Maitreya's Semtsema (Part 3 of 6)

by Khenchen Appey Rinpoche

I t is one of the attributes of the Buddha that His qualities are infinite and so, as hard as one may try to describe them, one can never even come close to embracing them all.

We have already described the first set of the Buddha’s qualities, which are referred to as ‘the four immeasurables’ - the Buddha’s attributes of kindness, compassion, joy and equanimity. We have also seen that the Buddha has attained thorough liberation, which means that not only is He free from all obscurations, but also that He is able to help beings become free of their own defilements. He has dominion over all phenomena, which serves to induce and inspire beings onto the path. His mind is liberated from the obscurations of knowledge and defilements. He has exhaustive meditative Samadhi, and can transmute all the ingredients that produce appearances. As He is omniscient and omnipresent, He embraces all knowable things with His knowledge, and exposure to His mind liberates beings. He has the capacity for spontaneous achievement, for achieving anything whatsoever, without any difficulty whatsoever. The Buddha is endowed with the supreme intelligence of distinctive awareness – He knows all phenomena, their nature, their base and definition, and He knows how to expound all of these.

And so, the next set of qualities of the Buddha that are eulogised in these verses is that of the six supreme clairvoyances. The first among these is what is called the supreme knowledge of magical clairvoyance. According to this, the Buddha can actualise His clairvoyance by creating non-existing manifestations and dissolving existing ones. Such an ability is called the clairvoyance of creating magical manifestations.

The second clairvoyance is that of reading people’s minds, their thoughts, their feelings and emotions, and their state of mind.

The third is the clairvoyance of divine ear. This refers to the visual and aural clairvoyance according to which He can see and hear all things without any difficulty, whether the object of His perception is gross or subtle, near or far.

The fourth is the clairvoyance of clearly recalling all past incarnations – not only His own, but also those of others – past lives, physical appearances, habits, experiences, activities.

The fifth is called the clairvoyance of divine eye – this is rather similar to the third one, except that this clairvoyance of divine eye means that the Enlightened One is able to see the future, everything that will happen in the future and in future incarnations. This means that the Buddha can predict and prophesy all future occurrences.

The sixth and last one is the clairvoyance of total exhaustion. This refers to the total elimination of contaminations. As beings progress along the path, they gradually purify themselves of their obscurations, and achieve certain stages of purification, such as the first bhumi. The Fully Enlightened Buddha has the clairvoyance of seeing the degree to which each being has eliminated his or her contaminations.

The author then goes on to describe the activities of these six clairvoyances. The Buddha performs three kinds of miraculous activities – those of body, speech and mind.

The activity related to the first clairvoyance of creating miraculous manifestations, is that of the Enlightened One miraculously appearing to those who are spiritually ripe, wherever they are, in order to train them. This is a miraculous activity of the body of the Buddha.

He performs this sort of activity in order to arouse faith in the minds of those potential trainees before whom He manifests. During the time when the Fully Enlightened One was in our world, it was quite common for Him to appear miraculously in certain places. If He needed to go somewhere that was too far for Him to walk, He would not only travel there miraculously, but He would also invite whoever shared the ability to travel miraculously to join Him, giving them a special piece of wood that they were to bring with them.

As an example of this, there was, at the time of the Buddha, a famous Dharma sponsor by the name of Anathapindika. He had a daughter called Mahā- Subhaddā, or Mahadabhadri, who was married to a king in a distant land where the Buddha’s teachings were not heeded. The king and his subjects adhered to other religious practices, and paid obeisance to preceptors of other spiritual persuasions, often making great feast offerings in their honour. Since Mahadabhadri was a devout Buddhist, this caused her much grief. But one day, she managed to persuade her husband to invite the Buddha to his palace.

Mahadabhadri knew of the Buddha’s omniscience and of his ability to read people’s minds, and she was aware that He could miraculously appear wherever He wished. And so, after obtaining the consent of her inlaws, she asked the family to prepare a feast worthy of the Enlightened One and of His companions, and then, holding in her hands a bunch of incense sticks, she prayed fervently to all the Buddhas to come and partake of her feast offering, along with whoever would care to accompany Him. In His omniscience, the Buddha heard her prayer and immediately invited all those who also had the miraculous ability to travel, to come with him to Mahadabhadri’s house. And so the Sravakas and Pratiekabuddhas all went, and were there to greet the Buddha when He arrived. This is an example of the miraculous omniscience of the Buddha, whereby He knows people’s thoughts, and of His ability to physically appear instantly, as soon as His presence is needed, combining the first two supreme clairvoyances, one of the mind, and one of the body.

