The Great Treatise on the Stages of the Path to Enlightenment is endowed with Master Atisha’s lineage. For the sake of passing down this lineage, he sacrificed 20 years of his life. We should never forget such a great virtuous teacher. He left his homeland, faced the language barrier, unable to adapt to a different diet, yearned to see flowers and missed the sound of elephants’ trumpeting that was impossible to hear in Tibet. He probably might not have adapted well to the weather either. Therefore, the kind of challenging circumstances he had to endure, and the kind of mighty courage and perseverance he had to possess, even to the extent of sacrificing his life, in order to ensure that the lineage of Buddha Dharma could be passed down.
Global Lamrim 2, Lecture 0009 BW Monastery 吉祥宝聚寺 — Lecture No. 0009
We hear of the many sacrifices made by past dharma masters to preserve the teachings for future dharma practitioners like us. What can we do to repay this kindness？ What benefits will we get?
Hence, I supplicate for the longevity of all great virtuous teachers! I also supplicate for those who are able to hear this lineage teachings, that they cherish this precious lineage in their hearts and uphold them properly! This is a way of repayment and showing gratitude to our past Lineage Masters. Don’t you agree? BW Monastery 吉祥宝聚寺 — Lecture No. 0009
I hope to be able to follow the Teachings and practise accordingly in order to benefit myself and others. I think this will be my way of repaying the kindness now.
We can do what all great virtuous teachers would like us to do, which is to practice as best as we could in accordance to the teachings. They will rejoice to see our progress in our practice, no matter how small the improvements are. They will bless us; their blessing will become our mental strength to fight away the obstacles!
Practising correctly the dharma teachings which the past dharma masters have left for us, and doing our best to continue what they have done to preserve the teachings, so that our future generation can learn the dharma too, especially in this era now when Buddhism is dwindling. One of the benefits is that as long as the dharma teachings continue in the future years to come, we can continue to learn to be a better person, and so can those around us.
Our teacher taught us to supplicate for the longevity for all the great virtuous teachers, and also supplicate to be able to hear the teachings from the lineage. We should also cherish the precious lineage in our hearts and uphold them properly. Upholding them means to put them into practice, and then show gratitude, this will be the way to show gratitude and then to repay the kindness.
But what benefits will we get by doing this? If we want to continue to be able to meet the perfect and complete teachings in our future lives then we got to plant the karmic seeds for it, the karmic cause for it. And the best way to do this is really to cherish this precious teachings in our hearts. Uphold them properly, we should also be able to bear hardship and sacrifices in order to learn the teachings properly so this will not only repay the kindness of the past lineage masters. But will also enable us to continue to be able to learn from them and learn the teaching in the future lives.