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Asanga’s Teaching of Great Compassion... To conceive the spirit of Enlightenment, you first must develop equanimity toward all beings, and then contemplate the sevenfold cause-and-effect spiritual instruction given by Maitreya to Asanga. First imagine before you a being who has neither helped you nor harmed you. Think, "From his own point of view, he wants happiness and does not want suffering, just like everybody else. I will free myself from attraction and aversion. I will not feel close to some and help them while feeling distant from others and harming them. I will develop equanimity towards all beings. Lamas and gods, enable me to do this!" Once you feel equanimity toward that neutral person, imagine a person who attracts you. Try to feel equanimity toward that person. Think, "My partiality is due to my attraction. Since I have always desired attractive beings, I have been reborn constantly in the miserable life-cycle." Thus restrain your desire and meditate. Once you feel equanimity toward that attractive person, imagine an unattractive person. Try to feel equanimity toward him. Think, "Because there has been discord between us, I have developed an aversion to him and so lack equanimity. Without it, I cannot conceive the spirit of Enlightenment!" Thus restrain your aversion and meditate. When you feel equanimity toward that unattractive person, imagine both  persons together. Think, "These two are the same in that each, from her own viewpoint, wants happiness and doesn’t want misery. From my viewpoint, this one who seems so close now has been reborn as my enemy countless times. This one toward whom I feel hostile has been reborn as my mother countless times and has cared for me with love. Which one should I like? Which one should I hate? I will feel equanimity and free myself from attachment and aversion. Lamas and gods, please enable me to do this!" When you feel such equanimity, extend it to all beings. "All beings are the same. Each wants happiness and doesn’t want misery. All beings are my relatives. Therefore I will learn equanimity and be free from attachment and aversion to near and far, helping some and harming others. Lamas and gods, help me to accomplish this!" Once you have developed this mind of equanimity, implement the first of the seven causal instructions for attaining the spirit of Enlightenment. Visualize the lamas and gods before you and contemplate: "Why are all beings my relatives? As there is no beginning to the life-cycle, there has also been no beginning to my rebirths. In passing through these countless lives, there is no form of life which I have not adopted countless times, and there is no country or realm in which I have not been born. Of all beings, there is not one who has not been my mother innumerable times. Each has been my mother in human form countless times, and will become my mother many times again." When you have fully experienced this truth, contemplate the kindness which living beings have shown you when they were your mother. Visualize the lamas and gods before you, and imagine clearly your mother of this life, when she was young and as she grew old. "Not only is she my mother in this life, but she has cared for me lives beyond number. In this lifetime, she lovingly sheltered me in her womb, and when I was born she lovingly put me on soft pillows and cradled me in her arms. She held me to the warmth of her breasts, and suckled me with her sweet milk. She welcomed me with loving smiles and looked at me with happy eyes. She cleaned my snotty nose and wiped away my excrement. My slightest ailment gave her worse misery than the thought of losing her own life. Scorning all affliction, torments, and abuse, not considering herself at all, she provided me as well as she could with food and shelter. She gave me infinite happiness and benefit, and protected me from measureless misery and harm." Contemplate her very great kindness. Then, in the same way contemplate the kindness of your father and others close to you, for they have also been your mother countless times. When you have fully experienced this truth, meditate on beings toward whom you feel impartial. "Though it now seems that they have no relationship to me, they have been my mother times beyond number, and in those lives they protected me with love and kindness." When you have experienced this truth, meditate on those beings who are

now your adversaries. Imagine them clearly before you and think: "How can I now feel these are my enemies? As lifetimes are beyond number, they have been my mother countless times. When they were my mother they provided me with measureless happiness and benefits and protected me from misery and harm. Without them I could not have lasted even a short time and without me they could not have endured even a short time. We have felt such strong attachment countless times. That they are now my adversaries is due to bad evolutionary actions. At another time in the future they will again be my mother who protects me with love." When you have fully experienced this truth, meditate on the kindness of all beings. Then meditate on repaying the kindness of all beings, your mothers. Visualize the lamas and deities before you and contemplate: "From beginningless