Steps on the Path to Enlightenment

A Commentary on Tsongkhapa's Lamrim Chenmo, Volume 4: Samatha

Lhundub Sopa, James Blumenthal

• Publisher: Wisdom Publications
• Year: 2016
• ISBN:
  9781614293118
• Topic: Teología y religión
• Subtopic: Budismo

An exploration of the practice of samatha, the style of meditation devoted to focus and attention Geshe Sopa continues his elucidation of Lama Tsongkhapa's masterwork on the Buddhist path with an explanation of the core meditative practice of samatha, or calm abiding. Showing how it is absolutely essential for--and goes hand in hand with--the achievement of insight into reality, he gives practical tips for countering sleepiness, agitation, and their more subtle counterparts. Leading us step by step toward deeper levels of concentration, volume 4 of the Steps on the Path to Enlightenment series brings readers closer to the ultimate goal of samatha: unlimited and effortless focus.

1

Śamatha and Vipaśyanā

2" In particular, how to train in the last two perfections

(a) The benefits of cultivating śamatha and vipaśyanā

(b) How śamatha and vipaśyanā include all states of meditative concentration

(c) The nature of śamatha and vipaśyanā

(d) Why it is necessary to cultivate both

(e) How to be certain about their order

(f) How to train in each (chapters 2–6 and volume 5)

2" IN PARTICULAR, HOW TO TRAIN IN THE LAST TWO PERFECTIONS

ŚAMATHA AND VIPAŚYANĀ are the cornerstones of the Buddhist path in virtually all Buddhist traditions. As was noted above, a key way that the Mahayana traditions outline the path to buddhahood is by way of the six perfections: generosity, ethical discipline, patience, perseverance, meditative stability, and wisdom. These last two perfections are pursued with the practices of śamatha and vipaśyanā.

It is highly rewarding to understand the deep meaning of these wonderful teachings that Tsongkhapa has offered to us. Śāntideva illustrates this point with an apt analogy. He says that just as the skin of sugar cane does not have the sweet essence of the sugar, so too a spiritual practice that consists of a mere surface knowledge of teachings, prayers, and so forth misses the sweet essence of the deep meaning. If you acquire only intellectual knowledge of Buddhist practice, you will not achieve its goals.

The primary purpose of Buddhist practice is to rid yourself of the mental afflictions that are the main source of your suffering and misery. Unlike animals, who are concerned only with their own temporary pleasure, human beings can see a deeper spiritual meaning in life. Humans can choose to pursue the superior goal of perfect everlasting happiness for all sentient beings. They can recognize that temporary happiness is not ultimately satisfying. Suffering may be reduced temporarily in one area, only to arise again someplace else. Humans must go deeper to find the root causes of misery and pull them out completely.

According to Buddhism, the root cause of suffering is not outside of us; it is within. The internal causes of our suffering are mental afflictions such as greed, hatred, and jealousy, all of which are grounded in ignorance. As long as these mental afflictions dominate our minds and our lives, we will experience misery. We will see problems everywhere, inside and outside. Only with spiritual practice can we free ourselves from these afflictions and finally become perfect buddhas.

Once the mind is freed from all afflictions and obstacles to knowledge, it is perfect. The mind is then omniscient, compassionate, and loving. It then embodies all the positive enlightened qualities of a buddha, while all the negative qualities along with their sources are removed. This is the main spiritual goal of all the teachings of Buddhism; this goal can be accomplished with a human mind. After all, the Buddha appeared in the world as a human being.

(a) THE BENEFITS OF CULTIVATING ŚAMATHA AND VIPAŚYANĀ

When Tsongkhapa explains the practice of any one of the six perfections, he begins by explaining the benefits of engaging in that practice and taking it to heart. It is important to know the benefits of doing an activity in any serious aspect of life, but especially for spiritual practice. In fact, it is important to see both sides: the benefits of doing the practice and the disadvantages of not doing the practice. For by seeing the great advantages of a practice and the disadvantages of neglecting it, we are inclined to put greater effort into it and persevere through hardships and difficulties. Therefore it is important to see the benefits of cultivating both śamatha and vipaśyanā.

Śamatha is achieved when you are able to remain focused single-pointedly on your object of meditation for as long as you wish with complete clarity and without any excitement or mental laxity. Wisdom realizing the true nature of reality is cultivated in reliance upon śamatha; it cannot be developed without it. Only when the achievement of śamatha is combined with the wisdom that knows reality can you begin to remove the mental afflictions keeping you bound to samsara. You then have a great opportunity to make significant spiritual progress, to achieve emancipation, and even to achieve the enlightened state of complete buddhahood.

