1. Offerings Cause Enlightenment
When we say offering one flower to a statue of Buddha causes one to achieve liberation, we have to understand it is causing us to realize the whole path, every single path to liberation and the steps of realizations within each path. It causes us to achieve the great liberation of full enlightenment. (Lama Zopa Rinpoche)
Photo: Bill Kane, Choe Khor Sum Ling Centre, Bangalore, 2016
Offering a Tiny Flower
Since we are going to make many offerings and engage in the practice of extensive offering, I think it is good to understand the inconceivable benefit that offering has. This is very important. Offering one flower to a statue of Buddha creates results that never finish until one achieves liberation. If we think of all the samsaric pleasures that we have had from beginningless rebirths, and all the samsaric happiness we will have in the future, still the result of offering one flower to a statue of Buddha doesn’t end.
“Until one achieves liberation” does not just mean liberation from samsara. It means great liberation, full enlightenment, the non-abiding sorrowless state in which one has ceased all the gross and subtle mistakes of the mind and completed all the qualities. Even to achieve liberation from samsara, you have to complete all the paths. Liberation doesn’t happen suddenly without the preliminary of actualizing those steps on the path. When we say offering one flower to a statue of Buddha causes one to achieve liberation, we have to understand it is causing us to realize the whole path, every single path to liberation and the steps of realizations within each path. It causes us to achieve the great liberation of full enlightenment.
This gives an idea of the unimaginable benefit that offering a flower to a Buddha statue contains: all the past samsaric pleasure that one has experienced from beginningless past lives, and all future samsaric happiness, and on top of that, attaining the whole path to liberation and the whole path to enlightenment. Even after one has achieved great liberation, the benefits of offering one flower to a statue of Buddha still don’t end. Why? Because then you are able to benefit numberless sentient beings. You cause those who are devoid of temporary happiness to have temporary happiness. You cause those who don’t have ultimate happiness to have ultimate happiness. You bring numberless sentient beings from happiness to happiness to full enlightenment. Not just one sentient being; you benefit numberless sentient beings until everyone becomes enlightened.
Even if you offer a tiny flower or a single rice grain, you achieve all those benefits. We are not aware of the limitless skies of benefits we achieve from the practice of offering, what we can achieve and enjoy from life to life. Even while we are in samsara, we will enjoy good rebirths, wealth, and every happiness. Even just the samsaric perfections are amazing, without adding all those incredible realizations that allow us to offer deep benefit to sentient beings, liberating them from the oceans of samsaric suffering and the cause: delusion and karma.
It’s not only from offering flowers. I was at Deer Park Center and explained the benefits of offering one flower to the Buddha, and the next day many people went to buy flowers! But this is just an example. It doesn’t mean only flowers; the benefit comes from any offering.
Offering to a statue of Buddha and offering to the actual living Buddha are exactly the same. Offering to a statue does not create less merit than offering to the actual Buddha. When Buddha was in India, the bodhisattva Meaningful to Behold asked, “Now we see the Buddha and make offerings, but in the future, we will not be able to see the Buddha. What should we do?” Buddha said, “There is no difference at all between making offerings to me now and making offerings to my statue in the future.”
And there is no difference between offering to a statue of Buddha and to a visualized Buddha. Even if there is no statue, but you think of Buddha and make offerings, it has incredible inexhaustible benefits. Why? Because Buddha has inconceivable qualities; he completed the two types of merit and ceased all the mistakes of the mind. Why does any service or offering to Buddha have inconceivable, unimaginable, unfathomable merit? Because Buddha has unimaginable, unfathomable, and incomparable qualities. The limitless skies of benefit we receive are due to Buddha’s qualities, and Buddha achieved these limitless qualities in order to help us. All these qualities came from the root, which is compassion. Compassion causes one to realize bodhichitta, the mind taking full responsibility to liberate numberless beings from all the suffering and its cause and bring them to enlightenment. From bodhichitta, one achieves enlightenment for sentient beings.
We must remember that every single offering we make in our daily lives to Buddha has all these unimaginable benefits and results. Therefore, during this life until death comes – however many years, months, weeks, days, hours, minutes, or seconds we have until we die – we shouldn’t miss out on such an opportunity. It is so easy to do and the result is inexhaustible happiness; not only temporary happiness, but ultimate happiness and the ability to enlighten all sentient beings.
There is so much you can enjoy in life, like the limitless sky. You can make life meaningful all the time. After you collect all this merit, you dedicate it to the numberless hell beings, numberless hungry ghosts, numberless animals, numberless human beings, numberless suras and asuras, even the arhats and bodhisattvas. You dedicate for them to achieve enlightenment. Not only do you collect all this merit, but then you give it to all living beings, for their happiness. That is another unbelievable thing to enjoy in this life!
