We are studying this letter that Tsongkhapa wrote to his friend, a fellow meditator, Konchog-tsultrim, with whom he exchanged various teachings. And Tsongkhapa is replying to a request that this great meditator made to him asking him to explain some practical advice on how to practice sutra and tantra.
Review of Previous Sessions
Tsongkhapa first speaks about, as an introduction, that we’ve found an excellent working basis (the precious human rebirth), and we’ve met with the teachings, and we’re cared for by qualified spiritual masters, and we have the power to discern what’s to be adopted and rejected. In other words, we have all the conducive circumstances that will allow us to follow this spiritual path and develop ourselves, and so we need to engage ourselves in the teachings.
For that, we have to rely on the spiritual teacher, not just have met with a master but really rely on them and rely on one who is qualified. And the main qualifications that Tsongkhapa speaks about are very practical ones, that the teacher has to be able to know distinctly what are the pathways of mind that we need to develop to reach our goals of liberation and enlightenment and what are not, and not to teach anything which is additional and superfluous that would take us astray, or to leave anything out, leave any steps out, and know how to actually adopt it in its proper order and sequence to each student. The teacher himself or herself has to have gained certainty about all of this from having also been led in a similar fashion by his or her own spiritual teacher. The way of study needs to be in accordance with the great classics. That is an important point to understand, that the texts and the actual practices are not something different, there isn’t a “practice Dharma” and a “textual Dharma,” but everything in the Buddhist texts are intended for practice.
Then he went on to say how we begin our practice, and the main thing is to tame our mind. For that, what is essential is the motivating mental framework. We saw that the motivating mental framework has to do with the intention or goal that we are aiming for, the intention to achieve it, and the emotional state which backs that, and turning away from something and turning ahead toward achieving something else. The way that Tsongkhapa outlines this is in terms of the graded stages of motivation (the lam-rim) coming from Atisha (Skt. Atiśa), based on the Indian text.
On the initial level, we think in terms of our mental continuums going on, no beginning and no end, and how we have this precious life now but it’s going to end. We will continue, and it can either be one of the better situations or one of the worse situations, and we want to continue having a precious human rebirth, because it’s going to take quite a long time to achieve liberation and enlightenment. We turn away from our interest being just in this lifetime and turn it to thinking in terms of future lives. For that, we need to give up as much as possible the destructive behavior which would cause our worse rebirth states.
Then, on the intermediate level, we think of the entire mental continuum again and how, the way that it’s going, even if we have a precious human rebirth, even if we have better and better states, still if it’s within a samsaric existence — under the influence of disturbing emotions and disturbing attitudes and the karmic impulses that that brings on and perpetuates — we’re going to just continue to have over and over again a samsaric situation with all this un-satisfactoriness. We think of the advantages of liberation from that, turn away from interest just in samsaric happiness, and turn toward liberation. For that, we have disgust with samsara (Skt. saṃsāra), renunciation, willingness to give it up, to give up the causes of our samsaric existence (disturbing emotions and attitudes and behavior based on that) and work for liberation with ethical discipline, concentration, and discriminating awareness.
Then, on the advanced level, again we think of the mental continuum, that not only do we have a mental continuum that experiences samsaric rebirth but is not stained in its nature by these emotional obscurations that are preventing our liberation, but the same thing is true of everybody else. Nobody wants to have the suffering that they have. Everybody wants to be happy. We’re just completely interconnected with everybody, and it doesn’t make any sense to just work for our own liberation alone.
In order to be able to help everybody, we need not to just have love and compassion and wish them well, and even not just taking responsibility to help them all the way to liberation and enlightenment — we need to have an omniscient mind, which knows how best to help them and what are all the causes for the way that they’re acting and what will be all the consequences of anything that we teach, so that we know how best to help them. For that, we have to realize that our mental continuum is not only not intrinsically stained by the emotional obscurations but likewise it’s not stained by the cognitive obscurations that prevent us from seeing all the cause and effect connections and that make our mind perceive things as if they existed in isolation with what’s called truly established existence, which is an impossible way of existence — things established all on their own. The mind doesn’t intrinsically produce that type of appearance, although it does now all the time. We have to work to overcome that as well, with bodhichitta (Skt. bodhicitta) motivation and the far-reaching attitudes, and turn away from just working for our own liberation by itself.
This is the lam-rim (graded stages), something that many of us have studied quite a lot. But Tsongkhapa says that it’s important not to have these just with words. Dharma development is not just having kind thoughts and so on, but it’s actually changing our minds, integrating these motivating mental frameworks with our whole mental continuum. We need to have it in an uncontrived type of way (in other words, a sincere type of way) and something that comes automatically, eventually, in an unlabored manner, that we don’t even have to work up to it. But to do that, we do have to work up to it, and so it’s important to meditate to build them up as beneficial habits.
Then, as for how to do that, how to meditate and build them up, Tsongkhapa says we have to know many different things. If we’re going to generate a certain state of mind, we have to know the causes (or in other words, all the steps that go before it, what it depends on). We have to know all the aspects of it, so all the features, all the details. Like if we are thinking of compassion, we need to have equanimity for everyone and concern for them, see our interconnectedness with them, and so on, so we can feel empathy. And being focused on their suffering, we need to know all the aspects of their various types of suffering. And we also need to know: What would be helpful for developing this state of mind? What would be harmful for developing this state of mind? Once we develop it, what does it rid us of? What do we gain from that? Where do we go on from there? And when we know what we’re focusing on, then we also need to know how our mind takes that. Like with compassion, focusing on the suffering of others, and the way our mind takes that is with the wish for it to be removed and also taking some responsibility to do it ourselves. All of these things need to be understood very, very well in order to meditate, which means “build up something as a beneficial habit.”
We need to also gain confidence in these practices, in the validity of the practices, by reading the various accounts of great masters and the Buddha and so on, who have developed these themselves. Do this in between sessions. Also, what Tsongkhapa doesn’t mention here but which is important also, is to gain the confidence that it is possible to achieve these states. That often we get from looking at the biographies of others, of great masters, seeing that they worked very, very hard to achieve what they achieved. They started out the way that we are, but with a great deal of work they were able to achieve what they achieved.
