Bodhisattvacharyavatara: Chapter VI, Patience – verse 125; reflectionary

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Bodhisattvacharyavatara by Acharya Śāntideva

Chapter VI– verse 125

Transglomeration: From now on, as means of delighting all Tathāgatas, I shall make of myself the loyal and life-devoted servant to all beings of the world.   Let these beings walk all over me, let them kick me in the head, but even at the risk of dying – may the Guardians of the World rejoice – I shall not retaliate!

~~~ “BCA” ~~~

V. 124 confession for harm caused to Buddhas by harming sentient beings
↑ Stitch ↓
V. 125 confession follow-through: let them do anything to me, I will be the servant of the world

Text: deliberation over the words to use for (a) ‘pleasing/satisfying’ the Buddhas, of making myself the (b) ‘slave/servant’ of the world; I need to get to the intention of what these references mean otherwise it is going to be too easy to fall into a perverse sadomasochistic relationship here, which I am sure is not healthy; also (c) ‘the crowd’ of sentient beings, and also does the ‘crowd’ (d) put the foot on my head and break it and/or kill me, (is this ‘foot on the head’ as in the ultimate show of disrespect)? … Sanskrit: (a) ‘to please or satisfy’ (the Buddhas, (b) ‘servitude’ to the world, (c) ‘mass, multitude’ as in all beings, (d) ‘foot on my head’ – can’t find any explicit reference to killing, possibly the reference to ‘foot on the head’ is indicative of ‘all sorts of violent behaviour including up to …’, ‘foot on the head’ would be culturally and suggestively evocative of the ultimate violence rather like ‘taking a spade to the head’

Personal: and have you noticed, Mark, that this Vow requires that you benefit all beings even if they kick you in the head and kill you and far, far, far from benefitting them all with the hope that they’ll recognise what a visionary teacher you were or what jaw-dropping writer you may have been; this Vow never was, and certainly shouldn’t be some perverse mode of ‘me, me, me’; you have touched the minds of whosoever’s mind was to be touched in teaching quite independent of whether you had a wonderful mark-book or a cognitive infrastructure of lesson-construction or not; and you have moved whosoever’s mind’s eye was to be moved in your poetry quite independent of how many hit you have got on your blog; stop getting in the way of yourself, so much – let the benefit flow through you, despite ‘me’

Reflection: so this is like an echo/reflection of the Bodhisattva Vow established in chapter 3 but built upon the realisation, this time, that quite despite whatever nice intentions we may have had beforehand, we have harmed and damaged other beings through our self-centered behaviour and that, from this moment onwards, we will stop it (in order to fulfil this Vow); the avowal to go as far as letting people put their foot on my face or kill me doesn’t mean I’ll invite people to do that, but that beings may harm me back (as they will because of the karmic debt I have left with them through my previous behaviour) and that I would not retaliate even if they showed me the ultimate disrespect or killed me: this comes towards the end of the long chapter on the discussion of the minutiae of patience, what is therefore left implicit in this verse is … ‘I will not retaliate’ to this abuse and killing for all of the reasonings that this chapter has been exploring; this is not scary stuff, this is not sadomasochistic stuff, this is the inherent grandeur of the Vow that has been taken, this is how far a Bodhisattva is prepared to take it, either in actuality or aspiration … ‘may it increase infinitely’

Practice: bottom-line: ‘do what thou wilt’ to me, I will (use all of my mulched wisdom about how things work to make sure I do) not retaliate

Bodhisattvacharyavatara: Chapter VI, Patience – verse 127; reflectionary

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Bodhisattvacharyavatara by Acharya Śāntideva

Chapter VI– verse 127

Transglomeration: It is just this that both honours and delights the Tathāgatas, it is just this that also wins fulfilment of my own true purpose, it is just this that ends the suffering in the world, therefore it is just this which is my life-long Vow and practice.

~~~ “BCA” ~~~

V. 126 because Buddhas see the nature of beings as themselves
↑ Stitch ↓
V. 127 serving beings serves Buddhas serves my own ends ending suffering = my Vow & practice

Text: Sanskrit has this verse as ‘my Vow’; Tibetan has it as ‘I shall always practise it’ – they are saying the same thing, Sanskrit names it from the point of view of the result (the Vow – vrata), Tibetan describes it from the point of view of maintaining the Vow (what else do you do with vows in order for it to be named the Vow you have taken…?)

