Khen Rinpoche Geshe Chonyi, Lama Zopa Rinpoche, Gen Tenpa Choden, and Ani Jangsem offering five-colored khata to the Boudha Stupa with prayers, Nepal, February 2021. Photo by Ven. Roger Kunsang.

In the following excerpt from Lama Zopa Rinpoche’s video teachings on thought transformation, Rinpoche explains that every single holy object is the basis for you to create all the merits that bring every success and pleasure that you experience now, as well causing your future liberation and enlightenment. All these holy objects came from every single sentient being, including the tiniest ant. Therefore, they are all sooooo precious, much more precious to us than millions of dollars. Whether a person is Buddhist or not, just seeing a holy object allows them to create soooo much merit.

If you put your hands together in prostration when you see a holy object, as well as offering lights and flowers rather than just thinking, “This is just a statue or painting,” you create even more merits than if you were to just see it.

Rinpoche explains that your motive for every daily activity should be only to benefit every living being and bring them to enlightenment. Getting up in the morning, dressing, eating breakfast, taking medicine, working, studying, meditating, and so forth, all should be done with the wish to benefit every single living being, including the tiniest insect.

Then you’ll have such a happy life, Rinpoche explains. You’ll have no regrets now, and when you die and in your future lives, you’ll achieve every success and realization, especially being able to benefit so many sentient beings. You should realize that you’re soooooo fortunate! This awareness will persuade you to create as much merit as possible.

Watch the eighteen minute video “Every Holy Object Comes from Every Sentient Being”:
https://youtu.be/sEqLVPQU7uA

Here is the transcript of Rinpoche’s teaching in this video:

Not Only Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha but Every Single Holy Object Comes from Every Sentient Being

Even the holy objects, not only Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha, but even every single holy object came from every insect, every human being. Not only every Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha came from them, but every statue, stupa, scripture—with which we create every single merit, the cause of happiness, the cause of enlightenment—came from them. We received [every single merit] from them, from every sentient being, every insect, every ant, every mosquito, every hell being, every hungry ghost, every animal, every human being, every sura being, every asura being, every sentient being. So they are the most precious.

Just by Seeing a Painting or Statue of a Buddha You Collect Numberless Greater Merits Than by Making Offerings to Solitary Realizer Arhats Equaling the Atoms of the Whole Entire Universe

འཇམ་དཔལ་རིགས་ཀྱི་བུའམ།   རིགས་ཀྱི་བུ་མོ་གང་ལ་ལ་ཞིག་གིས་བསྐལ་པ་གངྒཱའི་ཀླུང་གི་བྱེ་མ་སྙེད་དུ་འཇིག་རྟེན་གྱི་ཁམས་ཐམས་ཅད་ཀྱི་རྡུལ་སྙེད་ཀྱི་རང་སངས་རྒྱས་དག་ལ་ཉིན་གཅིག་བཞིན་དུ་ལྷའི་ཟས་རོ་བརྒྱ་དང་ལྡན་པ་བྱིན་པ་དང་།   དེ་བཞིན་དུ་ལྷའི་གོས་རྣམས་སྦྱིན་པ་བྱིན་པ་བས།   འཇམ་དཔལ་རིགས་ཀྱི་བུའམ།   རིགས་ཀྱི་བུ་མོ་གཞན་གང་ཞིག་གིས་སངས་རྒྱས་རི་མོར་བྲིས་པའམ།   གཟུགས་སུ་བྱས་པ་མཐོང་ན།   འདི་ནི་དེ་བས་བསོད་ནམས་ཆེས་གྲངས་མེད་པར་སྐྱེད་ན།   ཐལ་མོ་སྦྱོར་བ་འམ།   མེ་ཏོག་གམ།   བདུག་པའམ།   སྤོས་སམ།   མར་མེ་འབུལ་བ་ལྟ་ཅི་སྨོས་ཏེ།   འདི་ནི་དེ་བས་ཆེས་བསོད་ནམས་གྲངས་མེད་པར་སྐྱེད་ཏེ།   ཞེས་གསུངས་སོ།

