Nice Knowledge is a bridge to enlightenment

“Mahamudra: Essence and Practice” ( Book II)

Nice Knowledge is a bridge to enlightenment.

◎ChenYiXin: Why does Vajrayana value gurus?

●Xue Mo: We need to know, for practitioners who haven’t seen the nature; the Buddha statue is actually dead for them. If they don’t have correct faith, it will be just a one-way relationship of superstition from the practitioners to the statue, not a bi-directional communication.

This mutual communication is based on living beings, in magnetic field. Resonance could be achieved in it, and this is what we called, correspondence.

A practitioner, who doesn’t break attachment, can hardly benefit from Buddhism. Human-being can only sense and response to language, biological-field, biological pulse from human. So we can only reach resonance with the power of dharmadhatu, through virtue of Guru in the world. That is the reason why Vajrayana values gurus so much.

In the old days, when you perceived the true nature, it is called as breaking through the first gate. This is a critical step. For a practitioner, seeing the nature means that you’re on the Great Way. You can only go recluse when you are come to this level. You can only study Buddhism, but not recluse, before this.

The main purpose of study is to find the person who can show you the true nature. This person is not necessarily being a monk, “living Buddha”, or celebrity, but this person can make you seeing the true nature.

Previously, we have talked about the lineage. The meaning of lineage is that it carries some religious rituals. These rituals bear a spirit that enables you to grow up and changes your heart gradually during the practices, in order to have your root ripen. The guru that teaches us in this way is called lineage guru. The other kind of guru, who has already achieved the Buddha-hood, can enlighten your soul directly and show you the true nature when you are ready. And this is the root guru as I said.

For lineage guru and root guru, I have a very good metaphor that, the lineage guru is like courier who inherits the firestone and matches from Buddha, and deliver them to you. Although he doesn’t enlighten your soul, you can still use the firestone and matches to make fire by yourself.

The root guru belongs to achieved gurus and he is a torch himself. He can light your heart directly, with his fire of wisdom.

A practitioner can have many lineage gurus. But for the root guru, there is only one in his life. For you only experience true enlightenment once in your life. The enlightenment I am talking about is to perceive the citta and see the true nature. It is not the enlightenment in lots of sayings, like how many times of minor enlightenment and how many times of major enlightenment. The enlightenments like these are still understanding on theory, which belongs to worldly Dharma. For a real enlightenment of transcendent Dharma, there is only one.

About the relationship between the lineage guru and the root Guru, I always say: “the linage guru is like star and the root guru is like the sun. When the sun arises, all starts vanish into the sun light.”

In your life, only when you meet your root guru, you can say that you find the true guru.

Next, let’s go on and talk about Buddhism study. The main purpose of it is to find your root guru. During seeking, it is quite easy for someone or quite hard for somebody else. It all depends on your predestine fate and faith.

In this world, there are lots of people who mark themselves as guru. But the real achieved guru is very rare. If you can’t recognize that which people are real achiever and which one are not, you would probably follow “pseudo guru” or “the blind”. It is like a bind man riding a bind horse, or standing at the edge of deep pool at midnight, very dangerous. Those victims of cult are like the bind man as above. For some of them, the lives are totally ruined. If you follow a pseudo guru, you can easily get possessed by the Devil. Because, when your practice are guided by pseudo guru, you will take illusion as reality, see the wrong as the right and waste your life, even fall into evil. You may go beyond the bottom line as a human unconsciously. I used to have a student who was once a very nice person. But, unfortunately, he got along with some bad friends. He fell as fast as free fall. Human is creature with desires. If you don’t have the wisdom to choose and composure, bad friends can easily trigger your lust and release evils in your heart, destroy your root of faith and achievement.

If you are lucky enough to find your root guru and see the nature, the most importance task is to maintain the state. At this stage, seclusion is must.

After you experience and realize the true nature, the candle of wisdom in your heart is lit. But candle can be easily blown out by evil wind. So the best thing we need to do is to set up several walls around the candle. These walls are disciplines. For a practitioner, no discipline means no composure, and wisdom can’t grow accordingly.

At the same time, when light of wisdom is turned on, we need to feed fire with more firewood. Such firewood is called as accumulation, which is faith and merit. With enough firewood, the flame of fire grows bigger and bigger, and turns into bonfire, into fire what expands to the entire universe. This is what we call as attainment maintenance. It serves to stabilizing your attainment.

When your attainment is stabilized and can’t be moved, you went into the third stage. You still need to back to the world, to practice and test. You need to test your attainment: for example, whether you are lost when you see a beautiful lady, whether you are frightened when facing death, whether you are moved by money, whether you are moved when experiencing difficulty.

In the process of practice, the whole world is the tool for your mind calibration.

If you are not moved when experiencing all kinds of dangerous and temptations, you are really proved to be achiever.