Abstract: being the benefitting of beings by recognising and responding to their true nature as being identical with the compassion of the Buddhas … pleases the Buddhas, source of infinite personal virtue, dispels the suffering of the world

Reflection: Geshe Kelsang makes it explicit (in Meaningful to Behold), but what is otherwise referred to as a ‘Vow’ or ‘my Practice’ is actually keeping patience with beings and holding them as the same nature as the Buddhas in compassion, which is the other side of the coin of practising patience

Embroidery: is this Vow different from the Bodhichitta Vow taken in chapter 3: no, this is the very same Vow, but that the practice of patience, now, has enhanced and deepened it; the Perfections in general are the practice of that self-same Vow (‘… may I become a fully Enlightened Buddha in order to benefit all migrating beings’), which practice implements and deepens the Vow, each in their particular ways (giving, discipline etc.); the practice of patience is based both on developing the understanding that everything is subject to causes and conditions (and therefore there is no basis on which to get angry – so this stops anger) and (and this makes it the practice of the Perfection of Patience) realising the nature of sentient beings is that they are embraced by the compassion of the Buddhas; sentient beings are not just subject to causes and conditions rendering them like phantoms (cf. verse 31) and that’s all they are; they are also sentient, they want happiness and do not want suffering (a glimmer of that ultimate true nature of theirs (of ours) which is stuck in conditionality) and whose ultimately empty nature is infused with the compassion of the Buddhas; so they are more than phantom nuisances who just keep pushing my buttons and stop me practising patience, damn them, there is much more to them than this; and this ‘infusion’ is not some boon or grace bestowed from benevolent ones who have chosen to bestow it (maybe on some, maybe not on others … is it a punishment if I don’t get this infusion …?), rather it cannot not be infused, the same as water being poured into a body of water will become water without any transformation (of the nature) of either the water added or the body of water to which it was added; therefore the recognition of the empty-and-compassion-infused nature of sentient beings (a wisdom) and the response to that recognition (by deepening one’s Vow through determining to benefit beings according to this empty-and-compassion-infused nature, rather than vie with them as rivals to my self-grasping/cherishing nature) like water pouring into water (a method) is dissolving that trichotomy, benefitting both myself and others; this is the Bodhichitta Vow; with this recognition (of beings’ and Buddhas’ nature) and commitment to see them and myself as of the same nature, I and all beings become like water in water and the Bodhichitta that has taken birth, increases infinitely

Determination: therefore “just this” will be my Vow and practice, certainly for the rest of this life, and hopefully with enough momentum for future existences too

Bodhisattvacharyavatara: Chapter VI, Patience – verse 31; reflectionary

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Bodhisattvacharyavatara by Acharya Śāntideva

Chapter VI– verse 31

Transglomeration: Thus, everything that happens is under influence of, subject to and governed by something else, and even those other governing factors, powers, causes, influences on which they are dependent are not autonomous: they are not self-controlled, they are not self-caused.   So, having understood this correctly, why, and how, could I get angry at things – people, the way things are, events, attitudes – that, like automatons, do not initiate activity themselves and move about like magical apparitions and phantoms.

~~~ “BCA” ~~~

V. 27-30 – there is no real universe or Self towards which to get angry
↑ Embroidery↓
V. 31 – everything is like an illusion – there is no worthy object of anger

Reflection: … because nothing (world or person) is self-sufficient in this (above-shown) way, there is nothing ‘solid’ to which to react, it all (all appearances, good or bad, in all their variety, in all their sight, sound, smell, taste, feel), are just myriad conjunctions and crossroads of a million shifting threads of causation like mist in the wind; Geshe Kelsang has emphasised, in his heading in Meaningful to Behold, that this verse is about curbing anger towards beings whereas all other translations have it as curbing anger towards all phenomena (although nevertheless-nevertheless it does mention in verse 22 that we don’t get angry with ‘things’ but usually only people – so Geshe-la’s bevel, here, is just a thread loop – up and over to be plainly seen – a reminder of what the whole sense of these verses is about: curbing anger … wherever it is directed);

Embroidery: the power of verse 31 would not be there if there hadn’t been a previous exploration that maybe there are some things which are not caused to which we can direct our anger; having cleared the mind that it is even possible for something un-caused to exist, then … the fact that things appear to exist that harm us is lessened by the fact that they must be illusory appearances, they cannot be truly existent, they cannot be true threats;

Reflection: easy to get attached to the idea that they are illusory/like phantoms, and let the conclusion rest there, thinking that all attacks and difficulties are wafting all about you and are insubstantial like ghosts passing through walls, passing through you: if you just stay with this idea, there is a tendency to think that the walls through which they pass are real, that the ‘you’ through which they pass is real; there is more to this verse than that, it is emphasising both that all things are dependent-arisings and that this fluid determinacy makes them ‘like’ phantoms (but doesn’t make them ‘transparent’ in an otherwise solid universe)

Practice: holding the understanding (Geshe Kelsang, ‘…remember to look at things in this light…’, Pema Chodron, ‘… see the absurdity…’), and therefore the experience of the understanding, that there is nothing (real) to get angry at …

Bodhisattvacharyavatara: Chapter VI, Patience – verses 28-29; reflectionary

Bodhisattvacharyavatara by Acharya Śāntideva

Chapter VI– verses 29-30

Transglomeration: [29] If the Self is innate and static (as the Naiyāyika assert) it is therefore not sentient and thereby quite clearly and evidently cannot perform actions just as space cannot perform action – how could it?   And even when in proximity with – even if surrounded by – causes and conditions, how could that whose nature is unchanging do anything, how could it connect with causes and conditions to act?   [30] And even if it could connect with causes and conditions to bring about an act, at the time of the (connecting) action, in what way could the Self have participated in, or responded to, the act when, both at the time and afterwards, it remains as it was before?   In what sense could it be said that anything happened?   And even if it were conceived that the Self had had the action (that this condition had made the Self act), then which of the two, the condition or the Self, caused the other to connect, how could the two have become related (when the Self is held to be innate and static)?

