If, after meeting a virtuous teacher who reveals the unmistaken path, we devote ourselves to him correctly, we gain all the benefits mentioned above. Thus we can easily see that if we don’t rely upon a virtuous friend at all, we don’t receive those eight benefits, which itself is a powerful shortcoming. And if we have established a relationship with a virtuous friend but devote ourselves to him incorrectly and don’t confess and change our negative thoughts and actions, we experience the following eight shortcomings.

2. THE SHORTCOMINGS OF NOT DEVOTING TO A GURU OR OF DEVOTING INCORRECTLY

The eight disadvantages, or shortcomings, of incorrect devotion are:

(1)    If we criticize our guru we criticize all the buddhas
(2)    Each moment of anger toward our guru destroys merit for eons equal in number to the moments of our anger and will cause us to be reborn in the hells and suffer for the same number of eons
(3)    Even though we practice tantra, we will not achieve the sublime realization
(4)    Even if we practice tantra with much hardship, it will be like attaining hell and the like
(5)    We will not generate any fresh knowledge or realizations and our previous knowledge and realizations will degenerate
(6)    We will be afflicted even in this life by illness and other undesirable things
(7)    In future lives we will wander endlessly in the lower realms
(8)    In all our future lives we will lack virtuous friends

Acting in ways opposite to correct devotion to the virtuous friend is the root of all failure, from failure to find happiness and success in this life up to failure to achieve enlightenment. One way of making mistakes is not to recognize the mistakes we are making because we haven’t checked our behavior in terms of the guru devotion teachings in the lamrim. Another way of making mistakes is simply to be careless. 

For people who don’t know the complete teachings on guru devotion, life becomes the continual creation of heavy negative karma. Any negative karma created in relation to the guru is the heaviest because the guru is the most powerful object, more powerful than numberless buddhas. Even if you have created one or more of the five uninterrupted negative karmas, which bring immediate rebirth in the heaviest hot hell realm without the interruption of another life, you can purify them and still become enlightened in that life. However, making even a small mistake in devoting to the virtuous friend, such as a small criticism or disrespectful action, is heavier than that. It is then difficult to achieve realizations and enlightenment, which means it is difficult for you to accomplish your ultimate goal of benefiting sentient beings. 

Without understanding the complete teachings on the eight shortcomings of incorrectly devoting ourselves to a guru, we have no way to practice, no way to face and stop our wrong conceptions. How much effort we put into avoiding the eight shortcomings depends on how much we understand their importance. Doing the practice is our own responsibility. 

If, on the one hand, we do a lot of Dharma practice—studying, doing preliminaries or retreat, reciting many mantras—but, on the other, continuously make mistakes in our devotion and displease our virtuous friend, we create a great obstacle. If we don’t pay attention to fulfilling the holy wishes of our virtuous friend, we won’t accomplish much because we will have created an obstacle the size of this earth. There is no greater obstacle than this. 

If we don’t know or don’t apply the teachings on guru devotion, after some time our mind becomes like a rock; it can’t be moved or easily changed. Nothing we meditate on affects our mind, not even the lamrim. When the extensive philosophical teachings don’t move our mind, there’s still hope that listening to and studying the lamrim will. However, if our mental state becomes like this, when we hear lamrim teachings or read lamrim texts, we find it difficult to have any feeling for them in our heart. This is a sign that our mind has degenerated. 

The realization of guru devotion means seeing the guru as a buddha, which is made possible by looking at the guru as a buddha. Without this practice, negative minds arise because our mind has been habituated to negative thoughts during beginningless rebirths. Most of us are not habituated to positive thoughts. Some great practitioners, who practiced in their past lives and developed pure minds back then, are born with pure minds. That is a different matter. Most of us have minds that have been habituated to attachment, anger and all the other delusions during beginningless rebirths. Because of this it is extremely difficult for us to overcome negative thoughts toward the guru. So if we don’t practice guru devotion we’ll continue to generate negative thoughts, especially anger and heresy, toward our guru, the shortcomings of which are very heavy. 

The Essence of Nectar says,

Just as there are inconceivable advantages 
In correctly devoting to a virtuous friend, 
There are also inconceivable shortcomings 
In not devoting or incorrectly devoting to a virtuous friend. 

(1) IF WE CRITICIZE OUR GURU WE CRITICIZE ALL THE BUDDHAS

If, having established a Dharma connection and accepted a guru-disciple relationship, we criticize or give up that guru, we incur the same heavy negative karma as having criticized or given up all the buddhas. Similarly, getting angry at our guru is the same as getting angry at all the buddhas. Why? As Pabongka Dechen Nyingpo explains, the guru is the embodiment of all the numberless buddhas of the ten directions and the actions of all the buddhas manifest through the guru in order to subdue our mind. Of course, since the guru is a much more powerful object than all the buddhas of the three times and ten directions, the negative karma is actually much heavier. 

This first shortcoming is similar to breaking the first tantric root vow by abusing or belittling the guru but includes criticizing the guru out of anger, heresy or other negative thoughts. The Tibetan word nyä-mö has two aspects: the heavier aspect is giving up, or abandoning, the guru as an object of respect of our body, speech and mind; the other aspect is criticizing the guru and generating anger, heresy and other negative thoughts.

There’s a difference, however, between a thought just passing through our mind and something we feel from our heart. Sometimes words such as “sentient beings don’t matter” pass through our mind. I checked with His Holiness the Dalai Lama as to whether this broke the bodhisattva vow. His Holiness replied, “It’s not renouncing the wishing thought but it’s better to stop such thoughts because they can lead to the actual thought of renouncing bodhicitta.” You could say that such passing thoughts are preparation for actually breaking the vow. It could be similar here.

It’s easy to give rise to negative thoughts when things don’t go according to our wishes—for example, when our guru stops us from doing something we want to do. We’re not obliged to generate heresy. We can make the decision to hear things from our guru without generating heresy. But if we haven’t trained our mind well in guru devotion, we’re in danger of giving rise to heresy because we think that we know better than our guru. When heresy arises we can feel it in our heart. Our mind becomes like a hot, barren desert. 

Among all the tantric root falls and other negative karmas, giving up the guru is the heaviest one. This non-devotional thought is the heaviest obstacle to our achieving realizations of the path to enlightenment, and without realizations we can’t really offer true, deep benefit to other sentient beings. 

It is more than simply getting angry at our guru and abusing him, though abuse can easily happen when we get angry. When I wrote to His Holiness Ling Rinpoche to ask the definition of the first tantric root fall, Rinpoche replied that it doesn’t mean simply getting angry at the guru but giving up the guru as an object of respect by thinking, “What use is this person to me?” We experience this shortcoming if, after establishing a guru-disciple relationship, we abandon the guru as the object of our respect.

A tantric text says,

The vajra master is equal to all the buddhas; therefore, we should never belittle or criticize the vajra master.

This is related to the explanation that the virtuous friend is the essence, or embodiment, of all the buddhas. If we serve or make offering to our virtuous friend we are serving or making offering to all the buddhas. On the other hand, if we criticize or give up our virtuous friend, it is the same as criticizing or giving up all the buddhas. 

The Essence of Nectar says,

It is said that the actions of all the Victorious Ones 
Appear in one’s own guru.
Disrespecting him is thus disrespecting all the Victorious Ones. 
What could have a heavier ripened aspect result than that?

Leave aside criticizing or disrespecting the lama who reveals Dharma by sitting on a high throne, even doing so to your everyday teacher, the one who taught you to read and with whom you live, becomes in fact criticizing or disrespecting all the buddhas of the ten directions. Remember the story I told earlier about how Je Drubkhangpa failed to achieve realizations because of his disrespectful attitude to his alphabet teacher. When you meditate, if you forget to visualize the gurus from whom you have received teachings with the recognition of a guru-disciple relationship, even though you have no negative thoughts toward them, that itself becomes a big obstacle to your attainment.

Once you become someone’s disciple, even making a threatening gesture with your fist or saying something bad behind your guru’s back is the same as disrespecting all the buddhas of the ten directions. This applies to any disrespect you show, not only with your speech but also with your physical gestures. 

The tantric text Commentary on the Difficult Points of the Krishnayamari Tantra mentions,

A person who does not regard as a guru 
Someone from whom they have heard even a single verse of teaching
Will be reborn as a dog for one hundred lifetimes, 
And then as a human being of low caste.

