Like a Skilful Doctor
The purpose of a teaching or instruction given by the teacher, no matter how simple or profound, is for us to put into practice. Some people take the teachings merely as an intellectual pursuit, or as something to be contemplated upon while on the meditation cushion. Sometimes, students are selective with what they want to practise and what they would rather ignore and forget. This separation of what we hold sacred and trivial does not allow us to develop spiritual realisations and in fact, often results in a contradiction between our actions and the teachings, and leads to broken samaya and heavy negative karma.
The teacher, through his vast store of wisdom and experience, has given the instructions and teachings for the benefit of the student. The spirit of the instructions is meant to benefit and nurture the student along the spiritual path. Furthermore, it is meant to lead the student away from distractions, negative actions or avert problems and obstacles. That is why when the student resists, deliberately rejects or goes against the teachings and instructions, negative karma and obstacles arise. When that happens, the student should not blame the teacher or the Dharma. A student can only blame themselves for not embracing the teachings in the first place. It was in this spirit that Kyabje Pabongka Rinpoche shared the metaphor of a skilful doctor, which was recorded in Liberation in the Palm of Your Hand,
The medicine is the thing that helps the patient’s illness, but perhaps the patient doesn’t follow the doctor’s advice and instead just leaves the prescribed medicine by his bedside. When the patient does not do what the doctor says, and does all the things he says not to do, and never gets better, you cannot blame the doctor and you cannot blame the medicine, because the patient brought it on himself.
The spiritual guide is like a skilful doctor but if you listen to many oral instructions, which are like a medicine to pacify the disease of delusion, and do not put them into practice, they will not benefit your mindstream, no matter how profound or extensive they may be. You should not blame the guru; you should not blame the Dharma. It is the very student not putting the Dharma into practice who is at fault. As it is said in the King of Single-Pointed Concentration Sūtra:
After constant searching, the patient finds
A skilled and intelligent doctor,
Who, eyeing him with much compassion,
Tells him, “Take this medicine,” which he dispenses.
Yet the patient does not take this most wholesome
And precious medicine, the potential cure.
Do not blame the doctor; the medicine’s not at fault.
Rather, the patient himself is to blame.
So too with people ordained into this doctrine:
They may know full well about
The [ten] forces, the dhyāna concentrations, the [ten] powers—
But make no true effort to meditate.
How could nirvānạ come without the right effort?
And:
I have taught you most wholesome Dharma.
If you do not practice what you’ve heard,
You are like the patient who left the medicine
In its pouch, thinking, “This cannot cure my disease.”
~ Kyabje Pabongka Rinpoche in Liberation in the Palm of Your Hand
For more interesting information:
- Holy and Profound Pabongka Rinpoche
- Power Place: Jog Falls
- Vajra Yogini – The Powerful Divine Red Lady
- Twenty-Four Holy Places & Eight Great Charnel Grounds
- 6 Yogas of Naropa by H.H. Kyabje Zong Rinpoche
- Make Offerings to Vajra Yogini in Kechara Forest Retreat
- Getting Closer to Vajra Yogini
- The Miraculous Vajra Yogini of Ditsa Monastery | 支扎大寺殊胜的那洛空行母
- Kechara Forest Retreat’s Vajra Yogini
- TRANSCRIPT: How Lama Tsongkhapa transforms to Vajra Yogini | 宗喀巴如何转化成金刚瑜伽母
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Great teachers are rare. It is a privilege and special opportunity when we have a great one. They are able to take a variety of styles and mold them into their own unique style to meet the needs of the students.
The purpose of a teaching is to teach us to put into practice and learning from there to improve by keeping the end in mind. The spirit of the instructions is meant to benefit and nurture the student along the spiritual path. Thank you for the sharing, the best spiritual teachers guidance are always alive to inspire and to help others.
The teacher, through his vast store of wisdom and experience, has given the instructions and teachings for the benefit of the student. The spirit of the instructions is meant to benefit and nurture the student along the spiritual path.
If we don’t see positive changes in our life, it is not because our teachers or the Dharma is not good, it is because we don’t practice according to our teacher’s instruction. Thank you for the good article.