Then also Tsongkhapa says that we need to develop all of these states in their entire progression. In other words, we can’t just start with an advanced level of motivation. We need to build them up one by one, because each of them is based on the prior one.
What we were speaking about last time is that we have to maintain these motivating mental frameworks steadily and continuously throughout our sessions. We shouldn’t think that this is something that we just generate at the beginning of a session (even if we are able to generate it sincerely) but then forget about it during the course of our meditation session or during the course of the day or during the course of listening to a lecture or something like that. It’s something that we need to try to keep mindful of — mindful means the mental glue — hold on to it throughout our session. We discussed last time how it’s very easy to lose that motivation and become rather mechanical in our practice if we don’t have the strong motivation.
There’s also a bit of a discussion about can we really generate a motivation in a rational type of way based on reasoning — how do you actually feel something based on reasoning? And this is something that His Holiness the Dalai Lama speaks about whenever he mentions that. When we talk about compassion, for example, there are three types. There’s compassion, which is based on attachment, like compassion directed at our relatives, our loved ones, our friends — people that we’re quite attached to and so we want them to be happy and not be unhappy. But this is a very unstable type of compassion and love, because at the slightest thing — if the person annoys us or disappoints us and so on, then we no longer like them: we get angry and so on.
Then the second type of compassion His Holiness mentions is compassion, which is a type of pity, of looking down on the other one and thinking that we are so much better. And it has a flavor to it of arrogance and doesn’t have a flavor of respect for the other person, but pity. That also is not terribly stable.
But the third type of compassion is compassion which is based on reason, and the reason is that everybody is equal: everybody wants to be happy, nobody wants to be unhappy. It’s an unbiased type of compassion. His Holiness points out that — because some people might say, “Well, where’s the feeling, where’s the emotion that is in that?” — but His Holiness points out that this unbiased type of love and compassion is supported by biology; it’s instinctive. And he uses the example of a newborn infant. A newborn infant comes out of the womb and doesn’t know the mother, so the mother is a complete stranger, but yet will very automatically, instinctively bond with the mother. And the mother will instinctively bond with the baby and show love and affection, and the baby will cling to the mother and be very warm and feel very comfortable and so on with the mother. This is supported with biology, by various… I don’t know if it’s hormones or what it is in the brain, but that’s been demonstrated, that there is a certain bonding aspect in the brain in terms of chemical or whatever aspect. It’s unbiased. The mother doesn’t know who this child is — especially if you think in terms of previous lives — it could be anybody, but the mother automatically will feel this love and affection toward that infant, and the infant will feel it toward the mother. His Holiness says we do have a biological basis, then, for this more reasoned type of love and affection which is unbiased, which is directed to everyone and anyone.
Participant: Daniel Goleman also talks about how we have evolved mechanisms to make social bonds because it’s also important for survival, to have this kind of bond.
Dr. Berzin: Right. That also is pointed out by Daniel Goleman and others, that… I mean, it’s basic sociology, for our survival, that we have to make social bonds; otherwise it’s not possible to survive. So it works both on the individual family level, that the mother and infant have to make this bond in order for the baby to survive, and similarly on a larger scale: the society has to make bonds with each other in order for the society to survive.
You can’t say that that unbiased love between a mother and a child is without emotion. And of course, that emotion which is involved there could become mixed with attachment and clinging and all of that. That’s not saying that it wouldn’t. But the basis is there. In most situations… I mean, obviously there are exceptions, where the mother and child don’t bond very well. You see that sometimes in the animal world, and we have that with this polar bear here in the zoo in Berlin. But in most cases, it happens. And in most cases also the connection between the mother and child (and often usually the father and child as well) is not really dependent on how the child behaves. Regardless of how the child behaves, the parents still feel “This is my child” and feel connected. There is emotion there as well, a healthier emotion.
OK. We need to build up these motivations based on reasoning and understanding.
Integrating Our Motivation with Our Mental Continuum
Then Tsongkhapa goes on — where we start today — he says:
Therefore, meditating on a bodhichitta aim at the beginning of a session and, at the session’s end, directing (the positive force from it toward our enlightenment) with great waves of prayer are a great skillful means for causing what is really constructive cultivated during the actual fundamental part of the session to hit the mark (of our intended aim) and become inexhaustible. Since (this is the case), then, without being satisfied with just anything that sometimes comes up (in our meditation), we must be certain each time (we meditate) to integrate (our motivation) with our mental continuum.
Tsongkhapa here is saying that not just do we set this bodhichitta aim as our motivating mental framework at the beginning of a session, not only do we try to maintain it throughout the session, but at the end the dedication is very important: we need to direct that positive force toward enlightenment.
When we look at the word which is translated as collection — as in the “collection of merit,” is the usual way it’s translated — I don’t like the word collection. Network is better. It’s not just collecting points. We’re talking about positive force and the positive force from something. Now, it’s true that the word in Sanskrit that is being translated here, sambhara, does also mean “to gather together” (sam is a prefix meaning “together” and bhara means “to gather”). But that’s not the intended meaning here. This is pointed out by Haribhadra, an Indian master, in his commentary to Abhisamayalamkara (Skt. Abhisamayālaṃkāra) (The Filigree of Realizations) by Maitreya. In that Sanskrit commentary, Haribhadra explains this word sambhara as having a second meaning, which is to... sam also is a prefix which means “perfectly” and bhara can also mean “to build.” He says that it is something which builds something else. This is really the meaning here.
Of course, all the positive force will network with each other — we can understand that as a secondary meaning — but what it’s doing is building up something. Either it is going to build up happiness in samsara, which is normally what happens with positive force or merit if it’s not dedicated, or it can build up liberation if it’s dedicated toward liberation, or it can build up enlightenment if it’s dedicated toward enlightenment. What it builds up when we network all this positive force together cumulatively is very much a function of our state of mind at the conclusion of doing something constructive, both at the beginning, with the intention that “May this act as a cause for reaching enlightenment,” and at the end, again “May it act as a cause for reaching enlightenment.” If we don’t make that dedication, which is sort of a shaping or a pushing of this energy in our minds, then the automatic thing that will happen is that it’s just going to improve our samsaric situation like an ordinary karmic positive force. This is an important point.
