Thank you for joining us for this week’s Buddhist Hour radio broadcast.  As you may remember we have been presenting Master John D. Hughes’ oral commentary on the famous Buddhist text called “A Lamp for the Path to Enlightenment,” which was written by the great Buddhist master Atisha.

Today’s program is the seventh instalment.

In the last instalment, Master John Hughes explained that at the bedrock of our minds, we have various suppositions.  These suppositions, whether we are aware or not, drastically affect how we act, speak and think.  He then continued on to explain the incredible precision of Atisha’s disciple’s request.

John explained, “So the request by the disciple of Atisha was extremely precise, clear and specific.  It wasn't a general question.  It had a, it was a specific, well defined, well stated, mission statement if you want to use the word.  Because it is important to understand what the request was I'll get you to wait your turn to read.  Read the request.  And when your mind can come to get the same request you are then ready to hear the Atisha's explanation.  But until you can, maybe in the process, you have to drop some of your logic systems because they're the logic systems which the other people in Tibet had that caused the dispute.”

In this area of Tibet there are persons who misinterpret the Mahayana path of the Buddha's teaching.  Gurus and spiritual friends are arguing back and forth about things they themselves do not comprehend.  They all have their own logic to anlayse their suppositions about the profound view and broad practice.  With so much disagreement on all sides, I beg you to clear up these doubts for us.

We continue now with the reading of part seven of John D. Hughes teaching on Atisha’s “A Lamp on the Path to Enlightenment.”

JDH:  Alright, so the practice is to get the correct view of the arrays of the Bodhisattvas and the Buddhas and to pay respect to them.  Having done the correct vision, if you like, of the nimitta, of the Buddhas and the Bodhisattvas you can pay respect to those, with the conditions, that you don't end up with the Mara ones.

Facing an image of the Perfect Buddha,
Or in front of the holy reliquaries and the like,
Give worship with flowers and incense
And whatever objects may be at hand.

Then with the Sevenfold Worship as expressed
In the deeds of Samantabhadra,
And a mind that does not turn back until
The heart of enlightenment is reached,

With great faith in the Three Jewels,
Bending knee to the ground,
And folding the hands,
First take the Three Refuges thrice.

Then, because the Thought of Love for
All creatures is the prerequisite,
One looks out on all the world,
Suffering in death, transmigration
And rebirth in the three evil destinies:

At sight of that suffering, one suffers;
And he who wants to free the world,
From the very cause of such suffering,
Must beget this Thought of Enlightenment
That is pledged never to turn back.

Every quality that belongs to
Begetting thoughts of such Resolution
Has been well explained by Maitreya
In his sutra, the Stalks in Array.

So the sutra was ‘Stalks in Array’, read that sutra or hear it from a Guru, and when the infinite benefits of the perfect enlightenment thought are seen, then, for that very, reason you will beget the thought of perfect enlightenment again and again.

The benefits of hearing the reasons for you quickly attaining perfect enlightenment, the reasons you'll hear again and again.  When your mind says yes, that's for me or something like that, then you understand and the mind will, having validated it a hundred percent, if you get it a hundred percent, if it's ninety eight percent you mightn't remember again.  Ninety nine percent you won't remember again, it's got to be total impact.

So, what are the reasons for wanting to get the thought of enlightenment?  So the supreme worship has two divisions with objective basis and without objective basis.  They are three things that are supreme for attendance upon and worshiping of the Tathagatas, the Tathagatas means the thus gone ones, the Buddhas.  What are these three?  These are three methods of worship of Buddha.  They are producing the thought of enlightenment, comprehending the holy doctrine as Dharma, and begetting the great compassion for creatures.

I used to wonder how, when you, when you get to a certain point your mind thinks at the rate I consume merit, just in the ordinary day of living, and the difficulty of making merit is so great, it seems impossible that anyone could ever attain enlightenment.  This is a certain level of the mind.  Because, you see, the mind, that sort of mind, is not a very good mind and it thinks in small ways, it thinks oh, you know, how could I make merit?  And then it always goes to something that is very difficult.  It goes to say, ah, well I'll stay in birth, I'll meet a Buddha, and then I'll offer the Buddha, you know, ten million stupas or something.  If you say to such a person go and make your mother a cup of tea, they'd say no.  I'd say why not?  They say, well that doesn't make a big amount of merit.  They don't know that it, see they don't understand anything.

