Thu, 28 May 2009
At the Lamas' Feet
First, a story Khenpo Tsultrim told Mondayat the Spring Retreat. He was asked if there were still mahasiddhas in India toady and he replied that he thought so. He told a story about a contemporary Indian man whose wife was sick. He met a yogi and asked him to cure his wife. The yogi cut some flesh from a corpse, wrapped it in a cloth and told the man not to open it until he was at his wife's bedside. When he arrived there, he opened the cloth and inside was a flower with a beautiful scent. The ssent cured his wife's disease.
And here are two thing Lama Phurbu Tashi said Tuesday that stuck in my mind. He said that when visualizing the deity, the visualization should have the qualities of clarity, stability, and purity. The first two qualities have their usual meanings, but purity refers to understanding the symbolic meaning of the form. That is, the four arms of Chenrezig represent the four immeasurables, the wish fulfulling gem represents bodhicitta, and so on.
He also told the story of his interview with Bokar Rinpche at the end of his three year retreat. Rinpoche asked which of the practices he had done was most meaningful and helpful. Lama replied that all the practices were wonderful, but he got the most benefit from the Seven Points of Mind Training and the practice of sending and taking. Accordingly, Lama plans to teach a class on the Seven Points of Mind Traing. Unfortunately, Lama's lostt the current location he's teaching at. It's really a wonderful thing to have such a qualified lama in Maryland. We're just going to have to figure out how he can continue teaching.
Mon, 25 May 2009
Retreat News
Memorial Day weekend always marks the beginning of the Spring Retreat at the Tibetan Meditation Center. I hadn't been up there in a while and the center has been repainted since I was there last center. Khenchen Konchog Gyaltsen, who founded the center, was there and was teaching on a text he had composed: "Permissions and Prohibitions: Their Mode of Abiding." He explained that the title came from Buddha's famous dictum, "Cease to do evil, learn to do good, purify the mind." I sat next to Luther during the morning, who was Twittering Khechen's talks. I was taking notes on my new nettop and they'll see the light of day one way or another. During the afternoon Khenpo Tsultrim taught on a text by Phagmodrupa. The text is similar to Jewel Ornament of Liberation, but simpler and more pragmatic, sort of like the relationship between the Path of Purification and the Path of Liberation. Terry was the man of the hour, as he had translated both Khenchen's text and Phagmodrupa's. I spoke with Lama Gyaltsen and found out that his visa problems have been cleared up and he's on track for a green card. Ani Trinlay was at the retreat and led today's discussion session. It was pleasnt to be back in a class with her, though I'm afraid I made my points too forcefully. It's getting late (for me) so I'll wind things up. Tomorrow I take off my Drikung hat and put on my Karma Kamtsang hat. It's back to Lama Phurbu Tashi. I'm definitely on lama overload this week.
Sat, 23 May 2009
Advice from the Lamas
I've been busy lately with little time to post, but I'm still around. I don't have much time to post tonight, but I'll pass along some advice from two different lamas. I was telling Lama Phurbhu Tashi about the lump I had on my head last November that I thought was cancer but turned out to be only an abcess. I was asked how I felt about it and I replied that I tried to view whatever happened to me as the guru's blessing. He grinned broadly and said that was a good way to practice, but it's difficult. So I'll try to take my own advice apply it more seriously. And I pass it on to you for the same reason.
I was at the Spring Retreat at the Tibetan Meditation Center. Pete and Kathy both had interviews with Khenchen and both were told to practice more, to practice every day. It's advice everyone can take to heart. If you study the dharma but don't practice, you're just a dharma tourist. I meet too many dharma students who didn't practice regulaly, which is a real shame.
Mon, 18 May 2009
Trivial Pursuits
I don't know if people are interested in the trivia of my life, bute here it is. As I mentioned Sunday we had a traditional Tibetan doctor give a talk on the Tibetan view of disease. Tibetan medicine views disease as an imbalance of the three humors, wind, bile, and phlegm. I have notes, but I think they may not be useful or even harmful if taken out of context.
