Question asked by confused
Hi
I have a question regarding nature and estanlishment of guru/disciple realtionship.
First of all, how Guru/disciple relationship is established? I kinda have two types of information on this, but I think that I might have misunderstood something. One of my sources says that the Guru is the one from whom you take vows, this it what it says in Berzin archives.com: " …demarcation line of an actual spiritual teacher, if we look at the definitions, it’s the one that we take vows with. There are lay and monk vows, bodhisattva vows, there are tantric vows. That’s where you establish the relation with the spiritual teacher.It’s not that you have to say, “Oh, you’re my teacher,” and they have to say, “You’re my disciple.” So this is not what we do to"
Now few days ago I was reading Lama Yeshe wisdom archives.com about Guru devotion. There, lama Zopa rinpoche was exhanging letter with students and said in one letter to student that, if you are in the precence of teacher and he is teching dharma, and you think in your mind that this person is guru and I am his student, that`s when you establish guru/disciple relationship. I want to however say that these are personal letters sent between teacher and student and then later published. Many times (almost always, rather) the context is not revealed at all so information can be received in very distorted way and misunderstandings can happen. I think that this is just the case here but I am not sure.
So how is it that you establish guru/disciple relationship really?
His Eminence Tsem Rinpoche has 14 gurus, but Rinpoche regards Kyabje Zong Rinpoche as his root guru, although Kyabje Zong Rinpoche is not Tsem Rinpoche’s first guru, and he is also not the first guru to give Tsem Rinpoche initiation. So why is Kyabje Zong Rinpoche Tsem Rinpoche’s root guru?
Tsem Rinpoche explains that, the guru who has the most impact on you, who affected you the most in your spiritual path, is your root guru.
Therefore to answer your question, a guru can be the one who gives you vows, and a guru-disciple relationship can also be established in the case of Lama Zopa’s which you mentioned above. After all, we can have more than one guru, and Tsem Rinpoche has 14!
However, you can only have one root guru, and the way to determine your root guru, is what I have mentioned above.
I strongly recommend you to watch these amazing and very important videos of Tsem Rinpoche’s teachings about gurus and disciples here: https://www.tsemrinpoche.com/tsem-tulku-rinpoche/buddhas-dharma/gurus-for-hire-enlightenment-for-sale.html
Hoep this helps. Please feel free to ask more questions. It is my pleasure to share what I learned from Tsem Rinpoche with you.
Thank you!
Pastor Loh Seng Piow