Even three times a day to offer
Three hundred cooking pots of food [to monastics]
Does not match a portion of the merit
In one instant of love.

By meditating on love for just one moment we accumulate more merit than we do by offering food to all living beings three times every day.

Note that the words “to monastics” are according to Jeffrey Hopkins’ commentary (Nagarjuna’s Precious Garland, p. 26), with the above amplification found in his books A Truthful Heart (p. 177), and Cultivating Compassion (p. 151).

Nearly two years ago, NKTWorld.org warned its readers to “Be Careful with NKT’s Quotes” (source: www.nktworld.org/becareful.html), in this case objecting to Geshe Kelsang’s commentary above because of the change in number—from 300 beneficiaries to all living beings: “Surely, feeding trillions of living beings three times a day offers greater benefit than meditating even on love for just one moment.” That is to say, while the merit accumulated by meditating on love for just one moment is greater than feeding 300 monastics thrice daily (as per Nagarjuna’s original wording), certainly the same could not also be said when every living being is so benefitted. In the latter case, NKTWorld.org supposes, the merit of meditating on love would actually be less than, not greater than, the merit of feeding all living beings.

Is NKT accurate in its portrayal of Nagarjuna’s advice? Or, is NKT paraphrasing Nagarjuna to rationalize why it rarely if ever offers sustenance to living beings (without a fee)?

Various English translations are readily available, none of which supports NKT’s version.

It is the aim of this essay to support Geshe Kelsang Gyatso’s commentary by referencing other Tibetan Lamas’ commentaries to the same verse. To begin, Sonam Rinchen explains the general meaning of Nagarjuna’s verse:

In the Precious Garland Nagarjuna praises the virtues of love by saying:

Even if you donated three hundred pots
Of cooked food three times each day,
It could not compare to even a fraction
Of the merit from just a moment’s love.

On the fifteenth day of the fourth Tibetan month, on which the Buddha’s birth, enlightenment and passing away are commemorated, many beggars come here to Dharamsala and line the road to the main temple. Giving one rupee to each beggar is considered a very good thing to do. Nagarjuna refers to a particularly delicious Indian rice dish cooked in a small clay pot. Imagine going to the trouble of preparing three hundred individual little pots of food, one for each beggar, not just once but daily. This would create much merit, yet he tells us that feeling true love and compassion for them and all living beings for even an instant is worth much more. (Atisha’s Lamp for the Path to Enlightenment, p. 66)

Geshe Lhundop Sopa explains how the meditation on love, by definition, is not a “selfish exercise.” Moreover, its nature is to offer living beings true happiness:

…One creates far greater virtue if, in addition to not harming others, one provides them with excellent and blissful things. Instead of being concerned only with oneself, one is focused upon benefiting others. Thus love and compassion are the foundation of Mahayana practice.

Tsongkhapa quotes from Nagarjuna’s Precious Garland to elaborate this point:

There is no comparison between the merit
Created from one short moment of love
And that from offering three times everyday
Three hundred pots of the best food.

Producing love for sentient beings even for a short time creates greater merit than making vast and extensive offerings. Nagarjuna explains this with an example that people of his day could easily understand. In ancient India the best foodstuffs were cooked in small clay pots. He says that the merit created by offering others three hundred pots of this food three times a day cannot compare to the merit created from an instant of love. (Steps of the Path to Enlightenment, vol. 3, p. 87)

Geshe Jampa Tegchok explains that these meditations far surpass other offerings because love and compassion are the substantial causes of bodhichitta:

In The Land of Manjushri Sutra, the Buddha said that to the northeast of our world, there is a world called “The World of the Great Sovereign,” which contains thousands of Buddha lands. When the monastics in that world enter the meditative absorption of cessation, they experience great pleasure and peace because the gross disturbing attitudes are prevented from manifesting. If we were able to make many sentient beings possess peace and pleasure like those monastics have for tens of millions of years, the positive potential would be very great. But the positive potential of meditating on love generated equally for all sentient beings even for the duration of a finger-snap would be far greater. If the benefit of meditating on love for such a short time is so great, what need is there to mention the benefit of meditating on it for hours, days, months, or years? Why is there such benefit from meditating on love and compassion? When we reflect on them, we create the unique causes of bodhichitta, and bodhichitta is the basis of the Bodhisattva practices of the six far-reaching attitudes.

