Audio recorded at Buddha House Adelaide. Transcript auto-generated and AI-corrected; may contain errors.
About this talk. In this 46-minute talk, Venerable Pende Hawter guides practitioners through Tibetan Buddhist teachings on death, the intermediate state, and rebirth. Beginning with the eight stages of dissolution that occur during dying—a process he connects to familiar experiences like sleep, dreaming, orgasm, and fainting—he explains how trained yogis use these states to simulate the death process. He then explores the intermediate state being: its attributes (moving through solid objects, instant travel by thought, lack of shadow, feeding on odors), the confusion and visions it encounters, and how a person’s mental clarity and karmic imprints shape their experience. He discusses the Tibetan Book of the Dead as a practical guidebook and offers examples of how to guide the dying person through frightening visions by reminding them these are mind-projections, empty and illusory. He addresses rebirth, refuting the Western New Age idea that we consciously choose suffering to learn lessons, and instead explains the Buddhist understanding: karma and delusion propel consciousness into rebirth without our control. He concludes with practical and ethical reflections on consciousness entering the fetus, the karmic implications of abortion and IVF, and how relatives’ actions and state of mind after death affect the deceased’s transition. Suitable for both newcomers and serious practitioners seeking to understand the dying process.
File metadata (for organising)
File: 07 D and D 1994 11 13.mp3
UUID: df2d5b65-820a-4d1f-a291-e80a9f868507
Teacher: Ven Pende Hawter
Collection: Death and Dying (Ven Pende Hawter)
Date: 1994-11-13
Recorded at: Buddha House Adelaide
Duration: 45.9 minutes
Words: ~6,125
This state being can stay in that state for anything from a few moments up to forty nine days. And after each seven days, we’ll we’ll have a sort of a small death and and will be reborn into another intermediate state being body. And so that, in effect, there can be six small deaths in that intermediate state situation. One thing I wouldn’t have mentioned yet is that in terms of the eight stages of dissolution during the dying process, it’s said that it varies, you know, it’s something that actually we’re not unfamiliar with in at least an abbreviated form. So it’s said that, for instance, during sexual orgasm, that you actually go through those eight stages and you, in a sense, have a glimpse of the clear light, which is why the sexual act is so blissful because you’re actually getting a glimpse of that clear light, that very blissful experience.
And I remember years ago reading that a French a French name for for orgasm was le petit mort, the little death. I can see why they call it the little death, because in a sense, it’s like that type of experience. Similarly, says that when we faint, we go through that experience. And actually every night when we go from the awake state to the sleeping state, we go through the eight stages. When we arise into a dream body, we come back through the reverse stages.
So the dream body is like an intermediate state being body and when when that dream body dies, that’s like going back through those eight stages and then when we awake, we come back again into the eight stages, back back into the into the body. And so that’s why as I saying yesterday, the yogis will use sleep, dreaming and waking states as a simulation of the death process because you’re actually going through those various stages. Perhaps in a may not be a complete form and certainly it can be fairly quickly, but it still is a similar process. So the Yogi actually will simulate death, intermediate state and rebirth by doing these Yogas of sleeping, dreaming and waking. So that’s interesting.
So the intermediate state being can be seen by beings of its own type and it’s sometimes known as a smell eater because it feeds on odors, it exists on odors, on smells. Now Joy can you move it down to the next and perhaps move the overhead up, Challenge for you. So these are I shouldn’t pick on my old friend. So these are some of the attributes of being in the intermediate state. I’ll just remind people that all of this information has been taken from this book called Death, Intermediate and Rebirth in Tibetan Buddhism by Lati Rinpoche and Jeffrey Hopkins.
It’s a superb little book. Why it’s a fairly academic, it’s not easy reading, but it’s a comprehensive description of these processes for those who want to study it in more detail. Death, intermediate state, and and rebirth in Tibetan Buddhism. And so these these are the attributes of a being in the intermediate state. It can move through solid objects, can travel anywhere instantly just by thinking of it, and I think I mentioned yesterday the one story on a video we have of a lady who had a near death experience, who just by thinking of it found herself in another town at one sister’s place, thought of another sister somewhere else, and ended up at her place, and sort of knew that those sisters had gone out shopping.
