Dhammapada and the Jataka Tales
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Date: 22 February to 1 March 2008
Venue: Main Temple, Dharamsala, India His Holiness the Dalai Lama's annual spring teaching on Dhammapada and the Jataka Tales. | In order to view the webcasts you will need to use RealPlayer software.  |
Date: 22 - February - 2008 ( Day 1 )
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Morning session | |||
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Afternoon session | |||
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The two texts His Holiness the Dalai Lama is to teach
belong to the Six Major Texts of the Kadampa Tradition: the Jatakas and Udarnavaga
(Dhammapada); Asanga's Bodhisattva Grounds and Maitreya's Ornament
of Sutras; finally, Shantideva's Guide to the Bodhisattva's Way of Life
and Compendium of Trainings.
His Holiness clarifies that his approach to presenting
the Buddhadharma is first to describe its benefit and second how to put it into
practice. All sentient beings yearn for happiness, but not all know how to
achieve it. Clearly, material development counts for a lot, but not if it
increases your anxiety. More important is having a calm mind. Recently doctors
have demonstrated that medication alone does not affect a cure; calmness of
mind also has a role to play. Cultivating love and affection, warm-heartedness
in our relations with others is a source of inner calm.
His Holiness contrasts religious views of a creator
god, the self and so forth. Buddhism has no use for a creator god, seeing
instead that everything is subject to dependent arising, the existence of
causes and conditions. Likewise, the self does not exist the way it appears,
that is, as a singular, independent entity apart from the body and mind. The
self is described as a merely designation on the basis of these. With regard to
the Four Noble Truths, the existence of suffering, its causes, of which
ignorance is principal, its cessation and the path to that; it is clarified
that whereas mind has no beginning or end, ignorance does have an end.
Beginning to read the Udarnavaga, a compilation
of the Buddha's advice that, as the Dhammapada is a major text of the
Pali tradition, the first chapter concerns impermanence. |
Date: 23 - February - 2008 (Day2)
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Morning session | |||
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Afternoon session | |||
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Quoting the great
Indian master Chandrakirti, His Holiness the Dalai Lama recommends that we
should use our sophisticated intelligence to benefit others rather than harming
them. Being self-centred and doing harm will bring us no good in the long run.
Whereas even predatory animals are calm and peaceful once their hunger is
satisfied, human beings seem able to engage in relentless harm and slaughter.
Look at the appalling sophistication of modern weapons, technology. Although
these weapons systems are allegedly for their defensive and deterrent purposes,
they are actually employed to destroy others. Just as we examine
physical objects to see how they would be useful to us, we should investigate
our mental states. Some mental characteristics lead to calm and satisfaction,
while others are clearly disturbing. Think about the result of generating
anger, which generally yields no benefit. We should
distinguish between those mental states whose affect is useful or neutral and
those that are disturbing and therefore harmful. Afflictive or disturbing doubt
can cause us to lose direction. On the other hand, only by questioning on the
basis of curiosity and doubt do we find things out. The opposite, blind faith
is not very useful. Faith needs to be employed with intelligence and wisdom.
The Buddha encouraged his followers not to accept his words at face value, but
to examine them shrewdly the way a goldsmith examines gold. |
Date: 24 - February - 2008 (Day 3)
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Morning session | |||
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Afternoon session | |||
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His Holiness
begins by reminding his listeners that having achieved such a precious
opportunity to practise the Buddhadharma, as is presented by our present lives
as human beings, we need not only to make the best use of it, but also to
ensure that we will be able to continue to practise in the future. We need to
find a guide who possesses both scholarly knowledge and actual experience. The
purpose is to ensure that all our activities of body, speech and mind are
conducive to virtue. The text His Holiness is reading the Udanavarga or Dhammapada
is a straightforward and readable source of advice and inspiration. He is
passing on the oral transmission of the text itself, although he doesn't have
transmission of a commentary to it. By employing
discriminating wisdom on his progress to enlightenment, the Buddha was able to
judge what to cultivate and what to give up in terms of thought, speech and
conduct. Most important was generating concern for others, which overcomes
self-centredness. Arya Nagarjuna summarised the path of a bodhisattva as
consisting of great compassion, wisdom understanding emptiness and the
awakening mind. The Jataka Tales, compiled in Sanskrit by the renowned
poet Aryasura, contain accounts of what prompted Buddha Shakyamuni in various
previous existences to enter into the bodhisattva's way of life. |
Date: 25 - February - 2008 (Day 4)
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Morning session | |||
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Afternoon session | |||
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Many accomplished
beings have arisen as a result of the teachings the Buddha gave more than 2500
years ago. They overcame the disturbing emotions that give us trouble and which
are rooted in ignorance. An example of our ignorance is the way we almost
instinctively respond to pleasant and unpleasant objects either avidly wanting
them or wishing to be rid of them. Disturbing emotions have no long term remedy
other than understanding of emptiness.
His Holiness
continues to read from the Jataka tales that cite incidents in the
former lives of the Buddha, when he was still a bodhisattva, that retain a
moral for today. Repeatedly he engaged in significant acts of generosity and
was an exemplar of virtue.
During the tea
breaks, His Holiness resumes the transmission of the Songs of Milarepa
that he has been giving steadily for the last two or three years. |
Date: 26 - February - 2008 (Day 5)
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Morning session | |||
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Afternoon session | |||
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His Holiness
begins by quoting the Dhammapada he has been reading from, saying, it is
with the help of alertness and conscientiousness that we guard our minds.
Guarding the mind leads to liberation or nirvana, which comes into being as a
result of causes and conditions. Likewise, favourable states in cyclic
existence are achieved through causes and conditions. The basis of training or
taming the mind is to cultivate the ten wholesome actions. His Holiness remarks
that while in the normal run of things we tend not to notice the movement of
our minds, if we pay attention to it, we will gradually distinguish pure and
impure states of mind. For example if we encounter the teachings of the Buddha
and try to put them into practice, we should notice that our minds become
calmer. Ultimately, it is the awakening mind that provides the greatest benefit
to sentient beings. His Holiness continues to read the Jataka tales
which reveal the importance of speaking the truth, the drawbacks of drinking
liquor, the virtues of attachment and how those who wish to benefit themselves
abandon the state of the householder, how important it is to strive for virtue
and how by controlling anger we can appease our enemies. |
Date: 27 and 28 - February - 2008 (Days 6 and 7) No Teachings
Date: 29 - February - 2008 (Day 8 - Very Short)
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Afternoon session | |||
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After giving the
empowerment of the Sixteen Drops of the Kadampa over three days, His
Holiness resumes his reading transmission of the Jataka Tales. In the tale of
the Ruru Deer, the Bodhisattva's compassion even extends to protecting one who
had repaid an earlier kindness with betrayal, revealing that the root of all
virtue is in compassion. The truly virtuous benefit others even at their own
expense. |
Date: 1 - March - 2008 (Final Day)
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Morning session | |||
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