The Precious Garland of the Middle Way says that if we were to give many types of delicious food to all the beggars three times each day, great positive potential would be created. Yet there would be even more positive potential in meditating on love and compassion because in the long term having these attitudes will enable us to benefit a far greater number of beings in more ways. In addition, we will naturally stop harming them and thus will be spared the negative experiences that result from our negative actions. (Transforming Adversity into Joy and Courage, pp. 185-186)

Je Phabongkhapa explains that affectionate love gives rise to the wish to liberate living beings from changing suffering:

[C]ontemplate as follows: “I can discount the uncontaminated happiness in the mindstreams of all sentient beings; they have only the contaminated sort. Even the thing they take to be happiness has not transcended the nature of suffering. How wonderful if all sentient beings had happiness! May they come to have it! I will procure for them such happiness!”

Nagarjuna’s Precious Garland mentions the following benefits of meditation on this type of love:

The merit of giving the three hundred types of food
Every day in the three times
Cannot compare with the merits gained
From meditating once for a short while on love.

Though such a person might not be liberated,
He will achieve love’s eight cardinal virtues.
Gods and humans will come to love him
And will give him protection;

He will have mental ease and much happiness;
Poison and weapons will not harm him;
He will achieve his aims effortlessly
And be born in Brahma’s world.

The benefits are enormous, such as achieving these eight cardinal virtues of love. You will be reborn as a universal emperor or as Brahma the same number of times as the number of living beings you took as objects for your meditation on love. That is why the meditation is called the brahmavihara or “stages of Brahma.” But if you take all sentient beings as your object, all beings who extend to the limits of space, you will achieve the nonabiding [or dynamic] form of nirvana—the mahabrahma state [that is, the Mahayana nirvana—buddhahood]. (Liberation in the Palm of Your Hand, pp. 529-530)

Like Geshe Jampa Tegchok’s explanation above, Sonam Rinchen explains that Nagarjuna’s advice about meditating on love would hold true even if we were able to feed all worlds:

…Here love consists not only of thinking, “If only all living beings could be happy. May they be happy!” but also of, “May I be the one who helps them find happiness.”

It is said that such love creates more merit than filling all world systems in the universe with offerings. In his Precious Garland Nagarjuna mentions eight benefits that come from feeling strong love for even just a moment… (The Bodhisattva Vow, pp. 44-45)

Thus, whether it is “300 monastics” or “all living beings,” what matters most is the quality of the happiness being offered. Are we removing just one suffering, or all sufferings? As the Dalai Lama explains:

If such great benefit arises from wishing that all beings be freed from a single type of suffering, think how amazingly beneficial it is to wish that all beings be freed from all suffering. As Nagarjuna says, there is merit in making donations to poor monastics, but love is even more powerful. (How to Expand Love, p. 84)

In comparing the power of these two virtuous actions, it is not the number of living beings involved which these Lamas are drawing our attention to, but the nature of the action itself (i.e., which action will be most beneficial, long-term). Geshe Kelsang Gyatso’s commentary clarifies this for us, showing that—with “all living beings” as the common denominator—the difference lies in what an enlightened being versus an unenlightened being is able to do for others, as Shantideva prays in Guide to the Bodhisattva’s Way of Life (4:21b):

May I become the basis from which everything arises
For sustaining the life of countless living beings;

The same is Geshe Kelsang’s wish in Liberating Prayer, which will be fulfilled once we attain enlightenment for the benefit of all:

Please nourish me with your goodness,
That I in turn may nourish all beings
With an unceasing banquet of delight.

As explained at the beginning of this short essay, NKTWorld.org’s interpretation and Geshe Kelsang Gyatso’s commentary are diametrically opposed. NKTWorld.org does not substantiate its assumption of the correct meaning of Nagarjuna’s quote beyond referencing its literal wording. As seen above, no other Tibetan Lama supports NKTWorld.org’s claim, but rather coincide with Geshe Kelsang’s teaching.

NKTWorld.org repeatedly questions the NKT and Geshe Kelsang Gyatso on a number of doctrinal issues, but I would wager that it is actually Buddha’s teachings in general that NKTWorld.org has issues with, since so many of the things taught in the NKT which raises red flags for the contributor(s) of NKTWorld.org are also taught by other Tibetan Teachers, including the Dalai Lama. I wonder whether NKTWorld.org is as well-read as they would have us to believe.

After a number of times experiencing this myself, I wrote to one of the Teachers, and this was her “take it on the chin” response to me and others who complained, for which now several years later I am finally grateful:

Dear All,

This is a portion of a talk that Garchen Rinpoche gave in Toronto on his first visit to the US. His advice has served other sanghas well. This seems like a good time to share it with you.