Jam päl rig kyi bu’am / rig kyi bu mo gang la la zhig gi käl pa gang gäi lung gi je ma nye du jig ten gyi kham tham chä kyi dül nye kyi rang sang gyä dag la nyin chig zhin du lhäi zä ro gya dang dän pa jin pa dang / de zhin du lhäi gö nam jin pa jin pa pä / jam päl rig kyi bu’am / rig kyi bu mo zhän gang zhig gi sang gyä ri mor dri pa’am / zug su jä pa thong na / di ni de wä so nam chhe drang me par kye na / thäl mo jor wa am / me tog gam / dug pa’am / pö sam / mar me bül wa ta chi mö te / di ni de wä chhe sö nam drang me par kye te / zhe sung so

Buddha said, “Manjushri, a boy or girl of the race, for eons equaling the sand grains of the River Ganga, offers divine food of a hundred tastes and, likewise, divine dress every day to solitary-realizer buddhas equaling the atoms of the whole entire universe, but, Manjushri, any other boy or girl of the race who sees a painting or statue of a buddha collects numberless greater merits.  What need is there to mention that anyone who puts their palms together or offers flowers, scent, incense, or lights collects numberless greater merits than that?”]

So, there it says, if you see, just by seeing—it doesn’t matter whether you have devotion or non-devotion [or whether] you are a Buddhist or not—just by seeing a statue of Buddha or a painting of Buddha, just by that, just by seeing it, you create faaaaar more numberless, numberless greater merits, greater merits, but numberless, you create than the next one. You have to understand it well! [Than] for a hundred, for, I think, a hundred eons. I think that but I don’t [remember]. You get faint [when you understand for how many] eons. But for how many eons? According to the number of sand grains, the sand grains of the River Ganga, the Indian River Ganga. According to the number of… Eons, how many eons? According to the number of the sand grains of the River Ganga. I always forget that one.

By Putting Your Hands Together and Making Offerings to a Painting or Statue of a Buddha You Collect Numberless Greater Merits Than by Seeing It

Then it says, then it says, thäl mo jor wa am, “if you put the palms together like this or offer flowers or incense,” “scented smell or incense,” powder incense, stick incense, scented smell, incense stick, “or light….” Before I was telling [this to] the people who are offering water bowls here, so I was adding “water bowls.” It doesn’t mention water bowls but it is the same for everything. It can fit all the offerings. Before, I mentioned it before they left. I think before the last one left.[1] [If you offer] water bowls, no question, [you collect] even greater merit and numberless times than seeing a painting of Buddha, a picture, or a statue of Buddha. Di ni de wä chhe sö nam drang me par kye te / zhe sung so.

It is most incredible, most incredible, incredible. But many times we don’t know that, so, [we think] “Oh, that’s [just] a statute.” Even if you know it is a statue but you don’t do even this prostration, putting the palms together, you do nothing [due to thinking,] “Oh, that is [just] a statue or stupa.” You collect [so many merits] if you do like this. (Rinpoche shows putting the hands together in prostration.) So just by seeing you collect greater merits than before, all that, just by seeing a painting, picture, or statue. Oh, that is greater merits and numberless! Then, after that, if you do like this (Rinpoche shows putting the hands together in prostration) [you collect] even greater merits than before and numberless! For example, [if you prostrate to] Buddha.

All the Holy Objects Come from the Kindness of Every Single Insect, So They Are So Precious

So, all these holy objects that we see, we see numberless holy objects, statues, stupas, scriptures, they came from this mosquito, by the kindness of this mosquito, this ant, this tiny insect on humid wood. Whatever shape, [such] that it looks like a spider or whatever, [it came from] their kindness. It came from them. Wow, wow, wow. They are soooooo precious. Wow, wow, wow. They are sooooooooooooo precious, sooooooooooooo precious, sooooooooooooo precious. Now I ruin my voice. Now I ruin my voice. I have to save it.

It is incredible, if you know. So, their kindness, they are precious not by qualities as a buddha [is precious] but by their kindness. Aaaah. They are so, so, so precious. They are more precious than the Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha to whom we always pray, as I said before. We get liberated from the lower realms by remembering them (you don’t want to get reborn in the lower realms when you die) and you even get free from samsara and even get free from the lower nirvana, so you get enlightenment, free from suffering and obscurations. So, it all came from every sentient being, every insect. So, they are so precious. Lama khyen, lama khyen.