Even when, after many rebirths, the karma to be born as a dog is finished and the person is again born as a human being, he is born in a low caste, which means that he will not be respected and will have little power or freedom to extensively benefit other sentient beings. Though the commentaries by Pabongka Rinpoche and other lamas say that one is born as a human being of low caste, His Holiness Song Rinpoche said that one is then born as a scorpion. You can use whichever is more effective for your mind. 

This happens once you have made a Dharma connection if you forget to devote yourself to that person as a guru, either through lack of understanding of the guru devotion teachings or through failure to pay attention to him, even though you don’t generate anger or heresy toward that guru or give him up. The same applies to the situation where you later decide that you don’t like a particular guru with whom you have made a Dharma connection. Because you don’t like the person you don’t devote yourself to him and leave him out of the visualization when you do lamrim meditation. 

Just imagine if our human body slowly started to change into that of a dog. We would be so worried! If one day we suddenly started to grow a dog’s nose we would immediately go to hospital to have an operation. Since we couldn’t stand to have a dog’s nose for even a day, there is no doubt about how we would react if the rest of our body turned into that of a dog. How could we bear to be a dog for a whole life? We couldn’t, especially after having had this human body, with its incredible capacity to think deeply, understand and communicate. As human beings, if someone explains to us that virtue is the cause of happiness, we immediately understand. But with dogs, cows, horses, sheep and other animals, even if it were explained to them for eons that virtue is the cause of happiness, there would be no way that they could understand the meaning of virtue. 

This verse is not referring to just anybody from whom you hear a teaching. Even when you have a Dharma discussion with your friends you can hear many explanations that are beneficial for your mind. Or you can hear teachings when somebody gives a lecture on Buddhism. It is not talking about that kind of thing. This verse is describing a situation where first you have the recognition of yourself as a disciple and the other person as your guru, then, with that recognition, you receive a teaching—even a single verse—but fail to regard that person as your guru. This can happen because either you don’t know the lamrim teachings on guru devotion or you have heard or read them in the past but don’t actually practice them. 

Here we are not talking about your generating anger or heresy toward that guru or intentionally giving him up but either your knowing about the practice and not doing it or simply forgetting to do it. The karmic consequences of not devoting yourself to that guru are rebirth for one hundred lifetimes as a dog and, after that, rebirth as a person of low caste or a scorpion. 

(2) EACH MOMENT OF ANGER TOWARD OUR GURU DESTROYS MERIT FOR EONS EQUAL IN NUMBER TO THE MOMENTS OF OUR ANGER AND WILL CAUSE US TO BE REBORN IN THE HELLS AND SUFFER FOR THE SAME NUMBER OF EONS

The most dangerous thing is generating anger or heresy toward our guru. If we become angry at our guru we will destroy eons of merit we have accumulated in the past equal in number to the moments of our anger, and for the same number of eons will be reborn and suffer in Inexhaustible Suffering, the lowest and hottest of the hot hells, which means we will experience the heaviest suffering. If we are angry at our guru for even one moment, we create the karma to be born in hell for one eon. The longer we have to be in hell, the more distant we will be from temporary happiness, the result of virtue, and the ultimate happiness of liberation and enlightenment. 

Also, our realizations of the path will be delayed for the same number of eons as the moments of our anger. If we are about to realize renunciation, bodhicitta, emptiness or some other realization and get angry at our guru, our realization will be delayed for eons equal in number to the moments of our anger. Even if the merit has been dedicated, the experience of the result of that merit is delayed for that number of eons. 

The Essence of Nectar says, 

However many moments one is angry at the guru 
Destroys merit accumulated for eons equaling that number 
And one will be born in hell for the same number of eons,
It is said in the Kalachakra Tantra.

The Kalachakra Tantra itself explains,

One destroys the merit accumulated over eons equal to the number of moments one feels angry at the virtuous friend and for the same number of eons one experiences intense suffering in the hells and so on.

According to the Vaibhashika, the first of the four schools of Buddhist philosophy, there are sixty-five moments in the duration of a person’s finger snap. This means that generating anger or heresy toward the virtuous friend for the duration of a finger snap brings rebirth in the hell realms for sixty-five eons. According to the Prasangika Madhyamaka school, however, there are 365 moments in the duration of a finger snap, so generating anger or heresy toward the virtuous friend for the duration of a finger snap brings rebirth in Inexhaustible Suffering for 365 eons. This is much longer than the entire time it takes a world system to evolve, which is eighty intermediate eons. It takes twenty intermediate eons for the world to evolve; it then exists for twenty intermediate eons, decays over twenty intermediate eons and remains empty for twenty intermediate eons. Being empty means that there is nothing in the particular space where that world system had existed. A new one then starts to evolve in the same place.

During all those eons you are in hell, a whole world system will have evolved, existed, degenerated and become empty several times over. During all that time, if, before you died, you hadn’t confessed and purified the mistakes you had made in relation to your virtuous friend, you would still be in the hell, Inexhaustible Suffering. 

Even when this world had completely disappeared, your own karma to be in hell would still not have finished. From there you would again reincarnate in hell in another of the numberless universes and continue to experience suffering. This is something to keep in mind. Simply meditating on this point is very effective because you can then easily control your disturbing thoughts and avoid creating the heaviest negative karmas, which destroy your liberation and enlightenment and interfere with even your temporary happiness.

The tantric text Self-Arisen and Self-Manifested explains, 

One should not go against the good advice; if one does, one will fall into a hell state. Criticizing the virtuous friend or fabricating his faults is like having killed a hundred thousand ordained beings. It is only the cause of the Inexhaustible Suffering hell. Even if one thinks that the vajra master is bad-tempered, one has to suffer for sixty eons in Inexhaustible Suffering. 

Criticizing the guru is only cause to be born in the hot hell Inexhaustible Suffering, where your body is red-hot and one with fire, like the wick of a candle; the only way that you can be discriminated as a sentient being is by the sound of your screaming. One tiny spark from the first category of the hot hells, Being Alive Again and Again, is said to be seven times hotter than the fire at the end of time, which melts even mountains; and the fire at the end of time is sixty or seventy times hotter than all the fire energy of the whole earth right now. Even a tiny spark from Being Alive Again and Again is unbearably hot and each category of hell is twenty times hotter than the one preceding it.

Thus criticizing the virtuous friend is cause only for rebirth in the Inexhaustible Suffering hell. Simply generating for the duration of a finger snap the thought that your vajra master has great anger, for example, throws you into Inexhaustible Suffering for sixty eons. 

A Guide to the Bodhisattva’s Way of Life mentions that one moment of anger destroys the merit accumulated by practicing charity and making offerings to the tathagatas for a thousand eons.⁵¹ If we get angry at a bodhisattva for one moment we destroy the merit we have accumulated over one thousand eons, and even if the merit has been dedicated, it postpones the result of that merit, which means happiness and realizations, for a thousand eons. Before getting angry for that one moment we might have been ready, through having accumulated powerful merit, to generate the realization of emptiness or bodhicitta that very day, but after that moment’s anger our realization gets postponed for a thousand eons. This shows just how harmful anger can be. 

Since the guru is the most powerful of all holy objects, much more powerful than a bodhisattva, getting angry at a guru destroys much more merit and postpones realizations for many more eons. It becomes the heaviest obstacle. Here we’re not talking about just anybody recognized as a guru in the world but our own guru, a person with whom we have established a Dharma connection.

The destruction of our merit is an incredible loss because we put so much effort and material expense into collecting merit in this life and from life to life. We have to put in a lot of effort to transform our mind into virtue and to then produce a virtuous action. We find it difficult to make an action become virtue, or Dharma, even though the action might appear to be Dharma. When we are meditating, reading scriptures or making charity to sentient beings, our action might appear to be Dharma, but its appearing to be spiritual doesn’t mean it actually is spiritual. It depends on our motivation, not on what we are doing externally. If our mind is pure, our action becomes pure. Otherwise, our actions might appear to be Dharma but they’re not actually Dharma. 

If it is dangerous to allow anger to arise toward our guru for just a moment there’s no doubt about the result of being angry at our guru for hours, days or months. We can’t comprehend all the disadvantages we would have to experience; it’s something that our mind can’t grasp. By remembering this shortcoming, we should try to control ourselves as much as possible when we are in danger of generating negative thoughts, especially those of anger, toward our guru.