As I mentioned, I bought a new small laptop to replace my Alpasmart. It arrived a week ago, but I had to send it back because the hard disk was bad, probably dropped during shipment. Today the replacement arrived. It ships with Windows, but I fixed that by installing Ubuntu Linux. It seems to work fine from the little bit I've been able to use it. It still needs to be configured for how I plan to use it. I hope I have that done before this weekend's teaching.
Yes, this weekend starts the Drikung meditation center's annual retreat. Khenchen Konchog Gyaltsen will be teaching on two texts he composed. The first is "Precepts and Prohibitions: Their Mode of Abiding" Though P & P sounds like a text on Vinaya. it's actually a short summary of the path in verse. The second text is a short guru yoga to Jigten Sumgon, the founder of the Drikung lineage. Every time Khenchen teaches here, it's a big deal, because he founded the Frederick center and many there know and love him.
I also bbought a new shrine table from Ikea and spent the morning putting it together. Ikea, of course, doesn't have shrine tables in its store, it's a repurposed television table, which was the best substitute I could find. It took some time for me to get it put together, as I'm tools challenged. And it's slightly crooked, but it will do.
Sun, 17 May 2009
The Doctor's Story
Amchi Thubten Tsering visited our group and told the story about how he first got interested in Tibetan medicine. He came down with malaria and was put in an allopathic hospital. Allopathic treatment didn't help, he only got worse. A Buddhist nun offered him a Tibetan "precious pill." He took an infusion of it every morning and slowly regained his health and weight. So when he graduated from high school, he went to the Tibetan Medical Institute in Dharamsala and asked for a job. He got a job compounding Tibetan medicine and later selling them. He was asked to attend the Institute as a student and agreed. The coursework was based on memorizing the four medical tantras. Many of his fellow students were monks and had no problems with this, as memorization is also part of monastic education, but he struggled with it. So he went out in the woods each evening reciting the texts in order to memorizing. So he finished and got his degree and now he's in Washington>
Fri, 15 May 2009
Two Videos
Here are two recent Youtube videos featuring Khenpo Karthar Rinpoche. The first has Khenpo Rinpoche talking about his skin cancer that was recently removed. He thanks his students for their prayers and concern and hopes they keep pure samaya with the Karma Kagyu lineage, The second video show Khenpo Rinpoche blessing the new addition to the monastery as the insignia of the lineage is placed on it. It also shows copies of the Seventeenth Karmapa's commentary on the 37 Bodhisattva Activitis being received. The people in the second video are the lamas and staff at KTD. I won't identify anyone except the translator, Lama Karma Drodul, who is his nephew and his attendant.
Thu, 14 May 2009
Story Time
I'm too tired to do a proper weblog post tonight, so let me just repeat a story I heard Tuesday from Lama Phurbu Tashi. I heard the same story previously from Khenpo Tsultrim, so I'm pretty sure I got it right. A Kadampa master saw his student circumambulating a stupa. He commented, "That's good, but it would be better if you practiced the dharma." So the student stopped and went to his room and started reading a sutra. The master saw him in his room, and said, "That's good, but it would be better if you practiced the dharma." So the student put the sutra away and sat down on his cushion to meditate. The master passed by his room again and said, That's good, but it would be better if you practiced the dharma." The student was confused and asked, "How do I practice the dharma?" The master replied, "Renounce worldly dharmas! Renounce worldly dharmas!"
Mon, 11 May 2009
Buying Stuff
Early last Thursday morningI woke up when I heard a crash. Yje shelves in my bookcase had collapsed. It seems that their fiberboard core softened in the damp weather we've been having. Saturday I bought a new bookcase from Ikea and this morning I assembled it. It's taller and narrower than my old bookcase. I had better hope there are no earthquakes in Baltimore, or I'll die in my sleep when it topples over on me.