~~~ “BCA” ~~~

V. 27-28 – refutation that there is a real universe in which bad stuff happens
↑ Stitch ↓
V. 29-30 – refuting that there is a Self (in that universe) towards which to get angry

 

Reflection: a stand-alone self would not act (like sky) it would be un-transitive, it would not be able to pervade on other things, nor could other things affect it; a stand-alone self and Other is un-relationship-able, is un-causal, is impossible; if the action is in the stand-alone self, then is there causality within the permanent, self-existing self, and, if so, does the self exist prior to the action (in which case it would change once the action was activated, and is therefore not permanent) or does the action exist prior to the self (in which case where is the self when ‘acting’, like a flower in space), if the action and self exist simultaneously then the action is always acting (but where is there an ever-acting activity as an example); … therefore there is no basis anywhere on which to legitimately become angry

Reflection: so the whole of these verses is exploring how to connect ‘act’ with (a permanent, non-changing) ‘Self’: 29ab: if ‘Self’ is permanent it cannot ‘act’; 29cd: if you put ‘act’ and ‘Self’ together, the Self cannot have (connection with) it (because it is unchanging); 30ab: what sense would there be if an ‘act’ acted on a ‘Self’ but the Self didn’t change, it remained as it was before; 30cd: how could the ‘Self’ have an ‘act’ (being unchanging), how could an ‘act’ have a ‘Self’ to en–act it; this analysis is particularising the mutual incompatibility of ‘act’ and ‘Self’ – to act is to move from a state of not-doing to doing, an immutable Self would not move from one state to another and still be immutable; soaking in to this mutual incompatibility would significantly dissipate the, what could become quite a visceral, confabulation of ‘act’ and ‘Self’ which fuels the villains of our lives – an inherently existent enemy is just simply not there to get angry with, it is just not there, it couldn’t have been before, no matter how much I cry ‘how dare you’, and it cannot be so in the future, no matter how clever and scheming my paranoia would have it be; it just cannot be; it is beyond ‘not logical’ it is beyond possible, it is beyond even theoretically possible; it just isn’t

Reflection: there is no innately bad or wrong person/being/self/enemy that would be the justifiable object of my anger or resentment; build it up as much as I want, spend my life loathing something which is My Adversary, it doesn’t make something which just does not exist, exist any the more – there is no Bogeyman, no Focus-of-my-Striving-Anger, no Nemesis who will always arise to confound my being, no Ready-Made and Implacable Demon against whom I cannot gain ground: it just isn’t there, it just isn’t possible, there is only my wild and flailing anger …

Reflection: … and can I even find a Bogeyman in my experience, in my life; even Thatcher thought she was made of iron and acted so in her own cage, even Blair was spun by his own spin into his sticky web, even Trump just practises his own stupid unaware that he has a conical hat on his head, even Hitler just had low self-esteem, even my Dad was weak-willed and influence-able; I’m going to have to go to fiction to find an innately existing Bogeyman and when I find it, it’ll be unconvincing, without motive, just ‘doing’ evil for … no reason …