In Dharma,

Khenmo Trinlay

*****

Take, for instance, a person who is very aggressive, has a negative feeling about everyone and who acts negatively toward everyone else. He develops a negative or aggressive demeanor, carries an aggressive expression on his face, and other people are aggressive in return. People just react to the way he expresses himself. Such a person always finds himself in a situation where other people are aggressive to them, and they feel aggressive to everyone else. Inevitably, they get into conflicts. Other people, though, develop a calm and friendly demeanor toward everyone. They have a relaxed and friendly expression because they have that feeling in their own hearts. People respond to them with friendship and caring, so they develop positive relations with their world. For the aggressive person who always finds himself in aggressive situations, the demon is there in his own mind. The demon is not only staying in his mind, but is expressing itself in the world and creating their own world around them, a world of strife, conflict and pain.

We find ourselves in this life on the border, the border being our own mind. If, with our own mind, we each develop an aspiration for enlightenment, a truly positive orientation toward all sentient beings, then we will create the capacity to find ourselves in the Buddhafields. But if we develop the expression of our own negative emotions, then we will create a future in the lower realms. Thus, we find ourselves in a critical situation in this lifetime. What I hope for all of you is that you will develop the positive side of your mind, that you will develop an uncritical, loving sense for each other, and trust and confidence in Dharma. Thus, you will be of benefit to yourselves and others. We are all brothers and sisters in Dharma, and it is of utmost importance that we keep our precepts of harmony and trust in each other in the community.

Now a feeling that one might get is a real, true sense of devotion to our spiritual master. We can keep our precepts with our master, but the other students who are around in our community, that’s bit too much, that’s too hard. We can’t maintain harmony with the other people who are around, just with the teacher. This doesn’t go; this is not a positive attitude.

The communication of enlightened mind was passed from the Buddha Shakyamuni through an unbroken lineage until us now. In a physical sense, Shakyamuni left the world, but in the sense of understanding, he never left the world because he communicated his understanding. It was communicated through the lineage and, so, the understanding of the guru is still the understanding of Shakyamuni. The communication of Dharma is like my rosary. The bodies are different, like the different beads, but the mind is one, like the string which holds the beads. They stay together because of the keeping of the precepts. You’ll notice that when you cut the string of a rosary, the beads fall off. Wherever you cut the string, it doesn’t matter where, all the beads fall off. That symbolizes that by breaking the faith, breaking your relationship with the community, the lama, or the precepts, there is no longer communication of enlightenment in the world. All the beads fall off, and there is no lineage for you.

A spiritual community like this one here, can be of very great benefit, but perhaps can also be a great danger. All people who make a connection with this community, even if it is making a symbolic offering of one penny, wherever they go in this life and in future lives, will benefit from all the merit created by all the practitioners of Dharma who practice within this community now, and for so long as this community persists. A person who participates in this community reaps great benefit from all the practice carried out by all the members. Even if a person would spend only a month as a participant in this community, they continue to reap great benefits. Infinite benefit is created by a person who participates in this community even if it is only for one hour, even if it is only for one session. If a person finds himself incapable of staying in a community and leaves the community, this is certainly a fault.

If a person should arrive in the community who is of a rough, aggressive demeanor, then one must relate to such a person with care. If such a person of bad demeanor should enter the community, we should not feel that he is not a fit person for our community because he is too aggressive, too violent or too mean. Rather, we should welcome him into our community as a very valued member, a person who will be able to teach us how to be patient, how to be forbearing, a person who will be able to teach us to deal with difficult circumstances and about the reactions in our own minds. We must all gather around and pay special attention to such a person, treating him in such a way that we do not react to his aggressive or rough demeanor. If we do this, and if the person can persevere for even a short time, we will find that the character and demeanor of that person will change by force of their relationship with the community and they will become a person of positive attitude. We must treat all the members of our community with great care, as valued members of the community. Treat all our fellow Buddhists, wherever they might be, with great care. Treat all people, all beings, with care. In such a way, we will not create conflict.

• According to NKT, NKT’s only leader, Gyatso, is this world’s ‘Third Buddha’ and only living Buddha. (nktitesVSshugdenites.html)
• Gyatso had to market Tsongkhapa as the second Buddha even though Tibetan Buddhists considered Tsongkhapa as an emanation of the Buddha Manjushri. (fundamentalist.html)
• Gyatso had to market himself as the third Buddha, only the second to ever become a Buddha during human life, and the only living Buddha and seer of past, present and future. (fundamentalist.html)
• NKT claims that its founder, Kelsang Gyatso, is a spiritual descendant of Buddha Shakyamuni and only the third Buddha ever in this kalpa (universe). (deadend.html)
• NKT promotes Kelsang Gyatso as the only pure Kadampa lineage holder and living Buddha and only the third Buddha ever. (unique.html)
• NKT pitches Kelsang Gyatso as a Buddha with infinite knowledge and understanding (except perhaps fluency with English), and only the third living Buddha ever on this earth. (cored.html)

