Kongpo Lama
Yeshe Tsondru
(1761 – 1816)
His Holiness the Dalai Lama will begin the Jangchup Lamrim Teachings tomorrow, so with this message we complete the 2012 Daily Lamrim Quotes.
We hope you have enjoyed!
“So, what is the cause through which I and all sentient beings, from beginningless time until the present, have circled in this state of samsara, afflicted uncontrollably by many hundreds of sufferings? It is this: though this mind’s of indifferent nature, first the thought arises that self and other and so forth exist independently and inherently. Through this appearance that self and other exist inherently, grow all defilements, such as attachment for self and hatred for others. Through these one heaps up karma, and whirls like a firebrand round the realms of the six classes, whence comes this disturbance by suffering, like ripples on water. Therefore, in the end, the root of samsara is that all dharmas of samsara and Nirvana are not grasped as mere conceptual imputations, but appear and are grasped as inherently existent.”
From The Essence of Nectar – Stages of the Path to Enlightenment by Kongpo Lama Yeshe Tsondru as published in The Essential Nectar: Meditations on the Buddhist Path by Geshe Rabten. Edited and verse translation by Martin Wilson. Wisdom Publications (currently out of print).