Tonight,
we did a Guru Rinpoche prayer. After which, Acho Rinpoche mentioned that Dharma
Brother Zhong just asked him many questions related to the practice. The last
question raised by Zhong was indeed a very good one: how should one practise the
teachings after becoming a Buddhist？Acho Rinpoche advised that a Buddhist should practise
the Three Teachings viz. precepts, meditation and wisdom. Minimally, a Buddhist
must abide strictly by the Five Precepts and do good. The Five Precepts include
no stealing, no sexual misconduct, no excessive drinking of alcohol (drunk), no
lying and no killing; a Buddhist must not transgress any of the said precepts. It
is indeed difficult for anyone to eradicate his negative propensities formed after
the numerous lifetimes. However, a Buddhist must henceforth resolve to
gradually eradicate his negative propensities no matter how long it would take.
For a person who has not attained the state of full enlightenment, he will continue
to face the issues of his negative propensities; even a renowned teacher is not
spared of this dilemma. Grand Master advised his students not to pick on his
shortcomings but should learn his positive values instead. In addition to the
need to abide by the precepts, a Buddhist should also do all actions that will
bring benefit to others.
A
Buddhist should also practise the Six Perfections (offering, discipline,
tolerance, diligence, meditation and wisdom). Offering includes the offering of
teachings, offering of wealth and offering of fearlessness. When one comes
across a good teaching such as the Lotus Sutra, he should share the teachings with
others; this is considered an offering of the teachings. Building temples,
printing the teachings and helping the poor are considered the offering of
wealth. When one helps to dispel the sense of fear in others and even
sacrifices himself to protect others, is considered making offering of
fearlessness. A person who is rich in this life must have offered his wealth to
help others in his past life; such action of kindness would have helped him earn
the good merits for this life. A person who is poor in this life had obviously
not offered his wealth to help others in his past life; such action lacking in
kindness would not have helped him earn any merit for this life. Therefore, a
poor person should try his best to offer his wealth to help others in this
life, so that he will earn his merits and become a rich person in his next
life. A Buddha is also known as “The Holy One Who Has Perfected The Two Full
Accomplishments”, which refers to his full accomplishment of merits and wisdom.
Tolerance is another crucial practice of the Six Perfections. Anyone living in
this world must tolerate all the adversities in life including the nagging of
his wife and criticism of others etc. When
one learns to tolerate an adversity in life, he is likely to feel being treated
unfairly while trying very hard not be carried away by his negative emotions;
not losing one’s head is a commendable achievement. However, the ultimate
teaching of tolerance actually requires a person to not feel emotional at all
in the face of adversity. Diligence means doing one’s spiritual practice with
vigor. Meditation is just part of the spiritual practice. Finally, our innate
wisdom will naturally unfold through the practice of meditation.
Acho
Rinpoche also mentioned two cases of dispute which occurred in the Buddhist
circle recently. The first case is related to a Tibetan Buddhist teacher who lives
in the west, who is being accused by his westerner students for his misconducts.
The second case is related to a successor of a Buddhist sect in Taiwan. The
Tibetan Buddhist teacher being mentioned in the first case has been teaching in
the west for about 30 years by now, who has established more than 100 seats
worldwide and who has tens of thousands of westerner students. However, he was
being accused by his closed disciples for his misconducts such as beating up his
students and sexually assaulting his female students. His students consulted
H.H Dalai Lama on how should this problem be handled. H.H Dalai Lama told the
students that although this teacher is a good friend of his but the latter has
indeed misbehaved. Initially, this teacher offered to enter a retreat and
stopped his teachings. However, he was finally forced to fully relinquish his
role as the spiritual director of all the seats worldwide. The second case is
related to a Taiwanese Buddhist sect which is quite huge in size. Many of its
ordained and layman students attended the teachings of H.H Dalai Lama in the
past on the Lamrim (“Stages of the Path” by Master Tsongkapa). However, before
the late abbot of this Taiwanese Buddhist sect passed away, he appointed a
Chinese female layman Buddhist to be his successor as he believed that she is
the reincarnation of Master Khedrup Gelek Pelzang. This lady has been leading the ordained community
of the sect since then, which is a clear violation of a rule set by Sakyamuni
Buddha in the past. She is also being accused of having wrongful affair with a
novice monk in her sect. Some of the students of this sect consulted H.H Dalai
Lama on whether it is wrong for a lady to lead an ordained community, and they
also complained about her other wrongful actions. Similarly, H.H Dalai Lama advised
the students to publicly expose the wrongful acts of a Buddhist teacher, in
order to protect the true teachings of the Buddha. Acho Rinpoche supports the rule
set by Sakyamuni Buddha that a layman Buddhist must not lead an ordained
community. However, Acho Rinpoche disagrees with the view that a female cannot
be a spiritual leader (this is a common view held by most of the traditional Buddhist
sects that belittle the spiritual capacity and attainment of a female
practitioner) because historically, there are indeed great adepts among the
female practitioners.
Acho
Rinpoche said that there are all sorts of news being circulated on the
Internet, with true facts and fake news mixed together, causing a lot of
confusions to the readers. A practitioner will need to differentiate between
the truth and fake news using his wisdom, to avoid being misled into the wrong
paths; this is indeed a sad situation of the current age of degeneration. In
short, the most crucial point is just that a practitioner must abide by the
precepts strictly and do his daily spiritual practice with vigor.
Reported by Sun-moon KFS on 12-8-2017 @Singapore
