6. Special series

Cultivating a true self-confidence: Adopting a winning strategy for overcoming our faults, continued

Kadampa Ryan Cultivating a true self-confidence

In the last post we outlined the first three steps of the strategy for overcoming our faults.  In this post, I will explain the last five steps:

Step 4:  Avoid the extremes of repression and expression by learning to accept and overcome.  One extreme is repressing our delusions.  This is when you pretend, or try to pretend, that you don’t have a delusion (you are really mad or really attached, but deny it).  This just pushes delusion into the more subtle levels of mind, where is still functions but is now hidden, so it is actually worse.  It will later resurface in some dramatic way.  The most dangerous delusions you can suppress are those with respect to your Dharma practice, such as doubts about a particular subject, problems with somebody in the Sangha or with a teacher, and so forth.  These are the most dangerous because if left unchecked they will rob you of everything.  If uncontrolledly you do this, then afterwards make the request:  “please help me to identify my delusions in a way that I can overcome them.”  Realize that suppressing itself is the delusion of running away.

The other extreme is expressing the delusion.  This is when you follow the direction or advice of the delusion (you give in to it).  Normally we do this because we think this ‘gets it out of our system.’  But the relief we feel when we give in is just changing suffering – the reduction of the pain of your uncontrolled desire – you have the object so the desire temporarily subsides.  But the reality is it just plants new tendencies to do the same thing, so it will only be harder next time.

The middle way between these two is to accept and overcome.  This is when you accept that you have the delusion, and clearly realizing it is a treacherous mind, you decide to confront it head on.  We cannot run away from our karma – no matter where we go, our karma goes with us.  So there is no getting around our karma, the only way is through it.  To accept that we have the delusion in your mind, we need to do two things:  accept its existence but not its validity.  We accept the fact that a cloud of delusion exists within our mind.  Our mind is sick with this delusion.  Acceptance primarily prevents repression.  We accept that yes, we have a delusion.  Just as it is the nature of the body to fart, it is the nature of a contaminated mind to have delusions.  We shouldn’t expect it to be any different.  On this basis, we accept the existence of our delusions in our mind without judgement.  We don’t, however, accept the validity of the delusion itself.  Not accepting the validity primarily prevents expression.  We recognize delusions for what they are:  necessarily deceptive minds.  The promise us happiness but only give us problems.  It is like spam in our email inbox.  We accept that there is spam in our inbox, but we are not fooled by its message.  By not accepting the validity of spam messages, we no longer believe what they have to say, and so we cannot be fooled.  The power of the spam over us is cut.  Just as this is true of spam, it is equally true of delusions.  The delusions may be present in our mind, but we know with certainty that they are wrong, so they have no power over us.

Step 5:  Cut your identification with the delusion.  Other people’s delusions are not a problem for us because we don’t identify with them.  Our delusions are a problem because we do identify with them.  If you want to eliminate the problems associated with your delusions, stop identifying with them.  We are not our delusions, they are simply the cancer in our mind.  We are our pure potential (we will talk more about this in the next post).   When we cut our identification with our delusions, we do so by saying ‘not me’ with respect to our delusions, and backing up into either our pure potential or our self-generated deity.  Kadam Bjorn clearly explained that if you try fight your delusions while you are still identifying with them, the only thing you will do is develop self-hatred and suppress them.  If you cut your identification with the delusions and then fight them, you will actually get rid of them.

Step 6:  Increase your desire to be free from the delusion.  Kadam Bjorn also explained that our ability to overcome our delusions is not so much how well we know the opponents, but rather how strong is our desire to be free from the delusions.  Normally we think to not express is to suppress.  But this is true only when we our ‘on-net’ desire is to indulge in the delusion.  When your desire to be free from the delusion is greater than your desire to have the object of your delusion, then you will have enough power.  Otherwise, you will eventually give in (desire realm being) or explode. To increase our desire to be free, we can contemplate how delusions are necessarily deceptive minds.  They destroy our inner peace and so make us miserable.  Following our delusions moves us deeper into samsara:  either we are going deeper into samsara or we are moving out.  We want to get out of samsara for ourself (renunciation) or for others (bodhichitta).

Step 7:  Apply opponents to decrease the delusion.  Every delusion has its own specific opponent, but the following work in all cases.  It is better to get deep experience of a couple tools than superficial experience of countless tools.  (1) Breathing meditation – imagine you breathe out the delusion and you breathe in your guru’s realization of the opponent.  (2) Mantra recitation – you recite the most appropriate mantra making the request that the particular Buddha heal your mind of the particular delusion.  (3) Change objects.  For example, with anger we want to be free from suffering and we think external condition is the source of our suffering, so we wish to harm it/destroy it.  With wisdom, we try recognize that the problem is our own anger and attachment, so we try direct the same energy against our delusions wishing to harm/destroy them instead.  With attachment we want to experience happiness and we think that the external condition is the source of our happiness, so we wish to acquire it.  Here, with wisdom we try recognize that happiness comes from virtue, so we direct that same desire towards mixing our mind with virtue instead.  (4) Use the Lamrim.  We directly use the Lamrim as an opponent to our specific delusions.  Directly or indirectly the Lamrim is the opponent to all delusions, so just a regular and consistent practice of Lamrim will wear away at all of our delusions simultaneously.  But when we have a very strong delusion, we can directly use each of the Lamrim meditations as an opponent (how can meditation 1 help me overcome my attachment, etc.)

Step 8:  Eradicate the delusion with the wisdom realizing emptiness.  Emptiness essentially explains that none of this is real, it is all a dream, so there is nothing to be attached to and no us for that matter!  Ultimately, the wisdom realizing emptiness eradicates all our delusions.

 

Cultivating true self-confidence: Adopting a winning strategy for overcoming our faults

Kadampa Ryan Cultivating a true self-confidence

We continue with our discussion of how to generate a reliable basis for self-confidence.  In the last post, we talked about how to generate the basis of virtuous actions through enjoying engaging in virtue.  In this post, I will talk about how to generate the basis of our ability to overcome our faults.  In the next post we will talk about generating the basis of our pure potential.