Reflection: even to try to visualise it – prakṛti and Self – to try over these arguments, brings up some difficulties; try to imagine a self-existent primal ‘stuff’ – I just come up with a big block of stuff, featureless, just there, floating in space, unconnected with anything else; and already I have problems: I can’t even ask ‘where’ it comes from, ‘when’ it got here, ‘what’ was there before it, ‘what’ it is made of, ‘why’ it is there, ‘what’ it is doing there, all these questions are inadmissible to a self-existent, unchanging … something (see, it’s not even a phenomenon, in order to ‘be’ ‘some’ ‘thing’ it would have to ‘stand out’ from ‘nothingness’ or not-being-ness, and in order to do that it would have to have been caused to do so, and if it were caused to do so, then it would not be self-existent and unchanging); therefore I cannot even conceive it to exist because doing so would be to impute observable features or qualities onto it which it cannot by nature have; therefore even to postulate that it exists confounds its own nature – so it either doesn’t exist because the very conception of its existence would deny its own nature, or it doesn’t exist because existence is a mode of being in which it can have no part or contact; either way, it doesn’t exist … so certainly you cannot hold it responsible to you for the bad things happening in your life – no wonder there is just the receding echo of your own shouting when you demand a self-existent God to account for the evil in life; if I try to imagine a Self that is impermanent and eternal, I start off with some vague being of light which floats in space, but then I think it has eyes and a head which makes it too adventitious (it sees … it thinks?) so then … I end up with a pillar of stone, featureless, no personality, no action, much like prakṛti, but not so big … and neither ‘in’ prakṛti nor in any relation to it – and this is the object of my ultimate anger, this is my life-nemesis, the one I would raze a universe to defeat … I wanted a bogeyman; there is nothing ultimate to be angry with …

Bodhisattvacharyavatara: Chapter VI, Patience – verse 25; reflectionary

Bodhisattvacharyavatara by Acharya Śāntideva

Chapter VI– verses 22-23

Transglomeration: Whatever offends, is faulty, makes mistakes, has shortcomings, transgresses, and whoever commits misdeeds or evil, whoever acts negatively, errs or commits crimes, in whatever various and diverse ways, all of these arise through the force of implacable causes and conditions and do not operate under their own power, nor do they just happen on their own, spontaneously or self-directed; independence is not known.

~~~ “BCA” ~~~

Reflection: nothing happens by itself; nothing is evil in itself, everything just reacts to conditions; this is a wondrous verse; this applies to all mistakes, all degenerations, all faults, it makes these things easier to be patient with because they do not obviously act by agent, they just happen, there is no one to blame; it applies to actions of creatures (a bit more difficult to be patient with because there is the possibility that the damage might have been avoidable, ‘it might not have been’, ‘the creature needn’t have acted as it did, but, really, the tendency to fear, and react to it, is a stronger impulse); it applies to all (seemingly) wilful actions of people, that people seem to be able to choose what they say and do and can therefore be held accountable for what they choose (they could have chosen otherwise – therefore it is very easy to bear judgement on others and have a strong sense of righteousness about that judgement, therefore the anger can be strong and atrocious), but the force of the verse is that, nevertheless, even the most ‘evil’ are subject to the most complicated macro- and micro- conditions of their/our own making;

Reflection: this observation (everything is caused and conditioned) muddies things up – everything happens because of causes and conditions, everything is just so much more complicated and webbed ‘behind’ the event than just the happening of the event itself; whereas a quick judgement, a quick clearing out of all the complicating considerations (in fact a snap-ignoring of all the complicating considerations), makes it all so much clearer and straight-forward to act with anger; considering the muddy web takes so much time and never arrives back at a beginning point from which to start assessment or reaction – making a snap-judgement makes immediate action (or re-action) possible; anger is just lazy, anger can’t be bothered with all this consideration because itjustneedstoact in order to preserve its own sense of identity and worth, especially as an unhappy state of mind was making it feel unsteady and worthless in the first place; and anger is so quick, like a flick of a switch, almost before the echo of the event has had a chance to die down, someone skilled at dropping-all-else-to-be-angry can be in a state of full-blown anger: judged, raged, threat and punishment already delivered … wh’; it is so quick, and makes life so clear; therefore, abstaining from anger requires a lot of slowing down so that that switch isn’t just flicked without thought, and it requires taking the much bigger picture into consideration, which requires that your precious and squeamish self not be so afore-committed to any situation that requires any sort of self-defence or damage-limitation on its behalf – slow and steady; and you don’t need to know all of the intricacy of each web that leads up to each bark, you just need to know, on the moment, that there ‘are reasons’ for why whatever-is-happening is happening … bigger picture, karma, don’t join in, don’t get in the way, but then, don’t flinch away from it, don’t be callous, care and say “I’m sorry” (it’s come to this)

Practice: this leaves a world barren of enemies and evil, a world in which there is nothing to blame, but only the realisation that nothing and nobody is in control of itself; there is just the under- and over-weave of flow – view the world as such, view others as such

Bodhisattvacharyavatara: Chapter VI, Patience – verses 22-23; reflectionary

Bodhisattvacharyavatara by Acharya Śāntideva

Chapter VI– verses 22-23

Transglomeration: [22] So, I do not get angered and enraged when my body feels out of sorts, such as jaundice of the liver (which is inanimate), even though they are a major source of quite intense sorrow; then, why get angry at those (things which happen to be animate, sentient beings)?   They too are impelled and provoked by circumstance and conditions.   [23] Just as acute pain comes about, although in no way wanted or expected, so anger (and the other damaging kleśas) are strong and quick to arise in beings quite automatically, although equally not desired.

