EDITOR’S PREFACE

WHEN I was compiling Lama Zopa Rinpoche’s teachings for The Six Perfections, the chapter on patience presented a major problem: it became longer and longer. This was obviously Rinpoche’s favorite perfection to teach on. (His name, Zopa, does mean “patience,” after all.)

The chapter needed serious paring down so that it wouldn’t overwhelm the other chapters, but the teachings Rinpoche has given on patience are not just vitally important but also wonderful. When we looked to see if having a separate book just on patience would work, we realized we could structure it around the sixth chapter of Shantideva’s A Guide to the Bodhisattva’s Way of Life.

Rinpoche had actively taught on many of the verses of that chapter in the early Kopan courses, but there were sections he had not specifically covered. However, when I searched for teachings related to those verses, I was pleased to find nearly perfect matches. If you find that in a few places the commentary does not exactly reflect the content of the verses, I apologize. Probably, somewhere in Lama Yeshe Wisdom Archive’s vast store of transcripts from Rinpoche’s teachings, there are perfect ones, but I was unable to find them. Fortunately, these are very few, and mostly it is as if Rinpoche and Shantideva are of one mind. It was a joy to discover, as I compiled the book, that here was a complete commentary on this crucial chapter of one of the most important books in Tibetan Buddhism that also encompassed the quintessence of Rinpoche’s teachings.

This has been a delight to edit. Long my favorite Buddhist text, I have read A Guide to the Bodhisattva’s Way of Life many times, but working through the sixth chapter in order to compile this book has meant exploring it in a depth that simple reading doesn’t allow. My hope is that, because each small block of verses is the core of a teaching by Rinpoche, you too can have the taste of going deeper into this profound and very beautiful text.

We have chosen to use the translation by Luis Gómez, from his Introduction to the Practice of the Bodhisattva (Wisdom Publications, forthcoming). With the publisher’s permission, we have changed his prose translation into verse, as that’s how the text traditionally appears. Other texts quoted have been cited.

So many people have worked so hard to make this book a reality. Not just the team at Wisdom Publications, and specifically Laura Cunningham, who I worked closely with, but also all the staff and volunteers who work for Lama Yeshe Wisdom Archive, painstakingly recording, transcribing, and archiving all of Lama Zopa’s courses. I want to thank them all for helping to spread Rinpoche’s words — words that are absolutely vital in this very fractured world.

I apologize for any errors found in this book; they are 100 percent mine. May this book inspire people to turn away from anger and selfishness and develop patience and compassion. May whatever merits gained from the creation of this book be dedicated to peace in this world, to the long life, well-being, and fulfillment of the wishes of all our holy teachers, especially His Holiness the Dalai Lama and Lama Zopa Rinpoche, and to the flourishing of the Foundation for the Preservation of the Mahayana Tradition and of the Dharma throughout the world.

Gordon McDougall

Bath, UK