They weren’t home, they’d gone shopping, and knew what they were buying and where they were and later on she checked with them and in fact they were out shopping and it was exactly as she had seen or experienced in the near death experience so it’s sort of corroborated by people who’ve had a near death experience. Friends and relatives ignore you or ignore the person who’s died and I think I mentioned like the person often won’t know that they’ve died, they will find themselves perhaps at the meal table, sorry, there’ll be no place at the meal table for them, friends and relatives won’t talk to them, they’ll walk through them, must be very disturbing when someone walks through you, I think. And so, they get very confused and perhaps quite, well you can imagine quite distressed if they’re not aware of what’s going on. And that’s why it’s very important, a very important part of this tradition is it’s explained, as I’ll say a little later, it’s explained to the person what’s going on. Everything is effortless, they just can do anything effortlessly.
No light comes from the sun and the moon, and the body has no shadow. So as I often say to people that if you’re walking outside and you notice that you don’t have a shadow, then you should worry because it means you’ve died. And then if you can again move down, Joyce. So they’re called the six distant signs, and then there’s the six signs of uncertainty in behavior. So, and this is, again, is part of this confusing experience that the person might have at this time or as they go into the intermediate state.
I said, a person is said to have the experience of continually moving through places known and unknown, some beautiful, some ugly and frightening. Being inside many environments in rapid succession, like forests, temples, different places. Constantly changing actions, for example, eating, then walking, then sleeping, just many different things happening in succession. And then changing reactions to food, sometimes good, sometimes bad. Uncertainty of companionship, sometimes friendly, sometimes strange or intimidating, and also instability of thought patterns.
So this process, this intermediate state can be very confusing, very and so we can compare this to the absolute clarity and stillness of the clear light experience that as a person is reborn into this intermediate state, then all of these things would be going through the mind. Because remember they’ve gone from that very clear subtle state of mind and in a sense they’ve taken rebirth into the intermediate state and so again they’re perhaps operating from more of a gross mental level rather than a subtle mental level. Now importantly here and this again comparing to that clear light of death is that in this intermediate state situation that a person has many visions. Some are peaceful and some are frightening. And so this in a sense is what the Tibetan book is about and describes about all these different visions.
And the technical name for the Tibetan Book of the Dead, the literal name is Liberation Through Hearing in the Bardo. So it’s like a guidebook for the person going through the intermediate state. And telling them what’s happening and what to do and it’s saying things like, now don’t be attracted to that dull light which may just cause you to have another suffering rebirth, but move towards the bright light, the very clear light. Because it’s said that sometimes people are frightened by the brightness, the brilliance of that white light, and they want to move towards the more attractive dull light. And so it’s advising them, walking them through it.
And as an example, there’s a series of teachings in Tibetan Buddhism about helping people who have already died and advising people who have already died. And and there are many different types of scriptures. And so the Tibetan book of the dead is is one. But this is the sort of thing that this these scriptures might say. Some of them can sound a bit funny when you’re when you read them initially, but it it describes it’s it’s it’s like a guidebook for a person who’s died, and some of these can can be read to the person after they’ve died to help them through that process.
Or you can just do it in a more sort of general way and often that’s how I’ll do it. Haven’t yet sort of read to people after they’ve died, although I think I’ll start doing it, but I’ll just give them a general description and say, now this is happening, you may be having these visions, don’t be afraid, let go into the light, and all and all that sort of thing. Perhaps also because I’m a little bit familiar with some of the teachings. So it might be something like this. Ah, so be it.
Are you who are called such and such, who have died and gone to the other side of the world, listen to me now. You are dead. This is quite frank, really. It’s not an innocent words. It’s not it doesn’t want the person to be uncertain about what’s happened to him.
