Audio recorded at Buddha House Adelaide. Transcript auto-generated and AI-corrected; may contain errors.
About this talk. In this 23-minute Q&A, Ven Jampa Ignyen explores dependent arising, mapping the twelve links across lifetimes and defining ignorance as not knowing emptiness. The core teaching centers on the Buddha’s rebirth in hell: pulling a cart alongside a companion, he develops great compassion when the companion collapses and offers to carry both loads. A hell guardian kills him for this, yet this compassion leads to rebirth among the gods and becomes the seed of bodhicitta. Jampa Ignyen uses this to show compassion as the antidote to lower rebirth. He then connects emotional patterns to realms (anger to hell, craving to hungry ghosts, ignorance to animals) and discusses aspiration for pure lands like Sukhāvati, where liberation is assured.
File metadata (for organising)
File: 05 DA 2001 06 10.mp3
UUID: 284d6655-5df5-45de-a7f6-36febdf7ba78
Teacher: Ven Jampa Ignyen
Collection: y Dependant Arising (Ven Jampa Ignyen)
Date: 2001-06-10
Recorded at: Buddha House Adelaide
Duration: 23.5 minutes
Words: ~2,170
At most, we can have six occurring in one lifetime. In general, this is said to be the case. Mhmm. So what Yeah. It is.
In fact, also we have ignorance all the time. Our ignorance is there all the time. But the ignorance that serves as one of the twelve links occurs in one particular lifetime, its result occurs in a in a future lifetime. So in a sense, we can say that one, two, and three occur well, we’ll just say this to begin. One, two, three, eight, nine, ten can occur in one lifetime.
Four, five, six, seven, eleven, twelve occur also in one lifetime, in the next lifetime, or in a future lifetime. But this we’ll go into in some some detail a little bit later. But these twelve links either occur in two minimum of two or maximum of three lifetimes. But at present, we do experience ignorance. And based on that ignorance, we have intention to act.
And based on that intention to act, we have consciousness that’s imprinted. Ignorance basically is not knowing, just not understanding something. Just, yeah, simply that not knowing something, not cognizing something, being unaware of something. It it can also. In a sense, it generally has a passive sense.
Yeah. It generally has this passive sense, but some also say it has an active sense as well. But firstly, we should understand the passive sense of ignorance. The ignorance of just not knowing something. But here, it’s ignorance of emptiness, ignorance of suchness, or thatness, or selflessness.
So it’s a particular type of ignorance. That’s right. There’s different views on what ignorance is. Some say that even the active misinterpretation of something is also a type of ignorance. Like if we wrongly hold something to exist in a way that it doesn’t exist in, that that’s ignorance.
But in general, ignorance has this more passive sense to it. Just not knowing, not understanding. How it’s possible to get out of the hell realm? Yes, because also the teachings say that once you’re down there, it takes a very long time to get out. Yes.
Once one is reborn in the hells, it is difficult. And generally, one remains there until the causes that have led to one’s rebirth there are exhausted. It’s yeah. Being reborn in hell is it’s a disaster. And there is a cause for being reborn there, and once that cause is exhausted, then one will die from that state.
So we’re supported. If we’re reborn in hell, we’re supported there by our karma, our past karma. What does that have to be based on? Anger? Anger is the main cause for rebirth in the hot hell.
But it’s possible to if if one is a bodhisattva, one doesn’t stay long in the hells. Much — oh, that’s Yeah. Sorry. The other part to that question is something that I think I heard Geshe Rabten say, and that is that even when we have some understanding of the nature of dependence arising, we can’t go down into the Understanding empty even with the understanding of emptiness, we can still be reborn in hell. But once we generate great compassion and bodhicitta and progress to a certain level, maybe the patience stage of the path of preparation, then one will not be reborn in hell due to the power of karma and ignorance.
But That’s a fair way along the path. That’s a fair way along the path. Yeah. That’s far along. We must be slack. Still, by generating great compassion, that will be an antidote.
If we’re able to generate great compassion, then it’s incompatible for us to remain in the hells. So really generating great compassion is the best thing we can do to overcome the possibility or to lessen the possibility of rebirth in hell. In fact, there’s a story of the Buddha. You may have heard of it. The Buddha was down there before enlightenment, wasn’t he?
Yeah. There was a a story of the Buddha himself of and which is one explanation of how the Buddha first became a bodhisattva, how he generated compassion. And that was that he was reborn in hell and that he was pulling a cart with a companion. And they were in hell, and there were hell guardians standing around with weapons. And the companion of the Buddha was sick and was unable to bear the load of the cart, and he collapsed.
The Buddha in this previous life went to help him. And and he was saying, look. And the hell guardians are there beating him. And the Buddha was saying, look. I will carry the load for both of us.
Because at that point, he developed a great compassion towards other beings, to his companion, and so on. And then the hell guardians, it said then one of the hell guardians took up his mace and struck the Buddha dead saying, you cannot carry the load of another sentient being. Each sentient being carries their own load and struck him and killed him. But because he generated compassion at that point, he was reborn in, I think, the realm of the thirty three gods and remained there for a very long period. And it is stated that that was how Śākyamūni Buddha first generated great compassion and first then how he developed bodhicitta, which comes from great compassion.
So if one can generate great compassion, it’s incompatible with remaining in the hells. But we can still go to the other long run? Yes. Animal realm. hungry ghost realm.
Yeah. At present, we’re not beyond rebirth in those realms. They’re like they’re beings who are born in through great attachment, especially great craving and great attachment, are reborn in a state of great craving, which are these beings. And if we look at the diagram here, they’re usually depicted as beings with very long and thin necks and very big bellies, which indicates a being with great big belly there represents someone with great attachment, say, and drink and objects in general. And through that great attachment, they’re reborn there.