With the above mistaken bullet points in hand, NKTWorld.org then tries to draw out their apparent implication: “Pabongkha and Trijang are reincarnations of Tsongkhapa (but not Buddhas, confirmed by Gyatso’s self identification as the 3rd Buddha following Shakyamuni and Atisha)” (WhoIsHe.html). And again:

Unlike Tsongkhapa who did not become a Buddha until after he died (i.e., when Shugden died again in 1419), Gyatso became a Buddha during his life (1931-present). Since Gyatso is marketed as the 3rd Buddha, Pobangkha and Trijang, even though they are reincarnations of Shugden who according to Gyatso is a Buddha, have yet to find their Buddhahood. (WhoIsHe.html)

However, the explanation is quite simple. The Kadampa glossary entry for ‘Buddha Shakyamuni’ states:

The Buddha who is the founder of the Buddhist religion. Buddha Shakyamuni is the fourth of one thousand founding Buddhas who are to appear in this world during this Fortunate Aeon. The first three were Krakuchchanda, Kanakamuni, and Kashyapa. The fifth Buddha will be Maitreya.

Following after Buddha Shakyamuni, a number of Buddhist Masters throughout history have been affectionately called the “second Buddha,” having formed or re-formed major movements within the faith. For example:

• Nagarjuna, founder of the Madhyamika school
• Bodhidharma, founder of the Zen tradition
• Padmasambhava, founder of the Nyingma tradition
• Atisha, founder of the (Old) Kadampa tradition
• Je Tsongkhapa, founder of the New Kadampa tradition

Obviously, in this context “second Buddha” could hardly mean that no one else had achieved enlightenment since the time of Buddha Shakyamuni, or that they were the only living Buddha at that time. It also explains why Gelugpas refer to Atisha and Je Tsongkhapa both as the second Buddha.

Similarly, Geshe Kelsang Gyatso—founder of the New Kadampa Tradition – International Kadampa Buddhist Union (NKT-IKBU)—is also like a founding Buddha, having introduced this new presentation of Dharma for the modern world.

Yet, everyone should think of their Guru as being like a second Buddha. (After all, is it not our Spiritual Guide who has turned the Wheel of Dharma in our heart?) For example, in Offering to the Spiritual Guide (Tib. Lama Chöpa)—which many Gelugpas recite as a daily practice—we remember the good qualities of our Guru by saying:

Great ocean of moral discipline, source of all good qualities,
Replete with a collection of jewels of extensive learning,
Second Buddha, venerable saffron-robed monk,
O Elder and Holder of the Vinaya, to you I make requests.

About the third line, the Dalai Lama says, “One should reflect on the fact that the guru is endowed with the qualifications as explained in the vinaya, is a bikkshu and is like the successor of Buddha, and on that basis cultivate faith” (The Union of Bliss & Emptiness: A Commentary on Guru Yoga Practice, p. 123). This explains why Geshe Thubten Soepa of the FPMT praises the 14th Dalai Lama as a second Buddha:

Praise also to His Holiness, Tenzin Gyatso,
who in our times, just like a second Buddha,
performs enormous deeds of love and peace —
to further your teachings and foster the roots of virtue
of all the world’s beings—a life-protecting lord.

Summary

1. The term “second Buddha” does not mean that someone is only the second person to have become a Buddha since the time of Buddha Shakyamuni
2. The term “second Buddha” does not mean that someone is the only Buddha alive at that time
3. For having established Dharma in their minds, everyone should think of their Guru as being like a second founding Buddha

To learn more about how Geshe Kelsang Gyatso is viewed in the New Kadampa Tradition, read The Third Buddha: Cultish Guru Devotion in the NKT?

Importantly, these freedoms are social freedoms, not necessarily organizational requirements. For example, requiring a legitimate religion to include all aspects of another religion would be inappropriate and often seriously disruptive and antithetical, AND a mockery of religious freedom. Requiring Islam to merge Christianity or Judaism into Islam would be heretical, as it would be to mandate that all forms/sects of Christianity include liturgies of all other forms/sects of Christianity. Likewise, requiring a Buddhist sect to include the liturgies and beliefs of another Buddhist sect would be improper. (source: freedom.html)

When I told my Teacher about this quote, she responded, “Exactly!” This is exactly what Dorje Shugden represents as the Dharma Protector of Je Tsongkhapa’s tradition, protecting the Gelugpa, or New Kadampa, tradition from being mixed up with other Buddhist sects or even non-Buddhist religions.