You are dead. Your old body has been left behind, but a new one has not yet been found. This is the state of existence called the Bardo of becoming. You must understand that this is precisely the situation you are in. How do you know that you are in the Many strange and fearful sights, unlike anything you have held before, are occurring.
This is a sign that you are in the Bardo. Also, the powers of the bodily energies of the earth element have failed. And so it says here that a person can relate it to the various dissolution of the elements that we talked about, and a person can have some frightening experiences. And these are described as follows: The powers of the bodily energies of the earth element have failed, and therefore you are experiencing sounds of mountains cracking open and the earth trembling. And above the earth, everything seems to be disintegrating and falling, and a rain of stones is pelting down.
The energy of the element water has failed and consequently the terrifying sensations of sinking in the middle of a huge ocean are occurring. The energy of the fire element has failed and therefore it seems that fire is blazing everywhere and terrifying sounds as of cracking and the rushing of flames are exploding in your ears and pounding in your heart. Finally, because the energy of wind is reversed, you feel as though you are standing in the midst of the great windstorm that marks the end of an age and you are overcome by terror. These various terrifying events are all signs that you have died and are now in the Bardo. As well, there are also the six distant signs, that’s the ones we mentioned.
And it says, There are also the six signs of uncertainty in behavior, which I’ve mentioned, and so on. So it’s like explaining to the persons what’s happened. And the part of this description is that it’s saying, don’t be sort of afraid of these different visions. They are all just projections of your own mind. Everything that you see in the intermediate state or that you’re experiencing as you go through this process and beyond are projections of your own mind.
They’re all completely illusory. They’re all completely empty. And so, also for instance, people will ask, well, if the person’s not a Buddhist, surely they’re not going to see these hundred peaceful and wrathful deities. And no, that’s true, they won’t. What they will see is the projected images that they’re familiar with.
So they might see, if they’re a Christian, they may see images of Jesus or Mary or who’s the guy who looks after hell? Satan. Or fearful images. So these are all just projections of the person’s own mind. And interestingly, most of the experiences people have had in the near death experience have been very peaceful experiences, but there are also quite a lot of accounts of people who have had very fearful experiences in the near death experience.
And so basically what a person experiences in the as they’re going through the dying process process and in the intermediate state, again, is a reflection of the causes they’ve created. And a person who’s created a lot of positive causes is more likely to have positive, pleasant visions, and a person who’s engaged in a lot of negative actions is more likely to have fearful sort of visions. Just as it is, perhaps, you can say now in our ordinary life, the sort of dreams we have are going to be a reflection of the sort of life that we have led and also of imprints from past lives. And so it is in the intermediate state. Yes, I think that’s true.
Just before we break for tea, I’ll mention a couple of things here. This this point following Joy’s just saying, does this relate to this medical phenomena of terminal restlessness. And I’ll just mention something I’ve got here. People tend to die as they have lived, so obviously the need for preparation, as we’ve been saying all weekend. And so it says here, those who die within a virtuous attitude have a sense of passing from darkness into lights, are free of anxiety and see pleasant appearances.
Those with non virtuous thoughts have a sense of going from light to darkness and see unpleasant forms. So Joyce, in your experience that some people have this restlessness and others don’t? Oh, very much. But it depends, in my mind, on their state of mind. I think that’s exactly true.
So I think this you can see sometimes when people are dying, they almost are grimacing, and and I think they’re grimacing because of the mental images they’re having, not because of physical pain. And those mental images will be a reflection of of what’s in their mind or in their subtle mind. That’s a really interesting point. And now the next thing that’s interesting as well from the Buddhist perspective and it says those desiring heat may be reborn in a hot hell. They may be going to a very unpleasant hot place.