If you worship the Buddhas correctly, if the Buddha says you give your mother a cup of tea, you'll make more merit than if you built four thousand pagodas.  The Buddha says like that, and you think it's a bigger deal because your materiality, remember you’re a materialist, you think one cup of tea is drunk by mother and gone.  I build four thousand pagodas and I'll be remembered as Fred the four thousand builder of pagodas and my name will be in history.

The one is the materiality of just the Wats (temples) and the buildings, but the other is the function of keeping mother alive with a cup of tea or whatever.  So the mind that says I've got to do a big deal, and then says well the conditions aren't right yet, therefore do nothing. That's a cop out mind, it's just a sort of logic process that some people do.

So somebody said, you know, give two cents to Bangaladesh or something for the orphanages.  I say, no I'll give ten thousand dollars.

They say, I won't give you two cents, that's not a big deal.  But you wait, I'll go and make it ten million and then I'll give you ten thousand dollars, cause they don't make ten million, those sort of people.  The mind that says, as they say in Sri Lanka, if you got a little, give a little.  That attitude is the correct attitude. So why do you, sitting, holding off on waiting for some big deal or, you know, gargantuan thing.  The time, say, you know the drop, drop, drop, drop of sand in the hourglass goes by and you've made no merit at all.  The mind that says I want to do great things and won't do little things is an error mind.

Because, you see, if you do something great, it's like if you build a ten thousand brick wall it's only one brick, one brick, one brick.  It's not a, if you could adjust the mind correctly you'd get, you get your logic correct, you will see how to worship the Buddha.

So, if you thought how can I make a big merit, well if you can't make merit now, this second, if you don't know how to make an offering to the Buddha now, you'll never know how to make an offering, cause you're being, you've heard repeatedly, repeatedly, repeatedly, you say I can't do it now you'll never be able to do it.  You can offer flowers to the Buddha walking down Burke street.  You see a flower, offer it to Buddha.  Now what sort of a logic system says that’s, you know, I've got to go to the temple and do all this and do all this, you see, that is Mara!  Your logic system that says like that is Mara.  It's Mara who colonised your own mind if you say I've got to do a big deal.  I'll do a little deal.  You don't want to make some merit?  Feed a mouse!  Give a mouse one crumb of bread.

The mind that says, ah, I've got to do something immense is defeated by Mara.  If you can't do a perfect offering to the Buddha this second, when will you be able to?  So, you've got to drop the logic system that says I can't do the world's greatest offering.

Now, so as I said the other day, I was going to show you how to do the twenty-seven mandalas that Atisha offered as a prerequisite.  I learnt this from this Tibetan lama, I looked for a couple of years, no one knew how to do.  And then this great lama came over for that conference and I was talking to him and one of the questions I asked him, I said “Do you know what the twenty seven mandalas of Atisha were?” He said yes, and he showed me.

So, I won't do it at the full burst, at the full mind, because I'll let you see, because at the full might it's so vast it's done a million times, you can't see it, but I'll show you how to do. Is that, you know that circular bronze mirror from China, is that under the base of that Buddha over there?  It's in a nice case, can you get it Minnie?  It's on that altar.

MM:  Is it on that altar?

JDH:  Yeah.

MM:  Cause Julie's cleaned that altar.

JDH:  Well, what happened is there's a circular replica of an ancient Chinese mirror, it's made out of brass and I think it's under that Thai Buddha. What's that Thai Buddha sitting on?

MM:  A box.

JDH:  A box.  In that box.  Right, bring us this.  So get us the box out and I'll show you.  Now it is twenty seven and your mind will have to follow and watch and you'll do and I'll show you how this was done.  Then later I'll let you use this.  You use grains of rice, grains of rice...

STUDENT:  Do you want me to get some?