Ironically, however, the above quote is actually presented as an attempted criticism directed against Buddhist practitioners in India who were expelled from their monasteries because they continued to practice Dorje Shugden. Even their private practice of Dorje Shugden—previously allowed by the Dalai Lama—was now grounds for expulsion. When the Western Shugden Society cried foul, NKTWorld.org reasoned along the following lines:

If Tibetan and Indian Buddhist monasteries wish to refrain from Shugden spirit worship, are they not free to do so? Is it religious freedom for a minority of ordained clergy to worship spirits not condoned by the monastery where these Shugden worshipers have been ordained and live? In analogy, must all religions include the practices of all other religions or otherwise be called liars and opponents to religious freedom? (whoisshugden.html, essayhighlights.html)

To continue the analogy, must Shugden practitioners include practices of all other Buddhist sects or religions, or otherwise be called sectarians and opponents to religious harmony? When Nagarjuna was accused of being a nihilist by someone denying emptiness (and thereby also denying cause and effect), Nagarjuna responded, “When you foist on us all your errors, you are like a man who has mounted his horse and has forgotten that very horse.” How ironic, then, that Shugden practitioners are now being accused of forcing eclecticism on others:

• NKT is a shameful and shamefully-marketed religion, abusing the almost universal ideal of religious freedom to market Shugden as a mandatory Buddha deity in Tibetan Buddhism. (freedom.html)
• Though no other religion on earth requires other religions to worship its deities, NKT demands it. (freedom.html)
• NKT’s demand that Shugden be worshipped is ridiculous. (proveit.html)

These claims about the NKT are what’s ridiculous—nothing could be further from the truth! Once again, these things are the exact opposite of what Dorje Shugden practice represents, which comes from confusing non-eclecticism with sectarianism.

With the above in mind, consider what Georges Dreyfus observed happening at about the time the Dorje Shugden controversy first erupted in the mid-1970s:

[T]he present Dalai Lama developed the role of Nying-ma rituals in the practice of his own personal Nam-gyel monastery. The monastery’s repertoire was expanded from the usual Ge-luk tantric rituals to include typical Nying-ma practices such as Vajrakilaya and others. He invited several Nying-ma lamas to give teachings and empowerments to his monks. He also ordered them to do appropriate retreats. I remember the tongue in cheek comments of some of my friends of the Nam-gyel monastery about their “becoming Nying-ma-bas.” They were surprised, taken aback and uncomfortable, for the rituals of the Nam-gyel monastery had been for many years Ge-luk, not very different from that of the two tantric colleges… They profoundly resented the adoption of rituals they saw as coming from an alien tradition.

The Dalai Lama now offers Bodhisattva vows to non-Buddhists: Just visualize Jesus or Allah if you are a Christian or Muslim. This goes beyond ecumenical show-and-tell to actually having one faith participating in the vow-taking ceremonies of another, taking inter-faith ‘dialogue’ to the extreme. All this in the name of a public relations war against sectarianism, but one has to ask is it overkill? At what point is this brand of non-sectarianism taken too far? Why can’t we just be ourselves?

Someone recently commented on Wikipedia that, as an anthropology term, “Sectarianism is a man-made word used to communicate the simple fact that different religious groups do exist.” There are dozens of major religious groups in the world, each with multiple sub-sects. In order to demonstrate non-sectarianism à la the Dalai Lama, you would have to study all of them, right? (After all, if you left one of them out, wouldn’t that constitute sectarianism?) How do you know when you have studied other religions’ theologies adequately enough? How much time does that leave for the study of your own tradition?

In order to have equanimity towards all sentient beings, does one have to know each and every one of them personally? Is it not sufficient to understand that they are just like us in wishing to have happiness and be free from suffering? Knowing exactly how each and every one of them is experiencing happiness or suffering is not a pre-requisite for our having equanimity towards them.

Likewise, in order to have equanimity towards other religious traditions, does one have to be acquainted each and every one of them in detail? Is it not sufficient to know that other traditions are spiritual paths just like our own in that they wish to bring happiness to others and free them from suffering? Knowing exactly what each and every one of them teaches about happiness or suffering is not a pre-requisite for our having equanimity towards them.

Summary

1. Dorje Shugden represents the wisdom of practicing one tradition single-pointedly, without mixing
2. Dorje Shugden practitioners do not demand that others worship Dorje Shugden, but wish only to practice freely themselves
3. Non-sectarianism, which is an expression of equanimity, can be achieved simply by being a sincere practitioner of one’s own tradition and developing equanimity towards others

To learn more about developing equanimity towards other religious traditions without mixing them, read One Truth, Many Paths: So What’s Wrong with Mixing Them?