Most of the reason why we lack self-confidence has to do with the fact that we have so many faults and make so many mistakes.  We have so many delusions that our mind is out of control and we do things that make the situation worse and we can’t stop ourselves from doing it.  When we try overcome our faults, they defeat us everytime, so we just give in to them everytime they arise.  This reinforces our feeling of being helpless against our delusions and this destroys our self-confidence even further. Because we have even less self-confidence, we have no power to fight our delusions, and the vicious cycle continues downward.

In this post, I will try explain how to reverse this situation by adopting a winning strategy against our delusions.  When we gain familiarity of using this method, we will be able to start winning battles against our delusions, and little by little we will be able to have confidence that we will be able to overcome all our faults.  Then we will have nothing to fear.

So what is a strategy for overcoming our delusions?  I will take as my example for illustrating how the method works strong desirous attachment.  Attachment quite simply is a mind that thinks some external condition is a cause of our happiness, and is usually thinks without this external condition I can’t be happy.  This is a delusion because happiness is a state of mind, and so comes from the mind.  The real cause of happiness is inner peace, whose cause is virtuous states of mind.  Desirous attachment can take many forms, such as alcohol, drugs, cigarettes, for a partner, for being with somebody (not being alone), sex, attractive forms, etc.  Just for simplicity, I will us the example of cigarettes, but it is equally applicable to any other type of attachment, such as sexual attachment.

The strategy consists of eight steps.  The first three I will explain in this post and the final five I will explain in the next post.  Before any of the steps, we recall the problem.  For example, we see or think about a cigarette and generate an urge to smoke.  Then:

Step 1:  Analyze the nature and the cause of the problem.  The nature of the problem is not something external, the fact that you saw a cigarette; it is the unpleasant feelings in your mind.  The cause of the problem is not something external, it is the delusion of attachment within your own mind.

Step 2:  Ask yourself the question:  what kind of being am I?  If you are a worldly being, namely you are interested in external happiness, then this strategy won’t work for you.  If you are a spiritual being, in other words you are interested in gaining spiriutal realizations, then everything works.  We can change what kind of being we are through the practice of Lamrim – whose main function is to change our desire.  Again, we are so lucky to have access to Kadampa centers where we can receive introductory and advanced teachings on the Lamrim.  Within the Lamrim, the quickest way to change our desire is to recall death by asking ourself the question:  “Do I want to arrive at my death and realize what I could have accomplished spiritually but didn’t because I wasn’t motivated enough to overcome this attachment?”

Step 3:  Make requests to Dorje Shugden:  “Whatever is best with respect to this delusion, please arrange.”  If it ceases, then end of story.  For example, there is a very pure monk named Gen Togden.  He told me the story of once when he had really strong anger, he requested Dorje Shugden to arrange what is best with respect to this delusion being present in his mind.  Through the faith of his request, his anger subsided immediately.  This is not some miracle.  When we know whatever is happening is for the best, all worry, anxiety, attachment or fear vanish.  Even if it doesn’t completely vanish, it will be reduced considerably.  Any residual of the delusion that persists means that Dorje Shugen wants you to train in overcoming this delusion.  Either way, you accept with infinite faith that this is perfect for your practice, so you are happy (because what you want is to practice).

In the next post I will explain the remaining steps.

Cultivating true self-confidence: The joy of pure actions

Kadampa Ryan Cultivating a true self-confidence

As explained in the previous post, there are three different reliable bases upon which we can build a true self-confidence, the first of which is our own virtuous actions.  Virtuous actions are actions that are consistent with the way things actually are – they are in harmony with the reality that we are all interconnected at a very profound level.  They are generally speaking actions that seek to help others find happiness or become free from suffering.  Because they are in harmony with the way things actually are, they work and are therefore reliable. The key to cultivating this basis for self-confidence is to learn how to enjoy engaging in such actions.  Normally we think virtuous actions are things we ‘should’ do, but don’t really want to.  We do them reluctantly, or motivated by guilt, and so are unhappy about it.  To reverse this, we need to learn how to enjoy engaging in virtuous actions.  Since we naturally do what we enjoy, if we can enjoy engaging in virtue, we will effortless cultivate this basis for self-confidence.

So the question then becomes how can we come to enjoy engaging in virtuous actions?  Virtuous actions are actually naturally joyful to engage in.  Why?  Because virtue, by definition, functions to produce the experience of inner peace within our mind – and inner peace is the main cause of our happiness.  When we mix our mind with virtue, it naturally becomes more peaceful, and so we become more happy and joyful.  So really our task is simply to remove the obstructions to our joy.  When we remove the obstructions, joy will naturally arise.

So how do we do this?  By learning how to enjoy practicing itself – to enjoy creating good causes.  There are four main points which enable us to do this:

Change what you desire to be to create good causes.  If what you desire is pleasant external or internal conditions, then attachment to results is inevitable, and we will be like a yo-yo.  If what we want is to create good causes, then whether things go pleasantly or unpleasantly, either externally or internally, it is all good, because all such circumstances equally give us an opportunity to practice – to create good causes.  What enables us to make this change in our desire?  The practice of Lamrim.  This is the main function of the Lamrim.  Because of the importance of the Lamrim, we are so lucky to have the opportunity to attend classes at Kadampa centers on the Lamrim.  Where else can we learn this?

Accepting where you are at without guilt or judgement.  This is what it means to be a sincere practitioner.  There are generally two extremes when it comes to where we are at:  guilt and complacency.  Guilt is anger directed towards our self.  Because our self is a bodhisattva, guilt is actually anger directed towards a bodhisattva which is hugely negative karma.  We feel that guilt is good because we think it motivates us to abandon negativity.  But this is the tricky mind of self-cherishing that encourages us to abandon a small negativity by cultivating a bigger one (anger towards ourselves).  So on-net, we are worse off.  Guilt leads to high expectations of our self, and when we fail to meet them, we feel guilty, so it is a vicious cycle.  The other extreme is complacency.  This allows delusions and negativity to remain in our mind like they are no problem.  Normally when we let go of guilt we go to the other extreme and become more negative because we have principally been using guilt to keep us in check.  We then go to the other extreme of admitting we are negative and deluded and saying we don’t care.  It allows delusions to run unchecked in our mind and we are gradually swept away (down) by them.  The middle way between these two extremes is regret.  Regret differs from guilt and complacency in three ways:  (1) Regret accepts ourselves without judgement.  It accepts the existence of the delusions in our mind, but not their validity.  We will talk more about this in a later post.  (2) Regret blames our delusions, not ourselves.  It makes the distinction between ourselves, which are completely pure; and our delusions, which are like the cancer of our mind.  It directs the energy against the delusions, not ourself, in the form of a strong wish to be free from our delusions.  When we have guilt it turns into the wish to harm or punish ourselves, even leading up to suicide (a case I dealt with a few times).  (3) Regret is forward looking, not backward looking.  We accept our past mistakes by using them to learn what to do differently next time.  It considers the horrific future we will have if we allow delusions and negativity to remain in our mind.  It makes plans for what to do to avoid this future.  The best analogy of regret is imagining you just drank poison.  We wouldn’t waste our time beating ourselves up over making a mistake, but would actively seek an antidote and take it.