They have great difficulty finding any food and drink. They suffer from heat, suffer from thirst and hunger a great deal. And they tend to live very long lives. And the main cause for rebirth there is attachment, strong greed and attachment. Yeah, even attachment is the main cause, but it generally requires quite a strong attachment.
But if we develop a strong attachment at the point of death, then there’s a danger that we we’re reborn as a a hungry ghost or a preta, a being that’s experiencing the intense suffering of craving all the time. That story about the ruling hell, is that from some future Yeah. It does. It’s actually quoted in one text called The General Meaning of Ethics, of Discipline by Jetsün Chökyi Gyaltsen. And there he quotes quite a long passage which talks about how the Buddha first attained great compassion.
Sorry. The Oh, we can see it in that way as well. It’s in a sense, we can see that the anger whenever we get angry, that’s the hells. That’s the hot hells. When we have hatred, that’s the cold hells.
Just ignorance about things, that’s the animal realm. When we’re craving something, that’s the hungry ghost realm. Whenever we generate a virtue, that on a basic level, that’s the human realm. Whenever we really intensely generate love and compassion, that’s the divine realm. Not in one life.
No. No. You would in one life, you’d be reborn in hell in one lifetime. Yes. You need to die generally, one needs to die from the hells in order to leave them.
That’s right. But they’re human to begin with, so they’re in the human realm. Even though some of their experience may be similar to a being’s rebirth, but still they’re a human being. Yes. Yeah.
Yes. No, they are a separate state of existence, a separate type of existence. We can’t see them, they’re too subtle. Their physical bodies are too subtle for us to see, but they can exist on Earth, you know, in haunt houses and things like this. And some people can see them?
And some people can. Yeah. It’s possible. If one has the right karma or the right conditions come about, one can see them. But in general, we can’t.
What should we do about that? Oh, then we should generate compassion for them. But if you can see them, you need to go to the Absolutely. In a sense, the only thing we need to do is generate compassion. But no.
Why? One’s sorry? Yeah. Well, then one can practice one can practice the practice called chöd, in which one does actually, you know, chöd, where one does visualize giving away even one’s flesh and so forth to other beings. But the main thing there is compassion.
Just generating patience and compassion towards those beings. They’re a mass projection, but they that’s right. They exist on a level of mass of being projected by conception. Oh, no. They’re actually well, they’re subtle form, but they’re a type of existence like our current existence.
I mean, they’re as real as we’re real in that sense. Yes. Yes. It is. If it is.
Because if we’re reborn in the god realms, especially a god realm where there’s no possibility of continuing to practice, or we’re gonna forget practice to practice Dharma, then, yeah, it’s like being reborn in the hell realms in a way. It’s just a place where we’re not doing a great deal. And we’re not suffering either, generally. That’s right. We’re burning up the merit at a pretty fierce rate.
Well, at present, we don’t have much control. We don’t really have control over our rebirth. Well, one would aspire to it going to a place, a god realm where there is the possibility of practicing. Say, where bodhisattvas live. So aspiring to be reborn in Tuśita.
That’s fine. That’s a divine realm, but Maitreya is there, Atisha is there, Tsongkhapa is there, and so forth. So one aspires or to go to a pure land, reborn in a pure land, where one will definitely attain enlightenment too. No. That would one would be reborn there in order to attain enlightenment as quickly as possible for the sake of other beings.
Tuśita is not a pure land. It’s a it’s a realm within the desire realm. It’s a planet or a place within the desire realm. Sukavati. Sukavati.
Sukavati. That’s Devachen. That’s the abode of Amitābha in the west. How do you mean? Oh, it’s just that there are other realms that are talked about.
Like, there’s one called Devachen. Have you heard of Devachen? In Sanskrit, it’s Sukhāvati. It means the blissful. Sukha, maha sukha, you know the Sukha means bliss.
It’s a blissful place. It’s a place where a Buddha resides. And even ordinary beings such as ourselves can be reborn there if we generate the causes. And if we’re reborn there, definitely, we’ll become enlightened there. We’ll become Buddhas there.
One is very good, very strong aspirations to benefit other beings. Absolute commitment. Difficult because this is part of the desire realm here. But at times, it’s possible that something a little bit like a pure realm does you know, when the Buddha was alive, it was a little bit like a pure realm, but not actually a pure realm because it’s a a human realm in a desire realm. But, yeah, if enough people get together and practice practice, then it, you know, gradually, it becomes like a pure or it has qualities about it that are really pleasant.
Imperfection? Well, we have the potential to be become a Buddha, but that potential still needs to be awakened and developed. As yet, we’re still developing it. We’re still going through the process of beginning to awaken our Buddha potential. The conditions for that are not there yet.
We’re when we look inside at the state of our current mind, we it’s possible to begin to understand why we haven’t awakened our Buddha potential yet. Gradually, that’s possible because our Buddha potential is just the mind we have in the present moment. That mind has the potential to know everything. But as yet, it doesn’t know everything. Offer well, it exactly.
It’s really it’s very strange. We think we’re already coming from a place of knowing how things are. That we think generally how the way we understand the world is pretty much how it is. But we’ve got a fair way to go yet. We’ve got lots of preconceptions about how things are, and a lot of those preconceptions are not don’t really reflect how things are in fact in actuality.
So gradually, have to start peeling them away, disentangling ourselves from them. Right. So we should stop there. Let me just recite the dedication on page twenty two.