Audio recorded at Buddha House Adelaide. Transcript auto-generated and AI-corrected; may contain errors.
About this talk. In this 46-minute talk, Venerable Jampa Ignyen explores the Buddhist teaching of the Twelve Links of Dependent Arising through the lens of modern reproductive science and bioethics. He focuses on the moment of conception — when consciousness enters the union of egg and sperm — and applies this framework to contemporary questions: embryo research, IVF, cloning, and freezing of embryos. From a Buddhist perspective, he explains that intermediate beings (those between death and rebirth) are attracted to conception sites through karmic connection with their future parents, and that both naturally conceived and artificially created beings are individual sentient humans from the first moment. He examines how killing is always non-virtuous regardless of motivation, addresses whether cloning or IVF constitute harm, and discusses wrong livelihood in animal slaughter and industrial farming practices. The talk balances scriptural doctrine with practical engagement with modern science and ethical dilemmas, pitched at practitioners familiar with Buddhist concepts.
File metadata (for organising)
File: 01 12 Links 2001 06 11.mp3
UUID: 8cdf685c-0ddc-4424-8b6e-1eae10f3e4ae
Teacher: Ven Jampa Ignyen
Collection: y 12 Links of Dependant Arising (Ven Jampa Ignyen)
Date: 2001-06-11
Recorded at: Buddha House Adelaide
Duration: 46.1 minutes
Words: ~2,329
Eventually, presentation needs to accord with whatever science says about this. This presentation is really also coming from well, it’s implied it’s coming from masters who have some understanding of what’s happening during the process, that are aware of the process while they’re actually in the process. And of course the description doesn’t sound very scientific when you read them. You know, they talk about, you know, the embryo like a soup or the embryo when it’s it’s a bit like a turtle or and so forth. But definitely, whatever is the fact here needs to be that’s predominant.
That’s the base point. And if science says that this occurs and that occurs, then that needs to be very seriously considered. Here, of course, the main area of focus in a sense is the awareness itself during this process. And the physical development of course is important because of its implications in the development of sensory awareness during the process of the embryo. Oh, definitely there’s consciousness there.
It has to have consciousness otherwise the embryo is not a sentient being, it’s not a human being. Now there is some debate about when a human being begins. From a Buddhist point of view, that being is a human being from the first moment of conception. And if that embryo were to be extracted and experimented on and killed, that would be killing a human being, even from the first moment. It’s still the karma of killing.
Yeah. Yeah. Definitely. Oh, definitely. If one has the intention to destroy the embryo, it’s really the intention to kill.
Absolutely. There may be some compassion. Yes, definitely. Obviously there is compassion there. But the act of destroying an embryo is an act of killing.
And the doctor in that situation is really taking on the karma of killing. Yeah, yeah. Killing yeah, that’s right. But still, killing itself is always non virtuous. Killing oneself is less negative than killing someone else.
However, it’s still non virtuous. But people if anyone saw the documentary with His Holiness in it the other day, and His Holiness was saying, well, there can be, you know, like, reasons for going to war which are justified, justified, when he was talking about the invasion and so on. But whatever the case, if killing is engaged then it’s non virtuous. Never becomes virtuous, no matter what one’s motivation is like. The act of killing itself is non virtue.
However, beings do take on that non virtue for a greater purpose. Right. This is very, very interesting because at the point here of name and form, which is really the first moment of conception, the point at which consciousness enters the union of the egg and the sperm, That description is given for a normal womb birth of a human being, for instance, or an animal and so on. But of course these days it’s become more complicated because we have, you know, the union of the egg and the sperm in a dish. Or, in fact, we’re putting genetic information into a what?
Into an egg, into a and gaining a result from that. So the implication is that still intermediate beings, those beings who are in the intermediate stage between their previous death and future rebirth are also attracted to the site of the petri dish which is being artificially fertilized, or fertilized outside of the womb, for instance. Also they’re being attracted to the site where scientists are engaging in developing clones and so forth. No. Those beings, those intermediate beings are being attracted there and then being captured in that very rudimentary physical stage that will serve as a basis for, for instance, a human or an animal existence.
