Tonight, we did a Guru
Rinpoche Practice under the guidance of Acho Rinpoche. After which, he
reiterated the two methods of Buddhist practice: practice and study. To layman
Buddhists like us, we can’t afford to go into a long-term retreat for intensive
training but we can do our daily practice as a householder. He also mentioned a
young layman Buddhist in Taiwan who became an ordained monk since young, who
later left for India to study under the guidance of the 17th Karmapa
for 6 years. He did very well in his debates in Tibetan Buddhism and was well
regarded by H.H Karmapa as one of the best. Later, he went to Japan and learnt the
Japanese Vajrayana Buddhism in Koyasan, and earned himself the qualification of
an Achraya. So, he has gone through an illustrious training on Buddhism ranging
from Theravada, Mahayana, Tibetan Buddhism to Japanese Vajrayana Buddhism. He is
well learnt and endowed with great memory. H.H Karmapa approves his
qualification as a Buddhist teacher who can start teaching others. He has also
read a lot of Buddhist doctrines translated from Pali to Chinese, some of which
have yet to be translated into Tibetan language. When he took part in the debates
with other Tibetan lamas, he would often make them dumbfounded when he drew his
citations from these doctrines which did not exist in Tibetan Buddhism. He is
now planning to translate these doctrines into Tibetan language for the benefit
of the Tibetan Buddhists, as he is fluent in Tibetan.
Acho Rinpoche has
watched a few video clips that he posted on the Internet. From these clips, it
was quite clear that those who emphasize too much on doing scholarly study on
Buddhism face the dilemma of being misguided by the superficial meaning of
words. For instance, someone asked him about his view on homosexuality. He did
not think that homosexuality was a transgression of precept. For he opined that
when Sakyamuni Buddha was about passing into Nirvana, he told Ananda that in
future, all Buddhists should regard the precept as their teacher; however, some
of the precepts could be forgone. At that juncture, Ananda did not seek
clarification from the Buddha on which precepts could be forgone and what would
the bottomline be. Later, Mahakasyapa facilitated a conference involving may
fellow students to study this issue and finally decided that none of the
precepts told by Sakyamuni Buddha in the past could be eliminated; however, any
precept not being mentioned by the Buddha in the past must not be included either.
Acho Rinpoche cited an example of the misuse of marijuana which did not exist
during the time of Sakyamuni Buddha. Does it mean that the misuse of marijuana
and drugs should not be included as part of the precept now? Although Nagarjuna
also advocated a few other precepts which were not being mentioned by Sakyamuni
Buddha during his time, they were simply ignored by this Taiwanese Buddhist because
he said that only the words of the Buddha count. Someone else asked him about a
sutra related to the vows of Ksitigarbha Bodhisattva and he did not seem to think
that this sutra was a teaching given by Sakyamuni Buddha personally, and
regarded it as one of those controversial issues. His way of explanations on
the various Buddhist doctrines was indeed not quite right and worrying.
Acho Rinpoche explained
that there are indeed arguments between the Theravada Buddhism and Mahayana
Buddhism, for the former does not recognize the authenticity of the Mahayana
Sutras as being taught personally by Sakyamuni Buddha. This is indeed a problem
when one emphasizes too much on his scholarly study on Buddhism and fails to attain
the true state of realization through practice, which goes beyond the superficial
meaning of words. So what if a person is the best debater? When he is facing
his final moment in life, all these literatures that he has read in the past
will only drag him back into the Six Realms of Cyclic Existence if he is just
an average practitioner. When a person is unable to fully comprehend the
various teachings and fails to understand the true meaning expounded by
Sakyamuni Buddha beyond words, he will end up sharing his weird ideas with
others which are not the true teachings of the Buddha. Therefore, Acho Rinpoche
advised us that it is suffice for a practitioner to learn the primary teachings
and guiding principles initially, such as the core teachings expounded in the
Heart Sutra and the Diamond Sutra, but the next important step is for us to do
the practice. Practice is the only way to help us attain realization in our
daily life.
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 7-10-2017 @Singapore