And we want it to become, as Tsongkhapa says, inexhaustible. Inexhaustible is referring to the fact that if we aim the positive force for something which is short term, a short-term goal — like, for instance, doing well on my exam next week or something like that — then if that positive force is strong enough so that it will ripen in this lifetime, then once it brings about that goal, it’s finished. Whereas if we dedicate it for a long-term goal, which is our enlightenment — and even more, toward the enlightenment of everybody, which is referring to our ability to bring enlightenment to everybody — so that it continues in that direction of ripening, then that positive force is not going to run out for a very, very long time (till everybody becomes enlightened).
The example which is used is to aim it not just for my enlightenment, but if we aim it for everyone’s enlightenment then it is joining with the positive force dedicated by all the bodhisattvas of the past, so that really is a very strong thing. Even if we are... Let’s say there’s this huge project to build, for instance, this enormous Maitreya statue in India, or a monastery or a stupa (Skt. stūpa) or whatever, printing the Kangyur or Tengyur or all the Buddhist teachings, whatever. Even if we only contribute something very, very small to that, if it’s properly dedicated it mixes together with all the other things that have been donated, all the rest of the money, and so it works together with this larger force. The example that’s used of course is a large bag of rice that’s taken on a journey, and even if you just throw a handful into it, still it’s something which is shared throughout the journey.
The dedication needs to be always something which is very, very vast, then of course the ripening will occur all the way to that goal. It’s not that it’s only going to be saved in the bank and you don’t get any interest on it all the way till it matures, but rather benefit will come all along the path. We need to then integrate our motivation with our mental continuum at the beginning, during the course of our practice, and at the end of any session.
OK. Any questions about that? All right. Now we’ll go on to the next major section of the text.
The Ethical Self-Discipline of Keeping Vows
Tsongkhapa starts — he says:
Suppose on top of having held, as something to cherish, enhancing in that way our motivating mental framework like that – in other words, (suppose on top of) having held as our foundation never letting it weaken, we (wish to) practice the two stages of secret mantra pathway minds.
Which we want to develop as a path… It’s not just the word path. That sounds like something that you walk on. But it’s talking about a mind, a level of mind. The generation stage (bskyed-rim) and the complete stage (rdzogs-rim). Generation, in which we generate — he’s talking in the highest class of tantra — in which we generate all the causes by working with our imagination, so that on the second stage everything is complete causally for us to be able to work with the subtle energy-systems so that we can actually produce the immediate causes for achieving the Bodies of a Buddha. These two stages of pathway minds. It has to be on the foundation of this motivating mental framework, particularly bodhichitta
Suppose we want to do that. What do we do? Tsongkhapa says:
Well in general, whenever we enter the doorway of any (Buddhist) vehicle of mind,
They always use this image of a vehicle. You know, the Great Vehicle (I call it the Vast Vehicle), or the Modest Vehicle, or the Tantra… Secret Mantra Vehicle is actually the term that’s usually used. It’s not just a vehicle — it’s not like a car — in a sense, it’s a vehicle of mind. Again, it’s talking about a state of mind which will act as a vehicle to bring us to a goal. We have to enter the doorway of it or the gateway of it. That’s the image that’s always used.
To do that, he says:
we need to set as its basis the ethical discipline of its own (set of vows). And especially when we enter secret mantra, then, as previously explained, since bodhichitta is the ultimate essential point for all the Mahayana pathway minds, it is very important for that to be firm (with the bodhisattva vows).
OK. Now that brings us into the whole topic of vows, which is a large topic, and of course we could just speed through it and not treat it in any depth, but I thought perhaps it might be helpful to speak a little bit about the lay vows and the bodhisattva vows and go through them. I mean, it’s up to you whether we go through the whole list of the 46 secondary bodhisattva vows as well, but at least go through the major root vows and also the five lay vows.
Tsongkhapa says: for each of these vehicles of mind… We’re talking about the Modest Vehicle, what’s called Hinayana (Skt. Hīnayāna), which is aiming for liberation. So, we have the vows for individual liberation (pratimoksha (Skt. prātimokṣa) vows in Sanskrit), which are the lay and monastic vows. That is specific for the Modest Vehicle of mind. If we want to achieve liberation, we need to keep one of these sets of vows. Then for general Mahayana (Skt. Mahāyāna) — as he says, for all Mahayana (which includes tantra as well) — then there are the bodhisattva vows. And then, in the next sentences after that, we’ll speak about the tantric vows for the Secret Mantra Vehicle.
OK. Now we begin our discussion. First of all, what is a vow? A vow is a phenomenon that is described in basically two different ways depending on our system of tenets that we follow. Within Hinayana — the Sautrantika (Skt. Sautrāntika) and also Theravada (Skt. Theravāda), — and within Mahayana, — the Chittamatra (Skt. Cittamātra) and the Svatantrika (Skt. Svātantrika) — according to these systems, a vow is a mental factor. A mental factor is a mind, a way of being aware of something, and so it’s a way of being aware of something with a restraint which is promised. It is that state of mind that is there that holds us back from acting in a destructive way or in a way which is against what the vow is.
And if we look within the Modest Vehicle of mind (Hinayana), then the Vaibhashika (Skt. Vaibhāṣika) school, and within the Mahayana or Vast Vehicle of mind, the Prasangika (Skt. Prāsaṅgika) school according to Gelugpa — not according to the other Tibetan traditions, but according to Tsongkhapa — then we say in these traditions that a vow is a form of physical phenomenon. It is a subtle type of physical phenomenon, what’s called a nonrevealing form (rnam-par rig-byed ma-yin-pa’i gzugs), which is something that is connected with a mental continuum and that is not visible or anything like that, but it is a subtle shaping of the mental continuum. It’s a subtle shaping of your behavior and so on. It is a little bit like a vibration if we put it into New Age type of terminology.
