10. A Treatise on Earth369
Paṇchen Chökyi Nyima
1 You stand firm amid the ocean of the two collections
at the very top of the staircase of the four buddha-bodies,
jingling sun and moon earrings—the two aims.
Supreme sage, the greatest of mountains, please protect me.
2 I pray that any youth adorned with a garland
of blue lotus flowers—the mark of perfect intelligence—
on the ground of this human life so difficult to find,
will come to listen to this discourse.
3 The eye of intelligence is necessary to sift through
what should and shouldn’t be done according to the two norms.
Similarly, a magnet is necessary
to separate iron filings from dust particles.
4 Just as earth’s essence can be turned into pure gold
by cleaning away the stains of rust,
even those who have limited intelligence can become
more learned if they listen a lot to wise sayings.
5 No one but someone with great analytical wisdom
can distinguish right from wrong.
Is there any use for stones other than
a jewel that grants all your wishes?
6 Thus those who wish to be learned
should hold on to precious gems of wise sayings,
and, whether they be large or small,
wear them as jewels that beautify the mind.
7 Just as this great earth is the foundation
for every aspect of the world and its inhabitants,
perfecting all the many actions of the two norms
is dependent on meritorious virtue. [359]
8 Therefore the best of all refuges
are the sovereign wish-fulfilling Three Jewels.
Wearing them like a crown ornament
create the causes of merit by making offerings and so on.
9 It is improper to take up any activity
without inquiring and examining its purpose.
How could you purchase a precious gem
without seeing it first?
10 Our friends, whether good or bad,
influence all the behavior of most of us.
Through glasses tinted with color
a display of many varied hues will appear.
11 Therefore properly discriminate
between the types of friends.
Do what you should and shun what you should not,
just as mercury separates gold from iron filings.
12 Some people talk a lot and are very devious;
they act like your bosom friend as soon as you’ve met.
Discard jealous, rough, and conceited friends
like stones that were used to scrape off excrement.
13 Good friends are upright, sympathetic,
have capacious intelligence, delight in virtue,
have disciplined minds, and are tolerant.
Hold such people close to your heart, like gold.
14 When you first endeavor to do something
do not heedlessly follow the lead of others.
Consider your long-term goal and the effort required,
just as farmers do when they cultivate fields.
15 Things may appear to be similar,
but weigh each one’s benefit or harm on its own.
Pure and adulterated gold are the same color,
but their actual natures are not identical.
16 Hold close to your heart and do not speak
about your important long-term goals for no reason.
Similarly, it is not appropriate to reveal
every precious treasure that you own. [361]
17 Just as farmers work hard,
grinding their bodies and speech into dust,
you must renounce fatigue and persevere
when working for an important aim.
18 When something desirable befalls you,
do not get distracted by its slight faults.
If you are unhappy about putting gold in a forge,
how can you engage in craftsmanship?
19 Even if a task is very difficult
it can be accomplished if you try.
You can see that even hard iron is made
into useful items by smelting and beating.
20 Even if someone’s external manner is bad,
it is hard to know what good qualities lie within,
so do not hold them in low esteem.
Likewise, gold and silver lie hidden deep in the earth.
21 Do not trust someone greedy and discreditable
even if his external behavior seems proper.
If you befriend him you will quickly fall
like a tree growing over the rim of a crevasse.
22 Do not engage in inconsiderate behavior,
insulting people lower and worse off than yourself.
You can see that a man could lose his life
from being wounded by a small stone.
23 If you act without examining and investigating
whether the words of others are tainted by deceit,
you will come to ruin, just as we’ve heard in fables
that the three worlds were lost by a few steps.370
24 A person who merely aspires to fill his belly
without differentiating help from harm or good from bad
will be derided and rejected by everyone and
left behind like ground on which someone vomited.
25 Poor soil will not bring forth a harvest
even if you plow it many times. Likewise,
anything undertaken by someone lacking
courage and perseverance will come to naught. [362]
26 Some people display hostile behavior
immediately upon seeing their enemy.
Like children playing in the dirt,
their manners reveal a brainless, weak mind.
27 Instead, respond even to your enemies
with pleasantries and appropriate skillful means.
Even huge chunks of iron ore
can be broken down by controlled smelting.
28 However, when the right time arrives
you must dauntlessly do what is necessary.
Similarly, in order to split open a rocky mountain
you must put dangerous substances into use.
29 Moreover, if you disparage, revile, and so forth
everyone you meet—whether they be high or low—
they will be like boulders that are above you:
when pried loose they will fall on your head.
30 You will become hardened if you are too deferential
to inferior people with coarse minds and evil natures.
Similarly, you will be harmed if you walk on ground
where you might trample on poisonous snakes.
31 Just as you must prepare the ground
that will be the foundation of a new house,
to accomplish your goals you must rely
on a leader with courage and skill.
32 You will be virtuous if you stay close to the wise;
nothing but faults will come from the wicked.
Wish-granting jewels grant all you desire;
snake-infested ground will reduce you to ruin.
