifteen minutes, then I’ll lead you through a metta meditation or simply a meditation on loving kindness. Sort of just think about what I’m saying and maybe repeat some words to yourself and some daily words rather than being artificial and having to make a great deal of effort to say them. Actual emotions that we’re trying to regenerate, the feelings will come spontaneously and effortlessly. So it’s a way of beginning.
The heart of all the various religious practices I think is love and compassion. So I think it’s worthwhile to consistently make some effort toward, in some small way, actualizing them in our lives. Even it’s just to once in a while generate some good feelings towards other people who we may normally not even stop to consider exist at all. Can you hear me okay in the back? So just you know, become sincere with the moment to get in contact with some of your feelings of dissatisfaction, some of your problems, and the fact that you want to be happy.
Whatever you may have done in the past, whatever various mistakes you may have created, you can simply regret them and determine as best you can not to repeat them again in the future. You can begin again. And however you may conceive of yourself, whatever identity you may hold, you can change. You can become anything that you want to be. For the present, we want to accept ourselves, all the various parts of ourselves, and develop compassion with a feeling of friendliness towards all those parts.
They’re worthy of our love and consideration. So simply direct some positive feelings towards yourself. Be gentle with yourself. Wish yourself happiness, good feelings. May I be happy?
May I be well? May I not suffer? May I grow? Just wish yourself everything that you would like to have. Be kind to yourself.
Now think of someone that you like, that you love, someone of the same sex, and imagine that person in front of you. If you can’t see them visually, then just feel that that person is there. Remember all the good times that you’ve shared together, all the happiness, all the kindness that this person has shown you. Begin to radiate out, direct the positive feelings which naturally arise when you think of this person. The feelings of caring, of closeness, of warmth, of wanting them to be happy.
And simply radiate, direct these feelings toward them, wishing them, May you be happy. May all that you desire, may you have it. All your wants fulfilled, all good things, just good feelings. Just wish this person well and happiness. Now think of someone that you neither like nor dislike, someone you feel indifferent toward.
Imagine that person in front of you. And we want to try to go beneath the superficial appearances that we usually cling to, that we usually judge people by, that we discriminate people by, whether they’re male or female, beautiful or ugly, young or old, rich or poor, educated or uneducated. Go beneath all of that to the essence of that person. There’s someone there who wants to be happy and doesn’t want to suffer exactly like yourself. Try to see that.
This is the bottom line of that person no matter what superficial appearance is, no matter what they may look like on the outside. And just as we wish our own self happiness and not to suffer, we have to begin to wish this person the same because it’s very much a reflection about how we feel about ourselves deep down, how we relate to the essential person, because basically we’re exactly alike. So wish them happiness, wish them not to suffer, that they’d be well, that good things happen to them. Now think of someone who disturbs your mind, someone you have some problems with, someone you dislike. Imagine that person in front of you.
This person wants to be happy and doesn’t want to suffer just like yourself. Perhaps their method of finding their happiness, eliminating their suffering, come in conflict with your methods. It’s just a conflict of interest, conflict of egos. You’ve hurt others either intentionally or unintentionally in the past to find the happiness that you were looking for. And this person has done the same to you.
Just as we have to forgive ourselves for the mistakes that we made, we have to begin to forgive this person for making the same types of mistakes. So just for the moment, set aside your hurt, your grudge, your anger, and see someone just like yourself, someone who’s doing the best they can to get some happiness out of life, very confused about how to go about it, and making many, many mistakes along the way. You wish them happiness just as you wish yourself, some good feelings. Imagine these people, all four of these people together, yourself and these three others. They all look different from the superficial aspects, their appearances.
You have different feelings towards them. We try to see them all from the perspective of wanting happiness and not wanting to suffer. In this they’re all exactly alike, no difference. Without any feelings of bias, just radiate out caring feelings, warm feelings, wishing them happiness to all four equally. And all the people in this room, people searching, inquiring, trying to grow, trying to find a path, trying to find satisfaction, fulfillment.
Wish everyone in the room success, that they find what they’re looking for, that they find some peace and love, and that they’re able to help others to find the same. Spread out, radiate out good feelings, positive feelings to everyone in the room. And all the people on the block, eating supper, cooking, watching television, reading the paper, getting ready for bed, everything they do is in order to find happiness, to eliminate their suffering. So radiate out the wish touching everyone on the block that they find the happiness that they’re for, that they not suffer. Extending out further to all of Adelaide, all the people in their cars and buses on the streets and their homes.
And further and further, opening your heart, your mind, radiating out further and further to all of South Australia, all the people, animals, and insects. Extending out, radiating out further and further, Alice Springs, Perth, Darwin, Brisbane, Sydney, Canberra, Melbourne, Hobart, the entire country. Extending out further, opening your heart, radiating out warm positive feelings. New Zealand, the entire southern hemisphere. Enveloping the entire world in your heart is caring, concerned, wishing of happiness.
All the people, black, white, red, yellow, all the animals, all the insects, everything that lives on the earth touched by your wish that you’d be happy. Radating out in all the directions of space. Further and further, without limit. To finally, without any boundaries, without any center, pervading all of infinite space, the wish, May all things be happy. May all things be happy.