I also bought a new laptop computer. It's one of those new netbooks and it's intended mostly for taking notes. It replaces my Alphasmart, whicg gave up the ghost during Drupon's last visit. I should have asked him to do phowa for it. It shipped with Windows NT, which I intend to replace with Ubuntu. Though it's a netbook, it's powerful enough to server as my main computer, if only its screen were bigger. I may do a little development on it, so I plan to install Apache and Mysql. And with emacs, I'll be able to take notes the way God, I mean Richard Stallman, intended.
Sun, 10 May 2009
Benami Deals
The Internet is an educational place and today I learned the term benami land deal. It's a term in Indian law for a sham real estate transaction, where one person buys land with the money of and for the benefit of another. And it's against the law in India. I don't think it's illegal in the United States, here you would just get a commision and a writeup in the local paper.
I read in the Indian press that the Tibetan monastaries of McLeod Gang, which is where the Dalai Lama and the Tibetan Government in exile are located, are accused by the Indian Income Tax department of benami land deals and that the monastery the Karmapa is living in has been raided by agents looking for evidence. This would not implicate the Karmapa, since he is a guest in a monastery owned by the Gelugpas, the Dalai Lama's school of Buddhism. This is a poin the author of the article misunderstands. The article also darkly hints at Chinese involvement. It's widely held belief that the Karmapa is a Chinese mole, sent to India to lure the Himalayan regions into his control and then render them over to China. It's a rdiculous idea, but when it comes to geopolitics, people are often paranoid.
There's plenty of money flowing into Tibetan monasteries from devout Buddhists in the West and China. I suspect it's this money which is buying the property and not the funds of some shady Indian tychoon. And the raid on the monastery the Karmapa is living in is the result of the grudge that some persons in the Indian government have toward him.
Sat, 09 May 2009
Enlightenment
According to the Tibetan Buddhist calendar, today is the full moon day. And the full moon day of May is celebrated in many countries as the day the Buddha attained enlightenment. Enlightenment is a vague term that means many things to different people. If you ask any Tibetan lama if they are enlightened, the answer will always be, "No, I am just an ordinary person." Some schools of Zen, notably the Sanbo Kyodan, make a great fuss over kensho experiences and talk them up. This is their way of getting their students to practice harder. If enlightenment has any definite meaning in the Tibetan tradition, it corresponds to the path of seeing, the transition between an ordinary person and a noble one (arya). Khenchen explained this transition in terms of the four patiences, but despite listening closely, I did not understand him at all. Neither do I understand the discussion in the Abhidharmakosha. The only thing I took away from Khenchen's talk was that they are called patiences because the experience of emptiness is a little frightening and one requires patience to bear it. The path of seeing is a very high level of attainment and very few people attain it in this degenerate age. Sometimes it's confused with the first glimpse of selflessness, which is really only the beginning of the path. Typically students of meditation confuse experiences with enlightenment. The difference is simple. Experiences are the result of causes and will cease when the causes cease. Typically someone has some powerful experience and then mulls over it. This is actually an obstacle on the path. Enlightenment, whether it's the first glimpse of the truth or the complete experience, is recognizing what has always been there. One test is that if it makes you feel proud, it's probably just an experience, but if it makes you feel foolish (for not recognizing it before), it may be realization.Fri, 08 May 2009
Gangkar Monastery
As I mentioned earlier, Lama Phurbu Tashi was recognized as a tulku of the Gangkar monastery in Kham. I went looking for information about it on the web, but can't be absolutely sure I located the right one. The name Gangkar is fairly nondescript, I believe it means white ridge. The Gangkar Monastery is fairly close to the large Chinese city of Chengdu. You can see pictures of the Gangkar Nonastery and it surroundings in these two photos. It looks like a good place to practice tummo. Here's an account of an American who travelled from Kangding (Dartsedo) to Gangkar. As often happens in Tibet, the trip was more memorable than the destination.