Having faith in the law of karma:  if you create the causes, the results will definitely come (so the results are assured).  Just as the laws of physics and science explain how the external world works, the laws of karma explain how the internal world works.  These are inviolable laws of nature.  If we have conviction in the law of karma that good results necessarily come from good causes and bad results necessarily come from bad causes, we will joyfully engage in virtuous actions.   It is likewise useful to cultivate faith in Dorje Shugden.  If we have faith in the law of karma, the only remaining question is when will the results ripen?  If you rely upon Dorje Shugden, they will ripen when it is best for your practice.  He is like a karma manager.  If the results haven’t yet ripened, it is because he wants you to continue creating particular causes. So if we haven’t yet experienced results we will be happy because we realize that we are saving our spiritual pennies for something bigger and better.

Some people really struggle when it comes to the question of faith, so it is worthwhile to say a few words about faith.  Faith in the Dharma is very different than faith in other contexts.  Faith is more like confidence born from scientific experimentation.  Geshe-la calls Dharma the ‘supreme scientific method.’  How can we understand this?  Through understanding the relationship between faith and wisdom.  It is actually a cycle.  (1)  Believing faith – this is faith based on a valid reason.  We have some valid reason for believing that good results come from good causes.  (2) Admiring faith – this admires the good qualities of whatever we believe in.  We believe that good results come from good causes, and admire good causes, thinking, ‘wow.’  (3) Wishing faith – this wishes to have these good qualities for ourselves.  Our admiring faith naturally transforms into a wish to have these good qualities for ourselves.  (4) joyful effort.  We joyfully put the instructions into practice.  Having faith in good causes, we joyfully engage in them knowing that good results will come.  (5) Personal experience/wisdom.  From this practice, we gain personal experience of the truth of the instructions.  This is wisdom – when we know something from our own side.  (6) A deeper believing faith.  This wisdom then serves as a new valid reason, which enables us to generate an even deeper believing faith, and so the cycle continues.

Cultivating a true self-confidence: Motivation for doing the series

Kadampa Ryan 6. Special series, Cultivating a true self-confidence

The purpose of this series of blog postings is to explain everything I think you need to generate a true self-confidence.  It can be summed up as one thing:  Being born in the vajra family.

Without self-confidence you can accomplish nothing.  When you accomplish nothing, you feel like you are incapable of doing anything which reinforces your lack of self-confidence, so it is a vicious cycle.  The main point of being able to generate true self-confidence is to do so with respect to a reliable basis that is within your control.  If you base your self-confidence on something unreliable or outside your control, then your confidence will be unreliable and outside your control.  For example, my mother was a beauty queen when she was younger.  She basically accomplished most things in her life through her good looks.  But this proved unreliable for her because eventually our looks fail us and because we become dependent upon the opinion of others.  In contrast, if it is based on something reliable and within your control, then it becomes indestructible and is a true self-confidence.  This series of posts will explain how we can learn how to distinguish between these two, and how to cultivate this reliable basis.

This series of posts will organized as follows:  The first part will explore how to meditate on self-confidence.  This consists of generating within our mind the three reliable bases for self-confidence:  our virtuous actions, our overcoming of our delusions and our pure potential or true self. The second part will be on how to actually practice self-confidence through the mind of acceptance, through taking personal responsibility for others’ enlightenment and through learning how to become part of something bigger than ourselves, namely the Bodhisattva family.  The last part will be an exhortation to seize the precious opportunity we have before us and thereby fulfill our spiritual destiny – in short, we will learn how to become the bodhisattvas we were born to be!

My motivation for doing this series of posts is simple:  Venerable Tharchin once explained to me that if we know how the Dharma works, we will become incredible confident and effort will come easily.  We stand at a pivotal moment in the history of our tradition where we make the double transition from Eastern to Western but also Ancient to Modern.  This is why the book Modern Buddhism, and the tradition’s subsequent completely reorganizing of itself around the presentation in this book, is so important.  It provides us the frame of reference.  Our tradition has been reborn, so so must be.  For this to happen, we need great confidence.  Venerable Geshe-la knows these methods best and he is supremely confident.  If we understand why, we will be just as confident as he.

My Kadampa understanding of the Bible: The story of John and Revelation

Kadampa Ryan 5. Reliance upon Dorje Shugden, My Kadampa understanding of the Bible

Some time had passed and all of Jesus’ apostles had died except John.  John was hiding in a prison on an island, sending out letters to all of the Churches under a false name to hide his identity.  The Roman emperor declared himself a God and demanded that all Christians in the Empire take him as their sole god or die.  The son of a Roman general who was acting as a spy in a Christian village heard rumors that John was still alive, so he went to his father in Rome to tell the Emperor the news.  The Emperor installed the general as governor of the area where the Christians were with orders to kill John and all of the Christians.  The general then sent his son under cover as a prisoner to the same prison John was hiding at.  While there, John impressed the son and eventually won him over.  During this time John received a series of visions about how Jesus’ story ends.  He was transported to heaven, shown the four horsemen of the apocalypse, but with Jesus eventually prevailing over all evil forever.  They then try a prison break for John before they all are to be killed, and in the process the general’s son becomes a believer in Jesus and stops the Roman commander who was about to kill John.  Then, the general arrived, said that the Emperor was assassinated and that the new Emperor declared an amnesty for all Christians.  John then went back to the mainland and preached for a few years before he died.  So just as John was the last to stay with Jesus when he died, so too he was the last to live to spread the word of Jesus.