So I’m going to talk a little bit about rebirth as best I can. Just to kind of cheer you up from last month’s talk when we all died. Give us some hope. So I’d like to cover, you know, very roughly and briefly two areas in connection with rebirth. One is to explore the question of the very fact of the existence of rebirth and briefly describe the process of rebirth as seen from a Buddhist perspective within the Buddhist system of psychology.
So, you know, in exploring this question of rebirth, I don’t presume to think that I’m going to prove its existence to anybody here tonight. But hopefully I can stimulate some inquiry, some questioning, you know, possible opening up our mind to its possible existence. You know, we should try, make some effort to come to an understanding as to whether rebirth exists or not because it’s important to know. It has a bearing on the way we live our life. If it didn’t, then of course it might be an intellectual curiosity, but it’s not very important.
There are perhaps many more important things that we could direct our attention to. But if in fact rebirth does exist, then it may in fact alter the way we lead our life. It perhaps should, I don’t know. If it doesn’t then it would be good to know that also. Perhaps you’ll find this rather extreme, but I remember one of my teachers in India.
He said, You know, if I didn’t have a firm conviction in the existence of rebirth, and I didn’t have a firm conviction in the law of cause and effect karma, then I would commit suicide. I mean, this was the ramifications of his understanding of the existence of rebirth, that if it didn’t exist, then by simply committing suicide, we finish our problems once and for all. We don’t have to go through all this trouble, this unsatisfactory quality of life. It’s not I should supplement that with the fact that he’s probably happier than anybody in this room, but he’s aware of the suffering nature, the unsatisfactory quality of any ego state, which we aren’t, probably aren’t. Okay?
So he’s a very happy person, but he’s aware of the unsatisfactory quality of existence bounded by ego. So what is the use of trying to go beyond ego? If we’re just going to die, why not just kill yourself? This was his thinking. But because of his firm conviction in existence of a future life that it’s not going to do him any good to kill himself because it’s just going to go on, he’s just going to have to go through the same work again, and he may not have the fortunate basis that he had then, that he has now hopefully, that he has a method to work with, that he has all the proper circumstances internal and external, that he has to take advantage of his situation.
Someday we’re all going to have to do this work, this job of liberating ourselves. This is the implication, the ramification, if in fact rebirth does exist. It does have a bearing on the way we lead our lives. It’s just not a manner for intellectual curiosity. Now, the problem is that the vast majority of the people who reject the notion of rebirth have never really considered it, even superficially.
And too, the same can be said for those who accept the notion rebirth. The vast majority of them I’ve never really considered. it, other than superficially. So either way, you know, having never really considered the concept deeply, never really having come to a firm conviction, firm conclusion that its existence or non existence has very little impact on their lives, and especially the existence of future lives. That they say, Yes, yes, I think it exists.
But never having really considered the ramifications and having a deep conviction. And even this mere superficial acceptance doesn’t play a very important role in the way they lead their lives, their conduct, their goal of their lives. So, you know, these people, they are either unthinkingly biased in the direction of a mechanistic interpretation of life, or they simply wish it to exist. It’s comforting in the face of the possibility of complete annihilation in the face of death. They wish it to exist, so they at least pay lip service to the fact that, Ah, yes, it exists.
They don’t have to face the question of the ultimate destruction of their ego or self annihilation, or the question of the necessity to become serious about the question of liberation. I can do it next life. So the question of establishing rebirth and by rebirth I mean reincarnation. I use the term rebirth. Other authors may use the term reincarnation.
I mean I think they mean exactly the same thing. So this can be approached by several different avenues. One is the easiest if we could just recall our previous lives. That would be an easy way out. Now we can come to this recollection through spontaneous recollection by training ourselves, cultivating the memory of past lives.
We can some people recall past lives through hypnotic regression. Some people are told about their past lives by other people. So, know, and then lastly there’s the possibility of establishing it through some rationale, some logical reasoning. So these various former methods, you know, are various there are many accounts, there are many books setting forth case histories, individuals experiences, experiments which have been conducted, which tend to support the existence of past lives. And so, you know, these various accounts you can all read at your leisure.
This is not the avenue which I am going to approach rebirth. These various accounts of other people’s accounts through their own experiences or the experiences of other people by whatever means of the existence of past lives. I want to focus on the rationale of rebirth, some of the reasoning involved. First, I want to do this for two purposes. First, to eliminate some of the misconceptions of what Buddhism means when it says, I’m going to be reborn.
I’m going to be reborn as an animal, or You better be careful, you’ll be reborn as a hell being. You know, what exactly is being reborn? What is this all about? I remember when I was young and they talked about rebirth, I kind of thought, well, you know, this body kind of flies up in the air and goes somewhere. So this was my conception.
Of course, that’s quite a childish conception which can quite easily be rejected. And therefore one rejects the throws the baby out with the bathwater and says, Rebirth doesn’t exist because I can see my body rotting. Well, this has nothing to do with the Buddhist conception of rebirth. So we can at least clarify what the Buddhist conception of rebirth is through this explanation of the rationale of rebirth. And also to show that the existence of rebirth has a logical foundation, that it is amenable to reasoning, to an intellectual investigation.