Purifying our mistakes

If we have been angry at a virtuous friend, criticized or given him up, harmed his holy body, gone against his advice or disturbed his holy mind, we can definitely purify the negative karma we have created to be born in hell (see appendix 3). It’s not that the negative karma is so heavy that it can never be purified, like in Christianity, where once people are born in hell they are stuck there forever, with no opportunity to change from that realm. Karma is a dependent arising, as is the mind that creates hell. Because karma depends on causes and conditions, it can be changed through other causes and conditions. If it did not depend on causes and conditions but existed from its own side, it could never be changed. The only good quality that negative karma has is that it can be purified.

There are many ways we can purify the negative karmas we have created in relation to the guru. The lamrim teachings advise that if the lama is living, we should immediately confess our mistake to him with strong repentance. The best way to purify is, on the basis of confessing our mistake, to then do something that pleases the holy mind of that guru, whether by following some advice that he has given us, offering him service or something else like that. By recognizing our mistake we change our attitude and actions. No matter what heavy negative karma we have created, we can purify it, and this is the best and quickest way to do so. 

By knowing his personal characteristics, we do whatever is most pleasing to that particular guru. If we know that certain things please a particular guru, we do those things. Some lamas, for example, don’t like to be praised; they show a displeased aspect when they are praised but straight talking makes them happy. Pleasing the virtuous teacher seems to be the best, quickest way to pacify obstacles to our temporary and ultimate wishes. Pleasing him is like opening the door for realizations within our mind. Any time we accomplish something that pleases our guru, much purification is done, the level of our mind becomes higher and we become closer to realizations. 

To purify our mistakes we can also perform “passing Dharma,” which means that by remembering our guru we make offerings of food and tea to fellow disciples of that guru. This is regarded as powerful purification, purifying any negative karma we have accumulated with that guru. 

We can also purify with Vajrasattva and especially Samayavajra practice, tsog offerings and by making offerings to that guru. While Vajrasattva is a general practice of confession and purification, Samayavajra is a specific practice to purify the heavy negative karmas created in relation to the virtuous friend. We can also purify negative karmas by reciting the prayer of the Thirty-five Buddhas with prostrations, because reciting the name of the last buddha purifies broken samaya with the guru. It seems that the thirty-fifth buddha, King of the Lord of Mountains Firmly Seated on Jewel and Lotus, specifically dedicated that his name help sentient beings to purify degenerated samaya with the guru. We can also purify by reciting mantras, reading the Perfection of Wisdom scriptures and so on; six different methods are mentioned in the lamrim teachings.⁵² 

The best, most powerful purification of mistakes we have made with a guru comes from following that guru’s instructions, whether to do retreat, work or something else. Pleasing the guru’s holy mind by fulfilling his wishes brings much more purification than reciting the Vajrasattva mantra for many months. Of course, it also depends on how we recite the mantra.

Phurchog Ngawang Jampa said, 

If you have broken samaya with one guru, you cannot generate realizations, even if you attempt not to break samaya with any of your other gurus. If the guru is living, confess to him. If the guru has passed away, confess to the pores of that guru.

Making a mistake with one guru is the same as making a mistake with all of our gurus. Gomo Rinpoche explained that disregarding the advice of one guru pollutes our relationship with all our other gurus. 

If our guru has passed away or for some other reason we can’t see him, we can purify our negative karmas by confessing them to his closest disciple if our guru was ordained, or to a member of his family, such as his spouse or child, if he was a lay person. We can also confess in front of our guru’s relics—hair, bones, nails, ashes, robes or other possessions—by placing them on the altar, thinking of them as the guru and making strong confession in front of them. This is how the Kadampa geshes confessed their mistakes. 

If we don’t purify the mistakes we have made with the virtuous friend in this life, even if we do meet a virtuous friend in our future lives we will again make the same mistakes, which is creating the result similar to the cause. If we don’t purify with the remedy of the four powers⁵³ in this life and don’t change our attitude, we will repeat our mistakes again and again and will have no development of mind from life to life. This will interfere very much in our work for self and for others. 

Even if we are able to purify the karma to be born in the hells by doing powerful confession and purification, our realizations of the path will still be delayed because we have destroyed such an enormous amount of merit. This is why the practice of correct devotion to the virtuous friend is emphasized so much in all the teachings of Buddha, and especially in the Mahayana tantric teachings.

(3) EVEN THOUGH WE PRACTICE TANTRA, WE WILL NOT ACHIEVE THE SUBLIME REALIZATION

If we make mistakes in our guru devotion practice, even if we practice tantra, we can never achieve enlightenment. No matter how well we understand the tantric path and no matter how many eons we meditate on it, we can never achieve the sublime realization. Until we purify the negative karmas accumulated in relation to the guru, no matter how much we practice tantra, there will be no enlightenment.

The Essence of Nectar says, 

Even one who has created heavy negative karmas
Such as the five uninterrupted actions and so on, 
Through tantra, can achieve sublime realization in this very life. 
But anyone who abuses his guru from the heart,
Will achieve no realization at all, even if he practices for eons.

The reference for this is the Guhyasamaja Root Tantra, which says,

Those who have committed heavy negative karma
Such as the five uninterrupted actions and so on, 
Can achieve the great ocean of Vajrayana, the sublime vehicle. 
But those who have scorned their guru from the heart
Will achieve no success in their practice. 

Even those who have committed the five uninterrupted negative karmas and so on, which includes the ten non-virtues, can practice tantra and still achieve the sublime Vajrayana, which means enlightenment, in that life. But those who have criticized their guru from the heart, even if they practice tantra, won’t have any achievement. Sometimes a critical thought just comes and goes, but here, from the heart means something serious. 

If we are careless in our relationships with our gurus but on the other hand do hundreds of thousands of prostrations and other practices, nothing will happen in our mind. No realizations will come even if we do retreat on secret, profound tantric meditations for many years in an isolated place. We will have no experiences; our mind will still be the same as before. We will not have even a good sign in a dream. 

After death, any sentient being who has committed one of the five uninterrupted negative karmas—killed her mother or father or an arhat, caused blood to flow from a tathagata or caused disunity among the Sangha—will immediately be reborn in hell, without taking another life in between. Even the heavy negative karmas of having killed a human being, incurred a root fall and so forth cause one to be born straight away in hell. However, by practicing tantra, even beings who have committed such heavy negative karmas can achieve enlightenment in that life. But the person who has criticized her master from her heart—no matter how much she practices tantra—won’t achieve any realizations in that life.

This doesn’t mean that a person who has criticized her guru from the heart cannot accomplish the Vajrayana at all in any life, that it is impossible for her to ever become enlightened. It might look like that from the words, but if it were like that, it would mean that it wouldn’t be true that in time all sentient beings will definitely become enlightened.

I asked Zimey Rinpoche about a similar quotation in The Great Treatise on the Stages of the Path to Enlightenment, where it says that if you break a bodhisattva root vow you can never become an arya being in that life. Rinpoche said, “It means that you can’t become an arya being in that life if you don’t purify the bodhisattva root fall.” Rinpoche said that it doesn’t mean that once you have made such a mistake you can never achieve enlightenment, though it sounds like that. It means that you can’t become an arya being if you don’t confess and purify the mistake. If you confess and purify it, it changes the situation. 

The whole point is that it is different if you change your attitude, confess your mistake and attempt not to make the mistake again. Otherwise, if you don’t change your attitude and don’t try not to repeat the mistake, no matter how much you practice tantra you will never achieve the sublime realization. This outline is very important to remember, especially if you feel you have made these mistakes. 

By transforming your attitude into the devotion that sees the guru as a buddha, you can purify those shortcomings. If you stop your incorrect practice, do confession to purify all your past negative karmas and again accumulate extensive merit by practicing correct devotion from that time, there is a possibility of achieving enlightenment by practicing tantra in a short time, even within a few lifetimes. But as long as you don’t change your attitude and remain critical of your guru, you can’t accomplish any realizations even if you practice tantra without sleeping or eating for years and years.