~~~ “BCA” ~~~

Review: the same as for inanimate things; conditions for anger arise including both animate and inanimate things (why get angry at one but not the other – although I personally can get frustrated so much with things that it verges on anger; why not not get angry with either?); get angry with kleśas instead

Text: [23] Sanskrit talks about anger arising unwantedly (in others, established from verse 22), the Tibetan has it as (also) more generally as the kleśas arising unwantedly

Reflection: this begins moving deeper into the problem of anger, firstly by analysing that bad conditions and circumstances just come about, because of circumstances – the hip bone is connected to the thigh bone; there is no intention behind them arising, there is no maliciousness against which to get angry – shit just happens when you’re stepping in it; this is deeper than just putting up with it (because the alternative, anger, is so destructive, as in the last section), this is dispelling that there is anything to get angry about in the first place – things is just what it is, what the great web of circumstance has weaved to be at this moment and at this time – with you at the centre; but it’s people, they got minds, they have intent: no, they have minds, and they have intent, but these minds and the intents that come out of them are too conditioned and circumspect, they don’t just act randomly and independently of any rule or consideration, they are as conditioned as an illness which works its way through a body;

Reflection: it seems these verses are exploring the non-independence of peoples’ intent, it’s putting peoples’ intent on the same level of activation and wilfulness as non-conscious things, like illnesses; it is the believing that people chose to do what they did to hurt us that fuels our anger (as per verse 11 – believing that people chose to do what we didn’t want or chose to hinder what we want), and so these verses are deconstructing this belief that fuels our anger, and dissimilates our phantom presumed-enemies into just the wave and froth of conditioned existence – there’s nothing there to get angry with; stuff, including people getting angry, just happens

History/Biography: why did Śāntideva chose ‘bile’ (translated, also, as ‘liver disease’, ‘jaundice’, understood as one of the humours … according to … Ayurvedic medicine?) as the illustration of something non-conscious which just arises due to causes and conditions: he needed a readily-recognisable-example and an example which clearly establishes something which gives a lot of discomfort and suffering and pain, but which just arises by itself, it doesn’t have the intention to hurt – was there a lot of dysentery or food-poisoning at Nālandā which a lot of his audience will have readily experienced and which, presumably, Śāntideva himself would also have experienced?

Reflection: actually, I think we do get angry with illnesses that happen, as well as the weather, and stubbed toes and pinching doors, but we get angry because it hurts and we weren’t expecting it, and even the most self-involved-and-paranoid person would find it hard to chew out and belittle a door for pinching the finger, to hold a grudge against it, try to undermine it, plan revenge which strikes right at the heart of its sense of identity, that’ll show it; we might get angry at a person for not doing something that they should have been doing with the door which resulted in us getting our finger pinched in it, but we wouldn’t get angry at the door itself – it just wouldn’t make sense because we know, bottom line, the door closed (as it does, you can’t fault that) and our finger was in the way of where the door shuts (for whatever reason, it was just there at that time) and, pinch.   When we acknowledge the facts of what is what, there’s nothing to get angry at; a door can’t not shut over its own hinge, or against the jamb, and still be a door.   And yet we will get angry at people because we hold that they have consciousnesses – they are animate and wilful, they decide to do things – whereas doors do not.   So we do something quite quirky and magical here, we anthropomorphise … humans, by presuming they have intention when they cut across us, and this gives us an ocean of excuse to engage in self-defence, in self-aggrandisation, in loudness, in spite, inspite of the fact that human wilfulness is as much determined and conditioned as a closing door – there is little room for manoeuvre