The Happiness That Comes from Money is Nothing Compared to the Happiness that Comes from Sentient Beings

Why do you think money is so precious, everybody spends the life, in the world people who don’t know, who doesn’t practice pure Dharma, they use their body, speech, and mind, even if human life is so precious, they use their whole life to make money, then they die. They suffer for money.

Now I’m forgetting what I’m saying. 

So now I’m using the example of money. Because if we have money we can buy whatever we want, so everybody is working for money for that. But that is nothing. That is nothing. Happiness came from, as I said before, from sentient beings. All your happiness from beginningless rebirths, now, and in the future, temporary and ultimate, liberation and enlightenment, totally, everything came from sentient beings.

Whatever Happiness You Offer Even to a Tiny Insect Is So Important and So Precious

I was telling the monks, so therefore—I’m not going to talk much, just only about emptiness—so I told them that offering service to them, even to a tiny insect, whatever they need you offer, even giving food to the ants, not only to big [animals] but to tiny [ones], whatever you can do to serve them, whatever happiness you can offer to save them from suffering, whatever you can do is sooooooooooooo important, important, important, so precious, so precious. For you, it is so precious. It is most precious for you, so precious, precious, precious. It is so, so important for you, so precious, wow, wow, wow, whoa, anything you can do. 

Doing Every Activity in the Service of Other Sentient Beings Is So Important

So, that’s why the motivation is to benefit sentient beings. Then, you get up, get dressed, and eat breakfast to benefit sentient beings, for them to achieve enlightenment, to free them from samsara and achieve enlightenment. To work for them, to benefit them, you are eating breakfast. Then you are going to work with that motivation to benefit sentient beings, to achieve enlightenment for sentient beings so that you can do perfect work. So, for the sentient beings, you are doing your work. Then having lunch. Then you are going, for sentient beings you are going to sleep. For sentient beings, everything is for sentient beings. Even if you are studying, any subject, Dharma or whatever, meditation, everything is for sentient beings. Eating medicine [is for sentient beings].

It is so important. So, it is very important, the service. It becomes service to all sentient beings, to the numberless sentient beings, to every tiny, tiniest insect, to the tiniest ones in the water, the ocean, I don’t remember the name. So, it is like that. You see? It is so important. Whatever you do by changing the motivation [and doing it] for others, then it becomes so, so important. It becomes very important service. It is so important [when you are] doing it for others, as service for others. Even studying Dharma, reflecting, meditation, even eating, sleeping. Then, your life is so happy. Most happy your life is. You have no regret. Now when you die, you are very happy, so satisfied, so happy. And in the future, you are so happy. From life to life, you have great success in benefiting sentient beings, [you have] more realizations, and [you are of] greater benefit to sentient beings. Then your happiness increases life to life and you go towards enlightenment. Wow, wow, wow.

That is okay. Now, the talk. 

The Benefits You Get from the Numberless Buddha, Dharma, Sangha, Statues, Stupas, and Scriptures Come from Every Single Sentient Being

So, what I’m saying is that the numberless Buddha, Dharma, Sangha, statues, stupas, and scriptures, which, as I just mentioned, are of so much benefit to you, wow, wow, wow, you receive by every single sentient being, every single insect, the numberless hell beings, hungry ghosts, so sentient beings. Sentient beings are the most precious, most kind, most dear, wish-fulfilling, your wish-fulfilling. [From them come] aaaaaaaaaaaall temporary and ultimate happiness, liberation, enlightenment. 

[1] Lama Zopa Rinpoche is referring to several students who helped Ven. Tenzin Namdrol with the water bowls during the lockdown at Kopan Monastery but then left to return to their home countries.

You can find resources and links on the topic of holy objects on the FPMT Education page Holy Objects.

Watch more from the video series Lama Zopa Rinpoche’s Teachings on Thought Transformation during the Time of COVID-19 and find links to videos in transcripts, MP3s, additional practice advice, and more:
https://fpmt.org/fpmt/announcements/resources-for-coronavirus-pandemic/advice-from-lama-zopa-rinpoche-for-coronavirus/

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.