Participant: So, the mental continuum is physical? The shape of it is physical?
Dr. Berzin: No, the mental continuum… Well, here we’re not using shape in a physical way. I’m using it in a very loose English way here, which is “you can shape the way that you’re thinking.” It’s not a physical shape, but it’s giving it a structure in a sense.
Participant: You said the vow was a form of physical phenomenon.
Dr. Berzin: A vow is a form of physical phenomenon. It is connected with a mental continuum. In the sutra teachings, they don’t speak in terms of the subtlest energy, but they do speak of the subtlest level of energy in the highest class of tantra, and there you would explain it as a shaping of that subtlest energy. In that way, it continues from lifetime to lifetime in the case of bodhisattva and tantric vows, which are taken all the way up to enlightenment. In the case of the pratimoksha vows, the vows for individual liberation, it’s taken only for one lifetime, so you don’t get the problem in the Theravada teachings so much. Actually, what’s explained is that it goes on — in terms of Mahayana, the bodhisattva vows — they go on from lifetime to lifetime, that if it’s a form of subtle energy or something like that, then it becomes just a potential or something like that in between lifetimes in the case of the bodhisattva vows. In any case, we have a vow.
First let’s speak in terms of the vows for individual liberation. And for these there are the one-day vows, there are the lay vows for men and women, and the monastic vows (there are the novice vows for men and women, and there is a provisional nuns’ vow, and the full nun and monks’ vows). There are these eight different classes with various things that one promises to refrain from.
The Five Lay Vows
Now, for the lay vows, why are we taking them? Why would anybody want to take them? This is an important point to understand. They are taken solely because you want to achieve liberation. That’s why they’re called vows for individual liberation. It is with the aim to overcome not only certain types of destructive behavior but also to overcome the disturbing emotions that would motivate the destructive behavior. If we look at these different types of behavior that we promise to refrain from, then we see that all of them would contribute to samsaric existence (they’re destructive), so we want to avoid them. Let’s look at them.
If we take lay vows… the lay vows are five. These are what we vow to avoid:
- Taking the life of others (killing).
- Taking what has not been given to us (which is stealing).
- Indicating what is untrue (so that’s lying).
- Indulging in — now, this is a very difficult word to translate (we’ll discuss it more fully when we get to this point) — contrary sexual behavior (contrary to trying to rid ourselves of disturbing emotions, basically; so, it’s contrary to that).
- Taking intoxicants (the vow is usually mentioned in terms of alcohol, but it would refer to all intoxicants).
Now, there are two ways of taking all five, if you take all five. Let me say it another way: It’s not necessary to take all five. You can take one or two or three or four or five. Nobody’s saying that you have to take all five. In taking the vow to avoid contrary sexual behavior, then, there are two ways of taking that, either just to avoid contrary sexual behavior, which is a whole list of different types of sexual behavior that we say we’re going to avoid, or you can take total celibacy, a vow of total celibacy, as part of that. There are two ways of taking that. Total celibacy in a Buddhist sense means really celibacy — no sex whatsoever, no masturbation, nothing.
We have the lay vows. Now, with each of these, let’s speak of each of them in detail. Also, by the way, you can take the vows, and you can, after a while, if you find that you can’t keep them, you can also give them up, or you can give up one or two. You can take them again. There is this flexibility with it, although of course that’s not recommended, but that is possible. Everyone has to be realistic in terms of whether or not you can actually keep it. If you’re not ready to keep one or more of these, there’s no reason to take them or to feel that you have to take it. You can take just the ones that you are capable of keeping.
For each of these, for the action to be complete… not for the action, for the destructiveness of the action — for the negative force that would come from it — to be its fullest, then there need to be four aspects of it which are complete. If any of these are missing, the negative force from it is less. It doesn’t mean that there’s no negative force. There is negative force from these, but it will be stronger or weaker depending upon how many of these factors are complete.
All of these have to have a basis (basis is referring to what the action is directed at). And then it has to have the urging framework that brings us into the action, so this has three parts: an unmistaken distinguishing of the object or the basis, and a motivating intention, and some disturbing emotion which is there. There are these three parts for number two. Then the third one is an implementation of an action — actually do something. The fourth is that the action has to reach its completion. OK?
Taking the Life of Others
Now, in terms of the basis: the basis for taking the life of others is some specific living being other than ourselves, either human or nonhuman, whether already born or still in the womb, and who could die as a result of our action. That is quite clear. That covers insects, that covers all these other… fishing, hunting, this type of thing, not just humans, and would also cover abortion (that is taking the life of someone else). Now of course there’s a big discussion of when does life actually begin. That is not an easy question to answer. We won’t go into that. But once it is established that the fetus is a living being, then to take its life is killing; it’s taking the life of another being.
What is not included here, in terms of the action being the fullest negative action, is suicide. Now, that doesn’t mean that suicide is not a destructive action. It is a destructive action. It does build up negative force. But it’s not a complete act of taking the life of others. The reason for that is that when you die from the killing of yourself, then already you are out of this rebirth and you’re into another rebirth, and so the negative karmic force that comes on to your mental continuum is basically in another lifetime. For that reason, it is weaker than the negative mental force that comes to your mental continuum of killing someone who dies before you do, while you’re still alive. That is explained in the teachings.
It has to be someone that would actually die from what we do. It becomes quite interesting about killing someone in a dream. If you kill somebody in a dream, is it the negative karma of killing? Yes, it is the negative karma of killing. The person in the dream can’t die from what we do, but if these other factors are there — you fully intended to kill the person, etc. — then it is an act of killing. We have to be clear here that there’s no real way of getting around it, that that is a negative action, although it is not a strong negative action, because the person in the dream doesn’t actually die (although you might dream that they die) and you’re not actually killing a live person. But you could have the intention. You could have the strong hatred. You know, “I want to kill this one.” You could commit a violent act toward the person in the dream, and so on. That builds up a negative force.