Practice: see all peoples’ anger (and other kleśas) as arising from conditions only, it’s just ‘stuff’ that makes them act so – this cultivates an understanding; … see everything, whether it affects you or not, as just the weave and flow of cause and conditions, again, an understanding, a perspective on the world, events and people

Bodhisattvacharyavatara: Chapter VI, Patience – verse 123; reflectionary

Bodhisattvacharyavatara by Acharya Śāntideva

Chapter VI– verse 123

Transglomeration: Just as there could be no joy, no alleviation in their mind, for someone being offered whatever sort of exquisite delicacy when their body was completely engulfed in fire, likewise, when beings are in torment, whether I directly perpetrate it or not, there is no joy to be found for the Compassionate Ones.

~~~ “BCA” ~~~

Text: still 4-liner verses in the Sanskrit (started verse 120), still haven’t figured out why this might be

Text: there is some riffing around the word ‘pleasure’ in this verse: no pleasure (for those burning) with objects of pleasure; no pleasure for those Beings of Ultimate Pleasure when beings suffer: no p in p when burning; no p for Ps when suffering

Text: It is only Berzin, so far, who has made this part read ‘there is no way to delight the Compassionate Ones’ (i.e. transitive, one making the Buddhas happy (with ones virtuous deeds etc.) cf. the previous verse) rather than ‘the Compassionate Ones cannot find joy when…’ (passive – suggesting, as phrased, a lack in the Compassionate Ones’ finding skills(!?), even less than the phrasing ‘there is no joy to be found here when …’); I think the transitive inflection fits better with what was established in verse 122, that of the incompatibility of pleasing the Buddhas with formal worship when, at the same time, causing harm to other beings in one’s everyday life

Text: Sanskrit tends to the generalised ‘when beings are in pain’, whereas Tibetan tends to the specific ‘when I give beings pain’: in both cases the point is the same (i.e. Buddhas – the Compassionate Ones, the Ones who have exchanged self-concern completely for other-concern and have exponential-ised that exchange through full realisation of the emptiness of any self of ‘one’ or the ‘other’ to be concerned about, so there is just Compassion – these ones cannot be happy (= there is no happiness to be found) as long as a sentient being is in pain), whether it was me (who is doing the offering/devotion to the Buddhas) who caused their pain or not, it’s just that it is wholly ironic if it is me doing the hurting while I am making worship to the Buddhas to try to better myself; it would be far better if I stopped doing this false worship and sort out my behaviour with other beings, in fact it would be an offering to the Buddhas if I behaved decently and well with all beings (in deed, in speech, in my mind)

Stitch: this an illustration of what was established in verse 122, and more specifically from the phrase ‘and as I bring pain to beings, likewise do I bring pain to the Munis’: and so, in the second half of verse 123, wherein it is shown that the Compassionate Ones can find no joy when beings suffer, it is already read and established that this means if I am all along ‘bringing pain to beings’; the Tibetan bevels this out a little more explicitly in its translation, but it is there clearly if the verses are being read ‘stitched’

Trichotometric embroidery: emphasising, again, that I (’oneself’) cannot leave the state of being sentient to being Enlightened (‘the Buddhas’), (it’s not like joining a club), without incorporating all other beings (‘all beings’) in the transition because the Buddhas are as enveloped in the welfare of all beings as it is possible to be – the heart of being a Buddha is the boundless compassion experienced for the plight of all beings in saṃsāra (heartbreakingly mixed with the realisation of all their lack of inherent being which makes their whole plight so pitiful); the Buddhas don’t just have compassion for ‘oneself’ – it’s not all about just ‘me, me, me’ – they will not be gratified by my self-serving worship of them if I am neglecting the benefit of others; the way of being (‘yāna’) of Bodhichitta is, and can only be, universal (‘Mahā’) or it is, certainly not nothing at all (it’s still far, far more than remaining sentient in saṃsāra), but much less (‘Hīna’) than all

Practice: don’t be self-satisfied with your own spiritual development if it is independent from meeting the needs and happiness of others; my devotion to the Buddha or my study of the Dharma Teachings or my reliance on the Saṅgha mean little if I, at the same time, wreak havoc and discomfort on other beings … reminiscent of the LoJong precept ‘don’t practise with partiality’ …

Practice: and even more specifically, it means not getting worked up about the progress of my spiritual practice, studies and projects at the expense of my responding to the needs and happiness of those to whom I am married, to whom I am a father, with whom I have occasional contact, both near or far: if I am shying away from contact with people because I think I won’t get as much study or reading or mantras in, then I know I’ve gone wrong somewhere – correct it

Bodhisattvacharyavatara: Chapter VI, Patience – verse 122; reflectionary

Bodhisattvacharyavatara by Acharya Śāntideva

Chapter VI– verse 122

Transglomeration: Whenever happiness is found amid the field of beings, the Munis, the All-Knowing Compassionate Ones, instantly know and are happy themselves of it, when they are pained, the Munis are likewise instantly immersed in pain.   And so, as I cultivate happiness in that field, the Munis themselves partake in that very happiness, and as I bring pain to beings, likewise do I bring pain to the Munis.