If you don’t correctly devote yourself to the virtuous friend, the root of the path to enlightenment, no matter how many eons you do strict retreat on the second stage of tantra, you can’t achieve enlightenment. Nothing will happen in your mind. Since the general realizations of lamrim and the particular realizations of tantra won’t happen, you can’t achieve enlightenment. But it is not saying that even if you practice tantra forever, you will never achieve enlightenment. It is not that once you have made a mistake, you can never achieve enlightenment. Of course, every sentient being can become enlightened in time, because there is buddha-nature. However, if you have abandoned the guru as an object of respect, you probably can’t achieve enlightenment in this life. 

(4) EVEN IF WE PRACTICE TANTRA WITH MUCH HARDSHIP, IT WILL BE LIKE ATTAINING HELL AND THE LIKE

If we have criticized, become angry at or made some other mistake in relation to our guru, as long as we don’t confess our mistake or revive the samaya, even attempting to practice tantra for many years by undergoing hardships such as foregoing food and sleep will be like attaining hell and the like. (And the like could refer to difficulties in this life as well as to the other lower realms.) This means that even if we endure many hardships—not eating, not sleeping, not speaking, not seeing anybody and reciting mantras and meditating day and night—to do many years of retreat in a solitary place, nothing will change in our mind if we have made mistakes in relation to one of our virtuous friends. 

However, it is not saying that all this intensive practice becomes the cause of the lower realms. And it is not saying that you are not collecting merit. Even though such heavy negative thoughts are arising, you may be collecting merit by performing various practices such as making prostrations and offerings to buddha, for example. Of course, even from the power of the object, such actions become virtue. However, the mountains of negative karma from your negative thoughts toward the guru are so heavy that the good karma you collect becomes insignificant. 

Negative thoughts toward the virtuous friend are the greatest obstacles to realizations, so unless you change these negative thoughts, no matter how many hundreds of thousands of preliminary practices you do, it will be like achieving hell. Until you purify the broken samaya, until you change your mind, until you stop creating that heavy karma, no matter how long or how hard you practice tantra, it will be like achieving hell. There is no way to achieve realizations.

It is explained in the root tantra Ornament of the Vajra Essence,

For those who have criticized their master, 
Even if they practice tantra for thousands of eons 
By avoiding all sleep and distractions, 
It will be like attaining hell.

Lama Tsongkhapa said,

Without being careful at all in regard to despising your guru, if you then try very hard to do listening, reflecting and meditating, it will be like opening the door to the lower realms. 

The Essence of Nectar says, 

The person who intentionally abuses and despises
The virtuous friend who reveals the path, 
Even if he puts effort into trying to realize the meaning of tantra,
Giving up sleep, dullness and distractions, 
It is, a tantra explains, like working for hell and so on.

No matter what hardships you bear to practice tantra— living in solitude and giving up eating, sleeping and talking—it will be like opening the door to hell rather than to realizations. 

Again, this is not referring just to getting angry at your guru but to giving him up as an object of respect of your three doors. The result mentioned implies that you have made the determination to renounce the guru as an object of respect, gone against his advice and broken samaya. 

The distractions referred to are those that distract you from doing a practice or a retreat session. (A person who is living in pure Dharma practice has given up the works of this life and is free from distraction, which comes from the attachment that clings to the happiness of this life.) Instead of being busy with Dharma practice, you pass the time just gossiping about worldly things and praising yourself and putting others down. You don’t get to recite even OM MANI PADME HUM. Because your present happiness seems so important, you have no thought of future happiness, of great ultimate happiness. You are under the control of the thought of worldly dharmas. Even if you give up those things, don’t eat, don’t gossip, don’t do business, don’t travel, don’t enjoy entertainment, but live in retreat on a mountain with fires around you so that you don’t fall asleep, if you have intentionally abused or despised your guru, it is as if you are accomplishing the hells.

If you don’t change your thoughts and actions, no matter how hard you practice not just tantra but even Highest Yoga Tantra, the quickest path to enlightenment, because of the mistakes you have made in relation to the virtuous friend, it will be like achieving hell rather than enlightenment. If you have ingested a deadly poison and continue to ingest it, it can become so strong that even taking its antidote has little power to benefit you and you move in the direction of sickness and death. It’s similar with this particular result of making mistakes in your guru devotion.

(5) WE WILL NOT GENERATE ANY FRESH KNOWLEDGE OR REALIZATIONS AND OUR PREVIOUS KNOWLEDGE AND REALIZATIONS WILL DEGENERATE

The fifth shortcoming of incorrect devotion is that we will be unable to achieve new scriptural understanding and realizations, and even those qualities we have generated within our mind will degenerate. In this way, incorrect practice of guru devotion is most harmful for the development of our mind. Our previous experiences of compassion, emptiness, renunciation, impermanence and so forth will be lost. Our faith will also degenerate. We will also forget things—we won’t even remember very much of the teachings. 

The Essence of Nectar says, 

If one is devoid of devotion for the sublime object, the guru, 
Qualities are not generated and those generated degenerate. 

Remember the great yogi Milarepa’s life story. For a long time Milarepa’s guru, Marpa, didn’t give him teachings but only hard work, scoldings and beatings. Marpa’s secret mother, Dagmema, felt compassion for Milarepa, so without asking Marpa’s permission she advised Milarepa to go to Lama Ngokpa, one of Marpa’s disciples, for teachings. After Lama Ngokpa gave Milarepa many profound teachings and initiations, Milarepa then did retreat. But no matter how much meditation Milarepa did, nothing happened, not even a good sign in a dream. 

When Milarepa discussed this with Lama Ngokpa, Lama Ngokpa asked him, “Did you get permission from Marpa to come here?” Lama Ngokpa was checking whether Milarepa had done anything wrong in relation to Marpa. After Milarepa explained the situation, Lama Ngokpa went to apologize to Marpa, taking all his possessions except for one goat with a broken leg as offerings to Marpa. Milarepa then returned to Marpa. Milarepa hadn’t had any good signs because he hadn’t gotten Marpa’s permission before going to receive teachings from Lama Ngokpa.

There is also the story of Je Drubkhangpa, which I have already mentioned. Je Drubkhangpa meditated on the lamrim for many years but didn’t generate even a single realization because he failed to visualize his alphabet teacher in the merit field. After Je Drubkhangpa visualized this teacher as the principal figure in the merit field, realizations came like rainfall. 

Even though Krishnacharya, a great yogi of Chakrasamvara, traveled from place to place by flying in the sky surrounded by many dakinis playing music, he didn’t achieve the supreme realization of enlightenment in that life because he disregarded a small piece of advice from his guru Jalandhari: when Krishnacharya had wanted to go to Oddiyana, one of the twenty-four holy places, to do the special tantric practices that are done just prior to enlightenment, Jalandhari advised him against it. However, Krishnacharya insisted that he wanted to go to Oddiyana, ignored his guru’s advice and went anyway.

Many inauspicious things happened along the way. Jalandhari, an embodiment of Chakrasamvara and Vajravarahi, manifested in various forms to protect him but Krishnacharya didn’t realize it. He met many transformations of Chakrasamvara and Vajravarahi in ordinary forms, but because he had left without his guru’s permission, he didn’t recognize them as deities. 

At one point, Krishnacharya came to a huge river, where an old woman with leprosy was waiting to cross. When Krishnacharya went to cross the river, the old lady asked, “Will you carry me across on your back?” Not realizing that she was an aspect of Vajravarahi, Krishnacharya ignored her and crossed the river. 

A little later one of Krishnacharya’s disciples, the novice monk Kusali, came along. When the leper woman asked him to carry her across, Kusali felt intense compassion for her. Even though she was very ugly and covered with leprous sores, he immediately picked her up and started to carry her across the river on his back. When he reached the middle of the river, however, the old woman suddenly transformed into Vajravarahi and, embracing Kusali, took him in that same body to the pure realm of Vajrayogini. Kusali’s impure karma, which prevented his seeing the old woman as Vajravarahi and made him see her as an ordinary being, was purified by sacrificing himself to carry her across the river. 

If Krishnacharya, Kusali’s teacher, had picked up the woman when she asked, he would have been taken to Vajrayogini’s pure realm and achieved enlightenment first. Even though Krishnacharya was a great yogi, going to Oddiyana against his guru’s advice became a hindrance to recognizing the leper woman as a manifestation of Vajravarahi. So, Kusali became enlightened before his guru Krishnacharya, who instead became enlightened in the intermediate state, after passing away at the holy place of Devikoti.