As a Kadampa, what does this story teach me?

  1. It was very hard to be a Christian in the early days, but because they never lost their faith despite their persecution their religion flourished.  There is something inspiring about somebody who is willing to sacrifice everything for their faith, especially when that faith seems to teach only love.  While believers will be persecuted, those who watch the persecution will be won over, and ultimately the persecutors as well will change their hearts.  As Kadampa’s we can admire and rejoice in such faith, and we can develop gratitude for those who suffered and died to keep the Kadampa lineage alive in this world.  In particular, Jangchub O.
  2. John was shown the end so that the followers of Christ would not lose hope and faith.  In Revelation, after horrific sufferings of war and fire, Jesus emerged triumphant, love emerged triumphant and in the end all were saved in the silence of heaven.  This is not unlike the story of Buddha’s enlightenment where all of the maras attacked him but he overcame them all with love.  The Christians were shown that love conquerors all evil through revelation, and knowing this gives them faith to follow the path of love all the way until the end.

I have learned a tremendous amount by considering each of the stories of the Bible through the lens of the Kadampa teachings.  We need to make a very clear distinction between mixing religions and appreciating all religions while following our own purely without mixing.  One extreme is sectarianism thinking that we alone have a monopoly on the truth and that only the Kadampa is correct.  This extreme is wrong because Buddhas reveal themselves in different ways to Buddhists and non-Buddhists alike.  The other extreme is mixing together all religions into a hodge podge of our own creation.  This transforms our ordinary self into our own spiritual guide thinking that we are somehow qualified to put together a spiritual path that is superior to the ones laid out by the holiest beings to have walked this earth.  The middle way is to follow one’s own tradition purely without mixing while appreciating all other traditions as valid for those who follow them.

There are close to 2 billion people on this earth who are Christians.  In particular, Modern Kadampa Buddhism has initially emerged in a Western, Christian cultural context.  Therefore, if we are to learn how to transmit the essential meaning of Kadampa Buddhism in such a cultural context, we must strive to possess the wisdom that can realize how the Kadampa path is revealed through the stories of the Bible.  These stories have shaped this civilization.  If we can see the Dharma in these stories, we will be able to see the Dharma in this civilization, and as such be much more capable of transmitting this wisdom perfectly.  It is with that intention that I have engaged in this project.  It is part of my appreciating other religions, but my appreciation arises out of how they reveal the truth of the Kadampa path or how the Kadampa path explains these stories and this religion.  Realizing this appreciation of the Judeo-Christian world through the lens of the Kadampa helps us eliminate the grasping at any tension between the cultural context we inhabit and the teachings of the Kadampa.  Therefore it helps us accomplish our mission of achieving the union of modern life and Kadampa Buddhism.    Just as it is not mixing to derive Kadampa lessons from the stories of our everyday life, so too it is not mixing to derive Kadampa lessons from what so many consider “the greatest stories ever told.”

I dedicate any merit I may have collected by doing this series of posts so that Dorje Shugden will bless the minds of all those who read these words and bestow upon them correct Kadampa understandings regardless of whether what I wrote was correct or non-sense.  Sometimes reading non-sense helps us realize wisdom, and so may whatever mistakes I have made ripen only as pure wisdom in the minds of those who read these posts.  May all Kadampas unite seamlessly their modern lives with Kadampa Buddhism in such a way that, like a magic crystal,it  functions to transform this ordinary impure world into a pure land in which all beings are free forevermore.

My Kadampa understanding of the Bible: The story of Saint Paul

Kadampa Ryan My Kadampa understanding of the Bible

After Jesus died and was ressurected, the disciples of Jesus didn’t know what to do or how to spread the good news of Jesus.  Peter then finally decided that, like Jesus, they can’t stay quiet and must be willing to endure suffering in the name of teaching about Jesus.  So Peter started teaching and baptising people.  Eventually the High Priests began to take notice.  Reuben, who was a leading priest but not the highest, decided to destroy what he considered to be a someone preaching to destroy the law, namely Jesus and his followers.  He felt he needed to do so to preserve Moses’ law and to pacify the Romans who feared insurrection.  Reuben convinced Saul, the captain of the temple guard, to join his cause and to kill if necessary all of the Jesus followers.  Saul was a Philistine, whereas Reuben was an Israelite.  Saul was extremely effective in persecuting the followers of Jesus, and became their most feared adversary.  When Saul went to Damascus to capture a key disciple, Jesus blinded him and asked him why he was persecuting him.  Jesus then told Saul that in a few days somebody would come heal him.  After Saul was healed, he generated great faith in Jesus and Jesus said to him that he had been chosen to bring Jesus’ message to the gentiles (non-Jews) and was to be called Paul.  When Reuben eventually learned of this, he wanted Saul/Paul killed.  Paul then escaped Damascus and went to Jerusalem.  He convinced Peter and the other disciples that he had made a genuine conversion to Jesus and asked for Peter’s blessings to go teach about Jesus to the gentiles.  Peter agreed and Paul went out.   Paul came to understand that this meant him eventually going to Rome itself to teach about Jesus.   He first went to modern day Turkey, then back to Jerusalem, then to Greece and back to Jerusalem.  Each time he went back he explained to Peter and the other disciples what was happening in the world of the gentiles, how they considered Jesus to be Christ, etc.  Just as Jesus taught the Jews that one should not be attached to the letter of the law, but rather to follow its spirit, so too Paul explained to Peter and the other disciples t not be attached to keeping Jesus’ teachings for the Jews but they could be understood by the world of the gentiles.  When Paul declared this in the temple in Jerusalem, the Priests wanted him killed, they sent him to the Roman Governor.  Paul explained that he was a Roman citizen and wanted to make his appeal before the Emperor.  So the governor sent him to Rome, which was Paul’s goal all along.  From there, Paul set in motion what became the eventual conversion of the Roman Empire to Christianity.

As a Kadampa, what does this story teach me?