JDH:  No.  I'll just show you.  As long as you understand how do you get to the twenty-seven.  It's the twenty-seven mandalas.  So what they, and, I've seen this.  I saw one of the, I think Geshe Loden, one of the Monks use a little round thing.  Now they use, this happens to be a pretty high-class replica of an ancient Chinese mirror, but this is an excellent thing for the mandala.  Now you've got to look on your mind, but basically what it is, you've got to get your twenty-seven mandalas.  The way you put it is, in the center is Mount Meru.  That is the west, the east, the north, and the south.  So here is the Mount Meru in the middle, and there are the four worlds or the four continents.

So, if you put in here, if you can imagine in there a mandala like that, and you could put in one grain of rice as an offering to Buddha.  Now this is saha.  Saha is this universe, this continent.  These four are the universes for other humans.  Robyn comes from the north one, totally different.  Long way.  If you put in, into the centre, saha, that's our, you know, this one, in this one.  You've got to know which this one is, Saha, this world system.  You put in, in there you put in one, two, three, that's Buddha, Dhamma, Sangha.  And one, Guru, Four.  Now, in the other world system the same. Buddha, Dhamma, Sangha, Guru.

Over here, Western world system.  Buddha, Dhamma, Sangha, Guru.  Over here, southern world system, Buddha, Dhamma, Sangha, Guru.  Here eastern world system, Buddha, Sangha, Buddha, Dhamma, Sangha, Guru. So you get four plus four plus four plus four plus four.  Alright?

Students:  Twenty.

JDH:  Alright, twenty.  Where is the other seven?  Where is the other seven?  Well, I'll show you another one, and I want you to find the other seven.  One is the mandala of the four worlds. So there is another one.  It's like those magic.  Know how many triangles there are Nick?  One is the mandala of the four continents, or four world systems.  Twenty-one.  Where is the other six?

MM:  In the mandala of this world. It's just that one.

JDH:  I won't tell you.

MM:  Yes, that's it. (laughs)

JDH:  Don't tell.  What happens is when you’re under, the type of logic system where you will see them, it can't be ritual.  So these twenty seven mandalas are done, and you find, you see, if you've got a, if you've got a mind that wants to do dana correctly, big dana, big merit, the power of your vow, I must do the, must be stronger than that, I'm not going to go up to full power to show you.

So I'll give you this.  I'll give you twenty-seven grains of rice. You'll find out for yourself.  It's the striving, it's not, and it’s the striving of being like solitary, of being absolutely determined.  See, it's not arrogance to say, see you always say, ah tell me this, and then it's weak.  You find.

So, then you've got, you will become aware when you do correctly, the merit I made is in that twenty seven mandalas, I made more merit in say one minute then I've ever made in the last thousand world cycles.  That will be a knowledge, your mind will just go up because it's starting to go towards Vajrayana secret, which is transmitted.

So, Shantideva says, if others are happy the great sages rejoice.  If others are sad, other sentient beings, if other, other sentient beings are sad, the sages are sad.  When others are content, all the sages rejoice.  Harm done others is harm done to the sage, to the wise man.

If you could make, you see, if you're really clear on being a benefactor, suppose your in a family, say you had ten brothers and sisters for example, and you say I want my ten brothers and sisters to be happy, and then you think oh well, I'll give her some money.  But then you think like this, in time, say my ten brothers and sisters married and they have children, we'll say for argument's sake five of them, or say, just to keep it simple for Dorothy's sake, my ten brothers and sisters are all women.  Right?  Ten sisters.  That shuts you up.

So you think, if I give money to my ten sisters they'll be happy.  But then, just supposing dear Dorothy that they have ten children each.  Then you think, as the children grow up my sister's children, my sisters can't be happy if their children are poor.  So, you do something like set up some money for your ten sisters, and you set up some fund which gives the sisters' children money, like a trust fund or something.  And then, because of that merit, you made sure of the sister's happiness.  So the true happiness of somebody you think over the horizon.  In the same way when you do the mandala correctly, you discover how to do.  You will see that you are doing the mandala over the horizon for the sake of many beings, not just yourself, and that's why it's so great.