And those desiring cold may be reborn in a cold hell and so on. So again, we see this sometimes joy will be very and others will be very familiar with this. Sometimes when people are dying, they seem to be freezing cold and they want blankets, and others seem to be throwing off their blankets and their sheets and they want to be completely naked and they need fans on them even when it’s quite cold. So this is an indication perhaps of the sort of rebirth they’re heading for. I showed my teacher, Lama Zopa, a picture of one of our patients.
It was several days before he died. He was very gaunt and skeletal and he had a kitten, someone had given him a kitten which was fondling on his chest. It was a really sort of quite a tender picture. When my teacher saw it, he said, oh, he said, now that attachment to that kitten could mean that he’ll be reborn as an animal. So anything we’re attached to at the time of death could actually, well, A, could indicate the sort of rebirth that we might take.
Our attachments are going to be detrimental. On the other hand, Lama Zopa also said prayers for this fellow who had met him and had great faith in him, so that would have helped him greatly, but by the natural cause of events, without Lama Zopa’s intervention, then he could have taken a he’d led a very difficult life and engaged in quite a lot of negative actions. Also then his ashes were actually blessed by Geshe Rinpoche while he was at Chenrezig and are going to be made into a whole batch of stupas. We’ve had the order from his partner of twelve various size stupas and one big one. So it’s our first stupa order.
We’re quite excited. The stupa manufacturing industry at Chenrezig. And this is also interesting, Joy and others who work in this area. It says that if the heat absorbs first from the upper part of the body to the heart it indicates a lower rebirth and if it absorbs first from the feet up to the heart it indicates a higher rebirth. So in other words, if the last part of the body to get cold is the upper part, a higher rebirth.
If the last part to get cold is the hang on, I’m getting this right. The last part to get cold, to retain warmth is the upper part, a better rebirth. If the last part to retain warmth is the lower part, a lower rebirth. This fits in, of course, as I was saying yesterday, if the consciousness leaves from the upper part of the body, it augurs for the best type of rebirth and the heat leaving the body is sort of related to the consciousness or the mind leaving that part of the body and so better for it to leave from the upper part of the body. So let’s stop and have a cup of tea.
Just immediately bringing the mind to the breath. So we were talking this morning about intermediate state, the various attributes of the intermediate state, and then we’re also talking about some of the signs that may indicate whether a person has taken a lower or higher type of rebirth, some of the things that may indicate to us where the person is heading, which of course is just a reflection of the way the person has lived, what’s going to happen to them at the time of death. And the other important point of that discussion about the various visions that happen in the intermediate state is that perhaps when we’re helping other people and also of course when it’s happening to us is just to remember or to remind the person that these are just projections of the mind, they have no real essence or substance, they’re just illusory and not to get caught up in those projections, not to be attached to them, just to see them as projections of the mind, as illusory, and just keep the focus on the white light of heading towards the white light. Now, the mind of the intermediate state being is much more clear than our minds, than the ordinary mind, and so for instance Sogyal Rinpoche says that the mind of the intermediate state being is something like seven times one of his teachers told him that the mind is something like seven times more clear than in the ordinary waking state.
Now the implications for that are that that intermediate state being at some level is going to be aware of the thoughts and actions of relatives and friends. So for instance, if the relatives are squabbling about possessions, fighting over the will, then it’s said that that will very much disturb the mind of the person who’s died and perhaps even cause them to come back as a spirit around those possessions not wanting to let go of those possessions. It will certainly interfere with the smooth transition from one life to the next, and similarly if the priests, the people conducting the funeral service are doing it more for the money, say, than for the genuine wish of the person who’s died sorry, for the benefit of the person who’s died and the wish for them to have a good rebirth, etc, and that’s said also to can really disturb the person who’s died. So, it’s really important after the person has died, even after they’ve entered the intermediate state, to maintain this sort of, for all the people connected with the person who’s died, to maintain this positive state of mind towards the person who’s died and not to get caught up in greed and attachment around the possessions or, you know, the money they’re getting paid for doing the funeral or whatever.
