The greater, more extensive compassion entails more than just ensuring the basic needs of sentient beings. Those needs should be taken care of, but they are not the focal point. The most important is to make all sentient beings understand the facts of samsara and the ways to be freed from it. This is the Buddha’s greatest compassion—to teach sentient beings the truth first, then the methods for liberation.
- Quote from The Right View, "Buddhism—the Definition"
Rongzom Pandita, one of the greatest scholars of the Nyingma lineage, once said, “The invariable definition of Buddhism is wisdom and compassion. No other explanation can fully express the core of Buddhism.”
- Quote from The Right View, "Buddhism—the Definition"
Some regard Buddhism as a kind of belief. Belief also means faith. Of course faith is needed in Buddhism, but it would be oversimplified to regard Buddhism as a belief since keeping faith is only one of the aspects of Buddhism. The foundation and the priority of Buddhism are not about belief, but wisdom and compassion.
- Quote from The Right View, "Buddhism—the Definition"
It is like on a summer day, or when the sun rises and it becomes warmer, a snowman or ice sculpture melts and disappears. Or sometimes in the midst of a blue sky, clouds appear in the shape of animals or solid structures but suddenly vanish without leaving a trace. Before realization is attained, the mind perceives all phenomena to be real. Once the nature of mind is realized, it will recognize the nature of either mind or consciousness is non-existent, like empty space. Suffering and happiness, which are attached to the mind, can also vanish suddenly without a trace like the clouds and ice. As in the saying, “To what do you attach hair if there is no skin?”
- Quote from Are You Ready For Happiness? Don't Let the Paper Tiger Scare You Off, "How to Face Happiness"
In the scriptures, Buddhism is defined by the two words—“doctrine” and “realization.” Doctrine refers to the teachings transmitted by the Buddha himself or the commentaries on canonical texts and other treatises written by the bodhisattvas after the Buddha gave his blessing and approval, such as the Tibetan Buddhist canon of Kangyur (The Translation of the Word) and Tengyur (Translation of Treatises). Realization refers to personal realization gained through practice, which encompasses discipline, meditation and wisdom. In other words, “doctrine” and “realization” stand for the whole of Buddha Dharma. Two other words, even more significant, can also summarize the full meaning of the Dharma, that is, “compassion” and “wisdom”.
- Quote from The Right View, "Buddhism—the Definition"
Knowing virtuous karma is, like dreams, intrinsically illusory. If we can contemplate in this way, even if anger arises, it cannot destroy the root of virtue.
The mind has two aspects: one is discriminating mind, or “discriminating thought”; the other is non-discriminating mind, or “non-discriminating thought.”
The eye, ear, nose, tongue, and body have feeling, but they do not reflect or contemplate; so these feelings are called nondiscriminating thought. When we are sick, regardless of what we are thinking, our body experiences a great deal of suffering; this is non-discriminating thought.
When we see and hear something, the sixth consciousness reflects and distinguishes between the good and the bad; this is called “discriminating thought.” The suffering experienced by the sixth consciousness is called the suffering of discriminating thought.
- Quote from Are You Ready For Happiness? Don't Let the Paper Tiger Scare You Off, "How to Face Suffering"
Buddhism has never meant to conquer anything or anyone. The Buddha also said that he cared not in the least the victory of fighting with another man, but most emphatically the victory from the battle with one’s own mind.
- Quote from The Right View, "Buddhism—the Definition"
If you would like to know more about karma, you can read the fourth chapter of the Abhidharma-kosha-shastra, which clearly explains the workings of cause and effect.