Then there is the unmistaken distinguishing. We have to distinguish this person from that person. “I intended to shoot this one, but I shot the other one by mistake. I missed.” Well, that’s not as strong as if I intend to: “I recognize this one is the one that I want to kill,” and then what comes next, the intention to kill this person. Killing by mistake the wrong person, that’s still killing, but it’s not as heavy, not as full, as killing when it’s unmistaken.
The same thing comes with the next one, which is intention. If you kill intentionally, that is heavier than killing unintentionally. But killing unintentionally is still killing. For instance, when we drive our cars and all sort of insects smack against the windshield, that’s still a negative act of killing, even though that’s not our intention. There’s certainly usually a bit of naivety which is associated with that — so that’s a disturbing emotion — that it doesn’t really matter, or we don’t really pay attention to the fact that we’re going to be killing a lot of insects as we drive in the summer. We have the intention, which is the decisiveness that “This is what I intend to do.”
One of the three poisonous disturbing emotions has to be there with the contemporaneous motivation. (There’s the causal motivation and the contemporaneous motivation, in terms of the emotional component here. The causal one could be, for instance, “I’m going to kill this mosquito that is buzzing around my child’s head, because it could give the child malaria.” There’s compassion for the child. But the contemporaneous motivation is the state of mind when you actually kill it, when you actually swat it. And when you actually swat it, then there is certainly hostility there. There’s the full intention that “I don’t just want to injure this mosquito or scare it away. I really want to smash it.”) In the actual act of killing, what is the mental framework that brings you into the action at the moment? That would be usually, in most cases, hostility or anger. It could be attachment in the sense of “I want to kill this animal in order to eat it, to drink its blood,” etc. Or it could be naivety in thinking that offering a blood sacrifice by sacrificing this goat is going to bring the favor of the gods or something like that. We have different types of disturbing emotions which could be there which brings us into the action.
Then the implementation of the action. We have to kill another being by any means. The text lists poison, a weapon, our own hands, black magic spells, and so forth. There has to be some sort of action that does that, that kills them. And we don’t have to actually execute the act ourselves. In other words, if we hire somebody else to do the killing for us, we build up the same negative force as the person who actually does the killing. This is very much explained in the context of war, that the general builds up as much negative karma as all the soldiers.
Then finally there’s the completion of the act. And the person has to actually die as a result of our act, and die before we do, for it to be a killing. If they don’t die, then it is… We had the intention to kill them, and so on, so it in a sense… Now, this becomes a very difficult point to debate. Have you built up the karma of killing even though the person didn’t die? Or did you just build up the karma of shooting them in the arm or injuring them? How is the act really determined? Is it determined by the outcome? Is it determined by the intention? Is it determined by the act? How is it determined? That tends to become a bit of a legalistic lawyer’s argument here or a discussion.
But in any case, here the person has to die before we do. And this could happen either directly at the time when we actually do our action, or it could be some time later. If they die after we die — you shoot somebody, and before they actually die, we get shot by the police or something like that, so we die before they die — then it’s the same case as a suicide. It’s less strong, the negative potential, the negative force, because we’ve taken another lifetime by the time that this person actually dies.
OK. That’s killing. There are many, many different types of examples that are given for this in the various texts.
It’s very interesting that in ancient India, when they had contact with the… at the time of Kushan (Skt. Kuṣāṇa) dynasty, they had contact with Ancient Persian society and Central Asian society. They were all ruled by one dynasty. Then there were certain customs that the Indians became familiar with which were not their own customs, and they found them really quite nasty, and so they mentioned them quite specifically in terms of naivety, examples of naivety. There are these examples from, I believe, from ancient Zoroastrianism, but I’m not quite sure — that there were certain animals which were considered evil by nature (scorpions, certain types of ants, and so on) and therefore it was considered good to kill them. This was an example of killing by naivety. It could be like the campaigns in the People’s Republic of China, that they had to kill all the rats or kill all the birds, or this type of thing. Or what we have in the West in terms of extermination of cockroaches (because somehow cockroaches are an unacceptable life form) or spraying the fields or something like that. We have that.
There was also this custom that they had at that time which was that old people were to be killed. If they were old and couldn’t take care of themselves and were very sick, and so on, then it was OK to practice some form of euthanasia, and that was also even for your own parents. That was seen as something quite terrible from an Indian point of view. That was mentioned in the texts as well.
Participant: Euthanasia without asking?
Dr. Berzin: Euthanasia without asking. Correct. Without asking. You know, this type of thing.
When the Indian Buddhist culture came in contact with other cultures, then, they expanded these things in the lists of different types of examples. That becomes an important point when we talk about contrary sexual behavior, because when you look at the evolution of the literature over time, more and more things were added to what you would vow to give up that were not there in the early texts. Then there’s always the big discussion: Why were they added? Are they necessary? Are they not necessary? And so on. That becomes an interesting point to analyze, which we’ll do in a moment.
Are there any questions about taking the life of someone else? Now, if you can’t do this, don’t take the vow. Nobody is forcing anyone to take the vow.
Participant: Can’t you help it, killing, by just walking on the street?
Dr. Berzin: Well, that’s just it. You can’t help but kill when you walk on the street or if you drive a car. There’s no way you can drive a car without killing, running over something, in terms of insects at least. That’s true. One is going to try as much as possible to refrain from doing this — particularly when the urge comes up to do it, not to act it out. Remember, it’s a refrain, it’s a restraint. Usually, it’s talking about when the urge would come to get into the action of stepping on that cockroach or swatting that mosquito, that you stop. It’s what holds you back from doing that, on the basis… I mean, these are the teachings of ethical discipline. It’s on the basis of understanding that this is something that’s destructive (it will lead to suffering), not just to the mosquito but to myself. Wanting to avoid that suffering. And in addition, of course, wanting to not cause suffering to the mosquito. Then you restrain yourself; you find some other method of dealing with it that’s a nonviolent method.