So that’s an important point as well. Now if I can have the next overhead please auntie Joy so and perhaps no perhaps covering up to about here. So just some some points about the the actual process of rebirth. Now importantly, there’s a common concept in the West, perhaps a part of New Age thinking if you like, that we choose a particular type of rebirth in order to learn lessons from it and we choose certain suffering experiences in order to learn from those suffering experience. Now Buddhist concept is a little bit different from that firstly for me it’s a somewhat ludicrous concept to think that anyone would ever choose suffering, mean we have enough now without choosing more.
Is there anyone here who’s ever actually chosen suffering in order to learn from it? No, so Not Not consciously. Because I think we’d all agree that that everything we do in life is done with the wish to obtain happiness. Now certainly we may have a deluded or obscured concept of what brings happiness. For example, the the terrorist who I was talking about yesterday, he got on the bus and blew himself and everybody else up on the bus, thought that that would bring bring happiness to to himself, perhaps by being a martyr, would bring happiness like a lot of the Iraqi and Iranian soldiers, the young boys in the family who go out and if they’re killed in action, they’re regarded as a martyr.
So it’s a deluded concept of what brings happiness and as with that terrorist, because a lot of people don’t understand that many people, a great number of people in society don’t understand that the law of karma in terms of the fact that positive actions bring happiness and negative actions bring suffering. So often people think that they’ll get some happiness from negative types of actions by harming somebody else, by killing somebody else. A classic example of that was a couple of weeks ago, I was doing a shift at the home of one of our patience, well, two of our patients, a husband and wife, both who have AIDS, dying of AIDS. And a couple of houses up, there was a lot of shouting happening, and a couple of minutes later, a very distressed girl came to the door of our house ironically, and she said, I realize what’s happening with the patient here, but my ex boyfriend is there and he’s got a gun and he’s threatening to kill himself. So she came in and we rang the police and there was another girl down the side of the house sort of whimpering or sort of crying and she went out to see her And then we sort of stayed inside for a while.
I wasn’t going out to check it out. I have a I have a healthy degree of cowardice within my my soul that protects me. So and so that next thing, there was a lot more shouting, and I heard him yelling out, go on, kill me. Kill me. There’s no reason for me to live.
There’s nothing worth living for. I don’t care if I’m in jail. And eventually, I saw a policeman walking past the place and went outside, and there was about four policemen around him out in the street. And he was obviously drunk or on drugs. He had a bottle in his hand, and one of them snatched the bottle from his hand.
He took a swing at one of them, and they overpowered him, saw them putting about three or four guns in one of the cars. It was just an example of how because the mind was so deluded and distressed, how his concept of what would bring happiness was just so screwed up, if you like, even thinking that if he killed himself, that would not so much bring happiness, but relieve suffering. That would that would be the least suffering alternative. Often, I mean, basic teaching of Buddhism is that what we think is happiness is actually the temporary relief from suffering. Might sound like a pessimistic viewpoint, but basically the things that we cling for to give us happiness are the things that actually are relieving our dissatisfaction or our distress.
So we we reach out to try and get these things to relieve our discomfort or our dissatisfaction. And so for him, it was so we see all the time that people have this very deluded concept of what’s going to bring happiness. And so they think, for instance, if there’s some argument in the family that if you actually, you know, it’ll make me happy if I go and actually kill that other person. It’s just such a screwed up concept of what’s going to bring happiness. So the basic point is that I think we’d all agree that every single action we do in the course of our lives, the course of the day, we do with the wish to obtain some sort of happiness happiness or satisfaction.
And, of course, that also relates to helping other people. At least that’s a positive action that will bring true happiness, but we we understand that when we help another person, it brings it brings us a good feeling. It’s nice to help another person. We feel good when we do it. So, anyway, that’s that’s a common concept in the West that we choose suffering experiences in order to learn from them or that we choose a particular family to be born into in order to to learn from that experience.