At the beginning of his chapter on meditative stability in Engaging in the Bodhisattva Deeds (Bodhisattva-caryā-avatāra), Śāntideva said:

Knowing that mental afflictions are completely destroyed

By the wisdom that rests firmly on śamatha,

Begin by seeking śamatha.

Śamatha is established with joyous nonattachment to the world.

An uncontrollable mind that is scattered, going here and there, cannot serve as a foundation for the wisdom that uproots the afflictions. When you properly employ the techniques for developing śamatha taught in the Lamrim Chenmo, your mind can achieve great stability. By analogy, just as a wild untamed elephant can cause a lot of damage, if your mind is out of control, it can cause you a great many problems in this life and the next. In contrast, a tamed elephant can help you do many things, and the same is true for your mind. Once it is trained to concentrate, it can serve as the basis for developing vipaśyanā. All of the mental afflictions are rooted in ignorance, which is the opposite of insight. By removing ignorance from the root with wisdom, you can completely and permanently remove the mental afflictions. When all of the mental afflictions are removed, you will have achieved liberation.

There are also temporary antidotes to the afflictions. Concentrating on love, compassion, and patience can reduce hatred and anger. Meditation on the impurity of objects and impermanence is an antidote to attachment. These antidotes can subdue these afflictions for a time. However, in order remove these afflictions entirely from the root, the ignorance upon which they are grounded must be removed by the power of wisdom. Therefore, you should try to cultivate śamatha as the basis for the wisdom that uproots mental afflictions. This is what Śāntideva is saying in the quotation above.

Tsongkhapa’s way of explaining śamatha is very detailed. As he explains, these teachings on śamatha were originally taught by Śākyamuni Buddha, recorded in the sutras, and then explained in more detail in the great Indian commentaries. Tsongkhapa investigates and analyzes these scriptural explanations in order to support their various statements with sound logic. Then he explains how to practice śamatha and describes the immediate and long-term results of such practice. This is all part of the extensive explanation of the Lamrim Chenmo. Tsongkhapa says:

All of the mundane and supramundane good qualities of the Mahayana and Hinayana are the result of śamatha and vipaśyanā.

When Tsongkhapa mentions the Hinayana, he is referring to practitioners whose spiritual focus is on freedom and emancipation for themselves. The Hinayana is called the small vehicle because the scope of that practice is relatively small; it is only for oneself. In contrast, the main goal of the Mahayana, the great vehicle, is to help all sentient beings achieve freedom. Mahayana practitioners known as bodhisattvas recognize that all sentient beings have been their dear mothers in previous lives. Thus they have great compassion and practice with the goal of liberating all sentient beings. For that purpose, they try to achieve the highest goal of buddhahood.

Mundane good qualities are spiritual attainments developed on the path by non-āryas, those whose insight into selflessness is not yet direct. There are other qualities that are attained by āryas, the “noble ones,” who have realized selflessness directly. These are the supramundane qualities that lead to nirvana and buddhahood. The mundane qualities are a result of strengthening your concentration; the supramundane qualities are the result of cultivating insight into the nature of reality on the basis of that concentration. All good, wholesome, and virtuous qualities and merits are the result of śamatha and vipaśyanā. This includes all of our mental development and spiritual realizations from the mundane to supramundane levels, including even buddhahood itself.

This point is also made in the Sutra Unraveling the Intended Meaning (Saṃdhi-nirmocana-sūtra):

Maitreya, you should know that all mundane and supramundane virtuous qualities, whether of śrāvakas, bodhisattvas, or tathāgatas, are the result of śamatha and vipaśyanā.

Having made such claims about the incredible value of śamatha and vipaśyanā, Tsongkhapa rhetorically asks how all good qualities can be the result of śamatha and vipaśyanā if śamatha and vipaśyanā themselves are good qualities that are achieved through meditation. In response to this question, Tsongkhapa replies that we must first understand the terms. The nature of śamatha is a stabilized mind that is able to remain on an object for as long as the meditator likes. There are nine stages of training, which serve as milestones of your progress in the cultivation of śamatha. The actual state of śamatha is the culmination of training through these nine stages, which we discuss below. As you progress through the nine stages, many excellent qualities arise: an increasing ability of the mind to control negativities, an increasing ability to stay vividly and clearly on the object of meditation without distraction or sleepiness for as long as you wish, and once śamatha is achieved there is the ability to meditate comfortably for as long as you like since the body is in complete harmony with the mind. This last quality is called the bliss of śamatha, a sort of sensual pleasure. The harmony of body and mind that results from śamatha is an example of a mundane, or worldly, virtuous quality in that it can be achieved by non-āryas.