But, you see, this is the nasty thing, which is that just having this type of physical basis… This is the third type of suffering when we talk about true suffering. We have the suffering of gross suffering (so that’s pain, etc.), we have the suffering of change (which is our ordinary happiness, which never satisfies, doesn’t last, etc.), and then we have the all-pervasive suffering. The all-pervasive affecting suffering is having this type of body and mind (and perpetuating it) that acts as the basis for the others. So long as we have this type of samsaric body, there’s no way that we cannot build up negative karma, because every time we walk, we undoubtedly step on something, and when we drink or eat, there are undoubtedly little insects and things that we destroy.
Now, it gets very interesting. In the Jain philosophy — that started about 50 years before Buddha (Buddha basically rejected some of their policies) — and in the Jain system, at the end, in order to attain liberation, basically you don’t move, and you starve yourself to death. Because moving or eating, or anything like that, is going to build up more negative karma. Buddha rejected that as part of this whole theme of rejecting fanatic asceticism. He rejected that. That’s not the way. The way is to eliminate the ignorance, the unawareness and so on, which would activate the karmic potentials which would cause further rebirth — to gain liberation that way.
When we take the vow — sure, if we kill unintentionally and stuff like that, then it weakens it. It doesn’t mean that we’ve lost the vow completely. There are various factors. (We’ll discuss that when we discuss the bodhisattva vows. They’re not brought in in terms of the pratimoksha vows, but they’re relevant for that as well.) You know, one feels regret, and try not to repeat it, and so on, not be happy about it, etc. There are all these factors. But if we know that we can’t, on a grosser level, deal with this, then you don’t need to take the vow.
This is a point that I want to bring up, particularly with the contrary sexual behavior, which is that… let’s say you say, “Well, I’m not going to kill people, but I can’t stop killing insects,” for example. Well, you can’t sort of pick and choose within the vow what you want. This I asked very specifically in India this last time when I was there with my teachers. You can’t pick and choose. It’s either the whole thing or no vow. Now, if you keep the ethical discipline of avoiding part of what’s included in the vow, with a very conscious “I’m going to avoid this,” that’s very positive. That’s much more positive than just “Whatever I feel like at the moment.” But it’s in a different category.
According to abhidharma, there are what are called vows, then there are — a very difficult term to translate — like an anti-vow. It’s a vow to do something negative, like joining the slaughterers’ union and “I vow that I’m going to kill animals,” or be in the army — you take an oath in the army to kill the enemy — this type of thing. That’s an anti-vow. Then there’s something which is in between. Promising to avoid part of what’s in one of these vows would be in that category of in between. That’s good, but it’s not the vow. Don’t call something that’s not the vow the vow. It’s still positive. It’s a matter of just keeping things clear, what one is doing.
Participant: I think eating meat is also different…
Dr. Berzin: Right. Eating meat. Whenever this is brought up, that point is always brought up. Eating meat is not taking... If you order somebody to kill an animal, that’s the same as killing the animal yourself. Now, in eating the meat, are you asking someone else to do the killing? Well, indirectly. Indirectly, not directly. How far do you take this is really the question. In stealing a computer, am I responsible for somebody building the computer? Did I cause people... I mean, this is a silly example; perhaps it’s not the correct example. But indirectly causing something. Just because I’m the consumer, have I caused the production? That’s a very difficult question.
Participant: Consumers create a market and the demand, so somebody has to kill.
Dr. Berzin: Consumers create a market. Right. But not originally, necessarily. But let’s stay with the example of killing. Let’s not get beyond that. Animals are going to be eaten. Animals in the wild are going to be hunted by other animals and eaten. That’s the nature of the animal world, or fish world, or things like that. Fish are eaten by other fish. Insects are eaten by other insects or by birds or whatever.
Participant: But people could also be killed by a car, say.
Dr. Berzin: People could be killed by cars and animals could be killed by cars.
Participant: But then you can’t say it’s OK.
Participant: They die anyway.
Dr. Berzin: They die anyway. But we’re talking about the action of eating as opposed to the action of killing. You could argue that eating meat is a destructive action. You could argue that. Or you could argue that it’s a neutral action. But, in any case, it might be difficult to argue that eating meat is an act of killing. Again, it becomes a legal question of what type of destructive act is it? Is it an act of killing — you accumulate the karma of killing? Do you accumulate... What do you accumulate?
Participant: Ignorance.
Dr. Berzin: Well, ignorance is behind that. But ignorance is behind everything that we do. There’s naivety, naivety in thinking that, for instance — but we have this all the time with everything — that this thing is self-established: it just arose like that in the butcher shop, independent of having been part of an animal. That’s naivety.
Participant: But in a butcher’s shop, you really cannot say, “This animal I eat, it has fallen down and the butcher just took it and sold it.” This you can’t really say. You cannot be that ignorant, to say that it would have died anyway, this cow. But you know this cow maybe wouldn’t have died now when you’re eating it. It was especially killed for your eating, and that you know.
Dr. Berzin: We have the situation, as she says, that if one is a thinking person — and most people, I must say, are not — they would know that this animal was killed especially for the meat to be there in the butcher shop. I think most people don’t even think of that, but that’s not our point here. The point is there is naivety there, whether it’s conscious or not. Now, if you live on a farm, of course, and you know the animal — there was your pet chicken that was killed — that’s of course something else. I’m just saying that in the standard list of descriptions, eating meat is not included as a negative act of killing.
Participant: That makes sense actually. But it’s also that we’re concentrating on karma and the consequences of that for you, but there are many other ways to create suffering in the world, not just through karma.
Dr. Berzin: I don’t understand your point.
Participant: There are many other ways to influence the world around you which don’t go through karma. For example, something like the market economy of creating a market for meat. That in itself creates suffering for a lot of animals, and it’s not going through karma directly.
Dr. Berzin: Right. Well, Jorge is saying that there are many ways that we can create suffering that don’t go directly through karma. I’m not quite sure that I would agree. But he’s saying like creating a market for meat, or a market for whatever, which is going to involve killing animals. I mean, you can also speak about creating a market that is going to exploit people in slave labor as well. There are many different types of things.