Buddhist says Buddhism says otherwise. It says that when the consciousness leaves the body or or when the person’s in the intermediate state, that what propels us into another rebirth is the karmic imprints on our mind. So the only thing that actually leaves the body is the very subtle mind with all of the karmic imprints on it, all of the imprints of our past actions of body, speech, mind in this and all of our past lives, all of those imprints which haven’t yet either ripened or been purified. And so that is what goes into the intermediate state being, and that’s what sort of throws us without control into the next rebirth. So it’s said that the the cause, the basic cause that actually gives us this physical body, that makes us want to have a physical body or that creates the body, is karma and delusion.
It’s the karmic imprints and the negative states of mind. That’s that’s the causes that gives us this body or that makes us want to have another body and that makes us want to grasp after another body. And because of that, in Buddhist teaching, because our bodies and minds are born from karma and delusion, then it’s inevitable that we’re going to experience suffering or dissatisfaction because that’s the very nature of our being. But the positive side of the story is that we can go beyond that dissatisfaction, suffering, and attain reach to a state beyond suffering, permanently beyond any suffering or dissatisfaction. So due to the force of karma, the consciousness is thrown towards its place of future rebirth, and as it says there, if we’re going to be reborn as a male, it said that we have an image, a picture of our future parents copulating.
And if we’re going to be reborn as a male, we have anger towards the father or jealousy towards the father, attachment towards the mother, and it’s that force of attraction or force of deluded mind, anger and attachment, in particular the attachment, that draws us to that place where that’s happening. And what actually says then is that when we’re drawn to that place, then we just see the sexual organs of our parents and we become very angry, and it’s that anger in a sense that causes us to then enter the fertilized egg at or near the moment of conception. And similarly, if we’re going to be reborn as a female, the opposite occurs. And so it’s a force of attachment, habitual attachment and clinging and grasping that causes us to take a rebirth. And it’s sort of without control.
Get classically, says we get blown to that place of future rebirth like a leaf being blown in the wind. And so in a sense, in the true sense, in Buddhist terms, we we choose not not that we physically not that we actually choose, but through the force of karma, we get thrown into that place of future rebirth. It’s like we’ve created the cause to get our parents, and they’ve created the cause to get us, which takes away all the family therapists would be out of a job if because if everyone believed this, because in a sense, there’s nobody to blame for anything that happens in families, because if we hadn’t created the cause for it, then we wouldn’t be in that situation. And that when we understand that, it helps us then to take away any resentment or blame towards our parents, siblings, etcetera, because we actually created the cause to be born into that particular family rather than just being some unfortunate stroke of luck. So that’s the the Buddhist concept of how we actually take rebirth.
Possibly can move down joy joy, please, on the chart. Okay. So, yeah, so the consciousness enters the fertilized egg, enters the womb at or near the moment of conception. And there are other philosophies, of course. I’ve spoken to people over the years, and some believe the consciousness doesn’t enter until, say, three months or or six months or even one person I spoke to who believe whose philosophy believes that consciousness didn’t enter the fetus until the time of birth.
And so in then so in terms of when you look at say for instance abortion, then at any time after the moment of conception that the fetus is aborted, that life is being finished and there is a karmic result. Now it’s not just black and white, it’s not just straight out killing a negative karma. As the Dalai Lama said, there are many shades of gray with abortion and it depends on the situation, on the potential health and welfare of the mother and the child and all those things, But there is implications, is a karmic result for the mother, the child and the doctor who performs the procedure, the operation. So that has to be kept in mind. And of course many years ago when IVF programs were starting, I remember taking an interest in it and going to a lecture in Bendigo by Professor Carl Wood, I think he was, one of the founders of that program, and just thinking about this in terms of Buddhism and the whole idea of implanting a fertilized egg into the female womb, And the fact that I remember in that lecture that he said that the fertilized eggs that weren’t needed or used were destroyed.
So in my mind that seemed to infer that many that there would have been a consciousness in all those fertilized eggs and they were all being destroyed, so there were sort of karmic implications there. Lama Zopa since told me that it’s not every fertilized egg that a consciousness enters, so perhaps many of those eggs actually doesn’t have But certainly the fertilized egg couldn’t continue to grow and develop into a fetus without a consciousness. So there’s sort of those implications. And I mentioned earlier that Natalie? Yes.