Notice

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《光明大手印：实修心髓》下

善知识是通向觉悟的桥梁

◎陈亦新：密乘为什么看重上师？

●雪漠：要知道，对于一些还没有明白的人来说，他在观修的过程中，佛像其实是“死”的。要是没有正信，他对它就只是单向的迷信，而构不成双向的交流。

所谓的双向交流，要依托活的生物体，从而形成一种磁场。在形成磁场之后，还要达成一种共振。我们将这共振称为相应。

一个没有破执的人，是很难真正受用佛法的。人类只能接受到人的语言、生物场、生物脉冲。我们只有借助人间上师，才可能跟法界的某种力量达成共振。这便是密乘非常重视上师的原因。

在过去，当你见到真心之后，被称为破初关，这个是非常重要的环节。因为，对修行者来说认知到真心就等于入道了。当修行达到这一步时，才有了闭关资格，而在之前，不能闭关，只能参学。

参学的主要目的，就是为了找到能够让你明心的人，这个人不一定是出家人，不一定是活佛，更不一定是名人，但这个人却能够让你明白心性。

以前，我们谈过传承问题。传承的意义就在于，它留下了一些宗教礼仪，我们称之为仪轨。它承载着一种精神，会让你在修行的过程中慢慢成长，慢慢地改变心灵，以便成熟你的根器。以这种方式传承教法的人，我们称之为“传承上师”。另一种上师，他已成就了，他可以直接点燃你的心灵，让你在机缘成熟时明白真心。他便是我所说的“根本上师”。

传承上师与根本上师有一个很形象的比喻：传承上师就像是一个送快递的人，他把智慧的打火石、火柴从佛陀那儿传承了下来，传给了你。他虽然没有直接点燃你的心灵，但你却能凭借火石和火柴，点燃自己的智慧之火。

根本上师属于成就上师，他本身就是一个火把。他可以直接用他证悟的智慧之火点燃你的心。

一个人的传承上师可以有很多个，但根本上师一辈子只有一个。因为你一辈子真正的开悟只有一次。我这里说的开悟，是真正的明心见性，而不是某些人说的大悟多少次、小悟多少次的那种开悟。这类多次的开悟，其实还是世间法意义上的理悟。出世间法意义上的真正开悟，其实只有一次。

我曾经谈过传承上师和根本上师的关系。我说：“传承上师像星星，根本上师像太阳。当太阳出现时，所有的星星就隐入阳光里了。”

人的一生中，当你遇到根本上师之后，你才算找到了真正的上师。

下面，我们继续讲参学。参学的主要目的，就是为了寻找根本上师。但这个寻找的过程，有人很难，有人很简单，这取决于你的缘分和信心。

在这个世界上，打着上师旗号的人很多，可是真正“明白”的上师却寥寥无几。要是你自己不能辨别哪个人明白了、哪个人不明白时，你就会错跟“邪师”或“瞎子”。要是你盲人骑瞎马，夜半临深池，那是非常危险的。像一些邪教的受害者便是这类人，他们中的一些人甚至会毁了一生。要是跟了邪师，修行也容易走火入魔。因为在修行过程中，要是遇不到明师时，你会执幻为实，视谬误为真理，误了一生，甚至还可能作恶。你会在不知不觉中，就堕落到做人底线下了。笔者有个学生，人本来很不错，但不幸交了恶友，其堕落的速度，有种“自由落体”的神韵。因为人是欲望的动物，要是你没有智慧的抉择和定力，恶友会轻易地激活你的欲望，帮你放出你心中的恶魔，毁了你的信根和道业。

要是你有幸遇到了根本上师、明白心性之后，最主要的任务就是保任。在这个阶段，一定要闭关。

当你明白了心性之后，说明你心中的智慧蜡烛已被点亮了，而那蜡烛是很容易被邪风吹熄的。所以，我们最应该做的，就是在火苗的周围加几堵墙，这墙就是戒律。对于一个修行者来说，没有戒律就没有定，也不会发显出真正的慧。

同样，当智慧的火苗被点亮之后，还需要添加柴火。这个柴火我们称之为资粮，也即信心和功德。加上足够的柴火后，这个火苗就会越来越大，进而变成火堆，变成铺天盖地的大火。这一点，被称为保任，目的是为了稳定你的证悟。

当你能保任到不动心的时候，就进入了第三个阶段，你还需要到社会中去实践和历练。你需要试试你自己的证悟：当你看到美女是否动心？当你面临死亡是否动心？当你看到金钱是否动心？当你遇到逆境是否动心？

在这个实践的过程中，整个世界都是你调心之物。

要是你在面临各种险恶或是诱惑时仍然不动心，就说明你已真正成就了。

声明：本文系文化志愿者试译，非专业人才翻译，错误定然不少，如出现疏漏及错误，敬请读者见谅。如有任何翻译上的建议及修正意见，欢迎及时与我们取得联系，我们会加以校对、修改，并希望有专业才能的朋友也能加入我们志愿者群体中来。

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