time these mothers have protected me with kindness. Yet as their minds are disturbed by the demons of addictive passions, they have not obtained independence of mind, and are crazed. They lack the eye to see either the path to the high states of humans and gods or the path to Nirvana, the supreme good. They are without a spiritual teacher, the one who is the leader of the blind. Continually pummeled by the discord of wrong deeds, they slip toward the edge of the terrifying abyss of rebirth in the life-cycle, especially its lower states. To ignore these kind mothers would be shameless. To return their kindness I will free them from misery of the life-cycle and establish them in the bliss of liberation. Lamas and gods, enable me to do this." Then meditate love. Imagine a person to whom you are strongly attached, such as your mother. "How can she have undefiled happiness when she does not even have the defiled happiness of the life-cycle? What she now boasts of as happiness slips away, changing into misery. She yearns and yearns, strives and strives, desiring a moment’s happiness, but she is only creating the causes of future misery and rebirths in lower states of being. In this life as well, weary and exhausted, she creates only misery. She definitely does not have real happiness. How wonderful it would be if she possessed happiness and all the causes of happiness! May she possess them! I will cause her to possess happiness and all its causes. Lamas and gods, please enable me to do this!" When you have gained experience of this, continue to meditate, first imagining other persons who are close to you, such as your father, then imagining a person toward whom you feel impartial, then an adversary, and finally all beings. Then do the meditation of great compassion and universal responsibility: "My kind fathers and mothers, whose number would fill the sky, are helplessly bound by evolutionary actions and fettering passions. The four rivers, the river of desire, existence, ignorance, and fanaticism, sweep them helplessly into the currents of the life-cycle, when they are battered by the waves of birth, old age, sickness, and death. They are completely tied up by the tight and hard to break bonds of various kinds of evolutionary actions. From beginningless time they have entered into the iron cage of holding the concepts of ‘I’ and ‘mine’ in the center of the heart. This cage is very difficult for anyone to open. Enshrouded by the great darkness of ignorance, which obscures judgement of good and evil, they do not even see the path leading to the happy states of being. Much less do they see the path leading to liberation and Enlightenment. "These wretched beings are ceaselessly tortured by the suffering of misery, the suffering of change, and the all-pervasive suffering of creation. I have seen all beings, my mothers, wretched, engulfed in the ocean of the life-cycle. If I do not save them, who will? If I were to ignore them, I would be shameless, the lowest of all. My desire to learn the Mahayana would be only words, and I could not show my face before the Buddhas and Bodhisattvas. Therefore, no matter what, I will develop the ability to pull all my kind sad mothers from the ocean of the life-cycle and to establish them in Buddhahood." Think this and generate a very strong and pure universal responsibility. Finally, meditate the spirit of Enlightenment. Ask yourself whether or not you can establish all beings in Buddhahood, and reflect, "I do not know where I am going; how can I establish even one being in Buddhahood? Even those who have attained the positions of disciple or hermit Buddha can accomplish only the minor purposes of beings, and cannot establish beings into Buddhahood. It is only a perfect Buddha who can lead beings to full Enlightenment. Therefore, no matter what, I will obtain peerless and completely perfect Buddhahood for the sake of all beings. Lamas and gods, please enable me to do this!"

The natural liberation through Naked Vision, identifying intelligence Be sure mind’s nature is groundless voidness; your mind is insubstantial like empty space - like it or not, look at your own mind! Not fastening to the view of annihilative voidness, be sure spontaneous wisdom has always been clear, spontaneous in itself like the essence of the sun - like it or not, look at your own mind! Be sure intelligent wisdom is uninterrupted, like a continuous current of a river - like it or not, look at your own mind! Be sure it will not be known by thinking various reasons, its movement insubstantial like breezes in the sky - like it or not, look at your own mind! Be sure that what happens is your own perception; appearance is natural perception, like a reflection in a mirror - like it or not, look at your own mind. Be sure that all signs are liberated on the spot, self-originated, self-delivered, like clouds in the sky - like it or not, look at your own mind! Vision-voidness natural liberation is brilliant void Body of Truth. Realising Buddhahood is not achieved by paths - Vajrasattva is beheld right now...   Therefore, to see intuitively your own naked intelligence, this natural Liberation through Naked Vision is extremely deep. So investigate this reality of your own intelligence. Profound! Sealed! Ema! (by Padma Sambava, last paragraphs.)