  1. We should rely upon the meaning of the teachings, not become attached to the letter.  The letter of any teaching has to be understood in the context of the society/culture that it was given.  But when society and cultures change, it is incumbent upon the practitioners to reexpress the same meaning in the new cultural context.  Whenever this is done, it will provoke resistance by those who are attached to the letter of the earlier teachings.  Venerable Geshe-la explains in Clear Light of Bliss that this is a principal root of sectarianism and is to be abandoned.  Jesus did this for the Jews, and Paul did it for the Jewish followers of Jesus.  In the same way, Venerable Geshe-la is taking the meaning of the Kadam Dharma as originally taught by the Indian Master Atisha but then later taught by the Tibetan Master Je Tsongkhapa and representing it in a Modern context.  This provokes resistance from the established order who view such repackaging of the teachings as a threat.
  2. One of the main messages of Paul was the need to put aside the prejudice the Jews had against gentiles.  The pure teachings of holy beings are for all beings, not just chosen people.  These teachings will need to be adapted to transmit the same meaning into a different cultural context, but they are for everyone.  Those whose primary concern is the pure spiritual practice of practitioners, they will see this logic, those who fear losing their power will not.
  3. Peter, Paul and the other disciples had to follow in the footsteps of Jesus and endure terrible sufferings, including torture and death, in the name of spreading teachings about Jesus.  But they were to meet this suffering as Jesus did, by loving those who persecute him.  In the beginning of Christian history, Christians were persecuted terribly, but they responded with faith, hope and love, but the greatest of these being love, and this won over those watching their persecution.  Eventually, it also won over those who were doing the persecution, including the Romans themselves.  Persecution still occurs, but in much milder forms, because those who were persecuted before us purified the collective karma of all those who follow after.
  4. Because Paul went to Rome, Rome eventually became Christian, and through this all of Europe did.  When Europe then proceeded to conquer the world, they brought Christianity to four different continents.  In this way, we can say that the actions of Paul, more than any other person since, established the Judeo-Christian world.  This is amazing skillful means of Jesus.

My Kadampa understanding of the Bible: The story of Jesus

Kadampa Ryan My Kadampa understanding of the Bible

The story of Jesus created the Christian world.  Jesus was born of a virgin mother, Mary.  Three wise kings followed the North Star to lay gifts at his cradle in the manger.  He was raised as a carpenter by Mary’s husband, Joseph.  A young woman from the family of Lazerus fell in love with Jesus, but Jesus could not reciprocate.  When Joseph died, Jesus went out into the wilderness to find God.  He first came upon John the Baptist, a relative of his.  Jesus asked John to Baptize him, and when he did a dove entered into Jesus and God spoke to all those watching that this was his son with whom he is pleased.  Jesus then went out into the desert for 40 days where he was tempted by the devil by wealth, power and the like.  Jesus then went back to his mother’s villiage where his first two followers were waiting for him.  After he healed from his desert wounds, he went of a friend’s wedding party.  One of his first two followers developed doubts wondering whether it was right to be at a wedding when Judea was under Roman occupation.  Mary encouraged Jesus to perform a miracle to establish faith in that one follower.  So Jesus turned water into wine.  Then he went to another village and the priests of the village wanted to expose Jesus as a charlatan so they sent to him a case of a woman who was to be stoned for adultry.  Jesus said “let he who is without sin throw the first stone,” and everybody went away in wonder.  Then Lazarus died and Jesus went to his tomb and raised him from the dead.  The High Priest of the Temple then feared that Jesus could spark a rebellion, which Rome would then crush along with the Temple and all of the blood of the direct descendants of the prophets, so he wanted Jesus dead.  King Herod, the Jewish king, feared that Jesus was coming to be considered as the King of the Jews so he wanted Jesus dead.  The Roman Governor feared that if there were a rebellion, Rome would kill him because it was tired of having to station so many troops to hold an area from an unruly tribe.  So the Roman Governor wanted him dead too.  Jesus realized that by willingly sacrificing himself as an act of love would pacify all of the conflict, bring peace and unleash a great wave of faith in God that was to become the Christian world.  He later said in the garden before being arrested that he would sacrifice himself to show people that you can love until the very end.  He then had the Last Supper with his disciples where he offered bread as his body and wine as his blood as his covenant with God’s people.  Judas then turns him in for money, Jesus is arrested, taken to the priests who rule that he should be killed, but only the Roman Governor could declare a death sentence, so they sent him to the Governor.  The Governor didn’t want to trigger a revolution by being the one who killed him, so he said it was for Herod to decide.  Herod did not want to be the one to kill him because then the people would totally hate him and he would lose his crown.  So Herod sent him back to the Priests, who then took him again to the Governor.  The Governor then flogged him and gave him a thorny crown but said he would not kill him.  This forced the Priests to beg so that he could avoid blame but still order the crucifixion.  Jesus then had to carry his cross up the hill.  He was then hung up on the cross.  At one point he said of his killers, “forgive them father for they know not what they do”, then just before the end before Jesus was to die he voiced “Oh God, why have you forsaken me?”  He then followed by willingly offering himself in sacrifice to save all beings from their sins and then he dies.  When he dies, the Temple of the High Priest cracks.  They then bury Jesus, but three days later he rises from the dead.  Jesus then went to his disciples, showed them that he was alive, encouraged them to go spread the good news, then promised that he would be with them until the end of time.  With this very brief account I have glossed over an extremely profound story, but I have at least tried to lay out the main themes for purposes of this blog post.

So as a Kadampa, how do I view this story, what does it teach me about the Dharma?  Really, I could write about 10 posts on this, so I will have to stick with the main points.