~~~ “BCA” ~~~

Text: the irony in the twist of the text (whichever words are chosen for ‘harm’/’gladden’): if I x beings, I also x the Buddhas

Text: the Tibetan translation adds in the reference to the ‘field’ (Tib. zhing) of beings (from verse 112) whereas the Sanskrit refers to them as ‘they’ … because the text holds, still, the reference made to the ‘field of sentient beings’ in verse 112; the Tibetan hasn’t added anything in here, it has just refreshed the subject-reference; all of which bevels up that the whole discussion since verse 112 is still and all about this trichotomous relationship between the Buddhas, all beings and oneself

Reflection: the first half of the verse establishes the link in general between the feelings and experiences of sentient beings with the feelings and experiences of the Sages (and that this epithet is used to refer to the Buddhas is emphasising that the experiences of sentient beings are known by the Buddhas, it is not suggested that the Buddhas likewise feel happiness or sadness themselves by proxy – they cannot, they are Enlightened, but they ‘feel’ it because they have totally exchanged self for other so that what beings feel, they feel, and they know it because of their omniscience); the second half completes the point by specifying that if I am to make pain or happiness for sentient beings, then that pain or happiness will be known so well by the Buddhas (the Knowers) that it would be as I if were injuring or pleasing the Buddhas directly because they (the Buddhas) have completely exchanged self for others and … whoever does it to these, the least of my creatures, does it to me

Embroidered Trichotomy: there is a mirroring going on here – what I do, good or bad, to sentient beings, I do to the Buddhas (why: because the Buddhas had exchanged self for others); I (‘oneself’) am wanting to forsake being a sentient being in order to become an Enlightened Being (‘the Buddhas’), but in order to do this I need to exchange my self-cherishing for others (‘all sentient beings’), so in order to ‘escape’ from being a sentient being I need to embrace all sentient beings as my own in order to become an Enlightened Being; I have a sense of myself as one in the infinite field of all sentient beings, Buddhas are beings who have completely let go their limited sense of self to encompass all beings and the worlds in which they live, they do not just escape from limitedness (saṃsāra), they know (Muni) (and ‘suffer’) the limitedness that deluded beings bring unnecessarily on themselves and are enveloped with great and ongoing and inexhaustible love and compassion for them (for us) because illusory limitedness still persists; the Buddhas will (do … always have, never stop) help this pitiful ‘me, me, me’ to become Enlightened and so I will become a Buddha, but in doing so, nothing will have changed, I will not celebrate with a party saying ‘I’m free, I’m free’, I will have relinquished all notion and activity of self (‘I’ will have long since totally dispersed) and, understanding and knowing everything with a completely unbounded mind, ‘I’ will be absorbed in the love and compassion for those same beings in the field of limitedness on whom I relied so completely to obtain my Enlightenment …

Practice: I should try to help and please beings, not so ‘I’ can be known as ‘nice’, but because I understand that it is not wasted (whether I receive the recognition of ‘being nice’ or not), and that it is not wasted because beings, thereby, to whatever great or small extent, will actually be benefitted by whatever help and benefit I proffer, and because the Buddhas are omniscient and a priori enfolded in compassion for all beings, they will know and they will accordingly be delighted: it will be my offering to the Buddhas