Shantideva says henceforth, or from now on, I'll go as a slave to the world in order to please the Tathagatas, the Buddhas.  It is right that the mass of men put feet on my head or even slay me, if only it please the lord of the world.  Unless your mind understands what this means you'll just be like.  The compassionate ones are making the entire world their own.  There is no doubt about it.  Is it not the lords who appear in all these creature forms.  How then not respect them?  It's the same as pleasing the Tathagatas.  The realisation comes that if you please the Bodhisattvas it's the same as pleasing the Buddha.  If you understand three diagrams you'll know what I mean.

And in Shantideva's compendium of training he says worshiping with loving intent constitutes a creature's greatness.  Merit from faith in the Buddha constitutes the Buddha's greatness.  And again Shantideva says in the progress in practice there is no other means of pleasing the victors or the Bodhisattvas except by showing deference to creatures, to sentient beings.  The whole subject is explained at length in that text and it should be consulted.  If your mind gets powerful enough you'll know all the texts, they'll come into your mind.

And then, part b.  For worship without objective basis.  It's the contemplation of the perfection of insight.  In this case there is no object of worship or worshiper or substance of worship.  In other words, you know anatta.  So in the ‘Perfection of Insight Sutra’ it says whoever sees me as a body or knows me as a voice, that person sees me falsely.  He doesn't see me.  The Buddhas are the body of truth, like Dharmakaya, something like that.  And those who are guided have studied that truth, yet its true nature is not seen and no one can be conscious of it as an object.

The chapter of ever weeping should be studied where this theme is expounded.  And in the ‘Lion's Roar Sutra’ there's a passage, if one does not see the Buddha when one has the concept Buddha, we don't see the Buddha.  When you've got the concept Buddha then what need to say how impossible it would be when one worships the Buddha.  Buddha is in quotes by the way.  What then does worshipping the Buddha mean?  It means worshiping without producing the marks of a concept.  This is worship without objective basis.

That means you have to have a logic system of great power, of great finesse, of great fineness.  Because it's not, it's not on concepts.  The worship of the Tathagata is that which is without mind, without products of mind.  Products of mind are things like logic systems.  Without concepts a Buddha, without concepts a community Sangha, and without concepts of personal self or others, the only way you can get to that is anatta.

That was the chapter the Lion's Roar.  One can also appropriately quote the noble Asanga.  The blessed Buddha is not as pleased by the worship of pleasing objects as he is by meditative worship.  In other words you are paying respect to the Buddha when you meditate correctly.   That is respect.  And as the Buddha, being the body of truth, chapter of the guards the Buddha says the Buddhas are the body of truth, the Tathagata does not originate, he is purified, just like space.  And the ‘Heavenly Treasure Sutra’ says if there is no objective basis to be found for the blessed Buddha in his essential reality, where can the objective basis for viewing him as a form with characteristics.  And as Nagarjuna said all things being empty of inherent existence, what is there to praise and who to praise it?  Rejecting origination and destruction.

Thank you for joining us. Please tune in next week for the eigth installment of Atisha’s A Lamp on the Path to Enlightenment.

May you beget the though of perfect enlightenment.

May you realise how to accumulate vast merit.

May you know the twenty seven mandalas of Atisha.

May I be well and happy.
May you be well and happy.
May all beings be well and happy.

This script was prepared and edited by Alec Sloman, Anita Hughes, Leanne Eames, Leila Igracki, Lainie Smallwood.

References

Recording Title: Atisha's Lamp on the Path
Tape 4, Side 1
Teacher: John D. Hughes
Date of recording: 23/09/1989
Transcribed by: Alec Sloman
Checked by:
CD Reference: 22_09_89T4S1
File Name I:\22_09_89T4S21_JDHtranscribe.rtf

Recording Title: Atisha's Lamp on the Path
Tape 3, Side 1
Teacher: John D. Hughes
Date of recording: 22/09/1989
Transcribed by  Alec Sloman
Checked by:
CD Reference: 22_09_89T3S1
File Name I:\22_09_89T3S1A_JDHtranscribe.rtf

Atisa. A Lamp for the Path and Commentary. George Allen and Unwin 1983.

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