In Exile From the Land of Snows (72 page)

JA: Love, based on attachment?

DL: Yes.

JA: Can you talk about the right kind of love?

DL: There are many reasons for it. When you have pity or compassion for a very poor man, at that moment you are showing sympathy because he is poor. That love is based on right reasons. Now, the love toward your wife, your children, or a close friend is love based on an object of attachment. Once your attachment changes, then that kindness no longer exists. The other kind of love is not based on your attachment, but is love—as in this case—because a man is suffering from poverty. So as long as he suffers from poverty, your love will remain.

JA: Are you saying that the correct love is found only in empathy?

DL: Yes. It is similar. The right kind of love will not change according to your emotional feelings toward the object. Love that is connected with attachment will fluctuate very much according to how you look at it.

JA: Buddhists believe that the emotions are obscurations—mental defilements—that should be abandoned. In the West, though, one major criterion for a full life is just how deeply feelings are experienced. If passion is avoided, one feels a person is superficial. On the other hand, people often admire someone who has richly experienced life. Must these two views negate each other?

DL: This is a little complicated. Certain strong emotions come into you because of your attachment. Similarly, strong feelings can even enter into your practice of Dharma or your attitude toward your guru. Although the emotion might seem good, if someone is practicing properly, at a later stage he has to get rid of these feelings.

JA: So there really is no way to equate the two views? What if someone’s friend or parent dies, don’t you think its good for them to feel sad?

DL: At the death of a parent or anyone else, there is a reason for being sad. I don’t find much wrong in this. If something unfortunate happened to your own parents or someone for whom you’ve had much love, there is a good reason to feel sad. Now here, if someone loses their parents and is sad, I think their sadness should be based on reasoning—no more, no less. I think that is correct. No less means he feels very sorry. No more, he accepts it. Now you see, the sadness that is based on strong attachment is bad. Because of that sadness people may even kill themselves. Going to that extent is beyond reason.

JA: So that is what should be abandoned?

DL: Yes.

JA: Can you discuss dreams: what type of mental phenomena are they?

DL: There are techniques for causing dreams to become nonmistaken as to the ultimate nature of reality. Otherwise dreams, though there are unusual ones, are of little value in developing the mind.

JA: Is it just because the mind is so restless that even when the body sleeps, it continues to function?

DL: When one is sleeping without dreams—in a dreamless state—there is less conceptuality. When dreams appear, one generates desire, hatred, and so forth; and then of course, there is a lot of conceptuality. A dream consciousness is easier to change or transform. The experience of pleasure and pain in it can influence the same experience by a coarser consciousness when awake. Because a dream consciousness is more subtle than a waking consciousness, it is more effective. But now, a special dream body occurs when the coarse body is actually left. There are cases of this due to one’s former actions or karma, like a gift at birth, a talent. These people can experience what is actually going on at this time externally—beyond their bodies. There are also cases of people who train in making use of the special dream body. Not to lose time in their religious practice, they often spread the pages of a book out before going to sleep. During sleep they then depart from their bodies and spend that time reading. The pages would be separated before because the dream body is incapable of moving coarse physical matter.

JA: Can you elucidate the Buddhist view of the various states within cyclic existence: life, death, and rebirth?

DL: There are four states. The birth state is said to be momentary, just at the point of conception. The next moment is the beginning of the prior time state, ranging from when the coarse body starts to form until death. Then during the death state, even though it is taking place within the old body, the relationship of support and supporter of consciousness abiding in the body has been severed. At the point of death, the relationship
of consciousness supported by a physical base takes place only on the subtlest level. At this point, individual consciousness is conjoined with the subtlest inner energy or “air,” as it says. For one who is going to pass through the intermediate or bardo states, as soon as the death state stops, the intermediate state begins. In the intermediate states although one doesn’t have a gross physical body, one does have a form—achieved through the interaction of inner air and consciousness. It is grosser than the most subtle body, but more subtle than the usual physical one we see.

JA: Does this have a shape?

DL: Oh yes. It will have the shape of the being that one will be reborn as. There are systems, however, which say that for the first half of the period of the intermediate state, the bardo body has the form of the past life, and for the next half, that of the life to come. Every seven days there is a small death that takes place to the bardo body. With seven such deaths occurring every seven days, it is possible to remain in the intermediate state for up to seven weeks, but no more. By that time one will definitely take rebirth. Beings in the intermediate state are like gods or spirits in that they do not have a gross physical body susceptible to many limitations. They can’t be seen by ordinary sight. Among all those who do not have gross bodies—not just bardo dwellers—there are many different types: gods, demigods, spirits, etc. As in human society there are those who have no contact with Buddhist practice, those who have a little contact, some more, some less. The oracles,
²³
generally speaking, are people like us, within cyclic existence. Such beings as Chenrezi among the society of gods are persons who have already obtained enlightenment. Now there are many different types of Chenrezis. The compassion of all Buddhas in general, its manifestation in form, is called Chenrezi. Thus, this type of Chenrezi is not an individual being. However, just as Shakyamuni is a specific person, there is also a Chenrezi who is a specific person. Also, there are people like us who might take Chenrezi as a special deity. When that person becomes enlightened, he or she will appear in the form of Chenrezi. Because the person at the time of the stage of generation in Highest Yoga Tantra
²⁴
generated his or her self as such, he is designated with the name Chenrezi. However, they don’t have to continue appearing just as Chenrezi. Simultaneously, they may appear in many different ways. From a Buddha’s own point of view one can only say that a Form Body is a final or highest Form Body
²⁵
One cannot say that inwardly it is one way or another. It appears simultaneously in many different forms in accordance with the needs of the trainees
²⁶
and in dependence upon that Buddha’s former wishes and prayers. Therefore, one Buddha would appear automatically and at the same time in the
aspect of Chenrezi, Manjushri, Maitreya,
²⁷
and so forth, according to the needs of the trainee.