You freeze it for three years. It’s very that’s right. You fertilize the embryo, you then freeze it. Now in the text such as Yangchen Gawai Lodro’s text, talks about death, intermediate state, rebirth, there he goes into some and if anyone can read that book, then it’s very useful because in that text he gives an overview of the process of rebirth. It’s actually by Jeffrey Hopkins, and he’s translated this text by Yangchen Gawai Lodro, the Tibetan master.
Now, in that description, talks about conception occurring through the normal process. And it doesn’t go into other possibilities. And in the normal process, have a mother and father and you have the intermediate being who has already activated a particular karma to be reborn, say, with those parents. There needs to be a karmic connection between those two parents and the embryo and vice versa, or between the intermediate being and the intermediate being and those two parents. There needs to be some connection there.
And then that intermediate being, that Bardo being, is attracted to the site of those two parents when they’re engaged in intercourse. And if that intermediate being is to be reborn male, they tend to be attracted to their mother. If they’re to be reborn female, they tend to be attracted to their father. And then and there’s different here but it’s generally said they enter through the mouth of the father, down through the sexual organ, and into that the union then of that sperm, the one sperm that fertilizes the egg, they enter that union. They’re attracted right to that point.
And when they reach that point of that fertilized egg, then they’re trapped there. Then they die as an intermediate being. And then the process of the development of the embryo occurs. From that very first moment they’re a human being. Oh, they’re simply attracted there.
They’re attracted, for instance, to the if they’re to be reborn male, they tend to be attracted to the female. Well, an intermediate being survives seven days, and then they pass away. And then they’re reborn as an intermediate being, and it’ll survive for another seven days. There’s said to be many, many intermediate beings here, you know, traveling around, you know, at any one time. How do they know that that particular sexual act has gone through, achieved conception?
Through their clairvoyance? Oh, that’s right. There are said to be quite many. But it’s intermediate being that has that karmic connection with that couple that will achieve conception or will.
But they’re attracted there, I think, not I don’t know if they get down and start fighting, but there may be some competition because there’s said to be many intermediate beings and less opportunities for rebirth than there are intermediate beings. But it’s not just the outside karma, but there’s got to be karmic connection. Oh, the karmic connection, that’s right. There needs to be a connection between that intermediate being and those two parents from the past. But if we’ve all been connected to Here we’re talking about stronger connection, more recent connection.
The strongest connection there will, in a sense, achieve rebirth there. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, that’s right. One’s birth parents, one has a karmic connection with, but that might not survive for very long. And then one has a karmic connection to be with, to be brought up by others.
Yeah. That’s death, yes. They’re a human being from the first moment. Then they die and go back to the bardo. You don’t see Buddhists out there protesting the right to life people there, like who?
I wonder how that is. Well, there’s not many Buddhists for a start in the west. And there are Buddhists that do protest. Yeah. And from a Buddhist perspective, yeah, abortion is killing.
Can be yeah. That’s right. Although, for different reasons, Buddhists would tend to follow the same line against abortion. But still, in Buddhist countries abortion is practiced, like in Japan, for instance. China, yes.
Well, actually, many people in China still probably practice, but not very openly. Just there. The sea problem, that really was surprising. We went to lost temples and they’re chock-a-block full of live people. We went to one and there have been, I believe, one hundred and fifty of them all live people all going through on that day.
Outside of the temples, and this is not only Beijing, Beijing, Shanghai, the three main places, was heaps of books and material available for you. Heaps of it. Just That’s having strong imprints. Yeah, which we need as well actually in order to Yeah. Well, that’s just said to be the situation for intermediate beings.
They survive for about seven days. Yeah, it’s a quick cycle. And then they experience the signs of death down to the clear light. And then from the clear light they are reborn as an intermediate being. Yeah, they have feelings and so forth.