Our life is full of opportunity; it is unbelievable what we can do. It is so easy to have realization. You can do the practice of offering not just one time, but many times a day and at night. You can’t plant crops in the field all the time – you have to follow certain seasons – but there is no limit to creating merit with the merit field, with Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha. You can do it twenty-four hours a day. It’s only from one’s own side that we don’t do it; there is no blockage from the side of the merit field. It’s not like gold and dollars, where now the value is very high and then it goes down. Buddha’s qualities don’t go down. Therefore, offering, making prostrations, circumambulating, service, and so forth – all these things related to Buddha – creates inexhaustible merit. It’s always the same.
Offerings Cause Enlightenment
(duration: 19 minutes)
Transcript Video 1: “Offerings Cause Enlightenment”
(You can read the transcript of the video below. Alternatively, you can read the same transcript alongside the video by clicking here to download it or view it in a separate window.)
Anyway, one grain… So if you offer to a statue of Buddha, or a scripture, or a stupa, or a picture, no matter how big they are, no matter how small they are, if you offer to them one grain or one tiny flower… Even if it is without a bodhichitta motivation, even without Dharma, neither bodhichitta nor renunciation to achieve liberation from samsara, nor the motivation to achieve the happiness of future lives, not even that – without any Dharma motivation; even if the motivation is totally black, totally the eight worldly dharmas, seeking the happiness of this life, nothing else – if you offer one grain or one tiny flower to a holy object, no matter how big or small it is, the minute you offer it you collect [merit] and it becomes the cause of enlightenment. Immediately, it becomes the cause of enlightenment.
Here, when [this text] talks about offerings becoming virtue and the cause of enlightenment, it doesn’t depend on the motivation being virtue. In these exceptional cases, like circumambulation and making offerings to even statues, stupas, or pictures of Buddha, it immediately becomes the cause of enlightenment. That means it becomes the cause of the happiness of future lives, not just the happiness of one life but hundreds of thousands of happinesses in future lives, such as a good rebirth and many things. It becomes many happinesses of future lives, then ultimate happiness – liberation from samsara; all happiness and, as I mentioned before, enlightenment.
When it says this becomes the cause of enlightenment, you have to understand this means it becomes the cause to achieve the five paths and ten bhumis, all those realizations. Offering to [a holy object], no matter how small or how big, how tiny a picture or statue, stupa, scripture it is, whether it is a picture or actually built, it becomes the cause of achieving all the five paths – the Mahayana path of merit, the Mahayana preparatory path, the Mahayana right seeing path, the Mahayana path of meditation, and the Mahayana path of no more learning – all the Mahayana five paths to achieve enlightenment, and then the ten bhumis. It becomes the cause of that. It also becomes the cause to achieve the tantric path – the clear light, illusory body, and the unification of no more learning. Before bodhichitta, it becomes the cause of renunciation of samsara, to realize that, to see all of the entire samsara in the nature of suffering. It becomes the cause of everything, all the realizations. You have to understand that. Being the cause of enlightenment means it becomes the cause of the realization of guru devotion, the root of the path to enlightenment, then of the whole entire – from the perfect human rebirth up to karma – graduated path of the lower capable being, all those meditations and realizations; then, the realizations of the middle capable being, seeing all of samsara in the nature of suffering, all that.
Before that, when you have all the realizations of the perfect human rebirth up to karma, then also you are able to abandon the ten non-virtues and practice the ten virtues. All this happens. Then, you realize how samsara is only in the nature of suffering. All the samsaric happinesses, how they are only in the nature of suffering, you realize all that. You have renunciation of samsara, then you are able to practice the three higher trainings, the path to achieve liberation. Then bodhichitta, the realization of the six paramitas, all that. Then as I mentioned before, the five paths and the ten bhumis. Then the tantric path. It becomes the cause of all those realizations. One has to understand that when it says “It becomes the cause of enlightenment,” it means that.
Not only that, by offering one grain or one tiny flower to a holy object, after that [when you attain enlightenment], then you liberate all the numberless hell beings from the oceans of samsaric sufferings, the numberless hungry ghosts from the oceans of samsaric sufferings, the numberless animals from the oceans of samsaric sufferings, the numberless human beings from the oceans of samsaric sufferings, the numberless suras and asuras from the oceans of samsaric sufferings, and the numberless intermediate state beings from the oceans of samsaric sufferings. Then you bring numberless hell beings to enlightenment, numberless hungry ghosts to enlightenment, numberless animals to enlightenment, numberless human beings to full enlightenment, numberless suras and asuras to full enlightenment, and numberless intermediate state beings you are able to bring them to full enlightenment. You, one person, are able to bring them to enlightenment. It is like that. That is most amazing, most, most, most, most amazing. You are able to cause all the happiness up to enlightenment to all the numberless sentient beings of each realm. That is most amazing. That is what you are able to do after you achieve enlightenment. You are able to do perfect works towards the sentient beings.