If we have obscurations, even if we meet someone who is a manifestation of Vajrayogini, Tara or some other deity, we won’t believe it. Even if we have had dreams or some other sign, because the person has an ordinary appearance, we will see her as an ordinary person. The belief that she is ordinary will be so concrete that we won’t recognize her as a deity or have faith in her, even when she is right there talking to us. Our concept that she is ordinary, solid as a rock, will interfere with our quick enlightenment.

There is also the story of one high lama, Labsum Gyaltsen, the head of the Sakya order and a lineage lama of the Vajrayogini path. One day in the street Labsum Gyaltsen saw a terrifying woman with fangs and pendulous breasts. He didn’t recognize that the woman was actually Vajrayogini. Thinking that she might be a spirit, he tried to dispel her with a wrathful aspect. She then said to him, “Guiding Labsum Gyaltsen didn’t happen this time. So, see you later.” 

There are many similar stories. We do meet such transformations, especially when we go to holy places, but our success in recognizing them as deities is determined by our having created the cause through correctly devoting ourselves to the virtuous friend. 

Milarepa’s disciple, Rechungpa, always served Milarepa, but when Milarepa refused to give him permission to go on pilgrimage to Lhasa, Rechungpa still insisted on going. Milarepa told him three times not to go, but Rechungpa didn’t listen and went anyway. Rechungpa had previously been a monk, but in Lhasa he met a woman, married her and got into a lot of trouble. His wife often beat him. For example, when making soup, she would stir it, then beat Rechungpa on the head with the wooden spoon such that he would end up with soup all over him, with vegetables hanging from his ears. Rechungpa said, “I have received many initiations, but never before the initiation of the wooden spoon; and I have worn many ornaments, but never before ornaments made of vegetables.” 

Rechungpa’s wife once gave him a blue turquoise but when a beggar came to beg for the turquoise, Rechungpa gave it to him. When Rechungpa went to see Milarepa on his return from Lhasa, Milarepa asked him what had happened to him. However, before Rechungpa could explain, Milarepa showed him the blue turquoise. The beggar had actually been an embodiment of Milarepa. I think Milarepa took the turquoise so that later he could prove to Rechungpa that he knew what had happened in Lhasa, in case Rechungpa didn’t tell him. Rechungpa was surprised to see the turquoise. Milarepa told Rechungpa, “Because you disregarded my advice three times, you cannot achieve enlightenment in this life. You will first have to be born as a great geshe for three lifetimes.” If Rechungpa had not gone against Milarepa’s advice, he would have received sublime realization in that life. 

If we make mistakes in devoting to the virtuous friend, qualities of understanding and realizations that we had generated previously degenerate. For example, in previous times in India, a master of low caste had a disciple from a high caste who had the power to fly. One day while flying in the sky, the disciple saw his guru down below seated on the ground. He thought, “Not even my guru has such power as this.” As soon as this pride arose, his power degenerated and he fell to the ground. (It doesn’t say whether he fell on top of his guru.) This happened because he had the thought of faults in relation to his virtuous friend. Even though he had the power to fly, that power immediately degenerated. 

There is also a story about Naropa. Tilopa had told Naropa, even though he was a great pandit, not to debate with the Hindus. But there came a time of great danger when a Hindu pandit wanted to debate with the Buddhists. A kind of bet was made, in which they gambled with the religion of all the people in the country: if the Hindu won, everybody in the country would have to become Hindu; if the Buddhist won, everybody would have to become Buddhist. Since Naropa couldn’t bear the thought of the Hindus winning and all the Buddhists having to become Hindus, he decided to debate with the Hindu pandit. 

At one point in the debate Naropa’s mind suddenly went blank and he couldn’t think how to answer the Hindu’s point. He then thought of his guru Tilopa and made a mental request to him for help. Tilopa immediately appeared in space in front of Naropa and blessed him; he was then able to continue and win the debate. Later Tilopa explained that because Naropa made the mistake of going against Tilopa’s advice not to debate with the Hindus, even though Naropa could have become enlightened in that lifetime, instead he would become enlightened in the intermediate state. 

Manjushri had predicted that two novice monks from a place near Tibet called Khotan had the karma to achieve the sublime realization of enlightenment in that life. The two young monks walked for many months to reach central Tibet to receive teachings from the Dharma king Songtsen Gampo. When they neared the place where Songtsen Gampo lived, however, they heard stories of how the king punished many people by having their heads cut off and saw for themselves all the heads piled up on the ground. 

In reality, Songtsen Gampo was an embodiment of Chenrezig, the Buddha of Compassion. Chenrezig manifested as the king and also as the judges who decided the punishment for the people who had created negative karma. All the many people who were executed were also manifestations of Chenrezig; they were not ordinary people. To stop the Tibetan people killing, stealing and performing other non-virtuous actions, the king made laws known as the sixteen human Dharmas and the ten deva Dharmas.⁵⁴  Basically they were laws in accord with the Dharma that encouraged people to abandon the ten non-virtuous actions. To stop the people in Tibet creating non-virtuous actions, Chenrezig manifested as the king, the judges, the executioners and also the many criminals. They were all embodiments of Chenrezig. The big pile of heads was to frighten people, but in reality there was no killing of ordinary people. It was all a way of guiding sentient beings.

The two novice monks didn’t understand this; they didn’t realize that even the people who were executed were the creations of Songtsen Gampo, not ordinary beings with a separate mind. Chenrezig manifested as all these beings to protect the Tibetan people from creating negative karma through harming others. However, it would be easy for anyone who didn’t know the real situation to see what was happening as evil. 

After having received Dharma teachings from Songtsen Gampo, the monks generated heresy because they thought that he was killing ordinary people. They then left to return home. If they had stayed and continued to receive teachings from Songtsen Gampo, they had the karma to become enlightened in that life; but because they generated heresy, their enlightenment did not happen, and they went back home with only a sack of gold. Even though they had the incredible merit necessary to be enlightened in that life, instead of achieving sublime realization, the only attainment they had was just one sack of gold. 

There are many such stories, even nowadays, of monks who created negative karma in relation to their teachers, then later were unable to continue their practice and experienced many difficulties. The incarnate lama who lived in the room next to where Lama Yeshe and I lived in Buxa Duar, just separated from us by a curtain made of flattened bamboo and cloth, had a fight with his teacher, and later experienced many problems in his life. Later, at a train station, he was bitten on the foot by a small dog that had rabies. He then went crazy and died. 

The scripture Connection to the Present Buddha’s Valid Cognizer mentions,

If a disciple harbors a grudge or dislike toward the guru, there is no way for him to achieve qualities. If one does not generate recognition of and respect for the guru as the founder of the Buddhadharma, Guru Shakyamuni Buddha, as well as for the practitioners of all three vehicles and the bhikshu who hasn’t revealed Dharma, there’s no way to accomplish the Dharma that wasn’t received before and not to lose what was received before. If one does not show respect, the Dharma is degenerated. 

Here it says that it’s important to recognize and respect not only the guru as the founder of the Buddhadharma but also the practitioners of the three vehicles, even those who haven’t generated any paths, and even a fully ordained monk with whom you haven’t had Dharma contact. If you don’t generate respect, you don’t receive understanding and realizations of the words and meaning of Dharma and that which you had received before degenerates. Not showing respect is the cause of degenerating your Dharma. For example, you will remember less and less of the teachings and commentaries you have received, even if you have studied them.

Having a mind that is forgetful or foolish, finding it very difficult to comprehend even a simple Dharma subject, is the result of negative karmas accumulated in relation to holy objects. It can also be the result of making polluted offerings, such as making offerings on the altar or even to the actual virtuous friend without covering your mouth and not blessing offerings with OM AH HUM. Any time we make an offering we should bless it by saying OM AH HUM; otherwise, interferers, which are different types of spirits, take the essence of the offering. In that way, many obstacles, or pollution, happen to the mind, making it unclear and unable to understand the teachings. It causes you not to understand even the meaning of the words of teachings on emptiness, for example. It is also difficult to have clear visualization and your concentration doesn’t last. When you try to concentrate, you are very distracted. You can also suddenly generate heresy and disrespect to the Dharma. 

In Liberation in the Palm of Your Hand, Pabongka Dechen Nyingpo warns that evil friends can also cause our knowledge and realizations to degenerate.