I think the point that has to be investigated is ordering somebody else to do the destructive action for you and you build up the same negative karma as the one who does the destructive action. That’s the point that has to be investigated: what does it actually mean to order somebody to do it. Does it have to be explicit, or can it be implicit? That’s really the legal point, the point of controversy, if we want to look at it from a legalistic point of view. I must say that I’ve never… I don’t know. I’ve never asked that, and I’m not quite sure how you would ask that. How far removed would you have to be?
Participant: Tibetans are very attached to meat, so it’s difficult.
Dr. Berzin: Tibetans are attached to meat, so that’s difficult. Not all Tibetan are. There are occasional rare ones, and there are some Buddhist scriptures that people have found in which Buddha also recommends being a vegetarian. That’s there. In certain traditions… The way the Chinese follow Mahayana, they’re vegetarian.
As I say, one can speak of it in terms of a... by eating an animal, does that build up the karma to be eaten yourself? Or does it build up the karma to be killed? I don’t know. These are the points. I think that one can… If you accept that eating meat is destructive… I mean, the argument is always “How much?” You could say that eating vegetables is destructive as well because insects get killed. “OK, I’m going to be organic and bio and eat vegetables that you don’t have sprays for insects,” but then the field was ploughed, so something died. This is another argument that’s given. Then it’s a matter of degree. One can try to minimize, of course. But as I say, I think it becomes a legalistic problem here of what do we classify it as.
If I’m in the barnyard and I don’t say directly to you to slaughter that chicken for me to eat, but I say, “Boy, am I hungry!” and just sort of look toward the chicken, and so on, sort of hint, this sort of thing — I mean, that’s indirect. How indirect can it be for it still to be considered asking somebody else to kill for you? I don’t know. Where do you set the limit?
Participant: I think with children one can see it very nicely, that they don’t actually realize where it comes from, the meat. Then, after a while, when someone says, “Oh, that was a fish,” and they maybe have pet fishes at home, it’s like “Oh, that was a fish like this one!” Or if they played with rabbits when they were small, and…
Dr. Berzin: Right. He’s saying that if children point out that it’s a fish that they’re eating and then they see a fish in a bowl, that they make that association and they might be averse to eating fish. I don’t think that’s necessarily the case. They could also be indoctrinated that animals and fish and so on have been created by God to be used and eaten by man. They could have a completely different attitude toward it.
Participant: I just want to say that that’s… On this level, I could see the naivety of not seeing what it is that they’re eating.
Dr. Berzin: Yeah, children don’t see initially what it is, but I think most adults don’t really think where the meat comes from. Most adults don’t. Who thinks of the cow when they’re at McDonald’s? If you think of your average person at McDonald’s, I’m sure they don’t think of the cow at all.
Anyway, let’s not get caught up in this. This is an endless discussion that comes up every time that the topic of killing is brought up. In other words, I don’t know how to settle the question, and I’ve never come across anybody who did settle the question: Is eating meat an indirect act of asking someone else to kill?
Participant: In the Pali canon, it’s written that no, it’s not an act of killing.
Dr. Berzin: Right. In the Pali canon, as she says, it’s not included as an act of killing.
Participant: Does it say that it’s not? Or is it just not mentioned? [continues in German]
Dr. Berzin: Right. To just summarize what you’ve said in German: That in the Pali canon when speaking to the monks, the monks are clearly… they said that eating meat is not an act of killing. That if a monk orders the person who invites them to kill an animal for them to eat, then they’re not allowed to eat — that that’s improper. But if the animal has already been killed and they’re offered a portion of it, then another criterion comes in, which is that monks and nuns are supposed to accept whatever they are given in their begging bowl and not say “I don’t like that” or “I don’t want that” or whatever, with the example used that even if a leper’s thumb falls in your bowl, you should accept that. That’s what it says in the text. I don’t know if you’re supposed to eat it. But, in any case, you accept whatever you’re given, because the aim there is to overcome this sort of ego thing that “I only want what I like.” But you said that the exception was with a fish, because a fish would have to be… they didn’t have refrigerators at that time, so the fish would have to be killed specifically, because one person eats one fish. They’re not talking about eating a whale, like with the Eskimos; they’re talking about something quite small here.
Participant: But there’s a big difference to us now, because we can choose what we eat. The monks — I can understand the rule for monks and nuns, that they accept what they get. But I go to supermarket, so I choose by myself.
Dr. Berzin: Right. Well, in our case we can choose what we eat. That’s true. It’s a slightly different point. Nevertheless, there’s not going to be a resolution to this question. We can discuss it forever and there still won’t be a resolution to this question.
Participant: Finished.
Dr. Berzin: Finished. I think, as a conclusion…
Participant: Until next time.
Dr. Berzin: If it is a destructive action… Well, any action that is done on the basis of attachment, as in attachment to meat, is destructive. But then again, so is attachment to vegetables. Destructive. We have to see what... Don’t think — I mean, this is the point — that just because you don’t eat meat, that “I’m so holy.”
Participant: Also don’t think that it doesn’t make a difference. Environmentally, it makes a difference.
Dr. Berzin: Also, don’t think that it doesn’t make a difference environmentally, because you have to grow all the food to feed the animals and so on, so what do you do with all the animals that are there in order to cut the... Anyway, let’s not go there. Let’s not get into this discussion. It’s endless.
Taking What’s Not Been Given to Us
Taking what’s not been given to us. The basis has to be some object of value that belongs to someone else. It has to belong to someone else. Picking an apple that grows in the forest doesn’t belong to somebody else. So, it has to belong to somebody else. This could be anything that we have no right to take or to use or to keep as our own. We use it, like using somebody else’s telephone for a long-distance call without asking them. It’s taking what was not given.