When you have brought every sentient being – every sentient being of the hell realm, hungry ghost, animal, human being, sura, and asura realms – to enlightenment, and there is not one sentient being left, that is the only time that the benefits of offering this one grain to a holy object – no question of actually offering it to Buddha, but I am just saying to a holy object – no matter how big or small, at that time when everyone has attained enlightenment, at that time the benefits are complete. Only at that time, when everyone is brought to enlightenment, are the benefits of offering one grain or one tiny flower – no matter how small it is – complete. That is when all this unimaginable unbelievable benefit, only at that time is it completed – when you have brought every sentient being to enlightenment. There is not one sentient being left. You have to understand that.
The Benefits of Being Buddhist
Therefore… I lost my talk! Okay, now I remember. So you understand that being Buddhist, you understand being Buddhist, wooow. You can’t imagine the opportunity for happiness, to create the cause, it is just inexpressible, just inexpressible. One tiny offering has all these benefits, can you imagine? To be achieved, for yourself and all sentient beings? That is the most, really. Even from this, you can see the benefits of being Buddhist, of having faith in the Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha, what you can do. Even if the world economics is going down, but from one tiny offering you can imagine what happiness you can achieve: all the happiness for yourself up to enlightenment, then you are able to cause numberless sentient beings, you can bring everybody to enlightenment. You can’t imagine. Just you are able to liberate, to bring them to the blissful state of peace, liberation from samsara. Even just that is the most amazing thing, that you are able to bring everyone [to that. But] even if it is just one sentient being, that is most amazing. Here, to free them from the oceans of samsaric sufferings and the cause – karma and delusion – to be able to do that to even one sentient being, just that is most amazing. That one sentient being, can you imagine? Who has suffered, who has been suffering from beginningless rebirths? It is so important to feel that, so important to realize that. Then you know how important it is, so serious a thing, to benefit others, so urgent; it is an emergency to help others.
But, of course, without yourself having qualities, how can you help others? You need qualities. First, your mind needs to be subdued. Do you understand? When your mind is full of problems, how can you benefit others? How can you help others? How can you be an example to others? How can others follow you? It is like that. The lineage lamas of the lam-rim, starting from Guru Shakyamuni Buddha, Maitreya, Manjushri, Asanga up to the present, His Holiness the Dalai Lama, can you imagine? All of those who have completed the path, those great lamas, that is why you can follow them. We have an example to follow. There is inspiration; it gives hope in life. Then, to bring them to enlightenment…
It is amazing being Buddhist, having faith in the Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha, able to accept them, to have faith in them, even though you don’t understand all of their qualities, just some of their qualities. You need to study them. You need to do extensive study in order to understand their qualities. Just praying alone… It is very important to pray, but that alone is not enough.
Of course, to understand every single quality of theirs is only when you become enlightened. Only at that time, can you see every single quality of the Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha, especially of the Buddha. To understand completely all of the qualities is only when you have become enlightened, when you have omniscience. But if you study [their qualities], then you get a basic idea. The more you learn the path, the more you understand the qualities of the Buddha, how they are gradually developed, how you remove the defilements more and more. The mind becomes more and more pure. It is like a mirror that is covered by dust. The more you clean, because it has the nature to reflect very clearly, because it has that potential, the more you clean it, it is able to give more and more reflection. After you clean it completely, then you are able to get a clear reflection, even of an entire city. Even though a mirror is small, it can reflect billions of things. The more you clean it, because it has that nature, the more clear and able to reflect it becomes. The more you clean and purify the mind, you see more qualities, because of buddha nature.
Really, it is really amazing to be Buddhist. Wow, the opportunity for happiness, what you can achieve and do. It is so easy. Can you imagine? There is so much to rejoice in. We must rejoice; this one time it has happened like this. You can’t imagine it. Of course, this doesn’t last long. Not every day is like this. It can be stopped any time, this incredible opportunity, this wish-fulfilling, precious human rebirth of having met Dharma, with which it is unbelievable what you can do. We don’t have this everyday; it can be stopped at any time. Therefore, we must take the opportunity every day, every hour, every minute, every second to create the cause, of course, towards sentient beings, but here I am talking about the benefits of making offerings to the Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha. That is so small, so easy, but the benefit is like limitless skies. You can’t imagine what you achieve. It is most amazing. Therefore, we should take this opportunity any time, while walking, while eating, while doing activities, whenever there is the opportunity, to make offerings.