The Relevance of Buddhism...  In the modern world, Buddhism has to contend with two broad alternatives to itself. These are theism and materialism. Paradoxically the Buddha had to contend with the very same ideologies in his own day. And now as then Buddhism offers the better alternative for the realisation of the greater happiness of all beings inhabiting the world (and not just humans alone). The relevance of Buddhism for the contemporary era would depend on its ability to meet the challenges posed by the contemporary world better than the rival ideologies of theism and materialism and very often a combination of the two. The unbridled exploitation of the earth's resources, almost amounting to a rape of these resources, has been another example of this greed. Buddhism teaches that man should live in harmony with the Universe. We have seen the extinction of many species of birds, animals and fish, and the threat of extermination of many more, because of the dominance of theistic and materialistic ethics, which have consistently refused to conceded the "right to life" to non-human forms of existence. It is only a step from this position to the exploitation of natural resources to the extent that eco-systems have been destroyed beyond repair, and has put into question the long-term possibility of survival. The lack of tolerance of diverging viewpoints has been one of the most potent causes of misery and war. Even though we would like to think that the worst excesses of sectarian conflict are behind us, we have no real ground to such optimism. The world meeds a measure of Buddhist tolerance. It has been said that the flavor of the Dharma is the flavor of freedom). The freedom that is meant here is primarily the freedom of the mind unburdened by crippling dogma (be they of ego or of God); but such mental freedom is the basis of all other freedom, even those of the more "worldly" kind, like political, social or economic freedom. In a world where freedom is constrained in many ways, the liberating effect of the Dharma is sorely needed. True freedom cannot be attained until the mind is set free. The Dharma actually provides a therapy for the freeing of the mind from mental defilement. Modern society seems to have aggravated rather than lessened the need for mental purification and calm. The pace of change has quickened, and external pressure on individuals increased. A balanced mind, created by a true understanding of the world and man's place in it, coupled with the practice of the Buddha's path, could serve as a radical new therapy. The importance of the Buddhist principle that a person should be free to believe according to one's freely formed and informed opinions, can hardly be overstated. The current practice of indoctrinating children with the religious views of their parents is one that comes to mind. Many religious organisations carry this process into formal schooling, and reinforce it later by using the latest technology of the information revolution. It then becomes a veritable "brain-washing" no less insidious because it has the full approval of the establishment. The right of a child to have its mind free of religious indoctrination until it can make a decision on this vital matter in full maturity with all the information at its command, is a right that is rarely mentioned, but one in which Buddhists can take a lead. Basic Buddhism is relevant for the problems of modern society in several other ways. But it must be remembered that the traditional practices of Buddhism in several of its schools, including to some extent in the Theravâda tradition, departs considerably from the principles enunciated by the Buddha. Here too what is needed is a return to the principles and practice of basic Buddhism.

The Doctrines of Karma and Rebirth... The Buddhist doctrine of kamma [karma] ("deeds," "actions"), and the closely related doctrine of rebirth, are perhaps the best known, and often the least understood, of Buddhist doctrines. The matter is complicated by the fact that the other Indian religious traditions of Hinduism and Jainism have their own theories of Karma and Reincarnation. It is in fact the Hindu versions that are better known in the West. The Buddhist theory of kamma (to give the Pali word) and rebirth are quite distinct from their other Indian counterparts. In Buddhism the law of kamma is the moral law of causation - good actions give good results and vice versa. It is the quality of an act which determines its consequences. But what determines the karmic quality of a deed? In Hinduism it is the correct performance of a person's "duty," especially his caste duties that counts. Early Buddhism, which recognised no caste distinctions, evaluates the karmic quality of an act in terms of moral and ethical criteria. In particular it is the mental factors which accompany the commission of deed that determines its consequences or "fruits" (vipâka). All negative kamma (i.e. those leading to bad consequences) arise from the three roots of unwholesomeness. These are greed (lobha), aversion (dosa), and delusion (moha). Accordingly, good kammic results follow from deeds that spring from generosity (caga), loving-kindness (mettâ) and wisdom (vijjâ). The Buddha emphasised that it is the mental factors involved, rather than the deeds themselves, that determine future consequences. Thus the same deed committed with different mental factors will have different consequences. Likewise, purely accidental deeds may have neutral consequences; however, if the accident occurred because insufficient mindfulness was exercised it could have adverse results for the person responsible for it. The theory of kamma presupposes that individuals have "free will." Everything that happens to an individual is not the fruit of some past kamma. In fact, the experiences that involve an individual may be of three kinds: some are the result of past action, some are deliberately committed free acts; and the remainder could be due to chance factors operating in the environment. The doctrine