33 Even if you kindly help malicious people
they repay your kindness with harm in the end.
Although mice live in the ground,
look how they throw dirt around.
34 It is difficult to destroy mountains from the outside,
but they are easily damaged by springs from within.
It is amazing how sickness, faults, and deception
instantly bring down even powerful people. [363]
35 Someone wise, intelligent, and good-natured
repays those who gave them just a little help
with something far greater in return.
Like radiant gold they become ever more lovely.
36 You should ask for advice and place your trust
in no one but the intelligent, learned, and upright.
How could anyone argue that pure gold
is the same as other types of earth?
37 If someone is your enemy, even if they weaken
you must remain attentive and careful.
Look how irregular streams in little gullies
gradually erode the mountains.
38 You must be careful of swindlers
with impenetrable external disguises
that conceal their intent within:
they are brass with a veneer of gold.
39 Too much affection leads to ruin
even if it is for your beloved friends and family.
It is said that Rāvaṇa’s head fell to earth
because he lusted for Sītā.371
40 No one will seek your company
if you continually say cruel words to others
because you are under the sway of anger.
Who likes rough and hard ground?
41 Even if a task is assigned to you by others,
commit yourself only after analyzing its feasibility.
In other words, who can successfully cultivate
fields that do not produce any crops?
42 It is unsuitable to heedlessly squander
even small items that you possess.
Similarly, even vast lands come to be
from a gradual aggregation of atoms.
43 When you are working toward an important goal
give freely without being chained by miserliness.
If you fill a treasury with precious things
but do not use them, they are someone else’s riches. [364]
44 The various actions you engage in
owing to excessive scheming and great ambition
will be the basis of your own ruin,
just as it was for King Māndhātṛ.372
45 It is easy to see the faults of others, but to see your own
is as hard as finding treasure hidden underground.
Therefore examine yourself properly:
it is important to distinguish faults from good qualities.
46 Thus, on the basis of having engaged
in mundane activities without error,
assiduously cultivate the soil of the holy Dharma
for the sake of this life and your future lives.
47 Who would be willing to exchange for money
a jewel that fulfills all your needs and desires?
This human life that can bestow permanent happiness
will be a loss if you are distracted by minor pleasures.
48 Just as the five sorts of precious materials
are brought forth from the treasury of the earth,
the realizations of the ten grounds and five paths
are accomplished through this good human life.
49 Just as the roots of wish-granting trees
rest in the foundation of strong ground,
the door to access the precious Dharma
is only the art of poetic composition.
50 Good qualities cannot arise in those
who do not know to read and write.
How can fruit trees, flowers, and other plants
grow without the earth as a foundation?
51 Thus all who desire to become learned
should dispel fatigue and strenuously endeavor
to become literate, just as one must work hard
smelting and working ore to get refined gold.
52 You must rely on an experienced guide
when you venture into unfamiliar regions.
Similarly, properly rely on a spiritual friend
who teaches the Dharma’s essence without error. [365]
53 Just as you examine the distinguishing features
of any place that you wish to travel,
never be satisfied with your effort to acquire learning
that discerns the ways to practice the Dharma.
54 Ground that is soaked in water
will soon collapse. Similarly,
this life does not last long, and then
we go on a path to one of the five realms.
55 Each step you take going down a road
gets you closer to your destination.
Likewise, as years, months, and days pass
you approach nearer to the Lord of Death.
56 It is difficult for anyone to help you
when the messengers of the Lord of Death
drag you away without your volition.
When the earth quakes, who can hold firm?
57 The only thing that helps at that time
is the precious gem of the holy Dharma.
It is the treasure that grants all your wishes:
focus on nothing other than that.
58 Therefore do not be entrapped
by superficial, adulterated muck.
Develop perseverance in the refined pure gold
of the excellent Dharma of the Ganden tradition.
59 If it’s hard to complete even the smallest task
under the influence of laziness and procrastination,
how could you take into your hands the gem
that produces beneficial, lasting happiness?
60 Therefore from a young age
you should forsake frivolous things
and endeavor only in the holy Dharma.
Be like a firm mountain that never wavers.
61 You may think you will try when youth is past,
but a weakened body and faculties
cannot complete things properly.
It is hard to cultivate an overgrown thicket. [366]
62 When you proceed to the world beyond,
as a result of your former black deeds
you fall into a huge chasm miles deep
and experience the suffering of the lower realms.
63 You will be born amid tongues of flame
whose blaze encircles all four directions;
dragged to a red-hot iron ground,
you will be tormented by being scorched.
64 Some experience the feeling
of having flesh torn from their bones
in a place so frigid that the excruciating cold
even causes stones to crack open.
65 In a place in between the hell realms
some alternate between pleasure and pain, day and night.
The types of misery in the occasional hells
are akin to what you have done before.
66 Think about the state of being tormented
by the suffering of hunger and thirst
with no chance to enjoy even an atom of food
for a period of many long years.