Teaching and learning is an art of appreciating life. The purpose of a teaching is to teach us to put into practice and learning from there to improve by keeping the end in mind. Tsem Rinpoche’s wisdom, teachings, experience , and instruction is important for us as student. We must follow and putting into practice. Well its like a doctor giving advice and prescription on medicines to a patient. The patient must listen and follow instructions, to get better. There many cases I have seen they the patients do not follow, and blaming the doctors for failure. Same goes to a teacher or guru, when student fail, they blame the teacher or guru in actual fact they got to blame themselves as they did not follow the teachings and instructions. The teacher or guru, spiritual guide is indeed like a skilful doctor .
Thank you pastor David for this wonderful sharing and teachings.
We are so fortunate to have a guru who can lead us in our spiritual path by giving us the right method and teaching. Guru is indeed like our Spiritual Doctor, giving us the treatment to our sickness and prescribing the medicine to us. Unfortunately, we students do not follow the instructions and neglect the kindness of our guru. Hence, when our negative karma ripen, we should not blame anyone but us, why didn’t we take the ‘medicine’ prescribed ? No point complaining if we are the one who do not want to change.
Thank you Pastor David for sharing this article and explanation.
“Yet the patient does not take this most wholesome
And precious medicine, the potential cure.
Do not blame the doctor; the medicine’s not at fault.
Rather, the patient himself is to blame”.
Thus when our Guru teaches us the Dharma and we do no more than “put it on the shelf”, how can we hope to make any progress on our spiritual journey to ultimate peace and Enlightenment? Our Guru is the most skilful of Doctors, but it is ultimately, the patient (his student) who determines if he benefits from the teaching by putting it into practice. The student will only benefit if he uses/practices the Dharma as the medicine to pacify / heal his disease of the mind – his delusions or mental afflictions, one of the root causes of suffering.
When the student does not practice the Dharma and the instructions from his teacher and does not heal his mental afflictions, the teacher as the skilful doctor, is not to blame. Rather it is the student who is to blame.
Thank you Pastor David for this clear elucidation of Kyabje Pabongka Rinpoche’s analogy of our Guru and the Dharma with a skilful doctor and the medicine he prescribes.
What our spiritual teacher gives to us is much more than anyone could ever give to us. Our teacher has the clairvoyance to know our past, present and future lives. He knows what we need to do in order to progress in our spiritual journey and reduce our sufferings. .The teacher, through his vast store of wisdom and experience, has given the instructions and teachings for the benefit of the student. The spirit of the instructions is meant to benefit and nurture the student along the spiritual path. Furthermore, it is meant to lead the student away from distractions, negative actions or avert problems and obstacles. That is why when the student resists, deliberately rejects or goes against the teachings and instructions, negative karma and obstacles arise. When that happens, the student should not blame the teacher or the Dharma. Some people take the teachings merely as an intellectual pursuit, or as something to be contemplated upon while on the meditation cushion. Sometimes, students are selective with what they want to practise and what they would rather ignore and forget. This separation of what we hold sacred and trivial does not allow us to develop spiritual realisations and in fact, often results in a contradiction between our actions and the teachings, and leads to broken samaya and heavy negative karma. Thank you Rinpoche and Pastor David for sharing such a profound explaination.??
What our spiritual teacher gives to us is much more than anyone could ever give to us. Our teacher has the clairvoyance to know our past, present and future lives. He knows what we need to do in order to progress in our spiritual journey and reduce our sufferings. When we are walking on the spiritual path, it is not easy.
Just imagine if we have cancer and have to go for the treatment, the kind of pain we have to go through before we can become better is quite unbearable. However, if we follow the instructions of the doctor and go through the treatment cycle, we will be healthy again. But if we don’t follow what the doctor has prescribed to us, we will not see the positive result. It is the same for spiritual practice. Sometimes, we might not feel comfortable when we are told by our teacher to do a certain task. But if we can overcome the discomfort, we will see positive changes.
If we don’t see positive changes in our life, it is not because our teachers or the Dharma is not good, it is because we don’t practice according to our teacher’s instruction. When we take refuge in our guru we have to trust him completely and do what he says. Whatever instructions our teacher has for us is not to harm us but to benefit us.