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Lama Zopa Rinpoche making prayers during the recording of a video teaching, Kopan Monastery, March 2021. Photo by Ven. Lobsang Sherab.
Lama Zopa Rinpoche continues his video teachings on thought transformation from Kopan Monastery in Nepal. Here is a summary of the most recent teaching:
Rinpoche begins this teaching, which contains the final session of the oral transmission of the Sutra of Great Liberation, explaining that His Holiness the Dalai Lama has said that if you meditate on bodhichitta for just one session, it is like doing many preliminary practices. Further, if you can’t generate compassion for one sentient being, there is zero chance of achieving enlightenment. However, if you generate compassion even for one insect, one person, or another being, you create the cause to achieve enlightenment.
The purpose of life is to free all sentient beings from the oceans of samsaric suffering and its causes, Rinpoche explains. This includes the numberless hell beings, hungry ghosts, animals, human beings, sura beings, asura beings, and intermediate state beings in numberless universes. There is nobody left out when you generate bodhichitta, not even one mosquito. When you generate bodhichitta, your friends, enemies, and strangers are all there.
Before Rinpoche continues the oral transmission of the Sutra of Great Liberation he reminds us that the motivation for listening is to bring all these numberless sentient beings to enlightenment, peerless happiness, the cessation of obscurations, and the completion of realizations by oneself alone. So we should think, “To do that without the slightest mistake, I must achieve the state of omniscience. Therefore, I’m going to take the lung of the Sutra of Great Liberation.” Rinpoche continues the oral transmission at 16:32 of this video.
At the end Rinpoche offers a dedication for all those who have now received the oral transmission of this sutra:
May anyone who received the teaching, the lung of this Sutra of Great Liberation, receive all the benefits mentioned in the sutra.
May they never ever, never EVER be reborn in the evil-gone realms. May this rebirth be the last rebirth in samsara! Even though the continuation does not have a beginning, even though it is beginningless!
May they achieve the state of omniscience—buddhahood—knowing directly all the past, present, and future phenomena at the same time in every second. May they be able to read the mind of every hell being, every hungry ghost, every animal, every human being, every sura being, every asura being, every intermediate state being (there are numberless sentient beings in each realm) at the same time.
May they be able to read everyone’s mind directly. May they have perfect power to reveal all the methods, whatever fits according to their karma, to reveal the methods, exactly.
Receiving the oral transmission of the Sutra of Great Liberation is more precious than skies of wish-granting jewels, Rinpoche explains. Because you have received it, you don’t need to be scared of death, the virus, or being separated from your family or your body.
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 “The Last Session of ‘Sutra of Great Liberation‘”:
https://youtu.be/oh1gKKfLsDY
- Read the transcript of Rinpoche’s teaching
- Find videos with Rinpoche giving the oral transmission of the Sutra of Great Liberatation
- Find Rinpoche’s Teachings on Thought Transformation translated into Spanish, Italian, French, Chinese, and Russian
- Dedication verses for COVID-19 Crisis Teachings
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/
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.