  1. All great beings have a great birth story.  Every being, actually, has a birth story.  It is actually quite useful to know our birth story.  Our birth story will have a big impact on our entire life’s trajectory.  Founders of paths always have great birth stories as a means of inspiring deep faith in the society within which the religion is being born.  Jesus had the immaculate conception, wise kings, etc.  Buddha had being born as a prince, the elephants coming down, etc.  Venerable Geshe-la was born on Buddha’s Turning the Wheel of Dharma Day.  Buddha is the founder of the Dharma in this world and Venerable Geshe-la is one of his “prophets” who appeared in a certain cultural context of the modern West.
  2. Miracles depend upon faith in those benefiting from the miracle.  Jesus performed all sorts of miracles so that others could generate faith in him.  But each time before he did a miracle, he always asked whether the other person believed he could heal them, raise somebody from the dead, etc.  After they said yes, then the miracle happened.  When we understand the relationship between emptiness, karma and blessings this makes perfect sense.  Blessings function to activate certain karmic seeds, such as the seeds of being healed.  Faith in holy beings opens the blinds of our mind to let the sunlight of their blessings to enter our mind and activate the seed.  The seed itself is just a karmic appearance, as is everything else.  So if we have these three, emptiness, karma and blessings, then miracles are perfectly possible.
  3. Jesus had to endure all that he did as a human would, so even though he was an emanation from the Dharmakaya, he conventionally showed the aspect of enduring all that he did as a human being.  The purpose of this is to show that if he can do it as a human, then I can do it as a human too.  Otherwise, people can dismiss his deeds as only possible because he was already a holy being.
  4. Jesus is a Buddha of purification and love.  All of the torment that was inflicted upon him was him taking on the negative karma of all living beings.  By generating faith in him as somebody who has taken upon himself all of our negative karma, we receive his special blessings which function to cleanse our mind of all negativity.  Likewise, he is a Buddha of love.  He said in the garden that he is voluntarily allowing himself to be killed so that he could show all beings that you can love all the way to the end.  He realized that by giving his life, he could purify completely the collision between Rome, the Jewish rebels and the High Priests.  Because he willfully gave his life in this way, this collision was purified, which then later paved the way for Christianity to eventually spread to the Roman empire where it has come to dominate Western civilization.
  5. Assuming Jesus had a perfect realization of emptiness, there is nothing that would necessarily prevent him from himself rising from the dead.  When we die, our consciousness can stay in our body for up to three days.  If we have control over our mind and winds, I don’t see any particular reason why he could not reinfuse himself into his subtle body and body.  But I think more likely what the explanation is is the disciples had on their minds very powerful karmic seeds of faith in Jesus.  Since Jesus’s body is an emanation body of a Buddha, he could bless the minds of the disciples which activates these seeds of faith which then enables them to see his emanation body again.  If Je Tsongkhapa and other Buddhas can appear to people after they have passed away through this mechanism, there is no reason why Jesus could not have done the same.
  6. Jesus helped the people of the time modernize their understanding of God’s law.  When holy beings first come, they establish their spiritual path and the people understand it and follow it purely.  But over time, people begin to grasp at the letter of the teachings and not their meaning.  As the karmic circumstance of the world continues to change, the letter of the teachings no longer perfectly fit with the new karmic conditions of the world, the same words no longer transmit the same meaning.  But not understanding practitioners should follow the meaning and not the letter of the words, some can become fundamentalist and sectarian in their interpretation of the teachings – sticking to the literal words dogmatically, even under circumstances where it is not appropriate to do so.  This is a danger for any spiritual tradition.  This had happened to the High Priests, and Jesus came and explained the meaning of the teachings.  Some of the Priests considered that blasphemy and contrary to Moses’ law, and so they therefore wanted him dead since they viewed him as spreading false teachings.  Venerable Geshe-la has done the same thing for us by bringing the meaning of the Kadampa teachings into a modern context.  We are very fortunate to be born at a time of spiritual rejuvination in this way.  In many respects, we are like those fortunate enough to be the direct disciples of Je Tsongkhapa or Jesus.

My Kadampa understanding of the bible: The story of Esther

Kadampa Ryan 5. Reliance upon Dorje Shugden, My Kadampa understanding of the Bible

The Persian empire conquered Judea, and the Jews were taken to Babylon.  Over time, while there, they prospered and rose to high positions.  Esther was an orphaned Jewish girl taken in and raised, like a daughter, by her cousin Mordecai.  In a drunken state, the Persian king Ahasuerus (also known as Xerxes) ordered his queen to appear before the court so that he could show her off as his most precious possession.  Not wanting to be considered an object she refused.  The king then banished her for disobeying a direct command of the king.  To find a new wife, he ordered all of the virgins be rounded up for him.  Mordecai told Esther to hide that she was Jewish so she could get better treatment.  Due to her courage, integrity and beauty, the king fell in love with Esther and made her his new Queen.  Mordecai overheard two conspirators who wanted to kill the king, and so he told Esther who told the king.  The king felt gratitude for Mordecai saving his life.  Later, Haman, a prominent prince in the area, became the king’s Chamberlain (much like a Prime Minister).  Mordecai refused to bow to Haman, viewing him as corrupt, and this infuriated Haman.  He then told the king that there is a group of people within the realm who refused to acknowledge the supremacy of Persian law and that they were a threat, and so therefore should be exterminated completely.  Haman did not say it was the Jews, just some random tribe in the empire.  The king agreed, and Haman set in motion his plans declaring that on a given day all Jews in the empire would be killed.  When Mordecai informed Esther of this, she understood why God had elevated her to be Queen of Persia.  She then went to the king, told him that it was the Jews who were to be killed, which included both herself and Mordecai, and the king was furious at Haman and had him hung.  But the king could not undo the royal decree established by Haman that all the Jews were to be killed.  The king then made Mordecai the Chamberlain and asked Mordecai and Esther to come up with a solution.  The solution they came to was granting the Jews the right to defend themselves by force.  When the day came, many died, but the Jews succeeded in defending themselves and as such were saved from extermination.  To remember this, Jews now celebrate every year a special holiday called Purim.  Some of the Jews decided to leave Babylon to go back to Jerusalem where they could be safe.  They were led by Ezra, who had the temple of Solomon rebuilt and became their spiritual leader.

As a Kadampa, what does this story mean to me?

