Lama Zopa Rinpoche with Khen Rinpoche Geshe Chonyi (left), Ven. Thubten Tender, and other Sangha, reciting prayers while circumambulating stupas at Kopan Monastery, Nepal, May 2020. Photo by Ven. Lobsang Sherab.

Lama Zopa Rinpoche continues his video teachings from Kopan Monastery in Nepal during the coronavirus pandemic. Here is a summary of the most recent teaching:

Rinpoche begins his teaching saying that Westerners might have the view that studying Dharma is supposed to be quiet. In fact, studying and practicing Dharma can be done very loudly, such as in the case with the Kopan monks, [who can be heard debating in the background of the video] who make a lot of noise when debating in a large group. 

Debate is a very special way to develop wisdom and explore different subjects. It is like an inner science of the two truths: absolute truth and conventional truth. Rinpoche explains that in Lama Yeshe’s notes it said, “between the object of the mind and the mind itself, the study of the mind is more extensive and subtle.” Monks receive teachings from their teachers, who have studied in the monastery their whole lives, and they also learn from many other teachers, who are also very educated. Then the monks debate with many thousands of other learned monks. They learn so much from this.

Rinpoche quotes one Western monk who said that, depending on the teacher, one learns more Dharma by debating than by taking teachings from the teacher. Debating helps one understand the teachings in a deep and clear way and eliminates wrong thoughts. This way, Dharma education becomes very deep and sharp, not shallow or just words.

Without a good understanding of Dharma, you can go crazy in retreat, or lose faith and give up the Dharma. You have to be careful; you have to watch your mind. If you don’t take good care of your mind, it is dangerous. Even when you do receive correct teachings and meditates correctly, if you don’t have enough merit, or if you haven’t done enough purification, it can be dangerous. It is not enough to purify and collect merit for one day or one month. We need to do purification and collect merit every day. We have been creating negative karma from beginningless rebirths. So that everything you do becomes non-virtue, obscuring the mind. So we must practice purification and collect merit every day.

Even after meditating for many years, you might not get the understanding that you can receive through debate. What you don’t understand, you clarify though debate. Of course, if you don’t actualize the teachings once you’ve learned them, if you only have an intellectual understanding, that’s your own mistake—not the mistake of Dharma. And if you don’t practice, you can’t expect happiness to come from the outside.

Anger harms your health. People who have a temper, who are more angry or get angry easier, many of these people die from a heart attack. From the health side, understanding Dharma—learning, practicing, and meditating—is so important. It is urgent. An angry and violent mind destroys your immune system, Rinpoche explains. There are sicknesses with no remedy, no protection for your health. So by practicing patience and overcoming anger, you are looking after yourself and keeping a healthy mind.

It is unbelievably important for your health to generate loving kindness, compassion, and cherishing others. With a good heart, you can achieve success for yourself and others. You can cease all the wrong concepts and delusions, and achieve total realizations. Learning about Dharma is learning about your mind, studying your mind. By learning about your mind, you are able to cease all the suffering and the causes of suffering—delusion and karma. If you want happiness and don’t want suffering, don’t harm others.

There are many ways you can benefit others, such as blessing beings with mantras, prayer wheels, and so forth. Even going to the beach, as an example, you can benefit the beings in the ocean by praying for anybody who hears about the beach, sees the beach, and remembers the beach. Rinpoche suggests that you can pray for them to never be reborn in the lower realms and to be free from physical and mental sufferings, and for all of their wishes to succeed according to holy Dharma. And you can dedicate for animals and people.

We invite you to go deeper into the topics presented here, plus many others, by watching Rinpoche’s video and reading the full transcript of Rinpoche’s teaching.

Watch Lama Zopa Rinpoche’s teaching “Debate, Study, and Meditation Are for the Purpose of Subduing the Mind”:
https://youtu.be/hOrbF2eaKAo

• Read the transcript of Rinpoche’s teaching “Debate, Study, and Meditation Are for the Purpose of Subduing the Mind”
• Dedication verses for COVID-19 Crisis Teachings

Find more advice and video teachings by Lama Zopa Rinpoche from Kopan Monastery during the COVID-19 crisis and also links to videos in translation, transcripts, MP3s, and more:
https://fpmt.org/fpmt/announcements/resources-for-coronavirus-pandemic/advice-from-lama-zopa-rinpoche-for-coronavirus/

Practice advice from our teachers, Dharma study-from-home opportunities, and more can be found on the page “Resources for the Coronavirus Pandemic.”

Lama Zopa Rinpoche is the spiritual director of the Foundation for the Preservation of Mahayana Tradition (FPMT), a Tibetan Buddhist organization dedicated to the transmission of the Mahayana Buddhist tradition and values worldwide through teaching, meditation and community service.