understanding the Bodhicaryavatara - chap.6

Chapter Six - Patience

The sixth chapter is on Patience or Tolerance. This is also very important in order to develop Bodhicitta. Santideva said, "For thousands of eons, one has accumulated merits, generosity and offerings to the Tathagatas (Buddhas). Whatever good actions one has accumulated can be destroyed by one chance of hatred. Therefore, hatred is the most destructive and leads oneself to the lower realms. There is no greater sin than hatred. This means hatred is the worst negative action and has the heaviest consequences that one has to experience, such as being in the hell.

Patience is the greatest merit and greatest practice. With patience, one can able to absorb all the qualities. Therefore, Buddha, in this teaching, emphasised tolerance or patience as the very important part. Hatred does not only lead one to the hell or lower realms, or sufferings in the next life, it has also the immediate effect that you can experience the sufferings. Once a person is angry with someone, it is impossible for this person to have happiness or peace of mind. This person will suffer very deep confusion. That means he is suffering tremendously from mental disturbances. Even within an instance, one can also experience that kind of suffering.

With relevance to the next life, or that, which accumulates the habitual tendency, according to many Sutras and Tantras, hatred directly leads to sufferings in the hell. This atmosphere of confusion becomes real when a person is undergoing the next rebirth so that he will constantly experience the consequences of hatred as if he suffering in the hell. Even though hatred is the greatest sin, it doesn't mean it is not unavoidable. It can be changed because there is nothing that cannot be corrected or changed in this world. Everything can be improved.

Therefore, Santideva advised: Try to develop patience when faced with very mild and very small harmful acts, move gradually to the more harmful ones, and then to the broader and most harmful ones. In this way, you can develop patience. Even though one may be very temperamental in the past, one can be tamed into a very patient person.

Whatever unfavourable things come your way from another party, one should not blame that person directly, because all these kinds of harm are done without intention and do not completely involve the individual himself. This is very much dependent on the conditions.

When causes and conditions are unfavourable, the person has no choice; he has to do it. Then comes the unfavourable result. One should not always blame that person. Rather, oneself should take part of the blame also, because oneself is also a condition to the effect. This is also a method of practice.

Normally, when these kinds of things happened, one always think oneself is perfectly faultless and the other is full of faults. When one tries to defend himself, it becomes worse. There is a method to contemplate in a way, not to blame the individuals. The example given is of a person who is possessed. When a person is possessed, lie or she can be very violent and very destructive. But still the physician, or the one who treats will not care about this violence. He understands the cause of the violence and therefore does not react in anger. He knows exactly what is happening.

Actually, this is the same in our daily life. Hatred is the defilement and a very powerful defilement. Once one is possessed, he has not a single choice. He has to act violently. As long as you understand the teaching, the cause and condition, then you should not take it seriously. You should have more understanding, just like a physician who understands his patient. This is a very profound method of application during our daily life.