We have no right to take or use or keep as our own, and it includes objects that we’ve loaned and not given back. You could include here not paying the admission fee to go into some event, taxes, fines, tolls, travel fare, this sort of thing, pirating stuff off of the internet, etc. All of that is taking what has not been given to us. Again, we shouldn’t minimize what that is. And even if we find something on the ground that somebody obviously has lost, still you don’t just take it for your own without making some sort of effort to find the rightful owner. If we’ve lost our wallet and somebody found it and gave it back, we would be very happy, so the same with the other person who lost their wallet.
The unmistaken distinguishing has to be there, for it to be complete, of what we intend to steal. We have to distinguish that it belongs to somebody else. If I take it by mistake, it’s not as heavy. “I thought this was my umbrella, but it was your umbrella.” This type of thing.
The intention is to take the object whether or not we plan to get rid of it immediately. Just to take it and… you know, take from the rich and give to the poor, and to give it away. “I’m stealing this to give to you.” Still it’s stealing. This type of thing.
A disturbing emotion needs to be there. Usually, it is attachment. We go out to rob because we want the money or we want the object or we want to watch that movie without paying for it, this type of thing. It could be anger or hostility: “I’m going to take everything from the enemy so that they have nothing.” This type of thing. Or it could also be naivety, thinking that there’s nothing wrong with it, that “I have a right to take anything that I want.”
Then the action: we must actually take an object, take the action, such as shoplifting, holding someone up, stealing from a house, or also riding through a toll without paying, downloading the pirated stuff from the internet. And it also is equally negative if we ask somebody else to do it for us.
Our act of theft reaches its completion when we develop the attitude that what we have taken is now ours. That’s how it is finished. “Now it’s mine. It’s no longer yours.” Even if we didn’t know that it belonged to somebody else, still it’s an act of taking what was not given.
Indicating What Is Untrue
The third one is indicating what’s untrue. That’s lying. That can involve either denying something we have actually seen, heard, and experienced with our senses (or known), or claiming to have seen, heard, experienced, or known something when we have not. Denying that... “Did you see so-and-so?” Denying it if we have, or saying we have when we haven’t. It works both ways. It includes knowingly misleading others through false information, purposely giving bad advice or incorrect teachings, making up qualities (faults) in others that we know they don’t have. These sorts of things. Even telling a small white lie which we think is just for fun. This type of thing.
The basis has to be some person who’s capable of understanding us when we lie. To lie to the baby and the baby doesn’t understand what we’re saying. It would have to be able to understand what we say. You’re lying to somebody.
Unmistaken distinguishing has to be there, which is that what we’re about to indicate does not accord with the truth. In other words, for a lie to be a lie, we have to clearly recognize what was the fact and then purposely change it. Then it’s a lie. If we’re unsure and we say something incorrect, it’s not complete for being a lie. If we say something that was wrong, that’s not a lie if we thought it was right (it’s just stupid). Then it becomes an interesting question. Is it still a lie? I don’t know.
Our motivation must be the full intention to lie, and one of the three poisonous attitudes has to be present. We could lie to someone because we want to get something from them, or we could lie to them because we want to mislead them (so we’re hostile toward them), or we could lie out of naivety (just thinking that it’s cool to lie, etc.).
I suppose exaggeration is probably there as well. Exaggerate is “This is the most fabulous, fantastic, wonderful thing in the world,” when it’s not. I don’t know. We’d have to investigate that. Or is that idle chatter?
The action involved must be expressing our lie, either out loud, in writing, or it could even be nonverbally by a gesture or a nod of the head. We don’t have to actually say the words in order to lie. Causing somebody else to lie for us is also the same as if we lied ourselves.
Well, we can get into this, but perhaps we’ll leave this a little bit for next time — is that there are certain situations in which the necessity overrules the prohibition, in which… For instance, saving a life. During the Second World War: “Do you have somebody that you’re hiding here?” When you’re hiding someone, you don’t say yes. Or “Where did the deer go?” when the hunter is looking for it, you point over there. If possible, you don’t say a direct lie; you sort of make it indirect.
But what’s always important is when it is necessary to commit one of these destructive actions, when the situation really calls for it, what is most important is to not mix it with a disturbing emotion. It has to be really pure, that you’re really doing this for love, compassion, etc., and you’re not doing it because of self-preservation — you know, “Me, me, me” — or fear, or something like that. But you’re really doing it for, sincerely, an undisturbed positive reason. That’s very difficult, of course, especially when it comes to doing something in self-defense. Somebody’s about to shoot you. Do you shoot back? Well, that’s a difficult situation, isn’t it? Very difficult situation. If it’s only for my self-preservation, then that’s still very negative. If it’s for compassion for the other person, that they don’t build up this negative karma, etc. — well, that’s pretty hard to be sincere about that, isn’t it, in the moment? In the moment.
What do you do? Depends what level bodhisattva we are. Even if we have to commit a destructive action, and even if it is because of self-preservation and so on, then we could try to weaken the force of that with regret afterwards, and we’re not happy about it, and “I really don’t want to repeat such a thing,” and so on. There are ways to lessen the negative force that we build up even if we act in a destructive way because of a circumstance or a situation.
OK. Those are the first three, and then next time we can speak about the next two, which are the more controversial ones for most people, this contrary sexual behavior (acting in a way which is contrary to the whole theme of trying to rid ourselves of disturbing emotions), and then taking intoxicants.
But what I’m thinking… I know a lot of people listen to this as a podcast, but for the people here in the class: there’s going to be a U-Bahn strike, a strike of the subway and bus system, here in Berlin for the next ten days, which means that next week it might be extremely difficult for anybody, including myself, to get here, unless we all take taxis, which I think is a bit much to ask. And so, I think that if the strike isn’t settled by next week in time for our class, that we don’t have the class. I think that’s a better solution, because only two of you come by car, or three of you come by car. OK. Is that agreeable? OK? I think let’s do that then, that if the strike is still on, we won’t have class. If the strike is over, we will. OK. Anybody who’s not here that you might know who might think to come, please tell them.
Let’s end with the dedication. We think whatever positive force is built up from this, may it act as a cause for reaching enlightenment for the benefit of all.