They can experience unpleasant feelings, negative feelings and so forth. It said for of seven lives seven times seven, forty nine days. Generally they’re reborn, in the most part they’re reborn. Unless they can’t find a rebirth site in which they may become like a spirit or something like that. Into any of it, that’s right.
Absolutely. In a sense, yes. Well, it is, yeah. There’s probably, you know, potentially countless beings looking for rebirth, but it’d be impossible to accommodate everyone on this Earth. Yeah, but at present the human population is expanding.
That’s true. No, no. Not possible to be reborn as a non-sentient being. Oh, that’s right. In fact, it’s recommended that we all become monks and nuns and so that That’s right.
Just not having children is not necessarily non virtuous at all. But actually, birth to someone is actually it’s like an act of generosity and so forth. And that’s why we need to think of the kindness of our parents because they’ve actually provided us a physical basis in the present. Without our parents, we wouldn’t be here, of course. And so they’re very kind in giving us this opportunity.
As I said, a precious human rebirth is very rare and we have that at present. And it’s as rare as you’ve heard the story. There’s a golden yoke floating on the ocean and a turtle who lives at the depths of the ocean, every hundred years they rise to the surface. And the chance of getting a precious human rebirth is the chance of that turtle sticking its head through the golden yoke. So it’s rare that we get such a rebirth.
Not at all, not at all. It’s a skillful means, yep. Any birth control is fine. Even things like embryo research, cloning and so forth are potentially not non virtuous. But if you cloned a being and then farmed them out for parts, that would be non virtuous because you have a human being there and then you start using them for their parts.
Or a pig also, yeah. Then there is non virtue in that. Of course, it may be done for a higher purpose, so there may be some virtue in the higher purpose, but that has to be weighed. And also from a Buddhist perspective, beings that are born in a petri dish, they’re viable. They’re human beings separate from you know, they’re viable in their own right.
Those that are cloned also are viable individual human beings. They’re not, you know, created from the consciousness of some other being. There, when the cloning process occurs, that intermediate being is entering that viable physical basis. So that cloned being is a separate individual. Well, they’re intermediate beings.
There’s a certain type of attracted petri dishes. They’re a bit kinky. That may be the case. Yeah. There needs to be a particular these things occur through causes and conditions.
You have to be careful talking about this, you know, and spending time when there’s so many people around, maybe. Oh, that’s right. In fact, it’s becoming an issue now. It’s becoming an issue now, isn’t it? With kids that are IVF kids and so forth.
And Yeah. It’s gone. Sorry? Yeah, it’s quite interesting. We’ve as a western society we’ve got very interesting karma.
What were we up to in previous lives? Did the body predict this at all in the Abhidharma? It may be. I haven’t seen anything specific, but these methods are not necessarily negative. Potentially, they give opportunity for beings to take rebirth.
There is a big debate at present, especially in the churches, the Christian churches, about whether cloning should be allowed or not. And even in Australia it’s going ahead, this debate. But, yeah, the Buddhist perspective is a little bit different, slightly different because, for instance, of this the acceptance of the twelve links. Well, there’s a mixture there. It depends on the motivation of that being.
If they’re doing it just for profit, then there’s not necessarily a great deal that’s positive there. They’re doing it for profit and they’re killing pigs. That may actually be helping human beings, so maybe there is inadvertently some positive potential created through that without there being a strong intention for that to happen. But that needs to be taken into account. The animals are actually being killed.
And that could therefore constitute a wrong livelihood. And in fact, there’s different types of wrong livelihood exist, and one of them, of course, is killing animals, being a slaughterer or even raising animals to be slaughtered, and so forth. Oh, that’s a disaster, I think. Because mad cow disease exists in Asia, but the policy in Asia is not to go out and kill the animals because the animals don’t die from it. They just develop antibodies and generally survive, and they’re okay.
But this policy in the West to try and get rid of every animal with antibodies Yeah, absolutely. Just it’s so devastating, see the farmers. Absolutely devastating. Mad cow then, something like that, which is a very serious disease then I mean, that is conditioned by this process of feeding what’s awful to animals, which is yeah, which is very