  1. Very often on the Kadampa path we will be put into certain circumstances that at first seem very bad but later we come to realize there is a deeper purpose.  What started out as severe misfortune, is later understood to be our greatest blessing.  Esther was initially kidnapped, but then became the Queen.  Mordecai was to be hung, but later became Chamberlain.  The Jews were to be exterminated, but were saved and became respected within the empire.  In the same way, if we rely upon Dorje Shugden there will be various times in our life where it seems like we are experiencing great misfortune and we don’t understand what is going on.  At such times, like the Jews did, we can feel that the holy beings have abandoned us.  But if we maintain our faith and reliance, then over time it will be revealed to us how what seemed like misfortune was in fact our greatest blessing.  It may not always be a great blessing from an external worldly perspective, but it always will be from an internal, spiritual perspective.
  2. If there is no harm to it, we need to sometimes act in accordance with local convention.  It may be true that Haman did not merit being bowed down to, but unnecessarily provoking him prompted him to want to kill all the Jews.  I understand that Jews are to bow down only to God, but bowing in this context is not declaring Haman a God (as would have been the case with Joseph and the Pharaoh), rather it is just recognizing his position within society and respecting local conventions.  As Kadampas, we are to act in accordance with local conventions and to not engage in extreme behavior.  Of course we should never abandon our refuge, even at the cost of our life, but refuge is an internal thing and sometimes we need to be skillful in how we express externally our convictions.  Esther, for example, hid the fact that she was Jewish and respected local customs.  As a result, she rose to be Queen and actually did more to break down the stereotypes because all were able to appreciate her good qualities without getting bogged down with religious labels.  Sometimes this is also necessary for us Kadampas, though in general we should not hide things because we are not doing anything wrong.  But there is a difference between not hiding and being intentionally provocative or flaunting our beliefs when we know it could upset others.  We need to be skillful.
  3. Wherever the Jews go, they thrive on the merit of their actions.  There is something about Jewish culture that causes them to thrive in all domains, political, economic, social and spiritual.  They are usually a minority religious community wherever they are, but absent persecution, they generally thrive.  The Mormans are similar.  I think as Kadampas we can learn from these two communities and emulate their merit based success in all that they do.  Nothing is ever given to them, but through the force of their own efforts and merit, they rise.  We should be the same, learning to be successful in all aspects of life.  We do so not because we seek worldly success, but because we seek excellence in all that we do, and all of our actions are motivated by wisdom, compassion and faith.  Since our actions are good, it is natural that we will come to enjoy great success in all endeavors.  But we must be careful with this success to not provoke persecution against us.  One of the reasons why the Jews are so often persecuted is precisely because they are such a small minority yet still manage to be so influential and successful.  If as Kadampas we gain in power and influence, we need to be vigilant to always use our power and influence for the good of others and we should make an effort to integrate fully into the societies we find ourselves.  This will help protect against unnecessary persecution.
  4. Some Jews decide to stay where they are a minority, others choose to go to Israel, their homeland, where they can be the majority.  This notion of a promised land is a big part of the Judeo-Christian narrative.  Within Kadampa Buddhism, we have no such notions.  Some people confuse the political cause of Tibet with the narrative of the promised land within the Judeo-Christian world.  But this is a false analogy.  According to Kadampa Buddhism, the Dharma is like a yoke on the surface of the ocean that goes from place to place depending upon the karma at the time.  It has no fixed geographical location.  Confusing the political cause of occupying and controlling certain geographical locations with the spiritual path of Buddhism, some people are willing to sacrifice the Dharma for the sake of the political cause of Tibet.  As Kadampa Buddhists, we never do this.  Of course we wish Tibetans to be free, as we wish this for all peoples, but there is no particular spiritual significance to worldly lands in and of themselves.  In any case, we would never sacrifice our spiritual beliefs for political purposes.

My Kadampa understanding of the Bible: The story of Samson and Delilah

Kadampa Ryan 5. Reliance upon Dorje Shugden, My Kadampa understanding of the Bible

The story of Samson takes place at a time when God is punishing the Israelites for not following God’s laws.  They are living under occupation by the Philistines.  The Israelites long to be free, but nobody is strong enough to lead a rebellion.  God then came to a couple that was too old to conceive and said that they would have a child who would free the Israelites – he would have superhuman strength, but should not drink alcohol or cut his hair.  He was born and grew up without any further signs.  Everyone knew he was strong and they wanted him to lead a revolt, but Samson knew if he did so they would just all die.  At one point, a Philistine patrol attacked his quasi-girlfriend and he defeated them.  At another point, he wrestled a lion and won. His myth grew and so the Philistines feared him, so they tried to capture him.  But he killed them all with a bone.  Seeing that his people did not help them, he gave up on them and went out wandering.  He came upon a kind Philistine family, fell in love with the daughter and wanted to marry her.  Samson’s mother thought this was terrible because she was not an Israelite, but Samson married her anyways.  At the party after the wedding, the Philistine army pressured the father of the bride to ask his daughter for the answer to the riddle that Samson posed to everyone.  Under pressure she did so, and when the army captain solved the riddle Samson realized what had happened, became enraged and killed all of the Philistine soldiers who were there. Later the Philistines killed his wife, and then Samson started a Rambo-like solitary war against the Philistines.  The Philistines didn’t know how to stop him through force, but they identified his weakness was beautiful women.  So they sent a princess, Delilah, to him.  She tricked him into falling in love with her, and she got him to reveal that his strength depended upon his hair not being cut.  She then cut his hair, he lost his strength and was captured and blinded.  The Philistines then proceeded to crush the Israelite rebellion.  Samson then went to work as a slave in the Philistine iron mines, where he labored and regained his strength.  At a party celebrating the Philistine victory, they brought Samson and tied him to some pillars to show off as a prize of war.  Samson, though blind, requested God’s blessings for strength again and he tore the pillars down causing the entire temple to collapse, killing all of the Philistine noble court.  This then turned the tide of the war and the Israelites were free of the Philistine occupation.

As a Kadampa, what does this story teach me about the Dharma?