[End of Video 1: “Offerings Cause Enlightenment”]
Offering Numberless Offerings to Numberless Holy Objects
Even just a tiny offering has an inconceivable, wow, result that you can achieve. In daily life, not only performing at the altar whatever extensive offerings that you can – water, food – whatever extensive offerings you can, but besides that, you should do as much as possible. The most important thing is that before you eat or drink, even a candy, anything, first make offering. Whatever you drink, even water; it is not only that you make offering of your main food, but not other things. That is opposite to the refuge practice. After you take refuge, it is part of the refuge practice that whenever you eat or drink, you need to offer it and then take it as a blessing to bless your heart, to bless you to achieve realizations, to achieve enlightenment, and be able to do perfect work for sentient beings. Because we drink and eat so many times in one day, can you imagine [what happens] every time when you make offering?
I already explained about offering one tiny flower to holy objects, the inconceivable merits, the results that you achieve. Can you imagine a plate of rice? There is so much rice there. I was talking about only one grain before, but we eat and drink so many times. If every time an offering gets done to the Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha, can you imagine? I was talking about offering one grain, one tiny flower to one buddha, to one statue, to one scripture. I was not talking about to all of them, but just to one, but now you offer, can you imagine offering to a thousand stupas, statues, scriptures, to a thousand buddhas? Now, you offer to numberless stupas, statues, scriptures, like when we did the food offering meditation practice the other day. Can you imagine?
Listen here. Now, [you offer to] numberless Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha and to numberless stupas, statues, and scriptures. The merits of offering to one stupa, statue, scripture [are as I mentioned above], but now here you offer to numberless stupas, statues, scriptures and to numberless Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha, so can you imagine it? This much merit that I explained before becomes numberless. Up until you achieve enlightenment and bring all sentient beings to enlightenment, it becomes the cause of that. Here, it becomes numberless merits from offering to numberless stupas, statues, scriptures and to numberless Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha. Now, like that, it becomes the cause to achieve all that happiness. The essence is for yourself to achieve enlightenment and to bring all sentient beings up to enlightenment. You create numberless causes for that, can you imagine?
So far, what I talked about is making one offering to numberless stupas, statues, scriptures and to numberless Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha, and to the highest one, the guru. Can you imagine? What I said before about making one offering to one buddha, one statue, one stupa, how much success is there? You [achieve every happiness] up to enlightenment and you bring numberless sentient beings to enlightenment. Now, numberless times that gets done. Numberless [offerings] get done so many times.
Collecting Merits in Daily Life
So, collect all the merits in daily life, in whatever activity you are doing, as much as possible. Whatever opportunity there is for merits, then collect them like that. Whether at your house or outside, if you see a beautiful flower, immediately make an offering to the root guru. Think of your root guru and make an offering of it. If you immediately remember your root guru and make offerings, then you collect numberless merits – greater merit than having made offerings to numberless Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha and to numberless stupas, statues, and scriptures. I am not talking about only those in this world, but all the holy objects that exist in all the universes, and all the Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha that exist in the ten directions. You create greater merit than having made offerings to numberless Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha and numberless stupas, statues, and scriptures. Offer it to numberless Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha and to numberless stupas, statues, scriptures in the ten directions who are manifestations of the guru. Can you imagine it? Every time this creates numberless causes of enlightenment! So many times these are collected. Then, it is the same with creating the causes of liberation from samsara; so many numberless causes of those happinesses are collected. That doesn’t take even a minute, in just only a few seconds it gets done.
The great Lama Je Drubkangpa, who built a hermitage in Tibet… Sera Monastery is here [Rinpoche points to a map on his hand], then on top, on the huge rocky mountain, there is a hermitage where Lama Tsongkhapa wrote his great commentary on Nagarjuna’s text Root of Wisdom; this Lama founded that. When he saw beautiful offerings in the garden, then he would make a mandala offering, sa zhi po kyi…, to his guru. Even if you are unable to do that, think of trees as wish-granting trees. Like in the mandala offering, the southern world has a wish-granting tree. All trees are wish-granting trees; think that they have all those qualities, then offer them. Do not only do this when you are doing mandala offerings, but in daily life you can do that, so you collect numberless merits. I am just giving you an idea, then whenever you have an opportunity, you must take it to make offerings.