The meaning of this epic song,
If unelaborated, could not be told,
So listen contentedly without irritation!So just as Lama Shabkhar advises, read with equanimity!
1.18 WHEN THE NATURAL PERFECTION OF MIND IS REALIZED, THERE IS NO NEED TO APPLY AN
APPROPRIATE ANTIDOTE TO EACH KARMIC IMPULSE
The purpose of any elucidation of the four philosophical views and the nine
approaches in buddha-dharma is to reveal and illuminate the natural perfection of
mind. If we understand the natural perfection of mind, then the keys to the
philosophical views are revealed, and the nine approaches are completed. Realize
the natural perfection of mind, and all our sinful obscurations, accumulated over
many eons, are purified in an instant. The karmas that we have accumulated in
previous eons are countless: a pile of karmas higher than Mt. Meru and wider than
the ocean is purified in a moment if only we realize the nature of mind.
Consider how obscurations can be purified. If each particularity needs a separate
antidote in order to be purified, since the karma of beginningless and endless
births has no limit, there can no possibility of exhausting it. As emotional
afflictions have no substantial existence but nonetheless appear through dualistic
delusion, just like mirage and dream, with the arising of the conditions that cause
them to vanish, they too disappear automatically. So a separate antidote need not
be applied to each emotion. Whatever needs correction is released just as it is if
only we can arrive at the natural place of intrinsic presence, where past, present,
and future are identical.
In Applying the Mahayana Method, Rongzompa introduces this discussion: A
man’s father was killed by a tree, and thereafter the man hated all trees. Does this
hatred depend upon or arise from the tree, or does it arise as an independent
phenomenon or separate entity? If it is the former, then burning down trees will
assuage the hatred. But we know that such activity does not facilitate the desired
result. If it is the latter, then the incidences of hatred would be beyond number;
even if they were counted to the limit of the eon, hatred would not come to an end.
Likewise, the process of abandoning each arising of hatred would proceed
endlessly, and we would never come to the end of abandonment.
In the tantra Recitation of the Names of Manjushri, it is said,
Instantaneous differentiation,
And also instantaneous buddha!Consider a lamp that illuminates a north-facing cave that has been in darkness for
a thousand years. We cannot say that the darkness of eons is beyond illumination,
for the instant a lamp is brought into it, the cave is surely illuminated. Once we
realize the natural perfection of mind, then there is no doubt that all the
obscurations of beginningless lives along with accumulated karmic imprints will