It seems there was a famous scholar at Gangkar monastery before the invasion known, not too surprisingly, as Gangkar Rinpoche. He taught Dezhung Rinpoche. among others and traveled to China where he taught Vajrayana Buddhism to the Han Chinese. His reincarnation is now at Tai Situ Rinpoche's monastery in India. I don't know the relation between Gangkar Rinpoche and Lama Phurbu Tashi, whether there are two recognized incarnations of the same lama (it happens) or if there are two tulkus at the same monastery, like Thrangu Rinpoche and Traleg Rinpoche at Thrangu monastery.
Wednesday night Lama Purbhu Tashi was talking about the eight great traditions of Tibetan Buddhism on the way to saying that all the traditions are excellent and all should be praised. He mentioned the zhijay (bzhi byed) tradition, brought to Tibet by Padampa Sangye. He couldn't come up with a translation on the spot, but now that I've seen the Wylie transliteration, it looks like it means making serene. The zi is the same syllable as in zhinay (bzhi nas), or shamatha. Padampa was the teacher of Machig Lapdron, who created the chod practice and it looks like zhijay was eclipsed by it. You can find some additional information about zhijay in this talk by Tai Situ Rinpoche. And there is more information about the lineage in the Blue Annals, of course.
Mon, 04 May 2009
Eightfold Path
I went to listen to Lama Phurbu Tashi again on Sunday. He gave a talk on the Eightfold Path. I've always had trouble remembering all eight, but his explanation made sense to me and I think I'll finally remember them. Here's a summary of what he said, put in my own words and filtered through my unreliable memory, as I didn't take notes.
The eightfold path begins with right view, which is cause and effect. It's the middle way between the views that things happen randomly and the view that things have an eternal fixed essence. Because we have the view of cause and effect, we eliminate what needs to be eliminated and cultivate what needs to be cultivated. So we practice right thought, which is free of malice and covetousness, right speech, which is kindly and appropriate, and right action, which does not harm others. We apply these three sorts of morality to our daily lives and practice right livlihood by not hurting or cheaing others in our job. We enhance our practice through right effort, which is joyously applying our practice to every moment of our lives. Doing this requires right mindfulness, which remembers to apply the correct remedy to each afflictive emotion. And when the power of mindfulness is applied with joyous effort as soon as each afflictive emotion arises, our minds naturally settle in right concentration.
Fri, 01 May 2009
Zen Wrapped in Karma
I don't read as many books as I used to. But I did finally get around to reading Brad Warner's new book, Zen Wrapped in Karma Dipped in Chocolate. If you don't know who Brad Warner is, he's a Soto Zen teacher who has authored three books which combine autobiographical material with teachings on Zen. Like many Zen teachers he takes an un-supernatural approach to Zen, what I like to call "Zen Agnosticism." This most recent book covers one hellacious year where his mother died, he broke up with his wife, and lost his job. The outline of the material will be familiar to those who have followed his blog, Hardcore Zen, though he fills in the details and understandably he didn't blog about his problems with his wife or his other sexual relations.
So how does a Zen Buddhist priest face life's problems? Like most anyone, by muddling through as best he could. His book talks about his problems and mistakes and what Zen has to say about them. The most notable quality of the book is its honesty. There's often a phoniness about religious writing even when written by good, sincere people. First there's a long list of things that are too impolite to talk about and then there's a sing song cant that even the best writers fall into. Brad's writing has improved in his third book. It's more relaxed and self assured. He's not a great prose stylist, but his writing does not get in the way of what he's trying to say. My biggest complaint is that once again he makes a few mistakes in Buddhist history and philosophy. None of these affect the point of the book, but his publisher should find an editor to double check him. I liked the book but I can't say it was awesome or life changing. Though I'm sure that some who pick up this book will find a mirror for their own problems in Brad's and some inspiration in how Zen can help you deal with them.