  1. When we are confronting suffering, it is good to draw the connection between our suffering and our own past wrong deeds.  The Israelites felt that the suffering of the Philistine occupation was God punishing them for their wrong deeds. The conclusion of this view is to accept the suffering as atonement and to redouble one’s efforts to follow moral discipline.  While in Kadampa terms we would never say that Buddha’s punish us for our wrong deeds, we would say that our past wrong deeds are the cause of all of our own present suffering.  This brings us to the same conclusion of the need to purify and redouble our efforts at moral discipline.
  2. Holy beings have the power to transform even our own uncontrolled delusions into something useful if we never abandon our reliance.  This is actually a very profound point which can easily be misunderstood.  Samson had three main minds:  faith in God, lust for women and a burning desire for revenge.  The latter two are obviously deluded minds.  But because he had faith, and the people of Israel had faith in him and God, God was able to channel Samson’s uncontrolled deluded actions skilfully towards a higher good of freeing the Israelites from oppression.  Thus, God was able to take even the impure and contaminated and use it for good because the power of faith of all those involved was greater than the delusions.  In exactly the same way, we are still deluded beings.  Even if we are still highly deluded beings, uncontrolledly forced to follow their deceptive advice, if we rely sincerely upon Dorje Shugden he can transform even our negative karma and delusions into our spiritual path – such is his power!  Our negative karma may ripen, but our faith opens our mind to view our suffering with wisdom and therefore learn spiritual lessons.  Our delusions may push us to engage in all sorts of stupid, deluded actions, but through our reliance on Dorje Shugden the mess that emerges from our wrong actions will still be what is perfect for our own and other’s swiftest possible enlightenment.  Disasters may strike us due to our own deluded and negative actions, but through the power of the Wisdom Buddha Dorje Shugden, he can transform these disasters into a perfect condition for our enlightenment.  We may not realize how at first, but over time it will become revealed to us how our past disasters were in fact our greatest blessings.  It will be revealed to us how our own past mistakes are our greatest teachers.  This does not mean delusions and negativities are good and are not to be abandoned, rather it means even if we are still deluded and negative, if we nonetheless maintain our faith the holy beings have the power to keep us moving forward on the path.  Such is their power.
  3. The Israelites always believed in a messiah, somebody who could come and deliver them from their suffering and oppression.  They believed this while under Philistine occupation, they believed Samson was sent to deliver them.  They believed that with Jesus as well.  As a Kadampa, how can we understand this?  We can understand this through faith in the laws of karma.  If you believe in a messiah, then you realize he will only come if you merit him coming through your atoning for your wrong deeds and by training in virtuous deeds.  By purifying and practicing moral discipline in this way, you create the karmic causes for a higher rebirth free from oppression and gross forms of suffering.  Higher rebirth does not just happen when one dies and is reborn, but it can happen many times even within a single human life.  So by believing in a messiah and acting accordingly, you create causes for the situation to change and for you to become more free.  Sometimes this may take many generations as the society as a whole accumulates the collective karma for their situation to change, but if people perservere with this course it is just a question of time before the “messiah” will come (will karmically appear).  The messiah might not always be a person and the messiah may not always liberate us in the way we think, but the effect will definitely be accomplished.  This is true due to the infallibility of the laws of karma.  Understanding this, when we find ourselves in a very difficult or unfree situation, if we strongly believe in the “messiah” of pure deeds, we will be delivered from bondage.  It is guaranteed!

My Kadampa understanding of the Bible: The story of Jerimiah

Kadampa Ryan My Kadampa understanding of the Bible

The story of Jerimiah takes place several hundred years after the story of Solomon.  He was the son of a high priest in Jerusalem.  Things had become very degenerate since Solomon.  When he was a child, God came to him in a dream and said he would be a prophet.  When he got older and was about to become a priest himself, he decided he wanted to marry.  But the king ordered her family into slavery because they failed to pay a debt.  God then came to him again and had him say in front of the temple that if people did not mend their ways, God would pass his judgment.  The king of Jerusalem heard this, Jerimiah’s father turned his back on him and Jerimiah left the city so that he could go marry the woman he loved.  God came to him in the desert and told him that he shall not marry nor have kids, but instead he should return to Jerusalem and tell the king it was not too late to repent, but if he failed to do so Babylon would come and destroy the city.  When Babylon came, the old king died, and his son was given up to the king of Babylon to save the city and a new king was crowned who was to pay tribute to Babylon.  Later the new king changed his mind and said he would not pay the tribute thinking he could form an alliance with the Egyptians.  God then had Jerimiah tell the new king that his alliance would fail and the city would be attacked, but to save the city and the people everyone should surrender to Babylon.  The king and his general refused this, threw Jerimiah in prison but then the alliance with the Egyptians failed and Babylon came and attacked again just as Jerimiah had predicted.  The king then asked what he could so, and Jerimiah said it was too late, he would become a slave.  Jerusalem fell, the city burned, and the king and his family were taken to Babylon where all but the king were killed.  The king was blinded.  Knowing of Jerimiah’s deeds, the king of Babylon ordered him freed, and Jerimiah predicted that the temple would eventually be rebuilt, both in Jerusalem and in men’s hearts.

As a Kadampa, what can I learn from this story?

  1. Once again, this theme of being a prophet comes up.  We need to learn how to open up lines of internal communication between ourselves and our Spiritual Guide.  Through training in faith, pure motivation and emptiness we can do this.  We need perfectly reliable guidance in every moment of our life, and with training we can have it.  Sometimes, we will be called to do absolutely crazy things (like returning to Jerusalem to tell the king he is doomed…), but if we have faith and rely sincerely we can accomplish any spiritual task given to us.  Nowadays, we don’t do things that are conventionally crazy, but we can nonetheless be inspired by the stories of the prophets and their willingness to follow the directions of God even though it meant great loss.
  2. If our actions are negative, it is just a question of time before doom will strike.  The reason why Jerusalem was destroyed was due to the collective karma of the beings who inhabited it.  Because they lost their moral discipline, they lost their refuge and therefore became subject to attack.
  3. Once negative karma has begun to ripen, the best thing to do is accept it and transform it.  Of course it is best to purify negative karma before it has ripened, but once it has there is nothing that can be done.  The negative karma of having Jersalem destroyed was activated and set in motion.  Jerimiah encouraged everyone to accept their fate and surrender to it because if they fought, they would be killed.  Within the Dharma, in every situation either we have some control or we don’t.  If we have some control, we should change things.  If we do not, then we should accept/transform.
  4. Sometimes things need to be destroyed in order to be rebuilt anew.  People had lost their way and it had reached the point where there was no reforming them.  In such a situation, it is better to just scrap everything and rebuild anew.  This may sometimes happen in our spiritual life where everything about the life we have is destroyed, but this frees things up for a new life to start anew.  This happens during our lives, and it happens as we pass from one life to the next.  We should accept this when it happens and focus on looking forward to building a new, better world.