Tonight, we did a Guru Rinpoche Prayer under the
guidance of Acho Rinpoche. After which, he shared an article posted by Dzongsar
Jamyang Khyentse Rinpoche (Dzongsar Rinpoche) on the Internet. Dzongsar Rinpoche
has set up many Buddhist Academies in India, Bhutan and Tibet which have
produced more than one thousand ordained Buddhists today. However, he is now
wondering if these students are Budddhist practitioners or mere scholars?
Besides, did they learn the true Buddhadharma? Most of these students could
recite the various sutras without referring to the books, and there are about
one hundred Khenpos among them (Buddhist scholars) who are qualified abbot
candidates for the various monasteries and qualified teachers for
the various Buddhist sects. He could not help but asked himself, “How many of
these Khenpos have actually attained the state of realization?” According to
his observations, many of these students have become very egoistic! In fact, many
of the ordained ones, scholars and Khenpos have developed a big ego as they pride
themselves as scholars who are knowledgeable of the teachings. They have lost their most genuine
and original faith in the teachings. They even belittle the various spiritual
practices including the chanting of mantra, meditation, circumambulation of
stupas, construction of stupas etc., by saying “Well, all such things are just
emptiness, we don’t need to do those.” They
are very fond of making such remarks. Next, Dzongsar Rinpoche used an analogy
to explain what he meant by a scholarly study. He said, a person who has never visited
the Bodhigaya in India (where Sakyamuni Buddha attained his enlightenment) will
study the map first but he may not be keen to go there personally. On the
contrary, there are others who thought that they had no time to study the map and
simply decided to just buy an air ticket and head straight to Bodhigaya! The Khenpos
have learnt about the teaching on emptiness but they may not be keen to visit
Bodhigaya personally, whereas others simply embark on the journey that might be
full of challenges but will certainly reach the destination eventually.
Acho Rinpoche
said that there are only two possible ways of learning the Buddhadharma: learning
through practice and learning through study. Learning through practice includes
going into a retreat for an intensive training or practising in our daily lives.
One who merely studies the teachings in a Buddhist Academy is just learning through
study. A person who does not learn the basic teachings might go astray because
the spiritual path is indeed full of challenges. However, a person who learns
too much of the teachings but does not apply them in his practice will never be
able to break free of the Six Realms of Cyclic Existence. He came across Khenpos
who appeared panic when faced with challenges, due to the lack of real practice.
There are also people who had visions of the spiritual deities and auras during
their practice but could not understand the reason of such experience and might
go astray too. Recently, he saw a video footage on the Internet of a Taiwanese
nun appearing on TV, criticizing other spiritual communities of their
behaviors. She sounded hostile, arrogant and impatient. This is a sign of one
knowing too much of the teachings in theory but fails to tame his own monkey
mind. Acho Rincpohe said, if he must choose between practice and study, he would
rather choose the former – practice! In the past, the Nyingma and Kagyud sects placed
greater emphasis on the need for practice than study. However, recently there
seems to be a change in their emphasis that they began to place a greater
emphasis on the study of the teachings like the Gelug, stressing on the need to
study the five main doctrines too. He opined that when a person over emphasizes
on the study of the theoretical aspect of the Buddhadharma, he will perpetually
be stranded in the realm of conceptual thinking and will never be able to
attain the state of enlightenment.
Finally,
we ended our prayer by reciting the names of the Buddhas under the guidance of
Acho Rinpoche, and dedicated the merits to all sentient beings - may all
sentient beings be happy, free of sufferings and attain enlightenment one day.
Reported by Sun Moon KFS on 28-9-2017 @Singapore