Of course, he would. Yes. Of course, he would. Yes. Yes.
Yes. I did. That was an oversight. Think the ones who are in a sense more more more directly, you know, because the baby’s in the mother’s way and the doctor, but the father also and any anybody else who who advises, consults the woman to do this or that is also has a car. Thank you for mentioning that.
Didn’t you just say that not every fertilized egg actually has a consciousness? Yes, that’s more relating to say the fertilized eggs that have been created and being stored for instance for IVF programs. And I guess I’m not sure of the physiology, but perhaps often an egg is fertilized and then doesn’t develop. Is that what happens physiologically in the mother’s womb? Perhaps the reason that it doesn’t develop is that her consciousness hasn’t come into it.
I’m not sure. That area, I’m not sure. Natalie, the point she’s just mentioned is an important one also, that in terms of karma, karma itself, we could talk all day about karma. But in terms of karma, the important consideration there is that there is equal karma in doing the action yourself or getting somebody else to do it. Doing it yourself, getting someone else to do it what’s the third there’s a third one, isn’t there?
What’s the third one? Doing it yourself, telling someone else to do it. I can’t think of the third case, but it’s it’s something about You had the intention to do it, but something stuck to the joke. No, no, that’s another one. It’s somehow approving of it or something like that.
If you approve of it anyway. Anyway, it’s the same karmic result whether you do it yourself or get someone else to do it. So if if you, say for the husband and wife, if the husband tells the wife that she must go and get an abortion, then he he actually incurs the karmic result of getting the the abortion just as much as the doctor does. Or if if the if the general tells the troops to go out and kill the enemy, then for every person killed, that general takes on the karma of those deaths. So it’s not just it’s actually not just the action, but the telling someone else or getting someone else to do the thing for you.
Whatever it might be, getting someone else to go and steal or rob or lie, tell a lie on your behalf, lying on your tax return, or getting your accountant to lie on your tax return. So all of those things generate a karmic result. Done? Impressing you, Zach. I’m sorry.
I’m sorry. Pende. This is not an easy path. What negative results are there with IVF per se, without taking into account eggs that are, fertilized eggs that are destroyed. I don’t think there’s any specific answer.
It’s a very complex issue, but in Buddhist terms, it always comes down in Buddhism to what harm is being created. And so for instance, so in terms of, you know, taking someone else’s sperm and a fertilized egg and implanting that into the mother, I don’t think there’s any sort of karmic implications. It’s more on the how that fertilized egg is treated and if that comes into a woman where then the child has a good family and is well treated, then there’s no sort of karmic problem. I guess comes into another issue of allocation of resources and what other sort of programs might be missed out on because of that money that’s being spent and that sort of thing. I mean, the cost of that is probably minimal compared, say, to the money that’s spent on premature babies.
I remember reading one article, I think, in Time in America. There’s just billions of dollars a year on these special units for very premature babies. Well, it depends on what’s being missed out on as a result of that and what I mean, that that’s another issue. Perhaps we won’t get into that. For an IVF baby?
Yeah. You’ve got a sperm donor over here and you’ve got somebody over here and you’ve got possibly, you know, processes happening in the middle. I mean, how how do you develop any attraction or aversion? Saying you had a fresh insemination. Do I mean, if you’re not seeing your parents copulating.
I’ve never been asked this question before. And I don’t know how to answer it. I’m not sure. You still have the the karmas of the two parents operating. I mean, that mean everybody He still comes up from the IVF program is gonna have massively confused sexuality?
You’d have to ask the sociologist that rather than that local monk. I’ll for wonder about that because mine’s just nice birds from the IVF programs. They have twins, triplets, and there’s It’s I’m not quite sure about I’ll have to think about that or ask my my teachers about that point of