LYWA Monthly e-letter Archive
No. 25: April 2005
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Dear Everybody,
I hope you are well. Thanks for subscribing to and reading
the LYWA e-letter. Please share it with your friends and
encourage them to sign up to get these great teachings every
month. Remember, you can always access
all of our past e-letters here.
So, what’s happening here? One thing is that we’ve
added several teachings to our Web site: a conversation
with Lama Zopa Rinpoche about being an
organ donor; Rinpoche's talk on the benefits
of studying the Perfection of Wisdom sutras; and a biography
of Ling Rinpoche,
who died in January 1984.
We have just begun to post
the transcript of
Rinpoche's teachings from the 15th
Kopan course in 1982.
 We've
also added some teachings by His Holiness the Dalai Lama
to our members'
area: the "Spirit
of Manjushri" teachings from New York City in 1999,
and His Holiness' commentary on the 8th Chapter from Shantideva's
Guide to the Bodhisattva Way of Life (Bodhisattvacaryavatara).
While these are not exclusive postings, they are a bit hard
to find, and we are presenting them here for the convenience
of our members.
The search capabilities on our website have also been upgraded
to make them more useful. The listings have been expanded
to help you more easily narrow
in on what you're looking for, and we are in the process
of making all our PDF files searchable — which means
you'll be able to search all of our books. Also, see
our
Advanced Search page for
sorting and searching options, and tips on how to search
for specific words and phrases.
Our long-delayed anthology (many apologies for several false
alarms) is now finally in design and production as a wonderful
book-to-be entitled Teachings from Tibet. Look for
more definite news next month. It’s a blockbuster!
Our teaching this month is a continuation of one we started
in our last e-letter, which is a talk Lama Zopa Rinpoche
gave at the Mahamudra Retreat in Australia last year. The
audio for this teaching can be found in the audio
section of our Web site—see Day 23 for
this teaching. It
includes
a discussions benefiting insects killed by your car, the
five powerful mantras and blessing your feet that may harm
beings as you walk. Rinpoche gave similar teachings at the
Vajrasattva retreat in 1999—see Teachings
from the Vajrasattva Retreat, pp. 546–552. You
can also read
this online here.
Much love,
Nick Ribush
Director
The Vajra Vehicle: Making Your Car Beneficial for
All Sentient Beings
Several years ago, in California, Roger [Kunsang, Rinpoche’s
assistant] bought a car for us to use. A red van. I think
he got it from a student’s husband’s friend,
something related, for quite a reasonable price. It had a
small TV inside the van. The car was also fairly noisy.
So Roger was very excited and brought the car up to the
Jacksons’ house, up above Vajrapani Institute, where
I was staying at the time. But I didn’t go to look
at the car right away; I went out late the next morning.
When I saw it I tried to think, “This is all sentient
beings’ car,” but of course it lasted only a
few seconds. I tried to think that the car belonged to all
sentient beings’ but the thought lasted only a
few seconds. After that it disappeared!
Later on we were at Geshe Sopa’s center in Madison,
Deer Park, taking teachings from Geshe Sopa—I think
it was at that time—we painted some messages on the
car. On one side it said that cherishing others is the source
of happiness, something like that. On the other, we amended
His Holiness’s quote “My religion is kindness” to “My
religion is kindness to all,” just to make it a little
more clear. Then we also stuck decals of the Buddha, White
Tara, Maitreya Buddha, the Thirty-five Buddhas—many
deity pictures—around the car. All this was done at
a shop in Madison while we at Geshe Sopa’s course.
The thing is that when you drive a car, in certain places
many insects get crushed on the windshield of the car, so
many that sometimes the entire windshield is completely covered
by their splattered bodies. When we were driving from California
to Madison I’d occasionally try to imagine the wind
coming from above the car pushing the insects out of the
way. Sometimes it seemed to help, but I didn’t do it
that much, so I’m not sure. However, we tried.
So, what to do? We tried putting a plastic screen on the
front of the car to deflect the insects but it didn’t
help much. Then we got the idea came of putting mantras all
over the front of the car—the five powerful mantras
of Mitukpa and so forth (see Teachings
from the Vajrasattva Retreat, Appendix 5, p. 663.
You can also read
this online here). Not only these five but several
others as well. They
weren’t
painted on; the shop made kind of computerized stick-on transfers.
The idea is that any wind, rain or whatever else touches
those mantras and then touches insects or other beings, they
get purified; their negative karma gets purified. And even
if the insects get struck by the car and die, at least they
touched the mantras and purify their negative karma. So that’s
what we did.
Then on the back of the car, on the spare wheel, we put
the Chenrezig mantra, OM MANI PADME HUNG, so that anybody
who sees it purifies their defilements, their negative
karma, and plants the seed of enlightenment.