Bodhisattvacharyavatara: Chapter VI, Patience – verses 18ii-19i; reflectionary

Bodhisattvacharyavatara by Acharya Śāntideva

Chapter VI– verses 18ii-19i

Transglomeration: [S18b/T18cd] In this way, I should become the master, invulnerable to all sorrow, harm and injury, not allowing discomfort and hardship to throw me off, not allowing it to become unbearable, insurmountable.   [S19a/T19ab] Not even when in pain or distress – not even in the thick of battle – should I, using my wisdom, let my mind become troubled or disturbed, my spirit retaining its tranquillity, its lightness, its composure, its balance, its confidence, its joy.

~~~ “BCA” ~~~

Text: the Sanskrit phrases the result of enduring suffering as ‘overcoming’ suffering, the Tibetan as ‘not being affected’ by it … ‘plus c’est la même chose’

Summary Practice: the essential point of practice: keeping a happy mind, keeping the mind happy, keep on keeping on; and not despite the suffering that one may be experiencing – not with gritted teeth – but with wisdom (reference to the ‘wise person’), knowing the context and cause of the suffering, knowing the faults of adding more anger on top of the suffering; ‘happy’ means a mind of equanimity, not wavering towards any of the eight worldly dharmas … ‘is that so’ with a funny half-smile; in the end, this is a simple practice, ‘don’t worry, be happy’, but it needs quite a bit of explanation because it could be so easy to get off-balance with this practice, like thinking ‘right, I’ll be happy, come what may’ and we go through life with a rigor-mortis smile before we have even encountered any adversity: we have put the result before the cause, it is when adversity arises that we should maintain our balance in response to the adversity, not despite it, it’s … a very subtle balance; the ‘happiness’ or balance of the mind is achieved on the basis of an understanding of what’s going on (cause and effect, conditionality, karma, the faults of reacting angrily), it is not based on happiness for its own sake, it is a ‘wise’ understanding, a wisdom, it sees what is going on and it puts what-is-going-on in its proper perspective, it is wisdom on recognising what is, not what one would hope it to be (the cause, usually, of falling to any of the eight worldly dharmas)

Bodhisattvacharyavatara: Chapter VI, Patience – verse 17; reflectionary

Bodhisattvacharyavatara by Acharya Śāntideva

Chapter VI– verse 17

Transglomeration: [17] Some [warriors], seeing their own blood are emboldened in their advance showing especial determination, strength and courage, while others lose heart and collapse within their own footsteps even as they advance at the sight of others’ blood.   [S18a/T18ab] These reactions [of the warrior] come from the set of the spirit, the disposition of the mind, whether it be resolute and brave or weak and faint-hearted.

~~~ “BCA” ~~~

Reflection: the difference between a firm mind and a weak, pathetic, babyish one, clinging to its own brittle sense of self and self-importance

Reflection: the Patience of Voluntarily Enduring Suffering – which these verses (12-21) are exploring, is simply that of ‘endurance’, it is the first stage of developing patience (the transformation of suffering experiences from anger comes later), the emphasis is on endurance first, and the motivation is simply to not make the inevitable (at the moment) suffering worse than it need be – keep the happy mind, later, we will transform it …

Reflection: … but it is also the courage to endure, not just the sheer gritted-teeth endurance of it, courage borne from reaction against the damage we have seen that outburst and anger can perform, courage to let the mind remain calm despite the difficulty undermining our sense of self-cherishing and self-grasping; steadfastness, standing fast in the storm with a smile that it is worth withstanding; it is how the mind is set that determines steadfastness or collapse; Geshe Kelsang reminds that this (courage, determination, fortitude) is the ‘force of familiarity’ which was inaugurated in verse 14 and having worked through the minor, and then more annoying, sufferings of verses 15 and 16 – not just gritted-teeth determination, but the force of having familiarised oneself with so many smaller difficulties that when it comes to something that really strikes at my heart and makes me bleed, I am not defeated by it but I become determined to see this kleśa out the back door

Honesty: am I – yes, I am at the moment – brought low when stuff doesn’t go my way, do I lose heart, do I despair, do I wonder what is the point, do I give up – and yes, I do; my resolve is so easily brought low; I put myself into such a self-contained and self-reliant position in order to limit the possibility that I might not succeed or might be obstructed, or might be wrong, and when I am frustrated anyway, then I feel I have lost everything and I doubt all that I was striving to achieve anyway; my resolve is not strong, I have no endurance because I have no strategic understanding of what I am trying to achieve, I just want to make myself feel OK, I just want to feel worthwhile, I don’t want to be discovered to be the sap or the stupid … I can’t bear that – I do not really practise and work for the benefit of others, I am too self-centered …

Practice: … to get some courage to really face myself and really address the faults I have rather than putting myself into my ‘safe space’ of reading and withdrawing and trying to be inscrutably wise beyond expression