Lama Tsongkhapa said,

If one wonders how to recognize a non-virtuous friend, it is someone who doesn’t help to stop the wrong conduct and natural vices one had before and helps to increase new wrong conduct. 

Also, the scripture Beyond the Sorrowless State says,

Bodhisattvas are more scared of evil friends than they are of a crazed elephant. The difference between the two is that the latter destroys only the body and the place while the former destroys the body of Dharma. Besides that, the crazed elephant cannot throw one into the evil-gone realms, while evil friends will definitely throw one into the evil-gone realms. 

(6) WE WILL BE AFFLICTED EVEN IN THIS LIFE BY ILLNESS AND OTHER UNDESIRABLE THINGS

The sixth shortcoming is that even in this life we will be harmed by disease and many other undesirable things. We will experience one torment after another. Fifty Verses of Guru Devotion mentions thirteen different ways someone who has made mistakes in their devotion to the virtuous friend can die: 

The great fool who criticizes the vajra master will die from an epidemic, cold disease, a demon, a fever or poison. That person may be killed by a king, fire, poisonous snake, water, wrathful dakinis, thieves, spirits or malignant fiends. After being killed in one of these ways, he then goes to hell. 

Being killed by a king is just an example—it also includes being killed by other human beings. Wrathful dakinis, who have different levels of tantric realizations, can become unhappy when a disciple generates heresy or breaks the samaya relationship with his guru and become a condition of untimely death. 

The Essence of Nectar says,

In this life disease, demon harms, untimely death and so on happen.

It is very easy for the fortune of those who have degenerated or broken samaya with their guru to go lower and lower. There is then more possibility of their receiving harm from the elements, nonhuman beings, such as spirits, and even human beings. They may also die by suicide. Even if there’s no one who kills them, they kill themselves. They have a terrible death. Even though they might have great Dharma knowledge and be expert in all five philosophical scriptures,⁵⁵ they end their life in a sad or terrifying way. 

With respect to experiencing undesirable things as a result of making mistakes in guru devotion, there is a story about Acharya Buddhajñana. One day while Buddhajñana was teaching to a large gathering of his disciples, his guru, the great yogi Saukarika, a swineherd, passed by the teaching place. Buddhajñana saw his guru but pretended he hadn’t and continued teaching. Later, after the teaching was over, Buddhajñana went to see Saukarika. As Buddhajñana was making his prostrations, Saukarika asked him, “Why didn’t you prostrate to me earlier?” Buddhajñana replied, “Oh, I didn’t see you.” Both of his eyes immediately dropped out onto the ground. Saukarika blessed both of Buddhajñana’s eyes but was able to restore only one of them. 

His Holiness Song Rinpoche said that yogis immediately experience the results of such actions whereas ordinary beings don’t. We ordinary beings accumulate the karma and even though we don’t experience any immediate result, we will experience the hells in our future life. We might be comfortable right now, with nothing bad happening to us, but all our negative karma is waiting to be experienced in the lower realms in the life after this.

Lama Yeshe once told me to sleep above him in the upper berth in a train from Pathankot to Delhi. Because Lama gave me permission, I stayed up there but didn’t feel comfortable about it. When I fell asleep that night, I dreamt there was an earthquake, with a huge crack appearing in the earth. I thought, “It’s not right!” and sat on the floor instead.

Also, a novice monk made a mistake in devoting to his guru, Kadampa Geshe Neusurpa. Neusurpa commented, “Before he dies he should make confession to me, but he won’t make any confession.” At the time of his death the disciple screamed out that he was being crushed by all the mountains of Neusur. He experienced unbearable fear, with the vision that he was being burned alive, with the mountains of Neusur crushing him. 

Lobpön Yeshe Zangpo, a nyung nä lineage lama, had a skin disease that wouldn’t respond to any treatment. When he tried going to some hot springs, the water just became hotter and hotter until he felt that he was being boiled alive. He then did a Red Yamantaka retreat but even that didn’t help much. Later he asked a lama to help him. The lama checked with Tara, who said that since the disease was the result of mistakes made in devotion to the virtuous friend in a past life, Yeshe Zangpo should make confession. Only after he made confession was there any improvement in his condition. 

The practice of confession is extremely important generally in purifying obscurations and pacifying obstacles to the generation of realizations of the path to enlightenment and specifically in curing serious disease. In the case of a heavy disease where nothing else helps, confession can be very powerful. If you do the confession strongly and perfectly, you can purify all the negative karmas you have created, which are set up in your mental continuum waiting to be gradually experienced in the future. 

As I mentioned before, as a child, I lived for seven years in Rolwaling with my uncle, Ngawang Gendun, who was my second alphabet teacher. The Rolwaling valley has a river running through it and mountains all around. On one side of the river there is a monastery and a large stupa with a road running around it; on the other side there is a green meadow where Western trekkers used to camp. Tourists, guided by Sherpa porters, would sometimes come there in the summer and the autumn. The guides sometimes brought the trekkers to my teacher’s house, and once or twice we went down to see them in their tents. 

The river was quite wide but the bridge crossing it to the meadow was rather narrow, just two tree trunks tied together. One day I wanted to give some potatoes to some Westerners in their camp. My teacher told me not to go but I think I pushed for his permission. Somehow I really wanted to give the potatoes to the Westerners. My teacher put some potatoes in a brass container that was used for serving rice or chang, the local beer, and off I went, alone. I stepped onto the bridge, and when I reached the middle, the bridge tilted (in my view, anyway) and I fell down into the water. 

My head bobbed up, then went down again. According to what my teacher later told me, I was first facing upriver, then later downriver. I was carried along by the river, with my head coming up from time to time, all the while getting closer and closer to a dangerous place where the river was very deep. One time when my head came up, I saw that my uncle was running down the mountain toward the river from the monastery, which was quite a distance away. He was wearing simple cloth pants and holding them up as he ran to catch me. 

At that time the thought came into my mind, “What people call ‘Lawudo Lama’ is now going to die. This is going to end.” I didn’t have much understanding of Dharma at that time and I had no idea of emptiness, but this thought came. I felt no fear. I would find it difficult if death came now, but at that time my mind was completely comfortable. There was no fear at all—just the thought, “What people call ‘Lawudo Lama’ is going 
to die.”

I was about to reach the deep water, where it would have been very difficult to rescue me, when my uncle finally grabbed me. I was dripping wet. My teacher said, “I told you not to go!” I think my falling down and dropping the container and the potatoes must have been a shortcoming of not listening to my teacher. 

I later heard that one of the Western tourists came down to the river with his camera and was taking pictures as I was being carried along by the water.

(7) IN FUTURE LIVES WE WILL WANDER ENDLESSLY IN THE LOWER REALMS

The seventh shortcoming is that in our future lives we will be reborn and die in the lower realms for an inconceivable length of time. One after another, endlessly, we will experience the sufferings of the lower realms. We will wander in the lower realms for an incredible length of time; it will be difficult to see the end of our suffering. 

The Essence of Nectar says, 

In future lives, one will wander endlessly in the evil-gone realms.

After we have established a Dharma connection with a teacher—even if we have received only the oral transmission of a few syllables of a mantra or one verse of a teaching with the recognition of a guru-disciple relationship—there is no doubt that the heaviest negative karma is criticizing or renouncing the guru. 

The Vajrapani Empowerment Tantra mentions that Vajrapani once asked Guru Shakyamuni Buddha, “Bhagavan, what is the ripened aspect result of despising the guru?” This refers to criticizing or renouncing the guru. 

Buddha replied, “Don’t ask me that, Vajrapani. If I explained the shortcomings of having made mistakes in devotion to the virtuous friend, all the devas and other worldly beings would be terrified.” He added, “The bodhisattvas, who have great compassion for sentient beings, would vomit blood.” 

In other words bodhisattvas, who have so much compassion for sentient beings, wouldn’t be able to stand the shock of hearing about the heavy suffering such a sentient being would have to bear for an unbelievable length of time. The bodhisattvas would find it unendurable, like a mother who knows the son she loves very much is being tortured. They would vomit blood from their holy mouths and pass away. 

Buddha then continued, “But steel yourself, and I will tell you a little, O Lord of Secrets. The person who has made mistakes in devotion to the virtuous friend by having criticized him, renounced him and so forth will be born after this life in the hell realm that I have described for the person who has committed the five uninterrupted negative karmas. He will abide there for infinite eons. Therefore, one should never belittle, criticize or give up the vajra master.”