Then, down below that, we wrote “May anybody who sees,
touches or remembers this car never ever be reborn in the
lower realms; may they be free from suffering and achieve
enlightenment soon”—something like that; I don’t
remember exactly.
Later on I got a decal of a mandala of the long Namgyälma
mantra. Now, usually, if you have a banner of this mantra,
whoever even the shadow of the banner touches—people
or animals, any sentient being—is purified of their
negative karma and doesn’t get reborn
in the lower realms. If that mantra is inside a house, those
who live in that house are always getting purified. If that
mantra is on the top of the mountain, then insects, people,
animals—whoever passes over that mountain, touches
that mountain, also gets purified and doesn’t get reborn
in the lower realms. Lord Buddha explained the extensive benefits of the Namgyälma
mantra in the certain scriptural texts.
Similarly, if you have just the mantra or the mandala of
it, either way, in your car, in the same way, whoever enters
the car is also constantly being purified.
So just as the Namgyälma mantra on a banner on a mountain
has the benefit I mentioned, just as the shadow of a banner
bearing the mantra that touches sentient beings purifies
their negative karma such that they don’t get reborn
in the lower realms and so forth, similarly, when you drive,
by having the mantra in your car, the many insects that you
can and can’t see that get killed, even though they
die against the car or under the wheel, at least their negative
karma is purified. Even if the shadow of your car touches
or passes over them, their negative karma is purified.
Later on, after I’d explained these benefits, one
of the students made many copies of the Namgyälma mantra
mandala for people to keep in their car or put on the window.
I’m talking about the car as part of the topic of
making life meaningful. Since even when we walk we kill insects
that we don’t see, there’s no question that when
we drive our cars many insects get killed. So how can we
make their getting killed meaningful? Having the Namgyälma
or other powerful mantras in the car purifies the negative
karma of the beings we harm when we drive and is a way
of benefiting them.
There’s a mantra for blessing the feet so that any
insects that get killed when we walk receive at least some
benefit. You recite it seven times and then spit on the bottom
of your feet or the soles of your shoes. Due to the blessings
of the mantra, any insect that is then crushed underfoot
is born in the deva realm of the Gods of the Thirty-three.
The mantra is OM TRE TSARA GHANA HUM HRI SOHA.
I think you could do the same with your car tires: recite
the mantra seven times then blow or spit all around each
tire where the rubber hits the road. Then any insects or
other creatures you run over will be benefited as with the
blessing of the feet.
What all this is saying is that whenever there’s a
way in which you can benefit others you must do it. If these
methods were not beneficial, Lord Buddha wouldn’t have
taught them. These mantras can be found in the Kangyur [the
canonical collection of the Buddha’s spoken word],
so there’s obviously a definite purpose to their having
been given.
However, this doesn’t mean you think, “Oh, I’ve
blessed my feet, I should tread on all the insects that I
can in order to benefit them.” It only benefits those
you kill inadvertently.
So, getting back to the car, at first I offered it to the
Maitreya Project relic tour in order to help them out, but
what finished up happening was that it caused great devotion
to arise in many people’s minds. After that we bought
other cars and put different messages and Buddha pictures
all around them so that even when you’re just driving
down the road you can purify many sentient beings’ minds.
As it says in the Sutra of the Mudra Generating the
Power of Devotion, “As great indeed is the merit of making
daily offerings of divine food, nectar and clothing to arhats
equal in number to the atoms in all the universes for eons,
it shrinks to nothing when compared to the merit of simply
seeing a painting or picture of the Buddha. Just seeing an
image of the Buddha purifies the mind and plants the seed
of enlightenment.”
Only once have I ever seen somebody who was unhappy with
the messages on our car. He might have been a devout Christian
or something. We were on our way to the San Francisco airport
and this guy slowly walked all around the car reading the
messages then gave us the finger! Most people, however, are
usually quite happy. Once we were parked at the supermarket
and a lady came and offered us flowers right there at the
car. Sometimes other people copy down the messages: “May
those who see, touch, remember or dream of this car purify
all their sufferings, generate compassion towards all beings
and achieve enlightenment”—something like that.
To be continued in the May e-letter.
Lama Zopa Rinpoche gave this teaching at the Mahamudra
Retreat, Adelaide, Australia, April 2004. It was excerpted
and edited
from the Lama Yeshe Wisdom Archive by Nicholas Ribush. Excepts
of the teachings from this retreat can be listened to on the
audio section of our website.
A booklet which includes the 5 powerful mantras mentioned
above is available from the FPMT
Foundation Store. The Archive also has a handful of
the decals of the Namgyalma mantra for
your
car that
Rinpoche
mentions.
Please
contact
us if you are interested in receiving one.
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