A Rude Jolt

Just the other day, I happened to read the biography of Nyag-bla Padma-bdud-’dul (1816–1872) and his songs of experience (nyams mgur). He was a yogin. He lived a sincere yogic life. He met dPal-sprul, who was vividly impressed by him. He vehemently opposed meat-eating and alcohol and drug consumption. He also opposed sectarianism. For him, the Three Great Ones (chen po gsum) have one intention, one taste. All phenomena appeared to him as texts. This is a well-known Tibetan cliché. It usually means that all Buddhist scriptures and treatises, no matter of which school, appear to one as non-contradictory. This is a good thing. But he also talks about the possibility of all phenomena appearing to one as one’s enemies. That is, if one is not careful. What does it really mean? As an academic, as an intellectual, one can never compromise one’s prajñā (discriminating insight). Prajñā is by nature uncompromising. So is light with darkness. If the prajñā were to be compromised, it must cease to be itself. So the idea that we should see good or bad in everything is like telling someone to be color-blind. For a Prajñāvādin, seeing good in everything is as bad as seeing bad in everything. A Prajñāvādin wants to see things as they are; not better, not worse. But the danger is that there are all kinds of prajñā. The best is, of course, the prajñāpāramitā. She is the mother of all siddhas and buddhas. There is, however, duṣprajñā (“damaged prajñā”). People talk of duḥśīla but not of duṣprajñā. Actually duṣprajñā is deadlier than duḥśīla. Āryadeva would nod at me with consent. For me, the bottom-line seems to be this: The greater is one’s prajñā and the better is one’s prajñā, the greater control one should have over one’s intellectual-emotional defilements (kleśa). Why is it so? This is because prajñā tends to cut the root of kleśas. One’s prajñā tends to undermine one’s kleśas. Despite one’s supposed enhancement of prajñā, if one sees an aggravation or intensification of one’s kleśa, it can be a sure sign that something is not going on well with one’s prajñā. One might as well be brewing inside a deadly concoction of duḥśīla and duṣprajñā. It is becoming an incurable disease. Dharma is said to be an antidote for adharma. But if the antidote itself turns into a poison, no other antidote would be able to cure this disease. Adharma can be said to have developed resistance to dharma. One would then lose the ability to feel with the heart and think clearly with the mind. One would have lost one’s śīla and one’s prajñā. One would lose all sense of appreciation. Even when one directly encounters and witnesses attitudes and activities of compassion, benevolence, joy, and impartiality, generosity, ethical-moral integrity, forbearance, diligence, composure, and wisdom, one would not appreciate. Even when one directly encounters and witnesses malevolence, gruesomeness, pain, and misery, one would not be touched in a wholesome way. Instead, everything and everyone in the world would appear like a fuel for one’s kleśas. Even a piece of log or twig might instigate one’s anger, hatred, and other forms of negativity. The whole world would become a pretext and a context for the explosion of one’s kleśas. This is, what I believe, Nyag-bla is trying say, when he states that all phenomena would appear as one’s enemies.