Many other people experienced this kind of event during the Buddha’s lifetime. The Buddha’s own father, Suddhodana once invited Him to Kapilavastu, and the bikkshu Charka was sent there early to make preparations for the Buddha’s visit. As usual, the Sravakas and Pratiekabuddhas arrived and performed all kinds of airborne feats above the palace. Amazed, and convinced that this was the Buddha Himself, Suddhodana asked Charka who they were, and was astonished to learn that they were merely disciples of the Buddha, and that He Himself was yet to appear.

As for the miraculous activities of the speech of the Buddha, they reveal themselves in four different ways.

The omniscient divine ear, first among the four qualities of the Buddha’s speech, empowers Him to know the language of each and every sentient being, enabling Him to expound the teachings in whatever language a particular being understands.

By the power of recalling past incarnations, the Buddha knows how beings have become what they are. The activity related to the divine eye, is that the Buddha knows the future of beings, what they will be and experience.

These two forms of omniscience, that of knowing the past and that of knowing the future, transcend the two pitfalls of nihilism and eternalism, countering both false notions, the one that denies past and future incarnations, and the one that is attached to a permanent self.

The fourth of the speech activities of the Buddha is related to the clairvoyance of eliminating contaminations – it reveals itself in the absolute knowledge of what procedure is most effective for beings to attain the complete elimination of their contaminations and to reach ultimate liberation.

Of these three kinds of miraculous activities of the Buddha, those of body, speech and mind, the most beneficial and far-reaching is the miraculous activity of speech. This is because it is through His speech that the Buddha teaches, and this is what most effectively establishes beings on the path.

So far, the qualities of the Buddha that have been expounded have been those of the Dharmakaya or the true body.

The following verse, on the other hand, is a eulogy to the qualities of the Rupakaya, the Buddha’s form body, His physical manifestation. It reads: “When all embodied beings see You, they know You to be a great person.” The Buddha appears as a sublime being, one endowed with unique physical characteristics– what we call ‘lakshan’ in Sanskrit and ‘tzen’ in Tibetan. These physical qualities are unequivocally the marks of an Enlightened One, and whoever sees these ‘lakshans’ are left with no doubt that their bearer is a great person or ‘Mahapurusha’. Of these marks, there are 32 major ones, such as a protuberance on the crown, and 80 minor ones, including coppery red nails. They have the function of instilling faith in those who see Him, and even of making liberation possible by the mere beholding of this great being.

The form body of the Buddha is incomparably attractive, and its beauty defies anyone’s imagination. Each of these major and minor marks is the result of unique virtues derived from the practice of the ten perfections, in particular that of tolerance.

Impatience and intolerance lead to a rebirth with an unattractive appearance, whereas the practice of patience and tolerance leads to a rebirth with a beautiful appearance, and eventually to the attainment of the perfect beauty of the Enlightened One. And so, by reflecting on these qualities, one comes to appreciate their value, and ones strives to attain them by practising virtue and avoiding negative behaviour. One does one’s best to avoid negative emotions, particularly anger. Even a short-lived moment of anger can bring with it many miseries and difficulties and can destroy many virtuous qualities.

As Shantideva said, if someone causes us harm and as a result we become angry, then we have been doubly wronged. If we have become agitated by someone’s words or behaviour and our mind cannot settle, Shantideva advises us to do anything we can to ease the situation that is agitating us, and to do our very best not to fall prey to anger. He stresses that it is particularly important not to bear resentment toward anyone, whatever they have done to us, as this emotion is extremely harmful to us.

There’s a famous story about resentment. Once, when the Tibetan translator Natso Lotsawa was working in Lhasa with Atisha, he accidentally spilled some ink, as was wont to happen with a translator whose tools were pen and ink. Atisha became quite agitated and, in no uncertain terms, asked Natso Lotsawa to leave. Natso Lotsawa felt dejected and complained: “You expelled me once in Ngari, and now you’ve done it a second time.” And Atisha answered: “See, I can become agitated, but I don’t hold a grudge. You’re filled with resentment. You should know how to curtail that emotion.”