JA: Does this, from the Buddhist perspective, explain the story of Jesus Christ?

DL: Though one couldn’t say definitely, it would seem that this was a case of an enlightened being manifesting in an appropriate way to lead others on. It is definite, though, that he was a superior being.

JA: Do these manifestations that appear like physical reflections of a higher being have a sense of “I,” a relative sense of self?

DL: There are many possibilities. For instance, a Bodhisattva who is able to perform emanations could emanate himself as a certain being. Then that being would have a sense of “I.” However, if that being in turn emanated out another form, then that one would appear to be a person but wouldn’t be. So there are many cases. Some have a sense of “I,” and some do not.

JA: The second emanation would be a body with consciousness, but not have a sense of “I”?

DL: The secondary one could perform the function of a human being but wouldn’t be a separate person. For instance, if an enlightened being emanated a hundred forms at one time, there would not be a hundred persons, there would still just be the one central being.

JA: Would the central emanator be simultaneously cognizant of everything occurring to the one hundred manifestations?

DL: There are different levels here. For those of lower realization, it would be necessary for the central emanator to control each one separately. For those of higher realization, the emanations can control themselves. The factor of spontaneity and acting without exertion is involved here. It is the difference in where the control is. When one can spontaneously emanate forms without exertion, then each of the emanations is under his or her own control.

JA: Is such a person simultaneously aware of their own self as well as their existence as an emanation?

DL: Yes. There are cases in which among one hundred emanations, each one knows what the other ones are doing. Certainly for a Buddha or a high Bodhisattva, this is true. But this is difficult to explain. Until one experiences it oneself, one might think that this was just talking about something that was senseless. Something like science fiction or religious fiction. (laughter)

JA: To what degree do you feel the
tulku
²⁸
system in Tibet was accurate? How many past incarnate lamas do you think were genuine?

DL: Oh, that is difficult. There are two things that are very important
in this. One is that examining the
tulku
should be done very thoroughly. It’s very easy for this examination or investigation not to be done properly. Secondly, we have got to see how the
tulku
leads his life. We have to judge by that also. The very purpose of voluntarily reincarnating is to produce some good result. Without that good result, then it is doubtful. The reincarnation takes rebirth with choice, intentionally, deliberately, with the definite purpose of serving humanity through religious or other means. Anyway, there must be some concrete result. In some cases where there is not this result, then I am doubtful. So I think fifty-fifty. It might be a little presumptuous on my part to say this.

JA: I know it’s hard to generalize. How has discovering incarnations worked since coming into exile?

DL: There are still a few who are being recognized. Some are quite authentic. Mainly it is the child’s own behavior: showing some significant signs.

JA: It’s obviously decreased in number
.

DL: Quite a lot! In the past, you see, there was a population of six million. Now there is only one hundred thousand. If you compare, I think it has decreased quite a lot. (laughter) We have some American lamas, also. (laughter)

JA: What do you mean?

DL: Yes. At least two, I think, recognized as Tibetan lamas.

JA: Can you say a little bit about them?

DL: I don’t know much.

JA: Are they certified in the same way?

DL: Maybe they themselves investigate it. I don’t know the details.

JA: Do you approve them?

DL: I have nothing to do with this.

JA: I’d like to draw a parallel to your description of emanations. Each cell among a hundred trillion in the human body performs its own function, yet all work in the same body. Could all sentient beings be similarly related as parts of one organism? In other words, are beings components or emanations of a single body?

DL: All sentient beings are of the same taste—in the sense of being the same type—in that the nature of their consciousness is mere illumination and knowing. Otherwise, they are not connected. If you suppose that many sentient beings come out of one source like a God, the answer is no.

JA: You believe they are independent of one another?

DL: Yes. They are separate. Even when they are enlightened, they remain separate though their realization is the same.

JA: How do you think the one hundred trillion cells work together?

DL: Wouldn’t there be a body consciousness pervading them throughout? For instance, where the eye sense is, within that matter, the eye consciousness holds or occupies that area. At the same time so does the body consciousness. The body consciousness pervades throughout the body.

JA: Though each cell contains the genetic code for the entire body, only certain genes are activated to determine its fate or role. What do you think guides this regulation?

DL: This is a physical function. It’s body, not consciousness. It’s held by consciousness, but the body performs the action.

JA: Before you stated that the mind and hence, beings, are beginningless. How far back does the memory of a sentient being go?

DL: For people who are untrained, the more one’s consciousness becomes subtle—such as at death—the more one becomes less aware. For one who is trained to utilize these consciousnesses, however, one has much greater awareness and much greater memory as the subtler states manifest. Among some people that I know, when a more subtle consciousness is produced, they are clearly able to remember seven, eight hundred, a thousand years back—with that consciousness.

JA: Can memory recall infinite time?

DL: To go back a very long period of time, it is not sufficient merely to generate and utilize a subtle form of consciousness. For times way, way back, it is necessary to remove all the obstructions to omniscience. I am referring to super, super sensory objects far off in time and space. For instance, even though he had great clairvoyance, Shariputra did not know about a very subtle root of virtue that was in a particular trainee, but Buddha did. Maudgalyayana’s
²⁹
mother was in an extremely distant place in space and time and he didn’t know where she was, but Buddha did. Since objects can be super, super sensory in respect to time or place, it is not enough just to manifest a subtle consciousness. One has to overcome the obstructions to omniscience, too.