This means he would be born not only in a hell realm, but in the lowest hot hell, Inexhaustible Suffering, which has the heaviest suffering in samsara, and abide there for infinite eons. His body would be one with fire, like a piece of burning wood, with the hottest fire coming from the ten directions. He would experience unbearable suffering and only by hearing the sound of his screaming would one know that a sentient being was there. 

However, when Kyabje Chöden Rinpoche was teaching on The Great Treatise on the Stages of the Path to Enlightenment at Land of Medicine Buddha,⁵⁶  Rinpoche said that one is reborn in the vajra hell, not in the eighth hot hell, Inexhaustible Suffering. According to Rinpoche, the vajra hell is something different and the suffering there is even greater. 

Buddha would only explain a small part of the result, that such a person would have to abide in hell for an inconceivable number of eons, because it is too terrifying to explain in detail. 

I mentioned earlier the quotation from the tantric text Self-Arisen and Self-Manifested, which explains that the negative karma of criticizing the vajra master, this most powerful object, is so heavy that it is like having killed one hundred thousand Sangha. There are many similar quotations. 

In going over these outlines, you can see that having killed a hundred, or even a thousand, people is not really so shocking. The negative karma of a butcher who has actually killed many thousands of animals but hasn’t accumulated heavy negative karmas in relation to a virtuous friend is light compared to these negative karmas. The negative karmas of killing are easier to purify. Mao Zedong’s case may be a little different because he destroyed the teachings of the whole of Tibet and killed many holy beings, though they were not his gurus.

Another tantric teaching explains,

You should never belittle or abuse the vajra master, the one who brought you into the mandala. You should never disturb the holy mind of the vajra master. If, out of ignorance, this has happened, it will definitely throw you into a hell realm. 

Because that negative karma is so heavy, even if you participate in some enjoyment with a person who has criticized her vajra master from her heart, it takes away your own realizations and causes the experiences you have developed to degenerate. It becomes the root of the pitiful suffering of the lower realms. 

Lama Tsongkhapa said that if you enjoy entertainment, such as having a meal, with someone who has criticized her guru from her heart, you won’t achieve realizations. Let alone you yourself disturbing your guru’s holy mind or criticizing him from your heart, even sharing a meal with someone who has done so means that you won’t achieve realizations. This is how heavy this negative karma is. There is no heavier karma than this, not even the five uninterrupted negative karmas. Anyone who eats with that person, talks with that person or otherwise associates with that person cannot achieve realizations. 

In a commentary to the Yamantaka initiation, the Thirteenth Dalai Lama explained that even eating or drinking with someone who has broken samaya with one of your gurus causes you to go to the lower realms. The pollution degenerates your mind and causes you to be reborn in the lower realms.

People with broken samaya pollute the place where they are. Even keeping in your room objects that belong to someone who has broken samaya with one of your gurus pollutes your mind. Strict practitioners would not keep even Dharma objects belonging to such a person in their house because they would be scared that the pollution would become an obstacle to developing their mind in the path to enlightenment and cause their mind to degenerate. I’m not saying that I’m a good practitioner, but in the past, because I had heard so many teachings about these shortcomings, whenever a Tibetan who had criticized His Holiness the Dalai Lama or some other high lama gave me a picture of a deity, I would put it outside in a high, clean place or give it away. The picture itself was a holy object, so it had to be respected; but because the pollution could have so much effect on the mind, I had it put outside or gave it away. 

His Holiness Song Rinpoche, who was the actual Heruka, used to mention something similar during initiations. Rinpoche explained that even drinking water in the area where a person with broken samaya lives causes you to go to the lower realms. Rinpoche was referring to the pollution from that person’s degenerated samaya. There is no doubt about the result for the person who has broken samaya, but the negative effect is so great that it even degenerates the minds of the other people around them, even though they themselves didn’t create that same negative karma. They incur much pollution just from being near that person that they are reborn in the lower realms. 

My kind guru Serkong Dorje Chang also said that even drinking water from the same valley where there is a fellow disciple who has scorned your own guru causes you to be born in the hells. 

When one of the gurus of quite a high lama in Lhasa was jailed by the Tibetan government, even though it was said that this lama had the power to help his guru, he didn’t help him. This lama later wrote a very clear scripture on the vinaya, one that the monks found very useful to memorize. But when Geshe Lekden, whose practice of guru devotion is excellent, was abbot of Sera Je College, he didn’t want the monks to receive pollution from this text, even though it was so well written. Geshe Lekden said that since this lama didn’t help his guru to get out of prison, the Sera monks might get pollution from the text. He was so concerned about the degeneration of their practice and the development of their mind that he had all the texts collected so that they could no longer be memorized. Serious practitioners who know the point of guru devotion practice are very careful about such things.

Besides being harmful for us to criticize or belittle our virtuous friend, we should not even see a person who has done so. When a disciple of Chag Lotsawa who had degenerated samaya came to a teaching being given by the great Nyingma yogi, Lingrepa, Lingrepa was immediately unable to move his mouth. He was unable to teach the Dharma and had to leave.

Also, if you have broken samaya by criticizing or abandoning your guru and then become a teacher, there is a danger of your polluting your disciples. 

(8) IN ALL OUR FUTURE LIVES WE WILL LACK VIRTUOUS FRIENDS

The eighth shortcoming of making mistakes in our devotion to the virtuous friend is that in all our future lives we will lack a virtuous friend. Even if the country where we live has thousands of qualified teachers—Tibet or India, for example—we won’t be able to find a guru. We will never meet a virtuous friend, someone to guide us to liberation and enlightenment. Endlessly we will have to wander in samsara and experience suffering.

Why will we lack a virtuous friend in all our future lives? Because even though there are numberless buddhas and bodhisattvas, without the guru we cannot achieve enlightenment. That is the whole point. No matter how many buddhas there are, they can benefit us only through this ordinary aspect of the virtuous friend, which manifests according to our karma. We don’t have the karma to see all the buddhas and to communicate with and receive teachings directly from them. The numberless buddhas do work for us, but only through the aspect of the guru. 

The Essence of Nectar says, 

If, by chance, one finds the body of a happy migratory being, 
Because of experiencing the result similar to the cause 
Of not having respected the guru, 
One will be born in unfortunate states without freedom
And one won’t even hear the words “holy Dharma” or 
“virtuous friend.”

The result of disrespecting the virtuous teacher is that in all future lifetimes we will not find a virtuous teacher, so we will not hear the holy Dharma. Not meeting a virtuous friend in the future is experiencing the result similar to the cause of having disrespected or made mistakes in relation to the virtuous friend. In life after life we will be born in places where there is no freedom to practice Dharma, where we will not meet a virtuous friend. (This is the opposite of the sixth advantage of correct devotion to the virtuous friend, where we meet a virtuous friend in life after life.) As we don’t meet a virtuous friend, we don’t meet the Dharma.

Also, if we don’t attempt in this life not to make mistakes in relation to our virtuous friends, the cycle will go on and on. Each complete karma, whether virtuous or non-virtuous, has four results, one of which is creating the result similar to the cause. The habit of making mistakes leaves impressions on our consciousness and when we meet virtuous friends in our future lives we will make the same mistakes we made in the past. This is creating the result similar to the cause. Even if we meet a guru in future lives, we will make the same mistakes again. We will go on and on in this way, creating the heaviest possible obstacles. 

Karma is expandable, more expandable than, for example, many millions of seeds coming from planting one seed. If we generate negative thoughts toward our virtuous friend or the teachings in this life, these become the cause for the same things to happen for many lifetimes. Going against our guru’s advice in this life becomes the cause of going against our guru’s advice in many future lifetimes. Even though it takes only a short time to commit the mistake in this life, we will experience the result for a long time, making the same mistake over and over again in many future lifetimes. Even if we are able to take vows, we will break them again; it will be very difficult to keep them purely. If we think of the long-term disadvantages we will be careful in this life to put all our effort into practicing purely.

It’s also helpful to think that all the failures in our Dharma practice—degenerating our vows, going against our guru’s advice, ending our relationship with our guru—are the results of our own past karma. 