The author then goes on to eulogise the four purities of the Buddha, which empower Him to easily perform the four activities.

The first among these is the purity of the base, or form. It empowers the Buddha to assume whatever physical form is necessary at any given time. This base, or physical manifestation, has the capacity to remain as long as the Buddha deems it necessary. This body also has the characteristic of giving itself unconditionally and unlimitedly in response to the needs of sentient beings.

The second purity is the purity of objects. This means that the Enlightened One is able to transmute objects – to render existing things non-existent and to create things from non-existence. The Enlightened One also has the purity of knowing what objects to create and what objects to cause to vanish, in order to benefit beings.

The third purity is the purity of mind. This empowers the Enlightened One to remain in meditative concentration as long as is useful or necessary.

The fourth one is the purity of primordial wisdom. It is unique to the Fully Enlightened One, and it means that nothing whatsoever obstructs Him from recognising, knowing and understanding whatever needs to be recognised, known and understood.

Next, the eulogy pays homage to the ten spiritual powers of the Buddha. This mainly refers to the invincible power of His mind.

The first among these is the power of knowledge, according to which the Enlightened One knows exactly the nature of things in relation to cause and effect. He knows the cause of existence as it is.

The second is the power of knowing the causes and effects of actions. A particular action creates this result. A particular action does not create that result.

The third is the power of knowing the result of a particular meditative concentration and what kind of liberation will derive from it.

The fourth is the power of knowing the aptitudes and predisposition of each and every sentient being. Among other things, the Enlightened One knows whether a person is of very sharp intelligence or of mediocre intelligence in relation to faith, diligence and wisdom.

The fifth one is more unique to the Enlightened One. It is the spiritual power of knowing the particular interests of all sentient beings. For instance, the Buddha will know whether a being is more inclined toward the higher vehicle or toward the lower one or, for instance, whether a being is more attracted by form or by sound, and so on. This will determine the way in which the Buddha will help this being.

The sixth is the power of knowing the basic elements of sentient beings, the seeds latent in their mindstreams. These refer to natural characteristics proper to each being – whether this be an innate talent or inclination, or a latent defilement, the Buddha will recognise these characteristics and dispense His teachings to each being accordingly.

The seventh is the spiritual power of knowing all the pathways that lead to the different realms, from the hell realms to the highest state of Enlightenment. The Buddha knows what predisposition in a being leads him or her to perform an action, whether this action leads to a higher or a lower rebirth, and knows what means to use to liberate this being and what path is most suited to each trainee.

The eighth, ninth and tenth spiritual powers have already been described in the previous set of qualities. The eighth one is that of recalling past incarnations, the ninth is the spiritual power of knowing future incarnations, and the tenth is the spiritual power of eliminating contaminations.

The eulogy then goes on to describe the activities derived from the ten spiritual powers. Generally speaking, the ten spiritual powers provide the ability to vanquish the four maras or the four evils.

Of these four evils, the first is the evil that deceives one into implementing the wrong method. It leads people to engage in wrong practices, such as slaughtering animals and sacrificing them to deities. The activity related to the first of the ten spiritual powers is that of discerning whether a particular practice is proper or improper.

The second is the evil that deceives one into finding refuge in the wrong object. By taking refuge in Ishvaras, or worldly gods, and by venerating them and seeking their favour by sacrificing animals to them, beings create causes that will produce negative results. The second spiritual power counters this, by fully knowing the causes and effects of each action, and avoiding all actions that bring about negative results.

The third is the evil that deceives one from knowing the correct purity. While some beings are deluded in thinking that bathing in rivers will wash away one’s sins, or that certain ascetic practices will gain them liberation, the Enlightened One knows that only meditative concentration can ultimately cleanse one’s karma.

The fourth is the evil that deceives one from finding the Mahayana path. If a person is fully ready to receive Mahayana teachings, but receives teachings from the lower teachings instead, this person is robbed of the opportunity to embark on the Mahayana path. Thanks to the seven last of the ten spiritual powers, according to which the Buddha knows the aptitudes, interests and elements of each being, He will recognise whether a being is ready to follow the Mahayana path, and if he or she is indeed ready, the Enlightened One will place this being on it, thus defeating the fourth evil.