of kamma is not a theory of predestination of any kind. One common misunderstanding is not to distinguish between the action and its results - between kamma and vipâka (fruits). It must also be mentioned that the fruiting of an act may be postponed, and that it is possible to reach Enlightenment - the goal of the Buddha's path - before all the previous kammas have yielded their results. The Buddhist theory of rebirth asserts that the fruits of some kamma may manifest themselves in "future lives." This brings us to the Buddhist theory of rebirth. Similar concepts occur in other religious systems - e.g. the Platonic theory of the "pre-existence of the soul" and the Hindu-Jain theory of re-incarnation. Such reincarnation theory involves the transmigration of a soul. In Buddhism, however, it is the unripened karmic acts outstanding at the death of an individual which conditions a new birth. The last moment of consciousness too is also a conditioning factor, but it is the store of unripened kamma generated by volitional acts (the sankhâras) of previous existences which generates the destiny of the new individual. A newly born individual needs not only the genetic blueprint derived from the genes of the natural parents, but also a kammic blueprint derived from the volitional acts of a deceased person. The question has been posed whether the new individual is the same as the old individual whose kamma it has inherited. The Buddha's answer to this question was somewhat enigmatic: "It is not the same, yet it is not another" (na ca so, na ca ańńo). To understand the Buddha's reply we have to investigate the criteria which establish personal identity. Is the child the same as the adult it later becomes? In the Buddhist sense we are making two observations at two points of time in a constantly changing psycho-physical entity. For legal and conventional purposes, some arbitrary criteria are used, such as physical continuity over time, or the retention of memory. These define only a conventional person. Just as it is a conventional or "fictional" persons who lasts continuously from birth to death, so it is just such a conventional person who persists from one life to another. In the Buddhist view of rebirth the only links between two successive lives is the karmic residue carried over and an element of consciousness, called the re-linking consciousness: (paisandhi vińńâna), which momentarily links the two lives. In Buddhism there is no conception of a transmigrating soul which inhabits successive material bodies until it unites with God. Buddhism uses the Pali term "sasâra" to denote the "round of births" in various planes of existence governed by the law of kamma. The acceptance of the validity of the hypothesis of sasâra is very difficult for some people, while for others it is the most natural of hypotheses. Some features of the observable world suggests it. In the Culakammavibhanga Sutta the Buddha is asked: "What is the reason and the cause for the inequality amongst human beings despite their being human?" (the context making it clear that it is inequality at birth that is meant). The Buddha answered: "Beings inherit their kamma, and it is kamma which divides beings in terms of their inequality." The theistic hypothesis cannot give a rational answer, except in terms of an iniquitous and unjust "God." Some support for the theory of rebirth comes from reports of recollections of past lives, whether spontaneously or under hypnosis, which have been reported from all parts of the world. While many such reports may be mistaken or even fraudulent, some are undoubtedly genuine. According to Buddhism, individuals can develop the power of "retrocognition" (i.e. the ability to recall past lives), but the development of such supernormal powers is usually the accompaniment of progress along the spiritual path of Enlightenment. It may be possible that some karmic factors may predispose some individuals towards such experiences. However parapsychological experimentation is still in its early stages, and many people have no personal recollection of their own previous lives. For such individuals the dogmatic acceptance of the doctrines of kamma and rebirth is not expected. The central tenets of Buddhism relate not to any abstract theories about rebirth or karma but to the interpretation of human experience which is within the capacity of every person to verify. This verification can be undertaken, not in terms of an abstract cycle of lives, but also in terms of the one life we are all familiar with. The Buddhist sasâra is to be seen in every moment of existence, as well as the whole "cycle of births." One would expect that in the Kâlâma Sutta, the discourse in which the Buddha decries the acceptance of theories on the basis of authority (which was quoted earlier), that he would address himself to the question of belief in the doctrine of kamma and rebirth. This he does. Referring to the "four-fold confidences" which the "noble person" (âriya puggala), i.e. the person who follows the path of the Buddha, attains to, the Buddha states: 'If there is the other world and if there is the fruit and result of good and bad deeds, then there is reason that I shall be reborn into the state of bliss, the celestial world, on the dissolution of the body, after death.' This is the first confidence that he attains. 'If, however, there is no other world and if there is no fruit and no result of good and bad deeds, then I shall myself lead he a happy life, free from enmity, malice and suffering in this very life'. This is the second confidence that he attains." Thus even the extreme rationalist who would suspend judgement on the truth of the sasâric hypothesis (i.e. the doctrines of karma and rebirth) would find that the Buddha-Dhamma would not have lost its rationale. He can aspire to the second confidence of the "noble person" and make the one life that he is sure of, a happy one. Disclaimer: All articles and/or images retain the original copyrights of their original owners.   11/18/06

December 1, 2006