Therefore, it is unbelievably important in this life to put all our effort into correctly devoting ourselves to our virtuous friends. If we don’t, we will repeat the same mistake again and again, and this is incredibly harmful. It is very important to think of the long-term disadvantages, not just of those in this life. Without needing to think of the lower realms, we can think of the shortcoming of making the same mistake again for many lifetimes. ¬Purifying any mistake and making the determination not to repeat it help to stop experience of the same thing in our future lives.

It is very helpful to know these important points and feel repentance. We should feel great regret about any negative karmas we have accumulated in the past by having made mistakes in our devotion to our virtuous friends, as if we had swallowed poison. Because of our strong repentance, the thought not to repeat our mistakes will naturally arise and we will have a strong wish to purify our negative karmas.

If those who have criticized or abandoned the virtuous friend don’t confess and purify their mistakes, it will be extremely hard for them to find even the body of a happy migratory being in their future lives. And even when, at last, they do receive the body of a happy migratory being, because of experiencing the result similar to the cause of disrespecting the virtuous friend, they will be reborn in a state where they have no freedom to practice Dharma. They will be born in a family or place where they cannot hear even the words “holy Dharma” or “virtuous friend.” 

For example, in Dharamsala in India, where His Holiness the Dalai Lama and many other lamas live and give many teachings, not everyone comes to the teachings. Even though they live close to the lamas, even in the same town, many people never come to listen to the Dharma. Tibetans and over the past years people from Singapore, Hong Kong and Taiwan, as well as, of course, the West, have come to listen to His Holiness’s teachings. But even though the Indian people who live there in Dharamsala all the time don’t have to buy an airplane ticket to come to the temple where His Holiness gives teachings, due to karma, they don’t come. His Holiness, an actual living buddha, is there, but they still somehow can’t realize it. They have no interest in or are unable to come to the teachings. 

The way we devote ourselves to our guru is extremely important; it determines whether we accomplish the multitudes of goodness in this life and in future lives. Therefore, it is important that we don’t do improper, or inauspicious, things, as when Milarepa offered Marpa an empty copper pot. Because of this inauspicious action, Milarepa experienced difficulty in obtaining the means of living when he was doing retreat. For Milarepa’s sake, Marpa skillfully beat the empty pot with a stick to fill it with sound. Because of that auspicious action Milarepa become famous all over the world, both in the East and West. Marpa also filled the pot with butter and made a light offering. Because of that, Milarepa received all of Marpa’s advice and in that very lifetime completed the realizations of the path and achieved omniscient mind. These various auspicious and inauspicious actions brought different results in Milarepa’s life.

Also, when Marpa went to India to see Naropa, Naropa created a manifestation of Hevajra and his mandala, then asked Marpa, “Are you going to prostrate to the deity or to me?” Marpa chose to prostrate first to the deity. Because of this inauspicious mistake, Marpa’s blood lineage ceased. When Marpa’s son, Darma Dodé, was killed, he didn’t have a wife or children. Marpa tried very hard to find a dead human body to transfer Darma Dodé’s consciousness into, but could find only the body of a dead pigeon. From that time there was no blood lineage, even though Lama Marpa had a wisdom mother and eleven sons. Marpa said that this was because he had made prostration to Hevajra rather than to his guru.

Also, during Lama Tsongkhapa’s time, his disciples didn’t make a painting of Lama Tsongkhapa on the walls of Ganden Monastery. Because of that inauspicious mistake, Ganden, although the mother monastery of the Gelugpa tradition, didn’t have the great, far-reaching prosperity of the other monasteries, Drepung and Sera. Many learned monks came out of Drepung and Sera, but not as many came from Ganden. Ganden also had fewer monks and suffered the most destruction by the Chinese.

Our practice of guru devotion in this life is incredibly important because the greatest profit and the greatest loss are related to correctly devoting ourselves to the virtuous friend and to making mistakes in relation to the virtuous friend respectively. If we are careful from the very beginning, when we first establish Dharma contact, to correctly devote ourselves to the virtuous friend, we will experience fewer shortcomings later.

We need to understand and study well the lamrim teachings on the benefits of correct devotion and the shortcomings of incorrect devotion and then to practice as perfectly as we can. Practicing guru devotion correctly in this life determines whether or not we meet a virtuous friend in our future lives and whether or not that virtuous friend will be perfectly qualified. The success of all our future lives will be determined by our guru devotion practice in this life. We must be most careful about these points in order to protect ourselves from all these dangers and shortcomings, now and in the future, and in order to have success, now and in the future. 

By knowing the benefits of correct devotion to the virtuous friend, we see the importance of relying upon the virtuous friend and all the profit to be gained from doing so. If we don’t know the shortcomings, we won’t be careful in correctly devoting ourselves to the virtuous friend because we won’t see the importance of it. In that way we will create more obstacles. By understanding the shortcomings, we see how correctly devoting to the virtuous friend is an extremely important root practice. We see how extremely important it is to be careful, because if we do this practice well, there will be no obstacles to the success of our temporary wishes or to our accomplishment of the path to enlightenment. There will be no obstacles to our achievement of the three great purposes: the happiness of future lives, liberation and enlightenment. 

We also know about these eight benefits and eight shortcomings from our own experience; they describe the failures and successes in our own life. For example, we may try to do retreat, but after some time many disturbances arise and we fail to complete it. Or we may be living in ordination with great ambition to work for the teachings and sentient beings like Lama Tsongkhapa, Lama Atisha or Guru Shakyamuni Buddha, but it doesn’t turn out that way. The wish is there, but it doesn’t happen because there are many obstacles. Even though we may have all the conditions to practice Dharma, many obstacles arise, and we fail. Such experiences are due to having made mistakes in our practice of guru devotion in past lives or this one. Because we didn’t practice guru devotion well in past lives we experience shortcomings in this life and many lifetimes to come, even though we meet the Dharma. Because we have made the same mistakes for many lives in the past, we create the result similar to the cause in this life. Even on those rare occasions when we meet a virtuous teacher and the teachings, we make the same mistakes again in our practice. 

However, even if we have made many mistakes, it is very important to make the determination not to make them again. Making a strong determination to put guru devotion into practice now and in the future is the remedy that prevents mistakes happening again. 

It is emphasized that everything, from the happiness of this life up to enlightenment, is depend¬ent on this root of guru devotion. That is why guru devotion is emphasized so much for the completion of the practices of listening, reflecting and medi-tating. Our understanding of and feeling for the eight advantages of following the guru correctly and the eight disadvantages of not following the guru correctly determine how beneficial our practice of guru devotion will be for our mind. With more understanding we will have more feeling in our heart and our guru yoga prayers won’t be just words. We will be able to do guru yoga practice by mixing it with our own mind.

Using every means, especially quotations and strong reasoning, meditate again and again on the advantages of devoting to the virtuous friend and the shortcomings of not doing so or of making mistakes in devoting to the virtuous friend. If you do this, the wish to devote to the guru will arise and you will feel great happiness in devoting yourself to the guru. 

The Essence of Nectar says,

In short, if the way one devotes to the guru is wrong,
One won’t have the opportunity to achieve higher states or liberation
But will wander forever in samsara, in general, 
And the lower realms, in particular. 

Since the benefits and shortcomings are beyond conception, 
And even the roots of the multitudes of goodness appear here, 
From now on, without running to the object of superstition, 
Why don’t I devote to and respect the virtuous friend?

---

Notes

⁵¹ Whatever wholesome deeds, 
Such as venerating the buddhas and generosity,
That have been amassed over a thousand eons
Will all be destroyed in one moment of anger. (Ch. 6, v. 1.) [Return to text]

⁵² The six methods of purification are reciting mantras of buddhas’ names; reciting the Vajrasattva mantra; reading sutras on emptiness; contemplating emptiness; making offerings; and making statues and paintings of buddhas or building stupas. [Return to text]

⁵³ The four powers that make confession effective in purifying negative karma are the power of regret, the power of the object of reliance, the power of the antidote and the power of making the determination not to commit the negative karma again. [Return to text]

⁵⁴ For a list of the sixteen human Dharmas see Liberation in Our Hands, Part Two, pp. 269–70, n. 115. [Return to text]

⁵⁵ The five major philosophical scriptures are Maitreya’s Ornament of Clear Realizations, Dignaga’s Compendium of Valid Cognition, Chandrakirti’s Entering the Middle Way, Vinaya and Vasubandhu’s Treasury of Knowledge. [Return to text]

⁵⁶ An FPMT center in Soquel, California. [Return to text]