67 How could you bear being an animal?
They are tormented in many ways:
wretchedly living in filth, underground, and in swamps,
eating one another, exploited, beaten, and so forth.
68 The precious Three Jewels are definitely
the refuge for all the beings who fill the three worlds;
they save us from the unbearable misery
of the lower realms as mentioned above.
69 It is unrealistic to expect that crops will grow
even in well-watered fields if you do not plant seeds.
Thus it is difficult to be saved if you do not create
the conditions of faith, admiration, and respect.
70 Thus if the sprouts of properly done good deeds
are nourished by the warmth and moisture
of prayers made with strong faith,
the fruits of high rebirth and liberation will ripen. [367]
71 Even the most marvelous treasures
of gods and men, on earth and in the heavens,
are sullied by the dust of birth, aging, sickness, and death.
How could they be anything other than that?
72 Craving for mundane affluence and power
becomes the cause for suffering to arise.
We hear that excessive desire for the earth’s honey
is the way that leads to the pain of being stung.
73 Contemplate the twelve links of dependent origination
that are the way we revolve and go without control
through the vast expanses of the three worlds—
from the peak of existence to the lowest hell.
74 Recognizing that every place in samsara’s three realms
is a platform on which hundreds of shortcomings arise,
become diligent about accomplishing the supreme path
that leads to the expansive space of liberation.
75 You should light the lamp of compassion
for all beings who have been your mother,
kindly nurturing you from beginningless time,
and who, because of suffering, live in the depths of darkness.
76 Even animals desire their own happiness;
but just having that is not sufficient.
Take up the practice of equalizing self and other;
it is the ground for accomplishing definite happiness.
77 Make an effort to produce bodhicitta;
it is the excellent alchemical elixir
that transforms the earth element of the impure body
into the precious gold of the three kayas.
78 Do not be tied up in knots of stinginess
for your piles of illusory property.
With the four precious types of generosity373
set out a treasure for the totally destitute.
79 Cultivate lasting happiness in the field
of pure ethical discipline. It is the foundation
from which every excellent thing grows:
high rebirth and the definite goodness of liberation. [368]
80 Even when pierced by the blazing weapons
of unending harsh words and beatings,
protect the state of your basic consciousness
by erecting the iron fence of patience.
81 Conjecturing that the thieves of distraction and laziness
will carry off the supreme wealth of your virtue,
you should bind shut the doors of your senses
with the long metal straps of perseverance.
82 When you focus your mind, do not stray from
whatever virtuous object you have chosen;
with mindfulness as stable as a mighty mountain
hold tightly to meditative stabilization.
83 Strive in the method that smashes into dust
the mountain of egoism—the view of the perishing collection—
with the thunderbolt of knowing the lack of true existence
that is free from all elaborations of dualistic appearance.
84 Although dreams do not truly exist,
they show signs of happiness and suffering.
Look how crops of dependent origination
ripen in the field of emptiness in the same way.
85 After training your mind on the common path,
be diligent in the means to establish
the stable pillars of the vows and pledges
that rest on the foundation of perfect empowerments.
86 Completely block ordinary conceptions
of the vast earth and all the things that it supports.
Strive in the supreme yoga of the generation stage
that makes every appearance arise as a mandala.
87 On the surface of the wall of pure ultimate reality
the brush of concentration brings into being
the Buddha’s form, vividly glowing with the noble marks.
So endeavor single-pointedly to establish union.
88 Then pray to lead all sentient beings
who live on the ocean-clad earth
to the grounds of omniscient wisdom
by emanating in various ways. [369]
89 Even though my effort is not worthy of holy beings,
I composed this jewel garland of wise sayings
glowing with manifold lights of the two norms,
thinking it would be useful as an ornament for beginners.
90 From the merits of this action
having the power of a wish-fulfilling jewel,
may the stainless teachings of the Victor
flourish on earth until samsara ends.
In general, the recommendations assembled in collections of advice for mundane activities can be a cause for nonvirtuous actions; therefore offering such advice can become a basis for downfalls among those holding vows. Such activities are something to be largely rejected. Nevertheless I am following the model of past masters who wrote treatises conjoining the two norms. Specifically, most people seem to find it difficult to devote themselves to study and contemplation of the great treasuries of precious advice that are vast and deep—such as the Stages of the Path to Enlightenment and so forth—because of the pressures of this degenerate era and because they are influenced by their own mistaken actions that are contrary to those treatises. Because of their preoccupation with concerns of this life alone, most people appear to value texts belonging to this wise-sayings genre that present matters of worldly norms. So I was motivated by the thought that it would be possible to gradually shift their minds from that toward the Dharma. And on top of that, my attendant, bearing the name Lakṣmī, also made a request, saying, “Something like this is needed.” Thus I, the Buddhist monk Dharmasūrya, composed this Treatise on Earth: A Jewel Garland That Glows with a Hundred Lights of Wise Sayings on the Two Norms. It was written at the temple at Wutai Shan, the pure land of glorious Mañjuśrī.