All successful meditation requires some degree of mental stabilization. There must be some stability for benefit to arise from any meditation, even if actual śamatha is not yet achieved. So when any sort of meditation practice is used as a means to cultivate virtuous qualities, we can say those qualities depend on the cultivation of śamatha. Vipaśyanā is insight that realizes the nature of reality. Any insight that distinguishes the relative and ultimate nature of things — and the virtuous qualities that follow from such insight — is said to arise from vipaśyanā. In this sense, we can talk about three types of wisdom:

1. Wisdom that arises from hearing is the wisdom that you gain from listening to teachings from a teacher and from studying Dharma books and so forth. This phrase arose in a time when it was not easy to get copies of books. To study the teachings you had to hear them from a teacher or guru. Today books are much more accessible and the study of texts is included here as well. From this sort of activity a certain a degree of wisdom arises, and from that understanding good qualities arise.

2. Wisdom that arises from contemplation is the wisdom that results from contemplating the wisdom that is generated from what you heard from teachers and read in books. When you seriously think about the meaning of these teachings, examine them, and analyze them through logical reasoning and personal experience, the wisdom that arises from contemplation arises. For example, you can use logical analysis in meditation on the four noble truths or impermanence and achieve some insight that is an aspect of vipaśyanā. And from this, good qualities arise.

3. Wisdom that arises from meditation refers to the wisdom that arises from meditating after hearing the teachings and analyzing them. The mind that engages in meditation is already trained in the subject under consideration from developing the wisdoms that arise from hearing and contemplating. The purpose of meditating is to become so deeply familiar with a topic that you eventually understand it internally and spontaneously. A direct realization of an aspect of the truth produces certain special effects. The qualities that arise from meditating on a direct realization of selflessness with the support of śamatha — the actual state of the union of śamatha and vipaśyanā — is supramundane in that it can cut the roots of samsaric existence.

This is what was meant in the sutras when the Buddha claimed that all virtuous qualities are a result of śamatha and vipaśyanā.

Another sutra, the Sutra of Cultivating Faith in the Mahayana (Mahāyānaprasāda-prabhāvanā-sūtra), makes this same point:

Child of good lineage, this list should inform you that faith in the Mahayana of the bodhisattvas — and indeed, everything resulting from the Mahayana — comes from accurately reflecting on facts and meaning with an undistracted mind.

An undistracted mind is single-pointed and concentrated. As the result of concentration, it is focused and stabilized and has aspects of the actual state of śamatha. “Accurately reflecting” refers to insight. The mind that properly examines, discerns, and utilizes analytical meditation is an aspect of vipaśyanā.

So this sutra makes the same point that Tsongkhapa does above. All the virtuous qualities of both the Hinayana and the Mahayana arise in dependence upon aspects of śamatha and vipaśyanā. That is to say, the virtuous qualities of both Hinayana and Mahayana practitioners arise from continuous effort to cultivate meditative stabilization and wisdom. In the struggle against internal faults such as ignorance, wisdom is the main weapon we must use. But in order for wisdom to be powerful, it must have śamatha as its basis. If a person has some wisdom but does not have mental stability, then wisdom will not function up to its full potential. To cut down a tree, you need a sharp axe. A sharp axe blade is like vipaśyanā. But a sharp axe blade is not enough; you must also have a good handle and strong arms — the mental stability of śamatha. When you have both śamatha and vipaśyanā, you can achieve the goals of both the Hinayana and Mahayana. This is what is meant by the claim that all the mundane and supramundane goals of the spiritual path arise from the basis of śamatha and vipaśyanā.

In order to clear away any potential confusion regarding this topic, Tsongkhapa quotes a variety of sutras. This detailed explanation elaborates how both śamatha and vipaśyanā can be classified in two ways: actual and partial. In order to reach the actual, or real, śamatha, there are nine stages of training and corresponding accomplishment. Each of these levels is a form of partial śamatha. Then, on the side of vipaśyanā, there are analytic meditations that are geared tow...