Is this not a wishful, a wishing thought, an emotional response to the prospect of death? So in setting forth the rationale rebirth, I’m going to it’s necessary to introduce a few concepts. Hopefully they won’t be very complicated and I’ll try to explain them simply if I can. We’re going to make use of these concepts later. Now the first is different The first is different types of causes.
There are two types of causes. One is substantial cause and the other is cooperative cause. Okay? We’re going to make use of these ideas later and I’m going to explain what a substantial cause is and what a cooperative cause is. And the other is similarity of type, similarity of type.
So And by way of example, basis of illustration for explaining the difference between substantial cause and cooperative cause. And I hope I don’t become what I hope I don’t lose anybody. I don’t mean I’m not particularly a logician, but I think that you I’m going to use some analogies, clarifying examples. So even though maybe you’re not used to some of the language I’m using, hopefully you’ll be able to follow along. And if not, you can wave your hand or just throw something at me.
And I try to explain it as best I can. But it’s just the words. The words shouldn’t be that much of a problem. So the difference between substantial cause and cooperative cause. So it can be most easily understood if we take as a basis of illustration a clay pot, a ceramic pot.
A ceramic, a clay pot. We happen to have one right here. Okay. The substantial cause of the clay pot is the wet lump of clay. Yeah?
Just this lump of clay, this, you know, whatever color, red or gray, just this massive clay, this huge lump is the substantial cause of the clay pot. This lump of clay itself becomes transformed into the pot. It is incorporated into the pot itself. It becomes the pot itself. It’s after the pot is made, this lump of clay is no longer in existence.
It itself is transformed into the clay pot. Okay? Its substance, this is where we get the word substantial cause the substance of it is transformed into the clay pot itself. Therefore we call it the substantial cause of the pot. On the other hand, the cooperative cause of the clay pot is the potter and the various tools, you know, he uses to form the pot.
His wheel, don’t know, knives or whatever. He is the cooperative cause. You know, after he’s finished making the pot, the pot’s created, he washes his hands, cleans up, and goes home. Know, and the tools are very pretty much like in the same condition as when he began. They’re not incorporated into the pot.
They’re not transformed. He is not transformed into the pot. The wheel is not transformed into the pot. His knife is not transformed into the pot. They simply cooperate in the production of the pot.
There’s still a cause of the pot. Without the potter and his tools and the wheel, we could not produce this effect of a clay pot. In producing any effect, anything which is produced tables, this building, lights, people, we have to have two types of causes: a cooperative cause and a substantial cause. If either one of them are missing, then no effect will arise. We cannot produce anything unless we have both substantial cause and a cooperative cause.
So another you know we can take another example to help clarify. You know we went to a flower. Flower. Okay, the substantial cause. It has a substantial cause and a cooperative cause.
The substantial cause of the flower is the flower seed. Yeah? The flower seed. The cooperative cause of the production of the flower is the soil, the moisture, the sunlight, the fertilizer. These all cooperate in producing the flower.
So there’s a difference that we can begin to see. The difference between substantial cause and cooperative cause. You know if we didn’t have both of these, for example, there is some there’s a you know, in actual fact they have found seeds, grains of wheat, think, which were found in the Egyptian pyramids, were probably five thousand years old. And these remained in a dormant state for five thousand years. They didn’t produce the effect of actually growing wheat.
Why not? The substantial cause was present, but there wasn’t the cooperative cause. They took these seeds after five thousand years, they put them in the earth, they’ve added some water, and they grew the wheat. So we can see the necessity of having two types of causes: the substantial cause and the cooperative cause. It’s obvious if we don’t have the seed, no matter how much earth we have, no matter how much moisture we have or sunlight, we’re never going to grow wheat without wheat seeds.
So we have to have both the cooperative cause and substantial cause. So this is the concept of these two types of causes, which we’re going to make use of in talking about rebirth. And the second concept is the concept of the similarity of type. It’s just simply that within nature there is always a similarity of type between cause and effect. Between cause and effect.
From an orange seed, we get an orange tree. We don’t get an apple tree. Ice arises from water. It doesn’t arise from wood. There’s always some similarity of type between a cause and its effect, the effect and its cause.
So it’s the view of mechanistic science. You know, I’m not saying science in general, just the mechanistic science. The view of a type of science which has become predominant in the last two three hundred years since Descartes and Newton in which the, you know, the universe and everything within it is seen as unconscious matter. And it’s merely the mechanistic approach to the universe. The recombinations of various that, you know, that life has risen through mechanical laws, which can be predicted.
I think it’s becoming obvious that this paradigm, as it stood for over three hundred years, is now being shifted due to the discoveries in theoretic physics, particle physics, that they’re beginning to see that the universe is a participatory universe. That it not only has relative existence, it’s not objectively existing. It’s just not a matter of mechanical lifeless objects processes occurring. Anyway, mechanistic science. It’s their view that the mind or the consciousness arises from the body or the nervous system or the brain, essentially.
Mechanistic science is saying that the mind arises from the brain. I think this is pretty well accepted.